Bania (caste)

This article is about the community of India. For the Nepalese community, see Bania (Newar caste).
Bania
Languages
Hindi, Marwari, Punjabi, Gujarati, Sindhi, Dialects of Marathi.[1]

The Bania (otherwise known as Baniya, Vani and Vania) is an occupational community of merchants, bankers, money-lenders, dealers in grains or in spices, and in modern times numerous commercial enterprises.[2] The term is used in a wider sense in Bengal than it is elsewhere in India, where it is applied to specific castes.[3]

Etymology

A traditional Bania

Bania is derived from the Sanskrit word vaṇij or baṇij, which means merchant.[4] In western India the caste is called Vani or Vania. Although in Bengal the term is applied to all people who are involved in moneylending and similar activities, elsewhere in India it is used in the more limited sense of referring to specific castes.[3]

Modern communities

The bania community consist of several jāti or subcastes, notably the Agrahari,[5] Agrawals,[6] Barnwals, Gahois, Kasuadhans, Khandelwals, and Maheshwaris of the north; Oswals, Roniaurs, the Arya Vaishyas of Maharashtra, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Telangana,[7] the Vaishya Vanis of Konkan and Goa, and the Modh Baniyas of the west.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Gazetteer of the Union Territory Goa, Daman and Diu: district gazetter by Vithal Trimbak Gune, Goa, Daman and Diu (India). Gazetteer Dept, published by Gazetteer Dept., Govt. of the Union Territory of Goa, Daman and Diu, 1979
  2. ↑ "When will the Brahmin-Bania hegemony end?".
  3. 1 2 Schrader, Heiko (1997). Changing financial landscapes in India and Indonesia: sociological aspects of monetization and market integration. LIT Verlag Münster. p. 68. ISBN 978-3-8258-2641-3.
  4. ↑ Monier-Williams, Monier (1986). A Sanskrit-English dictionary etymologically and philologically arranged with special reference to cognate Indo-European languages (New ed., greatly enl. and improved. ed.). Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass. p. 915. ISBN 81-208-0065-6.
  5. ↑ Kumar Suresh Singh, Amir Hasan, Hasan, Baqr Raza Rizvi, J. C. Das (2005). People of India: Uttar Pradesh , Voume 42, Part (illustrated ed.). Anthropological Survey of India. p. 66. ISBN 978-81-73041-14-3.
  6. ↑ Bhanu, B. V.; Kulkarni, V. S. (2004). Singh, Kumar Suresh, ed. People of India: Maharashtra, Part One XXX. Mumbai: Popular Prakashan, for Anthropological Survey of India. p. 46. ISBN 81-7991-100-4. OCLC 58037479. Retrieved 2012-04-25.
  7. ↑ The New Wind: Changing Identities in South Asia - Google Books


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