Tribal India: Past, Present and Future | ISC Class 12 Sociology Notes

This note covers the sociological understanding of tribal communities in India: the definition and features of a tribe, dormitories found in tribal society (their origin, features, functions and the impact of culture contact on them), and the present economic, political, social and cultural conditions and problems of Indian tribes, together with the government policies meant to uplift them, including Tribal Panchsheel, constitutional safeguards, the Kaka Kalelkar and Mandal Commissions, Special Central Assistance, the Integrated Rural Development Programme, Large Sized Multi-Purpose Cooperative Societies, the 20 Point Programme and educational policies.

What is a tribe? Definition and features

A tribe is a social group usually found living in a defined territory, having a common name, a common culture, a common religion and a common dialect, and feeling itself to be one community on the basis of kinship or a shared belief in descent from a common ancestor.

Sociologists describe tribal communities as being marked by unity and self-sufficiency: a tribe is normally a self-contained economic and social unit that produces most of what it needs and governs its own internal affairs without depending heavily on outside institutions.

The clan and family form the basic building blocks of tribal organisation. A clan is a group of persons who believe themselves to be descended from one common ancestor, and several such clans together make up the wider tribe.

Many tribes trace this descent to a common totemic ancestor: a plant, animal or natural object (the totem) which the clan treats as sacred, will not kill or eat, and uses as a badge of identity.

Occupation in a tribal society is traditionally linked to the natural environment of the territory the tribe occupies, such as hunting, gathering, shifting cultivation, settled agriculture, pastoralism or craft production, rather than to a graded, hereditary division of labour as in the caste system.

Marriage rules commonly require endogamy, that is, marriage within the tribe, even though marriage is usually forbidden within one's own clan.

Political organisation is typically informal and based on tribal councils, clan heads or chiefs rather than a formal bureaucratic state, and this political authority is closely tied to control over the tribe's territory.

Several further features complete the picture of a tribe.

• Common name: each tribe has a name by which its members identify themselves and are known to others, such as the Santhal, Bhil or Gond.
• Common language: members speak a common dialect, often unwritten, which binds them together and marks them off from neighbouring groups.
• Common culture: members share customs, dress, food habits, songs, dances and festivals, passed on from one generation to the next.
• Common religion: members share beliefs in spirits, sacred places and nature, often with totemic worship and a tribal priest or medicine man who conducts rites.
• Family: the family is the basic unit of living, production and consumption; it may be patrilineal or matrilineal, as among the Khasi and Garo of Meghalaya.

How do tribal dormitories work? Definition and origin

Definition: A dormitory in tribal society is a separate communal house, usually one for unmarried boys and often a separate one for unmarried girls, where young unmarried members of the tribe sleep, are trained in tribal customs and crafts and are socialised into adult community life away from their own parental homes.

Dormitories are thought to have originated as a practical response to crowded, single-room tribal homes that could not comfortably house growing unmarried children alongside parents and younger siblings, and as a deliberate community institution for training the young in the skills, songs, dances and moral codes of the tribe before marriage.

Well known examples recorded among Indian tribes include the Ghotul of the Muria Gonds of Bastar, the Dhumkuria of the Oraons, and the Morung found among several Naga tribes of the north-east.

These institutions functioned as a recognised stage of growing up, between childhood in the parental home and marriage, and membership of the dormitory was treated as a mark of a young person's transition towards adult responsibility within the tribe.

What are the features and functions of tribal dormitories?

A dormitory is usually a separate house, apart from the family dwellings, where unmarried young people of the same sex gather and sleep at night under the loose supervision of an elder or a senior member chosen from among the youths themselves.

Entry is generally linked to age, so that a child is admitted once considered old enough, and membership ends on marriage.

1. The dormitory serves as a centre of education and training, where the young learn tribal songs, dances, folklore, crafts and the skills needed for farming, hunting or household work.
2. It acts as an agency of social control, instilling discipline, respect for elders and knowledge of tribal customs, taboos and codes of conduct.
3. It functions as a recognised setting for recreation, with communal singing, dancing and story-telling that strengthen group feeling among the young.
4. In several tribes it also provides an accepted space for unmarried boys and girls to meet, which can lead to the formation of friendships that later influence the choice of marriage partner.

Through these functions the dormitory helps prepare the individual for full membership of the tribe and reinforces the tribe's unity and self-sufficiency by passing its culture on to each new generation without reliance on outside institutions.

What has been the impact of culture contact on tribal dormitories?

Contact between tribal communities and the wider society, through missionaries, traders, administrators, schooling and migration for wage labour, has weakened the traditional dormitory system in many areas.

