Centre and State Tribal Administration: Fifth Schedule, Sixth Schedule and PESA Act

India’s Constitution does not govern every tribal region the same way. A village in Chhattisgarh’s Bastar belt, a hill district in Meghalaya, and a forest pocket in Odisha each fall under different administrative rules, even though all three are home to Scheduled Tribes. This difference exists by design. The Fifth Schedule, the Sixth Schedule, and the PESA Act, working alongside a set of Union-level bodies, together decide how much self-rule a tribal area gets and who is accountable for its development. Understanding how these pieces fit together explains a lot about tribal governance in India today.

The Fifth Schedule: how Scheduled Areas are governed 🔗

The Fifth Schedule operates under Article 244(1) of the Constitution and applies to tribal-majority regions in ten mainland states, including Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, and Rajasthan. These regions are formally called Scheduled Areas, and it is the President who declares an area as Scheduled, acting on the Governor’s recommendation.

What makes the Fifth Schedule distinctive is the special role it gives the Governor of the state. A Governor here is not just a ceremonial head. The Governor can decide that a central or state law should not apply to a Scheduled Area at all, or apply only with modifications, if the law works against tribal interests. The Governor can also frame entirely new regulations for peace and good governance in these areas. In practice, these regulatory powers have most often been used to protect two things: tribal land, by restricting its transfer to non-tribals, and tribal households, by regulating predatory moneylending practices that historically pushed communities into debt bondage.

The Tribes Advisory Council 🔗

The Governor does not exercise these powers alone. Every state with Scheduled Areas must set up a Tribes Advisory Council (TAC), made up of up to 20 members, three-fourths of whom are Scheduled Tribe representatives from the state legislature. The Governor is required to consult this Council on matters concerning tribal welfare before making regulations. The Governor also submits an annual report to the President on how Scheduled Areas are being administered, and the Union government can issue directions to the state on this basis. This creates a loop of accountability: state action, tribal advice, and central oversight, all aimed at helping tribal communities retain their existing rights while gaining access to economic, educational, and social development.

In reality, TACs have often been criticised for functioning more as advisory formalities than active checks on state power, and the pace of notifying new Scheduled Areas has slowed considerably since the 1950s. Even so, the Fifth Schedule remains the primary legal shield protecting tribal land and customary rights across mainland India.

The Sixth Schedule: self-governance in the north-east 🔗

The Sixth Schedule takes a very different approach, and it applies only to Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram, and Tripura under Article 244(2). Instead of a Governor-mediated system, tribal areas here get their own elected Autonomous District Councils (ADCs), each with law-making, judicial, and administrative powers over subjects like land allotment, forest management, inheritance, marriage, and social customs.

How the districts are organised 🔗

There are currently ten autonomous districts operating under the Sixth Schedule: three in Assam (including the Bodoland Territorial Council, along with the Karbi Anglong and Dima Hasao councils), three in Meghalaya covering the Khasi, Garo, and Jaintia Hills, three in Mizoram, and one large council in Tripura. Each District Council can have up to 30 members, with four nominated by the Governor and the remaining 26 elected directly by the people. Where more than one tribal group shares a district, the Governor can also carve out a separate Regional Council for that group.

Why they’re called “a state within a state” 🔗

This description fits because Acts passed by Parliament or the state legislature do not automatically apply here. They apply only if the Governor specifically extends them by notification, and even then, often with local modifications. The councils can also frame their own laws on subjects within their jurisdiction, run their own courts for customary disputes, and levy certain local taxes. This is a far stronger form of self-management than what the Fifth Schedule offers, reflecting the distinct pre-colonial history of self-rule that many north-eastern tribal communities had, and the different political demands that shaped this part of the Constitution.

Who runs tribal administration at the Centre 🔗

Beyond the two Schedules, a separate layer of Union-level institutions coordinates tribal policy across all states.

The Ministry of Tribal Affairs 🔗

Until 1999, tribal welfare was handled within the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, alongside policies for other disadvantaged groups. That year, the Ministry of Tribal Affairs was carved out as a separate ministry, specifically to give Scheduled Tribes a more focused, coordinated approach to development. It now acts as the nodal agency for tribal policy, planning, and coordination at the national level, even though the actual delivery of most schemes still happens through state governments, union territory administrations, and other central ministries responsible for specific sectors like health, education, or forests.

