PM paying 'lip service' to Adivasis' cause, govt denying them justice: Congress
New Delhi (PTI): The Congress on Friday accused the Centre of going "full throttle" on attempts to deny Adivasis justice and said the Dharti Aaba Janjatiya Gram Utkarsh Abhiyan (DAJGUA) was a "full mockery" of the Forest Rights Act, illustrating the government's hypocrisy.
The Opposition party also claimed that DAJGUA, in "typical Manuvadi fashion", only sees these communities as forest-dwelling 'vanvasis' who are 'labhaartis' (beneficiaries), rather than political and economic actors in their own right.
Congress general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh said today is the 150th birth anniversary of 'Dharti Aaba Bhagwan Birsa Munda', one of the greatest sons of India and a fierce advocate of self-governance and social justice.
"The non-biological PM is in Jamui, Bihar paying lip service to the cause of the Adivasis on this occasion, even as his Government goes full throttle on attempts to deny Adivasis justice," Ramesh alleged in a statement.
"The Dharti Aaba Janjatiya Gram Utkarsh Abhiyan (DAJGUA) - named after Bhagwan Birsa Munda, but a full mockery of the Forest Rights Act- illustrates this hypocrisy," he said.
Ramesh said the Forest Rights Act ( FRA 2006) passed by the Manmohan Singh's government was a revolutionary law and it transferred power and authority over forests from the forest department to the gram sabha.
In another departure from precedent, the Ministry of Tribal Affairs was empowered as the nodal authority to implement the law, he pointed out.
The FRA empowered the Adivasi community and gram sabhas to govern and manage forests as a major reform to ensure democratic governance of forests, Ramesh said.
"After the revolution, however, came Narendra Modi's counter-revolution.
DAJGUA fundamentally undoes this historic law and the democratic reform in forest governance," he claimed.
Ramesh said it dilutes the authority of Ministry of Tribal Affairs by giving authority to the Ministry of Environment, Forests, and Climate Change in the implementation of FRA.
Rather than empower the FRA's statutory bodies - namely the gram sabha, the sub-divisional committee, the district level committee, and the state level monitoring committee - DAJGUA has created a vast parallel institutional mechanism of FRA cells at the district and sub-divisional levels and arming them with large funds and contractual staff, he pointed out.
They are directly under the centralised bureaucratic control of Ministry of Tribal Affairs and State Tribal Welfare Departments, and lack accountability to the FRA's statutory bodies.
DAJGUA empanels and engages technical agencies/domain experts /corporate NGOs for the FRA implementation and CFR management activities of the gram sabhas by the State Tribal Welfare Departments, he said.
Ramesh argued that these FRA cells are to take over what the FRA statutory bodies are required to do by law, leaving these statutory bodies to be appendages to these FRA Cells, nominal bodies reduced to carrying out the biddings of these FRA cells, he said.
"This has been done without attention to the economic and social sensitivities involved, even as a massive budget has been allocated for this (Rs. 1 lakh for the technical agencies for each CFR). For example, in Madhya Pradesh, the BJP government engaged the Maharashtra Knowledge Company Limited (MKCL) to create the VanMiTRA app, which made the transparent process of submitting FRA claims into an obscure, online process that technical operators took charge of," he said.
Three lakh claims were rejected as a result, he added.
Adivasi groups are justifiably worried about the same happening at a large scale due to the engagement of such tech agencies, Ramesh said.
The forest department has now been allowed to be a part of the gram sabha's own committee for management of community forest resources, a direct violation of the FRA, Ramesh said.
"The FRA was enacted for empowering Adivasi and forest-dwelling communities to govern and manage their resources. DAJGUA, in typical Manuvadi fashion, only sees these communities as forest-dwelling vanvasis who are labhaartis, rather than political and economic actors in their own right," he alleged.
As captured in the Adivasi Sankalp unveiled by Rahul Gandhi during the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra in Nandurbar, Maharashtra on the 12th of March, 2024, the Congress is committed to the honest and fair implementation of the FRA, Ramesh asserted.
"It is part of our guarantees to the people in both Jharkhand and Maharashtra and will continue to be a priority for upcoming assembly and parliamentary elections," he stressed.
Tagging his statement, Ramesh said on X, "As the non-biological PM pays lip service to the Adivasi cause by celebrating the 150th birth anniversary of Dharti Aaba Bhagwan Birsa Munda today in Jamui, we should not be fooled: his Dharti Aaba Janjatiya Gram Utkarsh Abhiyan (DAJGUA) is nothing but an absolute mockery of the revolutionary Forest Rights Act (2006) and Adivasi self-governance."
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Porsche car crash case exposed systemic corruption: Pune police commissioner
Pune (PTI): The Porsche car crash case exposed "systemic corruption," but the Pune Police have successfully uncovered the nexus behind the replacement of the accused juvenile's blood samples with those of his mother, Police Commissioner Amitesh Kumar said on Wednesday.
The case made national headlines after the high-end car allegedly driven by the 17-year-old boy in an inebriated state mowed down motorcycle-borne IT professionals Anish Awadhiya and Ashwini Costa in the Kalyani Nagar area on May 19 last year.
"Last year’s Porsche car crash case sparked widespread discussions about Pune’s deteriorating social culture, alleged police corruption, and several other issues. Amid all the criticism, one positive aspect stood out: the case exposed systemic corruption.
"It also demonstrated how the police, working within the same system, managed to uncover the entire nexus behind the replacement of the juvenile’s blood samples with those of his mother," Kumar said while addressing Nasha Mukt Bharat Abhiyan, an initiative aimed at raising awareness against drug addiction, organised at Modern College.
He added that the juvenile has been released since he was a minor.
"However, his mother has remained in jail for over a year, and his father continues to be behind bars. Doctors from Sassoon Hospital and others involved are also still in jail," Kumar said, adding that one mistake by a child, and an attempt by his parents to cover it up, destroyed an entire family.
He said the police will follow up on this case until every guilty person is punished.
Kumar also appealed to students to stay away from intoxicating substances and drugs.
"You are not only endangering your own life but also putting your entire family at risk," he said, urging the youth not to fall prey to harmful addictions.
"Instead, stand strong and act as a force to ensure that drug abuse is curbed in your surroundings. We assure you of full police support," he added.
He further stated that if youth from all colleges unite and decide to end this menace, "the day is not far when not even one gram of drug will be sold in the city".
The investigation into the car crash had revealed that the juvenile's blood samples were replaced with those of his mother.
The roles of Dr Ajay Taware, head of the forensic department, Medical Officer Shreehari Halnor, and a hospital staffer came under scrutiny.
While the mother is currently out on bail, the juvenile’s father, Sassoon Hospital doctors Taware and Halnor, staffer Atul Ghatkamble, two middlemen, Ashpak Makandar and Amar Gaikwad, and others remain in jail for the alleged blood sample swap.
