Khatri () is a caste originating from the Malwa and Majha areas of Punjab region of the Indian Subcontinent that is predominantly found in India, and in small numbers in Pakistan. The Khatris claim they are warriors who took to trade. They were the dominant commercial and financial administration class of late-medieval India. while others were engaged in artisanal occupations such as silk production and weaving.
The Khatris of Punjab, specifically, were scribes and traders during the medieval period, with the Gurumukhi script used in writing the Punjabi language deriving from a standardised form of the Lāṇḍa script used by Khatri traders; the invention of the script is traditionally ascribed to Guru Angad. During the medieval period, with the rise of Persian as an elite vernacular due to Islamic rule, some of the traditional high status upper-caste literate elite such as the Khatris, Kashmiri Brahmins and Kayasthas took readily to learning Persian from the times of Sikandar Lodi onwards and found ready employment in the Imperial Services, specifically in the departments of accountancy (siyaq), draftsmanship (insha) and offices of the revenue minister (diwan). Others such as Mokham Chand commanded the Sikh Army against the Durrani Empire at Attock while those such as Sawan Mal Chopra ruled Multan after wrestling it from the Afghans.
During the British colonial era, they also served as lawyers and engaged in administrative jobs in the colonial bureaucracy. Some of them served in the British Indian army after being raised as Sikhs. Hindu Afghans and Sikh Afghans are predominantly of Khatri and Arora origin.
Khatris have played an active role in the Indian Armed Forces since 1947, with many heading it as the Chief of Army or Admiral of the Navy. Some such as Vikram Batra and Arun Khetarpal have won India's highest wartime gallantry award, the Param Vir Chakra.
Etymology
Historians, including W. H. McLeod and Louis Fenech, Peter Hardy, and A. R. Desai agree that the Punjabi term Khattrī has its origin in the Sanskrit Kṣatriya, not particularly surprising as Punjabi evolved from Sanskrit through intermediate stages of Prakrit and Apabhraṃśa, making it a descendant of the Sanskrit lineage. The Shabda-Sāgara, a Sanskrit-English lexicon, also supports this etymology, stating “the word Khattrī - used for the caste of Hindus from Punjab - derives from the Sanskrit Kṣatriya, with the female member being a Khatrānī (Skt. Kṣatrāṇī).”
Dr. Dharamvir Bharati comments that in Punjabi language, Kṣatriya is pronounced as Khattrī. As per Dr. GS Mansukhani and RC Dogra, "Khatri appears to be unquestionably a Prakritised form of Sanskrit word Kshatriya." According to philologist Ralph Lilley Turner, in his etymological Dictionary of the Indo-Aryan Lexicon, it is the Punjabi word "khattrī", meaning "warrior", derived from Sanskrit "kṣatriya", whereas another Gujarati word "khātrī", meaning "a caste of Hindu weavers", derives from Sanskrit "kṣattr̥", meaning "carver, distributor, attendant, doorkeeper, charioteer, son of a female slave".
John Stratton Hawley and Mann clarify the word "Khatri" derives from the Sanskrit "Kshatriya", in Punjab's context Khatri refers to a "cluster of merchant castes including Bedis, Bhallas and Sodhis". Purnima Dhavan sees the claim as originating from a conflation of the phonetically similar words khatri and kshatriya, but refers to Khatris as a "trading caste" of the Sikh Gurus.
Early history
According to S. Srikanta Sastri, Greek historians have mentioned Alexander faced stiff resistance from an Indian army of "Kathiyo" warriors. Sastri further says "even in present day modern-India, a group of martial caste members called Khati (Khatri) exist in North-India". Michael Witzel, writing in his paper "Sanskritization of the Kuru State" states the Kathaiois were Kaṭha Brahmins.
Medieval history
Emperor Jahangir in his autobiography Jahangirnama while talking about the castes observed "The second highest caste (after Brahmins in the caste system) is the Chhatri which is also known as Khattri. The Chhatri caste's purpose is to protect the oppressed from the aggression of the oppressors".
