The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India, Volume 4

17. Social status

The sweeper stands at the very bottom of the social ladder of Hinduism. He is considered to be the representative of the Chandāla of Manu,243 who was said to be descended of a Sūdra father and a Brāhman woman. “It was ordained that the Chandāla should live without the town; his sole wealth should be dogs and asses; his clothes should consist of the cerecloths of the dead; his dishes should be broken pots and his ornaments rusty iron. No one who regarded his duties should hold intercourse with the Chandālas and they should marry only among themselves. By day they might roam about for the purposes of work, but should be distinguished by the badges of the Rāja, and should carry out the corpse of any one who died without kindred. They should always be employed to slay those who by the law were sentenced to be put to death, and they might take the clothes of the slain, their beds and their ornaments.” Elsewhere the Chandāla is said to rank in impurity with the town boar, the dog, a woman during her monthly illness and a eunuch, none of whom must a Brāhman allow to see him when eating.244 Like the Chandāla, the sweeper cannot be touched, and he himself acquiesces in this and walks apart. In large towns he sometimes carries a kite’s wing in his turban to show his caste, or goes aloof saying pois, which is equivalent to a warning. When the sweeper is in company he will efface himself as far as possible behind other people. He is known by his basket and broom, and men of other castes will not carry these articles lest they should be mistaken for a sweeper. The sweeper’s broom is made of bamboo, whereas the ordinary house-broom is made of date-palm leaves. The house-broom is considered sacred as the implement of Lakshmi used in cleaning the house. No one should tread upon or touch it with his foot. The sweeper’s broom is a powerful agent for curing the evil eye, and mothers get him to come and wave it up and down in front of a sick child for this purpose. Nevertheless it is lucky to see a sweeper in the morning, especially if he has his basket with him. In Gujarāt Mr. Bhīmbhai Kirpārām writes of him: “Though he is held to be lower and more unclean, the Bhangia is viewed with kindlier feelings than the Dhed (Mahār). To meet the basket-bearing Bhangia is lucky, and the Bhangia’s blessing is valued. Even now if a Government officer goes into a Bhangia hamlet the men with hands raised in blessing say: ‘May your rule last for ever.’” A sweeper will eat the leavings of other people, but he will not eat in their houses; he will take the food away to his own house. It is related that on one occasion a sweeper accompanied a marriage party of Lodhis (cultivators), and the Lodhi who was the host was anxious that all should share his hospitality and asked the sweeper to eat in his house;245 but he repeatedly refused, until finally the Lodhi gave him a she-buffalo to induce him to eat, so that it might not be said that any one had declined to share in his feast. No other caste, of course, will accept food or water from a sweeper, and only a Chamār (tanner) will take a chilam or clay pipe-bowl from his hand. The sweeper will eat carrion and the flesh of almost all animals, including snakes, lizards, crocodiles and tigers, and also the leavings of food of almost any caste. Mr. Greeven remarks:246 “Only Lālbegis and Rāwats eat food left by Europeans, but all eat food left either by Hindus or Muhammadans; the Sheikh Mehtars as Muhammadans alone are circumcised and reject pig’s flesh. Each subcaste eats uncooked food with all the others, but cooked food alone.” From Betūl it is reported that the Mehtars there will not accept food, water or tobacco from a Kāyasth, and will not allow one to enter their houses.

