Ever heard a Mahua tree sing Vande Mataram? The ‘singing trees’ are part of Bhasha Van, or ‘forest of languages,’ at the Adivasi Academy in Tejgadh, Gujarat. Using an audio guide, you can hear trees 'sing songs' in 60 living languages
Illustration/Uday Mohite
Did you ever hear a Mahua tree sing Vande Mataram? Or its neighbour, a sal tree, sing songs in Chaudhari, a language I didn’t even know existed? These ‘singing trees’ and ‘speaking trees’ are part of Bhasha Van, or ‘forest of languages,’ started in 2013. It is an open museum of voice, where, with the aid of an audio guide, if it’s working, trees sing songs and tell stories in 60 living languages. Such an original idea: the metaphorical forest represents both the diversity of trees and languages of India. It is part of the Bhasha Research and Publication Centre (BRPC) and its arm, the Adivasi Academy (AA), that I visited recently, two hours by road from Vadodara, Gujarat. And all the while, mahua blossoms were drying in the sun, their intoxicating fragrance sweetening the air.
Dr Ganesh N Devy, linguistic scholar and cultural activist, is a Founding Trustee of the BRPC, along with Dr. Surekha Devi and Sandhya Gajjar. Former Professor of English at the Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, he gave up his academic career to work with the Adivasis, indigenous people, Denotified and Nomadic Tribes (DNT), totalling about 160 million population, 2011 Census. He founded the BRPC at Baroda in 1996, and the Adivasi Academy at Tejgadh in 2000. He also spearheaded the landmark Peoples’ Linguistic Survey of India, a study of 780 Indian languages, in 2010.
Dr. Madan Meena, Director, Adivasi Academy, and Trustee, Bhasha Research and Publication Centre, is an artist and folklore researcher. While Dr Devy aims to revitalise endangered languages, arts and culture, he believes in first supporting the communities stabilise economically, socially and from the rights perspective. The late Bengali writer and activist Mahasweta Devi, who has been a guiding spirit of the Academy, has a memorial dedicated to her. The AA, dedicated to the adivasis, aborigines, indigenous and nomadic communities of the world, is a Special Autonomous Centre of Indira Gandhi National Open University, and a Centre of Excellence, Ministry of Tribal Affairs, Government of India.
Dr GN Devy had already led the Dakshinayan (Southward) movement, in response to the murders of several intellectuals and artists in India, and moved to Dharwad in 2016, and Dr Madan Meena was away in Delhi (luckily, I have met both elsewhere). But Meenaji very kindly arranged for the PRO, Naginbhai Rathwa, to show me around. There’s a publications division, led by Sanjay Rathwa, with over 100 titles of Adivasi literature, a library and digitised archives. From far off, you can hear the sing-song of children at school prayers at the Vasantshala Residential Education Centre. A few drawing/colouring pages had been put up: rather than the city kid’s typical drawing of a sweet village at sunset, with mountains, river and a sun, here the drawings had people living in forests, meeting loved ones in jail, still others being thrashed by authorities—likely, the realities of families that fall through the cracks. There’s also Vaacha: The Museum Of Tribal Voice, with nearly 2,000 artworks; an ayurvedic clinic, guest rooms, a museum shop of sorts, and a studio-workshop, where older weavers taught young girls to weave kasota (a long cloth, that doubles as a traditional loincloth), in local weaving styles on looms. The three young girls, from villages nearby, wove beautiful kasotas, but were so shy, they huddled together, elbows touching, and staring down, in response to my questions, and were relieved when I let them go.
After a delicious lunch of roti, rice, dal and a veggie, I visited Vaacha: The Museum Of Tribal Voice. Unlike most museums, the Vaacha Museum is an open gallery, rather than a closed space, with windows and courtyards opening out to the landscape around and the sky. Its collection includes paintings, sculpture, pottery, bamboo objects, textiles, musical instruments, and more, sourced from Adivasi communities across India. AA has also created a National Consortium of Tribal Arts, collating the collections of all-India Tribal Museums et al. I thoroughly raided the modest ‘museum shop,’ buying beautiful bead jewellery, stunning kasotas (I’d wear them like a dupatta/shawl), books, and even that sweet bamboo-woven hand fan, similar to the one with which the newly-wed Sharmila Tagore fans her husband Soumitra Chatterjee, as he has lunch, in Satyajit Ray’s Apur Sansar. Deep sigh! My arms were full, but my heart was fuller.
Meenakshi Shedde is India and South Asia Delegate to the Berlin International Film Festival, National Award-winning critic, curator to festivals worldwide and journalist. Reach her at meenakshi.shedde@mid-day.com
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