The Vanias provide an example of such castes. Traditionally, the Brahman division was supposed to provide the priests for the corresponding divisions. Usually, a single Koli division had different local names in different parts of Gujarat, but more about this later. Disclaimer 9. Some of the other such divisions were Kathi, Dubla, Rabari, Bharwad, Mer (see Trivedi 1961), Vaghri, Machhi, Senwa, Vanzara, and Kharwa. Hence as we go down the hierarchy we encounter more and more debates regarding the claims of particular lineages to being Rajput so much so that we lose sight of any boundary and the Rajput division merges imperceptibly into some other division. Frequently, the urban population of such a division performed more specialized functions than did the rural one. The understanding of changes in caste is not likely to be advanced by clubbing such diverse groups together under the rubric of ethnic group. Toori. This was unlike the situation among the Rajputs who did not make any attempt to form small endogamous units. rogers outage brampton today; levelland, tx obituaries. They were involved in agriculture in one way or another. To have a meaningful understanding of the system of caste divisions, there is no alternative but to understand the significance of each order of division and particularly the nature of their boundaries and maintenance mechanisms. www.opendialoguemediations.com. So in this way, the Maharashtra caste list is given to all cast Aarakshan belonging to the Scheduled Castes category for the state of MH. The earliest caste associations were formed in Bombay in the middle of the 19th century among migrants belonging to the primarily urban and upper castes from Gujarat, such as Vanias, Bhatias and Lohanas (see Dobbin 1972: 74-76, 121-30, 227f, 259-61). Kuntasi, Lothal and Somnath of Gujarat regions in Harrapan civilization were familiar with weaving and the spinning of cotton for as long as four thousand years ago. These divisions have, however, been kept out of the present analysis for reasons which have become well known to students of Hindu society since the 1950s. Marriages were usually confined to neighbouring villages, so that marriage links were spread in a continuous manner from one end of the region to another. Today, there are two kinds of Koli areas. Our analysis of caste in towns has shown how it differed significantly from that in villages. I have bits and pieces of information about relations between a considerable numbers of other lower-order divisions in their respective higher-order divisions. Hypergamy was accompanied by sanskritization of at least a section of the tribal population, their claim to the Kshatriya Varna and their economic and political symbiosis with the caste population. Usually it consisted of wealthy and powerful lineages, distinguishing themselves by some appellation, such as Patidar among the Leva Kanbi, Desai among the Anavil, and Baj among the Khedawal. While some hypergamous and hierarchical tendency, however weak, did exist between tads within an ekda and between ekdas within a second- order division, it was practically non-existent among the forty or so second-order divisions, such as Modh, Porwad, Shrimali, Khadayata and so on, among the Vanias. The village was a small community divided into a relatively small number of castes; the population of each caste was also small, sometimes only one or two households, with little possibility of existence of subdivisions; and there were intensive relationships of various kinds between the castes. It has already been mentioned that every first-order division was not divided into second-order divisions, and that every second-order division was not divided into third-order divisions, and so on. To give just one example, one large street in Baroda, of immigrant Kanbis from the Ahmedabad area, named Ahmedabadi Pol, was divided into two small parallel streets. And how flexibility was normal at the lowest level has just been shown. A first-order division could be further divided into two or more second-order divisions. Limitations of the holistic view of caste, based as it is mainly on the study of the village, should be realized in the light of urban experience. It has been pointed out earlier that an emphasis on the principle of division existed in the caste system in urban centres in traditional India. The complex was provided a certain coherence and integrityin the pre- industrial time of slow communicationby a number of oral and literate traditions cultivated by cultural specialists such as priests, bards, genealogists and mythographers (see in this connection Shah and Shroff 1958). Here, usually, what mattered was the first-order division, as for example Brahman, Vania, Rajput, Kanbi, carpenter, barber, leather-worker, and so on. The tad thus represented the fourth and last order of caste divisions. The Rajputs, in association with Kolis, Bhils, and such other castes and tribes, provide an extreme example of such castes. Copyright 10. Although I have not, during my limited field work, come across hypergamous marriages between Rajputs and Bhils, ethnographic reports and other literature frequently refer to such marriages (see, for example, Naik 1956: 18f; Nath I960. The hypergamous tendency was never as sharp, pervasive and regular among the Vania divisions as among the Rajputs, Leva Kanbis, Anavils and Khedawals. Both were recognized as Brahman but as degraded ones. What may be called the census approach influenced a great deal of scholarly work. The tribal groups in the highland area, such as the Bhils and Naikdas, also did not have any urban component. The larger castes and even larger subdivisions among them used to have their houses segregated on their own streets (called pol, sheri, khadki, vad, khancho). In addition, they carried on overland trade with many towns in central and north India. The most important of them was the Koli division, which was, the largest division and mainly included small landholders, tenants