The Sagar Rajput is a

Hindu Hindus (; ; also known as Sanātanīs) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism, also known by its endonym Sanātana Dharma. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pp. 35–37 Historically, the term has also be ...

caste.

History and origin

The Sagar Rajput caste was formerly known as Shegar Dhangar. They were shepherds and farmers by tradition. They owned more farming land than other farming communities and also held the office of the Patil prior to independence. The living informants at the time of study of this caste by scholars asserted that they changed their name to Sagar Rajput after holding a caste meeting and one of these Rajputs claimed to have gone to a Pandit in Pune who had uncovered their lineage. This lineage connected them with the Maratha ruler

Malhar Rao Holkar Malhar Rao Holkar (16 March 1693 – 20 May 1766) was a noble subedar of the Maratha Empire, in present-day India. He was one of the early officers along with Ranoji Scindia, appointed by Peshwa Bajirao I to help spread the Maratha rule to nort ...

, who was a Dhangar Shepherd and back to the

Rajput Rājpūt (, from Sanskrit ''rājaputra'' meaning "son of a king"), also called Thākur (), is a large multi-component cluster of castes, kin bodies, and local groups, sharing social status and ideology of genealogical descent originating fro ...

Rulers of Rajasthan. Robert Eric Frykenberg states that they were originally from the

Shudra Shudra or ''Shoodra'' (Sanskrit: ') is one of the four varnas of the Hindu class and social system in ancient India. Some sources translate it into English as a caste, or as a social class. Theoretically, Shudras constituted a class like work ...

varna and successfully changed their status to twice-born by employing genealogists due to improvement in economic conditions and thus changed their name to Sagar Rajputs and started wearing the Sacred thread. They do not have any genealogical or historical evidence to support their claim of Rajput origin. This claim appears to be merely an attempt at

Rajputization Modern historians agree that Rajputs consisted of a mix of various different social groups (castes) and different varnas. Rajputisation (or Rajputization) explains the process by which such diverse communities coalesced to form the Rajput commu ...

to assert a higher social status, even though they are Shudras, not Rajputs.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sagar (Caste) Dhangar

History and origin

See also

References