ISSN (Print) - 0012-9976 | ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846

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Education, Assimilation and Cultural Marginalisation of Tribes in India

The cultural marginalisation of the tribal people in India through the school system in pre- and post-independence India is discussed by drawing parallels with the residential school system that existed in the United States and Canada.

 

Conceptualising and Thinking about Subaltern Politics

Adivasis and the State: Subalternity and Citizenship in India’s Bhil Heartland by Alf Gunvald Nielsen, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2019; pp 328, 695.

 

Need for Restructuring the Tea Plantation System in India

Despite tea being a major plantation industry in India, tea estates are in a deplorable condition. Poor wage structure for labourers, absence of the developmental state, weak unions and worsening of welfare facilities are some of the factors contributing to the sorry state of affairs in the tea estates. The only way to bring a positive change is by dismantling the deep-rooted colonial structure and ethos of the plantations and thereby restructuring them.

Is the Pathalgadi Movement in Tribal Areas Anti-constitutional?

The Pathalgadi movement has stemmed from the unabated alienation of land from tribal people, and is a democratic assertion for the realisation of their rights in light of the government’s failure to implement the same.

Coercive ‘Development’

The tribes, especially of mainland India, have lost their lands and livelihoods to development projects which have not brought them any benefits. In fact, they have been displaced without rehabilitation and adequate compensation.

Voiceless in Jharkhand

The Jharkhand Freedom of Religion Act, 2017 is the latest draconian act against tribes who are anyway battling dispossession of their land in the name of development. The Fifth Schedule of the Constitution provides for a number of measures to protect their interests. Yet, in the enactment of the law on freedom of religion in a number of states with sizeable tribal populations, their voice is missing.

Sharit Bhowmik, 1948-2016

A fellow academic and comrade of 33 years writes about the labour studies scholar, much loved teacher, indefatigable trade unionist and writer who combined street studies with grass-roots work and organising.

Statement of Social Scientists

We, as social scientists, scholars, teachers and concerned citizens, feel extremely concerned about the lynching at Dadri, and the murders of scholars and thinkers like M M Kalaburgi, Narendra Dabholkar, Govind Pansare and others, and wish to register our strong protest.

Politics of Language, Religion and Identity: Tribes in India

The initial discourse on tribal identity was shaped by those who advocated integration of tribals as citizens of a nation state and others who sought their assimilation into the Hindu fold. But identity definition for the tribals in the early post-independent years has been largely a process from without. While the state made efforts to draw tribals into the national sphere, other elements, chiefly right wing groups, advocated measures that would restore to the tribals their ancient heritage. It is in more recent times, with the advent of education and the threat posed to tribal ways of living by other dominant groups and demands imposed by development, that tribal identity articulation has been a process directed from within the tribal community, spearheaded by a growing middle class. Such articulation has not merely been in the form of demands for some degree of political autonomy but has also seen initiatives to ensure the protection and development of tribal language, customs and culture.

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