State asked to submit rehabilitation plan by July 14, 2021
The Eastern Zonal Bench of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) has sought response from the Tripura Forest Department and the North Tripura district administration on a public complaint regarding the state government’s move to resettle over 40,000 displaced Brus of western Mizoram in the reserved forest.
The NGT asked the state to submit the Bru rehabilitation plan to the bench before July 14, 2021. The order is under scrutiny while the response is being finalised, said principal chief conservator of forest DK Sharma. “I am not in a position to explain the stand of the government on the issue as it would be decided at the highest level.”
The Tripura government resettled 493 members of 426 Bru families, who spent 24 years in relief camps in Mizoram, in two forest locations of Dhalai district in April this year. There are a total of 6,500 Bru families living in camps.
The Tripura government plans to rehabilitate displaced families in various locations of North Tripura, Unokoti and Dhalai districts in a phased manner.
In the first phase, 252 members of 220 Bru families were resettled at Haduklau in Ambassa and another 241 members of 206 families were shifted to Bongofapara locality in Langtarai Valley of Dhalai district from Hezacherra, Ashapara and Naisingpara relief camps in Kanchanpur, North Tripura.
The government has cleaned jungles to make dwelling sheds for their temporary stay and provided funds for construction of pucca houses, according to the quadripartite agreement signed last year in New Delhi.
Each Bru family living in the camps will get a 40-feet by 30-feet plot of land, Rs 1.5 lakh assistance for building a pucca house, a fixed deposit of Rs 4 lakh, financial aid of Rs 5,000 per month, along with free rations supply for the next two years, according to the agreement.
The non-tribal people of North Tripura have been opposing the rehabilitation plan of Mizoram Brus in Tripura forest since the beginning. Several non-government and civil society organisations had observed a month-long strike in Kanchanpur in December last year protesting the move.
Violent protests widened the communal divide but the Bipla Deb government didn’t roll back the rehabilitation plan.
Dhanishwar Debnath, a citizen of Kanchanpur, lodged a complaint with the NGT against the government’s plan to rehabilitate the Brus, claiming it violates Section 2 of the Forest Conservation Act, 1980. NGT accepted the complaint June 9, 2021.
An e-tender was floated by the Tripura government on November 4, 2020 regarding constructions within a forest area, which is prohibited by the act, Debnath complained. The proposed construction for resettling the Brus would take place in a 250-hectare green belt, according to an estimate.
Central funds for land
In January last year, the agreement of Bru settlement in Tripura was signed by Tripura, Mizoram and the Centre with Bru organizations to resolve the impasse of about 40,000 Brus. People from the tribe had to leave their home and hearth following a series of communal attacks on them in October 1997 in the villages of western Mizoram.
There were several rounds of talk for repatriation of the Brus in Mizoram but the matter was unresolved because of disagreement between the community and the Mizoram government. In the last 10 years, however, about 7,000 Brus returned to Mizoram after nine phases of repatriation till November 30, 2019 but are unhappy in their homeland.
The Bru leaders alleged most of their problems were not addressed by the Mizoram government. As a result, the remaining families didn’t agree to go back to Mizoram and preferred to remain in Tripura.
At the initial phase of resettlement, the Tripura government shifted them to the forest villages with a temporary dwelling shed in their identified plot of land, along with basic amenities like drinking water and electricity.
The Centre had sanctioned a package of Rs 600 crore for Bru settlement in Tripura: Rs 150 lakh earmarked for land acquisition by state government and the rest for the welfare of the community and development of infrastructure in the localities.
The state government has identified 20 forest locations for the rehabilitation project, instead of buying private land, and targeted to complete the process by the current financial year.
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