Formal schools increasingly take over the educational role once performed by the dormitory, and the spread of individual family houses with more rooms has reduced the original practical need for separate sleeping quarters for the young.

Exposure to other religions and to mainstream notions of modesty has, in some communities, discouraged the practice of mixed gatherings of unmarried boys and girls in the dormitory, and migration of young people out of tribal areas for work has reduced the number of members available to sustain it as a living institution.

Where dormitories survive, they often continue in a modified form, retaining their recreational and community functions even as their training and marriage-related functions decline.

What are the economic conditions and problems of Indian tribes today?

Many tribal populations historically depended on access to forest produce and on shifting cultivation for their livelihood.

Colonial forest policy, from the late nineteenth century onward, reserved most forest tracts for government use and for maximising timber production, severing the long-standing rights that adivasis had exercised over the forest for gathering produce and for cultivation.

This took away the mainstay of tribal livelihoods and left tribal people either using the forest illegally, and being harassed and prosecuted as encroachers, or migrating in search of wage labour.

After independence, the government's monopoly over forests continued, and the policy of capital-intensive industrialisation required mineral resources and power-generation capacity that were concentrated in tribal areas.

Tribal lands were rapidly acquired for new mining and dam projects such as the Sardar Sarovar dam on the Narmada and the Polavaram dam on the Godavari, displacing very large numbers of adivasis, often without appropriate compensation or rehabilitation.

These processes are described as having become even more powerful since the 1990s, when economic liberalisation made it easier for corporate firms to acquire large areas of tribal land.

What political problems affect tribal India: regionalism and separatism?

Tribal political assertion has grown from the sense of being outsiders within the national mainstream and from experiences of displacement and loss of land and forest in the name of "development".

Regionalism among tribal groups refers to the demand that a region of concentrated tribal population be given greater political and administrative control over its own affairs, usually because the group feels that its distinct identity, resources and interests are being neglected by a distant state government.

Because tribal populations, unlike other disadvantaged groups, tend to be concentrated in contiguous geographical areas, their regional demands could take the form of statehood, and the most significant achievements of adivasi movements in independent India have been the attainment of separate statehood for Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh, carved respectively out of Bihar and Madhya Pradesh.

Where such regional aspirations are persistently unmet, mild regionalism can harden into separatism, in which a group seeks to break away from the existing state structure altogether rather than simply gain greater autonomy within it; this is a recurring concern in several tribal-majority regions of the north-east.

What social and cultural problems do tribal communities face?

Tribal groups continue to experience social exclusion and discrimination, including atrocities. The Constitution itself abolished untouchability under Article 17, and this constitutional guarantee was reinforced by the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act of 1989, which revised and strengthened the legal provisions punishing acts of violence or humiliation against Dalits and adivasis.

The movement of outsiders, referred to by many tribal groups as "dikus", into tribal districts since the mid-nineteenth century, alongside the simultaneous migration of tribal people out of these districts to plantations, mines and factories, has made it harder to find any area, apart from the north-eastern states, that is inhabited exclusively by tribal people.

Culturally, close and long-standing contact with Hindu society has made the boundary between "tribe" and "caste" porous in many regions, raising concerns about the loss of distinct tribal language, religion and custom.

The term "adivasi", meaning original inhabitants, was coined in the 1930s as part of the tribal struggle against intrusion by the colonial government, outside settlers and moneylenders, and continues to carry a sense of political awareness and assertion of rights over land and identity.

What is Tribal Panchsheel, and what constitutional safeguards exist for tribes?

Tribal Panchsheel is the set of guiding principles laid down for the administration of tribal areas and the development of tribal people, associated with Jawaharlal Nehru, which aimed to allow tribal people to develop along the lines of their own genius without outside interference while still being drawn gradually into the wider national life.

1. People should develop along the lines of their own genius, and imposition of an alien culture should be avoided.
2. Tribal rights in land and forest should be respected and protected.
3. A team of tribal people should be trained to do the work of administration and development, instead of introducing too many outsiders into tribal territory.
4. Tribal areas should not be over-administered or overwhelmed with a multiplicity of schemes; administration should work through, and not in rivalry with, the tribe's own social and cultural institutions.
5. Results in tribal development should be judged by the quality of human character that is involved, not merely by statistics of money spent.

Constitutional safeguards for tribal people begin with the recognition of Scheduled Tribes under Article 342 of the Constitution, which empowers the President to specify, by public notification, the tribes or tribal communities to be treated as Scheduled Tribes for a state or union territory.

