Realigning Dispossession and Negotiating Development: The Konda Reddis’ ‘Capacity to Aspire’

Introduction

Classified under a separate category since independence, the scheduled tribes have received special focus in the development agenda of the Government of India. This agenda is partly inherited from the colonial state that contributed to the dispossession of primary resources on which the scheduled tribe livelihoods is based. The dispossession included not only curtailment of forest rights and land alienation but through certain policies that prioritised revenue generation for the colonial state (Elwin, 1940; Guha, 1983), undermined indigenous knowledge of resource use and technologies of cultivation of the scheduled tribes. Consequently, the authority of the dominant had recorded the lives of the scheduled tribes from this perspective, labelling them as primitive societies (Rycroft, 2014). This labelling and categorisation was not just the consequence but also intentional and part of the colonial strategy of knowledge production for domination which facilitates dispossession.

With dispossession and unrest of the schedule tribes escalating, the colonial state selectively adopted a policy of protectionism through isolation and thus came the ‘Excluded and Partially Excluded Areas’ under the Government of India Act, 1935, along with other earlier and later protective Acts. ¹ However, the most important impact of the colonial state is their record of the tribe as primitive, backward and needing hand-holding for development (or living their lives the ‘right way’). As argued by Bhukya (2008, p. 103):

The construction of textual knowledge about Indian communities was a major genre in the colonial milieu as part of the project of colonial knowledge creation as a means of the extension of colonial power. This resulted in extensive literature on almost all communities that was not only used as a source for legal and general administration but also to establish colonial domination.

This strategy of colonial domination through ‘knowledge’ generation has been highlighted by other scholars and discussed by Bhukya (2008) including, Said (1995), Cohn (1996) and Inden (1990). Bhukya (2008, p. 105) further argues ‘how post-colonial writings on Adivasis did not dislodge colonial derogatories’. The knowledge for dominance has continued to dominate in Independent India which has embraced this perspective for the development of the scheduled tribes. After much debate over the isolation (Elwin, 1940) and assimilation (Ghurye, 1943) approach for scheduled tribe policy, independent India adopted a threefold strategy of protection, mobilisation and development for the scheduled tribes (Xaxa, 2003). It is important to note that though this threefold strategy is guided by Nehruvian panchsheel (Elwin, 1960), the spirit of the panchsheel has not defeated the constructed colonial knowledge of the scheduled tribes as discussed above. More recently, the ‘Report of the High-Level Committee (HLC) on the Socio-economic, Health and Educational Status of Tribal Communities in India’ states that,

Through the last six decades, the State has emphasized development while doing little to enhance the protections provided in the Constitution through the everyday practice of statecraft. Rather, the protective measures have been violated by the very State which is supposed to ensure the enforcement of these protections. It is this which largely explains the marginal status of tribal communities. (HLC, GoI, 2014, p. 26)

The colonial knowledge production and the categorisation that it supported the tribe together with the continuous dispossession of their livelihood resources has secured a place for them as beneficiaries of persistent poverty that development aims to eradicate. Mosse (2010) argues that poverty needs to be understood through a relational approach, as poverty is a creation of capitalism on which development policy depends for its eradication, ‘the consequence of historically developed economic and political relations’ (p. 1157). This collusion of capitalism and development can only perpetuate and make poverty persistent especially for those frozen into categories with the historical identity of the tribe. Harriss-White argues that in the 21st century, the concept of development has been impoverished starting as a ‘project of capitalist industrialisation’ and ‘reduced to an assault on poverty’ (2006, p. 1241). She states that, ‘there are at least eight ways in which capitalism creates poverty’ (ibid, p. 1241). It starts with, ‘creation of the precondition’ by the state where, ‘precapitalist rentier classes …and industry have to be destroyed …. Labour must also be dispossessed of productive assets … so as to be forced to work for wages’ (p. 1241). Mosse (2010) discusses the first three ways of poverty creation given by Harriss-White with the case of the Bhil Adivasi of western India in showing how they became victims of chronic poverty. The start of this process of poverty creation is linked to the historic dispossession of Adivasi forest resources which has continued in renewed forms post-independence and further in the neoliberal era. He argues that, ‘impoverishment is inseparable from normal processes of capitalist economic development, especially where these result in dispossession, confiscation or privatisation of crucial livelihood resources, whether for colonial forest extraction, infrastructure development or “new economic zones”’ (ibid, p. 1171). Thus, an industry of Development orchestrates how the Adivasi should live and perceive well-being.

