Bhubaneswar: Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik has urged union tribal affairs minister Arjun Munda to take necessary steps for Presidential notification of inclusion of 160 communities in the State in Scheduled Tribe (ST) list of Odisha.
In a letter to the union minister, the Odisha CM on Saturday has stated that a Task Force under ministry of tribal affairs had recommended 9 proposals from Odisha as priority cases for inclusion in the ST list of the State in the year 2014, but the same is yet to be notified in the Presidential Order. Because of the delay in their inclusion in the ST list, all these 160 plus communities of the State are becoming victims of historical injustice, Patnaik has pointed out.
ThebCM has urged the union ministe to look into the long pending matter and expedite the scheduling of these left out communities to deliver social justice to them in accordance with the provisions of the Constitutions of India.”
Since 1978 onwards, government of Odisha has recommended more than 160 communities of the State to the ministry of tribal affairs for their inclusion in the ST list of the State with approval of Tribes Advisory Council. Among these some are new entries. Some others are sub tribes/subsets, synonyms and phonetic variations of the existing ST communities residing in different parts of the State who are being deprived of the benefits availed by STS though they have the same tribal characteristics as their respective notified STS.
