111-612: The Balija are a Telugu -speaking mercantile community primarily living in the Indian states of Andhra Pradesh , Tamil Nadu , Karnataka and in smaller numbers in Telangana and Kerala . In Tamil Nadu, they are known as Kavarais . Variations of the name in use in the medieval era were Balanja , Bananja , Bananju , Banajiga and Banijiga , with probable cognates Balijiga , Valanjiyar , Balanji , Bananji and derivatives such as Baliga , all of which are said to be derived from
222-735: A Prakrit dialect without exception. Some reverse coin legends are in Telugu and Tamil languages. The period from the 4th century CE to 1022 CE marks the second phase of Telugu history, following the Andhra Ikshvaku period. The first long inscription entirely in Telugu, dated to 575 CE, is attributed to the Renati Choda king Dhanunjaya and found in the Kadapa district . An early Telugu label inscription, "tolacuwānḍru" (తొలచువాండ్రు; transl. rock carvers or quarrymen ),
333-618: A bloody legacy for South Asia that continues to exact a mounting toll". Caste and religion still form the most significant social constructs in India and the former, in particular, has been influenced by the Raj census efforts. Although there were certainly some enumerations of caste prior to the arrival of the British, some modern academics, such as Cohn and Dirks, have argued that the British, through their census and other works, effectively created
444-453: A command over the Telugu language, alongside Sanskrit , Tamil , Meitei , Oriya , Persian , or Arabic , is highly appreciated and respected for learning dances (most significantly Indian Classical Dances ) as dancers could have the tools of these languages to go into the primary material texts. Telugu is natively spoken in the states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana and Yanam district of Puducherry . Telugu speakers are also found in
555-712: A common root. Nayaka as a term was first used during the Vishnukundina dynasty that ruled from the Krishna and Godavari deltas during the 3rd century AD. During the Kakatiya dynasty , the Nayaka title was bestowed to warriors who had received land and the title as a part of the Nayankarapuvaram system for services rendered to the court. The Nayaka was noted to be an officer in the Kakatiya court; there being
666-586: A considerable impact on the structure and politics of Indian society. The first modern census in the United Kingdom (of a much smaller population) had been in 1801, repeated every ten years thereafter, and this provided the pattern for the Indian process, although this threw up many different problems. There were historical attempts to enumerate the population in parts of the Indian subcontinent as well as to assess landholdings for revenue purposes, which
777-788: A correlation between holding the Nayankara , the possession of the administrative title Angaraksha and the status title Nayaka . A more widespread usage of the Nayaka title amongst the Balijas appears to have happened during the Vijayanagara empire where the Balija merchant-warriors rose to political and cultural power and claimed Nayaka positions. The Vijayanagara empire was based on an expanding, cash-oriented economy enhanced by Balija tax-farming. Some Balija families were appointed to supervise provinces as Nayaks (governors, commanders) by
888-538: A fixed designation is now commonly recognised since new groups come and go, and there are movements between groups. Bhagat describes them as "fluid, fuzzy and dynamic historically" and gives as an example the emergence in the early 20th century of the Kamma and Reddy castes through coalescence of like-minded, politically motivated groups. Despite its variability, the published information relating to age caused significant angst among social reformers, notably in relation to
999-578: A group that invented tradition in the process often referred to as Sanskritisation . They claimed descent from the mythological Yadu and a Kshatriya status. Their creation as a caste was aided also by the Raj's policy of grouping people who bore similar names. Linguistic differences also presented difficulties, with different spellings and pronunciations for similar castes and administrative attempts to create language-based caste categories that had not been known. George Grierson 's Linguistic Survey of India had recorded 179 languages and 544 dialects, while
1110-1279: A guild, called the Five Hundred Lords of Ayyavolu that provided trade links between trading communities in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka . From the 13th century, inscriptions referring to " Vira Balanjyas " (warrior merchants) started appearing in the Andhra country. The Vira Balanjyas , whose origins are often claimed to lie in the Ayyavolu, represented long-distance trading networks that employed fighters to protect their warehouses and goods in transit. The traders were identified as nanadesi (of 'many countries') and as swadesi ('own country'). The terms balanjya-setti and balija were also used for these traders, and in later times naidu and chetti . These traders formed collectives called pekkandru and differentiated themselves from other collectives called nagaram , which probably represented Komati merchants. The pekkandru collectives also included members of other communities with status titles reddi , boya and nayaka . They spread all over South India , Sri Lanka , and also some countries in
1221-477: A handful of Telugu inscriptions in the Kakatiya era between 1135 CE and 1324 CE. Andhra is characterised as having its own mother tongue, and its territory has been equated with the extent of the Telugu language. The equivalence between the Telugu linguistic sphere and the geographical boundaries of Andhra is also brought out in an eleventh-century description of Andhra boundaries. Andhra, according to this text,
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#17327798132701332-547: A significant challenge to Britain's presence in India. The shock of that caused the end of the Company Rule and also caused influential members of the Indian Civil Service , such as the folklorist Richard Carnac Temple , to think that if further discontent was to be avoided, a better understanding of the colonial subjects was needed. The censuses formed one aspect of a wider series of ethnographic studies ,
1443-451: A thousand years. Pavuluri Mallana 's Sāra Sangraha Ganitamu ( c. 11th century ) is the first scientific treatise on mathematics in any Dravidian language. Avadhānaṃ , a literary performance that requires immense memory power and an in-depth knowledge of literature and prosody , originated and was specially cultivated among Telugu poets for over five centuries. Roughly 10,000 pre-colonial inscriptions exist in Telugu. In
