Bhuiya
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From The Tribes And Castes Of The Central Provinces Of India
By R. V. Russell
Of The Indian Civil Service
Superintendent Of Ethnography, Central Provinces
Assisted By Rai Bahadur Hira Lal, Extra Assistant Commissioner
Macmillan And Co., Limited, London, 1916.
NOTE 1: The 'Central Provinces' have since been renamed Madhya Pradesh.
NOTE 2: While reading please keep in mind that all articles in this series have been scanned from the original book. Therefore, footnotes have got inserted into the main text of the article, interrupting the flow. Readers who spot these footnotes gone astray might like to shift them to their correct place.
Bhuiya, Bhuinhar, Bhumia
The name of a very i. The important tribe of Chota Nagpur, Bengal and Orissa. The Bhuiyas numbered more than 22,000 persons in the Central Provinces in 1911, being mainly found in the Sarguja and Jashpur States. In Bengal and Bihar the Bhuiyas proper count about half a million persons, while the Musahar and Khandait castes, both of whom are mainly derived from the Bhuiyas, total together well over a million. The name Bhuiya means ' Lord of the soil,' or * Belong- ing to the soil,' and is a Sanskrit derivative.
The tribe have completely forgotten their original name, and adopted this designation conferred on them by the immigrant Aryans. The term Bhuiya, however, is also employed by other tribes and by some Hindus as a title for landholders, being practically equivalent to zamindar. And hence a certain confusion arises, and classes or individuals may have the name of Bhuiya without belonging to the tribe at all.
" In most ^ This article is compiled partly from furnished by Mr. B. C. Mazumdar, Colonel Dalton's Ethnology of Bengal pleader, Sambalpur, and papers by and Sir H. Risley's Tribes and Castes of Mr. A. B. Napier, Deputy Commis- Bengal ; a monograph has also been sioner, Raipur, and Mr. Hira Lai. VOL. II 305 X
parts of Chota Nagpur," Sir H. Risley says, " there is a well- known distinction between a Bhuiya by Bhoyar tribe and a Bhuiya by title. The Bhuiyas of Bonai and Keonjhar described by Colonel Dalton belong to the former category ; the Bhuiya Mundas and Oraons to the latter. The distinction will be made somewhat clearer if it is explained that every ' tribal Bhuiya ' will as a matter of course describe himself as Bhuiya, while a member of another tribe will only do so if he is speaking with reference to a question of land, or desires for some special reason to lay stress on his status as a land- holder or agriculturist." We further find in Bengal and Benares a caste of land- holders known as Bhuinhar or Babhan, who are generally considered as a somewhat mixed and inferior group of Brahman and Rajput origin. Both Sir H. Risley and Mr. Crooke adopt this view and deny any connection between the Bhuinhars and the Bhuiya tribes.
Babhan appears to be a corrupt form of Brahman. Mr. Mazumdar, however, states that Bhuiya is never used in Bengali as an equivalent for zamlndar or landholder, and he considers that the Bhuinhars and also the Barah Bhuiyas, a well-known group of twelve landholders of Eastern Bengal and Assam, belonged to the Bhuiya tribe. He adduces from Sir E. Gait's History of Assa})i the fact that the Chutias and Bhuiyas were dominant in that country prior to its conquest by the Ahoms in the thirteenth century, and considers that these Chutias gave their name to Chutia or Chota Nagpur.
I am unable to express any opinion on Mr. Mazumdar's argument, and it is also unnecessary as the question does not concern the Central Provinces. Distribu- The principal home of the Bhuiya tribe proper is the south of the Chota Nagpur plateau, comprised in the Gang- pur, Bonai, Keonjhar and Bamra States. " The chiefs of these States," Colonel Dalton says, " now call themselves Rajputs ; if they be so, they are strangely isolated families of Rajputs. The country for the most part belongs to the Bhuiya sub-proprietors. They are a privileged class, holding as hereditaments the principal offices of the State, and are organised as a body of militia. The chiefs have no right to exercise any authority till they have received the tilak or tion of the tribe
token of invcstituic from their powerful Bhuiya vassals.
