_Bania, Golapurab, Golahre._--This Jain subcaste numbers about 6000
persons in the Central Provinces, and belongs mainly to the Saugor,
Damoh and Narsinghpur Districts. Its distribution is nearly the
same as that of the Gahois, and it is probably also a Bundelkhand
group. The Golapurabs are practically all Digambari Jains with a small
Hindu minority. In some localities they intermarry with Parwar Banias
who are also Digambari Jains; and they will take food cooked without
water from the Nema subcaste who are Hindus. According to one story
the Golapurabs were the offspring of a Purabia, that is probably a
Bais Rajput, by a kept woman of the Ahir caste. This fits in very
well with the name, as Golak means a bastard, and the termination
_purab_ would be from Purabia; but it is probably the name which has
given rise to the story, or at any rate to the supposed descent from
a Purabia. In the United Provinces a small subcaste of Bania called
Golahre exists, belonging to the Jhansi District, that is the country
of the Golapurabs, and Jain by religion. There is no doubt that this
group is the same as the Golapurabs, and Mr. Crooke derives [149]
the name from _gola_, a grain-mart, which seems more probable than
the derivation suggested above. But it is an interesting fact that
there is also a caste of cultivators called Golapurab in the United
Provinces, found only in the Agra District. It is suggested that
these people are the illegitimate offspring of Sanadhya Brahmans,
with whom they appear to be closely connected. From their sept-names,
however, which include those of several Rajput clans and also some
titular terms of a low-caste type, Mr. Crooke thinks their Brahmanical
origin improbable. It is noticeable that these Golapurabs though a
cultivating caste have, like the Banias, a subcaste called Dasa,
comprising persons of irregular descent; they also prohibit the
remarriage of widows, and abstain from all flesh and from onions and
garlic. Such customs are peculiar in a cultivating caste, and resemble
those of Banias. It seems possible that a detailed investigation
might give ground for supposing that both the Golahre and Golapurab
subcastes of Banias in the United and Central Provinces respectively
are connected with this cultivating caste of Golapurabs. The latter
might have abandoned the Jain religion on taking to cultivation,
as a Jain cannot well drive the plough, which involves destruction
of animal life; or the Bania section might have adopted Jainism in
order to obtain a better social position and differentiate themselves
from the cultivators. Unfortunately no detailed information about
the Golapurabs of the Central Provinces is available, from which the
probability or otherwise of this hypothesis could be tested.