National Seminar on

Labour Market and Issues of Adivasis in India

(January 22-23, 2015, at NIRD&PR, Hyderabad)

S. R. Sankaran Chair

National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (NIRD&PR)Rajendranagar, Hyderabad – 500 030

www.nird.org.in

Failure of the developmental state to deliver justice to the marginalised tribal community: a case study of the Lodhas1 of West Bengal

Dr. Santanu PandaICSSR Post Doctoral Fellow

Dept. of Anthropology, Vidyasagar University, Midnapore-721102, West Bengal.Email: panda9732@yahoo.in/ panda973363@gmail.com

AbstractIn this paper I have made an attempt to study the failure of the development inputs to implementation among the marginalised Lodha community. The article based on empirical study in the selected study area among the Lodhas of Paschim (west) Medinpur district but qualitative in nature. ObjectivesThe main objective of this study is to narrate the findings of the anthropological field experiences of the author around the story of development of the Lodhas who were designated as a ‘criminal tribe’ by the British colonialists. The second related aim of this research is to advance some recommendations about how a better implementation of the governmental schemes could be made to bring confidence among the community for the improvement in their living conditions.

MethodologyThe study is based on intensive fieldwork conducted over a period of five years in several Lodha settlements of Paschim Medinipur district in West Bengal which was classified as one of the 25 economically ‘backward districts’ of India by the Planning Commission of India in 2004-05. The fieldwork for this research was carried out from a micro-level perspective by using anthropological participant observation and collection of case studies.

Major findingsOur findings revealed that a number of Lodhas received patta land for cultivation only on paper, the land being occupied by the dominant groups. Even those who received land in reality could not use it properly owing to lack of irrigation facility and agricultural implements. The beneficiaries received financial assistance for house building but in most of the cases the condition of the newly built houses was not suitable for living owing to the poor planning. Some of them received solar cells and were found sell them to their well-to-do neighbours.

1 The wikipedia says, ‘Lodha means piece of flesh named after their ancestor. Lodhas have been in the focus of anthropologists and social activists.During the early period of their rule, the British government in India oppressed the tribal people of Jungle Mahals, who were traditionally dependent upon the forests for a living. They had revolted but were ruthlessly suppressed. Having been deprived of their livelihood and without any alternatives, they took to criminal ways of life and were subsequently branded a criminal tribe. They should properly be labelled as uprooted rebels. Lodha titles are Nayek, Mallick, Digar, Sardar, Bhokta, Kotal, Dandapat, Bhunya etc. These titles reflect social responsibility. They are descendants of Jarasandh from Mahabharata. The Lodhas hold that they are Sabars.( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lodha_people accessed through Google on 21.10.2014).

IntroductionThe right to development implies the right to improvement and advancement of economic, social, cultural and political conditions. Improvement of global quality of life means the implementation of change that ensures every person a life in a society that respects and helps realise all human rights. These changes must include the abolition and improvement of widespread conditions of poverty, unemployment, and unfair social conditions. Social development implies that the basic needs of the human beings should be satisfied first and these needs are not only economic in nature; these include better access to education and health care delivery services, housing and fulfillment of various human rights.

After the Independence, about 153 communities in India who were designated as ‘Criminal Tribes’ by the British colonial administration were redesignated as ‘Denotified tribes’ and later some of them have been classified as ‘Primitive Tribal Groups’ (PTG). (Verma, 1990: Bhowmick, 1990; 55-66).The Lodha of West Bengal is one of them, who suffered from continued poverty, stigma of criminality and marginalization (Devi, 1983). In 1952, theCriminal Tribes Act was repealed by the Government of India and all the communities who were designated as criminal tribes were reclassified as denotified communities. Once again, in the name of ‘positive discrimination’ they were reclassified into another governmental category without being given equal status with the mainstream communities of the nation. Furthermore, the denotification process also carried the colonial hangover of looking at those ‘Criminal Tribes’ as born criminals.

In the post-Independence period the main aim of the government was to put off the stigma of criminal tribe designation of the Lodhas. At the same time the government also wanted to uplift the socio-economic condition of this tribe who mainly depended on forest produce and daily labour. Another important component of the governmental perspective centering round the development of the Lodhas was to settle this tribe as an agriculturist population. For this reason, every effort to improve the condition of the Lodhas consisted of giving them land, permanent houses, domestic animals and poultry birds. There was virtually no effort on the part of the Government and the NGOs to improve the economy of the Lodhas within the fold of the forests which the members of this tribe knew best. The traditional and intimate knowledge of the Lodhas about the forest and the animals on which the community sustained its livelihood were rarely studied and used by the governmental and non-governmental development agencies.

