Bengali Hindu of the Kayastha caste
Ethnic group
Bengali Kayastha
(
Bengali
:
?????? ???????
) is a
Bengali Hindu
caste originated from the
Bengal region
of
Indian subcontinent
, and is one of the main subgroups of the
Kayastha
community. The historical caste occupation of Kayasthas throughout India has been that of scribes, administrators, ministers and record-keepers;
[1]
the Kayasthas in
Bengal
, along with
Brahmins
and
Baidyas
, are regarded among the three traditional higher castes
[2]
[3]
that comprise the "upper layer of Hindu society."
During the
British Raj
, the
Bhadraloks
of Bengal were drawn primarily, but not exclusively, from these three castes, who continue to maintain a collective hegemony in
West Bengal
.
[5]
[6]
[7]
History
The social and religious patterns of Bengal had historically been distinctively different from those in the orthodox Hindu heartland of North India and this impacted on how the
caste system
developed there. Bengal, being located east of the traditional
Aryavarta
(Aryan) region between the
Ganges
and
Yamuna
rivers, remained insulated from the full impact of
Brahminical orthodoxy
for many centuries. The influence of Buddhism remained strong there, continuing under the Buddhist rulers of the
Pala dynasty
from the eighth through the eleventh century CE.
During the
Gupta
period, Kayastha had not crystallised into a caste, and represented a professional group. Kayasthas frequently appear in the Gupta inscriptions mostly as professional writers or scribes.
The importance of the
lekhaka
or writer seems to have increased during the Gupta period; the term 'Kayastha' was a part of the Gupta administrative terminology. A number of inscriptions during this period mention the office of
Prathama-Kayastha
, meaning chief scribe in the administrative office, and represented "probably the Chief Secretary to the administrative Board".
[10]
[11]
According to
Tej Ram Sharma
, an Indian historian, the office of Kayastha in Bengal was instituted before the Gupta period (
c.
320
to 550 CE), although there is no reference to Kayastha as a caste at that time. He says that
The names of brahmanas occurring in our inscriptions sometimes end in a non-brahmanic cognomen such as Bhatta, Datta and Kunda, etc., which are available in the inscriptions of Bengal. Surnames like Datta, Dama, Palita, Pala, Kunda (Kundu), Dasa, Naga and Nandin are now confined to Kayasthas of Bengal but not to brahmanas. Noticing brahmanic names with a large number of modern Bengali Kayastha cognomens in several early epigraphs discovered in Bengal, some scholars have suggested that there is a considerable brahmana element in the present day Kayastha community of Bengal. Originally the professions of Kayastha (scribe) and Vaidya (physician) were not restricted and could be followed by people of different varnas including the brahmanas. So there is every probability that a number of brahmana families were mixed up with members of other varnas in forming the present Kayastha and Vaidya communities of Bengal.
Sharma also mentions that
D. R. Bhandarkar
"has pointed out that identical surnames are used by the
Nagara-brahmanas
".
Referring to
Naishadha Charita
and
Usanas-samhita smriti
, Rabindra Nath Chakraborty mentions that according to these two medieval texts, "the Kayasthas were descended from Nagara Brahmin who had a large settlement in Bengal in the eighth century AD".
[12]
According to
Andre Wink
, another historian, the caste is first referred to around the 5th?6th century CE, and may well have become so identified during the period of the
Sena dynasty
. Between that time and the 11th?12th century, this category of officials or scribes was composed of "putative"
Kshatriyas
and, "for the larger majority",
Brahmins
, who retained their caste identity or became
Buddhists
. As in
South India
,
Bengal
had lacked a clearly defined Kshatriya caste. The
Pala
,
Sena
,
Chandra
, and
Varman
dynasties and their descendants, who claimed the status of Kshatriya, "almost imperceptibly merged" with the Kayastha caste, "which also ranked as shudras". However,
Richard M. Eaton
opines that, after absorption of remnants of these dynasties, Kayastha became "the region's surrogate Kshatriya or warrior class".
