The main criteria adopted for identification of ‘Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups’ (PVTG) – Government of India

The Dhebar commission (1960) and the Shilu Ao (1969) team recommended the Government of India that primitive tribal communities should be taken as a special category for which special programmes would have to be initiated as quickly as possible for their all-round development. (Sibi Zacharias, 2003). As part of tribal sub plan, seventy five tribal … Read more

Tagore’s commitment to Santal villages near Santiketan – UNESCO World Heritage Centre

Keeping Rabindranath’s ideas in mind, Surendranath Kar prepared the architectural plan and Nandalal Bose [>>Wikipedia] prepared the visual perspective based on the Borobudur style. The entire outside wall was decorated with beautiful relief work by Kala-Bhavana students under the guidance of Nandalal Bose. The Santals on either side of the main door and on the … Read more

Traditional social structures of Adivasis and the constitutional right to food: “Will this be the end of malnutrition and starvation in India?”

Source: 2022 Global Hunger IndexURL: https://www.globalhungerindex.org/india.htmlDate Visited: 30 June 2022 Legally entitled to a full stomach Fifty percent of the world’s hungry live in India [2012 estimates, see globalhungerindex.org for more recent figures]. But India is a democracy, which gives her citizens a lot of rights – for instance, the constitutional right to food. Based … Read more

School enrolment and literacy: State priorities towards education under colonial rule and since India’s independence – Gujarat, Jharkhand, Manipur, Rajasthan & West Bengal

Why does China soar where India continues to struggle? The most basic reason is state priorities towards education. As of 1947, the literacy rate in India was barely 11%. But the Chinese emulated Japan’s earlier policy choices (and were themselves soon copied by the south east Asian “tigers”) by investing very heavily in primary education. … Read more

Marlavai Training Centre – model for present day education of tribal people – Andhra Pradesh

Marlavai village in Jainoor mandal of Adilabad district was not this sleepy when Austrian anthropologist Christoph von Furer-Haimendorf was at work during the decade of 1940. He had launched his pioneering experiment in education of tribal people at this village. This experiment, christened Gond Education Scheme in Adilabad district, was the first concrete step in tribal … Read more