The Bot are a

Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism.Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

caste Caste is a form of social stratification characterised by endogamy, hereditary transmission of a style of life which often includes an occupation, ritual status in a hierarchy, and customary social interaction and exclusion based on cultura ...

found in the state of

Uttar Pradesh Uttar Pradesh (; , 'Northern Province') is a state in northern India. With over 200 million inhabitants, it is the most populated state in India as well as the most populous country subdivision in the world. It was established in 1950 ...

in India. They are distinct from the Bhotiya

ethnic group An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...

of the Indian

Terai The Terai or Tarai is a lowland region in northern India and southern Nepal that lies south of the outer foothills of the Himalayas, the Sivalik Hills, and north of the Indo-Gangetic Plain. This lowland belt is characterised by tall grasslands, scr ...

, although like the Bhotiya claim a

Nepal Nepal (; ne, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is mai ...

i origin.People of India Uttar Pradesh Volume XLII Part One edited by A Hasan & J C Das pages 344 to 350 Manohar Publications The community is said to have gotten its name from the fact that they are descended from the king of Botwal, a state that once existed in Nepal. They are said to have immigrated to what is now the Bahraich District of Uttar Pradesh in 1775. The community claim to Raghuvanshi

Rajput Rajput (from Sanskrit ''raja-putra'' 'son of a king') is a large multi-component cluster of castes, kin bodies, and local groups, sharing social status and ideology of genealogical descent originating from the Indian subcontinent. The term Ra ...

s, a claim not accepted by neighbouring

groups. They are a small community, found mainly in twenty villages of Bahraich District Jarwal block (Harrajpur, Dusarapara, Sakhouta, Gour, Katka, Lalpur Jagdishpur (Botanpurwa), Fakharpur, Kaiserganj, and Huzurpur blocks . The community now speaks

Awadhi Awadhi (; ), also known as Audhi (), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken in northern India and Nepal. It is primarily spoken in the Awadh region of present-day Uttar Pradesh, India. The name ''Awadh'' is connected to Ayodhya, the ancient city, w ...

, and have customs similar to neighbouring

communities. The Bot are strictly endogamous, but do not marry within the village. They occupy their own villages, very rarely sharing them with any other caste. Land is their main economic source, and they are community of cultivators. Of their main crops, they grow paddy and maize in the winter, and wheat and pulses in the summer. Each of their settlement contains an informal caste council, known as a ''biradari panchayat''. These ''biradari panchayats'' are headed by chaudhary, the village headman. The

panchayat The Panchayat raj is a political system, originating from the Indian subcontinent, found mainly in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal. It is the oldest system of local government in the Indian subcontinent, and historical ment ...

acts as instrument of social control, dealing with issues such as divorce and adultery.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bot (Caste) Social groups of Uttar Pradesh Indian castes

See also

References