Six editions of a book, on a subject applicable to a small part of the country, is a great source of achievement to any author. I am indebted to each of the readers of earlier editions, who have been my source of encouragement for continuously updating the book and bringing new editions. Publication of revised editions of an existing book is a big challenge specially in this digital era, where online reading is becoming more popular. However, the present work has surpassed the same by incorporating new material and revising the content to facilitate the readers.
Sixth Schedule to the Constitution was visualised by the founding fathers to recognise diversity of this great nation; and confer constitutional recognition of the customs, language, practices and traditions guaranteed to every strata of society. The importance of Sixth Schedule can be visualised by the fact that over a period of time, its provisions has been extended to the areas which were outside the purview of Sixth Schedule, as originally adopted by the Constituent Assembly on 26th November 1949. In the year 1984, Sixth Schedule was made applicable to the State of Tripura; and in the year 2003, it was applied to a large area in the State of Assam inhabited by the Bodo tribe. There has been demand of extending it to Gorkhaland in the State of West Bengal; and, of late, there is a big agitation demanding the applicability of Sixth Schedule in Ladakh, situated in the northern-most part of the country.
The book has traced the history of administration of tribal areas of the North-eastern States which was earlier termed by the British Government as ‘excluded areas’ and/or ‘backward areas’ from 1882 till the present position. In the preface, I propose to trace the history of the book since first edition in 1983, till the present edition in 2025.
0 Reviews For Sixth Schedule to the Constitution