Last July, a section of the Kheria Sabar tribes of Purulia district had made a fortune out of skyrocketing tomato prices. They had produced over two tonnes of tomato in the remote arid villages of Manbazar and Bandwan blocks; it was no mean feat. The absence of pre-monsoon showers and the relentless heatwave didn’t help them with the tomato this year, but they did make a good profit off their watermelons.

Sabars are tribals of Munda ethnicity and are known to be among the oldest inhabitants of Odisha and Bengal. They even find mention in the Mahabharata. The Kheria Sabars of Purulia had been labelled “statutory criminal communities” by British administrators. They were declared “denotified” by Independent India. The Act of 1871 was replaced with the Habitual Offenders Act, 1952. The legal change didn’t affect the lives of these ancient hunter-gatherers for close to three decades post-Independence.

Turning these tribes into farmers has not been easy. The harbinger of this change is called the Paschim Banga Kheria Sabar Kalyan Samiti, an association formed by schoolteacher Gopi Ballav SinghDeo. The Singh Deos were feudal lords of the area; Gopi Ballav’s ancestors had helped found a school near the samiti office in Rajnowagarh.

“Master Moshai” or Singh Deo stood up for the Sabars and inspired them to fightfor their basic rights, shakeoff the “criminal tribe” stig-ma. It was he who convinced them to strike out as agriculturalists and craftspeople and get an education.

Jaladhar Sabar is the secretary of the samiti. The drive from the samiti headquarters, 30 kilometres from Purulia, towards Kuda village, reveals many a field of freshly-planted tomatoes. Jaladhar describes with glee how their bilaati (local term for tomato) was lapped up by wholesalers in Calcutta at Rs 80 per kilo and was sold at Rs 120. “Brihaspati Sabar, one of the farmers, earned as much as Rs 75,000,” he says.

They are also learning to grow brinjal, cauliflower, cabbage and green chillies with some help from the agricultural scientists of Purulia’s Sidho- Kanho-Birsha University.

Since Purulia is largely a drought-prone area, most Sabars can’t depend on agriculture for livelihood all year round. The samiti has trained hundreds of members to create Sabar craft using split bamboo, date palm leaves and the local kashi grass. These items are sent to craft fairs in Calcutta and its suburbs. Over 500 members across 20 villages are being trained this year.

Last year, I visited the samiti office at the time of the Sabar Mela, an annual affair. There was a feast of khichdi and hot chutney made from the bountiful tomato harvest. Thousands of Sabars had gathered. In one corner of the office there was a memorial stone. Inscribed on it in Bengali was a sentence which means — after my death bring my ashes here and plant a mahul sapling over it. Those are the words of writer and activist Mahasweta Devi; she died on July 28, 2016.

This transition of the Sabars has not happened overnight. A big force of change was Mahasweta Devi. She advised Gopi Ballav, samity director Prashanta Rakshit and other members on how to get legal aid to stand up against police atrocities and false charges slapped on them.

Budhan, a Kheria Sabar youth in Akairbad village near Kuda, was framed and arrested. He died in police custody in 1998. Mahasweta Devi started a movement with Budhan’s widow Shyamali at the forefront. She also filed a writ petition in Calcutta High Court. The court ordered an investigation and the cops who had beaten Budhan to death were suspended. The court ordered that Budhan’s wife be paid a compensation of Rs 1 lakh. Last February, the officer-in-charge of the police station who murdered Budhan was convicted.

Says Bhim Mahato, who is a samiti member, “Now we know the nitty-gritty of police cases.” He continues, “Mahasweta Devi groomed me on the basics of legal aid and now I consult many legal practitioners on fighting cases on behalf of wronged tribe members.”

According to Rakshit, Mahasweta Devi was a regular at the fair. She wrote in her memoirs, “The Sabars, hitherto living inisolated clusters, came to know during the annual fes- tival that they too have a bro- therhood of thousands of Sabars… throughout the nights the Sabar men and women danced around the fire, sang, beat drums. And the policetoo were invited to share the warmth of the fire.”

Jaladhar says, “We had anointed her Sabar-er Maa.” He talks about how she had donated the proceeds of her “foreign award” — the Ramon Magsaysay Award for writing and activism — to build the samiti office and a guesthouse.

Ratnaboli Sabar is the only woman member of the samiti; a graduate from a local college, she is also one of the organising secretaries of the fair. She says, “Some of our members have learnt farm-ing, but there is not enough land.” It seems, Sabar craft doesn’t attract young men. Rakshit thinks Sabar youth should learn to repair tractors, instal solar generators andso on. There are others likeRamanita Sabar who have made a different choice. Ramanita is the first woman in the community to get a master’s degree. She wants to be a history teacher and appear for the civil service exams too.

There are other realities to be reckoned with. For instance, lack of employment opportunities continue to force many Sabars to work as namaals or migrant labourers in the brick kilns of neighbouring Burdwan. Ratnaboli says, “Many of our people don’t have the habit of saving. Whatever they earn, they spend on a tipple.” The samiti is working to change this habit.

But Jaladhar is not complaining. He says, “There was a time when Sabar men were scared to walk on the road. A police van would arrive and make a random arrest.” It has happened to his father, it has happened to him too. There was apparently a time when he ran away and hid in the forest for many weeks. He says, “Things are much better now. Things are decent.”

In the meantime, the mahul tree is growing.