A Study on the Current Profile of Schedule Tribes and Schedule Areas

The tribal communities in India are living mostly in remote and rural areas. Also, some of these tribes live in remote villages or hamlets. A minor tribal population has moved from remote areas to villages as well as urban areas. There are substantial reasons for lower pace of tribal development activities than what was expected. There is ignorance in these communities of various programmes of the Central and State Governments which have resulted in marginal participation of these communities in such programmes. This is due to lack of awareness and information of these programmes. Although, the Government of India and State Government want the benefits of this programmes to reach to tribal community which is poor, but the fact is that it is not reaching substantially. There are number of agencies of the State and Central Governments which are carrying out the programmes and it makes confusion in the implementation. Sometimes the programmes fail due to uncoordinated efforts. This paper reviews the current profile of the schedule tribes in India and scheduled areas with the intention that the plan development programmes meant for tribal development reach to tribal communities.