Tribe: concept & features

Theoretical overview

The tribal population of India represents a distinctive feature in the mosaic of Indian civilization and culture.

Tribes in India are called Janjati, Vanyajati, Vanavasi, Adimjati, Adivasi etc. 

According to D.N. Majumdar, a tribe is a collection of families or groups of families bearing common name, members of which occupy the same territory, speak the same language and observe certain taboos regarding marriage, profession or occupation and have developed a well-established system of reciprocity and mutuality of obligations. 

DISTINCTIVE FEATURES OF TRIBES IN INDIA 

1. Common name: Each tribe has a distinct name of its own. 
2. Common territory: Tribes generally occupy common geographical areas.
3. Common language: Members of one tribe speak the same language or dialect of a language.
4. Endogamy: Each tribe has the practice of marrying members within their own tribe. 
5. Political organization: All tribes have their own political organisation which includes council of elders
6. Economy: They follow ancient occupations such as gleaning, hunting and gathering of forest products. Most of the tribes are engaged in one or the other type of agriculture. 
7.  Religion: Most tribes in India are traditionally nature or totem worshippers.
8.  Inter-personal relations: Members of a tribe have strong feeling of unity. They have a common descent and are related to one another by blood relations. 
9. Closeness to nature: Traditionally tribal societies had a close symbiotic relationship with nature. However, every tribe does not share all of the above features. 

Tribes in contemporary India

A tribe is a group of people in a primitive or barbarious stage of development acknowledging the authority of a chief and usually regarding themselves as having a common ancestor. 

The tribal’s had maintained an autonomous existence till their territories were opened up by the British for strategic reasons. These reasons involved exploitation of forest and mineral resources as well as regular supply of cheap labour. Once the tribals were exposed to the wider world, they had traumatic experience of losing their land and right to forest and getting forcibly incorporated into a system about which they knew little. The tribals became vulnerable to various forms of social, economic and cultural exploitation.

 In today’s India the tribals suffer the adverse effects of imbalanced development. They assert their ethnic identity to earn a greater share of political power to protect their cultural and economic interests. Equal distribution of the benefits of modernization and development is a positive remedy against the grievances of the tribals. The constitutional guarantees for the Scheduled Tribes do not reach to the countless tribals. The new groups of tribal elites tend to monopolise them. Individualism and inequality have crept into the tribal life also. It will have to be matched by a positive concern and effective steps for reaching the benefits of the modernisation and economic development to the poor tribal masses.

ISSUE OF RESERVATION/POLICIES FOR SCS, STS AND OBCS 

Sociologists have differentiated between the compensatory discrimination provided to the SCs or STs and the privileges given to the OBCs. If SCs and STs are by now easily recognizable groups in Indian society the same cannot be said about the OBCs. Policies regarding OBCs differ from state to state and different groups of people are included. We can underline the following special features of compensatory discrimination in favor of OBCs:

1. Other Backward Classes are usually not defined in exactly the same way in different parts of the country. The most important measures adopted or recommended for their advancement are reservations in the educational institutions, especially in professional and technical colleges and government service. 
2. Reservations for the SCs and STs are directed basically towards the goal of greater equality in society.
3. The OBCs have a very different position in Indian society from that of the SCs and STs. The Harijans and the adivasis have been the victims of active social discrimination through segregation in the first case and isolation in the second. The same cannot be said to be true of OBCs.

Points to remember

• A tribe is a collection of families or groups of families bearing common name, members of which occupy the same territory, speak the same language and observe certain taboos regarding marriage, profession or occupation and have developed a well-established system of reciprocity and mutuality of obligations.
• Schedule cast schedule tribe and other backward classes are types of tribes
• To safeguard their interest government have done reservation for them in various fields.