Tribals and Land Alienation

The Indian Express, May 5, 1995

The land legislations in the agency area have closely followed the revolts and up rises of the tribals. The Rampa..oellion in East and West Godavari was followed by the Agency Tracts Interest and Land Transfer Act of 1917. Under this is a tribal can alienate his/ her land to a non-tribal only after training the written permission of the Agent of the government. (The District Collector is the government's agent). The Andhra Pradesh Scheduled Areas Land Transfer Regulation of 1959 was the first regulation after Indian Independence. Under this regulation, no tribal can alienate his/her land to a non-tribal, while transfer of lands between non-tribals is permitted. This was further amended by the Andhra Pradesh Scheduled Areas Land Transfer Regulation of 1970, known as Regulation 1 of 1970. With this amendment a presumption was created that all the lands of the scheduled areas belong to tribals unless proved otherwise. The burden of prove lives on the non-tribal who has to prove that the land does not belong to be noted that this amendment was a fallout of the Srikakulam movement in 1968. In a the same year saw at another regulation called the Andhra Pradesh (Scheduled Areas ryotwari settlement) regulations 1970 also known as regulation II of 1970. This law dealt with the villages in the erstwhile estates which were abolished in 1948 and taken over by the government. The regulation made it mandatory for a non-tribal to prove his legal and uninterrupted possession for at least eight years prior to the abolition of the estate. In the 1978, to further safeguard the rights of the tribals a penal provision was attached to the regulation I of 1970 which provided a penalty of imprisonment for one year of persons violating the land transfer regulations.

Following a writ petition, the AP High Court allowed the tribals, including women, to take part in the land survey.

With these statutory provisions an assumption is created that the land of tribals is protected from encroachment by non-tribals. But, what has been happening at the ground level seems to be different. The special duty collectors attached to the Tribal Welfare Department are entrusted with the duty of inquiring in to the claims of the tribals. Very often the tribals do not have any documentary proof possession or title. Their ownership of land is only in terms of an oral tradition. So, even in the few instances where their claim is acknowledged and land is granted, the non-tribals use legal means to delay and frustrate the process of a land transfer to the tribals. The process can drag on for years together.

The state responds to the problem only in ad hoc ways. Whenever there is an uprising, either fresh laws are passed or new committees are formed to deal with the issue. Thus, when the situation became tense in 1997 in this area, a meeting was convened involving officials of the revenue, social welfare and tribal departments. This meeting is significant since a member of an organization called Sakthi which has been involved in struggles of tribals, was also invited. The meeting resulted in a fresh batch of guidelines to resolve the land issue between the tribals and non-tribals.

The guidelines include the participation of tribals in the verification process of the land surveys.

But, none of the guidelines were followed in the verification process that was carried out in a few villages. The tribals were not allowed to be part of the process. A writ petition was filled on this ground in the AP High Court which was allowed to take part in the survey.

Despite the promises that verification process will be completed on a war footing no steps were taken in that direction and there is no move to create an atmosphere of trust.

(concluded)

VASUDHA N

The author is a practicing

Advocate based at Hyderabad .

Complaint against task force cops

Deccan Chronicle, May 31, 1995.

Eluru, May 30: Sivaramakrishna, Convenor of Shakti Samstha, a voluntary organization, lodged a complaint with the district Superintendent of Police against the atrocities of task force police on tribals.

In his complaint, he alleged that the task force personnel were tak­ing away valuables like motorcy­cles and utensils from tribal vil­lages and quoted instances of tak­ing away of a Bajaj Kawasaki motorcycle and three mopeds of his men after raiding Panduvarigudem and Vankavariguden vil­lages. The police also took away a Hero Honda motorcycle after taking a tribal Modiyam Srinu into custody, he said.

Urging the SP to take stringent action against the culprits, hr sought the SP to pass direction to the task force police person to stop harassing innocent tribal.

Awakening among tribals in agency tracts

The Hindu, Thursday, August 3, 1995.

From Our Staff Reporter

Rajahmundry , Aug. 2 : The series of events to the last two months in the agency tracts of West Godavari district, specially in the mandals of Jeelugumilli, Buttayagudem and Polavaram, which led to grave law and order problem, has shown that there has been a new awakening among tribals about their rights. They are asking inconvenient questions like, "when our land holdings are getting reduced for various reasons like division of property among offspring, how is it that those of non tribals are increasing?"

