[2] Tribes and Castes of Bengal, art. Beldār.
[3] The Castes and Tribes of Southern India, art. Odde.
[4] Akola District Gazetteer (Mr. C. Brown), pp. 132, 133.
[5] Amraoti District Gazetteer (Messrs. Nelson and Fitzgerald), p. 146.
Beria, Bedia.
[Bibliography: Sir H. Risley’s Tribes and Castes of Bengal; Rājendra Lāl Mitra in Memoirs, Anthropological Society of London, iii. p. 122; Mr. Crooke’s Tribes and Castes of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh; Mr. Kennedy’s Criminal Classes of the Bombay Presidency; Major Gunthorpe’s Criminal Tribes; Mr. Gayer’s Lectures on some Criminal Tribes of the Central Provinces; Colonel Sleeman’s Report on the Badhak or Bāgri Dacoits.]
1. Historical notice.
A caste of gipsies and thieves who are closely connected with the Sānsias. In 1891 they numbered 906 persons in the Central Provinces, distributed over the northern Districts; in 1901 they were not separately classified but were identified with the Nats. “They say that some generations ago two brothers resided in the Bhartpur territory, of whom one was named Sains Mūl and the other Mullanur. The descendants of Sains Mūl are the Sānsias and those of Mullanur the Berias or Kolhātis, who are vagrants and robbers by hereditary profession, living in tents or huts of matting, like Nats or other vagrant tribes, and having their women in common without any marriage ceremonies or ties whatsoever. Among themselves or their relatives the Sānsias or descendants of Sains Mūl, they are called Dholi or Kolhāti. The descendants of the brothers eat, drink and smoke together, and join in robberies, but never intermarry.” So Colonel Sleeman wrote in 1849, and other authorities agree on the close connection or identity of the Berias and Sānsias of Central India. The Kolhātis belong mainly to the Deccan and are apparently a branch of the Berias, named after the Kolhān or long pole with which they perform acrobatic feats. The Berias of Central India differ in many respects from those of Bengal. Here Sir H. Risley considers Beria to be ‘the generic name of a number of vagrant, gipsy-like groups’; and a full description of them has been given by Bābu Rājendra Lāl Mitra, who considers them to resemble the gipsies of Europe. “They are noted for a light, elastic, wiry make, very uncommon in the people of this country. In agility and hardness they stand unrivalled. The men are of a brownish colour, like the bulk of Bengalis, but never black. The women are of lighter complexion and generally well-formed; some of them have considerable claims to beauty, and for a race so rude and primitive in their habits as the Berias, there is a sharpness in the features of their women which we see in no other aboriginal race in India. Like the gipsies of Europe they are noted for the symmetry of their limbs; but their offensive habits, dirty clothing and filthy professions give them a repulsive appearance, which is heightened by the reputation they have of kidnapping children and frequenting burial-grounds and places of cremation.... Familiar with the use of bows and arrows and great adepts in laying snares and traps, they are seldom without large supplies of game and flesh of wild animals of all kinds. They keep the dried bodies of a variety of birds for medical purposes; mongoose, squirrels and flying-foxes they eat with avidity as articles of luxury. Spirituous liquors and intoxicating drugs are indulged in to a large extent, and chiefs of clans assume the title of Bhangi or drinkers of hemp (bhāng) as a mark of honour.... In lying, thieving and knavery the Beria is not a whit inferior to his brother gipsy of Europe. The Beria woman deals in charms for exorcising the devil and palmistry is her special vocation. She also carries with her a bundle of herbs and other real or pretended charms against sickness of body or mind; and she is much sought after by village maidens for the sake of the philtre with which she restores to them their estranged lovers; while she foretells the date when absent friends will return and the sex of unborn children. They practise cupping with buffalo horns, pretend to extract worms from decayed teeth and are commonly employed as tattooers. At home the Beria woman makes mats of palm-leaves, while her lord alone cooks.... Beria women are even more circumspect than European gipsies. If a wife does not return before the jackal’s cry is heard in the evening, she is subject to severe punishment. It is said that a faux pas among her own kindred is not considered reprehensible; but it is certain that no Berini has ever been known to be at fault with any one not of her own caste.” This last statement is not a little astonishing, inasmuch as in Central India and in Bundelkhand Berni is an equivalent term for a prostitute. A similar diversity of conjugal morality has been noticed between the Bāgris of northern India and the Vāghris of Gujarāt.[1]