Chapter 31

"The Oraon youths," Dalton states, "though with features very far from being in accordance with the statutes of beauty, are of a singularly pleasing class, their faces beaming with animation and good humour. They are a small race, averaging 4 feet 5 inches, but there is perfect proportion in all parts of their form, and their supple, pliant, lithe figures are often models of symmetry. There is about the young Oraon a jaunty air and mirthful expression that distinguishes him from the Munda or Ho, who has more of the dignified gravity that is said to characterise the North American Indian. The Oraon is particular about his personal appearance only so long as he is unmarried, but he is in no hurry to withdraw from the Dhumkuria community, and generally his first youth is passed before he resigns his decorative propensities.

"He wears his hair long like a woman, gathered in a knot behind, supporting, when he is in gala costume, a red or white turban. In the knot are wooden combs and other instruments useful and ornamental, with numerous ornaments of brass. [364] At the very extremity of the roll of hair gleams a small circular mirror set in brass, from which, and also from his ears, bright brass chains with spiky pendants dangle, and as he moves with the springy elastic step of youth and tosses his head like a high-mettled steed in the buoyancy of his animal spirits, he sets all his glittering ornaments in motion and displays as he laughs a row of teeth, round, white and regular, that give light and animation to his dusky features. He wears nothing in the form of a coat; his decorated neck and chest are undraped, displaying how the latter tapers to the waist, which the young dandies compress within the smallest compass. In addition to the cloth, there is always round the waist a girdle of cords made of tasar-silk or of cane. This is now a superfluity, but it is no doubt the remnant of a more primitive costume, perhaps the support of the antique fig-leaves.

"Out of the age of ornamentation nothing can be more untidy or more unprepossessing than the appearance of the Oraon. The ornaments are nearly all discarded, hair utterly neglected, and for raiment any rags are used. This applies both to males and females of middle age.

24. Dress of women

"The dress of the women consists of one cloth, six yards long, gracefully adjusted so as to form a shawl and a petticoat. The upper end is thrown over the left shoulder and falls with its fringe and ornamented border prettily over the back of the figure. Vast quantities of red beads and a large, heavy brass ornament shaped like a _torque_ are worn round the neck. On the left hand are rings of copper, as many as can be induced on each finger up to the first joint, on the right hand a smaller quantity; rings on the second toe only of brass or bell-metal, and anklets and bracelets of the same material are also worn." The women wear only metal and not glass bangles, and this with the three vertical tattoo-marks on the forehead and the fact that the head and right arm are uncovered enables them to be easily recognised. "The hair is made tolerably smooth and amenable by much lubrication, and false hair or some other substance is used to give size to the mass into which it is gathered not immediately behind, but more or less on one side, so that it lies on the neck just behind and touching the right ear; and flowers are arranged in a receptacle made for them between the roll of hair and the head." Rings are worn in the lobes of the ear, but not other ornaments. "When in dancing costume on grand occasions they add to their head-dress plumes of heron feathers, and a gay bordered scarf is tightly bound round the upper part of the body."

25. Dances

"The tribe I am treating of are seen to best advantage at the great national dance meetings called Jatras, which are held once a year at convenient centres, generally large mango groves in the vicinity of old villages. As a signal to the country round, the flags of each village are brought out on the day fixed and set upon the road that leads to the place of meeting. This incites the young men and maidens to hurry through their morning's work and look up their _jatra_ dresses, which are by no means ordinary attire. Those who have some miles to go put up their finery in a bundle to keep it fresh and clean, and proceed to some tank or stream in the vicinity of the tryst grove; and about two o'clock in the afternoon may be seen all around groups of girls laughingly making their toilets in the open air, and young men in separate parties similarly employed. When they are ready the drums are beaten, huge horns are blown, and thus summoned the group from each village forms its procession. In front are young men with swords and shields or other weapons, the village standard-bearers with their flags, and boys waving yaks' tails or bearing poles with fantastic arrangements of garlands and wreaths intended to represent umbrellas of dignity. Sometimes a man riding on a wooden horse is carried, horse and all, by his friends as the Raja, and others assume the form of or paint themselves up to represent certain beasts of prey. Behind this motley group the main body form compactly together as a close column of dancers in alternate ranks of boys and girls, and thus they enter the grove, where the meeting is held in a cheery dashing style, wheeling and countermarching and forming lines, circles and columns with grace and precision. The dance with these movements is called _kharia_, and it is considered to be an Oraon rather than a Munda dance, though Munda girls join in it. When they enter the grove the different groups join and dance the _kharia_ together, forming one vast procession and then a monstrous circle. The drums and musical instruments are laid aside, and it is by the voices alone that the time is given; but as many hundreds, nay, thousands, join, the effect is imposing. In serried ranks, so closed up that they appear jammed, they circle round in file, all keeping perfect step, but at regular intervals the strain is terminated by a _hururu_, which reminds one of Paddy's 'huroosh' as he 'welts the floor,' and at the same moment they all face inwards and simultaneously jumping up come down on the ground with a resounding stamp that makes the finale of the movements, but only for a momentary pause. One voice with a startling yell takes up the strain again, a fresh start is made, and after gyrating thus till they tire of it the ring breaks up, and separating into village groups they perform other dances independently till near sunset, and then go dancing home."

