Landless dalits and adivasis have occupied parts of a corporate rubber plantation at Chengara in Kerala for five years. Despite being pressurised in various ways, they have held out, sticking to their demand of land for them to pursue livelihoods. None of the agreements so far reached with the state government has been satisfactorily implemented. Yet, the issues raised by the Chengara struggle have a social and economic significance that no government can afford to ignore.

Whether from a class perspective or from a community identity perspective, it is undeniably the biggest failure that decades after the land reforms, a good majority of the dalits and adivasis in Kerala remain fully landless.