The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India Volume IV of IV

R >> R.V. Russell >> The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India Volume IV of IV

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12. Other functions of the Mali

Many Malis live in the towns and keep vegetable- or flower-gardens
just outside. They sell flowers, and the Mali girls are very good
flower-sellers, Major Sutherland says, being famous for their
coquetry. A saying about them is: "The crow among birds, the jackal
among beasts, the barber among men and the Malin among women; all
these are much too clever." The Mali also prepares the _maur_ or
marriage-crown, made from the leaves of the date-palm, both for the
bride and bridegroom at marriages. In return he gets a present of a
rupee, a piece of cloth and a day's food. He also makes the garlands
which are used for presentation at entertainments, and supplies
the daily bunches of flowers which are required as offerings for
Mahadeo. The Mali keeps garlands for sale in the bazar, and when a
well-to-do person passes he goes up and puts a garland round his neck
and expects a present of a pice or two.

13. Physical appearance

"Physically," Mr. Low states, "the Marar is rather a poor-looking
creature, dark and undersized; but the women are often not bad looking,
and dressed up in their best at a wedding, rattling their castanets
and waving light-coloured silk handkerchiefs, give a very graceful
dance. The caste are not as a rule celebrated for their cleanliness. A
polite way of addressing a Marar is to call him Patel."

Mallah

_Mallah, Malha_. [172]--A small caste of boatmen and fishermen in
the Jubbulpore and Narsinghpur Districts, which numbered about 5000
persons in 1911. It is scarcely correct to designate the Mallahs as a
distinct caste, as in both these Districts it appears from inquiry that
the term is synonymous with Kewat. Apparently, however, the Mallahs
do form a separate endogamous group, and owing to many of them having
adopted the profession of growing hemp, a crop which respectable Hindu
castes usually refuse to cultivate, it is probable that they would
not be allowed to intermarry with the Kewats of other Districts. In
the United Provinces Mr. Crooke states that the Mallahs, though, as
their Arabic name indicates, of recent origin, have matured into a
definite social group, including a number of endogamous tribes. The
term Mallah has nothing to do with the Mulla or Muhammadan priest
among the frontier tribes, but comes from an Arabic word meaning
'to be salt,' or, according to another derivation, 'to move the wings
as a bird.' [173] The Mallahs of the Central Provinces are also, in
spite of their Arabic name, a purely Hindu caste. In Narsinghpur they
say that their original ancestor was one Bali or Baliram, who was a
boatman and was so strong that he could carry his boat to the river
and back under his armpit. On one occasion he ferried Rama across the
Ganges in Benares, and it is said that Rama gave him a horse to show
his gratitude; but Baliram was so ignorant that he placed the bridle on
the horse's tail instead of the head. And from this act of Baliram's
arose the custom of having the rudder of a boat at the stern instead
of at the bow. The Mallahs in the Central Provinces appear from their
family names to be immigrants from Bundelkhand. Their customs resemble
those of lower-class Hindus. Girls are usually married under the age
of twelve years, and the remarriage of widows is permitted, while
divorce may be effected in the presence of the _panchayat_ or caste
committee by the husband and wife breaking a straw between them. They
are scantily clothed and are generally poor. A proverb about them says:

Jahan bethen Malao
Tahan lage alao,

or, 'Where Mallahs sit, there is always a fire.' This refers to their
custom of kindling fires on the river-bank to protect themselves from
cold. In Narsinghpur the Mallahs have found a profitable opening
in the cultivation of hemp, a crop which other Hindu castes until
recently tabooed on account probably of the dirty nature of the process
of cleaning out the fibre and the pollution necessarily caused to
the water-supply. They sow and cut hemp on Sundays and Wednesdays,
which are regarded as auspicious days. They also grow melons, and
will not enter a melon-field with their shoes on or allow a woman
during her periodical impurity to approach it. The Mallahs are poor
and illiterate, but rank with Dhimars and Kewats, and Brahmans will
take water from their hands.

