Regional names of shifting cultivation in India
Topic: Land Use, Farming Systems and Cropping Seasons in India · NCERT: Class 10, Ch 4 "Agriculture"
Meaning
Shifting cultivation ("slash and burn") is practised in many forest and hill areas of India, and each region has its own name for it. The method is the same everywhere. Farmers clear and burn a forest patch, grow crops on it until the soil loses fertility, and then move to a new patch.
The regional names are:
- Jhumming: the north-east (Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland)
- Pamlou: Manipur
- Dipa: Bastar (Chhattisgarh) and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands
- Bewar / Dahiya: Madhya Pradesh
- Podu / Penda: Andhra Pradesh
- Pama Dabi / Koman / Bringa: Odisha
- Kumari: Western Ghats
- Valre / Waltre: south-eastern Rajasthan
- Khil: Himalayan belt
- Kuruwa: Jharkhand
Example
Tribal farmers in the forested hills of Andhra Pradesh call the practice podu. In Bastar, Chhattisgarh, the same practice is called dipa.
Don't confuse with
- Names abroad: Milpa (Mexico and Central America), Conuco (Venezuela), Roca (Brazil), Masole (Central Africa), Ladang (Indonesia) and Ray (Vietnam) are not Indian names. Exam questions often mix the two lists.