The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India
Chapter 180 : Dangi 1. Origin and traditions._Dangi._--A cultivating caste found almost exclusively

Dangi

1. Origin and traditions.

_Dangi._--A cultivating caste found almost exclusively in the Saugor District, which contained 23,000 persons out of a total of 24,000 of the caste in the Central Provinces in 1911. There are also considerable numbers of them in Rajputana and Central India, from which localities they probably immigrated into the Saugor District during the eleventh century. The Dangis were formerly dominant in Saugor, a part of which was called Dangiwara after them. The kings of Garhpahra or old Saugor were Dangis, and their family still remains at the village of Bilehra, which with a few other villages they hold as a revenue-free grant. The name of the caste is variously derived. The traditional story is that the Rajput king of Garhpahra detained the palanquins of twenty-two married women of different castes and kept them as his wives. The issue of the illicit intercourse were named Dangis, and there are thus twenty-two subdivisions of the caste, besides three other subdivisions who are held to be descended from pure Rajputs. The name is said to be derived from _dang_, fraud, on account of the above deception. A more plausible derivation is from the Persian _dang_, a hill, the Dangis being thus hillmen; and they may not improbably have been a set of robbers and freebooters in the Vindhyan Hills, like the Gujars and Mewatis in northern India, naturally recruiting their band from all cla.s.ses of the population, as is shown by ingenious implication in this story itself. '_Khet men bami, gaon men Dangi_,' or 'A Dangi in the village is like the hole of a snake in one's field' is a proverb which shows the estimation in which they were formerly held. The three higher septs may have been their leaders and may well have been Rajputs. Since they have settled down as respectable cultivators and enjoy a good repute among their neighbours, the Dangis have disowned the above story, and now say that they are descended from Raja Dang, a Kachhwaha Rajput king of Narwar in Central India. Nothing is known of Raja Dang except a rude couplet which records how he was cheated by a horse-dealer:

Jitki ghori t.i.t gayi Dang hath karyari rahi,

'The mare bolted to the seller again, leaving in Dang's hand nothing except the reins.'

The Dangis have a more heroic version of this story to the effect that the mare was a fairy of Indra's court, who for some reason had been transformed into this shape and was captured by Raja Dang. He refused to give her up to Indra and a battle was about to ensue, when the mare besought them to place her on a pyre and sacrifice her instead of fighting. They agreed to do this, and out of the flames of the pyre the fairy emerged and floated up to heaven, leaving only the reins and bridle of the mare in Raja Dang's hand. Yet a third story is that their original ancestor was Raja Nipal Singh of Narwar, and when he was fighting with Indra over the fairy, Krishna came to Indra's a.s.sistance. But Nipal Singh refused to bow down to Krishna, and being annoyed at this and wis.h.i.+ng to teach him a lesson the G.o.d summoned him to his court. At the gate through which Nipal Singh had to pa.s.s, Krishna fixed a sword at the height of a man's neck, so that he must bend or have his head cut off. But Nipal Singh saw the trick, and, sitting down, propelled himself through the doorway with his head erect. The outwitted G.o.d remarked, '_Tum bare dandi ho_,' or 'You are very cunning,' and the name Dandi stuck to Nipal Singh and was afterwards corrupted to Dangi. There can be little doubt that the caste are an offshoot of Rajputs of impure blood, and with a large admixture of other cla.s.ses of the population. Some of their sept names indicate their mixed descent, as Rakhya, born of a potter woman, Dhoniya, born of a washerwoman, and Pavniya, born of a weaver woman. In past times the Dangis served in the Rajput and Maratha armies, and a small isolated colony of them is found in one village of Indora in the Nagpur District, the descendants of Dangis who engaged in military service under the Bhonsla kings.