Punjab
Historian Muzaffar Alam describes the Khatris of Punjab as a "scribe and trading caste". They occupied positions in revenue collection and record keeping and learnt Persian during Mughal era. However, this profession often created conflicts with the Brahmin scribes who discontinued the use of Persian and started using Marathi in the Deccan districts of the Mughal Empire. Because the Khatris were not only scribes but also merchants and traders, by the 1700s (but likely earlier) they dominated trade in Punjab, Afghanistan, and many parts of India. This complete domination by the eighteenth century has led some historians to hypothesize that the Khatris may have been present in Bengal before the Mughals arrived in 1576.
According to a 17th-century legend, Khatris continued their military service until the time of Aurangzeb, when their mass death during the emperor's Deccan Campaign caused him to order their widows to be remarried. The order was made out of sympathy for the widows but when the Khatri community leaders refused to obey it, Aurangzeb terminated their military service and said they should be shopkeepers and brokers. This legend is probably fanciful: McLane notes a more likely explanation for their revised position was that a Sikh rebellion against the Mughals in the early 1700s severely compromised the Khatri's ability to trade and forced them to take sides. Those who were primarily dependent on the Mughals went to significant lengths to assert that allegiance in the face of accusations they were in fact favouring "Jat Sikh followers of the rebel leader Banda". The outcome of their assertions - which included providing financial support to the Mughals and shaving their beards - was that the Khatris became still more important to the Mughal rulers as administrators at various levels, in particular because of their skills in financial management and their connections with bankers.
Kashmir
Sukh Jiwan Mal, a Dewan of Ahmad Shah Durrani, was a Khatri officer from Bhera. He liberated Kashmir from Afghan dominancy in 1754 and ratified his control over the valley by assuming his duties as a Raja. Mal was subsequently defeated in 1762 by Nur-ud-Din Bamzai, a general deputed by Durrani himself.
Benares
According to scholars, Khatri Hindus dominated the weaving industry in Benaras. When the first caravan of Muslim weavers arrived in Benaras, the Khatri, who were considered low-caste Hindus at the time, helped them. The Muslims had to depend on the Khatri weavers because the Muslims found it difficult to interact with the high-caste Hindus directly at the time. Since these new immigrant Muslims were cheap labour, the Khatris took over marketing and thus transited from weavers to traders over time. The Muslims, who learned the technique of weaving from them, soon came to be known as Chira-i-Baaf or 'fine cloth weavers'.
Bengal
right|thumb|225x225px|Mehtab Chand of Burdwan, c. 1860-65In Bengal, Burdwan Raj (1657–1955) was a Khatri dynasty, which gained a high social position for Khatris in the region resulting in the increased migration of Khatris from Punjab to Bengal. When Guru Tegh Bahadur visited Bengal in 1666, he was welcomed by the local Khatris, thereby supporting earlier waves of migration of Khatris to Bengal as well.
Gujarat
Historian Douglas E. Hanes states he Khatri weavers in Gujarat trace their ancestry to either Champaner (Panch Mahals District) or Hinglaj (Sindh) and the community genealogists believe the migration happened during the late sixteenth' century.
Suraiya Faroqhi, writes that in 1742 Gujarat, the Khatris had protested the immigration of Muslim weavers by refusing to deliver cloth to the East India Company. In another case Khatris taught weaving to Kunbis due to receiving excessive orders who soon became strong competitors to the Khatris,.much to their chagrin. In the mid-1770s, the Mughal governor granted the Kunbi rivals the rights to manufacture saris. This licence was later revoked in 1800 due to pressure from the British, after a deal was struck between the Khatris and the East India Company, in which the Khatris would weave only for the EIC until certain quotas were met.
The Gujarat Sultanate (1407–1523) was a medieval Muslim dynasty founded by Zafar Khan Muzaffar, a member of the Tank caste of Punjabi Khatris according to the contemporary historian Shiekh Sikander or Rajputs. He started as a menial but rose to the level of a noble in the Delhi Sultan's family and became the Governor of Gujrat. After Timur attacked Delhi, people fled to Gujarat and it became independent.
