Governors and the Fifth Schedule

The Constitution provides, in its PartX, the provision for the Fifth and Sixth Schedules. Article 244(1) refers to provisions under the Fifth Schedule and Article 244(2) provides those under the Sixth Schedule. The provision of the Fifth Schedule concerns the administration and control of the scheduled areas and Scheduled Tribes (STs) in any state except the tribal areas of Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Tripura which are administered by the provisions of the Sixth Schedule.

The overriding control of the union over the administration of the scheduled areas and the welfare of the STs has also been emphasised in Article 339. The Fifth Schedule was in force in nine states of India until the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh(AP), which raises the number to 10. The states with scheduled areas areAP, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh (HP), Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh(MP), Maharashtra, Odisha, Rajasthan and Telangana. The notification of an area as scheduled areas takes place through the presidential order, and the broad criteria adopted for such notification are: a numerical preponderance of tribal population, possibility of compact administrative unit, and the relative social and economic backwardness of the people/area. The largest administrative unit forming the scheduled areas has been the district and the lowest the cluster of villages in the block. Most of the districts form scheduled areas only partially.