Random musings from the fam-damily of Jackson-Chakraborty's for our friends, family and our children.

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jackson & chakraborty family blog
Thursday, March 15, 2012
I am posting this so that someday Tara and Kaya have somewhere to look up their maternal heritage. Of course being only half Kulin Brahmin makes
you not Kulin (pun intended) at all, nevertheless. Also after having this explained to me I now begin to understand those old bengali movies where a
pretty young thing of a girl is forced into marriage to an old doddering man with one foot in the grave, promptly to be followed by the torturous life of
a widow at age 15 on! Of course, re-marriage was never allowed for women. joys of being s Kulin Brahmin girl must have been few other than the
prestige and education made available at a younger age which was equal by few others.
I am told I am of Sanyal (Vatsav/Vatsya) decent on my father's side whose last name is Chakraborty and on my mothers paternal side I am a Maitra
(Kashyap) from Bangladesh and on her maternal side I am a Roy, so a Rarhi Brahmin.
Since we are paternalistic society that makes me a Rarhi Brahmin (east Bengal) of Vatsya (pronounced Bot-so) Gotra. Well thank god for modernity,
no one cares that I married a Canadian!
so here it is, the Kulin Brahmin system explained...
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Kulin Brahmins are those Brahmins in Bengal who can trace themselves to the five families of Kanauj (Kanyakubja), Uttar Pradesh who migrated to
Bengal. They were given immense power during the reign of the Sena/Sen kings who were staunch Hindus and did not encourage the practice of any
other religion. The five brahmin families were differentiated by their gotras. The Kanaujiya/kanyakubj brahmins who settled in Bengal had the following
gotras: (Shandilya, Bhardwaj, Kashyap, Swavarna and Vatsav/Vatsya); these gotras denote the Rishis whose followers the brahmins were.
Some of these kuleen families settled in Barendrabhoom and some in Rarhbhoom in what is present day Bangladesh. The descendants of these
families became known as Rarhi and Barendra brahmins as per their settlement.
The common surnames of Rarhi brahmin family are (ranked equally):
Mukherjee / Mukhopadhyay (Bharadwaja)
Banerjee / Bandyopadhyay (Shandilya)
Chatterjee / Chattopadhyay (Kashyap)
Ganguly / Gangopadhyay(Shavarna)
Khanna / (khan)
The common surnames of Barendra brahmin family are (ranked equally):
Sanyal (Vatsav/Vatsya)
Lahiri (Shandilya)
Bagchi (Shandilya)
Moitra (Kashyap)
Understanding the Bengali Kulin Brahmin Caste
Tara and Kaya my beautiful and fortunate little half breeds!
They are hiding out under the couch in this picture as Kaya learns to scooch backwards.
Kulin Brahmins
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jackson & chakraborty family blog: Understanding the Bengali Kulin B... http://jacksonchakraborty.blogspot.in/2012/03/understanding-bengali-ku...
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Apart from these many others like Chakroborty, Bhattacharya, Ray/Roy, Roy Choudhury, Majumdar, etc., which are, indeed, titles conferred on
certain privileged families from among the above mentioned surnames, could also be Kulin if they are Rarhi Brahmins. Khan and Chowdhury are titles
awarded to many kuleen brahmin families because of their ancestral rule or profession.
The connection between the saraswat brahmins and kanaujiya/kanyakubj brahmins is this that during the Aryan migration the saraswat brahmins,
called thus because they lived along the banks of the river saraswati, which began to disappear underground during Parushurama's time. These
brahmins migrated to south, north and northwestern parts of the subcontinent.
Gaud Saraswat Brahmins The kashmiri pandits are of the same lineage as these saraswats and consider themselves to be pure Aryan because their
descendants didn't mingle with the indigenous people. Those that settled in north India also went to what is present day Uttar Pradesh, where
Kannauj is located From here they migrated to Gaud or Gour. From Gour, a small community comprising about seven families migrated to the South
of the subcontinent.They were known as Gaud Saraswat Brahmins.
Kulin Pratha (Kulin System) was initiated by the Sena kings in Bengal whereby the kings gave land and power to the Brahmins to promote vedic
principles in the society, leading to a strict and disciplined lifestyle. Simultaneously they also enforced strict rules on family and marriage rules on
Brahmins, leading to the birth of Kulin Brahmins, an apex section/class/caste of the society. It was said that a person is Kulin if and only if all the 14
generations on his father's and mother's side were Kulin. This created a very problematic divide in the society. This was also opposed by many
Brahmins. Yet it became a norm, probably because the kulin Brahmins got lured by the newly acquired power in the society.
Kulin Pratha was a very strict practice leading to many problems in Bengali society. If a daughter of a Kulin family doesn't wed in a Kulin family then
the parent family loses their Kulin identity. These led to several problems like young girls getting married to old Kulin married men out of desperation
of finding a Kulin groom. It was not uncommon for Kulin grooms to have several wives, most of which stayed at their parents home, just to be wed
(for the sake of the ritual) to a Kulin and hence maintain their Kulin status.
