5 months ago
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Five years aft the Union Government initiated an ethnographic effort to classify 268 denotified, nomadic, and semi-nomadic tribes who were thought to person ne'er been classified before, the Union Government told Parliament connected Wednesday (December 3, 2025) that it is not considering immoderate connection to classify these communities into SC, ST, and OBC categories afresh.
This comes 2 years aft the Anthropological Survey of India completed the ethnographic survey of these communities and recommended their reclassification. In their study submitted successful 2023, the AnSI had recommended caller classification of 85 of these communities, reclassification of 9 others, and noted that galore others were lone partially classified.
This workout was initiated successful 2019 aft the Government constituted the Development Welfare Board for Denotified, Nomadic, and Semi-Nomadic Communities (DWBDNC). This committee was acceptable up pursuing the Idate Commission’s study of 2017, which had besides flagged the request for these communities’ due classification into SC, ST, oregon OBC lists, arsenic person erstwhile Commissions that person looked into denotified communities.
While mounting up the board, the authorities entrusted the task of classification of these communities to a NITI Aayog panel, which had commissioned the Anthropological Survey of India to survey them.
Pressure for quota
Responding to questions successful Rajya Sabha connected Wednesday (December 3) astir this survey and the government’s plans to finalise the classification of these communities, the Social Justice Ministry said, “There is nary connection nether consideration.”
This comes adjacent arsenic civilian nine organisations representing denotified communities successful northbound India person been pushing the authorities to recognise them arsenic a abstracted scheduled class akin to SCs, STs, and OBCs. Their rationale has been that precise fewer states were issuing assemblage certificates to these communities, successful the lack of which, they are incapable to assertion benefits meant for them.
The Ministry said that the DWBDNC was already administering the SEED strategy for the payment of each denotified, nomadic, and semi-nomadic communities. However, officials of the Board person told The Hindu antecedently that a large crushed for the dilatory uptake of the SEED strategy was the deficiency of clarity connected however to classify these communities.
