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Social Issues › Caste, tribe and social empowerment

Denotified communities

Denotified, nomadic and semi nomadic communities: their history, their count and the schemes meant for them.

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StandardPrelims and Mains30 Sep 2026

The Criminal Tribes Act, 1871 let the colonial government notify whole communities as "addicted to the systematic commission of non bailable offences"; their members had to register with the magistrate and could be confined to settlements. The Act was repealed after Independence and the communities were "denotified" on 31 August 1952, which they observe as Vimukta Jati Diwas. In its place came the Habitual Offenders Act of 1952, under which, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination said in 2007, the same communities "continue to be stigmatized"; it asked India to repeal the Act and rehabilitate them.
Nomadic and semi nomadic communities, pastoralists, entertainers, traders and craft groups who move for a living, share the same disadvantages without ever having been notified. The three groups are handled together as DNT, NT and SNT.

The caste count that began in September under Census 2027 is the first since 1931, and the denotified communities have asked for a column of their own in it. The Social Justice Ministry recommended to the Registrar General that the communities be enumerated, and reports say the Registrar General agreed; whether they will appear as a separate code, or only within the caste return, is not settled.
The demand is for a Schedule of their own, in the manner of the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes. Some of their organisations also want "graded backwardness" recognised within the group, as the Supreme Court allowed for the Scheduled Castes in its 2024 sub classification judgment.

Why there is no list

Two national commissions were asked to identify the communities. The Renke Commission's 2008 report estimated the population at 10.74 crore on the 2001 census. The Idate Commission (constituted February 2014, report December 2017) listed 1,262 communities: 425 denotified, 810 nomadic and 27 semi nomadic, and recommended a permanent commission, a caste census and classification of the communities by their socio economic status.
Most of the 1,262 have over seven decades been placed in a State's SC, ST or OBC list, so a welfare scheme for "DNTs" has to be routed through those lists, and a community that is OBC in one State may be ST in the next. The Idate report counted 267 communities that are in no list at all; they are the ones a scheme cannot reach, and the ones a census code would find.

A community without a category is invisible to every scheme that runs on a category: scholarships, hostels, reservation, the Atrocities Act. The census is where that changes or does not.
The 2024 sub classification judgment makes the question sharper. If a State may grade its Scheduled Castes by backwardness, the denotified communities inside those lists have a legal route to a share of their own, but only if the data exist to show their backwardness.

From "criminal tribe" to a census column: 155 years without a categoryOpen full size

Development and Welfare Board for DNTs, SNTs and NTs (DWBDNC, February 2019)

Set up on the Idate Commission's recommendation under the Social Justice Ministry to frame and run programmes for the communities; Idate had asked for a permanent commission.

SEED, the Scheme for Economic Empowerment of DNTs (15 February 2022; about ₹200 crore over 2021-22 to 2025-26)

For families earning ₹2.5 lakh a year or less who are not already covered by a similar scheme.
Four parts, each riding on an existing programme:
free coaching for competitive and professional examinations;
health insurance of ₹5 lakh a family through PM-JAY;
community livelihood initiatives through the National Rural Livelihoods Mission;
housing through PMAY, with ₹1.2 lakh in the plains and ₹1.3 lakh in the hills for families PMAY has not reached.
Applications are through a portal that gives each family a unique identity number; money goes to the bank account.

The Ministry's older DNT schemes are routed through the SC, ST and OBC channels: the Nanaji Deshmukh scheme of hostels and the Dr Ambedkar pre and post matric scholarships for DNT students who are not in any of the three lists.

Prelims: Criminal Tribes Act 1871; denotified 31 August 1952 (Vimukta Jati Diwas); Habitual Offenders Act 1952, which CERD asked India to repeal in 2007; Renke Commission report 2008, 10.74 crore people; Idate Commission report 2017, 1,262 communities (425 DNT, 810 NT, 27 SNT), 267 in no list; DWBDNC 2019; SEED 2022, income ceiling ₹2.5 lakh, four components through PM-JAY, NRLM and PMAY.
Mains: "Denotification freed the communities from a law and left them without a category." Discuss the case for and against a separate Schedule for denotified, nomadic and semi nomadic communities.

Show the questions

Mains 2017 GS1: What are the two major legal initiatives by the State since Independence, addressing discrimination against Scheduled Tribes (STs)?
Prelims 2024: Consider the following statements: 1. It is the Governor of the State who recognizes and declares any community of that State as a Scheduled Tribe. 2. A community declared as a Scheduled Tribe in a State need not be so in another State. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

Sources

The Wire, “Denotified tribes across country demand constitutional recognition, separate column in 2027 Census”
PIB
Deccan Herald, 27 January 2025, “Forgotten tribes”
Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, “CERD/C/IND/CO/19”

Settled facts (dates of Acts, constitutional provisions, standing definitions) are from standard references.