Tripura’s request for amending Forest Dwellers Act turned down

The Centre has turned down Tripura government’s request to amend the Forest Dwellers Rights Act 2006 to provide land to non-tribals traditionally living in forest areas of the state.According to the new Forest Dwellers Act, the people who have been living in forests for more than 75 years can get land allotment, but "we have demanded an amendment to the Act for giving ‘pattas’ to non-tribals living in forest areas for over 25 years," Tripura Forest Minister Jitendra Chowdhury said."Around 1,18,770 indigenous people were given official ‘pattas’ after scrutiny of papers only two non-indigenous people could be given official pattas among the 35310 applicants," he said.Chief Minister Manik Sarkar had sent a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh early this month to amend the Act, but it was turned down, saying it could not be amended now."Non-availability of land records of non-tribals is a major hurdle for giving pattas to them, but many of their records were misplaced due to displacement of people during the riot in 1980," an official said.The non-tribal people were invited by erstwhile tribal kings for wetland cultivation in the state from East Bengal (now Bangladesh) and were given pattas.