The Hemant Soren cabinet in Jharkhand on 14 September approved the draft for 'Local Residents of Jharkhand Bill' for defining a local, setting the year 1932 as the cut-off year for the proof of land records. According to this bill, the 1932 Khatiyan (land records) will be the main proof of domicile in the state.
The last land survey was conducted and completed in most parts of present-day Jharkhand in 1932 under the British colonial administration. Making 1932 land records as a proof of domicile had been a popular demand among the Adivasi and Moolvasi (native non-tribals) populations of the state since long.
Along with the domicile bill, the Soren cabinet also approved the 77 percent reservations for Scheduled Caste(SC), Scheduled Tribe (ST), Other Backward Categories (OBC) and economically weaker sections of the population in state government jobs. Most striking among all, is the hike in OBC reservations to 27 percent from the current 14 percent.
The bill also increases the ST and SC reservations to 28 and 12 percent respectively, from the present 26 and 10 percent. The decision fulfils the election promise of the present Jharkhand Mukti Morcha(JMM)-Indian National Congress(INC)-Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) government.
The decision comes amidst a political crisis in the state due to the threat of disqualification of Chief Minister(CM) Hemant Soren as an MLA over an office of profit case. Cornered by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Soren has responded by fulfilling the popular demands of the people and his election promises.
The domicile bill and the substantial increase in OBC reservations should not be looked at in isolation but along with another important decision of the Soren government of passing the Sarna Dharam Resolution on 11 November 2020 for reintroducing a separate column for the religion of STs in the census 2021.
I argue that all three decisions mentioned above collectively try to counter the BJP’s growing political dominance and its increasing reach among the Adivasi – Moolvasi population in Jharkhand.
Sarna Code: Adivasis Are Not Hindu
The Sarna Adiavsi Dharam Resolution passed by the Hemant Soren government in 2021 seeks to counter the BJP-RSS claim that Adivasis are essentially Hindus. The Hindutva brigade have always had problems with the identity assertion of Adivasis as a distinct socio-political group. Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) prefers the term Vanvasi (forest dwellers) to refer to STs in India.
The term Vanvasi tries to claim that Adivasis are nothing but ‘backward Hindus’ and necessary reform would bring them to the levels of other Hindus.
RSS's focus on the Adivasi areas started because of the substantial presence of Christian missionaries and the conversion of Adivasis into Christianity. Over the years, they used various mechanisms often mimicking the functioning of Christian missionaries themselves to assimilate Adivasis within the Hindu fold with limited success.
However, the increasing political and electoral dominance of the BJP in the Adivasi areas signals that Sangh Parivar's years of missionary work in the Adivasi areas are reaping rewards.
Adivasis Resist Religious Assimilation
In addition, the administrative act of denying Adivasis a separate religious column in the census in the post-independence period has also benefitted the politics of religious and cultural assimilation of Adivasis into mainstream religions.
Recognising the necessity for a separate religion column for Adivasis, many Adivasi activists had been organising and mobilising Adivasis for years to demand a separate Sarna Code in the Census.
The popularity of the movement among the Adivasi compelled the Soren government to pass the Sarna Code resolution in 2021 which is now pending before the Central government for approval. The recognition of a separate indigenous religion would prove to be a rallying point for increased Adivasi solidarity and countering any attempt to identify Adivasis as Hindus.
Tribal Sects Stand Politically Divided
The history of resistance in the state of Jharkhand tells us that the insider-outsider dichotomy has been crucial to the creation of the regional 'Jharkhandi' identity. Under the leadership of the charismatic Adivasi leader Jaipal Singh Munda, Jharkhand Party in the first decade after independence was able to forge an alliance between Adivasi and Moolvasi against the Diku (exploitative outsider) that became a formidable political force demanding separate statehood for Jharkhand.
However, since the decline of the Jharkhand Party, differences have emerged between Adivasis and Moolvasis. In the last three decades, BJP has dented the Jharkhandi solidarity by creating a cross-cutting alliance based on religious identity.Large sections of Moolvasi who practice Hinduism have moved towards the BJP in recent times which partly explains BJP’s electoral wins in Jharkhand.
The demand for a policy to define local inhabitants based on 1932 land records has been raised by Adivasi and Moolvasi for many years.
Hemant Soren’s move to frame domicile policy based on 1932 land records is in accordance with the popular demand and attempts to rebuild and rearticulate the regional Jharkhandi identity.
Will the Domicile Policy Reaffirm Tribal Solidarity?
The domicile issue in Jharkhand has been a politically sensitive one. The first CM of Jharkhand, Babulal Marandi brought a similar bill in 2002 to redefine the local inhabitant which was finally struck down by the court amidst massive protests both in support of and against the bill.
Marandi had to pay the political cost by losing his CM post. In 2016, the Raghubar Das government reformulated and redefined the ‘local’ by setting 1985 as the cut-off date for proof of residence.
However, this decision was seen as an attempt to bypass the popular demand of the natives in favour of the recent migrants. Since then, the demand for the 1932 domicile policy has been gaining momentum among the Adivasis and Moolvasis of Jharkhand.
Hemant Soren’s cabinet decision to define local inhabitants based on 1932 land records attempts to achieve multiple goals in one move. Firstly, it attempts to derail the BJP’s increasing support among the Moolvasis who feel that nothing changed for them with the creation of Jharkhand. A domicile policy that would preferably treat Moolvasis in terms of government jobs and access to state resources would create solidarity around the regional Jharkhandi identity.
Secondly, it aims to rebuild the bridge between the Adivasis and Moolvasis by reviving the historical memory of the struggle during the Jharkhand movement when the locals struggled and suffered together for separate statehood. It invokes the historical memory of solidarity among locals in the present context of religiously polarised politics for future actualisation of regional unity among the locals.
Will Increased Tribal Reservations Combat Hindutva?
The Jharkhand movement especially with the formation of JMM in 1973 entailed a creative fusion of politics of recognition and that of redistribution. Lalit Mahto, one of the founding members of AJSU (All Jharkhand Students Union), argues that the politics of recognition expressed in terms of the assertion based on Adivasi and the Jharkhandi identity was only one part of the movement while the other part dealt with the politics of redistribution-- an attempt to remake and reorganise the Jharkhandi society from the grassroots.
However, the redistribution politics has had a marginal presence in the politics of regional political parties since the formation of Jharkhand in the year 2000. Marginalisation of 'redistribution politics' in Jharkhand created space for Hindutva politics of the BJP in the socio-political context of Jharkhand, ripe for social change.
The move to expand the OBC reservation to 27 percent from a mere 14 percent and total reservation of SC, ST, OBC and economically weaker sections to 77 percent in state government jobs attempts to bring back the politics of redistribution to the centre stage of Jharkhand politics.
What the Politics of Redistribution Mean for the Locals
In a situation of political crisis, Hemant Soren has fallen back on the original politics of JMM based on the assertion of the Jharkhandi identity and the politics of redistribution. The 1932 domicile policy, Sarna Code, and expansion of reservations together try to radically restructure the political space in Jharkhand.
In the face of the BJP juggernaut, Soren government is making the political cauldron in Jharkhand simmer by creating space for politics from below and possibilities of renewed Jharkhandi solidarity.
Legal hurdles notwithstanding, the decisions of the government have ignited hope among the locals for the actualisation of the promises that the formation of Jharkhand entailed.
(Kunal Nath Shahdeo is a PhD student of Sociology from the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Bombay.This is an opinion piece and the views expressed are the author’s own. He tweets at @kunalshahdeo1. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)
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