Reclaiming Roots, The Unfinished Struggle for Justice in India’s Conservation Fortresses

Reclaiming Roots, The Unfinished Struggle for Justice in India’s Conservation Fortresses

In the dense, dappled light of Nagarahole Tiger Reserve, a profound and poignant conflict is unfolding—one that pits the letter of wildlife law against the spirit of human rights, and exposes a foundational flaw in India’s conservation paradigm. In May 2025, 52 families of the Jenukuruba Adivasi community did something extraordinary: they walked back into their ancestral haadi (hamlet) of Karadikallu Atturu Kolli, from which their elders had been evicted nearly forty years prior. They built huts, erected shrines, and planted themselves on the land, not as encroachers, but as rights-holders invoking the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 (FRA). Their quiet reclamation, and its forceful dismantling by over 250 forest guards and police, is not an isolated incident. It is the latest and one of the most visible eruptions of a long-simmering crisis, asking a question that India has persistently failed to answer: Can forest conservation make room for justice?

This clash in Nagarahole, and similar assertions by other Adivasi communities reported in late 2025, represents more than a land dispute. It is a symbolic return, a assertion of memory against amnesia, and a direct challenge to an exclusionary model of conservation that has, for decades, treated forest-dwelling communities as disposable inconveniences in the project of protecting biodiversity. As writer and public health practitioner Prashanth N Srinivas articulates, this struggle mirrors the unfinished history of India’s forest-dwelling peoples—a history where the state’s role has morphed from colonial extractor to post-colonial protector, yet continues to systematically exclude the original protectors themselves.

The Architecture of Exclusion: From “Fortress Conservation” to Legal Limbo

The modern Indian protected area network—comprising Tiger Reserves, National Parks, and Wildlife Sanctuaries—was largely built upon a 19th-century colonial model often termed “fortress conservation.” This model presupposes a binary: pristine nature versus destructive humanity. To save nature, people must be removed. This ideology conveniently ignored the reality that the landscapes being designated as “pristine” were, in fact, cultural landscapes shaped and sustained by millennia of symbiotic interaction with indigenous communities.

Post-independence, India inherited and intensified this model. The Wildlife (Protection) Act of 1972 provided the legal teeth for creating inviolate spaces, often leading to the displacement of Adivasis without adequate rehabilitation, as documented by committees like the Muzaffar Assadi Committee in Karnataka. The Jenukuruba eviction from Nagarahole in the 1980s is a classic case in point. The area was sealed for conservation, later notified as a tiger reserve, and the people were erased from its official narrative.

The FRA, passed in 2006, was meant to be a historic corrective. It acknowledged the “historical injustice” done to forest-dwelling communities and sought to vest them with both individual rights to cultivated land and collective Community Forest Rights (CFR) to manage, conserve, and govern forests. It was a revolutionary piece of legislation that promised to democratize forest governance and integrate conservation with human rights.

However, as the Nagarahole case demonstrates, the promise of the FRA has been systematically thwarted. The Jenukuruba families are not squatters; they are claimants who have been in bureaucratic purgatory since 2009-11. They have filed applications, attended surveys, and sat through committee hearings, only to be met with indefinite delay—a form of administrative violence that denies rights through inaction. When they finally exercise their dormant rights through physical reclamation, the state responds not with dialogue but with force, labeling them “illegal occupants.” This reveals a deep institutional schism: the forest bureaucracy, wedded to the fortress model, views the FRA not as binding law but as an impediment to its absolute control.

The Pernicious Narrative: Criminalizing and Infantilizing the Adivasi

The state’s response is often cloaked in a patronizing and divisive narrative. A senior Karnataka forest official dismissed the Nagarahole reclamation as an act by people who were “instigated.” This trope of the “instigated tribal” is pernicious and persistent. It serves a dual purpose: it infantilizes Adivasis, denying them agency and political consciousness, while simultaneously criminalizing their legitimate democratic assertion. As Srinivas pointedly asks, does any citizen need “instigation” to demand basic amenities guaranteed under law?

This narrative extends to official conservation doctrine. The National Tiger Conservation Authority’s 2024 report identifies Soliga Adivasi villages inside the BRT Tiger Reserve as a “threat,” citing population growth and demands for infrastructure. This assessment is an abistorical and ecological fallacy. The Soliga have co-existed with the tigers and forests of the Biligiri Rangaswamy hills for centuries, their practices embedded in sustainability. To frame their presence and their legitimate aspirations for development—roads, electricity, water—as a threat is to argue that they must remain frozen in time, bearing the disproportionate burden of conservation while being denied the fruits of citizenship.

