The evolution of Indian forest policy

Modern forest protection and conservation policies in India have turned on the principle of exclusion. Communities who have historically been part of the forest, depending on it for their survival and livelihood have been evicted in the interests of pristine flora and fauna.

Laws to regulate forests, instead of managing their conservation, are a continuing legacy of India’s colonial past when forest laws were geared to preserve the state monopoly over forest produce. Forest-dwelling communities were evicted from their homes and livelihoods leading to unrest and agitation. Independent India’s conception of development has continued the widespread environmental degradation and violent marginalisation of forest-dwelling communities.

In the last twenty years however, a number of laws have been enacted with the intention of protecting India’s ecological and environmental integrity. This did not stop the conception of forests as preserves of nature necessarily devoid of human habitation. The Indian Forest Act, 1927 (‘IFA’), the Wild Life Protection Act, 1972 (‘WLPA’), and the Forest Conservation Act, 1980 (‘FCA’), have all been premised on the misconception that any human interference in a forest ecosystem would lead to its destruction. All of them failed to realise that tribal groups also form an integral and natural part of this ecosystem, living off the forest and preserving it.

The National Forest Policy, 1988, outlined a renewed policy statement on conservation strategies. Challenging the traditional view, it preferred to recognise forest-dwelling communities as primary stake holders in forests and involve them in the conservation process. At clause 4.3.4.2 the Forest Policy read:
‘The holders of customary rights and concessions in forest areas should be motivated to identify themselves with the protection and development of forests from which they derive benefits. The rights and concessions from forests should primarily be for the bona fide use of the communities living within and around forest areas, specially the tribals’

The policy statements, notifications and judicial affidavits of the Government of India after 1988 have consistently pushed this agenda forward.5 On 1 June 1990, the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) notified that the state was encouraged to take full advantage of the expertise of village communities and voluntary agencies for regeneration of degraded forest lands. Of crucial significance are the circulars of 18 September 1990 issued by the MoEF. These circulars suggest guidelines for state governments to contain encroachment, review disputed claims on forest lands, review pattas, leases and grants involving forest lands, convert forest villages into revenue villages and settle other old habitations.

In the 1997 World Wildlife Fund for Nature case, the Supreme Court mandated the completion of the rights settlement process within a one-year period. Two years earlier, the Supreme Court in Pradip Prabhu’s case had injuncted the eviction of people from forest areas pending the government’s completion of the settlement process. However, the Supreme Court’s involvement and obvious interest in forest conservation is evidenced by the T. N. Godavarman case, where a bench of the court meets every Friday to look into matters involving forests and has taken serious exception to moves to alienate forest land. It is in this context that the bill has been drafted and placed before Parliament. The political will for such a move is evidenced by the Common Minimum Programme adopted on 27 May 2004 by the UPA coalition.