The Koli are an agriculturist caste of India, mostly found in Gujarat. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Koli caste was recognised as a criminal tribe under Criminal Tribes Act by British Indian government because of their anti-social activities but during World War I, Kolis were recognised as a martial caste by British Indian Empire. Kolis of Gujarat were well-known pirates of Arabian Sea.

The Koli caste forms the largest caste cluster in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh, comprising 24% and 30% of the total population in those states, respectively.

The Patidars of Central and North Gujarat were agricultural labour on the lands of Koli landlords or Koli chieftains but after Independence of India, Patidars enchraoched the lands of Kolis through land ceiling act of Independent India and reduced the Kolis in social status. after that, Kolis thought that they ruled the area but have no rights, so Kolis often plunders the Patidar villages in midnight in gangs. The Rajputs of Gujarat strongly allied with Kolis because Rajputs also were against Patidars because of their land rights. In central and north Gujarat, the Kolis had several battles with the Patidars on the issue of land tenancy, land rights and use of common village resources. It may be mentioned here that to win the elections in 1962 and 1967 the Gujarat Swatantra Party, dominated by the Patidars, won over some of the Koli leaders of the Gujarat Kshatriya Sabha and Sabha was dominated by Kolis of North Gujarat . The Party evolved a strategy referred to by the acronym PKASH; that is the 'party of Patidars and Koli Kshatriyas.' Party nominated a large number of the Kolis as party candidates and also gave them positions within the party organization. But that alliance did not last. The party and the Kshatriya Sabha's Koli leaders could not resolve ground-level conflicts between the Koli peasants and well Patidar peasants. The grievances of Patidar were resolved by Gujarat Kshatriya Sabha by several time meetings but it was not enough because Kolis were double in number of population if Gujarat and Patidars often targeted by influenced Kolis. most of the Patidar's children were engaged in collage study but Kolis not and it was a big beneficial point of Patidars.

Some of the Bhil chief's of early medieval Ahmedabad claim the status of Kolis in the medieval period. The Kolis of Gujarat being a part of the agricultural population, the Kolis might have included some other social groups claiming agriculturist status. The Kolis were not good cultivators in the medieval period and are not described as an economically homogeneous caste at the end of the nineteenth century. The character of the Kolis, as agriculturists, varies much in different parts of the Gujarat. Crimes of violence are occasionally committed among Kolis they were known as outlaw. but, as a warrior caste, they have settled down in the position of peaceful husbandmen marked contrast to their lawless practices fifty years ago. The Kolis of medieval Gujarat too figure in medieval source more as lawless elements than as peaceful producers. Raja Vikramajit, Shahjahan's governor of Gujarat, had to conduct an expedition in 1622 against Jagirdar Kolis in north of Ahmedabad who had been for generations a terror to travellers. Between 1662 and 1668, a Baluchi adventurer impersonating the late Dara Shikoh successfully gathered around himself a large number of the Kolis of Viramgam and Chunwal. The Mughal commander Mohabat Khan had to march out to drive him away and take control of the Kolis. Records of the East India Company mention that the Ahmedabad route to Surat was particularly dangerous because of the constant irruption of brigands, robbers, piracy and highwaymen Kolis. In fact, in 1644, some Kolis attacked a caravan between Ahmedabad and Broach, Kolis armed with bows and arrows and muskets attacked Fidauddin Khan's forces in the mid-eighteenth century; the Kolis also launched guerrilla attacks on Gaikwad forces. But it is significant that the eighteenth-century Kolis of Gujarat refused to accept the Bhils as a Koli, Alexander K. Forbes, writing on the Kolis and the Bhils of Mahikantha in the period of the Gaikwads, mentions that tribal bhils were trying to be in Koli status. The above point indicates that the status of "Koli' had become a respectable one for those tribal groups in Gujarat who sought to distinguish themselves from the larger mass of their kinsmen. The Kolis seem to have attained an important socio political status by the fourteenth century, at least on Konkan coast in Maharashtra. A Koli kingdom is known to have been founded by Jayba Popera in North Konkan in 1342. The chief of the celebrated Janjira fort was a Koli named Ram Patil in the time of Shivaji, Kolis had served the Maratha army under their Koli commanders Yesaji Kank and Tanaji Malusare since the time of Shivaji and exercised considerable control over the Konkan coast. The Bahmanis conferred the rank of Sardar on Koli chiefs who held charge of hill tracts. In contrast, we have noted that the Kolis of Gujarat were mostly perceived as a predatory tribe. From the way they are described in the literature of the medieval period and in travellers accounts, we suspect that some descendants of medieval Bhil chiefs, particularly those of Ahmedabad, could have claimed the status of Koli.

Records of Koli people exist from at least the 15th century, when rulers in the present-day Gujarat region called their chieftains marauding robbers, dacoits, and pirates. Over a period of several centuries, some of them were able to establish petty chiefdoms throughout the region, mostly comprising just a single village. Although not Rajputs, this relatively small subset of the Kolis claimed the status of the higher-ranked Rajput community, adopting their customs and intermixing with less significant Rajput families through the practice of hypergamous marriage, which was commonly used to enhance or secure social status. There were significant differences in status throughout the Koli community, however, and little cohesion either geographically or in terms of communal norms, such as the establishment of endogamous marriage groups.

Through the colonial British Raj period and into the 20th century, some Kolis remained significant landholders and tenants, although most had never been more than minor landowners and labourers. By this time, however, most Kolis had lost their once-equal standing with the Patidar community due to the land reforms of the Raj period. The Kolis preferred the landlord-based tenure system, which was not so mutually beneficial. They were subject to interference from the British revenue collectors, who intervened to ensure that the stipulated revenue was remitted to the government before any surplus went to the landlord. Being less inclined to take an active role in agriculture personally and thus maximise revenues from their landholdings, the Koli possessions were often left uncultivated or underused. These lands were gradually taken over by Kanbi cultivators, while the Kolis became classified as a criminal tribe due to their failure to meet the revenue demands and their tendency to raid Kanbi villages to survive. The Kanbi land takeovers also reduced the Kolis to being the tenants and agricultural labourers of Kanbis rather than landowners, thus increasing the economic inequality between the communities. The difference was further exacerbated by the Kanbis' providing better tenancy arrangements for members of their own community than for Kolis.

During the later period of the Raj, the Gujarati Kolis became involved in the process of what has subsequently been termed sanskritisation. At that time, in the 1930s, they represented around 20 percent of the region's population and members of the local Rajput community were seeking to extend their own influence by co-opting other significant groups as claimants to the ritual title of Kshatriya. The Rajputs were politically, economically and socially marginalised because their own numbers — around 4 – 5 per cent of the population — were inferior to the dominant Patidars, with whom the Kolis were also disenchanted. The Kolis were among those whom the Rajputs targeted because, although classified as a criminal tribe by the British administration, they were among the many communities of that period who had made genealogical claims of descent from the Kshatriya. The Rajput leaders preferred to view the Kolis as being Kshatriya by dint of military ethos rather than origin but, in whatever terminology, it was a marriage of political expedience.

In 1947, around the time that India gained independence, the Kutch, Kathiawar, Gujarat Kshatriya Sabha (KKGKS) caste association emerged as an umbrella organisation to continue the work begun during the Raj. Christophe Jaffrelot, a French political scientist, says that this body, which claimed to represent the Rajputs and Kolis, "... is a good example of the way castes, with very different ritual status, join hands to defend their common interests. ... The use of the word Kshatriya was largely tactical and the original caste identity was seriously diluted."