Every time the Metro stops at the Jhandewalan station on its way to Rajiv Chowk, one spots billboards advertising footwear and sunglasses and another of model Upen Patel promoting Lee Cooper jeans, all under the statues of Mahatma Gandhi and other freedom fighters. The colourful billboards overshadow the unassuming and undersized board that announces the name of the building: Bharatiya Adimjati Sevak Sangh Tribal Museum.

The building, located next to the Metro station, has tribal motifs and life-like figures on its main and side doorways. The accessibility, aesthetically designed gateways, and a mere Rs 5 entry ticket, however, have failed to draw tourists, say the people who work for the Trust that manages the museum. They hope that their refurbishing plans will get the museum more visitors.

Weaves, weapons, musical instruments, utensils, herbal medicines and tools make up the 200 displays in the museum. Life-size figures depict the daily lives of these people. An Ongi woman and her child from the Andamans; a hunter with a whole assortment of weapons coming home with his day’s catch; village elders smoking; an elderly Gurjar couple outside their modest home; women of the Junag tribe in traditional hand-woven dresses, the Deuris of Assam, the Kols of central India and tribal dance and rituals recreate the world of the tribals.

And if you still want to know more, there’s also a library here, with more than 6,000 books on tribes and anthropology—some of them rare and currently out of print. Just like the museum, the library, too, can be accessed only after unlocking a couple of doors. Located at the end of one corridor, the library is quite well-kept except for the damp and dusty smell of old books. It boasts of rare tomes authored by W B Brown, Verrier Elwin’s treatise on the Bonda Highlanders, J C Nesfield’s book on tribes of upper India, published in 1885, among others.

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