• 1 By Adivasi, I mean peoples from central India who consider themselves the “first inhabitants” of th (...)
• 2 This article was in the editing process when I came to know Alice Tilche’s Adivasi Art and Activism(...)

1Strictly speaking, activist art is a recent development within contemporary art, articulating reflections on artistic expression, art commodification and political criticism. A similar development can be discerned in Adivasi literature, which has recently become a growing area of study and is almost solely considered through the prism of literary criticism. Adivasi arts, by contrast, usually evoke images of circular dances or of Gond and Warli paintings of trees and animals, and tend to be studied by anthropologists of art.1 This article seeks to fill the gap between these perspectives, and to explore the confluence between Adivasi art and activism2. It also tries to address what could be referred to as the triple bond of Adivasi artists. Contemporary Indian artists already face a sort of double bond in the sense that they tend to be recognized either as “contemporary artists” or as “Indian.” The position of Adivasi artists is further complicated (Rousseleau 2017) by the fact that they belong to an economically disadvantaged cultural minority within India (Scheduled Tribes). Inasmuch as they tend to be labelled by their origins, Adivasi artists find themselves stuck some way between being stamped with a stigma, an ascribed identity, and their self-conception, thus facing three key issues: moral judgement, folklorization and appropriation, and identity conflicts. This article starts by outlining the historic landmarks in the recognition of Adivasi arts, as well as the artists’ assertion of their cultural and political identity. A fundamental change here concerns the status of dances and songs, which were considered to be of a “primitive tribal” nature by early ethnographers, before being stigmatized by missionaries and Hindu reformers, and later reclaimed as folklore or as forms of self-expression. Script and writing, on the other hand, were regarded as signs of “civilization” by colonial as well as by Indian agents. As this trend was particularly prominent in Jharkhand, I shall concentrate on this region, highlighting similarities and differences with other Adivasi-dominated areas in Gujarat, in India’s central belt.

• 3 Post-functionalist anthropologists have shown that orality constantly actualizes “tradition” (See L (...)

3The first Adivasi aesthetic expressions take the form of poetry and narratives in the artists’ own language, embedded in songs, riddles, and sayings, the “art of public speaking” in ceremonial contexts (Carrin 2015), as well as domestic and ritual paintings or sculptures. I insist on the pragmatic aspect of performances because the “creation stories,” for example, are not so much recited as actualized in songs and retain old structures while including innovations and references to the present.3

• 4 Xurux or Kurukh is the Dravidian language spoken by Oraon peoples living in Jharkhand, often in clo (...)

4In most Adivasi societies, two institutions played a central part in the transmission of this cultural heritage: the village center, which was used as a dance area (called akhara or sadar), and a communal house and dormitory for unmarried boys (dhumkuria in Xurux,4 giti-ora in Munda, dhangara/dhangari-basa in Oriya). The girls were usually housed separately. Here, young people learnt stories, songs, language games, dances and music in order to compete in choreographic and poetic jousts under the watchful eye of adults and ancestors. In this sense, authorship was collective, but individual mastery and creative talent in storytelling was priced at a local level (Hembrom 2022:1472; Jain 1998).

• 5 See the Tarzan series relocated to India, more recently Raavan (dir. Mani Ratnam 2010, Reliance BIG (...)

5Urban Indian authors, however, have tended to depict peasant festivals as rude and Adivasi ancestors as impulsive and impure “forest dwellers” or “hunters” (sabara, nishada, bhila). In the Epics, the Laws of Manu and medieval court literature, they project the opposite of their own royal and Brahmanical ideals onto Adivasis. In the Mahabharata, for example, the hunter Ekalavya is rejected by Prince Arjuna for not belonging to a kshatriya lineage and for being a better archer than the latter. Alternative versions of such stories are being reclaimed today and told by Adivasi authors (see part 3). Unfortunately, such stereotypes still feature, however, in Hindi or regional movies.5 These elements of an ancient Indian courtly imaginary contributed to the negative reception of highland customs before colonial agents added a new layer of clichés.

• 6 The Bhils are the largest Adivasi group (speaking an Indo-European language) which spread from Guja (...)
• 7 “The Tribal Folk”, “speech delivered at the opening session of the Scheduled Tribes and Scheduled A (...)

