Origin of the Toreas and their Expansion to the Nilgiris District

The Torear or Toreas are a tribe of Karnata (present Karnataka) although many of them have been long settled in Erode, Coimbatore, Salem and Mysore Districts. Those found in the plains are said to have once been fisherman and palanquin bearers and are now engaged as cultivators, contractors, petty tradesman and police constables. Although it is that certain Toreas of this caste went to the Nilgiris. The Toreyar hence became his subjects and servants, when the chief of the Ummattur Wodea was driven out by his rival Wodea Raja of Mysore over the tract of Melekotte in the Nilgiri region in 1610 A.D. The principal reason of it was the religious dominance between the two sects of Hinduism-Saivite and Vaishnavite, which created the state-wide disorder. When the Lingayat Wodear was emigrating over the Tamil soil, in several waves the Torear also followed them. So that Torear erected their hamlets near the nucleus villages of the Badugar to serve for their needs of their new masters. Because the Badugar was indigenous people of the Nilgiris District. The Toreas had no antique history in the region of the Nilgiris before 1610 A.D. So that today’s practical reason for writing the work of the Toreas is comprehensively obvious and cogent. This research is to have and preserve a real history of the Toreas. This paper will serve its purpose to take an extensive view of the formidable but fascinating flux of the affairs of the Torear community.