ABSTRACT
The census in Assam enumerates 23 tribal communities, as well as a small and notional twenty-fourth category described as ‘unclassified’. The hills tribes are a residue of the once composite state of Assam that included the four hill districts that eventually became the separate states of Nagaland, Meghalaya and Mizoram. These anomalies have to be seen in the context of the acknowledged social reality in Assam — that tribal and caste identities in Assam are marked by a certain elasticity defying the rigid stratifications in the rest of the country. A passage from Tribes of Assam Plains is worth quoting because it highlights other problems related to the enumeration and population of the plains tribes, including the tea garden tribes. There is a demand, and an on-now-off-now agitation as well, for the upgradation of the two districts into an ‘autonomous state within Assam’ under Article 244-A of the Constitution, a status enjoyed by Meghalaya before it became a full-fledged state.