An earlier study done by Professor P. K. Bhowmick, he described how the Central Government initiated a role for improving the living condition and rehabilitation of the Lodha community by providing facilities for housing, agriculture; cottage industries and education through Ashram Hostel from the primary level (Bhowmick,1985: 15) and Special funds have been sanctioned by the government to organize a Development Cell under the Project Officer & Backward Class Welfare Officer (PO & BCW) of the state government. (Bhowmick, 1985: 14). He also reported the post-colonial scenario under which various welfare measures have been undertaken by the Central Government to improve the living conditions of the Lodhas. After the independence of India from British colonialism many plans and projects of specific nature have been initiated by the Government to resettle the forest dependent and semi-nomadic Lodha minority community in an agriculture dependent sedentary life. Meanwhile, a good number of rehabilitation schemes have been formulated and implemented on the Lodhas and most of these schemes failed and no lasting impact of them could be made. (Bhowmick, 1985: 17).

History of CriminalityCriminal Tribes in colonial IndiaThe Criminal Tribes Act dates back to various successive pieces of legislation enforced in India during British rule. The legislation was first enacted in 1871 as the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871 which applied mostly in North India. The Act was extended to Bengal Presidency and other areas in 1876, and, the Criminal Tribes Act, 1911 was enacted. The act was extended to Madras Presidency. The law went through several amendments in the next decade and, finally, the Criminal Tribes Act, 1924 was enacted incorporating all the aforementioned provinces. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_Tribes_Act). In a recent article, Goldy M.George, sociologist of the Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policies of the Tata Institute of Social Sciences pointed out in a lucid manner, the rationale of the colonial administrators towards the promulgation of the law

Under the Act 150 notified castes of ‘hereditary criminals' within the Hindu system were to be kept under police surveillance. More castes were added to the list. The branding of these communities, as ‘criminal', was not based on the notion of heredity but rather as a community profession passed on from one generation to the next. The Act, therefore, provided for establishing reformatory schools and settlements for the reclamation of these people. Movements of members of the communities were restricted to specific areas and the Act provided for their arrest without warrant if there was any violation. The crimes covered included counterfeiting of coins and currency, murder, theft, robbery, dacoity and housebreaking. Children in the age group of 6 to 18 were separated from their parents and put in reformatory schools. In due course the Indian society mutely witnessed the emergence of a new class of people who were branded as born criminals. (George, 2009).

Interestingly, in an article entitled ‘The Criminal Tribes of India’ published in the Journal of the Royal Society of Arts in 1923, a retired British administrative officer Frederick de L. Booth Tucker wrote:

Crime in most countries is committed by individuals, in India usually by tribes, communities and gangs, who are highly organised and trained in it from childhood as a profession. The entire family and the relatives of an Indian criminal, including the women and children, are usually associated with him in the commission of crime. It is looked upon by these tribes very much as we regard the military profession, and is considered to be both honourable and lucrative. (Tucker, 1923:158-168).

According to Tucker, there were 18 settlements of criminal tribes and in the then Bengal Presidency there was only one such settlement and the community which was recorded by him as criminal was not the Lodhas but ‘Karwal Nats’. Moreover he stated in the same article that most of the families in those settlements were found to practice agriculture combined with petty commodity production and the rest were engaged in industrial occupations.(Ibid).Tucker’s description does not fit to the traditional occupation of the Lodhas practicing hunting gathering as was reported by the anthropologists much later. The question is how the Lodhas were included under the Criminal Tribe category and brought under the purview of the Criminal Tribes Act, 1911?

In the same volume of the journal published after five months, another British official of the Police in his correspondence in connection with a remark made by Sir Edward Henry in the

discussion on Commissioner Booth Tucker's paper dealing with Criminal Tribes Act observed:

The chief motive of the Act is to save criminal tribes from themselves; to reform and to reclaim them, so far as is humanly possible. The Act, as it stands, supplies to the criminal classes a method by which they may be able to improve themselves and to lead decent lives. To the general public it affords a scheme of protection while it places at the disposal of the police a lawful means for keeping potential criminals under proper supervision (Faulkner, 1923: 449).

