Extent of Utilization of Various Government Tribal Development Schemes by Primitive Tribes Living in Biodiversity Zone of Nilgiri District in Tamil Nadu

Abstract

Biodiversity hotspots have set up to protect at least 10 per cent of world's ecological regions in order to conserve biodiversity and safeguard many facilities provided by natural ecosystems. Biosphere Reserves are representative areas of natural and cultural landscapes that span a large area of agricultural, marine, or coastal ecosystems, or a combination of them, as well as representative bio-geographic domains or kingdoms. The Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve has richness and diversity, to protect it, the district has been declared as “Organic district” on July 2019. It is also the home to a wide range of human cultural diversity and especially the primitive and vulnerable tribes live in these areas. They are the designated tribal settlers identified by the government and these have their own religious believes, culture and traditions which is extremely different from others customs. They are called as "Adivasi" or "Aboriginals". So as to improve their life style and lead a better life like others, central government along with state government had bought several development schemes and plans under Ministry of tribal affairs. The Tribal Development Plan (TDP) was developed to proactively solve tribal issues and provide culturally compatible solutions, specifically considering indigenous people. The main objective of this study is the adoption level of government tribal development schemes and plans among the primitive tribes living in the biodiversity zone of Nilgiri biosphere. Thus the vulnerable and primitive tribal societies of like Toda, Kota, Kurumba, Paniya, Kattu naickan and Irular of Nilgiri district have been chosen for the investigation with the sample size of 120, in which 20 from each tribes have been chosen. Pre-tested and well-structured interview schedule have been made and thereby undergone survey. Thus it provided an overall picture about the level of adoption about various government tribal development schemes for their betterment and upliftment in among Nilgiri tribes.