Rahul to have FRA session in Odisha in September: Ramesh

Bhubaneswar: Senior Congress leader and former Union minister Jayram Ramesh today said the Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi is going to launch a nationwide campaign on the issue of implementation of Forest Rights Act (FRA) from August.

Rahul will have the first session of his campaign in Vishakhapatnam district in Andhra Pradesh on August 6 followed by the second session in Odisha. The next sessions will be held at Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Telengana, Chhattisgarh and Gujarat.

“Rahul will have deliberation on the individual rights and community rights under FRA. Till now, the tribals have been given only the individual rights, not the community rights. I hope the FRA session in Odisha will be held in September. The FRA sessions will be one of the major programmes of the Congress,” Ramesh said in a press briefing at Congress Bhawan here.

The BJD, on the other hand, has alleged that the AICC leader is keen on giving political statements.

“The former Union minister has come to Odisha as a traveller, but his real intention is to highlight the issue in favour of his party. The state government has given top priority to the socio-economic upliftment of the tribals. The Congress does not now the ground reality. Odisha has become the model state in the country in the implementation of Forest Rights Act (FRA),” BJD spokesperson Amar Prasad Satpathy told the media here.