Mr. N.C.Saxena who had been member of planning commission and National Advisory Council had visited our training institute. He was invited to deliver a lecture on Forest laws and Tribal Rights.
I was very happy to know his views on many issues such as displacement, Land acquisition acts, rights of other traditional forest dwellers etc.
We also had an opportunity to interact with him during dinner. We treaded upon various issues such as PDS vs Direct cash transfer, Identification of BPL, Naxalism, Panchayati Raj Institutions and finally how to criticize government if you have any difference of opinion. It was an enriching experience to know his views on all these issues.
Regarding Tribal Rights, he says there are many issues in tribal areas due to inaction of government. Land Alienation is one of the major problems. Some of the tribal lands in the country have majority of non-tribal population which has slowly encroached and settled well. Displacement is the another issue concerning tribals. Majority of people displaced by projects are tribals. The antiquated Land Acquisition act gives government authority to acquire land from anyone if it is for "Public Purpose". But the public purpose is not finely defined which leads to great discretion to government to declare anything under the sun as public purpose. So, there is a need to define public purpose narrowly. Ex: "National Security". But when it comes to acquisition by private parties for setting up huge industries, government should not interfere and use the power of eminent domain (All land belongs to govt and it can be claimed anytime). Instead the private parties should be allowed to negotiate independently with the people and give a compensation package which is acceptable to them. The new amendment to this act suggests that, if a private party acquires 70% of the land, 30% would be automatically acquired by government and given to the private parties. According to Mr.N.C.Saxena, this would lead to various issues.
1. It would give private party authority to acquire, so he would use land mafia or other means to threaten people and acquire without compensating them.
2. The land records and in very bad shape because of which it becomes impossible for private parties to compensate all the affected parties such as tenants, share croppers, real owners etc. Land records have names of ancestors while presently it might be in possession of someone else whose name appears no where in records. So there is a need to correct the law and ensure that everyone who depends on the land gets the benefit.
3. Thirdly, if huge tracts of land are acquired by government, it would be liable to rehabilitate them by providing land and various facilities at a new site. But when 70% of land is acquired by private and 30% by govt, it would not be the responsibility of government to compensate all of them.
Thus, he suggests that if a piece of land is to be acquired by a private party, 70% of people being displaced should agree to it. They would agree only when the compensation is satisfactory. Government should act as a regulator and ensure that this is done smoothly.
On the issue of Naxalism, he suggested that development should be the major weapon. Secondly, we should create an environment where Naxal leaders could lead struggle against injustice through legal means such as Jat Agitation, Tribal agitations against land acquisition etc. If they have a legal channel to vent their agony, there might be a win-win situation where govt works to solve their problems while their problems get addressed. In the present situation, there is loss of poor lives on either side (Naxals and Paramilitary forces involved in anti-insurgency operations) but there is no solution to the problem of neglect and exploitation of tribals.
When asked about his report on Identification of BPL, he said there is no conflict on parameters to identify the beneficiaries but there is difference of opinion in the machinery through which such identification is done. He suggested that local bodies should be involved in identification of BPL so that there is transparency and participation of beneficiaries in the process. In the present system it is done through Block Development Officer, who doesn't know the ground position. When we send a surveyor to the field to identify, anyone can stand in front of a hut and give wrong information and claim BPL status. We can never correct this wrong information unless it is verified by people themselves. The list thus produced with lot of errors gets approved by every higher level and becomes the basis for planning.
We expressed our apprehension about PRIs(Panchayati Raj Institutions) at various levels being ineffective and monopolized by few influential individuals. For this, he suggested that there are good examples in southern states like Kerala and Tamilnadu. In these states there is greater devolution of powers ( financial, decision-making) to these PRIs. Consequently they became effective decentralized institutions. (Simply put, if we feel our collector can redress our grievance, we would go to him with an appeal, but if he cant do anything and everyone knows that, who would want to waste their time??) So there is a need to strengthen PRIs and devolve greater powers (of course cautiously) in order to strengthen these institutions.
Coming to PDS vs DCT (Direct cash transfers), he thinks DCT can be implemented in few urban areas where there is well-established network of private suppliers of these essential commodities. It would be very difficult in remote rural and tribal areas where there is no network of private vendors and even the network of ATM and bank branches is still a dream. So he says both the systems would exist parallel to each other and its not possible to do away with PDS structure on the whole.
Finally, when we asked if we can criticize government policies when we feel they are anti-poor or illogical, he gave a beautiful piece of advice. He says criticism should be constructive and should offer a solution. For instance, we dont like something the way it is, we should identify its drawbacks and also suggest improvements. Only then, it would hold waters. Else it would be an anti-governmental tirade without any positive result.
It was a wonderful experience to know his ideas and interact with an experienced bureaucrat like him.