In over a hundred years of nurturing capitalist industry, there has been a politically and economically motivated strategy of silencing the voice of the Adivasi, in order to undermine their history as they see it and live. This is ensured through a clichéd consolidation of the Adivasi identity, their culture, given as markers till date for scheduled tribe identification. These markers last framed/revised ² by the Lokur Committee in 1965 include, ‘(a) primitive traits (b) distinct culture, (c) geographical isolation, (d) shyness of contact with the community at large and (e) backwardness’ (HLC, GoI, 2014, p. 25). These markers overlap and represent the culture and are then problematised as limitations for the purpose of development (Escobar, 1995). In this process, they make culture seem static and a hindrance resisting the change of economic growth that development intends to bring in. The question here is, is culture as perceived by development true? Is it wrongly understood, is there more to what Adivasi culture is? In that case, can culture facilitate development?

It is this last question that forms the focus of Rao and Walton’s (2004) edited volume on ‘Culture and Public Action’, in offering a corrective to the neglect and undermining of culture in development policy and advocate for the inclusion of culture in facilitating development. Amartya Sen in the same volume states that, culture is a ‘constitutive part of development’ and ‘cultural dimensions of development require closer scrutiny in development analysis’, where culture ‘should be taken into account in examining the challenges of development, and in assessing the demands of sound economic strategies’ (2004, pp. 37–39). Appadurai (also in the same volume) explains how culture has been negated and set in opposition to development for over a century by viewing culture, ‘as a matter of one or other kind of pastness—the keywords here are habit, custom, heritage, tradition. On the other hand, development is always seen in terms of the future—plans, hopes, goals, targets …. It is hardly a surprise that nine out of ten treatises on development treat culture as a worry or a drag on the forward momentum of planned economic change’ (2004, p. 60). In critiquing this long history, Appadurai argues for dissolving the wrongly assumed opposition, for ‘it is in culture that ideas of the future, as much as of those about the past, are embedded and nurtured’ and thus, ‘culture matter(s) … for development and for the reduction of poverty’ (ibid, p. 59).

In stating the above, Appadurai offers the concept of ‘capacity to aspire’ as a cultural capacity with three key dimensions of relationality, dissensus within consensus and weak boundaries that voice the future thinking in culture. The article explores this cultural capacity of the Konda Reddis (Andhra Pradesh state, South India), through conversations ³ carried out with them over an extended ethnographic study. In the process, the article questions, can the Adivasi; or have the Adivasis; or do the Adivasis; engineer the capacity to aspire within and outside the rhetoric of poverty and development. For this purpose, the following section provides further details of the concept, ‘capacity to aspire’.

A Brief on the ‘Cultural Capacity to Aspire’

As stated above, the concept, ‘capacity to aspire’ ⁴ is discussed by Appadurai (2004) in the context of development and poverty eradication and thus refers to the diverse group of the ‘poor’ (‘the excluded, the disadvantaged and the marginal groups’). Aspirations, according to Appadurai, have been misunderstood by economists as part of the individual ‘wants, preferences, choices and calculations’, when they have always been part of the collective social life having specific choices and preferences at different levels of this collective. The collective includes a larger group, to a smaller group to an even narrower group. Aspirations for a good life are conceived at these different levels of ‘local ideas and beliefs’ for ‘life and death, the nature of worldly possessions’ to ‘more densely local ideas about marriage, work, leisure, convenience, respectability, friendship, health, and virtue’ to ‘intermediate norms’ of ‘specific wants and choices: for this piece of land or that, for that marriage connection or another’ (ibid, pp. 67–68).

