Background and objectives: Arunachal Pradesh is the homeland of a large number of tribal communities. Although a wide range of variation between these populations can be seen in respect of socio-cultural practices, religious beliefs, languages as well as major metric characteristics in Arunachal one can see the theory of unity in diversity. This study examines the people of Arunachal Pradesh in terms of biocultural variation.

Material and Methods: This study is based on the materials collected from different secondary sources. To understand the cultural variation of Arunachal populations the variation in religion, language, and migration and material culture were considered. While to study the biological variation anthropometric and climatic factors (i.e. annual rainfall, altitude, relative humidity and mean annual temperature) were considered.

Results: Considering anthropometric characters of 21 endogamous groups of Arunachal Pradesh the findings do not seem to provide any interesting corroboration between morphometric characteristics and the intra- and intergroup relationship. While the biological variables are taken together they dependent largely on temperature, followed by altitude, annual rainfall and relative humidity. However, altitude seems to be the principal component for stature, whereas cephalic and total facial index seems to be largely dependent upon mean annual temperature.

Conclusion: Findings of the present study indicate that all these population groups are residing in their present habitat since the time immemorial and they have adopted themselves to their particular habitat in Arunachal Pradesh.