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Mahesh

23/10/23 08:37 AM IST

Hattees community

In News
  • Months after the Hattee community of Himachal Pradesh’s Trans-Giri area was included in the Scheduled Tribes list of the State, there is confusion in the Tribal Development Department about who the “Hattees” actually are and whether people already classified as Scheduled Castes should be included as members of this community.
Confusion
  • The State government has said that the matter regarding who the Hattees are was referred to the State Advisory Department (Law Department).
  • The department had suggested that the entry added to the ST list does not specifically exclude the communities already notified as SC and hence the amendment must be construed accordingly.
  • But it also noted that in the Bill to add the community, the statement of objects and reasons specifically said that the intent was to include Hattees, excluding communities that had already been designated as SC. 
  • The confusion was over how to interpret the entry that has recently been added to the State’s ST list. 
  • According to the Registrar-General of India, people who are referred to as Hattees in the region also include those from communities like Koli, Badhai, Lohar, Dhaki, Dom, Chamar, etc. which are already designated as SCs. 
Hattees Population
  • About 1.6 lakh people in Sirmour would benefit from Hattees being added to the ST list.
  • The district’s population is around 5 lakh, as per the 2011 Census, of which close to one-third are Scheduled Castes, with the district already having two Assembly seats reserved for SCs.
  • The only other ST in the region are the Gujjars.
  • “Hattee” was a term used to refer to the inhabitants of Trans-Giri area and that this included people from “upper status social groups” like the Khash-Khanet (Rajput) and Bhat (Brahmin) castes and people from Scheduled Caste communities like the ones mentioned above.
Hattees community
  • The Hattis are a close-knit community who got their name from their tradition of selling homegrown vegetables, crops, meat and wool etc. at small markets called ‘haat’ in towns.
  • The Hatti community, whose men generally don a distinctive white headgear during ceremonies, is cut off from Sirmaur by two rivers called Giri and Tons.
  • Tons divides it from the Jaunsar Bawar area of Uttarakhand.
  • The Hattis who live in the trans-Giri area and Jaunsar Bawar in Uttarakhand were once part of the royal estate of Sirmaur until Jaunsar Bawar’s separation in 1815.
  • The two clans have similar traditions, and inter-marriages are commonplace.
  • There is a fairly rigid caste system among the Hattis — the Bhat and Khash are the upper castes, while the Badhois are below them.
  • Inter-caste marriages have traditionally remained a strict no-no.
  • The Hattis are governed by a traditional council called Khumbli, which like the khaps of Haryana, decide community matters.
  • The Khumbli’s power has remained unchallenged despite the establishment of the panchayati raj system.
  • The community has been making the demand since 1967, when tribal status was accorded to people living in the Jaunsar Bawar area of Uttarakhand, which shares a border with Sirmaur district.
Source- The Hindu

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