Session 45 summary
A retrospect on what Adivasis have faced since colonial times – 15 years ago Dr. Devy made a network for identifying many tribals , the people were from the indigenous communities of North America, South America, Australia, New Zealand, East Asia, South Asia and Africa. There were few Europeans scholars also and they would meet regularly once a year. This was a group of scholars who know sufficiently well about indigenous communities. In those conversations Dr. Devy found a surprising thing that there were none to few indigenous communities in Europe and they debated why was that so. After a long time they came to the conclusion that the concept of indigenous originated from colonialism hence the lack of indigenous communities there. The tribes across the world are not the same, some are born out of or affected by colonialism and some are not. There are other reasons for the emergence of social category of indigenous. When this came up Dr. Devy started thinking about the indigenous in India and asked some of his friends working with marginalized community and asked them what the indigenous people have that other don’t. There was a common answer that a person can only come under caste or tribe. Dr. Devy thought deeply and seriously about his observation and tried to study if the communities which were Buddhist before were outside the caste fold or whether those republics were only for the tribals. When working with the tribals he noticed the presence of sickle cell anemia in the tribals. It is something that is observed only among the indigenous people in India. He tried collecting doctors to tackle it, who gave the opinion that long back in the history the human gene reacted to the repeated bouts of malaria and as a part of the reaction there was a genetic modification. It is that modified gene which carried the sickle cell tendency from one generation to the next.
If one were to take the line of research as to who were the Adivasis, then one would go back to pre- historic times by several millennials and think of all Adivasis as genetically related adivasis as if they came from the same blood –gene pool. But Dr. Devy didn’t want to accept this conclusion because he has seen many differences between their histories, tendencies, physical features, cultural memories, etc. But later, in about 10 years, it was discovered that the genetic source of all South Asia especially mitochondrial genes (M gene) is same. He did all this to raise the question as to who are adivasis? From where have they come? Where do they belong, sociologically, biologically and culturally? The answer to all these questions are yet to be answered in India. Its study must be done, it should be researched and pursued.
Before the 19th Century, when the Britishers ruled India, Europe was in a tense situation between Britain and France which stayed around 100 years with many clashes. In the 17th and 118th Centuries, the British and French Royalty had the difficulty of being overly dependent on the Lords and Barons. To free themselves from this dependency they decided to make their own army but to do so they needed money, so they changed their tax plan for a steady income. With this new change in tax the farmers faced the problem of paying tax even when the fields didn’t yield. The tax was changed from yield tax to area of land tax which provided a steady income to form and maintain an army. In wars one needs boats, France and Germany had lands to make them but England didn’t have a piece of land to produce timbre for boats. Germany and France had set up their forest department on industrial scale in order to produce large quantities of timbre for making warships. But British didn’t have that ability, that’s why the British authorities decided to make their forest departments on Indian lands. For this there needs to be land available. In the 19th Century, till 1817s, British had defeated the Indian rulers and made different treaties with them. The kings would have the authority over the land but not on the armies and they had to give a certain amount of tax. But when the rule of East India Company ended and the British Sovereign was introduced, then the British Royalty got the timbre for navy, railway trains, etc., so they decided to make the Forest Department. The lands which were not under anyone’s rule, were searched and listed, and then taken in the name of British Sovereign. These lands were the places where communities had not decided on appointing a ruler but instead things were done by the collective decision of the community. The Forest departments had officers with the power and weapons of a soldier. The existing settlements of these lands were not removed or pushed out, instead they were given a rule of giving fines to the Forest Department. If the fines were not paid, the officials would punish these people and in this process thousands of tribals died. Those who died from the bullets of forest guards have never been listed as freedom fighters, though they were trying to protect the freedom of their land. After this, the adivasis didn’t have much possession over their land and this insufficient ownership of land still continues in the present times. After independence the ownership of the land is inheritable but not transferable. This became a framework of the material condition of life for tribals, e.g.; one cannot dig the land=no proper irrigation= low income= tribals have to become indebted to money lenders. Hence, from the 1880s the tribals started becoming extremely indebted and remained in that condition, starved and