Bhil Pradesh: Demand for Seperate State

In News

• Recently, the demands for a “Bhil Pradesh”, a separate state for tribal people in western India, have begun to be raised again.

Background

• Mangarh massacre/ Adivasi Jallianwala: Bhil social reformer and spiritual leader Govind Guru first raised the demand for a separate state for tribals back in 1913 after the Mangarh massacre.
  • The massacre, which took place six years before Jallianwalla Bagh and is sometimes referred to as the “Adivasi Jallianwala”.
  • It saw hundreds of Bhil tribals being killed by British forces on November 17, 1913 in the hills of Mangarh on the border of Rajasthan and Gujarat.
• Post-Independence, the demand for Bhil Pradesh was raised repeatedly.
• Earlier, the Dungarpur, Banswara, Udaipur region in Rajasthan and Gujarat, MP, etc. was part of a single entity.
  • But post-Independence, the tribal majority regions were divided by the political parties, so that the tribals don’t organise and unite.

Bhil tribe

• The word Bhil is derived from “Veel”, which means “bow” in the Dravidian language.
• The Bhil tribe is called “Dhanush Purush of India” because they are highly adept at learning Dhanush.
• Bhils are a group of tribal Indians scattered throughout India from Gujarat in the west to Tripura in the Far East.
• As of 2013, they were the largest tribal group in India with the majority living in the states of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh.
• Bhils have a rich and unique culture. The Bhilala subdivision is known for its Pithora painting.
• Ghoomar is a traditional folk dance of the Bhil tribe.
  • Ghoomar is the symbol of femininity.
  • The young women take art in this dance and declare that they are stepping into women’s shoes.

Why do the tribals want a separate state of their own? / Major Reasons for Rise in demand for Separate state

• Economic backwardness of sub-regions within large states has also emerged as an important ground on which demands for smaller states are being made
• Linguistic and cultural reasons, which were the primary basis for creating new states in the country, have now become secondary in most of these cases.
• Slow execution: Several Union governments brought various “laws, benefits, schemes, and committee reports” on tribals, but went slow on their execution and implementation.
• There were various measures such as the protection of tribal interests through the Fifth Schedule under Article 244(1) of the Constitution, but most of these were mere assurances by the ruling party.
• The Provisions of the Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996.
  • The law was enacted in 1996.
  • The Rajasthan government adopted the law in 1999, and came out with its Rules in 2011. 
  • But even today people don’t even know about the law.

Challenges in Creation of New States 

• Setting up various institutions, government offices, universities, hospitals, etc. require huge sums of money, therefore, the new state might end up depending on the Union for funds, which may or may not be available.
• Different statehood may lead to the hegemony of the dominant community/ caste/ tribe over their power structures.
  • This can lead to the emergence of intra-regional rivalries among the sub-regions.

Way Forward  

• There should be certain clear-cut parameters and safeguards to check the unfettered demands.
• It is better to allow democratic concerns like development, decentralisation and governance rather than religion, caste, language or dialect to be the valid bases for conceding the demands for a new state.

Source: IE