Shakeelji greeted us with a gentle, disarming smile. Dressed in unpretentious, comfortable cottons and carrying the calm cadence of village life, he gives little hint of the world he left behind. A seasoned designer who studied and worked abroad, he once navigated high-velocity metropolitan circuits and international creative hubs.
Travel | Mujeeb Rahman Kinalur
The red dust of Bastar has a way of lingering on your skin, settling into the seams of your clothes, and quietening the restless mind. For decades, mainstream headlines have reduced this vast swathe of central India to a monolithic, uneasy trope: a volatile theatre of insurgencies, dense forest corridors, and security checkpoints. Yet behind the fog of newsprint lies another reality altogether; an enduring, luminous world where ancestral rhythms and tribal cosmologies continue to breathe.
I had first come across the name Shakeel Rizvi between the evocative lines of Aamcho Bastar, Nandini Menon’s Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award-winning travelogue. Her pages framed him not merely as a visitor studying remote terrains, but as an anchor deeply woven into the forest's quiet life. A brief online exchange bridged the miles, and on a sunlit morning along the red dirt roads of Bastar, our correspondence brought me straight to the courtyard of Bastar Tribal Homestay.
Shakeelji greeted us with a gentle, disarming smile. Dressed in unpretentious, comfortable cottons and carrying the calm cadence of village life, he gives little hint of the world he left behind. A seasoned designer who studied and worked abroad, he once navigated high-velocity metropolitan circuits and international creative hubs. Yet he consciously stepped away from that urban clamour to build a deliberate, rooted life in this forested hinterland.
Joining our morning conversation was Dipti Ogre, whose warmth and rich scholarly insights instantly brought the space alive. A dedicated researcher focusing on indigenous arts, performance traditions, wall murals, and tribal semiotics, Dipti works to sustain and celebrate local heritage through her grassroots initiative, Surooj Trust. Rather than examining tribal culture from a detached distance, she walks alongside communities to document and protect their living knowledge systems.
The space itself was a testament to indigenous aesthetics. Built with mud walls washed in terracotta hues, the homestay features delicate white mural patterns (bhitichitra) each brushstroke an ode to local folklore, fertility rites, and forest spirits. The hand-painted doors and earthen pots arranged on wooden shelves reflected the quiet soul of Dandakaranya. We settled in the open courtyard under the canopy of green trees, gathering around a hand-painted blue wooden table with steaming cups of tea.
Life in these interior settlements unfolds within a stark paradox. Caught under the watchful eye of the security apparatus on one end and decades of developmental neglect on the other, these hamlets still lack the basic amenities modern towns take for granted. Paved roads dissolve into rugged clay paths; healthcare and formal schools remain a distant walk away. During heavy downpours, power outages can stretch for weeks, quietly severing the settlement from the outside world. Yet sitting across from Shakeelji and Dipti, the conventional urban view of these hamlets as "backward" felt remarkably short-sighted.
"To the outside world, the forest is merely an inventory of resources waiting to be harvested," Shakeelji reflected softly. "For an adivasi, the forest is family."
His words unpacked a philosophy of profound restraint. In the tribal ethos, nature is not private property. No seed is planted without offering reverence to the soil; no branch is cut without seeking consent in the sacred groves known as Devgudis. They gather strictly what is necessary for seasonal subsistence, instinctively leaving the rest for birds, insects, and generations yet to arrive.
Dipti expanded on this with lively precision, explaining that the motifs adorning tribal walls and utensils are not decorative afterthoughts. They are living scriptures; visual records of agricultural cycles, ancestral rites, and communal harmony. From the ancient lost-wax metallurgy of Dhokra to the weekly haats where trade is an intimate social celebration, they spoke of a civilization sustained not by consumption, but by deep belonging.
By late morning, as our conversations wound down, the surroundings felt clearer, more resonant. Meeting Shakeel Rizvi and Dipti Ogre was not simply an entry in a travel diary. In a world racing headlong toward erasure, they stand as quiet guardians of memory on this red earth-living proof that true wealth lies in how gently we walk alongside nature.