Rai People

Rai People

The Rais are one of the most ancient indigenous ethnolinguistic groups of Nepal. They were Raipa meaning king (Rai means King in old Khas kura). Once someone was recognized as a ruler, Hindus awarded them the title Rai. When the king Prithvi Narayan Shah couldn't defeat Khambu king, he somehow took them in confidence that the land is theirs forever and gave them the title Rai in around B.S. 1832 . The title of Rai instead khambu kirant people who used to live in wallo kirant and majh kirant for particular reason. The Rai are the Khambu (people living in Mud Hut). Then the post Rai was provided to the topmost leaders of the region.They were given the power to collect land tax.That's why sometimes Rai people are called jimmi or jimmi-wal. The Rai belong to the Kirati group or the Kirat confederation that includes Limbu, Sunuwar, Yakkha and Dhimal ethnic groups.

According to the anthropologist Dor Bahadur Bista of Tribhuvan University and late Professor Suniti Kumar Chatterji (linguist and kiratologist, Calcutta University), Kirats migrated from the east via north Burma and Assam along the mid-hills (lower mountains) with their pigs in ancient times. (ref.30,31). It specially refers to Limbu and Dhimal who called themselves Yakthumba or Yoktumba. According to Imansing Chemjong they migrated from the Assam valley to Pallo kirant in around 600 AD.

According to Chatterji and other prominent linguists, the Rai, Limbu, and Dhimal languages are pronominalised (Austric/Kol influence) strongly indicating earliest migratory wave of these peoples compared to other Tibeto-Burmans whose languages are non-pronominalised. (ref.31)

The traditional homeland of the Rai extends across Solukhumbu, Okhaldhunga (Wallo Kirat or Near Kirat), home of the Nachhiring, Bahing, Wambule, Dumi subgroups); Khotang, Bhojpur and the Udayapur Districts (Majh Kirat or Central Kirat), home of Bantawa, Chamling, in the northeastern hilly region of Nepal, west of the Arun River in the Sun Kosi River watershed. Rais are also found in significant numbers in the Indian state of Sikkim and in the northern West Bengal towns of Kalimpong and Darjeeling.