Well done David!!! Clearly the knife is Indian. Interestingly the group of aboriginal tribes of the Nilgiris hills the Kota being one of them, besides being the smiths and artisans and the lowest caste largely resisted Hinduism though I do have a book "The Aboriginal Tribes of India. Stephen Fuchs, pub- India 1973 Uk 1977" where it is said that they followed Shiva and other deities. They kept buffalo which were used in ceremonies and eaten. One might expect to find a knife like this for skinning. Skinning has been mentioned before. I can find no reference to blood cults or human sacrifice in the Nilgiris hill though I do not know about times past {these acts could be kept secret} but that is not so for Tamil Nadu and Southern India.
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