Community Forest Rights Granted in Pillur, in a First for Tamil Nadu
December 10, 2022 By Community Well-being team In a groundbreaking motion and a first for Tamil Nadu, 13 villages in Pillur region were granted Community Forest Rights (CFR) in late November. This achievement is following decades of dedicated activism and grassroots work by Keystone’s Community Wellbeing team, local Forest Rights Committees (FRC) and local government […]
Faseela Receives an Award for Governance Work in Nilambur
November 26, 2022 By Keystone Field Centre – Nilambur Faseela V., from our Governance team at Nilambur in Kerala’s Malappuram district, has been chosen as the recipient of the All India Adivasi Mahasabha Awards! Every year, the committee of this tribal government wing, chooses three dedicated people for health, community service and media work. Faseela, […]
Evolving Ideas with the Coimbatore Collector and Officials
September 23, 2022 By Vinitha Murukesan and Bagavanidhi M.Project Coordinator – Community Well-being (Coimbatore)Technical Coordinator – Governance We’ve been working with the Tamil Nadu Urban Sanitation Support Programme (TNUSSP) for seven years now, with our projects largely based in the hills. With the two projects that were active in the plains (Periyanaickenpalayam and Narasimhanaickenpalayam) coming […]
Community Well-being at the HDCA Conference 2022 in Belgium
September 22, 2022 By Kanmani PalanisamyCommunity Well-being Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum theorized the ‘Capability Approach’ framework in the 1980s as a unique perspective on welfare economics. He proposed that a person or a community’s true capability (considering real world obstacles) to achieve a life that aligns with their values must be assessed rather than […]
Climate Stories: Shaping unique voices in environmental journalism
Keystone Foundation organised the first training session in environment journalism at its campus between June 9-10 as part of a new project titled #ClimateStories. The project, done with support from Earth Journalism Network, identified 15 IPLC (indigenous peoples and local communities) youth from the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve to be trained to report on environment issues […]
A Conundrum After Years of Petitions
Irulas from the Pillur region are still facing issues while claiming individual forest rights. With several mismatches, the community are perplexed by the situation.
Strengthening Grassroots Governance in Pillur – Stories and Experiences
Direct community engagement has enormous benefits. It allows us to observe and understand first hand the felt needs of the community, power dynamics and social relations within the communities, and perceived challenges. It helps to establish trust and develop effective working relationships with community leaders and allies. With these aspects in mind, we dedicated a […]
Developing an Area-wise Forest Management Plan
For Indigenous people, their forest has been relevant in many spheres of their lives – social, economic, political and spiritual. This makes their culture inseparable from the forest. Under the FRA, to claim for Community Forest Rights (CFRs) – historical evidence of traditional dependence on the forest is one aspect, but the underlying fact is to profess sustainable forest […]
Path to Salvation
In my first field visit to Hasanasur area, I had a chance to meet Ittarai – oor thalaivar (Village Leader) Ayyasamy. When I asked him about the Forest Right Act, he became dull and spoke in frustration. He said that he is very tired of travelling to government offices and meeting with officials. He strongly […]
Indigenous communities using Right Information Act to strengthen FRA
It is said that access to information or being informed can be empowering as it allows one to make good choices or decisions. To access or receive information, one must ask questions. And to ensure robust and useful information, the questions must be framed in a way that is clear, crisp and representative. As citizens, […]
