A Tribe in Turmoil (A Socio-Economic Study of Jammu Gujars of Uttar Pradesh)

Email

Whatsapp

Facebook

Pinterest

Twitter

Copy link

The nomadic Gujars of U.P., who profess Islam, constitute an obscure tribal group which has been neglected so far both by the State and social scientists. They form a deprived group that has remained outside the ambit of the planning process from the very beginning of the Five Year Plans. No wonder, the tribe, as a whole, is, in a state of ferment. The Gujars are one of the very few Muslim tribes found in India. They are an exceptional group among the Muslims as not only they have made no effort to ashrafize themselves unlike other Muslim converts, but have jealously and so far success-fully guarded their separate entity. However, the author points out that they are slowly passing through a process of Islamization. This book should be of interest to planners, administrators, social workers and anthropologists alike.

Amir Hasan, dedicated his life to the welfare of tribals. His interest was ignited when he was working as a research scholar of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research at the Central Fuel Institute, Jealgora, Dhanbad (Bihar) in 1953- 1954. This led to a long association with the tribals. Later, as a civil servant, he maintained a dedicated and productive association with the tribals and their welfare. His large collection of authored books is a result of his intensive live research.

Our earliest memories of our father, Dr. Amir Hasan (1929- 92) are of an author at work. Every morning, we would find him diligently working on some article, paper or book chapter. An early riser, his writing work would be taken up after a walk and a spot of gardening .He would be surrounded by reference books, loose sheets of paper and a tea tray precariously balanced in the midst of it all. One by one, we would wake up and troop to where our parents were having their morning tea. He welcomed us with a smile and read out parts of what he was working on. We were treated to beautifully worded narratives of Awadh, his experiences with the tribals of Tarai and on some rare occasions tribal folklore and also Awadhi shayari. All this was delivered in his deep mesmerizing voice which overrode the early morning chirping of birds and the whisper of breeze in the trees. The scents of the earth rose in the background from the plants he had watered when the rest were still asleep. We were given small proof-reading tasks in the summer vacations. We got to work after breakfast and competed with each other to complete our tasks. We were amateurs and perhaps our work yielded no real results but we learnt camaraderie, team work and we learnt to be proud of our ink-stained fingers. This was the nourishment we grew up on and this was the exposure that enriched our childhood and furnished us with a legacy for life. Our father did not teach us how to become authors. Through sharing his interests with us, he taught us a way of life. His writing was his hobby. He was a civil servant dedicated to the nation and his profession. By sharing his interests with us, he shared values, wisdom and notions of nobility.

During the relatively short span of over three decades, India has undergone traumatic experiences, externally as well as internally. External assaults may, however, not be as debilitating as internal cracks and fissures. To forge ahead in future, we must look within and introspect. The paeans in praise of unity in diversity may strengthen our psychological fabric, but they should also provoke thought towards concrete ways in which centrifugal tendency of diversity can be countered and unity fortified. A mass- inclined ideology could be a cementing substitute for the freedom struggle of the decades preceding Independence. Nevertheless, even an attractive ideology must operate fairly, and should also be seen to operate fairly, in a multi-lingual, multi-ethnic, multi- religious milieu, that ours is. It imposes on the leadership the great responsibility of not only observing the principles of equity and justice but doing so demonstrably.

The nomadic Muslim Gujars as distinguished from non- Muslim Gujars and settled Muslim Gujars are mainly found in Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and north-western Uttar Pradesh. They are among the few tribal groups which have not yet received adequate attention of social scientists. Among them, the U.P. Gujars especially are an obscure group which was not only not studied but, strange as it may seem, has remained outside the planning process and thus has been largely deprived of the fruits of development during the last 32 years of our planning. Despite their backwardness and tribal characteristics, these Gujars have not been included in the list of Scheduled Tribes or even Backward Castes in U.P. whereas their brethren in Himachal Pradesh, are a Scheduled Tribe and those in Jammu & Kashmir are listed among the Backward Classes.