Jarawa tribe

The Jarawa tribe are Pygmy Negrito people living in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands of India who are a remnant population representing perhaps the earliest migration out of Africa of modern Homo Sapiens. This Paleolithic tribe that still lives a Stone Age hunter-gatherer lifestyle has around 450 members in total.

The tribe represents one of the four tribal communities (Great Andamanese, Onge, and Sentinelese) living in the region that refused contact with modern society for the longest time. Unlike the Sentinelese tribe, who refused contact violently, the bow and arrow-wielding Jarawa tribe first established peaceful contact with the Indian government in 1997.

Today, approximately 450 members of the nomadic Jarawa tribe live in groups of 40-50 people in chaddhas – as they call their homes. Like most tribal peoples who live self-sufficiently on their ancestral lands, the Jarawa continue to thrive, and their numbers are steadily growing.

They hunt pigs, turtles, and fish with bows and arrows in the coral-fringed reefs for crabs and fish, including striped catfish-eel and the toothed ponyfish. They also gather fruits, wild roots, tubers, and honey. The bows are made from chooi wood, which only grows in the Jarawa territory. The Jarawa often travel long distances to Baratang Island to collect it.

Both Jarawa men and women collect wild honey from lofty trees. The group members will sing songs during the honey collection to express their delight. The honey-collector will chew the sap of leaves of a bee-repellant plant, such as Ooyekwalin, which they will then spray with their mouths at the bees to keep them away. Once the bees have gone, the Jarawa can cut the bee’s nest, which they will put in a wooden bucket on their back. The Jarawa always bathes after consuming honey.

A study of their nutrition and health found their ‘nutritional status’ was ‘optimal’. They have detailed knowledge of more than 150 plant and 350 animal species. The Jarawa of the Andaman Islands enjoys a time of opulence. Their forests give them more than they need.

In 1998, a few Jarawa emerged from their forest for the first time without their bows and arrows to visit nearby towns and settlements.

In 1990 the local authorities revealed their long-term ‘master plan’ to settle the Jarawa in two villages with an economy based on fishery, suggesting that hunting and gathering could be their ‘sports.’ The plan was so prescriptive that it even detailed what clothes the Jarawa should wear. A forced settlement had been fatal for other tribes in the Andaman Islands, just as it has been for most newly-contacted tribal peoples worldwide.

Editorial Desk