18. Occupation

Sweeping and scavenging in the streets and in private houses are the traditional occupations of the caste, but they have others. In Bombay they serve as night watchmen, town-criers, drummers, trumpeters and hangmen. Formerly the office of hangman was confined to sweepers, but now many low-caste prisoners are willing to undertake it for the sake of the privilege of smoking tobacco in jail which it confers. In Mīrzāpur when a Dom hangman is tying a rope round the neck of a criminal he shouts out, ‘Dohai Mahārāni, Dohai Sarkār, Dohai Judge Sāhib,’ or ‘Hail Great Queen! Hail Government! Hail Judge Sahib!’ in order to shelter himself under their authority and escape any guilt attaching to the death.247 In the Central Provinces the hangman was accompanied by four or five other sweepers of the caste panchāyat the idea being perhaps that his act should be condoned by their presence and approval and he should escape guilt. In order to free the executioner from blame the prisoner would also say: “Dohai Sarkar ke, Dohai Kampani ke; jaisa maine khūn kiya waisa apne khūn ko pahunchha” or “Hail to the Government and the Company; since I caused the death of another, now I am come to my own death”; and all the Panches said, ‘Rām, Rām.’ The hangman received ten rupees as his fee, and of this five rupees were given to the caste for a feast and an offering to Lālbeg to expiate his sin. In Bundelkhand sweepers are employed as grooms by the Lodhis, and may put everything on to the horse except a saddle-cloth. They are also the village musicians, and some of them play on the rustic flute called shahnai at weddings, and receive their food all the time that the ceremony lasts. Sweepers are, as a rule, to be found only in large villages, as in small ones there is no work for them. The caste is none too numerous in the Central Provinces, and in villages the sweeper is often not available when wanted for cleaning the streets. The Chamārs of Bundelkhand will not remove the corpses of a cat or a dog or a squirrel, and a sweeper must be obtained for the purpose. These three animals are in a manner holy, and it is considered a sin to kill any one of them. But their corpses are unclean. A Chamār also refuses to touch the corpse of a donkey, but a Kumhār (potter) will sometimes do this; if he declines a sweeper must be fetched. When a sweeper has to enter a house in order to take out the body of an animal, it is cleaned and whitewashed after he has been in. In Hoshangābād an objection appears to be felt to the entry of a sweeper by the door, as it is stated that a ladder is placed for him, so that he presumably climbs through a window. Or where there are no windows it is possible that the ladder may protect the sacred threshold from contact with his feet. The sweeper also attends at funerals and assists to prepare the pyre; he receives the winding-sheet when this is not burnt or buried with the corpse, and the copper coins which are left on the ground as purchase-money for the site of the grave. In Bombay in rich families the winding-sheet is often a worked shawl costing from fifty to a hundred rupees.248 When a Hindu widow breaks her bangles after her husband’s death, she gives them, including one or two whole ones, to a Bhangia woman.249 A letter announcing a death is always carried by a sweeper.250 In Bengal a funeral could not be held without the presence of a Dom, whose functions are described by Mr. Sherring251 as follows: “On the arrival of the dead body at the place of cremation, which in Benāres is at the basis of one of the steep stairs or ghāts, called the Burning-Ghāt, leading down from the streets above to the bed of the river Ganges, the Dom supplies five logs of wood, which he lays in order upon the ground, the rest of the wood being given by the family of the deceased. When the pile is ready for burning a handful of lighted straw is brought by the Dom, and is taken from him and applied by one of the chief members of the family to the wood. The Dom is the only person who can furnish the light for the purpose; and if for any reason no Dom is available, great delay and inconvenience are apt to arise. The Dom exacts his fee for three things, namely, first for the five logs, secondly for the bunch of straw, and thirdly for the light.”

19. Occupation (continued)

During an eclipse the sweepers reap a good harvest; for it is believed that Rāhu, the demon who devours the sun and moon and thus causes an eclipse, was either a sweeper or the deity of the sweepers, and alms given to them at this time will appease him and cause him to let the luminaries go. Or, according to another account, the sun and moon are in Rāhu’s debt, and he comes and duns them, and this is the eclipse; and the alms given to sweepers are a means of paying the debt. In Gujarāt as soon as the darkening sets in the Bhangis go about shouting, ‘Garhandān, Vastradān, Rupādān,’ or ‘Gifts for the eclipse, gifts of clothes, gifts of silver.’252 The sweepers are no doubt derived from the primitive or Dravidian tribes, and, as has been seen, they also practise the art of making bamboo mats and baskets, being known as Bānsphor in Bombay on this account. In the Punjab the Chuhras are a very numerous caste, being exceeded only by the Jāts, Rājpūts and Brāhmans. Only a small proportion of them naturally find employment as scavengers, and the remainder are agricultural labourers, and together with the vagrants and gipsies are the hereditary workers in grass and reeds.253 They are closely connected with the Dhānuks, a caste of hunters, fowlers and village watchmen, being of nearly the same status.254 And Dhānuk, again, is in some localities a complimentary term for a Basor or bamboo-worker. It has been seen that Vālmīki, the patron saint of the sweepers, was a low-caste hunter, and this gives some reason for the supposition that the primary occupations of the Chūhras and Bhangis were hunting and working in grass and bamboo. In one of the legends of the sweeper saint Bālmīk or Vālmīki given by Mr. Greeven,255 Bālmīk was the youngest of the five Pāndava brothers, and was persuaded by the others to remove the body of a calf which had died in their courtyard. But after he had done so they refused to touch him, so he went into the wilderness with the body; and when he did not know how to feed himself the carcase started into life and gave him milk until he was full grown, when it died again of its own accord. Bālmīk burst into tears, not knowing how he was to live henceforward, but a voice cried from heaven saying, “Of the sinews (of the calf’s body) do thou tie winnows (sūp), and of the caul do thou plait sieves (chalni).” Bālmīk obeyed, and by his handiwork gained the name of Sūpaj or the maker of winnowing-fans. These are natural occupations of the non-Aryan forest tribes, and are now practised by the Gonds.

