Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh(MP), India is known as the city of lakes. Within MP, it has the distinction of the greenest city, and well known for the Upper Lake and Lower Lake. There are many other beautiful places to visit. But today I would like to highlight about Tribal Museum that I had visited some time ago.
Tribal Museum was first conceptualized in 2011 and then inaugurated in 2013 by the then president Sri Pranab Mukherjee.
There are many types of museums you all might have visited and experienced. But this particular museum is not traditional to the typical exhibitions of dead objects, or with an imaginary cast of tribal's life, rather it is more about reproducing & recasting the lives of various tribes of MP.
MP is home to a wide list of tribes ranging from Gond, Bhil, Baiga, Kol, Korku, Bhariya, Madiya, Sahariya, etc. When I visited this place and interacted with one of the persons there, I got to know that the museum is built with traditional materials like wood, mud, hemp, leaves, etc to reproduced the real-life and culture of tribes of MP. Not just that, the people from each tribe participated in carving artistic display of their life, culture, and oral narratives. Even the maintenance of this museum is being done by the representatives of each category of the tribes.
If you go inside the museum, then you will experience dark themes everywhere with different colors of light(very low light), not to make the display shiny but to make you realize the true living style of the tribals.
The display and the carving also signify the intricacies, the culture and its appearance feel like they are alive across all artifacts.
Inside the museum, I experienced clay dwellings in many places and the kind of arrangement would make a visitor wander from different traditions to different forms of life.
In the end, I can only say it was an intuitive display of tribal life, arts, culture, and most importantly it was not about any artificial or monotonous exhibition of their lives and culture, rather it is more about the reproduction of their lives in a true sense and in the optimum possible way in this modern time. It is definitely treasure for the next generation to have a glimpse of tribes and their culture through this museum.
This place is hardly 11 KM from my home. I consider my visit as awareness about tribal rituals, customs, forms of worship, etc. If you are around Bhopal, then you should pay a visit to this place.
Thank you.
