Published Paper Details:

Abstract: Scheduled tribes of Jangle Mahal, eastern fringe of Chotanagpur plateau region are socio-economically backward and marginalised ethnic groups. Tribal people accounts 8.6 percent of India's total population. Since, after seven decades of independence, Scheduled Tribes (ST) are still at the margin of society. This study seeks a deeper insight into the demographic situation of the tribal communities. Primary data were collected from 117 and 114 sample houses of the Sabar and Santal communities, drawn from 9 selected villages following a stratified random sampling technique. The result indicates that Santals perform better in education than Sabar community. Both communities have high sex ratio compared to the national sex ratio. The average dependency ratio of the Sabar community is more (47.8 %) than Santal community (42.02 %). Also, the Sabar community show higher Child Women Ratio (284.72), indicating a higher level of fertility than the Santals (235.29). Sabar has a nuclear family system, with average family size of 3.65 and Santals shows joint family system with average family size of 4.59. The unemployment problem is very high among the Sabar community. The study reveals that illiteracy, a greater degree of dependency, and limited access to the mainstream socio-economic activities make the tribal people vulnerable. Collective and coordinated efforts of Govt. policy makers, planners, economists, and social scientists may formulate community specific plan for economic as well as social upliftment of these marginalised groups.