1554-464: A wide variety of people claiming to be members of Balija subcastes but who appeared to share little in common and thus defied the administrative desire for what it considered to be a rational and convenient taxonomy. Those who claimed to be Chetty had an obvious connection through their engagement in trade and those who called themselves Kavarai were simply using the Tamil word for Balija but, for example,
1665-933: Is Tirumala of the Telugu ation. Telugu place names are present all around Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. Common suffixes are - ooru, -pudi, -padu, -peta, -pattanam, -wada, - gallu, -cherla, -seema, -gudem, -palle, -palem, -konda, -veedu, -valasa, -pakam, -paka, -prolu, -wolu, -waka, -ili, -kunta, -parru, -villi, -gadda, -kallu, -eru, -varam,-puram,-pedu and - palli . Examples that use this nomenclature are Nellore , Tadepalligudem , Guntur , Chintalapudi , Yerpedu , Narasaraopeta , Sattenapalle , Visakapatnam , Vizianagaram , Ananthagiri , Vijayawada , Vuyyuru , Macherla , Poranki , Ramagundam , Warangal , Mancherial , Peddapalli , Siddipet , Pithapuram , Banswada , and Miryalaguda . There are four regional dialects in Telugu: Colloquially, Telangana , Rayalaseema and Coastal Andhra dialects are considered
1776-587: Is a classical Dravidian language native to the Indian states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana , where it is also the official language . Spoken by about 96 million people (2022), Telugu is the most widely spoken member of the Dravidian language family, and one of the twenty-two scheduled languages of the Republic of India . It is one of the few languages that has primary official status in more than one Indian state , alongside Hindi and Bengali . Telugu
1887-500: Is a result of an "n" to "l" alternation established in Telugu. The popular belief holds that Telugu is derived from Trilinga of Trilinga Kshetras being the land bounded by the three Lingas which is Telugu homeland. P. Chenchiah and Bhujanga Rao note that Atharvana Acharya in the 13th century wrote a grammar of Telugu, calling it the Trilinga Śabdānusāsana (or Trilinga Grammar) . However, most scholars note that Atharvana's grammar
1998-535: Is dated to around 200 BCE. This word was further analyzed by Iravatham Mahadevan in his attempts to decipher the Indus script . Several Telugu words, primarily personal and place names, were identified at Amaravati , Nagarjunakonda , Krishna river basin , Ballari , Eluru , Ongole and Nellore between 200 BCE and 500 CE. The Ghantasala Brahmin inscription and the pillar inscription of Vijaya Satakarni at Vijayapuri, Nagarjunakonda , and other locations date to
2109-585: Is found on one of the rock-cut caves around the Keesaragutta temple , 35 kilometers from Hyderabad . This inscription is dated to the Vishnukundina period of around 400 CE and is the earliest known short Telugu inscription from the Telangana region. Several titles of Mahendravarman I in Telugu language, dated to c. 600 CE , were inscribed on cave-inscriptions in Tamil Nadu. From
2220-425: Is not yet, and at the present moment their barriers have not so far decayed that their social importance can be ignored for public purposes. Despite the general ruling that caste was restricted to Hindus, which was later modified to include Jains, there were over 300 recorded Christian castes, and more than 500 castes were Muslim. The definition of Hindu, Sikh and Jain religious beliefs was always blurred, and even
2331-459: Is one of the languages designated as a classical language by the Government of India . It is the 14th most spoken native language in the world. Modern Standard Telugu is based on the dialect of erstwhile Krishna, Guntur, East Godavari and West Godavari districts of Coastal Andhra . Telugu is also spoken in the states of Karnataka , Tamil Nadu , Maharashtra , Chhattisgarh , Orissa and
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#17327798132702442-580: The British Crown . The 1865 census of the North-Western Provinces is sometimes referred to as the first proper census in India. By 1872, the only administrative area of British India in which there had not been an attempt to conduct a regionwide enumeration was Bengal Province . The various limited exercises conducted prior to 1869 have been described as "fragmentary, hardly systematic and lack[ing in] any uniformity". In 1872,
2553-496: The British Raj authorities concluded the first "all-India census". However, S. C. Srivastava noted that it did not in fact cover all of the country and that it was asynchronous by being conducted between 1867 and 1872 after an initial 1856 decision to introduce decennial enumerations from 1861 had been disrupted by the 1857 Rebellion. The first synchronous decennial census was conducted in 1881 and has continued thus since, but
2664-498: The Child Marriage Restraint Act (Sarda Act) of 1929. The legislation had been supported by the 1931 Census Commissioner, Hutton, who had noticed a declining trend in the custom of child marriages and saw the act as encouraging the decline. Eleanor Rathbone , a prominent campaigner for women's rights and a believer that the Raj authorities were not getting to grips with Indian social issues, used figures from
2775-512: The Goud Saraswat Brahmins (whose claim to Brahmin status itself is contested), their associations might comprise very disparate socioeconomic groups. Frequently, the enumerators just took what people claimed for granted. The theories of Risley, which broadly assumed that caste and race were related and were based on now-discredited methods of anthropometry and scientific racism , loomed large in attempts by Indologists and
2886-1020: The Linga Balija based their claim to Balija status on a sectarian identification, the Gazula were bangle-makers by occupation, the Telaga had Telugu origins and the Rajamahendram also appeared to be a geographic claim based on their origins in the town of Rajahmundry . Subsequent attempts to rationalise the enumeration merely created other anomalies and caused upset. Kapus are closely related to Balijas and both are often enumerated together in government, sociological and psephological contexts. Sri Andhra Vignanamu mentions four sections in Telaga community — Telagas (or Naidus), Ontaris (or Doras), Balijas, and Kapus. Anthropological Survey of India notes that Kapus of Coastal Andhra are ethnically similar to Balijas of Rayalaseema . Various sources note