Faulkner in the conclusion of his correspondence mentioned about how the Lodhas of the then Bengal Presidency might have been designated as a Criminal Tribe by the local administration who were empowered by the law to declare a whole tribe as criminal if a certain section of the community were found to commit certain non-bailable offences. We should quote Faulkner verbatim:

If only a part of the tribe is addicted to the systematic commission of non-bailable offences, then only that part of the tribe may be declared a criminal tribe for the purposes of the Act. This was, to my knowledge, done in the case of certain gangs of the tribe of Lodhas in the district of Midnapur( Ibid).

The above exchange between the two experienced British officials revealed the truth that the Lodhas as a community were not initially included under the designation of a criminal tribe at least like the other communities of India but some members of the community were definitely declared as ‘Criminal’ as early as the first half of 20th Century and then by the immense scope of the law and the discretion of the British officials the whole community was classified as a Criminal Tribe. Be that as it may, one thing was clear in the basic premise of the Criminal Tribe Act. The premise was clearly explicated in the first quote from Booth Tucker’s article wherein he opined that crime in India was committed by ‘tribes, communities and gangs’ who were ‘trained in it from childhood as a profession’ and they regarded crimes ‘to be both honourable and lucrative’ profession like the westerners who viewed military profession as admirable. (Emphases given by author).

The anthropological and activist discourse on Lodha-SabarsThe anthropological discourse on criminal tribes can be traced back to an article by K.M. Kapadia published in Sociological Bulletin as early as 1952, the year on which the criminal tribe act was abolished and the former ‘Criminal Tribes’ were put under the new governmental category named ‘Denotified Tribe’. In the pioneering article Kapadia thoroughly criticized the rationale of the colonial administrators in support of the promulgation of the Criminal Tribes Act. We quote him

The approach of the Government was fundamentally wrong. It postulated that (i) the so-called Criminal Tribes represented a group of born criminals, that (ii) crime was hereditary with their members and that (iii) criminals could be reformed by ruthless punishment and lifelong harassment.(Kapadia, 1952).

In the rest of his paper, Kapadia went on to show how the different layers of the government and police administration along with the elites of the society used the Criminal Tribes Act which through various direct and indirect consequences marginalized and sometime aggravated criminal activities among the members of the so called ‘Criminal Tribes and

Castes’. Kapadia, however, did not mention about the Lodhas although the socio-political process of marginalization of the ‘Criminal Tribes’ in other parts of India bear many similarities with the Lodhas. The discourse on the criminal tribes in anthropology continued at a more intensive level by an anthropologist of West Bengal, Probodh Kumar Bhowmick,who studied the Lodhas and also carried out action anthropological research for nearly four decades beginning from late fifties. Bhowmick’s findings on the predicament of the Lodhas in West Bengal bear many similarities with the discourse initiated by Kapadia. In one of hisremarkable publications in the journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britainand Ireland Bhowmick identified a set of socio-cultural processes which shaped the miserable condition and personality of the Lodhas, who were designated as a ‘Criminal Tribe’ and later put under the ‘Denotified’ category after the Independence of India. According to Bhowmick the economic and territorial displacement, societal oppression, chronic poverty and hunger made the Lodhas more marginalized. In his words

All these together have made the Lodhas isolated recoiling into the shell of their old tradition. They suffer from an excessive coyness, timidly and distrust. Without even a rudimentary education and with no skill in any craft or art, no land in their possession and no fixed employment, the Lodhas were compelled to live below the poverty line and to indulge in spurts of extra- legal activities whenever hunger compelled them to go against the wider society. (Bhowmick, 1981).

A former police official of the Government of West Bengal, Ranjit Kumar Gupta, who collaborated with the action anthropological experiments of P.K.Bhowmick in the rehabilitation of the Lodhas in West Midnapore reported in 1979 about the predicaments of the Lodhas in a vivid manner. Referring to a Police report Gupta in his book Essays in Economic Anthropology narrated

The only major police report relates to a combined mass attack by the Santals and the Mahatos on the Lodhas of the areas around a village called Mohulboni on 20th March, 1958, in course of which four Lodhas were killed and several Lodha huts were set on fire. The provocation was an armed robbery in Santal hut in Mohulboni by the Lodhas, and alleged rape on a Santal woman. The major background reason was obviously the tension due to the Lodha depredations against propertied classes who also happen here to different ethnic groups. It is to be noted that the Mahatos (the Kurmi Kshatriyas) who were not at all an injured party in this case took an active part in the outrage on the Lodhas. (Gupta, 1979).

