Govt to do away with ST criterion of ‘primitive traits’ status

<g data-gr-id="29">Government</g> has proposed to do away with the "primitive traits" criterion to accord Scheduled Tribe (ST) status to a particular community, saying it is "derogatory".

The proposed changes are part of the government's process of revising the entire procedure and criteria in order to ensure that only deserving communities get the status and reap the benefits given to the STs, said a senior official from the Tribal Affairs Ministry.

"We have proposed to do away with the criterion, 'indications of primitive traits', as the word 'primitive' is a derogatory term," he said. Also, the aim of changing the procedure is to include a few new communities with proper criteria in the ST list as the Tribal Affairs Ministry <g data-gr-id="23">everyday</g> receives many such requests from several states, he said.

According to sources, the criterion of 'Geographical isolation' could be also removed keeping in mind the migration of various members of certain communities in search of <g data-gr-id="20">livelihood</g>. The proposal which also suggests some procedural amendments have already been sent to the Cabinet.

The Tribal Affairs Ministry had constituted a Task Force on scheduling issues (scheduling of communities as STs), which had submitted its recommendations last year and those recommendations have also been incorporated, said the official. .

The Task Force comprised members from the Registrar General of India (RGI), National Commission for Scheduled Tribes (NCST), ministries of Tribal Affairs and Social Justice and Empowerment. As per the current procedure of according ST status to a particular community, the state government first recommends the case along with which they submit an ethnographic report.