Trans-regional trading history
The Khatris, as a part of the diaspora community known as Multani or Shikarpuri, played an important role in India's trans-regional trade during the period, being described by Levi as among the "most important merchant communities of early modern India." Levi writes: "Stephen Dale locates Khatris in Astrakhan, Russia during the late 17th century and, in the 1830s, Elphinstone, was informed that Khatris were still highly involved in northwest India's trade and that they maintained communities throughout Afghanistan and as far away as Astrakhan". According to Kiran Datar, they often married Tatar local women in Astrakhan and the children from these marriages were known as Agrijan. As per Stephen Dale, the children born out of Indo-Turkic alliance were in sufficient number to form an Agrizhan suburb in the city.
Dale states most of the 10,000 (as estimated by Jean Chardin) Indian merchants and money-lenders in Isfahan (Iran) in 1670, belonged to the Khatri caste of Punjab and north-west India. In Iran's Bazaars, Khatris sold cloth and various items and also practised money-lending. Dale believes Khatris had possibly been travelling from Punjab via caravans since the era of Ziauddin Barani (around 1300 AD). Chardin specifically stereotyped and expressed disapproval of the money-lending techniques of the Khatri community. According to Dale, this racist criticism was ironic given Chardin's non-English background but adds it was Chardin's way of giving an "ethnic explanation" to the economic disparity between Iran and India at that time.
Afghanistan
According to historians Roger Ballard and Harjot Oberoi, Afghan Hindus and Sikhs descend from the members of the country's indigenous Khatri population who resisted the conversion from Buddhism to Islam between 9th and 13th centuries. Later, they aligned themselves to the teachings of Guru Nanak, himself a Khatri and converted to Sikhism. Hence, Khatris of Afghanistan are in no way of "Indian origin" but are components of the original population of the region. George Campbell says "I do not know the exact limits of Khatri occupation to the West, but certainly in all Eastern Afghanistan they seem to be just as much part of the community as they are in the Punjab. They find their way into Central Asia." Sardar Gulab Singh Khatri founded the Dallewallia Misl, an independent 18th century Sikh sovereign state in Ludhiana and Jalandhar district that would later on join Maharaja Ranjit Singh's kingdom. In the Sikh Empire, Hari Singh Nalwa (1791–1837) an Uppal Khatri from Gujranwala, became the Commander-in-chief of the Sikh Khalsa Army. He led the Sikh conquests of Kasur, Sialkot, Attock, Multan, Kashmir, Peshawar and Jamrud. He was responsible for expanding the frontier of Sikh Empire to beyond the Indus River, up to the mouth of the Khyber Pass. At the time of his death, the western boundary of the empire was Jamrud.
Dewan Mokham Chand (1750-1814) became one of the most distinguished leaders of the Khalsa Army. He was the commander in chief of armies in Battle of Attock which defeated Durrani Empire Wazir Fateh Khan and Dost Mohammad Khan. Other Khatris like Diwan Sawan Mal Chopra served as governors of Lahore and Multan, after helping conquer the region,
Purnima Dhawan described that together with Jat community, the Khatris gained considerably from the expansion of the Mughal empire, although both groups supported Guru Hargobind in his campaign for Sikh self-government in the Punjab plains.
In the 1830s, Khatris were working as governors in districts like Bardhaman, Lahore, Multan, Peshawar and Hazara, but independently from Mughal rule.
British colonial era
Punjab
In Punjab, they were moneylenders, shopkeepers and grain-dealers among other professions. In Hyderabad, around the mid-20th century, Khatris and Padmasalis were the leading "Hindu weaving castes" who owned 43% of the looms. The Khatris specialised in silk, while the Padmasalis in cotton weaving.