The Lodhas are now treated as one of the denotified communities by the Central Government. In West Bengal, Lodhas are mainly concentrated in the districts of Paschim (West) Medinipur and Purba (East) Medinipur. As mentioned earlier, in the pre-Independence period they were treated as a Criminal Tribe till the revocation of the Criminal Tribes Act in 1952. In the first Census of India after Independence the Lodhas were recorded as a scheduled caste and their total population was returned to be 8,346 only in West Bengal (Mitra 1953: 89). According to the Census of 1951 the Lodhas were found to be distributed in the districts of Burdwan, Birbhum, Bankura, Midnapore, Hooghly, Howrah, 24 Parganas, Calcutta, Murshidabad and Jalpaiguri. In 1951, they were not found in the North Bengal districts like Nadia, Maldah, West Dinajpur, Darjeeling and Cooch Behar. In the same Census the total number of Lodhas in erstwhile Midnapore was 7040, that is 84.35 percent of the then total population of Lodhas in West Bengal. (Ibid: 89-90).

In a later period, the social scientists led by Probodh Kumar Bhowmick and his Institute of Social Research and Applied Anthropology (ISRAA) used their own resources and began to function in an adjacent area to establish a colony for the Lodhas at Daharpur in Narayangarh block. A school building, hostel and some education facility were provided to encourage the Lodhas for educating their children. In order to involve the Lodhas to adopt settled agriculture, improved seeds and other inputs were made available to them. A model nursery to supply plants was set up to encourage them in the cultivation of improved varieties of crops. After some years, the school gradually developed from Primary to Secondary level and an adult education centre and a pre-basic nursery school were also opened. In addition to these, family based cottage industries like mat-making, tailoring, weaving, carpentry were started for the self-employment of the Lodhas. Attempts were made to flourish the indigenous cultural resources of the Lodha community through cultural shows and festivals in which the community members performed dance, drama, and songs. These attempts were largely successful. The success of this experiment led to financial assistance from the state Government, although according to Bhowmick, ‘new adverse political forces have begun to operate, and are posing new obstacles to this scheme’ (Bhowmick, 1981: 6-8).

Another important observer of the marginalised condition of the Lodhas in West Bengal is Mahasveta Devi who is a famous Bengali litterateur and a human rights activist. Mahasveta Devi not only wrote on the abject poverty and exploitation of the Lodhas, she also worked for decades to fulfill the various demands of the community as regards their socio-economic condition. Although, not an anthropologist, Mahasveta Devi has firsthand personal experiences of the failures of governmental schemes and shortcomings of the government policies directed towards the development of the Lodhas in erstwhile Midnapore, and the adjoining districts of West Bengal. Unlike academic anthropologists, she practiced activism through the publication of a literary magazine in which many literate tribal persons including Lodhas wrote about their living conditions, violence committed to them by the state and higher classes of the society and the demands of the different tribal communities. Mahasveta Devi herself also wrote a number of articles in Bengali and English in which she depicted the ground realities regarding the problems of the implementation of development inputs and schemes among the Lodhas. In one of her articles published in the Economic and Political Weekly in 1983, Mahasveta Devi cited examples of some Lodha villages in the present Paschim Medinipur district in which government schemes have failed to reach the beneficiaries, although they were badly in need of the development programmes. In the article Mahasveta Devi categorically pointed out

Usually the schemes are made by people not knowing or caring to know what the tribal really need. The plan is then, after the usual procedures, left to the contractor…. I have seen contractor- made construction works meant for the Lodhas. It is better to make specious earthen huts. With a structure of cement, brick and sand, the inevitable contractor is bound to enter the scene. To whose benefit? Not the Lodhas’ .Over three decades, huge sums have been spent in the name of the Lodhas and the community has gone much below the poverty lines. (Devi 1983:948).

