By Barnes Mawrie
Every year on 9th August, the world celebrates the day of Indigenous Peoples. This international day was first instituted in the state of California in 1992 to coincide with the 500th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’ arrival in the Americas in 1492. The purpose of this day was to replace the traditional Columbus Day which symbolized colonialism and slavery, with a day to celebrate indigenous people’s power. It was on 23rd December 1994, that the UN adopted a resolution to institute 9th August as the International Day of Indigenous People, to be celebrated annually.
“Indigenous and tribal peoples” is a common denominator for more than 370 million people, found in more than 70 countries worldwide. Indigenous and tribal peoples have their own cultures, languages, customs and institutions, which distinguish them from other parts of the societies in which they find themselves.” Indigenous people are native to the place and therefore they have absolute right of ownership to the land they inhabit.
In India the population of indigenous people usually referred to as adivasis or tribals, is 104 million which constitutes 8.6% of the country’s population. The tribal people in India have been exploited for centuries and their land has been forcefully occupied by others or taken over by the governments with little or no compensation at all. When it comes to any developmental project, it is tribal land that the governments seek out and not that of non-tribals. Thus in most tribal lands in Jharkhand, Chattishgarh and other states, the governments from time to time have forcefully evicted tribal communities in order to mine minerals, set up industries, build dams or estates etc. The evicted tribal families are often given a pittance for the land taken or else the promises of compensation are never fulfilled. The helplessness of the tribal people due to their illiteracy, poverty and lack of political voice, has been exploited by the rich and powerful. In most cases, development projects benefit only the non-tribals who manage these projects and reap the benefits of these while the poor tribal people are left with low grade jobs with low salaries.
When it comes to Northeast India, we may say that tribal communities here are much better off with regard to land ownership. Because of the provisions of the Sixth Schedule, the tribal communities of our region are in a more advantageous position than their counterparts in other parts of India. However, what we see in this region is the growing influx of non-tribals and the absence of an effective mechanism to check such a phenomenon. In most cases, the local politicians themselves become the culprits and traitors to the communities by shielding refugees and even settling them permanently, all for the sake of vote banks. If the population of non-tribals has risen so dramatically in some states of our region, the blame lies in the governments. Assam is an example, where for the sake of votes, political parties have permitted an endless flow of migrants from Bangladesh. Today Assam right from Goalpara up to Lakhimpur, the demography has tilted in favour of non-tribals. Tripura is a classic example of how tribal communities have become a minority in their own land due to the blunder of their rulers. We could imagine that Jaintia Hills would have met with the same fate had the king of Jaintiapur not been defeated by the British in 1835. The king who had become a Hindu was already bringing in a lot of Bengalee Hindus into his kingdom for many purposes just like what the King of Tripura had done. However, the attempts to change the tribal demography in Northeast India have not ceased but are still going on in clandestine and tactical ways.
On this International Day of Indigenous People, we as tribals in India rejoice at the fact that we have the first tribal president of the country in the person of Ms Droupadi Murmu. Yet knowing that the president is only a nominal head, she would not be able to bring about desired changes on behalf of tribal communities. We look forward to that day when we will have a tribal prime minister, then only the situation can improve for the tribal population. In this connection, today is the right day to speak of the urgent need to have a national tribal political party which can be at par with any other national party. Keeping in mind that the tribal population is very large and spread out all over the country, such a party could become a reality not in the distant future. If this could be realized, the tribal communities would have a decisive political voice in the country. With a hundred or more tribal MPs in the parliament what a powerful pressure group we could build up. In a recent national conference of tribal scholars held in Shillong in June this year, there was a unanimous decision that academically, tribals in India should develop their own common full-fledged Philosophy and Theology which could become part of the academic curricula. This is already a positive step in the right direction towards unification of tribals in India. A national tribal political party would further enhance such unification and make the tribal communities a formidable force in the country. We look forward to the emergence of a true tribal statesman one who is universally accepted by tribal communities (someone like late P. A. Sangma) and who could bring all tribal politicians under one umbrella to fight as a unified force. The tribal people have been suppressed and ignored for a very long time. It is time that we rise up and claim our rights and privileges.