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preference for endogamy. This has been the case of transition from tribes
to castes, when the preference for endogamy was enforced. Language
too, has been very important in the identification of tribes in India. Fried
questions this by arguing the case of small-scale societies of people
speaking the same languages being divided into several endogamous as
well as examples of people intermarrying though their native languages
are different.
The relation between tribe, language and civilization in India can be
summed up as: the Dravidian languages of India include not only Tamil,
but also languages spoken by a number of tribes such as Baiga and Kond,
who live by shifting cultivation. The Tamils also share the same
fundamental structure of kinship and affinity with them. Thus, kinship
cannot be used as a basis for discriminating between tribe and civilization.
Moreover, some of the tribes, have no separate language of their own, but
use the language prevalent in the region they inhabit, for instance in the
states of Rajasthan and Gujarat. Fried therefore, argues that tribes are
neither a society nor a stage of evolution, but are too amorphous, and are
regarded as a secondary phenomenon, acquiring its form and identity
from some external source. This cannot be accepted always as in the
historical relations between state and tribe, the state has not always had
the upper hand. The tribal way of life has appeared many times as
superior to that represented by the state. There has been rise to power of
tribal dynasties in various places and at various times. E.g.- Ahoms in the
thirteenth century, came as intruders from outside. What is characteristic
of the relationship between tribe and civilization in India is that there was
virtually no way in which a tribal dynasty could legitimize its rule without
becoming Hinduized and therefore, in the due course of time, replicating
the hierarchical structure of caste. This cannot be regarded as a
secondary phenomenon as it wasn`t a uniform Hinduization alwaysmany
continued with the tribal way of life. The state was not always the most
durable product of Hindu civilization. The weakness and decay of states
allowed the emergence of tribal chiefs whose aim was to create not tribal
chiefdoms so much as kingdoms after the Hindu model.
The line of division between tribes and caste is quite unclear in the Indian
case. Tribal society when compared with Hindu society, with its elaborate
arrangement of castes, the sharpest contrasts are visible. The former is
homogeneous, undifferentiated and unstratified, whereas the latter is the
reverse of the former. The polarity of equality and hierarchy is visible. On
the other hand, when individual tribes are compared with individual
castes, a certain homology can be seenthey emphasize and perpetuate
collective identities. The confusion between caste and tribe can be further
seen in cases of castes of tribal origin in areas in which the caste-based
division of labour is well established and also in the converse case, with
the growth of occupational specialization and the emergence of caste-like
groups in the interior of tribal areas. The difficulty often arises at the
margins of Hindu civilization.
Tribal society also carries the marks of Hindu culture in India and viceversa. Thus, the Indian case reveals not only the co-existence of tribe and
civilization but also their interpenetration. Thus, the collective identities
survive the conversion of tribe into caste. The argument cannot be
expected to apply equally well in all cases of India. The tribes that have
been affected the most by the Hindu method of tribal absorption are the
ones in the interior hill and forest areas where influences from other
civilizations, whether, Islamic or Missionary, have been feeble or absent.
E.g.- Bhil, Munda, Santhals etc. Bose argues that the absorption of tribes
by the wider society was connected to a material advantage to both. The
material base of a tribal community because of a sudden population
expansion led to a precarious situation in which the tribes sought
economic security by aligning themselves with the wider society. This was
granted by the wider society on the condition that the tribes took the
lowest position within it. Bose was criticized for dwelling too much on the
symbiotic relation between the two and not on the asymmetrical and
exploitative character.
In conclusion, Beteille is of the opinion that the historical approach should
be more favoured than the evolutionary approach in terms of defining and
identifying tribes as in the Indian case, where tribe and civilization has coexisted, tribes have stood more or less outside the Hindu civilization and
they were all not at the same stage of evolution.
The process of designating or scheduling tribes in India began with the
British rule, especially with the 1931 census. There was a political
controversy regarding the same by British officials on one side arguing for
a need to mark the aboriginals from the rest of Indian society because of
their unique and distinct identity, and Indian nationalists arguing that the
aboriginals were very much a part of Hindu society. The Indian
Constitution finally accommodated both view-points recognizing tribes as
distinct from castes, but treating them as Hindus all the same. Thus, the
state lists and labels the tribes adopting several measures for its benefit,
and the tribes have in turn acquired new interest in being listed and
labelled. The Constitutional provisions have given to the tribal identity a
kind of definiteness with a legal sanction in its maintenance it lacked in
the past, leading to a substantial increase in tribal population in the recent
years. This assertion of tribal identity in the political domain can be
described as a process of retribalization.