Skip to main content

Full text of "The district of Bákarganj; its history and statistics"

See other formats 


!>'>. 


■> 


.    ^z>r7  i  O   i/CtZ>  /^-^^^/Vi 


J/k^  2^"^  /S35\        ^/T't^c^L^^ z^<^  . 


THE 

DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 


I'KINTF.D  RV  KALI.ANTYNE,   HANSON  AND  CO. 
EDINDt'RGH  AND  LONDON 


"^m 


THE 


DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ 


ITS  HISTORY  AND  STATISTICS 


H.  lBEVERIDGE,    B.C.S. 

MAGISTRATK  AND  COLLECTOR  OF  BAKAROANJ 


LONDON 
TKUBNER  &  CO.,  LUDGATE  HILL 

1876 
\All  rif/Ji.fs  resfirvrd] 


>- 

0= 

oe 


>1 

o 
en 


\3Al  Sst 


I  DEDICATE 


Cfjfs   13  a  ok 


in 

(M  TO 


THE   INHABITANTS   OF   THE   DISTRICT 

WHICH    IT   ATTEMPTS 

TO   DESCRIBE. 


357104 


i 


PREFACE. 


This  work  is  the  result  of  nearly  five  years'  experience 
in  Bakarganj,  and  of  subsequent  researches  in  the  India 
Office  and  the  Library  of  the  British  Museum.  My  pri- 
mary object  has  been  to  write  a  book  which  would  be 
useful  and  interesting  to  the  officers  of  Government  and 
the  inhabitants  of  the  district,  and  therefore  there  is 
much  in  it  which  can  have  no  attraction  for  the  oreneral 
reader.  It  is  pleasing  to  think  that  so  many  district- 
histories  are  now  in  print,  and  that  we  are  beginning  to 
have  for  Bengal  some  such  statistical  account  as  the 
industry  and  patriotism  of  Sir  John  Sinclair  caused  to 
be  prepared  for  Scotland. 

Among  older  works  we  have  the  accounts  of  Kangpiir, 
Dinagepiir,  and  Purneah,  by  Francis  Buchanan ;  that  of 
Cuttack,  by  Mr  Stirling ;  and  the  excellent  description 
of  Dacca,  by  Dr  Taylor.^     Among  the  more  recent  we 

^  This  work  was  published  by  Government  in  1839,  and  is  now  out  of 
print.  It  is  much  to  be  desired  that  Government  would  correct  and 
reprint  it. 


i 


viii  PREFACE. 

have  the  reports  on  the  districts  of  the  Dacca  Division, 
Mr  Brown's  report  on  Tipperah,  Colonel  Gastrell's  re- 
ports on  Jcssore,  Faridpiir,  and  Bakarganj ;  W^:  Hunter's 
description  of  Birbhum  in  his  "  Eural  Annals,"  and  the 
same  author  and  JMr  Toynbees  books  on  Orissa,  Mr 
Glazier  s  account  of  Rangpiir,  and,  above  all,  Mr  West- 
land's  admirable  report  on  Jessore.  The  reports  on  the 
Dacca  districts  owe  their  origin,  I  believe,  to  the  fore- 
thought and  public  spirit  of  Mr  Buckland,  but  more 
than  three-fourths  of  the  work  was  executed  by  com- 
petition-civilians ;  and  I  am  proud  to  think  that  four 
of  the  other  books  I  have  mentioned  have  been  written 
by  members  of  the  same  class.  In  other  parts  of  India 
this  new  class  of  civilians  has  not  been  idle,  and  I  have 
been  told  on  good  authority  that  one  of  the  best  district- 
histories  is  the  account  of  Ghazipur,  by  Mr  Oldham, 
B.C.S. 

It  will  perhaps  be  thought  that  I  have  written  too 
much  about  such  an  obscure  district  as  Bakarganj,  but 
my  own  consciousness  is  that  I  ought  to  have  written  a 
great  deal  more,  and  that  I  have  often  been  very  meagre 
in  my  treatment  of  important  subjects.  The  truth  is, 
no  one  man  can  write  an  exhaustive  district-history, 
and  still  less  can  a  foreigner  adequately  depict  a  district 
of  Bengal.  AVhat  I  have  chiefly  laboured  have  been 
the  descriptions  of  the  parganas  and  the  official  his- 
tory of  the  district.  I  did  this  not  because  they  were 
the  most  important,  but  because  they  were  less  likely  to 


PRE  FA  CE.  IX 

be  done  by  others.  My  idea  always  has  been  that  the 
proper  person  to  write  the  history  of  a  district  is  one 
who  is  a  native  of  it,  who  has  lived  all  liia  life  in  it,  and 
who  has  abundance  of  leisure  to  collect  information.  It 
is  only  a  Bengali  who  can  treat  satisfactorily  of  the  pro- 
ductions of  his  country,  or  of  its  social  condition — its 
castes,  leading  families,  peculiarities  of  language,  cus- 
toms, &c.  I  have  not  attempted  to  go  minutely  into 
these  matters,  but  my  hope  is  that  I  have  done  enough 
to  stimulate  discussion,  and  that  I  may  serve  to  ring 
the  fuller  writer  in.  I  have  said  very  little  about  the 
mode  of  cultivatinor  rice  or  other  a2;ricultural  methods, 
both  because  I  do  not  think  that  there  are  any  which 
are  peculiar  to  the  district,  and  the  ordinary  practices 
have  been  repeatedly  described  already,  and  because 
I  have  observed  that  such  parts  of  a  book  are  always 
the  first  to  become  out  of  date. 

In  the  chapter  entitled  "  General  Eemarks "  I  have 
indulged  in  the  luxury  of  making  some  observations  of 
wider  scope  than  were  admissible  in  the  earlier  part  of 
the  book.  Perhaps  some  may  think  that  these  observa- 
tions are  out  of  place  in  a  district-history,  but  I  hope 
they  have  some  connection  with  it,  since  they  presented 
themselves  to  me  while  writing  this  book.  I  do  not 
think  that  there  is  anything  singular  or  novel  in  the 
observations.  Indeed,  I  should  be  the  first  to  allow  that 
they  had  no  value  whatever  if  I  thought  that  they 
expressed  nobody's   opinions  but  my  own.     The  only 


X  PREFACE. 

value,  or  at  least  the  only  practical  value  of  opinions 
about  India,  or  perhaps  about  any  subject,  is  that  they 
are  shared  by  numbers  of  people,  and  are  such  as  natur- 
ally suggest  themselves  to  fair  and  reasonable  persons 
who  are  conversant  with  the  subject-matter.  With 
regard  to  the  question  of  the  gradual  abandonment  of 
India,  which  is  mooted  by  me  in  a  note  to  the  General 
Remarks,  I  am  glad  to  be  able  to  fortify  myself  with  the 
following  remarks  by  my  late  father  at  the  conclusion 
of  his  "  History  of  India  :  " — 

"To  the  attempts  made  to  christianise  India,  it  has 
been  objected  that  the  inevitable  result  of  their  success 
would  be  to  destroy  the  British  rule.  The  inhabitants 
made  aware  of  their  natural  rights,  and  become  capable 
of  self-government,  would  throw  off  our  yoke  and  declare 
their  independence.  Unquestionably  they  would.  But 
what  then  ?  Is  it  meant  that,  for  the  purpose  of  per- 
petuating our  empire  in  the  East,  we  must  endeavour  to 
keep  our  subjects  there  in  a  state  of  semi-barbarism,  and 
discountenance  all  endeavours  to  raise  them  to  our  level 
in  respect  of  intelligence,  religion,  and  general  civilisation? 
The  time  has  been  when  such  selfish  and  heartless  policy 
would  have  been  looked  upon  with  favour,  but  a  better 
spirit  now  prevails;  and  the  determination,  as  announced 
in  the  Queen's  proclamation,  and  cordially  acquiesced  in 
by  all  classes  of  society,  is  to  do  justice  to  India,  and 
more  than  compensate  her  for  all  the  wealth  she  has 
bestowed  upon  us  by  furnishing  her  with  the  means  of 


PREFACE.  xi 

rising  above  lier  present  degraded  state,  and  attaining  to 
the  highest  form  of  European  civilisation.  Should  the 
eifect  be  to  enable  her  to  dispense  with  our  tutelage,  we 
shall  have  the  satisfaction  of  feelinc^  that  we  ourselves 
have  been  the  willing  instruments  of  her  emancipation, 
while  she,  even  in  severing  the  political  ties  by  which 
she  is  now  bound  to  us,  will  not  forget  how  much  she 
shall  then  owe  to  us  for  the  enlightened  and  generous 
policy  which  gradually  prepared  her  for  freedom.  Should 
the  day  ever  come  that  India,  in  consequence  of  the 
development  of  her  resources  by  British  capital,  and  the 
enlightenment  of  her  people  by  British  philanthropy, 
shall  asjain  take  rank  amons;  the  nations  as  an  inde- 
pendent  state,  then  it  will  not  be  too  much  to  say  that 
the  extinction  of  our  Indian  Empire  by  such  peaceful 
means  sheds  more  lustre  on  the  British  name  than  all 
the  other  events  recorded  in  its  history." 

In  the  above  passage  my  father  speaks  of  christianising 
India.^  I  should  have  preferred  the  word  "  civilise," 
unless,  indeed,  the  term  christianise  be  used  in  a 
different  sense  than  it  is  at  present.  I  have  not  the 
slightest  expectation  that  the  inhabitants  of  India  will 
ever  become  Christians  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  that 

^  Much  of  my  father's  history  was  written  against  time  and  in  failing 
health,  but  the  vigour  of  his  mind  becomes  apparent  whenever  a  suitable 
subject  for  discussion  presents  itself.  Few  pieces  of  writing,  for  example, 
can  be  more  vigorous  than  his  reflections  on  the  administration  and  trial  of 
Warren  Hastings.  See  also  his  remarks  on  the  Permanent  Settlement  and, 
the  annexation  of  Oude. 


xii  PREFACE. 

word,  uor  do  I  suppose  that  any  well-informed  person 
believes  that  missionary  efforts  are  making  progress  in 
India. 

The  plan  of  my  book  is  first  to  give  an  account  of  the 
land.  Thus  I  begin  with  the  physical  features,  and  then 
go  on  to  a  description  of  the  j)arganas,  the  Sundarbans, 
and  the  Government  estates.  After  that  I  notice  the 
various  kinds  of  tenures,  and  I  have  endeavoured  to 
give  some  information  about  the  numerous  under-tenures 
of  the  district. 

The  chapter  on  antiquities  and  early  history  has  been 
placed  third  in  the  book,  in  order  to  lead  up  to  the 
constitution  of  the  parganas  and  the  financial  history  of 
the  district. 

In  Part  II.  I  have  described  the  people  and  the  natural 
productions,  &c.  ;  and  in  Part  III.  I  have  given  a  his- 
tory of  the  administration,  and.  chapters  on  detached 
points,  such  as  the  town  of  Barisal,  the  jail,  &c. 

The  question  of  the  correct  spelling  of  the  proper 
names  is  one  I  have  taken  some  trouble  with,  but  I  am 
aware  that  I  have  omitted  the  accents  in  many  places, 
and  tliat  also  the  spelling  is  often  wrong.  It  is  not  in 
every  case  easy  to  know  the  etymology  of  a  proper 
name,  and  in  the  absence  of  this  knowledge  we  are  very 
apt  to  make  mistakes  in  spelling. 

A  considerable  part  of  the  book  is  taken  up  with 
the  Appendices,  and  I  trust  that  whatever  judgment 
be  passed   on  the   rest  of  the  work,   it  will  be  found 


PREFACE.  xiii 

that  the  Appendices  contain  something  of  value.  I 
regret  that  T  have  been  obliged  to  print  the  letters  of 
Messrs  Douglas  and  Massie  from  the  imperfect  copies 
in  the  Barisal  office,  and  that  there  are  therefore  some 
passages  in  them  which  are  probably  incorrect.  The 
reports  of  the  Collectors  at  the  time  of  making  the 
Permanent  Settlement  are  the  most  important  docu- 
ments in  the  history  of  each  of  the  districts  of  Bengal, 
but  it  appears  that  very  few  of  them  have  yet  been 
printed.  They  are  fast  mouldering  away  in  our  record- 
rooms,  and  I  hope  that  before  it  is  too  late  Government 
will  publish  a  volume  containing  all  the  correspondence 
about  the  Permanent  Settlement  of  each  district. 

Since  writing  the  note  about  early  travellers  in  Bengal 
(Appendix,  p.  444)  I  have  seen  the  first  volume  of 
Eamusio's  "Collection  of  Travels"  (Venice,  1550),  and 
I  am  almost  convinced  that  the  lost  city  of  Bengala  is 
neither  more  nor  less  than  the  famous  city  of  Gour, 
in  the  Maldaha  district.  One  of  the  most  valuable 
accounts  of  early  India  appears  to  be  the  narrative  of 
Edward  Barbessa  or  Barbosa,  who  was  a  native  of 
Lisbon,  and  finished  his  book  in  1516.  He  afterwards 
sailed  with  Magellan  on  his  voyage  round  the  world, 
and  was  killed  at  the  island  of  Zebu  in  1521  (Biogra- 
phic Universelle).  Barbessa  gives  a  description  of  the 
city  of  Bengala  (p.  330),  and  it  appears  from  it  that  it 
was  a  Mahomedan  town — at  least  the  kin 2:  of  it  was  a 
Mahomedan,  and  he  appears  to  have  resided  in  it.     The 


xiv  PREFACE. 

narratives  of  Varthema,  and  of  the  anonymous  author 
of  the   "  Summary  of  the  People  of  the  East,"  &e., 
appended  to  Barbessa's  account,  also  describe  the  king 
as  being  a  Mahomedan,  and  this  fact  appears  to  me  to 
render  it  almost  certain  that  Bengala  is  Gour,  as  the 
latter  was  the  only  great  Mahomedan  city  in  Bengal. 
If  Bengala  had  been  a  Hindu  city,  and  governed  by  a 
Hindu  king,  we  could  understand  its  disappearance ;  but 
if  there  had  been  any  large  Mahomedan  city  in  Bengal 
except  Gour,  it  would  certainly  have  been  mentioned 
by  the  Mahomedan  historians.     The  anonymous  author 
above  referred  to  says  that  the  king  of  Tripura  was  tri- 
butary to  the  king  of  Bengala,  and  that  Bengala  was  a 
port  two  days'  journey  from  the  mouth  of  the  Ganges. 
This  was  written  in  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, when  Gour  must  have  been  much  nearer  the  sea 
than  it  now  is.     What  the  origin  of  the  name  Gour  is  I 
do  not  know,  but  I  believe  that,  like  Bengala,  it  was  a 
name  given  to  the  country  as  well  as  to  the  town.     We 
find  it  in  other  places  than  in  Maldaha ;  for  example, 
some  years  ago  there  was  a  village  called  Gournadi — 
i.e.,  the  river  of  Gour — iu  the  northern  part  of  Bdkar- 
ganj.' 

^  Dr  Wise  has  referred  me  to  a  passage  in  Ortelius  which  says  that 
Appian  considered  Bengala  to  be  the  emporium  of  Barakoura  mentioned 
by  Ptolemy,  and  that  Gastaldi  thought  Barakoura  was  Bacala.  (See  the 
"  Thesaurus  Geographicus,"  under  "  Baracura.")  Perhaps  this  name  Bara- 
koura is  the  origin  of  Le  Blanc's  remark  about  Batacouta.  Appian  is  properly 
Apianus,  and  this  again  is  the  Latin  appellation  of  Peter  Bienewitz  (both 
a-pis  and  hitne,  signifying  a  bee),  who  was  professor  of  mathematics  at  Ingol- 
Btadt  in  1520,  and  published  a  cosmography.     If  Gour  be  thought  too  far 


PREFACE.  XV 

There  is  a,n  interesting  remark  made  by  Barbessa 
which  bears  on  the  question  of  the  conversion  of  the 
Hindus  of  Eastern  Bensfal  to  Mahomedanism  discussed 

o 

by  me  at  p.  247.  He  says  that  the  king  of  Bengahi 
being  a  Mahomedan,  many  of  his  Hindu  subjects  are 
every  day  becoming  Mahomedans  in  order  to  get  favour 
with  the  king  and  his  governors.  The  anonymous 
author  of  the  summary  tells  us  that  the  kings  of  Ben- 
gala  had  been  Mahomedans  for  three  hundred  years, 
and  this  statement  nearly  corresponds  with  the  date  of 
Bakhtyar  Khilji's  conquest  of  Bengal  (1203).  The 
statement  in  my  Appendix  that  Varthema  was  the  jBrst 
traveller  in  Bengal  is  incorrect,  as  Nicolo  de  Conti  pre- 
ceded him  by  nearly  a  hundred  years.  Conti  was  a 
Venetian,  and  his  travels  are  printed  in  the  first  volume 
of  Eamusio. 

In  conclusion,  I  wish  to  say  that  the  Indian  Govern- 
ment is  in  no  way  responsible  for  any  of  the  opinions 
expressed  in  my  book,  and  that  these  must  not  be 
regarded  as  having  any  official  value  whatever.  I  trust, 
however,  that  I  have  not  said  anything  rashly,  or  which 
is  other  than  a  fair  expression  of  opinion,  and  I  do  not 
think  that  I  have  said  anything  which  could  give  just 
cause  of  offence  to  any  one. 

inland  for  Bengala,  then  Ilugli,  whicli  was  early  a  Mahomedan  town,  may- 
be the  place  meant.  (See  the  dictionary  of  Bruzen  de  La  ]\Iartiniere  (1730), 
under  the  word  "  Bengale.")  This  writer  says,  "  Dans  le  grand  nombre 
de  voyages  de  I'Indoustan  que  j'ai  lus  je  n'en  ai  jamais  trouvtj  oti  il  soit 
parle  de  Bengale  comme  d'une  ville  dont  on  ait  dit  quelques  particularites 
capables  d'en  certifier  la  position  ni  meme  I'existence. 


xvi  PRE  FA  CE. 

I  liave  to  express  my  obligations  to  the  report  on 
Bdkarganj  by  Mr  Sutherland,  to  Mr  "Westland's  Jessore, 
to  Colonel  Gastrell's  report,  and  to  the  disquisition  of 
Professor  Blochmann  on  the  geography  and  history  of 
Bengal.  I  have  also  been  assisted  by  the  Bengali 
account  of  Bdkarganj  by  Naba  Kanth  Chattanji,  which 
is  a  very  good  little  manual,  though  I  am  sorry  that 
the  author  has  not  acknowledged  how  much  he  has  bor- 
rowed  from  Mr  Sutherland.  Finally,  I  have  to  declare 
how  much  assistance  I  have  derived  from  the  native 
officials  of  Bdkarganj,  and  especially  from  the  CoUec- 
torate  Peshkar,  Babu  Koilas  Chandra  Ganguli. 

The  map  prefixed  to  the  work  is  a  reduction  from  the 
Ke venue  Survey  map,  and  I  have  made  some  alterations 
in  it  in  order  to  brins;  it  more  into  accordance  with  the 
existing  state  of  the  country,  and  also  to  exhibit  the 
names  mentioned  in  the  book.  I  am  indebted  to  the 
Indian  Government  for  permission  to  make  use  of  the 
Revenue  Survey  map. 

H.  BEVERIDGE. 

London,  23d  March  18/0. 


CONTENTS. 


PART  I. 

CHAPTER  I. 

PACK 

NTRODUCTION           ...... 

1 

CHAPTER  H. 

'hysical  Features — 

1.  General  Description            .... 

3 

2.  Climate       ...... 

10 

3.  Cyclones      .             .             .             .            .  •           . 

14 

4.  Tides           ...                        .            . 

15 

5.  Rivers          .             .             ... 

15 

6.  Lukes  and  Swamps              .... 

23 

CHAPTER  in. 

Antiquities  and  Early  History 


26 


CHAPTER  IV. 

Financial  History  and  Description  of  the  Parganas — 

1.  Historical  Sketch  of  the  Land  Settlements 

2.  Territorial  Divisions  of  the  District  and  their  History 


50 
65 


CHAPTER  V. 

SUNDARBANS — 

1.  General  Description,  the  Mugs,  &c. 

2.  Were  the  Suudarbaus  Inliabited  in  Ancient  Times  ? 


IGO 
169 


xviu 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Government  Estates,  etc. 


PAGE 

181 


CHAPTER  VH. 
Land  Tenures — 

1.  Teimres-iu-Cliief    . 

2.  Under-Tenures 

3.  Lakliiraj,  or  Eent-free  Tenures 


190 
192 
209 


PART  11. 


CHAPTER  Vni. 


The  People  of  BAkarganj — 

1.  General  Remarks    ..... 

211 

2.  Mahomedans           ..... 

246 

3.  Hindus        ...... 

257 

4,  Buddhists    ...... 

259 

5.  Christians    ...... 

260 

6.  Others         ...... 

268 

7.  Results  of  the  Census         .... 

268 

CHAPTER  IX. 


Productions 


278 


CHAPTER  X. 

Manufactures  and  Prices 


297 


PART  III. 


CHAPTER  XL 


English  Administration 


302 


CONTENTS.  xix 

CHAPTER  XII. 

Kevenur  Administration  .....        312 

CHAPTER  XIII. 

Progress  of  the  Criminal  Administration  and  General 

History  .......        323 

CHAPTER  XIV. 

Police  System      .......        345. 

CHAPTER  XV. 

The  Jail    ........        351 

CHAPTER  XVI. 
Education  .......        358 

CHAPTER  XVII. 
Roads  and  Communications        .....        3G2 

CHAPTER  XVIII. 
BarisIl     ........        367 

CHAPTER  XIX. 

General  Remarks  ...  .  .        372 


APPENDIX  A. 

I.  Four  Settlement  Reports  from  the  Collector  of  the 
Dacca  District,  dated  Cth  April,  5th  and  2Gth  May  1790, 
and  31st  July  1792     ......         397 

II,  Letter  from  Mr  Massie,  24th  March  1801  .  .         421 

III.  BXkarganj  in  1801,  being  a  Letter  from  Mr  AVintle,  dated 

7th  January  1802        .  .  .  .  .  .         424 


XX  CONTENTS. 


APPENDIX  B. 


Extract  from  Mr  Pellew's  Article  on  the  Physical  Char- 
acteristics OF  BXkarganj   .....        432 


APPENDIX  C. 

I.  Prices         ...... 

II.  India  Office  Eecords       .  .  .  . 

III.  Famines  of  1770  and  1787 

IV.  Establishment  of  Civil  Courts  at  BIkarganj 
V.  Character  of  the  People 

VI.  Dacoits        ...... 

VII.  Early  Travellers  in  Bengal 
VIII.  Francis  Fernandez  .... 


435 
436 

441 
442 
443 
444 
444 
446 


APPENDIX  D. 

Two  BAkarganj  Cases    ......        447 

APPENDIX  E. 

The  Language  of  the  District  ....        450 


APPENDIX  F. 

Note  to  page  75  .     .     .     .     .     .  .   451 

Note  to  page  142      .     .     .     .     .  .451 

Index .453 


THE 

DISTRICT    OF    BAKARGANJ. 


PART    I. 


CHAPTER   I. 

INTR  OD  UCTION. 

The  district  of  Bdkarganj  is  situated  in  Eastern  Bengal, 
and  is  one  of  the  four  collectorates  wliicli  compose  the 
Division  or  Commissionership  of  Dacca.  It  lies  in  the 
lower  portion  of  the  delta  Avhich  has  been  formed  by 
deposits  from  the  united  waters  of  the  Ganges  or  Padma, 
the  Brahmaputra,  and  the  Meghna,  and  falls  within 
latitudes  21°  to  23°  N.,  and  longitudes  89°  to  91°  E. 
The  boundaries  of  the  district  of  Bdkarganj  are  given 
in  detail  in  the  "  Calcutta  Gazette "  of  1 6th  September 
1874.  Briefly  it  may  be  described  as  bounded  on  the 
north  by  Faridpur,  on  the  west  by  Faridpiir  and  the 
Baleshwar  river  (which  separates  it  from  Jessore),  on  the 
south  by  the  Bay  of  Bengal,  and  on  the  east  by  the 
Meghna  and  its  estuary.  Its  length  from  north  to  south 
is  about  85  miles,  and  its  breadth,  including  the  island 
of  Dakhin  Shahbazpiir,  is  about  60  miles.  Its  area  is 
about  4300  square  miles.  It  is  thus  more  than  half  the 
size  of  Wales,  the  area  o-f  which  is  7397  square  miles. 


2  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

and  it  is  sliglitly  larger  than  the  two  counties  of  Somer- 
set and  Devon,  the  united  area  of  which  amounts  to 
4225  square  miles  (1G36  +  2589).  The  area  of  York- 
shire, to  wliich  also  it  may  be  compared,  is  5983  square 
miles.^  It  must,  however,  be  confessed  that  the  area  of 
Bakarganj  is  not  quite  accurately  known.  The  figures 
which  I  have  given  are  derived  from  the  Topographical 
Survey,  but  that  survey  was  made  in  the  years  1860  to 
1863,  and  considerable  changes  must  have  taken  place 
since  then  in  an  alluviatiug  district  such  as  Bdkarganj. 
Also,  I  do  not  know  the  precise  alteration  of  area  Avhich 
has  been  made  by  the  transfer  of  the  greater  part  of  the 
JMddarijDur  subdivision  to  Faridpur. 

The  population  of  Bdkarganj,  according  to  the  census 
of  1872,  and  after  exclusion  of  the  transferred  portion 
of  the  Mddaripur  subdivision,  is  1,878,144,  of  whom 
about  two-thirds  (1,254,429)  are  Mahomedans.  The 
remaining  third  is  composed  of  Hindus,  with  the 
exception  of  a  few  thousand  Buddhists  and  Christians. 

Bdkarganj  was  made  a  zihi  or  district  for  magisterial 
purposes  in  1797  by  Regulation  7  of  that  year,  but 
it  did  not  become  a  Collectorate  till  1817.  Barisd.1  is 
the  chief  town,  and  the  seat  of  the  courts.  It  is  about 
180  miles  east  of  Calcutta.  The  number  of  villages  or 
townships  in  the  district  appears  to  be  3312.  The  land 
revenue  is  about  thirteen  lacs  and  seventy  thousand 
rupees  (,€137,000),  and  the  total  revenue  from  all  sources 
may  be  stated  as  sixteen  lacs.^  The  cost  of  the  local 
administration  is  under  three  lacs. 

^  The  area  of  4935  square  miles  -which  is  assigned  to  Bakarganj  in  the 
Bengal  Administration  Report  for  1872-73,  includes  the  subdivision  of 
Lladaripilr,  which  is  now  part  of  Faridpur. 

^  In  the  Bengal  Administration  Eeport  for  1873-74,  p.  ir.  of  the  Statis- 
tical Returns,  the  land  revenue  of  Bakarganj  is  given  at  Rs.1,511,278,  and 
the  gross  revenue  at  Rs.  1,905,464,  but  this  includes  Madaripiir. 


(  3  ) 


CHAPTER   II. 

PHYSICAL    FEATURES. 
I.    GENERAL    DESCRIPTION. 

The  whole  district  of  Bakarganj  is  an  alluvial  formation, 
and  the  most  general  observation  which  can  be  made 
concerning  it  is  that  the  ground  is  everywhere  flat. 
There  is  not  a  hill  in  any  part  of  it.  The  general  slope 
is  from  north  to  south,  but  it  is  very  slight.  From  the 
Ganges  to  the  Bay  of  Bengal  (this  description  includes 
Faridpur)  the  difference  in  level  is  only  about  22  feet  over 
the  whole  distance  of  1 50  miles,  or  an  average  slope  of  1'8 
inch  per  mile.  There  is  also  a  general  depression  towards 
the  centre  of  the  district  (vicZe  Colonel  Gastrell's  Report). 
The  western  part  of  the  district  and  the  central  and 
southern  portions  down  to  the  Sundarbans  might  almost 
be  described  as  forming  one  vast  rice-field,  sprinkled 
with  trees  and  villages,  and  intersected  by  numerous 
watercourses.  The  northern  and  eastern  portions  are 
higher,  and  produce  large  quantities  of  cocoa  and  betel 
nuts,  sugar-cane,  'pdn,  and  some  jute  and  cotton. 

The  district  consists  partly  of  mainland,  and  partly  of 
islands  in  the  estuary  of  the  Meghna.  The  islands  are 
quite  flat,  but  are  for  the  most  part  well  raised  above 
the  level  of  the  sea ;  and  as  there  are  no  rivers  in  them, 
they  are  generally  less  swampy  than  Bdkarganj  Proper. 
Commonly  they  present  the  appearance  of  a  low  table- 


4  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

laud,  of  a  rich  soil,  and  yield  many  kinds  of  crops. 
Two  or  three  arc,  however,  uninhabited  and  unculti- 
vated, and  are  for  the  most  part  covered  with  tree 
jungle.  The  largest  island  is  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir,  which 
is  the  seat  of  a  subdivision,  and  has  an  area  of  about 
800  square  miles,  and  a  population  of  about  220,000 
persons.  The  other  principal  islands  are  Kali,  also 
called  Panchkhdli,  Kazal,  Bara  Baisdia,  Chota  Baisdia, 
and  its  adjuncts  Koralia  and  Kangabali,  Kalmi,  Chopa, 
Kukri  ]\Iiikri,  and  Manpura.  The  last  of  these  has  a 
population  of  about  4500. 

The  proper  Bengali  word  for  an  island  is  uixidwip, 
and  in  legal  j^bi'^seology  the  Persian  word  jazira  is 
employed,  but  the  word  in  common  use  is  char.  This 
name  is  applied  indifferently  to  large  islands,  and  to 
mere  shoals  and  sandbanks,  even  though  the  latter  fringe 
the  mainland.  Many  chars  are  submerged  at  every 
tide ;  hence  the  aspect  of  the  rivers  varies  much  during 
each  day.  At  flood,  the  estuary  of  the  Meghna  presents 
the  appearance  of  a  vast  expanse  of  water,  temjDting  one 
to  think  that  it  might  be  a  highway  for  all  the  ships  of 
the  world.  But  the  ebb  shows  the  deceptiveness  of  this 
waste  of  waters,  for  then  long  lines  of  sand  gradually 
emerge  even  in  mid-channeL  The  navigation  is  so 
uncertain  that  the  native  boatmen,  sailing  in  flat- 
bottomed  country  boats  which  draw  only  one  or  two 
feet  of  water,  do  not  like  to  set  out  much  after  slack - 
water,  lest  they  should  ground  as  the  ebb  advances,  and 
so  expose  themselves  to  being  caught  by  the  bore ;  if 
they-  have  a  fair  wind,  a  man  called  the  (joliija  or  bow- 
man is  continually  thrusting  a  bamboo  into  the  water 
ahead  of  the  boat  to  ascertain  the  depth.  English-built 
ships  have,  I  believe,  never  ascended  the  JMeghna,  but 
sloops  from  Chittagong  sail  up  it  in  the  cold  weather  to 


PHYSICAL  FEATURES.  5 

Narainganj,  and  also  cross  over  to  Dakhiii  Slialibflzpiir, 
ladeu  with  eartli-oil,  and  bringing  away  in  exchange 
cocoa  and  betel  nuts. 

I  have  said  that  the  district  is  an  alluvial  formation. 
In  fact,  it  may  be  looked  npon  as  a  conqnest  won  by  the 
Canges  and  the  Meghna  from  the  Bay  of  Bengal.  With 
its  central  depression,  and  its  deeply-indented  southern 
l)oundary,  it  has  somewhat  the  appearance  of  the  out- 
stretched palm  of  the  hand.  Thus  a  fanciful  eye  might 
regard  it  as  a  glove  flung  down  by  the  Ganges  to  the 
ocean,  in  gage  of  battle,  and  as  an  augury  of  future 
victories. 

As  might  be  expected  from  its  flatness,  the  scenery  of 
Bakarganj  is  somewhat  monotonous  and  uninteresting. 
As  most  of  the  district  is  of  comparatively  recent  origin, 
it  has  not  many  fine  trees,  nor  are  there  any  ancient 
buildings  to  give  picturesqueness  to  the  landscape.  In 
fact,  there  is  something  peculiarly  unromantic  and  pro- 
saic about  the  first  impressions  of  Bakarganj.  It  strikes 
one  as  being  a  sort  of  agricultural  Manchester,  producing 
bread-stuffs  instead  of  cotton  cloth,  but  without  the  art 
culture  for  which  Manchester  is  so  justly  famous.  There 
is  no  ancient  history  of  Bdkarganj  :  no  battles  have  been 
fought  in  it,  or  at  least  no  traces  of  them  now  remain ; 
there  are  hardly  any  resident  aristocracy ;  and  there  are 
no  art  products  of  any  kind.  Other  districts  have  their 
workers  in  ivory  and  silver,  their  shawlmakcrs,  &c., 
1  )ut  Bakarganj  has  none  of  these.  Committees  for  Inter- 
national Exhibitions  can  get  nothing  from  it  to  show  in 
Europe  as  trophies  of  Indian  skill  or  taste.  It  must  be 
confessed,  too,  that  there  is  something  depressing  in  the 
air  of  Bakarganj,  and  in  the  continual  prospect  of  swamps 
and  muddy  rivers.  One  longs  for  a  dry  tract  of  coun- 
try,   dotted   with    mango    topes    and    tamarind-trees. 


6  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

across  wliicli  one  coiikl  ride  or  walk  without  being 
l)ronglit  to  a  stand  every  three  or  four  hundred  yards 
by  the  slimy  bank  of  a  }Hidl.  Boats  are  all  very  well, 
and  one  acknowledges  that  there  is  no  other  mode  of 
conveyance  which  is  so  economical,  or  so  effectual  for  the 
transport  of  heavy  or  fragile  goods,  but  one  wishes  that 
it  could  be  dispensed  with  occasionally.  It  is  fatiguing 
to  find  that  you  cannot  reach  a  place  only  ten  miles  off 
on  the  map  in  less  than  eight  or  nine  hours,  and  that  if 
wind  and  tide  be  against  you,  you  may  not  reach  it  in 
less  than  a  day  and  a  half. 

Yet,  in  spite  of  all  these  disadvantages,  the  district  is 
not  without  its  interest  and  its  beauty.  A  writer  in  the 
"Calcutta  Review"  endeavours  to  coujure  up  a  feeling  of 
admiration  for  a  B4karganj  river,  by  suggesting  that  its 
muddy  waters  have  come  down  from  the  magnificent 
valleys  of  the  Himalayas ;  but  I  am  afraid  that  this  is 
an  idea  which  will  not  readily  come  home  to  men's 
bosoms,  at  least  except  of  that  small  minority  which  has 
seen  Gangotri,  &c.  I  would  rest  the  claims  of  Bdkar- 
ganj  to  the  possession  of  some  beauty  and  interest  on 
more  tangible  and  more  human  grounds,  and  would 
especially  insist  on  the  greenness  and  freshness  which 
characterise  its  scenery.  There  is  at  least  nothing  arid 
or  barren  about  the  Bakarganj  landscape ;  and  one  who 
has  seen  the  weary  plains  of  Cawnpore  or  Delhi  must,  I 
think,  turn  with  delight  and  refreshment  to  the  waving 
palm-trees,  the  wide  sheets  of  green  rice  spreading  with- 
out let  or  hindrance  of  hedge  or  wall  almost  as  far  as  the 
horizon,  and  the  full  and  flowing  rivers,  which  meet  the 
eye  in  Eastern  Bengal.  The  Mahomedans  called  Bengal 
the  Paradise  of  countries ;  the  Englishman,  panting  in 
the  heat,  and  longing  for  a  sight  of  something  more 
inspiriting  than  a  uniform  plain,  is  inclined  to  question 


PHYSICAL  FEATtlRES.  7 

the  justice  of  tlie  epitliet.  But  tliere  is  a  sense  in  wliicli 
it  is  justifiable,  and  tliat  too  one  wliicli  is  perliaps  higher 
than  any  mere  sentimental  feeling  for  fine  scenery  can 
he.  As  Macaulay  teaches  us,  the  love  of  rocks  and  moun- 
tains is  a  product  of  civilisation  ;  so  that  we  may  utter 
the  paradox,  that  the  love  of  nature  is  an  artificial  taste. 
But  no  aj)prenticeship,  and  no  study  of  poets  and 
painters,  are  required  for  the  admiration  of  a  field  of 
standing  corn,  or  of  a  wide  plain  of  rice.  Such  things 
appeal  to  our  sympathies  as  men,  and  are  lovely,  as  the 
face  of  a  friend  may  he  dear  to  us,  not  because  of  its 
mere  beauty,  but  because  of  its  associations.  If  we  look 
at  the  homesteads  of  the  Bakarganj  peasantry,  standing 
like  "moated  granges"  embowered  in  bamboos,  jdh 
fruit  and  plantain  trees,  tamarinds  and  palms,  and  sur- 
rounded by  luxuriant  rice-fields,  we  cannot  help  feeling 
that  the  inhabitants  enjoy  a  considerable  amount  of 
physical  wellbeing,  and  that  they  are  just  objects  of 
envy  to  the  residents  of  other  countries.  The  general 
character  of  Bakarganj  scenery  is  that  of  open  plains, 
called  hholas  (opens),  of  various  sizes,  separated  from 
each  other  by  ribands  of  fruit-trees,  and  traversed  by 
numerous  watercourses.  The  ribands  represent  the  vil- 
lages, the  houses  being  always  scattered  and  shrouded 
in  trees.  There  are  hardly  any  towns  in  Bakarganj,  and 
every  house  in  it  has  the  appearance  of  a  detached  villa, 
and  is,  with  its  orchard,  a  sort  of  rus  in  iirhe.  The 
houses  are  literally  "moated  granges,"  for  every  ryot's 
house  in  Bakarganj  is  surrounded  by  a  trench,  the  earth 
from  which  is  used  for  raising  the  foundation  of  the 
homestead  and  the  garden-ground.  With  the  same 
object,  it  is  common  to  dig  a  tank  wheiiever  a  home- 
stead is  made.  The  lines  of  villages  are  like  living 
walls,  the  bricks  and  lime  being  replaced  by  tree-stems 


8  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ, 

and  green  leaves  ;  and  when  the  sunliglit  falls  on  tliem, 
or  tliey  are  seen  in  the  calm  moonliglit,  the  effect  is  very 
beautiful. 

Kivcrs  are  always  objects  of  interest  in  a  landscape, 
and  though  those  of  Bakarganj  are  wanting  in  the  pic- 
turesqueness  of  mountain  streams,  yet  some  of  them  are 
noble  bodies  of  water,  and  their  banks  are  often  well- 
wooded  and  pleasant  to  the  eye.  There  is,  perhaps,  not 
a  more  graceful  sight  in  nature  than  a  group  of  areca 
palms  standing  on  the  bank  of  a  river.  The  spreading 
banyan,  the  sacred  fig  with  its  wealth  of  acuminated 
leaves,  the  gdh,  conspicuous  by  its  somewhat  dome- 
shaj^ed  habit,  and  its  massive,  dark-green  foliage,  and 
the  clumps  of  feathery  bamboos,  have  all  their  at- 
traction ;  but  perhaps  the  most  beautiful  tree  is  the 
tamarind,  which  often  attains  a  large  size,  and  has  a 
peculiarly  elegant  appearance,  from  its  pinnated  leaves 
and  its  air  of  ease  and  freedom.  The  branches  are 
long  and  drooping,  and  fall  about  the  stem  with  the 
luxuriant  and  unstudied  grace  of  a  woman's  hair  escaped 
from  a  fillet.  The  banks  of  some  of  the  smaller  rivers 
are  exceedingly  pretty.  For  example,  the  khdl  at 
Eahamatpur,  commonly  ealled  the  Rajah's  Moat  (from 
a  tradition  that  it  was  dug  as  an  entrenchment  for 
the  palace  at  Madhabpasha),  is  very  picturesque,  both 
banks  being  richly  clothed  with  fruit-trees,  flowering 
creepers,  &c. 

The  rivers  frequently  present  an  animated  appearance 
from  the  number  of  boats  which  traverse  them,  and 
there  is  something  cheering  and  inspiriting  in  the  sight 
of  a  fleet  of  white-sailed  boats  trooping  through  a  long 
reach  of  one  of  the  larger  rivers.  Such  a  sight  is 
often  seen  to  great  advantage  in  the  cold  weather  at 
Barisal,  when  boats  of  many  shapes  and  districts  come 


PHYSICAL  FEATURES.  9 

sailing  down  under  tlic  north  wind,  and  sweep  past 
the  town  on  their  way  to  Bakarganj  and  other  rice- 
marts.  The  traffic  on  the  rivers  is  no  doubt  very 
large,  but  their  tidal  nature  may  sometimes  make  it 
appear  greater  than  it  really  is.  Boatmen  are  very 
gregarious  in  their  habits,  and  like  to  keep  near  other 
boats  as  much  as  possible.  This  is  partly  from  a  desire 
for  companionship,  and  partly  is  a  reminiscence  of  the 
times  when  it  was  not  safe  to  travel  alone  in  Bilkarganj 
on  account  of  the  dacoits ;  but  independently  of  this, 
it  is  easy  to  see  that  if  rivers  are  tidal,  and  boatmen 
have  to  trust  chiefly  to  their  oars  and  towing-ropes, 
the  boats  must  keep  a  good  deal  together.  Cargo-boats 
never  row  against  the  tide,  and  though  they  will  tow 
against  it,  the  river-banks  are  not  always,  or  even 
generally,  provided  with  towing-paths ;  so  that  unless 
there  is  a  particular  reason  for  hurry,  they  come  to  a 
halt  with  the  turn  of  the  tide.  It  is  not  always  the 
same  tide  which  is  required  throughout  a  single  journey. 
Boat-travelling  is  very  circuitous,  and  the  tides  run  up 
and  down  the  rivers  and  khals  in  a  very  perplexing 
manner.  Thus  the  journey  from  Barisal  to  Calcutta 
is  far  from  being  an  ebb  journey  throughout.  It  is  ebl) 
as  far  as  Jhalukatti,  then  flood,  then  ebb  again  ;  and 
there  are  one  or  two  changes  before  the  Baleshwar  is 
reached  and  ascended  with  the  flood.  A  boat  arriving 
at  a  place  where  a  change  of  tide  is  required,  before 
the  tide  which  has  brought  it  has  run  out,  moors  or 
casts  anchor,  and  thus  gives  time  to  other  boats  to  come 
up.  Hence  the  sight  so  frequently  seen  of  a  crowd  of 
boats  anchored  at  some  turn  of  the  stream.  As  soon 
as  the  required  tide  commences  they  set  ofl"  together, 
and  the  river  appears  to  be  covered  with  boats ;  but  if 
we  were  to  return   to   the  place   in  another   hour,    we 


lo  DISTRICT  OF  BAkARGANJ. 

might  perhaps  not  see  a  single  boat.  The  river  now 
appears  deserted,  and  will  remain  so  till  a  tiu-n  of  the 
tide  bring  a  fleet  of  boats  from  the  opposite  direction. 

II.    CLIMATE. 

The  climate  of  Barisal,  the  headquarters  of  Bakar- 
ganj,  and  of  most  of  the  cultivated  tracts,  may  be  said 
to  be  good.  The  temperature  is  decidedly  lower  than 
that  of  most  places  in  Bengal.  In  a  report  for  1871, 
the  Civil  Surgeon  (Dr  Bensley)  writes  as  follows : 
"The  climate  of  Barisdl,  though  cool,  is  very  relaxing, 
and  recovery  from  any  severe  disease  is  extremely 
tedious,  often  necessitating  a  change.  The  past  year 
(1871)  has  been  remarkably  cool;  the  average  tem- 
perature during  the  three  seasons  was  67"835°  in  the 
cold  season,  75'932°  in  the  hot  season,  and  78*895°  in 
the  rainy  season.  The  rainfall,  as  measured  by  the 
S-andard  gauge,  was  89*41,  being  15*41  in  excess  of 
the  previous  year.  The  prevailing  winds  are  south- 
west and  north-west — the  former  about  eight  months 
of  the  year;  it  is  generally  cool  and  refreshing.-^ 
Barisal,  being  about  fifty  miles  from  the  bay,  and 
having  a  large  river,  the  wind  is  thereby  further 
cooled  and  purified  before  reaching  the  town.  Our 
north  -  west  is  not  similarly  protected,  and  during 
the  prevailing  winds  from  that  quarter,  the  town 
sufi'ers  considerably  from  malarious  diseases."  The 
months  of  ^larch,  April,  and  May,  which  are  usually 
so  hot  in  Calcutta  and  in  AVestern  Bengal,  are  com- 
paratively cool  in  this  district.  The  rains  com- 
monly set  in  about  the  middle  of  June,  and  continue 

^  It  is  observable  that  the  breeze  generally  comes  in  with,  the  tide,  and 
dies  away  with  the  ebb. 


PHYSICAL  FEATURES.  ii 

into  October.  Tlie  ^YO^st  time  of  the  3"ear,  and  also  the 
hottest,  is  the  period  between  the  rains  and  the  setting 
in  of  the  cokl  weather.  The  snn  is  exceedingly  power- 
ful in  the  month  of  October,  and  even  up  to  the  middle 
of  November.  Perhaps  the  most  disagreeable  period  of 
the  whole  year  is  that  from  the  15th  of  October  to  the 
1 5th  of  November.  This  is  the  time  of  sudden  changes 
of  temperature  —  sardi  garmi  (cold  and  hot),  as  the 
natives  call  it — and  the  result  is  a  large  amount  of  fever. 
The  dampness  and  steaminess  of  the  climate  also  malcc 
themselves  felt  most  at  this  time.  An  officer  (Mr  Wintle) 
describing  to  Government,  in  1801,  the  climate  of  the 
station  of  Bakarganj,  writes,  "  The  atmosphere  de- 
presses the  spirits  in  such  a  manner  as  to  cause  a  sensa- 
tion as  if  a  person  was  only  half  alive."  The  cold 
weather  is  pleasant,  but  it  is  not  so  bracing  as  that  of 
the  more  northern  districts,  and  does  not  last  more  than 
four  months.  It  is  said  that  the  proximity  of  Bakar- 
ganj to  the  sea  prevents  its  climate  from  ever  being  very 
cold.  The  general  complaint  against  it  is  of  its  damp- 
ness. This  depresses  vitality,  and  is  also  most  injurious 
to  furniture,  books,  &c.  It  is  impossible  to  keep  a 
house  dry  unless  it  is  built  on  arches.  ]\Iany  of  the 
native  government  officials  and  professional  men,  and 
even  many  of  the  traders,  belong  to  other  districts, 
especially  to  Dacca.  They  complain  of  the  salt  air  (Jona 
hoiva)  of  Bdkarganj,  and  say  that  it  gives  them  fever 
and  indigestion.  The  healthiest  place  in  the  district 
used  to  be  Mddaripl^n-,  and  police  constables  and  others 
used  to  be  transferred  there  when  in  bad  health.  Md- 
daripiir  is  now  in  Faridpur,  and  probably  the  most 
healthy  parts  of  the  present  district  are  the  portions  of 
Gournadi  thana  which  face  the  Arial  Khan,  and  the 
islands  in  the  estuary  of  the  Meghna.     Dakhin   Shah- 


12  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

bazpiir  and  its  chief  town,  Daulat  Klian,  seem  to  be 
liealtliy,  except  when,  as  happened  in  May  1869,  a 
cyclone  passes  over  the  isLand  and  destroys  the  tanks. 
Cholera  is  endemic  in  the  district,  usually  occurring  in 
the  beginning  of  November,  and  again  in  April  and 
May  ;  for  several  years,  however,  it  has  not  been  very 
severe.  Fever  and  dysentery  aj)pear  to  be  the  most 
deadly  diseases.  Dyspepsia,  spleen,  and  rheumatism 
are  common.  As  a  remedy  for  rheumatism  many  of 
the  inhabitants  are  in  the  habit  of  keeping  an  open 
issue  (seton)  in  the  arm  or  leg.  Dyspepsia  often 
assumes  the  form  called  pUslml.  Dysentery  and  diar- 
rhoea prevail  throughout  the  year,  the  mortality  being 
greatest  at  the  termination  of  the  rains,  and  during  the 
cold  season.  During  September  and  October  a  slight 
scorbutic  tendency  is  often  observed,  owing  to  the 
absence  of  sufficient  fresh  vegetables,  the  country  being 
at  the  time  more  or  less  under  water  [vide  Beusley's 
Report  for  1871).  Cutaneous  diseases — ringworm,  itch, 
&c. —  are  very  common.  The  first  is  seen  especially 
among  boatmen  and  others  who  work  in  water,  the 
soles  of  their  feet  beinq;  often  drilled  with  holes  like  a 
sponge. 

In  1860  there  was  a  great  mortality  from  fever  in 
the  islands  of  Kali,  Kdzal,  &c.,  and  in  1869  there  was 
a  similar  but  more  widely-spread  epidemic  of  fever  in 
Dakhin  Shahbazpur.  It  is  noteworthy  that  the  Barisal 
jail  has  always  been  unhealthy.  The  same  was  true  of 
the  old  jail  at  Bakarganj,  and  Mr  Wintle  writes  (7tli 
September  1801)  that  242  prisoners  had  died  within 
the  past  twelve  months. 

The  only  meteorological  observations  made  in  the 
district  are  those  of  the  rainfall.  There  are  four  rain- 
gauges — viz.,  one  at  Barisal,  and  one  at  each  of  the  three 


PHYSICAL  FEATURES. 


13 


siibdivisional  stations.     The  fullowino;  table  shows  the 
raiufuU  for  three  years  : — 


Jan.  1 

to 
Dec.  31. 

Barisiil. 

Teroz- 
pur. 

Danlat 
Khan. 

Inches. 

Inches. 

Inches. 

1871 

93-04 

92-45 

113-26 

1872 

82-14 

62-53 

81-49 

1873 

Gl-71 

57-18 

101-08 

I'atuyalihali. 


Inches. 
No  observation. 

90-73  1 

91-73 


In  connection  with  the  subject  of  climate  it  is  neces- 
sary to  notice  the  curious  phenomenon  called  the  Barisal 
guns.  This  is  a  sound,  resembling  the  discharge  of 
cannon,  which  is  heard  in  Bilkarganj  and  part  of  Dacca, 
Faridpur,  and  Jessore  at  the  beginning  of  the  rains — 
tliat  is,  in  May  and  June.  At  Barisal  the  sound  comes 
from  the  south  and  south-west,  and  is  generally  heard 
in  a  south  wind  and  before  rain.  It  is  sometimes  heard 
only  for  a  minute  or  two ;  sometimes  it  continues  for 
one  or  two  hours,  at  intervals  of  two  or  three  minutes 
between  each  discharge.  It  seems  to  be  heard  usually 
in  the  evening  and  at  night,  but  perhaps  this  is  only 
because  the  attention  is  more  drawn  to  it  when  there 
are  fewer  other  noises.  It  has  been  su]3posed  by  some 
that  the  sounds  are  merely  those  of  guns  fired  at  mar- 
riages ;  by  others,  that  they  are  caused  by  the  falling 
in  of  the  river-banks.  But  they  are  heard  away  to  the 
south,  among  the  Sundarbans,  where  there  are  no  mar- 
riages, and  where  there  are  no  high  river-banks  to  fall 
in.  They  are  heard  down  at  Kiikri  Mukri,  the  most 
southerly  island  in  the  district,  and  tlie  Mugs  there 
assured  me  that  they  are  distinct  from  the  noise  of 
the  breakers  or  of  the  tide  coming  in.      The  natives 


1  From  Uie  13lh  of  Mav  1872. 


14  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

poetically  account  for  the  sound  by  saying  that  it  is 
caused  by  the  opening  and  shutting  of  Ravan's  gates 
in  the  island  of  Lanka  (Ceylon).  This  fiction  is  valu- 
able, in  so  far  as  it  shows  that  the  sound  generally  comes 
from  the  south.  The  Mahomedans  say  that  it  is  caused 
by  the  firing  of  cannon  to  announce  the  approach  of 
their  Imam.  It  is  not  altogether  impossible  that  it 
originates  in  that  curious  submarine  depression  in  front 
of  Jessore  and  Bakarganj,  which  is  known  by  the  name 
of  the  Swatch  of  No  Ground.^ 


III.    CYCLONES. 

The  most  destructive  hurricane  which  has  ever  occurred 
in  the  district  of  Bdkarganj  was  that  which  began  on 
the  6th  of  June  1822,  and  lasted  till  the  9th  idem.  (For 
an  account  of  its  ravages  see  Chapter  XIII.)  On  the 
1st  of  November  1867  there  was  a  cyclone  which  in- 
jured the  crops  in  the  eastern  part  of  the  district, 
especially  in  the  island  of  Dakhin  Shahb^zpur,  then 
under  Noakhdli.  The  next  cyclone  occurred  on  the  16tli 
of  May  1869.  It  did  much  damage  to  the  roads  and 
villages  generally,  and  carried  away  the  station  road  on 
the  east  side  of  Barisdl.  Many  cattle  were  drowned, 
and  the  owsh  crop  was  injured.  The  cyclone  was  fol- 
lowed on  the  8th,  9th,  and  lOtli  of  the  next  month  by 
an  inundation,  which  did  great  damage  in  Dakhin 
Shahbdzpiir,  as  it  destroyed  most  of  the  fresh-water 
tanks.      In    consequence,    probably,   of  the  scarcity  of 

^  Vol.  liii.  of  the  Philosopliical  Transactions  for  1763  contains  two  inter- 
esting accounts  of  the  Chittagong  eartliquake  of  2d  April  1762.  In  that 
given  by  Mr  Gulston  is  mentioned  the  curious  circumstance  that  "  at  the 
time  of  the  first  shake  great  explosions  were  heard  like  the  noise  of  cannons, 
of  which  Mr  Plaisted  and  others  counted  fifteen." 


PHYSICAL  FEATURES.  15 

good  drinking  water,  an  epidemic  of  fever  broke  out 
ill  the  iskxnd,  whicli  is  said  to  have  decinfiated  the 
population. 

IV.  TIDES. 

The  subject  of  the  tides  in  the  Meghnais  very  interest- 
ing, but  I  am  not  competent  to  discuss  it,  and  can  only 
state  a  few  facts  concerning  it.  There  are  two  tides  in 
its  estuary,  which  are  known  by  the  names  of  the 
Chittagong  and  the  Daula  tides.  The  Chittagong  tide 
passes  up  between  Sandwip  and  the  Chittagong  coast, 
turns  west,  round  the  north  of  Sandwip,  and  then  flows 
south  along  the  east  coast  of  Dakhin  Shahbdzpur.  It 
meets  the  Daula  tide  about  half-way  down  the  latter 
island,  overpowers  it,  and  drives  it  back.  The  Daula 
tide  flows  up  between  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir  and  Hattia, 
coming  in  about  three-quarters  of  an  hour  before  the 
Chittagong  tide.  Its  waters  are  comparatively  fresh, 
so  that  inundations  by  it  are  much  less  dreaded  by  the 
peasantry  than  those  of  the  Chittagong  tide.  The  bore 
occurs  at  new  and  full  moon.  It  is  only  felt  in  shallow 
water,  where  it  rushes  up  in  a  white  wall,  said  to  be 
twenty  or  thirty  feet  in  height.  Boatmen  do  not  like 
to  put  out  on  the  days  of  the  bore,  and  especially  object 
to  setting  out  with  the  ebb,  lest  they  should  ground  on 
a  char,  and  there  be  overtaken  by  it.  It  is  called  the 
hdn,  also  the  s/iar,  both  words,  in  Bengali,  signifying 
arrow. 

V.  mVEES. 

The  rivers  of  Bdkarganj  are  very  numerous,  but  all 
draw  their  waters,  directly  or  indirectly,  from  the  Ganges 
or  the  Meghna.     Three  great  rivers  flow  through  or  past 


1 6  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

the  district  in  a  southerly  direction — viz.,  the  Meghna, 
the  Arial  Khan,  and  the  Baleshwar. 

1.  The  Meghna  flows  down  the  east  side  of  Bdkarganj, 
and  opens  out  into  an  estuary  at  the  head  of  the  island 
of  Dakhin  Shahbdzpilr.  At  the  north-east  boundary  of 
the  district,  the  Meghna  many  years  ago  broke  through 
to  the  west^vard  by  an  opening  called  the  Naya 
Bhangni  or  New  Opening.  Tradition  says  that  the 
new  channel  was  formed  in  a  sinMe  nioht.  It  is  not 
knowm  in  what  year  this  took  j^lace,  but  it  must  have 
been  less  than  a  century  ago,  for  the  passage  is  not 
marked  in  Kennel's  map.  In  a  report  by  Babu  Dinu 
Bandhu  Maulik,  a  Deputy-Collector,  it  is  stated  that  the 
channel  was  formed  in  b.s.  1200  (a.d.  1793).  It  is 
also  called  the  Harinathpiir  river,  and  is  the  channel 
south  of  Haturia.^  In  successive  parts  of  its  course  the 
Meghna  is  called  the  Satbaria,  the  Ilsa  (i.e.,  Hilsa),  and 
the  Tltulia.' 

2.  The  Arial  Khan  is  a  branch  of  the  Ganges  or  Padma. 
It  enters  the  district  east  of  Palardi  (the  site  of  the 
Gournacli  police  station),  and  pursues  a  south-easterly 
course  till  it  joins  the  estuary  of  the  Meghna,  by  the 
Mdskdtta  and  Kalinga  channels.  In  the  lower  part  of 
its  course  it  is  called  the  Dakaitia  and  the  Jahapiir 
river.  An  offshoot  from  the  Arial  Khan  flows  past 
Barisdl,  and  is  therefore  called  the  Barisdl  river. 

1  The  name  Naj^a  Bhangni  is  not  given  to  the  Muladi  river,  although  it 
is  marked  as  such  in  the  survey  map. 

2  Wilford,  Asiatic  Researches,  vol.  xiv.,  says  that  the  Meghna  is  the 
Magone  of  Megasthenes  as  cited  by  Arrian,  and  mentioned  as  one  of  the 
rivers  which  fell  into  the  Ganges.  It  is  the  Meghandd  or  Meghabahana  of 
Sanskrit  writers,  and  derives  its  name  from  megha,  a  cloxid,  in  allusion  to 
the  obscurity  of  its  origin.  This  is  in  contradistinction  to  the  Brahma- 
putra, whose  existence  of  course  is  accounted  for  by  his  being  the  son 
of  Brdhma. 


PHYSICAL  FEATURES.  17 

3.  The  Balesliwar  is  formed  l)y  the  junction  of  the 
Madhamati  and  the  Saldaha.  It  flows  past  the  west 
side  of  Bakarganj,  is  joined,  at  some  distance  below 
Perozpiir,  by  the  Kacha,  and  enters  the  sea  under  the 
name  of  the  Harini^hatta. 

There  is  considerable  difficulty  in  enumerating  the 
Bakarganj  rivers,  on  account  of  their  frequent  change 
of  name.  At  every  ten  miles  of  its  course,  or  at  an  even 
less  interval,  the  name  of  a  river  is  generally  changed. 
The  names,  too,  are  commonly  insignificant,  and  are 
merely  those  of  the  principal  bazilrs  or  villages  on  the 
bank.  Thus  we  have  the  Barisdl  river,  the  Nalchiti 
river,  and  the  Bdkarganj  river.  This  frequent  change  of 
name  is  common  enough  throughout  East  Bengal,  but 
it  is  especially  marbed  in  Bakarganj,  probably  because 
there  are  more  rivers  in  it  than  in  any  other  district, 
and  because  its  rivers  have  less  a2:)pearance  of  con- 
tinuity— are,  in  short,  less  like  rivers  than  those  of 
districts  farther  from  the  sea.  In  many  places  the  so- 
called  rivers  are  rather  marine  creeks  or  arms  of  the 
sea.  All  of  them  are  tidal,  and  it  is  only  in  the  height 
of  the  rains  that  their  waters  do  not  turn  with  the  tide. 
In  March  and  April  the  waters  of  most  of  the  rivers 
south  of  Barisal  are  salt,  or  at  least  brackish. 

After  the  three  already  mentioned,  the  following  are 
the  principal  rivers  of  Bdkarganj  : — 

4.  The  Baristd  river  flows  west  by  Nalchiti  and 
Jhalukatti.  Part  of  its  waters  then  go  down  by  the 
Dhansiddhi  into  the  Kaukhali  and  Kacha  rivers.  An- 
other part  flows  into  the  Bishkhali.  About  three  miles 
below  Barisal  a  branch  of  the  Barisdl  river  flows  south- 
ward by  Eanihat  and  Bakarganj,  under  the  name  of  the 
Kliairabad  river. 

5.  The  Pandab,  in  the  east  of  Bakarganj  thana. 


1 8  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

6.  The  Kdrkhami,  in  Bakarganj  and  Baufal. 

7.  The  Dhulia,  in  the  north  of  Baufal  thana. 

8.  The  Khairabdd.     (See  No.  4.) 

9.  The  Nohalia,  in  Bdkarganj  and  the  Patuyakhdli 
subdivision.  In  the  lower  part  of  its  course  it  is  com- 
monly called  the  Galachipa,  on  account  of  its  flowing 
past  the  Galachipa  bazar  and  thana. 

10.  The  Bishkhdli  is  a  very  large  river,  flowing  past 
Niamati  and  Kala  Megha,  east  of  and  parallel  to  the 
Baleshwar  and  Harino-hdttd,. 

O 

11.  The  Bighai  is  in  Mirzaganj  and  Giilsakhali,  and 
is  probably  the  widest  river  in  the  district. 

12.  The  Andarmanick,  a  large  and  wide  river  in  the 
Giilsakhdli  thana. 

13.  The  Barishar,  which  may  be  considered  a  con- 
tinuation of  the  Bighai. 

14.  The  Kacha  is  formed  partly  by  the  Kaukhdli  river 
and  partly  by  the  Kdliganga,  Avliich  issues  from  the 
swamps  of  the  Kotwalipara  and  Sarupkdtti  thanas.  It 
is  a  very  deep  river,  and  joins  the  Baleshwar  below 
Perozpur. 

15.  The  Sdpleza  (snake's  tail),  in  Matbdria  thana,  the 
Agunmiikha,  the  Kazal,  between  the  island  of  Kazal 
and  the  mainland,  the  Darchira  (destroyer  of  oars),  be- 
tween Big  and  Little  Baisdia,  and  several  others,  are 
rather  arms  of  the  sea  than  rivers. 

Nearly  all  the  above-named  rivers  have  a  southerly 
course.  The  cross-rivers  which  connect  them,  and  which 
generally  flow  in  an  easterly  or  westerly  direction,  are 
commonly  called  dones.  The  word  doii  is  applied 
rather  loosely,  but  it  generally  means  a  channel  which 
is  larger  than  a  khal,  but  not  sufliciently  wide  or  long  to 
deserve  the  name  of  river.  It  is  also  distinguished  from 
a  khdl  or  river  by  the  fact  of  its  having  no  source,  pro- 


PHYSICAL  FEATURES.  19 

pcrly  so  called.     It  generally  lias  two  mouths,  one  at 

each  end  of  its  course,  and  both  may  be  equally  large. 

Perhaps   this   characteristic  may  be  the  origin  of  the 

name  don,  which  seems  to  have  its  root  in  the  Bengali 

word  for  two. 
The  following  are  the  principal  doncs  : — • 
a.  The  Bishkhdli,  which  connects  the  Bishkhdli  river 

(at  Niamati)  and  the  Khairdbdd  river  (near  Kotarhat). 
h.  The  Amua  don,  in  Matbilria  thana,  connects  the 

Bishkhilli  and  the  Baleshwar  rivers. 

c.  The  Muradia  don  begins  at  Kadamtolli  Hflt,  in  the 
Bdkarganj  thana,  and  joins  the  Nohalia,  north-east  of 
Patuyakhdli.     It  is  the  chord  to  a  loop  of  the  Nohalia, 

d.  The  Damuda  connects  the  Kacha  and  the  Balesh- 
war, and  is  on  the  steamer  route  from  Calcutta  to 
Barisdl. 

e.  The  Patuyakhdli,  between  the  Nohalia  and  the 
Bighai. 

f.  The  Aila,  and  its  continuation,  the  Khak  don,  are 
deep  and  wide,  and  connect  the  Bighai  and  the  Bish- 
khdli rivers. 

g.  The  Bagi,  between  the  Andarmanick  and  the  Aila 
rivers. 

h.  The  Gajalia,  between  the  Bishkhdli  and  the  Kauk- 
hdli.  It  is  the  usual  steamer  route,  being  preferred  now 
to  the  Dhansiddhi. 

i.  The  Kalijiri  is  sometimes  called  a  river.  In  the 
upper  part  of  its  course  it  is  called  the  Sugandha,  or  the 
Fragrant,  in  allusion  to  the  tradition  that  when  the  god- 
dess Kali  was  cut  in  pieces  her  nose  fell  into  it. 

It  would  be  an  endless  task  to  enumerate  all  the  khdls 
of  Bdkarganj.  Many  of  them  exist  only  during  the 
rains,  when  every  village  has  its  khdl,  and  often  two  or 
three.      The   following   are    the   most   important,    not 


2  0  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

on  account  of  their  size  or  length,  but  for  their  use- 
fulness : — 

(l.)  The  Jobkhali  khal,  on  the  Barisdl  river. 

(2.)  The  Jhalukdtti  khal,  on  the  same  river.  These 
two  khdls  are  important  on  account  of  their  shortening 
the  distance  to  Calcutta.  The  Jhalukdtti  was  widened 
and  deepened  by  the  Public  Works  Department  some 
years  ago,  at  a  cost  of  11,000  or  12,000  rupees. 

(3.)  The  Lakutia  khdl  flows  through  the  town  of 
Barisdl,  where  it  is  generally  called  the  Jail  khal.  It  is 
about  six  miles  long,  and  shortens  the  journey  to  Dacca 
and  the  north  of  the  district.  It  was  originally  made  in 
a  great  measure  by  the  liberality  of  the  Lakutia  zamin- 
dar,  Babu  Eaj  Chandra  Kai.  The  Eoad  Committee  has 
since  spent  several  thousand  rupees  in  deepening  it. 

(4.)   The  Agarpur  khdl.       |    ,^^^^^^  ^^^^^  ^^^  .^  ^^^^ 

(5.)   The  Shikai^mr  khdl.      V       ^^^^^^  ^^  ^^^^  ^^.^^^.^^^ 

(6.)  The  Turki  khal.  J 

(7.)  The  Srimantapur  khdl,  also  called  the  Sibpiir 
khal,  flows  past  Bdkarganj  and  Sibpur. 

(8.)  The  Eajar  Ber,  at  Rahamat23ur,  so  called  because 
of  a  tradition  that  the  Rajah  of  Chandradwip  had  it  cut 
as  a  moat  to  his  palace  at  Madhabpd,sha. 

(9.)  The  Bhola  khal,  in  Dakhin  Shahbdzpur,  extends 
across  the  island,  and  has  been  widened  and  deepened 
at  a  considerable  expense. 

Many  of  the  khdls  and  dones  have  a  double  tide — 
that  is,  the  tide  flows  in  from  each  end  and  meets  in 
the  centre.  This  makes  them  apt  to  silt  up.  All  the 
rivers  and  khdls  wear  away  their  banks,  and  often  do 
much  damage  to  the  adjacent  lands ;  but  the  most 
destructive  in  this  respect  are  the  Arial  Khan  and  the 
Meghna.  They  often  change  their  course,  and  carry 
away  great  tracts  of  country.       It    is   true    that  they 


PHYSICAL  FEATURES.  21 

restore  the  land  farther  down  ;  but  this  sehlom  com- 
pensates the  proprietor,  especially  as  the  new  formations 
remain  for  many  years  as  barren  sandbanks.  At  the 
present  time  the  Ilsa  —  i.e.,  the  Meglnia — is  cutting 
away  its  west  bank  very  rapidly  in  thana  Mendiganj, 
and  the  estuary  of  the  Meghna  is  doing  the  same  with 
the  east  side  of  Dakhin  Shahliazpur.  The  Arial  Khan 
has  for  many  years  been  diluviating  its  east  bank,  and 
throwing  up  large  chars  at  Kalkini  and  Gournadi.  The 
old  village  of  Gournadi,  which  was  the  seat  of  a  police 
station,  has  been  altogether  washed  away,  and  the 
station  is  now  at  Palardi.  New  chars  have,  however, 
now  formed  on  part  of  the  old  site  of  Gournadi  village 
and  east  of  Palardi.  Close  to  the  Palardi  police 
station  there  is  a  curious  mark  of  the  changes  which 
have  taken  place.  This  is  the  abutment  of  an  old 
bridge,  which  must  have  been  made  at  a  time  when 
there  was  much  country  to.  the  east  of  the  police  station. 
The  river  came  and  swept  away  the  country  to  the 
eastward  and  the  bridge  which  at  that  time  spanned 
a  narrow  khdl.  Palardi  char  has  now  formed  opposite 
to  the  remains  of  the  bridge,  and  the  passage  has 
become  a  khal  once  more.  Three  or  four  years  ago 
the  Arial  Khan  cut  across  the  long  neck  of  land  at 
Kewaria,  east  of  Palardi,  and  the  appearance  of  the 
country  is  now  in  consequence  very  different  from  that 
represented  in  the  survey  map.  There  is  something 
very  desolate  in  the  appearance  of  the  country  near 
these  large  rivers,  when  the  force  of  the  stream  begins 
to  be  directed  against  any  particular  tract.  The 
peasants  make  haste  to  remove  their  houses,  and  to 
cut  down  their  groves  of  betel  and  cocoa  nut  trees ;  as 
the  diluviation  advances,  nothing  is  to  be  seen  near 
the  bank  but  stumps  of  trees,  the  earthen  foundations 


2  2  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

of  bouses,  and  the  broken  walls  of  tanks.  The  irrup- 
tion of  the  Meglina  into  the  tanks  is  perhaps  the  most 
melancholy  of  such  sights  ;  for  Dakhin  Shahbd,zp\ir  and 
Hattia  have  many  large  tanks,  which  must  have  been 
constructed  at  much  expense  and  labour.  They  are 
surrounded  by  high  walls  of  earth  in  order  to  keep  out 
the  salt  water,  and  when  a  breach  is  made  in  them 
they  become  useless,  and  whole  villages  suffer  in  con- 
sequence. AVhen  the  peasants  are  thus  driven  away 
by  the  rivers,  they  sometimes  merely  move  farther 
inland  ;  but  when  they  cannot  get  fresh  land  there, 
they  are  obliged  to  go  to  new  chars,  or  to  distant  parts 
of  the  country.  They  are  sometimes  expressively  called 
nadi-hlianga  16k — i.e.,  river-broken  people. 

Generally  it  may  be  remarked  of  Bdkarganj  rivers, 
that  they  are  deep  on  one  side  and  shallow  on  the 
other.  It  also  seldom  occurs  that  they  have  high 
banks  on  both  sides.  The  most  common  case  is  that 
one  bank  is  high  and  wooded,  and  the  opposite  bank 
low  and  sandy.  The  high  bank  is  always  the  one 
which  the  river  is  cutting  away,  but  it  does  not  always 
remain  on  the  same  side  of  the  river.  On  the  con- 
trary, the  general  appearance  is  a  high  bank  on,  say, 
the  right  side,  and  a  char  on  the  left ;  then  in  the  reach 
lower  down  a  high  bank  on  the  left  side,  and  a  char 
on  the  right.  The  high  bank  of  a  river  is  commonly 
higher  than  the  country  farther  inland,  hence  these 
river-banks  are  often  useful  as  roads  and  towing-^^aths. 
They  are  also  frequently  the  sites  of  villages,  and  are 
used  for  the  cultivation  of  crops  which  require  high 
land,  such  as  sugar-cane,  pan,  betel-nut,  &c.  The 
volume  of  water  brought  down  by  the  Ganges  and 
Meghna  must  be  very  great ;  perhaps  nothing  can  give 


PHYSICAL  FEATURES.  23 

a  clearer  idea  of  this  than  the  fact  that  in  October, 
and  even,  I  believe,  up  to  December,  the  water  sur- 
rounding Kiikri  Miikri  is  perfectly  fresh.  A  reference 
to  the  map  will  show  that  this  island  is  almost  in  the 
Bay  of  Bengal.^ 

VI.    LAKES   AND   SWAMPS. 

During  the  rains  most  of  the  country  is  a  swamp,  and 
tlie  rice-fields  do  not  dry  up  till  January  or  February. 
There  are  also  extensive  depressions,  in  which  the  water 
remains  all  the  year  round,  and  which  are  generally 
known  by  the  name  of  hils.  Of  these,  the  principal  are 
the  Jhanjhaniabil,  in  Gournadi  and  Sarupkdtti ;  Rampiir 
Chechari  bil,  in  Matbdria  ;  and  Dharandi,  Adampiir,  and 
Kala  Rajah  bils,  in  tliana  Baufal.  The  Kotwalipara  bils 
have  for  the  most  part  been  transferred  to  Faridpiir.  The 
large  bils  yield  fish  in  considerable  quantity,  and  there  is 
some  export  trade  in  this  article  from  the  Sarupkdtti  and 
Kotwalipara  bils  to  Calcutta.  They  are  also  valuable  for 
the  large  quantities  of  reeds  they  produce,  which  are 
extensively  used  in  making  mats,  and  are  also  exported. 
The  Kala  Rajah  bil  is  supposed  to  derive  its  name  from 
one  of  the  Chandradwip  Rajahs. 

Small  bils  are  common  all  over  the  district,  there 
being  one  in  almost  every  large  village.     They  are  valu- 

^  In  speaking  of  the  amount  of  soil  brought  clown  by  the  Ganges,  Lyell 
remarks  that  "  it  is  scarcely  possible  to  present  any  picture  to  the  mind 
which  will  convey  an  adequate  conception  of  the  mighty  scale  of  this 
operation,  so  tranquilly  and  almost  insensibly  carried  on  by  the  Ganges. 
It  may,  however,  be  stated  that  if  a  fleet  of  about  2000  ships,  each  freighted 
with  1400  tons  of  mud,  were  to  sail  down  the  river  every  hour  of  every 
day  and  night  for  four  months  continuously,  they  would  only  transport  to 
the  sea  a  mass  of  solid  matter  equal  to  that  borne  down  by  the  Ganges  in 
the  four  months  of  the  flood  season." — Principles  of  Geology,  p.  282. 


24  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

able  from  tlieir  yielding  reeds  and  cattle-grass,  and  also 
because  they  afford  convenient  ground  for  tlie  herding 
of  buffaloes.  Shells  abound  in  the  bils,  and  in  many 
places  are  collected  and  converted  into  lime. 

The  name  Sundarbunds,  or  more  correctly,  Sundar- 
ban,  is  said  to  derive  its  origin  from  the  sundari-tree 
[Heritiera  minor),  and  this  again  is  said  to  be  called 
sundari,  or  the  beautiful,  on  account  of  the  red  colour  of 
its  wood.  Probably  this  etymology  of  the  word  "  Sun- 
darban  "  is  correct ;  but  it  is  a  singular  fact  that  the  sun- 
dari-tree is  by  no  means  common  in  many  parts  of  the 
Bd-karganj  Sundarbans.  Thus,  in  the  island  of  Kukri 
Mukri,  which  is  covered  with  tree-jungle,  there  is  appar- 
ently not  a  single  tree  of  sundari ;  and  in  the  neighbouring 
island  of  Chopa  I  was  able  to  find  two  or  three  trees  only, 
and  these  very  young.  ^  The  prevailing  tree  in  these  and 
other  chars  is  that  called  the  kerua.  In  the  neis^hbour- 
hood  of  Chapli,  also,  the  sundari  is  not  so  common  as  the 
goma  and  other  trees.  The  Mugs,  however,  who  live 
there,  account  for  its  comparative  scarcity  by  the  greater 
demand  for  it  in  the  market.  The  area  now  covered 
by  the  Sundarbans  is  much  less  than  it  was  in  former 
years,  and  cultivation  is  still  advancing.  Many  tracts — 
such  as  Kamna-Bamna,  Aila,  and  Tushkhdli — have  been 
reclaimed,  and  now  bear  luxuriant  crops  of  rice.  Even 
now,  however,  there  are  extensive  forests  along  the 
southern  face  of  the  BdJiarganj  mainland.  The  aspect 
of  these  forest-tracts  is  by  no  means  cheerful.  The 
woods  are  dark  and  silent ;  the  trees  are  seldom  tall 

^  The  name  may  possibly  be  connected  witb  Sundavkul,  which  was  the 
old  name  of  a  tract  of  country  in  Bakarganj.  It  may  thiis  mean  "  the  forest 
of  the  river  Sunda  ; "  or  the  word  may,  after  all,  be  Sundarbund,  and  mean 
"  the  embankment  of  the  Sunda." 


PHYSICAL  FEATURES.  25 

cnoiigli  to  1)0  licandsome ;  aud  tlic  rivers  and  crocks  arc 
sullen  and  muddy,  and  suggestive  of  fevers  and  alli- 
gators/ 

1  An  interesting  article  on  the  physical  characteristics  of  Btikarganj  was 
piiblislied  by  Mr  Pellew  in  the  "  Calcutta  lleview,"  and  I  have  taken  the 
liberty  of  transferring  a  long  extract  from  it  to  my  Appendix.  This  extract 
refers  to  the  drainage  system  of  Bakarganj.  I  do  not  feel  competent  to 
discnss  the  suViject,  but  I  am  sure  that  M'hether  Mr  Pellew's  views  are 
correct  or  not,  his  remarks  are  worth  reading. 


