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The Baha festival. (1) The procession of six villagers returning from the grove, the priest leading them, the basket now containing only three fowls, a Santal woman washing the priest’s feet. (2) A Santal seated before a large post, resting on three round stones and ladling from it rice-beer; behind him a Santal man helping a drunken Santal to get up. (3) Three Santals carrying a long python and inserting its head in a slit trunk, the leading Santal about to behead it; below, a small snake about to be killed and cut up. To the right, chunks of snake meat stewing in a pot. (4) The ‘jogmanjhi’ (proctor of the village youth) preparing to fell with the butt-end of an axe a bullock whose tail is held by a second Santal, a third looking on.

Reproduced: M. Archer (1970), pl.65.

Note: The depiction in the same section of the scroll of two distinct killings - cow killing normally associated with the ‘bhandan’ portion of the funeral ceremony and python killing - suggests that at one time both were essential ingredients in the feasting connected with the Baha festival.