Materials and MethodsThe following account is a summary of the study which is based on my prolonged anthropological enquiries conducted in the Government departments and the study areawhich were located in the two subdivision viz. Jhargram and Khrgapur of Paschim (West) Medinipur district. Under the two subdivisions we have studied three blocks viz. Binpur II,

Nayagram and Narayangarh. Binpur II and Nayagram are rural administrative blocks in Jhargram subdivision of Paschim Medinipur district. These two blocks are covered by dense forest covered terrains. Total populations of both blocks were about one and half lakh (2001 census). The tribal populations of both blocks were near about fifty thousand. Most of the scheduled tribe populations depended on forest produce collection. According to District Human Development Report: Paschim Medinipur, the Human Development Index (HDI) of Binpur II and Naygarm blocks were very low and the rank is 27 and 29 out of 29 blocks of Paschim (west) Medinipur district. (DHDR. 2011: 17). Narayangarh block consisted of 16 gram panchayats and there was no urban area under this block. This block contained the agricultural area and most of the tribal populations depended on cultivation. According to 2001 census the total population was 2, 66,675 and the Schedule Tribe population 57,527.

The fieldwork for this research was carried out from a micro-level perspective by using traditional anthropological methods like participant observation and collection case studies. Data on the demographic, economic, political and socio-cultural dimensions of the selected Lodha settlements were collected in the study areas. The quantitative data collected for this research have been analysed by using simple descriptive methods(e.g. frequency distribution tables, bar graphs, histograms and polygons) with the help of Microsoft excel programme. The qualitative data have been analyzed through descriptions supported by some representative case studies.

The primary data for the research have been collected from three hundred thirty two (437) Lodha households and the total population is 1814. The block wise populations are as the followings.

Binpur II Surveyed population 319Nayagram Surveyed population 720Narayangarh Surveyed population 343

Salboni Surveyed population 432

Socio-demographic scenario of the study populationThe age-sex composition of the sample population reveals higher number of younger persons including children belonging to 0-4, 5-9 and 10-14 age groups. The female population in the higher age groups, particularly beyond the reproductive age, i.e. after 49 years, shows a greater number than the males in general. We, however, have not found any female above the age group 65-69 but there were 10 males above 69 years in the population. The interesting aspect about the demography of the Lodhas in this sample in the preponderance of females in almost all the age groups (the sex ratio being 1100). This fact is most revealing in all the younger age groups from 0-4 up to 35-39.Only in the age groups, 40-44 and 45-49, we find a predominance of males over females. If we consider the four blocks separately, then we find that the aggregate sex-ratios in Binpur II and Narayangarh are in favour of the females, whereas, in the Nayagram and Salboni blocks the overall sex-ratio is in favour of the males.

The overall literacy condition is not very satisfactory (43.35 %) and the condition of the females in this regard is worse than the males. The table shows that 22.58 percent males are illiterate out of the total population whereas 25.11 percent are literate out of the total population. Among the females 34.08 percent are illiterate and 18.23 percent are literate out of the total population. The percentage of illiterate persons in the early school going age groups (5-14) is higher among the females. The highest number of literate individuals is found among the males in the age group 10-14 while among the females it is in the age group

5-9. An upward trend of the number of literate persons in both sexes is observed from the higher to lower age groups indicating the fact that the younger Lodhas are gradually showing interest to become literate. (Panda, 2014).

The bigger age categories also revealed that the younger Lodhas have achieved more primary education than the older persons. This is true for the primary and junior high school levels. The contribution of younger age groups is also remarkably higher beyond the post junior high levels of school education, although there is a considerable difference between the males and females at this level. Marriage is a universal phenomenon among the Lodhas of our study area. No person remained unmarried after the age of 39, although variation in the beginning of marriage is noticed between the sexes. The females are found to marry at an early age than the males. The household size of the Lodhas in the surveyed population reveals a predominance of small households ranging between 4-6 persons; the mean household size being 4.2. (Panda and Guha, 2013).

Occupational scenario of the LodhasThe small household size of the population may be viewed in the context of the subsistence pattern of the Lodhas. We have observed that the majority of the individuals (47.03%) are engaged in forest produce collection to earn their livelihood. Only two persons were engaged in service. A substantial number of individuals (24.56%) were found to be engaged in agricultural as well as non agricultural labour. It is very low, because the Lodhas did not find the work as a day labourer and the higher caste zaminders (landlords) did not believe that the Lodhas were competent as an agricultural labourer. So, in that case most of the Lodhas could not get the lobourer’s work. In my study area I have found only one block where the Lodhas went out as migrant agricultural labourer. About 130 households have been found to be engaged in the cultivation of their own land. This constitutes 9.07 percent of total number of households of the study area. Some Lodhas were also found to pursue fishing and sal leaf plate making as subsidiary occupation. (Panda and Guha, 2015).

