Ajay Kumar at 00:04, 30 August 2023

2023-08-30T00:04:13Z

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{{short description|Tribe mostly belonging to the state of Maharashtra, India}}
{{Infobox ethnic group
| group = Katkari
| native_name =
| native_name_lang =
| image = Katkari at brick kiln.jpg
| image_caption = Katkari at a brick kiln
| population = 304,073
| regions = {{flag|India}}
| region1 = [[Maharashtra]]
| pop1 = 285,334
| region2 = [[Gujarat]]
| pop2 = 13,632
| region3 = [[Rajasthan]]
| pop3 = 4,833
| region4 = [[Karnataka]]
| pop4 = 274
| languages = [[Marathi language|Marathi]]{{*}}[[Katkari language|Katkari]]
| religions = [[Hinduism]]
| related_groups =
}}
The '''Katkari''' also called '''Kathodi''',<ref name="SarkarDasgupta2000">{{cite book|author1=Amitabha Sarkar|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iOiAAAAAMAAJ|title=Ethno-Ecology of Indian Tribes: Diversity in Cultural Adaptation|author2=Samira Dasgupta|date=1 January 2000|publisher=Rawat|isbn=978-81-7033-631-0|accessdate=2 April 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Ministry of Tribal Affairs|title=Annual Report|publisher=Government of India|year=2011|location=New Delhi}}</ref><ref name="Karade2008">{{cite book|author=Jagan Karade|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pnjaAAAAMAAJ|title=Development of scheduled castes and scheduled tribes in India|date=July 2008|publisher=Cambridge Scholars Pub.|isbn=978-1-84718-606-5|accessdate=2 April 2013}}</ref> are an [[India]]n tribe from [[Maharashtra]]. They have been categorised as a [[Scheduled tribe]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Heredia, R. and Rahul Srivastava|title=Tribal Identity and Minority Status: The Kathkari Nomads in Transition|year=1994|publisher=Concept Publications|location=New Delhi}}</ref> They are bilingual, speaking the [[Katkari language]], a dialect of the [[Konkani language|Marathi-Konkani languages]], with each other; they speak Marathi with the Marathi speakers, who are a majority in the populace where they live.<ref name="Singh2004">{{cite book|author=K. S. Singh|title=People of India: Maharashtra|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BsBEgVa804IC&pg=PA965|accessdate=2 April 2013|year=2004|publisher=Popular Prakashan|isbn=978-81-7991-101-3|page=965}}</ref>{{#tag:ref|According to the 1991 census 99.32 percent of the community professed Hinduism, 0.16 percent Christianity and 0.08 percent Islam. The Katkari also reside in the states of [[Gujarat]], [[Rajasthan]] and [[Karnataka]] where they are designated as a scheduled tribe, however they are not categorised as PTG. Less than 3 percent Katkaris speak one of the over 24 languages other than Marathi.{{citation needed|date=October 2020}}|group="nb"}} In Maharashtra the Katkari have been designated a [[Particularly vulnerable tribal group]] (PVTG), along with two other groups included in this sub-category: the [[Madia Gond]] and the [[Kolam people|Kolam]].<ref name="Tribhuwan2004">{{cite book|author=Robin D. Tribhuwan|title=Health Of Primitive Tribes|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BADwtBiyjPMC&pg=PA76|accessdate=2 April 2013|date=1 January 2004|publisher=Discovery Publishing House|isbn=978-81-7141-903-6|page=76}}</ref><ref name="GoM-20130402">{{cite web|url=http://www.mahashabri.com/tribal.html|title=TRIBAL SUB-PLAN AREA (TSP AREA)|publisher=Government of Maharashtra|accessdate=2 April 2013}}</ref><ref name="Laxmikanth">{{cite book|author=Laxmikanth|title=Governance In India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ri6XEuHlcJkC&pg=SA14-PA26|accessdate=2 April 2013|publisher=McGraw-Hill Education (India) Pvt Limited|isbn=978-0-07-107466-7|pages=14–}}</ref> In the case of the Katkari this vulnerability derives from their history as a nomadic, forest-dwelling people listed by the [[British Raj]] under the [[Criminal Tribes Act]] of 1871,<ref name="Weling1934" /> a stigma that continues to this day.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Bokil|first=M.|title=De-notified and Nomadic Tribes: A Perspective|journal=Economic and Political Weekly|date=12 January 2002|pages=148–54}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Heredia, R. and R. Srivastava|title=Tribal Identify and Minority Status|year=1994|publisher=Concept Publications|location=New Delhi}}</ref><ref name="Buckles&Khedkar" />

