70 SOCIAL SCIENTIST This texture was also reflected in the domain of arts and crafts. But the reflection was not mechanical, and there was enough scope for autonomy and innovation. It helped the blossoming of an indigenous tradition in the aesthetic spheres of motif, design, colour and form. A few examples may be relevant and suggestive. The local vegetable dye was profusely utilised for the traditional pinkish red gale (ankle-length skirt) for the use of the priests who conducted ponung dance and song. The marvellous hat and war-coats were associated with tribal hunting and warfare. Baskets and rain-shields were made of finer varieties of cane and bamboo. Pipes came to be engraved with exquisite silver designs. Painting on wood and tankas were traditionally practised by the tribes inhabiting the hills at high altitude. Their forms and bright colours would suggest that these were strongly influenced by the neighbouring Tibetan and Bhutanese styles. The artist or craftsman of Arunachal aspired to absorb the surrounding environs and sought to make his individuality social. It reflected his immense capacity for sharing experience and ideas. But as emotion was not everything to an artist, he had to know and practise the rules and conventions that guided the method of expression. The artists and craftsmen of Arunachal went through this exercise and transformed their aesthetic ideas and experience into the various traditional art forms. However, a crucial deficiency in the social life of Arunachal was manifested in the absence of any script (except Khampti) whatsoever for the dialects of the local tribes. This limitation has severely circumscribed the process of cultural exchange among the tribes and hampered the possibility of the growth of indigenous literature. Such deficiency stood in the way of shaping the perception of nationality among the inhabitants of Arunachal and made their fragmented existence vulnerable to the material and cultural inroads from outside. In the political sphere also, the internal structure did not take a consolidated because of the persisting intertribc rivalries within the narrow confines of feudal chiefdom. The tribal-feudal moorings of Arunachal began to experience the pressure from outside in the wake of major political and economic changes which were unleashed in North-East India after the Indo-Chinese border conflicts of the early 1960s. The moves were initiated by the Government of India mainly due to the geo-political importance of the region. The introductory measures were directly connected with military manoeuvres and systematic army mobilisation along the international borders of Arunachal. These measures inevitably led to the development of communication network, particularly extending roadways to hitherto inaccessible areas of most of the remote districts. Such expansion programmes entailed predictable consequences which, on the one hand, brought in a retinue of contrators out side and, on the other hand, set in the erosion of tribal-feudal isolation of Arunachal. For example, the ripple effects of monetised economy began to be felt in