and labourers. One of the clearly visible changes in caste in Gujarat is the increasing number of inter-divisional or so-called inter-caste marriages, particularly in urban areas, in contravention of the rule of caste endogamy. Moreover, a single division belonging to any one of the orders may have more than one association, and an association may be uni-purpose or multi-purpose. In the city, on the other hand, the population was divided into a large number of castes and each of most of them had a large population, frequently subdivided up to the third or the fourth order. No sooner had the village studies begun that their limitations and the need for studying caste in its horizontal dimension were realized. The existence of ekdas or gols, however, does not mean that the divisiveness of caste ended there or that the ekdas and gols were always the definitive units of endogamy. In 1931, their total population was more than 1,700,000, nearly one-fourth of the total population of Gujarat. The bulk of the population was spread all over the villages as small landholders, tenants and labourers. While certain first-order divisions were found mainly in towns, the population of certain other first-order divisions was dispersed in villages as well as in towns, the population of the rural and the urban sections differing from one division to another. Most inter-divisional marriages take place between boys and girls belonging to the lowest order in the structure of divisions. There was another kind of ambiguity about the Brahman status or two other divisionsKayatia and Tapodhan. endobj : 11-15, 57-75). endobj manvar surname caste in gujarat. In the past the dispersal over a wide area of population of an ekda or tad was uncommon; only modern communications have made residential dispersal as well as functional integration possible. There are thus a few excellent studies of castes as horizontal units. Jun 12, 2022 . The Kanbis (now called Patidars) had five divisions: Leva, Kadya, Anjana, Bhakta, and Matia. Pages in category "Social groups of Gujarat" The following 157 pages are in this category, out of 157 total. % In India Limbachiya is most frequent in: Maharashtra, where 70 percent reside, Gujarat . Patidars or Patels claim themselves to be descendants of Lord Ram. Even the archaeological surveys and studies have indicated that the people of Dholavira, Surkotada. Leva Sheri and Kadva Sheri, named after the two major second-order divisions among the Kanbis. endobj The Kolis seem to have had only two divisions in every part of Gujarat: for example, Talapada (indigenous) and Pardeshi (foreign) in central Gujarat and Palia and Baria in eastern Gujarat (significantly, one considered indigenous and the other outsider). Frequently, social divisions were neatly expressed in street names. Even if we assume, for a moment, that the basic nature of a structure or institution was the same, we need to know its urban form or variant. The Hindu and Muslim kingdoms in Gujarat during the medieval period had, of course, their capital towns, at first Patan and then Ahmedabad. In no other nation has something as basic as one's clothing or an act as simple as spinning cotton become so intertwined with a national movement. The census reports provide such figures until 1931, but it is well known that these pose many problems for sociological analysis, most of which arise out of the nature of castes as horizontal units. I will not discuss the present situation in detail but indicate briefly how the above discussion could be useful for understanding a few important changes in modern times. In the case of some of them the small population was so dispersed that a division such as that of barbers, blacksmiths, or carpenters, would be represented by only one or two households in each village and by a significant number of households in towns. It is easy to understand that the pattern of change would be different in those first-order divisions (such as Rajput) or second-order divisions (such as Leva Kanbi) which did not have within them subdivisions of lower orders and which practised hypergamy extensively. That there was room for flexibility and that the rule of caste endogamy could be violated at the highest level among the Rajputs was pointed out earlier. For example, among almost every Vania division there was a dual division into Visa and Dasa: Visa Nagar and Dasa Nagar, Visa Lad and Dasa Lad, Visa Modh and Dasa Modh, Visa Khadayata and Dasa Khadayata, and so on. Till the establishment of democratic polity in 1947, hardly any caste association in Gujarat had manifest political functions. Any one small caste may look insignificant in itself but all small castes put together become a large social block and a significant social phenomenon. The degree of contravention involved in an inter-divisional marriage, however, depends upon the order (i.e., first-order, second-order, etc.) Nor do I claim to know the whole of Gujarat. Prohibited Content 3. These marriage links do not seem to have allowed, among the Kolis, formation of well organized, small, endogamous units (ekadas, gols) as were found among some other castes. In any case, castes are not likely to cease to be castes in the consciousness of people in the foreseeable future. Marco Polo a Venetian merchant on his visit to India in 13th century Gujarat observed that "brocading art of Gujarat weavers is par excellent". There was also a tendency among bachelors past marriageable age to establish liaisons with lower-caste women, which usually led the couple to flee and settle down in a distant village. When the rural population began to be drawn towards the new opportunities, the first to take advantage of them were the rural sections of the rural-cum-urban castes. We shall return to this issue later. For describing the divisions of the remaining two orders, it would be necessary to go on adding the prefix sub but this would make the description extremely clumsy, if not meaningless. The humble