2997-607: The Musunuri Nayakas and Kondavidu kingdom . Balijas served as ministers, military generals, and provincial governors in the Vijayanagara Empire. A number of the Nayaka dynasties of the Vijayanagara and post-Vijayanagara periods were of Balija origin, including the Nayaka rulers of Madurai , Thanjavur , Gingee , Belur , Channapatna , Rayadurgam and Kandy . Velcheru Narayana Rao et al. note that
3108-856: The Proto-Dravidian language around 1000 BCE. The earliest Telugu words appear in Prakrit inscriptions dating to c. 4th century BCE , found in Bhattiprolu , Andhra Pradesh. Telugu label inscriptions and Prakrit inscriptions containing Telugu words have been dated to the era of Emperor Ashoka (257 BCE), as well as to the Satavahana and Vishnukundina periods. Inscriptions in Old Telugu script were found as far away as Indonesia and Myanmar . Telugu has been in use as an official language for over 1,400 years and has served as
3219-459: The Sat Shudra position. The fourfold Brahmanical varna concept has not been acceptable to non-Brahmin social groups and some of them challenged the authority of Brahmins who described them as Shudras . Warriors Zamindars Social Activists Telugu language Telugu ( / ˈ t ɛ l ʊ ɡ uː / ; తెలుగు , Telugu pronunciation: [ˈt̪eluɡu] )
3330-501: The Southeast Asia . Balija as a community is seen for the first time in an inscription of the Kakatiya period. According to Prataparudra charitra and Siddheswara charitra mentioned that the balijas lived at Orugallu , the capital of the Kakatiya kingdom . In the caste-based hierarchy, Balijas hold a high position along with Kammas , Reddis and Velamas . they also served as military generals ( Nayakas ) and warriors under
3441-594: The Telugu from the Telugu-Kannada alphabet took place. The Vijayanagara Empire gained dominance from 1336 to the late 17th century, reaching its peak during the rule of Krishnadevaraya in the 16th century, when Telugu literature experienced what is considered its Golden Age . The 15th-century Venetian explorer Niccolò de' Conti , who visited the Vijayanagara Empire , found that the words in
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3552-447: The classification of a population and it is inherently constrained. For example, the questions required non-overlapping responses, and both the questions and the lists of response options were guided by preconceptions resulting from political desires or needs. The political forces may emanate from within the government machine or from interest groups that seek recognition and self-advantage. The questions and available responses, as well as
3663-581: The "diseased and starved" population in Orissa , which had suffered a famine that was estimated to have caused the deaths of around a third of its three million people but whose numbers within five years exceeded the pre-famine total. The information provided for religion was described as "not altogether reliable, the Hindoos being probably over-estimated, the Mahomedans under-rated, and with the exceptions of
3774-584: The 14th century. In the latter half of the 17th century, the Mughal Empire extended further south, culminating in the establishment of the Hyderabad State by the dynasty of the Nizam of Hyderabad in 1724. This heralded an era of Persian influence on the Telugu language, especially Hyderabad State. The effect is also evident in the prose of the early 19th century, as in the kaifiyats . In
3885-628: The 1931 census to support her misguided claim that such marriages were not in decline and that the act had caused a significant spike in the numbers. She claimed that there had been a 50 percent increase in wives under the age of 15 and a quadrupling of wives under 5 years old since 1921, and that the lives of women were being blighted. She thought Indians incapable of helping themselves and in need of firmer instruction from British authorities, who should enforce change, rather than merely encourage it. In turn, debates such as those, based on untrustworthy information, informed opinions about Indian nationalism and
3996-453: The 1931 census, which covered a somewhat more extensive area, noted 225 languages. The 1872 and 1881 censuses attempted to classify people fundamentally according to the Varna mentioned in ancient texts. The broad caste basing proved not to reflect the realities of social relationships, but it was met with approval from scholars of Sanskrit and ancient texts. It also did not apply throughout
4107-468: The 1931 census. According to Shirras, Feeling ran so high over the return of religion in the Punjab that some exterior castes, asked by one party to register as Hindus, by others as Sikhs, and even as Moslems, declared themselves Ad Dharmi or "adherents of the original religion," whatever that may be. As with caste, recording age in the census amounted to a problematic attempt to impose Western values on
4218-474: The 1941 census, it was decided to merge the different caste groups under a single monolithic category – Hindu . The significance of religion, as well as caste, was considerable. Hutton said in his census report for 1931 that It is not in its devotional aspect that the census is concerned with religion.... [S]ocial conduct is much influenced by practices which may not be in themselves religious but which are subject to religious sanctions. The age of marriage,
4329-707: The 1941 exercise was severely curtailed and very little of its data was published due to World War II . The 1931 census is often considered be the last British-administered census. The report of the 1881 census comprised three volumes; that of 1931 comprised 28. British India ceased to exist in 1947, when Partition occurred. Throughout the British Raj, and onwards until 1961 in the Republic of India , responsibility for census operations lay with temporary administrative structures, which were established for each census and then dismantled. Those tasked with gathering
4440-410: The 6th century onwards, complete Telugu inscriptions began to appear in districts neighbouring Kadapa such as Prakasam and Palnadu . Metrically composed Telugu inscriptions and those with ornamental or literary prose appear from 630 CE. The Madras Museum plates of Balliya-Choda dated to the mid-ninth century CE, are the earliest copper plate grants in the Telugu language. During this period, Telugu
