Category Archives: Figures, census and other statistics

“After Independence, the erstwhile aborigines were classified as scheduled tribes, the untouchables were classified as scheduled castes and others included in the backward classes. Although, many of the denotified, nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes are spread among SC/ST/OBC, many are still not classified anywhere and have no access to socio-economic benefits, whether education, health, housing or otherwise. […] These communities/tribes account for nearly 10 per cent of community’s population as has been mentioned in some writings and there are nearly 820 communities and tribes in India, although some of the community leaders assess that their number would be more with 198 denotified tribes and nearly 1,500 nomadic tribes and their population may be even more than 10 per cent.” – Bibek Debroy quoting a 2016 Report of the National Commission for Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes NCDNT (Indian Express, 5 January 2017)
https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/crime-criminal-act-racial-discrimination-non-bailable-offence-criminal-tribes-act-an-unfortunate-legacy-4459258/
https://indiantribalheritage.org/?p=12284

“India is home to nearly 20 Cr. [200 million] traditional forest-dwelling Adivasis and OTFDs [other forest dwelling communities], who derive their subsistence and livelihoods from forest and forest resources over several generations and thousands of years.” – Research team (Sayantani Satpathi, Shambhavi Singh & Subhodeep Basu) in “Revisiting the Forest Rights Act: Status of Implementation with respect to Land Tenures and Collection of Minor Forest Produce), Bharat Rural Livelihoods Foundation (New Delhi, 12 July 2019)
https://www.academia.edu/41756309
https://indiantribalheritage.org/?p=10151

“About 80 per cent of the 5 million chronically undernourished tribal children live in just eight states of Karnataka, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Odisha.” – Programme report on Tribal nutrition: “UNICEF’s efforts to support the tribal population, especially children who suffer from malnourishment”
https://www.unicef.org/india/what-we-do/tribal-nutrition
https://indiantribalheritage.org/?p=11674

“Broadly, trafficking is the exploitation of people, most often for sexual exploitation or forced labour. The different elements are captured within the UN ‘Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children’,1 adopted in 2000 and implemented by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). […] The highest numbers of trafficking victims are detected in the countries in which they are citizens. […] Walk Free Foundation has used figures from household surveys to produce their ‘Global Slavery Index’, which estimated that on “any given day in 2016, an estimated 24.9 million men, women, and children were living in modern slavery in Asia and the Pacific” – Anna Tsalapatanis (Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, University of Oxford) in “An uncertainty of terms. Definitional and methodological concerns in human trafficking” (IIAS The Newsletter 87 Autumn 2020)
https://www.iias.asia/the-newsletter/article/uncertainty-terms-definitional-and-methodological-concerns-human-trafficking
https://indiantribalheritage.org/?p=36150

“There are over 500 tribes (with many overlapping communities in more than one State) as notified under article 342 of the Constitution of India, spread over different States and Union Territories of the country […] Primitive, geographically isolated, shy and socially, educationally & economically backwardness these are the traits that distinguish Scheduled Tribes of our country from other communities. Tribal communities live in about 15% of the country’s areas in various ecological and geo-climatic conditions ranging from plains to forests, hills and inaccessible areas.” – National Commission for Scheduled Tribes, Government of India (Ministry of Tribal Affairs) on 26 June 2019
https://www.ncst.nic.in 
https://www.indiantribalheritage.org/?page_id=22029

Cf. 2017 figures and distribution across India:
“There are over 700 tribes (with overlapping communities in more than one State) which have been notified under Article 342 of the Constitution of India, spread over different States and Union Territories of the country. The largest number of main tribal communities (62) has been specified in relation to the State of Orissa. The Scheduled Tribes have been specified in relation to all the States and Union Territories except Haryana, Punjab, Chandigarh, Delhi, and Pondicherry.” – National Commission for Scheduled Tribes, Government of India (Ministry of Tribal Affairs) on 10 April 2017
https://www.ncst.gov.in/content/frequently-asked-questions
https://indiantribalheritage.org/?p=22095