Abstract

This paper reflects a combination of traditionally important social work issues along with times need, challenges and future opportunities, resulting in comprehensive coverage of the whole field of social work. This paper examines the traditional methods and models of social work profession in India, both the structural and individual based models, set within a discussion of the need of strong strategic intervention in social policy and planning on the concerns and foci of social work in India. It has particular focus on socio-economical issues of Dalit and Tribals.

Introduction

Social work is emerging as an important profession in the modern world. Of the 217,000 social workers at the present time, more than 63,500 are the member of national Association of Social workers. Hence, it’s an important thing to know, what is actual inside of social work curriculum and what the real and most essential need of India is. The curriculum is these schools or departments are mainly patterned on the kind of curricula of the American schools of social work. The programme of training has three major components: class room lecturer, field work and research project.

Traditional social work emphasized three basic processes i.e. casework, group work and community organisation. Many social workers claim there is only one social work process – that of problem solving related to social relationship Again, the American or British books are developed and written on the lot of assumptions. It is rightly recognized that a professional social worker should have at least a minimum understanding of socioeconomically forces affecting the lives of the peoples he served and social and economical problems they face.

Still there is lot of weakness for structural analysis in social work. This has had detrimental effects on social work education, a product of which is our ‘caste blindness’ and a pejorative understanding of tribes in both our teaching content and perspective building also. Many thinkers argued that most professional social workers were caste-blind and inherently caste prejudiced. They simply cannot tolerate or appreciate difference and have least ability for self introspection at least in the context of the realities of the country. Some what extent it is true also. Across social work schools in the country the issues of Dalits are barely visible .Research on Dalit and Tribal issues made by social work professionals are very less in number than other general social problems.

It is an open secret that majority of Social Work Educators in India come from upper caste communities – their world view dominates and is deeply entrenched in social work education and at times, is nothing less than all-encompassing. The very few critical social work educators use this fact to point out the hypocrisy of the ‘Caste Blind Traditionalist’ school in social work. Hence that the first thing that professional social workers need to seriously consider doing is to de-caste themselves. No social work practice paradigm could contribute meaningfully and make any real dent on the marginalized till the same is first accomplished.

When India became an independent nation, it was confronted with the social and economical backwardness of some sections of its people among several other problems. Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes under Indian constitution are one of the groups which are most backwards. The term of ‘Dalit and Aadiwasi’ is inclusive of all the oppressed and exploited sections of society. These peoples are downtrodden, disadvantaged, and underprivileged, dispossessed, deprived and are subject to untouchability.

According to census of 2011 the population of Schedule caste and Schedule tribes is 166,635,700 and 84,326,240 which is 16.2% and 8.2% of India’s total population. It shows that near about 25% peoples are still downtrodden, disadvantaged, underprivileged, dispossessed, deprived. Schedule caste and Schedule tribes will not get any opportunity of sharing meaningfully the benefits of prospective economic growth. This will be essentially due to erosion of reservation policy on the one hand and the growing process of realization of jobs under special drive on the other.

Traditional View of Social Work

Social work as profession is of recent origin in India and its professional characters has not yet fully been accepted. In India social work has always understood to be synonymous with voluntary services. The giving to alms, the feeding of destitute and good neighbourliness has been practised as a part of all religions. The impact of Christian Missionaries and western education introduced a new tradition of social work based on not religious tenets but on ideas of rationalism, democratic and liberal humanitarianism.

Social work as a profession is a product of this century, which promotes Social change in human Relationships and the empowerment of people to enhance well- being. Traditionally all social work activities are obedient for six methods i.e Social case work, Social group work, Community organization, Social action, Social welfare research and Social welfare administration. ‘Professional’ social workers have been engaged in protection of populations at risk, extend material assistance, counselling of individuals and families, organization and development of communities and capacity building

The only Basic Principal of Social work is welfare of peoples. A person should have a through understand society. One should know what the position of individual and groups in society is. The important thing is knowledge of social changes. The social work profession is guided by a district set of abstract values and a code of ethics. These values are transformed into accepted practice principals for the purpose of informing intervention with person, group and community. The paper endeavours to provide information about

Social work and social welfare are often confused and sometimes used synonymously. Actually social welfare has broader meaning and encompasses social work, public welfare, and other related programs and activities. Social welfare in broad sense encompasses the well-being and interests large numbers of peoples, including their physical, mental, emotional, spiritual and economical needs.

The purpose of social work education is a category is not only to define a context precisely, but also to facilitate the drawing of clear boundaries that would allow an abstract delineation for informed action and reflection. It is within such a framework that we have used the category Schedule caste and Schedule tribes and not any other category although I am deeply connected to the Dalit and Aadivasi category.

