No grama sabhas yet in AP, recent Apex Court’s order gives imp to grama sabhas, Vizag officials begun work a year late

By SNV Sudhir

Visakhapatnam, April 24, 2013 : It’s more than two years that the state government issued a GO enacting the provisions of the Panchayats (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) (PESA) Act, 1996 of the union government empowering the Gram Sabhas in Scheduled Areas.

The PESA was enacted to empower grama sabhas  to safeguard and preserve the traditions and customs of the people, their cultural identity, community resources and customary modes of dispute resolution and ownership of Minor Forest Produce (MFP).

The G O MS No 66 of panchayat raj and rural development department issued on March 24, 2011 also talks about declaration of tribal villages under PESA Act in various Agency tracts and also formation of grama sabhas in those villages.

However not even a single village in the Agency tracts coming under Srikakulam, Vizianagaram, Visakhapatnam, East Godavari, West Godavari, Khammam, Warangal, Adilabad and Mahabubnagar districts were declared as scheduled area or PESA villages.

No grama sabha was formed.  Every village declared under PESA shall have a Gram

Sabha comprising of adult members, whose names are included in the electoral rolls at the village level. The Sarpanch of the Gram Panchayat shall be the President of the Gram Sabha. The Gram Sabha shall elect a Vice President and Secretary.

Interestingly official machinery here in Paderu Agency area which comes under union tribal welfare and panchayat raj minister, V Kishore Chandra Deo’s Araku constituency from where he was elected, have begun the identification of such villages to send proposals a year late. 

Officials at Integrated Tribal Development Agency (ITDA) Paderu entrusted with the job have started writing to the concerned tehsildhars to identify such villages from March 2012, after a year long delay. They have identified around 796 such PESA villages and sent the proposals just two months ago to the state tribal welfare commissioner for declaration.  State tribal welfare minister, P Balaraju is also elected from Paderu to the state assembly.

The grama sabha in a tribal village assumed significance with a recent Apex court’s order on the proposed bauxite mining in Niyamgiri hills in Odisha. The Supreme Court in its order on the case filed by Odisha Mineral Development Corporation (OMDC) on last Friday directed the Odisha government to place the issue of proposed before gram sabha and the gram sabha would take a decision within three months. Union Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) should take a final decision on the grant of stage II clearance for the bauxite mining project in the light of the decisions of the gram sabha within two months thereafter.

Unfortunately grama sabhas are yet to be formed in Vizag Agency where bauxite mining is also proposed.  “We have already started identifying the PESA villages and sent the proposals to the state tribal welfare commissioner. We are in communication with the state tribal welfare office over some objections. It’s the state government that has to declare the villages and grama sabhas basing on the proposals which we have already sent, which we are expecting in a couple of months,” assistant project officer (APO) of ITDA, Paderu, PVS Naidu told this correspondent.