== History ==
The Katkari were at one time a forest people living in the [[Western Ghats]] of Maharashtra, with a special relationship to forest creatures such as the tiger or ‘waghmare’, (wagh = tiger, mare = slayer; so tiger slayer) a common Katkari surname.<ref name = "Buckles&Khedkar">{{cite book|last=Buckles, D. and R. Khedkar|title=Fighting Eviction: Tribal Land Rights and Research-in-Action|year=2013|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=New Delhi}}</ref> The name Katkari is derived from a forest-based activity – the making and sale of [[catechu]] (katha) from the khair tree (Acacia catechu). Weling (1934, 2), drawing on census data from 1901, notes that the Katkari were ‘thickly scattered’ in small communities throughout the hill ranges and forests of Raigad and Thane districts in the present day state of Maharashtra.<ref name="Weling1934">{{cite book|author=A. N. Weling|title=The Katkaris: A Sociological Study of an Aboriginal Tribe of the Bombay Presidency|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zBkdAAAAMAAJ|accessdate=2 April 2013|year=1934|publisher=Bombay Book Depot}}</ref> Some also lived in hill areas in the southern part of the current state of Gujarat, and in the forests of what are now [[Nashik]], [[Pune]] and [[Dhule]] districts.<ref name="TomarTribhuwan2004">{{cite book|author1=Y. P. S. Tomar|author2=Robin D. Tribhuwan|title=Development of Primitive Tribes in Maharashtra: Status, Continuity, and Change|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZXCjtgAACAAJ|accessdate=2 April 2013|year=2004|publisher=Tribal Research & Training Institute}}</ref>

The Katkari population engaged in a wide range of livelihoods including the production and sale of catechu, charcoal, firewood and other forest products, freshwater fishing, hunting of small mammals and birds, upland agriculture and agricultural labour on the farms of both tribal and nontribal farmers.<ref name="HerediaSrivastava1994">{{cite book|author1=Rudolf C. Heredia|author2=Rahul Srivastava|title=Tribal identity and minority status: the Kathkari nomads in transition|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aD49AAAAMAAJ|accessdate=2 April 2013|date=1 January 1994|publisher=Concept Pub. Co.|isbn=978-81-7022-550-8}}</ref> The making of catechu declined sharply after independence when the felling of khair trees was banned by the Forest Department. Later restrictions by the Forest Department on delhi or [[shifting cultivation]]<ref name="GroveDamodaran1998">{{cite book|author1=Richard H. Grove|author2=Vinita Damodaran|author3=Satpal Sangwan|title=Nature & the orient|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wsYsAQAAMAAJ|accessdate=2 April 2013|date=28 May 1998|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-563896-7|page=708}}</ref> undermined the forest-based livelihoods of the Katkari.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Dalvi|first=Surekha|author2=M. Bokil|title=In Search of Justice: Tribal Communities and Land Rights in Coastal Maharashtra|journal=Economic and Political Weekly|year=2000|volume=35|issue=32|pages=2843–50}}</ref> These interventions left the Katkari with few options but to move seasonally in search of employment and new places to live.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Sathe|first=M.D.|title=Katkari Labour in Charcoal Making|journal=Economic and Political Weekly|date=July 30, 1988|pages=1565–68}}</ref>

Beginning in the 1950s, Katkari families began to migrate permanently from ancestral areas in the hills to the outskirts of agricultural villages on the plains. Many very small Katkari hamlets are now spread throughout the region, including [[Khalapur]], [[Sudhagad]], [[Karjat]], [[Pen, India|Pen]] and [[Panvel]] talukas in Raigad district and various talukas in Thane district, right up to the outskirts of [[Mumbai]].<ref name="Buckles&Khedkar" />

== Present circumstances ==
The Katkari of today are a fragmented and very scattered community, highly dependent on others for their livelihoods and for a place to live. Most Katkari are landless workers with only periodic and tenuous connections to their original nomadic, forest-based livelihoods. Many have become bonded labourers working on the brick kilns and charcoal units serving the urban and industrial interests of Greater Mumbai.

