Nomadic, Semi nomadic and Denotified tribes
It has been estimated that South Asia has the world’s largest nomadic population. In India, roughly 10 per cent of the population is Denotified and Nomadic. While the number of Denotified Tribes is about 150, the population of Nomadic Tribes consists of about 500 different communities. While the Denotified Tribes have almost settled in various States of the country, the Nomadic Communities continue to be largely nomadic in pursuit of their traditional professions.
The Indian Constitution does not mention the Denotified or Nomadic Tribes. It confines itself to the Scheduled Castes, the Scheduled Tribes and the Backward Classes. The Denotified & Nomadic Tribes have thus been largely out of focus of the social sector management except in a couple of States like Maharashtra and Gujarat. It has also been painfully observed that even though a large number of these Tribes and Communities are in the lists of SCs, STs and BCs/OBCs, they have not been able to take advantage of the affirmative action programmes launched by the Union and the States from time to time due to illiteracy and ignorance. As a result, these Communities continue to be the most disadvantaged and the most vulnerable section of the Indian society.
Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes-Historical Perspective Denotified Tribes
The so-called Criminal Tribes were notified as such by the British by enacting the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871 as a part of their misconceived strategy to control crime in British India by branding a large number of Indian castes and communities as criminal. This led to the creation of settlements of these tribes in
various parts of the country to enable the police to exercise constant surveillance over the movement and behaviour of such tribes and thus prevent them from committing crime. This arrangement caused considerable harassment and hardships to these castes and communities and adversely affected their lifestyles and sustenance. After India achieved independence in 1947, the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871 was reviewed and eventually repealed in 1952. As a result, all the castes and communities which were notified under the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871 were denotified. Unfortunately, though the Act was repealed, its adverse impact continued on both the castes and communities which were earlier branded as criminal by the civil society at large. This antisocial legacy of the British Rule persists even today and both the police and the civil society treat them with suspicion and humiliation.
The media continues to brand these communities as ‘criminal tribes’. Even educated members of these communities, who constitute a few first-generation office-goers or professionals, are subjected to deep suspicion and insult by the wider society when they set out to look for jobs, and at their workplaces. There is constant, relentless humiliation they suffer at the hands of ‘respectable’ people. Swimming against the tide each day, they struggle to enter the virtuous cycle of education, work and respectability, which has eluded them and their children for several generations. Since ‘criminal tribes’ continue to make sensational headlines so frequently, the phenomenon needs to be examined historically.
To begin with, the Criminal Tribes Act was operational mainly in Punjab and North West Frontier Provinces. Criminal Tribes Act, 1911, replaced this Act, and was applied to the whole of British India. Compared to the 1871 Act, the new CTA gave more powers to local governments to declare any tribe, section or class of people as a Criminal Tribe; to order registration of members of the Criminal Tribe and taking of their finger prints; to direct that every such registered member would report himself at fixed intervals to a police officer of the village; report to the police officer or the headman any change of residence; and to restrict the movements of Criminal Tribe members to a particular area.
The Criminal Tribes Act denied members of the Criminal Tribe normal rights under the common law and took away the jurisdiction of the courts to question the validity of notifications issued under the most crucial sections of the CTA by the Government. The registration of an individual or a community could no longer be questioned under this section, nor could their restriction of movements. It was not for any offence committed that all these punitive measures were employed, but only for ‘preventive action’ which was the professed purpose, albeit unofficially, of the Criminal Tribes Act. This could be done even though Criminal Tribe member had no convictions, had never been imprisoned or even never sentenced to a fine. This was because all that was required for the notification of a community as a Criminal Tribe was the ‘reason to believe’ that the community was addicted to crime. Another important feature of the CTA was that local governments were authorized to establish industrial, agricultural or reformatory schools and settlements for members of the Criminal Tribe. Under this scheme, employment was to be given to the Criminal Tribes either on government agricultural land, or in a private enterprise. The members were not allowed to go out without a pass, which was issued at the discretion of the manager of the settlement. The local government could subject them to further ‘discipline’, if any members tried to escape from such settlements. Hours of work in a settlement, rate of payment, disposal of products made by the settlers, all were decided by rules that the local governments had made.
Most nomadic communities were declared criminal and put into these settlements where they were forced to work without payment in British owned enterprises, plantations, mills, quarries and factories. This measure was meant to reform them, and surveillance of these supposed criminals was achieved through missionary organizations. One of these organizations, Salvation Army, was extremely influential with the British government, and considered these settlements to be an experiment in ‘curing criminals’.
The communities which had already lost their means of livelihood suffered grievously because of their having been notified as Criminal Tribes. Declaring them criminal only worsened the situation as far as finding work was concerned as they were feared and mistrusted. The British administration also admitted that those who were registered under the Act were left at the mercy of subordinate police officers.
The practical criteria that the administration came to apply for a community to be notified were (i) blood relationship of individuals with members of the Criminal Tribe who had conviction in their names; and (ii) blood relationship with those who had already been notified. Administratively speaking, what this meant was that once notification of a particular section of a community was done, it could be an automatic basis for a number of fresh notifications.
There is historical evidence that a number of communities in the north of India were involved in the rebellion against the British in 1857. These communities were used by the rebel princes and rajahs either directly to fight against the British or were indirectly involved in a variety of ways in assisting their armies. As a result, these communities were brutally suppressed during 1857, and later declared Criminal Tribes under the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871. The 1857 war of independence convinced the British that it was time to sort out the faithful from the rebellious, to differentiate between the loyal and the disloyal.
