Lalli

Lalli (लल्ली) /Lall (लल्ल) Lali (लली) Luli (लली) Loori (लूरी) Luri (लूरी) is gotra of Jats found in Punjab, India and Pakistan. Luri (लूरी) is a branch of Chauhans. Lali clan is found in Afghanistan.

Jat Gotras Namesake

• Luri = Mountains of Luristan = Zagros Mountains = Mount Zagrus (Pliny.vi.31)

History

Hukum Singh Panwar writes that the presence of Jats in Indus Valley is fully confirmed by external sources. Hamza of Isfahan (893-970) and half a century later, Firdausi furnish us with unimprechable evidence that "the Iranian emperor, Behram Gour (420-448 AD) secured from king Sankhala of North India his princess in marriage besides 12000 musicians of both sexes, known as Luri Jats, for participation in an Iranian national celebration, and in lieu of their excellent performances, settled them with ex gratia grants of land, oxen and grain in a province called as Luristan after them in Iran. Discovery of a district known as Zutt and certain villages of similar name in Luristan by Arab geographer and travellers, viz, Istakhari, Ibn-Hawkal, Mukaddasi, Yakut and Mustawfi reasonably compel us to conclude that those names must have been given by the Jats who were settled in Luristan by Behram Gour in the first half of the 5th century AD.

The famous Panjtar stone inscription, now in (Pakistan), written in the year 122 of Saka era. It refers to one “ Lala, the protector of the Kushana dynasty of Maharaja Kanishka” . This Lala, was a Lalli “Jat” It also refers to the gift of two trees by one Moika in the eastern region of “ Kasua”. That last word Kasua is the same as Kasuan the name of the Kushana clan (and territory) which is still existing.

Bhim Singh Dahiya has described about the history of Lohar clan. This clan is famous in Kashmir history and gave it a whole dynasty called Lohar dynasty. Their settlement in India was Loharin, in Pir Pantsal range. The Lohar Kot-fort of Lohars-is named after them. The famous queen Didda, married to Kshemagupta, was daughter of Lohar Kong Simha Raja, who himself was married to a daughter of Lalli (Jat Clan) Sahi king Bhima of Kabul and Udabhanda (Und, near modern Attock).

Thus Didda was a Lohariya Jat scion, and a granddaughter of Lalli Jats of Kabul baseless called Brahmans. The descendants of their ruling family are still called Sahi Jats.

Queen Didda, made one Sangram Raj, her successor. He was the son of her brother Udaya Raj and he died on 1028 A.D. Lohar itself remained with Vigrah Raj.

Bhim Singh Dahiya argues as Sung-Yun says Laelih was made ruler of Gandhara by the Yethas, the Laelih was most likely the governor of Gandhara because the clan name of Toramana and Mihiragula was Johal or Jauvala. It is important to note here that "Lalli" too is a well known clan name of the modern Sikh Jats. pronunciation of words "Laelih" and Lalli is almost identical. Furthermore, according to Sir Cunningham a "Lalliya" Shahi king ruled west of the Indus river as late as A.D. 900 with Ohind as his capital. Cunningham quotes Troyer who calls this king "the illustrious Sahi, of the country of Lalli".

Bhim Singh Dahiya writes that the last Jat kingdom of Jabulistan, ultimately destroyed by the Mohammedans, was a kingdom of Lalli clan of Jats. We have taken the following content about Lalli clan is from Bhim Singh Dahiya's book.

According to Bhim Singh Dahiya the Gondal clan represents the “Go-nanda” dynasty of Kashmir, the Lohar jats are the descendants of the Lohar kings of Kashmir, just as the Lalli, the Sahi, the Balhara, the Bring, the Takhar, the Dhonchak, the Samil, the Kular, and so on represent the people mentioned in the Rajatarangini of Kalhana.

In Rajatarangini

Rajatarangini tells us that King of Kashmir Shankaravarmma easily defeated Alakhāna king of Gurjjara who ceded Takka a part of his kingdom to his conqueror. The king of the Thakkiyaka family took service as guard under the king of Kashmira. The latter caused the kingdom of the Thakkiya king which had been usurped by the king of Bhoja to be restored to him. The king of the country which lay between Darat and Turushka, (as the Aryavarta lies between Himalaya and Vindhya,) Lalliya Shahi by name, who was among kings even as the sun is among stars, and was also lord over Alakhāna, did not submit to the king of Kashmira, on which the latter drove him out of his country.

