Note 65 — D.

Dikhit; Dikhshit (Sans. dikhshita, “initiated, consecrated”), a powerful sept of Râjputs.—The traditions of the sept65 relate that they are descended from the Sûrajbansi Râjas who for fifty-one generations ruled over Ajudhya. In the fifty-first generation from Ikshwâku, Râja Durgavâhu left Ajudhya and emigrated to Gujarât, where his descendants took the title of Durgbans after their founder. In the twenty-fourth generation from him Kalyân Sâh Durgbans went to pay homage to Râja Vikramaditya, the great King of Ujjain, the supreme monarch of India. From him (about 50 B.C.) he received the title of Dikhit, which his descendants bore instead of Durgbans. For many years they remained stationary in Gujarât, and at the time when the kingdom of Kanauj was at its zenith Balbhadra Dikhit took service with the Râthaur Râja, and his grandson Jaswant saw the death of the Râja of Kanauj and the destruction of the power and family of his benefactor. The name of Balbhadra’s father was Samapradhân, which is a singular name for a Râjput, and suggests a reason why the Dikhits do not rank so high in the precedence table as they ought to do if their tradition was correct. Pradhân was the old name for a Registrar (Qânûngo), which office was only given to Kâyasths. There may be some intermixture of Kâyasth blood which spoils the purity of their Sûrajbans descent. It is curious that in the two sets of villages bordering on old Dikhtiyâna and now held by Dikhits, there are traditions that the land once belonged to Kâyasths, who, when hard pressed by their enemies, obtained help from the Dikhits by ceding part of their villages to them. If the above hypothesis be true, the Kâyasths in this case only called in their own distant kindred. Jaswant Sinh had four sons, the eldest of whom remained in Samoni, and his descendants possess the estate to this day. The second, Udhaybhân, migrated into Oudh and colonized the district of Dikhtiyâna. The third, Banwâri, went still further north, crossing the Ghâgra and Râpti, and, choosing a safe retreat in the sub-Himalayan forests, founded there the great Sirnet Râj of Bânsi. The fourth, Khairâj, migrated to the east, and, settling down in the district of Partâbgarh, took the town of Bilkhar, whence his descendants are known as Bilkhariyas. The further fortunes of the sept are given in great detail by Sir C. Elliott.