Charkha (spinning wheel) and khadi became a dominant symbol of self-reliance, self-determination and nationalist pride. In the plains, therefore, every village had one or more towns in its vicinity. For example, just as there was a Shrimali division among Sonis (goldsmiths). Thus, finding any boundary between Rajputs and Kolis in the horizontal context was impossible, although there were sharp boundaries between the two in the narrow local context. Systematic study of small caste divisions in villages as well as in towns still awaits the attention of sociologists and anthropologists. The Mehta family name was found in the USA, and the UK between 1891 and 1920. I should hasten to add, however, that the open-minded scholar that he is, he does not rule out completely the possibility of separation existing as independent principle. The Rajputs in Radhvanaj, the village I have studied in central Gujarat, had no great difficulty in establishing their claim to being Rajputs: they owned substantial amounts of land under a traditional Rajput tenure, dominated village politics and possessed certain other traditional Rajput symbols. While the Rajputs, Leva Patidars, Anavils and Khedawals have been notorious for high dowries, and the Kolis have been looked down upon for their practice of bride price, the Vanias have been paying neither. Within each of these divisions, small endogamous units (ekdas, gols, bandhos) were organized from time to time to get relief from the difficulties inherent in hypergamy. The significant point, however, is that there were small endogamous units which were not, like ekdas and tads, part of any higher-order division. The most Mehta families were found in USA in 1920. The lowest stratum in all the three divisions had to face the problem of scarcity of brides. 4 0 obj Usually, the affairs of the caste were discussed in large congregations of some fifty to hundred or even more villages from time to time. Srinivas has called the unity of the village manifested in these interrelations the vertical unity of the village (1952: 31f. Caste associations have been formed on the lines of caste divisions. A large number of priestly, artisan and service castes also lived in both villages and towns: Bramhans, barbers, carpenters, blacksmiths, shoemakers, leather-workers, scavenges, water-carriers, palanquin-bearers, and so on. Far too many studies of changes in caste in modern India start with a general model of caste in traditional India which is in fact a model of caste in traditional rural India. The Kayatias main occupation was to perform a ritual on the eleventh day after death, during which they took away offerings made to ghosts: this was the main cause of their extremely low status among Brahmans. The institutions of both bride and bridegroom price (the latter also called dowry) were rampant in castes with continuous internal hierarchydowry mainly at the upper levels, bride price mainly at the lower levels, and both dowry and bride price among status-seeking middle level families. For example, the Patanwadia population was spread continuously from the Patan area to central Gujarat, and the Talapada population from central Gujarat to Pal. It owned corporate property, usually in the form of vadis (large buildings used for holding feasts and festivals, accommodating wedding guests, and holding meetings), huge utensils for cooking feasts, and money received as fees and fines. Nevertheless, a breakdown of the population of Gujarat into major religious, caste and tribal groups according to the census of 1931 is presented in the following table to give a rough idea of the size of at least some castes. Tirgaar, Tirbanda. Finally, while an increasing number of marriages are taking place even across the boundaries of first-order divisions, as for example, between Brahmans and Vanias, and between Vanias and Patidars, such marriages even now form an extremely small proportion of the total number of marriages. While we do get evidence of fission of caste divisions of a higher order into two or more divisions of a lower order, the mere existence of divisions of a lower order should not be taken as evidence of fission in a division of a higher order. Since Vankars were involved in production and business they were known as Nana Mahajans or small merchants. 1 0 obj As Ghurye pointed out long ago, slow consolidation of the smaller castes into larger ones would lead to three or four large groups being solidly organized for pushing the interests of each even at the cost of the others. There were also a number of first-order divisions, mainly of artisans, craftsmen and specialized servants, with small populations. Because of these two major factors, one economic and the other political, Gujarat at the beginning of the 19th century had a large urban population, distributed over a large number of small towns. A fundamental difficulty with these paradigms of change, as indicated by the above analysis, is that they are based on a partial conception of the systematic or structural whole in the past partially because it does not cover the urban situation and the complexity of horizontal units. stream Privacy Policy 8. This does not, however, help describe caste divisions adequately. The main aim of this paper is to discuss, on the basis of data derived mainly from Gujarat, these and other problems connected with the horizontal dimension of caste. The essential idea in the category was power, and anybody who wielded powereither as king or as dominant group in a rural (even tribal) areacould claim to be Rajput. They were found in almost every village in plains Gujarat and in many villages in Saurashtra and Kachchh. caste: [noun] one of the hereditary social classes in Hinduism that restrict the occupation of their members and their association with the members of other castes. This does not solve the problem if there are four orders of divisions of the kind found in Gujarat. For example, there were Khedawal Brahmans but not Khedawal