ABSTRACT
In 2007, at the issue of a seminar I gave in Ranchi on “Education and youth agency in Jharkhand”, I addressed the audience with a final question: “Don’t you think that after fifty years of struggle, you might propose an alternative model of citizenship to the rest of India?” I had in mind that in Jharkhand, many people were against caste feelings and atrocities committed against Dalits and Adivasis (from the Hindi word adi, “beginning” and vasi, “resident”, an equivalent of the word “aboriginal”). Then, somebody answered: “Yes, in principle, but you know we have also lost any hope of having a civil society.” This declaration was followed by a deep silence and then the discussion became private.
