The tribal people, the original inhabitants of India, were displaced from their well- developed settlements for various socio- economic reasons. Epics and scriptures from the Vedic Period depict the tribal people as savages, slaves and cannibals. The story revolves around two young men in the south of Bengal, the hot bed of extremist movement. The men were witness to the violent Food Movement of 1964, the uprising of the landless in 1967 and inally the large-scale violence with the advent of Naxals. The novel traces the history of the tribal people, their love-hate relationship, the manner in which they were treated as savages and how they got assimilated into the mainstream.