Mana

_Mana_. [174]--A Dravidian caste of cultivators and labourers
belonging to the Chanda District, from which they have spread to
Nagpur, Bhandara and Balaghat. In 1911 they numbered nearly 50,000
persons, of whom 34,000 belonged to Chanda. The origin of the caste is
obscure. In the _Chanda Settlement Report_ of 1869 Major Lucie Smith
wrote of them: "Tradition asserts that prior to the Gond conquest
the Manas reigned over the country, having their strongholds at
Surajgarh in Ahiri and at Manikgarh in the Manikgarh hills, now of
Hyderabad, and that after a troubled rule of two hundred years they
fell before the Gonds. In appearance they are of the Gond type, and
are strongly and stoutly made; while in character they are hardy,
industrious and truthful. Many warlike traditions still linger among
them, and doubtless in days gone by they did their duty as good
soldiers, but they have long since hung up sword and shield and now
rank among the best cultivators of rice in Chanda." Another local
tradition states that a line of Mana princes ruled at Wairagarh. The
names of three princes are remembered: Kurumpruhoda, the founder of
the line; Surjat Badwaik, who fortified Surjagarh; and Gahilu, who
built Manikgarh. As regards the name Manikgarh, it may be mentioned
that the tutelary deity of the Nagvansi kings of Bastar, who ruled
there before the accession of the present Raj-Gond dynasty in the
fourteenth century, was Manikya Devi, and it is possible that the
chiefs of Wairagarh were connected with the Bastar kings. Some of
the Manas say that they, as well as the Gowaris, are offshoots of
the Gond tribe; and a local saying to the effect that 'The Gond,
the Gowari and the Mana eat boiled juari or beans on leaf-plates'
shows that they are associated together in the popular mind. Hislop
states that the Ojhas, or soothsayers and minstrels of the Gonds,
have a subdivision of Mana Ojhas, who lay claim to special sanctity,
refusing to take food from any other caste. [175] The Gonds have a
subdivision called Mannewar, and as _war_ is only a Telugu suffix
for the plural, the proper name Manne closely resembles Mana. It is
shown in the article on the Parja tribe that the Parjas were a class
of Gonds or a tribe akin to them, who were dominant in Bastar prior
to the later immigration under the ancestors of the present Bastar
dynasty. And the most plausible hypothesis as to the past history of
the Manas is that they were also the rulers of some tracts of Chanda,
and were displaced like the Parjas by a Gond invasion from the south.

In Bhandara, where the Manas hold land, it is related that in former
times a gigantic kite lived on the hill of Ghurkundi, near Sakoli,
and devoured the crops of the surrounding country by whole fields at
a time. The king of Chanda proclaimed that whoever killed the kite
would be granted the adjoining lands. A Mana shot the kite with an
arrow and its remains were taken to Chanda in eight carts, and as his
reward he received the grant of a zamindari. In appearance the Manas,
or at least some of them, are rather fine men, nor do their complexion
and features show more noticeable traces of aboriginal descent than
those of the local Hindus. But their neighbours in Chanda and Bastar,
the Maria Gonds, are also taller and of a better physical type than
the average Dravidian, so that their physical appearance need not
militate against the above hypothesis. They retained their taste
for fighting until within quite recent times, and in Katol and other
towns below the Satpura hills, Manas were regularly enlisted as a town
guard for repelling the Pindari raids. Their descendants still retain
the ancestral matchlocks, and several of them make good use of these
as professional _shikaris_ or hunters. Many of them are employed as
servants by landowners and moneylenders for the collection of debts or
the protection of crops, and others are proprietors, cultivators and
labourers, while a few even lend money on their own account. Manas hold
three zamindari estates in Bhandara and a few villages in Chanda; here
they are considered to be good cultivators, but have the reputation
as a caste of being very miserly, and though possessed of plenty,
living only on the poorest and coarsest food. [176] The Mana women
are proverbial for the assistance which they render to their husbands
in the work of cultivation.

