JARWA TRIBE

THE CONTROVERSIAL video film released in January showing scantily clad Jarawa tribal women dancing for tourists in return for food and money woke up the Indian government from its slumber. On 31 May, Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting Ambika Soni announced that the Cabinet has decided to enact the Andaman and Nicobar Islands (Protection of Aboriginal Tribes) Amendment Regulation, 2012 to prohibit all commercial and tourist activities in a designated buffer zone within the 5-km radius around the Jarawa tribal reserve. The amendments also provide for punishments for unauthorised entry, photography, videography, hunting, use of alcohol, inflammable material or biological germs, advertisements to attract tourists in the buffer zone etc. Any violation can attract a prison sentence of three to seven years and a fine up to Rs 10,000.

What the minister did not state was the fact that the government had drafted the Andaman and Nicobar Islands (Protection of Aboriginal Tribes) Amendment Regulation in 2010 but no one bothered to table the Bill until the British newspapers exposed extreme vulnerability and abuse of the Jarawas. The 2010 amendments were brought to address the Calcutta High Court judgement that had set aside the notification issued by the Andaman Union Territory administration on 30 October 2007 to prohibit all commercial and tourist activities within a designated buffer zone. The Calcutta High Court dismissed notification on the grounds that the principal regulation only permitted such notifications for ‘reserved areas’ and the Regulation had no reference to ‘buffer zones’. India had recognised the problems in 2007 but lost five precious years literally doing nothing to protect the Jarawas.

The proposed 2012 amendments of the Regulation are too little too late, do not address the core problems of the Jarawas and provide no mechanism for implementation of the Regulation.

Firstly, the 2012 amendments of the Regulation are unlikely to change the ground situation. The existing 1956 Protection of Aboriginal Tribes Regulation already criminalises many of these offences. In fact, Constable Silvarious Kindo, the accused of the Jarwa exploitation video, was arrested under the 1956 Regulation. It did not act as deterrence despite the fact that the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 too can be invoked. While stringent punishment may deter, like all other laws of India, enforcement will remain a problem.

Secondly, the near extinction of the dwindling Jarawa populations cannot be addressed by a law whose enforcement remains suspect. The threat to the Jarawas does not only come from the tourists but equally from those settled in the Andaman and Nicobar islands. Taking cognisance of this, the Supreme Court in an order way back in 2002 directed the government to close the sections of the Andaman Trunk Road that run through the Jarawa reserve. In May 2007, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination while examining India’s periodic report recommended implementation of the 2002 Supreme Court order and further requested the Government of India to submit its reply on implementation of the recommendations within a year. Five years have elapsed but the government has failed to submit any reply to the UN body. It is clear that the government has no intention to implement the Supreme Court order.

SINCE 1956, the Government had not reviewed the Protection of Aboriginal Tribes Regulation until the Kolkata High Court judgement exposed its flaws. The government is still undecided on saving the Jarawas. On the one hand, the government proposes to make ‘unauthorised entry’ a criminal offence under the proposed amendments of the Regulation; on the other, it continues to allow movement of the people and vehicles into the Jarawa Reserve through the Andaman Trunk Road.

In February 2012, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights released ‘Norms for Protection of Indigenous Peoples in Isolation and Initial Contact of the Amazon Region, Gran Chaco and Oriental Region of Paraguay’. These are in line with the India’s Supreme Court order and encourage governments to allow isolated communities to remain on their own without any contact with the outside world.

Sadly, today, extinction of ‘human races’ such as the Jarawas is not on the same priority as the extinction of the major specifies like the ‘tigers’. India must not only close the Andaman Trunk Road but regularly review policies and programmes relating to nearly extinct indigenous tribal communities. The 2012 Regulation must provide for monitoring bodies and submission of implementation reports.

Chakma is director of the Asian Centre for Human Rights

HO tribe in new dimention

Jharkhand mulls mining in Ho tribe's homeland

TOI has documents showing that the Jharkhand government has sought and received applications for mining in more than 500 sq km of the dense forests -- home to the Ho tribe that the Union government wants to bring development to. Around 95 sq km of the forest is already leased out for mining.