(   26  ) 


CHAPTEE  III. 

ANTIQUITIES  AND  EARLY  HISTORY. 

There  is  not  much  to  be  said  about  tlic  antiquities  or 
the  early  history  of  Bakarganj.  It  has  always  lain 
remote  from  the  stream  of  Indian  history,  and  has  been 
happy  in  having  no  annals. 

According  to  one  tradition,  much  of  the  present  dis- 
trict was  formerly  the  bed  of  a  large  river,  called  the 
Sugandha  or  Fragrant.  This  river  threw  uj)  chars  or 
alluvial  formations  on  either  side,  the  lands  on  the  east 
receiving  the  names  of  Bakla  and  Bdkla-Chandradwip, 
and  those  on  the  west  the  name  of  Selimjlbad.  The 
name  Sugandha  is  still  preserved  under  the  shortened 
form  of  Sunda,  in  the  name  Sundarkul — i.e.,  bank  of 
the  Sunda — which  is  applied  to  a  village  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood of  Nalchiti. 

It  is  certain  that  the  general  name  for  much  of  the 
present  district  was  Bdkla,  and  that  the  territory  was 
ruled  over  by  a  Hindu  family.  This  family  was  one  of 
the  twelve  Ijliuyas  or  rulers  of  Bengal,  who  were  also 
poetically  known  as  the  twelve  suns  of  Bengal.  Its 
members  are  generally  known  by  the  name  of  Eajahs  of 
Chandradwip,  and  their  history  has  been  given  by  me 
under  that  ^jargana. 

Bdkla  is  mentioned  by  the  traveller  Kalj)h  Fitch,  who 
visited  it  in  1586.  He  says,  "  From  Chatigam,  in  Ben- 
gala,  I  came  to  Bacola,  the  king  whereof  is  a  Gentile 


ANTIQUITIES  AND  EARL  V  IIISTOR  Y.  27 

[i.e.,  Hiudu],  a  man  very  well  disposed,  aud  duliglitcth 
much  to  shoot  in  a  gun.  His  country  is  very  groat  and 
fruitful,  and  hath  store  of  rice,  much  cotton  cloth,  and 
cloth  of  silk.  The  houses  be  very  fair  and  high  builded, 
the  streets  large,  the  people  naked  except  a  little  cloth 
about  their  waist.  The  women  wear  great  store  of  silver 
hoops  about  their  necks  and  arms,  and  their  legs  are 
ringed  about  with  silver  and  copper,  and  rings  made  of 
elephants'  teeth." — Quoted  hy  Blochmann. 

This  Bacola  has  entirely  disaj^peared,  and  it  is  only 
a  conjecture  which  identifies  it  with  Kachua,  the 
ancient  seat  of  the  Chandradwip  Eajahs.  Fitch  docs 
not  mention  how  he  came  to  it  from  Chatigam — z.c, 
Chittagong — nor  is  there  any  local  tradition  of  there 
ever  havinsj  been  a  town  called  Bacola  or  Bilkla.  If  a 
town  so  large  and  flourishing  as  that  described  by  Fitch 
ever  existed  in  Bdkarganj,  it  must  have  been  washed 
away  by  the  Meghna  very  many  years  ago.  Bdkla 
was  famous  amongst  the  Hindus  as  the  seat  of  a  school 
of  pandits,  who  it  is  said  ranked  higher  than  those  of 
Nuddea.  Mr  Taylor,  in  his  history  of  Dacca,  speaks  of 
an  astrological  almanac  which  used  to  be  drawn  up  by 
the  Bdkla  pandits.  There  are  still  several  pandits  at 
Nalchira,  in  Gouruadi. 

In  the  "  Ain  i  Akbari"  (Gladwin's  translation)  there 
is  the  following  notice  of  Bakla  :  "  Sarkar  Bakla  is  upon 
the  banks  of  the  sea ;  the  fort  is  situated  among  trees. 
On  the  first  day  of  the  moon  the  water  begins  to  rise, 
and  continues  increasing  till  the  14th,  from  which  time 
to  the  end  of  the  month  it  decreases  gradually  every 
day.  In  the  twenty-ninth  year  of  the  present  reign, 
one  afternoon  at  three  o'clock,  there  was  a  terrible  in- 
undation which  deluged  the  whole  sarkar.  The  Eajah 
was  at  an  entertainment,  from  which  he  embarked  in 


28  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

a  boat;  liis  son,  Pannanand  Roy,  witli  many  people 
climbed  to  tlie  top  of  a  Hindoo  temple,  and  the  mer- 
chants betook  themselves  to  the  highlands.  It  blew  a 
hurricane,  with  thunder  and  lightning,  for  five  hours, 
during  which  time  the  sea  was  greatly  agitated.  The 
houses  and  boats  were  swallowed  up,  nothing  remaining 
but  the  Hindoo  temple  on  the  height.  Near  200,000 
living  creatures  perished  in  this  calamity." 

This  inundation  appears  to  have  taken  place  in  1583 
or  1584,  and  it  is  a  very  extraordinary  circumstance, 
that  Fitch,  who  visited  the  place  two  or  three  years 
afterwards,  says  nothing  about  it.^ 

AVe  should  have  expected  that  such  a  catastrophe 
would  have  left,  for  many  years,  conspicuous  marks  of 
its  occurrence,  and  that  the  country  would  not  after  so 
short  an  interval  have  worn  an  aspect  of  richness  and 
prosperity. 

The  next  reference  to  Bdkla  occurs  in  the  letters  of 
Nicholas  Pimenta,  who  was  a  Jesuit  priest  stationed  at 
Goa,  at  the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century.  These 
letters  are  referred  to  in  *'  Purchas's  Pilgrimage  "  (Lon- 
don, 1625),  book  V.  p.  513,  and  the  name  Bacola  occurs 
there ;  but  for  fuller  information  it  is  necessary  to  con- 
sult the  original  work.  Pimenta's  letters  were  written 
from  Goa  in  the  year  IGOO,  to  Claude  Aquaviva,  who 
was  then  general  of  the  Jesuit  Order.  There  is,  properly 
speaking,  only  one  letter,  but  it  is  a  comprehensive  one, 
describing  the  success  of  the  mission,  and  containing 

^  Professor  Bloclimann  (Asiatic  Society's  Journal  for  December  1868) 
gives  a  somewhat  different  translation  of  tliis  passage.  He  says  the 
merchants  got  upon  a  taXar  (not  highlands),  and  explains  that  a  tdlar  is 
a  wooden  house  built  on  four  pillars,  and  used  by  musicians  as  an  orchestra 
— a  navh  at-khana,  in  fact.  He  gives  1585  as  the  date  of  the  inundation — 
i.e.,  only  one  year  before  Fitch's  visit.  I  have  recurred  to  this  subject  in  the 
chapter  on  the  Sundarbans. 


ANTIQ  UITIES  AND  EARL  V  HISTOR  Y.  2  9 

extracts  from  the  letters  of  tlie  missionaries.  In  fact,  it 
is  a  missionary  report.  The  letter  was  originally  piilj- 
lished  in  Italian  at  Venice,  and  was  reprinted  at  Con- 
stance in  1603.  It  was  then  translated  into  Latin,  and 
published  at  Mayence.  The  title  of  this  edition  is  as 
follows:  "De  felici  statu  et  progressu  rei  Christianse 
in  India  Oriental!  Epistola  R.  P.  Nicolai  Pimentse  Socie- 
tatis  Jesu  ibidem  visitatoris  ad  admodum  R,.  P.  Clau- 
dium  Aquavivam  ejusdem  Societatis  Jesu  Prsepositum 
Generalem,  Calendis  Decembri  anno  mdc.  data." 

Pimenta  commences  by  giving  a  short  sketch  of  the 
history  of  Bengal,  and  states  that  the  government  of  it 
was  at  that  time  in  the  hands  of  twelve  princes  who  had 
formed  a  secret  league  among  themselves,  and  had  got  the 
better  of  the  Moghals.  He  adds  that  the  most  powerful 
of  the  twelve  were  the  lords  of  Sripur  and  Chandecan, 
but  above  all  the  Maafaddin  or  Masanddin  (?).  Perhaps 
this  is  isd  Khan  Masnad  i  Ali  of  Kliizrpiir,  described  by  Dr 
Wise  as  the  most  celebrated  of  the  twelve  bhuyas.  Nine 
of  the  twelve,  says  Pimenta,  are  Mahomedans,  and  this 
circumstance  very  much  retards  the  work  of  conversion.^ 
He  then  goes  on  to  describe  the  success  attained  by  the 
missionaries  who  were  sent  into  Bengal  in  1598  and  1599. 

These  missionaries  were  Francis  Fernandez,  Dominic 
da  Sosa,  Melchior  da  Fonseca,  and  Andrew  Bowes.  The 
first  two  left  Cochin  for  Bengal  on  3d  May  1598,  and 
the  other  two  in  the  following  year.  Fernandez  appears 
to  have  been  the  chief  of  the  four,  and  he  wrote  to  Pim- 
enta from  Sripur  on  the  22d  December  1599,^  giving 
an  account  of  the  proceedings  of  himself  and  his  com- 
rades.    They  appear  to  have  sailed  first  from  Cochin  to 

^  According  to  Du  Jarric,  the  three  Hindu  princes  were  those  of  Sripur, 
Chandecan,  and  Bacalu. 

*  There  is  also  a  letter  from  him,  dated  Sriptlr,  16th  February  1599. 


30  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

Cliittagong,  or  Porto  Grande,  as  the  Portuguese  called  it, 
and  then  to  have  gone  on  to  Diano-a.  Fernandez  writes 
as  follows  :  "  Shortly  after  our  arrival  at  Dianga,  Mel- 
chior  de  Fonseca  departed  for  Ciandcea,  in  accordance 
with  the  instructions  of  your  Reverence,  and  while  he 
was  travelling  through  Bacola,  the  Portuguese  who  lived 
there,  and  also  the  other  Christians,  being  inflamed  with 
a  desire  to  obtain  a  priest  from  whom  they  might  receive 
the  sacrament  (for  whole  years  pass  away  without  ever 
one  priest  coming),  took  care  that  he  should  be  brought 
before  the  King.  The  latter  received  the  father  gladly, 
and  honourably  entreated  him,  and  even  gave  him  a 
letter  of  authority  {JitercB  ixitentes),  which  I  here  sub- 
join. 

"  '  Ego  Rex  Bacolse  potestatem  facio  Societatis  Jesu 
patribus  hactenus  in  regna  BengalsB  admissis  et  aliis 
quotquot  veniant  ecclesias  erigendi  in  ditione  mea  uni- 
versa  et  annunciandi  veri  Dei  legem  omnesque  ad 
Christum  quotquot  potuerint  trahendi  citra  fortunarum, 
officiorum,  vel  dignitatum  quas  gerunt  detrimentum. 
Immo  omnem  honorem,  favorem,  et  benevolentiam 
deferem  illis  tanquam  subditis,  mandaboque  omnibus 
Prasfectis  et  Dominis  ut  cum  omnibus  novellis  Chris- 
tianis  idem  faciant ;  et  si  quando  ex  patribus  cognovero 
quempiam  huic  meo  mandato  non  obsecundasse  severe 
sciat  se  mulctandum.' " 

On  20th  January  1600,  Melchior  Fonseca  wrote  him- 
self from  Ciandeca,  and  gave  an  account  of  his  success. 
He  says  that  he  left  Chittagong  in  the  month  of  October, 
and  that  he  passed  through  the  kingdom  of  Bacola  at 
the  request  of  the  Commander  (II  Capitano)  and  the 
other  Portuguese,  who  for  two  years  had  been  without 
any  administration  of  the  holy  sacraments  :  ''  And  it 
appeared   to   be  by   the  disposition  of  our  Lord   that 


ANTIQ UITIES  AND  EARLY  IIISTOR V.  3 1 

when  I  was  about  to  go  to  Arracan  in  the  place  of 
Fernandez,  who  was  ill  with  fever,  I  too  should  fall 
ill,  and  should  be  transferred  to  Ciandeca ;  so  that  in 
this  journey  the  Company  gained  a  residency  in  the 
kingdom  of  Baeola.  I  had  scarcely  arrived  there,  when 
the  King  (who  is  not  more  than  eight  years  old,  Ijut 
whose  discretion  surpasses  his  age)  sent  for  me,  and 
wished  the  Portuguese  to  come  with  me.  On  entering 
the  hall,  where  he  was  waiting  for  me,  all  the  nobles 
and  captains  rose  up,  and  I,  a  poor  priest,  was  made 
by  the  King  to  sit  down  in  a  rich  seat  opposite  to  him. 
After  compliments,  he  asked  me  where  I  was  going,  and 
I  replied  that  I  was  going  to  the  King  of  Ciandeca,  who 
is  '  the  future  father-in-law  of  your  Highness  ; '  but  that 
as  it  had  pleased  the  Lord  that  I  should  pass  tlirougli 
his  kingdom,  it  had  appeared  right  to  me  to  come  and 
visit  him  and  offer  him  the  services  of  the  fathers  of  the 
Company,  trusting  that  his  Highness  would  give  permis- 
sion to  the  erection  of  churches  and  the  making  of 
Christians.  The  King  said,  '  I  desire  this  myself,  be- 
cause I  have  heard  so  much  of  your  good  qualities,'  and 
so  he  gave  me  a  letter  of  authority,  and  also  assigned 
a  maintenance  sufficient  for  two  of  us." 

Fonseca  then  told  the  Portuguese  that  Fernandez 
would  soon  come  to  receive  their  confessions,  and  that 
in  the  month  of  May  fathers  would  be  sent  to  com- 
mence a  residence.  Fonseca  goes  on  to  give  a  descrip- 
tion of  the  route  from  Baeola  to  Ciandeca,  which  I  give 
in  the   oriorinal  Italian  :    "  H  viapo-io  di  Bacolct  sin  a 

o  00 

Ciandecan  ^  il  piii  fresco,  delitioso  cli'  io  mai  vedessi,  per 
i  varii  fiumi  con  alberi  alle  rive  ch'  irrigano  il  paese,  c 
per  vedersi  da  una  parte  correre  numerose  schiave  di 
cervi,  per  1'  altra  pascere  moltitudine  di  vacchi ;  lascio 
le  campagni  spntiose  di  liso,  e  li  molti  canneti  de  caimc 


32  DISTRICT  OF  BAkARGANJ. 

mele,  gli  sciami  d'  api  per  gli  alberi,  e  li  simi  andar 
saltando  da  luio  albero  al'  altro  e  altri  particolarita  di 
grande  ricreationi  a  viandanti.  Non  mancono  per5  tigri 
e  crocodili  clie  si  pascono  di  cariie  liiimana  per  trans- 
curagine  e  peri  peccati  d'  alciini.  Sono  aiicora  per 
quelle  silve  rinoceroti  nia  io  non  ne  lio  visto  verruno." 

This  description  of  Bakarganj  and  the  Sundarbans  is 
interesting:,  both  on  account  of  its  liveliness  and  because 
it  makes  it  not  so  improbable  after  all  that  the  word 
"  Sundarban  "  may  really  mean  beautiful  wood,  and  may 
have  been  applied  in  this  sense  to  the  forests  by  the 
Brahmans.  For  if  a  poor  Roman  Catholic  priest  could 
see  the  beauty  of  these  woods  in  spite  of  the  tigers  and 
crocodiles,  why  might  not  a  Brahman  priest  do  so  also  ? 

Fonseca  arrived  at  Ciandeca  on  the  20th  November 
1599,  and  was  there  received  by  Father  Sosa  and  others. 
Sosa's  being  there  is  explained  by  Fernandez,  who  sa3's 
that  after  he  returned  to  Sripiir  (from  a  visit  w^hicli  he 
seems  to  have  paid  to  Ciandeca)  he  found  that  the 
regulus  in  Ciandeca,  called  Rajah,  was  displeased  be- 
cause they  did  not  return  to  him,  and  so  to  pacify  him  it 
was  necessary  to  send  Dominic  Sosa  to  him.  A  passage 
descriptive  of  Fernandez'  proceedings  at  Sripiir  may  be 
here  quoted  :  "I  held  discourses  with  the  people  every 
Sunday,  and  also  on  festival  days,  after  the  manner  of 
the  Goa  College,  and  this  thing  being  new  in  Bengal, 
wonderfully  attracted  everybody.  Little,  however,  was 
done  towards  conversion,  from  the  fault  of  the  people, 
and  also  from  my  ignorance  of  the  language." 

Fernandez,  in  describing  Fonseca's  success  at  Bacola, 
adds  that  he  had  wished  to  visit  Bacola  before  the 
departure  of  the  Indian  fleet,  and  to  obtain  more 
accurate  and  personal  information  which  he  might  send 
to  Pimenta,     He  had,  however,  been  prevented  by  his 


ANTIQUITIES  AND  EARL  V  HIS  TOR  V.  33 

liaviiig  Lad  to  wait  for  a  reply  from  the  King  of  Arracan. 
He  then  says  that  he  had  now  heard  of  Fonseca's  arrival 
at  Ciandeca,  and  that  he  had  been  received  with  much 
honour  and  kindness  by  the  King  and  people,  and  that 
he  had  a  church  in  which  mass  could  be  celebrated. 
This  was  the  first  church  of  the  Company  in  Bengal, 
and  was  on  that  account  called  by  the  holy  name  of 
Jesus.  "  It  now  remains  that  the  necessary  workmen 
be  obtained,  and  that  so  noble  a  vineyard  may  be 
fervently  commended  to  the  Lord." 

From  the  work  of  Pierre  du  Jarric,^  wdio  was  also 
a  Jesuit,  and  who  wrote  a  book  entitled  "  Histoire 
des  Choses  plus  memorables  advenues  tant  aux  Indes 
Orientales  que  autres  Pays  de  la  Decouverte  des  Por- 
tugais"  (Bordeaux,  1608),  we  learn  that  Ciandeca  was 
the  first  church  in  Bengal,  Chittagong  the  second,  and 
Bandel  the  third.  He  adds  that  the  latter  was  built  by 
Diesfo  Muones  de  Villalobos,  and  that  it  was  finer  than 
that  of  Chittao-ono-. 

The  favourable  hopes  entertained  by  Fernandez  and 
his  companions  were  doomed  to  be  speedily  disap- 
pointed, and  the  mission  came  to  a  melancholy  end. 
AVar  broke  out,  as  Du  Jarric  tells  us,  between  the  Por- 
tuguese and  the  King  of  Arracan  about  the  possession 
of  Sandwip  ;  and  a  tumult  arose  at  Chittagong,  where 
Fernandez  then  was.  The  immediate  cause  of  this  out- 
break was  a  dispute  about  port  dues.  Tlie  Arracauese 
apparently  took  advantage  of  this  tumult  to  try  and 
carry  off  into  slavery  some  children  whom  Fernandez 

1  Pierre  du  Jarric  was  born  at  Toulouse  in  1565,  and  was  for  fifteen 
years  professor  of  theology  in  that  town.  He  died  in  1616.  His  infor- 
mation was  partly  derived  from  a  Spanish  work  written  by  one  Felix  da 
(Jiiznian,  and  published  at  Alcala  in  1601.  Du  Jarric's  book,  however,  is 
the  more  valuable  of  the  two,  and  contains  nearly  everything  that  is  to  be 
found  in  Pimeuta,  &c.     It  has  been  translated  into  Latin. 

C 


34  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

had  under  liis  instruction.  Fernandez  interfered  on 
belialf  of  tlie  children,  and  was  severely  beaten  and 
blinded  in  one  eye.  He  was  then  put  in  prison,  and 
on  the  14th  November  1602  the  poor  old  priest,  says 
Du  Jarric,  "  changed  the  miserable  prison  of  this  earth 
for  a  celestial  mansion."  Andrew  Bowes  buried  him 
in  the  church,  which  was  now  in  ruins.  Bowes  was 
in  prison  too,  with  chains  on  his  legs  and  neck ;  and 
though  his  jailers  took  the  chains  ofi'  his  legs,  they 
retained  that  on  his  neck  when  they  allowed  him  to 
bury  Fernandez.  What  grieved  Bowes  most  of  all 
was  to  see  the  holy  chalice  in  the  possession  of  the 
Arracanese  chief,  and  used  by  him  as  a  spittoon.  After 
Fernandez'  death,  the  priests  left  Chittagong  and  took 
refuge  in  Sandwip ;  but  they  soon  afterwards  left  that 
island,  and  with  the  other  Christians  dispersed  them- 
selves over  Sripiir,  Bacola,  and  Ciandeca.  At  Cian- 
deca,  Carvalho,  the  commander  of  the  Portuguese, 
was  treacherously  murdered  by  the  Eajah,  who  hoped 
thereby  to  make  his  peace  with  the  King  of  Arra- 
can.  This  was  the  end  of  the  Bengal  Mission ;  for 
of  the  four  fathers  who  remained,  two  were  ordered 
off  by  their  Superior  to  Pegu,  and  two  returned  to 
Cochin. 

Du  Jarric  also  tells  us  the  fate  of  the  boy-king  of 
Bacola  who  had  entertained  Fonseca,  and  gives  what 
is  probably  the  true  account  of  the  downfall  of  the 
Chandradwip  family.  His  words  are  :  "  The  King  of 
Arracan  was  proud  of  having  taken  the  island  of  Sand- 
wip from  the  Portuguese ;  and  desiring  now  to  pursue 
his  design  of  conquering  all  the  kingdoms  of  Bengal,  he 
suddenly  threw  himself  upon  that  of  Bacola,  of  which 
he  possessed  himself  without  difficulty,  as  the  King  of 
it  was  absent  and  still  young."    I  may  add  here,  that, 


ANTIQ  UITIES  AND  EARL  V  IIISTOR  Y.  3  5 

according  to  AVilford,  "  the  King  of  ArraCcin  assumed 
the  title  of  lord  of  the  twelve  hhuniyas,  hhatties,  or 
principalities  of  Bengal.  The  kings  of  Arracau  and 
of  Commillah,"  he  says,  "were  constantly  striving  for 
the  mastery,  and  the  former  even  conquered  the  great- 
est part  of  Bengal.  Hence  to  this  day  they  assume 
the  title  of  lord  of  the  twelve  hhuniyas,  hhatties,  or 
principalities  of  Bengal." —  Wilford,  Ancient  Geography 
of  India,  vol.  xiv.  of  Asiatic  Researches. 

Although  the  island  of  Sandwip  does  not  belong  to 
Bd-karganj,  yet  its  history  is  in  some  measure  mixed  up 
with  that  of  Bakla,  and  I  shall  therefore  state  some 
facts  about  it  which  I  have  collected  from  Du  Jarric  and 
others.  Sandwip  is  evidently  a  very  old  island,  and 
seems  to  have  been  of  more  importance  three  hundred 
years  ago  than  it  is  now,  because  it  Avas  one  of  the  chief 
sources  from  which  Bengal  was  supplied  with  salt.  The 
first  notice  of  it  apparently  is  that  given  by  Caesar 
Frederick,  a  Venetian  merchant,  who  stayed  in  it  for 
more  than  a  month.  He  commenced  his  travels  in 
1563,  and  after  travelling  in  many  parts  of  the  East, 
left  Pegu  on  his  homeward  journey  in  1569.  He  went 
from  Pegu  to  Chittagong,  as  small  ships  sailed  thence  for 
Cochin.  On  the' way  to  Chittagong,  in  August  1569, 
his  ship  was  caught  in  a  typhoon.  After  haA^ing  been 
tossed  about  for  some  days,  an  island  was  discovered  at 
no  great  distance,  on  which  they  landed  to  see  Avliat 
land  it  was.  "  We  found  it  a  place  inhabited,  and,  to 
my  judgment,  the  fcrtilest  island  in  all  the  Avorld ;  the 
which  is  divided  into  two  parts  by  a  channel  which 
passeth  between  it.  With  great  trouble  Ave  brought  our 
ship  into  the  same  channel,  AA^hich  parteth  the  island  at 
floAving  Avater."  I  haA^e  quoted  this  sentence  on  account 
of  its  giving  some  description  of  the  configuration  of  the 


36  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

island.  Caesar  Frederick's  description  of  the  fertility 
of  tlie  island,  &c.,  may  be  seen  in  Bloclimann,  p.  22. 
Du  Jarric  devotes  a  chapter  (cap.  32  of  book  vi.)  to 
a  description  of  Sandwip.  He  tells  us  that  it  is  oppo- 
site Sripur,  and  that  it  supplies  all  Bengal  with  salt. 
The  island  belonged  of  i-ight  to  Kedar  Rai  of  Sripur, 
but  for  several  years  he  had  not  had  possession  of  it, 
because  the  Mogores  (MoghaLs)  had  taken  it  from  him. 
However,  in  1602,  Carvalho,  a  Portuguese,  and  a  native 
of  Montargil,  who  was  in  the  service  of  Kedar  Rai,  took 
possession  of  it.  As,  however,  he  was  not  strong  enough 
to  keep  it,  Emmanuel  de  Mattos  came  from  Chittagong 
to  help  him,  and  then  he  and  Carvalho  divided  the 
island  between  them.  Afterwards  Philippe  de  Brito 
built  a  fort  on  it.  The  King  of  Arracan  was  offended 
at  these  proceedings,  consequently  the  Portuguese  either 
left  it,  or  Avere  driven  out  by  him. 

Afterwards,  however,  Sebastian  Gonzales,  a  Portu- 
guese adventurer,  landed  on  the  island  in  1018  h.,  or 
A.D.  1609,  and  took  possession , of  it. 

"  This  Sebastian  Gonzales,"  says  Stewart  in  his  "  His- 
tory of  Bengal,"  ^'  became  absolute  sovereign  of  the 
island  of  Sandwip,  and  was  obeyed  by  the  natives  and 
Portuguese  as  an  independent  prince.  In  the  course  of 
a  short  time  his  forces  consisted  of  1000  Portuo^uese, 
2000  Indian  soldiers,  200  cavalry,  and  80  sail  of  vessels 
of  various  sizes,  and  well  mounted  with  cannon  ;  and  as 
his  government  was  conducted  with  equity,  many  mer- 
chants resorted  to  the  island,  and  by  their  commerce 
contributed  much  to  increase  his  revenue.  The  neigh- 
bouring chiefs,  astonished  at  the  prodigious  success  of 
Gonzales,  sought  his  friendship,  and  deprecated  his 
wrath ;  but  as  he  was  of  a  violent  and  covetous  disposi- 
tion, he  listened  not  to  their  friendly  overtures;   and 


Ai\TIQ  UITIES  AND  EARL  V  HISTOR Y.  3  7 

altlioiigli  lie  was  under  great  oLligatioiis  to  tlie  Eajah  of 
Batecala  [a  mistake  for  Bakla],  who  had  first  given  refuge 
to  the  Portuguese  in  their  distress,  he  ungratefully  seized 
ujDon  the  lands  of  Sliahbilzpiir  and  Patelbanga  [?],  which 
belonged  to  that  chief,  by  which  means  his  territories 
became  as  extensive  as  those  of  some  independent  prince, 
and  consisting  entirely  of  islands,  was  secure  from  the 
attacks  of  any  enemies  so  long  as  the  Portuguese  were 
masters  of  the  sea." 

Stewart  derived  his  infomiation  chiefly  from  the  work 
of  Manuel  de  Faria  y  Sousa,  called  "Asia  Portuguesa,"  and 
published  at  Lisbon  in  16GG.  An  English  translation 
of  this  work  was  published  in  1695  by  Captain  John 
Stevens,  and  appropriately  dedicated  to  the  Dowager 
Queen  of  England,  Catharine  of  Braganza.  I  have 
gathered  the  following  additional  particulars  from  Faria 
y  Sousa's  work.  "  Sebastian  Gonzales  Tibao  was,"  he 
says,  "a  man  of  obscure  extraction,  as  born  in  the  vil- 
lage of  St  Antony  del  Torzal,  near  Lisbon,  a  place 
which  never  yet  produced  any  worth  note  either  for 
parentage  or  worthy  action.  In  the  year  1605  he  em- 
barked for  India,  went  on  to  Bengal,  enlisted  himself  as 
a  soldier,  and  then  fell  to  dealing  in  salt,  which  is  a 
great  merchandise  in  these  j)arts.  Thus  by  this  trade  he 
soon  got  as  mucli  as  purchased  a /a/zVt — that  is,  a  sort  of 
small  vessel.  In  this  vessel  he  went  to  Dianga,  a  great 
port  of  the  kingdom  of  Arracan.  ...  Tibao  stipulated 
with  the  King  of  Bacola  that  he  would  give  him  half  the 
revenue  of  the  island  of  Sandwip  if  he  assisted  him  to 
conquer  it.  The  King  sent  some  shij^s  and  200  horse. 
Afterwards,  however,  instead  of  giving  the  King  of  Bacola 
half  the  revenue  of  the  island,  he  made  war  upon  him." 
Faria  y  Sousa  adds  that  Emmanuel  de  Mattos,  com- 
mander of  Bandel,  had  been  lord  of  Sandwij),  and  that 

357104 


38  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

Fatteh  Khan  had  held  it  for  him,  but  that  on  Mattos's 
death  Fatteh  Khan  had  kept  the  isknd  for  himself. 

In  the  end  Gonzales  was  ruined,  for  after  the  unfortu- 
nate issue  of  a  battle  in  1 6 1 5,  "the  King  of  Arracan  fell  on 
him  in  his  island,  took  it,  and  reduced  him  to  his  former 
miserable  condition.  So  his  sovereignty  passed  like  a 
shadow,  his  pride  was  humbled  and  his  vileness  punished." 
Such  are  the  unsympathising  remarks  of  the  Portuguese 
historian  about  a  man  who  at  least  possessed  vigour  and 
ability,  and  who  owed  his  fall  in  great  measure  to  the 
impetuosity  of  the  Portuguese  officer  who  was  sent  from 
Goa  to  assist  him,  but  who  was  too  proud  or  too  rash  to 
co-operate  fully  with  him.  The  Viceroy  was  also  to 
blame,  for  he  directed  his  officer  not  to  wait  for  Gon- 
zales. AVe  cannot  but  think  that  if  Gonzales  had  been 
an  Englishman,  and  his  historian  of  the  same  nationality, 
we  would  have  heard  a  o-reat  deal  about  Anolo- Saxon 
energy,  the  Berserker-spirit,  and  the  Vikings. 

Sandwip  was  finally  taken  by  the  Mahomedans  from 
the  Arracanesein  1G66.  I  may  here  note  that  according 
to  some  the  proper  name  of  the  island  is  Soma-dwipa — i.e., 
island  of  the  moon.  Much  information  about  the  history 
of  Sandwip  will  be  found  in  the  article  on  the  Feringhies 
of  Chittagong,  "Calcutta  Eeview,"  vol.  liii.  for  1871.  See 
also  article  "  Mofussil  Records,"  in  vol.  liv.  for  1872,  of 
same  Review,  p.  216,  for  reference  to  an  important 
petition  by  zamindars  of  Sandwip  dated  1789. 

In  the  Asiatic  Society's  Proceedings  for  January  1838 
an  account  is  given  of  a  copper^^late  inscription  found 
in  the  pargana  of  Idilpiir.  The  inscription  records  that 
three  villages  were  given  to  a  Brdhman  in  the  third 
year  of  Keshab  Sein — i. e.,  1 1 36  a.d.  These  three  villages 
cannot  now  be  identified,  and  though  it  is  possible 
enough  that  they  have  been  long  ago  washed  away  by 


ANTIQ  UITIES  AND  EARL  V  JIISTOR  Y.  39 

the  Meglina,  Avhicli  flows  past  Klilpur  pargaiiii,  it  may 
also  be  that  they  never  belonged  to  the  district  of 
Biikarganj.  The  fact  of  the  inscription  having  been 
found  in  a  Bakarganj  pargana  does  not  necessarily  imply 
that  the  villages  belonged  to  that  neighbourhood,  and 
there  does  not  appear  to  be  anything  in  the  inscription 
to  connect  it  with  Idilpiir.  Another  copperplate  in- 
scription {sdsanam)  was  found  about  three  years  ago 
near  INIadarijiur,  and  has  been  presented  to  the  Asiatic 
Society,  but  it  has  not  at  present  been  deciphered. 

The  only  clear  memorial  of  the  ancient  times  of  Bdkar- 
ganj  is  a  mosque  in  the  KSundarbans,  which  bore  an 
inscribed  slab  (now"  removed  to  the  Asiatic  Society's 
Museum)  purporting  that  the  building  had  been  erected 
in  1465.  This  mosque  is  built  of  brick,  .and  is  situated 
in  a  place  called  Masjidbari,  near  a  tributary  of  the 
Bighai,  and  a  few  miles  west-north-west  of  Gulsakhd^li 
police  station.  It  thus  lies  in  the  Patuyakh^li  sub- 
division, and  in  the  southern  part  of  the  district.  It  was 
discovered  at  the  time  of  the  Sundarban  Resumptions, 
and  was,  when  found,  surrounded  by  jungle.  Mr  Reilly, 
who  was  the  Commissioner  of  the  Sundarbans,  wrote  ^ 
an  account  of  the  mosque,  and  a  translation  of  the 
inscription  was  furnished  by  Colonel  Lees.  The  tran- 
slation is  :  "  The  Prophet  of  God  (on  whom  be  peace, 
&c.)  said,  '  Whoso  buildeth  a  mosque.  Cod  shall  build 
for  him  seventy  palaces.'  This  mosque  was  built  in  the 
reign  of  the  Sultan,  the  mighty  pillar  of  the  Church  and 
State,  Aboo-al-Mozaflar  Barbek  Shah,  son  of  the  Sultan 
Mahmood  Shah,  by  Khan  Moazzam  Ozyal  Khan,  year 
of  Hijira  870"  (=  a.d.  1465). 

I  visited  this  mosque  in  1874,  and  found  it  in  good 
preservation.     It  is,  however,  quite  devoid  of  architec- 

1  A.  S.  J.,  vol.  iv.  of  1860,  p.  406. 


40  ^     DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

tural  interest  or  beauty.  The  woods  which  once  sur- 
rounded it  have  been  cleared  away,  and  it  now  lies 
in  the  midst  of  rice-fields.  A  faqir  has  assumed  the 
charge  of  it,  and  is  supported  by  the  gifts  of  occasional 
visitors. 

There  is  another  old  mosque  in  Sialghuni  village, 
thana  Bakarganj,  which  is  said  to  have  been  built  by 
one  Nasrat  Ghazi.  It  appears  to  have  been  at  one 
time  richly  ornamented,  and  still  has  some  carved 
flowers  and  arabesques.  The  inhabitants  told  me  that 
there  had  once  been  an  inscription,  but  that  it  had 
fallen  down  and  disappeared.  Near  it  there  is  a  village 
called  the  Filkhana  or  elej^hant  stables,  which  would 
seem  to  indicate  that  elephants  had  once  been  kept 
in  it.  There  is,  however,  no  tradition  to  this  eftect. 
There  are,  as  far  as  I  am  aware,  only  two  other  old 
mosques  in  the  district,  one  is  iu'  the  village  of  Bibi 
Chini,  near  the  Niamati  outpost,  and  is  said  to  have 
been  built  by  a  lady  named  Bibi  Cliinij  sister  to  the 
Niamat  who  founded  the  villag^e  of  Niamati.  The  other 
is  in  the  village  of  Eamsiddhi,  thana  Gournadi,  and  is 
said  to  have  been  built  by  Sabhi  Khan*  It  is  a  much 
handsomer  building  than  that  in  Bibi  Ghini,  and  has 
four  stone  pillars.  Two  of  the  pillars  are  slender,  and 
are  said  to  have  been  worn  away  by  devotees  clasping 
them,  in  the  hope  of  thereby  obtaining  fulfilment  of 
their  wishes. 

SujABAD.  —  About  five  miles  south-west  of  Barisd,!, 
and  on  the  north  bank  of  the  Nalchiti  river,  there  is 
a  small  village  called  Sujdbdd,  which  derives  its  name 
from  Shah  Suja,  the  ill-fated  brother  of  Arangzeb.  In 
it  there  are  the  remains  of  a  fort,  wliicli  appears  to 
have  been  erected  by  Shah  Suja  when  he  was  Viceroy 


A NTJQ UITJES  A ND  EA RL V  IIIS TORY.  41 

of  Bengal,  and  liad  to  defend  tlie  country  against  tlie 
incursions  of  tlie  Mugs  or  Burmese.  The  fort  wns 
rectangular  and  surrounded  by  an  eartlien  wall,  with 
a  mound  at  each  corner.  Inside  were  four  small  tanks 
separated  by  roads,  and  in  the  centre  of  the  inner  space, 
where  the  four  roads  met,  was  the  prince's  dwelling- 
house.  A  great  part  of  the  wall  has  fallen  into  the 
river,  the  tanks  inside  are  nearly  choked  uji  and 
most  of  the  space  is  covered  with  jungle.  The  whole 
village  contains  only  11  acres,  and  there  is  an  interest- 
ino-  document   in   the    Collectorate  record-room   show- 

O 

ing  that  it  was  given  rent  free  by  Shah  Suja  to  the 
families  of  some  Afolians  who  had  fallen  in  battle 
iioainst  the  Muo-s.  It  is  further  said  that  the  ficfht 
lasted  two  days,  and  that  Shah  Suja's  force  was  victori- 
ous. It  is  said  that  four  forts  were  built,  and  this  pro- 
bably refers  to  the  fortifications  at  each  corner  of  the 
rectangular  space.  In  1845  it  was  proposed  to  resume 
the  grant,  and  an  cmwn  went  out  to  make  a  map  of  the 
locality,  from  which  it  appears  that  there  was  then  more 
of  the  earthen  wall  standing  than  is  now  visible.  The 
land  was  then  in  possession  of  the  descendants  of  the 
Afghans,  who  succeeded  in  obtaining  its  release  though 
they  had  lost  the  original  grant  or  sanad,  which  they 
stated  had  been  destroyed  in  the  great  inundation  of 
1822.  None  of  them  now  reside  on  it,  and  their  rights 
have  passed  by  purchase  into  other  hands.  There  is  a 
tragical  story  told  of  Asman  Singh,  one  of  the  last 
Afghan  residents  in  Sujabad,  which  has  been  made  the 
subject  of  a  popular  ballad.  He  had  a  wife  "svho  was 
unfaithful  to  him.  News  was  brought  to  him,  while 
away  at  Nalchiti,  that  his  wife's  paramour  (a  Mahome- 
dan)  was  in  his  house.  He  armed  himself  with  a 
sword,  and  rushed  home  to  avenge  himself.    On  pretext 


42  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

of  illness  his  wife  delayed  to  open  the  door,  and 
thereby  gave  her  lover  time  to  escape.  At  last  Asman 
Singh  burst  open  the  door  and  aimed  a  blow  at  his  wife, 
but  she  had  her  child  in  her  arms,  on  whom  the  stroke 
fell,  and  who  was  killed.  Asman  Singh  was  tried  for  the 
murder,  and  having  been  found  guilty,  was  hanged  in 
chains  on  the  river-bank,  near  the  scene  of  his  crime. 
The  ballad  adds  that  his  brother  in  Calcutta  succeeded  in 
obtaining  a  pardon  for  him,  and  hurried  with  it  to  Bari- 
sal,  but  that  he  arrived  just  too  late  to  stay  the  execu- 
tion. 

There  are  the  remains  of  two  forts  in  the  Jhalu- 
kdtti  thana — viz.,  one  at  Kupashia,  near  Jhalukdtti,  and 
another  at  Indrapasha,  near  Rajapiir  outpost.  Nothing 
appears  to  be  known  of  their  history. 

In  Major  Kennel's  map,^  made  from  surveys  in  1764 
and  1772,  two  mud  forts  are  shown  in  the  southern 
part  of  the  district.  They  had  been  built  to  repel  the 
Mugs.  No  trace  of  them  now  exists,  but  there  is  a 
village  called  S6ndrk6t,  near  Adampur,  in  the  Baufal 
thana,  which  stands  near  the  site  of  one  of  them,  and 
seems  by  its  name  to  indicate  that  it  was  once  a  fort 
(the  word  hot  often  meaning  a  fort).  There  is  also  a 
place  near  it  which  still  goes  by  the  name  of  the  Kil- 
laghd,tta,  or  landing-place  of  the  fort. 

The  map  above  referred  to,  which  has  been  repro- 
duced by  Colonel  Gastrell  in  his  statistical  report,  is  an 
interesting  record  of  the  former  state  of  the  district.^ 

^  Thougli  tlie  map  generally  bears  the  name  of  Kennel,  it  appears  from 
]\Iarkham  (Indian  Surveys)  that  the  credit  of  the  Sundarban  and  sea-coast 
portion  is  chiefly  due  to  Caj^tain  Ritchie,  who  was  hydrographical  surveyor 
from  about  1770  to  1785.  Ritchie's  work  is  still  in  MS.  in  the  India  Office. 
The  glory  of  making  the  first  correct  map  of  India  seems  due  to  the  French, 
whose  great  geographer  D'Auville  preceded  Rennel. 

2  Professor  Blochmann  has  given  a  reduced  copy  of  De  Blaev's  map. 


ANTIQUITIES  AND  EARLY  HISTORY.  43 

All  inspection  of  it  shows  that  Barisdl,  the  present  heacl- 
(piarters,  was  ah-eatly  a  place  of  note,  and  that  a  great 
part  of  the  Sundarbans  had  been  depopuLited  by  the 
Mugs.  At  that  time  Bakarganj  was  the  head(]iiarters 
of  the  district,  and  a  road  led  from  it  to  Kotarhat  and 
thence  to  Sitaluri,  which  is  near  the  modern  Jhalukiltti. 
From  Sitaluri  it  proceeded  to  Madhabpdsha,  and  thence 
by  Idrakpiir,  in  Gournadi,  across  the  swamps  to  Max- 
adpur.  The  tract  of  country  called  Sundarkui  is 
represented  in  this  map. 

The  history  of  the  Chandradwip  Rajahs,  and  notices 
of  the  old  buildings  at  Kachua  and  at  Raikatti,  will  be 
given  in  the  accounts  of  the  Chandradwip  and  Selima- 
bad  parganas. 

Aga  Bakar.^ — The  district  of  Bakarganj  derives  its 
name  from  one  Aga  Bilkar,  who  was  a  servant  of  the 
Nawab  of  Murshidabdd,  and  was  proprietor  of  pargaua 
Buzurgumedpur,  and  of  11^  anas  of  Selinitlbad.  He 
apparently  founded  the  mart  of  Bilkarganj,  which  was 
situated  in  his  zamindari  of  Buzurgumedpur,  and  was 
formerly  the  headquarters  of  the  district.  He  is  said 
to  have  taken  possession  by  force  of  the  11^  anas  of 
Selimabdd,  and  to  have  retained  them  until  his  death  in 
1160  B.S.,  when  he  was  executed  for  rebellion  (Thomp- 

There  is  a  very  interesting  old  map  Ijy  Van  den  Broucke  in  the  fifth  volume 
of  Frangois  A^alentyn's  work  (ed.  1724-26)  -which  ought  to  be  reprinted. 
Bacola  is  marked  on  it,  but  only  as  an  island.  There  is  a  place 
marked  as  the  "  Hoek  "  or  Cape  of  Sancraan,  and  from  its  position  I  think 
this  must  be  Saugrdm,  which  was  an  old  Moghal  fort  in  the  Mendiganj 
thana  (see  Wintle's  account  in  Appendix).  Van  den  Broucke  marks  the 
whole  of  the  Sundarbau  coast  as  unknown,  and  states  that  the  "  Ter  Schel- 
ling  "  was  wrecked  in  this  neighbourhood.  Sangram  Fort  is  referred  to  in 
the  Alamgirnama,  quoted  in  article  on  the  Feringhies  of  Chittagong, 
"  Calcutta  Review,"  vol.  liii.  p.  73.     It  was  fortified  in  16C5. 

^  Bdkar  is   an   Arabic  word,  and  the   correct   transliteration   of  it  is 
Baquir  ;  hence  some  write  Bd(iirganj. 


44  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

son  to  Board,  28tli  December  1793).     (See  account  of 
Selimilbad.) 

Dr  Taylor,  in  liis  "  Topograpliy  of  Dacca"  (p.  83), 
has  the  followiijor  notice  of  Aoa  Bdkar  and  his  son  : 

o  o 

"  Shamat  Jung  Nowazish  JMahomed  Khan,  the  nephew 
and   son-in-law  of  Aliverdi   Khan,   was  next  invested 
with  the  government  in  succession  to  Sarferaz   Khan. 
Like  his  predecessor,  he  resided  at  Murshidabdd,  and 
acted  in  the  twofold  capacity  of  Imperial  Dewan  and 
Deputy  Nazim,  appointments  wliich  he  held  for  many 
years  prior  to  the  British  conquest  of  the  country.     He 
employed  as  his  deputy  at  Dacca,  Hosein  Addeen  Khan, 
the  nephew  of  Hosein  Kuli  Khan,  his  minister  at  Mur- 
sliidabad.     When  Aliverdi  Khan  declared  in  favour  of 
his  adopted  son  Seraja  Daulah  as  his  successor  to  the 
Masnad,    feuds   arose   between   the    heir-apparent    and 
Shamat   Jung,    which    ended    in    the    assassination    of 
Hosein  Addeen  Khan  at  Dacca,  and  that  of  his  uncle 
at   MurshJdabad.      Aga   Sadoc,   the  son  of   a  wealthy 
zamindar  in  the  Bdkarganj   district,  was  employed  by 
Seraja   Daulah  to  carry  his   plans   into   effect   at   this 
place.     This  person,  who  had  proceeded  to  Murshid^bad 
to  appeal  against  a  decision  of  Hosein  Addeen,  instead 
of  obtaining  the  redress  he  expected,  was  detained  a 
jDrisoner  there   by   Hosein  Kuli   Khan.     He  was  soon 
induced,  therefore,  to  listen  to  the  proposals  of  Seraja 
Daulah.      Effecting   his   escape  from  MurshidabM,   he 
returned  to  Dacca,  where  his  father  Maliomed  Bakar 
was  now  residing,  and  prevailing  on  him  to  join  in  the 
conspiracy  on  the  promise  of  being  made  Nawab,  the 
party  contrived   to   get    admission   into  the   palace  at 
dead  of  night,  and  murdered  Hosein  Addeen.     When 
the  assassination  became  known  the  following  morning, 
the  inhabitants  of  the  town  rose  in  a  body  and  attacked 


ANTIQ  UITIES  AND  EARL  Y  HISTOR  V.  45 

Mahomed  Bakar  and  his  son.  The  former,  on  being 
required  to  produce  the  sanad  for  his  appointment  to 
the  Neabat,  pointed  to  his  sword,  and  \Yas  immediately 
killed,  but  Aga  Sadoc,  though  severely  wounded,  con- 
trived to  escape." 

The  accounts  of  this  affair  in  Mr  Scrafton's  "  Reflec- 
tions," and  in  the  "  Siyar  al  Mutakhereen,"  may  also  be 
inserted,  as  they  contain  one  or  two  additional  particu- 
lars. It  will  be  seen  that,  according  to  Mr  Scraftou, 
Aga  Bakar  held  the  office  of  governor  of  Chittagong  : 
"  The  conduct  of  this  aflair  was  left  to  Surajah  Doulah, 
Avho  chose  for  his  instrument  one  Aga  Sadoc,  whose 
father  was  governor  of  Chittagong,  but  resided  at  Dacca. 
The  son,  an  extravagant,  debauched  youth,  was  then 
under  confinement  at  Nowazis  Mahomed  Khan's  palace, 
being  left  there  as  hostage  till  he  paid  a  Jarge  sum  due 
for  the  revenues  of  his  government.  Surajah  Doulah 
assisted  him  to  escape.  He  landed  at  Dacca  the  1st  of 
December  1755,  and  engaged  his  father  in  the  enter- 
prise, deluded  probably  by  the  promise  of  Surajah 
Doulah  to  make  him  governor  of  Dacca.  The  father 
and  son,  with  twelve  of  their  dependants,  surprised  the 
governor  in  the  dead  of  night,  and  after  some  little 
resistance,  in  which  the  father  was  wounded,  they  cut 
off  his  head  and  proclaimed  it  to  be  done  by  the  order 
of  Surajah  Doulah.  But  the  next  day  an  order  arriving 
from  Nowazis  Mahomed  Khan  to  seize  Aga  Sadoc,  the 
great  men  of  the  city  immediately  assembled  their  forces 
and  attacked  him.  The  son,  with  some  of  his  desperate 
followers,  cut  their  way  through  their  opponents  and 
made  their  escape,  but  the  father  and  the  rest  of  their 
party  were  killed.  This  news  reaching  the  capital,  the 
different  parties  Avere  immediately  in  arms  ;  but  the  old 
Soubali  assuring  his  nephew  that  Aga  Sadoc  had  made 


46  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

this  attempt  entirely  in  revenge  for  liis  confinement, 
the  weak,  timid  Nowazis  was  appeased,  and  tlie  con- 
sequence was  that  Snrajali  Doiilah,  a  few  days  after- 
wards, murdered  Hosein  Kidi  Khan  in  the  street  of 
Muxadahad." — Scrafton's  Rrjiections  on  the  Government 
of  Hindustan,  p.  49,  London,  17G3  ;  reprinted  1770. 

See  also  "Siyar  al  Mutakhereen,"  vol.  ii.  p.  646, 
Calcutta,  4tli  edition,  1789  :  "To  ensure  success  to  his 
[Surajah  Daulali's]  design  he  made  use  of  some  art  to 
gain  the  heart  of  a  young  man,  who,  having  had  dis- 
putes with  the  officers  of  Hosein  Kuli  Khan,  deputy- 
governor  of  the  province  of  Dacca,  had  found  means 
to  lay  his  case  before  Nowazis  Mohamed  Khan,  who 
concerned  himself  on  his  behalf.  His  name  was  Aga 
Sadoc,  and  his  title  Sadakut  Mohamed  Khan,  son  of 
Aga  Bakar,  a  considerable  zamindar  of  these  parts. 
Surajah  Daulah  engaged  him  to  return  to  Dacca  in 
order  to  kill  Hosein  Addeen  Khan,  the  nephew  of  Hosein 
Kuli  Khan,  and  the  latter's  deputy  at  Dacca,  a  young 
man  who  for  some  reasons  had  fallen  into  a  melancholy 
that  had  disordered  his  senses.  The  man  did  exactly 
as  he  was  bid.  Such  a  murder  committed  so  openly 
struck  terror  and  consternation  into  the  minds  of  all 
the  inhabitants  of  that  great  city,  who  concluded  that 
an  action  of  that  high  nature  would  never  have  been 
perpetrated  had  not  some  person  of  the  first  rank 
afforded  it  countenance,  so  that  every  one  remained 
silent  and  thoughtful  until  it  became  known  that  the 
perpetrator  had  no  order  and  no  evidence  in  his  hand. 
He  was  therefore  set  upon  by  the  inhabitants  and  by 
the  friends  of  Hosein  Kuli  Khan,  who  missed  the  mur- 
derer, but  by  mistake  killed  his  father,  Aga  Bakar.  The 
son  having  escaped  so  great  a  danger,  fled  to  Murshida- 


ANTIQ  UITIES  AND  EARL  V  IIISTOR  Y.  47 

Ldd,  and  by  such  a  step  [the  assassination  ?]  tlircw  away 
both  his  peace  of  mind  and  safety  of  his  person." 

There  is  a  curious  reference  to  an  Aga  Bdkir  in 
Paton's  "  Arracan,"  vol.  xvi.  of  "  Asiatic  Researches." 
He  says  that  in  1113  of  the  Mug  era  (1751  or  thereby), 
Aga  Bdkir,  the  Dacca  Nawab,  having  been  worsted  in  a 
contest  near  Dacca  by  a  chief  named  Umed,  applied  to 
the  Kino;  of  Arracan  for  assistance.  He  sent  a  Sardar 
named  Laya  Murari  with  one  thousand  war-boats  to  the 
assistance  of  the  Nawab,  and  enabled  him  to  gain  the 
victory. 

I  do  not  know  if  this  be  our  Aga  Bdkar  or  not,  but 
if  he  is,  there  is  some  mistake  in  describing  him  as 
Nawab  of  Dacca.  Our  Aga  Bdkar  was  Governor  of 
ChittaiTjono:,  which  of  course  renders  his  connection  with 
the  King  of  Arracan  probable  enough. 

Besides  Edkarganj  bazdr  there  is  a  small  village, 
called  Bakarkdtti  or  the  clearing  of  Bdkar,  near  Kotarhdt, 
which  probably  also  owes  its  name  to  Aga  Bdkar. 

It  will  be  observed  that  most  of  the  parganas  bear 
]\[ahomedan  names,  showing  that  the  country  was  not 
portioned  out  till  the  Mahomedan  dynasty.  The  names 
are  probably  derived  from  the  first  grantees.  Thus  we 
have  Sultandbdd,  Shaistdbad,  Selimdbdd,  Shahbdzpiir,  &c. 
The  Selimdbdd  pargana  is  the  largest  and  most  im- 
jiortant  of  these,  and  extends  over  a  great  portion  of 
the  Perozpur  subdivision,  and  also  westwards  into  Bag- 
liahdt  in  Jessore. 

Probably  Bdkarganj  and  its  neighbourhood  were  the 
first  places  where  the  Mahomedans  settled,  for  it  is  here- 
abouts that  we  find  most  traces  of  them.  Thus  there  is 
a  large  tank  near  Bdkarganj  called  Boran  Klian's  Tank, 
and  Niamati  and  Bibi  Chiui  are  not  far  off.     In  the  latter 


48  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

there  is  the  old  mosque  ah-eady  noticed,  which  is  chiefly 
remarkable  for  the  height  of  the  mound  on  which  it  is 
built. 

There  is  also  a  mosque  at  Mendiganj,  near  Bakarganj, 
which  bears  an  inscription  purporting  that  it  was  built 
by  one  Mahomed  Shuffee  in  1161  B.s.  (a.d.  1753.) 

In  the  northern  part  of  the  district  the  most  con- 
spicuous name  is  Sabhi  Khan,  who  has  immortalised 
himself  by  the  roads  and  bridges  which  he  constructed. 
According  to  one  account,  he  was  a  Kotwal,  and  Kotwali- 
para  is  said  to  derive  its  name  from  him.  The  following- 
story  is  told  to  account  for  his  beneficence.  He  was,  it 
is  said,  the  son  of  a  wealthy  merchant,  but  was  stolen 
from  his  home  during  his  infancy,  and  brought  u]3  in 
the  forests.  In  course  of  time  he  grew  up  to  man's 
estate  and  became  a  hunter.  Meanwhile  his  father's 
house  was  attacked  by  enemies,  who  killed  his  father 
and  drove  his  mother  out  into  the  jungles.  There 
Sabhi  Khan  found  her  one  day  while  he  was  hunting, 
and,  in  ignorance  of  their  relationship,  he  took  her  as  his 
wife.  They  lived  together  for  awhile,  but  one  morning 
the  mother  observed  a  spot  on  the  sole  of  Sabhi  Khan's 
foot,  and  knew  thereby  that  he  w^as  her  son.  She  told 
him  the  miserable  discovery  she  had  made,  so  Sabhi 
Khan  went  to  a  holy  man,  and  asked  him  how  he 
should  expiate  the  terrible  sin  he  had  involuntarily 
committed.  The  answer  was,  that  he  should  atone  for 
it  by  doing  works  for  the  public  good,  and  hence  he  set 
about  making  roads  and  building  mosques.  His  roads 
traverse  parts  of  the  Gournadi  and  Kotwalipara  thanas, 
and  are  still  in  use.  They  are  known  by  the  name 
of  Sabhi  Khan's  jangdls.  They  have  been  obliterated 
in  many  places,  but  where  they  exist  they  are  broad 


ANTIQUITIES  AND  EARL  V  IIISTOR  Y.  49 

and  remarkably  well  raised.  There  is  also  a  village 
called  Sablii  Khan's  Par/  which  owes  its  name  to  him. 
The  word  jidr  refers  to  the  village  being  situated  on 
the  side  of  an  old  tank  which  is  said  to  have  been  ex- 
cavated by  Sablii  Khan. 

^  It  is  commonly  spelt  Cliobikapdr. 


(  5°  ) 


CHAPTER   IV. 

FINANCIAL  HISTOR  Y  AND  DESCRIPTION  OF  THE 
FA  RG  ANAS. 

I.  HISTORICAL  SKETCH  OF  THE  LAND  SETTLEMENTS. 

The  materials  for  the  early  financial  history  of  Bdkar- 
ganj  are  very  scanty.  The  following  facts  have  been 
gleaned  from  Mr  Grant's  "  Analysis  of  the  Finances  of 
Bengal,"  printed  in  Appendix  No.  4  to  the  Fifth  Report 
of  the  Committee  of  the  House  of  Commons,  1812,  and 
from  Professor  Blochmann's  monograph..  As  has  been 
already  stated,  the  name  Bilkarganj  is  of  comparatively 
recent  origin,  and  it  does  not  occur  in  Mr  Grant's  work. 
At  the  time  of  Rajah  Todar  Mai's  Settlement  in  1582, 
the  greater  part  of  the  present  district  appears  to  have 
been  included  in  the  ancient  zamindari  or  pargana  of 
Chandradwip,  which  belonged  to  sarkilr  Bakla,  also 
called  Ismailpur.  Bakla  w^as  one  of  the  nineteen  sarkdrs 
into  which  the  Khalsa  or  Exchequer  lands  of  Bengal 
Proper  were  divided  by  Todar  Mai,  who  was  Finance 
Minister  to  the  Emperor  Akbar.  Sarkd,r  Bdkla  con- 
tained only  four  mahals  or  parganas,  the  names  of  which 
are  given  by  Professor  Blochmann  as  Ismdilpur  or  Bdkla, 
Srirampiir,  Shahzddpilr,  and  Adilpiir.  The  three  last 
still  exist,  and  I  suppose  that  Btikla  was  identical  with 
Chandradwip.  This  pargana  is  still  occasionally  called 
Bdkla-Chandradwip.  The  following  account  of  Bjikla  is 
taken  from  Mr  Grant's  work  :  "  Bdkla  or  Ismailpiir,  east- 


J] I  STORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  51 

ward  of  Khalifutdbdcl,  cliiefly  on  the  western  bank  of 
the  Padma  or  o^reat  Gano-cs,  and  extend  in  sj  to  its  mouth 
near  the  ishind  of  Kabnjlbild,  which  forms  tlie  south-east 
angle  of  the  Bengal  delta,  as  also  the  further  extremity 
of  the  lowlands  of  Bhatty,  commencing  on  the  west  from 
Hidjili,  Two  years  subsequent  to  tlic  date  of  this 
account  (15B2),  fixed  for  convenience  at  the  com- 
mencement of  Todar  Mai's  financial  operations,  though 
not  completed  before  his  death  in  1589,  the  whole 
sarktir  now  described  was  overwhelmed  and  laid  waste 
by  an  inundation,  and  from  the  succeeding  ravages 
of  the  Mugs  continues  to  this  day  in  great  part  depo- 
pulated." 

The  revenue  of  the  four  parganas  in  it  was  lls.l78,2GG 
(sicca). 

The  eastern  portions  of  the  district,  including  Noiih 
and  South  Shahb^zpiir,  belonged  to  sarkar  Fathdbad. 
Selimdbdd,  in  the  west  of  the  district,  part  of  which 
now  belono-s  to  Jessore,  was  also  included  in  this  sarkar. 
Buzurgumedpur,  another  large  pargana  in  Bakarganj, 
was  probably  formed  at  a  later  period.  It  was  included 
in  sarkar  Bazuha. 

In  1658  another  Settlement  of  Bengal  was  made  by 
Sultan  Suja,  one  of  the  sons  of  Shah  Jehan.  In  this 
Settlenient  the  Sunclarbans  were  included  under  the  name 
of  Muradkhana  or  Jeradkhana.  Perhaps  the  village  and 
river  of  Muradia,  in  the  northern  part  of  the  Patuya- 
khali  subdivision,  are  parts  of  this  Muradkhana. 

In  1722,  or  1128  B.S.,  a  third  Settlement  was  made  by 
Nawab  Jaffar  Khan  in  the  reign  of  Mahomed  Shah.  On 
this  occasion  the  old  sarkars  were  included  in  chaklas, 
and  sarkar  Bdkla,  and  portions  of  sarkars  Fathdl^ad  and 
Bazuha  Avere  included  in  chakla  Jehano^irnaaar — i.e., 
Dacca.    A  few  years  before  this — namely,  in  1717 — the 


52  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

seat  of  Government  had  been  removed  from  Dacca  to 
Mursliiddbdd. 

JafJiir  Khan's  Settlement  was  improved  and  confirmed 
by  his  successor  Suja  Khan  in  1728,  or  1135  B.s.  He 
divided  the  suha  or  province  of  Bengal  into  ihtimams 
or  zamindaries,  and  the  greater  part  of  Dacca,  Faridpur, 
and  Bdkarganj  appears  to  have  been  included  in  the 
ihtimam  of  Jaldlpur. 

A  fourth  Settlement  was  made  by  Mir  Kasim  in  1763.^ 

The  next  Settlement  of  which  we  need  take  account  is 
the  Decennial  or  Permanent  Settlement  of  a.d.  1790,  or 
1197  B.s.  With  regard  to  this  Settlement  the  Fifth 
Eep)ort  observes  that  "  a  medium  of  the  actual  produce 
to  Government  in  former  years,  drawn  from  the  scanty 
information  which  the  collectors  had  the  means  of  pro- 
curing, was  the  basis  on  which  the  assessment  on  each 
estate,  whether  large  or  small,  was  ultimately  fixed." 

The  Permanent  Settlement  of  the  Bdkarganj  district 
was  made  during  the  coUectorship  of  Mr  AVilliam 
Douglas,  who  was  then  Collector  of  Dacca.  At  that 
time  the  Dacca  CoUectorate  was  called  Dacca  Jalalpiir.^ 

^  From  Warren  Hastings'  letter  of  23d  November  1773,  about  Provincial 
CWncils,  &c.,  printed  in  Judicial  Papers,  1774,  India  Oflfice  Library,  we 
find  that  Dacca,  wliicli  then  included  Bakarganj  and  Faiidpur,  was  put 
into  the  Fifth  Division.  This  was  composed  of  Dacca,  Sylhet,  Attia,  Kag- 
mari,  and  Barbazu.  The  first  members  of  the  Council  were  Barwell,  Purling, 
Thackeray,  Sliakespeare,  and  Holland.  Earwell  was  Chief,  and  drew 
Rs.3000  a  month,  but,  on  tlie  other  hand,  he  was  not  allowed  to  trade, 
wliile  the  other  members  were  allowed  this  privilege. 

2  There  were  formerly  two  jurisdictions — viz.,  Dacca  Jaldlpur  and  tlie 
city  of  Dacca.  These  were  amalgamated  by  Eeg.  5  of  1833.  Jaldlpur  is 
the  name  of  a  large  pargana  in  Faridpur  and  Dacca,  and  Dacca  Jaldlpur 
district  included  Faridpur,  There  was  a  Diwani  Addlat  for  Dacca  Jaldlpur 
and  another  for  the  city  of  Dacca.  The  jurisdiction  of  the  latter  extended 
over  the  city  and  the  j)laces  adjacent  (Reg.  3  of  1793,  section  4).  It 
appears,  however  (section  3  of  Reg.  7  of  1797),  that  the  Court  of  Dacca 
Jaldlpur  was  situated  in  the  city  of  Dacca.  It  was  removed  to  Farid- 
pur apparently  in  1812  (Bengal  Administration  Report  for  1872-73, 
p.  45). 


BIS  TOR  V  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  S3 

Tlie  districts  of  Faridpiir  and  NoakLdli  were  iu)t  llien 
in  existence,  nor  was  Bilkai-gaiij,  wliicli  was  included, 
along  witli  Fandpi'ir  and  Dacca,  in  Dacca  Jalal})iir. 
The  arranoements  witli  tlic  zamindars  were  made  at  tlie 
Eevenue  Court  of  Dacca,  and  not  in  this  district. 

The  first  reference  to  tlie  Decennial  Settlement  which 
I  have  been  able  to  find  is  contained  in  a  letter,  dated 
Glh  April  1790,  from  IMr  Douglas  to  the  Board  of 
Revenue.  He  mentions  in  it  that  he  has  received  the 
Board's  letter  of  the  18th  March,  and  its  enclosed  copy 
of  the  resolutions  of  his  Lordship  in  Council.  I  have 
thought  it  advisable  to  print  this  letter  in  the  Appendix. 
It  appears  from  it  that  the  proposals  for  the  Settlement 
were  supplied  by  Mr  Douglas's  predecessor,  Mr  Day, 
in  accordance  with  a  circular  which  had  been  issued 
on  10th  August  1787.  It  appears  from  a  letter  of  Mr 
Day's,  printed  in  an  appendix  to  the  Governor-General's 
Minute  of  Sd  February  1790  (Fifth  Report),  that  he 
was  Chief  of  Dacca  in  178G,  and  that  he  had  resided 
for  fifteen  years  in  various  parts  of  the  district.  It 
might  therefore  have  been  expected  that  Mr  Day  would 
have  been  well  qualified  to  assess  the  revenue  on  the 
zamindars.  It  appears,  however,  from  Mr  Douglas's 
reports,  and  also  from  subsequent  occurrences,  that 
many  of  Mr  Day's  assessments  were  extravagantly  high. 
I  may  add  here  that  the  early  correspondence  appears 
to  show  that  Mr  Douglas  was  a  man  of  good  sense  and 
humanity,  and  possessed  of  a  Ijrcadth  of  view  which  has 
never  been  very  common  among  officials.  Take,  for 
example,  his  remark  in  a  letter  of  29th  March  1790, 
about  the  administration  of  justice  by  the  zamindars  : 
"  The  zamindars  also  had  the  privilege  of  administering 
justice  in  their  respective  jurisdictions,  acting  something- 
like  justices  of  the  peace  in  our  own  country,  settling 


54  DIS2RICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

trifling  disputes,  and  rendering  easy  and  speedy  redress 
to  the  injured  party,  ayIucIi  would  have  been  rendered 
very  difficult  indeed  if  a  poor  man  liad  to  travel  to  the 
Hazoor  and  prefer  his  complaint  through  a  regiment 
of  corrupt  matsadies  [clerks],  every  one  of  whom  must 
have  been  bribed  before  he  could  obtain  what  a  respect- 
able zamindar  could  have  granted  him  on  the  spot  in 
a  day's  attendance." 

The  making  of  the  Settlement  occupied  a  year  or  two, 
and  it  was  not  until  31st  July  1792  that  Mr  Douglas 
sent  up  the  papers  "  of  the  proposed  Novennial  Settle- 
ment, commencing  with  the  Bengal  year  1198  (a.d. 
1791)  and  ending  with  1206."  The  Settlement  was 
called  Novennial  because,  in  consequence  of  the  delay 
in  making  it,  it  commenced  one  year  later  than  the 
Decennial  Settlement.  From  a  letter  of  Mr  Massie, 
dated  31st  March  1801,  it  appears  that  the  Board's 
instructions  on  the  subject  of  the  Settlement  were  issued 
on  the  30th  December  1790,  and  that  the  formal  tender 
of  the  Settlement  to  the  landholders  commenced  on  20  th 
May  1791.  In  the  same  report  Mr  Massie  points  out 
that  sufficient  regard  was  not  paid  at  the  conclusion  of 
the  Settlement  to  the  ascertainment  and  record  of  the 
names  of  the  real  owners  of  the  land,  and  he  goes  on 
to  observe  that  a  practice  has  prevailed  in  the  district 
(Dacca  Jahllpur)  from  time  immemorial,  of  conducting 
all  the  affairs  of  an  estate  from  generation  to  generation 
in  the  name  of  the  original  proprietor,  or  of  some  ficti- 
tious name  formed  by  him.  As  the  letter  gives  several 
specimens  of  the  manner  in  which  the  Settlement  was 
made,  I  have  printed  it  in  the  Appendix. 

In  another  report,  dated  7th  March  1801,  Mr  Massie 
refers  to  certain  abuses  which  were  committed  at  the 
time  of  the  Permanent  Settlement :  "  The  first  is  the 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARGANAS.  55 

frauds  committed  by  zamindars  at  the  time  of  the 
sej^aration  of  the  independent  tcduqdars,  in  causing 
taluqs  that  had  never  existed,  or  had  been  before  con- 
solidated, to  be  separated  at  a  certain  jama  from  their 
estates.  Tlie  second  is  the  frauds  committed  by  zamin- 
dars subsequently  to  the  separation  of  the  indejDendent 
taluqdars,  in  causing  the  lands  of  separated  taluqs,  of 
which  they  were  the  proprietors,  to  be  clandestinely 
annexed  to  their  zaraindaries,  leaving  only  small  parcels 
of  waste  or  jungle  lands  as  the  separated  taluqs.  The 
third  is  the  frauds  committed  by  the  independent  taluq- 
dars, after  their  separation  from  the  zamindars,  in  caus- 
ing fictitious  or  unproductive  taluqs  to  be  sc2:)arated 
from  their  taluqs,  and  inserted  gradually  in  the  accounts 
of  the  ziladars.  This  last  species  of  fraud,  your  Board 
will  observe,  must  have  been  committed  with  the  con- 
nivance of  the  ziladars,  and  though  I  fear  it  has  been 
carried  to  a  great  extent,  it  appears  hitherto  to  have 
escaped  detection,  owing  to  the  immense  number  of 
separated  taluqs  in  this  district,  and  the  impossil^ility 
of  the  Collector  himself  entering  so  minutely  into  the 
details  of  the  accounts  of  them."  From  the  same  letter 
it  appears  that  the  district  of  Dacca  Jalalpur  was 
divided  into  ten  zilas  or  collecting  circles,  and  that  Mr 
Massie  proposed  to  increase  their  number  to  thirteen. 
These  ziladars  were  liable  to  imprisonment,  and  on  11th 
January  1800,  Mr  Massie  reports  that  he  had  put  seven 
of  them  into  jail  for  not  giving  up  their  papers.  He 
adds  that  three  of  them  immediately  resigned. 

The  great  number  of  separated  taluqs  is  a  peculiarity 
in  the  land  settlement  of  Bdkarganj  and  Dacca.  In  fact, 
the  larger  portion  of  the  land  revenue  of  this  district  is 
paid  by  taluqdars.  There  are  3232  estates — i.e.,  lands 
— sul)ject  to  the  payment  of  revenue,  for  which  separate 


56  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

eno-ao-ements  to  Government  have  been  executed  (No.  8 
of  1800,  section  13),  and  no  less  than  2700  of  these  are 
independent  or  separated  taluqs.  The  total  revenue  paid 
by  zamindars  is  under  four  and  a  half  lacs  (444,107), 
whilst  that  paid  by  the  taluqdars  is  over  five  lacs 
(507,714).  N.B. — This  does  not  represent  the  whole 
of  the  revenue  of  the  district,  there  being  also  farras  and 
also  estates  held  under  direct  or  lilias  management. 

The  difference  between  a  zamindar  and  an  independent 
taluqdar  is  nowadays  merely  nominal.  The  revenue 
paid  by  both  is  equally  fixed,  and  their  other  rights  and 
privileges  are  the  same,  and  the  difference  of  title  is 
only  important  as  a  matter  of  social  consideration.  The 
nominal  distinction  even  is  not  always  observed,  for 
sometimes  the  same  landholder  is  called  indifierently  a 
taluqdar  and  a  zamindar.  The  distinction,  however,  as 
generally  made  is  as  follows.  If  a  landholder  owns  a 
pargana,  or  an  aliquot  portion  thereof,  he  is  called  a 
zamindar,  and  also  generally  receives  by  courtesy  the 
title  of  cliaudhari ;  but  if  his  estate  bears  no  relation  to 
a  pargana  or  its  divisions,  he  is  merely  a  taluqdar.  The 
districts  of  the  British  administration  are  a  modern 
arrangement.  The  old  divisions  appear  to  have  been 
into  sarkdrs  and  parganas  for  revenue  purposes,  and  into 
thanas  for  purposes  of  police.  The  word  zila  is  now 
taken  as  equivalent  to  district,  but  the  zilas  at  or  about 
the  time  of  the  Permanent  Settlement  were  not  districts 
in  the  modern  sense,  and  were,  as  we  have  seen,  merely 
collecting  circles.  Among  the  common  people  the  word 
zila  is  at  the  present  day  very  frequently  employed  to  sig- 
nify the  headquarters  of  a  district.  Parganas  are  divided 
in  the  first  instance  into  sixteen  parts,  corresponding  to 
the  divisions  of  a  rupee,  and  if  a  landholder  holds  one- 
half  or  one-quarter  of  a  pargana,  he  is  described  as  the 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARGANAS.  57 

liokler  of  eiglit  anas,  or  four  anas,  as  tlie  case  may  be. 
But  the  subdivision  does  not  stop  here,  for  each  ana,  or 
even  fraction  of  an  ana,  may  be  assumed  as  the  unit  and 
again  divided  into  sixteen  parts,  and  so  on.     Thus  it  is 
common  to  describe  a  person  as  the  hokler  of  eight  anas, 
or  one-half  of  a  one-ana  share  of  a  pargana  considered 
as  a  sixteen-aua  property,  and  such  a  person  is,  I  believe, 
always  entitled  to  be  called  a  zamindar.     A  taluqdar's 
estate  generally  consists  of  one  or  more  mozahs  or  vil- 
lages, or  of  portions  of  them.     These  jDortions  are  also 
divided  into  sixteen  parts,  and  it  may  be  mentioned 
here  that  this  mode  of  dividing  property  is  universal  in 
Bengal.     A  man  is  never  described  as  the  holder  of  so 
many  highas  or  acres,  but  as  the  holder  of  two  anas,  or 
one  pie,  or  five  gandas,  or  two  cowries,  and  so  on,  of  such 
a  taluq  or  hoivala,  or  other  tenure.     The  taluqdars  of  the 
Permanent  Settlement  are  of  two  sorts,  first,  the  inde- 
pendent or  hazuri  taluqdars,  who  had  already  paid  direct 
to  Government;   and  secondly,   those  who  were  then 
separated  for  the  first  time  from  the  zamindars.     The 
separation  of  the  taluqs  w^as  not  a  part  of  the  original 
scheme   of  the   Permanent    Settlement,    but  it  was   a 
favourite  idea  with  Lord  Cornwallis,  and  was  eventually 
carried   out.     In  his  minute  of  3d  February  1790  his 
Lordship    remarks,    "  The   proprietors    of  the   smaller 
zamindaries  and  taluqs  in  general  conduct  their  own 
business,  and  I  make  no   doubt  Avould  improve  their 
lands  Avere  tliey  exempted  from  the  authority  of  the 
zamindars,  and  allowed  to   -pay  their   revenue   imme- 
diately to  the  public  treasuries  of  the  collectors."     Li 
another  place  he  says,  "  When  the  demand  of  Govern- 
ment upon  the  zamindars  is  fixed  they  can  have  no  jDlea 
for  levying  an  increase  upon  the  taluqdars,  for  I  conceive 
the  taluqdars  in  general  to  have  the  same  property  in 


58  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

tlie  soil  as  the  zamindars,  and  tliat  the  former  are  to  be 
considered  as  proprietors  of  lesser  portions  of  land,  pay- 
ino-  their  revenues  to  Government  throne^h  the  medium 
of  a  larger  proprietor,  instead  of  remitting  them  directly 
to  the  public  treasury.  The  pernicious  consequences 
which  must  result  from  ajQfording  to  one  individual  an 
opportunity  of  raising  the  public  revenues  assessed  upon 
the  lands  of  another  at  his  own  discretion,  and  for  his 
own  advantao-e,  are  evident ;  and  on  this  account  I  was 
desirous  that  all  proprietors  of  land,  whether  zamindars, 
taluqdars,  or  chaudharies,  should  pay  their  rents  imme- 
diately to  the  European  Collector  of  the  district  or  other 
officer  of  Government,  and  be  subject  to  the  same  gene- 
ral laws.  The  number  of  names  upon  the  rent-roll  will 
add  little  to  the  business  of  the  Collector,  provided  that 
the  sum  to  be  paid  by  each  proj)rietor  of  land  is  fixed. 
In  support  of  this  opinion  I  have  annexed  some  extracts 
from  the  proceedings  of  the  Committee  of  Circuit,  the 
members  of  which  must  have  been  well  acquainted  with 
the  customs  and  practices  of  the  Mogul  Government." 

"  These  extracts  aftbrd  convincing  proofs  of  the  pro- 
prietary rights  of  the  inferior  zamindars  and  taluqdars, 
and  that  their  being  made  to  pay  their  rent  through  the 
superior  zamindar  of  the  district  was  solely  for  the  con- 
venience of  the  Government,  which  found  it  less  difficult 
to  collect  the  rents  from  one  principal  zamindar  than 
from  a  number  of  petty  pro23rietors." 

The  following  remarks  from  the  same  minute  may 
be  quoted  as  showing  the  materials  with  which  the 
Permanent  Settlement  was  made,  and  the  Governor- 
General's  views  of  their  sufficiency :  "  Twenty  years 
have  been  employed  in  collecting  information.  In  1769 
supervisors  were  appointed;  in  1770  provincial  councils 
were  established;  in  1772  a  Committee  of  Circuit  was 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  AN  AS.  59 

deputed  to  make  the  Settlement,  armed  witli  all  the 
powers  of  tlie  Presidency;  in  1776  ami'ns  Averc  appointed 
to  make  a  hastahud  of  tlie  country;  in  1781  the  pro- 
vincial councils  of  revenue  were  abolished,  and  collectors 
were  sent  into  the  several  districts,  and  tlie  general 
control  and  management  of  the  revenues  was  lodged  in 
a  Committee  of  Ivcvenue  at  Calcutta  under  the  imme- 
diate inspection  of  Government.  Like  our  predecessors, 
we  set  out  with  seeking  for  new  information ;  and  we 
have  now  been  three  years  in  collecting  it.  Voluminous 
reports  have  been  transmitted  by  the  several  collectors 
on  every  point  which  was  deemed  of  importance." 