The National Commission for Scheduled Tribes 🔗

A separate constitutional body monitors whether tribal safeguards are actually being followed. Set up under Article 338A after the 89th Constitutional Amendment split the earlier combined SC/ST commission into two bodies, the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes (NCST) investigates complaints of rights violations, evaluates how well constitutional protections are being implemented, and reports its findings to the President every year. Its interventions have touched on issues ranging from forest rights recognition to displacement caused by mining and dam projects, giving it a watchdog role that complements the Ministry’s policy function.

PESA: bringing panchayats into Scheduled Areas 🔗

When the 73rd Constitutional Amendment created a uniform three-tier Panchayati Raj structure in 1992, Scheduled Areas were deliberately left out. Tribal customary institutions worked differently from the standard panchayat model, and a one-size-fits-all law risked undermining them. Following recommendations from the Bhuria Committee, Parliament passed the Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996, commonly known as PESA, to extend panchayat governance to Fifth Schedule Areas with important local modifications.

The heart of PESA is the Gram Sabha, the village assembly of all adult residents. PESA gives it real decision-making power, not just an advisory role, over matters such as managing minor forest produce, approving land acquisition and resettlement plans, selecting beneficiaries for welfare schemes, and safeguarding customary resources and dispute-resolution practices. This is why PESA is often described as a law that restores traditional self-rule rather than simply imposing a new administrative layer. The Act currently applies to Fifth Schedule states, since Sixth Schedule areas already have their own autonomous councils and are excluded from its scope.

Implementation, however, remains uneven. Several states have been slow to align their panchayat laws fully with PESA’s provisions, and gram sabha meetings in many districts remain irregular or poorly attended, weakening the grassroots governance the Act was meant to guarantee.

Integrated Tribal Development Agencies: administration on the ground 🔗

While the Fifth and Sixth Schedules deal with law-making and self-governance, day-to-day development work in Scheduled Areas is carried out through Integrated Tribal Development Agencies (ITDA). The model traces back to the 1970s, when Andhra Pradesh’s Girijan Development Agencies were reorganised into a broader area-based approach, later adopted across other tribal-majority states.

The core idea behind an ITDA is single-window administration. Instead of a tribal family navigating separate departments for agriculture, health, education, and welfare schemes, an ITDA brings these functions under one administrative umbrella, headed by a Project Officer. From 1986 onward, many states also introduced Single Line Administration, which places development and regulatory staff working in Scheduled Areas directly under the ITDA’s control, reducing bureaucratic delay. ITDAs are typically organised as smaller administrative divisions than a full district, precisely because dispersed tribal populations and difficult terrain make communication and outreach harder. Where tribal population is more scattered, states use a related tool called the Modified Area Development Approach to reach smaller pockets that don’t justify a full ITDA.

How the Centre and states share responsibility 🔗

Put together, this system reflects a clear division of labour. The Union government, through the Ministry of Tribal Affairs and the NCST, sets policy direction, allocates funds, and monitors constitutional safeguards. State governments implement laws, notify Scheduled Areas, and run ITDAs and panchayat structures on the ground. The Governor acts as a constitutional bridge in Fifth Schedule states, while elected autonomous councils take over that role entirely in Sixth Schedule areas. Sectoral ministries, whether dealing with forests, health, or education, remain responsible for their own tribal-focused programmes, coordinated but not controlled by the Ministry of Tribal Affairs. No single authority runs tribal administration alone. It works, when it works, because these overlapping layers check and support each other.

What do you think? Do you think the Sixth Schedule’s model of elected autonomous councils would work better for Fifth Schedule states too, or does the Governor-led system suit mainland India’s more scattered tribal population? And with PESA on paper for nearly three decades now, what do you think is really holding back stronger Gram Sabha participation on the ground?

References

1. https://www.constitutionofindia.net/schedules/part-b-administration-and-control-of-scheduled-areas-and-scheduled-tribes/
2. https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=1778540
3. https://vajiramandravi.com/current-affairs/what-are-autonomous-district-councils-adc/
4. https://tribal.nic.in/AboutMinistry.aspx
5. https://www.pib.gov.in/newsite/erelcontent.aspx?relid=59940&reg=48&lang=2
6. https://www.drishtiias.com/daily-news-analysis/panchayat-extension-to-scheduled-areas-pesa-act-1996
7. https://www.thehansindia.com/amp/hans/opinion/news-analysis/revisiting-the-itdas-reimagining-their-role-in-the-current-context-1077650