4551-501: The Balijas were first mobilised politically by the Vijayanagara emperor Krishnadevaraya . Later, in the 15th and 16th centuries, they colonised the Tamil country and established Nayaka chieftaincies. At this time, Balijas were leaders of the left-hand section of castes. These Balija warriors were noted as fearless and some stories speak of them assassinating kings who interfered with their affairs. Cynthia Talbot believes that in Andhra
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4662-475: The British populace. The Journal of the Statistical Society of London stated that the 1872 census "must be regarded more as a creditable, and in the main successful attempt to deal with an exceptionally difficult subject, than as a complete or reliable statement of a class of facts". Among the problems, which were noted as "surely... some grave error", was the seemingly inexplicable figure for
4773-742: The Christian and Muslim believers could cause difficulties with classification although they were usually more easily defined. Kolis in Bombay worshipped both Hindu idols and the Christian Holy Trinity , and Kunbis in Gujarat were known to follow both Hindu and Muslim rituals and caused the census to classify them as socially Hindus but Muslim by faith. The Raj had also introduced constitutional changes that gave certain groups political representation. That led to events such as that in
4884-732: The Christians, the Jews, and the Parsees, the remainder being more or less conjectural". The figures for caste and nationality were also described as "for the most part conjectural". The 1872 census was, in the opinion of Crispin Bates, ...by far the least structured census ever conducted in the subcontinent and a printer's nightmare, since rather than fit the population into pre-determined categories census takers asked relatively open-ended questions about religious beliefs and occupations. The result
4995-605: The Indian public as the census went from an enumerative exercise of the British government to an authoritative representation of the social body and a vital tool of indigenous interests. The censuses that came later were much broader and, according to Crispin Bates, "more sophisticated" attempts at social engineering . Denzil Ibbetson , the Deputy Superintendent of the census in Punjab Province in 1881, stated in his official report: Our ignorance of
5106-729: The Indian states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana . It is one of the 22 languages under schedule 8 of the constitution of India . It is one of the official languages of the union territories of Puducherry . Telugu is a protected language in South Africa . According to the Constitution of South Africa , the Pan South African Language Board must promote and ensure respect for Telugu along with other languages. The Government of South Africa announced that Telugu will be re-included as an official subject in
5217-530: The Sanskrit term Vanik or Vanij , for trader. Another version for etymology states that Balija is derived from the Sanskrit word Bali , a sacrifice made during ' Yagna ' ritual and Ja meaning born. Therefore, Balija means 'born from sacrifice'. Beginning in the 9th century, references are found in inscriptions throughout the Kannada and Tamil areas to a trading network, which is sometimes referred to as
5328-688: The South African schools after it was removed from the curriculum in state schools. In addition, with the creation in October 2004 of a legal status for classical languages by the Government of India on 8 August 2008, Telugu was also given classical language status due to several campaigns. According to the famous Japanese historian Noboru Karashima who served as the president of the Epigraphical Society of India in 1985, there are approximately 10,000 inscriptions which exist in
5439-579: The Telugu language as of the year 1996 making it one of the most densely inscribed languages. Telugu inscriptions are found in all the districts of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. They are also found in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, and Chhattisgarh. According to recent estimates by ASI (Archaeological Survey of India) the number of inscriptions in the Telugu language goes up to 14,000. Adilabad, Medak, Karimnagar, Nizamabad, Ranga Reddy, Hyderabad, Mahbubnagar, Anantapur, Chittoor and Srikakulam produced only
5550-630: The Telugu language end with vowels, just like those in Italian , and hence referred to it as "The Italian of the East"; a saying that has been widely repeated. A distinct dialect developed in present-day Hyderabad region, due to Persian and Arabic influence. This influence began with the establishment of the Delhi Sultanate rule by the Tughlaq dynasty in the northern Deccan Plateau during
5661-653: The United States and the third most spoken South Asian language after Hindi and Urdu . Minority Telugus are also found in Australia , New Zealand , Bahrain , Canada , Fiji , Malaysia , Sri Lanka , Singapore , Mauritius , Myanmar , Europe ( Italy , the United Kingdom ), South Africa , Trinidad and Tobago , and the United Arab Emirates . Telugu is the official language of
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#17327798132705772-534: The Vijayanagara kings, some of which are: Velcheru Narayana Rao and Sanjay Subrahmanyam say that the emergence of left-hand caste Balijas as trader-warrior-kings in the Nayaka period is a consequence of conditions of new wealth produced by collapsing two varnas , Kshatriya and Vaishya , into one. Based on the Brahmanical conceptualisation of caste during the British Raj period, Balijas were accorded
5883-458: The above is true of all population censuses, the nature of society in British India posed particular problems. Even the geographically-smaller post-Partition India contains a myriad of languages and cultures, ethnicities and religions, many of which have evolved over several millennia. The 1931 census enumerated nearly 20 percent of the world's population, spread over 1,800,000 square miles (4,700,000 km ); G. Findlay Shirras said in 1935 that
5994-436: The advice of Brahmins, who subscribed to a traditional but impractical ritual ranking system, known as varna . The reliance on elites formed part of a colonial strategy to create attachment to a national identity in an arbitrarily-defined highly-disparate whole. The Raj aimed to gain favour with the elites, whose position would then lead to the idea of Indian nationhood percolating through the remainder of society. However, even
