INDIA’S Communists are demanding Prime Minister Narendra Modi take urgent action to prevent the eviction of over a million indigenous people from their homes.

Communist Party of India-Marxist politburo member Brinda Karat said the evictions amounted to a “virtual declaration of war against adivasis” (the collective term for indigenous groups, many of whom live in relatively undeveloped forest areas).

Under the Forest Rights Act tribespeople whose families had lived on land for three generations or more as of 2005 have the right to keep doing so, but a lengthy process of assessing claims has rejected more than half of four million occupancy claims.