Patterns of population change among the Katkari, reflected in birth and mortality rates, seem to coincide with the problems of the so-called 'vanishing' tribes in India.<ref>{{cite book|last=Maharatna|first=Arup|title=Deomographic Perspectives on India's Tribes|year=2005|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=New Delhi}}</ref>

More than a third of the Katkari hamlets in Raigad and Thane districts are on private lands outside of caste (Hindu) villages.<ref name="Buckles&Khedkar" /> In recent years, rising land values near India’s booming financial capital have prompted landowners to sell their land to developers, putting the Katkari at increased risk of eviction. Entire communities have been surrounded by barbed wire fences as landholders attempt to intimidate residents into moving to other locations. In some cases, houses have been leveled and families forced to move. This is a form of [[land grabbing]] involving domestic elites rather than transnational commercial interests.

The Katkari struggle to remain in their hamlets provides an important contrast to the land tenure problems facing urban slum dwellers<ref>{{cite book|last=Council for Social Development|title=India Social Development Report 2010: The Land Question and the Marginalized|year=2010|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=New Delhi}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Nijman|first=Jan|title=Against the Odds: Slum Rehabilittion in Neoliberal Mumbai|journal=Cities|year=2008|volume=25|issue=2|pages=73–85|doi=10.1016/j.cities.2008.01.003}}</ref> or Adivasis in remote areas displaced by large-scale development projects.<ref name="Baviskar2004">{{cite book|author=Amita Baviskar|title=In The Belly Of The River: Tribal Conflicts Over Development In The Narmada Valley|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_bq0AAAAIAAJ|accessdate=2 April 2013|date=1 December 2004|publisher=Oxford University Press India|isbn=978-0-19-567136-0}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Gosh|first=Kaushik|title=Between Global Flows and Local Dams: Indigenousness, Locality, and the Transnational Sphere in Kharkhand, India|journal=Cultural Anthropology|year=2006|volume=21|issue=4|pages=501–34|doi=10.1525/can.2006.21.4.501}}</ref> Unlike Adivasis impacted by mega-projects, unpredictable forces at the micro level are driving the Katkari from their homes – haphazardly and one hamlet at a time. And unlike the situation in many urban slums, the Katkari did not squat in public and private spaces illegally, but rather settled where they had been invited to do so by landholders and other employers in need of labourers who could be easily bonded.

Despite their service, the Katkari community is firmly excluded from membership in village society. Particular expressions of [[untouchability]], including physical exclusion, the assumption of criminality and a visceral reaction to Katkari food habits have created an extreme distance of the Katkari from the [[caste]]-based agrarian order.<ref name="Buckles&Khedkar" />

