The ongoing Tribes India Aadi Mahotsav has garnered a positive response from the people, based on the daily footfall. The festival is showcasing the rich heritage and traditions of the tribals from across the country through the regional handicrafts, paintings, cuisine and culture.

With more than 200 stalls from across the country and about 1000 artisans, the Aadi Mahotsav has an amazingly vast variety of ethnic, colourful and bright tribal products – beautiful handcrafted jewellery from the North-east and of the inimitable Dokra style, fine fabrics, weaves and textiles, silks, such as Maheshwari, Eri, Karvathi Kathi silk sarees, Tassar silks, and Pashmina shawls; Moonj Grass basketry and blue pottery from Jaipur, and paintings.

Other than these items, one can also finds the natural and immunity-boosting tribal produce such as organic haldi, dry amla, wild honey, black pepper, ragi, triphala, and lentil mixes such as moong dal, urad dal and white beans; chilli, turmeric sourced from different parts of the country.

Stalls offering these organic and immunity-boosting healthy produce and other herbs were in focus on Day 9 of the Aadi Mahotsav, which is being celebrated as the Van Dhan and TRIFOOD day. The highlight of these products is that these have been processed in Van Dhan centres across the country. In fact, tribals from Van Dhan centres from states like Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand are present at the Aadi Mahotsav displaying their produce. Commodities like mahua, amla, honey, cashew, tamarind, ginger, garlic and other fruits and vegetables are being processed and converted to mahua drink, amla juice, candy, pure honey, ginger-garlic paste and fruit and vegetable pulp.

Also grabbing one’s attention near the entrance of the fair, is the Van Dhan Demo Centre which gives a bird eye’s view into the activities of a regular Van Dhan centre. In fact, one can get freshly processed amla juice at the Van Dhan Demo Centre.

The Van Dhan tribal centres have emerged as a source of employment generation for tribal gatherers and forest dwellers and the home-bound tribal artisans over the past year. About 2,000 Van Dhan Kendras have been established under the Van Dhan Scheme.
The TRIFOOD project aims to enhance the income of tribals through better utilization of and value addition to the MFPs collected by the tribal forest gatherers. Work has been started in Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh already.

The Aadi Mahotsav- A Celebration of the Spirit of Tribal Crafts, Culture and Commerce is on at Dilli Haat, INA, New Delhi till the 15th February, 2021 from 11 am to 9 pm.

Visit Aadi Mahotsav and further the “Vocal for Local” movement! #BuyTribal

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NB/KG/jk-10-02-2021