Adivasi rights

A researcher and activist remembers the time spent with Father Stan Swamy at Bagaicha, a community training centre that was started by the Jesuit priest and tribal rights activist.

This article is an insight into the recent decision delivered by a five-judge constitution bench of the Supreme Court in Chebrolu Leela Prasad Rao and Others v State of Andhra Pradesh and Others on 22 April 2020. In effect, the Court nullified the 100% reservation to local Scheduled Tribes for posts of teachers in the Schedule V areas. Three focal concerns that the Supreme Court has overlooked while rendering this important decision are examined and it is shown how the apex court has been oblivious to the unique nature of the Schedule V scheme as laid out in the Constitution and has thereby failed to uphold the rights of the Adivasis. Following the judgment, Adivasi communities across Andhra Pradesh and Telangana are extremely agitated and the state governments of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana seem to be set to prefer a review of this judgment.

The emergence of the Forest Rights Act reasserted the vitality of the role people play in conservation and management of natural resources and carving out legal channels for recognition of their forest rights. But, in Himachal Pradesh, the FRA suffers at the hands of a bureaucracy that has buried it under the weight of colonial power structures. The conflicting narratives from Kinnaur are discussed, where instead of being recognised under the FRA, the tribals’ identity and forest dependence are being ripped away from them.