2. Caste subdivisions.

The Dangis have no subcastes distinguished by separate names, but they are divided into three cla.s.ses, among whom the principle of hypergamy prevails. As already seen, there were formerly twenty-five clans, of whom the three highest, the Nahonias, Bhadonias and Nadias, claimed to be pure Rajputs. The other twenty-two clans are known as Baisa (22) or Prithwipat Dangis, after the king who is supposed to have been the ancestor of all the clans. Each of his twenty-two wives is said to have been given a village for her maintenance, and the clans are named after these villages. But there are now only thirteen of these local clans left, and below them is a miscellaneous group of clans, representing apparently later accretions to the caste. Some of them are named from the places from which they came, as Mahobia, from Mahoba, Narwaria, from Narwar, and so on. The Solakhia sept is named after the Solanki Rajputs, of whom they may be the partly illegitimate descendants. The Parnami sept are apparently those who have the creed of the Dhamis, the followers of Prannath of Panna. And as already seen, some are named from women of low caste, from whom by Dangi fathers they are supposed to be descended. The whole number of septs is thus divided into three groups, the highest containing the three quasi-Rajput septs already mentioned, the next highest the thirteen septs of Prithwipat Dangis, and the lowest all the other septs. Pure Rajputs will take daughters in marriage from the highest group, and this in turn takes girls of the Prithwipat Dangis of the thirteen clans, though neither will give daughters in return; and the Prithwipat Dangis will similarly accept the daughters of the miscellaneous septs below them in marriage with their sons. Matches are, however, not generally arranged according to the above system of hypergamy, but each group marries among its own members. Girls who are married into a higher group have to be given a larger dowry, the fathers often being willing to pay Rs. 500 or Rs. 1000 for the social distinction which such an alliance confers on the family. Among the highest septs there is a further difference between those whose ancestors accepted food from Raja Jai Singh, the founder of Jaisinghnagar, and those who refused it. The former are called Sakrodia or those who ate the leavings of others, and the latter _Deotaon ki sansar_, or the divine Dangis. Pure Rajputs will take daughters only from the members of the latter group in each sept. Marriage within the sept or _baink_ is prohibited, and as a rule a man does not marry a wife belonging to the same sept as his mother or grandmother. Marriage by exchange also is not allowed, that is, a girl cannot be married into the same family as that in which her brother has married.

3. Marriage.

Girls are generally married between seven and twelve and boys between ten and twenty, but no stigma attaches to a family allowing an unmarried girl to exceed the age of p.u.b.erty. The bridegroom should always be older than the bride. Matches are arranged by the parents, the horoscopes of the children being compared among the well-to-do. The zodiacal sign of the boy's horoscope should be stronger than that of the girl's, so that she may be submissive to him in after-life. Thus a girl whose zodiac sign is the lion should not be married to a boy whose sign is the ram, because in that case the wife would dominate the husband. There is no special rule as to the time of the betrothal, and the ceremony is very simple, consisting in the presentation of a cocoanut by the bride's father to the bridegroom's father, and the distribution of sweets to the caste-fellows. The betrothal is not considered to have any particularly binding force and either party may break through it. Among the Dangis a bridegroom-price is usually paid, which varies according to the social respectability of the boy's sept, as much as Rs. 2000 having been given for a bridegroom of higher cla.s.s according to the rule of hypergamy already described. But no value is placed on educational qualifications, as is the case among Brahmans and Kayasths. The marriage ceremony is conducted according to the ritual prevalent in the northern Districts, and presents no special features. Two feasts are given by the bride's father to the caste-fellows, one consisting of _katchi_ food or that which is cooked with water, and another of _pakki_ food cooked with _ghi_ (b.u.t.ter). If the bride is of marriageable age the _gauna_ or sending away ceremony is performed at once, otherwise it takes place in the third or fifth year after marriage. At the _gauna_ ceremony the bride's cloth is tied to that of the bridegroom, and they change seats. Widow-marriage is not fas.h.i.+onable, and the caste say that it is not permitted, but several instances are known of its having occurred. Divorce is not allowed, and a woman who goes wrong is finally expelled from the caste. Polygamy is allowed, and many well-to-do persons have more than one wife.

