It is over three years now since the Schedule Tribes and other Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Rights) Bill came into public domain. Just before that Prime Minister stated in a book release function “In our Country both Tribal and Tiger will survive
happily�. No one knew the agenda behind these utterances. The Prime Minister expressed his intentions by creating Tiger Task Force, but that only brought shock among tiger conservationists. The report which suggested coexistence of Tribal and Tiger did not consider that tigers needed exclusive area for breeding and survival. The report also suggested that where co-existence was not possible, the villagers would be relocated in a time bound manner which meant putting the cart before the bullock.
However one member of the committee vehemently opposed the theory of co-existence. Finally the Schedule Tribe and other Traditional  Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006 came into existence after the rules were notified on 1st January 2008 for implementation. These three years have seen a turmoil and friends became foes. The conservation community called it controversial as the Act failed to recognize the existing National Parks or Sanctuaries or biodiversity rich areas. Whatever has been said in our Constitution was being ignored by activists, backed by land mafia and the politicians. The concept of conservation was tilted to such an extent that the theory of co-existence was pushed forward. Many of the human right activists called it a battle between those supporting the Bill and these conservationists who opposed it in the name of Tiger Crisis. Both sides attacked and counter attacked but one can imagine the political back up the human activists received.