NEW DELHI: Around 36,428 tribal-dominated villages across the country are being developed as ‘Adarsh Grams’ under the Pradhan Mantri Adarsh Gram Yojna. They will be provided all basic facilities by the Union government. An amount of Rs 7,300 crore has been allocated by the government for this purpose.
“The Modi government has not only started developing 36,428 tribal-dominated villages as Adarsh Grams, it has also decided that the birth anniversary of Bhagwan Birsa Munda will be celebrated every November to create a feeling in the tribal society that the revered persons of their society are special to all, including the government,” BJP’s national spokesperson Gaurav Bhatia told the media on Friday.
In India, there are 705 ethnic groups, which are officially recognised as Scheduled Tribes. Most of them are in Lakshadweep, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Odisha, West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Dadra & Nagar Haveli, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland. Among the states, Madhya Pradesh has the highest tribal population as per the 2011 census.
“Prime Minister Narendra Modi has spoken about the ‘Eklavya’ Model School’ for providing better education to the children from the SC and ST communities. Under this scheme, the government will build 452 schools and refurbish 211 existing schools in five years”, claimed Bhatia. In the Union budget, the government has increased from Rs 1,100 crore to Rs 6,000 crore the allocation for education of children from the SC and ST communities.