what a note on pastoralists of Jammu and Kashmir?
1. location
2. movement
3. cast
4. earning
Answers
Although according to a semi-popular magazine, “more than 200 tribes1
, comprising 6
per cent of the country’s population, are engaged in pastoralism” (Khurana, 1999),
there appear to be no reliable statistics available on the number of “active
pastoralists”. Since Independence, population censuses no longer collect data based
on caste adherence; besides, not all members of pastoral castes are actually engaged in
livestock keeping. Only a small proportion of young people from pastoral
backgrounds have the opportunity or interest to become livestock herders and are
engaged mainly in unskilled labour in cities.
Indian pastoralists can be divided into groups that practice horizontal movement
patterns in the dryland regions and vertical movement patterns in the mountainous
areas. But beyond that, they resist attempts for convenient classification and
systematisation. In the following section we discuss the major pastoralists groups in
India (see Tables 1 and 2 for summary).
Himalayan Region
Gujjars
Size and Location:
The Gujjars derive their name from the Sanskrit term Gurjara. Historically they were
once a dominant people in western India and gave the territory occupied by them the
name Gujarat. However, for unknown reasons, the Gujjars migrated from western
India and spread out all over the north-western part of Indian sub-continent and to
some extent central India. Cunningham (1871) describes their distribution to be in
great numbers in every part of north-west India, and from the Peninsular Gujarat. The
most reliable census data on Gujjars is over sixty years old. In 1931 the Census of
India reported 2,038,692 Gujjars inhabiting eight provinces and Indian states; Delhi,
Jammu and Kashmir, undivided Punjab (now consisting of Punjab, Haryana and
Himachal Pradesh), the North West Provinces (now Pakistan), and other areas in and
along the Himalayas.
There is a great controversy regarding the origin of the Gujjars. According to one
view, they were pastoral nomads of Central Asia that migrated into India during the
5th or 6th century AD. According to another opinion, they are of Indian origin and
were inhabitants of the region extending around Mount Abu in western Rajasthan,
Malwa and Gujarat. They are said to have migrated around the 16th century AD in a
north-west direction into Punjab Kandi, in primary and secondary waves. The primary
wave of migrants
1
The term”tribe” is often used to refer to pastoral and other indige