==Demographics==
The Census of India 2001 (GOI 2012) indicates that [[Maharashtra]] is home to 235,022 Katkari, mainly in [[Raigad district|Raigad]] and [[Thane]] districts. Small numbers of Katkari also live the states of [[Gujarat]], [[Karnataka]] and [[Rajasthan]].
{| class="wikitable"
|-
!'''Sr.No'''.!! '''DISTRICT'''!! '''NUMBER'''
|-
|1 ||Thane district|Thane(Palghar)|| 124507
|-
|2 ||Raigad district|Raigad|| 119573
|-
|3 ||[[Pune district|Pune]]|| 15824
|-
|4 ||[[Nashik district|Nashik]]|| 10861
|-
|5 ||Ratnagiri district|Ratnagiri|| 6921
|-
|6 ||[[Satara district|Satara]]|| 3646
|-
|7 ||Ahmednagar district|Ahmednagar|| 815
|-
|8 ||[[Mumbai Suburban district|Mumbai Suburban]]|| 539
|-
|9 ||[[Nandurbar district|Nandurbar]]|| 454
|-
|10 ||[[Sindhudurg district|Sindhudurg]]|| 414
|-
|11 ||[[Solapur district|Solapur]]|| 326
|-
|12 ||[[Aurangabad District, Maharashtra|Aurangabad]]|| 197
|-
|13 ||[[Latur district|Latur]]|| 142
|-
|14 ||[[Dhule district|Dhule]]|| 122
|-
|15 ||[[Sangli district|Sangli]]|| 121
|-
|16 ||[[Jalna district|Jalna]] ||109
|-
|17 ||Mumbai|| 91
|-
|18 ||[[Osmanabad district|Osmanabad]]|| 91
|-
|19 ||[[Kolhapur district|Kolhapur]]|| 86
|-
|20 ||[[Amravati district|Amravati]]|| 81
|-
|21 ||[[Nagpur district|Nagpur]]|| 79
|-
|22 ||[[Beed district|Beed]]|| 62
|-
|23 ||[[Parbhani district|Parbhani]]|| 54
|-
|24 ||[[Jalgaon district|Jalgaon]]|| 53
|-
|25 ||[[Hingoli district|Hingoli]]|| 40
|-
|26 ||[[Buldhana district|Buldhana]]|| 32
|-
|27 ||[[Yavatmal district|Yavatmal]]|| 26
|-
|28 ||[[Wardha district|Wardha]]|| 15
|-
|29 ||[[Washim district|Washim]]|| 13
|-
|30 ||[[Chandrapur district|Chandrapur]]|| 13
|-
|31 ||[[Nanded district|Nanded]]|| 12
|-
|32 ||[[Gadchiroli district|Gadchiroli]]|| 7
|-
|33 ||[[Akola district|Akola]]|| 6
|-
|34 ||[[Gondia district|Gondia]]|| 2
|-
|35 ||[[Bhandara district|Bhandara]]|| 0
|-
| || '''TOTAL'''|| '''285334'''
|}
<ref>https://trti.maharashtra.gov.in/images/statisticalreports/New%20District%20Wise%20and%20tribe%20wise%20population.pdf {{Bare URL PDF|date=March 2022}}</ref>

== Culture ==
"We put our hands in the mouth of the tiger, open the jaws, and count the teeth of the tiger. We are the Katkari. [Waghachaya jabdyat, ghaluni haat, mojite daat, jaat aamchi, Katkaryanchi!] -- A Katkari saying.

While no longer a forest people, Katkari knowledge of forest resources remains with them. Katkari living close to forested areas still consume over 60 different uncultivated plants and over 75 different animals and birds, gathering these with incredible ingenuity and skill.<ref>{{cite book|last=Khedhar|first=Rajeev|title=The Role of Uncultivated Foods in the Food Security of Tribal Communities of Raigad District|year=2002|publisher=South Asia Network on Food, Ecology and Culture|location=Hyderabad/Dhaka}}</ref> For example, Katkari women can draw crabs from their holes during the summer months by rubbing two stones to imitate the sound of thunder showers. Crabs think it is about to rain, and leave their holes only to be grabbed by the human thunder maker!

The food habits of the Katkari are a reason for their social exclusion. The Katkari are one of only a few tribal groups in India that eat rodents, including the Little Indian Field Mouse, the Black Rat and the Greater or Indian Bandicoot. They believe that their strength and long life comes from eating the meat of rodents. They have even created a cultural festival, the Undir Navmi, dedicated to the rodent.<ref name="Buckles&Khedkar" />

== Images ==
<gallery>
File:Katkari village enclosed.tif|Katkari village
File:Katkari at brick kiln.jpg|Katkari child at brick kiln.
</gallery>

==Notes==
<references group="nb" />

==References==
{{reflist}}{{Social groups of Maharashtra}}
[[Category:Social groups of Maharashtra]]
[[Category:Scheduled Tribes of India]]

Katkari people - Revision history

Ajay Kumar at 00:04, 30 August 2023