Introductory - Global Sikh Studies

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purity for such a long period after its originators left the scene.
We have taken the case of Rangretas because it is very much
illustrative, they being the lowest caste from which Sikhs were recruited.
But, it is the Jats, who form the majority in the present day Panth and
who have benefitted most in the elevation of their social status by
joining the Sikh ranks. .It is mainly because they were able to retain,
unlike the Rangretas, the gains that accrued to them. The present day
social status of the Sikh Jats is taken so much for granted that it is
seldom that their past, prior to their joining the Sikh movement, is
recalled. 'In A.D. 836, an Arab governor summoned them to appear
and pay jiziya, each to be accompanied by a dog, a mark of humiliation
prescribed also under the previous Brahman regime. ' 23 'Albaruni (C.
1030), whose direct experience of India was confined to the Lahore
area, took the Jats to be 'Cattle-owners, low Shudra people.' 24 The
author of the Debistan-i-Mazahib (Ca. 1655) in his account of Sikhism
describes the Jats as 'the lowest caste of the Vaishyas'. 25 In contrast to
this position, 'under the Sikhs the Rajput was over-shadowed by the
Jat, who resented his assumption of superiority and his refusal to join
him on equal terms in the ranks of the Khalsa, deliberately persecuted
him wherever and whenever he had the power, and preferred his title
of Jat Sikh to that of the proudest Rajput.'28 That this was all due to
the Sikh movement becomes clear if the status of Sikh Jats of the
Sikh tract is compared with that of other Jats who are his immediate
neighbours. About the non-Sikh Jats in the eastern submontane tract,
Ibbetson writes in his census report (1881) : 'In character and position
there is nothing to distinguish the tribes I am about to notice, save
that they have never enjoyed the political importance which
distinguished the Sikh Jats under the Khalsa.. .In the Sikh tract, the
political position of the Jat was so high that he had no wish to be
called Rajput; under the hills the status of the Rajput is so superior
that the Jat has no hope of being called Rajput.' 27 Similarly, although
the Jats of the south-eastern districts 'of the Punjab differ 'in little
save religion from the great Sikh Jat tribes of the Malwa', 28 they
remained subservient to the Rajputs upto a recent period of the British
Raj. There, 'In the old days of Rajput ascendancy, the Rajputs would
not allow Jats to cover their heads with a turban', and 'even to this day