Bania (caste)
The Bania is an occupational community of merchants, bankers, money-lenders, dealers in grains or in spices, and in modern times numerous commercial enterprises. The term is used in a wider sense in Bengal than it is elsewhere in India, where it is applied to specific castes.believes the origin of banya to lie in the Sanskrit word variously rendered as vanij, vanik and banik, as does the name of the Banjara community of traders and transporters. He says that the Bania were historically India's "pre-eminent" trading community.
In western India one merchant occupational group is called Vani or Vania; in Bengal the term is applied to all people who are involved in moneylending and similar activities.