26. Social customs

But more often they go on all night. Mr. Ball mentions their dance as follows: [365] "The Oraon dance was distinct from any I had seen by the Santals or other races. The girls, carefully arranged in lines by sizes, with the tallest at one end and the smallest at the other, firmly grasp one another's hands, and the whole movements are so perfectly in concert that they spring about with as much agility as could a single individual." Father Dehon gives the following interesting notice of their social customs: "The Oraons are very sociable beings, and like to enjoy life together. They are paying visits or _pahis_ to one another nearly the whole year round. In these the _handia_ (beer-jar) always plays a great part. Any man who would presume to receive visitors without offering them a _handia_ would be hooted and insulted by his guests, who would find a sympathising echo from all the people of the village. One may say that from the time of the new rice at the end of September to the end of the marriage feast or till March there is a continual coming and going of visitors. For a marriage feast forty _handias_ are prepared by the groom's father, and all the people of the village who can afford it supply one also. Each _handia_ gives about three gallons of rice-beer, so that in one day and a half, in a village of thirty houses, about 200 gallons of rice-beer are despatched. The Oraons are famous for their dances. They delight in spending the whole night from sunset till morning in this most exciting amusement, and in the dancing season they go from village to village. They get, as it were, intoxicated with the music, and there is never any slackening of the pace. On the contrary, the evolutions seem to increase till very early in the morning, and it sometimes happens that one of the dancers shoots off rapidly from the gyrating group, and speeds away like a spent top, and, whirlwind-like, disappears through paddy-fields and ditches till he falls entirely exhausted. Of course it is the devil who has taken possession of him. One can well imagine in what state the dancers are at the first crow of the cock, and when '_L'aurore avec ses doigts de rose entr'ouvre les portes de l'orient,_' she finds the girls straggling home one by one, dishevelled, _traînant l'aile_, too tired even to enjoy the company of the boys, who remain behind in small groups, still sounding their tom-toms at intervals as if sorry that the performance was so soon over. And, wonderful to say and incredible to witness, they will go straight to the stalls, yoke their bullocks, and work the whole morning with the same spirit and cheerfulness as if they had spent the whole night in refreshing sleep. At eleven o'clock they come home, eat their meal, and stretched out in the verandah sleep like logs until two, when poked and kicked about unmercifully by the people of the house, they reluctantly get up with heavy eyes and weary limbs to resume their work."

27. Social rules

The Oraons do not now admit outsiders into the tribe. There is no offence for which a man is permanently put out of caste, but a woman living with any man other than an Oraon is so expelled. Temporary expulsion is awarded for the usual offences. The head of the caste _panchayat_ is called Panua, and when an offender is reinstated, the Panua first drinks water from his hand, and takes upon himself the burden of the erring one's transgression. For this he usually receives a fee of five rupees, and in some States the appointment is in the hands of the Raja, who exacts a fine of a hundred rupees or more from a new candidate. The Oraons eat almost all kinds of food, including pork, fowls and crocodiles, but abstain from beef. Their status is very low among the Hindus; they are usually made to live in a separate corner of the village, and are sometimes not allowed to draw water from the village well. As already stated, the dress of the men consists only of a narrow wisp of cloth round the loins. Some of them say, like the Gonds, that they are descended from the subjects of Rawan, the demon king of Ceylon; this ancestry having no doubt in the first instance been imputed to them by the Hindus. And they explain that when Hanuman in the shape of a giant monkey came to the assistance of Rama, their king Rawan tried to destroy Hanuman by taking all the loin-cloths of his subjects and tying them soaked in oil to the monkey's tail with a view to setting them on fire and burning him to death. The device was unsuccessful and Hanuman escaped, but since then the subjects of Rawan and their descendants have never had a sufficient allowance of cloth to cover them properly.

