The women who paint Jharkhand: Sohrai-Khovar's journey from harvest ritual to galleries

Sohrai-Khovar, an ancient women-led art tradition from Jharkhand (Image: TWAC)A local artisan crouches by her doorstep, her hands stained with mud and colour drawn straight from the earth around her. The warmth of rust red, the hush of chalky white, the depth of a black gone nearly charcoal. With nothing more than a broken comb and a steady hand, she draws a peacock on a wall still damp from its coating of clay. In a few hours, this wall, like thousands of others across Hazaribagh, will carry the story of the land of Jharkhand, a mural to its beauty.Sohrai and Khovar paintings are a unique and tribal style of art originating from caves of Jharkhand. In 1991, celebrated and renowned environmentalist Bulu Imam documented rock shelters in the Isco hills of Hazaribagh district and noticed that