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II

CHILD-BIRTH

bridegroom has to search for her.

287

Sometimes the bride's

younger sister is dressed up in her clothes and the bridegroom catches her in mistake for his wife, whereupon the old women laugh and say to him, 'Do you want her also?' If finally he fails to find the bride he must give her some ornament.

After the wedding the bridegroom's marriage-crown is hung to the roof in a basket. And on the sixth day of the following month of Bhādon (August), he again dresses himself in his wedding clothes, and taking his marriage-crown on a dish, proceeds to the nearest stream or river accompanied by his friends. Here he throws the crown into the water, and the wedding coat is washed clean of the turmeric and unsewn and made up into ordinary clothes. This ceremony is known as moschatt and is common to Hindu castes generally. Widows are permitted to marry again, and the most usual match is with the younger brother of the deceased husband. Divorce is allowed at the instance either of the husband or wife, and may be effected by a simple declaration before the caste committee.

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birth.

After a birth neither the mother nor child are given 4. Childanything to eat the first day; and on the second they bring a young calf and give a little of its urine to the child, and to the mother a little sugar and the half of a cocoanut. In the evening of this day they buy all kinds of hot spices and herbs from a Bania and make a cake with them and give it to the mother to eat. On the second day the child begins to drink its mother's milk. The navel-string is cut and buried in the room on the first day, and over it a fire is kept burning continuously during the period of impurity. The small piece which falls from the child's body is buried beneath the mother's bed. The period of impurity after the birth of a girl lasts for four days and five days for a boy. On the sixth day the mother is given rice to eat. Twelve days after a child is born the barber's wife cuts its nails for the first time and throws the clippings away.

The ears of boys and girls are pierced when they are 5. Earpiercing. four or five years old; until this is done they are not considered as members of the caste and may take food from any one. The ear is always pierced by a Sunār (goldsmith), who travels about the country in the pursuit of this calling.

6. Disposal

of the dead.

I. Histori

A brass pin is left in the ear for fifteen days, and is then removed and a strip of wood is substituted for it in a boy's ear and a peacock's feather in that of a girl to enlarge the hole. Girls do not have their nostrils pierced nor wear noserings, as the Kāchhis are a comparatively low caste. They are tattooed before or after marriage with patterns of a scorpion, a peacock, a discus, and with dots on the chin and cheek-bones. During the period of her monthly impurity a girl is secluded in the house and does not eat flesh or fish. When the time is finished she goes to the river and bathes and dresses her hair with earth, which is a necessary ceremony of purification.

The

The bodies of children under five and of persons dying from smallpox, snake-bite or cholera are buried, and those of others are cremated. In Chhindwara they do not wash or anoint the corpses of the dead, but sprinkle on them a little turmeric and water. On the day of the funeral or cremation the bereaved family is supplied with food by friends. principal deity of the Kachhis is Bhainsāsur, who is regarded as the keeper of the vegetable garden and is represented by a stone placed under a tree in any part of it. He is worshipped once a year after the Holi festival with offerings of vermilion, areca-nuts and cocoanuts, and libations of liquor. The Kachhis raise all kinds of vegetables and garden crops, the principal being chillies, turmeric, tobacco, garlic, onions, yams and other vegetables. They are diligent and laborious, and show much skill in irrigating and manuring their crops.

Kadera, Kandera, Golandaz, Bandar, Hawaidar.1cal notice. A small occupational caste of makers of fireworks. The Kaderas numbered 2200 persons in 1911, and were most numerous in the Narsinghpur District. They consider themselves to have come from Bundelkhand, where the caste is also found, but it is in greatest strength in the Gwalior State. In former times Kaderas were employed to manufacture gunpowder and missiles of iron, and serve cannon in the Indian armies. The term Golandaz or 'ball-thrower' was also applied to native artillerymen. The Bandar or 'rocketthrowers' were a separate class, who fired rockets containing

1 Partly based on a paper by Munshi Kanhya Lāl of the Gazetteer office.

II

SUBDIVISIONS—SOCIAL CUSTOMS

289

With

missiles, the name being derived from van, an arrow.
them may be classed the Deg-andāz or 'mortar-throwers,'
who used thick earthenware pots filled with powder and
having fuses attached, somewhat resembling the modern bomb
-missiles which inflicted dreadful wounds.1 Mr. Irvine
writes of the Mughal artillery as follows: "The fire was
never very rapid. Orme speaks of the artillery firing once
in a quarter of an hour. In 1721 the usual rate of fire of
heavy guns was once every three hours. Artillery which
fired once in two gharis or forty-four minutes was praised
for its rapidity of action. The guns were usually posted
behind the clay walls of houses; or they might take up
a commanding position on the top of a brick-kiln; or a
temporary entrenchment might be formed out of the earthen
bank and ditch which usually surround a grove of mango-
trees." Hawāidār is a term for a maker of fireworks, while
the name Kandera itself may perhaps be derived from kand,

an arrow.

divisions.

