Dwindling forest cover : Adivasis purchase peacock feathers from other states

Instead of collecting them from jungles in the Adilabad district of Telangana, Adivasis these days are purchasing the peacock feathers from Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Rajastan and Chattisgarh states thanks to the fast depleting forests.

Adivasis use peacock feathers to make hats that are worn by Gussadis( Adivasis)  to perform the Gussadi dance as part of Dandari, celebrated for 15 days coinciding with Diwali.

In the Adilabad district, forest cover has come down to 20 percent from the 44 percent in the last 50 years due to various reasons including indiscriminate felling of trees, wood smuggling and penetration of non- tribals into tribal areas and expansion of small towns in the agency areas in the district. 

In the process, peacocks’population has also come down due to deforestation. Adivasis who used to collect peacock feathers from jungles these days purchases them at high prices.           

A single peacock feather sell for Rs 5 while a bundle for 100 comes for Rs 300. During Diwali, thanks to the demand, each feather sometimes sells for Rs 20.  comprising 100 peacock feathers sell for Rs 300 and each Rs 5.

Peacock feathers are also being collected from Zoos and peacock farms in other states. There are 10 shops in Jainoor selling peacock feathers and each shop will sell hundreds of bundles during the Diwali festival season.

Adivasis use to collect peacock feathers in the forests along with minor forest produce and some of the cattle grazers would also collect the feathers when they went to forest daily.

Abdul Khadir of Jainoor, owner of kirana shop that also stocks peacock feathers, said Adivasis were purchasing peacock feathers from their shops these days as finding them in jungles has become difficult due to drastic fall in the forest cover.

He added that that they have been selling peacock feathers during Diwali for the last 20 years. While earlier only a few bundles would be sold, now he sells hundreds of bundles. Khadir said they purchase peacock feathers in bulk from Rajastan, Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh and Gujarat.

Adivasi leader Kanaka Yadavrao appealed to the panchayat raj minister K. Taraka Ramarao at Jodeghat to ensure state funds to Gussadis to celebrate the event on the occasion of Diwali. 

Teej festival akin to Bathukamma

 

Lambada women playing as part of Teej like in Bathukamma

The nine-day Teej festival celebrated by Lambada tribal women was similar in many respects to Bathukamma celebrated by women folk of other communities in the Telangana.  

Both Teej and Bathukamma festivals have many similarities in celebration and purpose and their link with nature. Both the festivals were women centric and nine-day festivals.

The Teej festival starts on Rakhi pournamy in the month of Sravan and starts with sowing of wheat in woven bowls and which will come up as sprouts later.      

Bathukamma is popularly known as celebration of flowers which was linked to nature especially water bodies and flowers and trees in the village.

Water in the tanks and ponds will get purified with the petals of flowers as petals absorb polluted elements when the Bathukammas are immersed in the tanks and ponds on the last day.

In both the festivals, women pray the Goddess Gouramma (parvathi) in Bathukamma and Jagadamba in Teej for her blessing seeking good husband and married women for the well being of their husbands. In both the festivals, women prepare a special item with the roti mixed with jaggery.     

In both the festivals, women folk dress in colorful costumes and encircle the bowl of sprouts and Bathukammas keeping them in the centre. They clap in rhythm to the folk songs and dance gracefully to the music.

On the ninth day, in both the festivals women take out a procession with their Bathukamma and sprout bowls to local lakes or ponds and immerse them in the water.

Elderly women sing songs while younger women actively participate in the event and married older women guide the younger women in performing customs and rituals attached to Teej in nine days like in Bathukamma festival.

The state government for the first time released Rs 25 lakhs to each district to  celebrate the Teej festival officially recognizing it as state celebration like Bathukamma in the newly formed Telangana state.

Rathod Meenakshi of Utnoor said ‘there are many similarities between Teej and Bathukamma festivals and it seems there was connection between the two festivals and purposes and added that both the festivals will be played for nine –day and  ‘Sprout bowls’ and ‘Bathukammas’ will be immersed in the water bodies on the last day’.

Parents invite all their married daughters to maternal home for Teej festival like for Bathukamma.