Ground Down by Growth: Tribe, Caste, Class and Inequality in 21st Century India PDF
Preview Ground Down by Growth: Tribe, Caste, Class and Inequality in 21st Century India
Ground Down by Growth EBSCOhost - printed on 9/18/2020 9:26 AM via COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY - MAIN. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use Anthropology, Culture and Society Series Editors: Jamie Cross, University of Edinburgh, Christina Garsten, Stockholm University and Joshua O. Reno, Binghamton University Recent titles: The Limits to Citizen Power: Anthropology and Development: Private Oceans: Participatory Democracy and Challenges for the Twenty-first The Enclosure and the Entanglements of the State Century Marketisation of the Seas Victor Albert Katy Gardner Fiona McCormack and David Lewis Becoming Arab in London: Contesting Publics Performativity and the Organisational Anthropology: Feminism, Activism, Undoing of Identity Doing Ethnography In and Ethnography Ramy M. K. 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The Anthropology of Security: Second Edition Perspectives from the Frontline The Making of an African Thomas Hylland Eriksen of Policing, Counter-terrorism Working Class: and Border Control Politics, Law and Cultural At the Heart of the State: Edited by Mark Maguire, Protest in the Manual Workers’ The Moral World of Institutions Catarina Frois Union of Botswana Didier Fassin et al. and Nils Zurawski Pnina Werbner EBSCOhost - printed on 9/18/2020 9:26 AM via COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY - MAIN. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use Ground Down by Growth Tribe, Caste, Class and Inequality in Twenty-first-century India Alpa Shah, Jens Lerche, Richard Axelby, Dalel Benbabaali, Brendan Donegan, Jayaseelan Raj and Vikramaditya Thakur EBSCOhost - printed on 9/18/2020 9:26 AM via COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY - MAIN. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use First published 2018 by Pluto Press 345 Archway Road, London N6 5AA www.plutobooks.com Copyright © Alpa Shah, Jens Lerche, Richard Axelby, Dalel Benbabaali, Brendan Donegan, Jayaseelan Raj and Vikramaditya Thakur 2018 Where possible acknowledge all authors in citations. Otherwise, please refer to the book as ‘Shah and Lerche et al.’ The right of Alpa Shah, Jens Lerche, Richard Axelby, Dalel Benbabaali, Brendan Donegan, Jayaseelan Raj and Vikramaditya Thakur to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978 0 7453 3769 2 Hardback ISBN 978 0 7453 3768 5 Paperback ISBN 978 1 7868 0204 0 PDF eBook ISBN 978 1 7868 0206 4 Kindle eBook ISBN 978 1 7868 0205 7 EPUB eBook This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental standards of the country of origin. Typeset by Stanford DTP Services, Northampton, England Simultaneously printed in the United Kingdom and United States of America EBSCOhost - printed on 9/18/2020 9:26 AM via COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY - MAIN. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use Contents List of Illustrations vi Series Preface ix Preface x Alpa Shah and Jens Lerche 1 Tribe, Caste and Class – New Mechanisms of Exploitation and Oppression 1 Alpa Shah and Jens Lerche 2 Macro-Economic Aspects of Inequality and Poverty in India 32 K.P. Kannan 3 Tea Belts of the Western Ghats, Kerala 49 Jayaseelan Raj 4 Cuddalore, Chemical Industrial Estate, Tamil Nadu 82 Brendan Donegan 5 Bhadrachalam Scheduled Area, Telangana 115 Dalel Benbabaali 6 Chamba Valley, Himalaya, Himachal Pradesh 143 Richard Axelby 7 Narmada Valley and Adjoining Plains, Maharashtra 176 Vikramaditya Thakur 8 The Struggles Ahead 203 Alpa Shah and Jens Lerche Appendix: Tables and Figures 216 Notes 235 Bibliography 253 Acknowledgements 272 Index 273 EBSCOhost - printed on 9/18/2020 9:26 AM via COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY - MAIN. