Adivasi Struggles

The Constitution of India recognises Scheduled Tribes as a distinct social group, just as it does Scheduled Castes. The term jana or tribe originally referred to ‘people of the forest’ — communities whose economic, social and political life was shaped by their habitat in hills and forests. But this ecological isolation was never complete. Tribal groups have had long and close ties with Hindu society and culture, making the boundary between ‘tribe’ and ‘caste’ quite porous. (This idea was discussed in Chapter 3 of the textbook.) In the case of adivasis, the movement of populations from one region to another further complicates the picture.

Today, except for the North-Eastern states, there are no areas of the country inhabited exclusively by tribal people — only areas of tribal concentration. Since the middle of the nineteenth century, non-tribals have moved into the tribal districts of central India, while tribal people from those same districts have migrated to plantations, mines, factories and other places of employment. In the areas where tribal populations are concentrated, their economic and social conditions are usually much worse than those of non-tribals.

The impoverished and exploited circumstances under which adivasis live can be traced historically to the pattern of accelerated resource extraction begun by the colonial British government and continued by the government of independent India.

• From the late nineteenth century onwards, the colonial government reserved most forest tracts for its own use, cutting off the rights adivasis had long exercised to use the forest for gathering produce and for shifting cultivation.
• Forests were now to be protected for maximising timber production. With this policy, the mainstay of adivasi livelihoods was taken away, rendering their lives poorer and more insecure.
• Denied access to forests and land for cultivation, adivasis were forced either to use the forests illegally (and be harassed and prosecuted as ‘encroachers’ and thieves) or to migrate in search of wage labour.

After Independence in 1947, the government’s monopoly over forests continued. The policy of capital-intensive industrialisation required mineral resources and power-generation capacities that were concentrated in adivasi areas. Adivasi lands were rapidly acquired for new mining and dam projects. In the process, millions of adivasis were displaced without appropriate compensation or rehabilitation. Justified in the name of ‘national development’ and ‘economic growth’, these policies were also a form of internal colonialism — subjugating adivasis and alienating the resources upon which they depended.

These processes continue to prevail and have become even more powerful since the 1990s, when economic liberalisation policies were officially adopted. It is now easier for corporate firms to acquire large areas of land by displacing adivasis. …