'31 arrested tribals were women'

24 March 1997

Newsflash -

Eluru, March 24: The recent arrest of innocent tribals in Jeelugumilli mandal of West Godavari district was to suppress the genuine tribal movement, said Andhra Pradesh Civil Liberties Committee (APCLC) general secretary, Mr K Balagopal, here on Monday.

He toured the tribal villages of Chandramma colony, Thotaramannagudem, Barrinkalapadu colony, Vankavarigudem, Madakamvarigudem, Paduvarigudem and Pathacheemalapadu tribal villages.

He alleged that the intention of his tour was fact-finding. The police arrested 47 tribals and among them 31 were women. Cashew orchards were under the monopoly of non-tribals and with a fear that the tribals might trespass their orchards, the non-tribals prevailed on the police officials to arrest the tribals, he alleged.

The Deputy Supeintendent of Police Jangareddigudem who is to discharge his duties without any obligation or favourism is now shielding non-tribals said APCLC Secretary. The Chandramma colony incident itself proves how the DSP is acting. The Tribals are not allowed to take palmyrah leaves from Government Waste land whereas Tribals are freely moving in the land as if it is their patta land. The ill-treatment of Biksham and Pandu lakshmi by the police is inhuman, he said. Similarly at Barrinkalapadu village on a complaint by a rich land holder was given weight and eight tribals were arrested. The police are leveling bogus cases against the Tribals with a motive to suppress them for agitating against the Non Tribals occupation of their land.

Jeelugumilli mandal tribals accuse police of looting their houses

ELURU, March 25: The pol­ite looted five houses in the tribal hamlets of Panduvarigudem and Pathacheemalavarigudem in Jeelugumilli mandal and made off with nearly Rs.55,000 in cash and a gold ring worth Rs.3.500 (luring their raid there on March 20, allege the villagers.

It may be recalled that the pol­ice raided the hamlets for arr­esting the 'wanted' tribals in cer­tain cases of theft of soapnuts and cashewnuts belonging to non-tribals.

Chintam Rajamma and Kotta Venkatesh of Pathacheemalavarigudem told The Indian Express : "About 10 armed policemen ra­ided our hamlet at 10am. As most of our men and women had gone to earn their daily bread, the hamlet wore a deserted look. They read out the names of some of our men and asked them to surrender saying that they were 'wanted' in some cases. But they could not find any of them.

CASH TAKEN AWAY: "Then they broke, the lock and ga­ined entry into the thatched house of Naram Dharmaraju and took away cash of Rs.50.000 which he had borrowed from a money­lender for constructing a house tin the nearby site. Later, they

entered the houses of Podiam Venkatesh, Reddy Muthamma, Chintam Nagesh and Bhoodemma and made off with cash, gold and agricultural tools and knives. They also took away about 10 bags of rice, two bags of redgram and some quantity of tamarind from the houses."

Podiam Venkatesh said, "I run a small grocery at Panduvari­gudem. Only three days ago, I bo­rrowed Rs.5,000 from another shopkeeper in Dharbagudem for doing cashewnut business. I bought some stock with Rs.1,000 and kept the balance in a wooden box. 1 was out on some work when the police raided my house. My wife had gone to the nearby fields to fetch firewood. Along with the cash, they took away a gold ring weighing about one sovereign I recently bought from a goldsmith at Jangareddigudem.

"They took away cash of Rs.300 and Rs.200 from the houses of Muthamma and Bhoodemma respectively. They also raided Panduvarigudem and took away cash of Rs.200 and Rs.250 from the house of Mandu Lakhrrii and P Muthamma. This apart, they also made off with our tools and implements like sickles and kitchen knives."

COMPLAINT REFUSED:

"We returned to the hamlet in the afternoon only to see our homes looted. We went to Jeelu­gumilli police station to lodge a complaint. But the police refused to register it."

To substantiate their charge, the tribals showed The Indian Ex­press the damaged doors of the houses, an impaired lock as well as a stone and wooden stool allegedly used by the cops to break open the houses. The tribals of Thatirammannagudem too had something to say about the police raid in their ham­let.

Sariam Gangaraju said. 'Our Emma Rao' (mandal revenue officer) came to our hamlet at aro­und 1 pm on March 20. He asse­mbled about 90 of us at the school building saying that he would discuss the issues relating to the survey of controversial lands. In the middle of the discussions, he took off on a scooter along with a non-tribal farmer who came on the vehicle. We were waiting for him when the police arrived in a jeep and a van. Later, they took some of us even as we were asking the reasons for it".

WELL-HATCHED PLAN:

Former village sarpanch Mushte Pentaiah said, "Our pe­ople are innocent. They did not know about the imposition of Sec 44 in our areas. Of late, they understood that it was a well-hatched plan. The police might have booked a case of 'unlawful assembly' against us. They look away with them 22 men and women. Later, they released four men and a woman".

Chirri Muthayla Rao of Barrinkalapadu and Kunja Venkatalakshmi of Vankavarigudem too al­leged that the police raided then houses and took away soapnuts they had gathered from their own trees.

POLICE DENY CHARGE:

Refuting charges of looting, Superintendent of Police M Punna Rao said, the police had only arrested those tribals who were 'wanted' in cases like damaging tobacco crop, theft of soapnut and cashewnut from the gardens of non-tribals. "We have received numerous complaints against them. Our men even caught some of them redhanded while they were picking cashewnut."

The SP further said, "since you say that the tribals were not allowed to register a complaint at the Jeelugumilli police station let them or someone on their behalf forward it to my office I will immediately inquire into the matter."

