MY ORDERLY, Mongra Tudu, self-consciously handed me a dharwak leaf that was an invitation to attend the Santal Annual Hunt, to be followed three days later by a session of their annual panchayat or parliament, which turned out to be remarkably democratic . 
The hunt took place on the wooded slopes of the highest hill in the district, Parasnath. A somewhat tactless choice, as it was sacred to the Jains, the local Hindu sect who held all life sacred, even mosquitoes. 
I attended the parliament as an observer, squatting on the sandy bed of a dry river, on the fringe of about a thousand aboriginals. With joints unaccustomed to this posture, my shorts open to exploration by frogs, and members spitting freely as was their wont, I felt none too comfortable. 

It was past midnight, and their huddled, white-clad figures presented a ghostly aspect in the moonlight, their dark faces only dimly visible in the flickering light of camp-fires that had cooked their evening meal of venison, and now it was hoped would keep panther at bay. The intermittent call of jackals and occasional scream of a hyena, like a child being murdered, interrupted members' speeches, and to most present the surrounding jungle was peopled by bongas (devils) against whom the sacred slender sal trees seemed frail protectors. 

When I had arrived, the case under discussion seemed in itself trivial, but was an example of a court appeal to an 'upper house'. A Santal villager had accidentally killed a sow with an arrow three months previously, and had been fined three rupees by his village court or panch. His plea was that having paid the fine, the carcass should have been his. In the debate which followed it came out that the incident had become the occasion for a feast in which the whole village had taken part, members of the village court included. 
The appellant received a patient hearing, no-one interrupted or walked out. Speeches were long and with much repetition, and the finding against him simply 'grew' in the assembly, being voiced at last without a vote, by general consent. 

Though there were a thousand Santals around me, I had never seen so many together. I was told their race numbered two million. They are of ancient lineage, an exclusive hill and forest people who excel as pioneer cultivators, and who have resisted absorption by successive invaders for three and a half thousand years. Dark-skinned, not Negroid in feature and with straight hair, they pre-date the Ayrian invasion and civilisations of Mohenjo-Daro and of the other dark-skinned races of Dravidans who preceded them. 
They have oral traditions of a golden past, when they lived in forts among courtiers and kings , some of their tribal names denoting royal office - Kiskus were King's Treasurers, and Tudus Court Musicians. Others were rope makers for the King's war elephants. Other traditions are of a large-scale migration across a great river (probably the Ganges), the rear party requiring supernatural aid to achieve it. This probably refers to their exodus and flight from north-west India about 1500BC in the wake of the Aryan invasion of India. 
Present day Santals have a number of attractive traits. They are cheerful, musical, and have a strong poetic strain. Their truthfulness is proverbial, making them despair of crooked lawyers in district courts

They completely lack the servility of the Hindu, good humouredly pitying the Brahmin whose religion permits him neither to hunt nor to eat meat, and obliges him to wash daily. Or as their own storytellers relate: "The God Maarang Buru having decided to divide men into races, organised running contests with various kinds of food laid out on leaf-plates at the winning post as prizes - meat in one, fish in another, milk and rice in a third. The runners who came in first won the meat and became the Santals. Those who came in last found only milk and rice left, and became the Brahmins." 

As the House went on to discuss further wearisome cases in their own Santali language, its unique nature is worthy of mention. With no written literature and only oral traditional tales, it is a triumph of completeness and complexity, and so obviously beyond the needs of a simple pastoral people, that it is perhaps the best indication of a past greatness. Not only does it have 20,000 words and twenty-three tenses, but much of their everyday conversation is couched in poetry and metaphor. To take a single example: If one Santal says to another - "A new friend has come", and the other asks - "Does it carry on the head or the shoulder?" the actual meaning would be: "My wife has just had a baby" and "Is it a boy or girl?" (Girl carries loads on head, boy on shoulder). 
I stretched my uneasy limbs on the river bed, and wished the House would rise. I reflected that here was a perfect parliamentary language, in which every awkward question could be answered by the Santals' favourite rejoinder: Okobadi (who knows?), and occasionally, if feeling co-operative, ……"The answer is in the affirmative”….. as he has no direct word for yes or no.