India's Northeast against Delhi: new law will destroy our forests

From local governments-mostly led by the BJP, PM Modi's party-strong criticism of the reformed forest conservation law passed by the Indian Parliament earlier this month. Which excludes from protections unofficially registered areas (in many cases inhabited by tribals) and those within a 100-kilometer radius of national borders.

New Delhi (AsiaNews / Agencies) - The reform of the law on the protection of forests - approved by the Indian federal parliament on August 2, is arousing strong opposition in the states of the North-East - which denounce serious risks for their wooded areas linked to a legislation “passed without adequate debate”.

Consisting of a few articles (five pages in all), the reform modifies a law that has been in force for forty years in order - we read - "to broaden its horizons by keeping its provisions in step with the dynamic changes of ecological, strategic and economic aspirations". of the country. A periphrasis behind which opponents see a step backwards, with the opening up to new forms of exploitation of territories rich in raw materials.

The criticisms mainly concern two points: first of all the fact that the provisions of the new Forest Conservation Act will apply only to forests registered as such before 25 October 1980, the date to which the previous law dates back.

In fact, therefore, all the other non-officially classified forest areas would not be protected from forms of exploitation, despite the fact that there is an order of the Indian Supreme Court of 1996 which affirms the need to extend the restrictions to all Indian forests.

Furthermore, what alarms the states of the North-East even more is the fact that the law introduces the possibility of overcoming the constraints on forest areas for the construction of roads, railway lines or "strategic projects of national importance and concerning national security" within a radius of 100 kilometers from the borders of India.

In presenting a resolution opposing this act to the local legislature, the Minister of Forestry of Mizoram said that under this provision it would be possible to "completely clear" the forest areas of his state, which borders both Bangladesh and the Myanmar.

But three other states are also in the same situation: Nagaland, Tripura and Sikkim, all - among other things - governed by the BJP (the party of Indian premier Narendra Modi) or its allies. For its part, the government of Nagaland also recalls that in its territory "the entire 100-kilometre strip falls within the Indo-Burma Biodiversity Hotspot, one of the richest areas in the world in terms of biodiversity".

"With the weakening of environmental protections, the possibility opens up of replacing these forests with commercial plantations", environmental activist Pia Sethi also protests on the Scroll website.

Many of these forests belong to individuals, clans or village or community councils, thanks to the special privileges that the Indian Constitution grants to tribal communities. But this means that more than 50% of the forest areas in the North-East fall under "unclassified forests", which the new law would not protect.

"Many tribes have followed oral traditions for the delimitation of their forest areas and even today they may not have written them", Sethi recalls, fearing the risk that once again the Indian tribal groups will pay the consequences of Delhi's policies.