GUTTI KOYA TRIBALS
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Context: A Forest Range Officer was brutally killed allegedly by a group of Gutti Koya Adivasis with axes and sickles over a “podu land” issue in Errabodu forest area in Telangana’s Bhadradri Kothagudem district.
Details:
- Koya are an Indian tribal community found in the states of Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Chhattisgarh, and Odisha.
- Koyas call themselves Koitur in their dialect. The Koyas speak the Koya language, also known as Koya basha, which is a Dravidian language related to Gondi.
- Most important fair celebrated by Koyas is the Sammakka Saralamma Jatra once in two years on full moon day of the Magha Masam (January or February) at Medaram village in Mulug taluk of Warangal district.
- Podu is a form of shifting cultivation, as practiced by various tribal groups in forest areas has for long been an economical survival versus environmental sustenance issue.
- The tribal community faces the new threats of development and conflicts, posing a serious questions on its existence and civilization. For instance, the displacement and migration of Gotti koyas tribals taking place in Andhra Pradesh. In the absence of land and access to a forest, the Koyas depend on wage labour in farm lands. The scarcity of these jobs lead to malnutrition of children and instances of anemia in women.
- The Andhra Pradesh state government proposed Polavaram Project is posing a serious threat of displacement of 170,275 Koyas of the tribal population and more than 276 villages in the Khammam district of Bhadrachalam, Palwancha divisions
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