The capacity to aspire is nurtured by strengthening the ‘capacity for voice’ which is built through the ‘consensus and dissensus’ in a society, negotiating to alter their ‘terms of recognition’. The terms of recognition for the poor are the ‘norms that frame their social lives … whose social effect is to further diminish their dignity, exacerbate their inequality, and deepen their lack of access to material goods and services’ (ibid, p. 66). For instance, with reference to the Adivasis, the norms that frame their social lives often contrast with mainstream aspirations of material goods and thus have the effect of diminishing their dignity. Through people’s voice which may be expressed through ‘actions and performances’ using cultural ‘metaphors, rhetoric, organisation’ the imposed undermining terms of recognition needs to be altered (ibid, p. 67). This process of negotiating change in the terms of recognition brings out the cultural capacity to aspire and future thinking in a culture that facilitates development.

Appadurai points to two limitations in the capacity to aspire. Firstly, it, ‘is not evenly distributed in any society’ giving an advantage to those with relatively more ‘experience of the relation between … ends and means, because they have a bigger stock of available experiences of the relationship of aspirations and outcomes … because of their many opportunities to link material goods and immediate opportunities to more general and generic possibilities and options’ (ibid, p. 68). Secondly, ‘capacity to aspire, like any complex cultural capacity, thrives and survives on practice, repetition, exploration, conjecture, and refutation. Where the opportunities for such conjecture and refutation in regard to the future are limited …, it follows that the capacity itself remains relatively less developed’ (ibid, p. 69).

As stated earlier, the ‘poor’ are a diverse group suffering from different forms of exclusions (Sen, 2007) and experiences and therefore the two limitations play out differently with different groups. Through the concept of ‘capacity to aspire’, Appadurai offers a method of intervention in bringing culture to the forefront of development. Using this method, the paper explores the Konda Reddis’ capacity to aspire through their engagement with the state’s development policy envisaged and implemented for them. More specifically, the paper discusses the resettlement programme of the State’s Integrated Tribal Development Agency (ITDA), who since the late 1990s have been constructing colonies in the plains for the hill dwelling Konda Reddis. The vision of this programme continues to suffer from colonial knowledge production of undermining the economic viability of shifting cultivation practised by the Konda Reddis and its accompanied ‘isolation’ in hill habitations and ultimately negating the culture of the Konda Reddis in development planning.

The article highlights conversations with the Konda Reddis who have opted for resettlement and those who have not, in understanding their aspirations for and against the move. These conversations bring out the Konda Reddis concern for inclusion where they acknowledge a compulsion to participate in the development schemes of the State in order not to be excluded or ‘forgotten’ by the State. These conversations are a counter knowledge production of the dominant, the state that the Konda Reddis have been keenly observing and engaging with and concluding as a system of promises without the will to deliver. The conversations and group discussions carried out with the Konda Reddis show their capacity for voice, how they build consensus through dissensus and negotiate to alter their terms of recognition. These three aspects which together reflect their capacity to aspire are discussed in the following sections, before which an introduction to the Konda Reddis and a short history of development intervention planned for them is provided. Through conviction, compliance and compulsion the Konda Reddis voice their ‘capacity to aspire’ and negotiate development.

The Konda Reddis and Planned Development

Konda Reddis are one among the many forest-dwelling communities listed as scheduled tribes in the Constitution of India. Given the heterogeneity within the category of scheduled tribes with respect to the reach of development benefits, a further internal categorisation was identified as necessary by the Shilo Ao committee in 1969. This led to the creation of the Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG) ⁵ from the list of scheduled tribes. The category was created to include those groups with ‘(a) forest-based livelihoods, (b) pre-agriculture level of existence, (c) a stagnant or declining population (d) extremely low literacy and (e) a subsistence economy (NAC, GoI, 2013, p. 1). The Konda Reddis are one among the seventy-five groups who belong to this category and live mainly in the forested tribal concentration region, the schedule five region of northwest parts of Andhra Pradesh in South India.

