Annual Report of the ICITP-NEZ (April 2005 to March 2006)

April 24th 2005 :

The zonal leaders of ICITP- NEZ including Mr. Jebra Ram Muchahary, Mr. Sabdaram Rabha, Mr. Raphael Kujur, George Swansi and Mr. Pronob Basumatary participated in the 4 th Annual Conference of All Santhal Educational and Cultural Association (ASECA) in Chabua in Dibrugarh on special invitation from Mr. Prithibi Majhi, the founder member of the organization and the present honourable Speaker of Assam Assembly.

May 3 rd to 13 th 2005:

ICITP zonal leaders took active participation in the election campaigns of 1 st ever held general election of Bodoland Territorial Council (13 th May). ICITP leadership supported the local genuine IP/Tribal candidates in Thuribari, Bonorgaon, Gossaigaon and Baska.

June 1, 2005 :

ICITP-NEZ welcomed officially the “CEASE FIRE BETWEEN THE NATIONAL DEMOCRATICT FRONT OF BOROLAND (NDFB) AND THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA” and expressed happiness for this effort of creating a basic environment of a peace dialogue to find some amicable solution to the long standing Boro national issues. The ICITP-NEZ also announced solidarity in spirit to assist and cooperate with NDFB in ensuring peace building and meaningful dialogue.

June 6, 2005 :

ICITP-NEZ coordinated a “Car and bike rally for Peace” in the district of Chirang, BTC where more than 5000 peoples participated in more than 700 motor bikes, 60 Jeeps and 20 Buses and trucks to mark the Cease Fire of NDFB and the government of India. At the end of the rally, a public meeting was organized at Ballamguri to greet NDFB’s cadres who have declared ceasefire and came over ground w. e. from 1 st June 2005.

June 17, 2005 :

ICITP-NEZ participated in the mass celebration of “Cease Fire” between the NDFB and the government of India held at Udalguri.

June 18, 2005 :

ICITP-NEZ deputed Mr. Jebra Ram Muchahary, the President of the zone to attend the Governing body meeting of ICITP held in Indian Social Institute, Lodhi Road, New Delhi, who chaired the meeting.

June 24 - 27, 2005 :

A four day Capacity /Leadership building training workshop was organized for 30 zonal active leaders of the zone facilitated by Dr. Ram Dayal Munda and Mr. Jebra Ram Muchahary. The detail report of the training programme is attached below:

A four day Capacity/Leadership Building Training Workshop was held from 24 th of June to 27 th of June 2005 in ICITP-NEZ Zonal Office, Guwahati to help grooming of the Zonal Indigenous and Tribal Peoples’ leaders of the north east zone which was facilitated by Dr. Ram Dayal Munda, the Chief Advisor, ICITP and Mr. Jebra Ram Muchahary, the Chief President, ICITP.

The main purpose of the training workshop was not only to empower the zonal leaders but also to help identify the common urgent emerging problems/ issues of the IP and Tribal Peoples in the zone and to help the zonal leaders to analyze and develop strategies to find solutions with a special vision of strengthening the effective net work and peace building in the region. Altogether 30 tribal/local community leaders participated in the training workshop and the training workshop was facilitated by Dr. Ram Dayal Munda and Mr. Jebra Ram Muchahary.

On 24 th June 2005, in the first day, at 10 am the workshop was inaugurated by an indigenous invocation facilitated by Mrs. Malati Rani Narzary, the President of the Roje Eshansali, Salakati, Kokrajhar.

Mr. Jebra Ram Muchahary welcomed the participants and explained the purpose of the workshop in details. He mentioned the need of capacity building training for effective leadership and their growth by grooming them properly by systematic processes of capacity building/leadership training. He expressed happiness over Dr. Ram Dayal Munda’s acceptance to impart two days session to help social analyzing of the Tribal scenario in the North Eastern Region in particular and in the country in general.