Meo

Meo, Mewāti.—The Muhammadan branch of the Mīna tribe belonging to the country of Mewāt in Rājputāna which is comprised in the Alwar, Bharatpur and Jaipur States and the British District of Gurgaon. A few Meos were returned from the Hoshangābād and Nimār Districts in 1911, but it is doubtful whether any are settled here, as they may be wandering criminals. The origin of the Meo is discussed in the article on the Mīna tribe, but some interesting remarks on them by Mr. Channing and Major Powlett in the Rājputāna Gazetteer may be reproduced here. Mr. Channing writes:256

“The tribe, which has been known in Hindustān according to the Kutub Tawārīkh for 850 years, was originally Hindu and became Muhammadan. Their origin is obscure. They themselves claim descent from the Rājpūt races of Jādon, Kachhwāha and Tuar, and they may possibly have some Rājpūt blood in their veins; but they are probably, like many other similar tribes, a combination from ruling and other various stocks and sources, and there is reason to believe them very nearly allied with the Mīnas, who are certainly a tribe of the same structure and species. The Meos have twelve clans or pāls, the first six of which are identical in name and claim the same descent as the first six clans of the Mīnas. Intermarriage between them both was the rule until the time of Akbar, when owing to an affray at the marriage of a Meo with a Mīna the custom was discontinued. Finally, their mode of life is or was similar, as both tribes were once notoriously predatory. It is probable that the original Meos were supplemented by converts to Islām from other castes. It is said that the tribe were conquered and converted in the eleventh century by Māsūd, son of Amīr Sālār and grandson of Sultān Mahmūd Subaktagin on the mother’s side, the general of the forces of Mahmūd of Ghazni. Māsūd is still venerated by the Meos, and they swear by his name. They have a mixture of Hindu and Muhammadan customs. They practise circumcision, nikāh257 and the burial of the dead. They make pilgrimages to the tomb of Māsūd in Bahraich in Oudh, and consider the oath taken on his banner the most binding. They also make pilgrimages to Muhammadan shrines in India, but never perform the Haj. Of Hindu customs they observe the Holi or Diwāli; their marriages are never arranged in the same got or sept; and they permit daughters to inherit. They call their children indiscriminately by both Muhammadan and Hindu names. They are almost entirely uneducated, but have bards and musicians to whom they make large presents. These sing songs known as Rātwai, which are commonly on pastoral and agricultural subjects. The Meos are given to the use of intoxicating drinks, and are very superstitious and have great faith in omens. The dress of the men and women resembles that of the Hindus. Infanticide was formerly common among them, but it is said to have entirely died out. They were also formerly robbers by avocation; and though they have improved they are still noted cattle-lifters.”

In another description of them by Major Powlett it is stated that, besides worshipping Hindu gods and keeping Hindu festivals, they employ a Brāhman to write the Pīli Chhitthi or yellow note fixing the date of a marriage. They call themselves by Hindu names with the exception of Rām; and Singh is a frequent affix, though not so common as Khān. On the Amāwas or monthly conjunction of the sun and moon, Meos, in common with Hindu Ahīrs and Gūjars, cease from labour; and when they make a well the first proceeding is to erect a chabūtra (platform) to Bhaironji or Hanumān. However, when plunder was to be obtained they have often shown little respect for Hindu shrines and temples; and when the sanctity of a threatened place has been urged, the retort has been, ‘Tum to Deo, Ham Meo’ or ‘You may be a Deo (God), but I am a Meo.’

Meos do not marry in their pāl or clan, but they are lax about forming connections with women of other castes, whose children they receive into the community. As already stated, Brāhmans take part in the formalities preceding a marriage, but the ceremony itself is performed by a Kāzi. As agriculturists Meos are inferior to their Hindu neighbours. The point in which they chiefly fail is in working their wells, for which they lack patience. Their women, whom they do not confine, will, it is said, do more field-work than the men; indeed, one often finds women at work in the crops when the men are lying down. Like the women of low Hindu castes they tattoo their bodies, a practice disapproved by Musalmāns in general. Abul Fazl writes that the Meos were in his time famous runners, and one thousand of them were employed by Akbar as carriers of the post.

