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[edit] Halwah Das

This is an offshoot from the Kaibartta tribe, and is probably identical with the Chasa Kaibartta and Parasara Das, although the latter protest against this presumption. Very numerous along both banks of the Meghna in the Tipperah and Baqirganj districts, they are rare west of the Lakhya.

The Halwah Das are chiefly cultivators, weavers of Jamdani muslins, goldsmiths, and stonecutters, while the educated members are clerks and accountants.

The Brahman of the Halwah Das and of the cultivating Kaibarttas is the same person; but the priest of the fisher Kaibarttas is distinct. The Sudra servants everywhere work for them. They have three gotras, Aliman, Kasyapa, and Madhy Kuliya; and the common patronymics are Das, Chaudhari, Biswas, and Hazra.

Kali is chiefly worshipped, but the educated also observe the annual holiday sacred to Sarasvati, and the cultivators, relinquishing the Ganga Pujah, have adopted the Vastu Pujah and the Ambuvachi vacation.

The Halwah Das drink from the water vessels of the clean Sudra Brahman, but not from those of Patit Brahmans. Widows never remarry, but the aboriginal crime of eating flesh and drinking spirits is ineradicable.

Among the Halwah Das there are the same social ranks as with the Parasara Das, the rich endeavouring to assume a higher position, and refusing to give their daughters in marriage to the lower grades.

[edit] Notes