28. Character

"The Oraons," Colonel Dalton says, "if not the most virtuous, are the most cheerful of the human race. Their lot is not a particularly happy one. They submit to be told that they are especially created as a labouring class, and they have had this so often dinned into their ears that they believe and admit it. I believe they relish work if the taskmaster be not over-exacting. Oraons sentenced to imprisonment without labour, as sometimes happens, for offences against the excise laws, insist on joining the working gangs, and wherever employed, if kindly treated, they work as if they felt an interest in their task. In cold weather or hot, rain or sun, they go cheerfully about it, and after some nine or ten hours of toil (seasoned with a little play and chaff among themselves) they return blithely home in flower-decked groups holding each other by the hand or round the waist and singing."

29. Language

The Kurukh language, Dr. Grierson states, has no written character, but the gospels have been printed in it in the Devanagri type. The translation is due to the Rev. F. Halm, who has also published a Biblical history, a catechism and other small books in Kurukh. More than five-sixths of the Oraons are still returned as speaking their own language.

Paik

_Paik._--A small caste of the Uriya country formed from military service, the term _paik_ meaning 'a foot-soldier.' In 1901 the Paiks numbered 19,000 persons in the Kalahandi and Patna States and the Raipur District, but since the transfer of the Uriya States to Bengal less than 3000 remain in the Central Provinces. In Kalahandi, where the bulk of them reside, they are called Nalia Sipahis from the fact that they were formerly armed with _nalis_ or matchlocks by the State. After the Khond rising of 1882 in Kalahandi these were confiscated and bows and arrows given in lieu of them. The Paiks say that they were the followers of two warriors, Kalmir and Jaimir, who conquered the Kalahandi and Jaipur States from the Khonds about a thousand years ago. There is no doubt that they formed the rough militia of the Uriya Rajas, a sort of rabble half military and half police, like the Khandaits. But the Khandaits were probably the leaders and officers, and, as a consequence, though originally only a mixed occupational group, have acquired a higher status than the Paiks and in Orissa rank next to the Rajputs. The Paiks were the rank and file, mainly recruited from the forest tribes, and they are counted as a comparatively low caste, though to strangers they profess to be Rajputs. In Sambalpur it is said that Rajputs, Sudhs, Bhuiyas and Gonds are called Paiks. In Kalahandi they wear the sacred thread, being invested with it by a Brahman at the time of their marriage, and they say that this privilege was conferred on them by the Raja. It is reported, however, that social distinctions may be purchased in some of the Uriya States for comparatively small sums. A Bhatra or member of a forest tribe was observed wearing the sacred thread, and, on being questioned, stated that his grandfather had purchased the right from the Raja for Rs. 50. The privileges of wearing gold ear ornaments, carrying an umbrella, and riding on horseback were obtainable in a similar manner. It is also related that when one Raja imported the first pair of boots seen in his State, the local landholders were allowed to wear them in turn for a few minutes on payment of five rupees each, as a token of their right thereafter to procure and wear boots of their own. In Damoh and Jubbulpore another set of Paiks is to be found who also claim to be Rajputs, and are commonly so called, though true Rajputs will not eat or intermarry with them. These are quite distinct from the Sambalpur Paiks, but have probably been formed into a caste in exactly the same manner. The sept or family names of the Uriya Paiks sufficiently indicate their mixed descent. Some of them are as follows: Dube (a Brahman title), Chalak Bansi (of the Chalukya royal family), Chhit Karan (belonging to the Karans or Uriya Kayasths), Sahani (a sais or groom), Sudh (the name of an Uriya caste), Benet Uriya (a subdivision of the Uriya or Od mason caste), and so on. It is clear that members of different castes who became Paiks founded separate families, which in time developed into exogamous septs. Some of the septs will not eat food cooked with water in company with the rest of the caste, though they do not object to intermarrying with them. After her marriage a girl may not take food cooked by her parents nor will they accept it from her. And at a marriage party each guest is supplied with grain and cooks it himself, but everybody will eat with the bride and bridegroom as a special concession to their position. Besides the exogamous clans the Paiks have totemistic _gots_ or groups named after plants and animals, as Harin (a deer), Kadamb (a tree), and so on. But these have no bearing on marriage, and the bulk of the caste have the Nagesh or cobra as their sept name. It is said that anybody who does not know his sept considers himself to be a Nagesh, and if he does not know his clan, he calls himself a Mahanti. Each family among the Paiks has also a Sainga or title, of a high-sounding nature, as Naik (lord), Pujari (worshipper), Baidya (physician), Raut (noble), and so on. Marriages are generally celebrated in early youth, but no penalty is incurred for a breach of this rule. If the signs of adolescence appear in a girl for the first time on a Tuesday, Saturday or Sunday, it is considered a bad omen, and she is sometimes married to a tree to avert the consequences. Widow-marriage and divorce are freely permitted. The caste burn their dead and perform the _shraddh_ ceremony. The women are tattooed, and men sometimes tattoo their arms with figures of the sun and moon in the belief that this will protect them from snake-bite. The Paiks eat flesh and fish, but abstain from fowls and other unclean animals and from liquor. Brahmans will not take water from them, but other castes generally do so. Some of them are still employed as armed retainers and are remunerated by free grants of land.

