TRIBALS IN INDIA

TRIBALS IN INDIA Tribal in India live in the forests, hills and naturally isolated regions. They are known by different names such as Vanyajathi, Vanavasi, Pahari, Adimajati, Adivasi, and Janjati etc. Nearly all the tribal of India have been in continuous contact with their neighbors who live by farming and a large number of specialized manual industries and yet they have retained their customs and ethnic identity. This is because they usually marry with in their own communities and the clan elders or chiefs keep their cultural practices alive there. Barring a very small fraction, there is little difference between their economic status and that of the neighboring rural folk. Yet as the tribes have, more or less, retained their separate social identity and on the whole can be regarded as comparatively isolated and economically backward, they have been placed under the category of scheduled tribes. The first and foremost characteristics of the tribal economy are its close relation ship with the natural recourses and habitat, which is usually the forest. The tribes that inhabit islands also depend on natural sea products like fish. The tribal obtain their day-to-day requirements and without any technical aids. Nothing seems to escape from them edible roots, fruits, vegetables, flower and honey, insects, fish, pigeons and other birds, monkey, hares, pigs etc. The family, in a tribal economy is the entity of production. It is stratified for production. By age groups and is equipped with tools that are easily made and skills that are common and uncomplicated. The children set out for the jungle with their cattle herd. Some of them accompany the mother or elder sister to help in digging roots, collecting firewood or picking mahua flowers or fruits in the nearby jungle. The youth form the axis of familiar production. They take part in agricultural operations like preparing the fields, sowing, harvesting, collection of minor forest product or in finishing and hunting. The tribal in India are passing through a phase of economic change along with the rest of the country, Modern technology and concept are penetrating their culture. The factors that are shaping the future of tribal economies are: (a) education (b) exposure to urban market forces, (c) the co-operative movement (d) banks, loans etc. Education has opened new vistas for tribal and they are moving towards urban and industrial centers for white-collar jobs. Tribal markets have been linked with big markets and for tribal goods are finding their way to under consumer group. (Seshadri: 1993: 14) Tribal population of India constitutes about 8% of the total population or almost 53 million, as per the 1991 censes. The different stages of social, cultural and economic condition due to cultural pattern vary from tribe to tribe and region to region. The tribal groups inhabit widely varying ecological -geo-climatic conditions I different concentrations through out the country. There are more than 400 tribal communities in India, out of which the Government of India has identified 74 primitive tribal communities by 1984 in 15 states union territories. Tribal population in India is mounting now. In the table of ‘Tribal population in India' we can perceive the state wise figures of Tribal population in India from poles apart sources. When we look at these statistics of tribal population in India as a whole we hit upon that the number of tribal people in India in 1951 was 2, 25, 11,854 and it had increased to 3, 01, 72,221 in 1961. The growth in tribal population was 76, 60,367. The percentage of growth was 32.23%. But in the fo9llowing decade that is in 1961-71 the growth in tribal population was 78, 94,997 and percentage of growth was 26.17%. The fact obviously revels that even though there is a total number of tribal are increasing trend in the growth rate of their population, which is chiefly concerned to their economic conditions. The impact of migration and resettlement on the growth rate of the state is almost obvious. A large-scale migration of the tribal people from one state to the other seems to have occurred as a result of distress, growing poverty and allied factors. But the decreasing trend in general population of the Indian tribes is carnally surprising which draws the attention of the population experts’ planners and policy makers. The growth rate of the tribal people of Bihar during the Years 1961-71 and 1971-81 is 17.31 and 17.80% respectively. It apparently discloses the fact that our endeavor in the field of tribal development was not satisfactory. For more details refer appendix for table 1:1. The tribes of India may be classified on the basis of their (a) Territorial distributions (b) Linguistic affiliation (c) Physical racial characteristics (d) Occupation as economy (e) Cultural contact and (f) Religious beliefs. BS Guha has classified Indian tribes in to three zones: 1) The north and northeastern zones 2) The central or the middle zone. 3) The southern zone. Reserved by C.K.Rakhesh. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without prior permission of C.K.Rakhesh.