Indian
Express: Hyderabad: Thursday, 01 October 2015.
Central
Information Commissioner (CIC) M Sridhar Acharyulu (Madabhushi Sridhar) has
directed the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests to inform whether forest
rights of tribal people were recognised, and the written consent of the gram
sabhas were obtained for the rehabilitation package under the Polavaram
Irrigation Project.
The direction
of CIC was in response to appellant D Suresh Kumar, who filed an RTI
application with Forest Conservation Division of Union Environment and Forests
ministry on November 10, 2014 seeking detailed information about Forest
Clearance granted to the Polavaram Project.
Suresh Kumar,
in his petition, sought copies of the report given by the special officer sent
by the ministry and action taken thereon regarding the rights of the tribal
people. He also sought the correspondence copies between the Centre and AP
government. He contended that pursuant to grant of Stage-II Forest Clearance
for Polavaram project, the MoEF received various representations from the
affected villages of Polavaram project complaining about the non-implementation
of Forest Right Act(FRA).
On this, the
ministry after various communications with AP government about the
non-implementation of FRA, on February
2, 2011, sent a letter to the then AP government stating that the Director
General of Forest & Secretary (DGF&SS) would shortly visit the villages
affected by the said project to have on the spot assessment of the matter.
Seeking
relevant documents, Suresh Kumar had earlier filed an RTI Application at the
Ministry of Environment and Forests, alleging that the government claimed all
powers over forests against the people living in it.The CIC held that there was
no reason to deny this information to the appellant.