Implementation of Sixth Schedule in Arunachal Pradesh raised in Lok Sabha

23rd September 2020

NET News Desk

Arunachal Pradesh BJP, MP Tapir Gao today raised the issue to bring the frontier state under the purview of the Sixth Schedule by amending article 371 H in the parliament.

Gao during the ‘Matters of Urgent Public Importance’ in Lok Sabha requested the amendment of Article 371 H to protect the tribal rights, forest, water & resource rights along with customary practices.

It needs to be mentioned here that the state assembly on August 27 passed a resolution to include Arunachal in the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution and amend Article 371 (H) to protect the rights of its indigenous population.

The MP said when Arunachal was a Union Territory it was under the purview of the sixth schedule area, but when the state attained statehood in 1987, the sixth schedule was removed from the state. Arunachal consists of 99.9% of tribal people and recently, in the Arunachal assembly a resolution was passed to amend article 371 (H).

“Today during MoUPI, I requested to amend Article 371 H so that our tribal rights, forest, water & resource rights along with customary practices can be restored,” Gao tweeted.

After Arunachal Pradesh became a state in 1987; we were omitted from the VIth Schedule. As being a 99.9% tribal state, today during MoUPI i requested to amend Art. 371 H so that our tribal rights, forest, water & resource rights along with customary practices can be restored pic.twitter.com/uLrd8QyeWI
— Tapir Gao (@TapirGao) September 22, 2020

Earlier, Chief Minister Khandu said that Arunachal Pradesh has many tribes but not adequate laws to protect tribal rights. “We have no laws to protect our tribal rights and customary laws. It is time we need to act strongly for safeguarding our rights,” he said to media.

“We will place the resolution before the Centre explaining all the views expressed by the MLAs and the CBOs so that it can be taken up for discussion in both Houses of Parliament,” Khandu said.

The Indian Constitution introduced the Fifth and Sixth Schedule to protect the tribal indigenous communities and their customs. While Fifth Schedule provides for the administration of scheduled areas and scheduled tribes, the Sixth Schedule was formulated to provide autonomy to the tribal regions of the Northeast. It seeks to safeguard the rights of the tribal populations through the formation of ADCs, which gives considerable autonomy to the tribal community by empowering the council to enact laws for land protection.