What percent is the population of Scheduled Tribes in India?

8 percent

The correct answer is Option 2 - 8 percent

In India, the description ‘indigenous people’ is usually applied to the Scheduled Tribes who constitute nearly eight per cent of the population of the country. With the exception of small communities of hunters and gatherers, most indigenous populations in India depend for their subsistence primarily on the cultivation of land. For centuries, if not millennia, they had free access to as much land as they could cultivate. It was only after the establishment of the British colonial rule that areas, which had previously been inhabited by the Scheduled Tribe communities, were subjected to outside forces. Although they enjoy a constitutional protection in political representation, they have not got much of the benefits of development in the country. In fact they have paid a huge cost for development since they are the single largest group among the people displaced by various developmental projects since independence.