Utilise skills of DNTs, says Bisalaiah

Two-day conference begins at B N Bahadur Auditorium in city

He was speaking at the inauguration of a two-day conference on ‘Ethno Historical Development of Denotified Tribes (DNTs): Issues and Prospects’ organised by Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policy (CSSEIP) and Department of Studies in History, University of Mysore at B N Bahadur Auditorium here.

“Some among the tribal communities are good at hunting and can be employed for barefoot patrolling in the forests for Project Tiger”, said Bisalaiah giving an example of the talent they acquire.

Continuing, he said the government should concentrate on setting up ashram schools for their benefit to give a touch of academic to the intelligence among them. Most importantly bureaucrats and the society at large should be sensitised about such tribes.

Criticising that those belonging to afore said tribes have been branded as habitual offenders since  the rule of British started in the country, Bisalaiah questioned what about those belonging to other communities who have been really committing heinous crimes.

He stressed on considering them as the citizens of this country as a preamble of the Indian Constitution reads- We the people.  It is a mockery of the Constitution as DNTs have been pushed to a corner while other communities enjoy the benefits. “They are nobody’s people”, construed Bisalaiah.

Before summing up, he urged the historians and anthroplogists to join hands for a result that would be useful to the society. He chided researches being carried out for the sake of PhDs.

University of Mysore Vice-chancellor Prof V G Talawar said it had been made mandatory for the researchers to submit one page summary of the research to examination wing of the varsity to enable them to forward it to media for publication. However, it seems to haven’t yielded any results. “I don’t know what is preventing them from going to the media”, Talawar lamented.

CSSEIP Director Prof Ramesh, journalist Raveendra Bhat and DoS in History Chairperson Prof Sugeetha Suvarna were present.