HYDERABAD: Government should allot Rs100 crore for the development of the Chenchu community and provide them with drinking water, primary health centres, primary education and other basic infrastructure in their villages, demanded Vidithya Sankar Naik, founder of Girijana Vidyarthi Samakhya (GVS).Speaking at a one-day hunger strike in front of the DSS Bhavan here on Monday, he said that GVS was going to give a memorandum to Tribal welfare commissioner A Shanthi Kumari and Tribal welfare minister T Balaraju. "If the government does not take any action in a week, GVS will stage an indefinite hunger strike," he announced.He said the memorandum asks Srisailam Indian Tribal Development Agency (ITDA) to create a new Primitive Tribal Group (PTG) development organisation under it with `100 crore funds for the development of Chenchu community. It also asked the ITDA to put up a 100-bed hospital in Srisailam for Chenchus. Special schools with hostel facility should be provided for Chenchu students from class 1 to graduation, he said.Vidithya added that family counselling centres should be set up in order to change the food habits and lifestyle of Chenchus in Srisailam and Nallamala forest areas. The present ITDAs in the tribal areas had not ensured development, he claimed. There are 11 ITDAs in the state."The GVS demands to that IAS officers must be made ITDA project officers so that they can do pilot projects for the development of the area," Vidithya said.The hunger strike saw the participation of ST community leaders like V Narayana (president of Adivasi Hakkula Porata Samithy), B Pochaiah, (General Secretary of Tudumdebba) and about 120 ST students. Chenchu is one of the oldest tribal communities with a population of 35,000.
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