8. Jain subcastes of Banias.
Practically all the Jains in the Central Provinces are of the Bania caste. There is a small subcaste of Jain Kalārs, but these are said to have gone back to Hinduism.[10] Of the Bania subcastes who are Jains the principal are the Parwār, Golapūrab, Oswāl and Saitwāl. Saraogi, the name for a Jain layman, and Charnāgar, a sect of Jains, are also returned as subcastes of Jain Banias. Other important subcastes of Banias, as the Agarwāl and Maheshri, have a Jain section. Nearly all Banias belong to the Digambara sect, but the Oswāl are Swetambaras. They are said to have been originally Rājpūts of Os or Osnagar in Rājputāna, and while they were yet Rājpūts a Swetambara ascetic sucked the poison from the wound of an Oswāl boy whom a snake had bitten, and this induced the community to join the Swetambara sect of the Jains.[11]