The tribals are also questioning the ownership of lands of many a non-tribal in the agency area. When senior officials went to the spot and asked the tribals whether they want seeds, fertilizers of pumpsets, the reply was ­- "What do we do with all this without land. Give us some land."

The origin of the series of incidents can be traced to a decision taken, on May 4, by the Special Duty Collector (Tribal Welfare), Kotaramachandrapuram, West Godavari district in which about 27 acres of fertile land in Jilellagudem village in Jeelugumilli mandal was taken over by the authorities. In the face of strong pressure, specially on Mr. Arvind Kumar, Sub-collector, Kovvuru, land was distributed to tribals by May 30. This was stated to be a rare incident and had sent shock waves among farmers having lands in the tribal areas.

Court Stay

On previous occasions, what the non-tribal farmers did was to get a stay order from the High Court, for which there was 60 days time, and continue to enjoy the fruits of the land. But on this occasion, officials argued that the time of 60 days was meant for appeal and in no way came in the way of distribution of land taken over from the non-tribals. As expected, the non-tribals did bring a stay order from court but it became infructuous because lands had already been distributed.

However, this led to friction between tribals and non-tribals farmers in the agency area. In one particular incident, the tribals had gathered in strength and attacked non-tribal farmers, resulting in injuries to 20 persons. This was in the first week of May and the core issue was some 600 acres in Jillellagudem village.

This led to the arrest of many tribals and promulgation of Section 145 which prevented entry, by both tribals and non-tribals Encouraged by a favourable decision in the case of lands in Jeelugumilli, tribals in other parts have also occupied lands of non-tribals, which the latter have been enjoying for the last several decades, subsequent events have strengthened the claims of tribals for example, more than 60 non-tribal farmers have been enjoying an extent of 160 acres in Jillelugudem village.

The tribals, including some women, occupied these holdings, asserting that the land in question, that is 160 acres was part of AWD (Assessed Waste Dry) or what is popularly known as Government Poramboke, over which they (tribals) had a claim because it was located in the agency area. When officials asked the non-tribal farmers to produce documentary evidence in support of their claim over the lands, 17 farmers could not do so in respect of another 26 acres.

This phenomenon of tribals occupying lands of non-tribal had spread to other villages and hamlets such as Rachanagudem (where 29 acres had been distributed to tribals) Munugopula,. Reddinagapalem, Koyanagapalem, etc. while tribals claim that the land under possession of non-tribal farmers is AWD.

Relay fast by non-tribals

Since this is the start of the kharif season and farmers would have to commence their operations and this has been objected to by the tribals. The non-tribals started relay hunger strikes. Some farmers alleged that the Rampachodavaram based voluntary organization "Shakti" was in "instigation" the tribals. However, the chief of "Shakti", Mr. Sivaramakrishna was not apologetic and asserted that his organization would fight for the tribals rights.

The hon's share of the land is in the possession of non-tribals in the three agency mandals viz Polavaram, Buttayagudem and Jeelugumilli. According to official figures, while the percentage of tribals in Polavaram is 59 (total population 17,787 of which 10,524 are tribals) and in Buttayagudem 60 (total population 25,336 of which tribals are 6,627). While an extent of 18,358 hectares is held by the tribals, as much as 28,367 hectares is being enjoyed by the non-tribal farmers in the agency area.

As of now, both tribals and non-tribals have agreed on certain points. Status quo will be maintained, which means, tribals will enjoy the ladies for which pattas were given to them recently and they will also not occupy lands of non-tribals till a survey is conducted and ownership rights are decided. Officials have also agreed to read out, in public, the status of land bookings. In fact, records were read out in public in Munugopula, Jillellagudem on July 15. This was considered to be a victory for the tribals.

During 1987, a survey was done to implement the Telugu Girijan Maagani Samaaradhana Scheme (TGMS). This survey had identified the extent of Government lands, encroachments by non-tribals, the extent of cultivation land available, etc. The tribals have also been demanding publication of these details.