{"id":39859,"date":"2024-02-29T08:57:06","date_gmt":"2024-02-29T03:27:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=39859"},"modified":"2025-04-24T20:13:29","modified_gmt":"2025-04-24T14:43:29","slug":"article-371a","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/article-371a\/","title":{"rendered":"Article 371A of the Constitution of India"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>What\u2019s in Today\u2019s Article?<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Why in News?<\/li>\n<li>What is Article 371A of the Indian Constitution?<\/li>\n<li>Significance of the Article 371A<\/li>\n<li>Rat-hole Mining in Nagaland and Challenges in its Regulation<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Why in News?<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Article 371A of the Constitution of India has been the major hurdle in the Nagaland government\u2019s efforts to regulate small-scale illegal coal mining activities in the State.<\/li>\n<li>The State government has been under pressure to regulate coal mining activities after six miners died in an explosion in a rat-hole mine in the Wokha district.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>What is Article 371A of the Indian Constitution?<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>When Nagaland (erstwhile Naga Hills and Tuensang Area) was given the status of a State by the Constitution (13th Amendment) Act 1962 in the Indian Union, Article 371A was inserted into Part XXI of the Constitution.<\/li>\n<li>Article 371A allows Special Constitutional Provisions to the State and thus reads:\n<ul>\n<li>Notwithstanding anything in this Constitution, no Act of Parliament in respect of\n<ul>\n<li>Religious or social practices of the Nagas,<\/li>\n<li>Naga customary law and procedure,<\/li>\n<li>Administration of civil and criminal justice involving decisions according to Naga customary law,<\/li>\n<li>Ownership and transfer of land and its resources,<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Shall apply to the State of Nagaland unless the Legislative Assembly of Nagaland by a resolution so decides.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Significance of the Article 371A<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>The Constitution of India is a Federation with a strong unitary bias towards the Centre.\n<ul>\n<li>However, to accommodate the large diversity of the country, its federalism is asymmetrical, and Article 371A is an example of such asymmetry.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>The Article is not only a Constitutional right and legal mechanism but also resonates with a political process &#8211; a political barometer that represents the will of the people.<\/li>\n<li>The Article is seen as one of the recourses that safeguard the collective rights of the Nagas.<\/li>\n<li>However, there were concerns that Article 371(A) impedes the State\u2019s development.\n<ul>\n<li>Article 371(A) states that land and its resources in the State belong to the people and not the government.<\/li>\n<li>Due to this provision, the landowners usually do not allow the government to carry out any development activities on their plot.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Rat-hole Mining in Nagaland and Challenges in its Regulation<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Data from Nagaland\u2019s Geology and Mining Department say the State has 492.68 million tonnes of coal reserves but dispersed erratically and inconsistently in small pockets spread over a large area.<\/li>\n<li>Nagaland\u2019s coal mining policy, first notified in 2006, allows rat-hole mining as the coal deposits are too scattered for large-scale and coordinated operations.<\/li>\n<li>Small Pocket Deposit Licence may be granted only to individual landowners for undertaking rat-hole mining and shall not be granted to any company.<\/li>\n<li>However, rat-hole mining can be undertaken only with the consent of the departments concerned, including that of Forest and Environment.<\/li>\n<li>Officials claimed the State government awarded several rat-hole mining leases with proper forest and environment clearances and definite mining plans.\n<ul>\n<li>This has not stopped people from operating such mines illegally.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>The unique land rights conferred under Article 371A have made regulating illegal coal mining activities more challenging.<\/li>\n<li>Therefore, residents in coal-bearing areas depend on illegal mining for sustenance and they need to be educated on the adverse effects of such activities.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Q1) What is rat-hole mining?<\/h3>\n<p>Rat-hole mining is a hazardous way of extracting coal by creating small tunnels just large enough for a person to crawl through. The National Green Tribunal (NGT) banned the practice of rat-hole mining in India in 2014.<\/p>\n<h3>Q2) What is Part XXI of the Indian Constitution?<\/h3>\n<p>Part XXI of the Constitution is an amalgamation of various articles with temporary, transitional, and special provisions for India&#8217;s 12 states. In this, several amendments have been included from Article 371 A to J.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Source:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/news\/national\/other-states\/coal-mining-regulations-hit-article-371a-wall-in-nagaland\/article67894628.ece\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><u>Coal mining regulations hit Article 371A wall in Nagaland<\/u><\/a><u> | <\/u><a href=\"https:\/\/morungexpress.com\/article-371a-scope-limitations-and-challenges\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><u>MorungExpress<\/u><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Article 371A was inserted into Part XXI of the Constitution by the Constitution (13th Amendment) Act 1962 and it allows Special Constitutional Provisions to the State of Nagaland<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":39860,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-39859","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-mains-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39859"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39859\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39860"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}