Vol-8 Issue-6 2022 IJARIIE-ISSN(O)-2395-4396

EMPOWERMENT OF TRIBALS THROUGH

EDUCATION IN KARNATAKA - A LITERATURE
REVIEW
Dr.S. YAVANA RANI, Associate Professor, CMS Business School, Jain University, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India.
Email:[email protected]

ABSTRACT

A new dimension envisaged in the role of education in the developmental activities of the country. The economic
co-relation and expectations from formal education have been correctly delimited to urban areas It is anticipated that
formal education will continue to be expanded to rural areas in order to guarantee formal education and universal
literacy. That realisation makes the importance of education for tribal development clear.

Tribal societies are remote societies that inhabit densely packed communities in forest areas. The national average
for literacy rates among tribes is 29%; Gujarat has the highest literacy rate of tribes at 36% (48% males and 24%
women), while Rajasthan has the lowest literacy rate at 19.44% (female rates at 4.22% and male rates at 33.29%).

Today more than 40 million tribal groups require special attention from the government even though they live
largely isolated from the national culture. In India the government created so many policies and plans of education
and development for tribal groups but there are so many problems also occurred to implement these policies. The
objective of the paper is to analyze the trends in literacy rate in Karnataka with regard to region, and gender social
groups over the census periods 2001 and 2011 based on secondary data of Census of India.

Keywords: Empowerment, Education, Tribes

1. INTRODUCTION
Scheduled tribes (STs), often known as adivasis, tribes, or tribals, make up around 9% of India's total population.
Tribal society falls far behind in terms of education, improving its members' social and economic standing, and
including them into local development. India has a long and illustrious history, but a sizable portion of the
population has yet to benefit from it. They still exist as primitive tribal societies in remote locations (Verma 1996).
The government has made efforts to develop them because they are economically and materially underdeveloped.
Today, the governments in all countries are paying special attention to development of the tribes (Nithya 2014).
Though our national leaders and constitutional makers are committed to uplift the tribal people, a desired level of
development has not been achieved yet (Chandra Guru et. al: 2015).

Due to the low adoption of educational technologies, the majority of the population in tribal communities lags
behind the times. Even before independence, as part of community development, attempts were made at education
related to rural development. In 1961, only 8.54 percent of tribes were literate; by 2011, that number had risen to
63.1 percent. This essay explores Karnataka's tribal education laws, tribal population, literacy rates, and problems
and difficulties related to tribal education.

1.1 Tribal statistics in Karnataka

There are 50 scheduled tribe communities in Karnataka; the Jenu Kurubas, who live primarily in the districts of
Mysore, Chamarajnagar, and Kodagu, and the Koragas in Dakshina Kannada district, are considered "primitive
tribes." In the state, scheduled castes (16.2%) and scheduled tribes (6.6%) made up more than one fifth of the
population. Their proportion of the population has grown over time. In terms of scheduled tribes, Raichur, Bellary,
and Chitradurga had a larger share. The ST population made up 10 to 20% of the total population in 8 districts of
Karnataka. Even though there are other ethnic tribes, 6.95 percent of the population is made up of the Scheduled
Tribes, which include some of the most well-known tribes including the Soligas, Yeravas,TodasandSiddhis.

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Fig1: Map of Karnataka showing tribal population as percentage of total population in each of its 30 districts.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW :
In his research, Ghosh (2011) looked at the geographical differences in India's health, education, and human
development. His research on tribal education has provided a summary of regional variations in literacy rates
throughout Indian states. In Karnataka, Ahamed M.A. et al. (2012) examined district-level changes in literacy rates
between the 2001 and 2011 censuses. According to geography, gender, and social classes, Mohammed Ashfaq
Ahamed (2012) examined trends in the literacy rate in Karnataka across the census periods of 1991, 2001, and 2011.
Based on the above literatures, the study is aimed to analyse the literacy rates in Karnataka with regard to gender
social groups only for two census period 2001 and 2011 census.

3. OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY:

The main aim of this study is to identify the educational problems in tribal Areas in Karnataka to revitalize tribal
education and suggest suitable measures to overcome these problems.

1) To examine the tribal population and literacy rate in the state of Karnataka

2) To identify the problems and issues faced by tribes for Education.

