What is the difference between arora and khatri

Namespaces Appendix Discussion. Views Read Edit History. Add links. Found in South-West Punjab near Multan. In Sindh, they have taken the identity of Amils under the section of Lohanas. The name is probably derived from the founder of the clan whose name was based on the Sanskrit word meaning "joy". Arora was used as a surname by Aroras who lived in areas with low Arora population especially in Potohar and East Afghanistan.

Others used their clan specific names. The surname was specifically used by Khatris, Aroras and Bhatias who were Arya-samajis and didnt want to bear a caste specific name. The name is based on the ancient kingdom "Bahlika", now known as Balkh which is located in Afghanistan. It translates to clothier. We know how hard it is to find free register matrimonial sites and there is no better portal like Match finder matrimony.

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According to Seth, this is when hierarchical ordering within the Khatris was created. They were followed by the Char- ghar, ghar and the Bunjai Seth There are many problems with this story. While the episode may well explain the isolation of the Sarins, it cannot explain the structure within the community in a satisfactory manner. As we have already seen, Dhai-ghar do not have an identity distinct from the Char-ghar, and ghar.

It is not clear why social leadership in the hands of the Char-ghar should lead to their refusing to marry their daughters into the Bunjai. Significantly, there does not appear to be any mention of the episode in the Sultanate chronicles of the time. One wonders whether it was an historical event at all. Kochhars: a case study.

It may be instructive to narrate the story of birth of a clan preserved as oral history by the clan itself. A girl was married into the Nanda family. The boy became the progenitor of a new clan, which was named Kochhar for the following reason. The little boy was carried by his sister on her side lap called kuchhad in Punjabi.

As part of the commemoration, Dadi svaad da poorha is cooked, as a homage to a holy man who fed the brother-sister duo on their foot journey. Since now the Nandas became the foster parents of the Kochhars, they would not intermarry. Notably, the Nandas do have an assigned Gotra as can be expected from an old clan, but Kochhar have none. Although the Kochhars do not carry any living memory of the original sub-caste of their progenitor, according to Rose II , he was a Seth. If this be true, it is a remarkable piece of information.

The Kochhar as also the Nanda now belong to the lower-ranking Bunjai while the Seth are from the Char-ghar. The creation of the Kochhar clan thus belongs to an era when a Seth girl could be married to a Nanda. Beri are said to be an off-shoot of Chopra Rose , although details are not known.

Their ancestors took shelter with a Vaishya friend while their purohits, the Sarasvat Brahmins, interceded on their behalf with Parshuram who in turn spared their life on the condition that they give up arms and take to trade Seth There is another version of the story. After exterminating the Kshatriyas, Parshuram came looking for pregnant women who had taken shelter with Sarasvat Brahmins.

The hosts declared the Kshatriya women to be their own daughters and as a proof thereof partook food cooked by the Khatri women Seth This legend is hard to accept at face value. Parshuram belonged to the Bhrigu clan and is said to have lived some 30 generations before Rama and 60 generations before Krishna.

According to the Puranas, the target of his wrath were not all Kshatriyas but a specific section called the Haihaya.

Surely there were Kshatriyas, including the Haihaya, in the post-Parshuram period See Pargiter for details. As far as the Khatri community is considered, if it had taken to trade that early , it is unimaginable that the Kshatriya label would have stuck to it.

This legend runs counter to the one cited above which makes the Sodhi and the Bedi direct descendents of Rama. It is very likely that the Parshuram legend is a back formation consistent with known Khatri attributes. They were accordingly dubbed Aroras and made to constitute a separate endogamous group. The legend must have been influential in its time because it succeeded in putting the Aroras on the back foot.

The sage was pleased to spare and bless him. The logic here seems to be rather convoluted. If Parshuram could spare Arur for telling the truth, why did he exterminate the others? No matter when and why the Khatri — Arora split occurred, it must have taken place in the upper Punjab where the Khatris lived.

Once the Aroras were refused matrimonial alliances by the Khatris, lower Punjab and Sind were probably added to the Arora fold through marriages. The legend, no matter how unhistorical, does convey the important information that the Aroras and Khatris are accepted as being ethnically the same people, and that they separated before structure developed among the Khatri caste.