A number of communities that had sided with the rebels and mutineers in 1857 were declared Criminal Tribes in 1871. Similarly, those communities that not only assisted Rana Pratap but also fought the British were declared Criminal Tribes. Another set of communities which fell in the net had acquired a criminal
image with the Madras administration because of the resistance they put up to the British attempts of annexing areas they had dominated. To give an example of the broadness and flexibility of the term ‘criminal’, and the open-ended uses to which the Criminal Tribes Act was put, it was suggested within the British administration that the Act could be used profitably ‘for combating secret societies, political preachers who might create unrest and so on’ for combating the newly emerging nationalist movement. The forest laws put into force from mid-nineteenth century onwards deprived a large number of communities of their traditional rights of grazing, hunting and gathering, and shifting cultivation in specific areas. The affected communities were ignorant of the new laws, and frequently found themselves on the wrong side of the law because of the new legislation against their livelihoods. Moreover, throughout the nineteenth century, the British government cleared the forests for commercial use, and ordered the forest communities to provide the labour for the newly established plantations. The communities which resisted this move were declared criminal.
A large number of communities were nomadic and earned livelihood through petty trade with local settled communities. They used to carry their merchandise on the backs of their animals and moved around selling petty articles. Such communities slowly lost their means of livelihood when the road and railway networks began to connect villages and towns. Historical records show that in any case the British administrators suspected all nomadic people. It was also argued that once such communities had lost their legitimate means of livelihood, they must have been living by indulging in criminal activities. There is ample evidence to show that a very large number of communities that were formerly nomadic fell in the net of the Criminal Tribes Act because of such an argument. Communities forced to settle down were used in British owned enterprises or were handed over to loyal landlords who were allowed to use them on their land as free agricultural labourers.
The provisions of the CTA were such that they only required reasonable suspicion on the part of the authorities, and not substantive proof of a community’s criminality. If ‘respectable’ people of the village (landlords, high castes or those who paid taxes to the British) testified that a community was criminal, it got notified. As mentioned earlier, a criminal could be any one who resisted the British. A community could also be declared a criminal tribe if it resisted a local oppressive landlord or high caste member.
Indian society always had traditional groups which subsisted on alms and charity or paid in kind for ‘spiritual’ services. Such groups had a low but legitimate place in the social hierarchy of settled people. Many of them, sadhus, fakirs, religious mendicants, fortune-tellers, genealogists, traditional healers, etc., were accepted by the settled society for their services. There were groups that entertained the public through performing arts. There were nomadic musicians, dancers, storytellers, acrobats, gymnasts and tightrope walkers. The British declared a number of these nomadic communities criminal tribes. Similarly, many nomadic groups, which entertained the public with the help of performing animals and birds (such as bears, monkeys, snakes, owls, birds) were also declared criminal tribes.
A number of communities which used to work with iron, clay, bamboo, etc., made and repaired a variety of domestic articles, implements and artefacts were also notified as criminals. As it will be seen from the above description, the Criminal Tribes Act was extremely arbitrary and unjust and a large number of communities all over the country suffered its impact. Though the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871 was repealed in 1952, its legacy continues to socio-economically harm these tribes and their proper settlement and rehabilitation continues to be a major challenge before the Union and the State Governments even today.
Nomadic and Semi-nomadic Tribes
1. Hunting and Food-gathering Communities:
Hunting and gathering is said to be as old as the history of mankind. Mankind all over the world practiced it for centuries as a source of subsistence and livelihood. ‘Hunting’ is defined as catching or killing animals for food. Hunting communities use arrows, traps and nets or similar other strategies to catch animals. On the other hand, ‘food gathering’ (or simply, ‘gathering’) refers to the collection and accumulation of food like tubers, roots, shoots, berries, nuts, leaves, and fruit from plants for consumption. People practicing these forms of livelihood are called hunters and food gatherers, or even the term ‘forager’ is used for them. Hunting and gathering as a source of livelihood is different from hunting for pleasure and sport and poaching, which may be a violation of laws in many countries.
Some nomadic communities are in the process of settling down in permanent villages but they still largely depend on hunting and gathering as livelihood support and continue to traverse seasonally to forests for hunting and gathering. Hunters and food-gatherers have always been nomads. These communities move in search of forests for food according to a seasonal pattern. Eco-systems are
usually connected with migratory game species and hunter-gatherers tend to adopt migratory settlement patterns. Hunter-gatherers have been described as egalitarian, living in small community groups in forests, in social harmony with each other, and in ecological tune with their forest environment. Some of these communities are full-time nomadic foragers. They have been described as small, autonomous and highly mobile communal units spread over large territories. The policy of the colonial rulers towards hunting-gathering communities was biased. The remarks of the colonial administrators about them were rooted in the values of racism and ethnocentrism. The colonial rulers felt that while white people were more refined, civilized and hence superior, the forest dwellers were ‘animal-like, inferior, and un-human’. Braidwood sums up the colonial view of the forest dwellers in the following words: ‘A man who spends his whole life following animals just to kill them to eat, or moving from one berry patch to another, is really living just like an animal.’ The colonial governments all over the world believed that hunting-gathering people belonged to the natural world and not to the civilised society. An author notes that in one country colonised by the whites, living aboriginal huntergatherers until 1960 were counted in wildlife tallies for animals rather than in population census. Often the hunter-gatherers were referred to as ‘primitive people’ or ‘primitive race’ belonging to the ‘past’. The advent of colonization had a disastrous bearing on the lives of hunting and gathering communities. In colonial societies, the administrators saw the nomadic lifestyle of hunting-gathering communities as a ‘problem’. Nomadism was seen as an administrative obstacle that prevented the authorities to exercise their control over these communities. They also could not collect revenue from huntergatherers, as they were not settled at one place. The colonial rulers made all efforts to ensure that the hunters and gatherers settled down rather than wandered about. Following the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871, some of the hunting communities were declared as ‘criminal tribes’ by the British from time to time and this continued to impinge on the lives of their descendents. Interestingly, the notification of these communities as ‘criminal tribes’ was not resorted to because of the poaching habits or any other disastrous ecological activities involved in by the British. Many of these communities, including those in the princely states, were regularly employed by both the British and the royal India gentlemen to hunt for pleasure. The skills of these communities in hunting were explicitly recognized, and their active assistance taken by hunting parties in precisely locating the game, to guide them through the thick forests, and to attract the actual prey – frequently the now endangered tiger. The colonial administrators gradually asserted that hunter-gatherers were responsible for the decline of wildlife. They did not realise that they indulged in hunting for sport as a matter of right. The colonial rulers systematically exploited the forest resources for its commercial and industrial ventures at home. Resources were siphoned off from the colonies, and strict forest laws were enacted to stop its use by natives, having traditional rights over them. All this led to a situation where hunting-gathering communities lost their sources of food and livelihood. The thinking of colonial rulers on the issue of the relationship between these tribes and forests has continued even in independent India. The forest administrators have gone a step forward. Their strategy for forest conservation is not only continued with the earlier laws, but also to enact new, and stricter laws. The result is that the forest laws have led to a large number of such communities being subjected to intense hunger for the following reasons:
a. Lack of access to small games, like fowl, rabbits, deer, monkeys, which used to be staple for a large number of hunting communities.