4. METHODOLOGY OF THE STUDY:

This study is descriptive in nature. The information is based on the secondary data collected from various
documents like books, journals, government reports, abstracts and published unpublished material from Census of
India 2011 Primary Census Abstract Data Highlights Karnataka Series 30. Karnataka - The research areas for this
study are the villages in the eight districts of Karnataka viz: Belagavi, Bidar, Raichur, Ballari, Chitradurga,
Davanagere, Tumakuru and Mysuru. The proportion of Scheduled Tribe population is less than 5 per cent in 12
districts, between 5 to 9 per cent in 7 districts and above 10 per cent in the remaining 8 districts. Therefore, the
study selected the eight districts of Karnataka in India as the study.

5. SCHEDULED TRIBES LITERACY RATES

Table1: Scheduled Tribe Population 2011-karnataka Districts

State/Districts Scheduled Tribe Population 2011 % Change of improvement

(decadal change 2001-2011)
Total Rural Urban Total Rural Urban
KARNATAKA 42,48,987 34,29,791 8,19,196 22.66 16.88 54.72

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Belagavi 2,97,198 2,53,876 43,322 22.08 19.38 40.74

Bidar 2,35,822 2,14,759 21,063 29.42 26.23 74.22
Raichur 3,67,071 3,34,023 33,048 21.13 20.19 31.52
Ballari 4,51,406 3,34,131 1,17,275 23.80 18.77 40.77
Chitradurga 3,02,554 2,66,526 36,028 13.64 12.88 19.60
Davanagere 2,33,112 1,91,754 41,358 11.16 9.09 21.90
Tumakuru 2,09,559 1,80,024 29,535 8.12 5.94 23.63
Mysuru 3,34,547 2,57,081 77,466 23.29 14.64 64.48

350000

300000

250000

200000

150000 Rural

100000 Urban

50000

Fig2: Scheduled Tribe Population 2011-Karnataka districts

Table2: Scheduled Tribe Literates and Literacy rates 2011-Karnataka Districts

Literates 2011 Literacy rates 2011

State/Districts Total Rural Urban Total Rural Urban
KARNATAKA 4,06,47,322 2,26,49,176 1,79,98,146 75.36 68.73 85.78
Belagavi 30,52,032 21,34,792 9,17,240 73.48 69.28 85.56
Bidar 10,42,673 7,39,711 3,02,962 70.51 66.73 81.81
Raichur 9,79,769 6,59,440 3,20,329 59.56 54.11 75.12
Ballari 14,21,621 8,09,312 6,12,309 67.43 61.81 76.63
Chitradurga 10,87,392 8,34,419 2,52,973 73.71 70.68 85.89
Davanagere 13,08,540 8,38,823 4,69,717 75.74 71.77 84.02
Tumakuru 18,13,391 13,44,438 4,68,953 75.14 71.66 87.32
Mysuru 19,62,180 9,94,670 9,67,510 72.79 63.29 86.09
Source: CENSUS OF INDIA 2011 Primary Census Abstract Data Highlights KARNATAKA Series 30

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2500000

2000000

1500000

1000000 Rural
Urban
500000

Fig 3: Scheduled Tribe Literates 2011-Karnataka Districts

90
80
70
60
50
40 Rural
30 Urban
20
10
0

Fig4: Scheduled Tribe Literacy rates 2011-Karnataka Districts

Table 2 presents Karnataka - district wise literates and literacy rates in 2011. Most of the districts selected for study
have higher literacy rates in the urban areas. The highest literacy rate during the period 2011 is in Tumkuru district.
The lowest literacy rate is in Raichur in urban and rural areas.

Table3: Genderwise Scheduled Tribe Literacy rates 2011-Karnataka Districts

Literacy Rates2011
State/Districts Male Female
Rural Urban Rural Urban
KARNATAKA 77.61 90.04 59.71 81.36
Belagavi 79.12 91.10 59.20 79.95

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Bidar 76.28 87.42 56.82 75.88

Raichur 66.01 83.10 42.37 67.10
Ballari 72.42 83.58 51.02 69.62
Chitradurga 79.19 90.22 61.91 81.55
Davanagere 79.63 88.19 63.69 79.77
Tumakuru 80.48 90.93 62.71 83.67
Mysuru 70.64 89.50 55.78 82.67
Source: CENSUS OF INDIA 2011 Primary Census Abstract Data Highlights KARNATAKA Series 30

90
80
70
60
50
40 Male Rural
30 Female Rural
20
10
0

Fig 5: Genderwise- Scheduled Tribe Literacy rates 2011-Karnataka Districts in rural areas

100
90
80
70
60
50
40 Male Urban
30 Female Urban
20
10
0

Fig 6: Genderwise- Scheduled Tribe Literacy rates 2011-Karnataka Districts in urban areas

From Table3 the gender wise Scheduled Tribe Literacy rates 2011 in Karnataka Districts, the literacy rates among
male and female are almost equal in urban areas. The literacy rates among male and female vary significantly in
rural areas of the selected districts of study.

