To,
Mr. Rajeev Kumar
Joint Secretary
Ministry of Tribal Affairs
Room No.722, 'A' Wing,
Shastri Bhawan,
New Delhi - 110 001
E-mail address : rajeevkumar@nic.in
For the Policy document:
http://tribal.nic.in/finalContent.pdf

Sir,

Thank you for posting this information in the net work. However ICITP do strongly and seriously feel that the Tribal Affairs Ministry should have adopted some other means like sending the text in hard materials to different concerned political, social and community leaders, organisations and experst/academicians well in adavce to hear their comments/ suggestions/views/remarks on the draft policy. We beleieve that many tribal organisations/leaders/activists do not have this priviledge to have excess to information by email/websites as they live in remote areas where they have constraints of electricity and computer and some time skills altogther. ICITP raised this issue earlier too. We talked about free, prior and informed consent in all the mattres that eaffect us directly or indirectly. We talked about right to information to ensure our full and effective participations in our concerned issues. We repeatedly made several appeals/comments/suggestions to ensure that national draft policy be made available to majority of the concerned peoples if not to all (over 100 million) Indigenous and Tribal Peoples of India and enough space and time be given to contribute in the deliberations as this is a serious document that is going to influence/affect the Tribal Peoples in the next decades to come. But unfortunately it looks like the ministry is not very serious enough and same trend has been repeatedly followed to place this DNTP this time too. Is our ministry all set to follow the foot steps of their precedetns who utterly and miserably failed in the last 6 decades to do anything good to us?

Believe it or not It is very intersting to note that most of us do receive regular mails/information informing us about what is happenings/ future happenings in regional and international level as they have their own effective mechanisms /means of dissemination of information on Indigenous and Tribal Peoples's affairs world wide. If United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations (UNWGIP), (United Nations Working Group on Draft Declaration (UNWGDD), (United Nations permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPF), World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD), Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD),United Nations Forest Forum (UNFF),United Nations Frame Work Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Conference of Parties (COP) and other UN agencies can keep on providing regular information on the latest development of the Tribal/Indigenous affairs world wide well in advance then why not our TAM? Is there any lack of resources or technical difficiency or other difficulties that our Ministry cannot cop up and do this much favour of sending the documents to the concerned parties where a serious question such as Draft National Tribal Policy is concerned? Is this the political will and responsibilities of our Tribal Affairs Ministry?

For your kind information Most of the Tribal Peoples/activists/leaders/organisations of India are aware of the latest development in Human Right Council where the Draft Declaration of Indigenous Peoples are adopted in the recently held first session of UNHRC. We are aware of MDGs and development in CBD in relation to our concerned aspirations but we dont know what is happening in our own Tribal Affairs Ministry. With regret we must admit that it is easier for us to know what is happening in the Ministry through national/international support groups/NGOs rather than the MINISTRY CONCERNED. Are we still ignored or is it the Ministry's tradition who is otherwise responsible for ensuring to empower the Tribals of India for full and effective participations in all matters that affect us including decission makings? Is this their limitation or deliberate tactis to delay/avoid meaningful capacity building for us?

We talk about consultations/consents and transparency and good governance? Does Tribal Affairs Ministry have proper dierctory of all genuine Tribal organisations/list of Tribal leaders/community leaders/social activists/expersts/academicians to whom they can atleast reach with their minimum efforts for having proper consultations on any Tribal issues/policies in minimum possible period of time they they can expect feed back/comments/suggestions/views withing a stipulated time as in this case or do they still maintain their outdated traditional exclusive mechanism to limit the participations? I have serious doubt over how the Ministry is going to wind up this serious matter covering as many as 2000 different tribes and communities of different shape and sizes and in diverse geographical areas of the country with full commitment and sincerity. My 22 years of experience as a social worker in the region simply cannot understand how our TAM is going to achieve this gygantic task of seeking free, prior and informed consent to give a final shape to the said document in such a short period of time? We are equally concern that the Draft National Policy be properly reviewed by all concerned for the greater interest of the Tribal Peoples and their welfare in totality without discrimination.We have question to Tribal Affairs Ministry, do you have any magic to our concerned? We are eagerly waiting for your answer.

In Indigenous and Tribal Solidarity!

Best Regards,

Jebra Ram Muchahary
Chief President
Indian Confederation of Indigenous and Tribal Peoples (ICITP)

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

On Mon, 10 Jul 2006 Pankaj wrote :
http://tribal.nic.in/index1.html
No. F. 20025/ 3/ 2003-R&P (Part. IV)
Government of India
Ministry of Tribal Affairs

New Delhi, the 5th July, 2006

Subject : Inviting views/ comments/ suggestions on the draft "The National Tribal Policy (A Policy for the Scheduled Tribes of India)"

1. The Ministry of Tribal Affairs has formulated a revised draft The National Tribal Policy (A Policy for the Scheduled Tribes of India) to address various issues concerning the Scheduled Tribes.

2. Views, comments and suggestions are invited from members of the public, social activists, academicians, anthropologists, experts working for the welfare of tribal people and other stakeholders on the proposed draft policy before action is taken to finalize it.

3. The views, comments, suggestions on the proposed draft "The National Tribal Policy" may be conveyed to the following address, either through e-mail or by post by 10th August, 2006 :

Rajeev Kumar
Joint Secretary
Ministry of Tribal Affairs
Room No.722, 'A' Wing,
Shastri Bhawan,
New Delhi - 110 001
E-mail address : rajeevkumar@nic.in
For the Policy document:
http://tribal.nic.in/finalContent.pdf