His  Lordship  goes  on  to  say,  "  I  must  declare  that  I 
am  clearly  of  opinion  that  this  Government  will  never 
be  better  qualified,  at  any  given  period  whatever,  to 
make  an  equitable  settlement  of  the  land  revenue  of 
these  provinces,  and  that  if  the  want  of  further  informa- 
tion was  to  be  admitted  now,  or  at  any  other  future 
period,  as  a  ground  for  delaying  the  declaration  of  the 
permanency  of  the  assessment,  the  commencement  of  the 
happiness  of  the  people  and  of  the  prosperity  of  the 
country  would  be  delayed  for  ever." 

The  data  on  which  the  assessments  at  the  Permanent 
Settlement  were  fixed  are  clearly  stated  in  the  Bengal 
Special  Orders,  published  at  section  68  of  Eegulation  8 
of  1793.  "The  jama — i.e.,  revenue — of  the  preceding  year, 
compared  with  the  account  and  information  supplied  by 
the  collectors,  and  the  recommendations  of  the  Board  of 
Eevenue  founded  thereon,  is  to  be  the  standard."  Cer- 
tain qualifying  sections  follow,  and  it  is  exjjrcssly 
ordered  (section  70)  that  no  abatement  from  the  revenue 
of  the  preceding  year  is  to  be  allowed  without  the 
special  sanction  of  the  Governor-General  in  Council. 
Section   75   of  the   same  Regulation  observes  that  the 


6o  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

statemeut  above  referred  to  is  inapplicable  to  the  sepa- 
rated taluqs,  or  to  any  instances  where  the  actual  pro- 
duce may  have  been  ascertained.  In  such  cases  the 
assessment  is  to  be  regulated  so  as  to  leave  the  proprie- 
tors a  provision  for  themselves  and  families  equal  to 
about  ten  per  cent,  on  the  amounts  of  their  contributions 
to  Government.  But  taluqdars  who  had  paid  at  a  fixed 
rent  for  the  last  twelve  years  were  allowed  to  settle  at 
this  revenue. 

It  has  been  often  said  that  the  Permanent  Settlement 
ruined  those  who  accepted  it.  This  statement  is  pro- 
]:)al3ly  true  of  the  larger  zamindars,  but  it  is  not  appli- 
cable to  the  taluqdars,  many  of  whom  got  their  lands  on 
easy  terms,  and  have  handed  them  down  to  their  de- 
scendants to  the  present  day.  No  doubt  the  rule,  that 
if  they  had  j^aid  a  fixed  rent  for  twelve  years  it  was  not 
to  be  enhanced,  proved  the  safety  of  many  of  them. 
The  smallness  of  their  estates,  and  the  great  number  of 
them,  must  also  have  enabled  them  to  escape,  for  the 
collectors  could  not  know,  or  even  guess  at  the  real 
value  of  their  properties,  and  were  obliged  to  take  what 
they  offered,  or  what  they  had  been  paying  hitherto.  It 
may  generally  be  said  that  the  owners  of  the  backward 
and  less  known  zamindaries  fared  better  than  those  of 
which  the  resources  had  been  developed,  and  were  sup- 
posed, at  least,  to  be  accurately  known.  Thus,  Rajna- 
gar  and  Chandradwip  were  probably  over-assessed,  and 
the  owners  were  ruined,  whereas  Arangpiir  and  Selimd-- 
bdd  were  somewhat  lightly  assessed,  and  are  to  this  day 
in  the  hands  of  descendants  of  the  original  proprietors. 
This  remark  applies  to  more  districts  than  Bakarganj, 
and  perhaps  accounts  for  the  light  assessment  and  great 
prosperity  of  the  zamindars  in  such  remote  districts  as 
Mymensing  and  Eastern  Bengal  generally.     It  was  not 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  6i 

merely,  or  even  cliiefly,  that  the  eollectors  knew  lcs3 
about  tlie  eastern  districts  tlian  they  did  about  Burd- 
wan  or  Nuddea,  but  because  cultivation  was  much  more 
backward  in  the  former  districts.  Hence  the  burden  on 
the  zamindars  in  these  districts  got  lighter  every  year 
as  cultivation  advanced  and  more  ryots  came  in,  whereas 
in  Burdwan  or  Nuddea  the  zamindars  had  not  the  same 
margin  for  making  profits. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  zamindars  in  Eastern  Benfifal 
were  much  more  exposed  to  loss  from  diluviation,  owing 
to  the  great  rivers  which  flow  through  or  skirt  their 
estates,  and  many  flourishing  parganas  have  in  this  way 
almost  disappeared.  For  example,  pargana  Srirdmpur 
in  this  district,  which  was  one  of  the  four  original  par- 
ganas of  sarkdr  Bd-kla,  has  been  nearly  all  washed  away 
by  the  Meglina,  and  the  zamindars  of  it  have  long  since 
disappeared.  Pargana  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir  has  also  suf- 
fered much  from  the  same  cause.  I  do  not  know 
whether  it  is  to  this  cause,  or  to  the  abuse  of  the  prac- 
tice of  subdivision,  that  the  zamindars  of  Kotwalipara 
owe  their  poverty,  but  the  fact  is  certain  that  the  Kot- 
walipara zamindars  (they  now  belong  to  the  FaridjDur  dis- 
trict) are  among  the  poorest  and  pettiest,  if  not  the  very 
poorest  zamindars  in  Bengal.  As  the  rivers  wash  away 
estates,  so  also  do  they  form  new  ones,  and  it  might 
have  been  thought  that  the  new  formations  would  com- 
pensate the  zamindars  for  their  losses,  but  this  has  been 
far  from  the  case.  Not  only  do  the  new  formations 
remain  unproductive  for  many  years,  so  that  the  zamin- 
dar  may  be  ruined  by  the  loss  of  his  old  lands  and  sold 
up  before  he  can  get  any  benefit  from  the  substitutes  for 
them,  but  also  the  chars,  or  new  formations,  are,  or  at  least 
were,  in  general  resumed  by  Government  and  assessed 
anew.    The  above  is  somewhat  of  a  digression,  but  I 


62  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

have  been  led  to  enter  upon  it  in  order  to  counteract  a 
common  impression  that  all  zamindars  are  wealthy  men. 
In  fact,  there  are  more  poor  zamindars  than  there  arc 
rich  ones — i.e.,  comparing  them  with  other  classes,  such 
as  traders,  and  oven  professional  men — and  there  are 
many  taluqdars,  both  independent  and  dependent  (Ma?*- 
?}*«,  or  hazuri,  and  shihami),  who  are  richer  than  their 
zamindar. 

Mr  Westland  remarks  that  the  zamindars,  in  accept- 
ing the  Settlements,  set  the  seal  to  their  own  ruin.  This 
is  true,  but  the  fact  is  that  they  had  not  much  option  in 
the  matter.  If  they  did  not  accept  the  Settlements,  they 
were  ousted,  their  lands  were  managed  by  officers  called 
Kurah  amins,  oy  Kurah  sazaiuals,  or  were  let  in  farm, 
and  though  they  were  supposed  to  be  allowed  ten  per 
cent,  on  the  net  collections,  it  was  practically  very 
difficult  for  them  to  get  the  allowance.  A  letter  from 
the  Collector,  dated  20tli  February  1794,  shows  that  no 
proprietors  of  estates  held  khas — i.e.,  under  direct  man- 
agement— had  o^ot  the  mashahar a,  ov  allowance  sanctioned 
by  the  Eegulations,  except  the  proprietors  of  the  three 
divisions  of  Selimabdd.  In  short,  it  may  be  said  that 
by  not  accepting  the  Settlements  the  zamindars  were 
ruined  at  once,  and  by  accepting  them  they  were  ruined 
after  some  interval.  In  some  cases  the  acceptance  of 
the  Settlement  appears  to  have  been  even  less  voluntary 
than  the  reluctant  acquiescence  in  a  hard  bargain.  One 
zamindar — he  was  a  descendant  of  the  great  Eajah 
Raj  Ballab — complained  in  1797  that  the  Collector  (Mr 
Thompson)  demanded  agreements  from  him  and  his 
partners,  and  that  when  he  refused  to  give  them  he  was 
confined  under  a  guard  of  sepoys,  and  jDrevented  from 
bathing,  praying,  or  eating,  and  thereby  driven  to  sign 
an  application  for  settlement.     The  technical  word  for 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  63 

the  zamindar's  agreements  is  tahilt.  J\[auy  of  them  arc 
preserved  in  the  Collectorate,  and  are  small,  insignificant 
pieces  of  brown  country  paper,  containing  little  except 
the  obligor's  name,  the  amount  of  the  annual  revenue, 
and  the  instalments  in  which  it  is  to  be  paid.  The 
agreements  are  in  Persian,  and  are  surmounted  by  the 
Collector's  signature  or  initial. 

The  troubles  of  the  collectors  did  not  end  with  the 
general  completion  of  the  Permanent  Settlement.  The 
arrangements  about  the  separated  taluqs  took  time,  and 
on  12th  August  1793  the  Collector  reported  that  there 
were  nearly  4000  taluqs  (this  is  in  all  Dacca  Jaldlpiir) 
which  had  been  separated  but  of  which  no  settlement 
had  been  made.  Some  zamindars,  as  we  have  seen, 
would  not  come  to  terms,  and  the  collectors  had  to 
manage  their  estates  directly,  or  to  grant  temporary 
leases  of  them  ;  and  in  other  cases,  although  the  zamin- 
dars accepted  the  Settlement,  they  fell  into  arrears,  and 
their  estates  had  to  be  sold,  or  the  revenue  of  them 
to  be  collected  by  special  officers. 

Sayer  Duties. — Besides  the  revenue  from  land,  the 
Mogul  Government  was  in  the  habit  of  levying  taxes 
upon  professions,  and  each  tax  was  called  a  malial,  and 
let  out  in  farm,  just  as  if  it  had  been  a  landed  property. 
Thus  there  was  a  tax  on  washermen,  which  was  called 
the  Gdzar-mahal,  and  yielded  about  Es.60  a  year. 
There  were  also  the  Dhilmclari-mahcd,  which  was  col- 
lected from  bird-catchers,  snake-charmers,  &c.,  and 
yielded  about  Es.l450;  the  Bajantri-mahcd,  collected 
from  musicians,  and  yielding  about  Rs.310  ;  the  Maliai- 
mahal,  collected  from  the  dealers  in  dried  fish  ;  Char- 
mohmdia,  levied  on  sellers  of  vegetables ;  Chappa-jam- 
dannij,  levied  on  weavers,  &c.      I  do  not  find  that  there 


64     *  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

was  any  tax  on  the  sale  of  spirits  in  tlie  Dacca  division, 
and  probably  there  was  none,  on  account  of  the  aversion 
of  the  Mogul  Government  to  derive  any  profit  from  this 
source. 

Mr  Douglas,  in  his  report  of  the  5th  May  1790, 
objected  to  the  abolition  of  the  above  taxes  on  the  broad 
ground  that  professional  men  should  contribute  their 
quota  to  the  general  income  of  the  country.  He  writes  : 
"  As  far  as  I  have  been  able  to  learn,  they  [the  taxes] 
are  in  general  of  the  same  nature  as  taxes  on  the  same 
articles  in  other  countries,  and  I  am  inclined  to  think 
they  are  not  considered  as  oppressive  even  by  the  natives 
themselves.  ...  I  shall  not,  therefore,  take  on  me 
to  recommend  their  discontinuance,  whereby  the  Hon- 
ourable Company  must  sustain  considerable  loss,  while 
at  the  same  time  the  benefit  arising  to  individuals  would 
scarcely  be  a  compensation  for  giving  up  so  much 
revenue,  which  is  necessarily  appropriated  to  the  general 
defence  of  the  State,  and  in  the  benefits  of  which  every 
individual  participates.  I  therefore  see  no  reason  why 
professional  men,  tradesmen,  and  artificers  of  every 
kind  should  not  contribute  their  quota  to  such  a  use- 
ful and  necessary  purpose  as  well  as  the  ryot  or  hus- 
bandman, more  especially  in  times  of  pressing  exigencies." 
It  is  perhaps  to  be  regretted  that  these  views  did  not 
prevail,  and  that  a  tax  to  which  the  people  had  got 
accustomed  should  have  been  allowed  to  fall  into  desue- 
tude. However,  the  Government  of  the  day  took  another 
view,  and  abolished  these  miscellaneous  taxes.  They 
also  abolished  the  taxes  levied  at  bazars  and  markets 
from  shopkeepers  and  market-vendors,  and  gave  the 
zamindars  compensation  for  the  loss  of  them  in  the 
shape  of  a  deductibn  from  the  land  revenue.  In  fact, 
however,  the  zamindars  did  not  cease  to  levy  such  taxes, 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  AN  AS.  65 

and  probably  it  never  was  intended  that  zamindars 
should  be  prevented  from  establishing  such  bazdrs  and 
markets  and  deriving  revenue  therefrom.  Nearly  all 
the  markets,  and  probably  most  of  the  bazars  in  Bengal, 
have  been  established  since  the  Permanent  Settlement, 
and  on  zamindars'  land,  and  it  seems  legitimate  that 
the  zamindars  should  get  at  least  ground-rent  from  those 
who  make  use  of  them.  I  have  printed  Mr  Douglas's 
letter  about  the  bazilrs  and  markets  in  the  Appendix. 

II.    TERKITORIAL   DIVISIONS    OF   THE    DISTRICT   AND    THEIR 

HISTORY. 

The  subordinate  divisions  under  a  sarkar  or  chakla  are 
variously  called  'parganas,  tappas,  tarafs,  giixls,  and 
jodrs.  The  pargana  is  the  largest  and  most  common  of 
them,  and  it  is  generally  understood  that  the  word 
lappa  prefixed  to  the  name  of  a  tract  of  country  implies 
that  it  has  been  formed  out  of  part  of  a  pargana.  Thus, 
tappa  Nazirpiir  and  tappa  Sultandbjld  are  supposed  to 
imply  that  they  were  formed  out  of  pargana  Chandra- 
dwijj.  The  unit  in  the  division  of  tracts  of  land  is  gen- 
erally the  mozah  or  village,  though  this  is  sometimes 
divided  into  hismats  or  paras — i.e.,  hamlets.  A  pargana 
consists  of  a  number  of  mozahs,  but  their  number  and 
size  are  quite  uncertain,  and  hence  parganas  vary  greatly 
in  size  and  importance. 

The  number  of  parganas,  &c.,  in  Bd-karganj  is  reckoned 
at  forty-seven.  They  are  of  very  different  ages  and  im- 
portance, and  in  some  cases  the  divisions  appear  to  have 
no  better  foundation  than  the  notions  of  the  Taujih- 
navis  —  i.e.,  the  officer  of  the  Revenue  Roll  Depart- 
ment. They  are  also  far  from  being  compact,  and  it  has 
been  found  quite  impossible  to  make  them  the  basis  of 


66  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

administrative  divisions.  Still  they  are  well  known  to  tlie 
natives,  every  ryot  being  aljle  to  tell  to  wliicli  pargana 
his  villao^e  belono-s,  and  there  is  little  likelihood  of  the 
names  of  the  chief  parganas  becoming  obsolete.  Par- 
gana rates  of  rent  no  longer  exist,  nor  do  even  the  same 
weights  and  land-measures  always  prevail  over  a  whole 
pargana ;  but  still  the  word  iKivgana  is  used  by  the  public 
as  a  rough  means  of  classification,  and  the  rate  of  rent 
commonly,  though  not  invariably,  prevailing  in  a  par- 
gana is  often  appealed  to  as  the  standard.  I  have,  there- 
fore, resolved  to  take  up  the  parganas  one  by  one,  and 
give  a  short  history  of  each,  more  especially  as  this 
gives  a  convenient  opportunity  for  noticing  the  principal 
native  families,  as  their  history  is  for  the  most  part 
connected  with  that  of  their  parganas. 

In  the  following  list  I  have  arranged  the  parganas 
chiefly  according  to  their  geographical  position,  though 
I  have  deviated  somewhat  from  this  arransrement  in 
order  that  I  might  begin  with  the  four  great  parganas  of 
Chandradwip,  Buzurgumedpur,  Selimdbd,d,  and  Idilpiir. 
Some  of  the  parganas  also  are  so  scattered — e.g.^  Bai- 
kanthpiir — that  it  is  difficult  to  find  a  place  for  them. 

The  number  of  parganas  (forty-seven)  on  the  list 
appears  large,  but  many  of  them  really  belong  to  other 
districts,  and  are  only  represented  in  Bakarganj  by  a 
few  outlying  taluqs.  Thus  Rajnagar  and  Kasimpur 
Selapati  substantially  belong  to  Faridpiir,  and  Bikrani- 
piir  and  Jalalpur  to  Dacca ;  and  by  far  the  greater  por- 
tion of  their  revenues  is  paid  in  those  districts.  But  at 
the  time  of  the  Revenue  Survey,  and  on  other  occasions, 
it  was  found  that  some  taluqs  which  had  been  separated 
from  the  zamindaries  were  geographically  situated  within 
this  district,  and  therefore  their  revenues  were  made 
payable  at  the  Bdkarganj  treasury.     I  have  not  thought 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARGANAS.  67 

it  necessary  to  give  any  account  of  these  extraneous 
parganas,  and  have  relegated  them  to  the  end  of  th(3 
list.  The  first  thirty-seven  names  on  the  list  comprise  all 
tlie  parganas  whicli  are  territorially  important,  and  even 
many  of  these  are  veiy  small  and  insignificant.  Speak- 
ing generally,  it  may  be  said  that  the  north  of  the  district 
belongs  to  Bangrora,  llirmohan,  Idrakpiir,  and  Chandra- 
dwip;  the  eastern  portion  to  North  and  South  Shahbiiz- 
piir,  Idilpur,  Sultauabad,  Nazirpiir,  and  Ratandi  Kalika- 
piir ;  tlie  central  portion  to  Chandradwip,  Selimabad, 
Buzurgumedpiir,  and  Arangpiir  ;  and  the  western  portion 
to  Selimabad  and  Syedpiir.  The  south  of  the  district 
belongs  for  the  most  part  to  the  Sundarbaus,  and  is  not 
included  in  any  pargana.  If  we  study  the  subject,  we 
find  that  the  positions  of  the  parganas  are  by  no  means 
so  arbitrary  as  they  appear  at  first  sight,  and  we  can 
recognise  the  fact  that  most  of  them  were  originally 
tolerably  compact.  Indeed  it  is  reasonable  to  suppose 
that  they  were  so,  as  the  parganas  were  divisions  of  the 
country  made  for  revenue  purposes,  and  each  of  them 
was  j)i'ot>i^bly  originally  in  the  hands  of  a  single  indi- 
vidual or  family.  The  most  irregular  are  the  parganas 
which  were  composed  chiefly  of  taluqs,  such  as  Buzur- 
gumedpiir. The  absence  of  maps  and  the  want  of  local 
knowlede^e  anion  o;  the  officers  of  the  distant  courts  of 
Delhi  and  Dacca  of  course  prevented  the  divisions  from 
being  quite  regular.  J\Iuch  of  Bakarganj  also  was  in  old 
times  covered  with  jungle,  and  determinate  boundaries 
were  therefore  impossible.  Thus  the  great  pargana  of 
Buzurgumedpiir  appears  to  have  Ijeen  very  vaguely  de- 
fined towards  the  south,  and  was  considered  to  comprise 
many  of  the  lands  which  are  now  classed  as  the  Sundar- 
baus. It  has  been  said  that  Jeradkhana  and  Muradkhana 
were  the  old  names  for  the  Sundarl)ans,  but  as  regards 


68  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

tlie  Bdkarganj  Sunclarhans,  it  appears  to  mo  that  it  would 
be  more  correct  to  say  that  they  were  included  in  Buzur- 
gumedpiir.  Some  of  the  present  irregularities  of  the 
pargauas  are  interesting  as  showing  the  physical  changes 
which  have  taken  place  in  the  district.  Thus,  when  we 
find  the  parganas  of  Uttar  Shahb^zpiir,  Eamnagar, 
Nazirpiir,  and  Ratandi  Kalikapiir  on  both  sides  of  the 
Titulia  and  Ilsa,  some  portions  being  in  thanas  Mendiganj 
and  Baufal  on  the  mainland,  and  some  on  the  island 
of  Dakhin  Sbalibaz23ur,  we  are  reminded  of  a  time  when 
that  island  was  only  separated  from  the  mainland  by 
a  narrow  channel.  So  also  we  have  an  illustration  of 
the  action  of  the  rivers  in  the  parganas  of  Srirampur 
and  Idilpur,  one  of  which  has  almost  disappeared,  while 
the  other  is  neither  so  large  nor  so  fertile  as  in  old  times. 
It  should  be  noted  that  the  land  revenue  shown  in  the 
list  of  parganas  does  not  represent  the  revenue  of  the 
whole  district.  It  only  shows  that  of  the  parganas  and 
of  the  taluqs  separated  from  them,  and  does  not  include 
the  revenue  from  the  Sundarban  grants,  from  Govern- 
ment estates  {klias  mahals),  from  resumptions,  or  from 
fisheries.  The  list  only  shows  a  revenue  of  about  ten 
lacs,  but  the  total  revenue  of  the  district  is  upwards  of 
thirteen  and  a  half  lacs  (Rs.l, 367,770). 


JJJSrORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS. 


69 


List  of  the  Parganas,  &c.,  in  BXkarganj,  showing-  the  ll(!venue  of  each, 
and  the  Proportion  in  which  that  is  paid  by  the  Zaniindaries  and 
by  the  Taluqs. 


G 

7 
8 

9 

10 

H 

12 
13 
14 
15 
16 
17 

18 

19 

20 
21 
22 
23 
24 
25 
26 
27 
28 
29 
30 
31 
32 
33 
34 
35 
36 
37 
38 
39 
40 
41 

42 

43 

44 
45 
46 

47 


Name  of  Pargaua, 


Chandrae!  wip 

Gird-i-Biuular 

Buzurguiuedi)ui' ... 

Selimabad 

(  Tappa  JIavili  ) 
\      Selimabad  ..  J 

Tappa  Havili 

Idilpur  

Tappa  Nazirpur. ... 
J  P.  Rataiidi  ) 
1  Kalikapur...  \ 
Uttar  Shahhazpur 
(  Dakhin  Shah-  ) 

(      bilzpur ) 

Kistodebpur 

Aliiiagar 

llainnagar 

Ram  li  ari  char 

Kalrai  char 

Sultaniibad 

(  Kasimuagar  ) 
(  joar  Daspara  ) 
j  Khaiija  IJaha-  ) 
(      dur  Nagar...  ) 

Srirampur 

Tappa  Abduhipiir.. 
Tappa  Kadirabad.. 
Taj-pa  Azimpur .... 

P.  Jahapur 

Idrakpur 

liasulpur 

Baiigroi-a 

Biimoban 

Tappa  Birmohan... 

Habibpur 

Maizardj 

Jalalpur 

Shaistabad 

Sliaistaiiagar 

Shabzadpur 

Tappa  Bahadurpur 

P.  Arangpur 

Syedp(ir 

Balkan tb pur  ^ 

Tappa  Lakshirdiya 

llajnagar 

J  Tappa  Saiiiiur  ( 

t      Kala ] 

Aminibad 

Bikranipiir 

Gopalpur 

Durgapiir 

Kasimpiir  Selapati 


Revenue 

of 

No.  of 

Zamiudaries. 

Taluqs. 

82,562  14 

4i 

73 

1 

34,546  8  lis 

407  \ 

98,227  0 

1 

20 

11,055  11 

5 

9 

644  8  10 

5 

65,904  4 

11 

119 

28,783  1 

4-^ 

4 

25,237  11 

4 

0 

7,645  12 

% 

294 

44,413  15 

5 

4 

816  0 

0 

1,578  5 

5 

5,187  6 

0 

15 
1 
1 

21,128  13 

5 

10 

1,633  9  11 

64  8 

C| 

59 

441  4 

li 

84 

3,551  11 

6 

1 

962  15  lOi 

1 

2,749  6 

8A 

41 

853  11  10 

2 

3,278  11  10 

52 

47 

365  6 

y* 

939 
69 

13  5 

4 

27 

878  14  \n 

345  0 

6 

23 

365  6 

4f 

1 

1,040  14 

Oi 

5 

1,537  1 

6 

161 

6,897  3 

3i 

26 

4,913  1 

1 

2 

14,364  7 

6 

22 

6,570  13 

9 

4 
32 

27 
9 

62 

1 

1 
5 
1 

27 

78,654  0 

2 

2700  i 

Bevenue  of 
Taluqs. 


58,104  10  8^ 

53  5  4 

205,894  14  5 

4,798  4  l-i 

3,323  0  0 

480  0  \\ 
8,637  5  9" 
14,687  9  11 

3,314  1  0 

10,899  9  10^- 

15,531  10  6^ 


3,676  12  5 

119  4  6 

1,846  10  8 

5,646  13  1 


6,598  11  6 


4,797  9  4| 
798  0  0 
698  9  3i 

7,732  10  Oi 
42  15  111 

2,060  7  lOi 

984  0  9? 

20,724  2  9' 

272  13  9^ 

295  7  10 

427"  6  lOi- 
1,113  0  li 

991  15  O'' 
14,927  14  lOi 

850  4  6.? 

304  0  0' 

9,604  12  9i 

21,341  3  3" 

7,216  10  11 

1,251  3  6 

471  1  10 

877  1  n-i 

336  0  0 
34  3  8 
4,675  0  0 
4  14  Hi 
731  12  8i 


140,667  9  1 

53  5  4 

300,441  7  4S 

103,025  4  2.L 


507,714    6    Oi 


Total  Revenue. 


14,378 

1,124 

74,541 
43,470 

28,551 

18,545 

59,945 

816 

1,578 

8,864 

119 

1,846 

26,775 

1,633 


11  11 

8  Hi 
10    8" 

12  3i 

12  10 
6  8 
0    0 

0    0 

5    5 
2  Hi 
4     6" 
10    8 
10    6 

9  11 


0,663    4    Oi 


5,238 

4,349 

1,661 

10,482 

896 

5,339 

984 

21,089 

272 

308 

878 

772 

1,478 

2,032 

16,495 

7,747 

5,217 

23,'.1G9 

27,912 

7,216 

1,251 

471 


13    6 
11    6 


11    91 

3  8i 
0  9i 
9    6.i 

13    9S 

13  2" 

14  Hi 
8    4i 

6  6.1 
13    Oi 

0  4S 

7  10"" 

1  1 

4  3i 

0  O" 
10  11 

3    6 

1  10 

877    1  Hi 


The  Buz 
urgumed- 
pur  zamiu- 
dari  con 
sists  of  the 
farm  (No. 
1406),  the 
Dari  cbar 
(No.  1447), 
md  the 
Chakran 
(No.  1437). 
The  frac- 
tions are 
chiefly  the 
result  of 
the  con- 
verision  of 
sicca     into 

Govern- 
ment     ru- 
pees. 


336 

34 

4,675 

4 

731 


0    0 

3    8 

0    0 

14  \\\ 

12    Si 


There  is 
jalso  a  par- 
[gana  called 
Amrapdr, 
but  as  it  is 
represent- 
ed only  by 
akhas  ma- 
bal  with  a 
revenue  of 
Rs.7-2,  I 
have  not 
included  it 
in  the  list. 


986,368    6    2\ 


'  Baikanthpur  is  remarkable  for  its  lands  being  so  much  scattered.     There  is  part  of  it  in  Dakhin 
Shahbazpiir. 


70  DJSTJilCT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

I  now  proceed  to  describe  eacli  pargana  separately, 
and  begin  with  Chandradwip,  wliicli  is  at  once  the  oldest 
and  the  most  interesting  in  the  district. 

1.  Chandradwip. 
(a.)  Its  History. 

Chandradwip  was  one  of  the  four  mahals  or  parganas 
into  which  sarkar  Bdkla  was  divided  at  the  time  of 
Todar  Mai's  settlement.  At  that  time  it  seems  to  have 
been  known  by  the  name  of  Ismdilpiir  or  Bakla,  and  it 
appears  from  Professor  Blochmann's  work  that  Abul 
Fazl  nses  the  term  Bakla  as  synonymous  with  Chan- 
dradwij).  The  zamindar  of  Bakla,  who  had  in  1583  a 
son  called  Parmanand  Eai,  was  evidently  one  of  the 
Chandradwip  Rajahs,  and  probably  was  Eajah  Krishna 
Ballab. 

It  appears  from  traditions,  and  from  official  records, 
that  Chandradwip  belonged  from  early  times  to  a  Hindu 
family  of  the  Kayast  caste,  and  that  they  enjoyed  the 
title  of  Rajah.  The  name  Chandradwip  appears  to  mean 
the  island  of  Chandra,  whether  Chandra  be  taken  as  the 
name  of  a  man,  or  in  its  literal  signification  of  the  moon. 
The  name,  therefore,  appears  to  date  back  to  a  time  when 
a  great  part  of  the  district  Avas  covered  by  the  sea. 
According  to  tradition,  much  of  Bakarganj  was  formerly 
the  bed  of  a  large  river  called  the  Sugandha  or  Sunda ; 
and  the  name  of  Sugandha,  or  "the  Fragrant,"  is,  as 
already  stated,  said  to  be  derived  from  the  fact  that 
when  the  goddess  Bhagabati  was  cut  in  pieces,  and  the 
fragments  scattered  over  the  earth,  her  nose  fell  into 
this  river.  The  name  Sugandha  is  still  applied,  I  believe, 
to  the  upper  part  of  the  Kalijiri  river,  and  the  name  is 
perpetuated,  under  the  abbreviated  form  of  Sunda,  in  the 
name  Sundarkul,  or  bank  of  the  Sunda,  which  is  borne 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  71 

by,   I  think,  two  villages,   one  near  Pancliakaran,  and 
another  near  Nalchiti. 

The  following  romantic  story  is  told  in  connection  with 
the  name  Chandradwip  :  Tlierc  was  once  a  Brdhman  in 
Bikrampur  pargana  of  the  name  of  Chnndra,  whose  tute- 
lary deity  (Lshtodebta)  was  Bhagabati  or  Kali.  He 
married  a  young  Brahman  lady,  but  it  was  not  until  he 
brouo'ht  his  bride  home  tiiat  he  knew  what  her  name 
was.  He  then  found  out  that  she  bore  the  same  name 
as  his  patron  goddess,  and  was  greatly  distressed  by  the 
coincidence,  "for,"  he  said  to  himself,  "how  can  I  pray 
to  the  goddess  in  my  wife's  name  ?  It  will  seem  as  if 
I  were  worshipping  my  wife.  Or  again,  how  can  I  treat 
as  my  wife  one  who  bears  the  name  of  my  goddess  ?  It 
were  better  that  I  should  kill  myself  than  that  I  should 
run  the  risk  of  committing  acts  of  impiety."  Under 
these  feelings  of  perplexity  he  got  into  a  boat  and  re- 
solved to  sail  on  until  he  was  lost.  It  was  then  all  open 
sea  to  the  south  of  Bikrampur,  and  he  sailed  on  for  a  day 
and  a  night  without  meeting  any  one.  Next  morning, 
liowcvcr,  he  was  surprised  to  observe  a  little  boat,  rowed 
by  a  solitary  fisher-maiden.  He  addressed  her,  and 
asked  her  how  she  had  the  courage  to  be  there  all  alone. 
"  Oh,"  she  said,  "  I  am  following  my  trade,  and  I  have  no 
feaT ;  but  how  do  you,  who  are  a  Brahman  and  a  lands- 
man, come  to  be  in  such  a  place  ? "  Then  he  told  her  of 
the  perplexity  which  had  befallen  him.  The  girl  gave 
a  scornful  laugh,  and  said,  "0  Brahman,  how  foolish 
and  ignorant  you  are  !  Do  you  not  know  that  the  god- 
dess Bhagabati  dwells  in  every  womai:,  and  that  every 
woman  is  a  part  of  her  ?  Why,  then,  should  you  be 
sttirtled  to  find  that  your  bride  bears  her  name  % "  The 
Brahman  was  amazed  to  receive  such  a  reproof  from  a 
simple  fisher-girl,  and  at  once  felt  sure  that  she  was 
other  than  she  seemed,  and  was  a  goddess  in  disguise. 


72  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

Leaping  iuto  her  boat,  lie  clasped  her  knees,  and  adjured 
her  to  tell  him  who  she  really  was.  In  vain  she  reminded 
him  of  his  caste,  and  bade  him  not  sully  it  by  contact 
with  a  fisher-maiden.  He  refused  to  let  her  go,  and  she 
was  constrained  to  acknowledge  that  she  was  his  goddess 
Bhao^abati.  The  Brahman  was  not  slow  to  take  advan- 
tage  of  the  confession,  and  forthwith  supplicated  the 
goddess  to  bestow  a  boon  upon  her  worshipper.  She 
assented,  and  told  him  that  the  sea  on  which  he  then 
was  would  one  day  become  dry  land,  and  that  he  would 
possess  it,  and  call  it  Chandradwip,  after  his  own  name. 

Another  story  is,  that  there  was  a  great  ascetic,  of  the 
name  of  Chandra  Sekliar  Chakrabarti,  who  used  to  travel 
about  accompanied  by  his  disciple,  Eam  Nath  Dlianaj 
Mardan  De.  One  night,  when  he  was  asleep  in  his  boat, 
the  goddess  Kali  appeared  to  him  in  a  dream,  and  told 
him  that  there  were  some  images  lying  under  water  near 
his  boat,  and  that  he  should  secure  them.  Next  morn- 
ing he  made  his  disciple  dive  twice  into  the  water.  Each 
time  a  stone  image  was  brought  up.  Unfortunately,  the 
disciple  did  not  dive  a  third  time,  or  he  would  have 
brought  up  Ijakshmi,  the  goddess  of  Fortune.  The 
two  images  he  found  were  Katayani  and  Madan  Gopal. 
They  are  sculptured  in  black  stone,  and  are  still  wor- 
shipped in  Madhabpasha.  Chandra  Sekhar  then  pre- 
dicted to  his  disciple  that  the  sea  at  the  place  where  they 
were  would  one  day  be  dry  land,  and  that  he  would  be 
the  Eajali  of  it.  He  also  bade  him  call  it  Chandradwip, 
after  the  name  of  his  master. 

The  first  seat  of  the  family  was  at  Kachua,  a  village 
on  the  right  or  west  bank  of  the  Titulia  river,  and 
in  the  Baufal  thana  of  the  PatuyakhiUi  subdivision. 
According  to  one  tradition,  the  Eajalis  were  forced  to 
leave  Kachua  on  account  of  the  incursions  of  the  Mugs 
—  /.e.,  the  Burmese  —  and  according  to  another  story, 


HISTORY  OF  THE  FA  RG  AN  AS.  73 

tliey  left  it  on  account  of  the  encroaclimcntsof  the  river. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  much  diluviation  has  taken  pkce 
near  Kachua,  and  indeed  it  is  still  going  on.  The  local 
tradition  is  that  the  Titulia  was  once  a  very  narrow 
stream,  and  that  the  main  course  of  the  Meghna  flowed 
on  the  east  side  of  the  island  of  Dakhin  Shahbazpiir. 
This  view  is  supported  l)y  the  circumstance  that  the 
same  parganas  are  to  he  found  on  both  sides  of  the 
river — viz.,  Ratandi  Kalikapur,  Nazirpiir,  and  Uttar 
Shahbazpiir.  The  traveller  Ralph  Fitch  describes  a 
visit  he  paid  to  Bakla  in  1586.  There  is  no  town  or 
villao^e  of  the  name  of  Bakla  now  in  existence,  nor 
have  I  ever  heard  any  tradition  of  there  having  been 
such  a  town.  I  presume,  therefore,  that  Bakla  must 
be  the  same  as  Kachua,  though  if  so  it  must  have  been 
a  much  larger  place  in  Fitch's  time.  Probably  much 
of  the  old  town  has  been  washed  away.  Fitch  de- 
scribes the  country  as  being  governed  by  a  Hindu 
prince  who  was  of  a  good  disposition  and  fond  of 
shooting.  I  visited  Kachua  in  the  end  of  1874,  and 
found  that  the  only  remains  of  old  building  were  a 
lonely  and  deserted  temple  standing  on  a  high  mound 
overlooking  the  river,  and  a  series  of  vaulted  chambers 
of  very  strong  masonry,  which  are  said  to  have  been 
the  rajhari  or  palace.  The  temple  is  conical  in  shape 
and  is  double  storied,  which  is,  I  believe,  not  commonly 
the  case  in  modern  Hindu  temples.  It  is  evidently  of 
considerable  age,  for  there  is  a  large  tree  (a  iklIcout) 
growing  on  the  top,  which  is  so  branching  as  almost  to 
conceal  the  temple  underneath.^  The  rajbari  is  a  little 
farther  inland,  and  is  surrounded  with  jungle. 

^  Perhaps  this  was  the  very  temple  in  whicli  the  Rajah's  son  is  said  to 
have  taken  refui^^e.  It  certainly  was  a  natural  place  to  run  to  in  case  of 
an  inundation. 


74  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

The  genealogy  of  tlic  Chandmdwip  family  is  told  by 
tlieir  descendants  with  one  or  two  variations,  but  the 
most  correct  account  appears  to  be  as  follows  :  Earn 
Nath  Dhanaj  Mardan  De  was,  as  we  have  seen,  the 
founder  of  the  family.  He  lived  at  Kachua,  and  was 
succeeded  by  his  son  Ram  Ballab.  Ram  Ballab  was 
followed  hj  Sri  Ballab,  Hari  Ballab,  and  finally  by 
Krishna  Ballab,  who  had  no  sons,  and  with  whom 
therefore  the  direct  male  line  became  extinct.  Krishna 
Ballab,  however,  had  a  daughter  named  Kamala,  who 
has  left  her  mark  on  the  district,  and  deserves  a  passing 
remembrance.  I  have  said  that  Kachua  is  on  the  bank 
of  the  Titulia  ;  the  work  for  which  Kamala  is  famous 
is  the  excavation  of  a  large  tank  at  a  place  not  far  from 
Kachua,  and  near  the  mouth  of  the  Kalaia  river.  The 
tank  is  now  in  ruins,  but  enough  remains  to  show  that 
it  was  larger  than  any  tank,  not  excepting  Durga  Sagur, 
which  has  since  been  dug  in  the  district.  The  tradition 
is  that  after  Kamala  dug  the  tank  the  Avater  Avould 
not  rise  in  it,  and  that  the  people  reproached  her  family, 
saying  that  on  account  of  the  Rajah's  sins  the  water 
would  not  come  in.  Thereafter  Kamala,  being  warned 
in  a  dream,  w^ent  and  stood  in  the  middle  of  the  tank, 
and  the  waters  rose  up  and  closed  round  her,  and  she 
remained  in  their  midst  under  the  guise  of  a  water- 
lily.  According  to  another  tradition,  she  floated  out 
to  the  great  river  by  a  stream  which  still  flows  through 
the  tank.  The  tradition  goes  on  to  say  that  Kamala 
had  an  infant  child,  and  that  when  her  husband  saw 
the  waters  closing  round  her,  he  called  to  her  to  come 
out.  She  replied  that  she  could  not,  as  the  waters 
were  drawing  her  down  ;  and  then  he  asked  her  who 
would  nurse  her  child  if  she  did  not  return.  Under  in- 
structions from  the    goddess  Ganga,  Kamala  answered 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  75 

that  if  her  cliild  were  phiccd  every  morning  on  tlic 
steps  of  the  (jliAt,  or  landing-phi ce,  she  would  come  and 
nurse  him,  luit  no  one  else  must  sec  or  touch  her. 
The  child  Avas  accordingly  set  down  on  the  ghat  every 
morning,  and  Kamala  rose  out  of  the  water  and  nursed 
him.  But  the  Rajah,  being  disconsolate  for  her  loss, 
resolved  to  try  and  get  her  back ;  so  he  hid  himself 
near  the  ghat,  and  attempted  to  seize  Kamala  as  she 
Avas  giving  milk  to  the  child  ;  but  she  escaped  from  his 
embrace,  disappeared  in  the  Avater,  and  never  again 
emerged.  There  is  a  Beno-ali  sono-  about  these  occur- 
rences,  which  is  still  sung  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the 
tank.  A  fcAv  verses  of  it  have  been  recovered  for  me 
by  Babu  Chandra  Kumar  Ghose,  the  police  sub-inspector 
of  Baufal.  The}^  are  printed  in  the  Appendix.  Another 
part  of  the  tradition  is,  that  Avlien  Kamala  set  about 
making  the  tank  she  resolved  that  it  should  extend  as 
far  as  she  could  Avalk  without  turning  round.  She 
had  Avalked  about  four  clruns  (three  druns  and  thirteen 
kanies),  Avhen  her  servants,  being  alarmed  lest  she 
should  Avalk  too  far,  induced  her  to  turn  round  by 
smearing  her  heel  Avitli  the  blood  of  a  pigeon,  and 
calling  on  her  to  stop  as  her  foot  Avas  bleeding. 
Labourers  Avere  brought  from  Dakliin  Shahbdzpur  to 
dig  the  tank,  and  Kala  Bhadranath  and  his  twenty-seven 
sons  and  thirteen  grandsons  made  the  Jcodals  or  spades 
for  them.  The  digging  cost  nine  lacs  of  rupees.  Ac- 
cording to  one  account,  Kamala  Avas  the  Avife  of  Rajah 
Jagadanand  Bosu  ;  and  according  to  another  (unless  the 
two  names  refer  to  the  same  person),  she  Avas  the  Avife 
of  the  Kala  or  Black  Rajah,  AA^hose  name  still  survives 
in  the  Kala  Rajah  bil,  an  extensive  sAvamp  in  the  Baufal 
than  a. 

The  tank  is  no  longer  full  of  Avater,  but  Kamala's  good 


76  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

deed  lias  not  been  unfruitful,  for  its  bed  now  yields 
a  rich  harvest  of  rice,  and  its  lofty  walls  or  sides 
support  forty  or  fifty  homesteads,  luxuriant  in  tama- 
rind-trees, gab -fruit  trees,  and  l)amboos.  It  is  plea- 
sant to  see  these  homesteads  raised  high  above  the  sur- 
rounding swamps,  and  to  think  that  their  inhabitants 
owe  their  comforts  to  a  forgotten  Bengali  princess.  We 
are  reminded  of  the  noble  language  used  by  Burke 
when  speaking  of  the  tanks  in  the  Carnatic :  "  These 
are  the  monuments  of  real  kings,  who  were  the  fathers 
of  their  people ;  testators  to  a  posterity  which  they 
embraced  as  their  own.  These  are  the  grand  sepulchres 
built  by  ambition,  but  by  the  ambition  of  an  insatiable 
benevolence  which,  not  contented  with  reigning  in  the 
dispensation  of  haj^piness  during  the  contracted  tenure 
of  human  life,  had  strained,  with  all  the  reachings  and 
grasp  in  gs  of  a  vivacious  mind,  to  extend  the  dominion 
of  their  bounty  beyond  the  limits  of  nature,  and  to  per- 
petuate themselves  through  generations  of  generations  the 
guardians,  the  protectors,  the  nourishers  of  mankind." 

Krishna  Ballab  is  said  to  have  been  succeeded  by  his 
daughter's  son,  Sib  Nand,  alias  Parmanand  Eai.  He 
was  the  son  of  Balabhadra  Bosu,  and  with  him  com- 
menced the  Bosu  family.  Parmanand  was  succeeded  by 
Jagadanand,  who  was  drowned  in  the  Ganges,  and  whose 
son,  Kandarpa  Narain,  removed  on  this  account  from 
Kachua  and  settled  at  Madhabpasha,  about  seven  miles 
west-north-west  of  Barisdl.  There  is  a  tradition  that 
an  astroloojer  foretold  to  Ja2;adanand  that  he  would 
be  drowned,  and  that  to  i-uard  ao;ainst  this  he  shut 
himself  up  in  his  palace  at  Kachua.  But  at  the 
appointed  time  the  river  swelled  and  rose  up  to  the 
level  of  the  balcony,  and  as  the  Rajah  looked  out  upon 
the  flood  the  iroddess  Ganoa  rose  out  of  the  water  and 


IJISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  77 

stretclied  out  her  arms  and  beckoned  to  him  to  come. 
The  Kajah,  seeing  that  his  fate  was  inevitable,  yielded 
to  it,  and  sinking  into  the  arms  of  the  goddess,  dis- 
appeared into  the  river,  which  immediately  afterwards 
returned  to  its  old  bed.  This  tradition  appears  to  be  a 
poetical  reminiscence  of  the  great  storm  which  over- 
whelmed sarkd,r  Bdkla  in  1583  or  1584.  It  appears 
from  Professor  Blochmann's  work  that  tlie  son  of  the 
zamindar  of  Bakla  in  1583  was  called  Parmanand  Rai, 
and  this  may  have  been  Jagadanand's  father. 

Rajah  Kandarpa  Narain  was  succeeded  by  Ram  Chan- 
dra Rai,  who  married  a  daughter  of  the  famous  Rajah 
Pratapilditya.  It  is  said  that  when  Ram  Chandra  Rai 
went  to  his  father-in-law's  house  to  bring  away  his 
bride  he  was  accompanied  by  a  favourite  jester  called 
Ramai  Bhar.  This  man  dressed  himself  up  as  a  woman, 
and  so  gained  admission  to  Pratdpd,ditya's  zenana  and 
conversed  with  his  queen.  This  came  to  the  ears  of  the 
Rajah,  and  he  resolved  to  revenge  the  insult  by  killing 
his  son-in-law.  His  queen  told  this  to  her  daughter, 
who  communicated  it  to  her  husband,  and  he  contrived 
to  escape  from  the  palace  in  disguise.  On  coming  to 
his  boat,  however,  a  new  difficulty  presented  itself,  for 
Pratapdclitya  had  felled  trees  and  made  a  barricade  in 
front  of  the  boats  in  order  to  prevent  his  son-in-law's 
escape.  But  a  famous  athlete,  named  Ram  Mohan  Ma], 
who  was  in  the  Rajah's  company,  surmounted  the  diffi- 
culty. Though  the  boat  was  one  of  sixty-four  oars.  Ram 
Mohan  lifted  it  over  the  barricade  and  launched  it  into 
the  river.  Afterwards  Pratdpdditya  relented,  and  sent 
his  daughter  to  Ram  Chandra,  and  the  place  where 
she  landed,  near  Madhabpasha,  is  still  called  Bodhu 
Mata  Hdt,  or  the  Bride's  Market,  as  a  market  was 
established  there  in  her  honour.     It  may  be  mentioned 


78  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

here  that  Earn  Mohan  Mai  is  said  to  liave  been  the 
fouDcler  of  the  okl  family  known  by  the  name  of  the 
Raies  of  Ujirpur,  and  it  is  a  curious  circumstance  that 
the  present  Rajah  of  Chandradwip  is  a  scion  of  this 
family,  he  being  an  adopted  son.  Thus  Eam  Mohan 
Mai's  descendants  have  attained  the  dignity  which  their 
ancestor  helped  to  preserve.  Unfortunately,  however,  the 
glory  of  the  Chandradwip  family  has  long  since  departed. 

Ram  Chandra  Rai  is  mentioned  in  Harish  Chandra 
Tarkalankar's  history  of  Rajah  Pratapdditya,  but  the 
story  of  his  escape  is  told  somewhat  differently. 
Ram  Chandra,  it- is  there  said,  was  Pratdpaditya's  son- 
in-law,  and  had  left  his  country  and  fled  to  his  father- 
in-law's  house.  Pratdpaditya  resolved  to  have  him 
assassinated,  and  to  take  possession  of  his  kingdom.^ 
Pratdpdditya's  daughter  heard  of  the  plot,  and  warned 
her  husband,  who  called  in  the  aid  of  Udai  Aditya,  his 
brother-in-law.  Udai  Aditya  said  he  was  "going  that 
nio;ht  to  Jessore  to  a  ndcli,  and  sui^o'ested  that  Ram 
Chandra  should  disguise  himself  as  a  linkman  and 
accompany  the  palanquin.  Ram  Chandra  did  so,  and 
escaped  ;  and  then  Pratapaditya  sent  his  general,  Kamal 
Khoja,  to  take  Ram  Chandra's  country. 

This  Ram  Chandra  is  in  all  probability  the  boy-king  of 
Bdkla  whom  the  Jesuit  Fonseca  speaks  of,  and  who  was 
son-in-law  of  the  King  of  Chandecan.  Du  Jarric  says  he 
was  driven  out  of  his  country  by  the  Arracanese,  which 
ao^rees  with  the  statement  above  that  he  had  fled  to  his 
father-in-law's  house  (see  below,  in  chapter  on  Sun- 
darbans) . 

Ram  Chandra  was  succeeded  by  his  son  Kirti  Narain, 
who  is  reported  to  Lave  been  a  great  warrior,  and  who, 

^  Tarkalankar  speaks  of  Ram  Chandra  as  being  only  a  zaniiiidar,  but  tliis 
is  a  mistake  (see  the  original  life  of  Pratiipaditya  by  Ram  Ram  Bosu). 


HISTORY  OF  TJJJi  PA  RG  AN  AS.  79 

accordiuo-    to    a    tradition    coiiimuii    to    several    Hindu 
families,  lost  his  caste  by  smelling  a  Masalman's  dinner. 
He  lost  his  rajahship  from  the  same  cause,  and  was  suc- 
ceeded first  by  his  younger  brother  Bashodeb,  and  then 
by  his  son  Pratap  Narain.     Pratdp  Narain  was  succeeded 
by  his  son  Preni  Narain,  with  wdiom  the  Bosu  dynasty 
became  extinct,  and  was  replaced  by  the  Mitra  family. 
Prem  Narain  was   succeeded  by    his  son-in-law,   Gonri 
Cliaran  Mitra,  wdio  had  two  sons,  Udai  Narain  and  Paj 
Narain.    Udai  Narain  was  expelled  by  two  Mahomedans 
of  Chakar,  called  Mendi  Mozamdar  and  Sarafaddin  Mo- 
zamdar,  wdio  had  found  favour  with  the  ruling  Naw^ab 
by  giving  to  him  in  marriage  their  sister,  who  was  famed 
for  her  beauty.     Udai  Narain  went  to  plead  his  cause 
with  the  Nawab,  but  was  told  that  he  must  first  exhibit 
his  prowess  against  a  tiger.     An  arena  was  prepared. 
Udai  Narain   killed  the  tiger  in   the  presence   of  the 
Nawab,  and  then  craved  a  boon.     The  Nawab's  beauti- 
ful wife  was  present,  and  as  she  favoured  her  brothers, 
and  was  vexed  at  Udai  Narain 's  victory,  she  flung  him 
the  rind  of  a  plantain  fruit,  and  scornfully  told  him  to 
take  that  as  a  gift.     The  rind  of  a  plantain  is  called 
hdUa,  which  also,  as  w^e  have  seen,  w^as  another  name 
for    Udai    Narain's    zamindari.       So    the    ready-witted 
Hindu  quickly  picked  up  the  plantain  skin,  and  grate- 
fully thanked  the  Nawab  and  the  lady  for  having  given 
him  Bdkla.     The  Nawab  was  pleased  with  his  wit,  and 
restored  his  zamindari  to  him.     It  may  add  some  con- 
firmation to  this  story  to  mention  that  it  appears  from  a 
report  of  Mr  Massie's,  dated  18th  June  1801,  that  the 
Chandradwip  family  had  at  one  time  possessed   three 
firmans  or  grants  of  the  time  of  King  Mahomed  Shah, 
bearincr  the  seal    of   Nawab  Murshid   Kali  Khan — i.e., 
Nawab   Jaflar  Khan — confirming  Udai   Nai-ain  in    the 


8o  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

zamindari,  hissajat,  and  ndnhcr  lands  of  Cliandradwip. 
In  these  papers  lie  was  described  as  having  succeeded 
Indra  Narain,  who  had  died  without  children,  and  as 
being  the  grandson  of  Pratap  Narain. 

Udai  Narain's  brother,  Raj  Narain,  did  not  get  any 
share  in  the  zamindari,  but  he  got  a  taluq  called  Raj- 
mata,  and  established  himself  at  Pratappiir,  two  or  three 
miles  north  of  Madhabpisha.  Udai  Narain  was  suc- 
ceeded by  his  son  Sib  Narain,  who  became  insane,  set 
fire  to  his  house,  and  destroyed  many  old  jDapers  (see 
enclosures  of  Mr  Massie's  report  of  18th  June  1801).  Sib 
Narain  was  succeeded  by  his  eldest  son,  Lakshmi  Narain, 
who  died  shortly  before  1780  (see  enclosures  to  above 
report),  and  was  succeeded  by  Jai  Narain,  also  called 
Durga  Kuar  Narain.  During  Jai  Narain's  infancy,  his 
servant,  Sankhar  Bakshi,  got  possession  of  the  zamin- 
dari, but  Jai  Narain's  mother  recovered  it  with  the  help 
of  the  famous  Ganga  Govind  Sing.  Perhaps  it  was  on 
this  occasion  that  the  sanad  of  24tli  November  1780 
was  given,  which  bore  the  seal  of  the  Provincial  Council 
of  Dacca  and  the  signature  of  Mr  Holland,  the  Chief  of 
Dacca,  and  of  which  a  translation  is  appended  to  Mr 
Massie's  report  aforesaid.  The  getting  of  the  sanad  is 
said  to  have  cost  the  Rani  a  good  deal  of  money,  and 
this,  and  the  digging  of  a  large  tank  near  Madhabpasha, 
which  is  called  after  her,  Durga  Sagur,  are  said  to  have 
impoverished  the  estate.  Probably  it  was  tlic  expense 
of  feeding  the  Brahmans,  and  of  the  other  religious 
ceremonies  attending  the  construction  of  the  tank,  which 
weighed  more  heavily  on  the  estate  than  the  mere  cost 
of  the  manual  labour.  Jai  Narain,  alias  Durga  Kuar, 
was  the  last  zamindar,  as  in  his  time  the  Chandradwip 
pargana  was  sold  by  the  Collector  for  arrears  of  revenue 
in   1799.      Jai  Narain  was  succeeded  by  his  son,  Nar 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  8i 

Sing  Rai,  who  was  famed  for  bis  personal  beauty.  He 
liad  no  son,  but  each  of  his  two  widows  adopted  a  son, 
and  these  are  now  the  representatives  of  the  family. 
Their  names  are  Bir  Sin2:  Narain  Rai  and  Dabendra 
Narain  Rai,  and  they  are  popularly  known  as  the  Bara 
and  Chota  Raja.  They  live  at  Madhabpdsha,  but  are  in 
poor  circumstances,  as  they  have  nothing  to  support 
them  except  the  lands  round  about  Madhabpjisha,  which 
are  lakhiraj,  or  rent-free,  and  some  dependent  taluqs. 
Most  of  the  lakhiraj  belongs  to  what  is  called  the  Jchana- 
hari  or  homestead,  locally  called  Srinagar.  An  attempt 
was  made  to  resume  it,  but  it  was  finally  released.  The 
khanabari  is  of  considerable  extent,  and  is  bounded  on 
the  west  by  a  stream  called  Rajar  Ber,  or  the  Rajah's 
Moat,  whicli  commences  on  the  east  of  Rahamatpiir,  and 
which,  is  said  to  have  been  made  by  one  of  the  rajahs  as 
a  defence  to  his  palace.  Madhabpdsha  is  connected  with 
Barisdl  by  a  road  made  many  years  ago  by  a  Hindu  lady 
named  Parvati  Chaudharine.  There  are  many  ruins  of 
old  buildings  about  Madhabpdsha,  but  none  of  them  are 
at  all  remarkable,  and  the  finest  thing  about  the  place  is 
undoubtedly  the  large  tank  called  the  Durga  Sagur. 
There  is  a  brass  cannon  lying  near  the  bazjlr,  and  there 
is  a  small  old  tank  in  the  neis^hbourhood  called  Kaman- 
tolla.  Some  have  professed  to  read  the  name  Kan- 
darpa  Narain  on  this  cannon,  and  to  connect  it  with 
the  Rajah  of  that  name,  but  the  inscription  is,  to  say 
the  least,  very  indistinct,  and  it  seems  to  me  not  im- 
probable that  the  gun  may  have  been  brought  by 
Rajah  Durga  Kuar  Narain  from  the  Mahomedan  fort  of 
Sujabdd.  There  is  a  petition  among  the  records  from 
him  asking  leave  to  bring  away  some  cannon  from  that 
place. 

F 


82  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

(h.)  Financial  History  of  Chandradivip. 

In  tlie  Settlement  of  Todar  Mai  tlie  revenue  of  sark^u 
Bdkla  is  put  down  at  Rs.  178,206,  and  tins  is  larger 
than  the  revenue  at  that  time  of  Khalifatabad — i.e., 
Jessore.  In  1135  B.s.  the  revenue  of  Cliandradwip  par- 
gana  was  only  Rs.6608  (Grant,  p.  365).  This  small 
amount  only  represents  the  khalsa,  or  exchequer  revenue, 
and  is  evidently  the  result  of  the  greater  parts  of  the 
pargana  having  been  held  as  a  jaghir,  or  fief,  on  the 
condition  of  the  zamindar's  furnishino-  boats  and  crews 
to  the  Dacca  flotilla.  In  1105  (Grant,  p.  367)  the 
revenue  Avas  Rs.68,509,  of  which  only  Rs.ll70  were 
khalsa,  and  Rs.58,581  were  jaghir,  the  remaining 
E,s.8758  being  apparently  composed  of  ahiuahs  or  cesses. 
At  this  time  the  pargana  stood  in  the  name  of  Adi 
(Udai  ?)  Narain  of  the  Ganges,  and  is  described  as  con- 
sisting of  one  zamindari  and  twenty-two  mahals — i.e., 
app)arently  parganas.  This  circumstance,  that  the  zam- 
indari consisted  of  twenty-two  subordinate  mahals,  is 
very  interesting,  as  it  helps  to  explain  a  curious  fact 
in  the  topography  of  the  district — i.e.,  that  there  is 
one  village  in-  the  district  the  lands  of  which  belong 
to  no  less  than  twenty-two  parganas.  The  village  is 
Nohalia — a  large  village  in  the  Baufjil  tliana  of  the 
Patuyakhdli  subdivision,  and  therefore  not  very  far 
from  Kachua,  the  ancient  seat  of  the  Chandradvvip 
rajahs. 

The  following  parganas  are  to  be  found  in  this  village: 

1.  Buzurgumedpiir.  5.  Shaistanagar. 

2.  Bangrora.  6.  Bahadurpur. 

3.  Khanjababadurnagar.  7.  Fadainagar. 

4.  Arangptir.  8.  Uttar  Sbabbilzpur. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  83 

9.  Azimpur.  IG.  SliaistAbAd. 

10.  Ramuagar.  17.  FarokhAbAcl. 

11.  Idrakpiir.  18.  Tappa  Birinoliai). 

12.  Khorda  Sliafipiir.  19.  Nazirpur. 

13.  Shahzddpur.  20.  SultanAbAd. 

14.  Kasirapilr  Selapati.  21.  Shafipur  Kala. 

15.  Rasulpiir.  22.  Pargaiia  Birmohan. 

All  the  lands  of  these  parganas  are  now  traceable  in 
tlie  village  except  those  of  Farokhabad,  Kasimpur  Sela- 
pati, Khorda  Shafipur,  and  Rasulpiir,  which,  however, 
are  said  by  the  villagers  to  be  still  in  existence,  but  to 
be  hidden  in  the  jungle  which  covers  the  outskirts  of 
the  village.  On  account  of  this  grouping  together 
of  twenty-two  parganas,  the  place  is  popularly  called 
Gachani — i.e.,  the  bundling  or  tying  together.  The  word 
is  also  used  to  mean  the  forcing  a  person  to  accept 
something  against  his  will,  and  hence  in  revenue  par- 
lance gachani  means  the  compelling  a  proprietor  or 
farmer  to  take  the  settlement  of  several  estates — i.e., 
the  ofood  and  the  bad  together. 

Two  thino-s  are  deservino-  of  note  in  this  list.  The 
first  is,  that  tlie  name  Chandradwip  is  conspicuous  by 
its  absence ;  and  secondly,  that  the  large  pargana  of 
Ratandi  Kalikapur  is  not  mentioned.  Now,  it  is  known 
that  Ratandi  Kalikapur  was  formed  out  of  part  of 
Nazirpur  and  other  parganas  in  1149  b.s.,  and  therefore 
we  may  reasonably  conclude  that  the  gachani  took  place 
before  that  period.  This  circumstance  and  the  omission 
of  Chandradwip  give  countenance  to  the  following- 
tradition  :  Rajah  Udai  Narain's  brother.  Raj  Narain, 
did  not  take  any  share  of  the  zamindari,  but  in  order 
to  keep  alive  the  memory  of  his  rights,  and  also  of  the 
fact  that  Chandradwip  was  composed  of  twenty-two 
parganas,  he  made  the  village  of  Nohalia  into  a  taluq, 
and  aggregated  in  it  the  names  of  all  the  parganas.     It 


84  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

is  a  fact  known  from  otlier  sources  that  most  of  the 
parganas  in  Bakarganj  have  been  formed  out  of  Chan- 
dradwip ;  in  revenue  parlance  they  are  hharija,  or 
excluded  from  Chandradwip,  and  the  above  list  is  an 
additional  proof  of  this. 

In  1169  B.S.,  as  appears  from  a  report  by  Mr  Massie, 
dated  25tli  November  1800,  the  revenue  of  Chandra- 
dwip was  Es. 7 1,042;  and  in  1194 — i.e.,  1787 — it  was 
Rs. 8 5,725.  Mr  Day,  in  his  proposals  for  the  Permanent 
Settlement,  recommended  that  this  assessment  should  be 
increased  by  lis.  15,000,  in  consideration  of  the  Hissajat 
or  stipendiary  lands  held  by  the  zamindar.  The  Board 
of  Revenue  ajoproved  of  this  proposal,  but  expressed  a 
hope  that  it  would  not  cause  distress  to  the  zamindar  or 
his  family,  or  to  the  ryots.  On  6th  A|)ril  1790  Mr 
Douglas  reported  that  Rs.3000  of  the  increase  was 
obtained  in  1195,  and  Rs.lOOO  more  in  the  assessment 
for  the  current  year  (1196).  He  added,  "The  proprie- 
tor of  the  pargana  is  a  youth  of  seventeen  years  of  age, 
but  as  no  attention  has  been  paid  to  his  education,  he 
remains  in  total  ignorance  of  the  minutiae  of  the  Mofussil 
collections  ;  his  time  is  wholly  spent  in  the  luxuries  of  a 
zenana,  and  these  his  mother,  wishing  to  continue  in 
the  management  of  the  pargana,  supplies  him  with  the 
means  of  gratifying."  On  29th  April  the  Board  replied 
by  directing  the  Collector  to  make  the  Decennial  Settle- 
ment of  Chandradwip  on  the  revenue  of  1196 — viz., 
Rs.89,725.  On  4th  October  1791  Mr  Douglas  reports 
that  he  called  on  the  zamindar  to  enter  into  engagements 
on  the  terms  proposed  by  Mr  Day,  and  that  he  positively 
declined  to  do  so.  Mr  Douglas  adds,  that  some  of  the 
lands  had  suffered  much  from  the  inundation,  but  that 
he  thought  the  estate  could  bear  the  increase  if  it  were 
well  managed,  and  if  the  Hissnjat  lands  were  resumed. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  AN  AS.  85 

Eventually  Mr  Douglas  proposed  that  the  revenue  for 
the  remaining  years  of  the  Decennial  Settlement — viz., 
from  1200  to  1206— should  Le  fixed  at  Rs.87,652-1-8, 
and  this  was  approved  by  the  Board  and  the  Governor- 
General.  It  seems  that  a  tahsildar,  or  native  collector, 
of  Chandradwip  had  been  appointed,  owing  to  the 
Rajah's  having  defaulted;  and  on  26th  October  1791 
Mr  Douglas  reports  that  the  owsli  or  early  rice  crop  had 
been  much  injured  by  crabs,  and  that  he  had  therefore 
suspended  the  payment  of  an  instalment  of  the  revenue. 
The  zamindar  did  not  agree  to  Mr  Douglas's  proposals, 
and  on  21st  October  1795  the  Collector  (Mr  Armstrong) 
reports  that  the  zamindar  of  Chandradwip  is  not  under 
eno-aoements  to  Government,  and  that  he  orives  as  a 
reason  for  not  being  so,  that  some  taluqs  had  been  sepa- 
rated from  his  zamindari  in  1198  which  were  not  entitled 
to  separation,  and  that  others  had  been  separated  at  a 
much  inferior  rate  of  rent  to  that  which  he  used  from 
time  immemorial  to  receive  from  them.  Mr  Armstrong 
considered  that  there  was  some  truth  in  the  latter  asser- 
tion ;  but  aj^parently  Mr  Armstrong  was  not  a  suffi- 
ciently active  Collector,  for  he  was  called  upon  by  the 
Governor-General  in  Council  to  explain  why  the  revenue 
in  his  time  was  invariably  in  arrear,  whereas  under  a 
former  Collector  it  was  realised  with  the  greatest  regu- 
larity. In  his  defence  he  pleads  that  the  low  price  of 
grain,  and  the  protracted  suits  which  the  zamindars  had 
to  bring  against  their  under-renters,  prevented  them 
from  paying  the  revenue  (25tli  July  1795).  Meanwhile 
the  affairs  of  the  Rajah  of  Chandradwip  went  from  bad* 
to  worse,  and  on  11th  November  1799  Mr  Massie  re- 
ports that  the  whole  of  the  Rajah's  lands  have  been  sold 
by  public  auction,  and  that  there  was  still  a  balance  due 
of  upwards  of  Rs.35,000,  and  requests  that  he  may  be 


86  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

allowed  to  put  the  Rajali  in  the  Dacca  Civil  Jail,  if  he 
can  succeed  in  apprehending  him.  "  He  has  distin- 
guished himself  very  much,"  writes  Mr  Massie,  "  by  his 
refractoriness,  and  the  making  an  example  of  him 
would,  I  am  confident,  be  attended  with  very  beneficial 
efi"ects  in  this  district."  Tlie  Board  replied  on  the  22d 
idem  by  approving  of  this  proposal.  The  Rajali  was 
never  actually  imprisoned,  but  Mr  Massie  attempted  to 
carry  out  his  proj^osa!,  for  there  is  a  petition,  from  the 
Rajah's  mother  (called  by  Mr  Massie,  the  old  Rani  of 
Chandradwip),  dated  January  1800,  in  which  she  says 
that  apiada  has  come  to  summon  Rajah  Jai  Narain — i.e., 
Durga  Kuar.  "  How  shall  I  describe  to  you  how  sick 
the  Rajah  is  ?  The  whole  of  the  zamindari  has  been 
sold.  I  am  a  widow,  and  the  only  son  I  have  is  on  the 
point  of  death."  In  a  subsequent  petition,  dated  March 
1800,  the  Rani  begs  that  the  Collector  will  pass  an  order 
for  the  recall  of  the  piada  deputed  to  summon  the 
Rajah.  "  The  whole  of  the  zamindari  has  been  sold, 
and  the  Rajah  is  sick,  and  therefore  I  am  distressed 
beyond  measure ;  you  are  master  of  the  country,  and 
I  am  hopeful  that,  taking  compassion  on  a  poor  widow, 
you  will  remit  the  fine,  and  by  whatever  means  I  can 
I  will  pay  the  money."  It  may  be  noted  here,  in  ex- 
planation of  Mr  Massie's  apparently  harsh  proceedings, 
that  the  preamble  to  Regulation  3  of  1794  states  that 
"  from  the  earliest  times  the  rulers  of  these  provinces 
have  exercised  a  discretionary  power  of  confining  pro- 
prietors of  land  who  have  failed  in  the  discharge  of  the 
'public  revenue."  The  Regulation  took  away  the  power 
in  ordinary  cases,  but  section  14  retained  it  for  in- 
stances in  which  the  proceeds  of  the  sale  of  the  de- 
faulter's land  did  not  cover  the  arrears,  as  was  the  case 
with  the  Rajah  of  Chandradwip. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  TARGANAS.  87 

Cliandradwip  pargana  was  sold  at  Dacca  iu  1206  b.s. 
(1799),  and  was  bought  by  two  Greeks,  Messrs  George 
and  Alexander  Panioty,  by  one  Dal  Sing  of  Dacca,  and 
by  several  others,  of  wliom  the  chief  appears  to  have 
been  Ram  ^lanik  ]\Iudi.  It  appears  to  have  been  sold 
in  three  shares,  as  follows  : — 

A.  Gandaa.  Krants. 

Earn  Manik  Mudi  and  others  .         .     8     12|     2 

Messrs  Panioty 5     10       0 

DalSini? 1     171     1 


16       0       0 


Soon  after  the  purchase  the  pargana  was  attached 
because  the  purchasers  fell  into  arrears,  and  an  amin  was 
sent  to  collect  the  rents.  Another  amin  was  also  sent  to 
make  a  partition  of  the  pargana,  iu  accordance  with  a 
request  of  the  purchasers.  The  difficulties  of  the  Col- 
lector and  the  purchasers  lasted  for  some  time,  and  in 
one  petition  Messrs  Panioty  pathetically  observe  that 
"what  we  intended  as  a  purchase  of  lands  has  only  been 
the  purchase  of  dis^Dutes  in  the  Faujdari  and  Diwani 
Adalats."  On  15th  Aioril  1800  Mr  Massie  writes,  "It 
is  extremely  unpleasant  to  me  to  be  so  very  troublesome 
to  your  Board  with  regaid  to  the  affairs  of  pargana 
Chandradwip,  but  really  the  parties  concerned  are  so 
clamorous  and  harass  me  so  much  with  their  petitions 
and  representations  of  one  kind  or  another,"  &c. 

Messrs  Panioty  represented  that  they  were  the  only 
real  purchasers,  and  that  Ram  Manik  Mudi  was  only  a 
henamidar  (man  of  straw)  for  the  Rajah.  Unfortun- 
ately for  the  Chandradwip  family,  this  was  not  the  case. ' 
According  to  the  story  now  current  in  Bakarganj, 
Ram  Manik  was  a  mudi  or  petty  shopkeeper  in  the 
Madhabpd-sha  bazar,  but  he  was  also  the  Rajah's  agent 
or  gomasta,  and  he  pretended  to  him  that  he  was  only 


88  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

buying  the  estate  on  liis  behalf.  Afterwards,  how- 
ever, he  turned  round  and  claimed  to  be  the  real  pur- 
chaser. Earn  Manik's  descendants  are  still  in  posses- 
sion of  the  zamindari,  and  live  at  Madhabpasha  side  by 
side  with  the  representatives  of  the  old  rajahs.  They 
are  still  contemptuously  spoken  of  as  the  Mudi  Bansa 
or  family,  and  I  am  sorry  to  say  that  though  some  of 
them  are  rich,  they  have  done  very  little  to  wipe  out 
the  discredit  which  rests  on  their  ancestor's  name. 

The  difficulties  experienced  by  the  purchasers  in 
getting  possession  arose  partly  from  the  claim  of  the 
Rajah  to  hold  certain  lands  rent  free.  These  were  called 
Hissajat  lands,  and  are  thus  defined  by  Mr  Massie  in  a 
statement  submitted  to  the  Board  on  5th  November 
1798  :  "It  seems  that  in  the  time  of  the  incursions 
of  the  Mugs,  the  zamindars  of  this  part  of  the  country 
held  certain  lands  exempt  from  revenue  on  condition  of 
their  furnishing  boats  and  men  to  o^^pose  those  people. 
And  the  lands  so  held  were  termed  Nowara  lands. 
Some,  if  not  all  of  the  principal  zamindars,  exclusive  of 
furnishing  boats,  &c.,  engaged  to  go  in  person  in  these 
expeditions  against  the  Mugs,  and  in  such  cases  they 
were  allowed  to  hold  a  still  greater  proj)ortion  of  land 
exempt  from  revenue,  in  consideration  of  their  own 
personal  services.  And  the  lands,  though  included 
under  the  general  term  Nowara,  were  distinguished  by 
the  specific  term  Hissajat,  of  which  latter  description 
are  the  lands  alluded  to."  Durga  Narain  Kuar  peti- 
tioned about  these  lands,  and  Mr  Massie  submitted  a 
report  thereon  on  18tli  June  1801.  He  states  that 
Durga  Narain  produced  among  other  papers  a  pariuana 
signed  by  Mr  Holland,  the  Chief  of  Dacca,  dated  24th 
November  1780.  The  preamble  to  the  parwana  is  worth 
quoting.     "  To   the   matsaddies   that  are  emj)loyed   at 


I  11  ST  OR  V  OF  THE  PARC  AN  AS.  89 

present,  or  tluat  may  be  employed  hereafter,  the  cliaud- 
liaries,  zamindars,  kanangoes,  taluqdars,  ryots,  and  all 
otlier  inhabitants  of  pargaua  Chandradwip,  &c.,  sarkdr 
Bilkla,  Mahal  Nowara,  &c.,  dependent  on  Chakla  Jahan- 
girnagar,  in  the  sonba  of  Bengal,  the  paradise  of  king- 
doms,-— be  it  known  that  the  aforesaid  pargana,  &c,,  is 
a  zamindari  of  forty-two  cosas  [a  kind  of  boat],  of  thirty- 
two  mullahs  [boatmen]  each,  and  that  Hissajat  has  been 
allotted  to  Udai  Narain,  the  zamindar."  On  21st  July 
1801  the  Board  rejected  Durga  Narain's  claim  to  the 
Hissajat  lands. 

The  partition  papers  of  Chandradwip,  which  are  in 
the  Collectorate,  bear  the  date  of  1210  b.s.  (a.d.  1803-4), 
but  apparently  the  partition  was  not  completed  then, 
for  Mr  Batty e,  in  a  letter  of  8th  June  1807,  speaks  of 
the  extraordinary  delay  which  has  taken  place  in  com- 
pleting the  partition,  and  mentions  that  at  last  the 
zamindars  had  applied,  under  section  22  of  Eegulation 
25  of  1793,  for  permission  to  make  the  partition  by 
private  arrangement.  The  Board  had  approved  of  this 
proposal,  and  Mr  Battye  submitted  the  partition  papers, 
with  the  letter  aforesaid.  The  Board  confirmed  the 
partition  on  21st  July  1807.  A  portion  of  the  Paniotys' 
share  is  still  held  by  their  descendants,  and  another  por- 
tion has  been  bought  by  Babus  Eajendra  and  Mohima, 
of  Chaudharassi,  and  a  third  portion  belongs  to  the  Kal- 
lowas  family.  Dal  Sing's  share  is  still  held  by  his 
descendants. 

In  closing  this  account  of  Chandradwip,  and  of  the 
ancient  family  which  once  possessed  it,  it  is  impossible 
to  avoid  the  conclusion  that  the  ruin  of  the  rajahs  w^as 
inevitable.  Mr  Massie  may  have  been  somewhat  harsh, 
and  our  settlements  and  our  sale  laws  somewhat  rigid, 
and  Ram  Manik  may  have  behaved  to  the  Eajah  after 


90  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

the  fasliion  of  Glossin  iu  his  dealings  with  the  Laird  of 
EUangowau,  but,  after  all,  what  hope  was  there  for  a 
youth  like  the  Eajah,  who  had  sj^ent  all  his  life  in  the 
zenana  ?  If  none  of  the  other  adverse  influences  had 
existed,  he  must  still  in  time  have  gone  to  the  ground 
from  sheer  incapacity  to  manage  his  afiairs ;  and  if  it 
were  j^ossible  now  to  restore  Chandradwip  to  the  present 
representatives  of  the  family,  they  Avould  be  unable  to 
keep  it.  The  elder  or  Bara  Rajah  is  intelligent,  and  of 
fair  character,  but  he  is  devoid  of  energy,  and  the  demon 
of  discord  has  taken  possession  of  him  and  his  brother, 
so  that  cases  between  them,  and  these,  too,  of  no  very 
reputable  character,  not  unfrequently  come  before  our 
criminal  courts. 

