Abstract
In the previous chapter, I analysed the micropolitics of forest use and control by explaining the split role of the field-staff, and areas of tension between the SFC and local timber contractors. This chapter extends the discussion on micropolitics further by revealing new spaces of cooperation, conflict and contestations that have emerged under the NAP in Navni and Chinnora. The following questions are addressed in this chapter: (a) How effective has the NAP been in enhancing people’s participation through decentralised management of forest resources? (b) To what extent has the programme solved the problem of access to timber, fuelwood and fodder for village residents? (c) In what ways do local power relations determine the access of villagers to forest resources? (d) How do the differential capacities of various forest users determine their behaviours in transgressing forest regulations and indulging in illegal timber harvesting? On the whole, in this chapter, I present the experiences of the village community with the forest field-staff to assess how far the agenda of partnership between the FD and the village community has been realised in actual practice.
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Notes
- 1.
It is to be noted that the NAP guidelines suggest that the elections for the JFMCs should take place every year. However, in the villages of my study, the next round of elections took place only after 4 years. A new JFMC was constituted in November, 2007.
- 2.
It is important to note that thakur is traditionally a dominant caste group consisting mainly of landlords. Rattan Chand is an agriculturalist and a resident of Navni village.
- 3.
Sansar Chand (age 42), the JFMC member from Chinnora also informed me that the disproportionate representation of the JFMC in terms of residence was mainly because the Chairperson belonged to Navni and he, along with the Forester, selected other members known to them from the same village. Some issues of inter-village conflict between Navni and Chinnora will find mention in the narratives of sarpanch (who belongs to Chinnora) later in this section.
- 4.
In order to understand the issues of cooperation and conflict between the JFMC and the FD, it was important to have repeated interactions with the members of the committee and hence the information provided below is based on several conversations with them.
- 5.
In my conversations with the two female members of the JFMC, I found that they were not aware of the reasons for the formation of the committee, various project activities under the NAP or their responsibilities in forest protection. It appeared that although the reserved places for women in the JFMC were filled nominally, they hardly played any role in actual decision-making. The negligible role of female members in decision-making in forest programmes has also been highlighted by other scholars such as Springate-Baginski and Blaikie (2007) , Agrawal (2005) and Sarin (1998) .
- 6.
Making a similar observation, Kawosa (2001) notes that the village committee members usually consider their membership as an opportunity or stepping stone for future appointments in the Forest Department which when not achieved disappoints the members.
- 7.
This point has also been raised by Sundar et al. (2001: 206) in their study of the JFM in other states of India. They note that ‘the creation of autonomous forest protection committees at village level is potentially in conflict with the national pressure to revitalise the panchayat’.
- 8.
It is to be mentioned that Basanti Gupta is Mahajan by caste and the majority of the villagers in Chinnora are Gaddis. She succeeded in winning the panchayat elections in 2001 against five Gaddi candidates which shows her popularity in the village.
- 9.
It is to be noted that no panchayat elections have taken place in J&K since 2006. Basanti Gupta is a nurse by training and the first point of contact for the villagers to get any medical treatment. As such, she was held in recognition by the villagers even before being elected as sarpanch.
- 10.
After her tenure was over in 2006, she succeeded in pursuing the DFO to elect the new JFMC in 2007. However, the committee had not undertaken any projects until I conducted the second field trip to the village in November, 2008. The actual functioning of the new JFMC is beyond the scope of this study.
- 11.
I noted that the JFMC Chairperson was not present in the training camp and only two JFMC members attended it. This suggests that by the time of my fieldwork (2006–07), the JFMC had been surpassed by the ex-sarpanch and the DFO was dealing with the ex-sarpanch for all practical purposes. Effectively, the ex-sarpanch had started dominating in all matters of the FD and villagers in Navni and Chinnora even before formally taking up the position of the JFMC Chairperson of Chinnora in 2007.
- 12.
A self help group is formed by collecting a specified amount from each member of the group every month. Once the groups are 6 months old, they can apply for loans and start any income-generation activity.
- 13.
Poor villagers have little faith in the FD concerning the choice of species to be planted. In the past, the FDs across India have attracted public anger for the plantation of eucalyptus under the Social Forestry and Eco-development projects. Criticising this, Kumar (2002) states that by planting fast growing species, the JFM could succeed in halting forest degradation but the objectives of poverty reduction and meeting biomass requirements of the villagers are sidelined.
- 14.
It is to be noted that the actual fee for a permit is Rs. 350 but the local villagers are charged ten times more by the field officials due to their lack of awareness. We will observe this in the narratives of the villagers provided below. Those who could afford to pay Rs. 3000–3500 to the Forest Guard for a permit do so because the market value of timber is much higher, and beyond the affordability of most village residents. For example, the current market value of kail (10 cubic feet) is Rs. 14, 940 and chir (10 cubic feet) is Rs. 6260.
- 15.
