The study is an ethnographic and anthropological investigation of two divergent yet interrelated phenomena among the Ho and Munda tribal groups in a forested area of Jharkhand, northern India. The first phenomenon is the emergence of a new ‘caste’ through the adoption of a Hindu reformist movement by some members, while the second is the simultaneous revival of tribal essence and adherence to ancestral teachings and spiritual practices by others.

Following Srinivas’ (1966) Sanskritisation theory, the so-called “devotees,” or those who convert to the movement, adopt high-caste behaviors and introduce caste discrimination among agnates in an attempt to ‘liberate’ themselves from the forest as a symbol of their ‘backward’ past. However, the investigation highlights several relevant exceptions to this trend. It is argued that a process of ‘de-Sanskritisation’ is occurring among those who retain ancestral practices. By reviving the ancestral notion of wilderness and mastery over forests, these individuals—the so-called “rebels”—remain faithful to their primordial connection between spirits, land, and people. They continue their ancestors’ fight against land and forest dispossession.

The study concludes that, for these ‘rebels,’ higher social status claims are legitimized not by Brahmanical criteria of purity and pollution but by territorial precedence and mediation with local spirits.