Rajasthan
In the early 19th century, the Khatris, Bhatias and Lohanas were the main trading castes in Rajasthan, Delhi, Agra, Sind and Punjab. Banking, trading and business were considered "traditional occupations of the Khatri in Rajasthan".
Post independence
Harish Damodaran says the rise of Khatri industrialists in post-1947 India was a consequence initially of the cataclysmic Partition, which pushed them in droves towards Delhi and its neighbourhoods. This exodus opened new opportunities for them. A combination of enterprise, articulation, and strategic closeness to the national capital— which, in itself, was becoming a major growth hub - created conditions for Khatri capital to flourish in the post-Partition period.
Damodaran adds the land Khatris originally belonged to had very little industry and rail infrastructure until the 20th century and hence were not comparable to merchant groups like the Banias in terms of scale and spread of operation. Before independence they were only regional players and their rise in phenomenal proportions was a post-independence feature. Since then, they have produced leading entities in fields of pharmaceuticals, two-wheelers, tractors, paper, tyre-making and hotels with the groups of Ranbaxy, Hero, Mahindra, Ballarpur Industries, Apollo Tyres and Oberoi respectively. They have also co-founded companies like Snapdeal, Hotmail, YesBank, IndiaToday, AajTak, IndiGo Airlines, Sun Microsystems, Max Group etc.
Delhi NCR
Delhi's population increased by 1.1 million in the period 1941–1951. This growth of 106% largely resulted from the influx of Partition migrants among other reasons. These were members of the Hindu and Sikh Khatri/Arora castes of the West Punjab. Many moved to the city for better economic opportunities.
Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh
The Khatris of Kashmir, also known as "Bohras", were traders and had the second largest Hindu population after the Pandits. Many of these Khatris had to face the brunt of 1990 Kashmiri Hindu Exodus. The Khatris of Himachal Pradesh are the numerically most important commercial classes and are mostly concentrated in Mandi, Kangra and Chamba.
Maharashtra
Anthropologist Irawati Karve, based on the post-Independence research of castes in Konkan, Maharashtra, classified Marathi Khatris as one of the "professional/advanced castes" as they were doctors, engineers, clerks, lawyers, teachers, etc. during independence. She states their traditional professions was silk weaving and working as merchants although they had entered other professions later.
Demographics
Before partition
The French traveller Jean de Thévenot visited India during the 1600s where he commented "At Multan, there is another sort of gentiles whom they call Catry, the town is properly their country and from thence they spread all over the Indies." According to Dr. Madhu Tyagi, Thevenot is referring to the Hindu Khatri caste here.
The last caste-based census was conducted by the British in 1931 which regarded Khatri and Arora as a different caste. During 1931, Khatris were prominent in the West Punjab and North-Western Frontier Province (NWFP), which is now known as Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK). The Khatris spoke Hindko and Potohari language. The highest concentration of Khatris (excluding Aroras) was in the Potohar regions of Jhelum and Rawalpindi.
Arora-Khatris were centered in the Multan and Derajat regions of Punjab and NWFP. In the NWFP, the Aroras which are considered a sub-caste of Khatris by some scholars and were concentrated in the districts of Bannu, Kohat and Dera Ismail Khan. The Aroras spoke the Jatki language which is the 9th century version of Saraiki according to Ibbetson.
They were also found in Afghanistan at a population of 300,000 in 1880. According to an 1800s colonial source referred by Shah Hanifi, "Hindki is the name given to Hindus who live in Afghanistan. They are Hindus of Khatri class and are found all over Afghanistan even amongst the wildest tribes. They are wholly occupied in trade and form numerous portion of the population of all the cities and towns, and are also to be found in the majority of large villages."thumb|207x207px|Photograph of a Hindu Khatri man of [[Lahore c. 1859-1869]] thumb|[[Sikhs|Sikh of Sodhi clan, Lahore.|171x171px]] thumb|310x310px|Map depicting the most numerous community by district according to Census of India 1931.
