TRIBAL PEASANTRY 69 constitute 7.5 per cent of the population, is an integral part of the Constitution. The tribe in India, writes the author, is basically a "politico-administrative category and has hardly any socio-cultural or economic connotation". Many comparatively advanced communities are excluded from this list and others are striving for inclusion so as to secure certain benefits. Certain propositions in tribal research obstruct any scientific interpretations of these societies. He critically examines common notions which perceive tribal societies as being isolate, static, homogeneous and exploited by non-tribals. He argues that they have been a part of Indian class society. Refuting the assumption that communal ownership or absence of private ownership of land is characteristic of primitive society and hence the basis for identification of such a society, he puts forward "the relationship of men to land as crucial to understand different forms of precapitalist societies". Specific forms of cooperation of labour can be taken as a meaningful index for identification of tribes and it is changes within the character of corporate labour which created conditions for formation of class society. This leads him to believe that today less than one-tenth of the Scheduled Tribe population of India belongs to the universally valid category of tribe but the rest belong to class societies. All major tribes in India are actually peasant societies forming an integral part of the Indian economy, he says. Taking as example the case studies of five villages of Gujarat— Simalia Bujarag, Vanskui, Luheri, Padidi Ador and Baroj—he shows that their agrarian systems are structured widely open, with inter-village labour participation and seasonal migration to rich agricultural and industrial regions. The term 'tribe' is used to denote a stage in the evolution of the social and political structure. In the second chapter, he shows that in the colonial situation, a complex social economic system had already been established through the development of commercial activities and trade^ routes. The British terminated tribal isolation by incorporating them into the mainsti earn of Indian society. They followed the dual policy of strengthening the feudal crust of tribal society formed by Rajas, hill chiefs and zamindars and simultaneously creating conditions in which their traditional organization of productions and social system were radically altered. Alienation of land due to the zamindari system meant immiserization and eviction of Adivasis which compelled many to migrate as indentured and contract labour to tea plantations and coat mines. Market relations were also introduced by non-tribals from the plains Many also came, to escape the feudal oppression then prevailing in Bengal, Bihar and Orissa. This contact did eventually transform the local language, culture and social structure of the tribals. Here the term "diku" is significant. It is used even today to identify both exploiter and outsider. Of particular interest is his critical appraisal of the role of the Indian