Note 47 — Glossary

Kāst.—A small caste found in the Marātha Districts and Bombay, who appear to be a separate or inferior group of the Kāyasths. In Chānda they work as patwāris and clerks to moneylenders, while some are merchants and landholders. Like the Kāyasths, they wash their pens and inkstands on the Dasahra festival and worship them. Their principal deity is the god Venkatesh, a Marātha incarnation of Vishnu. In Bombay the Kāsts claim to be Yajur-Vedi Brāhmans, dress like them and keep the regular Brāhman ceremonies.47 But they are considered to be half Marāthas and half Brāhmans, and strict Deshasth and Kokanasth Brāhmans hold their touch unclean.48