The understanding of Common Property Resources through Hardin’s idea of the tragedy of commons has been critically debated on two major lines of arguments- everybody’s property is nobody’s property or its utilization can be seen as a strong determinant of ‘sustainable development’ particularly among the Indigenous communities worldwide. In India, the primitive legal system of the Indigenous/tribal communities was the practice of “common pool resources”, which have been historically transformed into “Common Property Resources” after the application of modern laws. The customary laws believed that natural resources like forests and land as a “pool” of resources and not “property” as categorized by the statute. The law of the land cannot record it as ‘private property’. This paper is based on “reciprocity theory” and empirical evidence of the idea of private and communal property, ownership rights is of community or of individuals among the tribal communities of Jharkhand, India. It has three major objectives to sort out. Firstly, how the common pool resources of the tribals/adivasis as practiced in their customary laws got transformed into common property resources under modern law. Secondly, it has critically questioned the applicability of “collective action theory” for the sustainable livelihood of tribal communities. Rather, it has argued for customary practices as advocated in “reciprocity theory”- which asserts that people are emotional reciprocators instead of wealth maximizers, trust among people promotes cooperation better than imposed material incentives and the rate of cooperation within the community has multiple equilibriums. Thirdly, it critically examines the extent of community rights in forests and land in the recently enacted Forest Rights Act, 2006 in India. Finally, to advocate that in common resources are more appropriate for sustainable development.
