View source for Minor Dominant Tribes

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This article is an extract from <br/>

PANJAB CASTES <br/>

SIR DENZIL CHARLES JELF IBBETSON, K.C. S.I. <br/>

Being a reprint of the chapter on <br/>
The Races, Castes and Tribes of <br/>
the People in the Report on the <br/>
Census of the Panjab published <br/>
in ''' 1883 ''' by the late Sir Denzil <br/>
Ibbetson, KCSI <br/>

Lahore : <br/>

Printed  by the Superintendent, Government Printing, Punjab, <br/>

1916. <br/>
''Indpaedia is an archive. It neither agrees nor disagrees ''<br/> 
''with the contents of this article.''
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[[Category:India|M]]
[[Category:Communities|M]]

== Minor dominant tribes==

The tribes or castes which I have included in Abstract No. 83 on the next page* are those which are, like the Jats and  
Rajputs, dominant in parts of the Panjab, but are not so numerous or 67. 
so widely spread as to rank with those great races. Indeed many of them 
are probably tribes rather than castes or races ; though in some cases their 
origin has been forgotten, while in others an obviously false origin has 
been invented. They are divided into four groups, the Karral, Gakkhar, 
Awan, and Khattar of the Salt-range Tract, the Khokhar, Kharral and 
Daudpotra of the Western Plains, and the Dogar, Ror, Taga, Meo and Khan
zadah of the Eastern Plains ; wliile the Gujar, who is more widely distributed 
than the rest, comes last by himself. With the Western Plains group are 
included the Kathia, Hans, and Khagga, for whom I have no separate figures : 
indeed it will be apparent from a perusal of the following paragraphs that 
the figures for all these minor castes in the western half of the Province are 
exceedingly imperfect. Not only are the lax use of the word Jat and the ill
defined nature of the line separating Jats from Rajputs already alluded to 
sources of great confusion, but many of these tribes have set up claims to an 
origin which shall connect them with the founder of the Mahomedan religion, 
or with some of the great Mahomedan conquerors. 


Thus we find many of them returned or classed as Shekh, Mughal, or what 
not ; and the figures of the Abstract alone are exceedingly misleading. I have 
in each case endeavoured to separate the numbers thus returned, and to include 
them under their proper caste headings ; and it is the figures thus given in the 
text, and not those of the tables, that should be referred to. Even these are 
not complete, for till we have the full detail of clans we cannot complete the 
classification. 

The ethnic grouping of the tribes discussed in this section is a subject 
which I had hoped to examine, but which lack of time compels me to pass by 
unnoticed. I will only note how the tendency on the frontier and throughout 
the Salt-range Tract is to claim Arab or Mughal, and in the rest of the 
Province to claim Rajput origin. The two groups of tribes which occupy the 
mountain country of the Salt-range and the great plateaus of the Western 
Plains are the most interesting sections of the Pan jab land-owning classes, 
need the most careful examination, and would reward it with the richest 
return. 

==The Karral ==

Caste No. 101 

The Karrals are returned for Hazara 
only ; and I have no information concerning them save what Major Wace gives 
in his Settlement Report of that district. He writes : The Karral country 
consists of the Nara ihiqah in the Abbottabad tahsil. The Karrals were 
formerly the subjects of the Gakkhars, from whom they emancipated them
selves some two centuries ago. Originally Hindus, their conversion to Islam 
is of comparatively modern date. Thirty years ago their acquaintance with 
the Mahomedan faith was still slight ; and though they now know more of 
it, and are more careful to observe it, relics of their former Hindu faith are 
still observable in their social habits. 

They are attached to their homes and 
their fields, which they cultivate simply and industriously. For the rest, 
their character is crafty and cowardly Major Wace further notes that the 
Karrals are identical in origin and character with the Dhunds. This 
would make the Karrals one of the Rajput tribes of the hills lying along the 
left bank of the Jahlam ; and I have been informed by a native officer that 
they claim Rajput origin. They are said too to have recently set up a claim 
to Kayani Mughal origin, in common with the Gakkhars ; or, as a variety, 
that their ancestor came from Kayan, but was a descendant of Alexander the 
Great ! But the strangest story of all is that a queen of the great Raja 
Rasalu of Panjab folklore had by a paramour of the scavenger class four 
sons, Seo, Teo, Gheo, and Kam, from whom are respectively descended the 
Sials, Tiwanas, Ghebas, and Karrals. They intermarry with Gakkhars, 
Saiyads, and Dhunds.


See [[The Gakkhar]]