RITES AND RITUALS OF THE TUTSA TRIBE OF ARUNACHAL PRADESH: A CRITICAL REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.53555/vgat6s14Keywords:
Tutsa Tribe, rites and rituals, Indigenous religion, Rangfraism, ritual specialist, Arunachal PradeshAbstract
The Tutsa tribe of Arunachal Pradesh maintains a complex system of rites and rituals that shape its religious worldview, social organization, and ecological relationships. These ritual practices, rooted in indigenous cosmology and agrarian life, regulate interactions between humans, ancestral spirits, and natural forces. Despite their cultural importance, Tutsa rites and rituals have received limited focused scholarly attention, often appearing only marginally in broader ethnographic works on the tribes of Northeast India. This paper presents an extensive critical review of available literature on Tutsa ritual practices, examining agricultural rituals, life-cycle ceremonies, the role of ritual specialists, and recent transformation under Rangfraism and Christianity. By synthesizing ethnographic accounts, historical writings, and contemporary studies, the paper highlights thematic continuities, interpretative gaps, and methodological limitations within existing scholarship. The review demonstrates that Tutsa ritual systems remain under-theorized in existing scholarship and calls for focused, theory-informed and ethnographically grounded future research.
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