Sekhar Bandyopadhyay also places their emergence as a caste after the Gupta period. In the eleventh century, Bengal was in the grip of
Brahminism
. The Kayastha evolved into a caste (from a professional group) in the 10th-11th century CE. Ancient scripts and inscriptions record a class of royal officials of writers or accountants, denoted as Karana or Kayastha.
[14]
[15]
Lexicographer Vaijayanti (11th century CE) appears to consider Kayastha and Karana as being synonymous and depicts them as scribes.
[15]
Two early scriptures of Bengal also note a caste group called Karana. Some scholars consider Karana and Kayastha castes as identical or equivalent.
[16]
[17]
[18]
Majumder claims that the Karana and Kayastha castes eventually fused to form a single caste in Bengal like other parts of India.
[15]
Referring to the linkages between class and caste in Bengal, Bandyopadhyay mentions that the Kayasthas along with the Brahmins and
Baidyas
, refrained from physical labour but controlled land, and as such represented "the three traditional higher castes of Bengal".
[3]
Eaton mentions that the Kayasthas continued as the "dominant landholding caste" even after the
Muslim conquests on the Indian subcontinent
, and absorbed the descendants of the region's old Hindu rulers.
In Bengal, between 1500 and 1850 CE, the Kayasthas were regarded as one of the highest Hindu castes in the region.
Varna status
The Hindu community in Bengal was divided into only two
varnas
: Brahmins and
Shudras
. Hence, although the Bengali Kayasthas and Baidyas had a high social status along with Brahmins, their ritual status was low, according to Edmund Leach, S. N. Mukherjee,
[20]
though it seems their ritual status is a subject of dispute as per other historians.
Colonial era
A survey of Indian writers and observers suggests that many of those acquainted with the Kayasthas considered them as
Dvija
or twice-born. Bellenoit gives the examples of
Rabindranath Tagore
and
Abdul Halim Sharar
to illustrate this point. According to Bellenoit, "although Tagore had Bengal specifically in mind, he argued that the Dutts, Ghoshs and Guhas were of Kshatriya origin, again citing their 'respectability and prominence in administration and overall rates of literacy'". Abdul Sharar, who was well acquainted with them also supported their claims of twice-born (Kshatriya and Vaishya origin) citing their high literacy rate which a Shudra caste could not have achieved. However, the claims of Bengali Kayasthas of having Dvija status was not supported by Indian observers like Jogendra Nath Bhattacharya who cited their rituals to refute their claims.
[21]
The Report of the 1931 census of Bengal noted that, the 'better-placed' Kayastha community claimed Kshatriya status.
[22]
Modern views
Some scholars note that "Hindu communities labelled 'Kayastha' are found all over northern India, but historically, their social ranking was not uniform. At different times and in different places, those labelled Kayastha were accorded the same status as Brahmins, Kshatriyas or Sudras, and there was even a claim that they formed a fifth
varna
within the Hindu caste structure".
[23]
Bengali Kayastha individuals are not uniformly from the northern region of India; however, they form a district genetic cluster.
[24]
Professor
Julius J. Lipner
mentions that the varna status of the Bengali Kayasthas is disputed, and says that while some authorities consider that they "do not belong to the twice-born orders, being placed high up among the Shudras; for other authorities they are on a level with Kshatriyas, and are accorded
twice-born
status."
[25]
According to
John Henry Hutton
, Kayastha is an important caste, which in Bengal "ranks next to Brahman"; the caste is now "commonly regarded as 'twice-born', and itself claims to be Kshatriya, though it was perhaps more often regarded as clean Sudra a hundred years ago".
[2]
Sanyal mentions that due to the lack of Vaishya and Kshatriya categories in Bengal, all non-Brahmin castes of Bengal, including the "higher castes" are considered as Shudras; the Bengali Kayasthas are considered among the three
uchchajatis
or higher castes as their social standing has been high.
[26]
Lloyd Rudolph
and
Susanne Rudolph
mention that
Ronald Inden
(an
anthropologist
), after spending part of 1964-'65 in Bengal, states in his dissertation on Kayasthas that inter-caste marriages are increasing among the urban educated "twice-born castes", Kayasthas, Brahmins, and Baidyas.
