Hatti Tribes:
The vibrant Boda Tyohar festival, the largest annual celebration for the Hatti tribes of the Trans-Giri region in Himachal Pradesh, kicked off recently with much enthusiasm and traditional fervour.
- They are a close-knit community who take their name from their traditional occupation of selling home-grown crops, vegetables, meat, and wool at small-town markets known as ‘haats’.
- There are two main Hatti clans: one in the Trans-Giri area of the Sirmaur district in Himachal Pradesh and the other in Jaunsar Bawar of Uttarakhand.
- The two Hatti clans have similar traditions, and intermarriages are common.
- They are governed by atraditional council called ‘khumbli’ which decides community matters.
- The Hatti homeland straddles the Himachal-Uttarakhand border in the basin of the Giri and Tons rivers, both tributaries of the Yamuna.
- The Tons marks the border between the two states.
- Hatti men traditionally don a distinctive white headgear on ceremonial occasions.According to the 2011 census, members of the community numbered 2.5 lakh, but at present population of the Hattis is estimated at around 3 lakhs.
- In 2023, the Government of India granted Scheduled Tribe (ST) status to the Hatti community in Himachal Pradesh.