Their position altogether renders their claim to be con- sidered Rajputs extremely doublful, and the stcjries told to account for their acquisition of the dignity are palpable fables. They were no doubt all Bhuiyas originally ; they certainly do not look like Rajputs." Members of the tribe are the household servants of the Bamra Raja's family, and it is said that the first Raja of Bamra was a child of the Patna house, who was stolen from his home and anointed king of Bamra by the Bhuiyas and Khonds. Similarly Colonel Dalton records the legend that the Bhuiyas twenty- seven generations ago stole a child of the Moharbhanj Raja's famil)', brought it up amongst them and made it their Raja. He was freely admitted to intercourse with Bhuiya girls, and the children of this intimacy are the progenitors of the Rajkuli branch of the tribe. But they are not considered first among Bhuiyas because they are not of pure Bhuiya descent.
Again the Raja of Keonjhar is always installed by the Bhuiyas. These facts indicate that the Bhuiyas were once the rulers of Chota Nagpur and are recognised as the oldest inhabitants of the country. From this centre they have spread north through Lohardaga and Hazaribagh and into southern Bihar, where large numbers of Bhuiyas are encountered on whom the opprobrious designation of Musahar or 'rat-eater' has been conferred by their Hindu neighbours. Others of the tribe who travelled south from Chota Nagpur experienced more favourable conditions, and here the tendency has been for the Bhuiyas to rise rather than to decline in social status. " Some of their leading families," Sir H. Risley states, " have come to be chiefs of the petty States of Orissa, and have now sunk the Bhuiya in the Khandait or swordsman, a caste of admitted respectability in Orissa and likely in course of time to transform itself into some variety of Rajput." The ^varying status of the Bhuiyas in Bihar, Chota 3. Example Nagpur and Orissa is a good instance of the different ways ^q^Ij^qj^ of in which the primitive tribes have fared in contact with the the abori- immigrant Aryans. Where the country has been completely fi^ndu" colonised and populated by Hindus, as in Bihar, the aboriginal society, residents have commonly become transformed into village
drudges, relegated to the meanest occupations, and despised as impure by the Hindu cultivators, like the Chamars of northern India and the Mahars of the Maratha Districts. Where the Hindu immigration has only been partial and the forests have not been cleared, as in Chota Nagpur and the Central Provinces, they may keep their old villages and tribal organisation and be admitted as a body into the hierarchy of caste, ranking above the impure castes but below the Hindu cultivators.
This is the position of the Gonds, Baigas and other tribes in these tracts. While, if the Hindus come only as colonists and not as rulers, the indigenous residents may retain the overlordship of the soil and the landed proprietors among them may be formed into a caste ranking with the good cultivating castes of the Aryans. Instances of such are the Khandaits of Orissa, the Binjhwars of Chhattlsgarh and the Bhilalas of Nimar and Indore. 4. The The Bhuiyas have now entirely forgotten their own Bhuiyas a lancruage and speak Hindi, Uriya and Bengali, according as Kolanan fc> & r > ^ t-? 1 • 1 1 tribe. each is the dommant vernacular of their Hmdu neighbours. They cannot therefore on the evidence of language be classified as a Munda or Kolarian or as a Dravidian tribe. Colonel Dalton was inclined to consider them as Dravidian : ^ " Mr. Stirling in his account of Orissa classes them among the Kols ; but there are no grounds that I know of for so connecting them.
As I have said above, they appear to me to be linked with the Dravidian rather than with the Kolarian tribes." His account, however, does not appear to contain any further evidence in support of this view ; and, on the other hand, he identifies the Bhuiyas with the Savars or Saonrs. Speaking of the Bendkars or Savars of Keonjhar, he says : " It is difficult to regard them otherwise than as members of the great Bhuiya family, and thus connecting them we link the Bhuiyas and Savaras and give support to the conjecture that the former are Dravidian." But it is now shown in the Linguistic Survey that the Savars have a Munda dialect.
