Dalits and adivasi (indigenous people) have never been part of the conventional trade systems in India. Today they are faced with the horrible hostility of trade and market policies. In recent times, trade entered the scene on a large scale through the principles of globalisation, liberalisation and privatisation. Mega industrial production still plays a key role in all trade deals not only at the national level but also at the international level.

Industrialisation, which made a colourful entry, is turning out to be the worst form of human development. The steady economic growth of industries with active support from the State machinery is directly proportional to the unchecked exploitation of the masses. Most of them belong to the marginalised communities such as Dalit, adivasi, women, and the working class. Although during the Independence struggle, ‘land to the tillers’ and ‘factory to the workers’ prominently came on to the national agenda, nowhere in post-Independence India did we witness the latter one being implemented. Resultant displacement, migration, repression of workers, loss of land and livelihood, pilfering state revenue, forest resources, and related problems have grown to monstrous levels.

This has amplified particularly with WTO taking the centre stage of all sorts of trade-related agreements and transactions at the international level. Trade is no longer buying and selling of goods and services but it encompasses issues like intellectual property rights. With this, the global market has been thrown wide open for exploration and exploitation of resources under the garb of free trade. Industrialised nations seem to have found the tools to maintain their supremacy on the world trade scene. Prophets of trade and commerce argue that free trade maximises world economic output. This is what is considered to be progress. But what we have been witnessing with the Dalits and adivasi in India is diametrically opposite to these claims.

Decline of people’s rights on natural resources

The symbiotic relationship between the forest-dwelling communities, especially the adivasi and the forest eco-system is an eternal truth. They had a traditional system of preserving the forest and wildlife. Many of the indigenous communities worship the forest and give offerings to the forest-gods/goddesses and to wild animals. Their lives cannot be segregated into watertight compartments such as social, economic, political, religious, cultural, administrative, intellectual, spiritual, etc. Life is a single organic whole. Due to the fast changing socio-economic trends, social values and traditional lifestyles are vastly being diverted. The degrees of change vary from rural to urban, urban to metropolitan, poverty to affluence, etc. Today, the spread of modern education, effect of media and expansion of rural bureaucracy has induced an element of elitism in rural areas.

Undoubtedly, the adivasis live in close relationship with the forests and are dependent on it. Many Dalit communities are significantly dependent on forests and natural resources for their survival. Artisan and craftsmen Dalit communities like Kurava in Kerala, Mala communities in Andhra Pradesh, Basod in Madhya Pradesh are dependent on forest resources. Various projects have already ousted them from land and property. Due to their emotional attachment with the forest, they always look for similar localities and settle down there. It is because of this that the adivasi and Dalit in many parts of the country are branded as encroachers. Apparently, their customary and traditional rights were either curtailed or ignored by every ruler, both colonial and national.

The past policies of the State seriously disturbed the close and lively relationship between people and natural resources – leading to the unrestricted destruction of forest wealth, affecting their wholesome lifestyle and struck at their very survival. Furthermore, the rule of globalisation directly or indirectly attempted to capture the resources throughout the world, which includes natural resources too. One of the greatest failures of this period was the scantiness of unified attempts from the Third World to resist this move. The segmentation of the Third World and their internal fighting to establish power, enriched the exploiter camp to manipulate the situation. Nevertheless, this reduced people’s control over natural resources.

People’s control over natural resources was further reduced with the direct intervention of International Monetary Fund, World Bank, World Trade Organisation, etc. Several World Bank funded projects have already worsened the condition of the forests and forest-dwelling communities. The major intention was not just to capture the resources from indigenous people, but also to establish an unquestionable political and social control over the world.

For indigenous communities like the adivasi and Dalit, their dependency on land and forest is not just in the form of a productive asset, but also as a symbol of their self-determination, co-existence, community feeling and dignity. Now this has became a tradable commodity.