Owing to their general adoption of Maratha customs, the Manas are now
commonly regarded as a caste and not a forest tribe, and this view may
be accepted. They have two subcastes, the Badwaik Manas, or soldiers,
and the Khad Manas, who live in the plains and are considered to be of
impure descent. Badwaik or 'The Great Ones' is a titular term applied
to a person carrying arms, and assumed by certain Rajputs and also by
some of the lower castes. A third group of Manas are now amalgamated
with the Kunbis as a regular subdivision of that caste, though they
are regarded as somewhat lower than the others. They have also a
number of exogamous septs of the usual titular and totemistic types,
the few recognisable names being Marathi. It is worth noticing that
several pairs of these septs, as Jamare and Gazbe, Narnari and Chudri,
Wagh and Rawat, and others are prohibited from intermarriage. And this
may be a relic of some wider scheme of division of the type common
among the Australian aborigines. The social customs of the Manas are
the same as those of the other lower Maratha castes, as described in
the articles on Kunbi, Kohli and Mahar. A bride-price of Rs. 12-8 is
usually paid, and if the bridegroom's father has the money, he takes it
with him on going to arrange for the match. Only one married woman of
the bridegroom's family accompanies him to the wedding, and she throws
rice over him five times. Four days in the year are appointed for the
celebration of weddings, the festivals of Shivratri and of Akhatij, and
a day each in the months of Magh (January) and Phagun (February). This
rule, however, is not universal. Brahmans do not usually officiate at
their ceremonies, but they employ a Brahman to prepare the rice which
is thrown over the couples. Marriage within the sept is forbidden,
as well as the union of the children of two sisters. But the practice
of marrying a brother's daughter to a sister's son is a very favourite
one, being known as Mahunchar, and in this respect the Manas resemble
the Gonds. When a widow is to be remarried, she stops on the way by the
bank of a stream as she is proceeding to her new husband's house, and
here her clothes are taken off and buried by an exorcist with a view
to laying the first husband's spirit and preventing it from troubling
the new household. If a woman goes wrong with a man of another caste
she is not finally cast out, but if she has a child she must first
dispose of it to somebody else after it is weaned. She may then be
re-admitted into caste by having her hair shaved off and giving three
feasts; the first is prepared by the caste and eaten outside her house,
the second is prepared by her relatives and eaten within her house,
and at the third the caste reinstate her by partaking of food cooked
by herself. The dead are either buried or burnt; in the former case a
feast is given immediately after the burial and no further mourning
is observed; in the latter the period of mourning is three days. As
among the Gonds, the dead are laid with feet to the north. A woman
is impure for seven days after child-birth.

The Manas have Bhats or genealogists of their own caste, a separate
one being appointed for each sept. The Bhat of any sept can only accept
gifts from members of that sept, though he may take food from any one
of the caste. The Bhats are in the position of beggars, and the other
Manas will not take food from them. Every man must have a Bhat for
his family under penalty of being temporarily put out of caste. It
is said that the Bhats formerly had books showing the pedigrees of
the different families, but that once in a spirit of arrogance they
placed their shoes upon the books; and the other Manas, not brooking
this insolence, burnt the books. The gravity of such an act may be
realised when it is stated that if anybody even threatens to hit a
Mana with a shoe, the indignity put upon him is so great that he is
temporarily excluded from caste and penalised for readmission. Since
this incident the Bhats have to address the Manas as 'Brahma,' to show
their respect, the Mana replying 'Ram, Ram.' Their women wear short
loin-cloths, exposing part of the thigh, like the Gonds. They eat
pork and drink liquor, but will take cooked food only from Brahmans.

Manbhao

1. History and nature of the sect

_Manbhao_. [177]--A religious sect or order, which has now become a
caste, belonging to the Maratha Districts of the Central Provinces and
to Berar. Their total strength in India in 1911 was 10,000 persons,
of whom the Central Provinces and Berar contained 4000. The name
would appear to have some such meaning as 'The reverend brothers.' The
Manbhaos are stated to be a Vaishnavite order founded in Berar some
two centuries ago. [178] They themselves say that their order is a
thousand years old and that it was founded by one Arjun Bhat, who lived
at Domegaon, near Ahmadnagar. He was a great Sanskrit scholar and a
devotee of Krishna, and preached his doctrines to all except the Impure
castes. Ridhpur, in Berar, is the present headquarters of the order,
and contains a monastery and three temples, dedicated to Krishna and
Dattatreya, [179] the only deities recognised by the Manbhaos. Each
temple is named after a village, and is presided over by a Mahant
elected from the celibate Manbhaos. There are other Mahants, also
known after the names of villages or towns in which the monasteries
over which they preside are located. Among these are Sheone, from
the village near Chandur in Amraoti District; Akulne, a village near
Ahmadnagar; Lasorkar, from Lasor, near Aurangabad; Mehkarkar, from
Mehkar in Buldana; and others. The order thus belongs to Berar and
the adjoining parts of India. Colonel Mackenzie describes Ridhpur as
follows: "The name is said to be derived from _ridh_, meaning blood,
a Rakshas or demon having been killed there by Parasurama, and it
owes its sanctity to the fact that the god lived there. Black stones
innumerable scattered about the town show where the god's footsteps
became visible. At Ridhpur Krishna is represented by an ever-open,
sleeplessly watching eye, and some Manbhaos carry about a small black
stone disk with an eye painted on it as an amulet." Frequently their
shrines contain no images, but are simply _chabutras_ or platforms
built over the place where Krishna or Dattatreya left marks of their
footprints. Over the platform is a small veranda, which the Manbhaos
kiss, calling upon the name of the god. Sukli, in Bhandara, is also
a headquarters of the caste, and contains many Manbhao tombs. Here
they burn camphor in honour of Dattatreya and make offerings of
cocoanuts. They make pilgrimages to the different shrines at the full
moons of Chait (March) and Kartik (October). They pay reverence to no
deities except Krishna and Dattatreya, and observe the festivals of
Gokul Ashtami in August and Datta-Jayantri in December. They consider
the month of Aghan (November) as holy, because Krishna called it
so in the Bhagavat-Gita. This is their sacred book, and they reject
the other Hindu scriptures. Their conception of Krishna is based on
his description of himself to Arjun in the Bhagavat-Gita as follows:
"'Behold things wonderful, never seen before, behold in this my body
the whole world, animate and inanimate. But as thou art unable to
see with these thy natural eyes, I will give thee a heavenly eye,
with which behold my divine connection.'