Girijans' 'harassment' figures in House

The Hindu, March 27, 1997.

Hyderabad , March 26: The Government has asked floor leaders of the CPI and the CPI-(M) Mr Ch. Vittal Reddy and Mr. B Venkateswara Rao respectively - to visit Buttayagudem area in West Godavari district for verifying whether the police are harassing girijans at the instance of local landlords.

The Communist leaders, however, have not indicated their mind.

Raising the issue in the Assembly on Wednesday through special mention. Mr Jakka Venkaiah, CPI-(M), who returned to the city after visiting the area, said that an extend of 12,000 acres belonging to girijans was alienated in Buttayagudem, Jeelugupalli and Janagareddy gudem mandals in the district in favour of non-girijans though rules prohibited any transaction involving gririjan lands. Following complaints from girijans, the police, instead of protecting. Began harassing them owing allegiance to landlords. Prohibitory orders had been issued under section 144 and the police entered gudems and had even taken away forest produce such as tamarind and cashew and money from huts. Even women were beaten up.

The Home Minister, Mr A Madhava Reddy said that prohibitory orders were issued only for the protection of girijans. The demands of the CPI(M) could be met only if the floor leaders of the two Communist Parties verified facts and provided information to the government.

50 tribals being detained for 'trespassing'

The Hindu, April 16, 1997.

By R.J. Rajendra Prasad

Hyderabad , April 15. About 50 Koya tribals have been detained in West Godavari district jails for the past one month, on a charge of trespass, when they picked the cashew kernels from the ground in the scheduled areas of the district, which they assert is Government land under non-tribal occupation. Six Koya tribesmen of Reddynagampalli village of Polavaram mandal were arrested when they fired arrows tearing intestines and liver, requiring surgical intervention.

A disquieting aspect of these disturbances is that Scheduled Caste landholders are pitted against Schedules Tribes people. Last year, non-tribal landholders attacked tribals at Manugopula village, injuring many tribals. There is a demand that "bows and arrows" be banned from these areas. The incidents represent a two-year old struggle for the effective implementation of Land Transfer Regulations in the scheduled areas of the State. The tribals demand that all Government poromboke land in the agency areas be assigned to them, not to plains people, and that land records be verified to check whether the plains people had valid pattas. The tribals say that al least 8,000 acres in the three Mandals of West Godavari district (Polavaram, Buttayagudem and Jeelugumilli) should be assigned to them after dispossessing the non-tribals of the land because it can be established that the non-tribals are in illegal occupation.

The tribal initiative has resulted from the intervention of a non-Government organization called SAKTI (Search for Action and Knowledge through Tribal Initiative), established by Dr. P. SivaramaKrishna, a research scholar who took his Ph.D. in tridbal folk songs, Recently, the High Court restrained the police from detaining Dr. SivaramaKrixshna, who is impleading himself in disputes between tribals and non-tribals on the side of the former.

Tribals demand that since the last "enjoyment" survey was conducted in 1933, ownership of land with tribals is decreasing and so tribal ownership be restored as per the old Re-Settlement Registers, and that Government as-sign Waste Dry and Poromboke land only to tribals by sanction of pattas. A clash took place in August last at Busarajupalli village in Buttayagudem mandal, when tribals resisted harvesting of crops in land under occupation by Scheduled Caste non-tribals. Upper caste plains people gathered in support of the Scheduled Caste farmers and resisted attempts of tribals to harvest forcibly the crops belonging to SCs.

On August 6 last year, the Chief Minister, Mr. N. Chandrababu Naidu, reviewed the situation at a high-level meeting, when he decided to create a new Settlement Court at Kovvur for speedy disposal of pending settlement cases. Mr. Chandrababu Naidu also created two "special teams" consisting of Revenue and Survey officials, headed by Deputy Tehsildars, to go into petitions submitted pertaining to land transfer regulations in the agency areas. There were 32 writ petitions in the High Court filed by non-tribals landlords, which stayed action of local Sub Divisional Magistrates in evicting non-tribals from land in scheduled areas. The Additional Advocate General was directed by the Chief Minister to have these writs disposed of early.

Tension prevails in villages such as Reddy Ganapavaram, Dharbagudem, Pandurangagudem and Jeelugumilli, as tribals started to prevent forcibly non-tribals from harvesting their crops, because there was no progress in land transfers. The Regulations 1 of 1971 specifically prohibits land transfer from one non-tribal to another non-tribal, and asserts that a non-tribal can transfer his land only in favour of a tribal. In 1979, while Dr. M. Channa Reddy was Chief Minister, Government issued an order, exempting farmers owning less than five acres of wet and 10 acres of dry, from this Tribal Regulation. The High Court quashed this order in December 1984, but the non-tribals who obtained exemptions in 1979 continued to cite that GO and remain in occupation of the land despite the court quashing it. The tribals say that Government did nothing to evict these non-tribals, and is not interested in having the writ petitions disposed of soon, because Government failed to file counters on these cases for about 10 years.

Dr. Sivaramakrishna managed to obtain the Settlement Records of 1932, and visited the tribal villages, reading out the names of owners of lands in specific survey numbers, as recorded in the 1932 records, and many tribal families were able to recognize their claims because their grand fathers were listed as owners. It is these farmers who are demanding a Re-Survey and Re-Settlement.

Finding the NGO a stumbling block, the local politicians including the MLAs and the Minister for Agriculture, Mr. K. Vidyadhara Rao, have criticized its role as being responsible for "creating" the problem. Prohibitory orders are in force in the agency areas of the district.