Vanias, and Lad Vanias but no Lad Brahmans. In central Gujarat, at least from about the middle of the 18th century, the population of the wealthy and powerful Patidar section of the Kanbis also lived in townsan extremely interesting development of rich villages into towns, which I will not describe here. The four major woven fabrics produced by these communities are cotton, silk, khadi and linen. The main point is that we do not completely lose sight of the lowest boundary among these three hypergamous divisions as we do among the Rajputs. Ideally, castes as horizontal units should he discussed with the help of population figures. This was because political authorities were hierarchized from little kingdom to empire and the boundaries of political authorities kept changing. Among the first-order divisions with subdivisions going down to the fourth order, there are associations for divisions of all the orders. The unit might possess some other corporate characteristics also. In some parts of Gujarat they formed 30 to 35 per cent of the population. That the role of the two principles could vary at different levels within a first-order division has also been seen. I have done field work in two contiguous parts of Gujarat: central Gujarat (Kheda district and parts of Ahmedabad and Baroda districts) and eastern Gujarat (Panchmahals district). Let me illustrate briefly. They co-existed in the highlands with tribes such as the Bhils, so much so that today frequently many high caste Gujaratis confuse them with Bhils, as did the earlier ethnographers. Gujarati migrations to the nearby metropolis of Bombay the first new centre of administration, industry, commerce, education, and western culture, followed the same links. After the commercial revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries, Gujarat had a large number of tradition towns on its long sea-coast. There were about three hundred divisions of this order in the region as a whole. Reference to weaving and spinning materials is found in the Vedic Literature. As for the size of other castes, I shall make mainly relative statements. It is important to note that the more literate and learned Brahmans lived in towns, more particularly in capital and pilgrim towns, which were, indeed, the centres of higher Hindu culture and civilization. Unfortunately, although the Kolis are an important element in Gujarats population, their earlier ethnography is confusing, and there is hardly any modern, systematic, anthropological, sociological or historical study, so that the confusion continues to persist. In the second-order divisions of the Vanias the small endogamous units functioned more effectively and lasted longer: although the hypergamous tendency did exist particularly between the rural and the urban sections in a unit, it had restricted play. The method is to remove first the barriers of the divisions of the lowest order and then gradually those of one higher order after another. The latter continued to be the provincial capital during Mughal rule. He does not give importance to this possibility probably because, as he goes on to state, what is sought here is a universal formula, a rule without exceptions (ibid.). Most associations continue to retain their non-political character. In 1931, the Rajputs of all strata in Gujarat had together a population of about 35,000 forming nearly 5 per cent of the total population of Gujarat. I shall first provide an analysis of caste in the past roughly during the middle of the 19th century, and then deal with changes in the modern times. So far we have considered first-order divisions with large and widely spread populations. The handloom weavers of Gujarat, Maharastra and Bengal produced and exported some of the world's most desirable fabrics. As a consequence, the continuities of social institutions and the potentiality of endogenous elements for bringing about change are overlooked (for a discussion of some other difficulties with these paradigms, see Lynch 1977). While almost all the social structures and institutions which existed in villagesreligion, caste, family, and so onalso existed in towns, we should not assume that their character was the same. Besides the myths, the members of a second-order division, belonging to all ekdas, shared certain customs and institutions, including worship of a tutelary deity. Our analysis of the internal organization of caste divisions has shown considerable variation in the relative role of the principles of division and hierarchy. All the small towns sections in each of the ekdas resented that, while the large town section accepted brides from small towns, they did not reciprocate. 3 0 obj They had an internal hierarchy similar to that of the Leva Kanbis, with tax-farmers and big landlords at the top and small landowners at the bottom. Frequently, marriages were arranged in contravention of a particular rule after obtaining the permission of the council of leaders and paying a penalty in advance. To obtain a clear understanding of the second-order divisions with the Koli division, it is necessary first of all to find a way through the maze of their divisional names. The members of a kings caste were thus found not only in his own kingdom but in other kingdoms as well. The Hindu population of Gujarat was divided first of all into what I have called caste divisions of the first order. Jun 12, 2022. Weaving and cloth trading communities of Western India particularly of Gujarat are called Vankar/Wankar/Vaniya. The above brief analysis of change in caste in modern Gujarat has, I hope, indicated that an overall view of changes in caste in modern India should include a careful study of changes in rural as well as in urban areas in relation to their past. Typically, a village consists of the sections of various castes, ranging from those with just one household to those with over u hundred. Division and hierarchy have always been stressed as the two basic principles of the caste system.