Moran and Saraniya consider themselves as Hindus under Ekasarana Dharma. The Garo and the Koch peoples follow rules of matrilineal society. Etymologies Bodo The term Bodo finds its first mention in the book by Hodgson in 1847, to refer to the Mech and Kachari peoples."As (Hodgson) admits in the end, his way of seeing the "Bodos" is twofold: he starts by using "Bodo" to designate a wide range of people (“a numerous race”), then wonders if some others are not "Bodos in disguise". He ends on a cautionary note and refrains from unmasking the dubious tribes, registering only the Mechs and Kacharis,..." Grierson took this term Bodo to denote a section of the Assam-Burma group of the Tibeto-Burman languages of the Sino-Tibetan family, which included the languages of (1) Mech; (2) Rabha; (3) Lalung (Tiwa); (4) Dimasa (Hills Kachari); (5) Garo (6) Tiprasa and (7) Chutiya (Deuri). Subsequently Bodo emerged as an umbrella term both in anthropological and linguistic usage. This umbrella-group includes such sub-groups as Mech in Bengal and Nepal; Boros, Dimasa, Chutia, Sonowal, Moran, Rabha, Tiwa in Assam, and the Kokborok people in Tripura and Bangladesh."The term Bodo is also used to denote a large number of tribes-the Garos of Meghalaya, Tippera of Tripura, and Boro Kachari, Koch, Rabha, Lalung, Dimasa, Hajong, Chutia, Deuri, and Moran of Assam and other parts of the Northeast. (M N Brahma, "The Bodo-Kacharis of Assam---A brief Introduction" in Bulletin of the Tribal Research Institute [Gauhati], 1:1 [1983], p.52)" This is in contrast to popular and socio-political usage, where Bodo denotes the politically dominant sub-group—the Boros—in the Bodoland Territorial Region."The media at the regional and national level; officials at the Centre and the state political parties of all hues and the people, in general, have accepted what may be termed as a contraction of the original denotion." The term Bodo generally stands for man in some of the cognate languages (Boro:Boro; Tripuri:Borok) but not in others (Garo:Mande; Karbi:Arlen). According to historians, the word "Bodo" is derived from the Tibetan Hbrogpa. The umbrella name "Bodo", denoting the umbrella group, is resisted by numerically smaller groups such as the Dimasas. Unlike Hodgson's assumption, Boro is no longer considered as the "core" of the Boro–Garo languages. Therefore, it has been suggested that the whole group should not be called "Bodo".But recent developments make it imperative to redefine the term Bodo and its wider denotation deserves to