Gaddi

Clans and Kinship

Rose (1911) describes Gaddi society as made up of Brahman, Khatri and Rajput, and Thakur and Rathi sections, each divided into gotras or exogamous sections, while the sections themselves are not strictly closed: in Kangra, for instance, the Jhunu got of the Khatris intermarries with Brahmans. Each section keeps the Brahmanical gotra of its original group, and these gotras are divided into countless als, septs that are also called gotras or gots. Many al names come from an ancestor's nickname, his trade or his place, or from some event at his birth. Marriages were arranged through the family priest, with betrothal either by gift (dharma puna) or by exchange (tola).

A selection of the gotras and als that Rose (1911) names as examples, grouped by section as he gives them. He names many more als, mostly from Chamba, and glosses their meanings, many of them nicknames; the glosses are not repeated here. Spellings are Rose's, from a scanned copy, and families today may write the names differently.

In the Official Lists

• Scheduled Tribe

  Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh

  Listed as: Gaddi

  Census 2011 counted the Gaddi of the then state of Jammu and Kashmir, which included Ladakh, together.

Checked against the Census 2011 tables and Wikipedia's compilation of the orders, which may not show amendments of 2022 to 2024. The Muslim Gaddis of the Delhi and Karnal country whom Rose also describes are a different community and are not covered here.

Checked on 2026-11-07 against the sources below. The lists are amended from time to time and can differ by district; for a certificate, the current order or the state's list is what counts.

Name and Origin

Rose (1911) records traditions that the Gaddis came from the plains: Chauhan Rajput and Brahman Gaddis are said to have come to Chamba with Raja Ajia Varma in 850-70, and some Rajput and Khatri families to have fled to the hills to escape Aurangzeb's persecutions. He found these consistent with the tradition that Brahmaur, the ancient Brahmapura, is the home of the Gaddis, the Dhaula Dhar having long given refuge to people from the plains. The Gaddis say that they took up the dress of Shiva and Parvati when they settled in Brahmaur.

History

In Rose's day the Gaddis of Chamba numbered 11,507, not counting Brahman and Rajput sections returned under their caste names. Many held land on both sides of the Dhauladhar: they reaped the winter crop in Kangra and returned in spring to cut the summer crop in Brahmaur. The men of a family took turns with the flocks, spending the summer in the high country of Pangi and Lahul and the winter in the low hills along the plains, with the move to Kangra in October and November and the return in April and May (Rose).

Faith and Worship

The Gaddis are Hindus and hold Brahmaur to be Shiva's land. Rose records pilgrimages in Bhadon and Asauj to the shrines of Narsingh, Hari-har, Lakshmi Devi, Ganesh and Kailung in Brahmaur, and, as a rule in Bhadon only, to Mani Mahesh; and in Chet to Jawalaji in Kangra. Godlings are linked with particular crops, Shiva and the Devis receive offerings at Shivratri, and some local beings, such as Kailu, are peculiar to the Gaddis or to Chamba.

Customs

The traditional dress of a Gaddi man is the chola, a knee-length coat of homespun wool with a deep collar, tied at the waist with a long black rope of sheep's wool, the dora; on the march a shepherd may carry four or five lambs in its fold. Women wear a long woollen gown tied with the same dora, with ornaments of their own such as heavy brass anklets (Rose). Ploughing, sowing and reaping are begun on a Sunday, Tuesday or Thursday, and the dead are cremated.

Festivals