International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples or World Tribal Day is being observed today. The day is aimed at promoting and protecting the rights of the world’s indigenous population. The date recognizes the first meeting of the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations in Geneva in 1982.

The day is celebrated on August 9th every year from 1994, in accordance with the declaration by the United Nations.

As a continuation of 2019 being observed as the Year of Indegenous Languages, this year the World Tribal Day celebrations are focussed on preservation and documentation of tribal languages.

In Tamilnadu, anthropologists have identified more than 500 tribes with their own unique culture, way and view of life as well as dialects.

Of these six – the Thodas, Paniyars, Kattunaickars, Irulas, Kurumbas and Kothars can be seen in the Nilgiris district that nestles in the Western Ghats.

Various Linguistics departments in the South like University of Kerala, The Centre for Advanced Stufies Anmalai University as well as the Linguistics department of the Bharathiyar University Coimbatore have made efforts to collect, preserve and document these languages.

Each tribal language represents a unique view of life. They have to be preserved – not only for the present generation, but for posterity too !