On the Future of Indigenous Traditions - Munin

identity was a stigma to keep their cultural and social distinctiveness. This
distinctiveness based on their collective orientation (and their traditional institutions
that represented them) were under threat by the very nature and character of
individualistic profit and accumulation, causing overexploitation of the Adivasi
people and their resources.
The mega development projects (built on the “public interest”) by the state, with the
focus on industrial development and large scale exploitations of natural resources
caused displacement of the Adivasi. Obviously, national development was the answer
to the need of the hour after independence of the country. It still continues against
Gandhi’s vision of self sufficient villages or the village as a unit to be the centre of
development. The bitter experience of displacement caused by such a development
marks an un-healing scar on the displaced persons –usually the Adivasis. The Peraj
displacement experience where Adivasis recovered less or none of there land
compared to the non-Adivasis who benefited more, shows that the Adivasis here not
only have economic relations with the land and their surrounding, but a cultural and
spiritual bond, the absence of which results in premature death, e.g. the case of
Lalbatti Murmu and some other Adivasis families illustrated in chapter two.
In the context of Jharkhand, the caste groups are often said to be business oriented
communities with profit being their goal (which is not only true for Jharkhand alone).
In the light of these different orientations the issue of special rights over equal rights
comes up clearly in the court cases against PESA by members of caste groups. The
opposition by Kurmi Mahtos and “Other Backward Class” -OBC for the Adivasis’ to
have special rights as against the equal rights, is an issue that comes up here. It is not
only because this gives the Adivasis special “privileges” but it violates their equal
citizenship rights when PESA reserves the chairpersons’ seat for the Adivasi in the
Gram Panchayat – the village council in the Scheduled districts. It is also because of
the two groups have different orientations of ‘caste’ and ‘tribe’. Kurmi Mahtos come
from to the caste structure; they were included in the Adivasi community in the later
part of the Adivasis history in Jharkhand. It is the question coming from them, which
many others would also ask, why should certain groups, e.g. ‘minorities’ indigenous
have special rights than the rest? Jarle Weigård addresses the issues of rights in this
context. He refers to Kymlicka and compares with Dworkin, and says:
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