Class or Community: The Existential Dichotomy of Adivasi Workers

Jul-Aug 2006 Vol 4. No 4.

Cover Story

Labouring Newborn Consciousness: The Adivasis of Jharkhand

Xavier Dias

“Labour in white skin cannot emancipate itself where the black skin is branded.”
Karl Marx’s observation on the U.S. in an 1866 letter to Francois Lafarge, quoted in Das Capital.

In the chamber of Naveen Patnaik, the Chief Minister of Orissa (2006), the world-famous Warli Adivasi
art forms a backdrop to where he sits. Since Adivasi art is considered a community creation and not
owned by a single individual, one cannot pinpoint its origins. The original paintings are made with cow-
dung and rice paste. The placing of an Adivasi painting in the Chief Minister’s chamber where he meets
visitors, especially foreign journalists, is not merely decorative. The likely intention is to create an
impression that the Chief Minister is close at heart to the Adivasis, their tradition and culture, and that he
is a ‘politically right’ statesman.

Of the country’s officially listed 437 Scheduled tribes (sic), 62 are in Orissa. They constitute 22.21 per
cent of the total population of the State (Census of India, 1991). It was reported that, in his first term,
Naveen Patnaik displaced over 50,000 Adivasis by handing over their land, rivers and forest to industry,
against their wishes, and without adequate compensation. In his second term, through an administrative
order (JOHAR–JMMAC Fact Finding Report on www.firstpeoplesfirst.in) on 24 December 2005, Naveen
Patnaik indicated to the police to ‘do what was necessary’ to hand over Adivasi land in Kalinga Nagar to
the Tata Iron & Steel Company, TISCO. Following this, on the 2 January 2006, the police and the TISCO
employees used landmines to trap and kill thirteen and maim over 40 Adivasis.

This issue of Labour File is focused on the Adivasi toiler from Jharkhand, from where the country gets a
large number of its contract and domestic labour. (Throughout this article, Jharkhand includes the Adivasi
homeland regions falling in Orissa, Chattisgarh and West Bengal.) We will, therefore, examine how the
duality of identity and its manipulations over culture and tradition go to form the consciousness of
mainstream society; how ethnicity as a social identity can be a mode of expressing consciousness, either
for having the potential for emancipation or defending the status quo; and how, from within the growth of
capital and its labour markets, the Adivasis struggle to shrink the centuries-long negative categorising of
their identity, thereby engaging in a struggle within, to find their own ‘real’ ethnic identity and a new
political consciousness that questions and exposes the power relations.

Culture and tradition

Culture is ‘the structure of meaning through which people give shape to their experiences (Geertz,
Clifford, Interpretation of Cultures, New York: Basic Books 1973). Thus, the struggle on this route — in
short, the politics that shape these expressions — is also an integral component of culture. If the process
has a politics, e culture cannot be one that grows organically or one that is sterilised from the play of the
different interests involved.

Volume 4 No: 4, July-August 2006

Over the years, the creation of class stratification and social harmony was necessary for nation-building
and the growth of capital. And for this, history and culture had to be continuously manipulated. Therefore,
‘socially, politically and economically opposed groups are merged into a make-believe harmonious
imagined community’ (Anderson, Benedict, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread
of Nationalism, New York, NY: Verso, 1983). Implicit and explicit in this agenda are the political efforts
to impose on others a particular concept of how things really are and, therefore, how people are obliged to
act. It is this ‘make-believe’ image that enters into public consciousness and, thereby, into social
discourse as the authentic past, that is, culture and tradition.

This, however, does not go uncontested. As the communities struggle against domination, different
groups organise themselves to take on a shared identity, that is, Adivasi, coolie, mazdoor, etc. The
dynamics within these new-found, shared identities, as they struggle over what collective action should be
taken (and by whom), for their emancipation, engenders another struggle within, for a ‘real’ ethnic
identity.

