Bhubaneswar, April 13: More than two months after the 12-million-tonne Posco steel project was accorded conditional clearance by the Centre, the Orissa government has sought to categorically assure the Union ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) that there were no other traditional forest dwellers in the project area as defined by the Forest Rights Act (FRA).

The letter of assurance from special secretary of the forest and environment B.P. Singh reached the Centre on April 8 confirming that no one in the project area satisfies the conditions laid down in the act to be treated as other traditional forest dwellers (OTFD).

The conditions stipulate that the claimants under the FRA should either have resided on forest land for 75 years before December 13, 2005, or been in occupation of the land before that date besides being presently dependent on the forest for their livelihood.

The Centre had sought an assurance from the Orissa government in this regard while giving its nod to the Rs 52,000-crore project, the country’s biggest foreign direct investment, with a slew of conditions on January 31.

The assurance, in fact, was the most important of the 28 conditions imposed by the MoEF which had made it clear that its final approval for diversion of 1,253 hectares of forestland would depend on the government’s letter that was crucial in view of conflicting claims about the settlement of forest rights under the FRA.

Chief secretary Bijoy Kumar Patnaik said: “We have sent our reply to the Centre. According to the report of the Jagatsinghpur collector, there are neither any tribals nor other traditional forest dwellers in the project area. There has been no violation of the FRA.”

Echoing Patnaik, the principal secretary, forest, Aurobindo Behera, said: “We had asked the collector and the Scheduled Caste and Tribes department to look into the matter. They told us there were neither any tribals nor OFTDs in the project area.”

Significantly, state officials denied having received the reported letter and email from the Union environment minister, Jairam Ramesh, referring to the claims of Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS), the outfit demanding relocation of the project, that it had proof about the presence of OFTDs in the area. “We have not received any such letter from the minister,” Patnaik said.

The PPSS on Monday had sent a letter to Ramesh stating that while it had documentary evidence to establish the existence of OFTDs in the project area, the gram sabhas held at Dhinkia and Gobindpur villages in February had refused to accord approval to the diversion of forestland for the steel project. Besides exercising their rights under the FRA, the gram sabhas had extended the deadline for the filing of claims under the act.

As such, people in the area continued to fill claim forms which proved that the state government’s assurance to the Union ministry was false.

Lashing out against the government, PPSS chief Abhay Sahu said: “We condemn the government report for we know that OFTDs have been living in the area for the last 300 years. We are going to burn copies of the report.”