6From the mid-19th century onward, missionaries, colonial officers, and ethnographers began to recast Adivasi peoples according to evolutionist terms. The imposition of permanent zamindari rights and land taxes in the Indian hinterland provoked a series of rebellions against British colonial rule and against regional kings who, on the basis of this legislation, infringed on Adivasi territories: Paharia (1784), “Kol” (1831–32), then the Bhil, Kond, Gond, and Khasi wars, the “great tumult” of Santal or Hul/Ulgulan (1855–56), led by Sidhu and Kanhu, and finally the Birsa Munda movement (1894–1900).6 These events laid the foundations for an—albeit only later—emerging consciousness of a collective Adivasi condition of dispossession of autonomy and lands (Devalle 1992; Rycroft and Dasgupta 2011). Missionaries played a key part in this process inasmuch as their works, though steeped in the colonial prejudice of Western superiority, were fundamental to the recognition of Dravidian and Munda languages, as well as being amongst the first written collections of poetry and “mythologies” (P.O. Bodding on Santali literature, for instance). As R. Hembrom points out, however, such studies were only possible due to the rich preexisting tradition of language and poetry on which they focused, while the “Santal guides, teachers, collaborators, and helpers like Sagram Murmu and other contributors were all but relegated to the margins of history” (Hembrom 2022:1480). Bodding’s main helper, Sagram Murmu (1892) can be said to be the first Santal author (Carrin 2014), and Majhi Ramdas Tudu the first to publish in Santali (in Bengali script) in 1894 (Choksi 2014:51). Murmu selected certain tales, legends and historic memories to be written down in his own style (Anderson, Carrin and Soren 2011). On the basis of these sources, M. Carrin (2015) takes the memories of the Santal “great tumult” to mark a shift away from creation myths toward present-day narratives and as a turning point in the tradition (p. 251). Among the Indian ethnographers and social workers who supported the Adivasi cause, albeit within a reformist framework, were Sarat Chandra Roy in Chota Nagpur and Amritlal V. Thakkar among the Bhils (Dasgupta 2022; Tewari 2022). William Archer and Verrier Elwin followed in their footsteps and published Oraon, Santal, and Gond collections of songs and poetry respectively, which betray their view of “traditions” as being fixed. The 1920s also saw the emergence of Bengali romanticism in Indian art which, in the form of “primitivist” novels and paintings, idealized Santals as “natural” (Bhattacharya 1998; Mitter 2007). Adivasi dances were a central recurring theme in clichéd representations. Colonial agents and ethnographers, such as Edward T. Dalton (Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal, Calcutta 1872), describe in positive terms scenes of girls moving in half-circles as they face boys playing drums, whilst simultaneously associating them with primitivity. Conversely, youth houses and dances came under fire from missionaries and Hindu reformists alike, who seemed to put Brahmanical purity on a par with Victorian puritanism. Nehru’s Adivasi politics shows the legacy of Elwin’s functionalism, as well as the influence of the Soviet approach to minorities, in the sense that it celebrates (cultural) diversity within a single (political) unity 7—as, for example, in the “folklorized” staging of Adivasi dances with feathers, bison horns and drums during Republic Day celebrations.

• 8 “Memorandum submitted by the Chota Nagpur Improvement Society” (Unatti Samaj 1928) and “Deputation (...)

7It was the mission schools which—despite the missionaries’ initial intentions and despite their limitations—paved the way for the emergence and the growing self-assertion of an Adivasi elite in Chhotanagpur. The Chotanagpur Unnatti Samaj or Improvement Society was created in 1915 by Adivasi priests and students from the Gossner Evangelical Lutheran Church and were joined by Anglicans, and later by non-Christian Adivasis. By submitting a Memorandum expressing people’s common opinion, it seized the opportunity that presented itself in the form of the Indian Statutory Commission or Simon Commission in 1928, which was set up to investigate the effects of reforms. In this landmark text, the authors present themselves as “we, the aborigines,” whose “forefathers cleared the jungles” and whose right to prior to occupation had been denied by alien landlords recognized as Zamindars by the British administration. They called for the abolition of the zamindari system, for villages to be granted self-government and for the creation of a separate province. They also criticized the existing voting system and demanded the introduction of mandatory primary education in the local language, under the governance of an aboriginal board, as well as facilities for higher education. As such, their demands comprised economic, political, and cultural stakes (Prakash 2001:57–9), and their introductory address bore witness to a unitary consciousness ten years before the birth of the Adivasi Mahasabha.8

• 9 Santal dramas follow a Bengali and Oriya tradition of social and political theatre (see Ruud 2003).