The objectified, categorised and distinctive ‘imagined’ social identities that we give them — in some
circumstances, a positive identity as the survivors of a ‘sustainable ecological’ culture and, in other
circumstances, an inferior social identity — divides them conceptually from other social groups. This is
further used to justify their subordination and exploitation. It is important that we examine how this
imposed social consciousness ultimately moulds our thinking and impairs our responses to their plight.

This dualistic attitude that sees ‘them’, on the one hand, as a ‘cultural/ecological resource’ community
and, on the other, as disposable humanity easily evicted from their livelihoods and as easily available,
disciplined, loyal and hard working labour is so engraved in our consciousness that we fail to recognise
the difference. This juxtaposition is present in our daily lives. Whereas our homes have interior
decorations that include their cultural richness, our kitchens are run by their domestic labour. In our desire
for a ‘politically right’ image and identity, this falsely constructed consciousness persists comfortably.
This is one of the reasons our discourses on the ethnicity question become more easily demystified on
paper than disarmed in everyday life. These remain, at best, frivolously apolitical and, at worst, obscenely
hypocritical in their apparent radicalism.

Ethnicity as a political identity

Within this situation, we have to examine the historical process, which not only forms our consciousness
but also reveals how social protest and resistance to subordination, exploitation and repression is
transforming consciousness, forcing us to re-examine the basis of our definitional duality.

The ethnic characterisation ‘Adivasis’ was not the way they identify themselves socially. Ethnicity
became an issue after the coloniser (the Aryan, the Mughal, the Crown and the present Indian ruling
class) intruded and occupied the world of the Adivasis. They identify the outsider/coloniser — the State,
the mahajans (middlemen moneylender), the school teacher, the police and, today, the mining companies
— with the word ‘dikku’, defining the relationship. Dikku is an onomatopoeic word. It evokes the sound
of the heart as it beats faster and faster, dik dik dik, in fear, intimidation or terror. This identity is
exclusively reserved for the outsider. It does not apply to the other outside ethnic fraternity, which
includes over a dozen different nations with different languages and social institutions, and with whom
they have been sharing territories for a long time.

Just as we do not identify ourselves as ‘dikku’, so also they did not recognise ‘Adivasi’ as their social
identification. The making of the present Adivasi ethos and their understanding of the dikku world is a
product of the route that capital formation took in India, from a colonial economy to higher modes of

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production. These dialectics defined the Adivasi-dikku relationship. The Adivasis strive to strip off the
imposed consciousness and struggle to develop their own; a long process, whereby the meaning of both
words get transformed by the dynamics of the political and economic history of the country. The
colonisation of their territories can be traced back for centuries. Interestingly, until the penetration of
higher forms of capitalism, that is, railways, industry, townships, etc., the rebellions against the colonisers
were all organised by their different nations exclusively; that is, the Santhal’s with the Hul Santhal, the
Mundas with their Ulgulan, the Hos with the Kol insurrection, etc., a nationality response to a colonial
occupation. The ethnic identity ‘Adivasi’ surfaced and became the shared identity when a shared political
response was called for at the advent of industrialisation. In all the struggles against the Crown, prior to
the arrival of TISCO in Jamshedpur (1907), the Adivasi identity was yet to be owned or born.

The fact that they are experiencing exploitation not as anonymous individual workers or isolated ethnic
people but as a cohesive social unit based on their ethnicity defined by themselves and others has led to
the emergence of ethnic consciousness and political activism. By their social actions, they have
challenged the dikku’s atavistic characterisations given to them over a 5,000-year period from the writings
of the Rig Veda: anar (nose less), black skinned, blood drinkers (non-vegetarian) to the present ‘junglie’
or ‘Adivasi’ to mean junglie. ‘Adivasi’ ethnicity as a social construct was thus created by their political
and social actions. Ethnicity as a political identity emerges within the arena of class and caste politics. It
struggles to add value to the meaning of power politics and, thus, defines what political actions are to be
taken.

