Union Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change Bhupender Yadav moved the Forest (Conservation) Amendment Bill 2023 as reported by the Joint Committee of Parliament to be taken into consideration in Lok Sabha and subsequently requested the House to get the Bill passed on yesterday. After deliberations and taking the views of Members of Parliaments, the Lok Sabha passed the Bill.
The Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980, is an important Central statute for the conservation of forests in the country. It provides that the de-reservation of reserved forests, use of forest land for non-forest purpose, assigning forest land by way of lease or otherwise to private entity and clearing of naturally grown trees for the purpose of reafforestation requires prior permission of the Central Government. The applicability of the act in various types of lands has been dynamic i.e. initially provisions of the Act were being applied to the notified forest land only. Subsequently, after the Judgement dated 12.12.1996, the Act was made applicable to revenue forest land or in lands which were recorded as forest in government records and to areas which look like forest in their dictionary meaning. Many of such lands were already put to non-forestry use such as habitations, institutions, roads, etc. with the required approval of the competent authority. This situation resulted in different interpretations of the provisions of the Act with respect to their applicability specially in recorded forest lands, private forest lands, plantations, etc. It has been observed that due to apprehensions that plantations on the lands of individuals and organisations can attract the FCA, the afforestation and plantation of trees outside forests is not getting desired impetus, which in turn is becoming a hindrance in enhancing green cover to fulfil the Nationally Determined Contribution targets of creating additional carbon sink of 2.5 to 3.0 billion tons of CO2 equivalent. Besides this, the strategic and security related projects of national importance need to be fast-tracked to ensure development of vital security infrastructures, especially along the international border areas such as Line of Actual Control (LAC), Line of Control (LoC), as also in the notified LWE areas. Similarly, small establishments, habitations on the side of roads/railways also need to be facilitated by providing them access and connectivity to main arterial roads and other public utilities. During the intervening period, after the promulgation of the Act, new challenges relating to ecological, social and environmental developments have emerged at national as well as international levels. For example mitigating the impact of climate change, achieving the national targets of Net Zero Emission by 2070, maintaining or enhancing the forest carbon stock, etc. Therefore, to carry forward the country’s rich tradition of preserving forests and their bio-diversity and to tackle the climate change challenges, it is necessary to encompass such issues in the ambit of the Act.