b. Lack of access to bark, roots, tubers, corns, leaves, flowers, seeds, fruits, sap, honey, toddy and other forest products, which were a regular source of nutrition for gathering communities.
c. Lack of access to fish in ponds and streams in the forest that used to be a traditional source of protein.
d. Lack of access to pasture land for grazing animals has led to a decline in the population of cattle which used to be the main source of milk and meat for some hunting gathering communities. The new forest policy of the Government of India has served to displace hunting and gathering communities from the forests by creating National Parks, Wildlife Sanctuaries, and protected areas. Hunting-gathering communities have lived along with wildlife in the forests since ages.
Although this process has not been much documented in India, some cases illustrating the marginalization and acute proletarianization of hunter-gatherers may be culled from literature. According to a survey done in 2003, more than seventy per cent of a particular community in Rajasthan gave hunting as their main occupation. Because of restrictions on hunting, a majority of this particular community has taken to protecting agricultural fields against crop depredation by animals like the nilgai (blue bull). Other communities living in the vicinity of forests are informally using their skill at hunting animals. But as this utilization continues at an informal level and there is no official recognition of their role as a protector of crops, the community members merely get in return for their efforts some food grains and a piece of land to build temporary shelters on the farmers’ fields. Unlike the earlier times when hunting was their major occupation, today they only resort to hunting in the times of distress. As a result, the study shows that on an average, more than seventy per cent of the families of this community interviewed faced food shortage crises.
To conclude, today’s hunting-gathering communities are in a state of penury as they have not only lost their traditional means of livelihood, but their very survival is also in jeopardy.
2. Nomadic Pastoral and Non-Pastoral Communities
Nomadism, along with its different variants, is a perpetually changing social formation. Communities which were always nomadic are slowly settling down, and those which had settled in the past are being constrained to a peregrinating existence. For instance, certain communities of displaced persons and projectaffected people usually become nomadic when their land is alienated and the compensatory alternatives, which the state provides them, fall short of sustaining them or their traditional lifestyles. Nomadism and sedentary living may be approached as cultural alternatives to seeking livelihood. What one chooses, or is forced to choose, depends upon the extraneous factors that are unremittingly shaped by the history of the community and the political state that exercises control over it. Perhaps, as archaeologists remind us, in pre-historic times, all human communities were nomadic and migratory. The search for better habitats, and what is metaphorically called ‘green pastures’, drove people from one place to another. Inter-community hostilities and scrimmages made people shift from the comforts of a place, where they had happily settled down, to less secure, difficult, and ecologically harsh lands. The folklore of many communities is replete with the stories of migration undertaken perforce under the environments of acrimony. The Gaddi of Bhanmore (in Himachal Pradesh), a Scheduled Tribe, attribute their nomadic existence to migration from Lahore (in Pakistan), where at one time they lived well until they were forced to move to their present location as a consequence of the atrocities to which the dominant community (professing a different religion) incessantly subjected them. When they reached the hills, they had to take up an occupation in harmony with its ecological demands. The castepeople, who came from Lahore, became ‘herdspersons’ (gadarīā), and came to be known collectively as Gaddi (the corrupt form of the Hindi word gadarīā), a community that comprises groups from different castes. The Gaddi offer a classical example of a tribal community which is composed of different castes, thus interrogating the distinction that anthropologists make between ‘tribe’ and ‘caste’ (Saberwal, 1999). A well-known saying in which the Gaddi sum up their history is: ujadā Lahore, basā Bhanmore (‘Lahore was deserted, Bhanmore was inhabited’). A lesson from this example is that for understanding the contemporary state of a community, it is imperative to look into its history (and also, ‘ethno-history’, which means the ‘past as the people construct it’). Another example here could be of a well-known nomadic community of blacksmiths of north India, originally from Chittorgarh in Rajasthan, called the Gadulia Lohar (Misra, 1977, The Nomadic Gadulia Lohar of Eastern Rajasthan, Anthropological Survey of India, Calcutta). These erstwhile sedentary people were constrained to leave their ancestral homes in Chittorgarh as it came under the control of the Mughal army in 1568. Along with the other great warriors, the Gadulia Lohar vowed that until Chittorgarh was liberated, they would not go to their fort, live in houses, sleep on cots, light lamps, and keep ropes for drawing water from the well, and this marked the beginning of their nomadic existence on bullock carts, moving from one place to another. Although in 1955, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru led them in a procession into Chittorgarh fort, thereby fulfilling their vows, they have continued to live nomadically perhaps because of the nature of their occupation, and its adaptation to social as well as natural environments.
