Given the diversities among tribal communities in India, in which specific contexts should they be…

Question

Given the diversities among tribal communities in India, in which specific contexts should they be considered as a single category ?

Ghissu Editorial · Accepted Answer

Despite deep diversity in language, livelihood and faith, tribal communities should be treated as one category for constitutional safeguards, land and forest rights, protection from atrocity and displacement, and closing a shared development gap. ST literacy was 59% against 73% nationally in Census 2011.

**Introduction**

Census 2011 counted over 10.4 crore Scheduled Tribes (8.6%) across 705 notified communities. Though highly diverse, they are grouped under Article 342 using the Lokur Committee's (1965) markers of distinct culture, isolation and backwardness.

**Diversities Among Tribal Communities**

SKETCH: tree | One Category, Many Tribes
- Scheduled Tribes (Art 342)
  - Santhal: Austro-Asiatic
  - Gond: Dravidian
  - Naga: Tibeto-Burman
  - Bhil: Indo-Aryan

1. **Livelihood**: Tribes range from hunter-gatherers such as the Jarawas of the Andamans, among the 75 PVTGs, to settled cultivators and the relatively prosperous, educated Meenas of Rajasthan.
2. **Region and faith**: Central Indian Adivasis under the Fifth Schedule differ from North-Eastern tribes, many of them Christian, under the Sixth.

**Contexts for Treating Tribes as a Single Category**

1. **Constitutional safeguards**: Reservation in legislatures and jobs under Articles 330, 332 and 16(4), and the welfare mandate of Article 46, rest on a shared history of exclusion that no single tribe could claim alone.
2. **Land, forest and self-rule**: Every tribe depends on land and forest, so PESA (1996), the Forest Rights Act (2006) and the Niyamgiri judgment (2013) on gram sabha consent treat them as one rights-bearing group.
3. **Atrocity and displacement**: The Atrocities Act, 1989 covers all tribes alike, and the Xaxa Committee (2014) found tribals bearing a disproportionate share of displacement.
4. **Development deficit**: ST literacy was 59% against 73% nationally (Census 2011), justifying collective schemes like Eklavya Model Residential Schools.

**Conclusion**

Tribes should be one category for rights, protection and representation, but many for delivery, as the PM-JANMAN mission (2023) for PVTGs shows by reaching those the common label leaves behind. Unity of rights with diversity of delivery honours both their identity and their equality.

Given the diversities among tribal communities in India, in which specific contexts should they be considered as a single category ?

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