Across Karnataka, this pattern of institutional failure is evident. In Ramanagara, Iruliga villages lack roads. In BRT, Soliga villages like Purani and Bedaguli, despite securing FRA titles, remain without electricity or piped water. In the proposed MM Hills tiger reserve, Soliga communities fear a renewed push into “legal and developmental limbo.” The message is clear: the granting of a paper right is not followed by the empowerment or development it is supposed to enable. The forest department’s resistance to FRA implementation turns a statute meant for healing into a permanent site of conflict with district administrations and communities.

Justice as Ecology: The Case for Inclusive Conservation

The central argument of fortress conservation is ecologically suspect. A growing body of global and Indian evidence shows that biodiversity can thrive under the stewardship of indigenous communities. From the Soligas in BRT managing forest produce to the Kondhs in Niyamgiri protecting sacred hills, communities often enforce stricter, more nuanced, and culturally-rooted conservation protocols than distant forest departments. Forests do not need to be “people-free” to be healthy; they need to be under the care of those who have a vested, long-term interest in their survival.

The exclusionary model is also profoundly unjust. It creates what environmental scholars call “conservation refugees.” Adivasi communities, who have historically contributed the least to global ecological degradation, are forced to pay the highest price for protection. They lose homes, livelihoods, and cultural roots, while the broader society enjoys the ecosystem services—clean air, water, carbon sequestration, wildlife tourism revenue—that these protected areas provide. This is not conservation; it is green colonialism.

The Jenukuruba’s stand, therefore, is not an obstacle to saving tigers. It is a pathway to a more robust, resilient, and just conservation ethic. Their declaration—”Our forests, our lands, our rule”—echoes the very spirit of the FRA, which envisages communities as active governors and protectors, not passive subjects or threats. Integrating justice into conservation means:

1. Accelerating and Honestly Implementing the FRA: This requires political will to overrule bureaucratic inertia. All pending claims, especially in Critical Tiger Habitats, must be settled transparently and speedily. CFR titles must be granted with full authority.

2. Co-Governance Models: Forest management must transition from a top-down, policing model to a co-governance framework where community-led institutions (Gram Sabhas) and forest departments share responsibility for protection, management, and benefit-sharing.

3. Decoupling Basic Amenities from Displacement: Providing roads, schools, healthcare, and solar power inside villages in protected areas is not antithetical to conservation. It is a basic right. These amenities reduce hardship and foster community investment in the landscape.

4. Recognizing Indigenous Knowledge: Conservation planning must actively incorporate traditional ecological knowledge, which offers time-tested insights into species behavior, forest regeneration, and fire management.

Conclusion: Democracy’s Final Frontier

The forests of Nagarahole, BRT, and MM Hills are the final frontiers of Indian democracy. The struggle unfolding there is a test of whether the constitutional promises of equality, justice, and fraternity extend to the country’s most marginalized citizens in its most ecologically sensitive spaces. The Jenukuruba’s makeshift huts, dismantled by the state, are a powerful metaphor: they represent a fragile but determined attempt to build a home within a homeland that no longer recognizes them.

The choice is no longer between people and tigers. That is a false binary crafted by a failing system. The real choice is between an authoritarian, exclusionary conservation that sows the seeds of conflict and a democratic, inclusive conservation that builds partnerships for resilience. In an era of climate crisis and biodiversity collapse, we need the forests. And to save the forests, we need to make peace with, and place power in the hands of, the people who know them and love them best. The path to ecological integrity runs through the gate of historical justice. Until India walks that path, the quiet reclamations, and the forceful raids, will continue—a tragic cycle where in the name of saving nature, we erode the very justice that makes society, and ultimately conservation, sustainable.

Q&A: Understanding the Conflict Between Conservation and Community Rights

Q1: What is the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 (FRA), and why is it central to this conflict?
A1: The FRA is a landmark law intended to correct the “historical injustice” done to India’s forest-dwelling communities, primarily Adivasis, by recognizing their rights over forest land and resources. It grants two key types of rights: Individual Forest Rights (IFR) to cultivated land up to 4 hectares, and Community Forest Rights (CFR) which give the community authority to use, manage, conserve, and govern forests within their traditional boundaries. It is central to the conflict because it legally empowers communities, challenging the absolute control forest departments have exercised since the colonial era. In cases like Nagarahole, communities have filed claims under the FRA but faced years of bureaucratic delay. Their reclamation of land is an assertion of these unmet legal rights, while the forest department, prioritizing the older Wildlife Protection Act, views their presence as an illegal encroachment, creating a direct clash of laws and worldviews.

