Tribal body rejects bid for ST status to six Assam communities

The Coordination Committee of Tribal Organisations of Assam (CCTOA) has rejected the “illegal and unconstitutional” recommendations of the Group of Ministers to grant Scheduled Tribe (ST) status to six communities.

The committee represents 14 tribes of Assam. The six communities for whom the three-member Group of Ministers recommended ST status are Chutia, Koch-Rajbongshi, Matak, Moran, Tai Ahom, and “Tea Tribes” (Adivasis).

In its report submitted to the 126-member Assam Assembly in November 2025, the Group of Ministers suggested dividing the six communities into three categories — ST (Plain), ST (Hill), and ST (Valley).

The Consultative Group of the CCTOA, chaired by New Delhi-based rights activist Suhas Chakma, on Friday said the recommendations, apart from being illegal and unconstitutional, would “affect and destroy the political rights” of the existing tribes at all levels from the panchayats to the Lok Sabha.

The CCTOA pointed out that while the Scheduled Castes are identified based on their status in the Hindu caste system, the STs are identified based on tribal characteristics — indications of primitive traits, distinctive culture, geographical isolation, shyness of contact with the community at large, and backwardness for the community as laid down in the Lokur Committee report of 1965.

The umbrella tribal body said that in 1993, the Assam Institute of Research for the Tribals and Scheduled Castes recommended the Other Backward Classes tag for the six communities, and the National Commission for Backward Classes notified them as Other Backward Castes.

“Once identified as SC, a community cannot be reclassified as STs by the same government for political expediency,” CCTOA leader Sukumar Basumatary said, citing the August 1947 Joint Report of the Excluded and Partially Excluded Areas (Other Than Assam) and the North-East Frontier (Assam) Tribal and Excluded Areas Sub-Committee as well as the Lokur panel report that recommended against ST status for tea plantation workers.

“The Koch-Rajbongshis are two different and distinct communities. In the erstwhile Goalpara district, Koch means those ‘Khotri’ Hindu Bengali migrated to Goalpara district from Rongpur district of East Pakistan, while Rajbongshi means indigenous peoples of Assam who were subsumed into wider Koch identity,” the CCTOA said.

“This distinction between the two communities was not noted by the Group of Ministers. As per the 1950 Constitution Scheduled Caste order, the Koch were identified as a Scheduled Caste in West Bengal. Once the Koch had been identified as Scheduled Castes in West Bengal, they cannot be classified as the Scheduled Tribes in Assam,” the organisation said.

It noted that four communities — Chutiyas, Mataks, Morans, and Tai Ahoms — are part of the mainstream Assamese people and that neither the 1947 report nor the Lokur Committee of 1965 included them as STs, thus negating their claim to be classified as tribes.

The CCTOA further said the Assam government recommended ST status for all 74 communities clubbed under “tea tribes”, despite the Ethnographic Expert Committee on Tea and Ex-Tea Garden Tribes recommending SC status for 38 of these communities. “The Assam government, the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, the Registrar General of India, or the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes have no jurisdiction to recommend contrary to the findings of the expert committees,” it said.

“The demand of these six communities to be considered as STs is only to ensure their political reservation, especially at the level of the panchayat, autonomous council, autonomous district council, and State Assembly, as there are no seats reserved for the OBCs in the State Assembly,” the CCTOA said.

“Otherwise, the rights and benefits of these six communities in terms of access to education and employment are already secured through 27% reservation as the OBCs at the State level and establishment of several autonomous and development councils for each of these communities,” it said.

“The granting of ST status will destroy the political reservation of the existing STs in addition to affecting the reservation from the Central government’s pool. The recommendation of reserving parliamentary seats (Kokrajhar and Diphu) will not justify the destruction of the reservation for the existing STs from the panchayat to the Parliament levels,” CCTOA coordinator Tilak Doley said.

“The scale of reservation in Assam is already unconstitutional according to a 1992 Supreme Court judgment, which stipulates that reservation must not exceed 50%. The Assam government provides 59% reservation [SC 7%, ST(P) 10%, ST(H) 5%, OBC/MOBC (including ‘Tea Tribes’ 3%, Adivasis 27%, and EWS 10%]. If 35 other Tea and Ex-Tea Garden Communities, which are not included in the ST list as yet, the reservation can go beyond 70%, which is absolutely unconstitutional,” the CCTOA said.

“As the reservation is based on proportionate populations, the existing STs shall suffer once these six communities are listed as STs. This goes against the recommendation of an all-party delegation of the Assam Assembly that the granting of ST status to the six communities must not affect the rights of the existing STs,” CCTOA leader Motilal Rabha said.