Thus, ‘ethnicity can be a mode of expressing consciousness, of defending the status quo, or having the
potential of organising social protest. It is one way among others in which people define themselves and
are defined by others who stand in opposition to them’(Nagengest, Carole and Keaney, Michael, ‘Mixtec
Ethnicity’) Why does ethnicity, in particular, play this role vis-à-vis other socially oppressed groups? The
above logic would apply to all oppressed groups, but those peoples whose society is not organised by
commodity production and market value are at an advantage to grasp the process of alienation. This is
best explained by examining their well-defined understanding of ‘work as creative’ and ‘work as a
commodity’.

In the Ho, Munda and Santhal nations, work, as a value, has a prime place in the hierarchy of their value
systems. The ability to work according to one’s physical condition is what differentiates them, not only
from one another, but also from the animal kingdom.

“In the Ho language they have two words that distinguish work from labour. One is ‘paiti’ and
the other is ‘nalla’. Paiti is what each and every Adivasi does; this means adults, the infirm and
even children, because in Adivasi culture paiti is honoured, respected and second only to eating
and drinking.”1 (Dias X, Keynote address, Mazdoor Adhikar Sammelan Chaibasa, November
2006)

Paiti is not only done for oneself but also for the neighbours or relatives. On certain occasions, one of
them being during the first sowing, paiti for the other becomes obligatory. This is called hermoot. It has a
higher and deeper spiritual meaning than helping one’s neighbour. Hermoot is collective ploughing and
sowing, that is, collective work, for the blessings of nature, ‘for all collectively and equally’. It implies
that we plough and sow as one people together and we reap the same ‘all together’. This maintains
egalitarianism in prosperity and eliminates individualistic competition.

“When one sells his/her ability to work for money such work is called ‘nalla’. It was shameful to
do nalla. Nalla was forced on them after the arrival of the dikku. When there is no food and,

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 therefore, no paiti, they are forced to go out to do nalla. Nalla keeps them away from starvation
and death. Before the arrival of the dikku, there was no nalla, only paiti. This means that with the
arrival of the dikku dramatic changes came about forcing them to do something that they had
never done before and which was considered shameful. They see paiti as work done for their
progress; it keeps their village together, happy and healthy. But nalla they realise is for someone
else’s progress. Hence, while paiti makes their lives and community better, nalla makes someone
else better. Nalla makes them coolies and rejas or mazdoors.” (Ibid.)

Deprived of their homes and livelihoods, with no adequate compensation, coupled with deforestation,
ecological erosion, devaluation of the products being sold and the absence of any other means of earning
money forces a majority of them to leave the village as migrant labour. After the painful alienation from
their livelihoods, they arrive in the ‘nalla desum’ (country in which nalla is available) to become
alienated labourers. After their lands, their labour power too has now become a commodity.

In industrial cities such as Jamshedpur, Bokaro, Bhillai, Rourkela, etc., the Adivasis, who have migrated
to these labour markets, have set up their own bastis (shanties) giving them names that match their native
villages or districts, for example, Gumla basti, Chaibasa tola, Munda Sai, etc. These serve as dormitories
for the Adivasi contract labour. Some of them bring their families to live there, while most of the men
share space with other families. There are no civic amenities (water, electricity, sanitation, schools, etc.)
and the shanties are built mostly on encroached lands, where they are ‘illegal occupants’.

Keeping the labour in suspended animation has its advantage. As illegal dwellers, they do not qualify for
any government schemes. The Company, be it the public or private sector, is content because the people
form a reserve pool of labour to be beckoned at will or fancy. Their labour provides for the domestic help,
child care, etc., of the whole city, relieving the burden on the Company for providing crèche facilities.
Should the labour organise themselves and demand their rights, the shanty can be bulldozed and flattened
overnight.