"The son of Pandu then beheld within the body of the god of gods
standing together the whole universe divided forth into its vast
variety. He was overwhelmed with wonder and every hair was raised
on end. 'But I am not to be seen as thou hast seen me even by
the assistance of the Vedas, by mortification, by sacrifices, by
charitable gifts: but I am to be seen, to be known in truth, and to
be obtained by that worship which is offered up to me alone: and he
goeth unto me whose works are done for me: who esteemeth me supreme:
who is my servant only: who hath abandoned all consequences, and who
liveth amongst all men without hatred.'"

Again: "He my servant is dear to me who is free from enmity, the friend
of all nature, merciful, exempt from all pride and selfishness, the
same in pain and in pleasure, patient of wrong, contented, constantly
devout, of subdued passions and firm resolves, and whose mind and
understanding are fixed on me alone."

2. Divisions of the order

The Manbhaos are now divided into three classes: the Brahmachari; the
Gharbari; and the Bhope. The Brahmachari are the ascetic members of
the sect who subsist by begging and devote their lives to meditation,
prayer and spiritual instruction. The Gharbari are those who, while
leading a mendicant life, wearing the distinctive black dress of the
order and having their heads shaved, are permitted to get married with
the permission of their Mahant or _guru_. The ceremony is performed in
strict privacy inside a temple. A man sometimes signifies his choice of
a spouse by putting his _jholi_ or beggar's wallet upon hers; if she
lets it remain there, the betrothal is complete. A woman may show her
preference for a man by bringing a pair of garlands and placing one on
his head and the other on that of the image of Krishna. The marriage
is celebrated according to the custom of the Kunbis, but without
feasting or music. Widows are permitted to marry again. Married women
do not wear bangles nor toe-rings nor the customary necklace of beads;
they put on no jewellery, and have no _choli_ or bodice. The Bhope
or Bhoall, the third division of the caste, are wholly secular and
wear no distinctive dress, except sometimes a black head-cloth. They
may engage in any occupation that pleases them, and sometimes act as
servants in the temples of the caste. In Berar they are divided into
thirteen _bas_ or orders, named after the disciples of Arjun Bhat, who
founded the various shrines. The Manbhaos are recruited by initiation
of both men and women from any except the impure castes. Young children
who have been vowed by their parents to a religious life or are left
without relations, are taken into the order. Women usually join it
either as children or late in life. The celibate members, male or
female, live separately in companies like monks and nuns. They do
not travel together, and hold services in their temples at different
times. A woman admitted into the order is henceforward the disciple of
the woman who initiated her by whispering the _guru mantra_ or sacred
verse into her ear. She addresses her preceptress as mother and the
other women as sisters. The Manbhaos are intelligent and generally
literate, and they lead a simple and pure life. They are respectable
and are respected by the people, and a _guru_ or spiritual teacher is
often taken from them in place of a Brahman or Gosain. They often act
as priests or _gurus_ to the Mahars, for whom Brahmans will not perform
these services. Their honesty and humility are proverbial among the
Kunbis, and are in pleasing contrast to the character of many of the
Hindu mendicant orders. They consider it essential that all their
converts should be able to read the Bhagavat-Gita or a commentary
on it, and for this purpose teach them to read and write during the
rainy season when they are assembled at one of their monasteries.