6105-528: The broad socio-economic implications of the varna system, but they were also applied inconsistently. William Chichele Plowden , the Commissioner in 1881, designated categories of Brahmans, Rajputs, Castes of Good Social Position, Inferior Castes and Non-Hindus or Aboriginal Castes; in 1921, the category of "depressed classes" was used; and in 1931 the nomenclature became "exterior classes". The 1901 census recorded 1646 distinct castes, which increased to 4147 in 1931. The first census results came in 1872. During
6216-472: The caste of Christians and Muslims was recorded if given by them. John Henry Hutton , who was Census Commissioner in 1931, stated that "tribe was provided to cover the many communities still organised on the basis in whose case the tribe has not become a caste; it was likewise determinate enough, and no attempt was made to define the term race which was generally used so loosely as almost to defy any definition". That assumptions such as immutability were inadequate
6327-461: The caste system as it exists today. Others, such as Dipankar Gupta , reject that idea, which Gupta considers to imply that Indians had "no identity worth the name" prior to the colonial period, but he acknowledges that the Raj had a significant role in how caste is now practised. Timothy Alborn is somewhat more sceptical, but his primary concern is to refute studies based on the theories of imagined community and objectification that have emerged from
6438-490: The categorisations of which became an essential part of the British administrative mechanism. Of those categorisations, caste was regarded as being "the cement that holds together the myriad units of Indian society", according to the 1901 Census Commissioner H. H. Risley . The role of Risley has sometimes drawn particular attention, with Nicholas Dirks stating, "Risley's anthropology worked not so much to retard nationalism as to render it communal. In so doing, it also left
6549-556: The census authorities, whose officials produced tables that demonstrated statistically-implausible spikes and age distributions from the 1880s onward. They came to recognise that the issues were exacerbated by a misunderstanding, with the populace often being unconvinced that the submitted data was not used at a personal level but was rather aggregated for analysis. Those issues could not easily be corrected because there were also significant variances caused by periodic outbreaks of famine and diseases such as cholera and influenza , as well as
6660-428: The census exercise "more telling of the administrative needs of the British than of the social reality for the people of British India". The differences in the nature of Indian society during the British Raj from the value system and the societies of the West were highlighted by the inclusion of "caste", "religion", "profession" and "age" in the data to be collected, as the collection and analysis of that information had
6771-412: The censuses were intended to introduce new taxes, aid military or labour recruitment, assist in conversions to Christianity or force migration were not uncommon, at least in the early decades. There were also incidents of violence although they tended to occur in places where tensions between native people and the British were already high. Ram Bhagat points out that a demographic census is an exercise in
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#17327798132706882-495: The centuries, many non-Telugu speakers have praised the natural musicality of Telugu speech, referring to it as a mellifluous and euphonious language. Speakers of Telugu refer to it as simply Telugu or Telugoo . Older forms of the name include Teluṅgu and Tenuṅgu . Tenugu is derived from the Proto-Dravidian word *ten ("south") to mean "the people who lived in the south/southern direction" (relative to Sanskrit and Prakrit -speaking peoples). The name Telugu , then,
6993-787: The colonial authorities to impose a Western paradigm on the census caste categories. The census administrators themselves also created caste communities in which none existed previously. In Bengal, Chandala , which was commonly used as a generic description for all low-caste people, was mistakenly used as a specific caste name by the authorities. That caused much resentment and attempts to achieve recognition as Namasudra . Castes such as Yadav and Vishwakarma appeared out of nowhere and were created as official categories for what had been geographically-disparate differently-named communities that happened to share traditional occupations, respectively as dairymen/grazers and craft artisans such as goldsmiths and carpenters. The Yadavs were also another example of
7104-400: The concept of Brahmanic elites is tricky: Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis has demonstrated that Bengali Brahmins were more similar to other castes in Bengal than to any of the Brahmin groups elsewhere. There was a general presumption that the caste of a person was immutable and unchanging and that it could only apply to Hindus although Jains were also thus categorised from 1901. In 1911,
7215-454: The country. Furthermore, as Ibbetson and others in the Punjab realised after 1872, the Brahmanic system had no practical purpose from an administrative point of view. In 1881, Punjab abandoned the primary categorisation by varna that was used in other British Indian jurisdictions in that year and preferred instead to assign more weight to the category of occupation. In 1891, the other jurisdictions followed suit. Attempts continued to recognise
7326-437: The court language for numerous dynasties in Southern and Eastern India, including the Eastern Chalukyas , Eastern Gangas , Kakatiyas , Vijayanagara Empire , Qutb Shahis , Madurai Nayaks , and Thanjavur Nayaks . It was also used as an official language outside its homeland, even by non-Telugu dynasties such as the Thanjavur Marathas in Tamil Nadu. Telugu has an unbroken, prolific, and diverse literary tradition of over
7437-401: The customs and beliefs of the people among whom we dwell is surely in some respects a reproach to us; for not only does that ignorance deprive European science of material which it greatly needs, but it also involves a distinct loss of administrative power to ourselves. Administrative needs were indeed a necessity, and the imperative increased with a recognition that the 1857 Rebellion had been
7548-481: The data faced various unusual situations. Matters of culture affected even simple processes such as house numbering, with Bhil people objecting on the grounds of superstition and Burmese people on the grounds of artistry. Enumerators also faced dangerous situations, including instances of being attacked by tigers. According to the 1891 Census Commissioner, the respondents were almost all illiterate and often "unwilling and obtuse". Objections based on various rumours that
