Bodo–Kachari people

Bodo–Kacharis (also Kacharis or Bodos) is a name used by anthropologist and linguists to define a collection of ethnic groups living predominantly in the Northeast Indian states of Assam, Tripura, and Meghalaya. These peoples are speakers of either Bodo–Garo languages or Assamese. Some Tibeto-Burman speakers who live closely in and around the Brahmaputra valley, such as the Mising people and Karbi people, are not considered Bodo–Kachari. Many of these peoples have formed early states in the late Medieval era of Indian history (Chutia Kingdom, Dimasa Kingdom, Koch dynasty, Twipra Kingdom) and came under varying degrees of Sanskritisation.

The speakers of Tibeto–Burman are considered to have reached the Brahmaputra valley via Tibet and settled in the foothills of the eastern Himalayan range which includes the whole of Assam, Tripura, North Bengal and parts of Bangladesh.

The belief that Bodo–Kacharis were early settlers of the river valleys is taken from the fact that most of the rivers in the Brahmaputra valley in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh today carry Tibeto–Burman names of Kachari origin—Dibang, Dihang, Dikhou, Dihing, Doiyang, Doigrung etc.—where Di/Doi- means water in Boro-Garo languages, and many of these names end in -ong, which is water in Austroasiatic. The Kacharis were the first people to rear silkworms and produce silk material and were considered to be associated with ahu rice culture in Assam before the advent of sali (transplanted rice) was introduced from the Gangetic plains.

These peoples aren't culturally uniform. Bodo, Deori, Tripuri and Reang follow patrilineal descent, Garo, Rabha and Koch follow Matrilineal descent, Dimasa follows both bilateral descent, and Tiwa follows ambilineal descent. Some of the groups, such as Moran and Saraniya consider themselves as Hindus under Ekasarana Dharma.