Tribal Land Ownership and the Forest Rights Act: Is India Truly International?
Date
2018-04-02
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Abstract
This thesis examines the statutory framework of the Forest Rights Act in light of India’s obligations under the ILO Convention 107, the CERD, and Article 27 of the ICCPR with respect to tribal land ownership. The Forest Rights Act is an express measure to address the ‘historic injustice’ perpetrated against tribal communities in matters of land rights. This thesis examines whether the Act fulfills India’s human rights obligations under international law, particularly the obligation to recognize and protect the right to tribal ownership in traditional lands. The analysis focuses on two main aspects of India’s obligations: whether the Forest Rights Act fulfills the obligation to fully recognize, delimit and demarcate the right to ownership of forest dwelling tribals based on traditional occupation of forestlands; and, whether the Forest Rights Act fulfills the obligation of effective participation imposed by international law before decisions (including state authorized resource development projects) are undertaken on traditional forest lands? The author concludes that the statutory framework of the Forest Rights Act does not fulfill India’s international human rights obligations with respect to the land rights of forest dwelling tribal communities, in particular with respect to the tribal right to ownership of traditional lands.
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ICCPR, CERD, Equality, ILO 107, Forest Rights Act, land ownership, title rights, tribal and indigenous peoples, effective participation
Citation
Garima, G. (2018). Tribal Land Ownership and the Forest Rights Act: Is India Truly International? (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/31761