Chennai: “Do you remember me, I applied for a free house site patta last year and it is still pending with local tribal welfare officer and I am finding it difficult to prove my anthropological origin as a Kuruman,” says Maasy (name changed), a tribe from Dharmapuri during his interaction with the staff at the directorate of tribal welfare here at Chennai.
Population of Tribal people in Tamil Nadu has been static for the past three years.
Maasy is good in communication and is always accompanied by his fellow tribes, but 90 per cent of the tribes in TN and in others parts of south India are yet to see the outer world. Admitting that tribes need social justice and empowerment, a young IFS officer B. C. Archana Kalyani, who has visited almost all the tribal settlements in Tamil Nadu as a director of state tribal welfare directorate in an interview opens to Deccan Chronicle about the myths and mystery of TN tribal community.
“Globally, tribes make up less than five per cent of the world population and their rights should be declared is the theme of United Nations on this World Indigenous People’s Day. And for the first time a dedicated website is to be developed by the state government to give an anthropological idea about tribes endemic to south India”, said the official, who is popular among tribal settlements in Coimbatore and Krishnagiri.
Most of the people think that tribes reside only in hillocks, majority of the tribes in TN now reside in plains and there are more than 10,000 tribes in Chennai.
When people think about tribes, they relate the ethnic population to Niligiris, but other urban districts like Kancheepuram and Tiruvallur which are highly urbanized now have more than 40,000 tribes interestingly this is more than tribal population of Nilgiris, which is around 32,800.
The total population of Tamil Nadu as per 2011 census is 7.21 crore, which includes scheduled tribes 7.95 lakh (1.10 per cent). Literacy rate among scheduled tribes is around 54.34 per cent (male — 61.81 female —- 46.80 per cent) and after periodical intervention the percentage is slowly increasing by one to two per cent, she said adding that educated tribes are now absorbed as teachers in the Egalavya tribal schools run by the state.
Tribal settlement
Major tribal settlements of TN include Salem - Yercaud, Pachamalai, Aranuthumalai and Kalrayan Hills), Namakkal, (Kolli Hills), Villupuram Kalrayan Hills), Tiruvann- amalai (Jawadhu Hills), Tiruchirapalli (Pachamalai), Dharmapuri (Sittheri Hills) and Vellore (Jawadhu and Yelagiri hills) where tribal population is 50 per cent or more of the total population.
