Salaam, Sat Sri Akaal, Namaste,

i was wondering if anyone could help me with finding the origin/meaning of the following surnames:

- Tola

- Kalhan

- Rupal

where in punjab are they from (i.e what city) and what is the etymology? i cant find anything specific online and was wondering if anyone here knew.

https://preview.redd.it/uc5v5ayo7vdh1.png?width=516&format=png&auto=webp&s=ea71b712a85ad8c7cfaeff9d4707fa48363a150a

guess where this influencer is from (dont tell the answer if u know already pls)

During partition, millions of people migrated between regions whether it was across Punjab, across Bengal, Muhajir Muslims from UP moving to Pakistan, Sindhi Hindus moving to India, but somehow Punjab ended up more split among religious lines than Bengal. For example, in West Punjab the modern percent of Hindus is 0.20% (around 249k) and there’s only around 16k Sikhs in all of Pakistan, and in East Punjab the modern percent of Muslims is only 2% of the population (around 535k). Meanwhile Bangladesh has around 7.9% Hindus (around 13.1 million) and West Bengal has around 27% Muslims (around 25 million). Is there a reason for this or is it just a coincidence?

my recent post where i included a survey of the ethnicities of students in my graduating class at my predominantly indian high school got traction! so i thought i’d share a bit more, since two or three commenters were interested about what it’s like socially at a predominantly indian-american high school. (btw i graduated recently, im class of 2026)

My Friend Group/Friend Groups in General

although my friend circle has changed a bit over the last 4 years, i’ve been close friends with the same 5 girls for these 4 years.

* 1 of my friends is a Dogra/Punjabi Baniya, 1 is a Punjabi Sikh, 1 is a Bengali Hindu and 2 are UP Hindus

* at my school, people don’t really care about religion as much as indians who live in india, or their parents. most indian kids here were either born in the US or have lived here since elementary school. i’ve never felt ostracized for being from a different religion and my friends never bring religion up anyway

* people also don’t befriend others solely for being from the same ethnicity. because our graduating class was majority indian, most friend groups were all indians but of varying ethnicities.

* it is very competitive here academically, and people often look down on kids who don’t take as many aps as them or have worse grades than them and may even stop being friends with them for these reasons.

Cultural Connections

* most kids here do not speak their mother tongue fluently, if at all.

* some kids don’t even know what ethnicity they are or what state their parents are from. i have a friend whose parents are from bareilly and she didn’t even realize she was from UP until this year 😭 she’s 18 years old btw

* most kids do generally recognize they are indian though. they will wear indian clothes for festivals, sweet sixteens and grad parties. they just don’t identify closely with their state/ethnicity very much

* we have an indian student association with about 400 members from across all 4 grades.

* lots of kids invite their friends to go to garba with them every year, even if they are not gujarati. in fact, most of the kids from my school who go to garba are not gujaratis

* besides garba, there is usually lots of holi celebrations. those are the two largest celebrations in this area

Families

* because the indian community where i live is diverse and come from many different states, indian families will befriend each other even if they are not from the same state. there’s no one “dominant” ethnicity in the indian community here

* my neighbors are two telugu families and they are very close family friends with my family (i’m half bengali and north indian)

If you have any questions, feel free to comment them! Also let me know if you can relate i’d like to hear more about others experiences as well

i go to a predominantly indian high school (won’t say where bcuz i don’t wanna reveal too much about myself) and here are the demographics of my graduating class of 2026: first by race, then a breakdown of indian ethnicities among indian students. thought it would be cool to share! (all percentages are rounded)

Racial Breakdown:

Indian: 54.83% (227 out of 414 students)

Asian (excluding Indians): 17.63% (73 out of 414 students)

Black: 8.21% (34 out of 414 students)

White: 11.11% (46 out of 414 students)

Latino: 7.01% (29 out of 414 students)

Arab: 1.21% (5 out of 414 students)

Breakdown of Indian Students by Ethnic Group:

Telugu: 15.42% of Indian students (35 out of 227)

Unspecified North Indian: 13.66% of Indian students (31 out of 227)

Marathi: 9.25% of Indian students (21 out of 227)

Bengali: 8.37% of Indian students (19 out of 227)

Tamil: 7.93% of Indian students (18 out of 227)

Gujarati: 7.05% of Indian students (16 out of 227)

Unspecified Indian: 7.05% of Indian students (16 out of 227)

Punjabi: 6.17% of Indian students (14 out of 227)

Konkani: 6.17% of Indian students (14 out of 227)

Malayali: 4.85% of Indian students (11 out of 227)

Unspecified South Indian: 3.96% of Indian students (9 out of 227)

Bihari: 3.52% of Indian students (8 out of 227)

Marwari: 2.64% of Indian students (6 out of 227)

Kannadiga: 1.76% of Indian students (4 out of 227)

Odia: 1.32% of Indian students (3 out of 227)

Sindhi: 0.44% of Indian students (1 out of 227)

Dogra: 0.44% of Indian students (1 out of 227)