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Source: The Hindu (http://www.hinduonnet.com/2009/10/04/stories/2009100451520300.htm)
Other States
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Orissa
  

Experts blame State for unrest in Narayanpatna


Staff Reporter


BHUBANESWAR: Has Orissa government’s alleged inaction in dealing with land disputes in scheduled areas led to ‘violent’ land struggles lime one in Narayanpatna block of Koraput district recently? The answer seems to be in the affirmative. Experts opine low number of cases against non-tribals for possessing tribal land indicates that administration has failed to take legal action adequately against those who have taken away land by betraying tribal people. The reply provided by the State government under the Right To Information say only 100 cases involving 206.66 acres of tribal land were pending pertaining to non-tribal possessing tribal land in Koraput district. According to reply, the first land settlement was done in 1962 in Narayanpatna block where 1,806 landless tribal families now live. In other scheduled areas such as Sundargarh only 36 such cases involving 36.689 acres were detected. Similarly, the RTI reply says, 2,718 cases relating land are pend!
ing in Keonjhar, 83 cases in Mayurbhanj and 307 cases in Kandhamal.
Civil society activists and experts on land reform say the cases would have been much more, had the administration conducted suo moto inquiry and instituted cases against “perpetrators”. “Orissa scheduled areas transfer of immovable property (by scheduled tribes) regulation, 1956 says a non-tribal person has to disclose voluntarily as to how he possesses a patch of land in scheduled area. The low number of cases indicate that neither non-tribal people have come up suo moto disclosure nor did the administration institutes cases against them for not doing so under the said Act,” said Biswapriya Kanungo, a human rights activist. Sricharan Behera, a researcher on land reforms in tribal areas, say “the cases which are reflected in RTI reply must have come after the land dispute reached a conflicting stage. Otherwise voluntary disclosure of land records and voluntary inquiry by administration has largely been absent.” “There are hundreds o!
f cases relating to informal mortgaging of land by tribals. However, there is little action on this front. What is needed is that government must do village to village survey on land holding pattern,” Mr. Behera said.






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