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S. Sinha projected the tribe and caste at two extreme poles of a lineal continuum to
identify the social structure of Indian society. M.N. Srinivas provided a mobility model
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for the analysis and interpretation of social and cultural change in Indian context. L.P.
Vidyarthi leaned on India’s ancient scriptures and epics for social facts and he perceived
Indian civilization in terms of sacred centres and their networks.
Folklore studies have been the other interesting arena in modem anthropology in India.
It is believed that huge social elements remain hidden in folk songs and folk-tales, which
need to be unearthed. Significant contributions to this field came from the
anthropologists like Durga Bhagat, L.P. Vidyarthi, K.V. Upadhaya, P.D. Goswami,
Sankar Sengupta, Dulal Chowdhury, R.M. SarkarjPasupatiMahato and others.
Anthropological interest in the study of primitive religion did not come to an end with
the concept of Bongaism as forwarded by Prof D.N. Majumdar (1950) or Srinivas’s work
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in South India, ‘Religion and Society among the Coorgs’ (1952). Rather it became
clothed with the idea of civilization and reflected in the works of L.P. Vidyarthi,
BaidyanathSaraswati, Makhan Jha and others.
Vidyarthi himself developed the concept of sacred complex for studying the places of
pilgrimage as a dimension of Indian civilization. Studies in power structure and
leadership as stimulated by the ideas of Oscar Lewis and H.S. Dhillon influenced a
number of Indian scholars. As a result, a study on tribal and rural leadership was
undertaken in different parts of India. In this respect we can utter the names of R.
Kothari, K.S. Singh, B.K. Roy Burman and others.
Most of the anthropologists of the present day have been conscious with the applied
field. They want to direct their knowledge in the welfare and development of the society.
Tribal as well as rural community development programmes have been benefited a lot
by the advice of eminent anthropologists like S.C. Dube, L.P. Vidyarthi, Prof.
Sachchidananda, T.B. Nayek, T.N. Madan and others. In many cases anthropologists
themselves have chosen the path of action anthropology being guided by the idea of
American anthropologist Sol. Tax.
In this context, the Lodha project of P. K. Bhowmick deserves special mention. Lodha is
an ex-criminal tribe in the district of Midnapore, West Bengal. Prof Bhowmick had
combined his research with the action programmes and earnestly tried to ameliorate the
conditions of Lodhas. As an action anthropologist he also devised some ways to
rehabilitate a section of Lodhas, economically as well as psychologically in the midst of
their advanced neighbours.
At the end of the twentieth century, after hundred years from Risley, we again found an
all India study on the Tribes and Caste to assess the aspect of change. The study was
conducted by Anthropological Survey of India.
Apart from this, a lot of in-depth and analytical studies on various communities were
encouraged which were absolutely free from the bias of western theoretical model. Here
we can cite the examples of B.K. Roy Burman’s study on Totos (1967), A.K. Das’s study
on Lepchas (1969) and so on.

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