9The discovery of the Indus civilization (1924) and its attribution to pre-Aryan populations by Sir John H. Marshall (1931) was an important catalyst for the growing self-assertion of the Adivasi people. The discovery was discussed by Dravidian-speaking and Munda authors (Ramaswamy 2001:122), amongst others, and several attempts have been made since then by Oraon/Xurux and Munda authors to relate Indus signs to their languages (e.g. Tirkey 2013). This debate, in conjunction with the language politics of the 1930s, informed successive “discoveries” of Adivasi scripts for Santali, Ho, Xurux, and others (Singh [1982] 2006). The existence of a script was considered evidence of “civilization” as well as of the capacity for self-representation (Rousseleau 2022). The Adivasis’ growing political engagement fueled and was in turn fueled by a drive towards education: Adivasi activists founded schools and wrote social novels and dramas as a way of spreading ideas among illiterate villagers (Carrin 2014:89; Choksi 2017:1535).9 The most prominent example of an Adivasi activist in the field of education is the Santal “Great guru” Ragunath Murmu, who had been an Industrial Institute instructor, but preferred to return to his native region to become a headmaster. There, he developed the Ol Chiki script around 1935–36, and wrote novels and plays in Santali. His plays Bindu Chandan (1942) and Kherwar Bir (1944) depict an idealized and reformed Santal past, represented as a communal Spartan Golden Age (Mahapatra 1982:150; Lotz 2007; Carrin 2014). In the early 1950s, he founded the Adivasi Socio-Educational and Cultural Association (ASECA, registered in 1964). Via a network of a growing number of local branches, it served to promote Adivasi literature and continued to run newspapers and magazines (Choksi 2017). In the 1960s, the journal Adivasi Patrika, for example, published stories by Alice Ekka (Alice Ekka ki Kahaniya, 2015 edited by Vandana Tete), who addressed women’s issues and questions of caste. Another cultural activist, Julius Tigga, a former Adivasi Mahasabha secretary, followed in Murmu’s footsteps and became headmaster of a Joint Adivasi School renamed Dhumkuria (from dormitory-school) in 1944. He integrated Xurux/Kurukh and Munda as languages of instruction into the modern curriculum, and established singing and dancing as means of knowledge transmission. The school became a center for literary activities (Kurukh Sahitya Samelan) but closed in 1957 due to a lack of funds. A. V. Thakkar, meanwhile, was instrumental in disseminating the term “Adivasi” from Jharkhand all the way to Gujarat, albeit only in reference to social reform.

• 10 I would argue that this expression draws on Elwin’s functionalist view of tribal vital energy.

12In recognition of his achievements, Munda was made vice-chancellor in 1986, and became a leading personality in the Jharkhand Movement (Padma Shree 2010). Meanwhile, under B.P. Keshari and S. Bosu Mallick, the Department’s cultural activism became increasingly political with the help of as well as in critical discourse with regional Marxist leaders—which eventually led to the formation of the Jharkhand Council in 1995 (see Naachi se Baanchi). At the same time, the Adivasi identity issue also started to embrace a broader Jharkhandi cultural context. In 1993, Ram Dayal Munda thus reframed Vidyarthi’s phrase “the tribes who dance cannot die,”10 and coined the new Nagpuri/Sadan slogan “saved by dance” or “by dance, survive” (naci se baci) (Babiracki 2001). In keeping with the convergence of political activism in the region, tribalness came to be defined as “a set of positively charged qualities or values” that non-Adivasis could equally acquire, either via their upbringing in the region, or by choice (Babiracki 2001:47, 42).

• 11 See for example R.D. Munda’s poem “The Pain of Development” (Vikas Ka Dard) (Yudhrat Aam Aadmi, 200 (...)

