Learn more about tribal communities in Madhya Pradesh

When it comes to protein and calorie counts, milk and bananas do not match up to eggs, particularly for [Madhya Pradesh], where development indicators are among India’s worst: Almost 51% of children under five years of age are underweight, and 49% are stunted. The state has India’s highest infant mortality rate, i.e. the number of … Read more

Irula communities: Spread over the three southern States with a language marked by unique features – Tamil Nadu, Karnataka & Kerala

3.10. Cultural Forms of the Irula People The life cycle rituals of the Irulas are markedly different from that of the other Hindu or Christian communities. They perform the life cycle ceremonies with the help of their women by well-established cultural patterns and do not depend on outside intervention to keep itself going. They celebrate … Read more

Bastar art and the Hindu-isation of the tribal myth – Chhattisgarh

Niranjan Mahawar, 75 [in 2012], is a self-taught ethnologist of Chhattisgarh. He spent almost five decades in southern Chhattisgarh to study the life and art of the Bastar tribes. […] Today, Mahawar — who was made famous in a series of interviews by the writer Dom Moraes — is considered an authoritative voice on central … Read more

Video | Sunderbans: the largest single block of tidal mangrove forest in the world – West Bengal

Music has an important role in the lives of the Adivasis of the Sundarbans. Groups such as the Santal, Munda, Oraon and Ho were brought to this region by the British in the 19th century. As indentured labourers, they cleared the forests and barricaded the rivers. Their descendants now speak Bengali after decades of living … Read more