Villagers perform the tribal dance in a circle

A drone camera hovers over a cluster of huts that make up Chhas Gaon, a sleepy hamlet in the foothills of the Sahyadris, about 200km from Mumbai. It’s home to several tribes of Maharashtra, including Warlis and Katkaris. In the next few frames, we witness the villagers going about their daily chores — women washing utensils or drawing water from a well, children bathing their siblings outside homes and men making their way to farms. However, the entire village comes alive during the Ganpati festival, as residents — both men and women — form a human chain and perform a tribal dance, tarpa, to hypnotic tunes of the eponymous instrument that resembles a snake charmer’s been (flute).