Special provision for the administration of tribal areas is made under the Fifth Schedule, drawn up under Article 244(1) for most tribal areas, and the Sixth Schedule, drawn up under Article 244(2) for certain tribal areas of the north-east, giving these regions a distinct administrative and legislative arrangement suited to local tribal institutions.

Reservation of seats for Scheduled Tribes in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies, and in government jobs and educational institutions, is provided in proportion to their share of the population, enabled constitutionally through provisions such as Article 15(4), which permits the state to make special provision for the advancement of socially and educationally backward classes including Scheduled Tribes, and Article 16(4), which permits reservation of posts in public employment for any backward class of citizens not adequately represented in the services, as part of the wider reservation policy extended to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes since before independence.

Which committees and commissions studied the welfare of Indian tribes?

The First Backward Classes Commission, headed by Kaka Kalelkar, was appointed by the first government of independent India under Jawaharlal Nehru to look into measures for the welfare of backward classes, and, appointed in 1953, it submitted its report in 1955, but the political climate of the time led to the report being largely sidelined.

The Second Backward Classes Commission, headed by B.P. Mandal, was appointed after the Emergency when the Janata Party came to power, and its report, known as the Mandal Commission report, was finally implemented by the central government only in 1990, a decade after it was submitted, after which the issue of backward classes, which includes many groups close in socio-economic status to Scheduled Tribes, became a major national political issue.

Both commissions are important for tribal policy because the category of "backward classes" that they studied overlaps, in several regions, with communities officially recognised as Scheduled Tribes, so that decisions on reservation and welfare for one category have had direct consequences for the other.

What economic programmes and facilities support tribal upliftment?

Special Central Assistance is additional financial support given by the central government, over and above normal state plan funds, specifically for schemes targeted at the economic development of Scheduled Tribes.

The Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP) was a government scheme for rural economic development whose implementation at the village level was monitored by members of the Panchayat, and such area-development schemes have been extended to tribal regions to raise household income and employment.

Large Sized Multi-Purpose Cooperative Societies (LAMPS) are cooperative societies set up in tribal areas to provide credit, to market tribal produce such as minor forest products at fair prices, and to supply essential goods, with the aim of freeing tribal cultivators and gatherers from exploitation by private moneylenders and traders.

The 20 Point Programme is a government programme covering a wide range of welfare and development goals, including provisions relevant to the tribal population, and alongside it the government has run schemes to encourage traditional crafts, home industries and agriculture among tribal communities so that their existing skills and resources are converted into sustainable sources of income.

Educational policies for tribal upliftment include the opening of schools, including residential and ashram-type schools, in tribal areas, and scholarships and other concessions intended to raise the very low levels of literacy and school attendance that have historically marked many tribal populations, so that tribal children are not kept out of the wider opportunities that education provides.

How does a tribe differ from a caste?

Although in actual historical practice the boundary between "tribe" and "caste" has often become porous through long contact, the two remain analytically distinct types of social group, as the table below shows.

Going beyond the syllabus

The categories "tribe" and "adivasi" are both defined, to an extent, negatively, by what they are not, much as the Other Backward Classes are defined as neither "forward" castes nor Dalits.

This has made it difficult, in both popular and administrative use, to arrive at a single, fully agreed definition of a tribe, and some scholars prefer to speak of degrees of "tribalness" rather than a sharp dividing line between tribe and non-tribe.

Long and close association between tribal groups and Hindu society and culture means that ecological isolation was nowhere absolute, so the boundary between tribe and caste has become porous in many regions over time, with some communities moving between the two categories across generations.

The movement of populations further complicates the picture: since the middle of the nineteenth century, non-tribals have moved into tribal districts of central India in search of land and resources, while tribal people from the same districts have migrated out to plantations, mines and factories in search of wage labour, so that today, apart from the north-eastern states, there are no areas of the country inhabited exclusively by tribal people, only areas of tribal concentration where conditions are usually much worse than for non-tribals living nearby.

