Oraon people

Kurukh

ওঁরাও/ कुड़ुख
Kurukh woman dancers in Bangladesh on Indigenous People's Day, 2014
Regions with significant populations
India	3,639,932
Jharkhand	1,716,618
Chhattisgarh	748,739
West Bengal	643,510
Odisha	358,112
Bihar	144,472
Languages
Hindi • Kurukh
Religion
Hinduism (36%) • Christianity (30%) • Sarnaism (29%) • Other (5%)

Hinduism (36%) • Christianity (30%) • Sarnaism (29%) • Other (5%)

The Oraon ওঁরাও tribes उरांव or Kurukh कुड़ुख tribe (Kurukh: Oṛāōⁿ and Kuṛuḵẖ), also spelled Uraon, Oran, or Oram, are an Adivasi group inhabiting various states across central and eastern India, Rakhine State in Myanmar, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Bhutan. Traditionally, Oraons depended on the forest and farms for their ritual and economic livelihood, but in recent times, a few of them have become mainly settled agriculturalists. Small numbers of Oraons have migrated to the northeastern part of India, where they are mainly employed in tea estates. Population estimates are unreliable, but the total population is estimated to be around 3.5 to 4.5 million people.

According to the Indian Anthropological Society, Konkan is said to be the original home of the Kurukh tribes, from whence they migrated to Northern India. A Kurukh substratum is very prominent in the Konkani language.

The Kurukh or Oraons are the tribals of Chota Nagpur Plateau. "Oraon" is an exonym assigned by neighboring Austroasiatic peoples, meaning "to roam."

Kurukhar are divided into many totemistic clans. They live all throughout the Chota Nagpur Plateau in east-central India: in Raigarh, Surguja, and Jashpur districts of Chhattisgarh; Ranchi district of Jharkhand; Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal; Sundergarh district of Odisha, Bihar; Rakhine State in Myanmar, and Bangladesh. A sizable number of Oraon have migrated to the northeastern part of India, where they are mainly employed in tea estates of West Bengal, Assam, and Tripura.