13Munda, meanwhile, had been engaged in the Indian Council of Indigenous & Tribal Peoples and, from 1987 onward, in the UN Working Group on Indigenous Peoples (WGIP, Karlsson 2006). In the 1990s, other tribal leaders founded the All India Coordinating Forum of Adivasi/Indigenous Peoples and the Asia Indigenous People’s Pact, as alternative Indian organizations to contribute to the UN debates. Despite other differences, all three organizations agreed on the demand for the implementation of international standards, on the basis that Indian Adivasi/tribes have the status of Indigenous People. R. D. Munda, though terminally ill by then, lived to see the creation of the State of Jharkhand (November 2000)—even if this was ultimately driven by corporate interests and led to further unregulated industrialization, environmental exploitation and Adivasi dispossession, so poignantly summarized in the slogan “jal, jangal, jamin” (rivers, forests, lands).11

• 12 With less freedom in terms of their movements and time, women rarely get similar opportunities.
• 13 Tilche (2022:17). Alice Tilche made a participative ethnography during the creation of Vaacha, Muse (...)
• 14 Lingo is both a god and a civilizing hero, who freed the Gond gods who had been locked in a cave by (...)

14In independent India, arts and artists gained recognition through the patronage of national academies, museums, and awards. The first Adivasis to be recognized as artists by Indian institutions were the two painters Jivya Soma Mashe, of Warli origin, and Jangarh Singh Shyam, a Pardhan-Gond. They both developed their own styles, drawing on but also excelling in a tradition of domestic and ritual wall paintings, which were previously mostly produced by women.12 The former received the National Award of Craft Master as early as 1976. In the wake of their contributions to the exhibition Les magiciens de la terre at the Centre Pompidou in Paris in 1989, both painters received recognition as post-modern artists, which was echoed by their celebration in India as “other master” painters (Jain 1998). Caught, as they were, between the expectations of their international patrons and their duty to their relatives, the two artists were not, however, engaged in activism. Art, in an Adivasi context, is not usually associated with “spontaneous community resistance”13; it is not clearly distinguished from craft (Rousseleau 2014) and is not considered a stable economic activity, but a “form of wage labor” and, as such, less desirable than a government job (Tilche 2022:17). The second generation of acclaimed Adivasi artists’ engagement is, for the most part, centered around the discourse on their identity in what has been called a process of ‘narrativization’ (Jain 1998; Hacker 2000). Jangarh’s nephew, Bajju Shyam (2004), published a book illustrating his residency in London in 2002, in which he compares his role as painter to that of storyteller bard whom the Pardhan had played among the Gonds. Another of Jangarh’s nephews, Venkat Raman Singh Shyam, in Finding my way (2016), co-written with the activist Anand, refers to the Adivasi past, always with a view to the story of his life and in connection with social discrimination and environmental issues. When he mentions the Mahabharata, he paints a very positive picture of Ekalavya as an archer who cares for forest life. Many of his reflections revolve around Jangarh, whom he likens to the god Lingo in the way he opens up new paths for his people,14 as well as to Rembrandt for his ability to incorporate other artistic styles and to influence fellow artists. His work concludes with a self-portrait, which plays on the ambiguity of his references and identities: “Rembrandt in Jangarh kalam with a plumed crown, me in Rembrandt style having nicked his sabre.”

• 15 The Constitution of India distinguishes between tribes living in Central India (art. 244.1 and the (...)
• 16 The best-known Adivasi writers in Maharashtra and Rajasthan are Vinayak Tukaram and Hariram Meena.

17In assessing the works of individual artists, we have to bear in mind that the situation regarding tribal languages in India varies considerably from one area to another (Xaxa 2008). In the Northeast, the dominant language within a region is usually a tribal one; the literacy rate tends to be high, and most people have a good command of English, and often of Assamese and Hindi. There has been an increase in the number of tribal and indigenous writers and poets in the Northeast-East today, who publish mainly in English. The focus of this study, however, is on Adivasi authors from India’s central belt15 where, by contrast, vernacular languages tend to be subordinate to the state’s respective dominant regional language. The Bhils and the Gonds/Koitors are the two largest tribal groups in India, but most of their authors write in the main regional languages: Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, and Telugu.16 As we will discuss only a few of these authors in the following section, I would like to recommend Akash Poyam (2021) for further details.

• 17 Nirmala Putul’s books have been translated into many languages, and have received many awards (Sahi (...)
• 18 The Munda writer Anuj Lugun and the Kharia cultural activist Vandana take a similar stand in their (...)

