Thug Behram ( – 1840), also known as Buhram Jamedar and the King of the Thugs, was a leader of the

Thuggee Thuggee (, ) was a network of organized crime in British Raj India in the 19th century of gangs that traversed the Indian subcontinent murdering and robbing people.Awadh Awadh (), known in British Raj historical texts as Avadh or Oudh, is a historical region in northern India and southern Nepal, now constituting the North-central portion of Uttar Pradesh. It is roughly synonymous with the ancient Kosala Regio ...

in central

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

during the late 18th and early 19th century, and is often cited as one of the world's most prolific

serial killers A serial killer (also called a serial murderer) is a person who murders three or more people,An offender can be anyone: * * * * * (This source only requires two people) with the killings taking place over a significant period of time in separat ...

. He may have been involved in up to 931 murders by strangulation between 1790 and 1840 performed with a ceremonial

rumāl A rumāl (Punjabi language, Punjabi: ਰੁਮਾਲ) is a piece of clothing similar to a handkerchief or bandana. It is worn by men who cut their hair and other guests when they are in a gurdwara. Covering the head is respectful in Sikhism and ...

, a handkerchief-like cloth used by his cult as a

garrote A garrote ( ; alternatively spelled as garotte and similar variants)''Oxford English Dictionary'', 11th Ed: garrotte is normal British English spelling, with single r alternate. Article title is US English spelling variant. or garrote vil () is ...

. Only 125 were confirmed.

Biography

While Behram is sometimes suspected of having committed 931 murders, James Paton, an

East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company that was founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to Indian Ocean trade, trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (South A ...

officer working for the Thuggee and Dacoity Office in the 1830s who wrote a manuscript on

Thuggee Thuggee (, ) was a network of organized crime in British Raj India in the 19th century of gangs that traversed the Indian subcontinent murdering and robbing people.Hindi Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...

word 'thag' (ठग). The thugs were covert members of a group, and the term 'Thugee' typically referred to an act of deceitful and organised robbery and murder. Buhram used his

cummerbund A cummerbund is a broad waist sash, usually pleated, which is often worn with single-breasted dinner jackets (or ''tuxedos''). The cummerbund was adopted by British military officers in colonial India, where they saw it worn by sepoys (Indian so ...

or ''

'', with a large medallion sewn into it, as a

to execute his killing. He could cast the ''rumal'' to cause the medallion to land at the

adam's apple The Adam's apple is the protrusion in the neck formed by the angle of the thyroid cartilage surrounding the larynx, typically visible in men, less frequently in women. The prominence of the Adam's apple increases in some men as a secondary mal ...

of his victims, adding pressure to the throat when he strangled them.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Behram, Thug Year of birth uncertain 1760s births 1840 deaths Criminals from Uttar Pradesh Executed gangsters Executed Indian serial killers Indian bandits Indian gangsters Indian people convicted of murder People executed by British India by hanging People from Jabalpur

Biography

See also

References