Coming from time-tested, self-sustaining economies and traditional self-governance, that is, the Manki
Munda (Ho), Majhi Parganha (Santhal) and Para Raja (Oraon), the Adivasis use these two cultural assets:
ability to self-sustain and govern their community, to adapt and survive in a new urban jungle, one more
venomous and hostile than their ancestral abode. With these assets, they do not need to look to a god or
government for help. Both the above skills are their cultural assets, which they bring with them to the
nalla desum, helping them survive; while the net benefit of it goes to capital.

Here too, in order to survive, they develop their own economies. They own micro-businesses (other than
micro-credit). Women sell ‘diang’, or fermented rice; men distil moonshine from the Mahua flower, some
are involved in tailoring, groceries, pan and beedi shops, etc. Earning money, however little it is, they are
able to remit small sums to their families, starved of any income, in the villages. The money is so meagre
that the Money Order service becomes too costly. The remittances are all done through relatives coming
and going; an assured no-cost courier service. Here too, the village economy subsidises their food needs:
rice, pulses, desiccated vegetables, etc., are all brought from their homes. It becomes yet another
contribution, freeing capital from meeting even the basic needs of a people, who play an important role in
its accumulation. Raised and nurtured by the village economy, they retire back to it at an early age.

“The life expectancy of Adivasis who live in and around mining townships in Jharkhand has come
down to 35 years while the national average is above 60. The infantile mortality rate is over 125
per 1000 births. The BPD Progress Report 9th Oct 2000 of Koraput Orissa mentions 95 per
1000.” (Dias X., Wealth Creation and Adivasi Homelands, Paper presented in the Boston
University Students Seminar, Nov. 2006)

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Their adult years are expended in the service of capitalist accumulation, and the village and its economy
suffer the loss of net value.

Yet, to the outside world, these are the ‘wicked’ places of prostitution, alcoholism, theft and criminals
and, logically, the first place that the police go to pick up scapegoats when crime charts need to be
doctored. Over and above this, the abysmal living conditions gives the Company the excuse for
statements such as, “This is how they like to live”, “They will not work”, “They do not want
development”, etc. This amounts to nothing but bigotry mediated by the pragmatics and exigencies of
labour cost and management.

”…. the meaning of capitalism will be subject to pre-capitalist meanings, and the conflict
expressed to such a confrontation will be one in which man is seen as the aim of production, and
not production as the aim of man”.
Michael Taussig, The Devil & Commodity Fetishism in South America, p.11, University of North
Carolina Press

From pre-capitalist systems of relations, the workers are thrown overnight into higher systems of
capitalist production. Earning no substantial benefit from this forced transition, they experience trauma
and exploitation in unimaginably inhuman situations. Their political consciousness is being moulded
amidst such contradictions. In academic polemics, this process is known as ‘proleterisation’ or the
creation of a ‘coolie proletariat’. This adds yet another tag to their identity while making them, in our
political consciousness, a ‘destitute’ people, ‘a problem’ that needs ‘our help’.

The ‘politically right’

In our discourses, we can, therefore, indulge in different solutions, the negation of their ethnic identity
(ethnocide) being one. When Adivasis become mazdoors, they dissolve into the multitude of the ‘working
class’, negating their ‘primitive’ past. The perfection of this logic was, at one time, indisputable and,
thereby, accepted as the inevitable. But the sentence of ‘inevitability’ is being challenged.

As Hindus, Christians or people with any other religious affiliation, they continue to remain, culturally,
Adivasis. However, when they become mazdoors, we argue that the negation of their ethnic identity is
inevitable. Further, this understanding implies that the assimilation into a monolithic mass is an
‘opportunity for emancipation’. Unfortunately, in trade union history, especially that of the left, ethnocide
was the one and only item on the menu offered to the ethnic (and caste) groups. A once self-sufficient
people, culturally endowed by the diversity of nature, are to go through the mill to come out as mazdoors
in order to become, hopefully, a self-sufficient people. The reality that they come from a culture and
tradition of accomplished artisans, superb agriculturalists, botanists, zoologists, and psychologists, etc., is
denied to them.