It  is  a  remark  of  Mr  HeljDS  in  his  life  of  Mr  Brassey, 
that  families  seem  to  be  like  certain  plants  which  take 
long  to  come  to  maturity,  and  then  flower  and  die  ;  and 
the  remark  is  probably  even  more  aj^plicable  to  Bengal 
than  to  Europe.  I  could  enumerate  many  native  fami- 
lies which,  after  being  long  obscure,  have  shot  up  during 
a  single  generation,  have  exercised  much  power  and 
influence,  and  then  have  sunk  back  into  insignificance 
with  the  death  of  the  one  leading  spirit.  The  great 
Narail  family  of  Jessore  is  a  case  in  point,  for  it  does  not 
appear  to  have  produced  a  single  man  of  mark  before 
or  after  Ram  Ratan  Rai.  The  Tagores  of  Idilpiir,  the 
Ghosals  of  Selimabdd,  and  the  Biswases  of  Jolabari  are 
also  instances ;  and  if  we  look  at  men  who  are  now 
flourishing — such  as  Khajah  Abdul  Ghani,  C.S.I,  of 
Dacca ;  Gholam  Ali  Chaudhari  of  Haturia ;  Raj  Ballab 
Rai  of  Madhabpdsha  ;  or  Boroda  Kanth  Rai,  the  present 
energetic  zamindar  of  Arangpur — we  must  feel  it  to  be 
very  doubtful  if  they  will  leave  successors  who  will  be 
able  to  walk  in  their  footstejis.     Apart  from  questions 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PA  KG  ANAS.  91 

of  climate  and  race,  I  think  there  are  two  circumstances 
Avhich  make  such  declensions  more  common  in  Bengal 
than  in  Europe.  One  is,  that,  as  a  general  rule,  a  man 
of  rank  in  India  gets  no  training  worthy  of  the  name. 
If  he  becomes  great,  he  docs  so  by  the  pure  force  of  his 
own  abilities,  and  l)y  breasting  the  blows  of  his  sur- 
rounding circumstances.  But  as  genius  is  always  rare, 
it  is  not  likely  that  it  should  show  itself  in  two  successive 
generations ;  and  there  is  no  external  aid  in  the  shape 
of  good  teaching,  &c.,  to  supplement  deficiencies,  and  to 
enable  a  man  of  only  average  ability  to  fill  a  difficult 
position.  Another  circumstance,  I  think,  is  that,  owing 
to  the  institution  of  caste,  it  is  not  so  easy  to  get  a  new 
strain  into  a  family  as  it  is  in  Europe.  In  Hindu  fami- 
lies the  practice  of  adoption  might  be  supposed  to  ha.ve 
some  influence  in  this  respect ;  but  not  only  is  the 
liberty  of  choice  in  adoption  restricted  by  the  rules  of 
caste,  but  also,  unfortunately,  adojDtion  must  take  place 
at  a  very  early  age,  and  therefore  before  anything  can 
be  known  of  the  capacities  of  the  adopted  child. 

The  present  revenue  of  the  Chandradwip  zamindari  is 
Ks.82,562-14-4j.  There  are  also  seventy-three  sepa- 
rated taluqs  in  it,  the  revenue  of  which  is  Es. 5 8,1 04- 
10-8^;  so  that  the  total  land  revenue  is  Es.  140,667- 
9-1.  The  Chakrabarties  of  Eahamatpiir,  said  to  be 
descended  from  the  Eajah's  dewan  or  minister,  are 
among  the  largest  talucj^dars  in  the  pargana.  The  par- 
gana  is  situated  chiefly  in  thanas  Kotwali,  Mendiganj, 
and  Baufal.  In  old  records  it  is  described  as  Chandra- 
dwip, &c.,  and  the  &c.  is  said  to  refer  to  two  obsolete 
parganas,  called  Jaffirabdd  and  Eafianagar.  The  Sundar- 
ban  portion  of  Chandradwip  belonged  to  these  two 
parganas.  The  lands  of  Chandradwip  are  in  general 
fertile  and  well  cultivated.     It  is,  along  with  Kotwali- 


92  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

para  and  one  or  two  other  parganas,  remarkable  for  tlie 
number  of  Bralmians  who  live  in  it.  Many  of  them 
hold  rent-free  lands,  though  the  quantity  in  each  case  is 
generally  small.  The  town  of  Barisal  is  situated  in  this 
pargana.  The  land  measure  in  use  is  the  hard.  It  is 
divided  into  gandas,  coAvries,  and  krants,  there  being 
twenty  gandas  in  a  kani,  four  cowries  in  a  ganda,  and 
three  krants  in  a  cowry.  Sixteen  kanies  make  one  drun. 
The  kani  is  measured  by  a  nal  or  rod  eight  cubits  and 
eight  fingerbreadths  in  length.  Twenty-four  nals  by 
twenty  make  a  kani,  and  as  the  eight  fingerbreadths 
are  reckoned  as  equal  to  six  inches,  a  nal  is  twelve  and 
a  half  feet  long  (the  cubit  being  of  eighteen  inches)  ;  so 
that  twenty-four  by  twenty  nals  are  equal  to  300 
by  250  feet,  or  75,000  square  feet.  The  standard  bigha 
used  in  the  measurement  of  Government  estates,  &c., 
is  in  area,  14,400  square  feet,  or  1600  square  yards ;  so 
that  the  Chandradwip  kani  is  equal  to  about  five  bighas, 
four  kathas,  and  two  chittaks— i.e.,  to  about  five  and  one- 
fifth  bighas,  or  about  one  and  three-fourths  of  a  statute 
acre.  The  same  measurement  is  in  use  in  parganas 
Azimpur,  Bangrora,  Buzurgumedpiir,  Gird-i-Bandar, 
Idilpiir,  and  tappa  Havili.  There  is,  however,  occa- 
sionally some  confusion  about  the  size  of  the  Chandra- 
dwip kani,  one  being  sometimes  referred  to  in  which  the 
nal  is  only  eight  cubits  long,  the  fingerbreadths  being 
omitted.  This  is  the  kani  referred  to  by  Mr  Hunter  in 
his  letter  to  the  Board  of  9th  December  1818,  in  which 
he  describes  the  Chandradwip  kani  as  being  288  by 
240  feet,  or  69,120  square  feet.  It  is  thus  equal  to  four 
bighas  and  sixteen  kathas,  or  upwards  of  one  and  a  half 
acre.  I  may  mention  here  that  it  is  almost  impossible 
to  state  all  the  land  measures  in  use.  There  is  an  old 
list  in   the  Collectorate,  and  on  this  Mr  Reilly,  when 


HTSTOR  V  OF  THE  PARGANAS. 


93 


Deputy-Collector,  constructed  a  table,  which  is  referred 
to  in  cases  of  doubt,  but  it  does  not  appear  to  be  ex- 
haustive. 

One  of  the  principal  families  residing  in  Chandradwip, 
though  their  property  lies  in  pargana  Azimpl!u',  &c.,  is 
the  Eaies  of  Lakutia,  about  six  miles  from  Barisd.1.  They 
are  a  Brd-hman  family,  and  their  ancestors  are  said  to 
have  been  originally  the  cooks  of  the  Rajah  of  Chan- 
dradwip. But,  whatever  their  origin,  they  can  boast  of 
at  least  one  member  who  would  have  done  honour  to 
any  family.  This  was  Raj  Chandra  Rai,  the  father  of 
the  present  owners.  He  was  a  pleader  and  an  en- 
lightened zamindar,  and  made  one  of  the  best  roads  and 
canals  in  the  district  (the  Lakutia  road  and  khdl)  en- 
tirely at  his  own  expense.  The  estate  at  present  be- 
longs to  three  brothers,  who  have  become  Brdhmos  and 
have  thrown  aside  their  sacred  thread. 

The  following  papers  connected  with  Chandradwip 
appear  in  a  volume  in  the  India  Office  Library,  called 
General  Appendix  to  Judicial  Papers,  1774  : — 

To  the  Ilonourahle  Warren  Hastings,  &c. 

We  beg  leave  to  refer  to  your  consideration  a  petition  which  has 
been  laid  before  us  by  the  vakil  of  Kaghanandan  Chaudhari,  security 
for  the  pargana  of  Chandradwip.  We  understand  the  two  Euro- 
peans there  mentioned  are  officers  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Judi- 
cature ;  and  Ave  transmit  this  petition  to  you  as  an  instance  of 
the  inconveniences  which  attend  this  jurisdiction's  being  exercised 
on  the  persons  employed  on  the  collections.  In  the  present  case 
we  presume  the  zamindars  are  not  amenable  to  the  power  of  the 
Supreme  Court,  not  being  servants  of  the  Company  or  any  European. 

(Signed)        KousE,  Purling,  kc. 
Dacca,  30<A  Oct.  1775. 

The    petition  of  Khosal  Chasat,  vakil  of   the  security  for  the 

parganas  Chandradwip,  JaffirAbdd,  and  Eafianagar. 
Showing — That  Odal  San  {]),  the  former  Naib,  having  preferred 
a  complaint  for  debt  against  Sib  Narain,  zamindar,  and  Ram  Sank- 


94  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

liar  Baksliy,  Naib  of  aforesaid  parganas,  in  Calcutta,  has  brought 
from  thence  two  Europeans  to  the  said  zamindar's  house,  seized 
and  confined  the  Naib.  .  .  .  If  the  zamindar  and  Naib  are 
carried  to  Calcutta  on  account  of  an  old  debt,  the  business  of  the 
collections  cannot  be  carried  on,  &c. 

2.  Gird-i-Bandar. 

Though  called  a  pargana,  this  is  merely  a  small  por- 
tion of  Chandradwip,  wliich  has  been  excluded  from  it 
in  order  to  form  the  bazar  of  Barisdl.  It  consists  of  one 
village  (Barisdl),  and  this  a  very  small  one,  and  is 
altogether  comprised  in  one  taluq,  called  Hari  Radha 
Nath  Dass,  of  which  the  revenue  is  only  Rs. 53-5-4. 
The  town  of  Baristil  now  includes  much  more  than  the 
villao;e  of  that  name.  The  civil  courts  and  the  col  lee- 
torate  and  the  maoistrates'  cutcherics  are  built  on  the 
aforesaid  taluq,  the  sites  being  held  by  Government 
as  an  under-tenure.  The  taluq  belongs  to  Babu  Chandi 
Charan  Rai,  and  is  a  very  profitable  one. 

3.    BUZURGUMEDPUR. 

This  is  an  old  pargana,  and  was  formerly  included  in 
sarkar  Bazuha.  It  is  said  to  derive  its  name  from  Buzurg 
Umed  Khan,  son  of  Shaista  Khan  who  governed 
Bengal  in  the  latter  half  of  the  seventeenth  century. 
Some  account  of  him  will  be  found  in  vol.  liii. 
of  the  *' Calcutta  Review"  for  1871,  article  '' Feringh- 
ies  of  Chittagong."  Buzurgumedpur  belonged  to  Aga 
Bdkar,  and  the  mart  of  Bakarganj,  which  gave  its  name 
to  the  district,  is  situated  within  it.  On  Aga  Bd-kar's 
death,  Buzurgumedpur  became  the  property  of  Rajah 
Raj  Ballab,  the  Naib  of  Shahamat  Jung,  nephew  and 
son-in-law  of  Aliverdi  Khan.  He  was  also  the  Peshkar 
of  the  Nowara  or  Fleet  lands.     Grant  refers  to  Buzurg- 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PA  KG  ANAS.  95 

umedpur  as  a  petty  zaminclari,  which  in  the  space  of 
five-and-thirty  years  anterior  to  1170,  improved  in  its 
rental  from  Rs.6000  to  two  lacs,  chiefly  through  new 
acquisitions  of  soil,  though  doubtless  partly  from  amelio- 
ration of  the  uncultivated  wastes  of  the  Sundarbaus,  in- 
creased manufacture  of  salt,  and  growth  of  betel-nut.  In 
1135  the  revenue  of  Buzurgumedpur  is  put  down  as  only 
Ks.4647.  At  present  it  is  upwards  of  three  lacs — that 
is,  including  the  revenues  of  the  permanent  taluqs  and  of 
the  tem^Dorarily  settled  estates.  The  zamindari  cutchery 
of  Buzurgumedpur  was  at  Golabari,  near  Bd-karganj. 
There  are  still  some  ruins  of  buildings  there,  and  the 
remains  of  a  road  which  connected  it  with  Bakarganj. 
The  name  Buzurgumedpur  is  older  than  that  of  Bdkar- 
ganj,  and  it  appears  from  an  official  order  published  in  vol. 
i.  p.  185,  of  Seton-Karr's  Selections,  that  Buzurgumed- 
piir  was  at  one  time  considered  important  enough  to  be 
managed  by  a  European  Collector,  and  that  Mr  Henry 
Lodge  had  charge  of  it  previous  to  1787.  A  petition 
from  the  vakil  or  ao-ent  of  the  zamindar  of  Buzurgu- 
medpur  (Rajah  Eaj  Ballab),  dated  1764,  is  printed  at 
page  408  of  Mr  Long's  Selections.  It  is  full  of  com- 
plaints against  the  English  traders.  "  By  reason  of  the 
oppressions  of  the  factories  of  the  Company  and  many 
other  English  traders,  all  the  inhabitants  are  fled  :  the 
people  of  the  factories  take  from  the  merchants  what 
they  please  at  half  price ;  cut  down  bamboos  and  trees 
belonging  to  the  inhabitants,  and  take  them  away  by 
force ;  if  any  one  complain,  they  punish  him  for  it. 
They  press  the  inhabitants,  and  carry  them  in  the  woods 
of  Sundarban,  paying  them  only  half  their  wages.  They 
take  possession  of  land  in  the  Sundarban  and  make 
tafalls  of  salt,  for  which  they  pay  no  rent.  They  seize 
the  salt  of  the  tafalls  of  the  pargana  and  of  the  inhabi- 


96  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

tants.  Tlicy  force  the  inhabitants  to  take  tobacco,  salt, 
and  other  articles,  and  refuse  to  pay  the  legal  duties  on 
the  trade  which  they  carry  on.  If  \^q,  demand  a  sight 
of  the  Company's  dustah,  they  beat  us  with  bamboos. 
Some  of  them  pretend  that  they  have  been  robbed  and 
insist  on  our  making  restitution,  placing  peons  ujDon  us, 
and  putting  us  to  a  good  expense.  They  judge  causes, 
impose  and  exact  fines.  They  send  peons  and  seize  the 
Naib  of  the  pargana,  taking  for  talabana  (peons'  fees)  one 
rupee  ever}^^  day.  They  grant  guards  to  many  of  the 
taluqdars  and  mahajuns  in  the  country,  by  which  means 
we  are  prevented  from  collecting  the  King's  revenues ; 
and  many  inhabitants  take  shelter  in  the  factories,  and 
thereby  avoid  paying  the  rents.  There  is  little  chunam 
made  within  the  distance  of  four  days'  journey  from 
hence,  the  whole  quantity  made  within  the  pargana  not 
exceeding  2000  maunds.  Notwithstanding,  Mr  Dob- 
bins has  established  two  factories  within  my  pargana, 
committing  every  species  of  injury  and  oppression,  and 
violating  the  women  of  the  inhabitants,  and  erectino; 
factories  in  places  where  none  ever  were  before,  drives 
away  the  inhabitants,  and,  upon  the  information  of  many 
people,  he  takes  upon  him  to  recover  debts  of  five  and 
ten  years'  standing." 

The  early  records  are  full  of  reports  about  the  Buzurg- 
umedpur  pargana,  and  of  petitions  by  its  proprietors. 
Kajali  Kaj  Ballab,  who  lived  at  Rajnagar,  in  the  Mulfat- 
ganj  thana,  and  was  the  most  conspicuous  native  in  the 
Dacca  division  in  the  middle  of  the  last  century,  got 
possession  of  the  pargana  on  the  death  of  Aga  Bdkar. 
He  had  it  measured  in  1167  B.s.  (a.d.  1759),  and  an 
assessment  was  made  according  to  this  measurement  in 
the  following  year.  Raj  Ballab's  history  rather  belongs 
to  Dacca  and  Faridpiir  than  to  Bdkarganj,  but  I  may 


HISTORY  OF  rilE  PARC  ANAS.  97 

mention  here  that  lie  liekl  tlic  ollicc  of  'peiilikav  of  tlie 
noivara  or  fleet,  and  that  he  was  also,  I  believe,  the 
tie  wan  of  the  Naib  of  Dacca.  He  was  a  Baidya  Ijy 
caste,  but  was  of  humble  origin,^  and  only  got  into 
good  society  by  dint  of  his  wealth.  He  is  said  to  have 
bought  for  the  Baidyas  the  privilege  of  wearing  the 
sacred  thread.  The  buildings  erected  by  him  at  Raj- 
nagar  have  all  been  washed  away  by  the  Padma,  l)ut 
the  large  tank  which  he  dug  there  is  still  in  existence. 
He  had  seven  sons.  Kissen  Dass,  one  of  the  seven,  is 
famous  as  having  been  the  person  who  fled  to  Calcutta 
in  Surajah  Daulah's  time,  and  whom  Governor  Drake 
refused  to  give  up — a  refusal  which  led  to  the  war 
between  the  Nawab  and  the  English,  and  to  the  battle 
of  Plassy.  Kissen  Dass  escaped  on  this  occasion  only  to 
die  a  violent  death  some  years  afterwards,  for  he  and 
his  father  were  seized  by  Mir  Kassim  and  drowned  in 
the  Bhagireti  at  Monghyr.^  Eajali  Gopal  Kissen, 
another  son,  thereon  succeeded  to  the  charge  of  the 
property.  He  died  24th  Ashar  1194  B.s.  (6th  July 
1787),   and   his  son  Pitambar  Sein,   and   Raj    Ballab's 

^  I  believe  it  is  correct  that  Raj  Ballab  was  not  of  good  family,  but  the 
evidence  of  the  Serishtadar  Mritanjai  Mukti,  when  examined  before  Mr 
Thompson  in  the  proceedings  about  Rajnagar  on  20th  September  1791, 
seems  to  show  tliat  Raj  Ballab  inherited  some  wealth,  and  was  not  alto- 
gether a  self-made  man.  The  Serishtadar's  words  are,  "  I  have  served  in 
the  zamindari  from  the  age  of  fifteen  or  sixteen  years,  and  am  now  sixty-two. 
My  father  served  before  me,  in  the  time  of  Raj  Ballab's  father,  and  we  were 
both  einploj-ed  as  the  head  Serishtadars  of  the  whole  zamindari." 

Raj  Ballab  is  referred  to  by  Orme,  who  saj's  that  he  was  the  dewan  of 
Nowazis.  Nowazis  died  in  1756,  and  Raj  Ballab's  influence  continued 
during  the  time  of  the  widow,  with  wliom  Raj  Ballab  was  said  to  be  im- 
properly intimate  (Orme,  vol.  ii.  p.  49). 

^  In  a  petition  of  Pitambar  Sein,  dated  June  1798,  he  says,  "  We  are  the 
descendants  of  Maharajah  Raj  Ballab,  who  was  a  welhvisher  of  the  Com- 
pany, in  consequence  of  which  Kassim  Ally  Khan  drowned  him  and  his 
son  Kissen  Dass  Bahadur  in  the  Ganges,  and  having  dejDuted  Aka  Reza, 
confiscated  to  the  State  his  house  and  property." 

G 


98  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

otlier  gTandcliildren,  inlierited  tlie  estate.  They 
quarrelled  among  themselves,  and  in  1790  Mr  George 
Thompson,  assistant  to  the  Collector  of  Dacca,  was 
deputed  to  make  a  partition  of  Eajnagar  and  Buz- 
urgumedpur.  It  appears  that  the  first  application  for 
the  partition  was  made  to  the  Civil  Court  l3y  Kali 
Sankhar,  one  of  the  partners,  that  he  got  a  decree 
in  1189  B.s.  (1782)  in  the  Dacca  Court,  and  that 
this  order  was  confirmed  on  appeal  in  Baisak  1194 
B.s.  (1787).  Mr  Day  accordingly  attached  the  par- 
ganas  of  Buzurgumedpur,  Eajnagar,  and  Kartikpiir 
Sujdbad,  but  through  the  intrigues  of  Pitambar  Sein, 
no  partition  was  made  until  afterwards.  Mr  Thompson 
accomplished  it.  It  was  Gopal  Kissen,  the  father  of 
Pitambar,  who  appealed  against  the  decree  of  division 
given  by  Mr  Duncanson  in  the  Dacca  Court. 

I  have  heard  it  said  that  Gopal  Kissen  had  his  cutch- 
ery  at  Sutaluri,  near  Jhalukdtti. 

It  also  appears  that  the  munsiff,  acting,  I  presume, 
under  Mr  Thompson's  superintendence,  was  the  authority 
who  directly  made  the  partition.  The  partition,  how- 
ever, generally  goes  by  the  name  of  Mr  Thompson's 
Batwara ;  and  he  is  stated  in  tlie  official  papers  to  have 
completed  the  partition  of  Eajnagar,  &c.,  Buzurgumed- 
piir,  &c.,  and  Kartikpiir  Sujabad  on  2d  May  1792. 
The  estate  was  divided  into  five  shares,  and  the  five 
partners  cast  lots  for  their  shares,  the  lots  being  drawn 
by  two  boys  of  the  Brdlimau  caste,  one  of  about  ten 
years  and  the  other  of  eight  years.  The  engagement 
was  made  for  eight  years,  ending  1799.  As  there  was 
much  jungle  in  Buzurgumedpur,  Mr  Thompson  did  not 
measure  the  pargana,  but  only  made  a  division  of  the 
revenue  and  rent  of  it.  He  also  did  not  include  the 
Sundarban  lands,  much  of  whicli  was  considered  to  be 


HISTORY  OF  TJIE  PA RG ANAS.  99 

j)art  of  Buziirgiimcdpiir,  in  the  assessment,  and  therefore 
tlicy  were  afterwards  resumed  by  Government  on  the 
ground  that  they  liad  not  Leen  included  in  the  Decen- 
nial Settlement.  In  the  original  engagement  the  partners 
said  as  follows:  "The  Sundarban  forest-lands,  as  Avell 
as  the  cane  and  reed  jungie-huids  appertaining  to  the 
pargana  Buzurgumedpiir,  our  zamindari,  not  being  in- 
cluded in  the  division  now  made  between  us,  but  con- 
tinue as  heretofore  our  joint  property  in  equal  shares, 
we  therefore  Avrite  and  deposit  this  as  our  engagement 
that  the  duties  and  revenue  forthcoming  therefrom,  and 
collections  under  the  Mahal  Bhashan  Gorekatti,  shall 
be  divided  and  received  by  us  severally  in  equal  shares, 
and  that  the  same  mode  of  division  shall  be  observed 
between  us  with  regard  to  all  revenue  or  profits  to  be 
derived  from  taluqdari  grants  made,  or  which  may 
hereafter  be  made,  of  the  aforesaid  jungle-lands." 

It  appears  from  the  record  that  there  were  three 
ranis  or  widows  of  Eaj  Ballab  living  at  the  time,  and 
it  was  a  stipulation  of  the  partition  that  each  of  them 
should  receive  Es.lOO  sicca  monthly.  The  revenue 
payable  by  the  zamindars,  according  to  Mr  Thompson's 
partition  of  1792,  was  sicca  Es.  18 1,1 07,  5  anas,  and  that 
payable  to  them  from  tlie  taluqdars  was  hliari  or  arcot 
Es.237,49G,  8  anas,  17  gandas,  equal  to  Es.2,30436-14-3 
sicca,  Es.7059, 10-14  being  deducted  as  batta.  (The 
bhari  or  Company's  arcot  rupee  was  coined  at  Calcutta, 
and  was  in  value  3^  per  cent,  less  than  the  sicca  rupee.) 

Mr  Thompson  received  the  thanks  of  Government  for 
his  work,  but  the  zamindars  complained  that  he  had 
over-assessed  them,  and  they  were  certaiidy  never  able 
to  pay  the  revenue.  Both  Eajnagar  and  Buzurgumed- 
piir had  suffered  severely  from  the  inundations  of  1787, 
and  it  is  probable  that  Mr  Thompson  did  not  make  suffi- 


loo  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

cient  allowance  for  tins  circumstance.  There  was  also 
much  controversy  about  the  mj  taluqs  or  private  tenures 
lield  by  each  shareholder  subordinate  to  the  zamindari, 
and  as  the  partners  were  at  bitter  enmity  Avith  one 
another,  it  is  probable  that  their  zidd  aud  envy  led 
to  the  over-assessment  of  each  of  them.  Buzurgumed- 
pur  Avas  a  taluqdari  mahal — i.e.,  most  of  the  land  was 
held  by  taluqdars,  and  as  the  lands  were  not  divided, 
to  each  shareholder  in  the  zamindari  was  assigned  onc- 
fiftli  of  the  revenue  of  each  taluq ;  and  on  the  same 
principle  each  shareholder  who  held  a  taluq  had  to  pay 
four-fifths  of  its  revenug^  to  his  co-sharers. 

Mr  Thompson  consid"ered  that  he  had  discovered  that 
a  great  fraud  had  been  committed  by  Eajah  Gopal 
Kissen  when  he  was  manager  of  the  estate,  in  that  he 
had  reduced  the  assessment  on  the  estate  by  E,s.  17,500, 
and  had  then  concealed  the  deficiency  by  adding  to  the 
paper  assets  of  the  estate  Rs.  17,500  as  the  proceeds  of 
a  sayer  mahal  which  had  formerly  been  abolished,  and 
therefore  could  not  really  yield  anything.  The  sayer 
mahal  was  called  the  Phanri  Malwa,  and  seems  to  have 
been  a  transit  duty,  as  the  word  phanri  means  a  station 
or  outpost,  and  is  still  in  use  to  designate  a  police  outpost. 
The  discovery  has  been  endorsed  by  Mr  Sutherland  in 
his  description  of  Bdkarganj,  but  Mr  Douglas's  letter  of 
6th  April  1791  shows  that  there  was  another  side  to  the 
question,  and  that  probably  Gopal  Kissen  had  been 
authorised  by  the  Government  to  make  the  deduction 
in  the  assessment. 

In  a  petition  from  Pitambar  Sein,  the  son  of  Gopal 
Kissen,  and  one  of  the  parties  to  the  batwara,  there 
occurs  the  following  significant  allusion  to  Sir  Elijah 
Impey :  "Mr  Hastings  having  inspected  these  [certain 
proceedings  of  the  Sujoerintendent  of  the  Khalsa],  referred 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  loi 

tlieni  to  tlic  decision  of  Sir  Elijah  Impey,  tlic  Judge  of 
the  Court  of  Appeal.  The  said  Sir  Elijah  having  received 
from  me  a  considerable  sum  on  account  of  commission, 
received  my  petition  for  the  two  parganas,  and  having 
issued  his  summons  and  iKivwanas  in  the  Mofussil,  inves- 
tigated for  a  length  of  time  the  cause,  and  leaving  his 
proceedings,  departed  for  Europe  without  passing  a 
decision  on  it." 

Buzurgumedpiir  soon  fell  into  arrears,  and  it  was  no 
easy  matter  to  recover  them,  although  there  was  a  tali- 
sildar  or  native  collector  stationed  at  the  golahari  or 
zamindari  cutchery  of  Buzurgumedpur,  near  Bdkarganj, 
for  several  years  after  the  PernMient  Settlement.  This 
officer  used  to  clear  his  balance  in  part  by  paying  the 
salary  of  the  Judge-Magistrate  of  Bakarganj,  who  in 
this  way  was  saved  the  trouble  and  expense  of  send- 
ing to  Dacca  for  money.  In  April  1801  the  tahsildar 
reported  that  the  buildings  at  the  golabari  had  been 
destroyed  by  a  storm,  and  in  1802  he  reported  that  he 
had  engaged  spearmen  at  the  rate  of  Es.2-8  a  month  to 
protect  the  treasure  against  dacoits.  On  16th  Novem- 
ber 1796  Mr  Armstrong,  the  Collector  of  Dacca,  reported 
that  he  had  put  up  the  pargana  to  sale  by  auction  for 
three  successive  days,  and  for  two  hours  each  day,  and 
that  nobody  had  made  a  bid  for  it.  This  was  in  con- 
sequence of  its  consisting  almost  entirely  of  dependent 
taluqs.  These  taluqs  were  of  the  description  called 
Jangalhuri  taluqs,  and  it  appears  from  a  letter  of  Govern- 
ment to  the  Board  of  Eevenue  (13th  July  1821)  that 
the  rules  about  Jangalburi  taluqs,  contained  in  section  8 
of  Eegulation  8  of  1793,  had  been  framed  with  reference 
to  this  very  pargana  of  Buzurgumedpur.  Jangalburi 
talucjs— I.  c. ,  j  angal-cutting  taluqs — were  generally  granted 
on  a  rent-free  tenure  for  a  number  of  years,  Avith  a  pro- 


102  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

vision  that  tliereaftcr  the  cultivation  shoiihl  he  measured 
and  assessed  at  certain  rates  specified  in  the  lease.  They 
were  common  in  Buzurgumedpiir,  because  about  three- 
fourths  of  the  pargana  were  formerly  tSundarban  jangal, 
and  could  only  be  cleared  by  the  granting  of  improv- 
ing leases  with  a  condition  of  permanency.  Under  the 
Government  orders  of  10th  October  1799,  Mr  Massie, 
the  successor  of  Mr  Armstrong,  bought  in  for  Govern- 
ment in  November  of  that  year  the  whole  pargana  of 
Buzurgumedpiir  (see  his  letter,  29th  November  1799), 
and  Government  has  ever  since  been  the  zamindar  of 
the  pargana.  Government  was,  of  course,  the  creditor 
at  whose  instance  the  estate  was  brounht  to  the  hammer, 
and  all  that  it  paid  for  the  acc[uisition  was  the  nominal 
price  of  one  rupee. 

The  sale  of  the  zamindari  was  followed  in  1801  by 
the  sale  of  the  dependent  taluqs.  There  were  then  594 
of  them  (28th  November  1801).  There  are  now  407. 
It  had  been  held  by  Government  (Resolution  of  Gover- 
nor-General of  31st  December  1790),  and  afterwards 
declared  by  law  (Regulation  8  of  1793),  that  Jangalburi 
taluqs  were  not  entitled  to  separation.  When,  however. 
Government  acquired  the  zamindari,  it  was  found  expe- 
dient to  allow  the  separation  of  the  taluqs,  as  in  that 
way  the  expense  of  collecting  the  rents  was  saved,  and 
also  the  arrears  were  more  speedil}^  and  regularly  col- 
lected. In  making  the  separations  the  Boafd  adhered 
to  the  rentals  shown  in  Mr  Thompson's  Batwara  papers ; 
but  a  letter  of  Government,  dated  13tli  July  1821,  and 
\|i/  written  by  the  famous  Holt  Mackenzie,  shows  that 
Government  by  no  means  approved  of  this  step,  and 
also  that  the  Board  had  exceeded  their  powers  in  grant- 
ing the  separations  at  all,  "  It  appears  to  have  been 
hitherto  assumed,"  he  writes,  "  that  the  rent  demandable 


HISTORY  OF  TJII':  PA  RG  AN  AS.  103 

by  (joveriuiicnt,  011  converting  the  talu(|s  iuto  indepeu- 
dent  tenures,  Wcas  necessarily  to  Ije  fixed  at  tlic  rate  speci- 
fied in  the  Batwara  jama  adjusted  by  Mr  Thompson ; 
1)ut  although  that  rate  might  justly  betaken  to  show  the 
amount  demandable  by  the  zamindar,  and  consequently 
by  Government,  until  a  fresh  Jamahandi  should  be  made, 
yet,  unless  iii  the  case  of  taluqs  holding  under  momirrcu'i 
tenures,  it  is  not  apparent  why  it  should  be  assumed  as 
constituting  the  ultimate  limit  of  Government  demand ; 
and  after  the  period  fixed  by  Eegulation  1  of  1801  for 
the  separation  of  taluqs,  no  taluqdar  could  of  course 
claim  to  become  liazuri  as  a  matter  of  right.  Under 
these  circumstances  Government  would  be  justified  in 
annulling  the  whole  of  the  separations  made  by  the 
Board  without  reference  to  Government."  He  then 
adds  that  the  great  length  of  time,  &c.,  prevented 
Government  from  taking  this  course.  In  1799,  the  year 
of  the  sale  of  the  pargana,  the  arrears  due  to  Govern- 
ment were  Es.l71, 346  ;  and  so  little  had  the  sale  im- 
proved matters,  that  the  arrears  had  increased  in  1801 
to  sicca  Rs.  3 8 6, 5 7 4.  It  was  then  that  the  sale  of  the 
taluqs  was  resolved  on.  The  separation,  however,  of 
the  taluqs  did  not  take  place  until  several  years  after 
their  sale,  and  was  only  accomplished  gradually.  A 
notification  was  issued  on  27th  January  1812,  inviting 
all  the  Buzurgumedpiir  taluqdars  to  become  hazuri — 
i.e.,  independent.  It  was  after  the  experiment  of  khas 
management  had  been  tried  and  had  failed  that  separa- 
tion was  had  resort  to.  There  was  great  confusion  in 
the  accounts  of  Buzurgumedpur  when  it  was  under  khas 
or  direct  management ;  and  indeed  this  might  be  antici- 
pated, when  we  consider  the  extent  of  the  collections, 
the  fact  that  there  was  no  Collector  of  Bakargauj  at  the 
time,  and  that  the  only  control  over  the  tahsildar  was 


104  DISTRICT  OF  DAKARGANJ. 

situated  so  far  off  as  Dacca.  Kali  Prasad  was  about  the 
last  Naib  or  talisildar.  He  was  guilty  of  embezzlement, 
and  fled  in  December  1812  to  his  home  in  Birblmm, 
where  he  shortly  afterwards  died.  He  was  succeeded  by 
Eadha  Nath,  who  remained  in  charge  till  Asar  1219 
(1813),  when,  in  place  of  the  direct  mode  of  manage- 
ment, the  taluqs  were  separated  off,  and  the  remainder 
of  the  estate  "\\^as  farmed.  There  is  a  full  report  by  Mr 
Prinsep,  the  Legal  Eemembrancer,  on  the  embezzlement 
and  mismanagement  in  connection  with  Buzurgumedpur, 
and  in  it  he  refers  to  the  state  of  the  Dacca  Collectorate, 
and  observes  that  "  the  state  of  the  amla  of  Dacca  has 
long  been  notorious"  (24th  March  1817).  In  1822  the 
revenue  of  Buzurgumedpiir  was  sicca  Rs. 244,8 67  ;  of 
this,  Rs.217,295  were  collected  from  the  separated 
taluqs,  and  Rs.27,571  from  the  dependent  tenures  in- 
cluded in  Tilak  Chandra  Piai's  farm.  This  farm  appa- 
rently consisted  of  such  under-tenures,  howalas,  and  the 
like,  as  were  not  considered  entitled  to  separation,  or 
the  holders  of  which  had  not  applied  for  it.  It  pro- 
bably also  contained  any  lands  which  had  been  the  klias 
or  direct  property  of  the  former  zamindars,  or  which  had 
been  their  nij  or  private  taluqs.  At  present  there  are 
407  separated  talucjs,  and  their  united  revenue  is 
Rs.265,895.  Each  of  these  taluqs  bears  a  separate  num- 
ber on  the  Revenue  Roll,  and  the  holders  of  them  pay  in 
the  revenue  direct  to  Government.  But  besides  these 
separated  taluqs  there  are  three  mahals,  or  estates,  be- 
longing to  Buzurgumedpiir,  and  numbered  respectively 
on  the  Revenue  Roll  1406,  1437,  and  1447.  No.  1406, 
which  goes  by  the  name  of  the  farm  or  izara,  contains  a 
great  many  properties,  and  is  apparently  the  portion  of 
the  pargana  of  which  Government  acquired  the  direct 
possession  when  it  bought  the  pargana  in  1799.      There 


HJSTOR  Y  OF  THE  PAR  GA  NA S.  105 

is,  however,  some  obscurity  about  its  history,  and  I  am 
not  able  to  state  positively  that  it  is  the  property  which 
was  known  in  1822  as  Tilak  Chandra  Eai's  izara.  There 
is  no  doubt,  however,  that  it  corresponds  to  it  in  some 
measure. 

There  are  in  No.  1406  149  estates  of  Avliich  the  reve- 
nues are  permanently  fixed,  and  there  are  47  temporarily 
settled  estates,  or  altogether  there  are  196  estates  in  No. 
1406,  each  one  of  which  ought  to  bear  a  distinct  num- 
ber in  the  Eevenue  Roll.  Owing  to  this  not  having  been 
done  as  yet,  the  full  number  of  the  estates  in  Bdkarganj 
is  not  shown  in  the  books,  and  the  true  amount  of  the 
work  in  the  Taujih  or  Revenue  Department  is  not 
exhibited.  Of  the  47  temporarily  settled  estates,  four 
are  ferries,  so  that  they  may  be  considered  as  relics 
of  the  old  sayer  duties.  They  have  been  leased  for 
terms  of  years.  They  are  the  ferry  on  the  Bishkhdli 
(revenue,  Rs.40) ;  the  Kumarkhdli  ferry,  on  the  Nalchiti 
river  {revenue,  Rs.46)  ;  that  between  Bishkhdli  and 
Tulatuli  (rcA^enue,  Rs.9)  ;  and  that  on  the  Srimantapur. 
The  total  revenue  annually  derived  from  them  is  Rs.ll5. 
I  once  proposed  to  make  them  public  ferries,  and  to 
transfer  them  to  the  Road  Committee,  but  the  proposal 
was  negatived  by  the  Commissioner.  The  43  other 
temporarily  settled  estates  are  let  in  farm  to  various 
persons.  No.  1437  is  let  to  Mr  Brown.  It  consists  of 
resumed  cJiakran  or  service  lands,  and  is  scattered  over 
no  less  than  45  kismats  or  hamlets.  It  was  bought  at 
a  sale  for  arrears  of  revenue  in  1840.  No.  1447,  also 
called  the  Dari  char,  consists  chiefly  of  resumptions. 
There  were  77  estates  in  it,  but  there  now  only  remain 
28  temporarily  settled  estates,  and  4  permanently  settled 
estates.     The  rest  have  been  sold. 

The   revenue  of  No.  1406  is  Rs.29,413,  and  of  this, 


io6  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

Rs.26jl96  Leloi]g  to  tlie  permanently  settled  estates, 
and  Rs.32l7  to  those  temporarily  settled. 

The  revenue  of  No.  1447  is  Rs.3935-4,  of  which 
Rs.3850  belong  to  the  farm,  and  Rs.85-4  to  the  per- 
manently settled  estates. 

It  is  reckoned  that  there  are  431  estates  in  Buzur- 
gumedpiir — viz.,  407  separated,  11  klias  mahals,  and 
2  zamindaries,  Nos.  1406  and  1447.  Altogether,  and 
with  inclusion  of  the  revenue  of  No.  1437  (I  do  not  know 
accurately  its  present  rental),  Buzurgumedpiir  yields  to 
Government  in  round  numbers  Rs.  337,000  annually.  It 
thus  yields  by  far  the  largest  revenue  of  any  of  the 
parganas.  Large  sums  also  were  obtained  when  Govern- 
ment sold  the  khasmahals  or  Government  estates  belong- 
ing to  it,  and  there  still  remain  some  to  be  sold. 

Buzurgumedpiir  is  remarkable  for  the  number  and 
value  of  its  taluqs.  The  most  interesting  as  regards  its 
origin  is  the  taluq  Padrian  or  Mission  taluq  of  Sibpiir. 
It  is  said  that  it  was  originally  granted  by  Raj  Ballab 
Sein  to  some  Christians  from  Bandel.  The  tradition 
is  that  he  wanted  to  coerce  his  tenantry,  who  were 
inclined  to  be  disobedient  to  him,  and  that  he  judged 
that  Christians  would  be  well  fitted  for  the  purpose,  as 
mere  contact  with  them  would  be  sufficient  to  destroy 
the  ryots'  caste,  and  that  the  latter  would  therefore 
gladly  come  to  terms  in  order  to  avoid  the  visits  of  the 
Christian  servants.  He  accordingly  applied  to  the 
Portuguese  Mission  at  Bandel  for  some  Christians,  and 
four  were  sent  to  him.  They  afterwards  applied  to  him 
for  a  priest,  in  order  to  perform  their  religious  cere- 
monies. He  procured  one  from  Bandel,  and  assigned 
him  four  pieces  of  land  or  howalas  for  his  maintenance. 
The  four  Christians  were  put  in  charge  of  the  23roperty, 
but  in    consequence  of  their   dissensions    the   howalas 


IIISTOR  V  OF  THE  PA  R  GA  NAS.  i  o  7 

were  formed  into  a  taluq,  uiul  made  over  to  tlic  priest 
ill  trust  for  the  mission.    The  first  priest  was  called  Fray 
Raphael  das  Anjos,  and  the  date  of  his  "pcitta  or  lease 
for  the  taluq  was  9th  Phalgun  1171  B.S.,  or  A.D.  17G4. 
In  the  decision  of  the  Sadr  Diwani  Adalat,  dated  18th 
April    185G,  it  is  said  that  the  lease  was  granted  by- 
Rajah  Pitambar  Singh  (Sein  ?),  zamindar  of  Arangdbcid, 
but  from  the  date   it  appears  more  probable  that  the 
lease  was    granted,   as  is  the  tradition,   by  Pitambar  s 
grandfather,  Rajah  Raj  Ballab.     It  was  renewed  by  Mr 
Thompson  in  1790  or  1791,  Avhen  he  was  making  the 
partition  of  Raj  Ballab's  estates  among  Pitambar  Sein 
and  the  other  heirs.     The  first  church  at  Sibpiir  is  said 
to  have  been  built  by  one  Pedro  Gonsalves,  but  it  has 
been  superseded  by  a  larger  edifice  built  with  money 
left  by  Domingo  de  Silva.    The  first  priests  were  Augus- 
tinian  monks  ;  and  they,  acting  in  subordination  to  the 
Prior  of  Bandel  and  to  the  Bishop  of  Meliapore,  from  the 
year  17G4  down  to  the  year  1836,  were  in  nninterrupted 
possession   of  the  Sibpur  taluq,  and   administered   the 
duties  of  priests  of  Sibpur.     But  in  1836  an  attempt 
was  made  to  bring  the  exercise  of  the  clerical  office  at 
Sibpur   and  the  management   of  the  property    thereto 
attached   under  the   immediate  control    of    the   Vicar 
Apostolic,  Dr  St  Leger,  who,  with  a  view  to  the  organ- 
isation of  the  Roman  Catholic  hierarchy  for   the  first 
time  in  Bengal,  by  the  Pope's  brief  of  18th  April  1834, 
had  been   appointed  to   that  office.     Dr  St  Leger  dis- 
missed Fray  Jos  das  Neves,  and  appointed  in  his  room 
Ignatius  Xavier  Mascarheuas  to   be  the  incumbent  at 
Sibprir,  and  this  Mascarhenas  managed  to  get  himself 
substituted  for  Fray  Jos  das  Neves  as  decree-holder  in  a 
rent  suit,  and  so  got  possession  of  the  taluf[,  &c.,  by  a 
summary  order  of  the  Bakarganj  Civil  Court  (S.  D.  A. 


io8  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

decision).  The  real  fact,  I  believe,  Avas  that  the  Roman 
Catholic  inhabitants  of  Sibpiir  qnarrelled  with  their 
pastor  because  he  refused  to  perform  the  burial  service 
for  a  parishioner  who  had  died  without  making  con- 
fession, and  that,  like  true  Bd>karganj  ryots,  they  placed 
themselves  under  the  zimha  or  protection  of  Dr  St 
Leger.  In  consequence  of  the  quarrel  the  Sibpur  in- 
cumbent left  the  place,  and  for  several  years  there  was 
no  service  in  the  church.  A  protracted  litigation  fol- 
lowed on  the  appointment  of  Mascarhenas.  The  Portu- 
guese priests  sued  for  recovery  of  possession  of  the 
church  and  lands ;  and  as  Mr  Loughnan,  who  was  the 
Judge  of  Bdkarganj,  was  a  Roman  Catholic,  the  suit  was 
at  his  request  transferred  to  the  court  of  the  judge  of 
the  twenty-four  parganas.  The  Augustinians  were  suc- 
cessful both  in  that  court  and  in  the  Sadr  Diwani  Adalat, 
and  the  litigation  ended  in  1857  with  their  recovering 
possession  of  the  taluq,  and  with  their  getting  a  decree 
for  mesne  profits,  which,  however,  was  not  enforced. 
The  decision  of  Mr  Robert  Torrens,  the  judge  of  the 
twenty-four  parganas,  dated  9th  December  1847  (pub- 
lished in  the  decisions  of  the  Zila  Judges  for  that  year), 
gives  a  full  account  of  the  suit.  It  states  that  the  taluq 
had  been  in  possession  of  Fray  Raphael  das  Anjos  pre- 
vious to  1171  B.s.  (1764),  and  that  in  that  year,  on  the 
9  th  Agrahan,  the  rent  payable  by  him  was  reduced  from 
Rs.2234-3  byRs.533-3,  making  the  yearly  rent  Rs.l701.^ 
The  patta  was  granted  to  Fray  Raphael  by  Lakyi 
Narain  Rai,^  and  after  the  death  of  the  former,  Pitambar 
Sein,   the  zamindar,  confirmed  the  grant  by  a  written 

1  The  present  rental  is  Rs.l76 1-8-10,  being  the  equivalent  in  Govern- 
ment rupees  of  Es.  1701  sicca. 

^  Lakyi  Narain  is  a  name  of  Vishnu,  and  was  the  name  under  which 
Rajah  Raj  Ballab  recorded  his  zamindari  of  Rajnagar  and  Buzurgumed- 
piir. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  109 

declamtioii  on  25tli   Plitilgau    1198  to   Fray   Eapliael's 
successor. 

It  also  a^^pears  from  Mr  Torrens'  decision  that  the  first 
church  was  built  by  Pedro  Gonsalvcs,  and  that  after- 
Avards,  in  accordance  with  the  will  of  Domingo  de  Silva,, 
his  son  Manuel  pulled  down  the  old  church  and  built 
in  1823  the  present  enlarged  edifice,  which  the  De  Silva 
family  have  continued  to  repair  (see  also  decision  of 
31st  December  1853).  Since  the  termination  of  the 
litigation,  the  Sibptir  incumbent  has  been  appointed  by 
the  Archbishop  of  Goa.  The  revenue  of  the  taluq  used 
to  be  paid  to  the  zamindar  of  Buzurgumedpur,  but  in 
1808  it  was  separated,  and  made  an  independent  taluq. 
The  agreement  with  the  Collector,  dated  1215  b.s.,  and 
stipulating  for  payment  of  revenue  in  eight  instal- 
ments, is  in  the  Collector's  record-room.  The  taluq 
yields  a  profit  of  about  Rs.700  or  Rs.800,  which 
are  spent  in  supporting  the  mission.  Tho  priest  also 
receives  the  fees  on  marriages,  funerals,  &c.  ;  and  these, 
I  believe,  amount  to  a  considerable  sum.  Sibpiir  w^as 
once  a  very  flourishing  place,  and  there  are  the  remains 
of  many  large  houses  in  it.  It  is  situated  on  the  Sriman- 
tapur  khal,  and  is  about  five  miles  from  Bd,karganj, 
with  which  it  is  connected  ]jy  a  road  (now  in  dis- 
repair), in  which  there  are  several  masonry  bridges. 
Its  prosperity  was  owing  to  the  rice  and  betel-nut  trade, 
but  now  Bakarganj  and  Kaliganj  have  taken  its  place. 
The  most  conspicuous  resident  of  Sibp{ir  was  Domingo 
de  Silva,  who  made  a  large  fortune  in  the  rice  trade. 
He  came  to  Sibpiir  (I  believe  from  Goa)  at  the  end  of 
the  last  century,  and  died  in  1821.  By  his  will,  dated 
7th  October  1821,  he  left  money  for  the  building  of  the 
church,  and  also  ordered  that  Rs.500  should  be  dis- 
tributed in  charity  every  year  on  the  anniversary  of  his 


no  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

deatli  (21st  November  1821)  to  poor  Cliristians  and 
needy  and  helpless  orphans,  "  together  with  such  poor, 
be  they  Mahomedans  or  Hindoos,  as  may  be  present  on 
that  day"  (at  Sil)piir). 

The  charity  still  exists,  and  the  money  is  paid  to  the 
priest  by  the  Administrator-General  of  the  High  Court. 
The  existence  of  the  charity  is  well  known  to  the  faqirs 
and  the  rest  of  the  begging  population  of  Bdkarganj, 
and  they  flock  down  to  Sibpiir  on  the  appointed  day. 

The  Feringhies  of  Sibpiir,  as  they  are  called,  are  less 
numerous  and  less  prosperous  than  they  were  half  a 
century  ago.  They  supjoort  themselves  chiefly  by  going 
about  to  Mahomedan  marriages  and  firing  o'S.  feux  de 
joie.  They  are  also  employed  by  the  villagers  to  kill 
pigs,  and  some  hold  appointments  in  the  police.  They 
are  indisposed  to  agriculture  or  other  regular  industry, 
and  they  are  about  as  ignorant  and  superstitious  as 
their  Bengali  neighbours.  The  only  thing  for  which 
I  can  heartily  praise  them  is  the  great  neatness  and 
cleanliness  of  their  homesteads.  Probably,  however, 
the  want  of  cattle  or  agricultural  implements  has 
something  to  do  with  this.  They  have  adopted  the 
Eastern  notions  about  the  seclusion  of  v;omen,  and  do 
not  like  to  give  their  daughters  any  education.  Their 
numbers  are  about  800 — the  census  giving  785  Chris- 
tians in  Bdkarganj,  and  43  in  IMirzaganj.  Sibpiir  is 
by  far  the  largest  settlement ;  but  there  are  a  few 
families  at  Kalada,  also  in  the  Bakarganj  thana,  and  at 
Maitbhanga  in  the  Mirzaganj  thana. 

The  largest  taluq  in  Buzurgumedpiir  is  that  called 
jodr  Ramna-Bamna,  which  is  now  in  possession  of  the 
Bamna  Chaudries.  The  revenue  is  Rs.l9, 487-10-8. 
It  is  situated  on  the  west  bank  of  the  Bishkhali  river,  in 
the  subdivision  of  Perozpiir,  contains  forty-tliree  villages, 


IIISTOR  V  OF  THE  PARC  ANA  S.  1 1 1 

and  is  very  j)i"ofitablc.  It  was  originally  entered  in 
the  name  of  an  Armenian  named  Kliajah  Michael,  and 
is  described  in  the  old  records  as  Mndafat  Kliajah 
Michael.  One  Mahomed  Shuffee,  the  ancestor  of  the 
present  proprietors,  got  a  settlement  of  the  taluq  from 
the  Board  in  1809.  The  popular  tradition  is  that  he 
was  originally  only  a  salt-piada,  and  this  is  supported 
by  the  fact  of  his  being  styled  in  the  official  papers 
Mahomed  Shiiffee  Jamadar.  At  the  time  of  Mr 
Thompson's  Batwara  the  land  was  waste,  and  was  entered 
as  Mudafat  Khajah  Michael.  It  seems  to  have  been 
originally  included  in  pargana  Shahzadpiir,  six  anas 
of  which  were  transferred  to  Buzurgumcdpur  (see 
Mr  Battye's  letter  of  19th  February  1807).  The  pro- 
perty was  at  one  time  in  the  possession  of  one  Sadasib 
Mozamdar,  who  was  Naib  of  the  former  zamindar  of 
Buzurgumcdpur.  Sadasib's  sons  disputed  Mahomed 
ShufFee's  claim  to  it,  and  said  that  he  was  only  ausat 
talucjdar,  and  that  their  father  held  a  ■  patta  for  it, 
given  in  1188  by  Rajah  Lakyi  Narain  Rai.  They,  how- 
ever, Jost  their  cause ;  and  Mahomed  Shuffee  got  the 
settlement  on  the  ground  of  his  former  possession, 
which,  it  appears,  dated  as  far  back  as  1202  (1795). 
The  settlement  made  with  him  in  1809  was  for  seven 
years,  and  the  annual  rent  was  Rs.  1165. 

The  leading  taluqdars  in  Buzurgumcdpur  are  the 
Rahamatpiir  Chakrabarties,  the  Narainpur  Chakrabarties, 
Khajah  Ahsanoolah,  Rassik  Chandra  Newgi,  Chandra 
Kanth  Mukharjya  of  Bara  Mozamdar,  the  Messrs  Brown, 
who  own  a  taluc]  with  the  curious  name  of  Bagdeshwar 
(a  mistake  for  Balthazar)  Johannes,  Prosunno  Kumar 
Sein,  the  Ghosal  family,  Thomas  Gomez,  the  De  Silvas, 
Bhagabati  Debya,  the  heirs  of  Dr  Clement  of  Dacca, 
the  Banarjis  of  Koulipara. 


1 1 2  DISTRICT  OF  bAkAR  GA NJ. 

One  Aiiiaddin  Sikdar,  who  lived  at  Chamta,  near 
Niamati,  and  was  a  notorious  dacoit,  had  taluqs  in 
Buzurgumedpiir.  In  1789  he  was  banished,  and  his 
property  confiscated.  Tliere  is  extant  a  vast  amount 
of  correspondence  about  this  man's  property,  and  about 
tliat  of  Mahomed  Hay  at,  which  was  confiscated  under 
similar  circumstances.  It  was  found  very  difticult  to 
discover  their  properties,  as  the  zamindars  did  their  best 
to  conceal  them ;  but  eventually  some  were  found,  and 
were  gradually  disposed  of  by  sale.^ 

The  most  remarkable  incident  in  the  history  of 
Buzurgumedpur  is  perhaps  that  by  which  many  thou- 
sand acres  of  land  in  it  were  given  away  in  perpetuity 
for  a  quit-rent  of  Ks.372  a  year.  I  refer  to  the  famous 
grant  of  the  villages  of  Aila  Tearkhali  and  Phuljhuri, 
which  led  to  a  long  litigation  between  Government 
and  the  purchaser  from  the  original  grantee,  and  which 
terminated  adversely  to  Government  on  26tli  January 
1870,  by  the  Privy  Council's  upholdiug  the  decree  of 
the  Hi2:h  Court. 

The  first  mention  of  the  lease  occurs  in  a  letter  dated 
18th  March  1805,  sent  by  Mr  J.  Batty e,  Collector  of 
Dacca,  to  the  Board  of  Bevenue,  and  in  which  he  for- 
wards a  copy  and  translation  of  a  petition  from  one  Ram 
Dhan  Chattarji  aj^plying  for  a  taluqdari  lease  of  some 
jungle-lands  in  Buzurgumedpur,  Bam  Dhan  Chattarji 
applied  for  a  rent-free  grant  for  seven  years,  and  ofiered 
to  pay  afterwards  a  fixed  rent  of  Bs.349  sicca.  He 
described  tJie  villages  as  Aila  Tearkhdli  and  Phuljhuri, 
and  gave  a  specification  of  their  boundaries.  Mr  Battye, 
in  forwarding  the  applicatiou,  said  that   the  ofi"er  was 

1  For  a  full  report  about  these  taluqs,  see  Mr  Massie's  report,  19tli  August 
1800.  A  full  report  on  Buzurgumedpur  generally  will  be  found  iu  a  letter 
of  Mr  Collector  Phillips  of  20th  December  1822. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  113 

the  highest  among  those  which  he  had  received,  and 
that  the  Land  had  not  been  included  in  Mr  Thompson's 
partition  of  the  pargana ;  and  that  from  the  information 
he  had  been  able  to  gather  through  his  officers,  the  land 
did  not  appear  to  be  able,  when  brought  into  a  state  of 
cultivation,  to  bear  a  much  higher  assessment.  Unfor- 
tunately, Mr  Battye  dejDended  for  his  information  on  the 
Naib  of  Buzurgumedpur,  who  was,  it  seems,  the  real 
applicant  for  the  lease.  Earn  Dhan  Chattarji  being 
merely  a  henamidar.  The  Board  sanctioned  the  proposal 
(with  the  authorisation  of  the  Governor-General)  on 
9th  April  1805,  and  on  the  17th  idem  Kam  Dhan 
executed  the  necessary  engagements  and  was  put  into 
possession  (Mr  Bird's  letter,  5th  November  1807). 

One  Surjya  Narain  Bannarji,  who  had  also  applied  for 
the  lease,  petitioned  Mr  Battye  and  Mr  Fortescue  his 
successor,  alleging  that  the  Naib  of  Buzurgumedpur  had 
himself  obtained  the  pottah  in  Ram  Dhan's  name,  and 
that  the  Naib  had  accepted  his  (Surjya  Narain's)  petition, 
and  promised  to  report  it  to  the  Collector,  but  had 
afterwards  not  done  so.  Mr  Bird,  the  Collector,  adds 
that  "repeated  parwanahs  were  issued  to  the  Naib  in 
consequence  of  Surjya  Narain's  petitions,  but  that  the 
Naib  had  denied  every  charge."  Mr  Bird  trusted, 
therefore,  that  the  Board  would  deem  Surjya  Narain's 
petition  worthy  of  no  further  consideration  !  It  appears 
from  a  report  of  Mr  Hunter,  dated  5th  August  1818, 
that  two  other  persons — namely,  Ram  Rattan  Bosu  and 
Chandra  Sekhar — petitioned  the  Collector  of  Dacca,  and 
made  the  same  allegations  against  the  Naib.  The 
name  of  the  Naib  was  Kali  Prasad  Mozamdar,  and 
it  appears  that  there  were  certain  sums  which  he  had 
not  accounted  for,  and  that  the  petitioners  alleged  that 
Kali  Prasad  had  spent  the  money  in   cultivating  the 


77 


114  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

jungle-lands,  and  offered  to  prove  tliis  by  tlie  evidence 
of  Domingo  de  Silva,  Maliomed  Sliaffi,  and  others. 
However,  says  Mr  Hunter,  no  final  orders  appear  to 
liave  been  passed  on  these  petitions,  nor  was  any  in- 
vesticfation  made  into  the  truth  of  the  assertions.  Earn 
Dhan's  lease  was  dated  Gth  Baisak  1212,  and  the  agree- 
ment was  that  he  should  begin  to  pay  rent  from  1219. 
On  14th  Chait  1213,  however,  he  sold  his  rights  to 
Nand  Kumar  Eai  Sarm  alias  Ganga  Nand  Eai  Sarm, 
alleg-ino-  that  he  was  unable  to  cultivate  the  land.  Earn 
Dhan's  name  was  struck  out  in  1216  B.s.  Nand  Kumar 
was  the  Naib's  brother,  and  he  purchnsed  the  property 
from  Earn  Dhan  in  the  name  of  Krishna  Govind  Charan 
Eai,  and  the  transfer  in  the  Collector's  books  was  made 
in  this  name.  '  The  name  Krishna  Govind  Charan  Eai 
was  said  by  the  petitioners  to  be  a  junction  of  two 
names — namely,  Krishna  Kislior  Eai,  the  son  of  Kali 
Prasad,  and  Govind  Charan,  the  son  of  his  brother 
Nand  Kumar.  Kali  Prasad,  as  we  have  already  seen, 
took  flight  in  order  to  escape  arrest,  and  his  brother, 
Nand  Kumar,  afterwards  sold  Aila  Phuljhuri  to  Hafiz- 
oolah  of  Dacca,  who,  I  believe,  was  the  grand-uncle  of 
Khajah  Abdul  Ghani,for  Es.21,000  on  27th  Chait  1219, 
or  8th  Aj^ril  1812.  Mr  Hunter  goes  on  to  observe,  "  The 
strongest  presumption  may  be  formed  that  Kali  Prasad 
[the  Naib]  was  the  real  proprietor  of  the  taluqs 
until  his  death,  as  the  transfer  of  it  in  1216  to 
Krishna  Govind  Charan  Eai,  the  son  and  nephew,  proves. 
It  must,  in  fact,  have  been  only  a  decejDtion,  he  being 
well  aware  that  claims  would  be  brought  against 
him  for  the  balance  of  his  unaudited  accounts  of 
1214-15,  and  that  it  would  be  an  easy  matter  to  prove 
at  that  time  that  the  original  jangalburi  patta  was 
henami,  although  now,  from  the  lapse  of  time  and  late 


IIISTOR  V  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  1 1 5 

transfer  of  records,  as  well  as  change  of  amla,  I  am 
much  puzzled  to  get  at  the  real  state  of  the  case.  This 
is  corroborated  by  Nand  Kumar  Rai,  his  brother's,  sub- 
sequent sale  of  the  property  without  explaining  in  his 
kaivcda  (deed  of  sale)  further  than  that  the  taluq  is  his 
benami,  Kissen  Govind  Charan  Rai.  I  have  not  a  doubt, 
though  I  might  find  it  difficult  to  prove  in  a  court  of 
justice,  that  Hafizoolah  was  well  aware  of  the  impend- 
ing cloud  over  the  heirs  of  Kali  Prashad  at  the  time 
he  bought  the  taluq,  as  he  is  an  inhabitant  of  Dacca, 
and  a  landholder  and  mahajan  in  that  zilla." 

Mr  Hunter's  object  in  writing  this  report  was  to 
make  Hafizoolah,  as  owner  of  Aila  Phuljhuri,  responsible 
for  the  amount  which  midit  be  decreed  agjainst  the 
Naib's  heirs  in  a  suit  which  Government  had  brought 
against  them  for  embezzlement,  and  which  was  valued 
at  upwards  of  Rs.70,000.  I  do  not  know  what  steps 
were  taken  on  this  letter,  but  it  is  curious  that  no 
attempt  aj^pears  to  have  been  made  by  Government 
to  impeach  the  original  patta  on  the  ground  of  fraud. 
Hafizoolah  afterwards  granted  three  anas  of  the  land 
to  Mir  Gholam  Imam  of  Shaistdbdd,  and  the  estate 
is  now  held  by  Khajah  Ahsanoolah  and  the  Mirs  of 
Shaistabad.  It  is  a  very  large  and  valuable  property, 
and  is  said  to  yield  Khajah  Ahsanoolah  a  profit  of  about 
one  lac  of  rupees.  The  question  in  the  suit  between 
Government  and  the  proprietors  turned  on  the  construc- 
tion of  the  boundaries  stated  in  the  patta  of  Ram  Dhan 
Chattarji.  These  consisted  of  rivers,  and  it  was  not  easy 
to  say  what  was  meant  by  the  terms  used.  The  litiga- 
tion began  as  early  as  1830.  In  the  latter  stages  of  the 
proceedings  the  Government  abandoned  all  claim  to  the 
resumption  of  Phuljhuri,  as  the  boundaries  given  of  it 
in  the  patta  were  precise  and  indisputable.     The  con- 


1 1 6  DISTRICT  OF  bAkAR  GANJ. 

test  tlius  became  confined  to  Aila  Tearkhali,  and  tlie 
great  question  about  it  was  the  determination  of  the 
Avestern  boundary.  Khajah  Abdul  Ghani  cLaimed  under 
his  patta  not  only  Phuljhuri  and  Aila  Tearkhd,li,  but 
also  three  chiichs  or  plots  called  Dhallooa,  Bargona, 
and  Naltonn,  and  Avhich  lay  to  the  south  of  Phuljhuri 
and  Aila.  His  contention  was  that  his  boundary  went 
down  to  the  sea.  He  instituted  a .  suit  for  the  recovery 
of  the  possession  of  these  three  southern  chucks  in  1857. 
Afterwards,  in  1860,  he  was  dispossessed  from  chucks 
Aila  and  Phuljhuri  by  Mr  Eeilly,  the  Commissioner  of 
the  Sundarbans,  who  resumed  them,  and  whose  proceed- 
ings were  confirmed  by  the  Commissioner  of  Nadiya  in 
the  following  year.  After  the  resumption,  Mr  Eeilly 
made  a  settlement  with  the  rj^ots,  and  appointed  the 
Messrs  Morrell  tahsildars  or  collectors  on  a  commission 
of  twenty-five  per  cent.  Khajah  Abdul  Ghani  then 
instituted  a  suit  for  the  recovery  of  possession  of  Aila 
and  Phuljhuri,  and  this  suit  and  that  instituted  in  1857 
were  tried  together,  as  both  were  based  on  Ram  Dhan 
Chattarji's  patta.  The  suit  for  the  three  southern  chucks 
was  dismissed  by  the  High  Court,  and  that  for  the  Aila 
and  Phuljhuri  chucks  decreed,  and  these  orders  were 
upheld  on  appeal  to  the  Privy  Council.  Afterwards, 
Khajah  Abdul  Ghani  instituted  a  suit  for  recovery  of 
mesne  profits,  and  this  was  compromised  in  May  1871 
by  Government's  paying  him  the  sum  of  Rs,272,348. 
In  addition  to  this  I  believe  that  Khajah  Abdul  Ghani 
indirectly  profited  by  his  dispossession,  owing  to  the 
howaladars  and  other  under- tenure  holders  on  the  estate 
giving  him  an  increase  of  rent  on  his  recovering  posses- 
sion, and  I  Ijclieve  that  the  increase  was  given  in  the 
shape  of  an  extra  rupee  of  rent  on  each  kani  of  land 
held  by  them.     This  was  given  by  them  in  acknow- 


I 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  117 

ledgment  of  Kliajali  Abdul  Gliani's  services  in  fighting 
their  and  his  battle  in  the  courts,  for  thirteen  years,  in 
India  and  in  England ;  for  when  he  ^yas  dispossessed  the 
under-tennre  holders  were  dispossessed  also,  the  settle- 
ment being  made  by  the  revenue  authorities  with  the 
karsadars  or  simple  cultivators.  When  therefore 
Khajali  Abdul  Ghani  was  restored  to  possession,  the 
under-tenure  holders  were  restored  also,  and  that  with- 
out their  having  borne  the  expense  of  the  litigation. 

Khajah  Abdul  Ghani,  or  rather  his  son,  Ahsanoolah, 
in  whose  name  the  property  is  now  entered,  has  a 
cutchery  at  Plmljhuri,  which  is  a  bazdr,  and  is  also  the 
seat  of  a  police  outpost,  subordinate  to  the  station  at 
Giilsakhdli.  Phuljhuri  is  a  place  of  some  trade,  as  sun- 
dari  wood  is  brought  there  for  sale.  It  is  reputed  to  be 
the  place  where  the  first  clearing  in  the  Bakarganj  Sun- 
darbans  was  effected.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the  grant 
of  the  Aila  Phuljhuri  lease  to  Eam  Dhan  Chattarji  was 
most  improvident,  and  deprived  Government  of  a  very 
large  revenue.  It  may  be  thought  that  it  at  least 
had  the  good  effect  of  encouraging  cultivation,  and 
that  the  public  have  been  in  this  way  indemnified  in 
some  degree  for  the  loss  of  revenue.  However,  what- 
ever has  been  the  result  in  subsequent  years,  it  aj)pears 
that  the  grant  did  not  for  a  long  time  give  an  impetus 
to  cultivation,  but  rather  was  a  hindrance  to  it.  The 
very  magnitude  of  the  grant  prevented  cultivation,  for 
there  was  too  much  land  to  be  managed  by  one  lessee, 
and  the  vagueness  of  the  boundaries,  &c.,  deterred  other 
cultivators  from  settlino-  in  the  neio:hbourhood.  It  is 
true  Aila  Phuljhuri  is  well  cultivated  now,  but  so  also 
is  Ramna-Bamna,  which  pays  a  considerable  revenue  to 
Government.  On  16th  December  1818  Mr  Hunter 
reports  that  ''  the  two  mozahs,  or,  more  properly,  girds 


ii8  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

of  Aila  Tearkhdli  and  Phuljburi  are  almost  entirely 
jungle.  A  portion  of  Pliuljlinri  is  at  present  in  a  state 
of  cultivation,  the  produce  of  wliicli  would,  even  now, 
admit  of  an  increase  of  revenue  in  a  quadruple  propor- 
tion, and  tlie  cultivation  is  at  present  being  extended. 
Aila  Tearkhali  is  so  extensive  that  it  occupied  me  more 
than  a  tide  to  pass  it  on  the  east  side ;  if  it  were  all 
cultivated,  which  I  have  reason  to  suppose  it  capable  of 
being,  the  revenue  derivable  from  it  would  be  very  con- 
siderable ;  but*  at  present  no  person  will  commence  on 
the  cultivation  while  the  pattadar  holds  it  along  with 
Phuljhuri,  from  the  fear  of  being  dispossessed  by  him." 
In  a  letter  written  one  day  previously,  Mr  Hunter  had 
said  that  he  had  visited  Eamna-Bamna,  and  had  found 
only  a  very  small  portion  of  it  under  cultivation.  On 
20th  December  1822  Mr  Phillips  writes,  that  if  the 
whole  tract  of  Aila  Phuljhuri  were  brought  into  culti- 
vation it  might  yield  Rs. 2.5,000.  The  revenue  received 
by  Government  for  it  is  Rs. 372-4,  this  being  the  equi- 
valent in  Government  rupees  of  the  Rs.349  sicca.  There 
is  a  market  at  Aila,  and  endeavours  have  lately  been 
made  to  establish  a  mela  or  fair. 

4.    SELfMABAD. 

This  is  a  very  large  pargana.  It  comprises  most  of 
the  land  in  the  west  c*entral  part  of  the  district,  and 
even  extends  across  the  Baleshwar  into  the  Bao;hahd,t 
subdivision  of  the  Jessore  district.  According  to  Pro- 
fessor Blochmann,  this  pargana  was  originally  called 
Sulaimdnabdd,  after  Sulaiman  Shah  of  Bengal,  and  he 
suggests  that  the  name  may  have  been  changed  to 
Selimjlbd,d  in  honour  of  Akbar's  son.  Prince  Selim, 
afterwards  known  as  Emperor  Jahd,ngir.     I  have,  how- 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  119 

ever,  never  seen  it  Jesignated  by  any  other  name  tluui 
Selimdbad.     It  belonged  to  sarktir  Fathdbdd. 

Its  liistory  is  given  by  Mr  Collector  Thompson  in  a 
report  to  the  Board,  dated  28th  December  1793.  He 
states  that  the  whole  pargana  "was  taken  possession  of 
by  Aga  Biikar  at  the  time  he  was  ivcidadar  or  farmer 
of  it.  In  1156  B.s.  the  dispossessed  proprietors  com- 
plained to  the  Subali,  and  were  restored  to  4-^  anas  of 
it.  This  4^  anas  were  some  time  afterwards  divided 
into  ten  shares.  Aga  Bdkar  remained  in 'possession  of 
11^  anas  till  11  GO  b.s.,  when  he  was  put  to  death  for 
rebellion,  and  Bajali  Raj  Ballab  was  appointed  to  attach 
his  property.  Rajah  Raj  Ballab  managed  to  retain 
possession  of  the  11|-  anas  up  to  11G4  b.s.,  when  Sheo 
Narain,  a  son  of  Jai  Narain,  one  of  the  original  proprie- 
tors, recovered  the  estate  in  the  time  of  Mr  Verelst. 
Sheo  Narain  was  assisted  by  the  influence  of  Gokal 
Chandra  Ghosal,  Dewan  of  the  Provincial  Council  of 
Chittagong,  to  whom,  as  a  reward  for  his  services,  Sheo 
Narain  gave  half  of  the  recovered  property — i.e.,  5  anas 
15  gondas.  This  share  was  entered  in  the  name  of 
Bhowani  Charan,  which  is  said  to  have  been  the  esoteric 
or  astrological  name  of  Gokal  Ghosal  (Massie,  12th  April 
A.D.  1798),  and  the  11^  anas  were  held  by  him  and 
Sheo  Narain  jointly  till  1179  B.S.,  when  at  their  request 
a  partition  was  made  by  Mr  Barwell,  who  was  then  Chief 
of  Dacca,  A  copy  of  the  partition  pa|)ers,  dated  1180 
B.S.,  exists  in  the  Bakarganj  Collectorate.  In  Grant's 
"  Analysis,"  Selimdbjid  is  described  as  belonging  to  Jai 
Narain,  Bhovv^aui  Charan,  and  others  in  1170  B.s.,  and 
as  consisting  of  four  zamindaries  bearing  a  revenue  of 
Rs.40,190.  On  14th  January  1791  Mr  Douglas  refers 
to  the  decline  in  the  assets  of  the  pargana,  and  states 
that  this  was  chiefly  owing  to  the  misconduct  of  Bhowani 


1 2 o  DISTRICT  OF  bAKAR GANJ. 

Charan,  wlio  used  to  live  in  Calcutta  and  let  tlie  office 
of  his  agent  or  land-steward  to  the  highest  bidder. 
Thus  there  had  been  as  many  as  four  goraastas  or 
agents  in  one  year.  Gokal  Ghosal,  as  I  find  from  an 
elaborate  report  of  Mr  Money,  dated  2d  September 
1847,  died  in  1779,  or  1186  b.s.,  and  ten  years  after- 
wards— namely,  on  6th  July  1789 — his  share  was  sold 
for  a  private  debt  under  a  decree  of  court,  and  bought 
by  Kashi  Nath  Chaudhari  for  Ks.29,100.  Kashi  Nath, 
however,  was  merely  the  ostensible  purchaser,  the  real 
buyers  being  the  Ghosal  family.  A  few  years  before 
this,  Sheo  Narain  had  fallen  into  arrears,  and  one-half 
of  his  share,  or  2  anas  1 7-g  gandas,  was  bought  by  Jai 
Narain  Ghosal  in  the  name  of  his  son,  Kali  Sankhar. 
This  was  in  1189  b.s.  In  1796  Kashi  Nath's  share  was 
sold  by  a  decree  of  the  Supreme  Court  to  Eajah  Kaj 
Kissen,  and  ten  years  afterwards  his  son,  Noba  Kissen, 
resold  it  to  Kali  Sankhar  Ghosal.  Thus  the  Ghosal 
family  became  possessed  of  8  anas  12  J  gandas  2  krants 
of  the  whole  pargana — namely,  5  anas  1 5  gandas,  and 
2  anas  17  gandas  2  krants — and  these  shares  they  still 
retain.  They  reside  at  Bhukoilas,  near  Calcutta,  and 
have  enjoyed  the  title  of  Eajah  from  the  time  of  Kali 
Sankhar  Ghosal,  who  was  made  a  Rajah  and  a  Bahadur 
in  1825  (Government  letter,  15th  July  1825).  The 
Ghosal  family  were  famous  for  many  years  for  the  excel- 
lent way  in  which  they  kept  their  accounts,  and  for  the 
quietness  with  which  they  managed  their  zamindari. 
They  never  were  in  the  criminal  court,  and  they  col- 
lected their  rents  chiefly  through  the  Collector's  office 
(Act  10  of  1859).  They  are  still  reported  to  be  easy 
landlords,  but  dissensions  have  broken  out  among  them, 
and  their  affixirs  are  now  in  the  hands  of  a  receiver.  One 
of  their  ancestors,  I  believe,  left  a  will,  or  made  some 


HISTORY  OF  THE  FARG ANAS.  121 

other  arrangement  to  prevent  tliat  subdivision  of  pro- 
perty among  heirs  which  has  pulverised  so  many  hirge 
estates.  Their  head  cutchery  or  office  is  at  Jhalukdtti, 
about  twelve  miles  west  of  l^arisdl.  Rajah  Satya  Charan 
Ghosal  built  three  houses  there,  laid  out  some  gardens, 
and  made  some  roads  througli  and  near  the  bazdr.  It 
was  in  consequence,  I  presume,  of  these  improvements 
that  Jhalukdtti,  which  literally  means  the  clearing  of 
the  fisherman,  received  the  more  dignified  appellation 
of  Maharajganj.  Jhalukdtti  is  one  of  the  largest 
marts  in  the  district,  and  is  the  seat  of  most  of  the 
wood  trade. 

The  descendants  of  Jai  Narain  live  at  Raikdtti,  in 
thana  Perozpur,  about  four  miles  from  the  subdivisional 
headquarters.  The  name  Raikdtti  means  literally  the 
clearing  of  the  Eaies,  and  points  to  a  time  when  the 
country  was  covered  with  jungle.  According  to  tradi- 
tion, one  Satrujit  Rai,  an  inhabitant  of  Deganga,  near 
Calcutta,  was  the  founder  of  the  family.  The  goddess 
Sidheshwari  is  said  to  have  appeared  to  him  in  a  dream 
and  directed  him  to  proceed  to  Sellmabdd  and  settle 
there.  The  family  is  one  of  the  oldest  in  the  district, 
and  there  is  a  Sanskrit  inscription  on  a  temj)le  of  Kali 
at  Raikdtti  to  the  effect  that  the  idol  was  set  up  by 
Radu  Narain  Rai  in  1050  b.s.,  that  the  temple  for  it  was 
erected  in  1144  b.s.,  and  that  Jai  Narain  Rai  inau- 
gurated it  on  30th  Pans  1162  b.s. 

Selimdbdd  was  at  one  time  a  chief  seat  of  salt  manu- 
facture, and  on  this  account  much  of  it  lay  waste.  In 
the  Ninth  Report  of  the  Committee  of  the  House  of 
Commons,  dated  25th  June  1783,  it  is  stated  that  an 
Armenian  merchant,  named  Khaja  Kaworke,  had  the 
salt  farm  of  Selimdbdd  in  1773.  In  1774  Mr  Barwell, 
the  Chief  of  Dacca,  held  the  salt  estates  of  Selimdbdd. 


1 2 2  DISTRICT  OF  BAkARGANJ. 

He  relet  tliem  to  Khaja  Kaworke  iu  consideration  of  a 
present ;  for  this  he  was  censured  by  the  Court  of 
Directors.  The  collections  of  Selimabad  gave  the  Gov- 
ernment officers  much  trouble  for  many  years.  On  20th 
June  1792  the  Governor- General  ordered  the  whole 
zamindari  to  be  held  khas — i.e.,  to  be  managed  directly 
by  Government  officers.  The  arrears  of  land  revenue 
were  borne  on  the  books  of  the  Dacca  Collectorate  for 
a  long  time,  and  were  even  transferred  to  Bdkarganj 
when  it  was  made  a  district  in  1817.  Thirty  years 
afterwards  Mr  Money  wrote  a  long  report  about  them, 
and  suggested  that  they  should  be  realised  from  the 
Gliosal  family. 