Rajatarangini tells that Then the virtuous and truthful Gopalavarmma (902-904), began to reign under the direction of his mother Sugandha. Though he was yet a boy, and lived among the vile and the seduced, yet he did not contract any bad habit. His mother was now a widow, and living in luxury, asked Prabhakaradeva, a minister (treasurer), to her embrace, and bestowed on her paramour wealth, rank, and three good districts. The treasurer robbed the queen of much wealth and built a town Bhandapura at Shahirajya. The reigning Shahi disobeyed his orders to build the town, on which he changed the name of the country to Kamalaka, and gave it to Tomarana the son of Lalliya. (Book V,p.122)

Laliya Sahi Jat of Kabul

Bhim Singh Dahiya writes... [p.221]: This important dynasty under Kabul and Gandhara was founded in 477 A.D. under king Hephthal II, of Balkh. His coins have been found and show that Balkh was his capital, because the legend on the reverse of his coins, in Tokhri script, mention the name of Balkh city. In 456 A.D. the Iranian emperor Yezdegird II was still fighting with the Jats when the latter sent an embassy to the Chinese Court of Emperor Wei. This is further proof of the fact that Hephthal II was a sovereign ruler. In 457 A.D. the Jats crushed the power of Sassanid emperors and Yezdegird II was killed. It was during this period that one of their clans, the 'Jaula' occupied Gazni and adjoining areas. They conquered Gandhara in 477 A.D.; Kashmir was taken in 478 A.D.; and in 479 A.D. they occupied Sogdiana and before 500 A.D. they had taken over Turfan and Qarashahr.

This date of occupation of Gandhara in 477 A.D. is further proved by the Chinese pilgrim, Sung-Yun, who stated in 520 A.D. that the Yetha had conquered Ye-Po-Lo, about two generations ago. Here the Ye-Po-Lo of the Chinese stands for Jauval/Jabul and the Yetha, of course, stands for the Jats; the Chinese Ye, ilVing the sound of 'J'. It is interesting to note that Hephthal III, who defeated and killed the next Iranian emperor Peroz, in a decisive battle in 484 A.D., is called Ye-ta-i-li-to meaning (Jaṭlāṭa) the king of the Jats. ⁶⁵ As shown above the Yetha/Yeta is the Chinese transliteration of the word Jat, and Lāṭa or Rāṭa is a

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64. U. Thakur, The Hunas in/ndia, pp. 109-110.

65. See Note I at the end of this section.

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[Page 222]: Scythian word for king. Buddha Prakash says that it is a manifestly non-Indian name, Rata being a suffix of foreign names.⁶⁶

The Chinese sources further say that one, Laelih was made ruler of Gandhara by the Yetha. Now the name Laelih has not come down in coins or other literary works. However, the coins of a king named, Ramanila have been found and these coins are related to this very period. We know that the paramount ruling clan was the Jaula, the 'gotra' of Toramana and Mihiragula. It is also known that the ruler of Gandhara was a Tegin meaning Governor- a subordinate title. From these facts it is easy to conclude that paramount rulers had appointed Ramanila, a Jat of Lalli clan (Laelih of the Chinese) as Governor of Gandhara. Thus we find that 'Sung-yun was correct in naming the ruler of Gandhara but, as often, he gave the clan name and not the personal name of the ruler, the latter being Ramanila of the coins. This however, does not mean that Gandhara, Kabul and Gazni were not under the Jats earlier. We know that up to the first century B.C. it was continuously ruled by them and the Jaulas had only replaced the Kasvan Jats, the so-called later Kushana/Kidarites.⁶⁷

However, It seems that when after Mihiragula and his son/ successor Ajitanjaya, their Indian empire was disintegrating the Jaula secured Jabulistan for themselves. As shown earlier, the word is Jauvlistan, the land of the Jauvlas, written as Jabulistan by the Arabs. ⁶⁸ On this basis, its king was mentioned simply as Janbil by the Arabs. However, when Hiuen- Tsang visited this area in 644-45 A.D. he found that the king of Jabulistan had succeeded a long line of kings and he was a follower of the sun-god.⁶⁹ Coins of a king of this dynasty, named Vakbha, have been found and the legends on these coins show that they had become markedly Indianised by this time.⁷⁰

Their wars with the Arabs

The first war that these Jats had to fight with the rising power of Islam was in 654/655 A.D. only ten years after the visit of Hiuen-Tsang.

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66. SIH&C, p. 140.