In Chota Nagpur this has been forgotten, and the tribe speak Hindi or Uriya like the Bhuiyas, but it remains in the hilly tracts of Ganjam and Vizagapatam.' Savara is closely related to Kharia and Juang, the dialects of two of the most primitive Munda tribes. The Savars must therefore be classed as a Munda or Kolarian tribe, and since Colonel Dalton identified the Bhuiyas with the Savars of Chota Nagpur, his evidence appears really to be in favour of the Kolarian origin of the Bhuiyas.
He notes further that the ceremony of naming children among the Bhuiyas is identical with that of the Mundas and Hos." Mr. Mazumdar writes : " Judging from the external appearance and general physical type one would be sure to mistake a Bhuiya for a Munda. Their habits and customs are essentially Mundari. The Bhuiyas who live in and around the District of Manbhum are not much ashamed to admit that they are Kol people ; and Bhumia Kol is the name that has been given them there by the Hindus.
The Mundas and Larka-Kols of Chota Nagpur tell us that they first established themselves there by driving out the Bhuiyas ; and it seems likely that the Bhuiyas formed the first batch of the Munda immigrants in Chota Nagpur and became greatly Hinduised there, and on that account were not recognised by the Mundas as people of their kin." If the tradition of the Mundas and Kols that they came to Chota Nagpur after the Bhuiyas be accepted, and tradition on the point of priority of immigration is often trustworthy, then it follows that the Bhuiyas must be a Munda tribe.
For the main distinction other than that of language between the Munda and Dravidian tribes is that the former were the earlier and the latter subsequent immigrants. The claim of the Bhuiyas to be the earliest residents of Chota Nagpur is supported by the fact that they officiate as priests in certain temples. Because in primitive religion the jurisdiction of the gods is entirely local, and foreigners bringing their own gods with them are ignorant of the character and qualities of the local deities, with which the indigenous residents are, on the other hand, well acquainted. Hence the tendency of later comers to employ these latter in the capacity of priests of the godlings of the earth, corn, forests and hills. Colonel Dalton writes : ^ 1 Linguistic Survey, vol. xiv. Mtnida and Dravidian Languages, p. 217. 2 Page 142. 3 Ibidem, p. 141.
" It is strange that these Hinduised Bhuiyas retain in their own hands the priestly duties of certain old shrines to the exclusion of Brahmans.
This custom has no doubt descended in Bhuiya families from the time when Brahmans were not, or had obtained no footing amongst them, and when the religion of the land and the temples were not Hindu ; they are now indeed dedicated to Hindu deities, but there are evidences of the temples having been originally occupied by other images. At some of these shrines human sacrifices were offered every third year and this continued till the country came under British rule." And again of the Pauri Bhuiyas of Keonjhar :
" The Pauris dispute with the Juangs the claim to be the first settlers in Keonjhar, and boldly aver that the country belongs to them. They assert that the Raja is of their creation and that the prero- gative of installing every new Raja on his accession is theirs, and theirs alone. The Hindu population of Keonjhar is in excess of the Bhuiya and it comprises Gonds and Kols, but the claim of the Pauris to the dominion they arrogate is admitted by all ; even Brahmans and Rajputs respectfully acknowledge it, and the former by the addition of Brah- manical rites to the wild ceremonies of the Bhuiyas affirm and sanctify their installation." In view of this evidence it seems a probable hypothesis that the Bhuiyas are the earliest residents of these parts of Chota Nagpur and that they are a Kolarian tribe.
There appears to be considerable reason for supposing
that the Baiga tribe of the Central Provinces are really a branch of the Bhuiyas. Though the Baigas are now mainly returned from Mandla and Balaghat, it seems likely
that these Districts were not their original home, and that
they emigrated from Chhattlsgarh into the Satpura hills on the western borders of the plain. The hill country of Mandla and the Maikal range of Balaghat form one of the
wildest and most inhospitable tracts in the Province, and it is unlikely that the Baigas would have made their first
settlements here and spread thence into the fertile plain of
Chhattlsgarh.