7659-427: The demarcations of natural disasters, a tendency to measure life by harvests and the cultural impact of puberty that starkly differentiated adults from children. Other cultural influences included the zodiac and a tendency among Brahmins to understate the age of unmarried late-teenage daughters because for them not to have been married by that time implied a dereliction of parental and religious duty, which would consign
7770-597: The exception of /ɳ/ and /ɭ/, all occur word-initial in a few words, such as / ʈ ɐkːu/ ṭakku 'pretence', / ʈ iːʋi/ ṭhīvi 'grandeur', / ɖ ipːɐ/ ḍippā 'half of a spherical object', and / ʂ oːku/ ṣōku 'fashionable appearance'. The approximant /j/ occurs in word-initial position only in borrowed words, such as. / j ɐnɡu/ yangu , from English 'young', / j ɐʃɐsːu/ yaśassu from Sanskrit yaśas /jɐʃɐs/ 'fame'. Vowels in Telugu contrast in length; there are short and long versions of all vowels except for /æ/, which only occurs as long. Long vowels can occur in any position within
7881-449: The first century CE. Additionally, the Tummalagudem inscription of the Vishnukundinas dates to the 5th century CE. Telugu place names in Prakrit inscriptions are attested from the 2nd century CE onwards. A number of Telugu words were found in the Sanskrit and Prakrit inscriptions of the Satavahana dynasty , Vishnukundina dynasty , and Andhra Ikshvakus . The coin legends of the Satavahanas, in all areas and all periods, used
7992-590: The honorific titles of perceived superior groups such as Brahmins and Rajputs as part of their name. Caste associations were formed to establish the authenticity of such claims, often by inventing traditions allegedly connected to mythology and ancient history, as did the Patidars , and they presented what Frank Conlon has described as a "deluge" of petitions for official recognition to the census authorities. Through such recognition, they thought that they could later make political and economic gains even though, as with
8103-605: The late 19th and the early 20th centuries, the influence of the English language was seen, and modern communication/printing press arose as an effect of British rule , especially in the areas that were part of the Madras Presidency . Literature from this time had a mix of classical and modern traditions and included works by such scholars as Gidugu Venkata Ramamoorty , Kandukuri Veeresalingam , Gurajada Apparao , Gidugu Sitapati and Panuganti Lakshminarasimha Rao . In
8214-408: The later Sanskritisation of it. If so the derivation itself must have been quite ancient because Triglyphum , Trilingum and Modogalingam are attested in ancient Greek sources, the last of which can be interpreted as a Telugu rendition of " Trilinga ". Telugu, as a Dravidian language, descends from Proto-Dravidian , a proto-language . Linguistic reconstruction suggests that Proto-Dravidian
8325-538: The neighbouring states of Tamil Nadu , Karnataka , Maharashtra , Odisha , Chhattisgarh , some parts of Jharkhand , and the Kharagpur region of West Bengal in India. Many Telugu immigrants are also found in the states of Gujarat , Goa , Bihar , Kashmir , Uttar Pradesh , Punjab , Haryana , and Rajasthan . As of 2018 7.2% of the population, Telugu is the fourth-most-spoken native language in India after Hindi , Bengali , and Marathi . In Karnataka , 7.0% of
8436-518: The officials queried even trying to impose the age category, Alborn noted: The response of actuaries to the challenge of inadequate Indian age returns between the Bengali census of 1871 and the final British-administered all-India census of 1931 was not very different from the recent critical work of historians and demographers about such unstable census-data categories as "occupation" or "race." As much as possible, they made do with what they had, all
8547-544: The outset in 1872, there was never a formal definition of the census categories for caste, race or tribe. For example, in 1891, the Jats and Rajputs were recorded as castes and as tribes, but the category of tribe was not formally adopted until the 1901 census. The recorded details changed in every census from 1872 to 1941 and the administrators struggled to comprehend Indian culture. They relied heavily on elitist strictures through their interpretation of regional literature and on
8658-434: The parents to a torrid period between death and reincarnation. Also, Indians were not very good at estimating the age of others, which made it difficult for census enumerators to assess or to correct the information with which they were supplied. In parallel with the introduction of censuses, the campaign to end infanticide led to the first formal attempts to register births, marriages and deaths. Legislation for that purpose
8769-565: The past tense. Census of India prior to independence Census in British India refers to the census of India prior to independence which was conducted periodically from 1865 to 1941. The censuses were primarily concerned with administration and faced numerous problems in their design and conduct ranging from the absence of house numbering in hamlets to cultural objections on various grounds to dangers posed by wild animals to census personnel. The sociologist Michael Mann called
8880-534: The population speak Telugu, and 5.6% in Tamil Nadu . There are more than 400,000 Telugu Americans in the United States . As of 2018 , Telugu is the fastest-growing language in the United States , (especially in New Jersey and New York City ), with the number of Telugu speakers in the United States increasing by 86% between 2010 and 2017. As of 2021 , it is the 18th most spoken native language in
8991-480: The population. Most people in British India did not know their age anyway, and the few who did, mostly Brahmins, were often reluctant to divulge the information with the degree of accuracy that was common in Britain and other Western countries. The nature of time had a different meaning to the people of India, who considered age to be a bureaucratic device and were more concerned with practical measures of time, such as
9102-406: The practice of remarriage, the observance of purdah, the occupations of women, the inheritance of property and the maintenance of widows, even diet, to name a few obvious cases, vary according to the caste and the religious community of the individual. The time will no doubt come when occupation will serve the purpose at present served by religion and caste in presenting demographic data, but that time
