“Tribal population was spread all over India and most of them occupied wild tracts, hilly and forested areas, away from more civilized centers. In 1880 their population was estimated at about seventy million. They had existed for centuries with their own social traditions and beliefs and subsisted on natural resources. They had preserved their near isolation and way of life until the British administration and policies made inroads into their territories.” – Subha Johari in “Tribal Dissatisfaction Under Colonial Economy of 19th Century”
http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1040271311
https://indiantribalheritage.org/?p=11961
We met adivasis who had been persecuted by the Naxalites, and other adivasis who had been tormented by the Salwa Judum vigilantes [i.e. “a strange, not to say bizarre, example of bipartisan co-operation“]. The situation of the community was poignantly captured by one tribal, who said […] “placed between the Maoists and the vigilantes, we … Read more
One of many broken agreements was that children were to be educated “whenever the Indians of the reserve shall desire it” in schools on the reserves. But rather than instruction being optional for those bands who desired it, as agreed, the state abducted Indigenous children and forcibly confined them in residential schools far from their … Read more
Dharmalingam Venugopal (Honorary Director of Nilgiri Documentation Centre) writes in The Hindu, September 17, 2011: The Todas and the Kotas of the Nilgiris have managed to preserve their strikingly unique culture in the face of relentless development. […] The World Heritage Committee of the United Nations has deferred India’s request to declare the Western Ghats as … Read more
Read the full story and view more images >> Source: ‘Every plant and animal is useful to us’: Indigenous professor re-thinking how we deal with invasive speciesURL: http://www.cbc.ca/radio/unreserved/every-plant-and-animal-is-useful-to-us-indigenous-professor-re-thinking-how-we-deal-with-invasive-species-1.4605344Accessed: 22 April 2018 MORE FROM THIS EPISODE
Adivasis in Colonial India – Survival, Resistance and Negotiation by Biswamoy Pati (Orient BlackSwan, 2011) How do we define ‘adivasis’? A post-modernist approach will situate them as ‘colonial constructs’. However, as this book goes to show, tribals were not just a colonial creation. They were a part of south Asian reality at the time of India’s … Read more