Nowadays many Brahmins have shunned their Kulin identity and have mixed equally with all the Brahmins and non Brahmins in Bengal and other parts
of India. It is hard to state the current stand of these families on Kulin Pratha. It may surface during the marriage process, but the young are not
concerned.
Marriages and gotras
Marriages within the gotra ("swagotra" marriages) are banned under the rule of exogamy in the traditional matrimonial system. People within the
gotra are regarded as kin and marrying such a person would be thought of as incest.
A much more common characteristic of south Indian Hindu society is permission for marriage between cross-cousins (children of brother and sister).
Thus, a man is allowed to marry his maternal uncle's daughter or his paternal aunt's daughter, but is not allowed to marry his father's brother's
daughter. She would be considered a parallel cousin who is treated as a sister.
According to strict Hindu tradition, the term gotra is used only for the lineages of Brahmin, Kshatriya and Vaishya varnas. Brahminical Gotra relates
directly to the original seven "saptarishis" Rishis of the Vedas. Later, the term "gotra" was associated with broader meanings of any lineage, Brahmin
or otherwise.
A common mistake is to consider gotra to be synonymous with clan or kula. A kula is basically a set of people following similar cultural rituals, often
worshipping the same God (the Kula-Devata - the God of the clan). Kula has nothing to do with lineage or caste. In fact, it is possible to change
one's kula, based on one's faith or Ishta-deva.
It is common practice in preparation for Hindu marriage to inquire about the Kula-Gotra (meaning Clan-Lineage) of the bride and bridegroom before
approving the marriage. In almost all Hindu families, marriages within the same gotra are prohibited, since people with same gotra are considered to
be siblings. But marriage within the kula is allowed and even preferred.
Posted by Tina at 11:55 PM
Labels: bengali, bengali kulin brahmin, brahmin, caste, gotra, kashyap, Kaya, kulin, maitra, roy, sanyal, Tara, vatsya
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7 comments:
Tina June 4, 2013 at 11:17 PM
This seems to be one of my most visited posts. I wonder if the traffic wanders in for matrimonial research?
Reply
Sampan July 21, 2013 at 12:56 PM
Came here searching for something but nice work because me being a Kulin Brahmin(originally Ganguly but got Chakrabort-my grandfather
got it fromZaminder).But Imust tell you that renaissance of Bengal happened because of these Kulin Brahmins started by Rammohan
Roy(originally Bannerjee.
Even today most of our intellectuals are coming from these Brahmin communityalong with Vaidya-Brahmin community.
WE were discussing it in a blog-Indian/Chinese IQ puzzle where average IQ of Indian Hindu is 86 but Kulin Bengali Brahmin with
115-122,more than Ashkenazi Jewish.Considering our tiny population we are producing more laurels in USA compared to Ashkenaziwith
Pulitzer winners,one of the greatest Biologist and inventor Anandamohan Chakraborty,A.Bannerjee(Nobel laureate signature award
winner),inventors etc.
Even Tagore or IVF pioneer Subhas Mukherjee came from Kulin Brahmin sect.
Nice article.
Reply
Tina July 22, 2013 at 3:05 PM
Sampan, though I understand your pride in belonging to the kulin caste, I have to say that the high IQ and the genesis of the bengali
renaissance at the hands of Kulin men, all have a direct relation to their access to education over the generations. Other castes were never
given the opportunity for an education and thus they never developed a culture of learning. Even today MOST Brahmins fall in the category of
educated middle class as opposed to industrialists or farmers or military.
Reply
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Tina February 12, 2014 at 11:59 AM
I will not be posting comments here that I feel are racist/caste-ist. As this is MY blog, I get to make these "judgement" calls! There is a thin
line between expressing pride in a communities' achievements and implied disrespect for those not belonging to said community. Cheers.
Reply
subham chakraborty March 20, 2014 at 5:52 AM
All Chakraborty are not brahmin surname. Few kshatriya family is having the surname Chakraborty, are rajput kshatriya, the surname
Chakraborty given by the Bengal Rajas. Like we are kshatriya and our surname is Chakraborty. We brought from Rajasthan as senapati to
protect the Bengal Raj from outside enimy. So all Chakraborty are not brahmin.
Reply
Tina March 20, 2014 at 2:42 PM
I did not know that all Chakrabortys were not Brahmins! I know there were non-Bengali Chakrabortys though :- )
Reply
Anonymous May 24, 2014 at 11:59 PM
Tina, apt reply to the obviously "caste supremacist " remark by "Sampan". Basically he is hinting that all intellectual work in in Bengal is by
the Brahmins as they are genetically predisposed to having a higher IQ than other castes !. Obviously this guy is in US now and is
desperately trying to find reasons to "justify" his own perception of the Brahmin caste being superior to other humans as the most intelligent
of all the immigrants .
Reply
Tina
Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
i am a thirty something mom of two girls, an architect by profession and an avid sci-fi and My Little Pony fan. I love to cook, but only
occasionally and am in the middle of rediscovering my heritage through food.
View my complete profile
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