The participants introduced themselves in brief and then the training was begun facilitated by Dr. Munda began his dissemination of information of How ICITP started its movement in India way back 1987 and how it has been actively involved in IPs movement and Tribal issues in India. He mentioned how ICITP began to attend United Nations meeting through World Council of Indigenous Peoples and Working Group on Indigenous Populations (UNWGIP). He shared information how WGIP function and after prolong struggle of IPs the UN has established Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, which is an advisory body of IPs under ECOSOC. He informed that UNPF has six mandates for indigenous peoples:

He referred about the government of India’s divide and rule policy of Tribal Peoples. He mentioned about the main objectives of ICITP and its activities. According to him the biggest and most challenging job for ICITP is to make solidarity with other Indigenous and Tribal Peoples and fight against the injustices meted to them. He said that there are over 2000 (Two Thousand) organizations under ICITP. ICITP is the only Indigenous Organization organized and managed by Tribal Peoples themselves in the country. He said Indigenous Peoples should speak for themselves and articulate their problems. He said that for effective leadership we should have training and sufficient exposures which help empowering one self. He said leadership training is of utmost important and require a lot of resources. He expressed gratefulness to EED, Germany for their continued financial support to initiate capacity building training programmes for ICITP.

He also shared that United Nations and some specialized agencies also carry out training programmes for IPs on various issues. He informed that UNITAR provides training on “Conflict Resolution and Peace Building Initiatives” and we should take advantage of availing this opportunity. The training was full of interactions as questions were raised by the participants and clarifications were made by the facilitators.

On the second day i.e. on 25 th of June 2005, Dr. Munda imparted training on Participatory Strategic Planning (PSP). He introduced the concept of PSP and stressed importance on basic elements of PSP as facilitated by Dr Assad Khan, EED, Germany who has been the official facilitators of ICITP on Capacity Building Training. He stressed importance on the need of PSP (Participatory Strategy Planning) and gave some points on how to carry out the Participatory Strategic Planning. He oriented on

V - Vision

M- Mission

R - Role

S - Strategy

P - Programme.

While talking on the need of strategic analysis, Mr. Jebra Ram Muchahary supplemented with additional information that for more effective analysis the following analytical elements/tools should be noted, which can be short scripted as “ SWOT ”.

He explained that in the SWOT analysis S stands for Strength, W for Weakness, O for Opportunities and T for Threats.

He elaborated that time to time analysis of SWOT helps in better management of an organization and cause of the peoples since it helps in retrospective evaluation and provide feed back and ample scopes of improving through self analysis. For success and failure, we can always take help of SWOT analysis. In the discussion the followings were identified as Strength, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats of ICITP and Tribal Organizations in India. He suggested to constantly evaluate and monitor the organizational behaviours to safeguard the movement/organizations.

STRATEGIC ANALYSIS OF IPS/TRIBAL MOVEMENTS

STRENGHT WEAKNESS OPPORTUNITY THREAT

S trength

HISTORY, CULTURE, TRADITION, LANGUAGE, RELIGION ETC;

MERGINALISATION BY GOVT/DOMINANT SOCIETY;

PEOPLES (MAN/WOMEN, YOUTH AND CHILDREN, STUDENTS /POLITICIANS /ACTIVISTS ETC);

PEOPLES INTENSIFICATION OF POLITICAL ASSERTION;

VOLUNTEERS/ACTIVISTS;

REGIONALLY AND INTERNATIONALLY;

MOVEMENT;

PEOPLES IN THE PROVINCES;

SITUATION(S);

GOOD RESULT/OUTCOME;

SUCCESFUL NEGOTIATION (WW SITUATION);

WEAKNESS

ALL THE REVERSE CHARACTERISTICS OF STRENGTH.

OPPORTUNITY

THREAT

He further stated that it is now time has come to strengthen the net working of IPs around the world to make the governments pay attention to improve the life of the IPs/Tribal Peoples in the country and around the world and advised the youths to take up the new challenges of building well-informed effective leadership to cop up with the situations which is increasingly under tremendous adverse impact of globalization.

The third day, i.e. 26 th of June 2005, the training workshop was facilitated by Mr. Jebra Ram Muchahary. He imparted training on Conflict Resolution and Peace Building initiative.