4. Religious and social customs.

The Dangis pay special reverence to the G.o.ddess Durga or Devi as the presiding deity of war. They wors.h.i.+p her during the months of Kunwar (September) and Chait (March), and at the same time pay reverence to their weapons of war, their swords and guns, or if they have not got these, to knives and spears. They burn their dead, but children are usually buried. They observe mourning for three days for a child and for ten days for an adult, and on the 13th day the caste-fellows are feasted. Their family priests, who are Jijhotia Brahmans, used formerly to shave the head and beard when a death occurred among their clients as if they belonged to the family, but this practice was considered derogatory by other Brahmans, and they have now stopped it. The Dangis perform the _shradhh_ ceremony in the month of Kunwar. The caste wear the sacred thread, but it is said that they were formerly not allowed to do so in Bundelkhand. They eat fish and flesh, including that of wild boars, but not fowls or beef, and they do not drink liquor. They take _pakki_ food or that cooked without water from Kayasths and Gahoi Banias, and _katchi_ food, cooked with water, from Jijhotia and Sanadhya Brahmans. Jijhotia Brahmans formerly took _pakki_ food from Dangis, but have now ceased to do so. The Dangis require the services of Brahmans at all ceremonies. They have a caste _panchayat_ or committee. A person who changes his religion or eats with a low caste is permanently expelled, while temporary exclusion is awarded for the usual delinquencies. In the case of the more serious offences, as murder or killing of a cow, the culprit must purify himself by a pilgrimage to a sacred river.

5. Occupation and character.

The Dangis were formerly, as already stated, of a quarrelsome temperament, but they have now settled down and, though spirited, are of a good disposition, and hard-working cultivators. They rank slightly above the representative cultivating castes owing to their former dominant position, and are still considered to have a good conceit of themselves, according to the saying:

Tin men neh terah men, Mirdang bajawe dere men,

or 'Though he belong neither to the three septs nor the thirteen septs, yet the Dangi blows his own trumpet in his own house.' They are still, too, of a fiery disposition, and it is said that the favourite dish of gram-flour cooked with curds, which is known as _karhi_, is never served at their weddings. Because the word _karhi_ also signifies the coming out of a sword from its sheath, and when addressed to another man has the equivalent of the English word 'Draw' in the duelling days. So if one Dangi said it to another, meaning to ask him for the dish, it might result in a fight. They are very backward in respect of education and set no store by it. They consider their traditional occupation to be military service, but nearly all of them are now engaged in agriculture. At the census of 1901 over 2000 were returned as supported by the owners.h.i.+p of land and 3000 as labourers and farmservants. Practically all the remainder are tenants. They are industrious, and their women work in the fields. The only crops which they object to grow are _kusum_ or safflower and san-hemp. The Nahonia Dangis, being the highest subcaste, refuse to sell milk or _ghi_. The men usually have Singh as a termination to their names, like Rajputs. Their dress and ornaments are of the type common in the northern Districts. The women tattoo their bodies.