Corporate property: YES! People’s rights: NO!
Forests, the nurturer of thousands of adivasi and other forest workers, are well under the inspection of corporate investors. This is what the principle of open market economy and international trade policies demands. The government along with the forest department has been engaged in dispossessing forest-based communities under the pretext of forest conservation and wildlife protection. On the other hand, it is opened for industrial purpose like mining, power, dams, etc., defence projects, so-called wildlife management, botanical gardens, bio-experiments, eco-tourism and so on.

In Chhattisgarh alone, almost 1,700,000 acres of land have been demarcated as protected area for the sake of wildlife conservation, where people face the threat of eviction. According to government sources there are more than 250 villages with a population of above 35,000. The majority of them are adivasi and Dalits, who are living in forest regions almost as bonded labourers of the forest department. Chhattisgarh has high potential in terms of forest resources. In fact, it covered nearly 45 per cent of the total forests in the erstwhile Madhya Pradesh. Bastar alone can serve at least ten per cent of the national requirement of forest. But in the last two decades, due to the irresponsible approach of the government, it is on the downslide; the forests have gradually degraded. In the state, ten major projects have already been completed, for which 257,033 acres of land have been lost. In all, 238 villages have been affected by these dams and their rehabilitation work has not yet been done. In addition, there are 30 medium projects affecting 123 villages, for which 32,745 acres of land have been acquired. Further, there are eight projects pending and six medium projects have been proposed, affecting 150 villages, for which 261,315 acres of land is to be occupied. Majority of the land lost is either forestland or has fuelled the destruction of forests. These are the statistics from 2000 when the state was about to be created. This chart has probably grown much higher.

Another major reason for forest destruction is the mass felling of trees for commercial purposes. In many areas of Chhattisgarh, there are cases of felling of trees through the forest department. A powerful lobby of timber contractors, politicians and bureaucrats are actively involved in illegal felling. One major case of similar character was exposed in Bastar. This case drew a lot of attention and the Supreme Court ordered a CBI investigation.

Free trade: a war against indigenous people
There already exists an unfair line created by the unjust socio-political divide. Under this circumstance what would free trade mean? War!

War, because the indigenous people are thrown out of their resource zones and livelihoods. Forceful change in life style, culture and eco-friendly ethos is reversed through this process. Land and forests are turned into a commodity of consumption, with concentration on private and individual (corporate) capital; it is not meant for welfare of all.

War, because their right to land, water and forests are yet to be defined by the nation state. Although there is sufficient proof of the symbiotic relationship of adivasi and Dalits with the forest environment and the eco-system at large, they are systematically and strategically bypassed, excluded and isolated. They are not recognised as the original inhabitants and owners of land and are subjected to mass displacement and migration, creating an army of domestic refugees. Let us not forget that free trade is also considered to be a part of economic growth and development. Hence, the historical omission of the already betrayed and battered continues in higher degree and magnitude.

War, because their skills and knowledge are patented under the newly coined phenomenon of intellectual property rights. The wealth of Indian natural zones and skills and knowledge of indigenous communities are immense. Once they are transferred, they could easily be brought under intellectual property rights.

War, because everything is now in the market, but the Dalit and adivasi are nowhere in the market. Other production-based communities have a minimum right to enter the market, but the indigenous people have no right to market.

War, because the exploitation of non-renewable resources is diametrically opposite in proportion to the human-resource relationship. At large, this disturbs the eco-system and erupts major ecological problems, which threatens the life of mother earth to unpredictable magnitude. In other words, life on earth is and will be at stake if the present process continues. This is particularly related to the question of mining. In fact the communities have no right to mining.

War, because jargons like ‘ecological democracy’ and ‘ecological equity’ will not go hand in hand with globalisation and the market; they are entirely opposed to each other.

War, because the corporate house needs resources whereas people need their livelihood. It is a war between surplus and survival. Thus the subsistent economy is transferred into a market economy.

War, because in an age of free trade and market, the life values sustained through the community’s life are constantly diffusing and substituted with competition.

War, because those who resist and “refuse to disappear”, as the Zapatistas say, are routinely arrested, beaten and even killed.

War, because when this kind of low-intensity repression fails to clear the path to corporate liberation, the real wars begin. This is the war being witnessed in Kashipur, Nagarnar, Mehendikheda, Koelkaro, Umbergoan and many other places. Perhaps free trade flows from the barrel of the gun and the head of lathis in India.

