Paper short abstract:

The paper focuses on the religious beliefs and practices, their indigenous knowledge, traditional health and disease healing practices among the Baigas, health-seeking behavior, various causes of illness, sickness due to the wrath of supernatural beings, and health inequalities among them.

Paper long abstract:

Tribal culture is rich since ancient times. The tribals are known for their love for the forest and the biodiversity conservation in their locality. Being a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG), the Baiga tribe depends directly and indirectly on the forest for their livelihood. Obviously, naturalism, animism, reverence, and respect for natural objects like plants, animals, rivers, mountains and forests etc, are an integral part of the socio-cultural life and tradition of Baiga.

Health and disease are measures of the effectiveness with which human groups, combining cultural and biological resources adapt to their environment. Baiga tribe’s culture combines both simple and complex belief systems. They have faith and belief in some supernatural power. They have a wide knowledge of the medicinal properties of wild plants of the jungle. They use these plants combined with some mantras or chants for curing various diseases. A true combination of indigenous knowledge and belief in supernatural powers can be seen in their traditional healing system.

The paper mainly focuses on the religious beliefs and practices, their indigenous knowledge, traditional health and disease healing practice among the Baigas, health-seeking behavior, various causes of illness, sickness due to the wrath of supernatural beings, and health inequalities among them. The paper is organized with the help of secondary data both published and unpublished. The published data has been collected from articles, publications, and websites.