Dangri

_Dangri._ [508]--A small caste of melon and vegetable growers, whose name is derived from _dangar_ or _dangra_, a water-melon. They reside in the Wardha and Bhandara Districts, and numbered about 1800 persons in 1911. The caste is a mixed one of functional origin, and appears to be an offshoot from the Kunbis with additions from other sources. In Wardha they say that their ancestor was one of two brothers to whom Mahadeo gave the seeds of a juari plant and a water-melon respectively for sowing. The former became the ancestor of the Kunbis and the latter of the Dangris. On one occasion when Mahadeo, a.s.suming the guise of a beggar, asked the Dangri brother for a water-melon, he refused to give it, and on this account his descendants were condemned to perpetual poverty. In fact, the Dangris, like the other market-gardening castes, are badly off, possibly on account of their common habit of marrying a number of wives, whom they utilise as labourers in their vegetable gardens; for though a wife is better than a hired labourer for their particular method of cultivation, where supervision is difficult and the master may be put to serious loss from bad work and petty pilfering, while there is also much scope for women workers; yet on the other hand polygamy tends to the breeding of family quarrels and to excessive subdivision of property. The close personal supervision which is requisite perhaps also renders it especially difficult to carry on the business of market-gardening on a large scale. In any case the agricultural holdings of the Malis and Dangris are as a rule very small. The conclusion indicated by the above story that the Dangris are an offshoot from the Kunbi caste of cultivators appears to be correct; and it is supported by the fact that they will accept food cooked with water from the Baone Kunbis. But their subcastes show that even this small body is of very heterogeneous composition; for they are divided into the Teli, the Kalar, the Kunbi and the Gadiwan Dangris, thus showing that the caste has received recruits from the Telis or oilmen and the Kalars or liquor-sellers. The Gadiwan, as their name denotes, are a separate section who have adopted the comparatively novel occupation of cart-driving for a livelihood. In Wardha there is also a small cla.s.s of Panibhar or waterman Dangris who are employed as water-bearers, this occupation arising not unnaturally from that of growing melons and other crops in river-beds. And a few members of the caste have taken to working in iron. The bulk of the Dangris, however, grow melons, chillies and brinjals on the banks or in the beds of rivers; but as the melon crop is raised in a period of six weeks during the hot season, they can also undertake some ordinary cultivation. When the melons ripen the first fruits are offered to Mahadeo and given to a Brahman to ensure the success of the crop. When the melon plants are in flower, a woman must not enter the field during the period of her monthly impurity, as it is believed that she would cause the crop to wither. While it may safely be a.s.sumed that the Dangris originated from the great Kunbi caste, it may be noted that some of them tell a story to the effect that their original home was Benares, and that they came from there into the Central Provinces; hence they call themselves Kas.h.i.+ Dangri, Kas.h.i.+ being the cla.s.sical name for Benares. This legend appears to be entirely without foundation, as their family names, speech and customs are alike of purely Marathi origin. But it is found among other castes also that they like to pretend that they came from Benares, the most sacred centre of Hinduism. The social customs of the Dangris resemble those of the Kunbis, and it is unnecessary to describe them in detail. Before their weddings they have a curious ceremony known as Dewat Puja. The father of the bridegroom, with an axe over his shoulder and accompanied by his wife, goes to a well or a stream. Here they clean a small s.p.a.ce with cow-dung and make an offering of rice, flowers, turmeric and incense, after which the man, breaking his bangle from off his wrist, throws it into the water, apparently as a propitiatory offering for the success of the marriage. It is not stated what the bangle is made of, but it may be a.s.sumed that a valuable one would not thus be thrown away. As among some of the other Maratha castes, the bridegroom must be wrapped in a blanket on his journey to the bride's village. If a bachelor desires to espouse a widow he must first go through the ceremony of marriage with a swallow-wort plant. Polygamy is freely permitted, and some Dangris are known to have as many as five wives. As already stated, wives are of great a.s.sistance in gardening work, which demands much hand-labour. Divorce and the remarriage of widows are allowed. The Dangris commonly bury the dead, and they place cotton leaves over the eyes and ears of the corpse. In Bhandara they say that this is done when it is believed the dead person was possessed by an evil spirit, and there is possibly some idea of preventing the escape of the spirit from the body. In Wardha the Dangris have rather a bad reputation, and a saying current about them is '_Dangri beta puha chor_,' or 'A Dangri will steal even a shred of cotton'; but this may be a libel.

Darzi

List of Paragraphs

1. _General notice._ 2. _Subdivisions._ 3. _Sewn clothes not formerly worn._ 4. _Occupation._ 5. _Religion._

1. General notice.

_Darzi, s.h.i.+mpi, Chhipi, Suji._--The occupational caste of tailors. In 1911 a total of 51,000 persons were returned as belonging to the caste in the Central Provinces and Berar. The Darzis are an urban caste and are most numerous in Districts with large towns. Mr. Crooke derives the word Darzi from the Persian _darz_, meaning a seam. The name Suji from _sui_, a needle, was formerly more common. s.h.i.+mpi is the Maratha name, and Chhipi, from Chhipa a calico-printer or dyer, is another name used for the caste, probably because it is largely recruited from the Chhipas. In Bombay they say that when Parasurama was destroying the Kshatriyas, two Rajput brothers hid themselves in a temple and were protected by the priest, who set one of them to sew dresses for the idol and the other to dye and stamp them. The first brother was called Chhipi and from him the Darzis are descended, the name being corrupted to s.h.i.+mpi, and the second was called Chhipa and was the ancestor of the dyers. The common t.i.tle of the Darzis is Khalifa, an Arabic word meaning 'The Successor of the Prophet.' Colonel Temple says that it is not confined to them but is also used by barbers, cooks and monitors in schools. [509] The caste is of comparatively recent formation. In fact Sir D. Ibbetson wrote [510] that "Darzi, or its Hindi equivalent Suji, is purely an occupational term, and though there is a Darzi guild in every town, there is no Darzi caste in the proper acceptation of the word. The greater number of Darzis belong perhaps to the Dhobi and Chhimba castes, more especially to the latter."