In Narsinghpur the Kaderas have three subcastes, 2. SubRājpūt or Dāngiwāra, Dhunka, and Matwāla. The first claim to be Rājpūts, but the alternative name of Dāngiwāra indicates that they are a mixed group, perhaps partly of Rājpūt descent like the Dangis of Saugor. It is by no means unlikely that the lower classes of Rājpūts should have been employed in the avocations of the Kaderas. The term Dhunka signifies a cotton-cleaner, and some of the Kaderas may have taken up this calling, when they could no longer find employment in the native armies. Matwāla means a drinker of country liquor, in which members of this group indulge. But with the exception of the Rājpūt Kaderas in Narsinghpur, other members of the caste also drink it.

customs.

They celebrate their marriages by walking round the 3. Social sacred post. Divorce and the remarriage of widows are permitted. They have a caste committee, with a headman called Chaudhri or Mehtar, and an inferior officer known as Diwān. When a man has been put out of caste the Chaudhri first takes food with him on readmission, and for this is entitled to a fee of a rupee and a turban, while the 1 Irvine, Army of the Mughals, pp. 158, 159.

VOL. III

U

4. Religion and occupation.

Diwan receives a smaller cloth. These offices are hereditary. The Kaderas have no purda system, and a wife may speak freely to her father-in-law. They bury the milk-teeth of children below the ghinochi, or stand for water-pots, with the idea probably of preventing heat and inflammation in the gums. A child's jhala or birth-hair is usually cut for the first time on the occasion of some marriage in the family, and is thrown into the Nerbudda or buried at a temple. Names are given by the Brahman on the day of birth or soon afterwards, and a second pet name is commonly used in the family. If a child sees a lamp on the chhati or sixth day after its birth they think that it will squint.

The caste employ Brahmans for religious ceremonies, but their social position is low, and they rank with castes from whom a Brāhman cannot take water. On the tenth day of Jeth (May) they worship Lukmān Hakīm, a personage whom they believe to have been the inventor of gunpowder. He is popularly identified with Solomon, and is revered with Muhammadan rites in the shop and not in the house. A Fakir is called in who sacrifices a goat, and makes an offering of the head, which becomes his perquisite; sugarcakes and sweet rice are also offered and given away to children, and the flesh of the goat is eaten by the family of the worshipper. Since the worship is paid only in the shop it would appear that Lukman Hakim is considered a deity foreign to the domestic religion, and is revered as having invented the substance which enables the caste to make their livelihood; and since he is clearly a Muhammadan deity, and is venerated according to the ritual of this religion by the Kaderas, who are otherwise Hindus, a recognition seems to be implied that as far at least as the Kaderas are concerned the introduction of gunpowder into India is attributed to the Muhammadans. It is not stated whether or not the month of May was selected of set purpose for the worship of the inventor of gunpowder, but it is at any rate a most appropriate season in India. At present the Kadera makes his own gunpowder and manufactures fireworks, and in this capacity he is also known as Atashbāz. The ingredients for gunpowder in Narsinghpur are a pound of saltpetre, two ounces of sulphur, and four ounces of char

II

KAHAR

291

coal of a light wood, such as saleh1 or the stalks of arhar? Water is sprinkled on the charcoal and the ingredients are pounded together in a mortar, a dangerous proceeding which is apt to cause occasional vacancies in the family circle. Arsenic and potash are also used for different fireworks, and sesamum oil is added to prevent smoke. Fireworks form a very popular spectacle in India, and can be obtained of excellent quality even in small towns. Bharbhūnjas or grain-parchers now also deal in them.

3

and sta

Kahar, Bhoi.-The caste of palanquin-bearers and 1. Origin watermen of northern India. No scientific distinction can tistics. be made between the Kahārs and Dhīmars, both names being applied to the same people. In northern India the term Kahār is generally used, and Mr. Crooke has an article on Kahār, but none on Dhimar. In the Central Provinces the latter is the more common name for the caste, and in 1911 23,000 Kahārs were returned as against nearly 300,000 Dhimars. Berar had also 27,000 Kahārs. The social customs of the caste are described in the article on Dhīmar, but a short separate notice is given to the Kahārs on account of their special social interest. Some Kahārs refuse to clean household cooking-vessels and hence occupy a slightly higher social position than the Dhimars generally. Mr. Crooke derives the name of the caste from the Sanskrit Skandha-kāra, or 'One who carries things on his shoulder.' The Brahmanical genealogists represent the Kahār as descended from a Brahman father and a Chandal or sweeper mother, and this is typical of the position occupied by the caste, who, though probably derived from the primitive nonAryan tribes, have received a special position on account of their employment as household servants, so that all classes may take water and cooked food at their hands. As one of Mr. Crooke's correspondents remarks: "This caste is so low that they clean the vessels of almost all castes except menials like the Chamar and Dhobi, and at the same time so high that, except Kanaujia Brāhmans, all other castes eat

1 Boswellia serrata.

2 Sesamum indicum.

3 This article is compiled from papers

by Mr. Sarat Chandra Sanyal, Sessions
Judge, Nagpur, and Mr. Abdul Samad,
Tahsildar, Sohagpur.

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