The article focuses on a cluster of hill habitations referred to locally as Kuturgattlu (hills of Kutur). These hill habitations are dispersed and have a small number of households (2–13). The main livelihood of the Konda Reddis is shifting cultivation or podu and is accompanied by hunting and collection of forest produce, maintaining kitchen gardens and making bamboo ware. Along with these different activities of production and collection, they also participate in barter and sale of articles, through which they bring in other resources for their subsistence. The Konda Reddis believe that their subsistence pattern is resilient to the risks posed by the elements of nature and sustainable because of its capacity to accommodate different food procurement activities through the integration of time, space and labour (Mummidi, 2012, 2019).

Under the agenda of development, the State has set out several schemes to help the Konda Reddis ‘develop’ and change from their hill dwelling podu cultivating lifestyles to plain dwelling settled agriculturists. The strain and accessibility to the Konda Reddi hill villages and their practice of shifting cultivation is looked at as the main deterrence to state development policy. And so, this policy prioritised to resettle the hill dwellers to the plains and replace shifting cultivation with settled agriculture. This policy draws continuity from colonial policies towards shifting cultivation (Mummidi, 2020). Accordingly, the thirty-one hilltop habitations were scheduled for resettlement into eight foothill colonies. The first colony was ready for occupation in 1996 and the final eighth colony in 2015.

Planning and implementation of this programme of resettlement were carried out by the Integrated Tribal Development Agency (ITDA) in Bhadrachalam ⁶ headed by a Project Officer (PO). In 2013, the Project Officer was framing the Comprehensive Community Development Programme (CCDP) for PVTGs (here for Konda Reddis). He stated that a recent visit of the Chief Minister to one Konda Reddi colony resulted in him promising a special package, the highlight of which was to go ahead with the eighth colony in Paitegudem, as a ‘model colony’. Reflecting on the resettlement programme that is being implemented for over a decade, the Project Officer acknowledged that all colonies suffer from lack of some basic amenities. He visualised a grievance redressal day in each colony, along with Officers of all concerned departments and recording the views of the people. He states,

the actual needs of the people can be identified only by sitting with the people, talking to the people and taking their view of the schemes that are being implemented at present. Then we have to study the output of the implementation. (Project Officer-ITDA, 2013, oral communication)

As much as the Project Officer acknowledges that the people are the best judge of development distribution, the approach of the grievance redressal day is visualised only in support and within the purview of resettlement, staying in the track of the development vision first conceived for the Konda Reddis. Two concerns stated by him in setting right the resettlement programme was with respect to the distribution of title deeds for agricultural land and the positive difference the model colony will make. The model colony envisaged in the special package,

will have all facilities including housing, electricity, water supply, road, school and anganvadi center…everything at the same place only for PTGs. But I’m not bringing any people down. I am focussing on the people who have already come down but residing in different places. (Project Officer-ITDA, 2013, oral communication)

The resettlement programme that started as the only hope for development was now careful in avoiding any record of forced resettlement. The strategy was to lure the Konda Reddis to the plains through the external trappings of urban development planned for the model colony. It is necessary to understand this vision of the model colony and the title deeds for land from the beneficiary perspective. Here, the paper explores, how and why the Konda Reddis participate in development? What are their aspirations? And are their aspirations in sync with the development vision or have they contributed to its change? If so, how? In exploring these questions, the following sections focus on the Konda Reddis’ capacity to aspire through the three aspects of consensus through dissensus, capacity for voice and changing the terms of recognition.

Consensus to Dissensus to Consensus

Over the many decades of development intervention that the Konda Reddis have been subjected to, they have constructed meanings of what it stands for and why. These meanings, however, do not share the consensus of all the Konda Reddis ⁷ and this is reflected in the divided opinions in support of the resettlement programme. Some have taken to understanding development as tutored by the development planners which claims to provide a ‘better/good/improved life’. The divided opinions further break up to list aspirations of wants and choices. The consensus on what is the right ‘choice’ and what should be the ‘wants’ is debated over time as choices are made and lived and reconsidered.

