The exclusion of women from wielding socio-political and economic power historically has resulted in their subjugation. Therefore, understanding gender dimensions of empowerment becomes central to fulfilling the Sustainable Development Goal of gender equality. Owing to the intersecting hierarchical structures of gender, caste and class, Adivasi women have become one of the most marginalized sections of Indian society and one of the worst sufferers of feminization of poverty. Due to their systemic exclusion, only 46 percent of Adivasi women in Jharkhand and 48 percent in Chhattisgarh are literate (MoTA 2020). According to MoTA (2013), only 9 percent of Adivasi women were availing higher education. Around 60 percent of Adivasi women are employed as marginal workers, which accentuates their economic/ human insecurities and results in undignified lives (Census 2011). The maternal mortality rate and unsafe abortion practices are high among Adivasi women due to the lack of economic resources and other structural facilities. Their poor economic status adversely impacts their educational opportunities, health and their overall living conditions. As such it is important to provide them with opportunities and skills that would empower them economically and politically, while simultaneously removing structural hurdles to their education and employment. In the past years, numerous schemes like GOAL, livestock rearing (Gujarat), etc., by the state and non-state actors have been launched to improve the conditions of Adivasi women, especially through skill development programmes. However, economic empowerment is redundant without political empowerment, rather is contingent upon it. Hence, this paper intends to study and analyse socioeconomic and political empowerment of Adivasi women through initiatives like ‘Tribekart’, self-employment trades with a special focus on traditional knowledge, production and sale of sanitary napkins by tribal women and the inclusion of Adivasi women in the peacebuilding process.
