POLITICS-INDIA: New State Has To Do Much for Majority Tribal People

By Ranjit Devraj Reprint | | Print |

Ranjit Devraj

NEW DELHI, Nov 1 2000 (IPS) - The birth early Wednesday of India’s newest federal province, carved out of the country’s biggest state, may not be of much help to its mainly tribal residents who are not likely to get a fair share of the region’s rich mineral wealth, say their supporters.

Chattisgarh, snipped out of central Madhya Pradesh, became the country’s 26th state on the midnight of Oct. 31, the first of three new provinces to be created out of bigger states. Last- minute political hitches delayed the Nov. 1 scheduled births of Uttaranchal and Jharkhand.

Jharkhand, another tribal dominant area, which is to emerge from eastern Bihar state, could not be inaugurated Wednesday because Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its ally, the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, could not agree on the chief minister for the new province.

Uttaranchal is to be carved out of the central Indian Himalayan foothills in northern Uttar Pradesh state. Its birth was deferred by administrative hitches and indecision over the choice of its capital.

A senior leader of India’s main opposition Congress party, Ajit Jogi, who is himself a tribal from the area, was sworn in as Chattisgarh’s first chief minister at a midnight ceremony in the new state’s capital, Raipur.

However, those who backed the cause of the tribals in the area, are not happy with Jogi’s selection.

“The struggle of the tribal people for their identity and control over their resources will go on,” says Anil Sadgopal, who was part of the campaign for a separate tribal state. Sadgopal thinks Jogi’s selection as chief minister is only of symbolic value because he is not a “true tribal.”

A career bureaucrat with an engineering degree, before he switched to politics, Jogi was well-known nationally as the Congress spokesman in the Indian capital. He was also active in national parliament, speaking out against the exploitation of the vast mineral resources of Chattisgarh, which include iron ore, coal, bauxite and diamonds.

The tapping of this mineral wealth by outsiders — rich industrialists who set up factories in the area — has been a long-standing complaint of tribal leaders.

Some even say that the movement for a separate Chattisgarh state was not genuine unlike that for Jharkhand and Uttaranchal, because it was largely based in the urban areas and led by powerful politicians and businessmen.

However, political observers agree that much of the credit for the creation of Chattisgarh must go to legendary local labour leader Shankar Guha Niyogi. Niyogi’s murder, six years ago, on the orders of powerful local industrialists, caused a national sensation.

The labour leader, who worked in the government-owned Bhilai Steel Plant, led a popular campaign against a reign of terror unleashed by local industrialists, allegedly in tandem with the police and local administration.

A district court subsequently found six persons, including two local industrialists, guilty of Niyogi’s murder. Five were awarded life terms and the man who actually gunned down Niyogi, was awarded the death sentence.

But the Madhya Pradesh state High Court subsequently exonerated all six on grounds of lack of sufficient evidence. An appeal is pending in the Supreme Court.

The Chattisgarh Mukti Morcha (CMM), which Niyogi launched to fight for the rights of mine workers, factory hands, peasants and farm workers in the area, eventually transformed itself into a movement for a new state.

However, the CMM has since given way to radical left movements targeted at industrialists, traders and other groups, who are believed to be exploiting the tribal people.

Jogi already faces opposition from the industrialist’s lobby, represented by influential political leaders in the state, say political observers.

Jogi said his immediate priority would be to tackle the severe droughts in an area, which was once considered the rice-bowl of Madhya Pradesh. But he will also have to design plans for sharing with the tribals, the benefits from industrial expansion, say political observers.