some interesting facts regarding marriage and women in #Rajasthan #Rajputs

Girls/women had/has manly names. Exceptions were there but majority male names. For e.g my birth name was Om later my grandfather changed it to my present name. The Surname used/is was only Kanwar (कँवर) so my janam patri has the name as Om Kanwar (ओम कँवर)

My other family ladies....
Nawal kanwar (नवल), sampat(सम्पत) kanwar, Ratan(रतन and not female version रतना) kanwar,
Mohan(मोहन )kanwar,
Kamal(कमल) kanwar
Neeraj (नीरज) kanwar
Sushil (सुशील) kanwar
etc. Here kanwar pranounced as कँवर and not कनवर

Now this tradition of keeping male names is almost over, we have more sophisticated names from sanskrit (everyone wants a unique unheard name for his/her child) mostly the educated and modern families.

Males on the other hand wrote Singh (सिंह) with name of the village they belong. For e.g Anand Singh chinchroli ( Chinchroli is the village) . Wherever we go or start living, we are known by the village we belong.

The villages or region is specific to particular lineage. For e.g shekhawati region villages have shekhawat lineage(All from Rao Shekha) that further have 4 sub divisions.

So no marriage between the children of Rajputs belonging to these villages as they all are brothers by same lineage. When I hear that someone's daughter has been married to some guy from same village(obviously from other communities) I wonder how its possible.

Mostly in bollywood movies i used to see guy falling for a girl from same village. Villages are not like this. You cant marry your sister. We are taught from childhood to call our neighbours in villages as chacha, kaka, bade papa, bua etc. That has meaning.

Jodhpur,Bikaner etc are Rathor's with a small section in jalore belonging to Chauhans(balote) Even sekhawats have a village Maunda near Chinchroli that is of Tanwars(तँवर) . So technically shekhawat can marry into one belonging to Maunda.

But shekhawats avoids it because they had given a daughter to Maunda and so the bhanjas lineage. Though some say its 7 generations now or more and no problem in marrying. But have seen avoiding it.

So a shekhawat lineage person can be married to a Rathor, chauhan, tanwar and many other communities in Rajput category. But if its a love marriage its usually accepted if the lineage doesnt match or from other communities outside of Rajputs.

Now about the girl. As I see in India and in other countries too the girl takes the name of the family she is married into. Its not the case in Rajput community. Neither her first name nor her surname is changed.

That is if i am writing my name as Om Kanwar it will always be written as Om Kanwar even after marriage. Reason given by elders is that a husband and wife are from different lineage, her blood cannot be changed otherwise she will be his sister

So if i write Om shekhawat(now a days women have started using family surnames)it will always be the same om shekhawat.But now many are adding their husband surname along with their name such as kirti bhati Rathore.(just an example) so her birth name is kirti bhati(rare though)

So most important is the root one belongs to. The village. By knowing the village we can easily find out the family and if they are genuine.

Some other things that are followed is the lineage of mothers of the boy and girl. It should not be the same as the girl or boy.

That is the lineage of girls mother should not be the same as the boy's and similarly the lineage of boys mother should not be same as girls.