Cambridge Scholars Publishing Democracy of the Oppressed: Adivasi Poverty and Hunger

The book revisits the concepts of “the new politics of welfare” and “Adivasi and Indigenous livelihoods”, situating the existing body of knowledge of these subjects within the context of state policy and the socio-cultural developments witnessed in India after independence, specifically the impact of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGA) in the Adivasi/ Indigenous areas. Since India’s independence, the major challenge before the State has been how to provide employment to the vast amount of unskilled labour in rural areas. In order to examine the functioning of institutions under MGNREGA in a tribal community of Andhra Pradesh and Odisha, this book assesses the act’s impact on, and drawbacks regarding, the socio-economic condition of the Indigenous people, evaluating the constraints faced by the functionaries in implementing the scheme. Its findings point out the inefficiency and rampant corruption involved in the implementation of the MGNREGA over the years. The book will serve to contribute to raising awareness on the part of the targeted groups and, above all, to showing officials the importance of transparency and responsible governance for the effective implementation of this scheme. India needs to develop its own pro-active measures to cultivate a democracy of the oppressed, in order to combat the current tyranny of the majority which prevails in the country. Its findings also provide new data showing that large-scale MGNREGA policy represents an important tool of mitigating violent conflict in India. About the Author Dr Ramdas Rupavath is Head of the Centre for Human Rights and Professor of Political Science at the School of Social Sciences of the University of Hyderabad, India. He has previously worked as Visiting Professor of the Department of Government at Uppsala University, Sweden. His areas of specialization include Indian political processes, democracy, development, tribal politics, education and politics, pluralism and politics of accommodation, and comparative politics in indigenous societies. He received his MA, MPhil, and PhD degrees from Jawaharlal Nehru University, India. His publications include the books Tribal Land Alienation and Political Movements: Socio-Economic Patterns from South India (2009); Democracy, Development and Tribes in India: Reality and Rhetoric (2015); Democracy, Governance and Tribes in the Age of Globalized India: Reality and Rhetoric (2015); Tribal Education: A Perspective from Below (2016); The Persistence of Land Alienation: The Experience of Tribal People of Andhra Pradesh (2014); and Tribal Alienation and Conflict in India: A Perspective from Below (2019), as well as a number of articles in both national and international journals. He is also the recipient of the Global Best Teacher Award in 2019.