Archaeologists tell us that with the Neolithic revolution (the age of food production, around 10,000 B.C.) came the gradual settlement of wandering communities. The settled agriculturalists developed symbiotic relationships with the other occupational communities (such as of the carpenters, basket-makers,
blacksmiths, potters, barbers, laundrymen, ethno-veterinarians, etc). Gradually, multi-community villages came into existence. Although the process of sedentarization of communities had begun, it did not imply that each community was destined to settle down. As some communities were settling down, along side were those that endured their nomadic way of life. For example, a study of the literary compositions in Tamil, dating back to the first six hundred years after the Christian era, points out that around two thousand years there were ‘wandering people’ who served the other communities as musicians, entertainers, fortune-tellers, and herbalists. They were also entrusted with the task of carrying messages from one state to the other. Some of them eked out their livelihood from beggary. These non-pastoral nomads, often dwelling the fringe areas of a community, occupied a lowly place in social hierarchy.
The relations of settled occupational communities with agricultural communities were different from the relations they and the agricultural communities had with nomadic people. The occupational communities served the agriculturists for the entire year, providing the products (say baskets, ploughs, shares, etc.) they produced, and were reciprocated in the form of grains at the end of the harvest season. By comparison, the services the nomads (including the pastoral) provided were not really a part of the agricultural operations or what the agricultural communities regularly needed. The peasants often kept milch and traction animals with them, and therefore, did not require an immediate dependence upon pastoral nomads for a regular supply of their products.
In other words, nomadic communities were not a part of the patron-client relations (what in north India are known as jajmānī ties) that usually characterized peasant villages in India. A settled occupational caste, which is a part of the jajmānī system, could remain dependent on a few peasant households, and meet its survival needs, but the nomads, particularly the non-pastoral, require a large number of clients dispersed over a large area for meeting their needs. The pastoral nomads needed to traverse a vast tract of land in search of grazing grounds for their flocks of animals. In that sense, a nomadic way of life was imperative for certain communities.
Moreover, it seems that in the past, the state wanted to keep some communities itinerant, for they would not only serve as ‘traditional postmen’, carrying messages from one state to the other, but also act as spies. Although appearing as bumpkin and rustic, the nomads were expected to bring in the ‘secrets’ of the other state. The role of peregrinators (not only of nomadic communities but also of mendicants) was recommended (and even extolled) by the Indological texts, including Arthasastra.
In addition, the policy of the ancient, and later on medieval, state with respect to nomadic communities was that of non-intervention. The state permitted the nomadic communities to wander and pursue an occupation they wished. Only when indulging in serious violations of law were they strictly dealt with, punished, and excommunicated. Interestingly, although the state was autocratic, it did not try to homogenize its subjects. On the contrary, if a community tried to usurp the occupation or the lifestyle of another community to which it objected, the state intervened to keep the multi-cultural world of the people intact.
Obviously, against this backdrop, if a community desired to remain nomadic, it could do so. Some communities were not fully nomadic, for they (or some of their members) returned to their villages during the months of monsoon for cultivation. Either they owned some cultivable land, which they tilled with domestic labour, or they worked on the land of others for wages. In the latter case, they returned to their respective camps after receiving wages. This was viewed as additional income.
Those who had land and tilled it, kept the produce with them for domestic consumption. However, in many cases, as it was difficult to transport the bags of grains and cereals from one place to another, they were sold off to agricultural castes, or even brought to the markets for disposal. Such communities, generally called semi-nomadic, usually cultivated just one crop. Sometimes they left the land fallow if the rains that year had been measly. Agriculture was caste-free. Anyone, from any caste, could take up agriculture as his occupation, either as a landlord or a tenant, or could render an agricultural operation (such as of weeding, ploughing, guarding the fields, as a labourer) for wages. Along side, each community also had a near monopoly on an occupation, the services and products of which it supplied to other caste communities. While pastoral nomads specialized in animal breeding and tending, thus contributing in a significant manner to the village economy, the non-pastoral nomads rendered a variety of services to a wide range of clients. They made and supplied a myriad of little useful items, such as mats, baskets, brooms, toys, brushes, and earthenwares. They also dealt with spices, honey, and plant and animal medicine. For instance, moving through villages, the Vaidus (or traditional healers) provided herbal medicines to their clients. Ghatiya Jogis made and repaired grinding stones. Some communities (such as Banjara, Lambadi) moved in caravans of packed animals with salt, while their women bartered jewellery (in silver or any other metal) they themselves had made. Gadulia Lohar arrived at the onset of the monsoon in peasant villages, selling and repairing agricultural tools and implements. In all cases, there obtained a relation of synergism between settled and nomadic communities, and as noted earlier, the state (or the nobility), whether in ancient or medieval times, did not force a community to follow a particular style of living. Each one was free to live the way it did, provided it did not defy the rules that sustained the autonomy of communities and communal harmony. We learn from historical accounts that the condition of nomads in ancient and medieval days was good, almost romantically eulogized. But the condition of nomads began changing during the British times, and gradually they lost their autonomy, peace and harmony. However, initially, the British rulers found nomads extremely useful for their knowledge. The nomads had established extensive communication networks with the communities to which they provided their services and goods. Since they travelled far and wide, they not only knew about different communities, their lifestyles and habits, but also about the paths, routes, hidden passes, and could guide visitors in their travels through deserts where a newcomer had the danger of being engulfed by a sand dune. For exercising effective control over their colonies, the British needed information about the people and their country, for which they took nomads under their patronage. Furthermore, they relied upon the nomads to help them setting up their trade routes and lead their armies through unknown terrains.
However, this period of honeymooning between the British and the nomads was short-lived. Soon the diabolical policies of the British started precipitating. The British gradually brought the areas where the nomads, shifting cultivators, and forest-dependent people lived, under their control. They also took over the common land. Intense demands were placed on the natural resources of the country for obtaining raw material for factories back home. More and more land was brought under cultivation, thus was not available for the flocks of animals. New forest laws were imposed, the outcome of which was that the forests became a public property, needing protection in name of the national interest. Shifting cultivation was viewed as destructive to forests; that was the reason why it deserved to be banned. Shifting cultivators – the ‘plunderers of forests’ – were believed to be in a state of ‘wildness’ and urgently needed to be civilized.