Theoretical Perspective

The Indian constitution directs the state to bring social transformation. It aims to eradicating feudal hierarchical social order of the Indian society. Attempt of state to provide the Dalits and Tribals equal opportunities and to create positive environment for improving their social and economical condition has become a vital part of Indian politics. After sixty five years of independence, Dalit and tribal issue remains the central concern. Traditional frame works of social work teaching are not able to solve this issue. Hence it is times need to take some special efforts enhance the capacities of social work students to enable them to formulate their own view on this vital aspect. Social work course contains should teaches students to look at the society more critically and question normally accepted paradigms which way helps to deconstruct the realities and look at the world from a subaltern viewpoint. Social work must be a perspective which guides practice in this regards which will involve working with groups, communities, individuals and families.

Ideologically, conceptualizing instances of violence against Dalits as ‘human rights violations’ and ‘SC/ST atrocities’ linked them to powerful legal frameworks but often distracted from the relational context producing them. As several elderly Dalit activists remarked, the practice of ‘socio-economic analysis’ and the Freirian, Marxist-inspired training. Dalit activism and the articulation of Dalit-ness is not constituted at any particular ‘local’ level but emerged in a transnational social field. The issue of local-global disconnect, then, seems not to be one of an isolation of different levels of activist activity or articulation and probably needs to be conceptualized differently.

Today the people of SC/ST have changed in their aspirations. They expect very tangible, direct results otherwise they won’t be with us. Hence, the Dalit movement now had to ‘closely combine the need for immediate fulfilment of needs with the long-term’ and this was precisely what Dalit and Tribals budgeting allowed for. Most important of all, perhaps, the Dalit and Tribal budgeting/SCP agenda. Though drawing on international expertise and linking to movements for ‘participatory budgeting’ in other countries, the focus this time would lie squarely on ensuring that Dalits and Tribals’ ‘fair share’ of the national budget would indeed end up tangibly in the hands of Dalit and Tribal families.

Scheduled Castes Sub Plan and Tribal Sub Plan are being implemented for the last three decades. Even though the basic principle of Scheduled Castes Sub Plan and Tribal Sub Plan is to make allocations in proportion of to the population of scheduled castes and scheduled tribes but these percentages were never implemented by ministries/ departments of union and state governments. It is estimated that more than Rs 4 lakh 15 thousand crores were denied to Scs and STs only in allocation by union government during the last three decades.

In this context traditional frame work of Social Work education should be transformed in to Anti-Caste social work which is the epistemological premise of Dalit Social Work, and have positioned the same as a theoretical position that challenges the structure of graded inequality, based on purity and pollution. Hereby, I would like to suggest some contents for Social Work Curriculum.

Social Justice

Dimensions of Justice: Philosophy, features and forms, Social Justice as a core value of social work profession, Equality before law, Human Rights & Fundamental Rights for social justice, Constitutional base of social justice, positive and protective discrimination, Indian legal system and its operational instruments – IPC, Cr.PC, CPC, Statutory bodies/organs for justice – NHRC, NCW, NCM, NC for SC/ST, Legal and public advocacy, PIL, legal literacy, free legal aid, RTI, Role of NGO pressure groups

Schemes of Social Justice in the State of Maharashtra.

Schduled Caste Sub-Plan (SCSP) : State Plan and District Plan, Tribal Sub-Plan (TSP), Dadasaheb Gaikwad Swabhiman and Sabalikaran Schemes, Nuclious Budget, Special Assistance Schemes, Gharkul Yojana, Schemes for Educational and Financial upliftment of Scheduled Castes and Tribes.

Social Welfare

Definition, meaning, concept, nature and importance of Social Welfare in context to Social Justice, Social Policy and Planning for social welfare, Welfare of scheduled castes and scheduled tribes, Social policies needed to understand administration, Participants in administration: the community, the board, the chief executive, the staff, and the beneficiaries, social welfare administration a group process

Field Work Perspective

The main goal of field work and placement is to build capacity of student by which they can easily identified and come to understand the root causes of the problem organization was working on advocacy on Dalit and Tribals issues like SCSP/TSP special sub plans and SC/ST (PoA) Act 1989. These are the remedial measures for Dalits and Tribals to come out of their current condition. Also to develop the ability to recognizes and value the potential within human beings specifically communities belongs to Dalit and Tribe groups developing awareness among them of inequality and injustice based on caste background. Motive of field work should be to develop methods of working in partnership where there are differences in partnership where discrimination is differences of caste, class, power, gender, culture and other differences.