{| class="wikitable sortable"
|+Population Concentration of Khatris & Aroras by region (Note: The numbers are expected to be more since many Hindus boycotted the Census)
|-
|Attock dist.
|Punjab (West)
|09.90%
|07.32%
|02.58%
|1901
|
|-
|Bahawalpur dist.
|Punjab (West)
|07.36%
|00.50%
|06.86%
|1931
|
|-
|Balochistan
|Balochistan
|01.93%
|00.03%
|01.90%
|1931
|
|-
|Bannu dist.
|KPK
|07.83%
|00.50%
|07.30%
|1921
|
|-
|DG Khan dist.
|Punjab (West)
|10.01%
|00.79%
|09.22%
|1891
|
|-
|DI Khan dist.
|KPK
|09.86%
|00.72%
|09.14%
|1901
|
|-
|Jammu Province
|Jammu-Kashmir
|03.01%
|03.01%
|00.00%
|1901
|
|-
|Kangra district
|Himachal Pradesh
|00.87%
|00.85%
|00.02%
|1931
|
|-
|Lahore district
|Punjab (West)
|08.01%
|05.10%
|02.91%
|1931
|
|-
|Shahpur district
|Punjab (West)
|11.08%
|03.02%
|08.06%
|1901
|
|}
After partition
Apart from Punjab, Khatris arrived in Delhi and Haryana among other regions after the partition where they make up 9% and 8.0% of the population respectively.
Clan organisation
Historically, Khatris were divided into various hierarchal endogamous sections. This includes urhai/dhai ghar, char ghar, barah ghar/bahri and bunjayee or bavanjah ghar which translated to House of 2.5, 4, 12 and 52 respectively. They formed the majority of Khatris and were deemed superior. This was followed by Sareen Khatris who formed a minority. Another sub-group of Khatris include Khukhrain which had split up from the bunjayees.
{| class="wikitable"
!Group
!Clan names
|-
|House of 2.5
|Kapoor, Khanna and Mehra/Malhotra
|-
|House of 4
|Including the above 3, Seth (also known as Kakar) is also added which forms this unit
|-
|House of 12
|Including the above 4, Chopra, Dhawan, Mahindru/Mohindra, Mehrotra, Sehgal, Talwar, Tandon, Vohra and Wadhawan is added
|-
|Aroras However, most scholars do not agree with the Khatris' claims to Kshatriya varna. They consider castes in north India, like Khatri and Kayastha to be merchant castes who claimed higher status based on the educational and economic progress they made in the past.
According to Yang, the Khatris in the Saran district of Bihar, were included in the list of "Bania" along with Agarwals and Rastogis of the Vaishya Varna. According to Yang, their position in the Varna system should be "just below" the twice-born varnas. Jacob Copeman writes "Agarwal, Khatri, and Bania usually denote people of merchant-trader background of middling clean-caste status, often of Vaishya varna". many others do not. According to some historians, even though they participated in mercantile or other occupationally diverse professions such as Agriculture, they were originally Kshatriyas.
The Saraswat Brahmins are the purohits of Khatris and accept gifts only from them. Jürgen Schaflechner cites the historian Rowe who states such Saraswat Brahmins who were considered a low caste, formed a symbiotic relationship with Vaishya castes such as Khatris, Lohanas, etc. who were trying to raise their varna status - which in turn would benefit the Saraswats as well. For this purpose, certain religious texts were written during the British Raj era.
Susan Bayly states the Khatris had scribal traditions and despite this Khatri caste organisations in the British Raj era tried to portray their caste as Kshatriyas. Similar caste glorifying ideas were written by the historian Puri who describes Khatris as "one of the most acute, energetic, and remarkable race [sic] in India", "pure descendants of the old Vedic Kshatriyas" and "true representatives of the Aryan nobility". Puri also tried to show the Khatris as higher than the Rajputs whose blood he considered "impure", mixed with ‘inferior’ Kolis or ‘aborigines’. Hardip Singh Syan says Khatris considered themselves to be of pure Vedic descent and thus superior to the Rajputs, who like them claim the Kshatriya status of the Hindu varna system.