3. Religious observances and customs

One of the leading tenets of the Manbhaos is a respect for all forms
of animal and even vegetable life, much on a par with that of the
Jains. They strain water through a cloth before drinking it, and then
delicately wipe the cloth to preserve any insects that may be upon
it. They should not drink water in, and hence cannot reside in, any
village where animal sacrifices are offered to a deity. They will not
cut down a tree nor break off a branch, or even a blade of grass, nor
pluck a fruit or an ear of corn. Some, it is said, will not even bathe
in tanks for fear of destroying insect-life. For this reason also they
readily accept cooked food as alms, so that they may avoid the risk
of the destruction of life involved in cooking. The Manbhaos dislike
the din and noise of towns, and live generally in secluded places,
coming into the towns only to beg. Except in the rains they wander
about from place to place. They beg in the morning, and then return
home and, after bathing and taking their food, read their religious
books. They must always worship Krishna before taking food, and for
this purpose when travelling they carry an image of the deity about
with them. They will take food and water from the higher castes, but
they must not do so from persons of low caste on pain of temporary
excommunication. They neither smoke nor chew tobacco. Both men and
women shave the head clean, and men also the face. This is first done
on initiation by the village barber. But the _sendhi_ or scalp-lock
and moustaches of the novice must be cut off by his _guru_, this being
the special mark of his renunciation of the world. The scalp-locks of
the various candidates are preserved until a sufficient quantity of
hair has been collected, when ropes are made of it, which they fasten
round their loins. This may be because Hindus attach a special efficacy
to the scalp-lock, perhaps as being the seat of a man's strength or
power. The nuns also shave their heads, and generally eschew every kind
of personal adornment. Both monks and nuns usually dress in black or
ashen-grey clothes as a mark of humility, though some have discarded
black in favour of the usual Hindu mendicant colour of red ochre. The
black colour is in keeping with the complexion of Krishna, their
chief god. They dye their cloths with lamp-black mixed with a little
water and oil. They usually sleep on the ground, with the exception of
those who are Mahants, and they sometimes have no metal vessels, but
use bags made of strong cloth for holding food and water. Men's names
have the suffix _Boa_, as Datto Boa, Kesho Boa, while those of boys
end in _da_, as Manoda, Raojida, and those of women in _Bai_, as Gopa
Bai, Som Bai. The dead are buried, not in the common burial-grounds,
but in some waste place. The corpse is laid on its side, facing the
east, with head to the north and feet to the south. A piece of silk
or other valuable cloth is placed on it, on which salt is sprinkled,
and the earth is then filled in and the ground levelled so as to leave
no trace of the grave. No memorial is erected over a Manbhao tomb,
and no mourning nor ceremony of purification is observed, nor are
oblations offered to the spirits of the dead. If the dead man leaves
any property, it is expended on feeding the brotherhood for ten days;
and if not, the Mahant of his order usually does this in his name.

4. Hostility between Manbhaos and Brahmans

The Manbhaos are dissenters from orthodox Hinduism, and have thus
naturally incurred the hostility of the Brahmans. Mr. Kitts remarks
of them: [180] "The Brahmans hate the Manbhaos, who have not only
thrown off the Brahmanical yoke themselves, but do much to oppose
the influence of Brahmans among the agriculturists. The Brahmans
represent them as descended from one Krishna Bhat, a Brahman who was
outcasted for keeping a beautiful Mang woman as his mistress. His
four sons were called the _Mang-bhaos_ or Mang brothers." This is an
excellent instance of the Brahman talent for pressing etymology into
their service as an argument, in which respect they resemble the
Jesuits. By asserting that the Manbhaos are descended from a Mang
woman, one of the most despised castes, they attempt to dispose of
these enemies of a Brahman hegemony without further ado.

Another story about their wearing black or ashen-coloured clothes
related by Colonel Mackenzie is that Krishna Bhat's followers,
refusing to believe the aspersions cast on their leader by the
Brahmans, but knowing that some one among them had been guilty of the
sin imputed to him, determined to decide the matter by the ordeal of
fire. Having made a fire, they cast into it their own clothes and
those of their _guru_, each man having previously written his name
on his garments. The sacred fire made short work of all the clothes
except those of Krishna Bhat, which it rejected and refused to burn,
thereby forcing the unwilling disciples to believe that the finger
of God pointed to their revered _guru_ as the sinner. In spite of the
shock of thus discovering that their idol had feet of very human clay,
they still continued to regard Krishna Bhat's precepts as good and
worthy of being followed, only stipulating that for all time Manbhaos
should wear clothes the colour of ashes, in memory of the sacred fire
which had disclosed to them their _guru's_ sin.