The first round of dialogue between the CPI (Maoist) and? Andhra Pradesh is failing over the issue of disarming the cadres of the former. Another roadblock is imminent: the Forest Conservation Act (FCA), 1980, which is turning out to be a hurdle for implementing land reforms - one of the major demands of the CPI (Maoist) - that mainly involves settlement in forestlands. The issue of land reform is closely linked with forests in the 12 Naxalite-affected states as the majority of tribals are settled within forests. So 12 states are demanding amendments to the FCA to facilitate regularizing settlements inside forests. This demand got a fillip with the ruling United Progressive Alliance (UPA) chairperson Sonia Gandhi lending her support to it and attributing the spread of Naxalite groups to the FCA. However, as things stand now and going by past experience with India's forest bureaucracy, these changes may not come about soon.

Of the 11 points that the Maoist Party wants to discuss, land reforms, including settlement of people's rights in forest areas, and people's rights over forest produce are the major non-political issues. "These two issues are central to our struggle and any negotiation will have to start with it," says Ramakrishna, the state secretary of the outfit who has come out of hiding.

The land reforms issue, officially accepted as a policy priority by all Indian states since Independence, could form the basis for the talks. In principle, all Naxalite-affected states agree to this, but they are citing FCA as the hurdle since land reforms is closely linked to forest lands in the Naxalite-affected states. AP, Chattisgarh, Orissa and Maharashtra are the states that have agreed to take up fresh land reforms and have asked the Union Home Ministry to amend the FCA.

"Land reform is definitely an agenda that we can start work on. However, some central legislations (pointing at the Forest Conservation Act) need to be changed and for that we need time," says Jana Reddy, the AP Home Minister. "Our concern is that many of the landless people are inside forests and for them the reform means regularizing forest lands. It is a bit complex issue," he says. In fact just before the dialogue started the state government decided to form a commission after the first round of talks to make an assessment of the lands to be distributed. But the findings of this commission would be useless unless the FCA is suitably amended.

Orissa, the second state to initiate a direct dialogue with the CPI (Maoist), has also shown helplessness in implementing land reforms. On 25 September, Navin Patnaik, the Orissa Chief Minister wrote to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh demanding that the Union government should take the? initiative to settle ownership rights with tribals living in forestlands. His letter also included a request to amend the FCA. In Orissa at least 5113 tribal families live in 4,729.0802 ha. of forest land and the State government cannot transfer the ownership of land to these people as the Forest Conservation Act, 1980, clearly stipulates that no land settlement could be made in favour of persons who living in the forest land after 1980. According to a government appointed emissary, who is now having preliminary talks with the CPI (Maoist), "Before coming face to face with the Naxalites we need to do our home works on what we can do and what we can't. It is clear that land settlement is proving to be very difficult. That is the reason why we need to involve the Union government very actively in the process."

At a meeting of the Union Home Minister and Chief Ministers of Orissa, AP and Jharkhand on 21 September, a consensus was reached that the Centre would take steps to amend the Forest Conservation Act so that tribals could be allowed to build houses and harvest and trade forest produce from the protected areas. The meeting also reached a consensus on speeding up forest rights settlement. Earlier, the State governments had put up a collective demand for amending the act? in 2002. The then MP Chief Minister, Digvijay Singh, had written to the then PM Atal Behari Vajpayee to scrap the Act to bring peace to the Naxalite-affected areas. In continuance of this meeting the Home Ministry instructed the states to send specific proposals that will be taken up with the Ministry of Environment and Forests to amend the Forest Conservation Act. However, sources in the Home Ministry point out that such proposals have yet to be finalized for dispatch to the MoEF. It is time the Union government plays its part in the peace dialogue? to seriously address this important issue.