The first participants to the resettlement programme were a small group of twelve households who left the hills for the plain’s colony in 1996. As narrated by one of them,

Our elders were not convinced by the government’s proposal for our development. They refused to leave the hills, but we were young and convinced that settling in the plains was ‘development’. The ITDA told us that it is better for us and our future generations as they will provide schooling and it is important that we educated our future. Besides other provisions of land and housing, access to health care was also promised. They promised that our children will receive free education and will get assured employment.

This was in 1996 and voices the expectations of those who left the hills. But two decades after, they look back and are not as optimistic about their expectations. What happened of their expectations? The first hurdle was that the land identified by the ITDA for the colony was under the forest jurisdiction and after putting up their huts, the forest department officials objected by force by tearing down and burning their huts. The ITDA then took time to identify land for the colony and finally procured from a Koya village (another Adivasi group) and settled the Konda Reddis. It took 6 years shifting from one temporary site to another before finally settling down. With time concrete housing was built and land for agriculture (2 acres per household) procured and granted. Many years later four bullocks for ploughing and then much later two tractors were provided on subsidy collectively to the twelve households.

In the meantime, the children of 1996 have become adults and required more housing and agricultural land. As the ITDA went ahead with more resettlement colonies for the Konda Reddis in the hills, the demand for more housing and agricultural land from existing colony settlers remained unfulfilled. Though motorable roads promised access to hospitals and schools, the settlers realised that mere access to transport does not ensure the benefits of health and education. The completion of the education in schools and then to college and eventually employment remains till date a distant dream, with not a single Konda Reddi completing schooling from the hill habitations or the resettlement colonies and majority children dropping out by class five. In the case of health, the Konda Reddis in the colony seems equally disappointed. Again, though roads and transport allow access to the hospital, the promised free medical treatment with ITDA support has not been forthcoming in many medical emergencies leading to loss of life and much discontent among the settlers.

The dissenting voices from the colonies now seem to align with the consensus of the hills. But what about those who refused to leave the hills for the colony? Why were they not convinced by the ITDA’s development plan? The reasoning for not opting for resettlement is strongly located in livelihood security. As argued by the people in the hills,

Why should we abandon the forest that provides for us, … we are the children of the forest, we cannot leave our forest mother and settle in the plains. … There are about 100 children together in these hill villages. The government promises two acres per household in the colonies, how will all the children and the generations to come, share these two acres. The promised land will be sufficient only for ten of the hundred children, then what about the livelihood of others. Here in the hills there is no question of inheriting land. Anyone, even our daughters can practice podu on any hill slope.

Through the above justification, people of the hills voice the weakness in livelihood assurance in the resettlement plan. It reflects the linkage between security and sustainability by looking into the future, in questioning the livelihood security for their children. It is here that the measure of cultivable land provided by ITDA falls short of this reasoning. On the other hand, the possibilities of education and employment are perceived as not reason enough to give up on hill resources. The promise of improved living is invalid if it cannot assure livelihood security. The finite distribution of land, a prime livelihood resource overruns access to education and health facilities. In fact, access to the hospital is argued as not an everyday requirement, ‘one is not always ill and when we are, we have our vejju (medicine man). When we need the hospital, we will go to it, not live there waiting for the day of illness’ (elder from hill village).

But more importantly, the weakness of livelihood assurance becomes more profound in comparison to the resilience of hill cultivation. Shifting cultivation practised in the hills neither supports private ownership of land nor has finite defined boundaries to land. ⁸ The first settlers did not foresee the challenges of livelihood. But with time as they weighed their development, their gain seemed trivial. As reflected by one colony settler,

The only change between us and our relatives in the hills is the dress. The plains have taught us to be more clean and dress well. We have stopped wearing a loincloth and wear shorts. These external changes are championed by the ITDA as development but our accumulating debts due to livelihood insecurity are not important for them.