Glossary

• Tribe — a social group, usually settled in a defined territory, sharing a common name, culture, religion, dialect and belief in descent from a common ancestor, and traditionally functioning as a self-sufficient unit.
• Clan — a group of persons within a tribe who believe themselves descended from one common ancestor.
• Totem — a plant, animal or natural object treated as sacred by a clan, used as its badge of identity.
• Endogamy — the rule requiring marriage within one's own group, such as one's tribe or caste.
• Dormitory — a communal house for unmarried young people of a tribe, used for sleeping, training and recreation.
• Culture contact — the meeting and interaction of a tribal community with other, often dominant, cultures, leading to change in tribal institutions.
• Adivasi — literally "original inhabitants"; a term coined in the 1930s that asserts tribal identity and rights.
• Diku — a term used by some tribal groups for outsiders who settle in or exploit tribal areas.
• Regionalism — the demand of a region or group for greater control over its own political and administrative affairs within the existing state.
• Separatism — the demand of a group to break away from the existing state structure altogether.
• Tribal Panchsheel — the five guiding principles for tribal administration and development associated with Jawaharlal Nehru.
• Fifth and Sixth Schedules — constitutional provisions providing for the special administration of Scheduled tribal areas.
• Special Central Assistance — additional central government funding for schemes targeted at Scheduled Tribes.
• LAMPS — Large Sized Multi-Purpose Cooperative Societies, set up to provide credit and fair marketing to tribal cultivators and gatherers.
• IRDP — the Integrated Rural Development Programme, a government scheme for rural economic development monitored at the village level by the Panchayat.

Common errors and misconceptions

• Misconception: A tribe is simply a backward or primitive form of caste. Correct: Tribe and caste are distinct social categories, with a tribe traditionally organised around clan and territory rather than a graded hereditary hierarchy, even though the two have interacted closely in India.
• Misconception: Dormitories exist only for unmarried boys. Correct: Several tribes maintain separate dormitories for unmarried girls as well as boys.
• Misconception: Tribal dormitories have disappeared completely because of culture contact. Correct: They have been weakened in their training and marriage-related functions in many areas, but some continue, often in a modified recreational form.
• Misconception: The Mandal Commission and the Kaka Kalelkar Commission dealt only with Scheduled Tribes. Correct: Both commissions were primarily concerned with the welfare of backward classes generally, a category that overlaps with but is distinct from Scheduled Tribes.
• Misconception: Regionalism and separatism among tribal groups mean exactly the same thing. Correct: Regionalism seeks greater autonomy or recognition within the existing state, while separatism seeks to break away from it altogether.
• Misconception: Tribal displacement from dams and mines is a purely colonial-era problem. Correct: Large-scale displacement of adivasis from mining and dam projects, such as the Sardar Sarovar and Polavaram dams, has continued in independent India and intensified after economic liberalisation.
• Misconception: All tribal areas in India are governed under the same constitutional provision. Correct: Most tribal areas are administered under the Fifth Schedule, while certain tribal areas of the north-east are administered separately under the Sixth Schedule.

Exam-style questions with model answers

Q1. State the meaning of endogamy as a feature of tribal society. [1 mark]

1. Endogamy is the rule by which marriage is confined to members of one's own tribe, even though marriage within one's own clan inside that tribe is usually forbidden.

Q2. Name the dam project on the river Narmada that displaced large numbers of adivasis. [1 mark]

1. The Sardar Sarovar dam, built on the river Narmada in western India, displaced hundreds of thousands of adivasis from their original habitats.

Q3. Describe four functions of dormitories in tribal society. [4 marks]

1. They are a centre of education and training, where the young learn tribal songs, dances, crafts and farming or hunting skills.
2. They act as an agency of social control, teaching discipline, respect for elders and tribal customs and taboos.
3. They provide an organised setting for recreation, including communal singing, dancing and story-telling.
4. In several tribes they provide an accepted space for unmarried boys and girls to meet, which can influence the later choice of marriage partner.

Q4. Explain, with reasons, how culture contact has affected tribal dormitories. [4 marks]

1. Formal schools have increasingly taken over the training function once performed by the dormitory.
2. Larger individual family houses with more rooms have reduced the practical need for separate sleeping quarters for the young.
3. Exposure to other religions and mainstream notions of modesty has discouraged mixed gatherings of unmarried boys and girls in some communities.
4. Migration of young people out of tribal areas for wage labour has reduced the number of members available to sustain the dormitory, so where it survives it often continues only in a modified, mainly recreational form.

Q5. Distinguish between regionalism and separatism among tribal groups, with one example of each. [4 marks]

1. Regionalism is the demand of a tribal-majority region for greater political and administrative control over its own affairs within the existing state, as seen in the movement that led to the separate statehood of Jharkhand, carved out of Bihar.
2. Separatism is the demand of a group to break away from the existing state structure altogether, rather than simply gain autonomy within it.
3. Regionalism is generally accommodated through administrative measures such as new states or autonomous councils, whereas separatism rejects the existing political arrangement entirely.
4. Persistent neglect of regional tribal demands is described as a factor that can harden mild regionalism into separatism, particularly in parts of the north-east.

