Date:22/02/2006 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2006/02/22/stories/2006022205981200.htm

National

Plea on Forest Rights Bill for STs

Special Correspondent

Left parties, BJP demand its early tabling

Is the Government delaying the Bill, asks the BJP

The committee would do its best to submit the report early: panel chairman

NEW DELHI: The Left parties on Tuesday joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in demanding that the Parliamentary Joint Committee on `The Scheduled Tribes (Recognition of Forest Rights) Bill, 2005' table its report in the Budget session itself. The demand was made in the Lok Sabha after Chairman of the Committee V. Kishore Chandra S. Deo sought the permission of the House to extend the deadline to the first day of the Monsoon Session.

Questioning Mr. Deo's request, Vijay Kumar Malhotra (BJP) said the report should be tabled in the post-recess part of the Budget session while wondering whether the Government was trying to delay the Bill. Mr. Malhotra found support from Basudeb Acharia (CPI-M) and Gurudas Dasgupta (CPI), forcing an intervention from the Leader of the House, Pranab Mukherjee.

Conceding the point made by the BJP leader, Mr. Mukherjee said the recess was just a fortnight long and all the Parliamentary Standing Committees would be busy examining the Demands for Grants of various Ministries. Also, some members would be caught up in the coming Assembly elections. "The consideration of the Bill should not be a victim of constraints of time,'' was his contention.

Earlier, Speaker Somnath Chatterjee said Mr. Deo had sought an extension since the Committee had received a large number of representations from various quarters and members wanted to go through all of them before arriving at any decision.

Examination

Further elaborating, Mr. Deo said members wanted to undertake a detailed clause-by-clause examination of this proposed legislation that seeks to give forest-dwelling Scheduled Tribes the right to collect, utilise and sell minor forest produce.

Report soon

Mindful of the sentiments expressed by members, Mr. Deo said the committee would do its best to submit the report as early as possible while placing on record the fact that the Bill was an attempt to deliver a promise made to tribals several times since 1927.

The proposed legislation seeks to correct the colonial oversight of not acknowledging the inseparability between forest dwelling tribes and forests.