{"id":62069,"date":"2025-09-05T11:09:59","date_gmt":"2025-09-05T05:39:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=62069"},"modified":"2025-09-05T11:42:45","modified_gmt":"2025-09-05T06:12:45","slug":"understanding-pvtgs-in-india-census-significance-population-and-challenges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/understanding-pvtgs-in-india-census-significance-population-and-challenges\/","title":{"rendered":"Understanding PVTGs in India: Census Significance, Population, and Challenges"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><b>Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs) Latest News<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MoTA) has urged the Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India (RGI) to enumerate <\/span><b>particularly vulnerable tribal groups (PVTGs)<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> separately in the upcoming Census.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The ministry requested that data on <\/span><b>households, individuals, and unique demographic, cultural, and socio-economic traits<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of PVTGs be collected.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This would enable more accurate planning and effective execution of <\/span><b>targeted welfare schemes<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, including the <\/span><b>Pradhan Mantri Janjati Adivasi Nyay Maha Abhiyan (PM JANMAN)<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>Understanding Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs)<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-62093\" src=\"https:\/\/d35xcwcl37xo08.cloudfront.net\/current-affairs-wp-uploads\/2025\/09\/unnamed-Copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"512\" height=\"466\" \/><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">PVTGs are a <\/span><b>sub-category of Scheduled Tribes<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (STs) characterised by declining or stagnant populations, geographical isolation, pre-agrarian practices, economic backwardness, and low literacy levels.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The category was created following the <\/span><b>Dhebar Commission<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (1960\u201361), which highlighted disparities among tribal groups and noted that some were far more vulnerable than others.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Initially, <\/span><b>52 groups were identified as PVTGs (then called Primitive Tribal Groups) during the Fifth Five-Year Plan<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (1974\u201379).\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Later, in 2006, 23 more groups were added, bringing the total to 75 PVTGs across 18 states and the Andaman &amp; Nicobar Islands.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Experts have raised concerns about the criteria used, particularly the emphasis on geographical isolation.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They suggested that the government should revisit and update inclusion parameters before conducting a fresh enumeration to reflect improvements or worsening conditions among different groups.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>Separate Enumeration of PVTGs<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So far, <\/span><b>no separate enumeration of PVTGs has taken place in any Census<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. Since PVTGs are a sub-category of Scheduled Tribes (STs), they are generally counted within the broader ST category.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Many PVTGs are not listed individually but grouped under a common nomenclature, leading to limited visibility in Census data.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">According to the Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MoTA), 40 out of <\/span><b>75 PVTGs<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> are listed as \u2018single entry\u2019 in the notified ST list under <\/span><b>Article 342 of the Constitution<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For example, in the 2011 Census, Baigas of Madhya Pradesh were counted separately, but groups like Abujh Marias, Bharias, Hill Korbas, and Kamars were not.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Later, in 2013, Abujh Maria and Hill Korba were formally added to Chhattisgarh\u2019s ST list through legislation.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">By convention, the Registrar General of India (RGI) only publishes data for the main STs, with sub-groups and synonyms automatically included, which has prevented focused data collection on PVTGs until now.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>Estimates of PVTG Population<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In November 2023, the government launched the \u20b924,104 crore PM JANMAN scheme to uplift PVTGs through improved health, education, livelihoods, and infrastructure in over 200 districts.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To support its rollout, the Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MoTA) and state governments conducted a habitation-level survey, estimating the total <\/span><b>PVTG population at 47.5 lakh<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Among states, <\/span><b>Madhya Pradesh had the largest estimated PVTG population<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> at 13.22 lakh, followed by <\/span><b>Maharashtra <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(6.7 lakh) and <\/span><b>Andhra Pradesh<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (5.18 lakh).<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The 2011 Census data showed that some PVTG groups had populations of fewer than 1,000 people, including:\u00a0<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"2\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the Jarawas, Onges, Sentinelese, and Shompens (Andaman and Nicobar Islands),\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"2\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Raji (Uttarakhand),\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"2\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kota (Tamil Nadu),\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"2\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Birhor (Odisha),\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"2\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kamar (Madhya Pradesh), and\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"2\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">small tribal groups in Bihar.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Sentinelese were the smallest community with just 15 individuals, while the Baiga of Madhya Pradesh were the largest, numbering 4,14,526.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Officials emphasise that accurate enumeration will plug gaps in welfare implementation, particularly in health and education, and help reassess whether current PVTG classification criteria remain relevant.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>Source:<\/b> <a href=\"https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/explained\/particularly-vulnerable-tribal-groups-pvtg-census-10229611\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">IE<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> | <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/socialwelfare.vikaspedia.in\/viewcontent\/social-welfare\/scheduled-tribes-welfare\/particularly-vulnerable-tribal-groups?lgn=en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">VP<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> | <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pib.gov.in\/Pressreleaseshare.aspx?PRID=1577166\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">PIB<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>PVTGs are the most disadvantaged tribal groups in India. Separate enumeration in the Census will help target schemes like PM JANMAN more effectively.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":62108,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[60,2520,22,59],"class_list":{"0":"post-62069","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-mains-current-affairs","8":"tag-mains-articles","9":"tag-particularly-vulnerable-tribal-groups-pvtgs","10":"tag-upsc-current-affairs","11":"tag-upsc-mains-current-affairs","12":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62069"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62069\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}