Paper short abstract:

Keywords: Legal Aid, Tribal Communities, Tribes, Non-Government Organizations, land and forest rights, natural resource rights, Weaker section, social, economic and political justice, principle of equality

Paper long abstract:

In the Preamble to the Constitution of India is enshrined the principle of social, economic and political justice to each and every citizen of India. Access to justice to ensure protection of social, economic and political rights of citizens is one of the essential elements of a democracy. Poor fail to secure justice due to their inability to meet the economic cost of the legal process. In such scenario, it becomes incumbent upon the State that it takes upon itself the responsibility to augment the principle of equality by providing economic assistance to the weaker section of the society.

Many non-governmental organizations are actively engaged in providing legal aid to tribal communities while various others which though were originally involved with tribal welfare issues but did not have legal aid in their agenda have come fore to provide assistance to these people in the legal process.

The study presented here is based on primary facts collected from 100 respondents. Sample selection is based on random selection procedure and primary facts have been collected through interview/ questionnaire schedule.

Results show that participation of non-government organizations in the process of providing legal aid and constitutional remedies to the tribal community has given a definite direction and impetus to tribal welfare programmes. But, a lot is still expected to be done to achieve the desired results. Detailed discussion is made in this regard in the research paper.