Students have to placed for a period of one month over each semesters in Dalit and Tribal People’s movements across the state, non government organizations and international organizations etc. Students can also option to work on specific self chosen themes under the guidance of a faculty member. Tribal village Lekha- Mendha of the Gadchiroli district is an ideal village for placement to student in this context. The foremost example of self-governance comes from a village Lekha-Mendha. This village is a perfect example of what a socially unprivileged but strongly united, and motivated community can achieve following the path of non violence and self-rule. Let’s see some features about this village.

Lekha Mendha an Ideal Place for Placement

Mendha is a small Tribal village in the Lekha Panchayat. It is situated in the Gadchiroli district in the eastern end of the central Indian state of Maharashtra with a forest area of 1800 hectares, it has a population not more than 450 people of the Gond tribe. Yet, they made it amply clear that representative democracy handed over to them by a political structure far removed from their own tribal customs would not work for them.

Devaji Navalu Tofa, a former sarpanch who has been coordinating and evolving the process of consensual decision making, he gave a popular revolutionary slogan “Mava Nate – Mawa Raj” (Mumbai, Dillit Amche Sarkar, Amchya Gawat Aamhich Sarkar) it means, At the centre, there is Delhi government, at the state level, there is Mumbai government, but we are our own government. Here, every decision is taken with everybody’s consent. Even if one member disagrees, the decision is put on hold. There have been no police or court cases against anybody here. We believe in swayam shasan (self-rule),”

The village is well known for its declaration of self-rule, its biomass-based subsistence economy and its self sufficiency. Gadchiroli district is situated at the tail end of the Satpura range of mountains and is largely forested. It is predominantly tribal and poor, with high dependency on its natural resource base. However, with appropriation of community forests by the State and the dwindling of forest cover due to increased population and extraction pressures, the rights of these tribals over their land have withered, deepening their level of poverty. Freeing itself from the clutches of poverty and wrestling back its right to natural resources, Mendha has been an exception to the rule. Mendha rose against the Government’s policy of taking over community forest rights back in the 1930s when it initiated the struggle to assert control over its 18 km 2 forest.

The case of Mendha provides key insights into the nature of governance and judicious use of resources at the community level. It shows ways of making programmes work. Hence, evaluation of the benefits and costs of community initiatives (overleaf) provides a platform to show the potential of community managed schemes in tandem with the government that do not sacrifice livelihood, cultural and environmental values. An application of multi-criteria evaluation to the social, economic and cultural gains and processes in the village would go a long way in future research and for understanding such societal processes. The village level implementation of self-rule for the maintenance of its forest and its continued success and scaling-up requires building confidence in the positive impacts of these initiatives.

An important lesson that could be learnt from Mendha is the concept of study circles. The villagers strongly believe that decision making powers can only be effective if the mechanism to make informed decisions are in place. Uninformed decisions can be irresponsible and dangerous. Regular informal discussions are therefore a way of life in the village. Lekha-Mendha put forward an ideal way to being village as self reliance and self sustainable by using forest based natural resources. Now a days this village play a role as ‘light house’ to many villages of India towards sustainable human development and community self reliance.

Conclusion

Caste’ has had and still has on the Indian social, political and economic reality, this has led the oppressed to confront structures that exclude and oppress them. In Marathi one famous quotation “Ji jata jat nahi ti mhanje Jat”. In the same breath, while tribe does not ruffle feathers too much within social work education, it is deeply embedded within a paternalistic frame.

In this context the main objective of social work education should be to create academically oriented students dedicated to the empowerment of Dalits and Tribes. To enhance their understanding to Indian structural realities from the lived experiences of Dalits and Tribes would greatly benefit from the programme. To provides perspective and skills to carry out work in numerous avenues. Student gets facilitate to understanding tribal issues more minutely and develop practice paradigms that are congruent with the lived experience and felt needs of tribal peoples.

Reference :

• Dr. Anilkumar Thakur & Prof. Ram Naresh Thakur (2008) : Impact of Economical reforms policies on Dalit and Weaker Sections, Deep and Deep Publication, New Delhi
• Dr. P.R. Gautam & Mr. R.S. Singh (2011):Social Work and Community Development, Centrum Press, Bangalore
• Dr. P.M. Parmar (2002): Social Work & Social Welfare in India, Sublime Publication, Jaipur
• Mr. Pathak, N. and Gour-Broome, V. (2001). Tribal Self-Rule and Natural Resource Management: Community Based Conservation at Mendha-Lekha, Maharashtra, India.
• Dr. Raj Kumar (2003): Essays On Dalits, Discovery Publishing House, New Delhi
• Online literature available on TISS’s web site