67. See Note II at the end of this section.

68. Sec Note III at the end of this section.

69. BRWW, Vol. II, p. 285/86.

70. R. Ghirshman, La Chionites-Hephthalites, p. 45.

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[Page 222]: It was beaten back. Another war and defeat of the invaders is noted from Kholau-Sul-ul-Akbar.⁷¹ Obaidullah, Governor of Seistan, was ordered by his superior, Hejauge, ruler of Khorasan, to invade Kabul. The ruler of Kabul is named as Retpeil (Ratha Pal ?). The war was fought in 697 A.D. and Rath Pal, "artfully retiring, drew the Mohammedan army into the defiles, and blocking up the rear, cut off their retreat, and Obaidullah was compelled to purchase his liberation by the payment of seven hundred thousand dirhams". The repeated attacks of the Arabs were fought back; and when it became necessary to solicit help, they found that their traditional and nearest helper, viz., Iran, was already under the Arabs and therefore any help from these quarters was out of question. The only other source was Chinese and it is to the Chinese that the Jats sent repeated embassies up to the year 755 A.D. But no help came and they had to fight with their own resources. The Indian nation shall be indebted to these Jats for stopping the Arabs from entering Kabul from 654 to 870 A.D. In 870/71 A.D. the Arab General, Yaqubb-in-Laith overthrew this kingdom of Kabul by treachery. The Persian work, Jama-al-hikayat-wa-lawama-al-Rawayat. of 1232 A.D., states that when Yaqub found that his army was no match for that of the Jats of Jabulistan, and could not defeat them in a field of battle, Yaqub invited the latter to meet him as a friend. At the meeting however, Yaqub resorted to Taqia and treacherously killed the king. Thus Kabul was lost by 871 A.D. Gandhara and Peshawar area, however, still remained with them till 1021 A.D. It does not mean that heroic efforts were not made to take back Kabul and Ghazni. Babar, relates a story of an attack on Ghazni by "The Rai of Hind" at the time of Subaktegin, when the latter put dead flesh (obviously cows) and impurities into their water supply and the "Rai" withdrew.⁷²

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71. Col. Tad, op., cit. Vol. II, p. 244.

72. ibid., p. 244 note.

Page 227

Note I - In fact, the Chinese used two words for the purpose, viz., Yetalito and Yue-che wang. The first is a transliteration of jatrat, and the second is a sort of translation of the same word, i.e. Guti-wang or Guti king or Jat king.

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Note II

Of tremendous historical importance is the search for the proceedings of the fourth Buddhist Council believed to have been engraved on copper plates, by Kaniska, the Kushana emperor, and buried in steel boxes, somewhere in Kashmir. If found, these documents will certainly revolutionise the Indian and Central Asian history! Reporting about the excavation work done near Pahalgam (Kashmir), the Hindustan Times (New Delhi) of 26/27.7.1978, mentions about some of the findings:

"The arc shaped tiles recovered near Hoi-Nar village of Pahalgam depict hunting scenes in two panels, showing a deer being struck with a spear by a hunter clad in Kushan-type dress. The hunter with hands raised skyward is a picture of joy.

The right corner of some tiles depicts the eight-spoked Chakra (wheel) of law common to the Buddhists. According to a director of the department, Mr F.M. Hassnain, the Kharoshti numerals on the tiles and their motifs take Kashmir's history back to the period when the valley formed part of the Kushan empire, and had close cultural and political relations with regions now forming Central Asia."

Note III

Vincent Smith implies that the word, Jaula, was a Huna title.⁸⁷ But Hoernle says, correctly, that it was the name of a tribe. ⁸⁸ Ibbetson does not admit the existence of any Jaula tribe, ⁸⁹ obviously because he had not heard about the Jaula or Johla Jats in the Punjab. As Jaulistan is mentioned on the coins of Vasudeva,⁹⁰ they, the Jaulas, must have come to India,

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87. JRAS, 1909, p. 268.

88. JRAS, 1905, p. 3.

89. Tribes and Castes, p. 40. ?O. ibid., p. 40.

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along with the Kushanas (Kasvan Jats) in the first century AD. "Cunningham's identification of Jaulistan with Jabultstan is incontrovertible, and Bhandarkar takes that to be Zabulistan-an equation which appears hardly open to dispute." ⁹¹

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91. ibid.

Distribution in Punjab

Villages in Gurdaspur district

Kala Nangal,

Distribution in Pakistan

Lalli - Lalli is an important Jat clan name and belongs to the White Hunas group of the Jats who invaded India in the 6th century AD. According to the ancient records, one Lalli used to be the governor of the Afghanistan area in the 7th century AD.

According to 1911 census, the Lali Muslim Jat clan had a population of 684 in Shahpur (Sargodha District) District, 1,640 in Jhang District in Pakistan.

Notable persons

• Dr. Prerana Chaudhary (Lalli): MBBS, Govt.Hospital Delhi, Mobile- 09050000793

• Darshan Singh Lalli (Major) (09.08.1925 - 21.09.1965) became martyr on 21.09.1965 during Indo-Pak war 1965. He was from Jalandhar district in Punjab.

• Bhagat Singh Lali (Major) (13.03.1941 - 15.09.1965) became martyr on 15.09.1965 during Indo Pak War-1965 at Ringpain in Jammu and Kashmir. He inflicted heavy casualties on enemy. He was awarded Vira Chakra for his act of bravery. He was from Kala Nangal village in tahsil Batala of Gurdaspur district in Indian Punjab.

Unit: 6 Guards.

References

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