The Konda Reddis in the hills and the colonies are constantly and introspectively engaging with the purpose of development with reference to each other. People of the hills continue to maintain their consensus that livelihood and thereby food security is above all other necessities. The people in the colonies have come to recognise this aspect but will this make them abandon the colonies. Will they dissolve the dissensus created in moving to the plains by moving back to the hills? Interestingly, the colony settlers do not wish to go back to the hills though they fully acknowledge the livelihood advantage. They reason,

There are more difficulties for people living in the plains than in the hills. But how can we go back to the hills now! Those of us, the early settlers who were allotted land, have worked hard to prepare our agricultural land, not just with our labour but a lot of money. We need money for everything in agriculture; for labour, for ploughing, for the ox or the tractor. The input costs are very high, and all linked with money. These input costs in the plains are so confusing that we don’t even know if we’ve made profit or loss. But in fact, there is no profit in this, we take a loan for initial input costs and at the end when we sell the surplus, we only settle the loan. We are now so accustomed to this that we show no remorse even if we are in debt, which we all are in. People from the hills who newly resettle and attempt this cultivation will find it very difficult to come to terms with this pattern as in the hills the question of loan and debt for cultivation does not exist. The people in the hills are more independent and work at their pace. Here, even those who have been given land are not cultivating it given the input costs. In the hills, they focus on the mixed millet cultivation and have all they need to consume. But for us in the plains, we need to take our money every day to the store to buy daily needs. Where will this money come from? We depend more and more on wage labour.

So, people stay on and try to make it work and come to terms with their new financial status of indebtedness as normal. The above opinions and conviction of the people show a transformation from the consensus of living in the hills to dissensus in the possibility of an improved living in the plains as proposed by development which again, with time changes to a consensus of better living in the hills. The consensus concludes in realigning the meaning of development. Even visible changes to their dress for the better seem trivial against mounting debt and dependence on monetary economy. They voice livelihood insecurity leading to impoverishment. Further, the lack of attention, care and support from the promised patrons of development threatens destitution. The nexus of capitalism and development which continuously creates and works to eradicate poverty, is set in motion, starting with the first poverty creating step of dispossession (Harriss-White, 2006; Mosse, 2010).

Voicing Aspirations

The realigned meaning of development influences the aspirations, the wants and choices people make with consensus by the hill and colony inhabitants. Development no more reflects limitation in their culture to be improved through resettlement. Neither do they abandon development, but in reversal, voice the limitation in development and direct what it should do. The metaphors used caution of developments’ unreliability and trustworthiness as voiced below,

ITDA lured our people to the plains. Like infants lured to the mother’s breast, they showed them land, once our people went down, they hid the breasts.… People from the hills can come down to settle in the colony but they need to ensure that they get housing and land for cultivation per household. They should receive pattas for the allotted land. That’s the basic for resettlement. But then we will need water for drinking and irrigation, so we will ask for a borewell, later depending on productivity, we will ask for a tractor.

The first settlers use their experience to guide or warn the new settlers on what should be ensured before they opt for resettlement. ‘Development’, whatever else it promises should first provide for livelihood. They consciously compare the livelihood of the hills and colonies to clarify on their aspirations,

In the hills, for generations we have been practicing podu and therefore do not see it as hard work. We have learnt to do podu as children and independently cultivate as nuclear families and if need be, a couple of households will join together and cultivate. In one podu cultivation, we have a mix of nine crops that are sequentially harvested, and so labour demands are distributed. Those who chose to go to the plains have to somehow find the means to cultivate in the plains pattern, they have to learn to cooperate in larger number of households as one bounded land has been given collectively to all households in some new colonies. This is challenging them, and the land remains uncultivated while the demand for separate land per household continues. ITDA thinks that they have provided land and our lives have become better. The media reports claim that we are having good harvests. How can we have harvest when we have no land or uncultivated land? In fact, we have no housing either. The housing under construction is slow and falls short of the demand.