The third session was very much interactive session. The burning issues of conflicts situation was placed vividly and the possible means of conflict resolution for peace building was given more emphasis in this session and the training session south some reference in exploring possible means of resolving conflicts for peace in the region on the basis of three basic concepts of conflict resolution propagated by UNITAR:

Mr. Muchahary shared that realizing the need and aspiration of the nations and the peoples the UN has been striving in peace building processes through regular training by its special organ called as United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), based in Geneva. He informed that ICITP is fortunate enough to have more than three members to under go such training in Geneva and Chiang Mai who in turn are to be engaged in imparting the same training for sensitizing and exploring ways and means for durable peace on the ground.

aspirations around the world and the governments remain dominant in the process. He said this is not a good and encouraging process of permanent or lasting peace as unrest relapses sooner or later. He also mentioned that when all the conflicting parties do not come forward for negotiation and find amicable solution/solutions on mutual understanding or mutual benefit, then there can not be any dialogue and no peace can be found out or there cannot be any arrangement for peace dialogue. This situation can be best described as “Loss – Loss” situation as both or all the concerned groups cannot expect or have any benefit out of this very situation rather all of them will be in loss situation. Technically this situation leads to death lock of the peace dialogue and therefore we need to avoid this situation to confront in the peace building process too. Mr. Muchahary shared that according to UNITAR, the last and the best way of conflict resolution is to create a “Win – Win” situation amongst the conflicting parties involved. When concerned parties come together for dialogue and worked out on mutual understanding/benefit on the basis of give and take (if necessary on mutual compromise) and thus reach to find an amicable solutions to their issues/problems which will benefit every parties or intent to benefit all the concerned groups or at least does not deprive or dissatisfy the parties involved in any forms or undermine any ones aspirations/articulations, then there can be a well-meaning negotiation which can be a durable one and will produce a good result in the dialogue which can be called a durable peace building initiative. He further stressed that for a successful peace negotiator’s training, one should give more importance in analysis of the conflicting situations with the help of mock exercise during the interaction sessions.

He illustrated elaborately how the internal conflicts (Boro- Santhals, Hmar-Dimsas) among the IPs/Tribal Peoples in the region could be best worked out through mock exercise and encouraged the participants to share information with sincerity to make use of their expertise to help building peace whenever inter-conflicts occurs amongst the IPs/Tribal peoples. He opined that the inter-conflicts weaken the very slogan and aspiration of solidarity which ICITP has been cultivating/aspiring since 1987 and appealed the participants to strengthen it through understanding among different IPs/Tribes. He further cautioned that divisive forces/ policies of the ruling cliques/dominant society may pause as an obstacle to create unity and solidarity amongst IPs/Tribal Peoples in India or elsewhere to weaken the movement of ICITP or any other organization/organizations which is the usual common and deliberate practices of most of the governments or ruling cliques/dominant society. Most of the participants realized and expressed concerned that inter-conflicts were rather a result of deep rooted conspiracy of the ruling cliques/dominant society and feels that due to lack of information sharing or due to lack of dissemination of information or communication most of the misunderstanding occurs amongst the different groups of Tribal Peoples and most of the time, the government try to take advantage to harvest most political interest than sincere attempts to address the situations/issues of the IPs/Tribal Peoples.

In the last day, i.e. 27 th of June, 2005 the training workshop was concluded with a group activities/ panel discussions developing strategies for effective net working amongst the IPs/Tribal Peoples’ leaders in the region and solidarity. The whole group was divided in to six different smaller groups and was encouraged to promulgate and put forward some ideas/methods/effective mechanisms for successful peace building and effective leaderships in the region contributed by the participants themselves. The group leaders presented their views to contribute towards building effective leaderships of the IPs/Tribal Peoples in the region.

Some of the qualities of effective IPs/Tribal Leaders must possess that were emerged as suggested by the groups are as follows:

The workshop came up with the following recommendations/suggestions to improve the net working of ICITP and the IPs/Tribal Peoples in India to make it more effective IP organization.

The training workshop was concluded on the afternoon of 27 th June 2005 in a simple valedictory session which was chaired by Jebra Ram Muchahary and co-chaired by Sabdaram Rabha, the President and the General Secretary of ICITP-NEZ respectively, who also gave away certificates of participation to the participants.

July 16 – 22, 2005 :

Mr. Jebra Ram Muchahary, Mr. Raphael Kujur and Mr. Don Bosco Chermako participated in the 23 rd session of UNWGIP held in Geneva from ICITP-NEZ on self funding. They made two collective statements along with the other ICITP members from other zones. The statement is attached for reference:

Agenda item no 4 (a)

Joint statement by member organizations of the Indian Confederation of Indigenous & Tribal Peoples (ICITP), Jharkhandis Organisation for Human Rights (JOHAR) and World Adivasi Council (WAC).

