The government has ruled out new proposals instead of the old policy to protect the wildlife areas. Under the new proposals tribal people can only be evicted from wildlife rich areas with their prior consent.
The new policy says that people and wildlife can co-exist in some cases, and that forest-dwelling communities should be involved in the management of parks.
The earlier policy has led to eviction of many tribal communities residing in wildlife rich areas. An estimated 100,000 people have already become conservation refugees.
They lost access to the lands and resources they relied on for generations, and have also been often barred from sacred sites and burial grounds, thereby having terrible impacts on their mental and physical health.
The older policy thus invited a lot of criticisms and has been scrapped due to a lot of pressure.