The consequence of all these policies was that the people were suddenly deprived of their life-support system. Thrown in a state of conundrum, they had no option but to shift to those areas that were hitherto un-surveyed, but soon, as was to happen, they also came under the control of the administration. Under these circumstances, the people had no alternative but to take up a criminal style of living that eventually alarmed the British, who went ahead with severely punitive legal and corporeal measures to domesticate the deprived communities. What the administration conveniently forgot was that it was solely responsible for making people deviant and criminal.
We may take some examples to show that one of occupational alternatives before nomadic and semi-nomadic communities as a result of the forces the British rule unleashed on them was to take up crime as a way of life. Take the case of the Lodha of West Bengal. These people of a pre-agricultural economy, mainly dependent upon forest products, lost the control of their forests to the Rajas and Zamindars, who secured it on fixed revenue from the British administration. As a consequence, the forests were cleared and converted into agricultural fields. Those who at one time were the ‘lords of the forests’, had the freedom to move from one part to the other, became ‘encroachers’, greatly restrained by forest guards from making use of the forest resources for their bare minimal survival. A situation of haplessness through which they passed forced them to adopt the ‘path of extra-legal activity’. From then on, they continued to indulge in anti-social activities, with the result that in 1871 they were declared to be a Criminal Tribe.
A sympathetic understanding of their history tells us that it was the outside invasions into their area, leading to usurping of their resources and a marauding of their life-support system, which led to these people opting for a criminal way of life. The stigma of criminality has dwarfed their status and prestige and thwarted their efforts to get a job and earn their livelihood. Suffering frequent police oppression, arrest, and confinement in prisons, their self-esteem is abysmally low. Under these circumstances, they have become incessantly migratory, as a consequence of which their group cohesion and family bondage
grievously suffer, contributing to an atomistic (or individualistic) living.
The Kanjar is one of the widely distributed communities of north India. Like the other foraging peoples, they have been living in the midst of settled communities for at least two millennia. Gradually, more and more forests were cleared up for agriculture. Settlements, roads, railway lines, and industries were laid out. In this process, the original habitat of the Kanjar was steadily destroyed. Resources for hunting and foraging were greatly reduced. Nagar (2008: 37) writes: ‘From being totally nomadic, the Kanjar bands had to settle down in the vicinity of villages and towns.’ Once their traditional sources of livelihood were jeopardized, they made new adjustments in their subsistence strategies, and one of them was to take crime as an alternative source of livelihood. Whilst the Kanjar were not as notorious as were the other communities of the plains (such as the Aheriyas, Haburas, and Sansi), they were known to commit theft and highway robbery. Travellers were afraid of moving through lonely or sparsely populated areas in the vicinity of Kanjar habitations.
The Pardhi of Madhya Pradesh are a semi-nomadic tribe, who have permanent houses away from peasant villages, where they live during the rainy season. During the dry months of the year, they are on the move, usually camping in forests, trying to catch wild animals that they hunt. This has been their traditional
occupation. Beginning with the British rule, there has been a deterioration of forests and a ban on hunting. Under the circumstances of not getting enough food for their survival, at some point of time, the Pardhi perforce took crime as a way of life. Enthoven) noted that though the Pardhi had peaceful habits, they often lived by thieving. They often robbed standing crops. So much were the landlords fearful of them that they tried to secure their goodwill by giving them gifts and a part of the produce. In this way, they were able to save their crops, otherwise they would have their total crops taken away or destroyed. Because of their proclivity to crime, all members of their community were regarded as criminal, and were rounded up by law-enforcing agencies whenever a case of crime occurred. In addition to the colonial rule’s take over of the land and resources of nomadic and semi-nomadic communities, there were some other factors responsible for the degradation of their condition. Nomads loved the freedom of movement, recognizing neither the national nor the international borders, which the administration tried to curtail. The leaders of nomadic groups were irritated by such moves. Many nomadic and semi-nomadic groups participated in the freedom movement of 1857, which was also a cause of worry for the administration, for it did not want it to snowball into a ‘national movement’. The nomads also carried information from one part to the other, thereby linking different communities, which made the British particularly nervous. Against this background the British prepared a list of Criminal Tribes, in which nomads, shifting cultivators, and forest-dwellers were classified, for the administration thought that this was the best way to deal with these communities, and keep them isolated from rest of the country.
The marginalization of nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes that began during the British rule continued unabated even after independence. Land reforms, which began in the 1950s, were a step towards the expansion of agriculture in the country. The emphasis in these reform programmes was on generating the
maximum revenue. The public land was colonized for cultivation of crops. The commons came to be grabbed by the influential villagers. In course of time, many forests and permanent pastures became private. Under the policy of ‘grow more food’, agriculture received the maximum attention to the neglect of pastoralism.
Areas that were earlier used as grazing sites came to be developed for agricultural fields, and were acquired by the peasant communities. For instance, the Rajasthan canal has brought vast tracts of land under cultivation, thus pushing the nomads out, who earlier used it for grazing purposes. In Gujarat, in 1950s and 1960s, the state supported land reforms known as Bhūdān movement, under which common lands were given away to low caste landless people. In the south-central region of Gujarat, known as Saurashtra, high tracts of commons were converted into croplands. As a result, permanent pastures were heavily reduced; they were less than twenty per cent of what they were at the time of independence. Pastoral nomads chose those lands for grazing their animals that had water sources nearby, but in course of time, they also started disappearing as the grazing lands were taken over by peasants. As a result, the condition of the nomads has worsened. At one time, there developed synergistic relations between the pastoralists and peasants. After the harvest, the agricultural fields were free to accommodate the migrating flocks of animals, which ate away what all was left and deposited manure therein. The agriculturists in fact invited nomadic pastoralists to their fields on the promise of some payment so that they could receive manure.