21Adivasi authors tend to lend greater importance to identity questions than, for example, their Dalit colleagues, and therefore also to issues of “folklorization” and to the appropriation of Adivasi aesthetics by mainstream artists (Rousseleau 2014; Guillaume-Pey 2018). This is certainly true of Nirmala Putul and Mahadev Toppo. The former is the most famous Santali poet17 who writes in Hindi and is known for works such as Apne Ghar Ki Talash Mein (“In Search of One’s Own House,” 2004), Nagare Ki Tarah Bajti Shabd (“A Voice like the Thundering of Drums,” 2005) and Beghar Sapne (“Homeless Dreams,” 2014). His poem “Santhal Pargana” addresses the cliché surrounding the protected Santal area, founded in 1855, which is now but a repository of tribal tradition. Putul particularly regrets the lack of perspectives for younger generations, who have been alienated from their ancestral roots for the sake of a Western market economy.18

• 20 He also co-edited an anthology of tribal poetry from Jharkhand (Kalam Ko Teer Hone Do, “Let the Arr (...)

22Another prominent voice airing this issue is that of Mahadev Toppo, an Oraon or Xurux/Khurukh author who published essays, short stories and poetry in Hindi.20 In his collection of poetry Jangal Pahad Ke Path (2017) or Lessons from Forest and Mountain (translated by S. K. Sonkar in 2020), he celebrates the Adivasis’ closeness to nature, in contrast to the “contemporary anthropocentric Indian value system.” However, it is in his satirical portrayal of the supposed “superiority” of mainstream Hindu society and of the appropriation of Adivasi knowledge and voices by Indian or foreign scholars that his work is particularly original.

• 21 Particularly in the poem “A maduâ sprout on the grave,” Angor (2016:53–55).
• 22 “The six-lane freeway of deceit,” Angor (2016:73–75.
• 23 “Death of the mother tongue,” Lands of the Roots 2018.

25The Oraon/Kurukh writer Jacinta Kerketta was a freelance journalist and a Human Rights activist before she became known for her poetry. She writes in Hindi and English in order to reach a wider audience. In her articles, as well as in her poetry collections such as Embers (Angor, Adivaani 2016) and Lands of the roots (Jarom ki zamin, 2018), she draws attention to the political and environmental infractions taking place in the name of “development.” She denounces the exploitation of forests and land, the pollution of rivers, the deeply engrained poverty and despair of villagers who are being exploited for their votes and driven to suicide by “vulture” moneylenders.21 At the same time, she casts a critical eye on Adivasi society and, drawing on her mother’s experience (Consolaro 2018), highlights its adversity to feminist quests. In this vein, she mentions the backward gaze into an idealized past of “the good old days”, the danger of alcoholism among the male population, people’s lack of political awareness and their allegiance to football, the “opium” of the people,22 the dilemma of the young generation caught between village life and exciting yet deceptive city opportunities (see the poem below), and people’s abandoning their mother tongue, just as her own mother did “[f]or the sake of her children’s future.”23 In conclusion, Kerketta calls for resistance, in the footsteps of Birsa Munda as well as of Buddha and Fidel Castro (“Arrows of Sido-Kanhu and Fidel,” Land of the roots 2018). By virtue of her engagement and her literary prowess, Kerketta has become one of the most prominent Adivasi artists and activists today. Some of her work echoes that of Alpa Shah’s powerful rendition of the Nightmarch (Among India’s Revolutionary Guerrillas, The University of Chicago Press, 2019):

• 24 This film uses Sora painting style to denounce the shots fired (Guillaume-Pey 2018:161).
• 25 The Niamgiri movement combines environmental and Kui/Kond committees with international NGOs: see F (...)
• 26 A local political representative.

26In recent years, film has become increasingly popular as another medium for pro-Adivasi activists as well as for Adivasi artists. An early example is the film Hul Sengell: The Spirit of the Santal Revolution, directed by Daniel J. Rycroft, Joy Raj Tudu and D. Mardi (2005), which traces the present Adivasi plight back to the Santal Revolution of 1855. More recent police infractions, such as their firing at protestors against the mining of Adivasis’ and other peasants’ lands in Kashipur (2001) and Kalinga Nagar (2006), continue to spark outrage and to fuel a vast protest movement. The Oriya activist and filmmaker Surya Shankar Dash has been documenting people’s protests since 2004, in the animated short films Shot Dead for Development (2007, 1 min.)24 or Niyamgiri: The Mountain of Law (2008, 9:49 min.).25 In The Human Zoo (2010, 9:41 min.), Dash challenges the folkloristic staging of “primitive” Konds at the “tribal fair” (Adivasi mela) in Odisha (Rousseleau 2014). From 2009 onward, the filmmaker also began to instruct young Adivasis in basic camera work. In 2018, Dash attended the first Indigenous International Film Festival put on by indigenous filmmakers from Borneo and Indonesia, Australia and New Zealand in Bali, alongside the Dalit filmmaker Soumya Ranjan Mallik and Dinja Jakesika, a Kond woman sarpanch.26 Subsequently, in February 2019, Dash and his Video Republic collective staged India’s first International Indigenous Film Festival in Odisha, which was conceived as a platform for dialogue and resistance (Joshi 2019).