Migration in the opposite direction would be more natural and probable. But it is fairly certain that the Baiga tribe were among the earliest if not the earliest
residents of the ChhattTsii^arh plain and the hills north and east of it. The IMiaina, Bhunjia and Binjhwar tribes who still reside in this country can all be recognised as offshoots of the Raigas. In the article on Bhaina it is shown that some of the oldest forts in Bilaspur are attributed to the Bhainas and a chief of this tribe is remembered as having ruled in Bilaigarh south of the Mahfinadi, They arc said to have been dominant in Pendra where they arc still most numerous, and to have been expelled from Phuljhar in Raipur by the Gonds.
The Binjhwars or Binjhals again are an aristocratic subdivision of the Baigas, belonging to the hills east of Chhattlsgarh and the Uriya plain country of Sambalpur beyond them.
The zamlndfirs of Bodasamar, Rampur, Bhatgaon and other estates to the south and east of the Chhattlsgarh plain are members of this tribe. Both the Bhainas and Binjhwars are frequently employed as priests of the village deities all over this area, and may therefore be considered as older residents than the Gond and Kawar tribes and the Hindus. Sir G. Grierson also states that the language of the Baigas of Mandla and Balaghat is a form of Chhattisgarhi, and this is fairly con- clusive evidence of their first having belonged to Chhat- tlsgarh.
It seems not unlikely that the Baigas retreated into the hills round Chhattlsgarh after the Hindu invasion and establishment of the Haihaya Rajput dynasty of Ratan- pur, which is now assigned to the ninth century of the Christian era
just as the Gonds retired from the Nerbudda valley and the Nagpur plain before the Hindus several centuries later. Sir H. Risley states that the Binjhias or Binjhwars of Chota Nagpur say that their ancestors came from Ratanpur twenty generations ago." But the Chhattlsgarh plain and the hills north and east 6. The of it are adjacent to and belong to the same tract of country branch ^ as the Chota Nagpur States, which are the home of the of the Bhuiyas, Sir H. Risley gives Baiga as a name for a "'^^^' sorcerer, and as a synonym or title of the Khairwar tribe in Chota Nagpur, possibly having reference to the idea that 1 In the article on Binjhwar, it was But the evidence adduced ahove appears supposed that the Baigas migrated east to show that this view is incorrect, from the Satpura hills into Chhattlsgarh. '-' Tribes and Castes, zx\.. Binjhia.
they, being among the original inhabitants of the country, are best qualified to play the part of sorcerer and propitiate the local gods. It has been suggested in the article on Khairvvar that that tribe are a mongrel offshoot of the Santals and Cheros, but the point to be noticed here is the use of the term Baiga in Chota Nagpur for a sorcerer ; and a sorcerer may be taken as practically equivalent for a priest of the indigenous deities, all tribes who act in this capacity being considered as sorcerers by the Hindus. If the Bhuiyas of Chota Nagpur had the title of Baiga, it is possible that it may have been substituted for the proper tribal name on their migration to the Central Provinces. Mr. Crooke distinguishes two tribes in Mirzapur whom he calls the Bhuiyas and Bhuiyars.
The Bhuiyas of Mirzapur seem to be clearly a branch of the Bhuiya tribe of Chota Nagpur, with whom their section -names establish their identity.^ Mr. Crooke states that the Bhuiyas are dis- tinguished with very great difficulty from the Bhuiyars with whom they are doubtless very closely connected.^ Of the Bhuiyars ^ he writes that the tribe is also known as Baiga, because large numbers of the aboriginal local priests are derived from this caste.
