On the Future of Indigenous Traditions - Munin

CHAPTER TWO: Adivasi Customs: Historical overview
and present situation
2.1. Sources of Adivasis to be the indigenous peoples
of India – in the evolution of cultural policies for
independent India
Where does one find the source of the Adivasis as the first settlers in the Indian
peninsula? If they are the Adivasis, why are they referred to as ‘tribes’ and thus
‘Scheduled Tribes’?
When we are talking of the Adivasis of India, one must know that they are a very
large number of different ethnic as well as language groups. They represent a category
of peoples within themselves, identified to be different in respect to their social,
cultural and political organisations. This distinction includes a unique history different
from those in the majority groups of the country.
To find an answer to this question we may have to group these sources within certain
disciplines into two or three broad categories. One of the sets of sources could be
Adivasis’ own traditions based on their own mythology, legends and oral traditions.
Second set of sources could be the earliest written source, such as the Hindu
scriptures written in Sanskrit language. Lastly, the disciplines of anthropology,
history, linguistic sciences and written literatures provide us a wide range of
secondary sources for our investigation.
Putting all these sets of sources together to identify the Adivasi we can see that they
form a distinct category of group among the larger Indian population. The present
Indian population is a composition of broadly six main races who came to the Indian
sub-continent in different stages of its history, among them the “earliest was the
Negrito and this was followed by the Proto-Australoid, the Mongoloid, the
Mediterranean, and later those associated with Aryan culture.” 12 It is stated by S.C.
Roy, particularly in reference to the Proto-Australoid group with whom the Kolarians
12 Romila Thapar, A History of India, Vol. 1. (Baltimore: Penguin, 1965), 26.
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