Cover Story: Nomadic 'livelihoods'

Comprising about 7 per cent of the population, the lives and livelihoods of the nomadic communities in India are in dire straits. Changing villages and consequent loss of patronage to their products and services, changing laws encroaching upon their traditional rights to resources, lack of permanent residence, lack of any asset base, extreme poverty and subhuman conditions, high illiteracy, lack of exposure to new skills and faint or no knowledge of changing livelihoods characterize the lives of the nomadic communities in the country today. They occupy the lowest rungs of social and economic ladder and are the most vulnerable. Many are not registered voters and face neglect. Worse, some nomadic communities continue to languish under the perils of Habitual Offenders Act of 1959.