India’s national commitment to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) presumes that decisive action will occur in tens of thousands of gram sabhas, ward sabhas and autonomous district councils scattered across an ecologically fragile subcontinent. Yet state-centric programmes still approach these local bodies as mere delivery agents. This review argues instead that the country’s tribal polities—Dongria Kondh, Maria Gond, Khasi, Garo, Lushai, Naga, Warli, Kodava, Toda, Santal, Paharia and others—already operate as working models of resilient, low-transaction-cost governance. Drawing on statutory texts, ethnographic monographs, court judgments, satellite analyses and greyliterature case studies (including CFR dashboards and PESA implementation audits), the paper maps how these societies manage land, water, forests and conflict; assesses the socio-ecological dividends they generate; and extracts design principles for mainstream local institutions. Findings show that when decision-making is nested, consent is legally binding, and commons remain corporately held, communities sustain carbon-dense forests, perennial water sources, diversified livelihoods and low levels of violent conflict. Conversely, gender exclusion, elite capture and legal ambiguity remain persistent weaknesses. The review concludes with a translational framework— federated scaling, restorative justice pilots, adaptive finance and digital commons trusts—through which India’s wider panchayati-raj architecture could adopt tribal design intelligence while correcting inequities.