Bediga

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This article is an extract from

THE TRIBES and CASTES of BENGAL. By H.H. RISLEY, INDIAN CIVIL SERVICE, OFFICIER D'ACADÉMIE FRANÇAISE. Ethnographic Glossary. CALCUTTA: Printed at the Bengal Secretariat Press. 1891. .

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Bediga

Bedea, Bejea, a small agricultural Dravidian tribe of Chota N agpur, supposed to be masiaut bluii, or cousins through the maternal aunt, of the Kurmis. Formerly, it is said, Bedias and Kurmis inter¬married, but a split occurred' when it was discovered that the former ate beef,' or more probably, when the latter gave up eating it. They do not claim any connexion with the Mundas, nor do the Mundas reoogni e them as cognates. Their septs are totemistic. In their marriages a barber officiates as priest. Bedias take kaclwhi food from Kurmis only. and Khanghar Mundns take similar food from them. The twelfth sept of the Santa.ls, which is supposed to have been left behind in Champa, and has long been separated from the parent tribe, bears the name of Bedia., and it seems not improbable that the Bedias of Chota Nagpur may be actually a branch of the Santals who did not follow the main tribe in their wanderings east¬ward. The connexion of the Bedias with the Kurmis tells rather for this view. The tribe has certainly nothing to do with the Bediyas of Eastern Bengal.