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People and their culture The tribal Gods called Baba Dev, Baba Pithora, and Pithora Dev are painted and
Chhota Udepur is a tribally dominant adored in Chhota Udepur's traditional Pithora painting as an expression of
district. The total population of Chhota gratitude (Figure 3). This is especially popular with the Rathwa community of

Udepur district is 241,377 that region. Pithoro God is painted with bright colors on the walls of the house
(censusindia2011.com). Most of the and is then worshiped to please the God. Most common paintings include
population belongs to the scheduled Pithora's marriage, long-necked horses, kings, farmers, cows, bulls, and forest
tribes of Rathwa, Baria, Nayaka (or creatures with yellow, indigo, orange, green, red, black, and silver colors. These
Nayak), Koli, and Bhil communities. The paintings are created for various purposes, such as when children, women, or
Bhils who occupy the rath (hills or men are sick for a prolonged time, when crops fail, or when there are other
plateaus) are called Rathias or Rathwas difficulties at home. They are associated with God’s wrath, and people believe
in Gujarat. Majority of Rathwas are that Bhuva (priest) can provide the necessary protection and security from
socially and economically marginalized God's wrath. Pithora paintings are more of a ritual than an art form (Karolia et
(Modi, 2013). In Chhota Udepur, al., 2017).
Rathwas dominate not only in terms of © Pratik Desai
numbers but also in terms of culture,
politics, and economics (Alles, 2020).
Nayak is the warrior caste, today their
economic condition is bad (Chaudhari,
2020).

They speak a very distinct dialect of

Gujarati - ‘Rathvi’ and their main
occupation is agriculture and livestock
farming (chhotaudepur.nic.in). The
most common agricultural crop they
grow is maize, and other crops are
cotton, tuver (pigeon pea), barley crop,
paddy crop, and seasonal vegetables. In
their daily lives, they eat roti/bread
(made from maize) with seasonal
vegetables, chicken, dal, rice, and Pania
(a typical Rathva recipe made from
maize and black gram). The main
festivals of the local community are
Holi, Divaso, Dussehra, Dev-Diwali, and

Akhatrij (www.gujarat tourism.in). Their
pottery is distinctive to this region and
well worth seeing. Every day in
adjacent villages, there are beautiful © Shalu Mesaria © Shalu Mesaria
"Haats" (tribal fairs), which serve as the
© Shalu Mesaria
tribals' primary selling occasions.

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