Union rural development minister Jairam Ramesh pushed and got a Rs 150 crore special package to develop roads, community centres, hospitals, schools, provide jobs and set up CRPF camps in the heart of the dense forest that has remained an impenetrable zone for the administration - with the government finding several 'lost' villages just recently.

But much of this could become redundant if the Jharkhand government's plans come true with almost the entire green patch wiped clean with coal pits dotting the landscape and a few Ho villages left spattered around. Of course, it would also be then flooded with a new world of contractors, labour and all the paraphernalia of the mining industry.

At the moment, some of the leased out mines are not operational and most of them lie on the eastern fringe of the sal forests. But once all the proposed mines become operational, the forest, which is also a critical elephant terrain, could be fragmented beyond recognition.

The Union environment ministry had previously given clearance for Chiriya mines inside the Saranda forests despite internal views against the move and now SAIL has come back for more.

Source :
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-06-01/india/31958588_1_mining-industry-saranda-forests-sq-km

Jrwa tribe and its region as buffer zone

JARWA TRIBE REGION AS BUFFER ZONE
Five months after two British newspapers released a controversial video film showing scantily clad Jarawa tribal women dancing for tourists in return for food and money, the government finally acted on Thursday: the Union Cabinet approved the

promulgation of a law that brings into effect a buffer zone in the 5 km radius around the Jarawa tribal settlements in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, and provides for imprisonment up to seven years for those violating government norms for this area.

Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Ambika Soni said the decision to promulgate the Andaman and Nicobar Islands (Protection of Aboriginal tribes) Amendment Regulation 2012 has been taken under Article 240 of the Constitution, which empowers the President to take such measures in case of Union Territories. “This regulation will cover the entire Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Tourist establishments will be prohibited and other commercial establishments will be regulated in the buffer zone, which will protect the aboriginal tribes from undesirable outside influences.”

The law provides for tough penal provisions to deter unauthorised entry, photography, videography, hunting, use of alcohol, inflammable material or biological germs, or even advertisements to attract tourists in the buffer zone. Any violation can attract a prison sentence of three to seven years and a fine up to Rs. 10,000.

An earlier attempt by the Andaman Union Territory administration to prohibit all commercial and tourist activities, through a notification on October 30, 2007, within a designated buffer zone was quashed by the Calcutta High Court on the grounds that the principal Regulation only permitted such notifications for “reserved areas.” A Special Leave Petition, challenging this, was subsequently filed in the Supreme Court, and it is in the pendency of this SLP that the Union Cabinet, using Article 240, has approved the promulgation of a law that will create a buffer zone. Official sources said this meant that the lacuna in the regulation that saw the Calcutta High Court quash the earlier notification has now been addressed: it was tantamount to a policy change.

The government's decision on Thursday follows the intervention by the Sonia Gandhi-headed National Advisory Council (NAC) that had mooted an amendment to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands (Protection of Aboriginal Tribes) Regulations, 1956. A larger buffer zone, it was felt, would mean increased space for tribals, while preventing outsiders from intruding on their privacy.

Simultaneously, the NAC has also been working on drafting a comprehensive policy for the protection and preservation of primitive tribal groups (PTGs), including the Jarawas in the Andamans. In India, about 75 tribal communities have been classified as PTGs, who are the poorest among those listed as Scheduled Tribes: they are spread across 17 States and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. The NAC, flagging the issue in 2006, had reported on the sexual abuse of Jarawa women and recommended policy interventions to ensure preservation and privacy of the tribe. Indeed, an NAC experts' sub-group had suggested eventual closure of the part of the Andaman Trunk Road that passes through the Jarawa Reserve.

Meanwhile, the debate on the Jarawas continues – whether they should continue to exist in their pristine habitat, cut off from the mainstream, or whether they should be “empowered” through interventions, especially relating to health and education. (The Hindu, 1 June 2012  )