Displaced from habitat: Tribals of Chhattisgarh

Aritra Chakrabarty on September 23rd, 2014

Migration from Chhattisgarh has been primarily driven by astute poverty conditions and inherent political instability. Drought prone areas of the state have recorded steady flow of men and women to other regions. Similarly, the presence of Naxalists has added to further problems for the population, majority of which, in some regions is Scheduled Tribes. They are caught in the crossfire between the government and the Naxals and have to forcibly move out in search for alternative livelihood opportunities. Among all ages, youth migration is quite high in the state, primarily for employment opportunities and education prospects.

Total number of migrants, including intra-state and inter-state is 6,784,937 persons (Census, 2001)

Sex-wise migration

Gender	Intra-state	Inter-state
Male	6.58	2.22
Female	8.64	2.38

Source: Census, 2001

Rate of Migration per thousand (Destination-wise)

Gender	Rural	Urban
Male	70	330
Female	531	590

Source: Census, 2001

Across gender, female migration rate is predominantly higher than males as reflected from the numbers. Although Census reports describe high female migration as occurring due to marriage related reason, it doesn’t capture the complete scenario. Working as domestic labour in metros, female migrants in that category are not accounted for in official estimates. Nationwide, female migration in the youth age group 15-32 years is 39 percent as compared to 37 percent for males. However, female migration is not being undertaken for education or formal employment. The reason being that incidence of informal employment is high for women at the destination.

Rural-Urban differential in temporary and seasonal migration (15-64 years age)

Rural	4/1000
Urban	21/1000

Source: NSSO 2007-08

Temporary and Seasonal migration

	All ages	15-64 years
Total number of migrants	3,29,700	2,62,700
Rate of temporary migration	14.3/1000	18.3/1000

Source: NSSO 2007-08

Short-distance migration is more evident than over longer distances. Surveys have shown that young people mainly migrate to nearby towns (intra-district) for employment and education. Willingness to migrate to other metro cities is negligible. Similarly, between men and women, the latter has a larger tendency and is more prone to migrate to other parts of the state. Most of the migration is temporary and or seasonal in nature, lasting about 3-6 months. This type of outmigration is the result of seasonal nature of agriculture and indebtedness. Majority of the rural youth migrates out to other districts in search of employment. Acute poverty and absence of government programs to provide rural employment (MGNREGS) compels the youth to migrate to other areas of the state or neighboring states. Skill employment opportunities not picking up, the youth is left with no option but to search jobs in other districts. If we consider the

Similarly, intense violence in Left Wing Extremism affected areas has left hordes of local people homeless. The problem of internally displaced people within the Red Corridor is most acute in the areas falling on the Chhattisgarh-Andhra Pradesh border. From the Bastar division, which comprises the major chunk of the Danda-karanya region, the worst Naxal affected region in the country, till 2012 30,000 families have crossed over to the bordering Khammam and Bhadrachalam districts in Andhra Pradesh. Violence in the Bastar division constitutes nearly 90 per cent of the total Naxal activity in the State. The tribes living in the south of Chhatisgarh belong predominantly to the Gond tribes and most of them live below the poverty line. The local population, especially in Bastar, Dantewada and Bijapur districts, often finds itself caught in the crossfire between the security agencies and the Naxals. This has compounded the already existing distressed situation of the tribals. They are displaced from their natural habitat, migrating to Andhra Pradesh to work as daily wage earners.

Given that the state is predominantly tribal (Scheduled Tribes) comprising 34 percent of the total population of 25 million, tribal population has been associated with seasonal and cyclical migration, migrating from one place to another (internally displaced). Seasonal migrants are usually from the highly impoverished sections that work as farm labourers and are forced to seek work in lean seasons on construction sites, in brick kilns. Moreover, official data misses out on their enumeration owing to their nature of migration. This issue has plagued Chhattisgarh for long since the tribes constitute the unique character of this region, who are struggling for survival being displaced from their habitat.

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Aritra Chakrabarty

Anchor, SHRAM (Till Dec 31st, 2014)

As a social researcher, I believe in knowledge-based policy action. With a postgraduate degree in Development Studies, I've been associated with social issues in my professional space. As a part of SHRAMIC initiative, was involved with data creation, sourcing of resources that will become the knowledge bank of this project.