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

7. Ordeals

The following is a description given by a Sānsia of their ordeals:616 If a Jemādār suspects a Sipāhi of secreting plunder a panchāyat is assembled,617 the members of which receive five rupees from both parties. Seven pīpal618 leaves are laid upon his hand and bound round with thread, and upon these a heated iron tawa or plate is set; he is then ordered to walk seven paces and put the plate down upon seven thorns; should he be able to do so he is pronounced innocent, but if he is burnt by the plate and throws it down he is considered guilty. Another ordeal is by fixing arrows, two of which are shot off at once from one bow, one in the name of Bhagwān (god), and the other in the name of the panchāyat; the place being on the bank of the river. The arrow that flies the farthest is stuck upright into the ground; upon which a man carrying a long bamboo walks up to his breast in the water and the suspected person is desired to join him. One of the panchāyat then claps his hands seven times and runs off to pick up the arrow; at this instant the suspected person is obliged to put his head under water, and if he can hold his breath until the other returns to the bank with the arrow and has again clapped his hands seven times he is pronounced innocent. If he cannot do so he is declared guilty and punished. A third form of ordeal was as follows: The Jemādār and the gang assemble under a pīpal tree, and after knocking off the neck of an earthen pitcher they kill a goat and collect its blood in the pitcher, and put some glass bangles in it. Four lines are drawn on the pitcher with vermilion (representing blood), and it is placed under a tree and 1¼ seers619 of gur (sugar) are tied up in a piece of cloth 1¼ cubits in length and hung on to a branch of the tree. The Jemādār then says, ‘I will forgive any person who has not secreted more than fifteen or twenty rupees, but whoever has stolen more than that sum shall be punished.’ The Jemādār dips his finger in the pitcher of blood, and afterwards touches the sugar and calls out loudly, ‘If I have embezzled any money may Bhagwān punish me’; and each dacoit in turn pronounces the same sentence. No one who is guilty will do this but at once makes his confession. The oath pronounced on 1¼ seers of sugar tied up in 1¼ cubits of cloth was considered the most solemn and binding which a Sānsia could take.

8. Sānsias at the present time

At present, Mr. Kennedy states,620 the Sānsias travel about in gangs of varying strength with their families, bullocks, sheep, goats and dogs. The last mentioned of these animals are usually small mongrels with a terrier strain, mostly stolen or bred from types dishonestly obtained during their peregrinations. Dacoity is still the crime which they most affect, and they also break into houses and steal cattle. Men usually have a necklace of red coral and gold beads round the neck, from which is suspended a square piece of silver or gold bearing an effigy of a man on horseback. This represents either the deity Rāmdeo Pīr or one of the wearer’s ancestors, and is venerated as a charm. They are very quarrelsome, and their drinking-bouts in camp usually end in a free fight, in which they also beat their women, and the affray not infrequently results in the death of one of the combatants. When this happens the slayer makes restitution to the relatives by defraying the expenses of a fresh drinking-bout.621 During the daytime men are seldom to be found in the encampment, as they are in the habit of hiding in the ditches and jungle, where the women take them their food; at night they return to their tents, but are off again at dawn.

Sānsia, Uria

1. The caste and its subdivisions

Sānsia, Uria.622—A caste of masons and navvies of the Uriya country. The Sānsias are really a branch of the great migratory Ud or Odde caste of earth-workers, whose name has been corrupted into various forms.623 Thus in Chānda they are known as Wadewār or Waddar. The term Uria is here a corruption of Odde, and it is the one by which the caste prefer to be known, but they are generally called Sānsia by outsiders. The caste sometimes class the Sānsias as a subcaste of Urias, the others being Benātia Urias and Khandait Urias. Since the Uriya tract has been transferred to Bengal, and subsequently to Bihār and Orissa, there remain only about 1000 Sānsias in the Chhattīsgarh Districts and States. Although it is possible that the name of the caste may have been derived from some past connection, the Sānsias of the Uriya country have at present no affinities with the outcaste and criminal tribe of Sānsis or Sānsias of northern India. They enjoy a fairly high position in Sarnbalpur, and Brāhmans will take water from them.