The Konda Reddis now engage with the state and follow the media in critiquing the inadequacy of development policy. The envisioned development through resettlement will soon fail to find the naive participants of 1996. The people have come to understand development as something to negotiate and bargain, as stated here,

For a family to be comfortable in the plains the government must give ten acres per family with two motors and a tractor. This may not happen, and we have no intentions of going down to the colonies. In fact, I have given a representation for laying a road to our hill settlement. It will facilitate transport in case of medical emergency. It will also be useful for our weekly transport to the market.

This aspiration of bringing road connectivity to forested/hill habitations have been elsewhere reported to have dire consequences of dispossession in facilitating the exploitation of indigenous populations by traders, moneylenders and others (Pandya, 2002; Windle, 2002). However, the hill Konda Reddis seems to think they can protect themselves from exploitation. The ‘capacity to voice’ includes the capacity to ‘debate, contest, inquire, and participate critically’ (Appadurai, 2004, p. 71). The many voices of the Konda Reddis discussed here clearly demonstrate this capacity and voice their choices in realigning dispossession by engaging critically in arresting the dispossession overlooked by development and demanding livelihood security. These demands are done not in full surrender or dependence on development but in negotiation careful not to lose what they have, as stated,

The ITDA’s resettlement programme is very short-sighted, it can neither provide enough for now or for the future. Moreover, if we leave this reserved land in the hills now, then they will not allow us to come back. If we go down now and later when land is not enough if we decide to come back, they will not allow us.

Altering Terms of Recognition

The clichéd terms of recognition of the Adivasis are that they are shy to interact, would hide in the forests the minute outsiders enter their village and resist change, indifferent to development. The voices of the Konda Reddis discussed here show that they have other reasons to refute development. Since the resettlement programme, the Konda Reddis from both the colonies and hills do not shy away from development but make it more accountable. They participate in development not as beneficiaries but as entitlement holders. They have reversed the critic of development on culture to a cultural critic of development by exposing the incapacity of the development agent to deliver their promises. They now go after the ITDA office demanding implementation of the promised development. They meet the state Chief Minister during his rallies and voice their grievance. They participate in state schemes like the Public Distribution System in regularly purchasing subsidised rice and in the 100 days’ work of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). The reasons for participation in these state schemes by the hill Konda Reddis is not for the direct benefits that these schemes offer but for them to register their participation with the state. As explained below,

We buy the subsidized rice given through PDS every month. But it does not replace our diet of millets, which is the staple and in adequate supply. Of course, most of us did not do podu this year because of the MGNREGA programme, but we still have supply of millets from the previous year harvest. In any case, we never do podu year after year if the harvest is good. We consume PDS rice regularly, but the quantity supplied is not enough for the whole month, it is enough for a few days. We still prefer the taste of millet. With pearl millet, we drink the whey and eat the millet. With the PDS rice we throw away the whey. Also pearl millet cools the body but rice heats the body. Because of all these benefits, we are holding onto the hills. But if we don’t take the PDS rice and eat our own crops, the government will forget us and exclude us from the subsidy. They will eventually ask who we are. That’s why we procure PDS rice.

On the question of accountability,

Every time we go to the ITDA they promise to do everything. But it remains in words only, no action is taken. The PO recently gave us metal sheets for house roofing and promised to pay the labour charges for carrying it up the hills. But till date they have not paid us. They have never delivered their full promises. That is why we doubt them. When you give your word you must deliver, but this has never been the case. I therefore don’t trust them.

This lack of trust with failing accountability is voiced upfront to the development officer,

Recently the ITDA PO came to the hills and asked us to choose the colony. In fact, he insisted that I go down, as village head, it will ensure that all the families will then resettle in the colony. But I told him I won’t, I was born in the hills and will live here. I told him that if some of the families that chose the colony live well and gain from all that the PO had promised and tell me they are living well; then I will also go down. But no family in the colony is happy, they have not got all that was promised. They have only accumulated big debts and are taking food provisions on credit from the private stores. They will never make enough money to clear their debts.… But as I said to the PO, if my relatives from the colonies assure me that their lives have become better, that they have spent half their earnings and saved the other half, and ask me to resettle, then I will. But if PO tells me to resettle then I won’t.

