A History of Assam c7.s1.25

c7.s1.25

The same was doubtless the case in the Surma valley, which must once have been dominated by Bodo tribes, allied to the Tipperas on the south and the Gāros and Koches on the north. At the present day, there are very few traces of a recent aboriginal element, but this is due largely to the absorbent power of Hinduism: as lately as 1835 Pemberton found that members of the Jaintia royal family were able in course of time to gain admission to the Kāyasth and Baidya castes, and if these castes opened their portals to aborigines of high social position, other less exalted communities doubtless did the same to those of a humbler status.