Ahluwalia (caste)
Ahluwalia (also transliterated as Ahluvalia) is an Indian caste jatt native to the Punjab region.[1][2]
History[edit]
In the 18th century, the Sikh chief Jassa Singh Ahluwalia adopted the surname "Ahluwalia" after the name of his ancestral village. His descendants became the ruling dynasty of the Kapurthala State. In the late 19th century, others also adopted the Ahluwalia identity, as part of a Sanskritisation process to improve their social status, resulting in the formation of the Ahluwalia surname.
According to this narrative, a group of people migrated to Punjab, where they came to be known as Jats, and became Sikhs. The account states that Sadho Singh and his four sons married into Kalal families, because of which the family came to be known as Ahluwalia.[3] Lepel Griffin (1873), a British administrator who wrote on the history of Punjab's rulers, dismissed this account connecting the Ahluwalias to the Jaisalmer royal family as spurious.[3] The Sikh author Gian Singh, in his Twarikh Raj Khalsa (1894), noted that the Ahluwalia family had adopted the Kalal caste identity much before Sadho Singh.[4]
Most of the Ahluwalias follow either Sikhism or Hinduism.[1][5]
References[edit]
- ^ a b W. H. McLeod (2009). The A to Z of Sikhism. Scarecrow Press. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-8108-6344-6.
- ^ Paramjit S. Judge (2015). "Caste Hierarchy, Dominance, and Change in Punjab". Sociological Bulletin. 64 (1). Sage: 62. JSTOR 26290720.
Ahluwalias, formerly known by the name of Kalal, are a caste of liquor distillers. At present, they are upper caste without any traditional stigma.
- ^ a b Ganda Singh (1990). Sardar Jassa Singh Ahluwalia. Punjabi University. pp. 1–4.
- ^ M. L. Ahluwalia (1996). Land marks in Sikh history. Ashoka International. p. 37.
- ^ Jogindra Singh Gandhi (1982). Lawyers and Touts: A Study in the Sociology of Legal Profession. Hindustan. p. 64.
Ahluwalia are bi-religious, having both Hindu and Sikh members