Inclusive development at the micro-level: an empirical accountThe Lodhas are regarded as a marginalised and economically backward tribe by the government and both the central and the state governments have allocated funds under various development schemes to improve the socioeconomic condition of the tribe since Independence. The administration also attempted to bring them to the mainstream from their traditional forest depended life and settled them as agriculturist. Apart from these, the government has given various types of development inputs under the Rastriya Sama Vikas Yojana (RSVY), Indira Awas Yojana (IAY), Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA). Integrated Tribal Development Project (ITDP) etc. The main aim of the schemes is to upgrade the socio-economic condition on the basis of respectable quality for their personal living.

The anthropologists however, have not yet made any empirical attempt to assess the impact of the development inputs given to this marginalised community. In this study we have made an attempt to assess the utilization of the various developmental inputs given by external agencies towards the Demarginalization of the Lodhas.

I have found various type of development inputs viz. i) Patta, ii) House, iii) Solar cell, iv) Job card v) Pond vi) cattle (cow, goat and bullock) and poultry bird, vii) Skill development training and viii) Loan (MT, Babui cultivation & Agriculture) etc. in the study area.

The beneficiaries of the study area have received the development inputs but they could not use the same properly. The implementation of the inputs by the Government has not been done in the appropriate manner. The Governments have been given the development inputs to the Lodhas for improving their marginalization. The ground reality is after the distribution of the inputs under the various governmental schemes the Government officials did not take any initiative to monitoring the development programmes. So, most of the cases the beneficiaries could not utilized the development inputs and it was also found that some the beneficiaries utilized the inputs partially. In case of patta land, Government has been given patta record to the beneficiaries but they did take initiative to give the actual right or possession of plot. So, the beneficiaries could not cultivate the land since the land is being utilised by members of other powerful and dominant communities, or it remained in unutilized condition.

In case of house, the Government has sanctioned financial assistance for house building or house under IAY, ITDP and Lodha housing scheme but the construction of the house has been made by the Government authorized contractors. The real scenario is the constructed houses lay in poor condition and non participatory nature of planning towards the construction of the houses by the concerned department of the Government.

In case of solar cell, we have found during our fieldwork that the beneficiary families have either sold them at a low price or those gadgets were lying non-functional. Solar plates containing very costly batteries required good maintenance and none of the beneficiary families who were given this sophisticated gadget had undergone any training as regards their maintenance. They were also deprived from all others development inputs. Here we would like to represent some case studies which would be supported my above observations.

The story of the utilization of governmental development inputs to the Lodhas.

The First CaseName of informant: Khokon Kotal Age: 48 Sex: Male

Village: Gaighata Jugdiha JL. No: 245 Block: Salboni.According to the informant there are four members in my family. They are dependent on forest resource collection and daily labour. He has received 0.80 acre patta land with record of right from the Block Land and Land Reforms Department in 2002. The family has also received financial assistance two times for house building in 2001-2002 from BDO office through Lodha Development cell and in 2011-2012 from backward class welfare office under Integrated Action Plan Bharat Sarkar. He received patta land but could not cultivate the land properly because the land is sandy highland (dangajami) and there is no any irrigation system. The land is situated in the bank of Kansabati River. After getting the land we cultivated the land for few years. In 2010, he gave the Land to original land owner as lease system for ten years by cash Rs. 1600/-. The land owner belongs in higher caste community. He received two houses from government and he has also a traditional earthen house. According to him, the earlier houses condition is very poor because there is no window and no ventilation system. This room has been used for cow shade. The second house is little bit better than earlier house. The outer snap of the house is very nice but in rainy season the rain fallen inside the room. The rain water has been store in the middle of the room, they clean the water from the room through one bucket after one bucket after that they used the room for living.

The Second CaseName of the informant: Ranjit Nayek, Age: 52 Sex: Male

Village: Bagmari J.L. No: 240 Block: Salboni

Acording to Ranjit Nayak, there are six members in his family. In 1989, his father Sanatan Nayak has received 0.12 acore patta land from the Block Land and Land Reforms Department of Salboni Block. The location of the patta land is bank of Kansabati River, in Bagmari Mouza, and the plot number 3. The case number for land registration is 2/1989 and S.L. No. is 18. According to the informant after receiving patta land his father successfully cultivated Rabi crops only one or two times but now he could not cultivate the land only because of every year in rainy season the Kansabati River stored huge amount sand and make it sandy mound among all these land. After that the land became an un-fertile land. The informant also reported that sometimes the patta land was lost by soil erosion of Kansabati River during the flood. Ranjit Nayak also informed that the B.L&L.R.O, Anchal Pradhan and Anchal Member everybody knows the condition of our patta land but they did not take any action by the competent authority.

