Tribal Villages, Wildlife Sanctuaries

Tags: displacement, indigenous people, rehabilitation, state, wild animals | No comments | 1,204 views

Rehabilitation is generally accepted as the solution for displacement, but is not easy to rehabilitate people. The latest instance is people of Dhain, a Korku tribal village, who were displaced for the Bori wildlife sanctuary. Bori wildlife Sanctuary in Hoshangabad district of Madhya Pradesh is India’s first reserve forest. Now Satpura Tiger Reserve has been created by merging Bori Sanctuary, Satpura National Park and Pachmarhi Sanctuary. 8 Villages from Satpura National Park, 17 villages from Bori Sanctuary and 50 villages from Pachmarhi sanctuary are in displacement zone. Overall, nearly 75 tribal villages are in the displacement zone and almost the same number of villages is lying on the border areas. It was decided to displace around 50 villages among them. All these villages are completely dependent on forest, water and other natural resources.

In 2005, Dhain villagers were rehabilitated in Babai Tehsil near Semri Harchand. Near the old Dhain village there were several rivers such as Sonbhadra. But here instead of rivers, there are hand pumps. For nearly 91 houses there are only 6 hand pumps and three are not working! The promise of providing irrigation water from the branches of Tawa Canal was not fulfilled. Since there was no provision for water and fodder, most of the cattle died. Though each displaced person was given 5 acres of land, the soil was not prepared for farming. According to villagers, there were trees in the land given to them. Though it was promised that stumps of the trees would be removed, it was not done. (Nearly 40 thousand trees were cut to settle the displaced) People are being forced to give their land for cultivation to farmers on lease and are becoming labourers in their own fields.

The life of Korku tribals was dependent on forests. They used to get Tendu, Achar(fruit) , Gum, fruits, flowers, Mashroom, roots, Nanmati, wild Ratadhu, Bechandi, Kdumati, etc abundantly. But here, in the new Dhain village, very few things from the forest are available except the firewood.

Since there are no support systems for their survival, women go for selling firewood which they have never done before. Now they are learning to bundle firewood and carry the heavy weight. It takes two days; One day they collect firewood from the forest and the next day they walk 5 to 6 kilometers to Semri Harchand and sell it. They earn around 50 Rs which they spend on essential commodities.

After the rehabilitation of New Dhain, the problems of its neighboring village Dobjhirna have enormously increased because the people of Dhain were given the land belonging to the villagers of Dobjhirna. It can be said that though they do not have documents of ownership, they possessed and cultivated the land for the last 20 to 25 years. Now there is tension among the two villages and they have even stopped talking to each other.

There is an increasing pressure on the forests. Now one more village from Bori Sanctuary has come to the rehabilitation zone. The pressure on the forests will be doubled and fight for fodder, fuel and forest products will likely to increase in the coming days.

There is only one teacher for the children belonging to class 1 to class 5. Though a lady teacher is also appointed for the school, she has gone on maternity leave. When I reached there with one of my colleagues, I found that all the classes are going on together in one room. The teacher was sitting in his room. When we asked about five classes and one teacher, he said that he is trying his best! This explains the level of education provided to the displaced tribal children. While such decisions that can make huge impact on the lives of people are taken, sufficient thought should be put in. Many hold the view that conservation of wildlife can be done along with the tribal settlements, without displacing them.

(Translated from the Hindi by Santhosh George)

October 6th, 2009 | Category: governmentality | (5 votes, average: 4.60 out of 5)
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