However, with fields becoming double or triple cropped, the symbiotic relations between peasants and pastoralists have broken down. Not only that, they are now of hostility and conflict. Every year, physical conflicts take place between migratory herds of animals and peasants, sometimes culminating in casualties on both sides. As a consequence, some nomadic pastoralists – such as the Raika of Rajasthan – have demanded the state to arm them so that they could protect them from peasants who consider the visit of animal-breeders to their areas as a nuisance and wish to deal with it strictly (Srivastava, 1999, in M.K. Bhasin and Veena Bhasin (eds.), People of Rajasthan, Kamla-Raj Enterprises, Delhi). Against this background, the nomadic pastoralists think that their occupation has become a difficult proposition.
Recongnition of denotified, nomadic and semi nomadic tribes
Independent India envisioned building an egalitarian society in which people with diverse socio-cultural and economic backgrounds can have equal opportunities in different fields with dignity and honour. To achieve this society, some sort of social engineering was imperative for bringing the historically wronged and deprived communities at par with the historically favoured and privileged. Positive discrimination along with developmental interventions, and capacity and asset building, was considered essential to this social engineering. For achieving a state of social and economic equality, the builders of modern
India have undertaken certain measures right from the time of Independence. As a part of this process the people who had been historically wronged and disadvantaged were put under different social categories, such as the Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs), and Other Backward Classes (OBCs).
Each was accorded certain privileges to overcome its socio-economic disabilities. In this categorisation, the communities that were earlier part of the Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes were also included in the lists of SC, ST, and OBC categories. However, their categorisation was not logical or uniform. There are still a number of Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes which have not been included in any one of these categories. Instead, they are placed at par with the communities of the general category. These communities have a long history of marginalisation, neglect and oppression, first during the colonial rule, and subsequently, in independent India.
Summary of Views of Different Committees and Commissions on Denotified and Nomadic Communities:
a) The Criminal Tribes Inquiry Committee, 1947
The Criminal Tribes Inquiry Committee, 1947, was constituted in the United Province. In its report, this Committee felt that till the Gypsies settled down, they would continue with criminal tendencies. It proposed that ‘efforts should be made under sanction of law (suitable provision may be made in the Habitual Offenders andVagrants Act) to settle them and teach them a life of industry and honest calling as against idleness, prostitution and crime to which their conditions of existence make them prone’.
b) Ayyangar Committee
A Committee was established under the Chairmanship of Mr. Ananthsayanam Ayyangar in 1949. After a detailed study of the working of the Criminal Tribes Act throughout the country, it submitted its report in 1950, in which it made several recommendations for the repeal of the Act and gave reasons for this. The
Committee also emphasized the need for allocation of adequate funds for their welfare and rehabilitation. It recommended that the Central Government should make a liberal contribution not exceeding 50 percent of the allocation to the State Governments for the initiation and execution of the schemes for a period of ten years in the first instance.
The Government of India accepted some of the recommendations of the Ayyangar Committee. It repealed the Criminal Tribes Act with effect from 31 August 1952 by the Criminal Tribes (Repeal) Act, 1952 (Act No XXIV of 1952). But, to keep effective control over the so-called hardened criminals, Habitual Offenders Act was placed in the statute book.
c) Kalelkar Commission
The first Backward Class Commission was appointed on 29 January 1953 under the Chairmanship of Mr. Kakasaheb Kalelkar. This Commission in paragraph 48 of its report suggested that the erstwhile ‘Criminal Tribes’ should not be called ‘Tribes’ nor should the names ‘Criminal’ or ‘Ex-Criminal’ be attached to them. They could be called ‘Denotified Communities’. The Kalelkar Commission further recommended that “these groups may be distributed in small groups in towns and villages where they would come in contact with other people and get an opportunity for turning a new leaf. This would help in their eventual assimilation in society”. The first Backward Class Commission in paragraph 41 mentions that there were as many as 127 groups aggregating 22.68 lakhs in 1949 and 24.64 lakhs in 1951 described in official records as Ex-Criminal Tribes. These groups could be divided into two sections, i.e., (i) Nomadic; and (ii) Settled. The nomadic groups included the gypsy-like tribes such as Sansis, Kanjars, etc., and ‘had an innate preference for a life of adventure.’ The settled and semi-settled groups were deemed to have descended from irregular fighting men or persons uprooted from their original homes due to invasions and political upheavals. The first Backward Class Commission took special note of the ‘wandering communities’ separately in the later part of its report in paragraph no. 135. The relevant portion is quoted below: ‘There are a large number of small communities who eke out a precarious existence in the countryside. They have no fixed place of residence and they move from place to place in search of food or employment. They often rear pigs and poultry, hunt wild animals to satisfy their hunger and collect forest produce to make a living. They live in thatched sheds or gunny tents and move in groups. They believe in witchcraft. Because of the insecurity of their life, some of these communities are given to crime. It should be the special responsibility of Government to give them a settled life’.
d) Lokur Committee
In 1965, an Advisory Committee was constituted for the revision of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes list by the Government of India under the Chairmanship of Mr B.N. Lokur. The pre-independence list of ‘Denotified and Nomadic Tribes’ consequently got divided into the three constitutionally recognized categories, i.e. Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes. Although the Lokur Committee in general followed the strict guideline for entertaining the requests of revision of the Schedule Caste and Scheduled Tribes lists, it had given quite favourable recommendations with regard to Denotified and Nomadic Tribes. The Committee was aware of the anomalous situation of the communities being listed as SC in one State and as ST in another (and also OBC in another).