Mīna

1. The Mīnas locally termed Deswā

Mīna, Deswāli, Maina.—A well-known caste of Rājputāna which is found in the Central Provinces in the Hoshangābād, Nimār and Saugor Districts. About 8000 persons of the caste were returned in 1911. The proper name for them is Mīna, but here they are generally known as Deswāli, a term which they probably prefer, as that of Mīna is too notorious. A large part of the population of the northern Districts is recruited from Bundelkhand and Mārwār, and these tracts are therefore often known among them as ‘Desh’ or native country. The term Deswāli is applied to groups of many castes coming from Bundelkhand, and has apparently been specially appropriated as an alias by the Mīnas. The caste are sometimes known in Hoshangābād as Maina, which Colonel Tod states to be the name of the highest division of the Mīnas. The designation of Pardeshi or ‘foreigner’ is also given to them in some localities. The Deswālis came to Harda about A.D. 1750, being invited by the Marātha Amīl or governor, who gave one family a grant of three villages. They thus gained a position of some dignity, and this reaching the ears of their brothers in Jaipur they also came and settled all over the District.258 In view of the history and character of the Mīnas, of which some account will be given, it should be first stated that under the régime of British law and order most of the Deswālis of Hoshangābād have settled down into steady and honest agriculturists.

2. Historical notice of the Mīna tribe

The Mīnas were a famous robber tribe of the country of Mewāt in Rājputāna, comprised in the Alwar and Bharatpur States and the British District of Gurgaon.259 They are also found in large numbers in Jaipur State, which was formerly held by them. The Meos and Mīnas are now considered to be branches of one tribe, the former being at least nominally Muhammadans by religion and the latter Hindus. A favourite story for recitation at their feasts is that of Darya Khān Meo and Sasibādani Mīni, a pair of lovers whose marriage led to a quarrel between the tribes to which they belonged, in the time of Akbar. This dispute caused the cessation of the practice of intermarriage between Meos and Mīnas which had formerly obtained. Both the Meos and Mīnas are divided into twelve large clans called pāl, the word pāl meaning, according to Colonel Tod, ‘a defile in a valley suitable for cultivation or defence.’ In a sandy desert like Rājputāna the valleys of streams might be expected to be the only favourable tracts for settlement, and the name perhaps therefore is a record of the process by which the colonies of Mīnas in these isolated patches of culturable land developed into exogamous clans marrying with each other. The Meos have similarly twelve pāls, and the names of six of these are identical with those of the Mīnas.260 The names of the pāls are taken from those of Rājpūt clans,261 but the recorded lists differ, and there are now many other gots or septs outside the pāls. The Mīnas seem originally to have been an aboriginal or pre-Aryan tribe of Rājputāna, where they are still found in considerable numbers. The Rāja of Jaipur was formerly marked on the forehead with blood taken from the great toe of a Mīna on the occasion of his installation. Colonel Tod records that the Amber or Jaipur State was founded by one Dholesai in A.D. 967 after he had slaughtered large numbers of the Mīnas by treachery. And in his time the Mīnas still possessed large immunities and privileges in the Jaipur State. When the Rājpūts settled in force in Rājputāna, reducing the Mīnas to subjection, illicit connections would naturally arise on a large scale between the invaders and the women of the conquered country. For even when the Rājpūts only came as small isolated parties of adventurers, as into the Central Provinces, we find traces of such connections in the survival of castes or subcastes of mixed descent from them and the indigenous tribes. It follows therefore that where they occupied the country and settled on the soil the process would be still more common. Accordingly it is generally recognised that the Mīnas are a caste of the most mixed and impure descent, and it has sometimes been supposed that they were themselves a branch of the Rājpūts. In the Punjab when one woman accuses another of illicit intercourse she is said ‘Mīna dena,’ or to designate her as a Mīna.262 Further it is stated263 that “The Mīnas are of two classes, the Zamīndāri or agricultural and the Chaukīdāri or watchmen. These Chaukīdāri Mīnas are the famous marauders.” The office of village watchman was commonly held by members of the aboriginal tribes, and these too furnished the criminal classes. Another piece of evidence of the Dravidian origin of the tribe is the fact that there exists even now a group of Dhedia or impure Mīnas who do not refuse to eat cow’s flesh. The Chaukīdāri Mīnas, dispossessed of their land, resorted to the hills, and here they developed into a community of thieves and bandits recruited from all the outcastes of society. Sir A. Lyall wrote264 of the caste as “a Cave of Adullam which has stood open for centuries. With them a captured woman is solemnly admitted by a form of adoption into one circle of affinity, in order that she may be lawfully married into another.” With the conquest of northern India by the Muhammadans, many of the Mīnas, being bound by no ties to Hinduism, might be expected to embrace the new and actively proselytising religion, while their robber bands would receive fugitive Muhammadans as recruits as well as Hindus. Thus probably arose a Musalmān branch of the community, who afterwards became separately designated as the Meos. As already seen, the Meos and Mīnas intermarried for a time, but subsequently ceased to do so. As might be expected, the form of Islām professed by the Meos is of a very bastard order, and Major Powlett’s account of it is reproduced in a short separate notice of that tribe.

