Minor typo deprives Kolis of ST benefits for 28 yrs

JAMMU: For the past 28 years the socially educationally and economically backward Koli community is being deprived of its constitutional rights due to a casual approach of the successive governments in JK

Updated At : 01:20 PM Jan 28, 2019 IST

Dinesh Manhotra

Tribune News Service

Jammu, January 27

For the past 28 years, the socially, educationally and economically backward Koli community is being deprived of its constitutional rights due to a casual approach of the successive governments in J&K.

Although the marginalised community was classified as a Scheduled Tribe (ST) in the Centre’s list, the successive state governments have failed to rectify a trivial typing error to restore constitutional rights to this section of society.

In 1991, when some marginalised tribes of J&K were granted the ST status, the tribe was left out as it was inadvertently spelt as ‘Kohli’ instead of ‘Koli’ due to a clerical mistake in the official documents. Koli and Sippi are the same tribe but the Sippis were classified as STs, but Kolis were left out.

“For the past 28 years, we have been struggling to get ‘H’ removed from the spelling of our tribe but to no avail,” rued Mangat Ram, a Koli leader of Ramnagar. He said except promises nothing had been done to give benefits which the community deserves.

“One year ago, the previous coalition regime had promised on the floor of the Legislative Assembly to rectify the mistake but nothing had been done so far,” said former MLA of Udhampur Pawan Gupta, adding, “the community is bearing the brunt of the discriminatory policies of successive regimes”.

“Restoring constitutional rights to the community is not a big deal. The state government just has to issue a fresh notification to clarify that ‘Sippi’ and ‘Koli’ are the same tribe,” said former MLA of Ramnagar RS Pathania. “The previous government had given this assurance on the floor of the Assembly,” he said, adding that it was high time to remove the 28-year-old discrimination against the tribe.

Tribe hails from remote areas

The Koli community hails from remote areas of Kathua, Udhampur, Ramban and Doda districts. Members are involved in rearing sheep and goats in the higher reaches
Due to educational backwardness they have not been able to effectively voice their demand
The community has almost negligible presence in bureaucracy and no political representative
The previous PDP-BJP government in its Agenda of Alliance had promised to grant the ST status to Koli, Pahari and Chopan castes but it remained only on paper