According to the Committee, ‘This anomalous classification appears to have had its origin in the fact that members of the Denotified and nomadic communities possess a complex combination of tribal characteristics, traditional untouchability, nomadic traits, and anti-social heritage’. The Lokur Committee observed that its ‘discussion with the State Governments, however, revealed that the type of development schemes usually designed for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes have not benefited the denotified and nomadic tribes to any significant extent because of their relatively small numbers, and their tendency to be constantly on the move. It is also clear that while these communities may possess some characteristics usually associated with the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, the dominant factors which govern their life are their anti-social heritage and tendency to move from place to place in small groups. We are inclined to feel that it would be in the best interest of these communities if they are taken out from the lists of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and treated exclusively as distinct group, with development schemes specially designed to suit their dominant characteristics’. Lokur Committee further suggested that ‘the present anomalous position regarding the denotified and nomadic tribes, who could more properly be identified as communities rather than tribes, should be rectified as soon as possible after a detailed investigation’
e) Mandal Commission
The Second Backward Class Commission under the Chairmanship of Mr. B.P. Mandal (1980) criticized the government policy for emphasizing the economic criteria and dismissing caste as a criterion to determine social and educational backwardness. Mr L. R. Naik wrote a separate minute of dissent with reference to the categorization of the socially and educationally backward classes. He states that, ‘By way of clarity they would be hereinafter, called ‘Depressed Backward Classes’ as distinct from the ‘Intermediate Backward Classes’…. The intermediate backward classes, in my opinion, are those whose traditional occupation had been agriculture, market, gardening, betel-leaves growers, pastoral activities, village industries like artisans, tailors, dyers and weavers, petty business-cum-agricultural activities, heralding, temple service, toddy selling, oil mongering, combating, astrology, etc. etc., who have co-existed since times immemorial with upper castes and had, therefore, some scope to imbibe better association and what all it connotes than many unfortunate ‘Depressed Backward Classes’ whose intermingling with the Indian society was either denied, prohibited and even segregated obviously on account of stigma of nomadism, resulting in their abysmally low social status. They, generally, are excriminal tribes, nomadic and wandering tribes, earth diggers, fishermen, boatmen and palanquin bearers, salt makers, washermen, shepherds, barbers, scavengers, basket makers, furriers and tanners, landless agricultural labourers, watermen, toddy tapers, camel-herdsmen, pig-keepers, pack bullock carriers, collectors of forest produce, hunters and fowlers, corn parchers, primitive tribes (not specified as Scheduled Tribes), exterior classes (not specified as Scheduled Castes), and begging communities etc. etc.… These very names amply connote their social and educational backwardness and, therefore, should have been postulated by the Founding Fathers of our Constitution as in the case of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes for the purpose of specification.… Liberty, Equality and Fraternity so richly enshrined in the Constitution of our country have still to acquire meaningful proposition for all of them’ (Pp. 229-230, emphasis added).
f) Justice Venkatachaliah Commission
The Report of the National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution under the Chairmanship of Justice M.N. Venkatachaliah, submitted to Government of India on 31 March 2002, made a very focussed review on the plight of Denotified and Nomadic Communities in Chapter 10 on ‘Pace of Socio-Economic Change and Development’ under 10.12.1 and 10.12.2 and recommended for the establishment of a Commission to review things related to these communities. The Report states that ‘The denotified tribes/communities have been wrongly stigmatized as crime prone and subjected to high handed treatment as well as exploitation by the representatives of law and order as well as by the general society. Some of them are included in the list of Scheduled Tribes and others are in the list of Scheduled Castes and list of backward classes. It is further suggested in the Report of Justice Venkatachaliah Commission that, ‘The Commission also considered the representations made on behalf of the Denotified and Nomadic Tribal Rights Action Group and decided to forward them to the Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment with the suggestion that they may examine the same preferably through a Commission’.
It is apparent from the observations of the above Committees or Commissions that the conditions of the Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes or Communities are deplorable and deserve a separate and special treatment so that their lot can be improved. This is essential for bringing this very large section of downtrodden citizens of India into the ambit of development and to confer upon them the dignity of citizenship with all its appended social, cultural, economic and political rights on par with the others. Otherwise, the words ‘constitution’ and ‘citizenship’ are hollow and irrelevant to them.
History
a) The Criminal Tribes Acts (CTA) of 1871
b) The Criminal Tribes Acts (CTA) 1911 under which between 150 and 200 communities were deemed to be ‘hereditary criminals’ and subject to surveillance, confinement and gross discrimination.
c) Habitual offenders act, 1952
d) Denotified tribes act/ Vimukta Jati based on recommendations of Kaka Kallelkar committee and All India Criminal Tribes Inquiry Committee (1949) Consists of
a) Nomadic, semi nomadic and gypsy like people
b) Trace descent from irregular fighting clans
c) They left their homes due to Invasions, Political upheaval, Innate adventurous nature
d) Psychological and cultural belief Problems
- a) Poverty
- b) Unemployment
- c) Discrimination
- d) Isolated in colonies
- e) Dark cloak around neck
- f) Automatic criminalisation due to birth
- g) Creation of separate reformatory settlements for the children of these tribes
- thus isolating children from their parents
- h) Social stigma and alienation
- i) Harassment and discrimination
- j) Suspicion during crimes
- k) Lack of provision of atrocities act
- l) Lack of reservations
- m) Economic hardships
Atrocities and Human right Violations
Denotified and Nomadic communities have always been on the receiving end, be it in the arena of development, law enforcement, justice delivery or what have you. Their situation is somewhat paradoxical. To put differently, if the fence eats the crop who can save the crop and to whom the crop can complain? If the State, which is supposed to look after the welfare of its citizens, becomes the tormentor, who can rescue its subjects and to whom can they look up to for help. This is exactly the dilemma that the Denotified and Nomadic communities have been facing since the British rule. Prevailing situation today calls for an overhaul of law enforcement and civil administration. It also requires educating the general public/civil society about these communities to remove the false images that they have developed about these communities. The following discussion would bring to the fore the alarming situation concerning these communities today.
