“Indigenous people need not be put in a museum and preserved like what they are today or what they have been. All the facilities and opportunities of development must reach them just as they are made available to other citizens of the country,” said Hari Ram Meena, former IG Police and recipient of the coveted Meera Award given by Rajasthan Sahiyta Academy.

He was addressing a function organized to celebrate UN International Day for World’s Indigenous People on 9^th August at Rajeev Gandhi Tribal University, Udaipur as chief guest.

He further stated that tribals in India continue to live in deprivation even today and if they organize for their rights they are dubbed as terrorists. Their condition has not improved much even after two decades dedicated to them by UNO.

The key speaker of the function, poet and activist Prof. Hemendra Chandalia made a power point presentation and talked about the basic issues related to the life of indigenous people. He mentioned that there are 370 million indigenous people spread in 72 countries of the world.

He said that the plight of the indigenous people began with colonization and the encroachment over their habitats increased with development pursued on the western model. Referring to David Stafford’s book The American Holocaust he stated that the American aboriginals consider the day of arrival of Columbus as the beginning of their misfortune.

Manik Arya, formerly Director of All India Radio Udaipur stated that the tribals have their traditions and are a community of jovial people who rejoice in their own music, art and culture. There is immense scope to learn from them.

Dr. Anil Paliwal, Professor talked about several pedagogical issues related to education of indigenous people and proposed editing of a dictionary of the tribal languages of south Rajasthan.

Presiding over the function, the Vice Chancellor of the University T. C. Damor related his journey from the tribal village of Kherwara to JNU, his long tenure as an IPS officer and finally as a Vice Chancellor. He said that he always enjoyed his work and was fully involved in whatever work he did, but he attached greater value to his tenure as a vice chancellor since it involved new challenges which he met successfully.

Eminent intellectuals Prof. B. L. Phadia, Prof. G.N.Mathur, Prof. N.K.Dashora, Prof. Sudha Chaudhary, Prof. Madhav Hada, Deputy Registrar Ashok Dwivedi, activist D.S.Paliwal, Sanjay Gour and the students of the University also participated in the discussion. The function was very ably conducted by the Assistant Registrar (Academic) Dr. Daya Dave.