Power does not proceed only from the state downwards. The effective exercise of power depends on such
distorted ‘social knowledge’ in our public discourse that protects popular opinion, which, in turn,
provides a space for exploitation. This space, then and now, depends on invoking the dualistic version of
‘Adivasi traditionalism’ that highlights the backwardness of the past to justify and explain contemporary
exploitation. At the same time, the positive aspects of tradition are glorified in a manner that denies the
continuing exploitation, making tradition a highly selective reading of history and an ideological device
invoked to justify the status quo. Their reification, ranking as a social group vis-à-vis the dikku,
eventually results in the control of the less powerful by the more powerful.

On the other hand, the Adivasis have formed associations and are experimenting with labour rights
activism, in an attempt to defend their interests. These political responses have been partially structured
and defined in terms of the ethnic identity that is alternately glorified and despised by the majority

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population, that is, the secessionists, Naxals, anti-development. However, seizing neither the positive nor
the negative myths of existing images, they are constructing a new identity based on both, thereby
enabling them to understand their experiences and attempting to make changes. The Adivasis are
beginning to define their reality in a highly contested struggle over the meaning of ethnicity amidst the
conditions of their daily lives. A new political consciousness and activism has coalesced into an emerging
pan-Adivasi ethnic identity: an ethnic awareness that transcends village or clan identification and
manifests itself in the form of resistance activity.

It is ironic that the Adivasis’ hitherto unrecognised identity as Adivasis has become an icon of their new-
found solidarity, both to themselves and to others. As they encounter more forms of repression, they are
actively resisting exploitation and repression by invoking some of the ‘traditions’ that previously served
them in a more passive form. They have organised themselves into different issue-related groups such as
JOHAR (www.johar.in), a mass-based human rights organisation; Jharkhand Jungle Bachao Andolan,
J.J.B.M., a front of forest dwellers and forest workers; Jharkhand Mines Area Coordination Committee
J.M.A.C.C (www.firstpeoplesfirst.in), an alliance of over fifty organisations of communities affected by
mining; and OMON Mahila Sangathan, a women’s front working on strengthening their traditional
system of healing. The Adivasis are now using all the mechanisms of civil society, the press, including
their own publications (www.adhikar.in), the electorate, judiciary, etc., to reach out and offer solidarity to
the established trade unions. These formations and political steps cannot be considered as desperate
responses to stress. By claiming adherence to the ‘traditions’ of their people, their language and culture,
and devising new ones with appropriate strategies, the Adivasis are struggling to control the politics of
meaning given to their identity. Simultaneously they are establishing the legitimacy of Adivasi workers as
Adivasis in altered circumstances and are transforming former passive resistance to indirect and direct
repression into active resistance. A new tradition, encompassing the Adivasi ethnic identity, political
consciousness and activism, has been created, contesting the very meaning of tradition.

In our attempts to be ‘politically right’ and during the transition to capitalism, we fail to recognise the
alienation of Adivasis from humanity. The separation of work from the rest of life, the bridling of
sexuality, the loss of contact with nature, the timing of labour by clocks rather than by the sun and the
seasons, the injunction to save by postponing gratifications — these are some of the painful changes that
have gone to make the political consciousness of the mainstream societies.

Warli Art, originating in the Neolithic period between 2500 and 3000 BC (www.craftsinindia.com/indian-
art-culture/warli-art-painting), serves as a good illustration to explain our delusions. Graphically, it
narrates how colonisation and the process of expropriation have affected their social reality. As literature,
it competes as one of the most creative and democratic ways of teaching without the alphabet. As a
political document, it explains the labour theory of surplus. Essentially, it is a document that questions the
power relations at different levels of society from economy to culture. However, for the powerful, it is
just an ‘ethically chic’ wall hanging. They are blind to its real meaning and interpretation, thereby
justifying and perpetuating the power the dominant class has over them.

I am indebted to Carole Nagengest, UCSC, & Michael Keaney, UCR, from whose paper ‘Mixtec
Ethnicity’ I source the logic of this article. xd