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6. PROBLEMS AND ISSUES OF EDUCATION OF TRIBALS:

The major problems facing the indigenous community are the higher rates of poverty among them, both in rural and
urban regions. Their insufficient resource base, poor status in the socioeconomic and political hierarchy, illiteracy,
and insufficient involvement in institutions are the main causes of their backwardness as well as their lack of access
to education.

Tribal education faces lots of issues and problems. They are as follows:

i. Medium of instruction: Language is one of the important constraints of tribal peopl which stops them to go to
school.

ii. Economic Condition: Their weak resource base and the economic condition of tribal people is so poor that they
do not allow the children to attend schools. The parents’ wants immediate returns for their daily expenses, they send
them to jobs.

iii. The proximity of school: The physical barrier creates a obstacle for the children of a tribal village to attend the
school in a neighbouring village.

iv. Discrimination with non tribal people and teachers: The teacher absenteeism in the remote tribal areas is a major
issue and this affects the quality of education. The criticisms of non tribal people hesitates the tribes for coming to
school.

vi. Lack of Proper monitoring: Lack of coordination between the Tribal Welfare Department and School Education
Department hinders tribal education.

7. CONCLUSIONS
Since confidence-building inside tribal societies is essential for their overall growth and for treating outsiders fairly,
education is regarded as being of the utmost importance to their progress. One-third of people in Karnataka who are
7 years of age and older are illiterate, despite the state's efforts to increase literacy at a quicker rate. Therefore, the
government should work to educate the vast majority of illiterate people in the country. Although it made progress
toward achieving a high literacy rate in 2011, it is still behind. The scheduled tribes are still far behind in nearly all
of the normal development metrics, despite the government's serious attempts to support their overall community
development. The tribes are not able to participate in the process of development, as they are not aware of most of
the programmes and policies made for their upliftment. The tribes should be educated for easy access of information
and more opportunities should be provided to the tribal children in order to bring them to the mainstream of
economic development.

I am thankful for the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR) under the Ministry of HRD for
sponsoring me to carry out the research project on “Tribal Education and Technology Adoption in
Karnataka and Tamilnadu – An Empirical Study On Community Development”. I am grateful to the
Director, IMPRESS Scheme Research Project Division for supporting me in all aspects. This research paper
is an outcome of the research.

8. REFERENCES:
1. Ahamed M.A and Dr.P.M.Honakeri (2012), “Regional and Gender Disparities of Literacy Rates in
Karnataka – Evidence From Census 2001 and 2011”, Indian Streams Research Journal,
Vol.2,Issue.III/April; 12pp.1-4
2. Census of India (2011). Provisional Population Totals, Paper 2, [Karnataka, Series 30], Vol. 1, 2011,
Government of India, New Delhi
3. Chandra Guru, Dr.B.P.Mahesh, H.S.Shivaram, M.Dileep Kumar & K.Rajagopala.2015. ‘Tribal
Development in India: An Overview’, International Contemporary Research Journal in Management and
Social Science, 1(2):75-79.
4. Ghosh, M. (2011). “Regional Disparities in Education, Health and Human Development in India”, Indian
Journal of Human Development, Vol.5, No.1, pp 5 – 29.
5. KHDR (2005), Planning and Statistics Department, Government of Karnataka, Bangalore
6. Mohammed Ashfaq Ahamed 2012, Analysis Of Literacy Rates In Karnataka – Reflections From Census
Data https://www.researchgate.net/publication/255968491

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7. Nithya, N.R.2014. ‘Globalization and the Plight of Tribals: In the Case of Kerala, India’, The Dawn
Journal, 3 (1): 727-758.
8. Verma, M.M.1996. Tribal Development in India: Programmes and Perspectives. Mittal Publication, New
Delhi: 2-4

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