Q2: Why do forest departments often resist the implementation of the FRA, particularly in Tiger Reserves?
A2: Forest department resistance stems from institutional culture, legal ambiguity, and differing conservation philosophies.

• Institutional Culture: For over a century, the forest bureaucracy has operated on a “command-and-control” model, seeing itself as the sole guardian of forests. The FRA, which transfers significant governance power to Gram Sabhas, is perceived as a threat to this authority and legacy.

• Legal Ambiguity: They often privilege the Wildlife (Protection) Act, which emphasizes creating “inviolate” critical tiger habitats. They interpret this to mean complete human exclusion, despite the FRA being a later, specific law that applies even in these areas. This allows them to frame community presence as a legal threat to wildlife.

• Philosophical Clash: The departments largely adhere to “fortress conservation,” believing biodiversity is best protected by creating people-free zones. The FRA is based on the philosophy of “community-led conservation,” which they often distrust or view as inferior. This leads to a systemic bias against settling claims, especially inside prestigious Tiger Reserves.

Q3: The official report cited describes Soliga villages as a “threat.” What is wrong with this assessment from historical and ecological perspectives?
A3: Labeling Soliga villages a “threat” is flawed on multiple counts:

• Historical: The Soliga have inhabited the BRT forests for centuries, with documented evidence dating back to the 1800s. They are not a recent population influx but an integral part of the ecosystem’s history. Describing them as a threat ignores their role as historical custodians.

• Ecological: Their traditional practices—shifting cultivation (podu), controlled collection of non-timber forest produce (NTFP), and cultural taboos—have shaped and maintained the forest’s biodiversity. Studies show their presence is compatible with healthy tiger and elephant populations. Their demand for basic infrastructure (roads, water) is a demand for civic rights, not an ecological hazard. The assessment confuses development needs with environmental destruction, blaming the community for state failure to provide sustainable amenities.

Q4: What are “Community Forest Rights (CFR)” and how can they potentially lead to better conservation outcomes?
A4: Community Forest Rights (CFR) under the FRA grant the Gram Sabha the right to protect, regenerate, conserve, and manage a community forest resource. This is not just a right to use, but a right to govern. This can lead to better conservation because:

• Local Stewardship: Communities with secure tenure have a strong long-term incentive to protect the forest, as it is directly tied to their livelihood, culture, and identity. They are present on the ground and can monitor against threats like illegal logging or poaching more effectively than distant forest guards.

• Traditional Knowledge: Conservation strategies can incorporate indigenous ecological knowledge about species, fire management, and sustainable harvesting, leading to more nuanced and effective practices.

• Reduced Conflict: When communities are partners rather than suspects, their cooperation becomes the cornerstone of protection, reducing the endless “us vs. them” conflict that hampers enforcement.

• Democratic Governance: CFR democratizes forest management, making it more transparent and accountable to local stakeholders, leading to more legitimate and accepted conservation rules.

Q5: Beyond land rights, what are the broader implications of this conflict for Indian democracy and development?
A5: This conflict is a microcosm of larger democratic deficits:

• Equal Citizenship: It questions whether all Indian citizens have equal rights to development and dignity. Denying Adivasis inside forests basic amenities like roads, schools, and electricity creates a tiered citizenship where their sacrifice for “national” conservation goals is taken for granted.

• Rule of Law: The systematic non-implementation of a parliamentary law (FRA) by the executive (forest department) undermines the rule of law and shows how bureaucratic resistance can hollow out progressive legislation.

• Development Model: It challenges India’s development paradigm, which often allows for massive ecological destruction (mining, dams, urbanization) elsewhere while imposing austere preservation on the poorest. It asks: who bears the cost, and who reaps the benefit?

• Conflict Resolution: The state’s default response of force (as in Nagarahole raid) over dialogue signals a failure of democratic conflict resolution, pushing communities to further alienation. A truly inclusive democracy must find ways to reconcile ecological integrity with social justice, making the forest a space of shared governance, not a battleground.