In news– ‘Food and Social Security at the Margins: The Parhaiyas of Jharkhand’ is one such study that examines the level of penetration and coverage of government schemes and the bottlenecks that hinder its implementation.
About Parhaiya tribe-
- Parhaiya is one of the nine Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs; earlier referred as Primitive Tribal Group-PTG) of Jharkhand state.
- They are mainly concentrated in Latehar and Palamau districts of Jharkhand state.
- It is a community that has the claim of being the earliest inhabitants of the region and finds mention in Megasthenes’ book as well as Hiuen Tsang’s travelogue.
- They go on hunting-expeditions, practice share-cropping as well as shifting cultivation, live in mud houses, collect firewood from forest and practice herbal medicine.
- They celebrate Magahī Parab (festival) with ecstatic joy and vivacious song and dance.
Who are PVTGs?
- PVTG is a sub-classification of Scheduled Tribe or section of a Scheduled Tribe, that is considered more vulnerable than a regular Scheduled Tribe.
- The PVTG list was created by the Indian Government with the purpose of better improving the living standards of endangered tribal groups based on priority.
- The Dhebar Commission (1960-1961) found that within the Scheduled Tribe classification an inequality existed in the rate of development of certain tribes over others.
- As a result in the fourth Five Year Plan the sub-category “Primitive tribal group” was created within the grouping of Scheduled Tribe to identify groups considered to be especially lacking in modern development.
- There are 75 tribes in this group.
- The 75th group recognised as PTG were the Maram in Manipur in 1993-94.
- In 2006 the government of India changed the name of “Primitive tribal group” to “Particularly vulnerable tribal group.
Source: The Hindu