They are divided into two subcastes, the Benetia and Khandait. The Benetia are the higher and look down on the Khandaits, because, it is said, these latter have accepted service as foot-soldiers, and this is considered a menial occupation. Perhaps in the households of the Uriya Rājas the tribal militia had also to perform personal services, and this may have been considered derogatory., In Orissa, on the other hand, the Khandaits have become landholders and occupy a high position next to Rājpūts. The Benetia Sānsias practise hypergamy with the Khandait Sansias, taking their daughters in marriage, but not giving daughters to them. When a Benetia is marrying a Khandait girl his party will not take food with the bride’s relatives, but only partake of some sugar and curds and depart with the bride. The Sānsias have totemistic exogamous septs, usually derived from the names of sacred objects, as Kachhap, tortoise, Sankh, the conch-shell, Tulsi, basil, and so on.

2. Marriage customs

Girls are married between seven and ten, and after she is twelve years old a girl cannot go through the proper ceremony, but can only be wedded by a simple rite used for widows, in which vermilion is rubbed on her forehead and some grains of rice stuck on it. The marriage procession, as described by Mr. Rāma Prasād Bohidār, is a gorgeous affair: “The drummers, all drunk, head the procession, beating their drums to the tune set by the piper. Next in order are placed dancing-boys between two rows of lights carried on poles adorned with festoons of paper flowers. Rockets and fireworks have their proper share in the procession, and last of all comes the bridegroom in his wedding apparel, mounted on a horse. His person is studded with various kinds of gold necklaces borrowed for the occasion, and the fingers of his right hand are covered with rings. Bangles and chains of silver shine on his wrists and arms. His forehead is beautifully painted with ground sandalwood divided in the centre by a streak of vermilion. His head carries a crown of palm-leaves overlaid with bright paper of various colours. A network of mālti flowers hangs loosely from the head over the back and covers a portion of the loins of the steed. The eyes are painted with collyrium and the feet with red dye. The lips and teeth are also reddened by the betel-leaf, which the bridegroom chews in profusion. A silk cloth does the work of a belt, in which is fixed a dagger on the right side.” Here the red colour which predominates in the bridegroom’s decorations is lucky for the reasons given in the article on Lakhera; the blacking of the eyes is also considered to keep off evil spirits; betel-leaf is itself a powerful agent of magic and averter of spirits, and to the same end the bridegroom carries iron in the shape of the dagger. The ceremony is of the customary Uriya type. On the seventh day of the wedding the husband and wife go to the river and bathe, throwing away the sacred threads worn at the time of marriage, and also those which have been tied round their wrists. On returning home the wife piles up seven brass vessels and seven stools one above the other and the husband kicks them over, this being repeated seven times. The husband then washes his teeth with water brought from the river, breaks the vessel containing the water in the bride’s house, and runs away, while the women of her family throw pailfuls of coloured water over him. On the ninth day the bride comes and smears a mixture of curds and sugar on the forehead of each member of the bridegroom’s family, probably as a sign of her admission to their clan, and returns home. Divorce and the remarriage of widows are permitted.

3. Religion and worship of ancestors

The caste worship Viswakarma, the celestial architect, and on four principal festivals they revere their trade-implements and the book on architecture, by which they work. At Dasahra a pumpkin is offered to these articles in lieu of a goat. They observe the shrāddh ceremony, and first make two offerings to the spirits of ancestors who have died a violent death or have committed suicide, and to those of relatives who died unmarried, for fear lest these unclean and malignant spirits should seize and defile the offerings to the beneficent ancestors. Thereafter pindas or sacrificial cakes are offered to three male and three female ancestors both on the father’s and mother’s side, twelve cakes being offered in all. The Sānsias eat the flesh of clean animals, but the consumption of liquor is strictly forbidden, on pain, it is said, of permanent exclusion from caste.

4. Occupation

In Sambalpur the caste are usually stone-workers, making cups, mortars, images of idols and other articles. They also build tanks and wander from place to place for this purpose in large companies. It is related that on one occasion they came to dig a tank in Drūg, and the Rāja of that place, while watching their work, took a fancy to one of the Odnis, as their women were called, and wanted her to marry him. But as she was already married, and was a virtuous woman, she refused. The Rāja persisted in his demand, on which the whole body of Sānsias from Chhattīsgarh, numbering, it is said, nine lakhs of persons, left their work and proceeded to Warārbāndh, near Rāj-Nāndgaon. Here they dug the great tank of Warārbāndh624 in one night to obtain a supply of water for themselves. But the Raja followed them, and as they could not resist him by force, the woman whom he was pursuing burnt herself alive, and thus earned undying fame in the caste. This legend is perpetuated in the Odni Gīt, a popular folk-song in Chhattīsgarh. But it is a traditional story of the Sānsias in connection with large tanks, and in another version the scene is laid in Gujarāt.625

