Volume 4 — Pārdhi
Reading edition
List of Paragraphs
1. General notice of the caste
2. Subdivisions
3. Marriage and funeral customs
4. Religion
5. Dress, food and social customs
6. Ordeals
7. Methods of catching birds
8. Hunting with leopards
9. Decoy stags
10. Hawks
11. Crocodile fishing
12. Other occupations and criminal practices
1. General notice of the caste
2. Subdivisions
Like other wandering castes the Pārdhis have a large number of endogamous groups, varying lists being often given in different areas. The principal subcastes appear to be the Shikāri or Bhīl Pārdhis, who use firearms; the Phānse Pārdhis, who hunt with traps and snares; the Langoti Pārdhis, so called because they wear only a narrow strip of cloth round the loins; and the Tākankars. Both the Tākankars and Langotis have strong criminal tendencies. Several other groups are recorded in different Districts, as the Chitewāle, who hunt with a tame leopard; the Gāyake, who stalk their prey behind a bullock; the Gosain Pārdhis, who dress like religious mendicants in ochre-coloured clothes and do not kill deer, but only hares, jackals and foxes; the Shīshi ke Telwāle, who sell crocodile’s oil; and the Bandarwāle who go about with performing monkeys. The Bahelias have a subcaste known as Kārijāt, the members of which only kill birds of a black colour. Their exogamous groups are nearly all those of Rājpūt tribes, as Sesodia, Panwār, Solanki, Chauhān, Rāthor, and soon; it is probable that these have been adopted through imitation by vagrant Bāwarias and others sojourning in Rājputāna. There are also a few groups with titular or other names, and it is stated that members of clans bearing Rājpūt names will take daughters from the others in marriage, but will not give their daughters to them.
3. Marriage and funeral customs
Girls appear to be somewhat scarce in the caste and a bride-price is usually paid, which is given as Rs. 9 in Chānda, Rs. 35 in Bilāspur, and Rs. 60 or more in Hoshangābād and Saugor. If a girl should be seduced by a man of the caste she would be united to him by the ceremony of a widow’s marriage: but her family will require a bride from her husband’s family in exchange for the girl whose value he has destroyed. Even if led astray by an outsider a girl may be readmitted into the caste; and in the extreme case of her being debauched by her brother, she may still be married to one of the community, but no one will take food from her hands during her lifetime, though her children will be recognised as proper Pārdhis. A special fine of Rs. 100 is imposed on a brother who commits this crime. The ceremony of marriage varies according to the locality in which they reside; usually the couple walk seven times round a tānda or collection of their small mat tents. In Berār a cloth is held up by four poles as a canopy over them and they are preceded by a married woman carrying five pitchers of water. Divorce and the marriage of widows are freely permitted. The caste commonly bury their dead, placing the head to the north. They do not shave their heads in token of mourning.
4. Religion
5. Dress, food and social customs
6. Ordeals
The Pārdhis still preserve the primitive method of trial by ordeal. If a woman is suspected of misconduct she is made to pick a pice coin out of boiling oil; or a pīpal leaf is placed on her hand and a red-hot axe laid over it, and if her hand is burnt or she refuses to stand the test she is pronounced guilty. Or, in the case of a man, the accused is made to dive into water; and as he dives an arrow is shot from a bow. A swift runner fetches and brings back the arrow, and if the diver can remain under water until the runner has returned he is held to be innocent. In Nimār, if an unmarried girl becomes pregnant, two cakes of dough are prepared, a piece of silver being placed in one and a lump of coal in the other. The girl takes one of the cakes, and if it is found to contain the coal she is expelled from the community, while if she chooses the piece of silver, she is pardoned and made over to one of the caste. The idea of the ordeal is apparently to decide the question whether her condition was caused by a Pārdhi or an outsider.
7. Methods of catching birds
8. Hunting with leopards
9. Decoy stags
10. Hawks
11. Crocodile fishing
For catching crocodile, a method by which as already stated one group of the Pārdhis earn their livelihood, a large double hook is used, baited with a piece of putrid deer’s flesh and attached to a hempen rope 70 or 80 feet long. When the crocodile has swallowed the hook, twenty or thirty persons drag the animal out of the water and it is despatched with axes. Crocodiles are hunted only in the months of Pūs (December), Māgh (January) and Chait (March), when they are generally fat and yield plenty of oil. The flesh is cut into pieces and stewed over a slow fire, when it exudes a watery oil. This is strained and sold in bottles at a rupee a seer (2 lbs.). It is used as an embrocation for rheumatism and for neck galls of cattle. The Pārdhis do not eat crocodile’s flesh.