What is "adivasi"

Adivasi (, ) is an umbrella term for a heterogeneous set of ethnic and tribal groups considered the aboriginal population of South Asia. Adivasi make up 8.6% of India's population or 104 million, according to the 2011 census, and a large percentage of the Nepalese population. They comprise a substantial indigenous minority of the population of India and Nepal. The same term Adivasi is used for the ethnic minorities of Bangladesh, Pakistan, the native Tharu people of Nepal, and also the native Vedda people of Sri Lanka . The word is also used in the same sense in Nepal, as is another word, janajati (; ), although the political context differed historically under the Shah and Rana dynasties.

Adivasi societies are particularly prominent in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and some north-eastern states, and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Many smaller tribal groups are quite sensitive to ecological degradation caused by modernisation. Both commercial forestry and intensive agriculture have proved destructive to the forests that had endured swidden agriculture for many centuries. Adivasis in central part of India have been victims of the Salwa Judum campaign by the Government against the Naxalite insurgency.