What next?
Many pundits say, “there is no alternative” (or TINA). This is not true; nor is it the correct approach. Our approach should begin from two primary viewpoints. One, that globalisation is not development. Secondly, trade and financial liberalisation do not raise social and labour standards. Once again, globalisation continues to colonise the poor, women, eco-system and environment as an integral part of this development. The greatest enemies of terror never lose sight of the economic interests served by violence, or the violence of capitalism itself. Is trade really free?

To identify viable alternatives, one must understand that the root causes of today’s predicament lie in the devastating development based on industrialism and wasteful growth, development packages spread by colonialism and capitalism. Developing countries must be allowed the policy flexibility and the political space to create national development strategies that increase incomes and secure livelihoods. Policies, which create employment and raise productivity, especially in the agricultural and natural resources and informal sector, linked with a progressive taxation system, land reform and equitable access to assets such as education, health, credit and technology, are the best means of raising social and labour standards.

Essentially one has to campaign for recognition and support the identity, culture and rights of indigenous people, and to promote appropriate conditions for them to benefit from forest use, to maintain their cultural identity, and to achieve adequate levels of livelihood through inter alia land tenure arrangements which serve as incentives for the sustainable management of forests.

Right to land when not recognised leads to land alienation. In case of indigenous communities, it leads to depeasantisation. The concept assumes utmost importance in the analysis of their rights as a part of human rights discourse. The problem of land alienation is a much deeply connected phenomenon full of contradictions related to the existing socio-economic order. The separation of land from the indigenous communities can be understood in a more scientific way with the assistance of the theoretical formulations of the concept of alienation.

Come lets’ build a campaign

It is vital that the Dalit and adivasi communities build a campaign against the politics of free trade and market economy. However, this needs to come as a bottom-up model, essential not only to protect the communities’ interests, but also other indigenous and ethnic minorities and aboriginals across the world.

No one is going to escape this trap. It is derived out of the historical modus operandi of capitalism. By all means, it is the re-establishment of the capitalistic regime through the imperialist formula of globalisation, liberalisation and privatisation. Attaining absoluteness of capitalism is the primary intention of open market and free trade in the current phase. Essentially, this needs to be blocked at all levels with urgency. To start with, one needs to think in terms of building a campaign against trade, trade related policies and market economy at large.

The possible core of the campaign

• Reorienting our economies from the emphasis on production for export to production for the local market.
  Strengthening the local market and its mechanisms through appropriate interventions.

• Strengthening the community’s base on natural resources ensuring rights over land, water and forest.

• Reinforcing the traditional systems of community life in an organic manner with rights over resources.

• In cases of exploration of minerals, the adivasi and Dalit communities shoul be actively involved in it. Free trade will not take place without taking the local community into serious consideration. Since the land belongs or belonged to them, they have a legitimate right on these resources.

• Transfer of mining lease without adivasi has been prohibited with the Samata Judgment. This has essentially banned mining! Such verdicts need to be upheld.

• Drawing most of our financial resources for development from within rather than becoming dependent on foreign investment and foreign financial markets.

• Carrying out the long-postponed measures of income redistribution and land redistribution to create a vibrant internal market that would be the anchor of the economy.

• De-emphasising growth and maximising equity in order to radically reduce environmental disequilibria.

• Not leaving strategic economic decisions to the market but making them subject to democratic choice.

• Subjecting the private sector and the State to constant monitoring by civil society.

• Creating a new production and exchange complex that includes community cooperatives, private enterprises, and state enterprises, and excludes trans-national corporations.

• Enshrining the principle of subsidiary in economic life by encouraging production of goods to take place at the community and national level if it can be done so at reasonable cost in order to preserve community. -GMG

Goldy M George is the convenor of Dalit Mukti Morcha, Chhattisgarh, and was actively involved in setting up its think tank, the Dalit Study Circle. He can be contacted at dalitstudycircle@yahoo.com

© Copyright 2004 Foundation for Humanisation