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use List of Illustrations photographs 1 Hill Valley estate in the Western Ghats, Kerala 51 2 Dalit tea pluckers bringing their day’s harvest in for weighing 60 3 Adivasi migrant labour returning to Jharkhand, waiting at a bus stop 73 4 Dalit women tea worker’s strike 81 5 SIPCOT Industrial Estate, Cuddalore, Tamil Nadu 85 6 Dalit woman by Dalit houses built through the government scheme 94 7 Anti-pollution activists in the SIPCOT Industrial Estate near Melpuram, Tamil Nadu 102 8 Rao’s village mansion, Bhadrachalam 123 9 Koya permanent Indian Tobacco Company employee’s mother 127 10 Koya, Lambada and Madiga women plucking cotton on Kamma land 130 11 CPI(ML)–New Democracy’s organised protest for house sites 135 12 A slice of the Himalayan Saal valley showing Badagaon (bottom) and forests and pastures (top) 149 13 A Gaddi shepherd and flock 151 14 Gaddis at work building roads 166 15 Bhils farming in the hills near the banks of the Narmada River 183 16 Boats of seasonal migrants crossing from Maharashtra to go to the sugar cane fields in Gujarat 188 17 Migrant colony of Bhil sugar cane cutters 202 figures 2.1 Poverty and poverty reduction by social group 36 3.1 Occupations of men by caste group, Hill Valley estate, Kerala 220 3.2 Occupations of women by caste group, Hill Valley estate, Kerala 221 3.3 Years of schooling of men by caste group, Hill Valley estate, Kerala 221 3.4 Years of schooling of women by caste group, Hill Valley estate, Kerala 222 4.1 Occupations of men by caste and tribe, Melpuram, Tamil Nadu 223 EBSCOhost - printed on 9/18/2020 9:26 AM via COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY - MAIN. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use list of illustrations vii 4.2 Occupations of women by caste and tribe, Melpuram, Tamil Nadu 223 4.3 Years of schooling of men by caste and tribe, Melpuram, Tamil Nadu 224 4.4 Years of schooling of women by caste and tribe, Melpuram, Tamil Nadu 224 5.1 Occupations of men by caste and tribe in a Bhadrachalam village, Telangana 226 5.2 Occupations of women by caste and tribe, in a Bhadrachalam village, Telangana 226 5.3 Years of schooling of women by caste and tribe, in a Bhadrachalam village, Telangana 227 5.4 Years of schooling of women by caste and tribe, in a Bhadrachalam village, Telangana 227 6.1 Occupations of men by community, Badagaon, Himachal Pradesh 230 6.2 Occupations of women by community, Badagaon, Himachal Pradesh 230 6.3 Years of schooling of men by community, Badagaon, Himachal Pradesh 231 6.4 Years of schooling of women by community, Badagaon, Himachal Pradesh 231 7.1 Occupations of Gujar and Bhil (Adivasi) men of three Nandurbar villages, Maharashtra 233 7.2 Occupations of Gujar and Bhil (Adivasi) women of three Nandurbar villages, Maharashtra 233 7.3 Years of schooling of Gujar and Bhil (Adivasi) men of three Nandurbar villages, Maharashtra 234 7.4 Years of schooling of Gujar and Bhil (Adivasi) women of three Nandurbar villages, Maharashtra 234 map India, showing our field sites and main migration patterns xx tables 2.1 Percentage distribution of population by poverty status and social groups, 2004–05 and 2009–10 35 2.2 A ‘trickle-down’ process? The pace of poverty reduction in relation to economic growth 1999–2000 to 2009–10 37 2.3 Multidimensional poverty among India’s social groups and states in a comparative perspective 40 EBSCOhost - printed on 9/18/2020 9:26 AM via COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY - MAIN. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use viii ground down by growth 2.4 Percentage distribution of population in specific educational categories by poverty status and social group, 2004–05 41 2.5 State-wise incidence of poverty and vulnerability by social group 43 2.6 Social-cum-regional-cum-gender inequality in long-term poverty: incidence of malnutrition (chronic energy deficiency) among women, 2005–06 47 3.1 Types of contracts of tea plantation workers, Hill Valley estate, Kerala 216 3.2 Relationship between education and occupation, Hill Valley estate, Kerala: occupational categories for each educational group, caste-wise (%) 217 3.3 Ten case histories of tea worker households, Hill Valley estate, Kerala 218 3.4 Caste-wise distribution of skilled/semi-skilled jobs, Hill Valley estate, Kerala 220 4.1 Relationship between education and occupation, Melpuram, Tamil Nadu: occupational categories for each educational group, by caste and tribe (%) 222 5.1 Population and landholding profile of a Bhadrachalam village, Telangana, by caste and tribe 225 5.2 Distribution of landownership by caste and tribe (%) in a Bhadrachalam village, Telangana 225 6.1 Distribution of landownership by community, Badagaon, Himachal Pradesh (%) 228 6.2 Average number of years schooling by community, age-range and gender, Badagaon, Himachal Pradesh 228 6.3 Relationship between education and occupation, Badagaon, Himachal Pradesh: occupational categories for each educational group, community-wise (%) 228 6.4 Schooling of Gujjars by generation, Badagaon, Himachal Pradesh 229 6.5 Differentiation within the Gujjar and Gaddi communities, Badagaon, Himachal Pradesh 229 7.1 Numbers of Bhil (Adivasi) households that have invested in allied activities, three Nandurbar villages, Maharashtra 232 7.2 Average household income and expenditure from agriculture for Gujars and Bhils (Adivasi) of three Nandurbar villages, Maharashtra 232 EBSCOhost - printed on 9/18/2020 9:26 AM via COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY - MAIN. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use Series Preface As people around the world confront the inequality and injustice of new forms of oppression, as well as the impacts of human life on planetary ecosystems, this book series asks what anthropology can contribute to the crises and challenges of the twenty-first century. Our goal is to establish a distinctive anthropological contribution to debates and discussions that are often dominated by politics and economics. What is sorely lacking, and what anthropological methods can provide, is an appreciation of the human condition. We publish works that draw inspiration from traditions of ethnographic research and anthropological analysis to address power and social change while keeping the struggles and stories of human beings’ centre stage. We welcome books that set out to make anthropology matter, bringing classic anthropological concerns with exchange, difference, belief, kinship and the material world into engagement with contemporary environmental change, the capitalist economy and forms of inequality. We publish work from all traditions of anthropology, combining theoretical debate with empirical evidence to demonstrate the unique contribution anthropology can make to understanding the contemporary world. Jamie Cross, Christina Garsten and Joshua O. Reno EBSCOhost - printed on 9/18/2020 9:26 AM via COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY - MAIN. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use Preface Alpa Shah and Jens Lerche Growing inequality is undoubtedly one of the most significant political challenges of our time. Income inequality, the gap between the rich and everyone else, has dramatically escalated in the last 30 years in many parts of the world, not least the US and the UK. Oxfam (2016) recently reported that the richest 1 per cent now have more wealth than the rest of the world combined. India, once to some extent shielded from the market forces of global expansion, is now no longer an exception. Right behind the US, China and Germany, and ahead of the UK, India ranks fourth on the list of dollar billionaires.1 The Indian wealthy now increasingly mark the country’s landscape with their air-conditioned malls, gated communities and high-rise apartments with swimming pools. But there is also an India of dislocation and despair. The ‘trickle down’ of India’s spectacular growth rate is a very slow drip. Armies of migrants from the countryside live under tarpaulin tents, with almost no citizenship rights, while building the infrastructure that is to sustain the Indian boom. Indebted farmers are committing suicide. Protests are increasing against displacement for mining and industrial development. Marking poverty in a land of plenty, around 800 million Indians survive on less than $2 a day (Kannan 2012: 36). Indeed, it is now no longer news that 8 Indian states have more poor people than 26 of Africa’s poorest countries put together (Alkire and Santos 2010). What is less well known is that social discrimination marks the contours of poverty in India; that certain social groups – India’s low castes and tribes – are overwhelmingly represented among the poor. Ground Down by Growth asks how and why, despite India’s celebrated economic growth, the mar- ginalisation of low castes and tribes persists in the country. It explores the inextricability of identity-based oppression – of caste and tribe in particular, but also region and gender – and class relations in the belly of the Indian boom. In this Preface, we provide the backdrop to the questions we ask in this book and how we seek to address them. economic growth, inequality and poverty Alongside China, India is the world’s fastest growing major economy and the two are predicted to become the world’s largest and most dynamic EBSCOhost - printed on 9/18/2020 9:26 AM via COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY - MAIN. All use subject to https://www.ebsco.com/terms-of-use
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