I now propose a hypothesis to explain their origin. It would seem that the insistence of the Punjabi Khatris to flaunt their Kshatriya antecedents was a defensive act, whose purpose was to divert attention from an un-Kshatriya taint they carried, This taint , I would like to suggest , was an alliance with the settlers of Greek extraction.

It should be kept in mind that what have been called Indo-Greeks had already been Persianized. During the period BC, the Persians made repeated efforts to annex Greece. While they were thwarted in their attempts to capture the mainland, they were able to subjugate the Greek states in Asia Minor, including Ionia from which the Sanskrit term Yavana is believed to come.

One of the consequences of the intermittent Greco-Persian wars was the establishment of Greek settlements in the eastern parts of the Achaemenid empire that is in and to the north of the Hindu Kush region. There were two type of settlers. For some, Hindu Kush was a safe haven. They had earned the wrath of their compatriots by collaborating with the invaders and therefore had to be shifted out for their own safety.

For others, Hindu Kush was a Siberia. They had valiantly raised the banner of revolt against the invaders and were consequently deported. In course of time both these types of settlers married locally and partially de-Hellenized themselves.

When Alexander encountered them, he judged them by the actions of their ancestors. There were pockets of Greek influence in the Punjab plains as well. The love for beauty was carried to an extreme. His grandson Ashoka BC in his edicts refers to Yavana and Kamboja on his north-western frontier. Similarly, there are numerous literary references as well. He was the first one to introduce bilingual coinage with inscriptions in Greek and Kharoshthi.

After him the kingdom split into two warring parts with Jhelum as the dividing line. The most prominent later king was Menander c. His capital has been identified with Sialkot.

The Indo-Greek rule lingered on till about 50BC, when its last king Hermaeus was dethroned by the Pahlava who also came from the north-west. The Indo-Greeks were unable to expand into mid-India.

Dharma-sastras do not think much of the Greeks. Atreya Dharma- sastra , which is quoted by Manu-smrti, mentions Yavanas among non-Aryan tribes Kane : Manu-smrti classifies Yavanas as dasyus who speak mleccha language Kane : and forbids Brahmins to dwell in the kingdom of a sudra Kane : Gautama Dharma-sastra quotes the widely held view that the offspring of a Kshatriya male and a Sudra female was designated a Yavana Kane : Significantly the latter does not mention Yavanas Kane : It is recorded that a Damodara made the Yavanas of Mulsthana modern Multan give up cow slaughter Kane : It would thus seem that the Persianized Greeks, or Yavanas, were looked down upon for their mixed pedigree, for eating beef, and more generally for not subjecting themselves to the Brahminical discipline.

What happened to the Yavanas? It is noteworthy that while the name Kamboja survives as a Punjab caste group, there is no preservation of Yavana in any contemporary caste or ethnic group. I would like to suggest that the Yavanas were absorbed by the Punjabi Kshatriya clans through intermarriage.

Product of this alliance was the Khatri caste. Since the Yavanas had been dubbed outsiders or half-castes by the Dharma-sastras , the Khatris deliberately shoved their Greek connection under the carpet, tenaciously stuck to the Kshatriya label, and emphasized their ancient lineage.

I would like to further suggest that the Sood of Punjab hills are the same people. It is noteworthy that the Khatri could claim and obtain high-caste status because their claim was supported by the Sarasvat Brahmins. Since the dominant slot in the hills was already occupied by the Rajputs, Sood were pushed down the hierarchy. It is significant that both the terms Khatri and Sood are derived from the ancient Varna names Kshatriya and Shudra; they are probably two sides of the same coin.

It was stated in the Khatri claims for a high-caste status that their rituals are in accordance with Manusmriti. Going strictly by the book seems to be a deliberate attempt at Sanskritization.

It is noteworthy that Brahmins do not have much of a hold in Punjab unlike in the Madhyadesh, for example. The Khatri community is clan-driven rather than gotra-driven.