Millions of native people are threatened by the rapid economic development

India’s 84 million native people, the Adivasi, are the losers in the rapid economic development on the subcontinent. This sobering conclusion is drawn by the Society for Threatened Peoples (GfbV) in it new 42-page human rights report "The Adivasi have no reason to celebrate” being published on the occasion of the 60th anniversary (15th August) of the independence of the former British colony. "Not a weeks goes by without Adivasi being driven out of their land to make room for gigantic mining, dam or industrial projects, "criticises the human rights organisation. "Above all the extension of the steel-working industry and the mining of uranium are cutting into the rights of the native people.”

Instead of being a blessing the wealth of raw materials in their traditional areas in central India have become a curse, says the report. It is above all the large companies which go about the extraction of the rich deposits of bauxite, iron ore, coal, uranium and manganese. In 2005 alone 40 preliminary agreements were concluded on the opening up of 20,000 hectares of Adivasi land for mining and industrial projects. For large dams several thousand native people will have to leave their land. Only a few of the well over ten million native people expelled since India’s independence have received adequate compensation.

"The Adivasi do not profit from the economic boom in India, 90 percent of them living under the official poverty line”, reports the GfbV. The medical care, nutrition and education of the native people are markedly worse than the national average. It is the children who suffer the most. Infant mortality is above average and 56 percent of the Adivasi children suffer from malnutrition. Government aid projects are mostly ineffective because either they are not implemented by local authorities or they are not directly applied directly to the Adivasi.

However the Adivasi are not taking the loss of their traditional land rights lying down, but are increasingly exercising non-violent resistance. Their occupation of land and demonstrations are met with violence on the part of the police. A "little chink of light” was provided by the forestry law which came into force at the beginning of this year, which expressly emphasises the significance of forest conservation for the Adivasi, states the GfbV. It remains to be seen however if the situation of the native people does in fact improve. In the past laws for their benefit have been persistently disregarded by the authorities without any sanctions being applied.