Adivasi mahasabhas are organised across Assam to politically mobilise the Adivasi communities. The paper argues that in contemporary Assam, Adivasi struggles are not limited to the issues of identity but through the mahasabhas, the student associations are claiming citizenship, economic and constitutional rights. While resisting the larger “Assamese” identity on the one hand, the Adivasi student associations also reproduce prevailing gender inequalities within the movement. The present study analyses the All Adivasi Women’s Association of Assam, which seeks to bring together the issues of women and labour to counter the patriarchy of both trade unions and student movements.