Savar

1. Distribution and historical notices

Savar, 626 Sawara, Savara, Saonr, Sahra (and several other variations. In Bundelkhand the Savars, there called Saonrs, are frequently known by the honorific title of Rāwat).—A primitive tribe numbering about 70,000 persons in the Central Provinces in 1911, and principally found in the Chhattīsgarh Districts and those of Saugor and Damoh. The eastern branch of the tribe belongs chiefly to the Uriya country. The Savars are found in large numbers in the Madras Districts of Ganjām and Vizagapatam and in Orissa. They also live in the Bundelkhand Districts of the United Provinces. The total number of Savars enumerated in India in 1911 was 600,000, of which the Bundelkhand Districts contained about 100,000 and the Uriya country the remainder. The two branches of the tribe are thus separated by a wide expanse of territory. As regards this peculiarity of distribution General Cunningham says: “Indeed there seems good reason to believe that the Savaras were formerly the dominant branch of the great Kolarian family, and that their power lasted down to a comparatively late period, when they were pushed aside by other Kolarian tribes in the north and east, and by the Gonds in the south. In the Saugor District I was informed that the Savaras had formerly fought with the Gonds and that the latter had conquered them by treacherously making them drunk.”627 Similarly Cunningham notices that the zamīndār of Suarmār in Raipur, which name is derived from Savar, is a Gond. A difference of opinion has existed as to whether the Savars were Kolarian or Dravidian so far as their language was concerned, Colonel Dalton adopting the latter view and other authorities the former and correct one. In the Central Provinces the Savars have lost their own language and speak the Aryan Hindi or Uriya vernacular current around them. But in Madras they still retain their original speech, which is classified by Sir G. Grierson as Mundāri or Kolarian. He says: “The most southerly forms of Munda speech are those spoken by the Savars and Gadabas of the north-east of Madras. The former have been identified with the Suari of Pliny and the Sabarae of Ptolemy. A wild tribe of the same name is mentioned in Sanskrit literature, even so far back as in late Vedic times, as inhabiting the Deccan, so that the name at least can boast great antiquity.”628 As to the origin of the name Savar, General Cunningham says that it must be sought for outside the language of the Aryans. “In Sanskrit savara simply means ‘a corpse.’ From Herodotus, however, we learn that the Scythian word for an axe was sagaris, and as ‘g’ and ‘v’ are interchangeable letters savar is the same word as sagar. It seems therefore not unreasonable to infer that the tribe who were so called took their name from their habit of carrying axes. Now it is one of the striking peculiarities of the Savars that they are rarely seen without an axe in their hands. The peculiarity has been frequently noticed by all who have seen them.”629 The above opinion of Cunningham, which is of course highly speculative, is disputed by Mr. Crooke, who says that “The word Savara, if it be, as some believe, derived from sava a corpse, comes from the root sav ‘to cause to decay,’ and need not necessarily therefore be of non-Aryan origin, while on the other hand no distinct inference can be drawn from the use of the axe by the Savars, when it is equally used by various other Dravidian jungle tribes such as the Korwas, Bhuiyas and the like.”630 In the classical stories of their origin the first ancestor of the Savars is sometimes described as a Bhīl. The word Savar is mentioned in several Sanskrit works written between 800 B.C. and A.D. 1200, and it seems probable that they are a Munda tribe who occupied the tracts of country which they live in prior to the arrival of the Gonds. The classical name Savar has been corrupted into various forms. Thus in the Bundeli dialect ‘ava’ changes into ‘au’ and a nasal is sometimes interpolated. Savar has here become Saunr or Saonr. The addition of ‘a’ at the end of the word sometimes expresses contempt, and Savar becomes Savara as Chamār is corrupted into Chamra. In the Uriya country ‘v’ is changed into ‘b’ and an aspirate is interpolated, and thus Savara became Sabra or Sahara, as Gaur has become Gahra. The word Sahara, Mr. Crooke remarks,631 has excited speculation as to its derivation from Arabic, in which Sahara means a wilderness; and the name of the Savars has accordingly been deduced from the same source as the great Sahara desert. This is of course incorrect.

