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Kolam-A Diminishing Tribe
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' Kolam ' A Tribe of Vidarbha Situated mainly in Wardha, Yeotmal and Nagpur districts, are a diminishing Tribe at the Juncture has advanced to the extent where babies are being born in Test Tubes.
There is hardly any growth in their population in 10 years.
' Kolam ' always live on the `Podes' which are small hutments which are two to three kms away from main village. They seldom mix with the other communities. No matter how much efforts the govt. of various times put in. A few of the Prime reasons of their diminishing Tribe is High infant Mortality and diseases like Malaria, Tetanus, Tuberculosis, Malnutrition etc., Early child marriage. The condition of kolami woman is even more deplorable as they are married at the age of 12 to 13 years and bears her first child even at the age as low as 13 years. This often results in the Mother`s Mortality, yherefore creating an imbalance in the male-female ratio. |
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Socio-Economic Conditions
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The main source of livelihood of kolami living in Wardha district is forests and Agriculture. The Agriculture is purely Rainfed and the main crops are soyabean, cotton and Tur. The output from the agriculture provides only 3 months support to feed their families and the rest of the year they are dependent on forests for their livehood. From forests they get leaves of specific trees to make Bidi. The average incom they generate per person is Rs.12/- to 30/-. Joint families do not exists, almost all the kolami have Nuclear family system. |
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Education Facilities |
There are 3 residential schools running in the Wardha and Arvi Tehsils of Wardha distric out of these 3, one is Govt. Ashram school and 2 are Anudanit Ashram Schools under the control of ATC, Nagpur. The in Government Residential School start taking the child at the age not less than 8 years, the reason stands that the children younger than this find difficulty maintaining themselves, and till then they have no means of local/village level primary education. By the time the children attain the age of 8 years they resist going to the school, as it becomes very difficult for them to adjust to an absolutely different environs than their 'podes'. They by that time start helping their parents, and despite the fact the parents want their wards to go to schools, they are at times helpless.
In 1999 we started a Residential School at Mandwa village Tal. and dist. Wardha. We made all possible efforts to brought their children`s to our school. As a result at present nearly 150 Kolami students are learning in our Residential School. |
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Government Support
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The various Government down the years have been relentlessly trying to find out ways and means to better the living conditions of the Kolamies. Senior officers of the district and the Additional Tribal Commissioner, Adivasi Vikas, Nagpur have been trying to do the Best, they can. There is a need of Health centres in the block. The village women folks must be trained to become mid wives to assist in the child birth. All efforts are being put in to educate then and make them self dependents. govt. is trying to bring them in the main stream by connecting the podes with the villages and providing them with infrastructure facilities like tar roads. |
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