The  present  revenue  of  Selimdbdd  is  Rs.98,227,  of 
which  Rs.59, 982-2-6^  are  paid  by  the  Ghosal  family. 
The  remainder  is  divided  among  fourteen  sets  of  share- 
holders, some  of  whom  reside  in  Jessore.  The  Ghosals 
are  Brdhmans  and  the  Raies  of  Raikdtti  are  Kayasts,  and 
among  the  most  respectable  of  that  caste.  The  most 
prominent  members  of  the  Raikdtti  family  are  Raj 
Kumar  Rai,  and  the  two  brothers  Madhab  Narain  and 
Nar  Narain.  Madhab  Narain  is  a  gentleman  of  con- 
siderable ability,  and  is  possessed  of  a  good  estate,  though 
I  believe  he  does  not  hold  a  bio^ha  of  land  in  his  own 
name.  Nar  Narain  has  distinguished  himself  as  an 
author,  and  as  the  supporter  of  an  Anglo-vernacular 
school  at  Raikdtti.  His  wife  also  has  published  some 
poems.  Nowhere  is  the  benami  princi|)le  carried  out 
further  than  at  Raikdtti,  nearly  all  of  the  shareholders 
holdinsr  their  lands  in  the  names  of  their  servants 
and  relatives.  This  is  owino*  to  most  of  them  bein^ 
in  debt.  Among  the  principal  taluqdars  in  Selimd,- 
bd-cl  are  Prosunno  Kumar  Sein  of  Kirttipdsha,  near 
Jhalukdtti,  who  is  also  a  small  shareholder  in  the  par- 


HIS  TOR  V  OF  THE  PAR  GA  NA  S.  123 

gana  ;  the  MaliuUanavises  of  Basanda,  where  they  have 
a  large  school ;  the  Biswases  of  Jalabari,  and  the  Datts 
of  Amrajhuri.  Prosunno  Kumar  Sein's  ancestor  was  the 
Dewan  or  Naib  of  Satrujit  Kai,  and  the  Mahulla- 
navises  Avere  formerly  servants  of  his  family.  ]\Iost  of 
Selimdbad  is  now  highly  cultivated,  and  produces  much 
rice,  supari,  and  pdn.  It  lies  chiefly  in  thanas  Jhalu- 
kdtti,  Surapktitti,  and  Perozpiir.  One  of  the  most 
important  places  in  it  is  BanarijDara,  which,  with  the 
neighbouring  villages  of  Gabha,  &c.,  is  inhabited  by  num- 
bers of  Kulin  Kayasts,  such  as  the  Thakurtas,  the  Guhas, 
&c.  The  land  measure  in  general  use  is  the  biglia. 
The  nal  is  small,  being  only  five  cubits,  but  these  cubits 
are  more  than  eighteen  inches  long,  for  the  nal  is  equal 
to  eight  feet  seven  and  a  half  inches.  Twenty  nals  by 
twenty  make  one  bigha,  which  is  equal  to  about  two 
bio-has  and  one  katha  of  the  standard   bif»ha   measure- 

O  O 

ment.  The  same  measurement  appears  to  be  in  use  in 
Arangpiir,  Kotwalipara,  and  Telihati. 

5.    TaPPA  HaVILI  SELfMABAD. 

This  is  a  small  pargana,  lying  chiefly  in  thana  Nal- 
chiti,  and  has  evidently  been  formed  out  of  pargana 
Selimabdd.  The  word  havili  implies  that  the  tract  was 
the  stipendiary  or  demesne  land  of  the  zamindar — that 
is,  it  was  the  land  appropriated  to  his  own  use.  It  thus 
corresponds  to  the  word  nankar,  which  literally  means 
bread-making.  It  is  a  peculiarity  of  this  pargana  that 
it  consists  of  seven  anas  instead  of  sixteen.  The  other 
nine  anas  have  been  included  in  Selimabild,  as  is  shown 
by  the  partition  papers  of  1180  B.S.,  already  referred  to. 
Four  anas  out  of  the  seven  belong  to  Khajali  Ahsanoolah, 
and  the  remainder  to   the  Panabalia   Chaudharies  and 


124  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

others.     Panabalia  is  a  little   below  Nalchiti,   and  was 
formerly  the  headquarters  of  the  zamindar  of  the  par- 
gana.     The    Sugaudha  or  Sunda  river  is    said  to  have 
flowed  past  it  in  old  times,  and  hence  a  village  in  the 
neighbourhood  bears  the  name  of  Sundarkul  or  shore  of;j 
the  Sunda.    There  is  an  ancient  image  of  Siva  at  ShamrailJ 
near  Panabalia,  and  it  is  fabled  that  Bhagabati's  fingei 
fell  here.     The  Panabalia  Chaudharies  belong  to  an  olcj 
Baidya  family,  but  they  are  now  in  impoverished  cir- 
cumstances, and,  moreover,  the  different  members  are  at 
enmity  with  one  another.     The  pargana  of  Syedpilr  is 
said   to   have  been  formerly  included  in  Havili  Selim- 
d,bdd,    and   to    have   been    separated  from    it   through! 
the  influence  of  Bhagirath  Singh,  who  was  a  kanungcj 
Gupta  Chaudhari  was  the  first  zamindar.     His  son  Ear 
Bhadra  Rai  is  said  to  have  fought  with  the  Mahrattas 
or  Bargis,  and  to  have  defeated  them  near  Panabalia^ 
Curiously  enough  there  is  an  entry  in  Mr  Long's  Selec- 
tions under  date  1748,  that  the  city  of  Dacca  was  mucl 
alarmed  on  account  of  the  approach  of  the  Mahrattas^ 
who  were  coming  by  the  Sundarbans,  and  had  advancec 
as  far  as  SundarkiU. 

6.  Tappa  Havili. 

This  small  pargana  appears  also  to  have  been  formed 
out  of  Selimabdd.  Its  lands  lie,  I  believe,  in  thanas 
Nalchiti  and  Bdkarganj.  It  is  divided  into  two  shares, 
a  ten-ana  and  a  six-ana.  The  ten-ana  share  is  possessed 
by  Asmat  Ali  Khan  and  Fazal  Ali  Khan  of  Charamadi, 
and  by  the  Glioses  of  Bakai ;  also  by  the  Bosus  of 
Bamrail,  The  six-ana  share  belonofs  to  the  Charamadi 
family  above  noted,  and  to  some  Br^hmans  of  Pingla- 
kdtti,  in  Gournadi  tliana. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  TARGANAS.  125 


7.    iDILPtJil. 

Professor  Bloclimjiim  states  that  the  real  name  of  this 
pargana  is  Adilpiir,  from  adil^  "just."  It  is  one  of  the 
four  parganas  originally  included  in  sarkdr  Bd-kla.  In 
Grant  it  is  described  as  having  belonged  in  1170  B.s. 
(1764)  to  one  Ram  Ballab,  as  situated  at  the  confluence 
of  the  Ganges  and  Meghna,  and  as  consisting  of  three 
zamindari^s  and  eight  mahals.  The  revenue  was 
Rs.  10 6,2 70.  Perhaps  no  pargana  gave  more  trouble  to 
the  early  collectors  than  Idilpiii*.  The  Chaudharies  of 
Idilplir,  as  they  were  called,  were  Hindus  of  the  Kayast 
caste,  and  did  not  bear  a  good  character,  as  they  were 
accused  of  harbouring  dacoits.  Doubtless  the  jungly 
condition  of  the  pargana  encouraged  bad  characters  to 
resort  to  it. 

On  23d  June  1795,  Mr  Armstrong  writes:  "In  the 
Bengal  year  1184,  during  the  existence  of  the  Provincial 
Councils  of  Revenue,  the  settlement  of  Idilpiir  was  ad- 
justed and  jama  fixed  atRs.83,506.  Some  animosities, 
however,  taking  place,  the  proprietors  tendered  up  a 
darhhast  to  the  Council,  requesting  their  estate  might 
be  divided.  An  amin  was  accordingly  deputed,  the 
estate  divided,  and  they  entered  into  separate  engage- 
ments for  the  payment  of  their  revenue  at  the  rate  of 
Rs.  8 1,1 15,  on  which  terms  they  continued  holding  it 
until  the  year  1188,  when,  declining  it,  it  was  given  in 
farm  to  Manik  Bosu  for  seven  years.  In  1195  it  was 
held  khas  and  fell  in  balance  Rs.30,541.  In  1196  the 
assessment  was  reduced  to  Rs.  8  0,0  00,  and  the  Chau- 
dharies aoain  undertook  the  manas^ement  of  it,  but  find- 
ing  it  was  not  equal  to  the  payment  of  such  a  high 
revenue,   relinquished  it  at  the  close  of  the  year.     In 


1 2  6  DISTRICT  OF  bAkAR  GANJ. 

1197  it  was  accordingly  held  klias,  when  the  col- 
lections did  not  exceed  Rs,G3,346,  out  of  which  the 
sezawal's  salary  (R,s.2G40)  and  the  zamindar's  masha- 
hara  (Rs.5936)  being  deducted,  the  net  collections 
appear  to  be  Rs. 54,769.  In  the  year  following  the 
taluqdars  were  separated  at  Rs.  13, 5 47-2- 13  (which  the 
zamindars  assert  was  only  half  what  they  used  to  pay 
before),  which  being  deducted  from  what  the  estate 
yielded  the  preceding  year  (Rs. 63,346),  the  remainder 
is  Rs. 49, 79 8-1 3."  The  Chaudharies  did  not  accept  the 
terms  offered  to  them  at  the  Decennial  Settlement,  and 
afterwards,  when  the  estate  was  sold  for  arrears  of 
revenue,  they  made  this  a  ground  of  appeal.  The  par- 
gana  was  held  klias  at  various  times,  but  this  did  not 
much  mend  matters.  There  is  a  long  report  on  the 
pargana  by  Mr  Armstrong,  dated  9th  February  1797. 
He  ascribes  the  balances  to  encroachment  of  the  river 
(the  pargana  lies  chiefly  in  the  Mendiganj  thana,  on  the 
west  bank  of  the  Meghna),  contumacy  of  the  Chaud- 
haries, and  interference  of  the  Civil  Court.  Another 
reason,  probably  more  powerful  than  any  other,  was 
that  many  chars  had  formed  in  the  Meghna,  and 
that  the  ryots  had  deserted  the  mainland  for  them. 
"  The  land  of  the  pargana  is  high,  and  as  there  are  few 
khdls  in  it,  the  soil  is  no  longer  fertile."  I  think  it 
proper  to  observe  here  that  it  is  precisely  the  highest 
and  most  valuable  lands  which  sufier  most  from  river 
action  in  Bdkarganj.  A  'priori  it  might  be  supposed 
that  the  low  lands  would  suffer  most,,  but  this  is  not 
so ;  for  the  evil  done  by  the  rivers  is  not  the  mere 
overflowing  of  the  land,  which  in  a  rice  country,  and 
where  there  are  so  many  khals  and  other  channels  to 
carry  off  the  water,  is  not  of  so  much  consequence,  but 
the  carrying  away  of   the  land  bodily.     A  high  bank 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PA  RG  AN  AS.  127 

is  always  tlic  sign  of  diluviation,  for  there  tlic  stream 
runs  deejDcst  and  strongest,  and  therefore  cuts  away  the 
land  most,  wJiile  on  the  shallow  side  its  force  is  broken 
by  tlie  shoals.  This  is  well  known  to  native  boatmen, 
who,  in  towing  or  rowing  up  against  the  stream,  always 
prefer  the  side  of  the  river  Avhere  the  bank  is  low. 

Mr  Armstrong  goes  on  to  say,  "  The  ryots  of  the 
high  land  pay  twelve  rupees  a  kani  (1645  square 
yards),  which  seldom  produces  more  than  ten  maunds 
of  grain,  and  the  land  takes  much  trouble  to  cultivate, 
not  only  from  its  being  a  hard  soil,  but  from  the  pre- 
valence of  underwood  and  jungle.  The  low  land,  on  the 
contrary,  is  easily  cultivated.  The  first  year  the  ryot 
pays  nothing,  the  second  only  one  rupee,  the  third  two 
rupees,  the  fourth  three  rupees,  and  the  fifth  the  full 
jama,  which  only  amounts  to  four  rupees  per  kani, 
which,  after  the  third  year's  cultivation,  always  pro- 
duces twenty  maunds  of  jDaddy.  The  consequence  of 
which  has  been  that,  instead  of  the  pargana's  being  in 
the  flourishing  state  of  cultivation  it  was  in  in  1177  b.s. 
(1770),  when  the  sezawal  realised  in-  it  one  lac  and 
sixteen  thousand  rupees,  the  lands  have  been  neglected, 
the  ryots  have  deserted,  and  the  jiargana  has  become 
in  many  parts  an  impenetrable  jungle,  and  its  cultiva- 
tion reduced  to  one-eighth.  .  .  . 

"  The  great  j^lenty  which  has  been  felt  in  the  pargana 
these  last  three  years,  and  particularly  in  the  present, 
has  also  affected  the  realisation  of  the  revenue  in  a  very 
great  degree.  Paddy  that  used  to  sell  for  three  maunds 
the  rupee,  and  then  considered  very  cheap),  now  sells  for 
eight  maunds  the  rupee,  eighty-two  sicca  weight.  Eed 
pepper  that  used  before  to  bring  two  and  a  half,  and 
sometimes  three  rupees  per  maund,  now  is  so  plentiful 
as  not   to  pay  for   the  expense  of  bringing  it  in,  and 


128  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

when  sold  never  yields  more  tlian  eight  or  ten  anas  a 
niaimd.  Molasses  that  formerly  sold  from  four  to  seven 
rupees  per  maund,  is  now  sold  for  one  rupee,  and  some- 
times twelve  anas."  In  a  letter  of  20tli  December  1796, 
the  Collector  says  that  if  the  river  does  not  take  a 
turn,  no  part  of  Idilpur  pargana  will  be  left  iu  two 
years,  and  also  reports  that  there  is  a  plague  in  the 
pargana  which  carries  off  hundreds  of  the  inhabitants 
daily. 

This  plague  is  also  referred  to  in  the  letter  of  9tli 
February  above  quoted.  Mr  Armstrong  writes,  "The 
mortality  has  likewise  been  of  infinite  injury  to  the 
welfare  of  the  pargana.  In  the  house  of  Sarbeshwar 
Pal,  in  particular,  a  grain  merchant,  who  by  his  trade 
has  supported  many  of  the  poor  families,  seventeen 
lives  were  lost  in  the  space  of  eleven  days ;  and  I  make 
no  doubt,  from  the  account  I  have  received,  that  400 
or  500  lives  have  already  fallen  a  sacrifice  to  the  plague, 
which  is  not  yet  subsided." 

I  do  not  know  if  these  explanations  proved  satisfac- 
tory, but  I  am  afraid  that  Mr  Armstrong  was  not  very 
successful  in  such  matters.  In  another  letter  he  writes 
that  the  sentiments  expressed  by  the  Govern  or- General 
concerning  him  have  weighed  heavy  on  his  peace  of 
mind,  and  concludes  a  long  letter  by  begging  the  Board 
to  have  the  goodness  to  make  allowances  for  a  mind  not 
at  ease,  from  the  idea  of  having  risked  the  censure  of 
the  Governor-General  in  Council  as  well  as  of  the  Board. 
He  appears  to  have  been  superseded  by  an  officer  of  a 
different  stamp  (Mr  Massie).  In  1198  b.s. — i.e.,  at  the 
time  of  the  Novennial  Settlement  —  Eam  Ballab  Kai, 
Kista  Ballab  Bai,  and  Nar  Sing  Rai  were  among  the 
principal  proprietors.  In  a  report  dated  August  1797, 
it  is  stated  that  the  pargana  is  subdivided  into  nine 


II IS  TOR  V  OF  THE  PA  R  GA  NA  S.  129 

distinct  shares,  and  tliat  there  are  numerous  partners 
in  each  of  them. 

The  Board  instituted  a  suit  ao-ainst  the  Chaudharies 
for   the   arrears    due    by  them,   and   gained   a   decree. 
Afterwards,  in  July  1804,  the  Board 'ordered  the  Chau- 
dharies to   be  put  in  possession  of  their  estate,  they 
having  agreed  to  \)^j  up  the  arrears  within  ten  years 
from  the  beginning  of  1214  B.s.     Here  we  appear  to 
have  an  instance  of  the  authorities  trying  to   bolster 
up  the  old  families ;  but  the  experiment  failed,  and  in 
1812  the  zamindari  was  put  up  to  sale,  and  bought  by 
Mohini  Mohan  Tagore,  in  whose  family  it  still  remains. 
The  revenue  is  Rs,65, 904-4-11,  but  there  are  also  119 
independent  taluqs,  the  revenue   of  which  is  Rs.8637. 
The  revenue    of  the   zamindari  is  still  paid  into  the 
Bdkarganj    treasury,    but   a   considerable   part   of    the 
pargana  has  been  transferred  along  with   the  Burirhat 
outpost  to   Faridp^ir.      Serious    affrays   took    place    in 
1815  between  the  auction  purchaser  and  the   old  pro- 
prietors.    Such  contests  are,  or  at  least  were,  frequent 
in  Bdkarganj  on  the  occasion  of  any  large  property's 
changing  hands ;  and  as  a  general  rule,  it  is  the  mazul 
or  old   proprietors  who  are  in  fault,  as    they   try  by 
force  or  fraud  to  deprive  the  purchaser  of  his   legal 
rights.     However,  it  would  appear  from  Mr  Sage,  the 
Magistrate's,  letter  of  23d  September  1815,  that  in  the 
case  of  Idilpur  the  auction  purchaser  was  to  blame.     The 
Naib  of  Mohini  Mohan  Thakur  found  that  some  lands 
claimed  by  the  Nawab  of  Dacc-a  as  a  jaghir  had  been 
let  to  the  taluqdars,  and  he  tried  to  get  hold  of  them. 
An  affray,  in  which  a  man  was  killed,  took  place  on 
8th  September   1815.     At  that  time  the  pargana  was 
under  the  district  known  by  the  name  of  the  City  of 
Dacca ;  and  it  was  on  account  of  such  affrays,  and  of 


130  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

the  difficulty  of  managing  the  pargana  from  a  place  so 
distant,  that  it  Tvas  transferred  to  the  Bdkarganj  magis- 
tracy. 

The  portion  of  Idilpiir  which  remains  in  Bdkarganj 
lies  chiefly,  if  not  entirely,  in  the  Mendiganj  thana. 
It  is  a  well- wooded  pargana,  and  the  land  is  high  and 
w^ell  adapted  for  riding  over.  It  suffers  from  the  want 
of  khd,ls,  and  there  are  as  yet  no  made  roads  in  it.  The 
whole  pargana  being  in  the  hands  of  one  zamindar,  he, 
or  rather  his  agents  (for  he  himself  is  an  absentee)  have 
considerable  power,  and  the  ryots  are  not  forward  with 
complaints.  The  thana  is  at  present  at  Patarhdt, 
although  it  has  been  proposed  to  remove  it  to  Allyganj. 
There  are  a  rural  re<?istrar's  office  and  a  bazdr  in 
Patarhat.  The  best  /jos  boats  are  made  in  thana 
Mendiganj,  near  a  place  called  Debaikhdli.  There  is 
a  large  betel-nut  cultivation  in  the  pargana,  and  it 
also  produces  a  few  oranges.  It  was  in  Idilptir  that 
the  copperplate  inscription  elsewhere  referred  to  was 
discovered.  There  are  some  old  villages  in  the  pargana, 
and  indications  of  forts  and  battles.  There  are  many 
Brdhman  families  in  Idilpiir. 

8.  Tappa  Nazirpi^r. 

This  pargana  Ls  described  in  one  document  as  a  tappa 
dependent  on  pargana  Kasimnagar,  sark^r  Bazuha.  Mr 
Douglas,  on  27th  May  1790,  reported  that  there  were 
thirteen  claimants  to  this  pargana — namely,  the  widow 
and  legitimate  son  of  Imamuddin,  the  late  proprietor, 
and  eleven  illegitimate  sons.  It  appears  to  have  been 
held  khas  for  several  years. 

Tappa  Nazirpur  is  somewhat  scattered,  part  of  ifc 
being  in  Gournadi  and  part  in  the  south  and  east  of 


HISTORY  01'  TIJE  PARC  ANAS.  131 

the  district.  This  pargana  or  tappa  is  a  very  old  one, 
and  Professor  Bloclimann  thinks  that  it  is  marked  on 
the  maps  of  Dc  Barros  and  BLacv  opposite  the  group  of 
ishands  called  the  Don  Manik  Islands.  I  douLt,  how- 
ever, if  this  be  the  Bdkarganj  Nazirpi'ir,  as  the  map 
seems  to  place  it  north  of  the  city  of  Dacca.  Char 
Kalmi,  one  of  these  islands,  was  claimed  by  the  zamin- 
dars  as  part  of  Nazirpilr,  and  was  afterwards  settled  by 
one  of  the  family.  Portions  of  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir 
belong  to  Nazirpur  and  to  Ratandi  Kalikapur,  which 
was  formed  out  of  it.  There  is  a  full  report  on  the 
early  history  of  Nazirpur  by  Mr  Massie,  dated  6th 
December  1797.  It  was  sold  for  arrears  of  revenue, 
and  bought  by  the  Tagore  family  in  1819.  Fourteen- 
sixteenths  were  purchased  then,  and  the  remaining  two- 
sixteenths  were  acquired  by  the  Tagores  by  private 
purchase  from  Mr  Panioty  and  others  in  1830.  The 
Tagore  family  are  thus  the  largest  zamindars  in  Bdkar- 
ganj,  as  they  hold  two  entire  parganas  (Idilpur  and 
Nazirpur).  Some  interesting  facts  regarding  Nazir- 
pur will  be  found  in  a  Privy  Council  decision  of 
March  1865  (Gopal  Lai  Thakur,  appellant,  Moore's 
Appeals,  vol  x.)  In  1704  (1111  b.s.)  Syed  Sham- 
suddin  Mahomed  was  the  zamindar ;  Syed  Imamuddin 
Mahomed  was  his  descendant,  and  died  in  1785  (1192 
B.s.)  The  family  is  now  represented  by  Mir  Mamta- 
zuddin,  who  lives  at  Nalchira,  where  the  old  family 
mansion  was.  He  is  very  poor,  and  the  family  has 
become  degraded  by  misalliances  contracted  for  the 
sake  of  gain,  but  it  still  enjoys  some  respect  on  account 
of  its  great  antiquity.  According  to  the  family  papers, 
Alfat  Ghuzi  of  Ghazipiir  was  the  founder  of  the  fiimily. 
He  was  vizier  of  one  of  the  Delhi  emperors,  and  came 
to  Dacca  in  the  time  of  Jahangir.      Possibly  the  old 


v' 


132  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

village  of  Uzirpiir  (the  city  of  the  vizier)  is  named  after 
him.  His  son  Syecl  Jan  obtained  the  zamindari  and 
settled  at  Tero  char,  and  the  grandson  of  Syed  Jan 
removed  the  family  residence  to  Nalchira.  His  name 
was  Ainuddin,  and  he  was  succeeded  by  Shamsuddin, 
who  created  a  taluq  in  his  own  name,  which  was  after- 
words bought  by  Mr  Gill,  grandfather  of  Mr  Brown  of 
Barisdb  The  zamindari  was  sold  in  the  time  of  Sham- 
suddin's  son  Hoseinuddin.^ 


9.  Ratandi  Kalikapdk. 

This  pargana  was  formed  in  1149  B.s.  by  a  sanad 
from  Aliverdi  Khan.  The  sanad,  a  copy  of  which  has 
been  filed  in  a  recent  lawsuit,  states  that  the  pargana 
is  formed  out  of  Nazirpiir  tappa  and  other  places,  that 
it  is  to  be  called  Ratandi  Kalikapiir,  and  that  Krishna 

1  The  name  of  Imaniuddin  figures  in  some  complaints  of  the  Provincial 
Council  of  Dacca  against  the  proceedings  of  an  attorney  named  Peat,  who 
settled  himself  at  Dacca,  and  used  the  processes  of  the  Supreme  Court 
against  the  zamiudars.  On  18th  September  1777,  Mr  Rous  and  the  other 
members  of  the  Provincial  Council  wrote  to  the  Governor-General  (Warren 
Hastings)  as  follows  :  "  For  instance,  the  zamindar  of  Nazirpiir,  which 
pays  an  annual  revenue  of  about  Rs.40,000,  is  seized  by  a  warrant,  in  order 
to  be  carried  away  to  Calcutta,  at  the  instant  he  was  proceeding  to  his 
lands  to  take  measures  for  discharging  the  revenues  for  which  he  has 
bound  himself.  Thereby  he  may  be  absent  for  many  months,  the  collec- 
tions Avill  be  ill-conducted  during  the  master's  absence,  the  revenue  of  the 
Government  will  fall  short,  and  at  last  his  pargana  is  sold  to  make  good 
the  deficiency.  It  will  be  a  poor  compensation  to  the  zamindar  in  the  end 
to  be  informed  that  he  was  unjustl}'  arrested." 

Lall  Ilai,  the  zamindar  of  Uttar  Shahbazpiir,  had  been  arrested  in  like 
manner. 

See  "  Observations  upon  the  Administration  of  Justice  in  Bengal,  oc- 
casioned by  some  late  Proceedings  at  Dacca." 

Imamuddin's  petition  is  printed  in  an  appendix  to  Judicial  Papers 
for  1774  (India  Office  Library).  He  says,  "Char  Tengra  Colla,  under 
tappa  Nazirpiir,  formed  by  the  inundation  of  the  river,  is  in  my  posses- 
sion, but  is  contested  with  me  by  Mahomed  Eadak,  taluqdar  of  pargana 
Bangrora,"  &c. 


HISTORY  OF  TJIli  PARC  ANAS.  133 

Earn,  the  son  of  Ratcaneshwar  (wlio  thus  gave  his  iiaiiio 
to  the  pargana),  is  to  be  the  chaiulhari  of  it.  It  is 
stipulated  that  the  zamindar  shall  pay  the  reveiuic 
(lis.  1777),  treat  the  ryots  well,  assist  in  suppressing 
evil-disposed  persons,  root  out  dacoits  and  thieves,  en- 
courage the  cultivation  of  the  land,  keep  the  roads  and 
gluits  in  good  order,  so  that  the  public  may  travel  about 
without  impediment,  prevent  the  drinking  of  intoxi- 
cants, and  at  the  end  of  each  year  file  his  papers 
signed  by  himself  and  the  kanungo.  The  kanungo  also 
entered  into  a  covenant  that  he  would  be  security  for 
the  zamindar  and  cause  his  attendance  when  required, 
and  that  if  the  latter  absconded  he  would  take  posses- 
sion of  the  estate  and  collect  the  revenue,  &c.  The 
descendants  of  Krishna  Ram  reside  at  Uzirpur,  in  the 
Gournadi  thana,  and  still  retain  a  share  in  the  zamin- 
dari.  They  are  much  reduced  in  circumstances,  and 
the  greater  part  of  the  pargana  has  j^assed  into  the 
hands  of  other  persons — viz.,  Sarup  Chandra  Guha, 
Brindaban  Chakrabarti,  Chandra  Nath  Sein  (these  three 
have  five  and  a  half  anas),  Abhai  C-liaran  Nazir  of  the 
Judge's  Court,  &c.  As  I  have  mentioned  elsewhere, 
the  family  is  said  to  be  descended  from  Eam  Mohan 
IMal,  a  servant  of  one  of  the  Chandradwip  Rajahs.  It 
is  one  of  the  four  old  Hindu  families  in  the  district, 
the  other  three  being  the  Chandradwip  Rajahs,  the  Rai- 
kdtti  family,  and  the  Arangpur  and  Shaistanagar  zamin- 
dars  (Kalaskiitti). 

10.  Uttar  ShaiibAzpijr. 

This  pargana  has  suffered  much  from  diluviation,  and 
is  now  of  small  extent.  It  is  situated  chiefly  in  thana 
Mendiganj,  but  there  are  portions  of  it  in  the  island  of 
Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir.    It  is  said  to  derive  its  nnme  from 


134  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

one  Sliahbdz  Khan,  a  Mogul  general  in  old  times.  A 
Sbalibaz  Klian  Kumboo  is  mentioned  in  Stewart's  "  His- 
tory of  Bengal "  as  a  general  of  Akbar,  and  as  liaving 
been  employed  in  the  subjugation  of  Bengal ;  but  Pro- 
fessor Blochmann  informs  me  that  the  name  Shalibdzpiir 
is  older  than  the  date  of  this  officer's  expedition.  The 
pargana  is  held  in  ten  shares.  The  j)i'023rietors  are 
chiefly  Hindus,  and  Kali  Nath  Eai  and  Eashamani 
Chaudharine  are  among  the  principal  of  them.  Some  of 
the  shareholders  have  held  their  lands  for  several  gene- 
rations, but  most  have  acquired  them  by  j^urchase  in 
recent  times.  It  is  curious  to  find  the  pargana  extend- 
ing down  into  the  island  of  Dakhin  Shalibazpur,  and  the 
explanation  commdnly  given  is  that  in  old  times  the 
channel  separating  the  island  from  the  mainland  to  the 
north  was  much  smaller  than  it  now  is.  On  lOtli  July 
1794  the  Collector  reports  that  the  zamindars  of  this 
pargana  had  not  given  tahut — i.e.,  had  not  agreed  to  the 
settlement. 

The  zamindar  of  Uttar  Shahbdzpur  was  one  of  those 
who  suffered  from  the  aggressions  of  Mr  Peat,  an  attor- 
ney, who  had  l^een  Mr  Justice  Hyde's  clerk.  Among 
other  things,  he  shot  a  native  for  trying,  as  he  said,  to 
resist  his  authority.  The  unfortunate  Provincial  Coun- 
cil of  Dacca  seem  to  have  been  driven  to  distraction  by 
Mr  Peat  and  his  English  law,  and  so  tried  to  turn  the 
tables  on  him  by  unearthing  a  statute  of  Henry  V. 
They  remark,  in  a  letter  dated  Dacca,  2  2d  Septem- 
ber 1777,  "We  take  this  occasion  to  notice  a  very 
important  circumstance  in  the  present  discussion,  that 
Mr  Peat  has  been  acting  contrary  to  law  during  the 
whole  time  of  his  residence  at  Dacca,  by  holding  a  very 
active  practice  as  attorney-at-law  at  Dacca,  proved  by 
his  original  letters  already  sent  you,  and  at  the  same 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PA RG ANAS.  135 

time  acting  as  Deputy-SlierifF,  contrary  to  a  statute  of 
Henry  V.,  which  enacts  *  that  an  Under-ShcrifF  can- 
not execute  that  office  and  practise  as  an  attorney  at 
tlie  same  time."  .  .  .  Mr  Peat's  threefold  capacity — 
Master  in  Chancery,  attorney,  and  DejDuty-SheritF — in  a 
situation  so  far  removed  from  the  Supreme  Court,  gives 
1dm  an  influence  and  advantage  in  the  suits  he  engages 
in,  and  leaves  little  chance  of  equality  to  the  poor  native 
against  whom  he  may  be  employed." 

The  following  paper  is  published  in  the  Proceedings  : 
"  Translation  of  a  petition  from  the  vakil  of  Lall  Ram, 
zamindar  of  Uttar  Shahb^zpiir. 

"  Your  petitioner,  Anand  Pam,  vakil  of  Lall  Pam,  the 
Chaudhari  of  Uttar  Shahbdzpur,  represents  that  Bhan- 
gesh  Cliaudhari,  partner  of  his  constituent,  having  falsely 
charged  him  with  plunder  and  devastation  in  the  cutch- 
ery  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Mr  Peat,  has  had  your 
petitioner's  constituent,  together  with  his  gomasta, 
arrested  and  confined  in  the  gaol.  Your  petitioner's 
constituent  has  never  been  employed  by  the  Company, 
or  in  any  English  service.     He  is  hopeful  for  justice." 

11.  Dakhin  Shahbazpur. 

This  pargana  belonged  to  sarkar  Khalifatdbdd,  which 
was  also  called  sarkar  Fathabad.  It  Avas  only  annexed 
to  Bdkarganj  in  1869,  or  rather  it  was  reannexed  in 
that  year,  for  it  had  belonged  first  to  Dacca  Jalalpiir 
and  then  to  Bd-karganj  up  to  1822,  when  it  was  trans- 
ferred to  the  newly- established  district  of  Noakhali. 
It  appears  from  a  petition  of  Khajah  Aratoon,  forwarded 
on  1st  October  1795,  that  the  pargana  formerly  be- 
longed to  Mirza  Jan,  and  that  in  1187  b.s.  (1780),  seven 
anas  of  it  were  sold  for  arrears  of  revenue,  and  bought 


1 3  6  DISTRICl^  OF  bAkAR  GANJ. 

by  Khajali  Michael,  an  Armenian  merchant  in  Dacca, 
and  the  father  of  Khajah  Aratoon.  In  1193  B.s.  (1786), 
the  remaining  nine  anas  were  sold,  and  were  also  bought 
by  Khajah  Michael;  but  in  1195  B.s.  Mr  Douglas  re- 
stored 3  anas  1^  gandas  1  krant  to  Mirza  Jan,  and  this 
share  still  belongs  to  his  descendants — i.e.,  the  Mirza 
Sahibs  of  Dacca.  It  is  separate  from  the  12  anas  18 
gandas  1  cowrie  2  krants  share.  The  latter  is  held  by 
many  proprietors,  some  of  whom  are  descendants  of 
Khajah  Michael,  and  some  of  whom  have  obtained  their 
shares  by  purchase.  Among  them  are  the  Stephenses  of 
Dacca,  Mr  Harney,  Mr  Lucas  of  Barisdl,  Mr  Bagram  as 
executor  for  the  Caspar  family,  and  the  Baisakhs  of 
Dacca.  All  the  zamindars  of  Dakhin  Shahbd-zpur  are 
absentees,  and  there  is  hardly  a  ^^a/c/ja-house  on  the 
island.  According  to  tradition,  the  first  zamindars  of 
Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir  were  Aman  Ula  Sikdar,  Bijai  Narain 
Mozamdar  of  Bhulua,  and  four  other  persons  from 
Dacca.  The  villages  of  Amani  and  Bijaipiir  are  called 
after  the  two  first-named  individuals,  and  the  zamindari 
cutch erics  of  several  of  the  shareholders  are  still  at 
Amani,  which  is  a  few  miles  from  Daulat  Khan.  Before 
this  time  the  island  seems  to  have  been  held  by  the 
Arracanese,  and  by  the  famous  Portuguese  pirate 
Gonzales,  who  had  a  fort  on  the  neighbouring  island  of 
Sandwip.  Aman  Ula  and  his  party  did  not  j^ay  the 
revenue,  and  so  the  pargana  was  made  over  to  a  faquir 
named  Abu  Syed,  who  took  it  in  the  name  of  one  of  his 
wives,  Sartaz  Bibi. 

Aim  Syed  and  his  dewan  Krishna  Eam  Chakrabarti, 
who  came  from  Srfrd,mpvir  in  Bdknrgaiij,  succeeded  in 
cultivating  the  island  by  letting  out  j)ortions  to  howala- 
dars  and  others  on  permanent  tenures,  as  no  one  would 
undertake  the  clearing  of  the  jungle  on  other  terms. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS. 


137 


Mirza  Jan,  or  Mirza  Ahmed  Jan,  was  Sartaz  Bibi's  grand- 
son, and  it  seems  that  it  was  the  disputes  between  him 
and  his  stepbrother,  Khiida  Baksh,  which  h'd  to  the 
sale  of  the  larger  share  of  the  property,  and  its  purchase 
by  Khajah  ]\Iichael.  In  Grant,  Dakhin  Shahbazpi\r  is 
entered  as  having  belonged  in  1165  (1759)  to  one 
Bushan  Ula,  to  whom  also  the  old  pargaua  of  Srirdm- 
piir  appears  to  have  beloiiged. 

The  revenue  of  Dakhin  Shahbazpiir  is  now  upwards  of 
Rs. 44,000,  but  it  was  formerly  greater,  being  Rs. 54,000 
(sicca)  at  the  time  of  the  Permanent  Settlement.  A 
deduction  of  Rs.  12,208  (sicca)  was  allowed  as  khalari 
suspension — i.e.,  as  compensation  for  land  occupied  by 
the  salt  manufacture.  In  a  statement  of  the  Board  of 
Revenue,  8th  May  1808,'  this  deduction  is  divided  as 
follows  among  the  two  shares  in  the  pargana  : — 

a.      g.    k.  Revenue.  Khalari  Suspension. 

Khajah  Aratoon's  share  12  IS  1  Rs.43.487  4  15  E?.9858  10  10 
Mirza  Jan's  share      .       3     13  10,358  12  15  2349     5  10 

There  were  then  two  salt  agencies,  one  at  Rai  Mangal, 
which  appears  to  have  been  the  same  place  as  Jhalukiltti, 
and  another  at  Bhulua  (Noakhdli).  The  Dakhin  Shah- 
bdzpiir  manufacture  belonged  to  the  latter  agency. 
Khajah  Michael  and  Khajah  Kaworke  were  at  one  time 
the  lessees  of  the  salt-farm,  and  we  find  a  reference  to 
Dakhin  Sliahbdzpiir  in  the  Ninth  Report  of  the  Com- 
mittee of  the  House  of  Commons.  The  place  was  then 
known  under  the  not  infelicitous  corruption  of  Savage- 
pore  ;  and  the  notorious  Mr  Richard  Barwell,  the  Chief  of 
Dacca,  had  the  salt-farm  in  1774,  he  having  engaged 
for  it,  as  he  said,  "  in  the  persuasion  of  its  being  a  very 
profitable  farm."  It  seems  that  Mr  Barwell  held  the 
lease  both  of  the  Selimdbdd  and  the  Shahbdzpiir  salt- 
farms,  and  that  he  relet  them  to  two  Armenian  mer- 


138  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

chants,  Michael  and  Kaworke,  on  condition  of  their 
paying  him  Es.  125,000,  exclusive  of  their  engagement 
to  the  Company.  Mr  BarwelPs  engagement  with  them 
was  benami— z.e.,  it  was  in  the  names  of  Basant  Rai  and 
Kissen  Deb  Sing,  as  it  was  not  thonglit  consistent  \vith 
the  public  regulations  that  the  names  of  any  Eurojieans 
should  appear.  Khajah  Kaworke  complained  that  after 
Mr  Barwell  had  let  him  the  farms,  and  taken  a  lac  and 
Rs.25,000  from  him  on  this  account,  he  dispossessed 
him,  and  relet  the  farms  to  another  person  for  another 
lac  of  rupees.  When  Mr  Barwell  was  first  called  upon 
to  explain  his  transactions  with  these  Armenians,  he 
candidly  confessed  that  the  salt-farms  of  Selimdbdd  and 
Savagepore  had  been  taken  by  him,  and  bursting  into  a 
fine  train  of  sentiment,  he  exclaims,  "  If  I  am  mistaken 
in  my  reasoning,  and  the  wish  to  add  to  my  fortune  has 
warped  my  judgment  in  a  transaction  that  may  appear 
to  the  Board  [of  Directors]  in  a  light  different  to  what 
I  view  it  in,  it  is  past ;  I  cannot  recall  it,  and  I  rather 
choose  to  admit  an  error  than  deny  a  fact."  In  another 
letter  he  said,  "To  the  honourable  Court  of  Directors  I 
will  submit  all  my  rights  in  the  salt  contracts  I  engaged 
in ;  and  if  in  their  opinion  those  rights  vest  in  the 
Company,  I  will  account  to  them  for  the  last  shilling  I 
have  received  from  such  contracts,  my  intentions  being 
upright ;  and  as  I  never  did  wish  to  profit  myself  to  the 
j)rejudice  of  my  employers,  by  their  judgment  I  will  bo 
implicitly  directed," 

Upon  these  expressions  of  Mr  Barwell  the  Committee 
caustically  observe,  that  "  the  extraordinary  caution, 
and  the  intricate  contrivances  with  which  his  share  in 
this  transaction  is  wrapped  up,  form  a  sufficient  j)roof 
that  he  was  not  altogether  misled  in  his  judgment ;  and 
though  there  might  be  some  merit  in  acknowledging  an 


HISTORY  OF  THE  FARGANAS.  139 

error  before  it  was  discovered,  there  could  be  very  little 
iu  a  coufession  produced  by  previous  detection."  The 
Board  of  Directors  ordered  a  prosecution,  but  it  never 
took  place.  Meanwhile,  Mr  Barwell  withdrew  from  his 
offer  to  abide  by  the  judgment  of  the  Directors,  though 
he  still  indulged  in  a  fine  flow  of  sentiment,  but  in  a 
new  vein.  His  compliance  (with  the  demands  made  on 
him)  would  be  urged  as  a  confession  of  delinquency,  and 
as  proceeding  from  conviction  of  his  having  usurped 
on  the  rights  of  the  Company.  Bather  than  do  this, 
he  resolved  "to  appeal  to  the  laws  of  his  country  in 
order  to  vindicate  his  fame."  Like]  draws  to  like,  and 
it  seems  that  Sir  Elijah  Impey  became  the  guardian 
of  Mr  Barwell's  children,  and  was  the  trustee  for  his 
afi*airs. 

AVhen  the  manufacture  of  salt  in  Dakhin  Shahbd.zpiir 
was  discontinued,  it  Avas  proposed  that  the  Bs.  12,000  of 
khalari  suspensions  should  be  readded  to  the  revenue  at 
the  zamindari,  but  the  proposal  was  negatived  at  the 
instance  of  Mr  Bicketts,  who  was  then  Commissioner  of 
Chittagong,  and  who  pointed  out  that  the  zamindars 
had  suffered  much  by  diluviation.  In  fact,  the  pargana 
is  by  no  means  very  profitable  to  the  zamindars.  Much 
of  the  land  has  been  washed  away  by  the  Meghna,  and 
though  there  have  been  many  re-formations,  these  w^ere 
for  the  most  part  resumed  by  Government  as  island 
chars.  At  that  time  the  law  of  re-formation  on  the  old 
site,  as  since  expounded  by  the  Brivy  Council,  was  not 
understood.  Some  lands  also  aj^pear  to  have  been  re- 
sumed by  the  Sundarban  Commissioners  in  rather  an 
arbitrary  manner.  For  instance,  the  island  of  Manpura 
was  taken  possession  of  by  them,  though  it  is  entered  in 
the  papers  of  the  partition  of  the  pargana  which  was 
made  before  the  Bermanent  Settlement.     Only  a  small 


I40  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

part  of  the  islaDcl  of  Dakliin  Shahbdzpur  now  belongs  to 
the  pargana  of  that  name,  and  the  south  of  the  island 
consists  mostly  of  chars  resumed  by  Government.  The 
most  valuable  interests  in  the  land  are  held  by  the 
howaladars  and  other  middlemen,  and  the  zamindars 
have  not  been  able  generally  to  enhance  their  rents. 
On  the  other  hand,  most,  if  not  all,  the  shareholders  in 
the  zamindari  have  also  subordinate  holdings  in  it,  and 
are  their  own  and  their  co-sharers'  taluqdars,  howaladars, 
&c.,  and  probably  these  are  among  the  most  valuable 
of  their  rights  in  the  pargana.  It  seems  that  formerly 
Dakhin  Shahbdzpur  pargana  was  bounded  on  the  west 
by  a  large  river  called  the  Betua ;  tliat  west  of  this 
river  were  the  lands  of  Ratandi  Kalikapiir,  Uttar  Shah- 
bdzpur,  Shaistanagar,  and  BaikanthjDur,  &c.  ;  and  that 
west  of  them  was  the  Ilsa  or  Titulia,  which  was  then  a 
small  river.  Now  the  Betua  has  been  dried  up,  and 
much  of  the  land  in  the  centre  of  the  island  is  situated 
in  its  old  bed,  and  was  resumed  by  Government,  while 
the  Titulia  has  become  a  very  large  river.  The  river 
between  Hattia  and  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir  was  also  small 
in  old  times,  and  there  is  still  a  small  portion  of  Dakhin 
Shahbd,zpur  pargana  in  Hattia.  It  is,  I  believe,  a  taluq, 
and  bears  a  Portuguese  name  (das  Anjos  ?),  so  that  it 
seems  to  be  a  reminiscence  of  the  days  when  the  Por- 
tuguese of  Chittagong  had  possessions  in  these  parts. 
There  are  no  descendants  of  the  Portuguese  now  in 
Dakliin  Shahbdzpiir,  though  there  were  a  few  till  lately 
in  the  island  of  Hattia. 

The  zamindar  of  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir,  who  then,  I 
presume,  resided  at  Dacca,  is  mentioned  by  Mr  Mill 
as  one  of  the  victims  of  the  usurj^ations  of  the  old 
Supreme  Court,  his  house  having  been  broken  023en, 
and   even   the   apartments  of  his  women   rudely  vio- 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  141 

latecl,  ou  pretence  that  lie  had  been  arrested  and  after- 
wards rescued. 

The  large  or  sliahi  kaui  is  in  use  in  this  pargana.  It 
is  four  times  the  size  of  the  ordinary  kani,  and  is  equal 
to  19^  bighas. 

Some  copies  of  the  partition  effected  in  1188  B.s. 
(1781)  are  in  the  Collectorate  record-room.  They  bear 
the  signature  of  Mr  Day,  who  was  formerly  Collector  of 
Dacca. 

The  book  in  the  India  Library,  already  quoted,  contains 
some  correspondence  about  Dakliin  Shahbdzj^ur.  One 
case  is  that  of  Sarup  Chand  Khazanchi.  He,  it  seems, 
had  been  imprisoned  by  the  Provincial  Council  for  not 
paying  the  revenue  of  the  pargana,  and  had  sued  out  his 
Habeas  Corpus  in  the  Supreme  Court.  In  a  petition  by 
him,  iijcludedin  the  Proceedings  of  the  Dacca  Provincial 
Council,  18th  August  1777,  he  says,  "At  the  time  of 
the  Committee's  handohast,  my  father,  Nitai  Anand  Dds 
Khazanchi,  was  security  for  the  pargana  of  Dakhin  Shali- 
bd,zpiir ;  and  I,  to  the  year  1 1 82,  borrowed  money  and 
discharged  the  Government  revenue,"  &c.  In  Chait  1183 
Mr  Purling  demanded  the  balance  to  the  end  of  the 
year,  and  confined  his  gomasta.  The  zamindars  ob- 
jected, alleging  "  the  plunder  and  oppression  by  the 
invasion  of  the  Mugs."  Sarup  Chand  was  released  by 
the  Supreme  Court.  In  his  examination  before  the 
Supreme  Court  he  mentioned  that  several  gentlemen  of 
the  Provincial  Council  were  privately  indebted  to  him 
in  large  sums.  The  case  seems  to  have  excited  a  good 
deal  of  attention,  and  Mr  Justice  Le  Maistre  recorded  a 
long  judgment  on  it. 

A  more  important  case,  however,  probably  was  that 
mentioned  above  of  the  zamindar  of  Dakhin  Shah- 
bazpiir.     The  papers  are  in  the  volume  above  quoted. 


142  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

The  zamindar  was  Mirza  Jan,  and  he  was  sued  by  one 
Elias  Abraham.  A  bailiff  of  the  Supreme  Court  came  to 
arrest  him,  and  in  trying  to  do  so  a  tumult  took  place, 
and  a  slave-girl  was  wounded  with  a  sword.  This 
occurred  on  1st  February  1779. 

I  may  note  here  that  in  the  list  of  members  of  the 
Provincial  Council,  given  in  General  Appendix  No.  30 
of  the  above-mentioned  volume,  the  name  of  W.  M. 
Thackeray^  (father  of  the  novelist?)  appears  as  third 
member  of  the  Dacca  Council.  His  pay  was  Es.500 
(sicca)  a  month,  exclusive  apparently  of  the  allowances 
accordintr  to  the  rank  he  would  have  held  in  Calcutta 
— viz.,  a  senior  or  junior  merchant,  factor,  or  writer. 

In  Appendix  No.  36  of  the  same  volume  a  list  of  the 

1  If  this  be  tlie  father  of  the  novelist,  then  he  is  probably  the  person 
who  was  the  Company's  Resident  at  Sylhet,  and  who  was  severely  censured 
by  the  Court  of  Directors.  It  seems  that  he  had  taken  under  a  fictitious 
name  an  elephant-farm  in  Sylhet,  and  that  he  had  supplied  elephants 
which  were  in  such  bad  condition  that  only  sixteen  out  of  sixty-six 
arrived  at  their  destination.  Tlie  elephants  had  previously  been  passed 
by  the  Patna  Council,  and  the  Company  applied  to  Mr  Thackeray  to 
know  how  this  had  been  done  ;  but  he  refused  to  tell,  because,  having 
given  his  Avord  and  honour  that  he  would  not  divulge  particulars,  "  he 
would  be  breaking  his  promise,  forfeit  the  character  of  a  man  of  prin- 
ciple and  honour,  and  suffer  in  the  opinion  of  his  friends."  The  Directors 
observed  that  "  these  reasons  appear  to  us  very  extraordinary  when  urged 
by  a  man  whose  duplicity  has  just  been  manifested,  who  had,  to  use  the 
Governor-General's  Avords,  been  convicted  of  having  secretly  obtained 
the  farm  of  Sylhet  under  fictitious  titles,  and  punished  for  that  offence  ; 
nor  are  we  able  to  reconcile  the  Governor-General's  tenderness  for  Mr 
Thackeray's  honour  and  delicacy  with  his  own  further  declaration  that 
from  the  above  transaction  Mr  Thackeray  had  been  imanimously  and 
justly  condemned."  Mr  Thackeray  appears  to  have  sued  the  Company 
in  connection  Avith  these  transactions,  and  he  got  a  decree  in  the  Supreme 
Court  for  R3.29,G00  and  costs.  Warren  Hastings  and  Mr  Barwell  allowed 
the  case  to  be  decreed  ex  parte,  and  General  Clavering  is  quoted  in  the 
Court  of  Directors'  letter  as  having  said  that  the  cause  was  lost  by  "  a 
most  shameless  desertion"  on  the  part  of  the  defendants.  See  India 
Papers,  vol.  i.  1787,  and  also  vol.  i.  of  Appendix  to  Parliamentary  Pro- 
ceedings against  Warren  Hastings,  p.  175.  The  Court's  letter  is  dated 
28th  November  1777. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  FA RG ANAS.  143 

zamindarics    of  the  Dcacca  division  and  tlieir  revenues 
for  the  year  1777-78,  &c.,  is  given. 

12.    TaPPA  KiSTODEBPtJR. 

This  tappa  is  situated  on  the  west  side  of  the  island 
of  Dakhin  Shahbazpilr,  about  half  way  from  its  north 
and  south  extremities.  It  is  said  to  have  been  formed 
out  of  Uttar  Shahbdzpiir,  and  to  be  named  after  a 
Brdhman  called  Kista  Deb  Bidyabagish,  who  got  a 
sanad  for  it  through  the  influence  of  Eajali  Ganga 
Govind  Sing,  in  whose  house  he  was  a  pandit.  The 
revenue  is  only  Rs.816,  but  the  pargana  has  so  increased 
by  alluviation  that  it  now  contains  more  than  a  lac  of 
high  as.  It  is  at  present  under  partition,  and  has  been 
so  for  many  years.  Part  of  it  has  been  sold  to  the 
Shahs  of  Baliatti,  and  the  Brahman  descendants  of  the 
original  owner  have  made  over  the  remainder  in  patni 
to  a  Mymensing  zamindar.  The  estate  is  highly  culti- 
vated, but  it  is  full  of  under-tenures,  so  that  the  profit 
to  the  zamindar  is  less  than  might  be  expected. 
• 

13.  Tappa  Alinagar. 

This  is  another  tappa  of  Uttar  Shahbazp{n\  It  is 
situated  in  the  northern  part  of  the  island  of  Dakhin 
Shahbdzpiir,  and  belongs  to  Mr  John  Courjon.  The 
revenue  is  only  Rs.l578,  but  the  collections  from  the 
ryots  amount  to  about  Rs.  14,000. 

14.  Pargana  Ramnagae. 

This  was  once  the  property  of  Rajah  Raj  Ballab.  It 
also  was  formed  out  of  Uttar  Shahbazpur.  Balia  aud 
Gangapur  belong  to  it,  and  it  is  now  chiefly  owned  by 


144  DlSl^RICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

a  Dacca  family,  the  Koulipara  zamindars.  They  have 
twelve  anas,  and  the  Madhabpasha  zamindars,  who  are 
descended  from  Kam  Manik  Mudi,  hold  the  other  four 
anas. 

15.  Taraf  Eam  Hari  Char. 

This  consists  of  one  taluq  called  Dordana  Khanam. 
It  was  created  by  Mr  Henckell  in  1785  under  the  same 
conditions  as  char  Kalmi,  and  was  granted  in  favour  of 
Dordana  Khanam,  which  was  another  name  of  Etimo- 
nissa.  The  amount  of  land  conveyed  was  313  bighas ; 
and  the  taluq  was  composed  of  chars  Patti,  Maya,  and 
Nangla,  the  last  two  of  which,  at  all  events,  are  a  little 
to  the  north  of  char  Kalmi.  The  history  of  this  taluq 
is  given  in  Mr  Fortescue's  report  of  9  th  May  1806.  See 
also  the  Board's  reply  of  the  16th  idem. 

16.  Kalmi  Char  and  Taraf. 

Char  Kalmi  is  an  island  in  the  estuary  of  the  Meghna. 
It  was  originally  let  on  a  jangalburi  tenure  by  Mr 
Tilman  Henckell  in  1192  B.s.  (1785)  to  Baidya  Nath 
Sein  and  others,  who,  it  appears,  were  merely  bSna- 
midars  for  Serajuddin,  the  son  of  Syed  Imamuddin, 
zamindar  of  Nazirpiir.  The  conditions  of  the  lease  were 
that  no  rent  was  to  be  paid  for  three  years ;  that  the 
rate  was  to  be  two  anas  a  biglia  for  the  fourth  year, 
four  anas  for  the  fifth,  six  anas  for  the  sixth,  and  eight 
anas  for  the  seventh.  This  last  rate  was  to  be  perpetual. 
The  agreement  was  for  245  bighas,  and  a  deduction  of 
one-ninth,  or  of  200  bighas  out  of  1200,  was  allowed 
for  malikana,  &c.  There  is  an  unauthenticated  copy 
of  the  original  lease  in  the  Collectorate.  ]\Ir  Henckell 
granted  this  and  other  leases  as  Superintendent  of  the 
Sundarbans.     He  was  Collector  of  Jessore,  and  figures 


HISTORY  OF  THE  P. I RG  AN  AS.  145 

largely  in  Mr  Westland's  account  of  that  district.  Mr 
AVestland  has  chronicled  Mr  Kenckell's  disputes  with 
the  Salt  Department,  and  his  endeavours  to  prevent 
their  oppression,  and  it  is  pleasant  to  quote  in  this 
connection  a  newspaper  extract  of  24th  April  1788, 
published  at  page  253  of  Seton-Karr's  Selections,  which 
in  all  probability  refers  to  Mr  Henckell.     ''It  is  a  fact," 

says  the  newspaper,  "that  the  conduct  of  Mr  H 

in  the  Sundarbans  has  been  so  exemplary  and  mild 
towards  the  poor  molunghies  or  salt  manufacturers, 
that,  to  express  their  gratitude,  they  have  made  a  re- 
presentation of  his  figure  or  image,  which  they  wor- 
ship among  themselves.  A  strong  proof  that  the 
natives  of  this  country  are  sensible  of  kind  treat- 
ment, and  easily  governed  without  coercive  measures." 
Mr  Hunter,  the  first  Collector  of  B^ikarganj,  visited  char 
Kalmi  in  1818  or  1819.  He  found  one  Matioolah  in 
possession  of  the  greater  part  of  the  island  as  aiisat 
taluqdar  under  Etimonissa,  who  was  the  widow  of  Sera- 
juddin.  Under  the  Board's  orders  he  made  the  settle- 
ment with  Etimonissa  at  a  rent  of  Es.  173 1-4  (sicca), 
beiiio^  at  the  rate  of  eio-ht  anas  a  bi<:iha  on  the  land  theii 
in  cultivation,  after  deduction  of  16^  per  cent,  (see  Mr 
Hunter's  letters  of  25th  May  and  31st  July  1818,  of 
17th  March  and  12th  June  1819,  and  the  Board's  letter 
of  6th  April  1819).  This  rent  still  holds  good,  the  dif- 
ference between  it  and  the  present  amount  (Rs.  1846) 
being  caused  by  the  conversion  of  sicca  into  Govern- 
ment rupees.  The  island  is  now  held  by  Imdad  Ali 
Munshi,  who  resides  on  it,  and  a  Gliose  family  resident 
in  the  Twenty-four  Parganas.  The  former  holds  seven 
and  the  latter  nine  anas.  I  visited  the  island  in  the 
end  of  1874,  and  found  it  well  cultivated,  though 
rice  was  almost  the  only  product.     The  survey  area  is 


\  ^ 


146  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

about  3300  acres.  Tliere  arc  about  635  inhabitants, 
all  of  whom  are  Mahomedans  except  one  or  two  Hindu 
washermen  and  barbers. 

Kalmi  taraf  is  marked  on  the  survey  map  as  a  distinct 
char,  but  it  seems  now  to  have  diluviated.  The  river 
at  Kalmi  appears  to  bear  the  name  of  the  Bura  Gouranga. 
Kalmi  is  said  to  have  been  first  cultivated  by  one 
Badan  Ali  Khan. 


17.  SultanabAd. 

This  pargana  is  chiefly  situated  in  thana  Baufal,  but 
there  are  j^ortions  of  it  in  thanas  Barisal  and  Bakar- 
ganj.  In  1797,  Kalab  Ali,  one  of  the  zamindars  of  the 
pargana,  is  described  as  being  a  lunatic.  Khajah  Ahsan- 
oolali  is  the  chief  proprietor,  as  he  holds  7  anas  10-^ 
gandas  \\  krants.  The  oldest  proprietor  seems  to  be 
Syed  Abdalla  Chaudhari  of  Dacca,  who  is  said  to  hold 
G  anas  3-|-  gandas ;  but  this,  again,  is  divided  into  six 
shares,  which  are  held  in  various  names.  Meharanissa 
Khanam,  a  lady  who  lives  in  Barisal,  holds  1  ana  1^^ 
gandas  1\  krants.  Ahsan  Mir  and  Mir  Tajammal  Ali, 
Deputy- Magistrate,  have  also  shares.  The  pargana  has 
been  undergoing  partition  for  many  years,  and  the 
division  is  to  be  into  ten  shares.  It  is  said  to  contain 
a  lac  and  thirty-six  thousand  bighas.  A  char  named 
Sanyasi  has  lately  accreted  to  the  pargana,  and  added 
a  new  difliculty  to  its  partition.  The  zamindari  assets 
are  reckoned  at  half  a  lac,  and  as  the  Government 
revenue  is  Rs.23,000,  the  pargana  is  not  a  very  pro- 
fitable one  to  the  landholders.  There  are  many  under- 
tenures  in  Sultand^bdd,  and  these  are  in  numerous  in- 
stances held  by  the  zamindars. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARGANAS,  147 

18.  Kasimnagar  Jo  All  DAspAra. 

This  is  a  small  estate  situated  at  tlie  ancient  village 
of  Dilspdra,  and  near  the  Baufal  police  station.  It  is 
reo-istered  in  the  name  of  Hamidonissa  Khatun. 

19.  Khanja  Bahadur  Nagar. 

This  is  another  small  estate  in  Baufal  thana.  There 
are  lands  belonging  to  it  in  the  village  of  Govindpur. 
Whether  its  name  be  connected  with  the  famous  Khanja 
All  I  know  not.  IMaulavi  Mahomed  Fazil,  formerly 
police  inspector,  holds  a  share  in  this  pargana. 

20.  Pargana  SRfRAMPtJR. 

This  is  an  old  pargana,  and  has  been  nearly  all  washed 
aw\ay  by  the  ]\Ieghna.  It  belongs  to  the  Mirza  Sahebs 
of  Dacca,  the  family  who  own  a  portion  of  Dakhin 
Shahbazpiir,  and  who  have  held  their  lands  for  many 
generations.  A  famous  riot  took  place  in  this  par- 
gana in  1869.  It  is  situated  in  the  Mendiganj  thana. 
Government  holds  several  chars  which  have  been  re- 
sumed from  this  pargana.  As  a  proof  of  its  deteriora- 
tion from  diluviation  and  other  causes,  I  may  mention 
that  Government  has  acquired,  by  purchase  at  sales  for 
arrears  of  revenue,  fifty- two  estates  in  Srirdmpur,  and 
that  their  total  revenue  is  only  a  little  over  Rs.200 
(227-9). 

21.  Tappa  Abdulapijr. 

This  appears  to  have  been  formed  out  of  the  four 
and  a  half  anas  of  Selimdbdd.     Its  lands  chiefly  lie  in 


148  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

Mendiganj,  but  there  are  some  in  Jhalukdtti.  It  be- 
longs to  a  Baidya  family  (Har  Natli  Kai  and  others) 
who  reside  at  Japsa  in  the  Mulfatganj  or  Palang  thana. 
Their  ancestor  was  one  Gopi  Raman  Sein. 

22.  Tappa  KadirAbad. 

This  small  pargana  belongs  to  a  Brdhman  family 
who  reside  in  the  district  of  Dacca,  and  are  known  as 
the  Koulipara  Banarjis.  Its  lands  are  situated  in 
Mendiganj. 

23.  Tappa  AziMPtJR. 

This  is  a  scattered  pargana,  and  appears  to  have 
suffered  from  diluviation.  It  is  situated  in  thanas 
Gournadi,  Barisdl,  and  Bdkarganj,  and  there  is  part  of 
it  also  in  Bikrampiir  in  Dacca  or  Farfdpur.  It  be- 
longs to  the  Piprakatti  Shamadars,  a  Brjihman  family, 
who  reside  near  Palardi,  in  the  Gournadi  thana ;  to  the 
Jahapiir  Datts,  to  Asmat  Ali  Khan  of  Charamadi,  and 
to  the  Lakutia  Raies.  The  last-named  shareholders 
have  acquired  their  share  recently  by  purchase.  The 
Collectorate  register  of  estates  being  arranged  alpha- 
betically, Azimpur  is  the  first  on  the  list. 

24.  Pargana  Jahaptir. 

This  is  an  old  pargana,  and  has  been  nearly  all  swept 
away  by  the  Arial  Khan.  It  is  situated  in  the  Men- 
diganj thana,  on  the  east  bank  of  the  Daliaitia  river — 
i.e.,  the  Arial  Khan.  Char  Jahapiir  has  probably  formed 
on  the  old  site  of  lands  belonging  to  this  pargana,  and 
it  too  has  lately  been  much  washed  away.    The  pargana 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  ANAS.  149 

belongs  to   an  old  but  greatly  reduced   Hindu  family 
called  the  Jaliapur  Datts. 


25.    PaRGANA  iDRAKPtJR. 

The  land  of  this  pargana  appears  to  be  ijmali  or  joint 
with  that  of  Easul^^ur,  there  being  many  holdings  in  it 
of  which  eight  anas  or  one-half  of  the  rent  is  paid  to 
Idrakpur  and  the  other  half  to  Kasulpiir.  It  is  situ- 
ated, in  the  northern  part  of  the  district,  on  both  sides 
of  the  Arial  Khan,  in  thanas  Gournadi  and  Mendi- 
ganj.  Three  anas  have  been  purchased  by  a  family  of 
traders  called  the  Kundas  of  Lohajang,  and  the  remainder 
belongs  to  a  Dacca  family,  of  which  the  present  repre- 
sentatives appear  to  be  Amiranissa  Khatun,  Abedanissa 
Khatun,  and  Karimanissa,  and  who  have  long  been  fight- 
ing in  the  civil  and  criminal  courts.  Their  offices  are 
at  Sarikal  and  Gachua.  A  part  of  the  pargana  has  been 
purchased  by  Nazimuddin  Chaudhari  of  Kartikpur. 
From  a  letter  dated  10th  July  1794  it  appears  that 
the  pargana  was  bought  in  1190  by  one  Imamuddin 
Chaudhari. 

26.  Pargana  Rasulpi^r. 

There  is  no  zamindari  belonging  to  this  pargana  in 
Bd-karganj.  It  suffered  a  great  deal  from  the  inunda- 
tions of  1787.  It  appears  also  in  old  times  to  have 
suffered  from  mismanagement,  for  the  Collector  writes 
of  it  as  follows  :  "  The  general  mode  of  realisino-  the 
revenues  when  the  settlement  was  concluded  with  the 
three  proprietors,  was  for  each  to  appoint  a  Mofussil 
manager  with  equal  powers.  The  consequences  were 
that  the  ryots  were  constantly  harassed,  and  frequently 
peons  were  placed  on  them  at  one  time  Ijy  the  three 


I50  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

managers  for  the  same  demand,  thus  it  often  happened 
that  three  rupees  were  extorted  from  the  ryots  when  the 
original  demand  was  only  for  one." 

27.  Bangrora. 

This  pargana  is  remarkable  for  the  large  number  of 
its  separated  taluqs,  there  being  nearly  a  thousand 
in  it.  Many  of  them  are  very  small,  and  their  lands 
are  greatly  intermixed,  so  that  frequent  disputes 
arise  among  the  owners.  The  zamindari  is  registered 
in  the  name  of  Hayatonissa  Khatun.  The  principal 
taluqdars  are  the  Datts  of  Batajor,  the  Dasses  of 
Goila,  and  the  Bakshies  of  Barthi.  The  large  village  of 
Goila  is  situated  in  Bangrora,  Avhich  lies  in  Gournadi 
thana  in  the  northern  part  of  the  district.  Most  of  the. 
land  is  very  fertile,  but  some  of  it  is  marshy.  The  land 
revenue  of  the  taluqs  is  Ks. 20, 724-2-9. 

28,  29.  Pargana  Birmohan  and  Tappa  Birmohan. 

These  are  situated  in  thana  Gournadi.  In  old  times 
Birmohan  was  infested  with  tigers,  and  the  Collector 
writes  in  July  1790,  that  he  had  endeavoured  to  in- 
duce the  tiger-killers  to  repair  to  it,  but  without 
success.  It  appears  that  the  tigers  had  increased 
in  consequence  of  the  desertion  of  the  pargana,  and 
its  consequent  relapse  into  jungle,  after  the  inunda- 
tions of  1787.  It  belongs  to  a  Brahman  family 
known  as  the  Birmohan  Chaudharies,  and  to  the 
Narail  family  (Jessore).  It  is  at  present  undergoing 
partition,  but  the  work  is  being  carried  on  at  Faridpiir, 
as  the  pargana  has  been  transferred  to  that  Collec- 
torate. 


HISTOR  Y  OF  THE  PAR  GANAS.  1 5 1 


30.  HABIBPtTE. 

This  pcargaua  is  in  the  Gournadi  and  Sarupkdtti 
thanas,  and  belongs  to  Lakya  Kanth  Bhuia  and  others 
of  Bikrampii]',  and  to  a  family  of  Ghoses  (one  of  them 
was  formerly  sub-inspector  of  Gournadi).  There  are 
many  dependent  taluqdars  in  the  pargana,  and  the 
chief  profit  from  it  is  received  by  them. 

31.  Maizardi. 

This  is  a  small  pargana,  situated  in  Mendiganj.  It 
belongs  to  the  Mirza  Sahebs  of  Dacca,  the  Srinagar 
zamindars,  and  Dinu  Bandhu  Chakrabarti  of  Tunghi- 
bari  (Bikrampiir).  Gholani  Gafur  was  the  original  pro- 
prietor, and  he  still  holds  a  small  share.  Maizardi  has 
suffered  much  from  diluviation,  like  all  the  parganas 
in  Mendiganj.  Part  of  it  was  at  one  time  bought  by 
Government  at  a  sale  for  arrears  of  revenue,  but  most 
of  the  purchase  has  been  resold.  In  March  1793  the 
Collector  reported  that  Maizardi  had  to  be  held  khas 
on  account  of  the  zamindar's  refusing  to  engage. 

32.  jALALPtJR. 

This  pargana  chiefly  belongs  to  Faridpur,  but  there 
are  portions  of  it  in  the  north  of  Bdkarganj  and  in 
Dacca.  It  is  remarkable  for  the  number  of  its  taluqs. 
Mr  Thompson  {5th  February  1794)  wrote  that  there  were 
about  2000  in  the  pargana,  that  many  of  the  taluqdars 
were  in  extreme  distress,  and  that  upwards  of  100  of 
them  had  fled,  from  inability  to  pay  their  revenue 
dues.  The  pargana  suffered  much  in  the  inundations  of 
1787. 


152  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

33.  ShaistabAd. 

This  is  a  small  pargana  formed  out  of  Cliandradwip. 
Syed   Hassad  Ali    states,   in   a  petition    forwarded   in 
February  1793,  that  he  is  the  zamindar,  and  that  the 
property  had  formerly  belonged  to  his  maternal  grand- 
father, Mahomed  Hanif  Chaudhari.     It  once  belonged  to 
JNIendi  Mozamdar  of  Chakar,  and  the  present  Shaista- 
bad  family  obtained  it  by  marriage,  their  ancestor  Mir 
Salimuddin  having  married  Mendi   Mozamdar's   grand- 
daughter.    Mir   Salimuddin   came   from  Mokimpiir  in 
the  Dacca  district.      According  to   a   paper   given   to 
me  by  Syed  Mozaffar  Hoosein,  one  of  the  present  pro- 
prietors, Shaistabad  derives  its  name  from  Shaista  Khan, 
who  was  Governor  of  Bengal  in  the  reign  of  Arangzeb. 
It  belonged  to  sarkd^r  Khalifatdbdd,  and  was  included  in 
chakla  Jessore.    The  lands  of  the  pargana  are  a  good 
deal  scattered.     The  zamindari  residence  is  near  Cha- 
raman,    in   the    village    of  Aicha,    about    eight    miles 
north-east  of    Barisdl.       PhultoUa,   Mirganj,   and   Ka- 
rimganj  are  the  chief  trading-places.      It  is  said  that 
one  Eerach  Khan,  a  soldier  or  servant  of  the  Nawab, 
obtained  tlie  pargana  as  a  jagliir,  and  bequeathed  it  to 
his  daughter  Omdatanissa,  also  called  the  Baliu  Begam, 
from  her  having  married  into  the  Nawab's  family.     She 
leased  the  pargana  on   a  fixed  rent  to  Mahomed  Hanif 
Chaudhari  by  a  sanad  dated  25  th  Safar,  5  th  jalus  (the 
chronological  year  cannot  be  deciphered).     On  the  death 
of  Mahomed  Hanif,  his  widow,  Amina  Khatun,  gave 
her    only   daughter   in    marriage  to    Mir    Salimuddin, 
and  made  over  the  estate  to  their  son,  Mir  Asad  Ali, 
by  a  deed  of  gift  dated  21st  Asar  1171.      Asad  Ali 
left  the    estate   to   his  three   sons,   Abbas   Ali,   Imdad 
Ali,  and  Gholam  Imam.    Abbas  Ali  left  no  son,   and 


HISTORY  02<  THE  FA RG ANAS.  153 

Gholam  Imam's  two  sons  died  without  issue,  hence 
the  property  devolved  on  the  four  sons  of  Imdad 
Ali — viz.,  ]\Iir  Tajammal  AH,  Mir  Abdul  Majid,  Mir 
Moazzam-  Hoosein,  and  Mir  Abdullah.  The  family  are 
Syeds,  as  descended  from  the  Prophet.  The  gentle- 
man who  has  oblio^ed  me  with  the  above  information 
has  given  me  his  genealogical  tree,  which  seems  to  me 
to  be  interesting,  and  I  therefore  subjoin  it  (see  p.  159). 
The  family  is  the  most  considerable  Maliomedan  one 
in  the  district,  and  is  remarkable  for  the  number  of 
officers  whom  it  has  given  to  the  public  service.  It 
holds  a  share  in  Sultanabad,  and  three  anas  of  the 
very  profitable  Sundarban  estate  known  as  Aila  Phulj- 
liuri. 

34.  Shaistanagar. 

This  is  a  small  pargana,  situated  chiefly  in  thana 
Bd^karganj.  It  belongs  to  a  Brdhman  family  knoAvn  as 
the  Garuria  Chaudharies,  to  the  Narail  family,  and  to 
Babu  Chandi  Charan  Kai  of  Barisd^l,  and  others.  The 
Garuria  Chaudharies  live  near  Kalaskdtti,  and  belong 
to  the  same  stock  as  the  Arangpiir  zamindars.  They 
are  a  very  old  family,  but  are  much  reduced  in  cir- 
cumstances.^ 

35.  Shahzadpur. 

This  is  a  small  pargana,  situated  chiefly  in  thana 
Nalchiti.  The  principal  owner  is  Durga  Gati  Eai  of 
Siddhakd,tti,  though  Har  Nath  Datt  of  Amrajuri  and 
others  have  also  shares.  Durga  Gati  belongs  to  a  very 
good  family,  and  is  what  is  called  a  Kulin  Baidya.     The 

'  This  Sliaistanagar  is  distinct  from  the  Shaistanagar  in  Dakhin  Shah- 
bdzpur,  the  revenue  of  which  is  paid  into  the  Noakhdli  treasury. 


154  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

pargana  is  an  old  one,  but  the  most  important  thing 
about  it  at  present  is  that  the  Nalchiti  bazdr  is  situated 
within  it.  In  a  petition  of  12th  May  1791,  Pitambar 
Sein  of  Eajnagar  claims  the  merit  of  having  established 
the  Nalchiti  market.  He  says,  "  Receiving  pottahs  for 
lands  belonging  to  ShahzadjDur  and  other  parganas,  and 
expending  a  large  sum  of  money,  I  erected  a  hdt  at 
Nalchiti."  In  reply,  Keval  Ram  and  his  other  co-sharers 
say,  "  In  regard  to  the  exclusive  claim  which  Pitambar 
Sein  makes  to  the  hat  Nalchiti,  we  have  to  observe 
that  the  land  upon  which  it  is  erected  was  received  by 
him  from  the  parganas  of  Shahzadpur  and  Shaistanagar 
in  exchange  for  others  given  by  him  to  the  proprietors 
of  those  parganas  from  that  of  Buzurgumedpur,  our 
joint  property  and  estate."  It  will  be  noticed  that 
the  co-sharers  hereby  admit  Pitambar 's  claim  to  be 
the  founder  of  the  market.  Pitambar  was  the  son 
of  Gopal  Kissen,  and  grandson  of  R-aj  Ballab,  as  has 
been  elsewhere  stated.  There  is  an  old  temple  of  the 
goddess  Tara  at  Nalchiti,  which  is  said  to  have  been 
founded  by  Gopal  Kissen. 

36.  Tappa  Bahadurpur. 

This  is  a  valuable  property,  situated  chiefly  in  thana 
Bdkarganj.  It  belongs  to  the  Messrs  Pogose  of  Dacca, 
who  inherited  it  from  their  grandfather,  Khajah  Nikus. 