[27]
Subcastes
Kulin Kayastha and Maulika Kayastha
According to Inden, "many of the higher castes of India have historically been organised into ranked
clans
or lineages".
The Bengali Kayastha was organised into smaller
sub-castes
and even smaller ranked grades of clans (
kulas
) around 1500 CE.
The four major subcastes were
Daksina-radhi
,
Vangaja
,
Uttara-radhi
and
Varendra
. The
Daksina-radhi
and
Vangaja
subcastes were further divided into
Kulina
or Kulin ("high clan rank")
and
Maulika
or Maulik, the lower clan rank. The Maulika had four further "ranked grades". The
Uttara-radhi
and
Varendra
used the terms "Siddha", "Sadhya", "Kasta" and "Amulaja" to designate the grades in their subcastes.
Origin myths
Bellenoit states that the Bengali Kayasthas are "largely seen as an offshoot of the main
north Indian Kayasthas
, they claim lineage from migrations into Bengal from the ancient capital of Kanauj at the request of Hindu Kings (900s) to settle the countryside. These Kayasthas took on the well known names of Ghosh, Mitra and Dutt. Over time they fashioned themselves as a Gaur subdivision of a broader Kayastha group, who claimed north Indian origins".
[30]
Kulin Kayasthas
, a subcaste of Bengali Kayasthas have an associated myth of origin stating that five Kayasthas accompanied the Brahmins from
Kannauj
who had been invited to Bengal by the mythological king Adisur. Multiple versions of this legend exist, all considered by historians to be myth or
folklore
lacking historical authenticity.
According to Swarupa Gupta this legend was
... fitted into a quasi-historical, sociological narrative of Bengal and deployed to explain the realities of caste and sub-caste origins and connections during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.
According to this legend, the five original Kayastha clans are
Bose/Basu
,
Ghosh
,
Mitra
,
Guha
, and
Datta
,
[33]
the first four of whom became Kulin Kayasthas;
the legend talks about the migration of Brahmins with the five Kayasthas, from
Kannauj
to Bengal, forming a caste considered to be of high status.
[24]
A modern genetic study evaluating this myth found that "individuals belonging to some of the Kayastha lineages, whether termed Kulin or Moulik in later times, show genetic relatedness with present-day populations in Uttar Pradesh (Bose, Pal), while others show a significant genomic contribution from South India, or do not yield any informative signal on the basis of available Indian populations for comparisons (Nandi)."
[24]
Notable people
- Pratapaditya
, the king of Jessore who declared independence from Mughal rule in the early 17th century,
- Kirtinarayan Basu
, 17th-century Raja of Chandradwip who converted to Islam
- Sri Aurobindo
, Indian philosopher, yogi and nationalist.
[35]
- Nagendranath Basu
, historian and editor
[36]
- Jagadish Chandra Bose
, Indian scientist
[37]
- Subhas Chandra Bose
, popularly known as
Netaji
("Respected Leader")
[38]
- Nirad C. Chaudhuri
, Indian writer
[39]
- Debapratim Purkayastha
, Indian educator and best-selling author
[40]
[41]
- Satyendra Prasanna Sinha, 1st Baron Sinha
[42]
- Swami Vivekananda
(b. Narendranath Datta)
[43]
[44]
- Paramahansa Yogananda
, author of '
Autobiography of a Yogi
'.
[45]
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there being no Kshatriya or Vaishya element in the indigenous population of Bengal. Ritually, the rank of the Baidya and the Kayasthas is the same as those of the Nabasakhs with whom they constitute the upper strata of the Bengali Sudras known as satsudra [sat meaning clean]. They are also referred to as jalacharaniya Sudras because of their right to offer drinking water to the clean Brahmans who can minister to them without defilement. However, in the secular context the Baidyas and Kayasthas, who were mostly landholders and professionals, occupy a much higher rank than the nabhasakshs, who are mostly traders, manufacturers, and agriculturists. It is due to this reason that Brahmans, Baidyas, and Kayasthas are usually combined together and referred to as uchchajati, i.e. higher castes
- ^
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