2. Tribal legends

Various stories of the origin of the Savars are given in Sanskrit literature. In the Aitareya Brāhmana they are spoken of as the descendants of Vishwāmitra, while in the Mahābhārat they are said to have been created by Kāmdhenu, Vasishtha’s wonder-working cow, in order to repel the aggression of Vishwāmitra. Local tradition traces their origin to the celebrated Seorī of the Rāmāyana, who is supposed to have lived somewhere near the present Seorīnārāyan in the Bilāspur District and to have given her name to this place. Rāmchandra in his wanderings met her there, ate the plums which she had gathered for him after tasting each one herself, and out of regard for her devotion permitted her name to precede his own of Nārāyan in that given to the locality. Another story makes one Jara Savar their original ancestor, who was said to have shot Krishna in the form of a deer. Another states that they were created for carrying stones for the construction of the great temple at Puri and for dragging the car of Jagannāth, which they still do at the present time. Yet another connecting them with the temple of Jagannāth states that their ancestor was an old Bhīl hermit called Sawar, who lived in Karod, two miles from Seorīnārāyan. The god Jagannāth had at this time appeared in Seorīnārāyan and the old Sawar used to worship him. The king of Orissa had built the great temple at Puri and wished to install Jagannāth in it, and he sent a Brāhman to fetch him from Seorīnārāyan, but nobody knew where he was except the old hermit Sawar. The Brāhman besought him in vain to be allowed to see the god and even went so far as to marry his daughter, and finally the old man consented to take him blindfold to the place. The Brāhman, however, tied some mustard seeds in a corner of his cloth and made a hole in it so that they dropped out one by one on the way. After some time they grew up and served to guide him to the spot. This story of the mustard seeds of course finds a place in the folklore of many nations. The Brāhman then went to Seorīnārāyan alone and begged the god to go to Puri. Jagannāth consented, and assuming the form of a log of wood floated down the Mahānadi to Puri, where he was taken out and placed in the temple. A carpenter agreed to carve the god’s image out of the log of wood on condition that the temple should be shut up for six months while the work was going on. But some curious people opened the door before the time and the work could not proceed, and thus the image of the god is only half carved out of the wood up to the present day. As a consolation to the old man the god ordained that the place should bear the hermit’s name before his own as Seorīnārāyan. Lastly the Saonrs of Bundelkhand have the following tradition. In the beginning of creation Mahādeo wished to teach the people how to cultivate the ground, and so he made a plough and took out his bull Nandi to yoke to it But there was dense forest on the earth, so he created a being whom he called Savar and gave him an axe to clear the forest. In the meantime Mahādeo went away to get another bullock. The Savar after clearing the forest felt very hungry, and finding nothing else to eat killed Nandi and ate his flesh on a teak leaf. And for this reason the young teak leaves when rubbed give out sap which is the colour of blood to the present day. After some time Mahādeo returned, and finding the forest well cleared was pleased with the Savar, and as a reward endowed him with the knowledge of all edible and medicinal roots and fruits of the forest. But on looking round for Nandi he found him lying dead with some of his flesh cut off. The Savar pleaded ignorance, but Mahādeo sprinkled a little nectar on Nandi, who came to life again and told what had happened. Then Mahādeo was enraged with the Savar and said, ‘You shall remain a barbarian and dwell for ever in poverty in the jungles without enough to eat.’ And accordingly this has always been the condition of the Savar’s descendants.

Other old authors speak of the Parna or leaf-clad Savars; and a Savar messenger is described as carrying a bow in his hand “with his hair tied up in a knot behind with a creeper, black himself, and wearing a loin-cloth of bhilawān leaves”;632 an excellent example of ‘a leaf-fringed legend.’