Q6. Describe the economic problems faced by Indian tribes, tracing their origin from colonial forest policy to the present. [7 marks]

1. From the late nineteenth century, the colonial government reserved most forest tracts for its own use, aiming to maximise timber production.
2. This severed the long-standing rights that adivasis had exercised to gather forest produce and to practise shifting cultivation, taking away the mainstay of their livelihood.
3. Denied legal access to forests and land for cultivation, adivasis were forced either to use the forest illegally, being harassed and prosecuted as encroachers, or to migrate in search of wage labour.
4. After independence, the government's monopoly over forests continued.
5. The policy of capital-intensive industrialisation required mineral resources and power-generation capacity concentrated in adivasi areas, so tribal lands were rapidly acquired for mining and dam projects.
6. Projects such as the Sardar Sarovar dam on the Narmada and the Polavaram dam on the Godavari displaced hundreds of thousands of adivasis from their original habitats, often without appropriate compensation or rehabilitation.
7. These processes have continued and become even more powerful since the 1990s, when economic liberalisation made it easier for corporate firms to acquire large areas of tribal land, leaving many tribal communities economically poorer and more insecure than before.

Q7. Explain the Tribal Panchsheel and any three constitutional safeguards provided for Indian tribes. [7 marks]

1. Tribal Panchsheel is the set of five guiding principles for tribal administration and development associated with Jawaharlal Nehru.
2. Its first principle holds that tribal people should develop along the lines of their own genius, without imposing an alien culture on them.
3. Its second principle holds that tribal rights in land and forest should be respected and protected.
4. Its third principle favours training tribal people themselves to carry out administration and development work, rather than introducing many outsiders.
5. Its fourth principle warns against over-administering tribal areas or overwhelming them with too many schemes.
6. Its fifth principle holds that results should be judged by the quality of human character developed, not merely by the amount of money spent.
7. Among constitutional safeguards, Article 342 formally recognises communities as Scheduled Tribes.
8. The Fifth Schedule provides for the special administration of most tribal areas.
9. The Sixth Schedule provides separately for certain tribal areas of the north-east.
10. Reservation of seats for Scheduled Tribes is provided in legislatures, government jobs and educational institutions in proportion to their population share.

Key takeaways

• A tribe is defined by unity and self-sufficiency, clan and family ties, a common totemic ancestor, territory, occupation, endogamy, dormitories, language, culture, name, religion and political organisation.
• Dormitories such as the Ghotul, Dhumkuria and Morung trained unmarried youth in tribal customs, crafts and discipline, and provided recreation before marriage.
• Culture contact through schooling, migration and new religions has weakened the training and marriage-related functions of dormitories in many areas.
• Colonial and post-colonial forest and industrial policy dispossessed many tribal communities of forest and land rights, driving migration and poverty.
• Regionalism among tribal groups led to the statehood of Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh; unresolved regional demands can harden into separatism.
• Tribal Panchsheel sets out five principles for tribal administration based on respecting tribal self-development, land rights and local participation.
• Constitutional safeguards include recognition of Scheduled Tribes, the Fifth and Sixth Schedules, and reservation in legislatures, jobs and education.
• The Kaka Kalelkar Commission (appointed 1953) and the Mandal Commission, implemented in 1990, shaped national policy on backward classes.
• Economic programmes such as Special Central Assistance, IRDP, LAMPS and the 20 Point Programme aim to raise tribal income and reduce exploitation.
• Educational policies, including residential schools and scholarships, seek to raise literacy and school attendance among tribal children.

Test yourself

What does endogamy mean as a feature of tribal marriage?

It means marriage is restricted to members of one's own tribe, although marriage within one's own clan is usually forbidden.

Name two examples of tribal dormitories mentioned for Indian tribes.

The Ghotul of the Muria Gonds and the Dhumkuria of the Oraons; the Morung of Naga tribes is a third example.

Why did colonial forest policy harm tribal livelihoods?

It reserved forest tracts for government use and timber production, severing tribal rights to gather produce and practise shifting cultivation.

Which two states were created mainly through adivasi regional movements?

Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh, carved out of Bihar and Madhya Pradesh respectively.

Who headed the First Backward Classes Commission, and when did it report?

Kaka Kalelkar headed it, and it submitted its report in 1953, though the report was largely sidelined at the time.

What is the purpose of LAMPS in tribal areas?

Large Sized Multi-Purpose Cooperative Societies provide credit and fair marketing for tribal produce, reducing dependence on exploitative moneylenders and traders.

What is the key difference between regionalism and separatism?

Regionalism seeks greater autonomy within the existing state, while separatism seeks to break away from the state structure altogether.