There is a lot going on this week. Opposition parties united in their demand to ask the government to roll back 18% GST on life and health insurance - an issue affecting 45 crore of the middle class. Banner headlines from Bangladesh. Vinesh Phogat. The silver lining of Neeraj Chopra and Indian hockey.

In all of this, some subjects do not get the column centimetres they deserve in newspapers, nor do they make for content for clickbaits.

On 29 June this year, a young MP from the Bharat Adivasi Party, representing Banswara, led a unique march. His supporters carried blood samples in protest of a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) minister's remark suggesting a DNA test to prove he was Hindu. The young MP stood firm - they were Adivasis who didn't need a DNA test to define their identity.

So today, on International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples, your columnist is writing about an issue, often ignored - tribal rights in the last decade of the ruling dispensation.

To begin, here's how the Ministry of Tribal Affairs fared in India Budget 2024:

According to the Xaxa Committee on Tribal Communities, over 40%........

© NDTV