Addition of four tribes to the scheduled tribes list.

The Union Cabinet, under the chairmanship of the Prime Minister, has approved the addition of four tribes to the list of scheduled tribes.

These tribes are from Himachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Chhattisgarh.
They are:
- Hatti tribe-Himachal Pradesh.
- Narikoravan and Kurivikkaran hill tribes-Tamil Nadu.
- Binjhia tribe-Chhattisgarh.

Further, the Cabinet approved a proposal to bring the Gond community residing in 13 districts of Uttar Pradesh under the scheduled tribes (ST) list from the scheduled caste list.
The Cabinet approved ‘Betta Kuruba’ as a synonym for the Kadu Kuruba tribe in Karnataka.

The Hattis are a close-knit community that got their name from their tradition of selling homegrown vegetables, crops, meat, wool, etc. at small markets called “haat” in towns.
The Hatti homeland can be seen on the Himachal-Uttarakhand border in the basin of the Giri and Tons rivers, both tributaries of the Yamuna.
There are two Hatti clans, in Trans-Giri and Jaunsar Bawar, that have similar traditions, and inter-marriages are common.
A traditional council governs the Hattis called the ‘khumbli’.

The Narikuravars are an indigenous, semi-nomadic tribal community living in Tamil Nadu.
The tribe was one of the many that were notified as’ criminals’ during colonial times. They were decriminalised under the Denotified Tribes Act, 1952.
Culture:
- The Narikuravas speak an unclassified Indo-Aryan language called Vaagri Booli.
- Each Narikurava clan has a bundle of clothes called Sami-mootai meaning “God’s bundle.”
- It is filled with the blood of animals sacrificed by the Narikuravas and clothes dipped in it.

The names Narikoravan, Narikuravan, and Narikoravar represent one and the same community.
Kurivikkaran is an additional colloquial name for this community in Tamil Nadu due to one of their traditional occupations of “trapping birds, especially sparrows” (Kurivi in Tamil denotes sparrow).

These tribal people are spread over the states of Bihar, Odisha, West Bengal, and Madhya Pradesh.
They are also known as “Binjhawars” in some areas, particularly the Chhattisgarh area.
The Binjhia speak a crude type of Hindi known as Jaspuri in Chhattisgarh.
Agriculture is the mainstay of the Binjhia economy.
Binjhia is an endogamous community. They are divided into several gotras (clans) such as
- Kaensa
- Kainsaba
- Nag
- Amrut
- Dadual
- Kusha
- Bhairab Kapil
- Kashyap
- Koshik
- Agnihotri

Their traditional community panchayat, constituted by the male representative of each family and their village-level community functionaries, still continues to be effective.
The traditional chief of the village, called “Ganju,” presides over the village council meetings. The post of their “Ganju” is hereditary.

Scheduled tribes were defined in Article 366 (25) as “such tribes or tribal communities, or parts or groups within such tribes or tribal communities, as are regarded to be Scheduled Tribes for the purposes of this constitution under Article 342.”

As per Census-1931, Schedule tribes are termed as “backward tribes” living in the “Excluded” and “Partially Excluded” areas.
The Government of India Act of 1935 called for the first time for representatives of “backward tribes” in provincial assemblies.
The Constitution does not define the criteria for recognition of scheduled tribes, and hence the definition contained in the 1931 Census was used in the initial years after independence.
However, Article 366(25) of the Constitution only provides a process to define Scheduled Tribes:
There are over 705 tribes that have been notified. The largest number of tribal communities is found in Odisha.
The Fifth Schedule of the Constitution lays out provisions for the administration and control of scheduled areas and scheduled tribes in states other than Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura, and Mizoram.
The Sixth Schedule deals with the administration of the tribal areas in Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura and Mizoram.

Pic Courtesy: Pinterest

Content Source: The Hindu