Bhubaneswar: Tucked away amid the rolling hills of western Odisha, a quiet rock shelter near Sambalpur is rewriting the story of the state’s prehistoric past. The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) has found and formally recorded Badbil Ushakuthi as Odisha’s first cave art site, marking a landmark moment for archaeology and heritage research in the region.
Located around six kilometres from Badbil village in Sambalpur district, the shelter lies close to the origin of the perennial Champali stream, which continues to sustain communities in the area. Reaching the site today still requires a journey through forested terrain and rocky paths, underscoring how generations of ancient communities may once have lived in close harmony with this landscape.
What makes Badbil Ushakuthi extraordinary is the nature of its art. According to the ASI, nearly 98 per cent of the engravings at the site are vulva motifs, which archaeologists interpret as symbolic representations of female or mother goddesses. In a post on X, the ASI described the site as “a landmark contribution to the understanding of prehistoric art traditions in Odisha,” noting that no cave art site in the state had been formally recorded by the organisation before this discovery.
“The petroglyphs observed at the site consist of pigmented engravings executed in ochre, black, and white. The thematic repertoire includes vulva motifs, paw marks, zoomorphs rendered through both engraving and pigmented engraving techniques, and a solitary rectilinear motif in dark reddish-black pigment,” the ASI said in a post on X. “Evidence of superimposition and multi-layered pigmentation on several motifs suggests continuity in artistic tradition and underscores the sustained cultural significance of both the motifs and the shelter,” it added.
Archaeologists have also recovered important material evidence from the cave floor. These include microlithic tools such as blades, crescents, flakes and fluted cores made from quartz crystal and chert. Polished stone tools, grinding stones, pestles and grinding holes point to a wide range of daily activities, from food processing to tool-making, offering rare insights into Stone Age life in this part of eastern India.
So far, scholars have documented around 120 rock shelters across Odisha, but Badbil Ushakuthi stands apart as the first cave art site officially recorded by the ASI. For historians and local communities alike, the discovery is a reminder that the land beneath familiar villages still holds stories stretching back thousands of years — stories etched patiently into stone by some of the earliest inhabitants of the region.
