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A break in the trees revealed the village far below - one more hour down through the wet, sweaty forest. We were in the Cardamom Hills, southernmost range of South India’s Western Ghats, trekking with the Munnuvans, a tribe of rainforest cultivators and gatherers. Wanting a rest, I sank towards a pile of stones beside the trail.

“Not for sitting,” shouted our interpreter.

I halted. The two Munnuvan guides were frowning. Apparently the stones were an altar for the elephant God. I made obeisance and the guides relaxed. The wild elephants of these forests are known to be aggressive; to offend their deity would be unwise.

While researching a guidebook on South India, I had been told that the Munnuvans and Todas - two hill tribes of the Western Ghats - were considering opening their remote settlements to small numbers of trekkers in return for much-needed cash. My girlfriend Kristin and I determined to be among the first Westerners to enter, but gaining access proved problematic. We discovered that almost all of India’s wildernesses require permits to enter. Even after we had spent weeks finding a trekking outfitter who could procure guides known to the tribes (Clipper Trekking of Bangalore), it still took us another month to get the necessary permissions from Delhi.

At first we thought the restrictions unreasonable, but observation of local tourists in one national park - Rajamallai, near the Munnuvans’ rainforest - proved them sound. The park harbours a species of ibex - the nilgiri tahr - indigenous to the Western Ghats, and only allows the public into one small section because of regular abuses. We arrived just after a car-load of drunken men from the city had been caught throwing bottles at the ibex herd. Add to this the pulling up of wildflowers and other plants, littering, graffitiing, and it’s small wonder that most of India’s wild areas are no-go except by special permission.

Sanjit, the first Munnuvan headman we spoke to, conceded that fear of local tourists had prompted the tribe to refuse a road-building project for the forest, but he added that the local forestry officials could be just as bad, accepting bribes from gangs of sandalwood smugglers occasionally operating in the area. The restrictions on travel, he claimed, were as much to keep out witnesses as to protect the forest. He also accused the local police of being on the smugglers’ payroll, routinely harassing the inhabitants of the settlements with trumped-up searches for marijuana among their clearings of wild cardamom, pepper and rice. We ran into just such a patrol, who wanted to fine us for illegal presence in the forest. Their disappointment, when we produced the relevant paperwork from our backpacks, was almost palpable.

Trekking into the Toda settlements required no special permits. Buffalo herders of the high grasslands above the forest, the Todas had their land guaranteed to them in perpetuity during the days of the Raj. They may invite anyone they choose to their upland settlements of long-houses and buffalo corrals, but, like the Munnuvans, the Todas wanted Western trekkers, yet feared that their presence might attract unwelcome attention from local tourists and government officials. Despite selling milk and crafts, such as embroidered blankets, in the local markets, the Todas keep apart from the outside world owing to their practice of polyandry - where women may take more than one husband. Polyandry is technically illegal in India and goes against Hindu convention. The Todas wanted only small numbers of trekkers using approved guides. “If they know you, we know you,” said Mani, head wife of the first long-house we stayed in.

The Toda are perhaps the only group in southern India where women hold as much power as their husbands, with an equal share of livestock and property. All our contact was with women - the men keeping in the background. We were asked penetrating questions, such as our ideas about God. Before going to sleep on the second night, the women sang to us - a strange nasal chanting quite unlike anything we had heard before, then they demanded that we reciprocate. Lying in the smoky half-dark, struggling through an old Irish folk song, I was struck by the sheer privilege of being there. Above stretched the curved beams of the long-house. Outside the buffalo grazed under the moon.

Traveling from the Toda’s sunlit uplands into the Munnuvan’s forest, one is struck by the exotic, scented flora. Giant sandalwood, wild mango, frankincense, camphor (whose sap can be lit with a match), rosewood and teak, glades of lemon-grass: all are in evidence. The Munnuvans are custodians of all this, seldom felling the valuable timber, and practising strict vegetarianism. There is no hunting in these forests and the wildlife is plentiful. From time to time brilliantly-plumed jungle fowl - wild precursors of domestic chickens - rocket out of the undergrowth, itself brilliant with wild flowers. While staying at a small forest lodge we walked up on a big bull elephant drinking at a stream, and beat a silent retreat through the bush, hoping he hadn’t seen us. That evening we watched gaur (Indian bison) and sambar deer grazing the forest fringes. As the moon rose, two big elephant came into the clearing - slow, grey ghosts. About midnight, we were woken by the loud, harsh growling of a tiger.

The Munnuvans do have one powerful protector - the Tata Corporation, which owns extensive tea plantations in the high country above the Munnuvans’ territory. Unusually, for an Indian industrial concern, Tata actively conserves the wild areas surrounding its land holdings. Both of the Munnuvan headmen we talked to said that Tata helped to intercede with local government officials, and was a buffer against the worst abuses of the smuggler gangs and police. They also complained that Tata was unwilling to see trekkers in the forest - back to the old fear of destructive tourism.

The day we came out of the forest, Varkey Kurian [of Clipper Trekking] and I went to discuss the eco-tourism projects with one of the Tata managers. A committed conservationist, and member of the several local wildlife groups, he voiced real concerns. These were fragile environments: would tour operators not overrun the mountains with trekkers? Would Western eco-tourists behave any differently from local tourists?

There was the heart of the matter: eco-tourism is still an unfamiliar ethic in many parts of the world. Only when Varkey agreed to work under the guidance of the local wildlife societies, did the manager consent to look at the possible benefits of letting the tribes control their own areas. Eventually he intimated that provided the issue of numbers was respected then yes, local eco-tourism might receive his (and thus Tata’s) blessing.

The Western Ghats are not easy to travel - the difficulties of getting in are many. But perhaps this is as it should be, with prices kept relatively high to bring the tribespeople the maximum return on the smallest number of people. Unlike the experience of trekking in much of northern India, where trails are overrun with Westerners, litter and even petty thieving, here in the Western Ghats the forest still crowds close and silent on a trail too narrow for walking abreast. In the gathering dark, one’s guide keeps a wary eye out for elephant as the fireflies dance between the trees. Above all, there is that deep peace found only in places where the wild is left to itself.

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