He also states that " Most Bhuiyars are Baigas and officiate in their own as well as allied tribes ; in fact, as already stated, one general name for the tribe is Baiga." ^ It seems not unlikely that these Bhuiyars are the Baigas of the Central Provinces and that they went to Mirzapur from here with the Gonds. Their original name may have been preserved or revived there, while it has dropped out of use in this Province. The name Baiga in the Central Provinces is sometimes applied to members of other tribes who serve as village priests, and, as has already been seen, it is used in the same sense in Chota Nagpur. The Baigas of Mandla are also known as Bhumia, which is only a variant of Bhuiya, having the same meaning of lord of the soil or belonging to the soil. Both Bhuiya and Bhumia are in fact nearly equivalent to our word ' aboriginal,' and both are names given to the tribe by the ^ Crooke, l^ribes and Castes, art. ' Ibidem, ail. Bhuiyar, para. i. Bhuiya, para. 4. - Ibidem, para. 3. < Ibid£in, para. 16.
Hindus and not originally tiiat by which its members called themselves. It would be quite natural that a branch of the Bhuiyas, who settled in the Central Provinces and were commonly employed as village priests by the Hindus and Gonds should have adopted the name of the office, Baiga, as their tribal designation
just as the title of Munda or village headman has become the name of one branch of the Kol tribe, and Bhumij, another term equivalent to Bhuiya, of a second branch. Mr. A. F. Hewitt, Settlement Officer of Raipur, considered that the Buniyas of that District were the same tribe as the Bhuiyas of the Garhjiit States.^ By Buniya he must apparently have meant the Bhunjia tribe of Raipur, who as already stated are an offshoot of the Baigas. Colonel Dalton describes the dances of the Bhuiyas of Chota Nagpur as follows : ^ " The men have each a wide kind of tambourine. They march round in a circle, beating these and singing a ver}^ simple melody in a minor key on four notes. The women dance opposite to them with their heads covered and bodies much inclined, touching each other like soldiers in line, but not holding hands or wreathing arms like the Kols." This account applies very closely to the Sela and Rina dances of the Baigas. The Sela dance is danced by men only w^io similarly march round in a circle, though they do not carry tambourines in the Central Provinces. Here, however, they sometimes carry sticks and march round in opposite directions, passing in and out and hitting their sticks against each other as they meet, the movement being exactly like the grand chain in the Lancers.
Similarly the Baiga women dance the Rina dance by themselves, standing close to each other and bending forward, but not holding each other by the hands and arms, just as described by Colonel Dalton. The Gonds now also have the Sela and Rina dances, but admit that they are derived from the Baigas. Another point of some importance is that the Bhuiyas of Chota Nagpur and the Baigas and the tribes derived from them in the Central Provinces have all com- pletely abandoned their own language and speak a broken form of that of their Hindu neighbours. As has been seen, too, the Bhuiyas are commonly employed as priests in Chota
7. Tribal
sub-
di\isions.
Xagpur, and there seems therefore to be a strong case for the original identity of the two tribes.^ Both the Baigas and Bhuiyas, however, have now become greatly mixed with the surrounding tribes, the Baigas of Mandla and Balaghat having a strong Gond element. In Singhbhum the Bhuiyas call themselves Pdivan-bans or ' The Children of the Wind,' and in connection with Hanuman's title of Pdivan-ka-pTit or ' The Son of the Wind,' are held to be the veritable apes of the Ramayana who, under the leadership of Hanuman, the monkey-god, assisted the Aryan hero Rama on his expedition to Ceylon.
This may be compared with the name given to the Gonds of the Central Provinces of Rawanbansi, or descendants of Rawan, the idea being that their ancestors were the subjects of Rawan, the demon king of Ceylon, who was conquered by Rama. " All Bhuiyas," Sir H. Risley states, " affect great reverence for the memory of Rikhmun or Rikhiasan, whom they regard, some as a patron deity, others as a mythical ancestor, whose name distinguishes one of the divisions of the tribe. It seems probable that in the earliest stage of belief Rikhmun v\-as the bear-totem of a sept of the tribe, that later on he was transformed into an ancestral hero, and finally promoted to the rank of a tribal god." The Rikhiasan Mahatwar subtribe of the Bhuiyas in the Central Provinces are named after this hero Rikhmun ; the designation of Mahatwar signifies that they are the Mahtos or leaders of the Bhuiyas. The Khandaits or Paiks are another subcaste formed from those who became soldiers ; in Orissa they are now, as already stated, a separate caste of fairly high rank. The Parja or ' subject people ' are the ordinary Bhuiyas, probably those living in Hindu tracts. The Dhur or ' dust
Gonds, and the Parja Gonds of Bastar may be noted as a parallel in nomenclature.
