Centre plans portal to take process of forest rights’ recognition, management online

The Union Government is developing a national web portal to try and take the entire process of forest rights recognition and management online, senior officials told The Hindu on Friday (December 19, 2025).

According to a presentation prepared by the Tribal Affairs Ministry, this new portal is proposed to act as a single window for all Forest Rights Act (FRA) processes, which include filing and processing of claims (from the Gram Sabhas’ Forest Rights Committee to State-Level Monitoring Committees), issuing digital title deeds, storing legacy data on titles granted, and mapping potential forest areas over which FRA rights could be claimed in the future in the form of an FRA Atlas.

The Ministry’s pitch came at a national consultative workshop organised by the National Tribal Research Institute in New Delhi on Friday (December 19, 2025) on the challenges in implementing the 2006 Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, popularly known as the Forest Rights Act or FRA, meant to recognise generationally held and exercised right of STs and other forest dwellers on forest land across the country. The law recognises various rights of forest dwellers on these lands, such as individual, community, the right to use resources, habitation, etc.

Welfare beneficiaries

On the sidelines of the workshop, senior officials said this portal would be part of the overarching FRA road map, which the Ministry was working to finalise by the first half of 2026. One of them said this was part of the government’s larger plans to use FRA records to identify beneficiaries for the saturation of existing government welfare schemes.

At the workshop, while Tribal Affairs Minister Jual Oram stressed how FRA rights were “fundamental” to ensuring sustainable livelihoods, Tribal Affairs Secretary Ranjana Chopra spoke of the need to geotag all recognised types of forest rights and called for solutions on livelihood promotion, securing habitat rights, and digitising records.

The Ministry’s presentation noted that there is a need to digitise RoFR (Records of Forest Rights), suggesting that “GPS mapping with satellite imagery” can determine “exact land boundaries”, which, it said, would help with resolving “disputes between competing claims and avoid duplication of claims”. It added that digitising the records of forest rights would make it “easier to monitor implementation and prevent manipulation”.

The government has also said that digitising was the answer to slow processing of FRA claims, noting, in a data sheet, that 15% of FRA claims faced processing delays, further arguing that this would “empower” Gram Sabhas and give them “tools to manage their resources effectively”. Officials said examples of digital platforms aiding monitoring had been seen in Maharashtra’s and Odisha’s implementation of the forest rights law.

Beta version

This portal has been designed by a team of six undergraduate students from across India, who recently participated in the Education Ministry’s 2025 Smart India Hackathon, where one of the problem statements had come from the Tribal Affairs Ministry. “It initially started as an idea on how to digitise FRA legacy data and possibly map the land more accurately so that it can be updated in the Record of Rights. But it has turned into a one-stop shop for FRA processes in the last few months,” one official said, adding that a beta version of the portal has already been developed, and it is being called TARANG for the time being.

In its strategy for the future, the Tribal Affairs Ministry said it saw the use of Artificial Intelligence-based Optical Character Recognition, eventual integration with the SVAMITVA data on survey and mapping of villages, digital title deeds, “extensive satellite and drone-based analysis”, and possibly also providing for funding under Article 275(1) of the Constitution for special Grants for ST welfare. 

Officials from various States where recognition of forest rights has been high are likely to be invited for a demonstration of the portal in January, according to the government officials. While the Ministry of Tribal Affairs can issue guidelines and is the nodal agency for the FRA, the law gives the responsibility of its implementation to State governments, a fact that the Ministry has mentioned while addressing issues on forest rights in Parliament time and again.

“So while the government can encourage and show them the way, the States have to follow through,” one of the officials said.

Apart from digitising and the national portal for FRA, the workshop discussed ways forward for the post-recognition phase of forest resource conservation and management, and increasing uptake of habitat rights to Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs) living in forest lands.