37.  Pargana  Arangpur. 

This  pargana  was  formed  out  of  Chandradwip.  Pro- 
fessor Blochmann  supposes  that  it  derives  its  name  from 
the  emperor  Arangzeb,  but  it  se^ms  unlikely  that  a 
comparatively  small  and  obscure  pargana  should  have 
been  named  after  him. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARC  AN  AS.  155 

The  pargana,  still  belongs  in  part  to  tlie  Brdliman 
family  who  held  it  at  the  time  of  the  Permanent  Settle- 
ment, though  now  there  are  many  other  shareholders. 
The  former  reside  at  Kaloskdtti,  near  Bakarganj. 
The  Shaistanagar  (Garuria)  and  Arangpur  families  were 
originally  one,  and  Gopal  Eai  is  said  to  have  been  their 
common  founder.  He  obtained  the  zamiudari  of  Shais- 
tanagar, and  died,  leaving  several  sons.  Among  them  was 
Janaki  BallaK  He,  I  suppose,  was  the  youngest,  and  his 
brothers  would  not  give  him  any  share  of  the  zamindari. 
Though  he  was  only  eight  years  of  age,  he  went  to 
Dacca  to  the  Nawab,  and  succeeded  in  getting  pargana 
Arangpur  from  him.  It  was  comj)osed  of  three  par- 
ganas — viz.,  Arangpur,  Eaghanathpur,  and  Itmadpiir, 
the  last  being  given  to  the  boy  by  Itmad  Khan,  a  ser- 
vant of  the  Nawab.  Up  to  a  recent  date  the  zamindari 
continued  to  be  entered  in  Janaki  Ballab's  name.  A 
large  part  of  the  -south  of  the  district  is  included  in 
tlie  pargana,  and  it  extends  down  to  the  line  of  the 
Sundarbans.  The  headquarters  of  the  Patuyakhali 
subdivision,  and  much  of  its  jurisdiction,  are  in- 
cluded in  Arangpiir.  The  largest  shareholder  in  the 
zamindari  is  Boroda  Kanth  Eai,  who  is  reputed 
to  be  the  wealthiest  man  in  the  district.  According 
to  a  story  current  in  Bdkarganj,  he  owes  part  of  his 
wealth  to  the  circumstance  of  his  having  been  fined 
Es.30,000.  He  had  given  recognisances  in  this 
amount  for  the  preservation  of  the  peace,  and  on  the 
occurrence  of  a  riot,  in  which  he  was  considered  to 
Ije  implicated,  his  recognisances  were  estreated,  and 
the  Es.30,000  levied.  Boroda  paid  the  money,  but 
immediately  lodged  an  appeal,  and  at  the  same  time 
recouped  himself  by  taking  Es.30,000  from  his  r3^ots. 
On   appeal  the   fine  was  remitted,  and  so  Boroda  got 


/ 


1 5  6  DISTRICT  OF  bAkAR GANJ. 

back  liis  money,  but  lie  did  not  return  to  the  ryots 
what  lie  had  levied  from  them.  A  story  somewhat 
similar  to  this  is  told  of  one  of  the  Bamiia  chaudharies. 
He  subscribed  Es.  10,000  to  the  patriotic  fund  which 
was  raised  at  the  close  of  the  Crimean  Avar,  and  received 
the  thanks  of  Government  for  so  doing.  Afterwards 
it  came  to  light  that  he  had  not  paid  the  money  from 
his  own  cofi'ers,  but  had  screwed  it  out  of  the  ryots. 
The  Governor-General  indignantly  ordered  that  the 
money  should  be  returned  to  him,  but  as  he  did  not 
make  restitution  to  the  ryots,  he  made  a  profit  of 
Rs.  10,000.  Although  I  narrate  these  stories,  I  must  say 
that  I  think  they  are  rather  apocryphal.  The  second 
is  of  very  dubious  authenticity,  for  I  do  not  think 
Government  would  be  so  foolish  as  to  give  back  money 
which,  according  to  the  hypothesis,  had  never  belonged 
to  the  ostensible  donor ;  and  as  for  the  first,  though  I 
believe  there  is  a  foundation  of  truth  in  it,  yet  the  fact 
of  Boroda's  having  been  put  on  Rs. 30,000  recognisances 
implies  that  he  was  already  a  Avealthy  man.  Boroda 
Kanth  is  a  type  of  the  conservative  Hindu,  being  very 
strict  in  his  religious  observances,  seldom  or  never 
wearing  anything  which  has  been  sewn,  and  very  chary 
of  visiting  the  ofiicials,  or  of  subscribing  to  schools  or 
dispensaries.  He  is  remarkable  as  a  benamidar — i.e.,  he 
holds  a  great  deal  of  property  in  other  peoj)le's  names. 
Thus  all  his  zamindari  is  held  in  the  name  of  his  wife, 
Muktakeshi  Debya,  but  this  is  so  openly  admitted  by 
him  and  his  agents  that  I  can  hardly  think  it  has  been 
done  for  the  sake  of  fraud  or  concealment.  Probably 
there  was  some  notion  of  luck  involved  in  it.  He 
also  holds  numerous  howalas  and  other  under-tenures 
in  Arangpiir  under  fictitious  names.  Arangpur  is 
divided   into  two  shares,  called  the  nine-ana  and  the 


niSTOR  V  OF  THE  PA  RGANAS.  1 5  7 

seven-ana.  This  division  was  made  by  private  arrange- 
ment in  1197  B.s.  (1790),  and  the  ryots  of  the  two 
shares  are  still  separate.  Each  of  these  shares  is,  how- 
ever, now  subdivided  among  many  people,  and  a  batwara 
or  partition  of  them  has  long  been  going  on.  This 
partition  is  one  of  the  opprobria  of  the  Bd,karganj  ad- 
ministration, it  having  been  commenced  more  than  fifty 
years  ago,  not  long  after  the  passing  of  the  Batwara 
Law  of  1814,  and  not  yet  being  finished.  Owing  to 
disputes  among  the  proprietors  the  seven-ana  share  of 
Arangpiir  was  attached  by  the  Civil  Court  many  years 
ago,  and  is  now  managed  by  Mr  Scott,  the  Sarbarakar  or 
Manager  of  Attached  Estates.  Khajah  Alisanoolali  has  a 
share  of  Arangpur,  and  so  also  have  the  heirs  of  certain 
Banarjis.  The  seven  anas  were  once  sold  for  arrears 
of  revenue.  Durga  Prosunno  Eai  had  a  share  in  the 
zamindari,  but  he  has  now  given  it  in  patni  to  Boroda 
Kantli  Eai,  and  I  understaijd  that  Khajah  Ahsanoolah 
has  done  the  same  tliinof  with  his  share. 


38.  PaRGANA  SVEDPtJE. 

This  pargana  is  in  the  south-west  of  the  district.  Ten 
anas  of  it  belong  to  Lalla  Mitrajit  Singh  of  Dacca,  and 
six  anas  to  the  heirs  of  Briju  Ratan  Das.  It  w\as  the 
disturbances  between  them  which  led  to  the  famous 
Singhkhdli  cases  some  twenty  years  ago.  Bhagirath 
Singh,  who  is  said  to  have  been  a  kanungo,  was  the 
founder  of  the  Singh  family.  The  Permanent  Settle- 
ment was  made  with  one  Lalla  Jeyt  Singh.  There  is 
a  report  by  the  Collector  on  the  pargana,  dated  27th 
December  1809.  Syedpiir  was  to  a  large  extent  a 
Sundarban  pargana,  and  the  Government  estate  of 
Tushkhdli   was   resumed   from  it,  and  is  described  as 


158  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

lakt,  or  adjacent  to  Syedpur.  The  Tdki  Babus,  as 
they  are  called,  a  family  of  Kayasts  residing  at  Tdki, 
in  the  Twenty-four  Parganas,  have  a  large  abdd  or 
tract  of  country  called  the  Debnathpiir  abdd  in  this 
pargaua.  It  is  held  on  a  permanent  lease,  and  con- 
tains about  thirty  thousand  bighas.  They  had  a  law- 
suit with  Government  (when  Tushkhali  was  measured 
and  settled),  and  succeeded  in  recovering  possession  of 
some  nineteen  thousand  bighas.  The  family  is  descended 
from  Kachu^  Eai,  whose  father  was  killed  by  Pratd- 
pd,ditya. 

^  The  name  is  said  to  be  derived  from  the  circumstance  of  his  having, 
when  a  child,  been  hidden  by  his  nurse  in  some  kachu  or  arum  jungle 
in  order  to  save  him  from  his  father's  fate.  See  the  "  Kshitisha  Bansa- 
vali  Charitam"  or  "Chronicle  of  Krishnagur,"  Berlin,  1852.  There  is  an 
analysis  of  this  work  in  the  Calcutta  Eeview  for  December  1855. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  PARGANAS. 


159 


MOHUMMUD,  THE  Prophet. 


FATIMA  (daughter). 

I 


1.  Hosein  (son).  Hasan  (son). 

2.  Syed  Zainolabideen  (son). 

3.  Syed  Blohummud  Baker  (son). 

4.  Syed  IMohumud  Emam  Jafer  Sady  (son). 

5.  Syed  Sha  Ahmud  Bulakhy  (son). 

6.  Syed  Abulunam  (son). 

7.  Syed  Anwarol  Huq  Bulkhi  (son). 

8.  Syed  Addlul  Huq  Bulkhi  (son),  buried  in  Samarkand. 

9.  -Syed  Sha  Alum  Bulkhee,  who  afterwards  died  at  Samarkand. 

10.  Syed  Sha  Abdul  Khalaque  Bulkhee,  lying  buried  there. 

I 

11.  Syed  Abdul  Razzak  (son),  of  Samarkand. 


12.  Syed  Abdul  Quader  (son),  of  Samarkand. 

13.  Syed  Godool  Huq  (son). 

14.  Syed  Shah  Sullan  (son). 
IS-  Salar  Samarkandi  (son). 

16.  Quorer  Samarkandi  (son).     . 

17.  Shah  Bukhsee  (son). 

18.  Shah  Amanuth  (son). 

19.  Shah  Zukuriah  (son). 

20.  Shumsuddeen  (son). 

21.  Shah  Mohummed  Wallee  (son). 

22.  Shah  Adam  (son),  Walee  Scindh. 

23.  Mortaza  (son). 

24.  Hasamuddeen  (son),  came  from  Scindh. 

25.  Shamsoddeen  (son). 

26.  Salimuddeen  Chowdhri  (son). 

27.  Assad  Ali  Chowdhry  (son). 


Syed  Abbas  Ali,  died 
without  issue. 


28.   Mir  Emdad  Ali. 


Meer  Gholam  Imam 

(left  two  sons,  who  died 

sub-equenlly). 


Meer  Tiijummol  Ali.       Meer  Abdul  Mujeed 


Meer  Moazzum 
Hosein. 


Meer  Abdullah.         Three  daughters. 


Meer  Tufuzzul 
Ahmed  (son). 


Meer  Abdul 
Hameed  (son). 


Abdul  Waheed 
(son.) 


Meer  Mohumed 
Israil  (son). 


Meer  Obcidullah 
(son). 


Meer  Mozuffer 
Hosein  (son). 


Meer  Abdur  Rub 
(son.) 


Meer  Mohumed 
Hosein  (son). 


Mir  Mohmood 
Hosein. 


Mir  Mothalin 
Hosein. 


(   i6o  ) 


CHAPTER    V. 

SUNDARBANS. 
I.    GENERAL    DESCRIPTION. 

The  different  explanations  of  the  origin  of  the  name 
Sundarbans  have  already  been  given.  The  lands  known 
under  this  name  were  not  included  in  the  Permanent 
Settlement.  It  was  directed  by  Regulation  9  of  1816 
that  a  special  ofiicer  should  be  appointed  to  the  charge 
of  the  Sundarbans,  who  should  be  styled  Commissioner 
in  the  Sundarbans.  Regulation  23  of  1817  (repealed 
by  Regulation  2  of  1819)  in  its  preamble  describes  the 
Sundarbans,  and  refei-s  to  B^karganj  and  Jaldlpiir. 

The  Sundarbans  were  surveyed  by  Lieutenant  Hodges 
in  1830.  Those  belonging  to  Bakarganj  are  small  in 
comparison  with  those  of  Jessore,  or  of  tlie  Twenty-four 
Parganas,  but  are  much  more  cultivated,  owing  to  their 
higher  level  and  to  the  large  quantity  of  fresh  water 
brought  in  by  the  Meghna  and  Brd-hmaputra.  The 
Commissioner  has  his  headquarters  at  Alipur,  near 
Calcutta.  Most  of  the  estates  in  the  Sundarbans  are 
managed  by  him  either  directly  or  through  farmers, 
and  the  Collector  of  Bdkarganj  has  no  connection  with 
them  further  than  that  their  revenues  are  paid  into 
his  treasury.  There  are,  however,  some  estates — such 
as  Ramna-Bamna,  Halta,  Sonakhdli,  Aila  Phuljhuri — 
which  have  been  permanently  settled,  and  are  no  longer 


SUNDARBANS.  i6i 

under  tlic  control  of  the  Commissioner.  These  estates 
are,  I  believe,  seventy-one  in  nnmber,  and  are  arranged 
in  the  Collectorate  papers  according  to  the  parganas  to 
wliich  they  are  lakt  or  contiguous.  Their  united  revenue 
is  Ks.  134,098.  (The  seventy-one  include  eleven  in  Buz- 
urgumedpiir  and  Nos.  1437  and  1447.)  The  estates  of 
Ramna-Bamna  and  Aila  Phuljhuri  have  been  described 
in  the  account  of  pargana  Buzurgumcdpiir.  Halta  and 
Sonakhali  belonix  to  Messrs  Morrell.  At  SchillerG;uno;e, 
on  tlie  banks  of  the  Sapleza,  Mr  Casperz  has  a  pro- 
perty of  about  12,000  acres,  which  he  has  called 
Caspenibdd,  and  which  is  for  the  most  part  rent  free. 
Dhallooa,  Bargona,  and  Naltona  lie  to  the  south  of 
Aila  Pliuljhuri.  They  were  claimed  by  Khajah  Ab- 
dul Gliaiii,  but  his  claim  was  rejected  by  the  Privy 
C^ouncil,  and  they  are  now  under  khas  management. 
Kolai'an  Cbandipur  is  a  Sundarban  taluq  situated  in 
the  Perozpur  subdivision,  but  the  revenue  is  paid  into 
the  Jessore  treasury.  Its  history  is  given  by  j\Ir 
Rocke  in  a  letter  to  the  Collector  of  Dacca,  dated 
21st  August  1790.  He  says  that  in  1192  b.s.  one 
Kanye  Ghosal  applied  for  seven  chucks  as  a  taluq. 
Three  of  them — viz.,  Kolaran,  Cliandipur,  and  Balesh- 
war — were  granted  to  him,  and  he  then  sold  them  by 
patta  to  Bijai  Ram  Sha  (the  ancestor  of  the  Shas  of 
Dattapara).  The  amount  of  land  stated  in  the  patta 
is  500  bighas.  JMr  Rocke  mentions  that  Bijai  Sha  com- 
plained that  the  zamindar  of  Selimdbdd  had  imprisoned 
his  son  for  rent. 

The  boundary  line  of  the  Suridarbans  is  irregular; 
and  we  find  estates,  such  as  Baisdia,  Rangabali,  Kazal, 
&c.,  which  are  the  property  of  private  individuals,  and 
were  so  at  the  time  of  the  Permanent  Settlement,  in 
the  middle   of  the   Government  Sundarbans.      This  is 

L 


i62  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

especially  llic  case  in  the  sontli-east  of  Edkarganj,  where 
the  kharija  or  separated  taliiqs  of  Chaudradwip  extend 
to  the  seaboard.  It  is  curious  that  the  islands  of  Kukri 
Miikri,  or,  more  properly,  Kukuria  Mekuria — i.e.,  Dog- 
and-Cat  Islands — belong  to  the  Sundarbans,  while  the 
neighbouring  island  of  Chopa  does  not. 

The  Sundarbans  proper  chiefly  occur  in  the  Gulsakhdli 
and  Perozpur  thanas.  Their  general  aspect  is  that  of 
lonely  forests  traversed  by  sullen  streams.  The  trees  are 
seldom  allowed  to  grow  to  any  great  height,  as  they 
are  cut  down  by  the  woodcutters,  or  hawalis,  as  they 
are  called.  These  people  go  down  in  the  cold  weather 
to  cut  wood,  and  in  spite  of  their  taking  faquirs  to 
charm  them  away,  are  often  carried  off  by  tigers.  There 
were  formerly  two  sayer  holdings  in  the  Sundarbans, 
called  Gore  Katta  and  Takta  mahals,  consisting  of  tolls 
levied  from  the  woodcutters.  They  were  abolished  by 
the  Board's  orders,  8th  May  1818.  The  chief  wood- 
marts  are  AmtoUi,  Gulsakhali,  Jhalukdtti,  Phuljhuri, 
Bdkarganj,  and  Nalchiti.  Charcoal  is  made  in  the 
Sundarbans,  but  in  a  rude  way  without  pits.  The  chief 
sujoply  for  Europeans  is  brought  from  Moidapiir,  near 
Nalchiti,  where  the  Mahomedans  manufacture  large 
jars,  and  afterwards  sell  the  charcoal  which  remains  in 
the  kilns.  The  Sundarbans  are  much  used  for  the 
pasturing  of  buffaloes,  which  are  swum  across  to  Kukri 
Miikri,  Chopa,  &c.  At  Dhula  char,  near  Chapli,  the 
wind  has  heaped  the  sand  into  low  dunes  or  sand-heaps. 
Boats  cannot  track  in  the  Sundarbans,  and  have  to 
depend  entirely  on  the  tides.  According  to  Mr  Gomess, 
about  one-half  of  the  Bd-karganj  Sundarbans  has  been 
cleared.  It  appears  from  a  statement  of  the  same  gen- 
tleman in  the  Census  Eeport,  that  276,804  square  miles 
(177,152  acres)  were  cleared  between  1830  and  1872. 


SUNDARBANS.  163 

In  early  times  the  Mugs  used  to  commit  depredations 
in  the  Sundarbans,  and  in  Kennel's  map  a  large  tract 
is  marked  as  depopulated  l)y  tUem.  They  have  been 
in  the  habit  of  trading  in  betel-nut  from  an  early  date, 
and  there  is  a  letter  of  Mr  Battye,  dated  31st  December 
1812,  about  some  Mugs  ^vho  had  come  over  from 
Ramu,  and  whom  he  had  arrested  under  the  idea  that 
they  were  adherents  of  one  Kiobering.  They  were 
afterwards  released,  and  Rs.326  were  paid  by  Govern- 
ment for  their  keep  (see  letters  of  17th  January  and 
11th  March  1812).' 

The  Mugs  at  the  present  time  occupy  many  parts 
of  the  Sundarbans,  but  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose 
that  they  have  been  there  since  the  time  of  their  early 
depredations,  and  probably  none  of  their  settlements  are 
more  than  seventy  years  old.  On  24th  March  1824, 
Thungari  Mug  petitioned  the  Board  of  Revenue,  saying 
that  he  had  brought  230  families  of  settlers  at  a  great 
expense  from  Chittagong  and  Ramu,  and  that  he  had 
been  dispossessed  by  Domingo  de  Silva.  He  added  that 
he  was  a  native  of  Arracan,  and  that  he  had  abandoned 
his  country  when  its  monarch  was  dethroned,  and  had 
availed  himself  of  the  asylum  offered  by  the  British 
Government.  He  had  brought  over  the  settlers,  he 
said,  on  the  faith  of  an  encouraging  letter  which  he  had 
received  from  the  Collector  of  Dacca,  dated  31st  July 

^  Mr  Sutherland  remarks  that  he  could  not  say  who  this  Kiobering 
■was.  I  have  found  a  description  of  him  in  Mr  Paton's  account  of  Arracan, 
vol.  xvi,  of  "  Asiatic  Researches/'  p.  368,  where  the  name  is  given  as  Khyng- 
lierring.  It  seems  that  he  attempted  a  rebellion  in  the  Mug  era,  1173 
(1811  ?).  Along  with  other  Sardars,  he  formed  a  resolution  to  expel  the  Bur- 
mese ;  and  having  collected  500  men,  invaded  Arracan  in  twenty-five  boats. 
He  was  defeated  by  the  King  of  Arracan,  and  after  making  various  other  in- 
effectual raids,  he  died  in  exile.  According  to  Sir  Arthur  Phayre,  A.  S.  J., 
vol.  X.  for  1841,  the  correct  name  is  Khyeng-byan,  literally  Khyeng- return; 
and  he  was  so  called  because  he  was  the  first-born  after  his  father  returned 
from  the  Khyeng  Hills.     A  son  of  Khyeng-byan  died  at  Akyab  in  1840. 


1 64  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

181G.^  Tlic  Mugs  now  in  the  district  state  tliat  tliey 
were  driven  from  their  country  Ly  war.  It  appears  that 
they  came  from  Arracan,  which  was  annexed  to  Burmah 
in  1787.  In  1798  30,000  Arracanese  took  refuge  in 
Chittagong,  and  it  is  probable  that  some  of  them  came 
to  Chapli.  The  principal  seat  of  the  Mugs  is  at  Khap- 
rabhanga,  near  Chapli,  in  thana  Gulsakhilli.  They  are 
also  numerously  settled  at  Chapli,  Nishanbari,  and 
Maudhobi.  Khaprabhanga  is  a  little  further  inland 
than  the  jDlace  usually  visited  by  Europeans.  When 
I  visited  it  in  October  1874,  I  found  a  priest  and  a 
small  haioung  or  monastic  school.  The  Mugs  are  all 
Buddhists.  They  are  very  good  clearers  of  jungle  for 
a  time,  but  seem  wanting  in  persistent  energy.  During 
the  five  years  I  was  in  the  district,  they  had  made  no 
noticeable  extension  of  cultivation.  Many,  indeed,  seem 
to  have  returned  to  Arracan,  and  the  number  and  energy 
of  those  who  remain  are  not  suflicient  to  make  much 
impression  on  the  vast  jungles  by  which  they  are  sur- 
rounded. The  number  of  Mugs  in  the  district,  accord- 
ing to  the  census,  is  4049,  of  whom  2140  are  men  and 
1909  women. 

The  Mugs  are  well  spoken  of  l)y  Bengalis  for  their 
truthfulness.  As  a  general  rule,  they  are  inoffensive, 
though  I  am  sorry  to  say  that  they  have  Ijeen  losing 
their  good  reputation,  and  that  some  dacoities  and  other 
crimes  have  lately  been  committed  by  them.  I  cannot  say 
that  I  have  been  favourably  impressed  by  them.  They 
are  a  dirty  people,  and  have  not  the  art  of  making  their 
houses  look  pretty  or  comfortable.  They  only  know 
how  to  clear  jungle  and   to  plant  rice,  and  for  their 

^  Tlie  Mugs  at  Chapli  informed  me  that  Thiingari  was  not  the  first 
settler,  and  that  Anju  Cliaudhari  was  the  first  to  come.  One  Mirasat 
Cliaudhari  told  me  that  Anju  Cliaudhari  and  Amparit  Chaudhari  were 
the  first  settlers,  and  that  Boro  Baisdia  was  the  first  settlement. 


SUNDARBANS.  165 

dhulat — i.e.,  cold -weather  crops — they  rely  upon  their 
Mahomedaii  tenants  and  neighbours.  Some  Mugs 
settled  in  Kukri  Miikri,  but  their  rice  crops  suffered 
extremely  from  the  Sundarban  rats,  which  are  there 
large  and  numerous.  The  Mugs  speak  and  write  their 
own  language,  but  have  also  picked  up  a  colloquial 
knowledge  of  Bengali.  They  are  generally  addressed 
by  Bengalis  by  the  title  of  Chaudhari — a  title  which 
seems  to  have  orio-inated  with  Chila  Chaudhari,  a  Mue* 
who  made  a  good  deal  of  money,  and  was  well  known 
to  the  Government  officers. 

The  Mugs  live  in  houses  raised  on  piles,  and  thatched 
with  the  golpati.  They  make  ropes  of  the  hanpdt,  a 
species  of  hibiscus,  and  the  women  weave  cloth.  They 
are  addicted  to  the  use  of  opium.  They  have  a  great 
objection  to  the  payment  of  rent,  and  often  desert  their 
clearings  when  it  is  demanded.  They  are  quite  omni- 
vorous, and  regard  as  a  great  delicacy  the  turtles'  eggs, 
which  they  collect  on  the  chars. 

As  Kukri  Miikri  is  seldom  visited  by  Europeans,  I 
append  here  an  account  of  a  visit  which  I  made  to  it  in 
October  1874  :— 

"Next  morning  we  left  Kalmi,  and  sailed  down  to 
KiikriMukri.  In  doing  so  we  left  the  ^maij — i.e.,  middle 
char — and  the  wooded  island  of  Chopa  on  our  left,  and 
the  reedy  and  swampy  island  of  Nalua  on  our  right. 
This  island  of  Nalua  is  not  marked  on  the  maps,  as  it 
formed  only  about  four  years  ago.  At  Kukri  Mukri  we 
moored  in  a  khal  near  the  sheds  of  some  buffalo-herds- 
men. The  island  is  large,  andu  covered  with  dark  tree 
jungle.  It  lies  athwart  the  stream,  and  at  a  distance  it 
looks  like  a  huo-e  black  allio-ator  stretched  out  on  the 
water.  The  buffalo-herdsmen,  who  were  Mahomedans, 
told  us  that  they  came  from  Kalmi  char,  that  they  kept 


i66  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

their  buffaloes    at  Kukri  Miikri  up  to  December  an3 

January,  and   that   they    then   removed  them,  as   the 

water  got  salt,  and  the  herbage  became  unfit  for  food. 

To  my  surprise  the  water  both   on  the  south  and  east 

side  of  Kiikri  Miikri  was  perfectly  fresh  ou  the  occasion 

of  our  visit,  and  I  believe  it  remains  so  till  December,  or 

even  later.     Such  a   fact   as  this,  I  think,  gives  a  very 

strong  impression  of  the  immense  volume  of  water  which 

must  be  brought  down  by  the  rivers,  for  a  reference  to 

the  map  will  show  that  Kiikri  Miikri  is  almost  in  the 

Bay  of  Bengal.     We  learned  from  the  herdsmen  that 

the  only  permanent  inhabitants  of  the  island  were  a 

few  Musts  or  Burmese,   who  lived  on  the  banks  of  a 

creek  to  the  eastward.      We   went   off  to   visit  them, 

and  in  doing  so  passed  through  the  don  or  channel — ■ 

called  the  Daiar  don — which  divides  Kukri  from  Miikri, 

or  rather  Kukuria  from  Mekuria.     The  sides  of  the  don 

were  thickly  clothed  with  wood,  and  the  creepers,  with 

which  the  trees  were  often  festooned,  had  a,  very  pretty 

appearance.     There  was  no  sound,  however,  in  the  wood, 

except  the  occasional  short  whistle  of  a  bird,  and  almost 

the  only  life  to  be  seen  was  a  kingfisher  flitting  with  his 

brilliant  plumage   over  the  muddy  water.     It  seemed 

almost  a  profanation  that  so  beautiful  a  bird  should  have 

his  home  by  a  sullen  creek  fit  only  for  alligators   and 

their  like,  instead  of  dwelling  by  the  crystal  waters  of  a 

mountain  stream.     But  such  is  nature;  and  we  need 

perhaps    not    wonder    to   find    a   kingfisher   and   mud 

together,  when  we  reflect  that  the  most  brilliant  dyes 

are  extracted  from  a  substance  so  nasty  as  coal  tar.     We 

found  the  Mug  settlement  to  consist  of  seven  households. 

They  had  been  on  the  island  for  four  years,  and  had  tried 

to  grow  rice,  but  had  failed  on  account  of  the  great 

number  of  bandicoot  rats.     \  am  afraid  that  Mugs  do 


SUNDARBANS.  167 

not  ill  the  long-run  make  good  settlers.  Tliej  are  very 
energetic  for  a  year  or  two,  and  clear  a  lot  of  jungle,  but 
they  seem  to  relapse  into  lazy  habits  after  a  time.  Khela, 
the  principal  Mug,  spoke  favourably  of  the  island.  He 
said  the  climate  was  cool  and  healthy,  the  soil  rich,  and 
that  there  were  no  tigers.  If  the  rats  could  only  be  kept 
down — and  surely  this  might  be  done  with  the  help  of 
poison — the  island  might  become  highly  cultivated.  I 
suppose  it  has  an  area  of  about  seven  thousand  acres. 
There  is  another  island  to  the  east  of  it  called  Phul 
Kachia,  and  to  the  east  of  it  again  there  is  a  small  island 
with  trees  on  it,  and  which  is  not  marked  on  the  map). 
I  did  not  go  to  it,  but  Khela  informed  me  that  the  Mugs 
occasionally  visit  it  in  quest  of  turtles'  eggs.  The  trees 
at  Kiikri  Miikri  grow  to  the  height  of  fifty  or  sixty  feet. 
The  chief  tree  is  called  the  kerua.  I  did  not  see  any 
sundari-trees  on  the  island,  and  the  Mugs  told  me  that 
there  are  none.  The  sundari  is  rarely  met  with  on  the 
chars,  and  is  indeed  by  no  means  so  common  in  the 
Sundarbans  as  one  would  ex^ject.  In  Chopa,  which  is  a 
little  to  the  north  of  Kiikri  Mukri,  I  saw  only  two  or 
tliree  young  trees  of  sundari.  The  kerua  was  the 
prevailing  tree.  Another  tree  which  is  very  common  on 
the  chars  is  the  holye.  This  tree  does  not  seem  to  be 
so  well  known  as  it  deserves.  Its  inner  bark  yields  a 
strong  fibre,  which  the  herdsmen  twist  into  tethering 
ropes  for  their  buffaloes,  and  which  is  also  largely  used 
instead  of  rattan  or  string  in  the  roofing  of  houses.  The 
tree  is  bushy,  with  large  leaves,  and  seems  to  affect  espe- 
cially the  sides  of  khdls.  It  grows  so  abundantly  that 
possibly  the  bark  might  have  a  commercial  value.  AVhen 
burnt  it  yields  an  ash  which  is  used  by  the  washermen 
as  a  substitute  for  soap,  I  questioned  Khela  Mug  about 
the  curious  phenomenon  known  by  the  name  of  the 


1 68  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

Barisd,!  guns.     He  said  that  be  lieard  them  often  in  the 
months  of  Jaist  and  Ashar — /.e.,in  the  beginning  of  the 
rains.     He  described  the  sound  as  being  exactly  that  of 
the  discharge  of  a  cannon,  and  said  it  appeared  to  have 
no  connection  with  the  tide,  and  tliat  the   noise  was 
quite  different  from  that  of  the  bore  or  of  the  coming 
in  of  the  breakers.     The  noises  appeared  to  come  from 
the  nortli,  south,  and  south-west.     This  statement,  that 
they  are  sometimes  heard  from  the  north,  is  important, 
for  hitherto  we  have  supposed  that  no  one  ever  got  to 
the  south  of  them.     It  is  because  tliey  are  always  heard 
from  the  south  that  natives  poetically  represent  them  as 
caused  by  the  shutting  and  opening  of  Ravan's  gate  in 
£he  island  of  Lanka  (Ceylon).     Khela's  statement  seems 
conclusive  against  three  hypotheses  for  the  origin  of  the 
sounds.     These  are — 1st,  that  they  are  nothing  but  the 
guns  fired  at  marriage  processions ;    2d,  that  they  are 
caused  by  the  falling  in  of  the  river-banks ;    3d,  that 
they  are  the  sound  of  the  breakers.     But  there  are  no 
marriage  processions  and  no  high  river-banks  north  of, 
or  anywhere  near.  Kukri  Mukri ;  and  as  the  breakers 
come  in  on  the  south  side  of  Kukri  Miikri  with  great 
force   in  the  stormy  season,   Khela  must  be  well  ac- 
quainted with  the  sound  they  make.     When,  therefore, 
both  he  and  the  Mugs  at  Cliapli  say  that  the  Barisd-l  guns 
are  not  the  sound  of  the  breakers,  I  do  not  see  how  we 
can  refuse  to  believe  them.     The  conclusion,  therefore, 
which  I  come  to  is  that  the  sounds  are  atmospheric,  and 
in  some  way  connected  with  electricity.     In  conclusion, 
I  should  mention  that  there  are  no  deer  on  Kukri  Miikri 
or   the   neighbouring   island    of  Chopa,  but   there   are 
wild  buffaloes  and  wild  pigs.     On  Kukri  Mukri  there 
are  also  wild  cattle,  which  are  said  by  some  to  have  been 
carried  there  by  an  inundation,  and  by  others  to  be 


SUNDARBANS.  169 

the  remains  of  some   cattle  employed  Ly  former  culti- 
vators."— Bengal  Times,  November  7,  1874. 


II.  WERE  THE  SUNDARBANS  INHABITED  IN  ANCIENT  TIMES  ? 

This  is  a  questiou  whicli  lias  excited  a  great  deal  of 
attention.  The  Bengali  mind,  as  being  prone  to  the 
marvellous,  and  to  the  exaltation  of  the  past  at  the 
expense  of  the  present,  has  answered  the  question  in 
the  affirmative,  and  maintains  that  there  were  formerly 
large  cities  in  the  Sundarbans.  Some  persons  also 
have  suggested  that  the  present  desolate  condition  of 
the  Sundarbans  may  be  due  to  a  subsidence  of  the  land, 
and  that  this  may  have  been  contemporaneous  with  the 
formation  of  the  submarine  hollow  known  as  the  "  Swatch 
of  No  Ground."  It  seems  to  me,  however,  to  be  very 
doubtful  indeed  that  the  Sundarbans  were  ever  largely 
peopled,  and  still  more  so  that  their  inhabitants  lived  in 
cities  or  were  otherwise  civilised.  As  regards  the  eastern 
half  of  the  Sundarbans — namely,  that  which  lies  in  the 
districts  of  Bakarganj  and  Noakhali,  and  includes  Sand- 
wip  and  the  other  islands  in  the  estuary  of  the  Meghna — 
it  seems  to  me  that  the  fact  of  so  much  salt  having  been 
manufactured  there  in  old  times  militates  against  the 
view  of  an  extensive  cultivation,  for  the  salt  could  not 
have  been  made  without  a  great  expenditure  of  fuel, 
and  this  of  course  implies  the  existence  of  large  tracts 
of  jungle.  Du  Jarric  speaks  of  Sandwip  as  being  able 
to  supply  the  whole  of  Bengal  with  salt,  and  it  seems 
evident  that  in  old  times  salt  was  reckoned  as  the  most 
valuable  production  of  this  part  of  the  country.  How 
inimical  this  must  have  been  to  a  widespread  cultiva- 
tion of  the  neighbouring  tracts  may  be  judged  of  from 
the   fact   that  in   modern  times    the   Government  salt 


lyo  ■  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

mauufacture  Avas  a  great  obstacle  to  the  clearing  and 
colonising  of  the  chars  and  islands  in  Bdkarganj  and 
Noakhali.  The  Government  officers  used  to  insist  npon 
the  jungle  being  maintained  for  the  supply  of  the 
tafals,  and  the  disputes  between  them  and  the  lessees 
of  waste  lands  and  other  settlers  led  to  much  corre- 
spondence. The  tendency  of  the  salt  manufacture  to 
keej)  land  out  of  cultivation  is  shown  by  the  circum- 
stance, elsewhere  mentioned  by  me,  that  the  zamindars 
of  Dakliin  Shahbdz|)ur  annually  obtained  a  large  reduc- 
tion of  their  land  revenue  on  account  of  some  of  their 
lands  being  taken  up  for  the  salt  manufacture. 

Sandwip  was,  it  is  true,  cultivated  in  Csesar  Frede- 
rick's time  (1569),  but  so  it  is  now,  and  there  is  no 
reason  to  suppose  that  its  civilisation  was  greater  then 
than  it  is  at  present.  It  may  have  had  at  that  time,  as 
it  certainly  had  some  thirty  or  forty  years  later,  one  or 
more  forts,  but  these  were  marks  of  insecurity  rather  than 
of  prosperity,  and  they  do  not  now  exist  simply  because 
there  is  peace  in  the  land,  and  the  Arracanese  and  the 
Portuguese  pirates  are  no  longer  formidable. 

Ealph  Fitch  visited  Bdkla  in  1586,  and  describes  the 
country  as  being  very  great  and  fruitful.  He  does  not 
expressly  say  that  Bdkla  was  a  city,  and  it  is  possible 
that  he  found  the  people  of  the  country  living,  as  they 
do  now,  in  detached  houses,  and  not  crowded  together 
in  large  towns.  But  even  if  we  take  the  words,  "  the 
houses  be  very  fair  and  high  builded,  the  streets  large," 
to  mean  that  there  was  a  city  of  Bdkla,  and  give  full 
credence  to  Fitch's  statements,  the  next  clause  of  his 
description — viz.,  "  the  people  naked,  except  a  little 
cloth  about  their  waist  " — does  not  suggest  the  existence 
of  much  civilisation  or  refinement.  Moreover,  it  appears 
to  me  that  Fitch  was  not  a  very  observant  or  satisfac- 


SUNDARBAArs.  171 

toiy  trcaveller.  His  descriptions  of.jDlaces  arc  meagre, 
and  his  itinerary  not  distinct.  I  think,  too,  that  if  he 
had  kept  his  eyes  and  ears  open  he  must  have  been  able 
to  tell  us  something  about  the  great  storm  which  had 
devastated  Bakla  only  a  twelvemonth  or  so  before  his 
arrival.  It  is  hardly  possible  that  a  storm  which  is 
said  to  have  drowned  200,000  people  could  have  left  no 
physical  marks  behind  it  which  Fitch  might  have  seen, 
and,  at  all  events,  its  moral  effects  must  have  been  still 
existent,  and  Fitch  could  hardly  have  had  any  inter- 
course with  the  inhabitants  without  hearing  of  it.  I 
think,  therefore,  that  we  must  not  press  his  statements 
too  far.  It  is  not  likely  that  he  stayed  long  at  the 
place. 

However,  the  question  of  Fitch's  credibility  and  intelli- 
gence is  not  very  material,  for  there  is  nothing  to  show 
that  Bdkla  was  situated  in  the  Sundarbans.     It  probably 
was  the  same  as  Kachua,  which,  according  to  tradition, 
was   the   old   seat    of  the    Cbandradwip   rajahs.      But 
Kachua  is  in  thana  Baufal,  which  is  at  this  day  one  of 
the  most  fertile  and  best  cultivated  parts  of  Bakarganj, 
and  is  the  only  thana  in  the  south  of  the  district  which 
contains  a  large  Hindu  population.     No  doubt  there  has 
been  a  great  amount  of  diluviation  near  Kachua,  and  the 
river  between  the  mainland  and  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir  has 
become  much  wider  than  it  v/as  in  old  times.     In  this 
way  the  old  city  of   Bdkla  and  much  of   its  territory 
may  have  disappeared,   and  to  this  extent  there  pro- 
bably has  been  a  decay  of  civilisation.     I  have  no  doubt 
also   that  many  settlers   in  the  south   of   the   district, 
especially  the  Hindu  portion  of  them,  left  their  homes 
when    the   Ohandradwip   rajahs   removed   to   Madhab- 
pdsha,  and  when  the  Mug  inroads  became  troublesome, 
but   I   do    not   believe   that   these   settlers  were    very 


172  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

numerous,    or   tliat  tliey  were  civilised   and  dwelt   in 
cities,  &c. 

Another  thing  which  indisposes  me  to  believe  in  the 
early  colonisation  of  the  eastern  Sundarbans  is  the  ter- 
rible hardships  which  the  crew  and  passengers  of  the  ship 
"Ter  Schellino"  suffered  on  this  coast  in  1661.  The 
"Ter  Schelling"  was  a  Dutch  ship  which  sailed  from 
Batavia  for  Angueli  (Hijli),  in  Bengala,  on  the  3d  Sep- 
tember 1661,  and  which  was  wrecked  off  the  coast  of 
Benp-al  on  the  8th  of  the  following  month.  The  narrative 
of  the  shipwreck,  and  of  the  sufferings  and  adventures 
of  the  crew  and  passengers,  was  written  by  one  of  the 
latter  named  Glauius.  He  was,  I  presume,  a  Dutchman, 
and  his  account  was  first  published  at  Amsterdam,  and 
after Avards,  in  1682,  at  London,  under  the  title  of  "A 
Eelation  of  an  Unfortunate  Voyage  to  the  Kingdom  of 
Bengala."  The  shi|) wrecked  men  seem  to  have  landed 
on  an  island  near  Sandwip,  and  their  sufferings  from 
hunger  were  most  terrible.  They  were  compelled  to 
live  on  most  disgusting  objects,  such  as  a  putrid  buffalo, 
a  dead  tortoise,  a  small  quadruped  called  by  the 
natives  a  legane,  and  which  the  sailors  found  eating  the 
buffalo,  serpents,  snails,  &c.  A  chief  part  of  their  sus- 
tenance was  derived  from  eating  the  leaves  of  the  jungle 
trees,  and  they  even  tried  eating  grass,  but  this  they 
could  not  manage.  Their  only  drink  was  salt  water. 
They  saw  very  few  inhabitants,  and  those  whom  they 
did  come  across  were  in  almost  as  wretched  a  plight  as 
they  themselves,  and  a^^jDcared  to  have  been  driven  out 
from  more  civilised  regions.  They  were  several  times  on 
the  eve  of  resorting  to  cannibalism,  but  eventually  they 
got  to  Sandwip,  where  they  were  kindly  treated  by  the 
Governor  and  sent  on  to  Balwa  (Bhalloah).  The  Prince 
of  Balwa  was  also  kind  to  them,  and  sent  them  on  to 


SUNDARBANS.  '  173 

Decka  (Dacca),  where  tlicy  were  impressed,  and  made 
to  serve  under  Mir  Jamla  in  the  war  against  Assam. 
Eventually  they  got  their  release  and  made  their  wny 
to  Hijll,  but  Glanius  did  not  return  to  Europe  for 
several  years.  Unfortunately,  he  does  not  clearly  men- 
tion the  site  of  his  shipwreck,  hut  it  was  apparently 
somewhere  on  the  sea-coast  of  the  Sundarbans.  The 
people  whom  he  met,  or  at  least  some  of  them,  were 
Mahomedans,  for  they  used  the  expression  salami 

I  do  not  wish,  however,  to  lay  too  much  stress  on 
Glanius's  description,  for  his  shipwreck  took  place  in 
1661,  and  it  may  be  that  "  the  depopulation  by  Mugs  " 
noted  in  Kennel's  map  occurred  at  an  earlier  date. 
Indeed,  we  know  from  Du  Jarric  that  the  King  of 
Arracan  conquered  Bdkla  in  the  beginning  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  and  it  may  be  that  the  desolation  of  the 
country  dates  from  this  time. 

I  may  also  notice  here  that  the  copperplate  inscription 
found  at  Idilpur  in  B^karganj,  and  described  by  Babu 
Pratd,p  Chandra  Ghose  in  the  Asiatic  Society's  Journal 
(1838),  seems  to  indicate  that  the  inhabitants  of  that 
part  of  the  country  belonged  to  a  degraded  tribe  called 
the  Chandabhandas,"  a  fact  which  is  not  favourable  to 
the  supposition  of  the  Sundarbans  having  been  at  an 
early  period  inhabited  by  a  high-caste  ^Dopulation. 

By  far  the  most  interesting  account  of  the  Sundarbans 
is  contained  in  the  letters  of  the  Jesuit  priests  who 
visited  Biikarganj  and  Jessorein  1599  and  1600.  They 
were  addressed  to  Nicholas  Pimenta,  a  visitor  of  the 
order  stationed  at  Goa,  and  were  forwarded  by  him, 

^  In  Professor  Blochmann's  "  Contributions  to  the  Geography,  &c.,  of 
Bengal,"  p.  18,  reference  is  made  to  Van  den  Broucke's  map  in  Valentyn's 
work,  as  showing  the  phice  where  the  "  Ter  Schelling  "  was  wrecked. 

2  Babu  P.  C.  Ghose  compares  the  Cliandabhandas  to  the  Molunghies. 


174  *         DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

along    with    some    remarks    of    his    own,    to    Claude 

Aquaviva,  who  Avas  then   general  of  the  order.     The 

letters  seem  to  have  been  originally  written  in  Italian, 

and  were  first  published  at  Venice  in  1602  or  1603, 

and  w^ere  afterwards  translated  into  Latin  and  French. 

I  was  indebted   for  my  introduction  to   them  to  my 

friend  Dr  Wise,  who  told  me  that  they  were  quoted  in 

"Purchas's  Pilorimao'e."     Extracts  from  the  letters  and 

the  subsequent  history  of  the  mission  will  be  found  in 

Pierre  du  Jarric's  "  Histoire  cles  Glioses  plus  memorables 

advenues  aux  Indes  Orientales,"  &c.,  Bordeaux,  1608-14. 

It  appears  from  Pimenta's  account  that  he  sent  the 

priests    Fernandez  and  Sosa   to   Bengal   in    1598,    and 

two  others — namely,  Melchior  da  Fonseca  and  Andrew 

Bowes — in  the  following  year.      Fernandez  and   Sosa 

sailed  from  Cochin  on   3d  May  1598,  and  arrived  in 

eighteen  days  at  the  Little  Port  (Porto  Pecpiino),    From 

thence  they  sailed  up  the  river  to  Gullo  or  Goli,  where 

they  arrived  in  eight  days  after  leaving  Porto  Pequino. 

From  here  they  seem  to  have  gone  on  to  Chittagong. 

While  at   Gullo  they  received  an  invitation  from  the 

King  of  a  place  called  Chandecan  (in  Italian,  Ciandecan) 

to  pay  him  a  visit.     They  did  not    go   then,  but   as 

Fernandez   afterwards  heard  that   the  King  was  angry 

at  their  not  coming  to  him,  he  sent  Sosa  to  Chandecan 

sometime  in  1599,  and  he  met  Avith  a  very  favourable 

reception.       Afterwards    Fernandez    himself    went    to 

Chandecan  in  October  1599,  and  got  letters-patent  from 

the  King  authorising  him  to  carry  on  the  mission,'     In 

December   1599   Fernandez  was  at  Sripiir,  and  on  the 

22d  of  that  month  he  wrote  a  letter  to  Pimenta  giving 

an  account  of  the  mission;  and  on  20th  January  1600 

Fonseca  Avrote  a  similar  letter  from  Chandecan.   Fonseca's 

letter  is  most  interesting,  and  has  been  c[uoted  at  p.  31. 


SUNDAKBANS.  175 

For  my  present  purpose  it  is  only  necessary  that  I  quote 
the   foUowing  passage:    "The   King    [of  Bdkhi],    after 
compliments,  asked  me  where  I  was  bound  for,  and  I 
replied,  *  I  am  going  to  the  King  of  Ciandecan,  who  is 
to  be  your  Highness 's  father-in-law.'"    These  words  are 
extremely  important,  because  they  help  ns  to  identify 
both  the  King  of  Bakla  and  the  King  of  Chandecan. 
Chandecan,  as  I  hereafter  will  show,  is  identical  with 
Dhumghdt  or  Jessore,  and  the  boy-king  of  Bilkla  (Fonseca 
says  he  was  oidy  eight  years  old)  can  be  no  other  than 
Eam  Chandra  Rai,  who,  we  know,  married  a  daughter  of 
the  famous  Pratipdditya.     Before,  however,  going  into 
this  matter,  I  wish  to  draw  attention  to  Fonseca's  de- 
scription of  the  journey  from  Bakla  to  Chandecan  (sec 
p.  31).     Now,  though  the  good  father  evidently  had  an 
eye  for   natural  scenery,  and  was  delighted  with  the 
woods  and  rivers,  it  is  evident  that  what  he  admired 
so   much  must  have  appeared  to  many  to  be  '^  horrid 
jungle,"  and   indeed  was  very  like  what    the   Sundar- 
bans   now    arc.     In  fact,  Fonseca's  description  of  the 
route  from  Bdkla  to  Chandecan  mioht  almost  be  used 
at  the  present  day  to  describe  the  route  from  Barisd-l 
to    Kaliganj,    near    which    Pratdpdditya's    capital   w^as 
situated.     The  chief  difference  is  that  the  ]Di'ogress  of 
civilisation  has  driven  away  the  herds  of  deer  and  the 
monkeys  from  the  ordinary  routes,  'though  they  are  still 
to  be  found  in  the  woods,  and  the   herds  of  deer  have 
given  their  name   to   one  of  the  largest  rivers  in  the 
Sundarbans  (Haringhattii).    The  faithfulness  of  Fonseca's 
description  seems  indicated  by  his  modestly  admitting 
that  he  had  never  seen  a  rhinoceros,  while  stating  (quite 
truly)  that  there  were  such  animals  in  the  woods.     Had 
Fonseca    come    upon  any   town  on  his   journey,   it  is 
reasonable  to  suppose  that  he  would   have  mentioned 


1 7 6  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

it ;  and  my  point  is,  tluat  liis  description  shows  that  the 
Sundarbans  were  in  mnch  the  same  condition  in  1599 
as  they  are  in  now. 

I  may  add  that  the  missionaries  speak  of  dacoits  as 
infesting  the  rivers,  which  certainly  was  a  marked 
feature  of  the  Sundarbans  up  to  the  last  fifty  or  sixty 
years.  Fonseca  arrived  at  Chandecan  on  the  20th 
November  1599,  and  there  he  found  Fernandez'  com- 
panion, Dominic  de  Sosa,  The  King  received  Fonseca 
with  great  kindness,  so  much  so  that  he  says  a  Christian 
prince  could  not  have  behaved  better  to  liim.  A  church 
was  built  at  Chandecan,  and  was  formally  opened  on 
1st  January  1600.  It  was  the  first  church  in  Bengal, 
and  was  on  this  account  dedicated  to  Jesus  Christ. 
Chittasono'  was  the  second,  and  Bandel  the  third. 
The  last  was  built  about  this  time  by  a  Portuguese 
named  Villalobos. 

In  reply  to  the  questions,  Where  was  Chandecan,  and 
who  was  its  King  ?  I  answer,  that  as  I  believe  Chandecan 
to  have  been  identical  with  Dhumghdt,  or  at  least  in 
the  same  neighbourhood,  it  must  have  lain  in  the 
Twenty-four  Parganas,  and  near  the  modern  bazd,r  of 
Kaliganj,  and  that  its  king  was  no  other  than  Part^p- 
dditya. 

My  reasons  for  this  view  are,  firstly,  that  Chandecan^ 
or  Ciandecan  is  evidently  the  same  as  Chand  Khan, 
which,  as  we  know  from  the  life  of  Rajah  Pratd^^dditya, 
by  Ram  Ram  Bosu  (modernised  by  Haris  Chandra 
Tarkalankar),  was  the  name  of  the  former  proprietor  of 
the  estate  in  the  Sundarbans  which  Pratdpdditya's  father 

^  Chandecan  does  not  appear  to  be  marked  on  any  of  the  old  maps,  and 
as  far  as  I  am  aware  Bernouilli  is  the  only  other  person  besides  the  priests 
■who  refers  to  it.  In  the  article  on  the  Feringhies  of  Chittagong,  in  "  Cal- 
cutta Review,"  Bernouilli  is  quoted  as  speaking  of  Kandccan,  an  old  name 
for  the  province  of  Satigam,  which  included  Hughli,  <fcc. 


SUNBARBAA^S.  ly'y 

Bikramaditya  got  from  King  Dnond.  Cliaiid  Khan 
Masaudari  liad  died,  we  arc  told,  witliout  leaving  any 
heirs,  and  consequently  liis  territory,  which  was  near 
the  sea,  had  relapsed  into  jungle.  Bikramaditya  saw 
that  King  Daoiid  would  be  ruined,  as  he  had  taken  upon 
himself  to  resist  the  Emperor  of  Delhi,  and  therefore 
Bikramaditya,  who  was  his  minister,  took  the  precaution 
of  establishing  a  retreat  for  himself  in  the  jungles. 
King  Daoud  was  killed  in  1576,  and  Bikramaditya, 
though  he  had  prepared  a  city  beforehand,  seems  to 
have  gone  to  it  in  person  about  this  time.  His  dynasty 
had  been  only  about  twenty-four  or  twenty-five  years 
in  the  country  when  the  Jesuits  visited  it,  and  it 
would  have  been  quite  natural  if  the  name  of  the  old 
proprietor  (Chand  Khan)  had  still  clung  to  it.  More- 
over, we  know  that  Pratapaditya  did  not  live  always, 
at  least,  at  his  father's  city  of  Jessore.  He  rebelled 
against  him,  and  established  a  rival  city  at  Dhumghat. 
In  so  doing  he  may  have  selected  the  site  of  Chand 
Khan's  capital,  and  this  may  have  retained  the  name  of 
Chand  Khan  for  tAvo  or  three  years  after  Pratapaditya 
had  removed  to  it.  Nor  is  there  anything  in  this  opposed 
to  the  fact  that  one  Klianja  Ali  formerly  owned  Jessore  ; 
Khanja  Ali  died  in  1458,  or  about  120  years  before  Bik- 
ramaditya appeared  on  the  scene,  so  that  Chand  Khan 
may  very  well  have  been  the  name  of  one  of  Khanja 
All's  descendants. 

But  there  is  still  more  evidence  of  the  identity  of 
Cliandecan  with  Dhumohat, 

The  fair  prospects  of  the  mission,  as  described  by  Fer- 
nandez and  Fonseca,  were  soon  overclouded.  Fernandez 
died,  on  14th  November  1G02,  in  prison  in  Chittagong,  in 
consequence  of  injuries  which  he  had  received  in  a  tumult 
there,  and  the  other  priests  took  refuge  in  Sandwip.      In 


178  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

consequence,  liowever,  of  a  war  with  the  King  of  Arracan. 
they  soon  left  the  isLand  and  took  refuge  in  Chandecau. 
But  the  King  of  Chandecan  was  cruel  and  treacherous 
(traits  which  agree  with  the  description  of  Pratdpadit3^a), 
and  was  desirous  of  making  his  peace  with  the  King  of 
Arracan,  who  was  then  very  powerful,  and  had,  as  Du 
Jarric  informs  us,  taken  possession  of  the  kingdom   of 
Bakla.     Carvalho,  the  gallant  captain  of  the  Portuguese, 
was  at  Chandecan,  and  the  King  of  Chandecan,  who  was 
then    at    "Jasor,"^    sent   for    Carvalho,    and   had  him 
murdered  in  order  to  ingratiate  himself  with  the  King 
of  Arracan.      Du  Jarric  adds  that  the  news  of  Carvalho's 
murder   at  Jasor  reached  Chandecan  on  the  following 
midnight,  which  may  give  us  some  idea  of  the  distance 
between  the  two  places. 

This  ended  the  Bengal  Mission,  for  the  King  of  Chan- 
decan destroyed  the  church  and  ordered  the  priests  out 
of  the  country.  We  are  glad  to  think  that  this  king, 
if  he  was,  as  we  believe,  Pratd,pdditya,  shortly  after- 
wards expiated  his  crimes  and  died  in  an  iron  cage  at 
Benares.  That  Pratdpaditya  was  a  cruel  monster,  and 
quite  capable  of  directing  the  assassination  of  a  brave 
man  like  Carvalho,  we  have  proof  enough  in  the  work  of 
his  admiring  biographer,  who  tells  us  that  Pratdpdditya 
cut  off  the  breasts  of  a  female  slave  who  had  offended 
him. 

There  are  two  other  slight  pieces  of  evidence  in  sup- 
port of  the  identity  between  Pratapaditya  and  the  King 
of  Chandecan.     One  is  that  Du  Jarric  tells  us  that  the 

^  Ja&r  means  "bridge"  in  Arabic,  and  General  Cunningliani  derives  the 
name  Jessore  from  this  word,  and  observes  that  the  appellation  indicates 
the  nature  of  the  country.  He  also  states  that  the  old  name  of  the  Ganges 
delta  was  Samotata.  Murali  was  an  old  name  for  Jessore  ;  quer}'',  was 
this  connected  witli  Muradkhana,  which  we  know  to  have  been  an  old 
name  for  the  Sundarbans  ? 


S  UN  DA  RBANS.  1 7  9 

young  King  of  Bakla  was  absent  when  tbe  King  of 
Arraean  overran  his  territory,  and  we  know  that  Ram 
Chandra  Rai  Avas  for  awhile  a  prisoner  in  the  city  of  his 
fixther-in-law,  who  wished  to  assassinate  him.  Another 
is  that  when  Fernandez  ^ame  to  Chandecan  in  October 
1599,  and  got  the  King's  signature  to  the  letters-patent, 
he  took  the  precaution  of  having  them  also  signed  (with 
the  King's  permission)  by  the  King's  son,  who  Avas 
then  about  twelve  years  old.  This  may  have  been 
Pratdpdditya's  son  Udai  Aditya,  whom  wo  know  to  have 
been  a  great  friend  of  his  brother-in-law  Ram  Chandra 
Rai,  and  to  have  succeeded  in  savino;  his  life.  The  two 
young  princes  must,  from  the  accounts  of  Fonseca  and 
Fernandez,  have  been  of  nearly  the  same  age,  and  this 
makes  the  story  of  their  friendship  all  the  more 
probable.  , 

I  must  not  omit  to  point  out  that  the  fact  that 
Bikramaditya  chose  Jessore  as  a  safe  retreat  is  the 
strongest  jDOSsible  evidence  of  the  jungly  nature  of  the 
surrounding  country.  It  is  true  it  had  been  cultivated 
in  the  pre^dous  century  by  Khanja  Ali,  but  the  experi- 
ment had  proved  a  failure,  and  the  land  had  in  the 
time  of  his  successor,  (?)  Chand  Khan,  relapsed  into 
jungle. 

To  sum  up,  it  seems  to  me  that  the  Sundarbans  have 
never  been  in  a  more  flourishing  condition  than  they  are 
in  at  present.  1  believe  that  large  parts  of  Bdkarganj 
and  Jessore  were  at  one  time  cultivated,  that  they 
relapsed  into  jungle,  and  that  they  have  now  been 
cleared  again ;  and  I  have  also  no  doubt  that  the  Court 
of  the  Kings  of  Bd,kla  and  of  Chandecan  imparted  some 
degree  of  splendour  to  the  surrounding  country  ;  but  I 
do  not  believe  that  the  gloomy  Sundarbans,  or  the  sea 


i8o  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

face  of  Jessore  and  Bd-karganj,  were  ever  well-peopled 
or  tlie  sites  of  cities.^ 

^  The  following  interesting  description  of  the  Sundarbans,  as  they  appeared 
in  1712-13,  is  given  by  Pere  Barbier  iu  vol.  xiii.  of  "Lettres  edifiantes 
et  curieuses,"  ed.  1781.  Pere  Barbier  accompanied  Bishop  Laynez  when 
the  latter  made  a  visitation  to  the  Bengal  portion  of  his  diocese,  and  this  is 
what  they  saw  on  the  journey  from  Chandarnagore  to  Chittagong  :  "Pour 
nous  y  (Chittagong)  rendre  nous  eumes  a  tenir  une  route  affreuse.  Huit 
jours  en  tiers,  quoicju'on  ramat  dix-huit  heures  chaque  jour  et  que  le  courant 
et  souvent  la  mar^e  fussent  favorables,  suffirent  a  j^eine  pour  nous  faire 
trouver  une  habitation  ;  jusques  la  nous  ne  vimes  que  des  bois  epais,  des  bras 
de  rivieres  par  oil  le  Gauge  se  degorge,  tantot  d'une  etendue  prodigieuse, 
tant6t  si  etroits  qu'on  ne  le  pouvoit  ramer  que  d'un  cote.  Les  bords  garnis 
de  grandes  arbres  dont  les  branches  s'avancent  fort  avant  dans  I'eau  et  par- 
dessus  tout  I'apprehension  continuelle  oil  I'on  est  des  tigres  dont  on  voit  des 
vestiges  de  temps  en  temps  par  des  pieux  plantds  aux  endroits  oii  il  y  a 
des  personnes  devorees  ^  terre  ou  bien  enlevees  jusque  dans  leurs  bateaux. 
Dans  I'eau  se  trouvent  des  crocodiles  longs  de  vingt  et  trente  pieds  qui 
engloutissent  hommes  entiers.  Enfin  on  y  est  souvent  a  la  merci  des 
voleurs  qui  rodent  incessament  dans  ces  parages  montes  sur  des  panceaux 
(pans ways)  qui  vont  comme  un  trait."  From  Chittagong  they  went  to 
Bhulu  (Noakhdli),  where  there  was  then  a  Christian  settlement,  and 
from  thence  to  Dacca  and  Rangamatti,  passing  on  the  way  Hooseinpur  in 
Mymensing. 

The  literature  of  the  Sundarbans  is  very  scanty.  Ritter  has  collected 
the  principal  authorities  in  his  "  Erdkunde."  Williamson,  in  his  "  East 
India  Vade  Mecum,"  gives  some  account  of  the  state  of  the  molunghies  or 
salt-makers  in  the  Sundarbans.  See  also  Forbes's  "  Oriental  Memoirs." 
Other  authorities  are  Gastrell's  Report,  Westland's  J^^J^gSQre,"  Hooker's 
"  Himalayan  Journal,"  vol.  ii.,  Pogson's  "  Tour  to  Chittagong."  (S£i-i«H|*uiv- 
1831),  "  Calcutta  Review,"  March  1859,  article  ''  Gaugetic  Delta."  A  map 
of  the  Sundarban  grants  has  been  madeb}^  Mr  Gomess,  and  I  believe  he 
has  also  written  a  memorandum  on  the  Sundarbans.  Lloyd's  memoir,  on 
his  survey  of  the  coast  from  Calcutta  to  Chittagong,  is  still  in  MS.  (see 
Markham,  Indian  Surveys). 

The  Lieutenant-Governor  considers  that  the  reclamation  of  the  Sundar- 
bans has  been  carried  sufficiently  far  for  the  present,  and  that  there  is  a 
danger  of  the  woods  being  too  much  cut  down.  No  more  clearing  grants 
are  to  be  made,  and  the  tract  has  been  placed  under  the  management  of 
the  Forest  Conservancy  (B.  A.  Report  for  1873-74,  p.  36). 


(   iSi    ) 


CHAPTER  VI. 

GO  VERNMENT  EST  A  TES,  ETC. 

The  number  of  Government  estates  in  Bakarganj  was  at 
one  time  very  large,  and  though  many  of  them  have 
been  sold,  a  considerable  number  still  remain.  There 
is  probably  no  other  district  in  Bengal  Proper  where 
Government  has  so  many  and  such  valuable  estates,  and 
therefore  we  may  say  that  there  is  no  other  district  in 
which  Government  has  so  large  and  direct  an  interest. 

We  have  seen  that  Government  is  the  zamindar  of 
Buzurgumedpiir  pargana,  but  besides  this,  it  owns  a 
great  many  islands  and  chars.  This  is  a  natural  con- 
sequence of  the  fact  that  the  district  is  an  alluvial 
formation.  The  rivers  continually  throw  up  islands  and 
chars,  and  under  the  resumption  laws  these  were  taken 
possession  of  by  Government.  Of  late  years,  however, 
resumption  proceedings  have  nearly  ceased,  and  Govern- 
ment now  only  takes  possession  of  islands  in  navigable 
rivers.  The  existence  of  these  is  brought  to  light  by 
Government  officers  in  tlieir  tours,  or  more  commonly 
l)y  some  one  reporting  that  a  sandbank  has  formed  in 
such  and  such  a  river,  and  asking  for  a  settlement  of  it 
These  petitions  are  generally  referred  to  a  deputy-col- 
lector for  inquiry,  and  if  the  formation  is  found  to  be 
really  an  island- — i.e.,  if  the  Avater  between  it  and  the 
shore  is  not  fordable  at  any  time  of  the  year  (Regulation 
11  of  1825,  sec.  4,  cl.  3) — he  takes  possession  of  it  by 


iS2  DISTR1C7'  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

sticking  up  a  bamboo  on  it.  Such  inquiries  are  more 
protracted  than  they  were  in  former  days,  for  now 
private  individuals  are  more  alive  to  their  rights  and 
better  skilled  in  maintaining  them,  and  the  decision  of 
the  Privy  Council  in  the  famous  Lopez  case  has  enabled 
many  persons  to  raise  with  success  the  plea  of  reforma- 
tion on  an  old  site.  The  apparently  simple  question  of 
fordability  is  not  always  easy  of  determination,  for  the 
rivers  vary  much  in  depth,  according  to  the  season  and 
the  state  of  the  tide.  According  to  the  rule  now  in 
force,  the  question  of  fordability  is  decided  when  the 
rivers  are  at  their  lowest — i.e.,  in  or  about  the  month  of 
February.  The  number  of  islands  in  Bakarganj  which 
are  now  the  property  of  Government  apj)ears  to  be  133. 
Many  of  them  belong  to  the  Dakhin  Shahbazpur  sub- 
division, and  were  transferred  along  with  it  to  Bakarganj 
in  1869,  from  the  district  of  Noakhali.  The  most  in- 
teresting of  the  island-estates,  or  jaziras,  as  they  are 
called,  is  Manpiira,  an  island  situated  to  the  south- 
south-east  of  Dakhin  Shahbazpiir.  It  was  resumed  by 
the  Commissioner  of  the  Sundarbans  in  1833,  though  it 
seems  doubtful  if  the  resumption  was  justifiable,  for  the 
island  is  an  old  formation,  and  was  included  in  the  parti- 
tion of  the  Dakhin  Shahbazpur  zamindari,  which  took 
place  in  1188  B.s.  (a.d.  1781) — that  is,  nine  years  before 
the  Decennial  Settlement.  It  is  said  to  owe  its  name 
to  one  Man  Ghazi,  who  oot  a  lease  from  the  Dakhin 
Shahljdzpur  zamindars,  and  was  the  first  to  break  up 
the  soil.  At  the  time  of  the  resumption  the  island  was 
in  the  hands  of  the  zamiiidars,  and  there  were  536  acres 
under  cultivation.  According  to  the  papers  of  the  parti- 
tion already  referred  to,  the  amount  of  cultivation  in 
1781  was  thirteen  kanies — that  is,  about  250  biglias  or 
160  acres,  as  the  kani  in  use  in  Manpiira  is  the  large  or 


GOVERNMENT  ESTATES,  ETC.  183 

shahi  kaui,  wliicli  is  four  times  the  size  of  tlie  ordinary 
one.  ]\Ianpiira  is  diluviating  at  the  north-east,  and 
alluviatino-  at  the  south  and  west,  where  a  lame  char 
called  Kista  Prasad  has  formed.  The  area  of  Manpiira 
is  about  fourteen  scjuare  miles,  and  its  population  4500. 
Three- fourths  of  the  inliabitants  arc  Hindus,  so  that 
the  island  is  an  exception  to  the  general  rule  that  the 
inhabitants  of  the  islands  and  chars  in  Bdkarganj  are 
Mahomedans,  The  Hindus  are  all  low- caste  men,  and 
are  called  Dasses  or  Halia  Dasses — i.e.,  Dasses  who  hold 
the  plough,  as  distinguished  from  the  Dasses  who  follow 
clerical  pursuits,  or  who  are  fishermen.  The  Dasses  are 
a  quiet  and  well-behaved  set  of  men,  and  are  very  hard- 
working. It  is  a  Bengali  saying  that  the  Dass  and  the 
hhaisli — i.e.,  the  buffalo — are  equally  strong  and  laborious. 
They  have  two  customs  which  are  looked  upon  with 
abhorrence  by  the  stricter  Hindus — they  eat  pigs, 
and  they  marry  widows.  The  remaining  fourth  of  the 
inliabitants  are  Mahomedans,  and  they  too  are  quiet 
and  inoffensive,  and  do  not  seem  to  be  tinctured  with 
any  Ferazi  notions.  There  are  a  schoolmaster,  a  post- 
master, a  pound-keeper,  and  nine  chaukidars  on  the 
island,  but  there  is  no  magistrate  nor  any  regular  police. 
The  island  is  well  raised,  and  is  very  fertile,  though  rice 
is  nearly  the  only  product.  There  is  no  jungle  on  it 
except  a  belt  which  surrounds  it,  and  which  is  preserved 
by  the  inliabitants  because  it  breaks  the  force  of  the 
waves  and  keeps  out  the  salt  water  from  their  cultiva- 
tion. A  few  deer  and  a  good  many  .pigs  live  in  this 
jungle,  but  there  are  no  tigers  or  leopards.  For  every- 
thing except  rice,  milk,  and  firewood,  the  inhabitants 
have  to  depend  on  the  markets  in  the  adjacent  island 
of  Dakhin  Shahbazpiir.  During  the  cold  weather  boats 
come  from  Dacca,  and  from  the  bazar  of  Bakarganj,  &c., 


iS4  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

and  export  rice  from  tlie  island.     During  the  rains  the 
ishmd  is  not  easily  accessible,  and  is  seldom  visited  by 
boats   from   a   distance,  though  a  ferry-boat  regularly 
plies  between  it  and  Tazamuddin  in  Dakhin  Shahbdz- 
piir.     I  have  referred  in  the  chapter  on-  under-tenures 
to  the   curious  fact  that   four   different   classes  of  pro- 
prietors have  sprung  up  in  the  island.     The  late  settle- 
ments have  been  made  with  the  ahddkdrs,  but  the  rate 
of  rent  payable  to  them   by  the  howaladars  has  been 
fixed  at  eleven  anas  three  pies  a  bigha.     The  old  rate 
prevalent  in  the  island  was  Ils.2-8  the  small  or  karslia 
kani,  or  eight  anas  four  pies  a  bigha.     No  expenses  of 
collection  were  allowed  to  the   abadkdrs  or  howaladars 
in  former  times ;  but,   on  the   other  hand,  they  were 
allow^ed  a  deduction  on  account  of  ails — i.e.,  the  limits 
or  ridges  separating  the  fields — and  for  matan,  as  it  is 
called — i.e.,  a  deduction  allowed  to  a  tenant  as  his  profit 
on  condition   of  his  bringing   the   adjacent   lands  into 
cultivation.     The  rate  of  rent  actually  paid  in  former 
times  was,  after  deduction  of  matan  and  for  ails,  seven 
anas  three  pies  a  bigha.     The  above  rate  of  Rs.2-8  a 
kani  was  the  general  one  in  all  the  Noakhali  chars,  and 
was  adopted  by  Mr  Ricketts  in  his  settlements.     Man- 
pura  is  divided  into  eight  estates,  the  net  revenue  from 
which  to  Government  is  about  Rs.8500.     In  1844  the 
revenue  was  only  Rs.1311.      The  first  settlement  was 
made  in  1837,  when  Mr  Ricketts  was  Commissioner  of 
Chittagoug.     The  holdings  of  the  ryots  under  the  howa- 
ladars and  nim  howaladars  are  called  jotes.     These  in- 
ferior ryots  are  divided  into  two  classes — viz.,  hhudkast 
and  ijcdkast,  the  khudkast  being  those  who  cultivate 
lands  on  the  estate  on  which  they  reside,  and  the  paikast 
those  who  cultivate  lands  on  other  estates.      The  same 
person  -may  be  both  a  khudkast  and  a  paikast  ryot — 


GO  VERNMENT  ESTA  7ES,  ETC.  185 

i.e.,  kliudkast  with  regard  to  the  hind  he  cultivates  near 
his  homestead,  and  paikast  with  regard  to  that  which 
he  cultivates  at  a  distance.  There  arc  226  khudkast 
ryots,  and  179  of  them  have  rights  of  occupancy. 
Sixty-six  paikast  ryots  have  similar  rights.  The  total 
number  of  ryots  is  566  ;  so  that  if  we  reckon  five  to 
a  family,  the  ryots  number  2830,  or  more  than  half  the 
population  of  the  island.  The  other  inhabitants  are 
howaladars  and  nim  howaladars,  but  they  for  the  most 
part  cultivate  their  own  lands.  The  ryots  pay  Rs.l6 
to  Rs.24^  per  shahi  kani,  according  to  the  nature  of 
their  lands.  They  have  also  to  work  two  days  in  the 
year  on  the  lands  of  their  titular  superiors,  or  to  pay 
eight  anas  in  lieu  of  this  service.  The  island  originally 
contained  only  one  estate,  which  was  divided  into  blocks 
under  orders  of  Mr  Ricketts  in  order  to  facilitate  culti- 
vation. When  Mr  Garrett,  the  Deputy-Collector  of 
Noakhc^li,  reported  on  the  island  in  1841,  there  were 
only  two  classes  of  residents — namely,  howaladars  and 
jotedars.  Six  out  of  the  eight  estates  have  been  settled 
up  to  1907  B.s. 

The  incidents  in  the  history  of  Manpiira  are  not 
numerous.  In  1218  b.s.  (1811)  the  manufacture  of  salt 
was  introduced,  and  caused  so  much  oppression  that 
350  homesteads  had  been  deserted  by  1225  B.s.  (1818). 
In  1229  B.s.  (1822)  a  cyclone  swept  over  the  island  and 
drowned  most  of  the  inhabitants,  and  another  inunda- 
tion took  place  in  1850,  and  led  to  a  remission  of 
one-fourth  of  the  revenue.  Four  or  five  years  ago  a 
whale  was  stranded  on  the  island,,  and  some  of  its  bones 
were  afterwards  brought  to  Barisal  and  placed  in  the 
public  library.  I  have  said  there  are  no  tigers  or 
leopards  ;  there  are  not  even  any  jackals  ;  but  there  are 
snakes,  and  cases  of  death  from  snake-bite  occasionally 


iS6  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

occur.  I  liiive  referred  to  Mr  Ricketts  in  connection 
with  Manpiira,  and  I  may  take  this  opportunity  of 
noticing  that  this  ofhcer  (now  Sir  Henry  Ricketts)  is 
famous  all  over  Dakhin  Shahbazpiir  and  Noakhali,  and, 
I  believe,  throughout  the  whole  Chittagong  division,  for 
his  settlements,  and  tliat  there  is  no  name  more  fre- 
quently or  more  honourably  mentioned  either  by  ryots 
or  by  old  native  servants  of  Government.  His  letter 
of  22d  May  1841  is  the  most  imj^ortant  one  in  the 
history  of  the  settlements  of  Manpiira,  and  is  that  in 
which  the  title  taluqdar  is  applied  to  the  abd,dkars. 

There  is  a  very  full  and  excellent  report  about  Man- 
piira by  Babu  Anand  Chandra  Sein,  Deputy-Collector, 
dated  3d  December  1873,  and  to  this  reference  should 
be  made  by  all  who  wish  to  know  more  about  Manpiira 
and  its  settlements.  The  Babu  made  the  settlements, 
A\'hich  have  lately  been  confirmed  by  the  Board  and  by 
Government. 

It  would  take  up  too  much  space  if  I  were  to  describe 
the  other  islands  belonging  to  Government,  and  I  am 
not  aware  that  there  is  anything  specially  interesting- 
connected  with  them.  Many  of  them  have  ceased  to  be 
islands,  owing  to  the  silting  up  of  the  intervening  chan- 
nels ;  and  it  is  probable  that  at  no  distant  date  Manpiira 
will  also  cease  to  be  an  island,  and  be  joined  on  to  the 
Dakhin  Sliahl)azpiir  mainland.  Many  of  the  islands 
sliow  by  their  names  the  periods  at  which  they  were 
formed,  or  at  least  at  which  they  were  taken  possession 
of  by  Government.  Thus  we  have  Lord  Hardinge  char 
and  Lawrence  char  (spelt  Lallon  on  the  map,  and  situ- 
ated in  Noakhdli),  which  point  to  the  period  of  the  Sikh 
war ;  wliile  Falcon  char,  Alexander  char,  Drummond 
char,  Price  cliar,  Hankey  char.  Brown  char,  Ram  Kanye 
char,  Henderson  char,  &c.,  point  to  the  time  when  the 


GOVERNMENT  ESTATES,  ETC.  187 

officers  wliose  names  they  Ix'ur  M'erc  collectors  of 
Noakhali,  or  otherwise  employed  in  that  district. 

Besides  the  islands,  there  are  ninety-four  or  ninety- 
five  Government  estates  included  in  parganas,  which 
have  chiefly  been  acquired  by  purchase  at  sales  for 
arrears  of  revenue.  Such  estates  are  not  generally  of 
much  value,  for  it  is  ahnost  always  owing  to  their 
deterioration  that  Government  has  to  j^ut  them  up  to 
sale  for  arrears  of  revenue,  or  that  Government  is 
enabled  to  j^^^ii'chase  them  at  the  upset  price  of  Rs.  1. 
Fifty-t\^'0  of  them  belong  to  the  pargana  of  Srirampiir, 
forming  ])art  of  an  old  estate  called  Gokul  Mukarjya 
(see  p.  147). 

AVith  the  addition  of  Nos.  1406,  1437,  and  1447 
(described  under  pargana  Buzurgumedpur),  the  khas 
mahals — i.e.,  Government  estates  (exclusive  of  the 
islands) — may  be  reckoned  as  numbering  ninety-seven 
estates,  and  as  bearing  a  revenue  of  about  Rs.l  15,000. 

There  are  also  resumed  or  hazyafti  estates.  These  are 
the  property  of  individuals,  but  are  managed  by  Govern- 
ment, either  directly  or  through  farmers,  owing  to  the 
owners  not  accejDting  the  terms  of  settlement  offered  by 
Government.  Such  resumptions  were  made  under 
Regulation  2  of  1819  and  9  of  1825,  and  are  to  be  dis- 
tinguished from  resumptions  under  Regulation  11  of 
1825,  whereby  islands  become  the  exclusive  property  of 
Government.  There  are  111  bazyafti  mahals,  and  the 
Government  revenue  from  them  is  about  Rs. 8 4,000. 
The  owners  receive  mcdikana  or  proprietary  allow-ance. 
Some  bazyafti  mahals  not  included  in  the  111  have  been 
permanently  settled  with  their  owners.  The  bazyafti 
mahals  are  chiefly  taujirs — i.e.,  lands  which  have  accreted 
since  the  Permanent  Settlement,  and  which  were  not 
included  in  it.     They  are  numerous  in  Dakhin  Shah- 


i88  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

bazpiir,  where  the  collections  from  resumptions  amount 
to  about  Es. 50,000.  The  largest  is  Jainagar,  which  is 
managed  directly  by  the  Collector  through  a  tahsildar, 
and  which  yields  about  Es.  15,000  a  year.  It  belongs  to 
the  heirs  of  the  notorious  Sibkissen  Banarji.  The  bazyafti 
mahals  were  let  b}'  Government  to  abadkdrs  or  improving 
tenants,  and  now  that  the  lands  have  been  cleared  the 
owners  are  coming  forward  and  claiming  them. 

The.  large  estate  of  Tushkhali  in  the  Perozp{ir  sub- 
division is  the  exclusive  property  of  Government,  and 
should  have  been  mentioned  among  the  khas  mahals. 
The  rental  is  about  Es,  78,000,  and  the  estate  is  at 
jDresent  undergoing  settlement  with  a  view  to  enhance- 
ment. The  rate  of  rent  hitherto  prevailing  was  Es.1-4 
a  bigha.  It  was  farmed  to  the  Morrells  for  twenty 
years,  but  their  lease  has  been  cancelled,  and  it  is  now 
under  direct  management.  Tushkhdli  was  resumed  from 
pargana  Syedpfn^,  and  was  first  cleared  by  the  De  Silva 
family.  It  was  once  sold  to  the  Ghosal  family,  but  the 
sale  was  cancelled  in  consequence  of  the  lawsuit  referred 
to  at  p.  158. 