imprisoned in material denials. After 1920s when small towns started using bricks, cement and steel, the tribals started going out to work in these construction sites in the second season of farming. They would leave after Dusshera and return in Holi, because of this these festivals became their major festivals as one was the time of departure and the other of return. In theological terms and the religious belief system, the tribals had nothing to do with either of the two festivals or the gods. Tribal gods were of different kind, these gods did not exist in a hierarchal structure like the gods of the Hindus. Tribals in India have remained non-hindu even though the Vedic civilization spread all over India. The people who resisted the spread of Sanskrit language in Central India were the tribals who were sandwiched between the Indo-Aryan and Dravidian languages. Though their language imbibed some of the influences of Indo-Aryans and Dravidians, but they worshipped their deities non-templed and in the open. Their idea of sacred was not limited to space, instead it was tied with the sense of time. In many tribal communities when a person dies the relatives do not say that the person has gone to heaven or hell as many other religious beliefs. They say that the person has gone into a different time but is still around in the space in which they inhabit. Therefore on various special occasions adivasis offer food for their ancestors at the time of eating. The tribals are the children of time and not space hence they don’t pay attention to the practice of appointing a rule of the land. The Adivasi consciousness is governed by a relation with time far deeper than relation with space. Because the colonial times created the non-caste category, non-princely state category of societies hooked onto memories of the past rather than awareness of domination or the space.
By the time we come to independence there is a need felt that the new nation which believes in equality, the nation had to think specially of Adivasis and the credit goes to Jaipal Singh Munda. He was a great hockey player, ICS officer, an Administrator, Scholar (University of Oxford), member of the Constituent Assembly of India, where he put forward the case of the Adivasis (Schedule Tribes). When he was questioned would Tribals join all other princely states in the nation, Jaipal Singh Munda countered with, “Yes Indeed. We can join the nation, but shall we join on equal footing.” The Assembly agreed that the Adivasis would be joining India on equal footing and therefore the special schedules were created, various acts and articles were incorporated. Things looked good at that time but after Independence this didn’t happen because of the question who are Adivasis? The power of making this decision was very rigid hence many who should have been in the list are not and those who are there should not be there. Almost one-third of the world’s indigenous population resides in India but they have not received a fair deal. There is a lack of tribal representation in higher education. There is also a stereotype towards positive discrimination against reservation. This stereotype continues to exist and will continue unless and until we are not aware of our provision (benefits) introduced in the constitution. If the Adivasis are not aware of the tribal council and do not learn to insist on tribal rights then nobody else is going to offer those rights on a gold platter. Many tribal languages are excluded from National language census. Out of the languages which went extinct, 90% of it was a tribal language. Not having their languages, gods, their relation with the past not coming in the forefront. This continued and the tribal identities listened to them silently. This type of incognito identity was being created. It is therefore necessary for us to look at the design of identity and change that design into something different what we need is something comparable to Australian indigenous communities have got. We must change the historical design by bringing in new imagination of a free society which learns to value humans for their values and not for the value they have got.
About the Speaker
Dr. Ganesh Narayandas Devy
Critic, Thinker, Editor, Educator, Cultural activist
Dakshinayan Movement
Dharwad
He is a thinker, cultural activist and an institution builder best known for the People’s Linguistic Survey of India and the Adivasi Academy created by him. His first full length book in English ‘After Amnesia’ (1992) was hailed immediately upon its publication as a classic in literary theory. Since its publication, he has written and edited close to ninety influential books in areas as diverse as Literary Criticism, Anthropology, Education, Linguistics and Philosophy. Dr. Devy was educated at Shivaji University, Kolhapur and the University of Leeds, UK. Among his many academic assignments, he held fellowships at Leeds University and Yale University and has been THB Symons Fellow (1991-92) and Jawaharlal Nehru Fellow (1994–96). He was Professor of English at the Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda (1980-96). In 1996, he gave up his academic career in order to initiate work with the Denotified & Nomadic Tribes (DNT) and Adivasis. During this work, he created the Bhasha Research and Publication Centre at Baroda, the Adivasis Academy at Tejgadh, the DNT-Rights Action Group and several other initiatives. Later he initiated the largest-ever survey of languages in history, carried out with the help of nearly 3000 volunteers and published in 50 multilingual volumes.