9213-424: The precolonial era, Telugu became the language of high culture throughout South India . Vijaya Ramaswamy compared it to the overwhelming dominance of French as the cultural language of Europe during roughly the same era. Telugu also predominates in the evolution of Carnatic music , one of two main subgenres of Indian classical music and is widely taught in music colleges focusing on Carnatic tradition. Over
9324-678: The princely Hyderabad State , the Andhra Mahasabha was started in 1921 with the main goal of promoting Telugu language, literature, its books and historical research. Key figures in this movement included Madapati Hanumantha Rao (founder of the Andhra Mahasabha), Komarraju Venkata Lakshmana Rao (founder of the Library Movement in Hyderabad State), and Suravaram Pratapa Reddy . Since the 1930s, what
9435-428: The role of Britain generally in the country. Rathbone herself was confronted by Rama Rau, an Indian feminist, who said that the British were simply not well-placed to understand Indian culture and that "educated Indian women were working in every province of their country to eradicate social evils and outmoded customs and prejudices, and we refused to accept the assertion that the removal of social evils in Indian society
9546-411: The ruler of an additional population more than equal to that of the whole of England and Wales". Proposed benefits such as improvements in public health and targeted famine relief, but they were often not realised in those particular instances because the poor data relating to age (mortality rates, as an example) prevented the sort of mapping of the population that over time was improving the well-being of
9657-490: The similarities between the communities of Kapu , Telaga , Balija, and Ontari. These terms are often used as synonyms and are mentioned as sections of each other. Kapu, Telaga, and Balija are considered as variant names of the same community in different regions. Andhra Pradesh government's Kapu Welfare and Development Corporation refers to Kapu, Telaga, Balija, and Ontari communities collectively as Kapu. Some Balijas use surnames such as Naidu or Nayudu, and Naicker, which share
9768-463: The split of Telugu at c. 1000 BCE. The linguistic history of Telugu is periodised as follows: Pre-historic Telugu is identified with the period around 600 BCE or even earlier. Pre-historic Telugu is considered one of the most conservative languages of the Dravidian family based on its linguistic features. One of the earliest Telugu words, nágabu , found at the Amaravati Stupa ,
9879-534: The state that is currently divided into Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. It also has official language status in the Yanam district of the union territory of Puducherry . It is the fourth most spoken Indian language in India after Hindi , Bengali and Marathi . It is one of the six classical languages of India . Telugu Language Day is celebrated every year on 29 August, the birthday of Telugu poet Gidugu Venkata Ramamurthy . The fourth World Telugu Conference
9990-522: The statistical and logistical methods, change over time, and the same can be true of geographical boundaries and of population identities, such as race and nationalities. However, as well as being an administrative tool, a series of censuses can act as a coalescent of the population or at least of parts of it, causing various groups within the whole to form identities in space and over time. The ability of people to classify themselves can both reinforce and create classifications with which they identify. While
10101-572: The three Telugu dialects and regions. Waddar , Chenchu , and Manna-Dora are all closely related to Telugu. Other dialects of Telugu are Berad, Dasari, Dommara, Golari, Kamathi, Komtao, Konda-Reddi, Salewari, Vadaga, Srikakula, Visakhapatnam, East Godavari, Rayalaseema, Nellore, Guntur, Vadari Bangalore, and Yanadi. The Roman transliteration used for transcribing the Telugu script is the National Library at Kolkata romanisation . Telugu words generally end in vowels. In Old Telugu, this
10212-435: The transformation of occupational descriptors into caste-based descriptors did not occur until at least the 17th century. The classification of people as Balija was one of many challenges for the census enumerators of the British Raj era , whose desire was to reduce a complex social system to one of administrative simplicity using theories of evolutionary anthropology . Early Raj census attempts in Madras Presidency recorded
10323-531: The transliteration of the Telugu script used here (where different from IPA). Most consonants contrast in length in word-medial position, meaning that there are long (geminated) and short phonetic renderings of the sounds. A few examples of words that contrast by length of word-medial consonants: All retroflex consonants occur in intervocalic position and when adjacent to a retroflex consonant, for instance. /ʋɐː ɳ iː/ vāṇī 'tippet', /kɐ ʈɳ ɐm/ kaṭṇam 'dowry', /pɐ ɳɖ u/ paṇḍu 'fruit'; /kɐ ɭ ɐ/ kaḷa 'art'. With
10434-560: The union territories of Puducherry and Andaman and Nicobar Islands . It is also spoken by members of the Telugu diaspora spread across countries like United States , Australia , Malaysia , Mauritius , UAE , Saudi Arabia and others. Telugu is the fastest-growing language in the United States. It is also a protected language in South Africa and is offered as an optional third language in schools in KwaZulu-Natal province. According to Mikhail S. Andronov, Telugu split from
10545-436: The very imperfect system of registering life events. Attempts at correction were made, but the figures remained unreliable throughout the Raj period, and perhaps worse, the attempts to correct them in the official reports were not always based on sound methodology. Amartya Sen is among those who have been criticised for allegedly failing to appreciate the underlying statistical problems in the published data. Noting that some of
10656-570: The while preaching caution about the shaky empirical foundation on which their charts and graphs were built. The outcomes of the census exercise were sometimes startling. For example, the 1872 census in Bengal suggested that the population was considerably greater than had been believed. A supervisor there noted that it "rose in one day from 42 to 67 millions" and that the Lieutenant-Governor "suddenly found that he had unconsciously been
