Yadav
Yadav refers to a grouping of traditionally non-elite,[2][3] peasant-pastoral communities or castes in India that since the 19th and 20th centuries[4][5] have claimed descent from the mythological king Yadu as a part of a movement of social and political resurgence.[6] The term Yadav now covers many traditional peasant-pastoral castes such as Ahirs of the Hindi belt and the Gavli of Maharashtra.[2][7]
Traditionally, Yadav groups were linked to cattle raising and as such, were outside the formal caste system.[5] From the mid-19th century onward, many British ethnographies attempted to understand India's tribes and castes by attempting to document the differences and to explain them in the prevailing ideologies of the period; the lack of such understanding was felt to be one of the reasons for the Indian rebellion of 1857.[1] Since the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the Yadav movement has worked to improve the social standing of its constituents,[8] through Sanskritisation,[9] active participation in the armed forces,[4] expansion of economic opportunities to include other, more prestigious business fields, and active participation in politics.[8] Yadav leaders and intellectuals have often focused on their claimed descent from Yadu, and from Krishna,[10] which they argue confers kshatriya status upon them,[11] and effort has been invested in recasting the group narrative to emphasise kshatriya-like valour,[12] however, the overall tenor of their movement has not been overtly egalitarian in the context of the larger Indian caste system.[13] Yadavs benefited from Zamindari abolition in some states of north India like Bihar, but not to the extent that other Upper Backwards did. According to Ranabir Sammadar, the Yadavs mere most discriminated caste among the other OBC and the "Upper Caste" often make folk jokes on them that Yadav attains inteligence not before the age of 60 years, portraying them as most stupid and rustic people. The "Upper Caste" also looked down on them as the later had in past worked as cattle grazers (Charvaha) for them.[14]
The term Yadav (or sometimes Yadava) has been interpreted to mean a descendant of Yadu, who is a mythological king.[15]
Using "very broad generalisations", Jayant Gadkari says that it is "almost certain" from analysis of the Puranas that Andhaka, Vrishni, Satvata and Abhira were collectively known as Yadavas and worshipped Krishna. Gadkari further notes of these ancient works that "It is beyond dispute that each of the Puranas consists of legends and myths ... but what is important is that, within that framework [a] certain value system is propounded".[16]
At the core of the Yadav community lies a specific folk theory of descent, according to which all Indian pastoral castes are said to descend from the Yadu dynasty (hence the label Yadav) to which Krishna (a cowherder, and supposedly a Kshatriya) belonged. ... [there is] a strong belief amongst them that all Yadavs belong to Krishna's line of descent, the Yadav subdivisions of today being the outcome of a fission of an original and undifferentiated group.[17]
Historians such as P. M. Chandorkar have used epigraphical and similar evidence to argue that Ahirs and Gavlis are representative of the ancient Yadavas and Abhiras mentioned in Sanskrit works.[18]