The Third CaseName of informant: Swapan Mallick Age: 52 Sex: Male

Village: Singdhui, JL. No: 06 Block: Nayagram

According to Swapan they are dependants on forest resource collection and daily labour for their survival. The informant received a solar cell in 2004 under the RSVY scheme and financial assistance for house building in 1994 under IAY scheme from the Government He said: ‘I received the solar cell in 2004 and for this I had to deposit Rs. 1200/- to the Panchayat Pradhan in 2003. After receiving the solar cell, I used it for lighting bulbs in my house. After few days in this year in the summer, I could not get any work as daily labour and during this period the forest was also dry. It was a period of acute crisis. So I decided to sell the solar cell for sheer survival. I talked to a well-to-do Mahata family of Chandabila village of Nayagram block through my father-in-law that I wanted to sell my solar cell. After three days the man came to my home with a CPI (M) leader and asked me about the price of the solar cell. I replied to him that it will be Rs. 8000/-. After hearing the rate the leader said to me, “You don’t know the real price of the solar cell in the market.” But I did not want to lower down my price. Next day, a man came to my home by riding on a motorcycle. His name was Ajoy Mahata. He came from Singaduba village. I sold it to him at a price of Rs. 6000/- and with the money I purchased a bicycle, some clothes for my family members and repaired my house. I was in need for these things more than the solar cell.’ He added: ‘I have no money in my hand to purchase food items like rice, wheat and oil etc. even from the Public Distribution Shop in which those items were sold at a lower price than the market.’ Swapan again stated: ‘I received financial assistance for house building in 1994 but the newly built house was not suitable for living. The construction and plan of the house was very poor since it was made by the Government contractor who did not consult me. Had we built the house by following our traditional methods and raw materials, it would have been much better for us to live in it.’ (Panda & Guha: 2013)

The Fourth Case

Case study 4Name of the Informant: Sekhar Kotal Age: 49 Sex: Male

Vill: Bamunbandh J. L No: 244 Block: SalboniAccording to Sekhar Kotal he has received 0.04 acre patta lands from Salboni Block office in 1999. This land is jala jami, but land is located too far from his house. The distance of the land is 5 km. After received patta land, the beneficiary cultivated the land only one or two times. Owing to long distance he was not able to successfully cultivate the land. So, he did not cultivate the land since last 10 years. The land remained vacant. Sadanada Ghosh (a powerful CPIM leader and a strong farmer) captured the patta land and cultivated paddy and another Rabi crops. Sadanada who are belonging in a general higher caste. He cultivated that land without given any money to Sekhar Kotal. Sekhar informed to the BDO and B.L. & L.R.O about his problem, but none of them has taken action to recover the patta land for the Lodha family.

The Fifth CaseCase Study 5

Name of informant: Subrata Kotal Age: 45 Sex: MaleVillage: Gaighata Jugdiha JL. No: 245 Block: Salboni.

According to the informant there are five members in his family. They are dependent on forest resource collection and the he also worked as a mason. He has received 0.80 acre patta land with record of right from the Block Land and Land Reforms Department in 2002 on which he started paddy cultivation but could not continue for the successive seasons owing to paucity of water. Moreover, the quality of the land was not also good. It contained excessive amount sandy soil. He also did not possess agricultural implements. So he had stopped cultivation in the land given to him by the Government. In sum, he did not have enough resources to make the land cultivable. Subrata further reported that he had given the land on lease to a higher caste family only at Rs.1600/- for ten years. Interestingly, the higher caste man has been able to make the land cultivable through irrigation by drawing river water with the help of electrical pump and was found to grow cash crops.

The family has also received financial assistance for house building in 2011-2012, under Integrated Action Plan of Bharat Sarkar. All the family members were found to live in the house but it was not suitable for living as the roof got damaged. During rainy season water comes in the room. The house was constructed by a contractor under the supervision of panchyat Pradhan and local political party leaders.

