Note 112 — B (continued 2)

Religion. 7. The tribal deities are Kâli-Bhawâni and Ganga Mâi, or Mother Ganges. To the east of the Province they offer sacrifices of pigs to Vindhyabâsini Devi, at Bindhâchal. In Jhânsi they offer to Kâli or Jagadamba Devi, during the Naurâtra of Chait and Kuâr, or in other months, on a Monday or Friday, cocoanuts, sweets, spirits, betel leaves, and sometimes a goat. In Jhânsi they also worship various deified persons who are called Bâba. Thus there is Gusâîn Bâba, who has a platform under a pîpal tree near Moth Tahsîl, in the Jhânsi District. He is said to roam about in his ascetic costume in the neighbourhood, and sometimes speaks to people. Nat Bâba has no special shrine; but his platform is to be seen in many villages with a little niche for holding a light, which is occasionally lighted in his honour. Many curious tales of this worthy are told, one being that after his death he attended the marriage of his grand-daughter, and made all the arrangements for the reception of the guests. Mahton Bâba is the ghost of some celebrated village headman of the olden time, of whom little is known except that he is now a guardian of villages, and wards off famine and pestilence from men and cattle if he be duly propitiated with some sweets and cocoanuts. The Sayyid, or Shahîd Mard, is some Muhammadan martyr, whom they greatly reverence, and another worthy of the same class, Jîwan Shâh Bâba, is also much respected. In no part of this worship are the services of Brâhmans required; but the Joshi or village astrologer is occasionally consulted to select lucky days for weddings and the like. Their holidays are the Phagua or Holi, the Kajari, the Panchaiyân, Naumi, and Dasmi, at all of which they get drunk, if they can afford to do so. They are much afraid of the ghosts of those who die a violent death by drowning or some other accident. Such ghosts haunt the scene of the accident, and need careful propitiation. They have a very vague idea of the other world. They believe in a sort of hell into which evil-doers are flung and fall into a pit full of human ordure and urine.112 This place they call Narak, of which Manu enumerates twenty-one varieties. Some of them who are becoming more enlightened have now begun to perform some rude kind of srâddha. Women who are tattooed on the arms, wrists, breast, and below the knee, become holy, and the door-keepers of Bhagwân admit them into his paradise.