Fisheries. — It  might  be  supposed  that  there  would 
be  many  fisheries  in  Bdkarganj  belonging  to  Govern- 
ment. There  are,  however,  only  four,  and  the  total 
revenue  derived  from  them  is  very  little  more  than 
one  thousand  rupees  (1029),  They  are  the  Jahapiir 
Fishery,  the  Meghna  Jhap  Fishery,  the  Bishkhali  Fish- 
ery, called  Surjya  Narain  Chakrabarti  or  the  Buzurgum- 
edpur  Bishandi  Jal,  and  the  Bhashan  Titulia.  The  first 
of  these  is  a  resumption,  the  second  is  a  jiart  of  the 
Gokul  Mukarjya  taluq  already  referred  to  as  lying  in 
Srirdmpdr  pargana,  and  the  third  and  fourth  belong  to 
pargana  Buzurgumcdpur,       There  was  a  lawsuit  about 


GOVERNMENT  ESTATES,  ETC.  189 

tlie  Bliasliau  Titulia  Fishery  in  1858,  and  there  is  a  full 
account  of  it  in  a  letter  of  Mr  Collector  Dalrymplc  .to 
the  judge,  dated  lltli  December  1858.  It  appears  that 
hhashan,  or  floating,  means  the  right  to  collect  rent  from 
fishmongers  who  within  certain  limits  in  the  Titulia 
buy  fish  from  the  fishermen.  Bhashan  Titulia  was 
originally  an  under-tenure  of  Buzurgumedpur,  and  was 
separated  at  the  application  of  its  owner  in  1803,  and 
registered  as  bearing  a  revenue  of  Rs. 9 7-7- 15.  It  was 
held  that  the  right  to  such  an  estate  was  not  affected 
by  Regulation  27  of  1793.  The  taluq  is  now  in  the 
hands  of  the  Chakrabarties  of  RupatoUi,  who  have  given 
an  ausat  taluq  of  it  to  certain  nikaries  or  fishmongers. 

It  appears  that  altogether  there  are  3232  estates  on 
the  Bdkarganj  revenue  roll,  but  fifteen  of  these  do  not 
bear  any  revenue. 

COURT  OF  WARDS  AND  ATTACHED  ESTATES. 

The  number  of  these  is  very  small,  and  none  of  them 
possesses  much  interest  or  importance.  The  largest  is 
the  seven  anas  of  Arangpur  pargana,  which  was  attached 
by  order  of  the  Civil  Court,  and  is  under  the  charge  of 
Mr  Scott,  the  Sarbarakar  or  Manager-General.  The 
most  important  ward's  estate  is  that  of  the  lunatic 
Jao-at  Narain  Chakrabarti,  who  is  a  small  shareholder 
in  the  Selimabad  pargana,  and  resides  at  Raikatti,  The 
estate  is  managed  by  his  son. 


(     IQO     ) 


CHAPTER  VIT. 

LAND    TENURES. 
I.    TENUEES-m-CHIEF. 

The  tenures- iii-cliief  of  Biikarganj  have  been  described 
iji  the  chapter  on  financial  history,  and  in  the  account 
of  the  different  parganas,  but  before  proceeding  to  de- 
scribe the  under-tenures  it  seems  desirable  to  say  a  few 
words  more  about  the  zamindars. 

The  number  of  zamindaries  in  the  district  is  reckoned 
to  be  101,^  but  the  number  of  zamindars  is  at  least  four 
or  five  times  this  number.^  No  notice  is  taken  in  the 
official  reo^isters  of  subdivisions  of  estates  which  have  not 
been  announced  by  the  owners  to  the  Collector,  and 
there  are  many  estates  entered  in  one  name,  but  wliich 
really  belong  to  several  families.  \\\  looking  over  the 
list  of  proprietors  of  zamindaries  and  independent  taluqs, 
we  find  that  most  of  them  are  Hindus  of  the  Brdhman 
caste,  and  that  there  are  comparatively  few  Mahomedans. 
The  pi'incipal  Brdhman  family  resident  in  the  district  is 

^  According  to  a  return  in  tlie  Bengal  Administration  Eeport  for  1872-73, 
p.  74,  there  were  forty-six  large  estates  in  Bakarganj,  664  of  moderate  size, 
and  4618  under  500  acres  apiece.  This  includes  the  estates  of  the  Mddaripur 
suljdivision,  and  I  think  exaggerates  tlie  number  of  large  estates.  At  least 
it  must  not  be  supposed  that  each  of  these  forty-six  estates  is  in  the  hands 
of  one  man,  or  even  familj^,  for  nearly  every  one  of  them  is  divided  among 
several  families.  N.B. — The  word  "estate"  includes  all  lands  paying 
rent  direct  to  Government,  Avhether  they  be  zamindaries,^  taluqs,  or 
farms. 

2  According  to  census,  there  are  1963  zamindars  (males  only). 


LAND  TENURES.  191 

that  of  the  Arangpur  zamindar,  for  the  Tagore  and  Ghosal 
families  are  absentees.     Some  country-l)orn  Greeks,  Ar- 
menians, and  Eurasians  have  properties  in  the  district, 
but  no  one  of  European  Lirth  and  parentage  holds  land      i 
in  Bilkarganj. 

The  dearth  of  old  Mahomedan  families  in  a  district 
which  is  so  full  of  IMahomedans,  and  where  so  many 
of  the  parganas  and  villages  have  names  of  Mahomedan 
origin,  is  not  a  little  remarkable.  Khajah  Ahsanoolah 
of  Dacca  is  a  stranger  to  the  district,  and  his  possessions 
in  it  have  all  been  acquired  by  purchase  in  comparatively 
recent  times.  Even  the  Shaistdbad  family,  though  com- 
monly considered  the  best  in  the  district,  has  not  been 
long  settled  in  it,  the  present  family  having  accjuired 
the  estate  by  marriage,  and  having  originally  belonged 
to  Faridpur.  The  Mahomedan  families  of  Charamudi, 
Bamna,  and  Gyanpara  are  of  no  great  standing,  and  do 
not  enjoy  much  respect.  The  family  which  is  really  the 
oldest,  is,  I  believe,  that  of  the  INIozamdars  of  Chdkdr ; 
but  they,  as  well  as  the  old  family  Avho  once  held 
Nazirpiir  pargana,  have  long  ceased  to  be  zamindars. 
It  appears  certain  that  Mahomedan  families  are  less 
able  to  keep  up  with  the  age  than  Hindus,  and  that 
they  decline  more  rapidly.  Even  those  which  still  keep 
a  footing  in  the  district  are  for  the  most  j^art  in  insolvent 
circumstances.  It  would  be  difficult  and  invidious  to 
discuss  minutely  the  causes  of  this  difference  between 
Mahomedans  and  Hindus,  but  I  think  somethino-  must 
be  attributed  to  the  practice  of  polygamy  among  the 
former.  At  least  this  seems  to  have  led  to  the  ruin 
of  the  Nazirpur  family,  the  last  zamindar  before  the 
Permanent  Settlement  having  left  twelve  sons  by  dif- 
ferent mothers  to  dispute  his  succession.  It  is  also 
a  fact  admitted   l)y  Mahomedans  themselves  that  the 


1 9 2  DISTRICT  OF  BAKAR GANJ. 

wealthy  professors  of  their  creed  are  more  prone  to  idle- 
ness and  dissipation  than  are  Hindus. 


II.    UNDER-TENURES. 

Bdkaro'anj  is  famous  for  the  number  of  its  under- 
tenures.  It  has  been  supposed  that  this  is  due  to  the 
litioious  and  intris^uino-  character  of  the  inhabitants, 
and  no  doubt  this  cause  has  not  been  without  effect ; 
but  even  the  j)eople  most  prone  to  litigation  and  in- 
trioiie  seldom  act  from  the  mere  love  of  these  things, 
and  we  must,  I  think,  search  deeper  for  the  efficient 
cause  of  so  much  sub-infeudation. 

Undoubtedly  the  first  cause  is  the  jjhysical  charac- 
teristics of  the  district.  This  has  acted  in  two  ways : 
firstly,  it  has  made  the  principal  landholders  absentees, 
and  has  thrown  the  direct  management  of  the  soil  into 
the  hands  of  the  under-tenants ;  and  secondly,  it  has 
made  the  latter  insist  upon  permanency  of  tenure. 

Bclkarganj  has  never  been  a  favourite  residence  of  the 
wealthier  classes.  Its  remoteness  from  Calcutta,  its 
larffe  rivers  and  the  banditti  who  infested  or  were 
supposed  to  infest  them,  and  above  all,  the  jungle  and 
tlie  salt  air,  have  made  the  upper  classes  shy  of  living 
in  it.  The  great  zamindaries  of  the  district  are  held  by 
absentees,  and  by  absentees  of  the  most  pronounced 
type,  for  I  believe  that  the  present  holders  of  the 
three  largest  properties  in  Bdkarganj — viz.,  Khajah 
Ahsanoolah  and  the  representatives  of  the  Ghosal  and 
Tagore  families — have  never  even  set  foot  in  the  district. 

The  zamindars  who  do  live  in  Bdkarganj  are  generally 
too  poor  to  have  much  influence,  and  besides,  even  they 
live  a  long  way  off  from  portions  of  their  estates,  and 
owing  to  diflicultics  of  communication,  &c.,  seldom  visit 


LAND  TENURES.  193 

them.  In  the  cold  season,  when  the  aman  harvest  has 
been  gathered  in  and  the  ryots  arc  flush  of  money,  tlie 
zamindars  and  taluqdars  are  in  the  habit  of  making 
progresses  through  their  estates,  and  of  collecting  rents 
and  presents.  But  for  nine  months  in  the  year  the 
under-tenantry  are  left  to  themselves  and  the  land- 
stewards.  Even  the  latter  are  not  always  present,  for 
as  they  are  generally  Hindus,  they  do  not  like  to  live  in 
the  midst  of  a  Mahomedan  population.  They  go  to 
their  homes  at  the  time  of  the  durga  puja,  and  do  not 
return  for  two  or  three  months.  As,  therefore,  the 
zamindars  cannot,  or  do  not,  live  on  their  estates,  they 
are  forced,  in  Burke's  phrase,  to  govern  with  a  loose  rein, 
and  to  allow  the  under-tenantry  to  create  or  acquire 
transferable  rights.  But  apart  from  this,  it  is  plain  that 
when  a  country  is  covered  with  jungle,  people  will  not 
settle  in  it,  or  undertake  the  cultivation  of  it,  unless  they 
get  permanency  of  tenure.  Therefore,  as  in  old  times, 
much  of  Bilkarganj  was  covered  with  Sundarban  jungle, 
and  as  also  much  of  it  consisted  of  newly-formed  land, 
which  could  not  be  made  productive  until  several  years 
after  occupation,  the  Government  and  the  zamindars 
found  it  necessary  to  grant  improving  leases  carrying 
permanent  rights.  Hence  arose  the  system  of  jangal- 
buri  taluqs,  ahdas,  &c.  The  pargana  of  Buzurgumedpiir 
was  entirely  composed  of  such  taluqs,  and  it  is  chiefly 
by  the  instrumentality  of  the  holders  of  them  that  the 
revenue  of  the  pargana  has  been  raised  from  a  few 
thousand  rupees  to  upwards  of  two  lacs.  It  is  a  common 
stipulation  in  improving  leases  that  no  rent  is  to  be  paid 
for  the  first  two  or  three  years,  and  that  there  is  to  ho,  a 
progressive  rate,  or  rasad,  as  it  is  called,  until  the  full 
rate  [pur a  dastur)  has  been  attained.  The  technical 
name  for  a  reclaimer  of  jungle  in  Bdkarganj  is  cd)ddkdr 


194  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

— i.e.,  clearer  or  cultivator — and  liis  tenure  is  called  aiidd- 
hdri  or  ahddi.  But  the  freedom  from  rent  for  several 
years  is  such  a  general  incident  of  the  tenure  that  the 
word  ahda,  which  seems  to  Ije  a  corruption  of  abadi, 
has  come  to  mean  rent  free.  Thus,  to  hold  land  abda, 
means  in  Bakarganj  to  hold  it  rent  free,  though  the 
term  is  only  applied  to  lands  held  temporarily  rent 
free  for  purposes  of  cultivation. 

As  a  j^roof  that  the  system  of  under-tenures  is  the 
growth  of  circumstances,  and  is  not  to  be  ascribed  to 
the  chicanery  of  the  Bdkarganj  ryots,  I  may  refer  to 
the  island  of  Manpiira,  which  is  a  Government  property, 
and  which,  up  to  the  last  five  years,  belonged  to  the 
district  of  Noakhali.  Government  acquired  possession 
of  this  island  about  forty  years  ago,  under  a  decree  of 
the  Eesumption  Commissioner.  It  was  then  nearly  all 
covered  with  jungle,  and  the  few  cultivators  who  in- 
habited it  appear  to  have  been  all  of  one  class,  and  to 
have  borne  the  name  of  jotedars.  At  present  there  are 
about  4500  inhabitants  on  the  island,  and  there  are  four 
classes  of  persons  possessing  distinct  rights  in  the  soil. 
There  are  first  the  abddkars  or  taluqdars,  who  pay  the 
Government  revenue ;  secondly,  the  hovvaladars;  thirdly, 
the  nim  howaladars ;  and  fourthly,  the  karshadars  or 
simple  cultivators. 

"It  is  a  natural  consequence  of  hereditary  benefices," 
says  Hallam,  "  that  those  who  possess  them  carve  out 
portions  to  be  held  of  themselves  by  a  similar  tenure." 
This  result,  wliich  appeared  in  the  feudal  system  in 
Europe,  has  not  failed  to  show  itself  in  India,  for  human 
nature  is  the  same  everywhere.  The  existence  of  a  right 
generally  leads  to  the  exercise  of  it,  and  persons  who 
acquire  permanent  and  transferable  interests  in  land 
soon  begin  to  alienate  them  in  whole  or  in  part. 


LAND  TENURES.  195 

Another  cause  of  sub-infeudation  is  that  tracts  of 
iiucultivated  land  are  often  let  out  to  several  persons 
Avho  club  together  to  clear  them.  Thus  the  lease  of  a 
howala  is  often  in  the  names  of  ten  or  twelve  persons. 
At  first  they  all  cultivate  the  land  together,  and  gene- 
rally one  of  their  number  has  a  certain  representative 
capacity,  and  is  the  man  to  whom  the  landlord  looks  for 
rent.  But  as  cultivation  advances,  the  lands  become 
marked  off  into  aliquot  parts,  two  anas,  four  anas,  &c., 
or  portions  of  them  are  granted  to  inferior  tenants,  as 
nim  howalas,  karshas,  &c.  A  ryot  cannot  cultivate 
more  than  a  certain  amount  of  land — say  forty  or  fifty 
bighas  at  the  outside — and  if,  therefore,  he  get  a  grant 
of  jungle  which  is  double  or  quadruple  that  size,  he  is 
obliged  in  time  to  let  out  a  portion  to  some  one.  It 
is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  the  cultivation  of  jungle 
in  Bakarganj  has  been  accomplished  by  squatters.  Mugs 
squat  in  the  Sundarbans,  and  occasionally  a  Bengali 
may  take  possession  of  an  uncultivated  bit  of  land,  but 
such  instances  are  rare.  Neither  has  the  reclamation 
been  accomplished  by  the  zamindars  or  other  large  pro- 
prietors of  land.  As  a  rule,  these  men  are  absentees  or 
indolent,  and  the  main  stress  of  the  work  of  cultivation 
has  fallen  on  the  under-tenure  holders  or  middlemen. 
It  is  the  howaladar  and  the  nim  howaladar  who  have 
brought  the  Sundarbans  and  the  chars  of  Dakhin  Shah- 
bdzpiir  into  cultivation. 

In  consequence  of  under-tenures,  we  often  find  three 
or  four  persons  holding  different  rights  in  the  same  piece 
of  ground.  It  has  been  said  that  the  number  some- 
times amounts  to  eight  or  nine,  Ijut  I  have  never  come 
across  an  instance  of  so  many.  It  is  c[uite  common, 
however,  to  find  three  or  four ;  and  it  is  this  complica- 
tion  which   makes    the   taking  up  of   land  for  public 


1 96  DISTRICT  OF  BAKAR GANJ. 

purposes  such  a  thorny  piece  of  business  in  Bakarganj. 
At  the  top  we  have  the  zamindar  or  independent 
taluqdar,  who  pays  the  revenue  to  Government,  and 
who  is  thus  the  tenant  in  cafite  of  feudal  haw.  After 
him  come  the  ausat  taluqdar,  the  howaladar,  the  nim 
howaladar,  and  the  karshadar  or  tiller  of  the  soil.  The 
karshadar  is  the  lowest  in  the  scale,  unless  we  add  the 
borohadar ;  but  there  is  more  than  one  description  of 
karsha-tenure.  There  is  the  mircis  karslia,  or  miras 
malguzari,  as  it  is  also  called,  which  is  a  hereditary  and 
transferable  tenure,  and  is  often  underlaid  by  the  miadi 
or  temporary  karsha.  The  incidents  of  a  karsha  are 
different  also  in  different  parts  of  the  district.  Thus 
in  Dakhin  Shahbazpiir  a  karsha  is  by  local  custom 
transferable  by  sale,  and  is  sold  in  execution  of  decrees 
accordingly,  whereas  in  Bakarganj  Proper  karshas  are 
generally  looked  upon  as  not  saleable.  All  over  the 
district,  however,  ryots  are  in  the  habit  of  selling  their 
holdings,  especially  their  homesteads,  and  in  practice 
these  transfers  are  generally  recognised  by  the  superior 
landlord.  The  rent  is  commonly  paid  to  a  gomasta  or 
tahsildar,  and  he  is  glad  enough  to  get  it,  for  often  he 
has  contracted  to  pay  a  certain  sum  to  his  master, 
whatever  his  collections  may  amount  to ;  and  if  the 
transferee  pays  him  the  rent,  and  also  gives  him  a 
nazzar  or  present,  he  seldom  objects  to  the  change  of 
name. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  because  there  are  a 
great  number  of  under-tenures  in  Bakarganj,  there  must 
be  at  least  an  equal  number  of  distinct  persons  who  hold 
these  separate  rights.  It  often  ha^^pens  that  one  and 
the  same  person  holds  three  or  four  classes  of  rights  in 
the  same  piece  of  ground  ;  and  thus,  though  it  is  com- 
mon enough  to  find  four  or  five  gradations  of  rights  in 


LAND  TENURES.  197 

one  field,  it  is  not  so  common  to  iind  tluat  cacli  of 
these  riglits  is  lield  by  a  distinct  person.  Tims  the 
same  person  is  often  both  ausat  talnqdar  and  howaladar  ; 
and  nearly  all  zamindars  and  taluqdars  possess  subordi- 
nate riglits  in  their  estates,  and  are  their  own  ausat 
taluqda.rs,  howaladars,  and  even  karshadars.  The  exist- 
ence of  each  of  these  riglits  is  carefully  kept  up  in 
the  zamindari  accounts,  and  leads  to  a  very  intricate 
system  of  debit  and  credit,  or  jama  kharach,  as  it  is 
called.  Thus  a  zamindar  will  be  found  crediting  him- 
self with  rent  payable  to  him  as  zamindar  by  himself 
as  howaladar,  and  again  debiting  himself  as  howaladar 
w^itli  the  rent  due  to  himself  as  zamindar.  Nor  is  the 
system  so  superfluous  or  irrational  as  it  at  first  sight 
appears.  It  arises  in  a  great  measure  from  the  sub- 
division of  property,  and  from  the  fact  of  many  estates 
being  held  jointly  —  i.e.,  ijmdli.  Thus  a  person  may 
have  a  two  or  threc-aud-a-half  ana  share  in  a  zamindari, 
and  under  this  there  is  a  taluq  or  liowala,  the  rent  of 
which  is  payable  to  all  the  shareholders  in  the  zamin- 
dari— that  is,  in  the  case  under  illustration,  the  person 
gets  two  or  two  and  a  half  anas  rent  of  the  taluq  or 
howala ;  but  if  this  taluq  or  how^ala  is  sold  by  decree 
of  court  or  otherwise,  and  the  shareholder  in  the  zamin- 
dari buy  it,  he  acquires  a  new  right,  and  one  which 
may  be  very  valuable  to  him.  If  the  whole  right  in 
the  taluq  or  howala — i.e.,  the  sixteen-ana  right,  as  it 
is  called — is  sold,  he  becomes  full  proprietor  of  the  lands 
comprised  in  it,  and  pays  fourteen  or  thirteen  and  a  half 
anas  of  the  rent  of  it  to  his  co-sharers  in  the  zamindari, 
and  pays  the  remainder  to  himself.  It  does  not  follow 
that  because  he  has  bought  the  taluq  or  howala,  he  gets 
khas  or  direct  possession  of  the  land ;  for  there  may  be 
a  nim  howala  or  a  karslia  below  the  right  he  has  pur- 


198  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

cliased,  and  if  he  wishes  direct  possession,  he  may  have 
to  go  on  purchasing  the  other  rights  in  the  land.     It  is 
the  contests  between  shareholders  in  zamindaries  about 
the  buying  or  otherwise  getting  possession  of  under- 
tenures  in   their  joint  estates  Avhicli  lead  to  so  much 
fio-htino-  amongst  tlicm  in  and  out  of  the  courts.    Though 
we  may  deplore  the  circumstance,  we  can  hardly  say 
that  it  is  absurd  or  unnatural.     It  is  also  this  system 
which  makes  it  so  very  difficult  to  carry  through  a  bat- 
wara  or  partition  in  Bakarganj,  or  indeed  anywliere  in 
Bengal.     At  first  sight  it  seems  simple  enough  to  divide 
a  zamindari  into  three  or  four  shares,  but  when  we  find 
that  the  zamindari  share  is  by  no  means  the  only,  or 
even  the  most  valuable  rioht  which   each  shareholder 
possesses,  the  problem  becomes  much  more  complicated. 
The  shareholders  in  a  zamindari  often  make  a  rough 
kind  of  division  of  their  shares,  or  a  Mofussil  batwara, 
as   they   call    it  —  that   is,    their   zamindari  lands  are 
often  distinct,  and  their  ryots  are  distinct  also.     There 
are  often  ryots  who  pay  the  whole,  or  the  sixteen  anas, 
of  their  rent  to  one  shareholder,  and  who  have  nothing 
whatever  to  do  with  any  of  the  other  shareholders,  and 
this  although  no  legal  partition  of  the  estate  may  have 
taken  place ;  but  the  relation  of  ryot  and  zamindar  is 
never  the  only  one  which  exists  in  a  joint  estate.     Each 
si) are  is  dovetailed  into  the  others  by  an  intricate  series 
of  under-tenures,   and  it  is   the    separation    and   con- 
solidation  of  these  subsidiary  rights  possessed  by  the 
shareholders  which  constitutes  the  difficulty  of  making 
a  partition.     The  outside  public  cannot  be. expected  to 
know  much   of    such    matters,   and   may  therefore  be 
excused  when  they  denounce  the  delay  in  making  23arti- 
tions,  and  ascribe  it  to  the  trickery  of  the  amins  and 
insouciance  of  collectors.      But  I  have  known  a  Com- 


LAND  TENURES. 


199 


missioner  who  ^Yatt  no  better  informed,  and  who  gravely 
observed  that  all  wliich  was  required  for  the  partition 
of  an  estate  containing  some  thirty  thousand  acres  was 
to  make  a  map  of  it,  and  tlien  to  divide  it  off  into 
three  or  four  blocks,  according  to  the  number  and  extent 
of  the  shares.  Truly  this  seemed  simple  enough  ;  but 
suppose  that  one  block  had  consisted  of  under-tenures 
paying  a  low  and  unenhanceable  rent,  and  that  another 
had  consisted  of  ryotwari  land  paying  the  full  pargana 
rate,  and  the  tenants  of  which  could  be  evicted,  where 
would  be  the  equality  in  value  of  the  two  blocks  ? 

Although  the  system  of  undcr-tenures  has  mainly 
arisen  out  of  the  physical  characteristics  of  Bdkarganj, 
I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  their  number  has  not 
often  been  multiplied  unnecessarily  by  the  subtlety 
or  tenacity  of  the  Bengali.  One  use  frequently  made 
of  the  large  number  of  under-tenures  is  to  enable  a 
man  to  retain  his  hold  on  a  property  after  one  or  more 
of  his  rights  has  been  sold.  Thus  we  may  say  that 
the  sale-law  is  one  cause  of  sub-infeudation.  Suppose, 
for  instance,  that  a  zamindar's  rigbt  and  title  in  his 
zamindari  are  sold  for  arrears  of  revenue,  or  in  satisfac- 
tion of  a  decree,  it  might  be  imagined  that  this  would 
terminate  his  connection  with  the  estate ;  but,  as  a 
general  rule,  this  would  Ijc  far  from  the  case.  The 
mazul  —  i.e.,  quondam  zamindar  —  does  not  surrender 
his  hold  on  the  land  so  readily.  If  he  cannot  in  any 
way  impeach  the  sale  by  showing  that  he  did  not  get 
notice  of  it,  that  the  estate  was  sold  below  its  value, 
that  the  decree  was  fraudulent,  &c.,  or  that  the  pro- 
perty did  not  belong  to  him,  but  was  his  wife's  or  his 
brother-in-law's,  he  proceeds  to  another  battle-field,  and 
claims  to  hold  a  nij  taluq — i.e.,  a  taluq  belonging  to  the 
zamindar — or  a  howala,  or  other  under-tenure.     Indeed, 


200  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

the  Bengali,  and  especially  the  Bdkarganj  Bengali,  holds 
on  to  his  land  with  a  persistence  which  reminds  one  of 
the  Athenian  soldier  who  grasped  the  Persian  ship  with 
his  ricrht  hand,  and  who,  when  that  was  cut  off,  seized 
it  with  his  left,  and  when  that  too  was  lopped  away, 
cluno-  to  it  with  his  teeth.  The  last  fight  of  all  made 
by  a  dispossessed  proprietor  is  generally  that  for  the 
hhanahari  or  paternal  homestead,  and  is  literally  a  fight 
pro  ard  etfoco.  The  most  serious  riots  in  the  district 
have  their  origin  in  disputes  between  the  auction  pur- 
chaser and  the  old  proprietor,  and  the  casus  belli  is  then 
generally  a  dispute  about  an  under-tenure.  Such  a 
riot  occurred  in  the  early  part  of  this  century,  when 
the  Tagores  took  possession  of  Idilpiir,  and  also  when 
All  Khan,  the  grandfather  of  Khajah  Ahsanoolah,  took 
possession  of  his  share  of  Selimdbad,  &c. 

ZiMBA. — A  practice  which  gives  rise  to  much  sub- 
infeudation, and  to  many  breaches  of  the  peace,  is  that 
called  zioiiha,  and  which  seems,  in  name  at  least,  pecu- 
liar to  Bdkarganj.  Zimba  literally  means  charge  or  pro- 
tection, and  the  system  of  zimba,  as  it  is  understood  in 
B^karganj,  means  a  practice  by  which  a  ryot,  or  other 
subordinate  holder  of  land,  transfers  his  allegiance  from 
his  proper  landlord  to  a  third  party.  This  third  party 
is  called  his  zimhadai\  Thus  A.  B.  is  a  ryot  having  a 
right  of  occupancy  in  his  land.  He  is  oppressed  by  his 
landlord  or  is  discontented  with  him,  and  so  he  goes  to 
another  proprietor  and  offers  to  come  under  his  zimba. 
If  this  oft'er  be  accepted,  he  generally  transfers  his  hold- 
ing to  his  protector  by  deed  of  sale,  and  receives  it  back 
again  by  another  deed.  Thus  the  possession  of  the  land 
does  not  actually  pass,  the  ryot  continues  to  hold  his 
house  and  land  as  before,  but  pays  his  rent  to  his  zimba- 


LAND  TENURES.  201 

dar,  who  in  turn  pays  it  to  the  real  landlord.  Should 
the  latter  refuse  to  receive  it,  it  is  deposited  in  court, 
or  simply  withheld  till  a  suit  is  brought  and  a  decree 
obtained.  In  the  deed  by  which  the  ryot  gets  back  his 
land  he  is  generally  described  as  getting  the  tenure  next 
below  that  which  he  sold.  Thus  if  he  be  a  howaladar, 
he  sells  the  howala  and  becomes  the  nim  howaladar;  if  he 
is  a  miras  karshadar,  he  becomes  an  ordinary  karshadar. 
If  in  reality  he  have  no  transferable  right,  and  be  merely 
an  occupancy-ryot,  or  even  a  ryot  without  the  right  of 
occupancy,  he  will  still  describe  himself  as  an  under- 
tenure  holder  of  some  kind — i.e.,  a  nim  howaladar — and 
so  get  over  the  difficulty  of  his  position.  The  system  of 
zimba  is  especially  common  in  ijmali  or  joint  estates, 
and  the  reason  for  this  is  intelligible  enough.  When  a 
ryot  has  several  masters  he  is  often  oppressed  or  har- 
assed by  them.  He  therefore  finds  it  his  best  plan  to 
come  under  the  zimba  of  the  most  j^owerful  or  the  most 
troublesome  among  them,  as  thenceforth  he  has  only 
one  man  to  conciliate.  The  system  is  a  bad  one,  and 
nothing  gives  rise  to  more  disputes,  I  am  sorry  to  say, 
too,  that  it  appears  to  have  received  a  fresh  imjjetus 
from  the  passing  of  the  Eegistration  law,  and  that  many 
deeds  which  are  pointed  to  as  proofs  of  the  increase  of 
sub-infeudation  are  in  reality  merely  paper  transfers,  and 
do  not  express  any  substantive  change  in  the  tenancy 
of  the  land.  I  may  note  here  that  the  purposes  of  the 
Eegistration  law  are  often  perverted  by  persons  who 
want  to  take  possession  of  laud  which  docs  not  be- 
long to  them.  The  Bengali  cannot  get  rid  of  the  idea 
that  a  registered  hahuliyat  is  evidence  against  third 
parties  ;  so  when  two  parties  are  fighting  about,  say, 
the  possession  of  a  newly-formed  char,  each  of  them 
takes  a  troop  of  his  dependents  to  the  register  office, 


202  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

and  makes  tliem  register  kabiiliyats  or  leases  for  land 
wliicli  they  have  not  possession  of.  It  is  Ly  no  means 
easy  to  punish  such  proceedings,  for  as  between  the 
parties  there  is  no  fraud  or  deception,  and  if  no  action 
is  taken  after  the  registration,  it  is  difficult  to  prove 
that  a  third  party  has  been  injured.  There  is,  I  think, 
a  defect  in  the  Eegistration  law  on  this  point. 

When  a  ryot  gives  his  land  in  zimba  lie  generally 
oives  a  present  or  salarai  to  the  zimbadar,  and,  I  believe, 
he  defrays  all  the  conveyancing  expenses  —  i.e.,  the 
stamps,  registration  fees,  &c.  The  proper  landlord  of 
the  ryot,  of  course,  opposes  the  zimbadari  process  as 
much  as  possible,  for  not  only  does  he  lose  prestige  by 
his  ryot  being  no  longer  "  his  man,"  so  to  speak,  but 
he  loses  certain  incidents  of  homage.  In  fact,  he  hence- 
forth gets  merely  the  bare  rent  of  the  land,  and  loses 
the  cesses  paid  by  the  ryot,  such  as  marriage  presents, 
fines  for  cattle  trespass,  &c.,  as  all  these  are  paid  to  the 
zimbadar.  In  Hallam's  "  Middle  Ages  "  mention  is 
made  of  the  system  of  commendation,  which  he  de- 
scribes as  a  personal  relation  between  lord  and  vassal, 
resembling  that  of  patron  and  client  in  the  Roman  Re- 
public. I  think  that  this  system  must  have  closely 
resembled  the  Bdkarganj  zimba,  and  I  would  suggest 
that  the  word  "  zimba "  mis^ht  be  translated  "  com- 
mendation."  , 

Perhaps  the  description  of  one  or  two  actual  cases  of 
zimba  will  put  the  matter  in  a  much  clearer  light.  I 
shall  take  the  first  illustration  from  the  subdivision  of 
Perozpiir,  which,  by  the  wa}^,  is  the  most  troublesome 
part  of  the  district,  and  is  to  the  other  subdivisions  of 
it  what  Bdkarganj  is  to  the  rest  of  Bengal.  There  is  a 
village  called  Kal  Megha  in  the  Matbdria  tliana,  in  the 
Sundarban  estate  of  Gyanparo.,  and  away  down  at  the 


LA^'I)  TENURES.  203 

mouth  of  the  Bishkhali  river.     The  land  had  lono-  re- 

o 

mained  as  a  Sundarban  forest,  but  some  years  ago  the 
wealthy  Hindu  family  of  the  Seins  or  Mahallana\-ises  of 
Basinda  acquired  certain  rights  in  the  place,  and  set 
about  reclaiming  the  jungle.  For  this  purpose  they 
brought  in  ryots  from  other  vdlages  and  settled  them  at 
a  considerable  expense.  Here  I  must  make  a  digression 
in  order  to  explain  the  process  by  which  jungle  is  re- 
claimed, when  done  not  by  the  middlemen  or  under- 
tenure  holders  acting  independently,  but  by  a  zamindar 
or  moneyed  man.  It  then  becomes  a  regular  case  of 
colonisation.  The  zamindar  does  not,  as  might  be  sup- 
posed, hire  a  number  of  labourers  to  clear  the  ground, 
but  he  acts  somewhat  as  the  Xew  Zealand  Government 
acts  with  emigrants.  He  induces  ryots  to  come  and 
settle  by  making  them  advances  for  the  removal  of  their 
houses  and  cattle,  by  giving  them  rice,  by  establishing  a 
convenient  market  for  them,  &c.  In  many  cases  he  has 
to  purchase  cattle  for  them,  and  to  build  their  houses. 
Further,  he  takes  no  rent  from  them  for  three  or  four 
years,  and  he  promises  them  permanency  of  tenure  at 
a  moderate  rent.  AVhen  a  ryot  accepts  such  terms  and 
comes  down  to  the  jungle,  he  generally  leaves  his  wife 
and  family  behind  him  for  a  year  or  two,  and  puts  up 
a  small  house  where  he  and  one  or  two  of  his  brothers 
or  friends  can  sleep.  In  this  doala  homestead — i.e., 
subsidiarv  or  second  home — he  lives  during  the  workino" 
season,  and  only  occasionally  revisits  his  home.  If  he 
find  the  place  unhealthy,  or  too  much  infested  with 
rigers,  or  otherwise  unsuitable,  he  aljaudons  it ;  but  if 
he  think  that  it  will  suit  him,  and  elect  to  remain,  he 
gradually  plants  fruit-trees,  &c.,  and  eventually  brings 
away  his  old  house  (roof  and  aU  being  carried  on  boats), 
and  settles  in  the  new  place  with  his  family.     In  mak- 


204  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

ing  siicli  arrangements  regular  leases  or  pattas  are  not 
given  at  first.  This  would  be  too  expensive,  on  account 
of  the  registration  and  stamp  fees ;  and  besides,  neither 
party  can  precisely  say  what  the  land  is  worth  until 
after  two  or  three  years'  trial.  The  practice,  therefore, 
is  that  either  no  documents  are  given  at  all,  or  only  a 
preliminary  one  on  unstamped  paper,  and  not  hard  and 
fast  in  its  terms.  This  is  given  to  the  ryot,  and  is  called 
an  amilnama. 

This  25ractice  was  followed  by  the  Seins  in  Kal  Megha, 
but  after  the  ryots  had  been  settled  for  some  years,  and 
had  cleared  a  good  deal  of  land,  the  Seins  delayed  or 
refused  to  give  them  permanent  leases.  The  excuse 
given  by  them  for  not  giving  them  was  that  the  ryots 
were  threatening  to  be  rebellious,  and  that  they  w^ere 
afraid  lest,  by  giving  them  permanent,  and  therefore 
transferable  rights,  they  should  be  putting  weapons  into 
their  hands,  which  might  be  used  against  themselves  by 
the  transference  of  their  rights  to  a  zimbadar.  Disputes 
arose  between  the  Seins  and  the  ryots  about  this,  and  as 
the  quarrel  was  fomented  by  one  Sidam  Mia,  a  Maho- 
medan  taluqdar  of  the  neighbourhood,  a  number  of  the 
newly-settled  ryots  went  over  to  him  and  under  his 
zimba,  saying  that  they  were  nim  howalas  and  not 
simple  ryots. 

The  Seins  seeing  this,  and  fearing  lest  they  should  be 
suddenly  dispossessed  and  deprived  of  the  fruits  of  their 
labours  and  expenditure,  hired  clubmen,  and  endeavoured 
to  bring  the  ryots  back  to  their  allegiance,  and  to  keep 
Sidam  Mia  out  of  the  village.  The  result  was  several 
affrays,  in  which  firearms  were  used  and  one  or  two 
persons  killed. 

It  might  be  thought  that  this  was  a  dispute  which 
could  have  been  easily  settled  by  the  authorities,  as  Sidam 


LAND  TENURES.  205 

Mia  was  manifestly  a  usurper,  and  was  trying  to  reap 
what  lie  had  not  sown.  But  in  fact  the  matter  was  not 
so  simple.  It  is  true  that  neither  he  nor  the  ryots  could 
say  that  he  had  spent  any  money  in  improving  the  pro- 
perty, or  could  deny  that  the  ryots  had  been  brought  in 
by  the  Seins,  but  Sidam  Mia  had,  nevertheless,  rights 
in  Gyanpara.  He  Avas  the  superior  landlord  and  paid 
revenue  to  Government,  and  he  could  and  did  say  that 
the  subordinate  or  under-tenure  rights  claimed  by  the 
Seins  did  not  exist  or  were  exaggerated,  and  that  the 
clearings  were  part  of  his  khas  land — i.e.,  were  included 
in  the  land  of  which  he  had  direct  possession.  For  these 
reasons  an  attempt  made  by  the  magistrate  to  quiet 
the  dispute  by  j)i'ohibiting  Sidam  Mia  or  his  people 
from  entering  the  village,  failed  before  the  Sessions 
judge,  and  the  contest  continued  for  several  months. 

At  length  Sidam  Mia  died,  and  though  his  claims 
were  maintained  by  his  family,  they  had  eventually  to 
yield  to  the  longer  purse  of  their  opponents.  Sidam 
Mia's  share  in  Gyanpara  Avas  put  up  for  sale  in  execution 
of  a  decree,  and  was  bought  by  the  Seins  and  others  for 
some  Rs.40,000,  so  that  they  have  now  both  the  superior 
and  the  subordinate  rights  in  the  estate. 

An  instance  of  zimba  was  nearly  occurring  the  other 
day  in  the  large  Government  estate  of  Tushkhali,  which 
is  also  in  the  Perozpur  subdivision.  This  estate,  which 
yields  upwards  of  R.  78,000  a  year,  was  let  in  farm  for 
twenty  years  to  the  Messrs  Morrell.  The  ryots  became 
discontented  with  the  farmers  because  the  latter  wanted 
to  raise  their  rent,  and  indeed  had  taken  the  farm  at  an 
advance  of  Rs.  15,000  on  the  old  rental,  on  the  condition 
that  they  were  to  be  allowed  to  enhance  the  ryots'  rents. 
The  ryots  objected,  urging  that  their  dols  or  leases 
were  permanent,  and  refused  to  break  them,    as   they 


2o6  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

phrased  it,  by  giving  any  higher  rate.  When,  there- 
fore, the  farmers  issued  notices  on  them,  and  took  other 
steps  to  raise  their  rent,  the  ryots  went  to  various 
zamindarsin  the  district — i.e.,  to  the  Raikd,tti  zamindars, 
to  Khajah  Ahsanoolah,  and  to  Har  Chandra  Chakrabarti 
of  Kajlakdtti — and  offered  to  make  over  their  dols  to 
them  and  to  come  under  their  zimba.  As  an  inducement 
to  the  acceptance  of  this  offer  they  were  willing  to  pay 
salami,  &c.  Had  their  offers  been  accepted,  a  serious 
disturbance  might  have  occurred,  but  the  zamindars 
were  afraid  and  held  aloof. 

It  is  a  melancholy  fact  that  the  more  energetic  and 
able  a  zamindar  is,  the  more  is  he  disposed  to  create 
disturbances  with  his  neighbours  and  to  thwart  the 
authorities.  Such  a  person  is  always  thrusting  himself 
into  the  affairs  of  other  estates,  and  is  a  centre  of  mis- 
rule and  disaffection.  Doubtless  this  is  in  a  great 
measure  the  result  of  the  exclusion  of  such  men  from 
legitimate  careers  ;  and  it  must  be  said,  too,  that  his 
interference  is  not  always  unneeded,  and  not  always  quite 
spontaneous  on  his  part.  If  a  zamindar  has  a  reputation 
for  ability  and  courage,  the  ryots  of  other  estates  come 
to  him  and  beg  him  to  assist  them  against  their  oppres- 
sors. If  interference  of  this  kind  was  pardonable  or 
commendable  on  the  part  of  the  ancient  Romans,  who 
built  up  their  empire  in  this  way,  we  cannot  severely 
blame  a  Bengali  zamindar  for  acting  in  a  similar  manner. 
I  do  not  mean  to  defend  the  zimba  system,  but  I  believe 
that  it  often  serves  to  protect  the  weak  against  the 
strong,  and  that  it  will  last  as  long  as  the  administration 
of  justice  is  weak,  uncertain,  and  dilatory.  The  know- 
ledge that  his  ryots  will,  if  driven  to  extremities,  accept 
tlie  protection  of  a  zimbadar,  will  often  prevent  a  tyran- 
nical landlord  from  oppressing  them  too  much.     In  other 


LAND  TENURES.  207 

districts  ryots  run  away  when  too  much  trampled  upon  ; 
in  Bdkarganj  they  go  to  a  zimbadar.  If  elsewhere 
zamindari  management  may  often  be  described  as  op- 
pression tempered  by  the  fear  of  desertion,  it  may  be 
described  as  being  in  Bakarganj  oppression  tempered 
by  the  fear  of  zimbadari.  Oppression  from  their 
zamindar  is  not  the  only  kind  under  which  ryots  have 
to  suffer.  They  are  often  still  more  grievously  oppressed 
by  their  fellow-villagers,  and  have  resort  to  the  zimba- 
dari system  to  protect  themselves  against  this  form  of 
oppression  also.  The  following  is  an  instance  of  oppres- 
sion by  fellow- villagers. 

In  the  village  of  Phalaghar,  near  the  Bd,karganj  thana, 
there  was  in  1871  a  Hindu  ryot  who  had  a  quarrel 
with  his  neighbours  about  a  road.  He  was  a  boat- 
builder  as  well  as  a  cultivator,  and  required  access  to 
the  khdl,  which  flowed  within  a  few  yards  of  his 
homestead.  When  he  and  his  neighbour  were  on  good 
terms,  the  latter  allowed  him  a  right  of  way  across 
his  homestead,  but  when  for  some  reason  or  other 
they  quarrelled,  his  neighbour  would  not  allow  him 
to  use  the  road  any  longer,  at  least  not  for  his  cattle ; 
it  became,  therefore,  necessary  that  the  boatbuilder 
should  find  a  new  road.  I  have  seen  the  place  myself, 
and  can  therefore  say  that  the  road  was  a  necessity 
for  Kamal  and  Golab,  the  two  owners  of  the  more 
remote  homestead.  When  their  neighbour  Chandra 
Dali  inhibited  them  from  crossing  his  homestead,  they 
tried  to  make  a  new  road,  a  little  to  one  side  of  the 
old  one.  Unfortunately  there  was  a  small  bit  of  waste 
land  in  the  new  line  of  road,  which  belonged  to  Chandra 
Dali,  and  which,  though  it  was  of  no  use  to  him,  he 
would  not  let  them  have.  Here  I  should  explain  that 
the  homesteads   both   of   Chandra   Dali  and  of  Golab 


2o8  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

and  Kamal  were  included  in  a  taluq  belonging  to  a 
member  of  tlie  De  Silva  family  of  Sibpiir.  Kamal  and 
Golab's  homestead,  however,  w\as  a  nim  howala,  and 
included  in  the  first  instance  in  a  howala  belonging 
to  one  Raj  Narain  Bannerji,  which  again  w^as  included 
in  the  De  Silva  taluq.  Chandra  Dali  was  also  con- 
nected with  Raj  Narain  Bauarji,  as  he  was  his  kar- 
shadar;  but  I  believe  this  was  for  lands  other  than 
his  homestead.  Kamal  and  Golab  first  tried  to  get  the 
little  bit  of  waste  land  from  Raj  Narain,  but  though 
they  got  a  right  in  it,  they  could  not  dispossess 
Chandra  Dali,  who  to  make  his  position  stronger, 
suddenly  put  up  a  small  hut  on  the  land  and  placed 
an  old  female  relative  in  it  to  act  as  watchwoman. 
By  the  way,  it  is  rather  a  favourite  trick  with  Bakar- 
ganj  people  to  make  use  of  their  poor  relations  as 
chaukidars  and  as  signs  of  possession.  They  run  up 
a  hut  in  a  night,  put  an  old  man  or  woman  into  it, 
add  a  few  pots  and  j^ans,  and  then  when  the  police 
come  they  are  ready  to  swear  that  the  hut  has  been 
on  the  spot  and  in  occuj^ation  for  several  years.  Kamal 
and  Golab  being  unable  to  get  their  road  amicably, 
went  ofl!"  some  fifteen  miles  to  a  powerful  zamindar  at 
Madhabpdsha,  who  had  long  been  anxious  to  get  a 
footing  in  the  village  of  Phalaghar,  and  who  was  on 
bad  terms  with  the  De  Silvas,  and  offered  to  come 
under  his  zimba.  He  agreed ;  a  deed  was  executed, 
whereby  the  zamindar  bought  in  the  name  of  his 
brother-in-law,  for  Rs.25,  a  portion  of  Kamal  and 
Golab's  nim  howala ;  and  shortly  afterwards  the 
real  consideration  was  paid  by  the  zamindar's  de- 
spatching a  body  of  clubmen  to  the  village.  They 
arrived  in  the  night,  and  early  next  morning  (it  was 
Christmas  Day)  they  and   a  party  of  ryots  proceeded 


LAND  TENURES.  209 

to  make  a  road  across  the  waste  land ;  Init,  inifor- 
tuuately  for  tlicmselves,  Chandra  Dali  and  his  reLatives 
heard  the  noise  of  the  workers,  and  rushed  out  to 
oppose  them.  A  fight  ensued,  in  which,  as  might  l)e 
supposed,  the  professional  clubmen  were  victorious,  and 
in  which  two  of  Chandra  Dali's  party  were  killed  and 
one  severely  wounded.  This  case  is  an  illustration  of 
the  anarchy  which  often  prevails  in  a  Bdkarganj  village. 
Had  De  Silva  or  the  Madhabpasha  zamindar  been  good 
landlords,  they  might  have  arbitrated  in  the  matter, 
and  have  satisfied  both  parties ;  but  they  preferred  to 
indulge  their  natural  animosities,  and  the  above  was 
the  result. 

It  might  be  expected  that  I  should  give  statistics  of 
the  number  of  under-tenures  in  Bakarganj,  but,  in  fact, 
no  trustworthy  figures  are  procurable.  The  inquiries  in 
connection  with  the  road  cess  will  doubtless  give  some 
information  on  the  subject,  though  I  doubt  if  even  they 
will  elicit  complete  information. 

III.    LAKHIRAJ,    OR    RENT-FREE    TENURES. 

The  number  of  officially-recorded  rent-free  tenures  is 
only  twenty-three,  and  of  these  several  are  of  recent 
origin,  having  been  created  by  the  rule,  which  was  for 
some  time  in  force,  of  selling  rent  free  the  properties 
which  yielded  less  than  a  rupee  of  revenue  to  Govern- 
ment. There  are,  however,  1143  lakhiraj  sanads  or 
grants  in  the  Collectorate  record-room,  and  these  are 
prol^ably  valid,  though  their  authenticity  has  never  been 
formally  recognised,  and  it  is  not  known  even  whether 
the  lands  referred  to  in  them  are  in  existence  or  not. 
The  number  of  rent-free  holdings  in  Bdkarganj  is  in 
reality   very   considerable,    though    in   most   cases   the 


2IO  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

quantity  of  land  is  so  small  that  the  Government  officials 
did  not  inquire  into  the  validity  of  the  grant.  Many 
of  these  rent-free  lands  are  Brdhmuttar — i.e.,  they  are 
lands  granted  to  Brd,hmans.  They  are  especially  com- 
mon in  pargana  Cliandradwip,  and  are  said  to  owe  their 
origin  chiefly  to  the  liberality  of  Rajah  Sheo  Narain,  who 
was  a  oreat  patron  of  Brdhmans,  and  who  ended  by 
becoming  insane  and  setting  fire  to  his  palace.  In  his 
liberality  to  priests  he  resembled  that  Scotch  king  who 
was  described  by  one  of  his  successors  as  a  sore  saint 
for  the  crown. 

None  of  the  lakhiraj  tenures  seems  to  be  of  any  interest 
excejDt  the  Srinagar  holding  of  the  Chandradwip  Rajahs, 
and  that  at  Sujdbdd,  formerly  possessed  by  some  Afghan 
soldiers.     Both  of  these  have  been  described  elsewhere. 


(     211    ) 


PART  II. 

CHAPTER  VIII. 
THE  PEOPLE    OF  bAkARGANJ. 
I.  GENERAL  REMARKS. 

The  population  of  Bdkarganj,  according  to  the  census  of 
1872,  and  after  deductions  on  account  of  tlie  transfer  of 
the  Mddaripur  subdivision,  is  1,878,144;  of  whom 
1,254,429  are  Mahomedans,  615,269  Hindus,  4049  Bud- 
dhists, and  3264  Christians/  It  thus  appears  that  two- 
thirds  of  the  inhabitants  are  Mahomedans.  The  Hindus 
are  in  a  minority  in  almost  every  part  of  the  district, 
but  are  especially  outnumbered  in  the  south  and  in 
Dakhin  Shahbdzpur,  where  nearly  the  whole  population 
is  Mahomedan.  The  Hindus  are  most  numerous  in  the 
northern  and  western  thanas  of  Gournadi,  Jhalukdtti, 
and  Sarupkdtti. 

Before  proceeding  to  describe  the  inhabitants  of 
Bdkarganj  according  to  the  divisions  made  by  their 
different  creeds,  it  seems  right  to  say  something  of  their 
general  characteristics,  apart  from  the  colouring  which 
particular  religions  may  have  given  to  portions  of  them. 

Carlyle  says  that  the  most  important  thing  about  a 
man  is  his  religion ;  but  he  afterwards  so  qualifies  this 
remark,  so  flattens  out  its  point,  so  to  speak,  that  it 

1  See  note  at  p.  247. 


212 


DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 


becomes  the  mere  truism,  that  tlie  most  important  thing 
about  a  man  is  his  character,  or  even  the  tautological 
statement,  that  the  most  important  thing  about  a  man 

is what  is  most  important  about  him.     It  seems  to  me 

that  it  would  be  truer  to  say  that  the  most  important 
thino-  about  an  individual  man  is  the  character  of  his 
parents,  and  about  a  people  the  race  to  which  it  belongs. 
Certainly  I  do  not  think,  in  looking  at  the  Btikarganj 
people,  that  it  would  be  correct  to  say  that  the  most 
important  thing  about  the  majority  of  them  is  whether 
they  are  Hindus  or  Mahomedans.  They  were  Bengalis 
before  they  were  Hindus  or  Mahomedans  :  as  regards  the 
world  in  general,  the  most  important  fact  about  them  is 
that  they  belong  to  the  Bengali  race ;  and  as  regards 
Bengal,  that  they  are  natives  of  Bakarganj.  It  is  true 
that  Bdkarganj  is  not  a  natural  division  of  country,  and 
that  it  is  not  even  an  old  artificial  one.  Still  it  is  a 
large  and  tolerably  compact  tract  of  territory,  containing 
nearly  two  millions  of  inhabitants,  who  must,  from  con- 
tiguity of  place  and  other  similarity  of  circumstances, 
have  some  characteristics  in  common.  We  find,  accord- 
ingly, that  by  general  consent  of  foreigners,  whether 
Englishmen  or  inhabitants  of  other  parts  of  Bengal,  the 
people  of  Bdkarganj  have  certain  peculiarities  which 
mark  them  out  from  the  rest  of  their  countrymen.  These 
peculiarities  are  not,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  of  an  amiable 
description,  and  consist  in  tlie  possession  of  superior 
craftiness  and  greater  turbulence  of  spirit.  Hence  the 
frequency  of  remarks  such  as  that  every  man  in  Bdkar- 
ganj  is  a  lawyer,  nothing  is  impossible  in  Bcikarganj,  &c. 
It  would  be  idle  to  attempt  to  deny  altogether  the  truth 
of  such  remarks.  Foreigners  seldom  or  never  abuse  the 
people  of  any  country  altogether  without  cause  ;  and  it 
is  better  for  the  latter  to  accept  external  criticisms  as 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  213 

partially  true,  and  endeavour  to  profit  by  tliem,  than  to 
get  angry,  and  regard  tliem  as  entirely  false.  AVhat 
especially  strikes  foreigners  is  the  litigiousness  of  the 
Bilkarganj  people,  and  no  doubt  this  is  a  marked  fea- 
ture in  their  character.  Cases,  both  civil  and  criminal, 
are  more  numerous  and  more  intricate  in  Bdkarganj  than 
in  other  districts.  Bakarganj  ryots,  too,  are  a  byword 
for  turbulence,  and  for  the  readiness  \Yith  which  they 
combine  to  oppose  their  landlords.  Forgery  and  perjury 
are  of  frequent  occurrence ;  and  such  is  the  insecurity  of 
the  relation  of  landlord  and  tenant,  that  a  practice  has 
arisen  which  is,  I  believe,  almost  peculiar  to  Bdkarganj. 
I  refer  to  the  practice  of  zamindars,  and  other  receivers 
of  rent,  taking  chaldns  from  their  ryots  on  the  payment 
of  rent ;  so  that  there  are  always  two  documents  drawn 
up  on  such  occasions,  one  being  the  receipt  given  to  the 
payer,  and  the  other  the  chalAn  given  to  the  payee.  The 
origin  of  this  custom  is  the  anxiety  to  preserve  a  record 
of  title,  chaldns  being  always  filed  in  suits  about  land  to 
prove*  possession  by  receipt  of  rent. 

There  is  a  famous  description  of  the  Bengali  character 
by  Macaulay,  in  which  he  says  that  what  the  Italian  is 
to  the  Englishman,  what  the  Hindu  is  to  the  Italian, 
the  Bengali  is  to  other  Hindus.  Looking  at  the  char- 
acteristics of  the  people  of  Biikarganj  as  described  by 
foreigners,  we  might  carry  on  Macaulay 's  illustration, 
and  say  that  what  Bengalis  are  to  other  nations,  that 
are  the  inhabitants  of  Bakarganj  to  other  Bengalis.  I 
may  add  that  a  Deputy-Magistrate,  who  had  been  long 
in  the  district,  once  localised  the  climax  still  further  by 
saying  that  what  Bdkarganj  is  to  Bengal  generally, 
that  the  subdivision  of  Perozpur  is  to  the  rest  of  Bakar- 
ganj. 

As  far  as  the  degrees  of  comparison  go,  I  think  the 


2 1 4  DISTRICT  OF  BAKAR  GANJ. 

illustration  a  good  one.  If  Macaulay's  estimate  of  the 
Bengali  character  be  correct,  the  Bdkarganj  people  may 
be  said  to  be  BeDgalis  of  the  Bengalis,  for  they  excel 
the  rest  of  their  countrymen  in  the  points  noticed  by 
the  essayist.  But  Macaulay's  description  is  much  too 
neat  and  c^^igrammatic  to  be  true,  and  there  are  a  great 
many  lights  and  shades  of  Bengali  character  which  he 
has  not  noticed.  A-ssuming,  however,  his  estimate  to 
be  correct,  I  think  we  may  say  that  the  people  of  B^kar- 
ganj  are  typical  Bengalis,  and  may  proceed  to  inquire 
how  they  come  to  be  so.  I  am  inclined  to  think  that 
the  answer  is  to  be  found  in  part  in  the  facts  that 
Bdkargauj  has  been  chiefly  peopled  by  emigrants  from 
the  rest  of  Bengal,  and  that  emigrants  are  generally 
people  of  marked  character.  It  is  the  listless  and 
sluggish  who  remain  at  home,  preferring  to  bear  the 
ills  they  have  than  to  fly  to  those  they  know  not  of, 
while  the  active  and  enterprising  endeavour  to  better 
themselves  elsewhere.  Just,  then,  as  w^e  find  the  Ameri- 
cans exhibiting  certain  of  the  qualities  of  the  English  in 
an  exaggerated  degree,  so  we  may  expect  to  find  the 
B^karganj  people  exhibiting  certain  Bengali  charac- 
teristics with  peculiar  prominence.  Again,  we  find  that 
the  jDcople  of  Bdkarganj  have  been  less  controlled  and 
less  subjected  to  extraneous  influences  than  Bengalis 
generally ;  hence  their  characters  have  developed  more 
fully  and  completely.  The  district  has  always  been 
somewhat  neglected  and  despised,  and  has  lain  apart 
from  the  stream  of  events.  The  people  have  been  left 
to  themselves  amongst  their  jungles  and  swamps,  and 
have  practically  enjoyed  much  freedom.  If  we  ask 
Bengali  gentlemen  why  Bdkarganj  people  difier  from 
the  inhabitants  of  Nadiya  or  other  more  civilised  dis- 
tricts, they  commonly  reply  that  it  is  because  there  are 


THE  PEOFLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  215 

so  few  of  the  upper  classes  in  the  district.  No  doubt 
this  is  a  vera  causa,  Bakargauj  landlords  are  nearly- 
all  absentees,  and  the  j)i'ofcssional,  and  even  the  trading 
and  shopkeeping  classes,  are  largely  composed  of 
foreigners.  There  is  not  a  single  resident  in  the  dis- 
trict who  has  an  income  of  £10,000  per  annum,  and 
I  believe  there  are  not  ten  who  have  an  income  equal 
to  that  of  the  district  judge.  Nothing  shows  more 
clearly  the  absence  of  the  upper  classes  from  Bakarganj 
than  the  smallness  of  the  returns  from  the  income-tax. 
Thus  we  find  that  when  all  persons  who  had  less  than 
Es.750  a  year  were  exemj^t,  there  were  only  1567 
assessable  persons  in  the  whole  district ;  and  that  when 
the  minimum  was  raised  to  Es.lOOO,  there  were  only 
847.  We  find  also  that  the  scarcity  of  rich  people  was 
most  marked  in  the  south  of  the  district,  and  that  in  the 
large  subdivision  of  Patuyakhdli,  with  a  population  of 
upwards  of  400,000,  there  were  only  eighty-four  asses- 
sees  when  the  minimum  was  Rs.750,  and  thirty-four 
when  the  minimum  was  Rs.  1000.  In  other  words,  out 
of  400,000  people  there  are  only  about  thirty  who  are 
worth  £100  a  year.  At  the  same  time,  there  is  pro- 
bably less  actual  want  and  poverty  in  Bd,karganj  than 
in  the  rest  of  Bengal.  The  soil  is  fertile,  and  Bdkarganj 
ryots  are  notoriously  comfortable.  They  have  plenty  of 
rice,  can  catch  fish  in  every  ditch  and  water-hole,  and 
have  cocoa-nuts,  betel-nuts,  plantains,  &c.,  in  their 
orchards.  There  is  little  they  need  buy  except  salt, 
clothes,  and  tobacco.  We  may  therefore  apply  Long- 
fellow's description  of  Grand  Pre  to  B^ikarganj,  and  say, 
"  There  the  richest  is  poor,  and  the  poorest  lives  in 
abundance."  This  plenty,  comlnned  with  the  feeling  of 
ownership  and  independence  produced  by  the  system  of 
peasant  properties,  gives  vigour  and  energy  to  the  char- 


2i6  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

acter.  The  effect  of  the  inaccessibility  of  Bdkarganj  on 
the  disposition  of  the  people  has  already  been  touched 
upon,  but  the  subject  calls  for  further  elucidation. 
Bakarganj  is  difficult  of  access  from  Calcutta,  for  though 
it  is  only  180  miles  distant,  there  is  no  land  route,  and 
boats  take  six  or  even  ten  days  on  the  journey.  The 
route,  too,  is  through  the  dreaded  and  inhospitable  Sun- 
darbans,  which,  in  the  minds  of  the  timorous  Bengalis, 
are  still  haunted  by  dacoits  and  wild  beasts.  Hence 
we  find  that  Bakarganj  has  been  little  visited  by  the 
great  of  the  earth.  Besides  this  external  inaccessibility, 
Biikarganj  has  very  few  roads,  and  it  is  consequently 
exceedingly  difiicult  to  travel  rapidly  or  with  comfort. 
The  islands  of  the  district  are  surrounded  by  large  rivers 
which  are  really  formidable  during  the  rains,  and  they 
are  seldom  visited  by  strangers,  except  in  the  cold 
weather.  The  south  of  the  district  especially  is  inter- 
sected by  rivers  and  creeks,  and  as  its  climate  during 
and  immediately  after  the  rains  is  considered  unhealthy, 
it  is  generally  abandoned  for  the  greater  part  of  the 
year  by  every  one  who  can  get  away  from  it.  It  is  in 
this  part  of  the  district,  where  the  people  have  been 
much  left  to  themselves,  that  w^e  find  their  peculiarities 
most  strongly  developed.  Not  only  are  they  separated 
from  the  outer  world,  but  they  are  also  isolated  from 
one  another,  so  that  each  person's  individuality  gets  full 
scope.  Villages  in  Bdkarganj,  and  especially  in  the 
south,  are  verv  different  from  villaoes  in  Behar  or  the 
north-west,  or  even  in  Bengal  generally.  The  houses 
are  much  more  scattered,  and  there  is  little  of  collective 
village  life.  Each  house  stands  by  itself  on  its  mound, 
surrounded  by  a  thicket  of  fruit- trees,  and  there  is  often 
no  other  house  in  sight  or  nearer  than  several  hundred 
yards.     The  intervening  space,  too,  is  generally  a  swamp 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  217 

across  which  it  is  toilsome  and  difficult  to  walk.  In  such 
villages  the  system  of  village  police  is  almost  non- 
existent. Mr  Eeilly,  in  an  interesting  passage  of  his 
report  on  the  Bd-karganj  police,  has  touched  upon  this 
peculiarity  of  life  in  the  south  of  the  district,  and  assigns 
to  it  the  frequency  of  serious  crime. 

I  have  said  that  Macaulay's  estimate  of  the  Bengali 
character  is  not  a  correct  or  complete  one.  I  may  here 
briefly  state  how  it  errs,  in  my  opinion.  It  does  not  do 
justice  to  some  virtues  possessed  by  Bengalis — namely, 
temperance,  frugality,  and  patience.  Neither  is  it  quite 
just  in  the  matter  of  courage,  for  though  the  Bengali  is 
cowardly  in  some  respects,  he  is  not  altogether  timid. 
For  example,  he  is  probably  more  courageous  with  regard 
to  wild  beasts  than  most  Europeans.  The  inhabitants 
of  Bd,karganj  are  hardy  boatmen,  and  often  cross  rivers 
in  rouoh  and  dano;erous  weather.  The  most  serious 
charge  of  all  brought  against  Bengalis  is  that  they  are 
liars.  On  this  head  I  may  cjuote  from  a  lecture  which  I 
delivered  in  Scotland  some  years  ago  :  "As  regards  the 
charge  of  the  Bengalis  being  liars,  people  who  abuse 
them  of  course  make  a  great  deal  of  what  Lord  Macau- 
lay  has  said  on  the  subject  in  his  essays  on  Clive  and 
Warren  Hastings.  Now  Lord  Macaulay  Avas,  as  all  the 
world  acknowledges,  a  very  brilliant  writer,  but  his 
eloc[uence  and  love  of  paradox  were  apt  to  lift  him  off 
his  feet.  He  was  a  Scotchman  by  origin,  and  therefore 
he  had  to  a  certain  extent  the  Scottish  intellect,  which, 
like  the  French,  is  deductive  and  generalising,  and  apt 
to  draw  large  conclusions  from  a  scanty  induction  of 
facts.  ...  At  the  same  time,  I  am  not  here  to-night  to 
defend  the  Bengalis,  but  to  tell  the  truth  about  them  as 
far  as  I  know  it,  and  therefore  I  must  admit  that  they 
are  rather  addicted  to  falsehood.     I  think  that  the  ex- 


2i8  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

tent  of  their  lying  propensities  has  been  exaggerated, 
and  that  a  great  deal  of  what  we  are  apt  to  consider 
deliberate  falsehood  on  their  part  proceeds  from  nervous- 
ness, from  a  want  of  precision  in  thought  and  expres- 
sion, and  from  our  ignorance  and  impatience.     Still  it 

I ''  is  not  to  be  denied  that  lying  is  the  great  vice  of  the 
Oriental  character,  just  as  harshness  and  want  of  feel- 
ing are  probably  the  most  distinctive  vices  of  Western 
nations ;  and  it  is  possible  that  in  both  cases  many 
centuries    will    elapse    before    such    characteristics    be 

1       obliterated." 

The  following  remarks  may  also  be  quoted :  "  The 
charge  of  'ingratitude  brought  against  Bengalis  hardly 
deserves  a  serious  answer.  In  the  first  place,  it  is  not 
true  that  they  are  destitute  of  a  word  expressive  of 
gratitude  ;  and  in  the  second  place,  even  if  the  dic- 
tionary did  not  give  such  a  word,  every  one  who  knows 
the  natives  knows  that  they  have  the  sentiment  in  their 
hearts,  and  that  they  show  it  in  their  actions. 

"  The  general  character  of  the  Bengali  is  amiable. 
He  has  no  large  sympathies  and  little  vigour  of  mind, 
but  he  is  gentle  and  affectionate,  and  very  charitable  to 
the  poor.  He  is  particularly  fond  of  children,  and  a 
Bengali  servant  makes  a  capital  nurse  for  his  master's 
children  ;  he  is  so  patient  with  them,  and  so  willing 
and  delighted  to  sit  with  them  and  amuse  them  all  day 
long.  Bengalis,  indeed,  are  said  to  s]3oil  their  children 
by  over-indulgence,  and  certainly  they  seem  to  indulge 
their  whims  to  almost  any  extent.  I  remember  to  have 
seen  a  common  Bengali  peasant  ploughing  his  field, 
which  happened  to  be  at  the  time  under  two  or  three 
inches  of  water,  w^hile  his  little  child  was  perched  on 
his  shoulder.  On  my  asking  why  he  had  the  child 
with  him,  I  was  told  that  it  cried  at  being  left  behind 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  219 

when  liis  father  went  out  to  ploiigli.  So  the  father  had 
taken  him  out  with  him,  though  he  would  have  to  bear 
his  weight  the  whole  forenoon  in  order  to  keep  him  out 
of  the  water. 

"One  of  the  charges  most  frequently  brought  against 
the  Bengali  is  his  fondness  for  litigation.  A  wealthy 
native,  it  is  said,  plumes  himself  on  having  two  or  three 
heavy  law  pleas  on  hand,  much  as  a  wealthy  English- 
man plumes  himself  on  the  possession  of  a  yacht  or  a 
picture  gallery.  Nor  is  the  poorer  native  backward  in 
his  liking  for  the  same  kind  of  sport ;  notliing  se;ems  to 
delight  a  Bengali  peasant  so  much  as  the  having  an 
opportunity  of  stating  his  claim  in  a  court  of  justice. 
The  great  subjects  of  the  lawsuits  are  disputes  about 
land ;  for,  as  a  rule,  the  commercial  classes  keep  out  of 
the  courts,  and,  moreover,  the  Bengalis  are  much  more 
an  agricultural  than  a  trading  people.  Land  in  India 
is  not  the  property  of  a  few,  as  it  is  in  this  country,  for 
the  system  of  peasant  ^proprietorship  is  in  vogue,  and, 
except  in  the  case  of  the  inhabitants  of  great  towns, 
almost  every  householder  has  his  small  j^iece  of  land. 
Sometimes  he  holds  the  land  rent  free,  but  generally 
pays  rent  for  it,  either  to  the  British  Government  or 
more  commonly  to  some  superior  landholder,  or  zamin- 
dar  as  he  is  called.  The  amount  of  rent  depends  a  good 
deal  upon  the  custom  of  the  district,  and  cannot  be 
increased  at  the  mere  will  and  pleasure  of  the  zamindar. 
Neither  can  the  tenant,  or  ryot  as  he  is  called,  be  evicted 
from  his  holding  as  long  as  he  pays  the  customary  rent, 
unless  the  zamindar  can  prove  that  certain  changes  have 
taken  place  in  the  value  of  the  produce,  &c.,  which 
make  the  old  rent  too  low  to  be  fair  and  equitable. 
Such  proof  is  rather  difficult,  and  leads  to  tedious  and 
expensive  litigation,  and  so  ryot  and   zamindar  gene- 


2  20  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

rally  settle  the  matter  amicably.  For  example,  if  land 
Lecomes  much  more  valuable  on  account  of  a  large  bazdr 
having  sprung  np  in  its  neighbourhood,  or  of  a  rail- 
way passing  through  the  district,  the  ryot  will  consent 
to  an  increase  of  rent ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  if  the 
land  becomes  impoverished  from  overcropping,  or  from 
drought,  the  landholder  will  make  a  corresponding  de- 
duction from  the  rent. 

"  The  system  of  agriculture  undoubtedly  appears  very 
rude,  but  it  seems  to  answer  well,  for  the  Bengalis  get 
cajDital.  crops  from  their  lands.  They  plough  with 
bullocks,  or  occasionally  buffaloes.  The  plough  is  a 
very  light  and  ramshackle  -  looking  affair,  Avhich  the 
ploughman  carries  over  his  shoulders  when  going  to 
and  from  his  work.  It  is  made  of  wood  and  bamboo, 
with  a  little  iron  at  the  point,  and  does  not  go  more 
than  a  couple  of  inches  into  the  ground.  Some  Euro- 
pean indigo -planters  have  tried  deep  ploughing  with 
steam-ploughs,  but  the  result  has  not  answered  their 
expectations,  the  crops  being  no  better  than  those  pro- 
duced by  the  surface-ploughing,  while  the  expense  is 
much  greater.  In  fact,  much  of  Bengal  is  so  fertile 
that  we  may  apply  to  it  the  saying  of  some  one  about 
rich  land  in  other  countries,  '  Tickle  it  with  a  hoe,  and 
it  smiles  a  harvest.'  The  great  crop  is  rice;  but  besides 
this  the  Bengali  ryot  cultivates  sugar-cane,  tobacco, 
jute,  &c.  All  these  latter  are  much  more  valuable 
crops  than  rice,  and  require  more  trouble  and  ex- 
pense for  their  cultivation.  The  rice  is  cut  with  a 
short  knife  or  sickle,  and  is  threshed  by  being  trodden 
by  cattle.  The  threshing-floor  is  a  circular  space  in 
the  field,  made  bare  and  hardened  by  beating  down. 
The  cattle  employed  are  never  muzzled. 

"  I  have  no   wish  to   enter  into   the   merits   of  the 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  221 

vexed  question  of  tlic  comparative  merits  of  large  and 
small  systems  of  agTiculture,  or,  in  other  words,  of  tlie 
system  of  large  farms  and  tliat  of  small  holdings.  I 
can  only  say  that  the  latter  seems  to  ^York  well  in  Ben- 
gal, and  that  I  should  be  very  sorry  to  see  the  Bengali 
ryot  or  cottier  sinking  into  the  condition  of  a  hired 
labourer.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the  feeling  of  being 
to  a  certain  extent  his  own  master  is  a  great  satisfac- 
tion to  the  Bengali  peasant-proprietor,  and  fosters  in 
him  an  honourable  spirit  of  independence  —  makes  a 
man  of  him,  in  short,  and  keeps  him  from  many  bad 
habits.  As  a  general  ride,  the  Bengali  peasant  is  a 
sober,  well-conducted,  frugal  man,  fond  of  his  home 
and  his  family,  and  contented  with  his  lot.  Indeed,  the 
great  fault  that  many  people  find  with  him  is  that  he 
is  too  easily  pleased,  and  they  would  like  better  to  see 
him  have  more  wants,  so  that  he  might  be  stimulated 
to  greater  exertion  in  order  to  satisfy  them.  The  great 
majority  are  very  poor,  and  their  houses  are  dark, 
comfortless  -  looking  places,  with  bare  floors  and  no 
furniture,  except  perhaps  a  wooden  bedstead  and  a 
stool  or  two.  Their  houses  are,  in  fact,  little  more 
than  sheds  for  sleeping  and  cooking ;  for  they  are  out 
of  doors  nearly  all  day,  and  when  they  come  home  in 
the  evening  they  are  not  long  in  retiring  to  rest. 
Instead  of  one  house  containing  two  or  three  rooms, 
as  in  this  country,  the  Bengali  peasant's  house  consists 
of  one  room  only,  so  that  he  has  generally  two  or  three 
houses  in  his  homestead  —  viz.,  a  sleeping -house,  a 
kitchen,  and  a  cowhouse.  The  well-to-do  ryots  often 
have  a  fourth  house,  which  they  use  as  a  parlour  in 
which  to  sit  o.nd  talk  with  their  friends,  or  as  a  sort 
of  chapel  for  worship.  All  these  houses  are  constructed''' 
of  bamboos,  with  a  few  wooden  posts  to  support  the 


2  2  2  DISTRICT  OF  bAKAR  GANJ. 

thatched  roof^,  and  are  movable,  the  peasant  always 
carrying  away  at  least  the  roof  of  his  house  when  he 
makes  a  flitting.  Of  course,  the  comfortless  appear- 
ance of  the  Bengali's  house  is  in  part  explained  by 
the  simplicity  of  his  habits  and  the  warmth  of  the 
climate.     .     .    . 

"  Such  money  as  the  ryot  has  he  expends  in  buying 
ornaments  for  his  wife  and  children,  or  \\\  marrying 
his  sons  and  daughters.  These  ceremonies  are  the 
only  times  when  he  becomes  thoroughly  improvident 
and  extravagant.  Undoubtedly  the  thoughtless  expen- 
diture of  money  on  such  occasions  is  very  foolish, 
but  it  has  always  been  an  Oriental  custom  to  spend 
largely  at  marriages ;  and  it  appears  to  me  that  the 
Bengali  who  spends  his  savings  upon  his  son's  mar- 
riao-e  is  not  much  worse  than  the  man  who  ruins  him- 

o 

self  by  horse-racing  or  a  contested  election. 

"  Although  the  peasantry  of  Bengal  are  generally 
poor,  yet,  except  in  the  case  of  a  famine,  there  is 
hardly  anything  like  actual  destitution  among  them. 
The  small  piece  of  land  which  each  holds  supplies  suf- 
ficient rice  to  keep  his  family  from  starvation,  and  the 
climate  does  the  rest,  for  warm  clothing  and  substantial 
dwelling-houses  are  not  required.  Hence  it  is  in  great 
measure  that  the  country  manages  to  get  on  without 
anything  in  the  shape  of  a  poor-law  or  organised  relief, 
and  that  there  are  not  many  perpetual  beggars  except 
those  who  are  either  too  idle  to  work  or  who  are  led  by 
religious  motives  to  subsist  on  alms.  The  above  are  in 
great  measure  the  causes  of  the  absence  of  destitution, 
but  there  is  another  cause,  and  that  is  the  charitableness 
of  Hindus.  It  is  not  the  habit  of  the  Oriental  to  devote 
large  sums  to  the  founding  of  hospitals,  or  to  other  great 
schemes  of  charity,  but  he  is  very  open-handed  in  the 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  223 

distribution  of  food  and  clothing,  and  many  rich  men 
spend  hirge  sums  yearly  in  relieving  the  poor  at  their 
gates.  No  doubt  a  great  deal  of  this  cliarity  is  indis- 
criminate, and  must  do  harm ;  still  it  does  some  good, 
and  often  saves  the  lives  of  those  who  have  become 
temporarily  destitute  from  the  failure  of  their  crops  or 
from  other  causes. 

"  In  spite,  or  perhaps  in  some  measure  in  consequence 
of  the  distinctions  of  caste,  there  is  a  considerable 
amount  of  symj^athy  between  the  rich  and  poor  in 
India,  and  a  mutual  understanding  of  their  respective 
trials  and  difficulties.  I  have  said  that  this  sympathy 
may  in  some  measure  be  a  consequence  of  caste,  and 
though  the  statement  seems  paradoxical,  it  contains 
a  truth  ;  for  it  is  plain  that  the  very  fact  of  the  fixity 
of  caste,  the  kno^jdedge  that  a  difierence  of  caste  can 
never  be  eftaced,  and  that  the  Sudra  can  never  marry 
the  daughter  of  the  Brdhman,  or  sit  down  at  meat  with 
him,  must  extinguish  jealousy  and  make  the  high- 
caste  man  feel  perfectly  safe  in  being  kind  to  those 
below  him.  The  high-caste  man  in  India  has  none  of 
those  fears  which  are  said  to  haunt  some  of  the  great  in 
this  country ;  the  fear,  namely,  lest  the  distinctions  of 
rank  and  station  become  obliterated,^ and  all  persons  be 
reduced  to  one  common  level.  Moreover,  there  is  no 
necessary  connection  between  high  caste  and  riches,  and 
it  often  happens  that  a  man  of  high  caste  is  poor,  while 
the  low-caste  Sudra  is  rich. 

"Apart  from  all  these  causes  there  is  also  the  fact 
that  a  feeling  of  sympathy  and  compassion  for  poverty 
and  old  age  has  always  been  a  characteristic  of  the 
Oriental  mind." 

