Road To Muthanga - Sabotaging The Tribal Act
By G. Prabhakaran
What happened in Muthanga on February 19, 2003 was the culmination of the continuous sabotaging of The Kerala Scheduled Tribes (Restriction on Transfer of Land and Restoration of Alienated Lands) Act, 1975 by the successive governments and political parties.
The 1975 Bill was a revolutionary attempt on the part of the state Government backed by the then central government led by the late Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi, to restore the land taken away from the tribals by the settlers.
The 1975 Bill
The Debar Commission instituted by the first Prime Minister, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, in 1950s suggested restoration of alienated tribal land back to the tribals with the effect from January 26, 1950.
But 25 years later, following an outbreak of unprecedented starvation death in the early 1970s, a meeting of the State Revenue Ministers called by the then Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi, in New Delhi on April 1, 1975, recommended passing of a legislation in tune with the Debar Commission report.In April, 1975, the Kerala Assembly, with C. Achutha Menon, leading the Uninted Front Government and CPI (M) leader, E.M.S. Namboodirippad, as the leader of the Opposition, uananimously passed the Tribal Land Act which assured restoration of all the lands lost by the tribals in the state from January 26, 1960, instead of 1950 suggested by the Debar commission.
Moving this historic Bill in Assembly, the then Revanue Minister, Baby John, declared that "the Government would treat all alienated tribal lands as "stolen property" and assured that the government was fully committed to restore it to its traditional rightful owners - the tribals.
In June 1975, as part of national Emergency, Indira Gandhi proclaimed her 20-point programme that included the restoration of alienated tribal land back to the tribals.
On November 11, 1975, the Tribal Land Act got the mandatory assent of the President of India and was included in the 9th schedule of the Indian Constitution.
Between 1975 and 1986, nothing was done by the successive UDF-LDF Governments to implement the Act.
In 1986, rules were formulated to implement the Act with the retrospective effect from January 1982 (bypassing 1950 fixed by Debar Commission and 1960 by the parent Act)
In 1988, Nalla Thampi Thera of Mananthavady, Wayanad, moved the first writ petition before Kerala High Court pleading to direct the State Government to implement the Tribal Land Act of 1975.
On October 15, 1993, the Kerala High Court directed the State Government to implement the 1975 Act.
But the Governments led by K. Karunakaran and A.K. Antony sought repeated extension to scuttle the implementation of the law.
In April 1996, an attempt made by the then UDF Government led by Mr. Antony to bring an Ordinance amending the 1975 Act was rejected by the Governor on the ground that it was violation of the election code.
In may 1996, the LDF Government led by E. K. Nayanar assumed power and on August 9 the Principal Secretary of SC/ST Welfare informed the Hight Court through an affidavit about the Governments inability to to implement the 1975 Act due to "organised resistance" from the powerful encroacher - settlers in the tribal belt. But no force was used to evict the encroachers or meet the "organised resistance."
But on August 14, 1996, rejecting the claim of the Government, the Hight Court of Kerala firmly gave a final directive to implement the Act within six weeks ending september 30, 1996
The Hight Court also directed that the "RDOs should effect deliver of possession of alienated tribal lands to its original owners in cases where no appeals were pending against orders for restoration of land and where no compensation was payable," and that adequate law and machinery could be used to carry this out and that the RDOs had to file affidavits by September 30, 1996.
But the Government had not provided any police force where the RDOs tried to evict the encroachers.
A case in point was from Attappady where when the district collector of Palakkad, W.R.Reddy, tried to implement the law, the then Revenue Minister , K.E. Ismail, and then Fincance Minister, T. Sivadasa Menon, allegedly put pressure on the district administration and stopped evictions.
To top it all, the LDF brought the Kerala Scheduled Tribes (Restriction on Transfer of Land and Restoration of Alienated Lands) Amendment Bill, 1996 with the support of all the UDF MLAs, barring K.R. Gauriamma, in a hurried attempt to avoid contemt of court proceedings on the RDOs.
The amendment was to scuttle the spirit of the 1975 parent Act. It was described by the tribals as the "great betrayal of tribal cause by the communists in Kerala"
The new Bill held all transactions of tribal land between 1960 to January 24, 1986 as legal and valid. In other words the same Assembly which had proclaimed in April 1975 that all alienated tribal lands since 1960 were "stolen property" tried to give it sanctity. The present Agriculture Minister, K.R.Gauriamma, then described the amendment brought by the LDF Government as the "foremost reactionary bill ever introuduced since the formation of Kerala Assembly in 1957."
In March 1998, despite a joint LDF-UDF delegation, led by the then Chief Minister, E.K. Nayanar and then leader of the Opposition, A. K. Antony, went to Delhi seeking Presidential assent to the widely condemned anti -tribal amendment Bill of September 1996, the same was rejected by the then President, K.R. Narayanan, on the ground that an Act included in the 9th schedule of the Constitution could not be amended by the State Assembly.
But in 1999, a second amendment was passed in the assembly to bypass the presidential assent. However, the High Court rejected both the 1996 and 1999 amendment Bills.
In 2000 and 2001, the State Government filed writ appeals before Supreme Court of India, to get stay on High Court verdicts. Petitions by Nalla Thampi Thera and 'Niyamavedi' Kochi against these stay orders are still pending before the Apex Court.
Thus political parties and the successive Governments acted "unanimously" to deny the tribals their ancestral land which the High Court had repeatedly ordered to be restored.
The Hindu
February 4, 2003