The Rautadi are a territorial group, taking their name from a place called Raotal. The Khandaits practise hypergamy with the Rautadi, taking daughters from them, but not giving their daughters to them. The Pabudia or Madhai are the hill Bhuiyas, and are the 1 The question of the relation of the Baiga tribe to Mr. Crooke's Bhuiyars was first raised by Mr. E. A. H. Blunt, Census Superintendent, United Promost wild and backward portion of the tribe. Dalton writes of them in Keonjhar : " They arc not bound to fi;4ht for the Raja, though they occasionally take up arms against him. Their duty is to attend on him and carry his loads when he travels about, and so long as they are satisfied with his person and his rule, no more willing or devoted subjects could be found. They arc then in Keonjhar, as in Bonai, a race whom you cannot help liking and taking an interest in from the primitive simplicity of their customs, their amena- bility and their anxiety to oblige ; but unsophisticated as they are they wield an extraordinary power in Keonjhar, and when they take it into their heads to use that power, the country may be said to be governed by an oligarchy composed of the sixty chiefs of the Pawri Desh, the Bhuiya Highlands.
A knotted string passed from village to village in the name of the sixty chiefs throws the entire country into commotion, and the order verbally communicated in connec- tion with it is as implicitly obeyed as if it emanated from the most potent despot." This knotted string is known as GnntJii. The Pabudias say that their ancestors were twelve brothers belonging to Keonjhar, of whom eight went to an unknown country, while the remaining four divided among themselves all the territory of which they had knowledge, this being comprised in the four existing states of Keonjhar, Bamra, Palahara and Bonai. Any Pabudia who takes up his residence permanently beyond the boundaries of these four states is considered to lose his caste, like Hindus in former times who went to dwell in the foreign country beyond the Indus.^ But if the wandering Pabudia returns in two years, and proves that he has not drunk water from any other caste, he is taken back into the fold. Other subdivisions are the Kati or Khatti and the Bathudia, these last being an inferior group who are said to be looked down on because they have taken food from other low castes. No doubt they are really the offspring of irregular unions. In Raigarh the Bhuiyas appear to have no exogamous s. Exo- divisions. When they wish to arrange a marriage they ^^^^ compare the family gods of the parties, and if these are not identical and there is no recollection of a common ancestor 1 Mr. Mazunidar's monograph.
for three generations, the union is permitted. In Sambalpur, however, Mr. Mazumdar states, all Bhuiyas are divided into the following twelve septs : Thakur, or the clan of royal blood ; Saont, from sdmanta, a viceroy ; Padhan, a village headman ; Naik, a military leader ; Kalo, a wizard or priest
Dehri, also a priest ; Chatria, one who carried the royal umbrella ; Sahu, a moneylender ; Majhi, a headman ; Behra, manager of the household ; Amata, counsellor ; and Dand- sena, a police official. The Dehrin sept still worship the village gods on behalf of the tribe.
Marriage is adult, but the more civilised Bhuiyas are gradually adopting Hindu usages, and parents arrange
matches for their children while they are still young. Among the Pabudias some primitive customs survive. They have the same system as the Oraons, by which all the
bachelors of the village sleep in one large dormitory ; this is known as Dhangarbasa, dhdngar meaning a farmservant or young man, or Mandarghar, the house of the drums, because these instruments are kept in it. " Some villages," Colonel Dalton states, " have a Dhangaria basa, or house for maidens,
which, strange to say, they are allowed to occupy without any one to look after them.