Panka

List of Paragraphs

1. _Origin of the caste._ 2. _Caste subdivisions._ 3. _Endogamous divisions._ 4. _Marriage._ 5. _Religion._ 6. _Other customs._ 7. _Occupation._

1. Origin of the caste

_Panka._ [366]--A Dravidian caste of weavers and labourers found in Mandla, Raipur and Bilaspur, and numbering 215,000 persons in 1911. The name is a variant on that of the Pan tribe of Orissa and Chota Nagpur, who are also known as Panika, Chik, Ganda and by various other designations. In the Central Provinces it has, however, a peculiar application; for while the Pan tribe proper is called Ganda in Chhattisgarh and the Uriya country, the Pankas form a separate division of the Gandas, consisting of those who have become members of the Kabirpanthi sect. In this way the name has been found very convenient, for since Kabir, the founder of the sect, was discovered by a weaver woman lying on the lotus leaves of a tank, like Moses in the bulrushes, and as a newly initiated convert is purified with water, so the Pankas hold that their name Is _pani ka_ or 'from water.' As far as possible then they disown their connection with the Gandas, one of the most despised castes, and say that they are a separate caste consisting of the disciples of Kabir. This has given rise to the following doggerel rhyme about them:

Pani se Panka bhae, bundan rache sharir, Age age Panka bhae, pachhe Das Kabir.

Which may be rendered, 'The Panka indeed is born of water, and his body is made of drops of water, but there were Pankas before Kabir.' Or another rendering of the second line is, 'First he was a Panka, and afterwards he became a disciple of Kabir,' Nevertheless the Pankas have been successful in obtaining a somewhat higher position than the Gandas, in that their touch is not considered to convey impurity. This is therefore an instance of a body of persons from a low caste embracing a new religion and thereby forming themselves into a separate caste and obtaining an advance in social position.

2. Caste subdivisions

Of the whole caste 84 per cent are Kabirpanthis and these form one subcaste; but there are a few others. The Manikpuria say that their ancestors came from Manikpur in Darbhanga State about three centuries ago; the Saktaha are those who profess to belong to the Sakta sect, which simply means that they eat flesh and drink liquor, being unwilling to submit to the restrictions imposed on Kabirpanthis; the Bajania are those who play on musical instruments, an occupation which tends to lower them in Hindu eyes; and the Dom Pankas are probably a section of the Dom or sweeper caste who have somehow managed to become Pankas. The main distinction is however between the Kabirha, who have abjured flesh and liquor, and the Saktaha, who indulge in them; and the Saktaha group is naturally recruited from backsliding Kabirpanthis. Properly the Kabirha and Saktaha do not intermarry, but if a girl from either section goes to a man of the other she will be admitted into the community and recognised as his wife, though the regular ceremony is not performed. The Saktaha worship all the ordinary village deities, but some of the Kabirha at any rate entirely refrain from doing so, and have no religious rites except when a priest of their sect comes round, when he gives them a discourse and they sing religious songs.

3. Endogamous divisions

The caste have a number of exogamous septs, many of which are named after plants and animals: as Tandia an earthen pot, Chhura a razor, Neora the mongoose, Parewa the wild pigeon, and others. Other septs are Panaria the bringer of betel-leaf, Kuldip the lamp-lighter, Pandwar the washer of feet, Ghughua one who eats the leavings of the assembly, and Khetgarhia, one who watches the fields during religious worship. The Sonwania or 'Gold-water' sept has among the Pankas, as with several of the primitive tribes, the duty of readmitting persons temporarily put out of caste; while the Naurang or nine-coloured sept may be the offspring of some illegitimate unions. The Sati sept apparently commemorate by their name an ancestress who distinguished herself by self-immolation, naturally a very rare occurrence in so low a caste as the Pankas. Each sept has its own Bhat or genealogist who begs only from members of the sept and takes food from them.

4. Marriage