10767-464: The word, but native Telugu words do not end in a long vowel. Short vowels occur in all positions of a word, with the exception of /o/, which does not occur word-finally. The vowels of Telugu are illustrated below, along with the Telugu script and romanisation. In most dialects, the vowel /æː/ only occurs in loan words. In the Guntur dialect, [æː] is a frequent allophone of /aː/ in certain verbs in
10878-518: The work of Benedict Anderson . He stated of the claimed objectification of caste: ... such accounts risk overstating the capacity of British census officials to control their subjects through the mere act of counting them. If age, seemingly one of the most straight-forward features of the census, posed the serious difficulties of biased reports and independent verification, concepts like "objectification" are of especially dubious value in more controversial categories like caste and ethnicity. From
10989-435: Was a proliferation of columns concerning occupations in particular. Individuals appeared as 'con-man', 'pimp', 'prostitute', 'idiot' and 'thief', or however else they might appear or describe themselves. Worse still, castes and tribes were listed as to whether they were 'animist', Christian, Hindu or Mohammedan, with little structure or system beyond the self-representation of the respondents. That caste should not be treated as
11100-413: Was absolute; in the modern language m, n, y, w may end a word. Sanskrit loans have introduced aspirated and murmured consonants as well. Telugu does not have contrastive stress , and speakers vary on where they perceive stress. Most place it on the penultimate or final syllable, depending on word and vowel length. The table below lists the consonant phonemes of Telugu, along with the symbols used in
11211-502: Was acknowledged, for example, by the 1911 Commissioner, E. A. Gait , who commented on the demonstrably obvious processes of fusion and fission in social groups that gave rise to new group identities. Similarly, Hutton noted: a caste which had applied in one province to be called Brahman (priestly caste) asked in another to be called Rajput (warrior caste) and there are several instances at this [1931] census of castes claiming to be Brahman who claimed to be Rajputs ten years ago". Hutton
11322-562: Was bounded in north by Mahendra mountain in the modern Ganjam district in Odisha and to the south by Srikalahasteeswara temple in Tirupati district . However, Andhra extended westwards as far as Srisailam in Nandyal district , about halfway across the modern state. According to other sources in the early sixteenth century, the northern boundary is Simhachalam and the southern limit
11433-423: Was considered an "elite" literary form of the Telugu language has now spread to the common people with the introduction of mass media like movies, television, radio and newspapers. This form of the language is also taught in schools and colleges as a standard. Telugu is one of the 22 languages with official status in India . The Andhra Pradesh Official Language Act, 1966, declares Telugu the official language of
11544-433: Was enacted between 1866 and 1872, but the system was underresourced and reliant on village officials. Although the registration processes improved over the years, they were significantly disrupted at times, notably when officials were preoccupied in dealing with famines and, from the 1920s onward, by the actions of the Indian independence movement . The problems of registration, age irrelevance and ignorance were known to
11655-406: Was heavily influenced by Sanskrit and Prakrit, corresponding to the advent of Telugu literature. Initially, Telugu literature appeared in inscriptions and poetry in the courts of rulers, and later in written works, such as Nannayya 's Andhra Mahabharatam (1022 CE). The third phase is marked by further stylisation and sophistication of the literary languages. During this period the split of
11766-435: Was observing the effects of a popular belief that the purpose of the census was to define the relative position of people in society. Therefore, respondents would often claim to be of a socially-superior community to that which they actually were. That misconception gave an outlet for aspirational people to seek advancement and caused the evolution, sometimes almost overnight, of completely-new social identities that often adopted
11877-508: Was organised in Tirupati in the last week of December 2012. Issues related to Telugu language policy were deliberated at length. The American Community Survey has said that data for 2016 which were released in September 2017 showed Telugu is the third most widely spoken Indian language in the US. Hindi tops the list followed by Gujarati, as of the 2010 census . In the Indian subcontinent,
11988-498: Was spoken around the fourth millennium BCE. Comparative linguistics confirms that Telugu belongs to the South Dravidian-II (also called South-Central Dravidian) sub-group, which also includes the non-literary languages like Gondi , Kuvi , Koya , Pengo , Konda and Manda. Proto-Telugu is the reconstructed linguistic ancestor of all the dialects and registers of Telugu. Russian linguist Mikhail S. Andronov, places
12099-637: Was the largest such exercise in the world but "also the quickest and the cheapest". Scholars such as Bernard S. Cohn have argued that the censuses of the Raj period significantly influenced the social and spatial demarcations within India that exist today. The use of enumerative mechanisms such as the census, which were intended to bolster the colonial presence, may indeed have sown the seeds that grew to be independent India, but not everybody accepts that. Peter Gottschalk has stated of that cultural influence: ... classifications of convenience for government officials transformed into contested identities for
12210-474: Was then a primary consideration, as attested in the writings of Kautilya , Abul Fazl and Muhnot Nainsi . The East India Company , too, carried out quantitative exercises in various places and at various times prior to the Indian Rebellion of 1857 after which its authority to govern the country, often referred to as Company Rule , was replaced by the administrators operating under the auspices of
12321-413: Was titled Atharvana Karikavali. Appa Kavi in the 17th century explicitly wrote that Telugu was derived from Trilinga . Scholar C. P. Brown made a comment that it was a "strange notion" since the predecessors of Appa Kavi had no knowledge of such a derivation. George Abraham Grierson and other linguists doubt this derivation, holding rather that Telugu was the older term and Trilinga must be
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