They appear to have very great liberty, and slips of morality, so long as they are confined to the tribe, are not much heeded." This intimacy between boys and girls of the same village does not, however, commonly end in marriage, for which a partner should be sought from another village. For this purpose the girls go in a body, taking with them some ground rice decorated with flowers. They lay this before the elders of the village they have entered, saying, ' Keep this or throw it into the water, as you prefer.' The old men pick up the flowers, placing them behind their ears. In the evening all the boys of the village come and dance with the girls, with intervals for courtship, half the total number of couples dancing and sitting out alternately. This goes on all night, and in the morning any couples who have come to an understanding run away together for a day or two. The boy's father niust present a rupee and a piece of cloth to the girl's mother, and the marriage is considered to be completed. Among the Pabudia or Madhai Bhuiyas the bride-price
consists of two bullocks or cows, one of which is given to the girl's father and the other to her brother. The boy's father makes the proposal for marriage, and the consent of the girl is necessary. At the wedding turmeric and rice are offered to the sun ; some rice is then placed on the girl's head and turmeric rubbed on her body, and a brass ring is placed on her finger.
The bridegroom's father says to him, " This girl is ours now : if in future she becomes one-eyed, lame or deaf, she will still be ours." The ceremony concludes with the usual feast and drinking bout. If the boy's father cannot afford the bride-price the couple sometimes run away from home for two or three days, when^ their parents go in search of them and they are brought back and married in the boy's house. A widow is often taken by the younger brother of the 10. Widow- deceased husband, though no compulsion is exerted over ^rid"^^^ her. But the match is common because the Bhuiyas have divorce, the survival of fraternal polyandry, which consists in allow- ing unmarried younger brothers to have access to an elder brother's wife during his lifetime.^ Divorce is allowed for misconduct on the part of the wife or mutual disagreement.
The Bhuiyas commonly take as their principal deity the n. Reii- spirit of the nearest mountain overlooking their village, and S'°"' make offerings to it of butter, rice and fowls. In April they present the first-fruits of the mango harvest. They venerate the sun as Dharam Deota, but no offerings are made to him. Nearly all Bhuiyas worship the cobra, and some of them call it their mother and think they are descended from it. They will not touch or kill a cobra, and do not swear by it. In Rairakhol they venerate a goddess, Rambha Devi, who may be a corn-goddess, as the practice of burning down successive patches of jungle and sowing seed on each for two or three years is here known as rambha. They think that the sun and moon are sentient beings, and that fire and lightning are the children of the sun, and the stars the children of the moon. One day the moon invited the sun to dinner and gave him very nice food, so that the sun asked what it was. The moon said she had cooked her own children, and on this the sun went home and cooked all ^ From Mr. Mazumdar's monograph.
his children and ate them, and this is the reason why there are no stars during the day. But his eldest son, fire, went and hid in a rengal tree, and his daughter, the lightning, darted hither and thither so that the sun could not catch her. And when night came again, and the stars came out, the sun saw how the moon had deceived him and cursed her, saying that she should die for fifteen days in every month. And this is the reason for the waxing and waning of the moon. Ever since this event fire has remained hidden in a rengal tree, and when the Bhuiyas want him they rub two pieces of its wood together and he comes out.
This is the Bhuiya explanation of the production of fire from the friction of wood. In the month of Kartik (October), or the next month, they bring from the forest a branch of the karin tree and venerate it and perform the karma dance in front of it.
They think that this worship and dance will cause the karma tree, the mango, the jack-fruit and the mahua to bear a full crop of fruit. Monday, Wednesday and Friday are considered the proper days for worshipping the deities, and children are often named on a Friday. The dead are either buried or burnt, the corpse being placed always with the feet pointing to its native village. On the tenth day the soul of the dead person is called back to the house. But if a man is killed by a tiger or by falling from a tree no mourning is observed for him, and his soul is not brought back. To perish from snake-bite is considered a natural death, and in such cases the usual obsequies are awarded. This is probably because they revere the cobra as their first mother.
