forest rights act issue: Forest Rights Act: Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis assures farmers | Times of India
MUMBAI: Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis has directed the state authorities that all the pending applications under the Forest Rights Act should be disposed of by March 15.
Under pressure from farmers organisations who have threatened a protest march in Mumbai on February 27, Fadnavis chaired a meeting on Sunday to address various issues.
One of the major demands of the tribals and landless farmers who will be marching from Nashik to Mumbai is the implementation of the Forest Rights Act, under which the piece of land that these tribals are tilling for generations should be transferred in their name. The process, if very slow and cumbersome in the state, has been one of their major complaints.
The state government clarified that in the last three months more than 43,000 forest rights applications have been cleared, of which 10,000 applications are from Palghar and 11,372 from Thane district.
Farmers led by the All India Kisan Sabha will start from Nashik on February 20 and will reach Mumbai on 27th. A similar long march had culminated in Mumbai in March 2018.
Some of their demands are a complete loan waiver for all the farmers in the state, implementation of the Swaminathan Committee report which mandates from a minimum support prices to give a 50% profit to the farmers, drought mitigation measures, drought relief compensation, allotment of land under the forest rights act.
More than 208 organisations which was supported by All India Kisan Sabha had marched to Delhi in November to draw the attention towards the agrarian crisis in the country.
Meanwhile, the state said more than 90,000 farmers in 14 “suicide-prone” districts of the state have been provided “counselling” under its project ‘Prerna’.
Prerna, which has been underway since 2015 to stop farm suicides, comprises social workers, psychiatrists and ASHA (Accredited Social Health Activist Scheme) workers among others who counsel farmers suffering depression.
