LAND, FOREST, AND IDENTITY: ADIVASI STRUGGLES IN POSTCOLONIAL INDIA

Abstract

For Adivasi communities in India, land and forest are not simply economic resources. They are the foundation of social life, cultural memory, and collective identity. Since colonial rule, and continuing through the postcolonial development era, Adivasi people have faced large-scale displacement from their territories through mining projects, dam construction, industrial corridors, and forest reservation policies. This article examines the historical origins of this displacement, its continuation in post-independence India, and the legal and political struggles that Adivasi communities have mounted in response. Drawing on three regional case studies from Jharkhand, Odisha, and Chhattisgarh, and on data from the Census of India, the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, and the Forest Rights Act implementation reports, the article traces the pattern of what scholars call accumulation by dispossession. It also examines the Forest Rights Act of 2006 and the 2013 Niyamgiri judgment as significant but limited moments of institutional recognition. The article argues that resolving India's land conflict with Adivasi communities requires not only legal reform but a fundamental rethinking of how development policy treats territory, ecology, and identity.