Noted Adivasi rights activist Abhay Xaxa is no more. The 37-year-old research scholar from Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) was in Jalpaigudi in West Bengal where he was conducting a workshop with a few other activists when he passed away unexpectedly on the evening of Saturday, March 14, 2020.

Xaxa who had a degree in Social Anthropology from the University of Sussex had worked extensively across India to raise awareness about concerns of Adivasis and forest dwelling communities. He has also written extensively in multiple publications including ours to educate people about the disrespect, deprivation, marginalization and oppression faced by Adivasis every day.

Xaxa had shed light on the powerful nexus of industrialists, bureaucrats and the police who have made successive attempts made to usurp their forests, land and water resources. He has also spoken extensively against systemic exclusion and a culture of inequality in institutes of higher learning. He has also never minced words about exoticisation and appropriation of Adivasi culture.

His two poems; “I am not your data” and “The Republic of Memory Lost” also highlight this quest for justice and dignity.  Xaxa had also been a key speaker at our Netizens for Democracy conclave in 2019.

Fr. Nicholas Barla, who was with Abhay at the time of his passing, told The News Minute, “Dr Abhay was in Jalpaigudi in West Bengal to conduct a workshop, and complained of shortness of breath, and was taken to the hospital. He was declared brought dead. His body is undergoing a post mortem, and will be taken to his native place in Chhattisgarh on Monday.”  

In Xaxa’s passing, SabrangIndia and Citizens for Justice and Peace, have lost a dear friend. His last interview to CJP may be viewed here:

Related:

The Republic of Memory Lost

Spaces of Higher Education are the New Battlegrounds of Inequality: Abhay Xaxa

Beautiful Damaged People

The post Adivasi scholar and activist Abhay Xaxa passes away appeared first on SabrangIndia.

I am not your data, nor am I your vote bank,

I am not your project or any exotic museum object,

I am not the soul waiting to be harvested,

Nor am I the lab where your theories are tested,

I am not your cannon fodder or the invisible worker,

or your entertainment at India Habitat Centre,

I am not your field, your crowd, your history, 

your help, your guilt, medallions of your victory,

I refuse, reject, resist your labels,

your judgments, documents, definitions,

your models, leaders and patrons,

because they deny me my existence, my vision, my space,

your words, maps, figures, indicators,

they all create illusions and put you on pedestal,

from where you look down upon me,

So I draw my own picture, and invent my own grammar,

I make my own tools to fight my own battle,

For me, my people, my world, and my Adivasi self!”

The post I refuse, I reject and I resist! (a poem by Abhay Xaxa) appeared first on SabrangIndia.