Banjara

The Banjara are a nomadic ethnic group of India. They may have origins in the Mewar region of what is now the Rajasthan state of India. The Gor usually refer to themselves as Banjaras and outsiders as Kor but this usage does not extend outside their own community. A related usage is Gor Mati or Gormati, meaning Own People. Motiraj Rathod believes that the community became known as banjara from around the fourteenth century AD and but previously had some association with the Laman, who claim a 3000-year history. Irfan Habib believes the origin of banjara lies in the Sanskrit word variously rendered as vanij, vanik and banik, as does the name of the Bania caste, which historically was India's "pre-eminent" trading community. However, According to B. G. Halbar, the word Banjara is derived from the Sanskrit word vana chara. Despite the community adopting a multitude of languages, Banjara is used throughout India, although in Karnataka the name is altered to Banijagaru. A survey conducted in 1968 by the All India Banjara Seva Sangh, a caste association, recorded 27 synonyms and 17 sub-groups. Recorded groups include Charan, Dharia, and Mathuria. The Banjara community not having constitutional recognization as tribes community. As such the Gaur Banjara is one of the historic tribes ethnically identified by isolation, their own language, culture and traditions, festivals, cuisine, dance and music. This Banjara community significantly holds such an enigmatic culture and hospitality and contrasting patriarchal and matriarchal society. It is a bramhanical and Marwadi related culture and popular community in India, which is also known by different names in various parts of the country namely, ‘Gor, Gour Banjara, Laman, Lambani, Lambadi, Gour Rajput, Nayak, Baldiya, and Gouriya’. They are mainly distributed in Maharastra, Karnataka, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha and West Bengal States and living in all the other States except the North-Eastern States and Union Territories.