Niyamgiri: Is Odisha playing smart with tribals? Centre writes to Governor

By Sandeep Sahu

Bhubaneswar: The Naveen Patnaik government’s plans to work around the Supreme Court order of 18 April leaving the final decision on mining in the Niyamgiri hills, considered sacred by the Dongria Kondhs who inhabit the area, on the local gram sabhas, by restricting the number to 12 carefully chosen villages appears to have hit a giant wall in the shape of the Union Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MoTA).

In a letter to Odisha Governor SC Jamir earlier this week, Tribal Affairs Minister V Kishore Chandra Deo has minced no words in accusing the state government of ’treating with scant respect’ the Supreme Court order of 18 April and ‘colluding’ with Vedanta Aluminium Limited (VAL) to push the highly controversial mining project in the Niyamgiri hills in Kalahandi district. Deo sought the urgent intervention of the Governor in the matter, saying “under the powers bestowed upon you under Para 3 of Schedule V to the Constitution, I urge you to kindly intervene and exercise your executive powers for the protection of tribals and marginalised sections residing in the state”.[caption id=“attachment_918791” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Vedanta Aluminium office in Orissa. AFP [/caption]

Deo’s decision to write to the Governor-and not to the state government-and actually seek his intervention has raised eyebrows in the bureaucracy for it is not often that the Centre bypasses the state government in this manner. But it has also convinced the babus that the MoTA, which incidentally has been appointed the nodal authority to supervise the whole process by the Supreme Court order of 18 April, cannot be trifled with. What apparently got the Union tribal affairs minister’s goat was the response-or rather the lack of it-from the state government to a letter written earlier in the month by Vibha Puri Das, secretary in the MoTA, to Odisha chief secretary BK Pattanaik.

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Making it clear that the state government’s interpretation of the apex court verdict was ‘incorrect’, the letter said: “The list of villages where the rights of forest dwellers are guaranteed under the Forest Rights Act (FRA) or where cultural and religious rights are likely to be affected, cannot be arbitrarily decided by the state government. It is to be decided by the people (gram sabhas) where claims would be filed through a transparent manner so that no genuine gram sabha who have a legitimate claim is left out of the process,” said the letter.

Instead of assuring the MoTA that it was taking steps to address its concerns, the state government restricted itself to saying, “We have sought legal opinion in the matter.” And that remains the government’s position even after the latest missive from Deo. “Even before this letter, we have sought the opinion of the law department. We shall decide on the next course of action after we receive its opinion,” Santosh Sarangi, secretary in the Scheduled Tribes (ST) and Scheduled Castes (SC) Development department, told Firstpost on Saturday.

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As per the state government’s reading, the apex court order of 18 April refers to the 12 hill slope villages where gram sabhas had earlier been held for settlement of claims under FRA. But the MoTA is of the view that this is a narrow and incorrect reading of the judgement.

The tribal affairs ministry’s determination to broadbase the opinion seeking process has not made things easy for the Naveen Patnaik government, which is already under fire from the local Dongria Kondhs who live in the vicinity of Niyamgiri. A delegation of Niyamgiri Suraksha Samiti (NSS), the apex body of Dongria Kondhs fighting for the rights of the local tribals, recently met Governor SC Jamir and demanded that gram sabhas be held in all 104 villages, which have a ‘sentimental attachment’ with the Niyamgiri hills. Emerging out of the meeting with the Govenor, Kumuti Majhi, president of NSS, said the local tribals had no faith in the state government, which was ‘working to safeguard the interests of Vedanta’.

The twin attacks, both of which have expressed a complete lack of faith in the state government and have sought the good offices of the Governor, has poured cold water on the plans of Vedanta, which was planning to soon reopen its 1 million ton per annum (MTPA) refinery at Lanjigarh, closed since 5 December last year for want of raw material. After a meeting with Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and chief secretary BK Pattnaik on 7 June, a buoyant SK Roongta, managing director (MD) of VAL, had said that the company hoped to restart the refinery by June end with temporary supply of bauxite from elsewhere till the state government found ways to meet its commitment of supplying raw material for the plant.

But with the Centre determined to prevent the Odisha government from having its way in the matter of holding gram sabhas, Vedanta will now have to rework its plans.