Note 13 — H

In connection with the Holeyas of South Canara, it is recorded13 that “the ordinary agricultural labourers of this district are Holeyas or Pariahs of two classes, known as Mūlada Holeyas and Sālada Holeyas, the former being the old hereditary serfs attached to Mūli wargs (estates), and the latter labourers bound to their masters’ service by being in debt to them. Nowadays, however, there is a little difference between the two classes. Neither are much given to changing masters, and, though a Mūlada Holeya is no longer a slave, he is usually as much in debt as a Sālada Holeya, and can only change when his new master takes the debt over. To these labourers cash payments are unknown, except occasionally in the case of Sālada Holeyas, where there is a nominal annual payment to be set off against interest on the debt. In other cases interest is foregone, one or other of the perquisites being sometimes docked as an equivalent. The grain wage consists of rice or paddy (unhusked rice), and the local seer is, on the average, as nearly as possible one of 80 tolas. The daily rice payments to men, women, and children vary as follows:—