3. Their robberies

The crimes and daring of the Mīnas have obtained for them a considerable place in history. A Muhammadan historian, Zia-ud-dīn Bāmi, wrote of the tribe:265 “At night they were accustomed to come prowling into the city of Delhi, giving all kinds of trouble and depriving people of their rest, and they plundered the country houses in the neighbourhood of the city. Their daring was carried to such an extent that the western gates of the city were shut at afternoon prayer and no one dared to leave it after that hour, whether he travelled as a pilgrim or with the display of a king. At afternoon prayer they would often come to the Sarhouy, and assaulting the water-carriers and girls who were fetching water they would strip them and carry off their clothes. In turn they were treated by the Muhammadan rulers with the most merciless cruelty. Some were thrown under the feet of elephants, others were cut in halves with knives, and others again were flayed alive from head to foot.” Regular campaigns against them were undertaken by the Muhammadans,266 as in later times British forces had to be despatched to subdue the Pindāris. Bābar on his arrival at Agra described the Mewāti leader Rāja Hasan Khān as ‘the chief agitator in all these confusions and insurrections’; and Firishta mentions two terrible slaughters of Mewātis in A.D. 1259 and 1265. In 1857 Major Powlett records that in Alwar they assembled and burnt the State ricks and carried off cattle, though they did not succeed in plundering any towns or villages there. In British territory they sacked Firozpur and other villages, and when a British force came to restore order many were hanged. Sir D. Ibbetson wrote of them in the Punjab:267

“The Mīnas are the boldest of our criminal classes. Their headquarters so far as the Punjab is concerned are in the village of Shāhjahānpur, attached to the Gurgaon District but surrounded on all sides by Rājputāna territory. There they until lately defied our police and even resisted them with armed force. Their enterprises are on a large scale, and they are always prepared to use violence if necessary. In Mārwār they are armed with small bows which do considerable execution. They travel great distances in gangs of from twelve to twenty men, practising robbery and dacoity even as far as the Deccan. The gangs usually start off immediately after the Diwāli feast and often remain absent the whole year. They have agents in all the large cities of Rājputāna and the Deccan who give them information, and they are in league with the carrying castes of Mārwār. After a successful foray they offer one-tenth of the proceeds at the shrine of Kāli Devi.”

Like other criminals they were very superstitious, and Colonel Tod records that the partridge and the maloli or wagtail were their chief birds of omen. A partridge clamouring on the left when he commenced a foray was a certain presage of success to a Mīna. Similarly, Mr. Kennedy notes that the finding of a dried goatskin, either whole or in pieces, among the effects of a suspected criminal is said to be an infallible indication of his identity as a Mīna, the flesh of the goat’s tongue being indispensable in connection with the taking of omens. In Jaipur the Mīnas were employed as guards, as a method of protection against their fellows, for whose misdeeds they were held responsible. Rent-free lands were given to them, and they were always employed to escort treasure. Here they became the most faithful and trusted of the Rāja’s servants. It is related that on one occasion a Mīna sentinel at the palace had received charge of a basket of oranges. A friend of the same tribe came to him and asked to be shown the palace, which he had never seen. The sentinel agreed and took him over the palace, but when his back was turned the friend stole one orange from the basket. Subsequently the sentinel counted the oranges and found one short; on this he ran after his friend and taxed him with the theft, which being admitted, the Mīna said that he had been made to betray his trust and had become dishonoured, and drawing his sword cut off his friend’s head. The ancient treasure of Jaipur or Amber was, according to tradition, kept in a secret cave in the hills under a body of Mīna guards who alone knew the hiding-place, and would only permit any part of it to be withdrawn for a great emergency. Nor would they accept the orders of the Rāja alone, but required the consent of the heads of the twelve principal noble families of Amber, branches of the royal house, before they would give up any part of the treasure. The criminal Mīnas are said to inhabit a tract of country about sixty-five miles long and forty broad, stretching from Shāhpur forty miles north of Jaipur to Guraora in Gurgaon on the Rohtak border. The popular idea of the Mīna, Mr. Crooke remarks,268 is quite in accordance with his historical character; his niggardliness is shown in the saying, ‘The Meo will not give his daughter in marriage till he gets a mortar full of silver’; his pugnacity is expressed in, ‘The Meo’s son begins to avenge his feuds when he is twelve years old’; and his toughness in, ‘Never be sure that a Meo is dead till you see the third-day funeral ceremony performed.’