Bhubaneswar: ST & SC Development Department has taken up a virtual tour to Odisha State Tribal Museum on every Sunday. This Sunday i.e. on 7th November the visitors can visit the life and culture of Lanjia Saora Community by opening the Facebook and Twitter pages @stscdev, @scstrti, said Director SCSTRTI Prof. (Dr.) A. B. Ota.
Lanjia Saora constitute one of the primitive section of Saora tribe. They live in Gajapati, Rayagada (Eastern Ghats Region). Their occupation are Icon (Wall Painting), wood carving, stone terracing and water management, cashew plantation and processing.
Lanjia Saora are called so by their neighbours for their distinct dressing pattern which is a loin cloth hang in front and tail like tails (Lanja). The traditional dress of a Saora woman is a traditional coarse waist cloth. In chilly weather they cover their upper body with another cloth. Saora women do not use too many ornaments. The women greatly enlarge their ear-lobes to wear wooden ear plugs and have a characteristic tattoo in the middle of the forehead.
The Lanjia Saoras have a shattered type of housing pattern in the hill slope. They install the village guardian deities represented by wooden posts in the entrance of the village. They pursue shifting cultivation and ingeniously prepare stone bounded terrace fields with inbuilt water management system for paddy cultivation. They have no clans for lineage organisation called as Birinda. They have their male and female samans to fulfill their magico-religious needs. They are famous for their attractive wall painting called idital.