• 27 G. Devy, M. Devi and L. Gaikwad founded the Denotified and Nomadic Tribes Rights Action Group (DNT- (...)

27Another well-known name today in Adivasi film is Dakxinkumar Bajrange, of the Chhara community (belonging to the sub-category of DNT: Denotified and Nomadic Tribes) of Ahmedabad. Starting out as a playwright in Gujarat, he became known for the play Bhudan (2002) about Budhan Sabar, who was killed while in police custody in Bengal (Bajrange Chhara 2010). Encouraged by Ganesh Devy and Mahasweta Devi,27 Bajrange went on to found the Budhan Theatre Company (2004), in order to advocate for the rights of his community. He subsequently took up producing documentary films, and sometimes taught at the Tribal Academy in Tejgadh. His work is inspired by real events and often characterized by social theater aesthetics. Particularly noteworthy amongst his seventy or more films are Fight for Survival (2005), about the lives of snake charmers, and The Lost Water, (2007), about Agharya salt workers in the Kutch desert (Friedman 2011). On his website, Bajrange has also published short stories, addressing, for instance, the terrible condition of DNT communities during the Covid lockdown, as well as podcasts and full-length films (see budhanpodcast in the website list). In collaboration with the anthropologist Alice Tilche (University of Leicester, UK), Bajrange has realized film projects such as the very sensible Broken gods (2019). This film addresses the coexisting “dynamics of preservation and erasure” among Gujarat Adivasis towards their older forms of rituals (wall paintings, etc.) and their willing “reform” to a Hindu modernity represented by local gurus, despite the latters’ explicit denigration of Adivasi heritage (Tilche 2022: chapt. 4).

• 28 Theater festivals still exist in eastern India, such as Under the Sal Tree organized by the Rabhas (...)
• 29 A ‘contemporaneity’ which is more dynamic than Jagadish Viswanathan (Jangarh Singh Shyam’s mentor) (...)

30To conclude, I would like to emphasize, first of all, the fact that historical and ethnographic analyses alike show the importance of performance, centered on dancing and singing, in older forms of expression in Adivasi culture. Aimed at village audiences, performances had a close connection to the social fabric of the village and, thus, strong local undertones. The first outside perspectives, that is, the urban Indian and, later, the colonial gaze tended to stigmatize such customs as ‘jungly’ and ‘primitive’, if not indecent. By the same logic, original scripts, independent from dominant languages, and literacy as such played an important part at the beginning of the “aborigines/Adivasi” cultural movement which gave way to the Jharkhand Andolan. Social theater plays were instrumental during this period.28 It was R. D. Munda who eventually de-stigmatized dance by adapting it to an urban audience and redefining it as a form of vital self-expression of unified Jharkhand. This era also saw the rise to fame of Adivasi painters, even if they initially felt compelled to stick to an idealized and essentialized version of their art. Later, critical and self-assertive voices began to appear in commentaries on paintings (see Venkat Raman Singh Shyam). A look at contemporary Adivasi literature and at the work of several well-known writers highlights the three main issues they face today: folklorization and appropriation, moral judgement and identity conflicts. In recent years, documentaries, films and the internet have played an increasingly important role in and for Adivasi art and activism. The growing popularity of performance and film can be seen as a revival of a tradition of orality, albeit, this time, with a global audience. A central issue therein is the question of what the Adivasis themselves consider to be an integral part of their heritage, and what they would prefer to forget or to erase from their communal memory (Tilche 2022). In the sense that oral transmission is essentially the constant re-working, refreshing and updating of so-called tradition, Adivasi artists are no doubt “contemporary29” in their manifold interpretations of the heritage and experiences of their people.