The argument made above not only stresses the impossibility of debt-free livelihoods in the colonies but more importantly on the autonomy of the Konda Reddis. The autonomy of making their own decisions taken away by development is brought back by telling the PO that it is not his voice that is important in decision making but their own kin who only can be trusted in informing people in hills one their decision to opt or not for resettlement.

Negotiating Development with Conviction and Compliance

Is culture really a ‘drag to planned economic change’; the reasoning of the Konda Reddis shows that they are not against ‘forward momentum of planned economic change’ but doubt if the planned economic change can lead to forward momentum. This argument again is not based on sentiments of holding on to their traditional habitations for spiritual reasons or because their livelihood skills are limited to survive in the plains, but more for reasons of livelihood security which in the hills is ensured by the collective access and use of land and technology of food production that is, economical on input costs that include labour cooperation and balance the output, the harvest which allows the scope of crop storage for risk mitigation besides annual consumption. The lack of trust in a planned development is stated through the many voices of the Konda Reddis.

One village head explains how he settled in the colony, worked hard in agriculture by leasing land and cultivating cotton and pulses. He ran into debt and still held on trying it again and again for eight years and finally came back to the hills for shifting cultivation. He is not against settling in the plains again but wants the planned development model to show it is worth it. So now he does not say ‘no’ but wants his kin in the new colonies to say they have received all the promised support from the development special package and that they have succeeded in achieving the ‘good life’ as promised by planned development. Once he gets this assurance then he will join them. Participation in development thus is not resisted but weighed against the variables prioritised in his culture.

Accessibility to transport for health emergencies and education is acknowledged as limitations in the hills but one cannot forego livelihood security and thereby food security for this. This is the order of priority for the Konda Reddis and to deny the worth of this priority as primitive traits or backward is short-sighted if not biased.

The Konda Reddis have come to understand the language of the state and its development agenda. In the early nineties, it perplexed them when government officials visited the hill villages and asked them what they wanted and that they had come to provide for them. The government was being responsible in taking forward its public service through development. But the question, ‘is there something you want’, was difficult to comprehend for the Konda Reddis. It was difficult because they found it absurd to be expected not to work out for themselves how to satisfy their needs and wants and wait for the day when the state will reach them and ask this question. On one such occasion, a village head said just that to the officials. He voiced that their elders and ancestors had provided them with the knowledge of the forest and taught them the required livelihood skills and with this knowledge and skills have made their living sustainable. This response perplexed the officials who concluded that the Konda Reddis refuse development and why, because of their culture.

But more recently, the Konda Reddis have understood the purpose of the state and planned development. They have understood that voicing self-sufficiency and sustainability with forest-based livelihoods implies primitivism and backwardness. So now they have learnt to articulate their aspirations to the questions of ‘want’ but are careful in not losing their autonomy in fending for themselves.

Conclusion

Looking through the experiences of the Konda Reddis in understanding, accommodating and negotiating development; this article has explored the significance of culture for development in line with the propositions made by Sen (2004) and Appadurai (2004). Development Policy has consistently followed the pattern of moving people from autonomy to dependency. The vision for a model colony is based only on providing the external trappings of urban development, such as concrete housing, electricity and ease of accessibility through the creation of roads. But for the Konda Reddis, the priority is land for food cultivation. However, sufficient provision of agricultural land in the plains seems to be a challenge in the planned development. On the other hand, input costs are a challenge for Konda Reddis to cultivate available land. Neither of the two is able to overcome their challenges. For forward momentum of planned economic change, should the Konda Reddis learn to participate actively in credits and debts to bare the input costs leading to their impoverishment. Or should the state explore the viability of shifting cultivation that accommodates collective ownership and no input costs leading to self-sufficiency. Development policy especially for scheduled tribes has been preoccupied with providing inputs without taking stock of the significance of what people have and why? It is time, development policy changes its approach by starting with what people have and why they value it. The approach for development can then move on from this assessment offering additions that complement these factors. This then brings back ‘culture’ into development.