The price Dumka’s Adivasis pay for home
Mining, water scarcity and erratic rainfall are making life harder for the Indigenous Santhal communities of the district in Jharkhand. Many migrate for work, earning enough just to return to their land, language and forest The post The price Dumka’s Adivasis pay for home appeared first on Dialogue Earth .
Ukhrapahari, a village nestled deep within the Jharkhand forest, is a tight-knit community where residents gather for discussions and village meetings under a bamboo shelter. For five months, Mercilla Tudu and her husband Baghal Hembrom were away from their village working on cardamom plantations in Kerala. After saving enough money, they returned to Ukhrapahari, their home and a vital part of their identity.
The village is more than just a place to live; it is a safe haven and community that supports its members through ups and downs. However, as the forest surrounding the village is depleted and rainfall becomes unpredictable, livelihoods in Ukhrapahari are becoming increasingly uncertain. Many residents find themselves migrating to other states like Kerala to meet expenses, only to return once those needs are fulfilled.
Experts attribute this migration pattern to two primary forces: the decline of Adivasi life due to mining, declining agricultural incomes, erratic rainfall, and government neglect, and the exploitation and alienation experienced by migrants in the states they work in. In Dumka, around 273,000 people are currently migrants, and nearly 39,000 are return migrants, indicating that leaving the village has become an integral part of staying.
Written by urgent.news from Dialogue Earth's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
