Cannot pressure State to declare Badaga community as ST: Madras HC

CHENNAI: We cannot compel the State to take steps to declare the Badaga community of Nilgiris as a Scheduled Tribe, said the Madras High Court as the government already decided that the community doesn't possess any primitive traces like other tribal communities based on a communication from the Union government.

The letter from the Ministry of Tribal Affairs to the Adi Dravidar and Tribal Welfare department of Tamil Nadu requesting further justification to declare Badagas as ST cannot be construed as a ground to declare the community as tribal, held a division bench of Justice SM Subramaniam and Justice K Rajasekar.

"We cannot compel the State to send a fresh proposal to the union government seeking such declaration, any decision in this regard should be taken based on facts and available data," wrote the bench while dismissing a petition moved by a non-governmental organisation.

The petitioner Green Mount India Foundation stated that the unique nature of the Badaga community has been the subject matter of extensive study for a long time. The community should be declared as ST and seeking direction from the union government to make decisions based on the representation of the State.

Tamil Nadu government had sent a proposal to the Union government seeking to declare Badaga as ST, however, the Registrar General and Census Commission refused the proposal as there were no materials to support the proposal.

Further, an ethnographic information was also published stating that Badagas are a prosperous and significant landowning peasant community of Nilgiris, who do not seem to have traces of primitiveness.

Accepting the communication the State took a decision and closed the matter.

Subsequently, on June 16, 2023, the Ministry of Tribal Affairs sent a communication to the State Adi Dravidar department seeking further justification to support the proposal.