1. Theories of the origin of the caste.
Jāt.[1]—The representative cultivating caste of the Punjab, corresponding to the Kurmi of Hindustān, the Kunbi of the Deccan, and the Kāpu of Telingāna. In the Central Provinces 10,000 Jāts were returned in 1911, of whom 5000 belonged to Hoshangābād and the bulk of the remainder to Narsinghpur, Saugor and Jubbulpore. The origin of the Jāt caste has been the subject of much discussion. Sir D. Ibbetson stated some of the theories as follows:[2] “Suffice it to say that both General Cunningham and Major Tod agree in considering the Jāts to be of Indo-Scythian stock. The former identifies them with the Zanthii of Strabo and the Jatii of Pliny and Ptolemy; and holds that they probably entered the Punjab from their home on the Oxus very shortly after the Meds or Mands, who also were Indo-Scythians, and who moved into the Punjab about a century before Christ.... Major Tod classes the Jāts as one of the great Rājpūt tribes, and extends his identification with the Getae to both races; but here General Cunningham differs, holding the Rājpūts to belong to the original Aryan stock, and the Jāts to a later wave of immigrants from the north-west, probably of Scythian race.” It is highly probable that the Jāts may date their settlement in the Punjab from one of the three Scythian inroads mentioned by Mr. V. A. Smith,[3] but I do not know that there is as yet considered to be adequate evidence to identify them with any particular one.
The following curious passage from the Mahābhārata would appear to refer to the Jāts:[4]
“An old and excellent Brāhman reviling the countries Bāhīka and Madra in the dwelling of Dhritarāshtra, related facts long known, and thus described those nations. External to the Himāvan, and beyond the Ganges, beyond the Sārasvati and Yamuna rivers and Kurukshetra, between five rivers, and the Sindhu as the sixth, are situated the Bāhīkas, devoid of ritual or observance, and therefore to be shunned. Their figtree is named Govardhana (i.e. the place of cow-killing); their market-place is Subhadram (the place of vending liquor: at least so say the commentators), and these give titles to the doorway of the royal palace. A business of great importance compelled me to dwell amongst the Bāhīkas, and their customs are therefore well known to me. The chief city is called Shākāla, and the river Apaga. The people are also named Jarttikas; and their customs are shameful. They drink spirits made from sugar and grain, and eat meat seasoned with garlic; and live on flesh and wine: their women intoxicated appear in public places, with no other garb than garlands and perfumes, dancing and singing, and vociferating indecencies in tones more harsh than those of the camel or the ass; they indulge in promiscuous intercourse and are under no restraint. They clothe themselves in skins and blankets, and sound the cymbal and drum and conch, and cry aloud with hoarse voices: ‘We will hasten to delight, in thick forests and in pleasant places; we will feast and sport; and gathering on the highways spring upon the travellers, and spoil and scourge them!’ In Shākāla, a female demon (a Rākshasi) on the fourteenth day of the dark fortnight sings aloud: ‘I will feast on the flesh of kine, and quaff the inebriating spirit attended by fair and graceful females.’ The Sūdra-like Bāhīkas have no institutes nor sacrifices; and neither deities, manes, nor Brāhmans accept their offerings. They eat out of wooden or earthen plates, nor heed their being smeared with wine or viands, or licked by dogs, and they use equally in its various preparations the milk of ewes, of camels and of asses. Who that has drunk milk in the city Yugandhara can hope to enter Svarga? Bāhi and Hīka were the names of two fiends in the Vipāsha river; the Bāhīkas are their descendants and not of the creation of Brahma. Some say the Arattas are the name of the people and Bāhīka of the waters. The Vedas are not known there, nor oblation, nor sacrifice, and the gods will not partake of their food. The Prasthalas (perhaps borderers), Madras, Gandharas, Arattas, Khashas, Vasas, Atisindhus (or those beyond the Indus), Sauvīras, are all equally infamous. There one who is by birth a Brāhman, becomes a Kshatriya, or a Vaishya, or a Sūdra, or a Barber, and having been a barber becomes a Brāhman again. A virtuous woman was once violated by Aratta ruffians, and she cursed the race, and their women have ever since been unchaste. On this account their heirs are their sisters’ children, not their own. All countries have their laws and gods: the Yavanas are wise, and preeminently brave; the Mlechchas observe their own ritual, but the Madrakas are worthless. Madra is the ordure of the earth: it is the region of inebriety, unchastity, robbery, and murder: fie on the Panchanada people! fie on the Aratta race!”
In the above account the country referred to is clearly the Punjab, from the mention of the five rivers and the Indus. The people are called Bāhīka or Jarttika, and would therefore seem to be the Jāts. And the account would appear to refer to a period when they were newly settled in the Punjab and had not come under Hindu influence. But at the same time the Aryans or Hindus had passed through the Punjab and were settled in Hindustān. And it would therefore seem to be a necessary inference that the Jāts were comparatively late immigrants, and were one of the tribes who invaded India between the second century B.C. and the fifth century A.D. as suggested above.