Vanvasi Or Adivasi — Mapping The Contours And Grammar Of Belonging Among India's Tribals

Adivasi or Vanvasi: Tribal India and the Politics of Hindutva. Kamal Nayan Choubey. Penguin Random House, India. Pages: 281. Price: Rs 799.

What's in a Name?

When we hear of this constant tussle between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Indian National Congress (INC) on the usage of vanvasi (dweller of forests) and adivasi (indigenous people), there seems to be an unsaid mutual understanding about how the dictionary shapes political narratives.

This is in due consonance with Judith Butler’s writings on performativity and Austin’s famous speech-act theory. Language is not just a way to say things, but it is an action in itself. These theoretical frameworks manifest themselves in laying down the significance of this book.

For the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and its affiliated organisations, it is an intention to avoid the inherent idea associated with adivasis: that they are supposedly the original inhabitants of the land, who were displaced and ignored after the so-called Aryan invasion or subsequent foreign invasions, which is eerily similar to the Dravidian theories. The use of adivasi can be roughly translated to indigenous people. G.S. Ghurye notes that the term was used in the colonial period for imperialist politics.

While it may seem innocent to a regular reader, the usage manages to create several narratives that impact politics severely.

First, it manages to reaffirm the belief of the person in the mythic Aryan invasion. This evangelical narrative somehow also creates a gap between Hinduism and the tribals, that the RSS intends to bridge with the idea of Sanatan Dharma (translating roughly to, as old as time).

Second, with the tribals facing an identity dilemma, it furthers the cause of evangelical proselytisation.

Third, it leads to separatism and a sentiment of secession, which causes national security concerns for the state.

The Akhil Bharatiya Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram (VKA) was formed in 1952, with a sentiment to lay down the groundwork of challenging the evangelical proselytisation and curbing the missionary activities in the deep forests of central India.

The book, 'Adivasi or Vanvasi: Tribal India and the Politics of Hindutva', by Kamal Nayan Choubey is a comprehensive and novel study that traces the work of the VKA through a historical, empirical, and comparative approach.

There are seven chapters that discuss various facets of the organisation, including its expansion, policy stances of the VKA on Sarna Code, Forest Rights Act (FRA), Panchayat (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act (PESA), amongst others, and a critical examination of its work with other left-oriented organisations.

Tu-Main Ek Raqt (You and I Carry the Same Blood)

With 1,08,735 active beneficiaries of hostels and education centres (p. 94), the VKA has been one major pillar of the Sangh Parivar. It was founded by Ramakant Keshav Deshpande and Morubhau Ketkar, with the financial and moral support of the Maharaja of Jashpur, Vijaydev Bhusan Singh Judev.

Deshpande was first appointed as the Regional Director of the Tribal Welfare Department by the then Chief Minister of Central Provinces, Ramakant Shukla, on the recommendation of Thakkar Bappa. Today, it reaches over eighteen thousand villages, yet it may boggle the mind to think that there was no nuanced literature that spoke of it.

In the words of the author, the Left assumes it to be a static organisation working towards a Hindu majoritarian state, while the sympathisers of the RSS overlook it as yet another affiliate. Clearly, there is an enormous research gap that this book seeks to address.

To the author, the VKA is a harmony of Gramsci’s organic and traditional intellectuals, which could be seen through its dynamic stands over the period of time. The author argues that for the past few years, the VKA has championed the causes of leftist activism in the tribal regions and has gone as far as contradicting the BJP’s political views, too.

For instance, it took a “sharp and unambiguous” stand against the thirteen-point roster system in government jobs that was introduced by the BJP government. Later, the government restored the 200-point roster through an ordinance. While reconversion to Hinduism, amongst other aggressive and radical social issues, has been taken up by other bodies like the Janjati Suraksha Manch (JSM), the VKA has remained persistent in its endeavour to gain the trust through its non-political social services.

The VKA’s ground-level understanding of issues like beef-eating and evangelical conversions has led to the BJP’s understanding and subsequent victories in the Northeastern states.

While the organisation strongly and staunchly supports the effective implementation of the PESA in all ten states and the FRA across the country, it clearly discredits anything that can potentially harm the civilisational ethos and the integration of tribals into the umbrella of Sanatan Dharma. For instance, in 2018, the Kendriya Karyakari Mandal (KKM) of the VKA denounced the demand for the Sarna Code, which creates a scope for tribes to identify themselves as a separate religion.

Concluding Take

Although Kamal Choubey’s book is a successful attempt at mapping the trajectory of the VKA with precision, the limitations cannot be ignored, either.

First, the book comes across as somewhat incomplete. We find certain ideas scattered throughout the book despite chapters having clear points of demarcation, which leads to a certain degree of redundancy in the middle chapters, with the author constantly coming back to the VKA’s historical origins.

Second, while there is no doubt about the author’s extensive research on the VKA, he falls short on understanding Hindutva, and constructs a classic straw man by making Savarkar the sole custodian of it. He writes that “Hindutva started with the writings of Savarkar” or how “Savarkar argues that he coined Hindutva” (pp. 27–28); and a cursory reading of Hindutva can tell that it was Chandranath Basu who coined the word in 1892.

Furthermore, he also goes on to write that the RSS “invented the idea of Sanatan Dharma as an indigenous religion,” and a reader can only wonder how the editors at Penguin India could let such basic factual inaccuracies pass freely by their sight.

Third, there seems to be a missing link. A reader would certainly wish to read more comprehensively into the background of the various Government of India legislations that are brought into discussion. Without it, some readers may argue that the book could have been more suitable as a research paper.

Fourth, we find (p. 197) that “…VKA started to work on these issues after the works of Gandhian or left-oriented tribal organisations,” which comes across as another inaccuracy where a reader is left wondering if the author is equating the Gandhian organisations with the radically violent left-oriented organisations, or if that is just an editing oversight.

While such rectifications should be expected in revised editions, it does not diminish the avenues this book opens up for further understanding of the VKA and tribal politics.

Kamal Choubey’s careful study pushes the readers to look at the VKA as something beyond the definition of a tribal welfare non-governmental organisation or an RSS adjunct, something more towards the idea of an actor that oscillates between assimilation and accommodation towards a greater integration of the nation.