3. Tribal subdivisions

The Bundelkhand Savars have been so long separated from the others that they have sometimes forgotten their identity and consider themselves as a subtribe of Gonds, though the better informed repudiate this. They may be regarded as a separate endogamous group. The eastern branch have two main divisions called Laria and Uriya, or those belonging to Chhattīsgarh and Sambalpur respectively. A third division known as the Kālāpithia or ‘Black Backs’ are found in Orissa, and are employed to drag the car of Jagannāth. These on account of their sacred occupation consider themselves superior to the others, abstain from fowls and liquor, and sometimes wear the sacred thread. The Larias are the lowest subdivision. Marriage is regulated by exogamous septs or bargas. The northern Savars say that they have 52 of these, 52 being a number frequently adopted to express the highest possible magnitude, as if no more could be imagined. The Uriya Savars say they have 80 bargas. Besides the prohibition of marriage within the same barga, the union of first cousins is sometimes forbidden. Among the Uriya Savars each barga has the two further divisions of Joria and Khuntia, the Jorias being those who bury or burn their dead near a jor or brook, and the Khuntias those who bury or burn them near a khunt or old tree. Jorias and Khuntias of the same barga cannot intermarry, but in the case of some other subdivisions of the barga, as between those who eat rice at one festival in the year and those eating it at two, marriage is allowed between members of the two subdivisions, thus splitting the exogamous group into two. The names of the bargas are usually totemistic, and the following are some examples: Badaiya, the carpenter bird; Bāgh, the tiger; Bagula, the heron; Bahra, a cook; Bhatia, a brinjal or egg-plant; Bīsi, the scorpion; Basantia, the trunk of the cotton tree; Hathia, an elephant; Jancher, a tree (this barga is divided into Bada and Kachcha, the Bada worshipping the tree and the Kachcha a branch of it, and marriage between the two subdivisions is allowed); Jharia (this barga keeps a lock of a child’s hair unshaved for four or five years after its birth); Juadi, a gambler; Karsa, a deer; Khairaiya, the khair or catechu tree; Lodhi, born from the caste of that name (in Saugor); Markām, the name of a Gond sept; Rājhans, a swan; Suriya Bansia, from the sun (members of this barga feed the caste-fellows on the occasion of a solar eclipse and throw away their earthen pots); Silgainya from sil, a slate; and Tiparia from tipari, a basket (these two septs are divided into Kachcha and Pakka groups which can marry with each other); Sona, gold (a member of this sept does not wear gold ornaments until he has given a feast and a caste-fellow has placed one on his person).

4. Marriage

Marriage is usually adult, but in places where the Savars live near Hindus they have adopted early marriage. A reason for preferring the latter custom is found in the marriage ceremony, when the bride and bridegroom must be carried on the shoulders of their relatives from the bride’s house to the bridegroom’s. If they are grown up, this part of the ceremony entails no inconsiderable labour on the relatives. In the Uriya country, while the Khuntia subdivision of each barga see nothing wrong in marrying a girl after adolescence, the Jorias consider it a great sin, to avoid which they sometimes marry a girl to an arrow before she attains puberty. An arrow is tied to her hand, and she goes seven times round a mahua branch stuck on an improvised altar, and drinks ghī and oil, thus creating the fiction of a marriage. The arrow is then thrown into a river to imply that her husband is dead, and she is afterwards disposed of by the ceremony of widow-marriage. If this mock ceremony has not been performed before the girl becomes adult, she is taken to the forest by a relative and there tied to a tree, to which she is considered to be married. She is not taken back to her father’s house but to that of some relative, such as her brother-in-law or grandfather, who is permitted to talk to her in an obscene and jesting manner, and is subsequently disposed of as a widow. Or in Sambalpur she may be nominally married to an old man and then again married as a widow. The Savars follow generally the local Hindu form of the marriage ceremony. On the return of the bridal pair seven lines are drawn in front of the entrance to the bridegroom’s house. Some relative takes rice and throws it at the persons returning with the marriage procession, and then pushes the pair hastily across the lines and into the house. They are thus freed from the evil spirits who might have accompanied them home and who are kept back by the rice and the seven lines. A price of Rs. 5 is sometimes paid for the bride. In Saugor if the bride’s family cannot afford a wedding feast they distribute small pieces of bread to the guests, who place them in their head-cloths to show their acceptance of this substitute. To those guests to whom it is necessary to make presents five cowries are given. Widow-marriage is allowed, and in some places the widow is bound to marry her late husband’s younger brother unless he declines to take her. If she marries somebody else the new husband pays a sum by way of compensation either to her father or to the late husband’s family. Divorce is permitted on the husband’s initiative for adultery or serious disagreement. If the wife wishes for a divorce she simply runs away from her husband. The Laria Savars must give a mārti-jīti kā bhāt or death-feast on the occasion of a divorce. The Uriyas simply pay a rupee to the headman of the caste.