According to Subrata, the money should have been directly given to him since it was sanctioned under his name but the panchayat Pradhan took the money. Moreover, he being a mason could have built his own house by using his own skill and labour. When he asked for the money, the Pradhan who belonged to a Hindu higher caste told him, ‘The Lodhas are illiterate and lazy and if I give you the money then you may squander it by buying food and drink.’ Finally, when the contractor started the work, Subrata expressed his utter dissatisfaction regarding the poor quality of the house building materials and he also reported the matter to the Pradhan. The contractor stopped the work for a week but then again the Pradhan, contractor and the local political party leaders threatened him and said that if, he did not allow the contractor to resume work then the money sanctioned for his house would be returned to the Government. In this way, Subrata was forced to accept the construction of his house by the contractor. After completion of the house a small toilet was constructed out of

the left over raw materials and it was unusable from the very beginning owing to its extremely small size and it was not in the original sanction plan. This, in a nutshell is the story of house construction for a Lodha family under governmental scheme. When I visited the house I saw that on the wall of the house it was written: ‘Total cost of house is Rs. 1, 15,000/-.[Translated by me literally from Bengali].The writing on the wall was done according to the guidelines of the scheme to maintain transparency. I came to know that this was written by the contractor in presence of the beneficiary. The toilet however was being used a place for storing fuel wood for the family.

Some representative plate from the field

A landless Lodha showing his patta record Solar Cell kept in an unprotected placewho had never seen his plot.

The house use for cow shade A hut of a Lodha Family Conclusion

The Lodhas are regarded as a marginalized and economically backward tribe and both the Central and the State Governments have allocated funds under various development schemes

to improve the socioeconomic condition of the tribe since Independence. The condition of the tribe however did not improve considerably, although, various development inputs were given to this marginalized tribe. The subsistence pattern of the Lodhas in the study area revealed that they were mostly engaged in forest produce collection and they were also found to be working as labourers in the agricultural and non-agricultural sectors. A small number of Lodha families were found to cultivate their own land and a much smaller number were engaged in the service sector. We have then described the utilisation of the three main development inputs in each block separately and also presented some representative case studies. These case studies were qualitative in nature which brought out the views of the beneficiaries.

Our findings exposed that a number of the beneficiaries received patta land only on paper. They could not use the land properly owing to lack of irrigation facility, agricultural implements, fertile land and also owing to encroachment by the locally dominant caste and tribal groups. The beneficiaries received financial assistance for house building but in most of the cases the condition of the newly built houses were not suitable for living owing to the poor planning of the house by the contractor appointed by the panchayats who did not care to consult the beneficiaries. A number of beneficiaries received solar cells but they had no knowledge about how to use and maintain the high technology gadgets properly. It was also found that the beneficiaries sold the gadgets to their well-to-do Santal and Mahata neighbours.

Under the above scenario, I have made an attempt to enumerate a list of recommendations which may be considered by the concerned departments of the Government and the policymakers for the better implementation of the development inputs according to the specific needs of the Lodha community. The recommendations are as the following.

The Lodha families to whom patta land have been issued on paper should immediately be given the actual right of possession with full protection against all kinds of disturbance by the district administration and the panchayat. The Government land departments should take initiative in the context of the ground reality of the vest land before their distribution as pattas. The Government should be given the agricultural implements and irrigation facilities.

The financial assistance for house construction plans should also have been made in consultation with the beneficiaries to give honour and importance to their specific needs.

Solar cells should not be given to individual Lodha families without enquiring into their socioeconomic conditions. This of course does not mean that solar cells should never be given to individual Lodha families.

In our study area the Lodhas were found to be dependent on the collection of minor forest produce to a large extent. Therefore, attempts should be made by the Forest Department to involve the Lodhas in the Joint Forest Management (JFM) related activities and also to ensure their rights to forest under the new Forest Rights Act, 2006.

Acknowledgements

I owe my debts to the members of the Lodha community of the selected blocks for their help and cooperation during my fieldwork and we also express gratitude to the Government officials of Paschim Medinipur district and the selected blocks. I am obliged to the organizer of NIRD for considering my paper for oral presentation in the conference. I also express our gratefulness to the Indian Council for Social Science Research (ICSSR) for providing financial support for continuous fieldwork. I am also thankful to the discussant Dr. Sarmistha Pattanaik, IIT Bombay for her valuable observation and comments on my paper. Last, but not least I am grateful to my teachers Dr.Abhijit Guha of the Department of Anthropology, Vidyasagar University for their valuable suggestions on the paper.

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Corresponding author: Dr. Santanu Panda Email: panda973363@gmail.com, Dept. of Anthropology, Vidyasagar University, Midnapore-721102, West Bengal.