Human rights situation of Denotified and Nomadic communities, more so in case of the former, is appalling and deplorable, to say the least. They are subjected to atrocities everyday by the police, civic and revenue administration, and civil society. Many of these atrocities go unnoticed as they are never reported or reported wrongly. Unwittingly, media is one of the major enhancers of stigma wrongly attributed to them and their relentless campaign against these hapless communities day in and day out in their columns. While reporting crime in their daily columns they report that these crimes are done by some Pardhi, Sansi, Bavaria, etc., gangs. This makes the readers to believe that these communities are criminal in nature.
There are varied reasons for the perpetuation of atrocities on these communities, the major one being the colonial rule. In a way, they are the helpless victims of the wronged past as well as the present due to deliberate orchestration of falsehood by the dominant groups or interests. Today, law enforcement, revenue and civic administration are the major culprits and colluders in perpetuating atrocities and human rights violations on these communities. The mindset of these perpetrators is one of arrogance, disrespect for law and human values. This is more so in case of lower rung officials of different departments of government and even judiciary who are steeped in corruption and debased values. They behave as if they are the rule-makers and take law into their hands and harass these helpless and poor members of the communities. The harassment is not restricted to individuals only but is extended to the other members of the family and their wider kin. These communities being poor, resource-less, homeless, illiterate, naïve and ignorant, fatalistic, and scattered, consider these happenings as their misfortune for being what they are. They lack organisation, political clout, and resources. They are disadvantaged in all respects and hence, become an easy prey. In this regard, no discrimination is made between men, women, children or aged by the perpetrators of violence and abuse, be they the police, neighbouring caste communities, wider civil society and visual and print media. Denotified and Nomadic communities encounter many a humiliation, and both verbal and physical abuse for meeting their basic needs, like food and shelter, and in accessing amenities like drinking water, fuel, fodder, burial place for their
dead, etc. They are constantly hounded out, living in grip of fear and threat for their existence. In light of this, one can easily understand the atrocities committed by the police, village communities, local power-holders, revenue and civic officials, who all form a cliché against these hapless Denotified and Nomadic communities. Commission has witnessed this in many places across the country that it had visited. Many a time, the complaints from the Denotified and Nomadic communities are not even registered, leave aside their expediting. They prejudge and regard them as bad elements, criminals and are always wrong. Police assert that the Denotified and, in some cases, Nomadic communities, continue to be criminal by birth and invariably are made liable to all crimes in their jurisdiction. In a way, they are law unto themselves.
Justice is a mirage and unaffordable to these communities. They do not have any one to stand in their support, except for a handful of civil rights activists. There is a need for massive campaigning against the ill-conceived notions about these hapless communities, sensitizing the police, officials, and civil society on the lines of HIV/AIDS. In fact, this social malaise is no less dangerous than the dreadful disease that the HIV/AIDS is.
Bala Krishna Renke committee
The National Commission for Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes (NCDNSNT) is a national commission set under Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, Government of India, to study various developmental aspects of Denotified and nomadic or semi-nomadic tribes in India. The recommendations of the committee are:
a) Denotified tribes to be identified as a special group
b) Reservations in education, employment and other sectors
c) Special housing scheme for five years
d) Provision of land for agriculture
e) Scheme for skill development
f) Establishing a national commission and corporation for education and health
g) Aadhar card for every person of DNT.
h) Union Government initiate steps to enumerate DNTs in the next census due in 2011
i) For implementation of welfare Schemes for DNTs State-wise list of such tribes should be prepared.
j) Advisory Committees may be made at District and State level to assist the socio-economic condition of the DNTs, so that action plan can be drawn for their welfare.
k) State Government may take special steps to issue Caste Certificates and ration cards to every member of DNT, and BPL Certificates and to the concerned members, expeditiously.
l) Union of India may take special campaign for issue of voter ID to the eligible members of DNT.
m) Basic civic amenities be provided to the DNTs living in colonies and clusters.
n) Ministry of SJ&E may earmark outlay for the welfare of DNTs.
o) Central should modify the existing Housing Schemes in urban/rural areas and earmark specifically for DNTs.
p) Special drive be made for awareness of DNTs particularly among women to avail the benefit of various schemes for educational empowerment. Special Residential Schools for DNT Boys and Girls be made to encourage education among them.
q) Skill Development Programmes be taken up for DNTs to improve their self employability and wage employment, in collaboration with National Small Industries Corporation (NSIC), Khadi & Village Industries Commission (KVIC), the Central Cottage Industries Corporation of India Limited, the Handicrafts and Handlooms Exports Corporations of India Limited.
r) States/UTs and Central Ministries should formulate and implement DNT Sub-Plan for DNTs
s) Separate Finance and Development Corporation for DNTs, like National Scheduled Castes Finance & Development Corporation, may be set up at the centre.
t) Considering the gravity of their plight, there is a need for a separate department for the welfare of DNTs at the State level and separate Ministry/Department for the welfare of DNTs at the Centre.
u) It is necessary that the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 be, mutatis mutandis, made applicable to DNTs, and the implementation of the same be reviewed and monitored from time to time.
v) Constitution may be amended to include “Scheduled Communities” under Article 330 and Article 332 to enable these communities to be eligible for reservation of seats in the Houses of the People and in the Legislative Assemblies of the States.
w) Seats may be reserved in Block/Taluka Panchayats and Zila Panchayats/Zilla Parishad, and the Urban Local Bodies for DNTs wherever their population is concentrated.
x) To mobilise additional resources to improve the socio-economic conditions of DNTS, it is suggested that 10% of the funds earmarked for M.P. Local Area Development Fund.
y) It is suggested that the DNTs be given 10% reservation in Government jobs even if the total reservation exceeds 50%.
z) Research Institutes should be set up by the States/UTs for DNTs.
aa)A multicultural complex/Academy may be set up in every State/UT to develop, preserve and exhibit the diverse and rich cultural heritage of DNTs