The Pabudia Bhuiyas throw four to eight annas' worth of copper on to the pyre or into the grave, and if the deceased had a cow some ghi or melted butter. No division of property can take place during the lifetime of either parent, but when both have died the children divide the inheritance, the eldest son taking two shares and the others one equal share each. 14. Physi- Colonel Dalton describes the Bhuiyas as, " A dark- cai appear- bfown, well -proportioned race, with black, straight hair, ance and > 1 x o occupation, plentiful on the head, but scant on the face, of middle height, figures well knit and capable of enduring great fatigue, but
li^ht-fnimcd likt> the lUiulu rather tliaii i)re.seiitiiii^ the usual muscuhir development of the hillman." Their dress is scanty, and in the Tributary States Dalton says that the men and women all wear dresses of brown cotton cloth.
This may be because white is a very conspicuous colour in the forests. They wear ornaments and beads, and are dis- tinctive in that neither men nor women practise tattooini^, though in some localities this rule is not observed by the women. To keep themselves warm at night they kindle two fires and sleep between them, and this custom has given rise to the saying, ' Wherever you see a Bhuiya he always has a fire.' In Bamra the Bhuiyas still practise shifting cultivation, for which they burn the forest growth from the hillsides and sow oilseeds in the fresh soil. This method of agriculture is called locally Khasrathumi. They obtain their lands free from the Raja in return for acting as luggage porters and coolies. In Bamra they will not serve as farm- servants or labourers for hire, but elsewhere they are more docile.
A woman divorced for adultery is not again admitted '^S- Social TT 11 1 • -11 customs. to caste mtercourse. Her parents take her to their village, where she has to live in a separate hut and earn her own livelihood. If any Bhuiya steals from a Kol, Ganda or Ghasia he is permanently put out of caste, while for killing a cow the period of expulsion is twelve years. The emblem of the Bhuiyas is a sword, in reference to their employment as soldiers, and this they affix to documents in place of their signature.
Bhuiya
(From People of India/ National Series Volume VIII. Readers who wish to share additional information/ photographs may please send them as messages to the Facebook community, Indpaedia.com. All information used will be gratefully acknowledged in your name.)
Synonyms: Manjhi, Rikhiasan [Bihar and/or Jharkhand] Groups/subgroups: Baro Bhuiya, Bhogta, Chota Bhuiya, Dharwar, Dorha Bhuiya, Ghacwar, Mahatwar, Oriya Bhuiya (Nayak Bhuiya), Soutar, Tirwar [Bihar and/or Jharkhand] Gatwal, Katras, Musahar, Roy, Thakur [West Bengal]
- Subcastes: Bathudia, Dhur, Kati or Khatti, Khandaits or Paiks, Madhai, Pabudia, Parja, Rautadi, Rikhmun or
Rikhiasan [Russell & Hiralal] Titles: Deshmandal, Ghatowal, Paramanik, Pradhan [Bihar and/or Jharkhand] Bhogta, Chharidar, Kopat, Mahton, Manjhi, Naik, Rai Singh, Thakur, Tikayat [H.H. Risley] Surnames: Bhuiya, Manjhi, Nayek, Roy, Sing [Bihar and/or Jharkhand] Bhuiya, Ghatwal, Roy, Singh, Thakur [West Bengal]
- Exogamous septs: Amata, Behra, Chatria, Dandsena, Dehrin, Dehri, Kalo, Majhi, Naik, Padhan, Sahu, Saont
[Russell & Hiralal] Nag(snake), Sankh (conch shell), Surya (Sun) [West Bengal] Bhuinhar or Bhuiyar, Dandwar, Magahiya, Mahatwar, Mahthek, Musahar, Tirvah [W. Crooke] Gotra: Kashyap, Nageswar (snake), Sandilya [West Bengal] Exogamous units/lineages (gotta): Basuki (a serpent), Kachhim (tortoise), Kali (a serpent), Lalakiri, Sal (a fish), Sigari (fox), Sinjikiri [Bihar and/or Jharkhand]
