KULASTE CALLS FOR ECONOMIC EMPOWERMENT OF TRIBALS FOR AN INTEGRATED
TRIBAL DEVELOPMENT IN THE COUNTRY
India has the largest
concentration of tribal people in the World perhaps next to Africa.
They comprise 8% of India’s total population. Prominent tribal
areas constituting about 15 percent of country’s total geographical
area, Scheduled Tribes inhabit in all States and Union Territories
except in Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, Chandigarh and Pondichery.
Even though the Constitution
of India guarantees for protection of socio-economic and political
development of ST s and in spite of the fact that the Constitution
incorporates several special provisions for promotion of education
and economic interests of STs, as they still suffer from illiteracy,
poverty, ill health, social injustice and all forms of exploitation.
Addressing the one
day Seminar on Tribal Welfare and Development here today, Shri
Faggan Singh Kulaste, Union Minister of State for Tribal Affairs
exhorted on the crucial issues of tribal development to bring
focused attention on the felt needs of the STs and he emphasised
on the monitoring of the flow of funds to the Tribal Sub-Plan
from the State Governments/Union Territories/Central Ministries
& Departments. He suggested to improve for better targeting
of tribal beneficiaries and speed up the pace of expenditures
on various schemes and programmes.. He further spoke that lot
more need to be done to improve livelihood and social amelioration
of tribal communities who are largely disadvantaged by the primitive
traits, geographical isolation, age old backwardness, shyness
of contact with outsiders, poverty and illiteracy.
The Minister appealed
to the NGOs working for the Central and State Governments to develop
aholistic approach for the upliftment of the tribals at-large
and especially of the Primitive Tribals who are on the verge of
extinction. He called for an economic empowerment of tribals for
a sustainable growth of tribal people and communities living in
the far-flung areas of the country.
To delineate on these
crucial issues of tribal development and to come out with concrete
proposals, he congratulated the members of the Manav Kalyan Adhyatmik
Sansthan, a registered body of Prajapita Brahma Kumaris Ishwariya
Vishwa Vidyalaya, Delhi for arranging such a Seminar to deliberate
on the themes, Role of Media and Social access to information,
education and communication –key to tribal development jointly
with Voluntary Action Group and enlisting support of the Ministry
of Tribal Affairs.