Mr. Chairman, Distinguished Members of the Working Group

Hon’ble Representatives of the observer States

UN specialised agencies

Fellow Indigenous Brothers & Sisters from around the World

Ladies and Gentlemen

I bring cordial greetings to you from our people. Sir, I wish to speak in general. Firstly, we have been raising on this platform several issues affecting our people. We wish to report that some of the issues have been attended to and some progress has been made.

While we appreciate and thank the government of India on the issues where progress has been made, we also call upon them to attend to the issues mentioned above. We call upon through your office Mr. Chairman to take immediate steps facilitating restoration of peace in the concerned areas.

Thank you Mr. Chairman, for your kind attention.

NAME ORGANISATION SIGNATURE

9. Don Bosco Chermako All Adibasi Students Association of Assam

10. Raphael Kujur “

Twenty Third Session United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations Geneva, July 16 – 22, 2005  

Agenda item no. 5(a)

Joint statement by Jharkhandis Organisation for Human Rights (JOHAR) and the Indian Confederation of Indigenous and Tribal Peoples (ICITP).

Hon’ble Chairman, distinguished members of the working group

Distinguished government representatives

Distinguished representatives from the UN specialized agencies

Fellow Indigenous delegates from around the world

Ladies & Gentlemen,

I bring warm greetings from my people. Mr. Chairman, I wish to speak briefly regarding a few laws concerning Indigenous/ tribal peoples passed by the government of India and the provincial government of Jharkhand, where I come from.

First is the constitutional provision of the 5 th schedule within which there is the provision of the Tribes Advisory Council (TAC) which must be taken into confidence for the administration and development of the tribal areas. However the concern States constantly disregard this provision and go ahead with the plans of encroaching upon tribal lands and forest. The 5 th schedule also empowers the Hon’ble Governor of the State to take special measures to safeguard tribal interest, however no Governor ever made any effort to take recourse to this discretion in addressing the issues of the concerned tribal areas.

The second is the provision of the Panchayat Extension to the Scheduled Areas (PESA – 1996). The Act empowers the gram sabha (village council) to control virtually everything that concerns the tribal communities – management of land, water, forest, managing schools, health centres, controlling village markets, restoring illegally alienated lands and settling disputes in the traditional village council. The spirit of the law is to allow the gram sabha in its totality which includes in relation to the other gram sabhas and their regional groupings. Under the present status the function of the gram sabha ends within its village boundary, which means in matters where inter village disputes or cooperation in involved, gram sabha has no role to play. Thus in matters of inter village disputes, management of forest and large scale development projects that involve the entire region, the role of the gram sabha is reduced to nothing.

The third is the rehabilitation and resettlement policy which specifically deals with the issue of relocation of the people affected by large scale development projects – construction of large dams, mining, power (thermal & hydel) and eco – development projects. he law comes after 50 years of developmental activity during which about 20 million Indigenous Peoples have already been displaced without there being any consultation with the concerned Indigenous peoples.

Indigenous Peoples from forest areas is appreciable, not specifying the nature of the said deeds is confusing and is likely to amount to a great loss o part of Indigenous Peoples. In practice the Indigenous Peoples might end up getting pieces of land at the rate of 20’ X 20’ for their hutments only.

The State/provincial laws I would like to mention are :

All the above mentioned laws while they are framed keeping safeguard the tribal interest in mind, they had very little room for Indigenous/Tribal participation.

We recommend:

August 2, 2005 :

A massive public meeting was organized in Barlawgaon Bodo High School Play ground to felicitate the newly elected members of Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) including the Chief Executive Member Shri Hagrama Mohilary, Deputy Chief Executive Member Shri Chandan Brahma, Shri Kampa Borgoyari, EM, Shri Emanuel Muchahary, EM and others 17 of other members of the BTC. The felicitation ceremony was jointly-organized by ICITP-NEZ, Barlawgaon Tengfakri Library, All Bodo Students Union (ABSU), Barlawgaon Unit, Bodoland Peoples’ Progressive Front (BPPF), Thuribari Unit. A strong reception committee was formed to host the programme. The massive programme was attended by more than 30 thousand local publics. The programme was supported financially by local peoples themselves. The reception committee on behalf of the public of Bijni submitted the following memorandum to the Chief of BTC: