Mistri, or Mistry, is a term for a master-craftsman, foreman or supervisor of manual workers in India. Mistri is being replaced with "supervisor" and other terms, as for example by the Indian Railway who replaced it with supervisor in 2005. The word ''Mistri'', or ''Mistry'', is adopted into the

Gujarati language Gujarati (; gu, ગુજરાતી, Gujarātī, translit-std=ISO, label=Gujarati script, ) is an Indo-Aryan language native to the Indian state of Gujarat and spoken predominantly by the Gujarati people. Gujarati is descended from Old G ...

from the

Portuguese Portuguese may refer to: * anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal ** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods ** Portuguese language, a Romance language *** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language ** Portu ...

word ''Mestre'' meaning ''Master'' or ''Teacher''. The Portuguese were present in Gujarat since 1500 in Diu. The Kadias and

Kadia Kshatriya Gurjar Kshatriya Kadia, also known as Gurjar Kadia/ Gujjar Kadia, and Kadia Kshatriya are a Hindu community mostly in Gujarat and Maharashtra. They are artisan community, occupation is masonry work and are related to larger artisan group of Kadi ...

s worked on building Diu Fort and the Portuguese called them ''Mestre'' due to their skills at fort building. MistriBabu besides carpenter ( for Suthar community ) also meant Contractor
American anthropology, 1971-1995: papers from the American anthropologist edited by Regna Darnell page 768 ( mainly for

Mistris of Kutch Kutch Gurjar Kshatriya (also known as Mistri or Mestri) are a minority Hindu and one of the Socially and Educationally Backward communities of Gujarat in India, who claim to be Kshatriyas. They are an artisan community related with Kadia w ...

- majority of whom worked as Railway, PWD & Forest Contractors during British India ). Many

Parsi Parsis () or Parsees are an ethnoreligious group of the Indian subcontinent adhering to Zoroastrianism. They are descended from Persians who migrated to Medieval India during and after the Arab conquest of Iran (part of the early Muslim conq ...

family working as Contractor, therefore, also adopted surname Mistry, as their occupational surname. One such famous Parsi businessman is

Pallonji Mistry Pallonji Shapoorji Mistry (1 June 1929 – 28 June 2022) was an Indian-born Irish billionaire construction tycoon. He was chairman of the Shapoorji Pallonji Group and a major shareholder of India's largest private conglomerate, Tata Group. He w ...

. The word Mistri or Mistry in Gujarat is today identified with people, who are expert in building construction.

See also