2. Subdivisions.

The Darzis, however, are now recognised as a distinct caste, but their mixed origin is shown by the names of their subcastes and exogamous sections. Thus they have a Baman subdivision named after the Brahman caste. These will not take food from any other caste except Brahmans and are probably an offshoot from them. They are considered to be the highest subdivision, and next to them come the Rai or Raj Darzis. Another subcaste is named Kaithia, after the Kayasths, and a third Srivastab, which is the name of a well-known subcaste of Kayasths derived from the town of Sravasti, now Sahet Mahet in the Gonda District. [511] In Betul the Srivastab Darzis are reported to forbid the remarriage of widows, thus showing that they desire to live up to their distinguished ancestry. A third subcaste is known as Chamarua and appears to be derived from the Chamars. Other subcastes are of the territorial type as Malwi, Khandes.h.i.+, Chhattisgarhi, Mathuria and so on, and the section or family names are usually taken from villages. Among them, however, we find Jugia from Jogi, Thakur or Rajput, Gujar, Khawas or barber, and Baroni, the t.i.tle of a female Dhimar. Mr. Crooke gives several other names.

3. Sewn clothes not formerly worn.

It may thus reasonably be concluded that the Darzis are a caste of comparatively recent origin, and the explanation is probably that the use of the needle and thread in making clothes is a new fas.h.i.+on. Buchanan remarks: "The needle indeed seems to have been totally unknown to the Hindus, and I have not been able to learn any Hindi word for sewing except that used to express pa.s.sing the shuttle in the act of weaving...." "Cloth composed of several pieces sewn together is an abomination to the Hindus, so that every woman of rank when she eats, cooks or prays, must lay aside her petticoat and retain only the wrapper made without the use of scissors or needle"; and again, "The dress of the Hindu men of rank has become nearly the same with that of the Muhammadans [512] who did not allow any officer employed by them to appear at their _levees_ (Durbars) except in proper dress. At home, however, the Hindu men, and on all occasions their women, retain almost entirely their native dress, which consists of various pieces of cloth wrapped round them without having been sewn together in any form, and only kept in their place by having their ends thrust under the folds." And elsewhere he states: "The flowering of cotton cloth with the needle has given a good deal of employment to the Muhammadan women of Maldeh as the needle has never been used by the Hindus." [513] Darzi, as has been seen, is a Persian word, and in northern India many tailors are Muhammadans. And it seems, therefore, a possible hypothesis that the needle and the art of sewing were brought into general use by the Moslem invaders. It is true that in his _Indo-Aryans_ [514] Mr. Rajendra Lal Mitra combats this hypothesis and demonstrates that made-up clothes were known to the Aryans of the Rig-Veda and are found in early statuary. But he admits that the instances are not numerous, and it seems likely that the use of such clothes may have been confined to royal and aristocratic families. It is possible also that the Scythian invasions of the fifth century brought about a partial relapse from civilisation, during which certain arts and industries, and among them that of cutting and sewing cloth, were partially or completely lost. The tailor is not the familiar figure in Hindu social life that he is, for example, in England. Here he is traditionally an object or b.u.t.t for ridicule as in the saying, 'Nine tailors make a man,' and so on; and his weakness is no doubt supposed to be due to the fact that he pursues a sedentary indoor occupation and one more adapted to women than men, the needle being essentially a feminine implement. A similar ridicule, based no doubt on exactly the same grounds, attaches in India to the village weaver, as is evidenced by the proverbs given in the articles on Bhulia, Kori, and Jolaha. No reason exists probably for the contempt in which the weaver cla.s.s is held other than that their work is considered to be more fitting for women than men. Thus in India the weaver appears to take the place of the tailor, and this leads to the conclusion that woven and not sewn clothes have always been commonly worn.