In the feudal times, there was a practice of rast, a form of informal dues paid by the local villagers for the maintenance of forests. But even now the Forest Guard collects rast from the villagers. It may include items for consumption such as ghee (clarified butter), maize, grains, pulses, kidney beans or even cash. According to the villagers, the Forest Guard argues that this is for the firewood he provides them. If one does not give rast, the Guard does not allow them to collect firewood or fodder from the forests.
- 16.
In the context of the JFM programmes in Andhra Pradesh, Saito-Jensen and Jensen (2010) suggest that prior to the JFM, although the forest boundaries were drawn between state-owned forests and those of villagers, they had de facto access to forest resources. The villagers used to enter the forests to collect various forest produce by avoiding the timing and locations of patrols of forest guards. However, the JFM has led to a significant redefinition of these forest boundaries by establishing closures and assigning the task of vigilance to the JFMCs. This has reduced local people’s access to resources as we also see in Navni and Chinnora.
- 17.
As mentioned earlier, the women and children collect medicinal herbs such as vanaksha, guchhi, doop, kaur and patis from the forests and sell these to local shopkeepers for additional incomes.
- 18.
A few of the respondents recalled that 5 years ago, the Guard charged them a Rs. 150 fee to collect fodder from the closures. Since the FD claims to provide fodder to the villagers for free, it can be inferred that the Guard charged the villagers illegally.
- 19.
The gujjars and bakerwals are traditional nomadic graziers who trade in livestock and its products. Generally, bakerwals rear sheep and goat for wool and meat while gujjars rear buffaloes for milk.
- 20.
Sundar et al. (2001) make a similar observation in other states of India where the villagers informed them that livestock numbers had decreased since the early 1990s, corresponding to a decrease in availability of fodder. They note that this assessment by the villagers themselves contrasts with the perceptions among foresters that livestock numbers are increasing.
- 21.
Pastoralists in other parts of India also adopt different strategies to compensate for reduced availability of fodder in their villages. For example, Saberwal (1999: 41) mentions various methods adopted by the herders in Himachal Pradesh to cope with the shortage of fodder through local level negotiations within the herding community as well as between herding and cultivating communities. He notes that a herder may draw upon family labour to ‘pay’ for access to grazing. Alternatively, a herder may choose to pay for such access through a monetary transaction, or through reciprocal sharing of winter and summer grazing grounds. Similarly, Agrawal (1999) in his study of a migrant pastoral community in Rajasthan argues that shepherds negotiate with the neighbouring landowners in the villages and with state officials in order to get access to fodder from both private and common lands. Axelby (2007) also notes similar processes of negotiations in the context of Gaddi shepherds in Himachal Pradesh.
- 22.
While there is no grazing fee for cows, and up to six horses, the fee is Rs. 1.15, Rs. 0.20 and Rs. 0.40 for a buffalo, sheep and goat respectively. My respondent, however, informed that the pastoralists have to pay much higher than the official fee for grazing.
- 23.
The FDs throughout India consider encroachment, by way of expansion of agricultural activities, as the biggest threat to the forest areas. For example, Das (1997: 57) notes that the forest officials hold the view that ‘notwithstanding the people’s allegations and denials’, encroachment of forest land for agriculture is ‘frequent and rampant’.
- 24.
Bhurjis or boundaries are conventionally made of stone and mud though the FD is now proposing to make cemented bhurjis in the villages to discourage the practice of encroachments.
- 25.
Das (1997) , in the context of Rajasthan, notes that the forest guards and other field-staff generally take cash, or are bribed with milk and milk products, in exchange for which they allow the villagers to encroach on the forest land for cultivation, entry into the enclosures, and felling trees.
- 26.
This corroborates the findings of Sundar et al. (2001: 186) that although encroachments are a desperate response by marginalised people for subsistence, the richer households are mainly involved in this practice because ‘bribing the forest staff and ploughing freshly cut forest land is expensive’.
- 27.
Robbins (2000) makes a similar note in the context of rural Rajasthan and argues that corruption is structurally perpetuated by co-opting the poor. The caste and class elites offer minor concessions to the poor who, in turn, surrender the ability to complain and remain complicit.
- 28.
I went to see encroachments with him in a forest named Baskar. He showed me the land of a Muslim cultivator who had encroached nearly 30 kanals of forest land about 20 years ago by bribing the forester. The second case was of another Muslim agriculturalist who had encroached 40 kanals of forest land. Although the FD has, on paper, reclaimed the area from him, he has constructed his house on the encroached land and is still living there. He explained that this land included around 500 deri trees, which are of even better timber quality than deodar.
- 29.
Newspaper reports suggest that the unrest in Kashmir during the summer of 2010 has immensely benefitted timber smugglers in the state. As noted by a press agency, ‘timber smugglers have largely benefitted from the restricted movement of forest guards and other officials during the course of unrest in Kashmir. The illegal felling of trees has shown an upward trend and has become so widespread that during the last 3 months alone, forest officials have seized more than 5000 cubic feet of timber from smugglers in different parts of the Valley’ (Ganae 2010).
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Gupta, S. (2018). The Micropolitics of Forest Use and Control: New Spaces for Cooperation and Conflict. In: Contesting Conservation. Advances in Asian Human-Environmental Research. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-72257-3_8
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