I  may  also  quote  from  the  same  lecture  some  remarks 
on  Beugali  women  : — 


224  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

"  Perhaps  the  most  Avidely-known  fact  in  this  coimtiy 
about  women  in  India  is  that  of  widows  being  obliged 
to  burn  themselves  along  with  the  bodies  of  their  hus- 
bands. This  horrid  practice  of  sail,  as  it  is  called, 
Avas  at  one  time  prevalent  all  over  Bengal,  and  there  are 
still  Europeans  living  in  India  who  have  witnessed  the 
spectacle  of  a  widow-burning,  even  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  Calcutta.  The  custom  is  now  strictly  forbidden  in 
British  territory,  and  has  become  as  obsolete  as  the 
practice  of  duelling  among  ourselves.  The  abolition  of 
sati  is  one  of  the  benefits  which  Hindus  owe  to  Lord 
William  Bentinck,  and  on  the  pedestal  of  the  statue 
erected  to  that  nobleman  in  Calcutta  there  is  a  bronze 
representing  a  Brahman  leading  a  young  Hindu  widow 
to  the  funeral  pyre,  but  prevented  from  effecting  his 
purpose  by  an  officer  of  the  British  Government,  while 
the  mother  of  the  dead  man  holds  up  her  grandchild  to 
her'  daughter-in-law  and  invites  her  to  live  for  its  sake. 

''  Nowadays  Hindu  widows  are  not  only  not  burnt, 
but  they  are  even  allowed  to  marry  again,  and  in- 
stances of  widow-marriages  are  by  no  means  uncom- 
mon. It  is  to  be  hoped  that  this  reform  will  spread 
rapidly,  for  the  lot  of  a  Hindu  widow  is  commonly 
a  hard  one.  Often  she  is  a  mere  child,  for  early 
marriages  continue  to  be  the  rule,  and  a  parent  is 
thought  to  fail  in  his  duty  to  his  daughter  if  he  does 
not  get  her  married  by  the  time  she  is  eight  or  nine 
years  of  age.  Soon  after  her  husband  may  die,  but  she 
is  bound  by  the  laws  of  society  to  remain  single,  and  to 
spend  her  days  in  perpetual  widowhood  for  a  husband 
whom  she  may  never  have  seen.  She  must  relinquish  all 
her  jewels  and  finery,  eat  only  once  a  day,  fast  every  new 
moon,  and  absent  herself  from  every  scene  of  festivity 
and  social  enjoyment.     It  is  probable  enough  that  many 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  225 

a  young  and  cliildless  Hindu  widow,  finding  herself 
stranded  almost  before  she  has  entered  on  the  current 
of  life,  may  curse  the  humanity  which  has  preserved 
her,  and  wish  in  the  bitterness  of  her  heart  that  the 
sharp  but  short  pain  of  fire  might  relieve  her  of  the 
burden  of  existence. 

"  Widows,  however,  are  not  the  only  women  in  India 
who  are  unfortunate  in  their  lot.  All  women  are  con- 
sidered as  inferior  to  men,  and  therefore  as  subject  to 
their  control.  As  one  of  the  Hindu  law-books  expresses 
it,  '  In  every  stage  of  her  life  woman  is  created  to  obey. 
At  first  she  yields  obedience  to  her  father  and  mother. 
When  married,  she  submits  to  her  husband  and  to  her 
father-  and  mother-in-law.  In  old  age  she  must  be  ruled 
by  her  children.  During  her  life  she  never  can  be  under 
her  own  control.' 

"  The  wife  never  eats  with  the  husband,  but  waits 

until   he  has  done,  or,  as  the  same  law-book  puts  it, 

'  What  woman  would  eat  till  her  husband  has  first  had 

his  fill  ? '     Speaking  of  other  duties,  the  same  authority 

says,  '  When  her  husband  sings,  she  must  be  in  ecstasy ; 

when   he  dances,   she  views  him   with    delight :  if  he 

speaks  of  science,  she  is  filled  with  admiration ;  when  in 

his  presence,   she  must  be  always  gay.'     So  the  poor 

woman  must  have  occasionally  a  hard  time  of  it ;  and 

one  wonders  what  Mrs  Caudle  would  have  said  to  some 

of  these  regulations.     Fortunately,  the  Bengali  husband 

is  not  much  given  to  joviality;  and  if  he  ever  dance,  he 

does  not  do  so  with  young  ladies  ;  and  if  he  ever  sing,  he 

is  not  likely  to  indulge  in  such  strains  as  '  we  won't  go 

home  till  morning,'  a  ditty  which  it  would  be  too  much  to 

expect  any  daughter  of  Eve  to  listen  to  with  equanimity, 

far  less  ecstasy.     As  a  curious  instance  of  the  reserve 

which  a  wife  maintains  with  reo-ard  to  her  husband,  I 

p 


2  26  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

nicay  mention  that  slic  is  most  unwilling  to  utter  Lis 
name,  and  that  when  she  is  a  witness  in  court,  she 
generally  fences  with  the  magistrate  a  long  time  before 
she  acknowledges  whose  wife  she  is.  The  Bengali  hus- 
band has  a  similar  delicacy  in  referring  to  his  wife,  and 
if  he  has  occasion  to  mention  her,  generally  describes 
her  by  some  such  circumlocution  as  'the  mother  of 
my  children.' 

'''One  touch  of  nature  makes  the  whole  world  kin.' 
The  Bengali  matron  resembles  her  British  sister  in  her 
unwillingness  to  answer  another  question  which  the 
magistrate  is  sometimes  obliged  to  put  to  her.  She  ob- 
jects stoutly  to  mentioning  her  age,  and  generally  takes 
refuge  in  the  plea  of  ignorance.  When  addressing  her 
husband  in  private,  she  calls  him  ndtli — i.e.,  lord. 

"  The  seclusion  of  women  is  a  practice  which  does 
not  appear  to  have  been  in  force  in  early  Hindu  times, 
and  which  the  Hindus  are  supposed  to  have  learned 
from  their  Mahomedan  conquerors.  It  is,  however, 
almost  universal  now,  and  few  Bengali  women  of  re- 
spectability will  consent  to  appear  before  strangers. 
The  part  of  the  house  she  inhabits  is  that  farthest  away 
from  publicity,  and  is  called  emphatically  the  '  inner 
place.'  In  Scotch  phrase,  she  spends  all  her  time  in  the 
hen,  and  never  appears  in  the  hut.  AVhen  she  is  obliged 
to  give  evidence  or  to  hold  any  communication  with  a 
stranger,  she  does  so  from  behind  a  curtain  or  from 
within  a  covered  palanquin.  Some  aft'ect  to  be  still 
more  particular,  and  will  not  hold  direct  communication 
with  any  man,  even  though  a  curtain  be  hung  between 
them.  Such  ladies  insist  upon  the  conversation  being 
carried  on  through  the  intervention  of  a  third  party, 
generally  a  female  servant,  who  carries  the  questions 
and    answers  from  one  to  the  other.     The  pomp    and 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  227 

circumstance  of  an  interview  conducted  witli  these 
formalities  sometimes  contrast  ludicrously  with  the 
silliness  of  the  questions. 

"  When  a  native  lady  has  occasion  to  travel,  she  does 
so  in  a  covered  palanquin  or  litter,  or  in  a  boat.  Some- 
times she  travels  on  an  elephant,  the  howdah  being 
carefully  covered  over.  Many  now  make  use  of  the 
railway,  and  I  have  heard  bitter  complaints  from  Ben- 
gali boatmen  of  the  loss  of  custom  sustained  from  this 
cause.  '  Formerly,'  they  said,  '  a  gentleman  taking  his 
family  to  Benares  or  Allahabad,  or  other  place  of  pil- 
grimage, would  hire  a  boat,  and  would  be  weeks  or 
even  months  on  the  journey;  but  now  he  engages  a 
carriage  in  the  train,  and  the  whole  distance  is  per- 
formed in  one  day.'  Of  course  no  native  lady  ever  thinks 
of  ridiuG^  on  horseback,  and  next  to  their  daucino-  with 
other  men  than  their  husbands,  nothing  in  the  conduct 
of  our  countrywomen  seems  to  surprise  them  so  much 
as  their  riding. 

"  The  only  time  when  a  native  lady  has  a  chance  of 
seeing  the  world  is  when  she  goes  on  jDilgrimage,  and 
doubtless  this  is  one  reason  why  pilgrimages  are  so 
popular.  It  is  by  no  means  entirely  or  even  chiefly 
from  religious  motives  that  women  crowd  to  Hurdwar 
or  to  Piiri,  &c.,  and  I  think  our  missionaries  are  wrong 
when  they  refuse  to  see  anything  in  pilgrimages  but 
the  degrading  superstition  of  the  Hindu  religion.  It 
is,  of  course,  foolish  and  pitiable  that  Hindu  women 
should  suppose  that  bathing  in  the  Ganges  or  Brahma- 
putra will  cleanse  them  from  their  sins,  but  the  change 
of  scene  and  the  novelty  must  do  some  good.  I  am 
persuaded  that  many  rich  old  women  go  to  the  Ganges 
or  to  Kdmrup  for  much  the  same  reason  that  rich 
women  in  England  go  to  Brighton  or  Homburg.     When 


228  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

a  Hiudu  widow  lias  become  advanced  in  years,  and  lias 
either  no  cliildren  or  tliej  are  settled  in  life,  it  is  con- 
sidered the  projoer  thing  for  her  to  retire  to  the  holy  city 
of  Benares,  and  to  remain  there  till  her  death.  Many 
old  men  do  the  same,  and  the  good  results  of  living  and 
dying  in  Benares  are  said  liy  some  to  be  so  great  that 
even  a  Christian  dying  there  has  a  chance  of  getting  to 
heaven ! 

"  Women  in  the  poorer  classes  are  of  course  unable 
to  maintain  the  state  of  rigid  seclusion  I  have  described. 
They  must  go  to  the  tank  or  the  well  to  draw  water,  and 
they  have  to  go  on  foot  if  they  want  to  visit  a  temple 
or  witness  a  religious  ceremony.  In  all  ranks,  how- 
ever, the  marketing  is  done  by  men ;  the  only  women 
who  are  ever  seen  in  the  markets  being  poor  widows 
who  have  no  one  to  look  after  them  or  bring  them  home 
their  food." 

The  following  remarks  on  the  subject  of  food  I  extract 
from  the  same  lecture  : — 

"  Speaking  generally,  the  Bengali  is  one  of  the  most 
temperate  of  men,  and  the  large  class  of  temptations  to 
vice  produced  by  strong  drink  have  little  hold  over  him. 
His  chief  drink  is  cold  water,  about  the  quality  of  which 
he  is  most  fastidious  ;  hence  it  is  that  the  digging  of 
wells  and  tanks  is  considered  such  a  meritorious  act. 
At  the  same  time,  the  Bengali  forms  no  exception  to  the 
general  observation  that  every  nation  has  some  kind 
of  stimulant,  and  he  supplies  the  place  of  wine  and 
spirits  by  tobacco  and  pdn.  Pan  is  a  compound  of 
lime,  the  leaf  of  the  pd,n  plant,  and  the  nut  of  the  betel 
or  supari  tree,  with  occasionally  other  ingredients  in  the 
form  of  spices.  Both  tobacco  and  pdn  are  universally 
used  by  men,  and  all  women  chew  pdn,  and  not  a  few  of 
them  smoke  also.    These  practices  even  enter  into  their 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  dAkARGANJ.  229 

religious  worsliiji ;  for  with  the  daily  food  of  rice,  &c., 
with  which  they  sn2:)p]y  tlieir  gods,  they  offer  also  pan, 
and  in  some  cases  tobacco  and  a  pipe  in  which  to  smoke 
it.  A  Hindu  seldom  cats  flesh  except  what  has  been 
offered  in  sacrifice,  and  therefore  when  he  wishes  to 
treat  himself  to  a  meat  dinner,  the  ortliodox  way  of 
doing  so  is  to  offer  a  goat  or  a  buffalo  to  the  goddess 
Kali,  a  goddess  who  delights  in  bloody  sacrifices.  The 
animal  is  killed  at  her  shrine  by  beheading,  some  ex- 
ecutioners being  so  expert  that  they  can  sever  the  neck 
of  a  buffalo  at  a  single  blow.^  Most  Hindus  eat  fish 
without  scruple,  though  some  Brdhmans  are  so  parti- 
cular as  to  reject  even  this  kind  of  animal  food.  Fish 
are  abundant  in  the  rivers  and  tanks  of  Bengal,  and  are 
caught  either  by  nets  or  with  the  rod.  Some  scrupulous 
peo2Dlc  draw  a  distinction  between  these  two  modes  of 
capture,  and  will  catch  fish  in  nets  but  will  not  bait 
lines  for  them.     The  reason  they  give  for  the  distinction 


1  There  is,  however,  some  trickery  in  the  way  this  is  done.  Not  only 
is  the  buffalo  selected  for  sacrifice  generally  only  a  calf,  but  it  is  not 
standing  loose  or  only  tethered  when  it  is  decapitated.  The  unfortunate 
animal's  neck  is  placed  in  an  upright  wooden  fork,  and  there  secured  by  a 
bolt.  Several  persons  then  pull  the  hind  legs  and  others  the  head  until 
the  latter  is  almost  torn  from  the  body,  and  the  neck  becomes  tight  and 
drawn,  and  almost  as  thin  as  a  knife-edge.  It  is  after  these  preparations 
that  the  beheading  takes  place.  They  take  some  time,  and  meanwhile  the 
poor  beast  bellows  with  fear  and  pain,  and  is  almost  dead  before  the  final 
blow  is  given.  I  have  never  witnessed  the  sight  myself,  but  it  has  been 
described  to  me  as  being  a  most  horrid  one,  and  as  calling  for  the 
interposition  of  the  Legislature.  No  doubt  some  fixing  of  the  head  is 
necessary,  and  such  a  mode  of  executing  a  bull  as  is  shoAvn  in  Eaphael's 
cartoon  is  probably  an  impossibility.  At  all  events,  the  real  circumstances 
of  a  sacrifice  in  ancient  times  were  probably  much  less  graceful  tlian  the 
painter  has  represented  them  to  be.  Still,  if  buft'aloes  and  goats  must 
loe  sacrificed,  some  less  painful  mode  of  killing  them  might  be  adopted. 
If  this  were  done,  there  would  be  comparatively  little  evil  in  the  j^ractice, 
for  the  victims  are  generally  eaten,  so  that  a  sacrifice  is  only  a  roundabout 
way  of  procuring  animal  food. 


230  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

is  that  rod-fisliing  implies  deceit  and  trcaclieiy,  the  fish 
being  deluded  into  being  caught  by  the  fisherman's  put- 
ting on  the  mask  of  kindness  and  pretending  to  ofter 
them  food.  Fowls  are  an  abomination  to  the  Hindu; 
so  wlien  a  Mahomedan  and  a  Hindu  are  next-door 
neighbours,  it  is  a  frequent  complaint  of  the  latter  that 
the  Mahomedan's  fowls  have  flown  into  his  courtyard 
or  kitchen  and  defiled  it.  Fowls'  eggs  are  also  regarded 
as  unclean,  though,  strangely  enough,  many  Hindus  will 
eat  duck  and  goose  eggs  without  scruple.  The  main 
food  of  the  Bengali  consists  of  rice,  which  is  generally 
prepared  by  boiling.  He  cooks  only  once  a  day,  dining 
about  midday  ;  and  if  he  takes  a  second  meal,  it  is  eaten 
cold,  and  consists  of  the  remains  of  his  midday  meal. 
The  Bengali  eats  with  his  fingers,  using  the  right  hand 
only,  and  considering  it  improper  to  touch  his  food  with 
the  left.  As  rice  is  not  a  nutritious  food  it  is  necessary 
to  eat  it  in  large  quantities  in  order  to  obtain  the 
requisite  amount  of  sustenance.  The  constant  use  of 
one  kind  of  food  cannot  be  wholesome,  and  Bengalis 
are  in  consequence  often  dyspeptic.  In  some  parts  of 
Bengal,  where  the  evils  arising  from  want  of  change 
of  food  are  aggravated  by  the  badness  of  the  water, 
the  pangs  of  indigestion  occasionally  become  so  great  as 
to  drive  the  sufi'erers  to  commit  suicide.  There  were 
several  instances  of  suicide  from  this  cause  in  the  dis- 
trict (Mymensing)  to  which  I  was  first  appointed, 
and  in  every  case  a  'post  mortem  examination  showed 
a  quantity  of  undigested  rice  in  the  stomach.  Very 
few  natives  use  tea  or  cofi"ee  except  in  illness,  when 
they  are  very  fond  of  a  cup  of  tea,  and  in  the  case  of 
fever  consider  it  a  good  remedy.  Corpulence  is  con- 
sidered by  Bengalis  a  sign  of  health,  and  of  a  man's 
being  at  ease  in  his  possessions.     They  say  that  when 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAKARGAN/.  23 1 

a  man  is  poor  lie  is  fretful  and  envious  of  the  prosperity 
of  others,  and  that  these  feelings  keep  him  lean,  hut 
that  when  he  aets  on  in  the  world  his  mind  becomes 
tranquil  and  he  grows  fat.  Certainly,  whether  from 
this  cause  or  from  want  of  exercise,  wealthy  Hindus 
are  generally  fat,  and  they  take  care  to  keep  themselves 
so  by  consuming  large  quantities  of  melted  butter,  sugar, 
and  sweetmeats." 

The  above  remarks  were  written  w^itli  reference  to 
Bengalis  in  general,  but  they  apply  very  well  to  the 
districts  in  Eastern  Bengal,  in  which  my  experience  has 
been  almost  exclusively  gained.  I  shall  supplement 
them  with  some  further  observations. 

It  is  often  said  that  drinking  has  become  prevalent 
among  the  upper  classes  in  Bengal,  but  I  believe  there 
is  a  good  deal  of  exaggeration  on  this  point.  A  desire 
to  imitate  the  English  has  led  some  wealthy  and  indo- 
lent Babus  to  take  to  champagne  and  brandy,  and  the 
harder  work,  and  change  of  hours  for  meals,  &c.,  occa- 
sioned by  attendance  at  our  courts  or  by  Government 
service,  have  led  some  lawyers  and  public  servants  to 
habituate  themselves  to  the  use  of  stimulants  ;  but  as  a 
general  rule,  the  educated  classes  are  too  poor  to  drink 
to  any  great  extent,  even  if  they  felt  inclined  to  do  so. 
Those  who  do  drink  to  excess  generally  confine  their 
orgies  to  Saturday  night,  and  they  have  then  the  whole 
of  Sunday  in  which  to  recover  from  their  debauch. 

The  Bengali  professional  men  residing  in  Barisal  have, 
I  am  sorry  to  say,  rather  a  bad  reputation  for  drinkino-. 
Formerly  they  drank  rum,  but  several  rum-drinkers 
having  died  suddenly,  the  topers  have  now  taken  to 
country  spirit,  which  they  consider  more  wholesome. 
This  spirit  is  manufactured  in  the  Public  Distillery  at 
Barisdl,  and  there  is  also  a  distillery  in  each  of  the  sub- 


232  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

divisions.  It  is  made  from  guv— i.e.,  native  sugar— and 
is,  I  believe,  a  tolerably  pure  spirit,  and  is  generally  sold 
very  weak.  I  believe  some  natives  of  Bdkarganj  excuse 
themselves  for  drinking  on  tlie  ground  that  the  salt  air 
requires  the  use  of  stimulants  ;  and  all  natives  remark 
that  Englishmen  thrive  better  at  places  on  the  coast 
— such  as  Diamond  Harbour,  Chittagong,  &c. — than 
natives.  It  is  not  improbable  that  a  vegetarian  diet  is 
less  suitable  for  the  sea-coast  than  a  meat  diet.  Women, 
I  believe,  never  drink,  except  the  prostitute  class,  which 
is  a  very  large  one  in  towns. 

The  excise  system  of  the  English  Government  un- 
doubtedly tends  to  familiarise  Bengalis  with  the  subject 
of  drinking,  and  to  throw  temptation  in  their  way.  In 
this  respect  our  Government  contrasts  unfavourably  with 
that  of  the  Moguls,  who  seem  never  to  have  derived 
profit  from  an  excise  on  liquor.  The  central  distillery 
system  is,  no  doubt,  an  improvement  in  many  respects 
on  the  old  out-still  system,  but  it  certainly  mixes  Go- 
vernment up  more  with  the  trade ;  and  as  natives  are 
apt  to  believe  that  it  is  the  duty  of  Government  to  teach 
morality,  they  may  be  led  to  think  that  Government 
approves  of  drinking,  and  this  may  have  a  prejudicial 
efiect  on  their  ideas.  There  is  one  way  in  which  the 
central  distillery  system  works  badly,  which  has  not,  I 
think,  been  sufficiently  noticed ;  this  is  the  corrupting 
influence  it  exercised  on  the  Government  servants  em- 
ployed in  it.  The  inferior  excise  officers  are  of  neces- 
sity natives,  and  they  are,  I  believe,  always  Hindus,  for 
Mahomedans  will  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  liquor 
traffic.  They  are  not  very  well  paid,  and  have  no  pro- 
spect of  rising  to  any  lucrative  or  important  employ- 
ment. They  are  also  looked  down  upon  by  their 
countrymen  on  account  of  their  occupation.     The  natu- 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  233 

ral  consequences  follow,  tliat  the  excise  department  is 
officered  by  men  of  inferior  aLility  and  standing,  who 
are  less  capable  of  withstanding  temptations  which 
are  of  a  j^cculiarly  seductive  kind.  They  have  to  deal 
with  a  rather  low  class  of  men — namely,  the  vintners 
and  (7«?ya-sellers — and  they  have  much  opportunity 
for  fraud.  They  have  also  the  temptation  to  drink 
offered  by  its  being  possible  to  get  liquor  at  little  or  no 
cost,  and  I  fear  that  to  many  this  temj^tation  is  too 
strong  to  be  resisted.  My  experience  has  shown  me 
that  there  is  more  drinking  among  excise  officers  than 
in  any  other  class  of  Government  servants.^ 

Ganja  is  consumed  in  considerable  quantities  by  boat- 
men and  others,  and  not  unfrequently  leads  to  the  com- 
mission of  crime  and  to  insanity.  It  is  imjDorted  into  the 
district  from  Eajshye.  The  stricter  sects  of  Mahome- 
dans,  such  as  the  Ferazis,  use  little  or  no  ganja,  and 
as  far  as  my  experience  extends,  it  is  the  Dacca  boat- 
men who  are  most  prone  to  the  vice. 

Oj^ium  is  used  medicinally  and  also  as  a  stimulant  by 
the  Hindus,  especially  after  they  have  passed  middle  age. 
They  think  that  it  is  a  preservative  against  rheumatism, 
and  also  that  it  is  nourishing.  It  is  sold  at  the  Treasury 
in  two-pound  cakes  at  a  cost  of  about  £1,  3s.  per  pound; 
it  is  also  sold  in  .  similar  quantities  at  the  central  dis- 
tilleries. It  is  of  course  only  dealers  who  buy  023ium  in 
cakes.      They  retail  it  in  tolas  (rupee-weights),  or  still 


^  The  revenue  in  1873-74  from  country  spirits  in  Bakargaiij  was 
Rs.l7,910,  against  E,s.l7,228  in  the  previous  j^ear.  This  is  more  than  in 
Mj'mensing,  another  district  of  the  Dacca  division  with  which  Bakar- 
ganj  ha3  several  points  of  resemblance.  On  the  other  hand,  ganja  yielded 
in  Bakarganj  only  Rs.28,457,  against  Rs.97,846  in  Mymensing  ;  spirits, 
Ils.18,364,  against  Rs.37,658  in  Mymensing.  The  entire  net  revenue 
from  excise  in  Bakarganj  in  1873-74  was  Rs.62,249,  against  Rs.  154,095  in 
Mymensing  for  the  same  period. 


2  34  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

smaller  quantities,  charging  of  course  somewhat  more 
than  the  wholesale  price.  Hence  it  is  easy  to  see  that 
opium  is  consumed  only  by  the  comparatively  wealthy. 
I  have  already  spoken  of  the  almost  univei'sal  use  of 
tobacco  by  the  male  portion  of  the  population.  It 
is  mixed  with  giir,  and  smoked  in  the  water-pipe 
or  hookah,  familiarly  known  amongst  Europeans  as 
the  hubble-bubble.  There  is  not  much  chewing  of  to- 
bacco, nor  is  snuff  largely  taken,  though  pleaders  and 
others  who  cannot  always  find  an  opportunity  of  smok- 
iug,  occasionally  carry  snuff-boxes.  Hardly  any  tobacco 
is  grown  in  the  district,  and  the  wants  of  the  people 
are  almost  entirely  supplied  from  Kuch  Behar  and 
Eangpur.  Nalchiti  is  the  principal  mart  of  the  trade. 
Tobacco  is  not  allowed  in  the  jail,  and  no  provision 
in  the  jail  code  is  more  difficult  to  enforce  than  this. 
The  prisoners  have  endless  devices  for  procuring  the 
drug,  and  it  is  probable  that  even  in  the  best  regulated 
jails  they  arc  occasionally  successful.  Even  in  jails  in 
which  discipline  is  most  lax,  the  prisoners  cannot  how- 
ever get  their  smoke  regularly,  and  this  is  no  doubt  felt 
as  one  of  the  greatest  hardships  they  experience  in  jail ; 
it  might  therefore  be  a  useful  means  of  rewarding  good 
conduct  to  grant  permission  to  smoke.  I  may  mention 
that  1  once  knew  the  case  of  a  native  who  had  given  up 
smoking  altogether,  because  he  lost  the  habit  during  a 
six  months'  imprisonment.  Besides  pdn  and  tobacco, 
another  form  of  stimulant  is  obtained  from  highly- 
spiced  curries.  Boatmen  and  others  who  are  much 
exposed  to  the  weather  are  notorious  for  the  use  of  large 
quantities  of  red  pepper  in  their  curries. 

There  is  in  Barisdl  a  large  number  of  professional  pro- 
stitutes, and  there  are  some  also  in  every  bazdr.  They 
are  chiefly  Hindus.     The  destitute  condition   of  many 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAKARGANJ.  235 

Hindu  widows  no  doubt  often  drives  them  to  prostitu- 
tion as  a  means  of  living,  and  when  a  Hindu  woman 
has  thus  fallen  there  is  no  way  open  for  her  return  to 
her  home.  On  the  other  hand,  among  Mahomedans  it 
is  by  no  means  uncommon  for  a  man  of  respectable 
position  to  marry  a  prostitute,  or,  as  the  phrase  is,  to 
take  his  wife  out  of  the  bazar.  Such  an  action  is  re- 
garded as  laudable  rather  than  otherwise,  as  it  restores 
a  woman  to  virtue,  and  it  is  said  that  such  women  not 
uncommonly  make  very  good  wives.  It  is  a  singular 
illustration  of  native  feeling  that  one  of  the  most  common 
words  used  to  denote  a  prostitute  is  'peshagar,  which 
literally  means  a  professional  person,  as  if  a  woman's 
profession  or  trade  must  necessarily  be  an  immoral  one. 

Amusements. — The  peasantry  of  Bdkarganj  have  not 
many  pastimes.  As  a  rule,  the  Bengali  is  a  sedate  and 
somewhat  melancholy  personage,  and  even  Bengali 
children  seldom  let  their  high  spirits  run  away  with 
them.  The  cares  of  a  family,  which  so  early  fall  on  a 
Bengali,  undoubtedly  tend  to  steady  and  even  some- 
times to  depress  him,  and  his  low  diet  and  the  relaxing 
nature  of  the  climate  keejD  him  from  boisterousness  or 
horse-play.  At  the  same  time,  he  is  easily  pleased, 
and  has  a  childish  delight  in  fireworks,  tamashas, 
or  shows  of  every  kind,  and  in  kite-flying,  which  is 
practised  with  great  assiduity  at  one  period  of  the  year. 
All,  whether  Hindus  or  Mahomedans,  take  more  or  less 
part  in  the  durga  puja  processions,  and  in  the  navanna, 
or  harvest-home.  The  durga  puja,  indeed,  is  quite  the 
Bengali  Christmas.  Every  one  who  can  afford  to  do  so, 
and  even  very  many  who  have  to  borrow  money  for  the 
purpose,  go  to  their  homes  at  this  time  and  entertain 
their  friends.     There  is    very  little   drinking  or  other 


236  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

dissq^atiou,  but  there  is  a  vast  amount  of  talking  and 
eating  and  smoking,  and  very  late  liours  ara  kept.  A 
Bengali's  power  of  sitting  up  at  night  on  such  occasions 
is  wonderful,  and  he  will  listen  with  invincible  patience 
to  hours  of  monotonous  singing.  Jdtras,  theatrical  per- 
formances, ndtches,  are  common  at  this  season.  Bengali 
women  especially  look  forward  to  the  coming  of  the 
durga  puja,  for  the  annual  sup23ly  of  clothes  is  bought 
at  this  time,  and  it  is  a  pleasant  sight  to  go  into  the 
villages  and  see  men,  women,  and  children  in  their 
new  attire. 

Boat-races  take  place  at  the  durga  puja  and  at  the 
Bengali  new^  year,  and  even  the  native  Christians  can- 
not resist  the  pleasure  of  joining  in  them.  Curiously 
enough,  horse  or  rather  pony  races  are  a  favourite 
pastime  in  Bdkarganj,  especially  among  the  Mahomedans 
of  the  south  of  the  district.  The  ponies  are  ridden  by 
boys  across  the  wide  oj^en  space  left  after  the  rice  crops 
have  been  cut.  I  do  not  think  that  there  is  any  betting 
on  such  occasions.  Marriages  take  place  chiefly  in  the 
cold  season,  and,  except  among  the  Ferazies,  are  cele- 
brated with  considerable  pomp,  firing  of  guns,  beating 
of  drums,  &c. 

At  one  time  a  gambling  mania  took  possession  of  the 
people  of  Barisjil,  and  this  ancient  and,  so  to  speak, 
classic  vice  of  Hindustan  is  still  a  good  deal  practised 
in  the  villages. 

Professional  men  and  Government  servants  generally 
make  a  holiday  of  the  English  Sunday,  but  the 
peasantry  of  course  do  not  observe  it.  Neither,  I 
think,  do  the  Mahomedans  particularly  observe  Friday, 
except  perhaps  that  they  say  their  prayers  oftener 
and  more  publicly  on  that  day.  For  Mahomedans,  the 
great  holiday  is  the  Maharam,  though  the  Sunies  among 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  237 

tliem  do  not  mucli  regard  it.  The  Maharam  is  a  mov- 
able feast;  a  circumstance  wliicli  often  causes  a  good 
deal  of  inconvenience.  The  durga  puja  is  also  a  mov- 
able feast,  and  sometimes  comes  too  early  in  the  season 
to  be  enjoyable,  at  least  by  Europeans.  The  Alaho- 
medans  are  strict  enough  in  observing  the  fast  of  the 
Ramzdn,  and  as  it  too  is  movable,  their  sufferings  are 
often  very  great ;  for  example,  it  is  no  light  thing  for  a 
Mahomedan  boatman  to  work,  as  he  often  will,  from 
sunrise  to  sunset  in  an  exhausting  July  day  without 
eating  or  drinking,  or  even  smoking.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  fast  is  over  as  soon  as  the  sun  sets,  and  before 
it  has  risen  again  the  Mahomedan  has  made  two  and 
sometimes  three  meals — that  is,  he  eats  a  little  as  soon 
as  the  sun  goes  down,  makes  an  ample  dinner  at 
about  midnight,  and  gets  up  again  at'  three  or  four 
in  the  mornino;'  and  has  his  food  and  his  darlinof  smoke 
before  the  labours  of  the  day  begin. 

It  is  not  without  pleasure  that  one  sees  how  human 
nature  asserts  itself  during  the  Ramzdn,  and  proves  too 
strong  for  the  curbing  influence  of  superstition.  The 
fast  was  undoubtedly  intended  as  a  means  of  mortify- 
ing the  flesh,  but  many  turn  it  into  an  occasion  for 
feasting,  and  it  is  notorious  that  all  the  best  dinners 
are  given  at  this  season.  It  is  at  this  time  too  that 
the  sweetmeat-sellers  make  their  greatest  profits,  and 
as  soon  as  the  sun  has  set  the  Mahomedans  make 
haste  to  gorge  themselves  with  all  the  delicacies  they 
can  procure. 

Riots. — Bdkarganj  used  to  be  famous  for  its  riots. 
The  lathials,  or  clubmen,  however,  who  fought  in  them 
were  in  many  cases  inhabitants  of  other  districts,  espe- 
cially of  Faridpiir,  which  was  formerly  as  much  noted 


238  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

for  its  lathials  as  Bikrampur  was  and  is  for  its  clerks 
and  maliarirs.  In  many  cases  tlie  riots  were  fomented 
by  the  zamindars  and  taluqdars,  but  many  were  also 
got  up  by  the  villagers  themselves.  This  last  circum- 
stance has  often  prevented  magistrates  from  nipping 
breaches  of  the  peace  in  the  bud,  and  thus  helped 
to  give  Bd,karganj  its  bad  name.  Before  zamindars 
fio-ht  with  one  another,  there  are  lawsuits  and  simmer- 
ino^s  of  various  kinds  before  the  actual  outbreak,  so 
that  the  authorities  have  time  to  be  Avarned  and  to 
take  preventive  measures ;  but  villagers  break  out  into 
quarrels  suddenly  and  unexpectedly.  It  is  to  the  credit 
of  the  ryots  that  they  are  so  independent  and  so  pre- 
pared to  assert  their  rights  without  seeking  the  aid  of 
the  zamindars,  but  tlic  circumstance  certainly  damages 
the  criminal  returns. 

It  may  be  added  that  the  definition  of  a  riot  in 
the  penal  code  is  so  general  that  many  comparatively 
trifling  ofiences  can  be  brought  under  it.  Bengalis  are 
gregarious  in  their  mode  of  action ;  and  their  custom 
of  two  or  three  brothers,  with  their  families,  living  in 
one  homestead  increases  the  number  of  persons  inte- 
rested in  any  quarrel.  It  takes  only  five  persons  to 
make  a  riot,  and  this  number  of  men  can  be  furnished 
from  nearly  every  house  in  which  two  or  three  brothers 
live.  The  greatest  and  most  notorious  dispute  in  the 
district  is  that  which  culminated  in  the  Singhkh41i 
case,  and  as  its  history  throws  a  considerable  light  on 
the  genesis  and  development  of  riots,  and  on  the  state 
of  Bdkarganj  some  twenty  3^ears  ago,  I  subjoin  an 
account  of  it  taken  from  official  records. 

Extract  from  the  remarks  of  Mr  Steer,  Judge  of 
Bd,karganj,  on  the  trial  of  Gogan  Mia  and  others,  14th 
September  1854,  and  5th  January  1855  : — 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  239 

"  The  cliief  person  who  figures  iii  this  case  is  Gour- 
hunoodin,  commonly  and  extensively  known  as  Gogan 
Mia.  He  is  charged  with  being  concerned  in  eight 
distinct  cases,  chiefly  of  plunder,  riot,  and  arson.  The 
rest  of  the  prisoners  appear  in  distinct  calendars,  some 
in  some  and  some  in  others.  It  will  be  advisable  to 
give  a  brief  history  of  past  events  which  led  to  these 
crimes. 

"  Pargana  Syedpiir  belongs  in  portions  of  ten  anas 
and  six  anas  to  Lalla  Mitrajit  Singh  and  Babu  Birja 
Rattan.  The  pargana  has,  as  is  usual  in  this  district, 
several  valuable  dependent  taluqs  in  it.  The  desire  of 
each  of  the  two   sharers   seems    to    have  been  to    wiX, 

o 

exclusive  possession  of  as  many  of  these  valuable  pro- 
perties as  they  could  each  manage.  Summary  suits 
were  brought  unknown-  to  and  against  the  taluqdars, 
and  all  the  tenures  purchased  in  for  a  song.  In  some 
cases  the  old  proprietors  fought  the  purchasers,  in  others 
the  purchase  by  one  of  the  zamindars  led  to  disputes 
with  his  co-sharer,  and  thus  things  continued  to  go  on. 
At  length  the  ten-ana  j^roprietor  seems  to  have  resolved 
on  taking  vigorous  measures  to  put  down  opposition, 
come  from  what  quarter  it  might.  For  this  j^^^'P^^® 
he  secured  the  goodwill  of  two  brothers,  indubitably 
the  most  notorious  turbulent  characters  to  be  found  in 
this  notoriously  lawless  district.  These  brothers  were 
Gogan  Mir  and  Mohan  Mir  (since  not  inaptly  named 
the  Gog  and  Magog  of  these  parts).  The  means  em- 
ployed to  gain  them  over  to  the  ten-ana  interest  was  a 
lease  on  easy  terms  of  certain  desirable  properties ;  but 
this  compact  was  destined  to  be  of  short  duration,  from 
the  bad  faith  of  the  ten-ana  proprietor,  who,  after  receiv- 
ing a  great  part  of  the  purchase-money  of  one  of  the  taluqs 
transferred  to  the  Mias,  refused  to  complete  the  sale  by 


240  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

tlie  acceptance  of  the  remainder  of  the  purchase-money 
and  the  delivery  of  the  deed  of  sale.  The  alliance  before 
existing  was  thus  cut  asunder,  and  these  parties  became 
Mitrajit  Singh's  worst  enemies.  Innumerable  were  the 
foujdari  (criminal)  cases  which  these  parties  brought 
ao-ainst  each  other ;  but  the  long  purse  of  the  Babu 
soon  exhausted  the  small  means  of  the  Mias  in  this 
expensive  and  profitless  warfare,  and  then  the  Mias 
changed  their  tactics.  Leaving  the  Babu  to  the  courts, 
the  Mias  gave  him  real  cause  to  resort  to  them.  They 
plundered  the  zamindar  s  cutchery,  they  robbed  and 
oppressed  all  who  professed  to  be  favourable  to  him ; 
and  this  course  of  life  proved  so  tempting,  from  the 
plunder  obtained,  that  the  Mias  were  able,  without  any 
money  of  their  own,  to  collect  and  keep  together  a  force 
which  Mitrajit's  hired  bands  were  not  strong  enough  to 
cope  with.  Seeing  that  the  Mias  were  such  a  match 
for  his  old  opponent,  Birja  Kattan,  the  six-ana  proprie- 
tor, moved  by  past  wrongs,  and  hopeful  tliat  the  utter 
ruin  of  his  adversary  would  secure  him  from  the  like  in 
future,  joined  hands  with  the  Mias,  who  thereby  felt  so 
strong  that  they  defied  not  only  Mitrajit  but  the  police. 
A  fortified  house  was  built,  from  which  the  rabble  of 
that  part  of  the  country  issued  to  plunder  the  inhabi- 
tants. Not  a  day  passed  that  a  report  of  some  adven- 
ture did  not  reach  the  station ;  and  at  length  the  police, 
who  made  several  ineffectual  attempts  to  apprehend  the 
Mias,  reported  that  they  were  powerless,  and  entreated 
the  Magistrate  to  take  the  field  in  person.  And  indeed 
it  was  time  he  should  do  so,  for  the  district  was  in  a 
state  bordering  on  insurrection.  The  Magistrate,  how- 
ever, did  not  go  in  person,  but  he  ordered  three  darogahs 
and  the  entire  police  of  three  thanas,  with  all  their 
chaukidars,  to  attack  the  Mias'  stronghold,  and  to  cap- 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAKARGAAJ.  241 

ture  tliem.  The  attempt  made  to  do  so  hardly  merits 
to  be  called  an  attempt.  The  cowardly  police,  so  strong 
in  numbers,  hardly  dared  show  their  faces  within  sight 
of  the  Mias'  stockade,  and  all  fled  on  the  first  show  of 
resistance.  On  the  report  of  this  discomfiture  reaching 
the  Magistrate,  he  determined  to  proceed  in  person  to 
the  sj)ot.  He  did  so,  and  found  the  fort  deserted  by  its 
old  defenders.  Everything  about  the  place  gave  evi- 
dence of  the  great  concourse  of  men  who  had  lately  been 
assembled  there.  Weapons  of  various  sorts,  and  gun- 
powder, and  materials  for  making  it,  with  remnants  of 
plundered  property,  were  found  in  j^lenty  in  and  about 
the  premises. 

"  The  Magistrate  having  left  the  place,  Gogan  and  Mo- 
han of  course  soon  returned,  and  the  proprietors  having  in 
the  meantime  been  induced  to  compromise  their  differ- 
ences, the  Mias  no  longer  confined  their  depredations 
against  the  adherents  of  the  ten-ana  shares,  but  robbed 
and  plundered  every  one  without  discrimination.  A  new 
species  of  toll,  or  rather  black-mail,  then  first  began  to 
be  heard  of.  This  toll  was  called  hica  or  torch  salami ; 
and  if  money  commensurate  with  the  demand  was  not 
paid  by  the  owner,  the  torch  was  applied,  and  his  house 
burnt  down  before  his  eyes.  At  length  a  high  reward 
led  to  the  capture  of  Gogan,  one  of  the  two  Mias,  and 
he  has  been  made  over  in  eight  distinct  cases,  some  of 
which  occurred  prior  to  the  Magistrate's  ap2>earanco 
before  his  house,  and  some  subsequently  to  that  event." 

On  this  case  coming  before  the  judges  of  the  Nizamat 
Adalat,  they  severely  remarked  that  the  sobriquets  of 
Gog  and  Magog,  given  to  the  two  2:)risoners  in  the 
Sessions  Judge's  letter  of  reference,  were  quite  out  of 
place,  and  evinced  a  levity  which  was  too  indiscreet  to 
be  passed   over   without  some  notice.     Mr  Alexander', 

Q 


242         -  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

the  Magistrate,  was  resisted  in  an  attempt  to  capture 
Mohan  and  to  destroy  his  fortification.  His  letter  of 
19th  December  1854  thus  describes  the  circumstances  : 
"  We  had  to  walk,  I  should  say,  upwards  of  two  miles 
before  we  'reached  a  khdl  at  the  end  of  a  long  avenue 
that  leads  direct  to  Mohan  Mia's  house.  Having  crossed 
the  khiil  without  meeting  with  any  resistance  or  even 
seeing  any  oj^ponent,  we  marched  on  towards  the  house 
through  an  avenue  some  five  hundred  yards  long  and 
not  more  than  twelve  or  thirteen  feet  broad,  lined  on 
both  sides  with  tall  cocoa-nut  and  other  trees,  thick 
jungle,  and  a  deep  ditch.  As  up  to  this  time  I  had 
not  seen  the  darogah  return,  I  imagined  he  had  hitherto 
met  with  no  opposition,  and  must  have  arrived  at 
Mohan  Mia's  house.  My  astonishment,  therefore,  was 
great  when,  without  any  previous  intimation  of  an 
attack,  from  sixty  to  eighty  sidjiivaUalis,  or  spearmen, 
each  armed  with  a  spear  of  about  twelve  feet  in  length, 
and  defended  by  a  shield,  gun-shot  and  sulfi-proof, 
capable  of  covering  the  whole  body  in  a  stooping  pos- 
ture, according  to  their  mode  of  attack,  came  rushing 
down  the  avenue  to  oppose  our  farther  progress.  They 
were  evidently  well-trained  and  determined  men,  for 
they  came  down  without  flinching,  even  when  they  saw 
us  three  Europeans  in  front  of  our  party  with  guns  in 
our  hands.  Four  abreast  they  advanced  in  an  orderly 
and  compact  body.  As  soon  as  we  saw  them  we  called 
out  to  them  to  retreat  and  disperse,  but  not  to  attack 
us.  Instead  of  retreating  they  came  on  the  faster, 
each  man  advancing  in  a  stooping  posture,  with  the 
whole  of  his  body  covered  by  the  shield  in  the  left 
hand,  and  brandishing  the  spear  in  the  right  hand. 
We  again  urged  them  to  retreat,  l)ut  they  were  bent  on 
an  attack.     Being  most  desirous  of  avoiding  bloodshed, 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAKARGANJ.  243 

I  desired  our  party  to  retreat  gradually,  with  our  faces 
towards  the  enemy  and  our  guns  levelled.  In  this 
manner  we  retreated  about  ten  paces,  when  the  assail- 
ants approached  still  nearer.  A  third  warning  proved 
equally  ineffectual ;  they  persisted  in  coming  on,  and 
there  was  not  the  least  doubt  that  they  intended  to  kill 
us.  They  approached  to  within  ten  yards  of  us,  and  in 
another  second  their  spears  would  have  been  into  us, 
when,  seeing  no  ho^^e  of  keeping  them  off  by  any  other 
means,  we  each  of  us  fired  our  double-barrelled  guns, 
which  was  loaded  with  shot,  at  the  sulfiwallah  directly 
in  front  of  us.  About  six  of  them  rolled  over  on  the 
ground,  but  as  they  were  mostly  only  hit  about  the  left 
leg,  they  managed  to  get  up  and  limp  off.  Those  in 
the  rear,  however,  were  not  checked  by  this  discharge, 
but  rushed  on  as  before.  We  were  therefore  compelled 
to  make  use  of  our  second  guns,  which  were  loaded  with 
ball.  In  this  second  volley  some  five  men  must  have 
been  killed.  Upon  this  the  whole  body  of  spearmen 
retired  in  confusion,  but  stoj^ped  and  took  up  their 
stand  at  Mohan  Mia's  house,  some  thirty  or  forty  yards 
in  front  of  us,  where  there  was  a  reserve  force  of  spear- 
men and  gunmen.  Thinking  at  first  they  had  fled  for 
good,  we  followed  them  ujd  for  about  twenty  yards, 
within  which  distance  I  mj^self  saw  three  men  lying 
dead.  I  ordered  their  bodies  to  be  carried  off  by  my 
police,  but  the  confusion  was  such  that  my  order  was 
not  executed." 

Mr  Alexander  was  on  this  occasion  accompanied  by 
two  of  the  Messrs  Morrell  from  Morrellganj,  and  the 
tradition  is  that  Mohan  Mia's  people  did  not  know  that 
the  Magistrate  was  present,  and  mistook  him  and  his 
companions  for  Sibpiir  Feringhies,  whom  they  thought 
the  zamindars  had  hired  to  attack  them.    Mr  Alexander 


244  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

retreated  witliout  securing  any  prisoners,  and  he  men- 
tions that  some  one  in  Mohan  Mia's  house  had  the 
audacity  to  fire  a  gun  after  them.  Mohan  Mia  shortly 
afterwards  surrendered  himself  to  the  autliorities,  and 
as  he  and  his  brother  were  each  sentenced  to  fourteen 
years'  imprisonment,  the  combination  of  rioters  came  to 
an  end. 

The  visit  to  the  house  referred  to  in  Mr  Steer's  judg- 
ment, was,  I  believe,  one  made  by  Mr  Harrison,  and 
took  place  before  Mr  Alexander's  visit.  Mr  Harrison's 
letter  contains  an  interesting  descrijjtion  of  the  way  in 
which  the  house  was  fortified.  It  is  dated,  I  think,  28th 
February  1854, 

Fairs. — There  are  several  fairs  held  in  the  district, 
but  none  of  them  is  of  great  importance.  I  do  not  think 
that  any  of  them  is  attended  by  the  inhabitants  of  other 
districts,  and  there  is  certainly  none  of  them  which  can 
at  all  compare  in  importance  with  the  Kartik  Barani 
fair  in  the  neighbouring  district  of  Dacca.  Nearly  all 
the  fairs  are  held  in  the  cold  weather,  and  the  result  of 
this  sensible  arrangement  is  that  there  is  very  little 
sickness  at  any  of  them.  The  Perozpiir  fair,  which  is 
held  on  the  occasion  of  the  Dol  Jatra  (March),  is  the 
only  one  which  takes  place  far  on  in  the  season.  By 
far  the  oldest  of  all  the  fairs  is  that  colled  the  Kalisuri 
Mela.  It  is  held  at  Kalisuri,  a  small  village  on  the 
borders  of  the  Baufal  thana  (Patuyakhdli  subdivision), 
in  the  month  of  Agrahan  (December).  It  is  said  to 
have  been  established  some  two  hundred  years  ago  by  a 
Mahomedan  saint  named  Syed  Al  Arfan,  and  his  tomb 
is  still  shown  at  Kalisuri,  It  lies  at  the  foot  of  a  very 
old  banyan-tree,  and  is  visited  by  great  numbers  of 
believers,  some   of  whom  sacrifice  oxen  on  the  spot. 


THE  rEOFLE  OE  bAkaRGANJ.  245 

I  am  told,  however,  that  the  number  of  worshippers  lias 
diminished  of  late  years  owing  to  the  spread  of  Ferazi 
tenets. 

The  tradition  is  that  Syed  Al  Arfan  was  a  holy  man 
who  had  the  power  of  working  miracles,  and  that  one 
day,  as  he  was  floating  down  the  river  on  his  magical 
carpet,  he  saw  a  Hindu  girl  come  down  to  the  bank 
to  wash  rice.  He  asked  her  to  cook  some  food  for 
him,  and  when  she  said  that  she  could  not  cook  for  a 
Mahomedan,  he  bade  her  look  into  the  vessel  in  which 
she  had  been  washino-  the  rice.  On  her  doing-  so,  she 
saw  that  the  rice  was  already  cooked — a  miracle  which 
made  her  at  once  become  a  convert  to  the  Syed's 
religion.  She  besought  him  to  grant  her  a  boon,  and 
in  reply  he  promised  that  the  place  Avhere  she  was 
standing  should  become  the  site  of  a  great  annual 
gathering,  and  that  it  should  be  called  after  her  name. 
As  the  girl's  name  was  Kali,  and  she  belonged  to  the 
Suri  caste,  the  village  and  fair  received  the  name  of 
Kalisuri. 

Kalisuri  fair  is  by  no  means  a  gay  or  animated 
gathering.  There  is  a  grave  air  of  business  about  it, 
and  it  is  very  useful  to  the  country-peoplCj  as  they  buy 
their  winter  clothing,  &c.,  at  it ;  but  as  a  spectacle  it  is 
nothing,  and  the  impression  produced  on  the  casual 
visitor  is  one  of  very  great  dulness.  The  booths  are 
chiefly  occupied  by  Barisd/1  shopkeepers,  and  the  goods 
exposed  are  for  the  most  part  the  same  as  those  sold  in 
any  ordinary  bazdr.  The  only  frivolities  allowed  are  a 
merry-go-round,  aud  perhaps  an  exhibition  of  a  han- 
maniish  (ourang  -  outang)  or  a  leopard.  One  most 
commendable  feature  in  the  management  of  this  fair  is 
that  no  prostitutes  are  allowed  to  practise  their  trade  in 
it,  nor  do  they  visit  it.     In  this  respect  Kalisuri  ofi"ers 


246  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

a  most  edifyiDg  contrast  to  the  other  fairs  in  the  dis- 
trict, where  prostitutes  abound,  and  immorality  assumes 
its  grossest  and  most  disgusting  form.  No  doubt  the 
semi-religious  character  of  the  Kalisuri  fair  keeps  away 
the  prostitutes.  I  do  not  think  that  any  drinking  goes 
on  at  Kalisuri,  and  there  is  not  much  at  the  other  fairs, 
although  a  good  deal  of  ganja  is  sold  at  them. 

The    other   principal   fairs   are    those   of   Kalaskdtti, 
Jhalukiitti,  Banaripara,  and  Lakutia. 


II.    MAHOMEDANS. 

I  have  already  said  that  the  majority  of  the  in- 
habitants are  Mahomedans.  This  preponderance  of 
Mahomedans  is  a  feature  which  is  common  to  all  the 
districts  of  Eastern  Bengal,  and  which  becomes  most 
marked  as  we  approach  the  seaboard.  A  'priori  we 
might  have  expected  that  the  proportion  of  Mahomedans 
would  have  been  laro-est  in  the  neio;hbourhood  of  the 
Mahomedan  seats  of  Government,  but  Mr  Beverley  has 
pointed  out  in  his  report  on  the  census  that  the  facts 
of  the  case  are  otherwise.  "  In  Dacca,  which  for  a  long 
time  contained  the  seat  of  Government,  Mahomedans 
are  very  slightly  in  excess  of  Hindus.  In  Maldah, 
which  contained  the  city  of  Gour,  the  Mahomedans  form 
only  46  per  cent,  of  the  population.  In  Murshid^bdd 
they  are  scarcely  45  per  cent.  In  Patna  they  only 
form  12  per  cent,  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  district. 
On  the  other  hand,  in  Btlkarganj,  Tipperah,  Rangj^iir, 
and  Mymensing  they  constitute  two  -  thirds  of  the 
population;  and  in  Dinajpiir,  Nadiya,  Jessore,  and 
Farldpur  more  than  half.  This  circumstance  seems  to 
point  to  tlie  conclusion  that  the  existence  of  Mahome- 
dans in  Bengal  is  not  due  so  much  to  the  introduction 


THE  PEOPLE  OE  BAKARGANJ.  247 

of  Moglial  blood  into  the  country  as  to  the  conversion 
of  the  former  inliahitants,  for  whom  a  rigid  system  of 
caste  discipline  rendered  Hinduism  intolerable." 

The  causes  of  the  preponderance  of  Mahomedans  have 
been  ably  discussed  by  Mr  Beverley,  and  he  has  pointed 
out  that  though  the  dislike  of  the  Hindus  to  the  sea 
may  account  for  their  being  in  a  minority  in  some  of 
the  eastern  districts,  yet  another  explanation  must  be 
found  for  their  numerical  inferiority  in  such  inland 
districts  as  Rajsh3"e  and  Bograh.  In  Kajshye  the 
Mahomedans  are  11  per  cent,  of  the  population,  and 
in  Bograh  they  are  proportionally  more  numerous  than 
in  any  other  district  of  Bengal,  not  even  excepting 
Chittagong  or  Noakhdli,  and  are  upwards  of  80  per  cent, 
of  the  population. 

Mr  Beverley  thinks  that  the  preponderance  of  Maho- 
medans is  chiefly  due  to  conversion  from  the  lower 
castes  of  Hindus,  and  that  though  in  some  cases  per- 
secution may  have  been  employed,  yet  probably  the 
low  -  caste  Hindus  were  generally  glad  to  change 
a  religion  of  degradation  for  one  which  gave  them 
independence  and  self-respect.  In  support  of  this 
view  he  refers  to  the  fact  that  the  Hindus  who  live 
in  Bdkarganj  and  other  ]\Iahomedan  districts  are  chiefly 
of  the  lower  castes,  and  observes  with  truth  that  these 
men  are  even  now  especially  open  to  proselytising  in- 
fluences. It  is  among  the  Chandals  of  Faridpur  and 
Bd-karganj  that  the  Baptist  missionaries  have  made 
nearly  all  their  converts  ;  and  there  are  at  this  moment, 
I  believe,  more  native  Christians  in  Bdkarganj  than  in 
any  other  district  of  Bengal,  except  Nadiya  and  the 
Twenty-four  Pargauas.^     I  may  add  also  that  the  sup- 

1  It  is  probable  also  that  many  of  the  Christians  in  these  two  district 
liave  European  blood  in  their  veins. 


2  48  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

position  tliat  tlie  Hindus  were  forcibly  converted  to 
Mahomedanism  appears  to  be  negatived  by  the  re- 
marks already  quoted  about  the  paucity  of  Maho- 
medans  in  districts  which  contained  the  seats  of 
Mahomedan  Government,  and  more  especially  by  the 
fact  that  the  relative  number  of  Mahomedans  is  less 
in  Mahomedan  cities  than  in  Mahomedan  districts. 
Thus  in  the  Mahomedan  cities  of  Murshidd-bdd  and 
Berhampiir  we  find  that  there  are  twice  as  many 
Hindus  as  Mahomedans;  and  in  Dacca,  wdiich  we 
habitually  speak  of  as  a  Mahomedan  town,  and  which 
appears  to  have  been  founded  by  the  Mahomedans  less 
than  three  hundred  years  ago,  the  Hindus  slightly 
outnumber  the  Mahomedans  (34,433  against  34,275 
Mahomedans),  although  in  the  district  as  a  whole 
there  are  more  than  a  million  of  Mahomedans  against 
less  than  800,000  Hindus.  Now,  if  persecution  had 
been  the  agency  employed  in  converting  the  Hindus,  we 
should  naturally  expect  that  the  result  would  have  been 
greatest  where  the  Mahomedan  power  and  influence 
were  most  in  the  ascendant — namely,  at  the  seats  of 
Government. 

One  thing  \vhich  we  should  not  lose  sight  of  in 
discussing  this  and  other  questions  of  a  similar  nature, 
is  that  our  districts  are  for  the  most  part  artificial 
divisions  of  the  country,  and  in  many  cases  are  of  very 
recent  origin.  I  am  afraid  that  officials  are  apt  to 
forget  this,  and  that  they  endeavour  to  account  for 
certain  phenomena  in  a  district  as  if  it  was  an  entity 
which  had  been  separated  off"  for  as  long  a  time  as  an 
English  shire  or  parish.  Bengal  districts  are  subject  to 
continual  change,  partly  from  diluviation  and  alluvia- 
tion,  but  still  more  from  the  idiosyncrasies  of  their  rulers. 
Thus  within  the  last  few  years  the  proportion  of  Maho- 


THE  PEOPLE  OE  BAKARGANJ.  249 

medaiis  in  Bakargaiij  was  increased  by  tlic  transfer  of 
the  intensely  Maliomedan  tliana  of  JNIulfatganj  from 
Dacca  to  Bdkarganj,  and  then  it  was  again  increased  in 
1873  by  the  transfer  of  the  Madaripiir  subdivision  to 
Faridpiir.^  Simihar  changes  have  occurred  in  other  dis- 
tricts, and  perhaps  the  abnormal  number  of  Maho- 
medaus  in  Bograh,  for  instance,  may  be  accounted  for 
by  some  disturbing  cause  of  this  kind.^ 

But  in  addition  to  the  agencies  of  conversion  and  of 
the  Hindu  dislike  of  the  sea,  there  is  another  potent 
cause  of  the  Mahomedanism  of  Bdkarganj — namely, 
that  many  parts  of  it  were  not  inhabited  until  the 
Hindu  religion  and  polity  had  fallen  into  decay.  Much 
of  the  district  is  of  recent  formation,  and  even  the 
older  parts  of  it  were  probably  covered  with  jungle 
till  a  comparatively  recent  period.  The  northern  part 
is  the  oldest,  as  being  the  farthest  from  the  sea ; 
and  here  we  meet  with  some  ancient  names,  such,  for 
example,  as  that  of  Gournadi.^  Chandradwip,  however, 
which  was  the  name  formerly  given  to  much  of  the 
district,  im^^lies  that  it  Avas  in  or  near  the  sea ;  and 
Selimdbad,  the  name  given  to  the  western  part  of  the 
district,  seems  to  imply  that  the  country  was  not  re- 
deemed from  the  jungle  till  the  time  of  Prince  Selim, 
the  son  of  Akbar,  who  was  afterwards  Emperor  Jehaugir. 


1  Mulfatganj  was  included  in  the  transfer  to  Faridpur,  Ijut  still  the 
effect  was  to  increase  the  proportion  of  Mahomedans  in  Bakarganj,  for 
Kotwalipara  is  essentially  a  Hindu  thana,  and  the  proportion  of  Hindus  is 
also  very  large  in  Madaripiir. 

2  Speaking  of  Jessore,  Mr  Westland  remark.^,  "  The  district  is  now  of 
course  far  from  conterminous  with  Rajah  Pratripiiditya's  territories  ;  but  that 
is  only  because  since  1786,  the  date  of  its  establishment,  it  has  been  made 
to  suffer  changes  of  boundary  so  violent  that  only  half  of  what  then  was 
Jessore  is  within  the  limits  of  the  district  as  it  now  stands." 

^  Although  the  name  still  exists,  Gournadi  village  has  long  since  been 
carried  away  by  the  Arial  Khan, 


250  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

The  recent  origin  of  much  of  the  district  is  shown 
by  the  fact  that  salt  was  manufactured  some  fifty 
or  sixty  years  ago  at  places  which  are  now  far  inland, 
and  Tvhere  the  water  is  now  sweet  for  the  greater  part 
of  the  year.  Thus  we  find  tafals  or  places  for  making 
salt  at  Sibpi\r,  Niaraati,  &c.  The  former  nature  of  the 
country  is  also  indicated  by  the  word  'kdtti — i.e.,  cutting 
or  clearing- — which  we  find  affixed  to  the  names  of  so 
many  villages.  Thus  we  have  Eaikdtti,  or  the  clearing 
of  the  Raies  ;  Jhalukiltti,  or  the  clearing  of  the  fishermen  ; 
Sarupkdtti,  or  the  clearing  of  Sarup ;  Kdnudasskdtti,  or 
the  clearing  of  Kanu  Dass,  &c. 

It  is  probable  tliat  when  the  stream  of  Hindu  civili- 
sation came  in  from  the  north,  it  spread  itself  chiefly 
over  "Western  and  Central  Bengal,  and  only  slightly 
sprinkled  the  eastern  tracts,  which  thus  became  Maho- 
medan  by  right  of  civilisation  and  conquest :  by  civilisa- 
tion, namely,  by  the  driving  out  of  the  wild  beasts  and 
by  clearing  the  jungle ;  and  by  conquest,  in  north-east 
Bengal  from  the  aboriginal  tribes  of  the  Koches  and  the 
Assamese,  and  in  the  south-east  from  the  Burmese  and 
Portuguese. 

It  is  true  that  Ralph  Fitch  describes  Bdkla  as  being 
a  large  Hindu  city  in  1586  ;  and  Sripiir,  Chandecan,  and 
probably  also  the  lost  city  of  Bengala,  were  in  the 
possession  of  Hindu  princes.  But  on  the  other  hand, 
though  the  island  of  Sandwip  was  not  concj^uered  by  the 
Moghals  till  1666,  it  appears  to  have  had  a  Mahomedan 
population  a  hundred  years  before  this;  for  Csesar 
Frederick  describes  the  people  as  being  Moors — i.e., 
]\Iahomedans — in  1569.  The  Jesuit  priests,  also,  who 
visited  Bengal  in  1599,  state  that  nine  out  of  the 
twelve  bhuyas  of  Bengal  were  Mahomedans.  However, 
even  if  we  suppose  that  most  of  the  inhabitants  as  well 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAKARGANJ.  251 

as  the  Rajahs  of  Sripdr  and  Balda  were  Ilindu.s,  and 
that  also  the  Simdarbans  had  a  much  hirger  popuhitioii 
formerly  than  they  now  have,  it  is  clear  that  the 
original  inhabitants  eventually  died  out  or  left  the 
country,  Avliich  thereon  relapsed  into  jungle,  and  was 
not  cleared  again  till  a  comparatively  recent  period. 
Indeed,  "whatever  was  the  condition  of  the  Sundarbans 
some  three  hundred  years  ago,  it  seems  certain  that 
their  present  colonists  have  not  been  settled  for  more 
than  fifty  or  sixty  years.  No  doubt  the  great  storm 
of  1584,  in  which  we  are  told  that  200,000  persons 
perished,  did  much  to  depopulate  the  country ;  and 
Grant,  in  a  passage  already  quoted,  ascribes  the  desolate 
condition  of  Bakla  to  this  cause,  and  also  to  the  subse- 
cjuent  ravages  of  the  Mugs.  Probably  this  last  cause  was 
more  potent  even  than  the  inundation.  The  tradition 
is  that  it  was  the  Mugs  who  compelled  the  Chandra- 
dwip  Rajahs  to  forsake  their  ancient  seat  of  Kacliua,  and 
we  have  already  seen  that  Du  Jarric  describes  the  King 
of  Arracan  as  having  taken  possession  of  Bdkla  in  the 
beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century.  Rennel's  map 
also  represents  a  large  tract  in  the  south  of  Bdkarganj 
as  depopulated  by  the  Mugs. 

It  was  only  when  a  strong  Mahomedan  power  was 
established  at  Dacca,  and  a  fleet  raised  for  the  express 
purpose  of  combating  the  Mugs,  that  their  inroads  re- 
ceived a  check.  The  Mugs  were  hardy  and  experienced 
sailors,  and  the  Hindu  princes  were  totally  unable  to 
contend  with  them.  It  is  doubtful  if  they  ever  pos- 
sessed any  ships,  and  their  notions  about  the  impurity 
of  boat-life,  &c.,  were  sufficient  to  deter  them  from  the 
sea.  Du  Jarric  says  that  the  island  of  Sandwip  belonged 
of  right  to  Kedar  Rai  of  Sripiir ;  but  even  if  this  were 
true,  it  is  evident  that  he  could  not  make  good  his  right 


252  DISTRICT  OF  BAKAKGANJ. 

to  it  without  the  caid  of  Carvalho  and  the  Portuguese 
sailors,  and  neither  he  nor  the  Rajah  of  Bdkla  were  able 
to  resist  Gonzales  when  the  latter  chose  to  carve  out 
for  himself  an  independent  principality.  I  may  note 
also  that  Kedar  Rai's  right  to  Sandwip  could  not 
have  been  of  very  long  standing,  for  it  was  in  the 
hands  of  a  Mahomedan  king  when  Csesar  Frederick 
visited  it. 

AVlien  the  Mugs  began  to  give  trouble,  the  more  re- 
spectable— i.e.,  the  more  inert  and  unwarlike — Hindus 
appear  to  have  left  the  country^  and  Mr  Westland  (p. 
220)  describes  Khalia  in  the  Narail  subdivision  of 
Jessore  as  having  been  established  by  men  of  the  upper 
castes  who  had  left  their  homes  in  the  south  on  account 
of  the  incursions  of  the  Burmese,  Most  of  the  Hindus 
who  remained  in  Bakarganj  probably  became  voluntary 
converts  to  Mahomedanism,  and  there  is  little  doubt 
that  the  process  was  hastened  by  the  fact  that  the  mere 
circumstance  of  their  living  side  by  side  with  Mugs, 
Portuguese,  and  Mahomedans  was  sufficient  to  tarnish 
their  caste  in  the  ej^es  of  Hindus  of  other  districts,  and 
so  to  deprive  them  of  the  social  advantages  of  Hinduism. 
It  is  not  improbable  that  some  mixture  of  races  took 
place,  and  local  traditions  seem  to  countenance  the  sup- 
position. Thus  the  Dasses  of  Ramzanpiir  char  in  the 
Arial  Khan  say  that  they  lost  their  caste  owing  to  a 
Mu2-   having   touched    one    of  their  women   with   the 

o  o 

humane  intention  of  saving  her  from  drowning.  He 
was  passing  along  the  river-bank  while  she  was  bathing, 
and  she  seeing  a  stranger  dived  under  water  in  order  to 
elude  his  gaze.  The  Mug  thought  she  was  drowning, 
and  jumped  in  and  brought  her  to  land,  the  result 
being  that  she  and  all  her  tribe  lost  their  status,  and 
were  no  longer  regarded  as  respectable  Sudras. 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  253 

We  find  also  that  to  tliis  day  the  Hindus  of  Western 
and  Central  Bengal  look  down  on  the  inhabitants  of 
Eastern  Bengal,  and  call  them  Bangals.  This  word, 
though  etymologically  it  only  means  an  inhabitant  of 
Banga — {.<?.,  Eastern  Bengal — has  acquired  an  oppro- 
brious signification,  and  is  used  to  mean  a  rough  or 
bungling  person.  It  thus  resembles  in  its  use  the  adjec- 
tive "  Hieland  " — i.e,^  Highland — which,  in  spite  of  fine 
theories  about  the  civilisation  and  superiority  of  the 
Highlanders,  is  still  used  by  the  common  people  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  Glasgow  as  a  synonym  for  anything 
stupid  or  awkward.^ 

The  existence  of  such  sentiments  would,  of  course, 
,  predispose  the  Hindus  of  Bdkarganj  to  embrace  Maho- 
medanism.  Still  I  have  no  doubt  that  the  excessive 
preponderance  of  Mahomedans  in  the  southern  part  of 
Bdkarganj  is  not  so  much  due  to  conversion  as  to  colo- 
nisation. In  the  Patu3'akhdli  subdivision  the  Mahome- 
dans are  80 "8  of  the  whole  po^^ulation,  and  in  the 
Gulsakhdli  thana  of  it  they  are  as  much  as  8 6 '4  per 
cent.,  wliereas  in  the  Sadr  or  Barisdl  subdivision  they 
are  only  64 '8  per  cent.  It  is  the  pressure  of  population 
in  other  districts,  and  also  the  protection  against  rob- 
bers afi'orded  by  the  British  Government,  which  have  led 
to  the  colonisation  of  Southern  Bilkarganj  ;  and  when 
the  process  began,  the  Mahomedans  easily  outstripped 
the  Hindus  in  the  race  for  taking  possession  of  the  new 
country. 

^  A  curious  illustration  of  the  opprobrious  use  of  the  word  "Baugal" 
Avas  given  a  few  years  ago  bj'  a  lathial,  or  clubman,  when  he  was  dying 
from  the  effects  of  a  spear-wound  inflicted  in  a  Btikarganj  riot.  Profes- 
sional lathials  have  certain  rules  among  themselves,  and  do  not  take  unfair 
advantage  of  one  anotliei-,  or  inflict  deadly  wounds  on  each  other  if  they  can 
help  it.  But  a  clodhopper  had  disregarded  this  rule,  and  had,  like  Nicole 
in  '•  Le  Bourgeois  Gentilhomme,"  given  a  thrust  not  authorised  by  science, 
and  30  the  lathial  died  regretting  that  a  Bangui  had  killed  him. 


2  54  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

Maliomeclans  are  not  nearly  such  "stay-at-homes"  as 
Hindus.  They  have  fewer  local  superstitions,  and  no 
local  gods,  while  the  principle  of  the  family  is  less 
strong  among  them.  The  joint-family  system  is  un- 
known to  them,  and  the  practice  of  polygamy  is  un- 
favourable to  fixity  of  residence.  There  is  also  no  doubt 
that  ]\Iahomedans  are  more  enterprising  than  Hindus ; 
and  that  their  more  generous  diet  fits  them  better 
to  endure  an  unhealthy  climate,  and  especially  the 
salt  air  of  the  eastern  districts.  Hence  we  find  that 
the  chars  and  islands  are  almost  exclusively  peopled 
by  Mahomedans.  Where,  as  in  Manpura,  there  is  a 
Hindu  settlement,  it  is  of  people  of  inferior  caste, 
who  eat  meat,  and  have  otherwise  broken  with  Hindu 
practices. 

The  Mahomedans  of  Bdkarganj  are  nearly  all  Sunis, 
and  do  not  particularly  observe  the  Maharam.  They 
are  altogether  stricter  in  their  religious  notions  than  the 
Shias  of  the  Dacca  district.  They  do  not  drink  spirits, 
and  iudulgc  sparingly  in  ganja  and  opium,  as  is  shown 
by  the  comparatively  small  excise  revenue  of  the  district. 
Very  many  are  Ferazis-*— {.e,,  observers  of  the  law  or 
Ferz — and  are  thus  followers  of  Dudha  Mia.  Dudlia 
Mia  was  born  in  thana  ]\Iulfatganj  (now  transferred  to 
Farldpur),  and  his  sect  is  particularly  strong  in  that 
neighbourhood.  It  originated  with  his  father,  Shariyat 
Oolah.  The  Ferazis  have  often  been  identified  with 
the  Wahabis,  and  there  is  undoubtedly  a  resemblance 
between  their  creeds.  Both  appear  to  aim  at  a  sort  of 
primitive  Church  movement,  or  return  to  the  doctrines  of 
Mahomed,  and  to  attempt  to  abandon  the  superstitious 
practices  which  have  gathered  round  the  earlier  creed  by 
lapse  of  time  and  by  contact  with  Hindus  and  other 
infidels.     It  does  not  appear,  however,  that  the  Ferazis 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAkARGANJ.  255 

share  the  dangerous  political  views  of  tlie  Walialjis,  or 
that  their  revolutionary  views  extend  beyond  dieput- 
ing  their  landlords'  claims  for  rent.  Hindu  zamindars 
and  alarmists  generally  are  fond  of  representing  the 
Ferazis  as  politically  dangerous,  but,  I  think,  without 
sufficient  reason.  No  doubt  they  are  more  vigorous 
and  less  tractable  than  ordinary  Mahomedans,  but 
this  need  not  be  a  disadvantage  in  their  character. 
They  have  no  music  at  their  marriages,  they  do  not 
reverence  saints,  and  they  are  distinguished  somewhat 
from  other  Mahomedans  by  the  arrangement  of  their 
dhiiti,  as  they  do  not  allow  the  end  to  fall  down  behind, 
but  tuck  it  carefully  up.  They  also,  I  believe,  hold 
that  it  is  not  right  to  have  mosques  or  places  of  public 
prayer  in  a  country  governed  by  infidels. 

Many  Mahomedans  of  Bdkarganj  call  themselves 
followers  of  the  late  Karamat  Ali  of  Juaupiir,  but  as  far 
as  I  know,  he  had  no  distinctive  theological  tenets, 
being  chiefly  a  preacher  of  morality. 

The  Mahomedans  have  adopted  a  number  of  Hindu 
customs  from  their  neighbours.  Thus  they  not  only 
observe  the  dusserah  puja,  but  keep  the  novanna,  and 
are  fond  of  talking  of  their  caste.  ■^  There  are  several 
subdivisions  among  them.  One  class  is  called  the  chd- 
kars,  or  servants.  They  are  the  palki-bearers  and  pun- 
kah-pullers, and  are  in  considerable  number  near  Bari- 

^  Dr  Taylor  says  in  his  "Topography  of  Dacca"  that  the  boatmeu 
worship  a  river-god  named  Budder.  Budder  or  Badr  is,  I  am  told,  a 
Mahomedan  saint  who  is  buried  at  Chittagong.  The  Bakarganj  boatmen 
often  chant  the  following  Bengali  verse  ; — 

"  Amra  achhi  pala  p{ia, 
UUa  hoilo  nigahbjjn. 
Gangar  sire  panch  pfr. 

Budder,  Budder." 

The  meaning  being,  "  We  are  children,  God  is  our  guardian.  There  are 
five  saints  (sitting)  on  the  head  of  the  Ganges.     Budder,  Budder." 


2 5 6  DISTRICT  O F  bAkARGANJ. 

sal.  Tliey  are  somewhat  looked  down  upon  by  otLer 
Maliomedans,  who  will  not  intermarry  with  them. 
The  nikdris,  or  fishmongers,  are  another  class  by  them- 
selves. The  largest  class  is  that  of  the  hehajias,  or  so- 
called  gipsies.  They  live  in  boats  or  houses  raised  on 
piles,  and  subsist  by  selling  fish-hooks,  &c.  They  do 
not  cultivate  land,  but  keep  ducks  and  poultry.  Their 
largest  settlements  are  at  Amtolli  and  Bdkarganj,  but 
they  are  also  to  be  met  with  at  Jhaluk^tti,  Kalaskdtti, 
Sarikal,  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir,  &c.  They  do  not  appear 
to  be  thieves. 

Converts  are  occasionally  made  from  Hinduism  to 
Mahomedanism,  but  a  love  affair  is  commonly  involved 
in  the  conversion.  A  Hindu  widow  perhaps,  tired  of 
her  loneliness  and  poverty,  adopts  a  neighbour's  creed 
and  espouses  him ;  or  a  Hindu  man  falls  in  love  with  a 
Mahomedan  woman,  and  changes  his  religion  for  her 
sake. 

It  has  been  said  elsewhere  that  almost  all  the  Malio- 
medans of  Bdkarganj  belong  to  the  lower  classes.  There 
are  few  families  of  distinction  in  the  district.  The 
great  bulk  of  the  Maliomedans  are  employed  in  the 
cultivation  of  the  soil.  Comparatively  few  are  in  the 
service  of  Government  or  belong  to  the  professional 
classes.  The  pleaders,  native  physicians,  traders,  shop- 
keepers, barbers,  carpenters,  blacksmiths,  potters,  fisher- 
men, and  washermen  are  nearly  all  Hindus.  The  only 
cjuasi  -  literary  occupation  which  Mahomedans  much 
affect  is  that  of  the  muJchtar,  or  attorney. 

A  strikino:  feature  in  the  character  of  the  Mahome- 
dan  population  is  the  frequency  of  cases  of  elopement 
amongst  the  women.  The  subject  has  attracted  a  good 
deal  of  attention,  but,  as  might  be  expected,  no  legisla- 
tive remedy  has  been  adequate  to  cure  the  evil.     It  must 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAKARGANJ.  257 

be  admitted  that  tlie  sexual  morality  of  Bdkarganj  Ma- 
liomcdans  is  low.  Many  of  tlicm  arc  boatmen/  lead- 
ing wandering  and  solitary  lives.  Like  most  sailors, 
they  arc  an  immoral  class ;  and  their  wives,  from 
being  left  to  themselves  so  much,  often  fall  into  in- 
trigues. 

The  Mahomedans  of  Bdkarganj  are,  generally  speak- 
ing, very  ignorant,  and  have  an  aversion  to  Govern- 
ment schools.  They  are  especially  averse  to  the  edu- 
cation of  their  daughters  in  schools,  and  rarely  send 
them.  On  the  other  hand,  it  must  be  said  that  girls 
belonging  to  the  uj^jDcr  classes  are  generally  taught 
at  home,  and  that  a  knowledge  of  reading  and  writing 
is  more  common  among  them  than  among  Hindu  girls 
of  similar  position. 

The  Bakarganj  ]\Iahomedans  have  been  described  by 
Mr  Sutherland  and  others  as  peculiarly  bad  specimens 
of  their  class.  I  have  had  experience  in  Dacca  and 
Noakhd,li,  and  did  not  find  the  Mahomedans  of  those 
districts  superior  to  those  of  Bakarganj.  If  there  is 
any  difference  perceptible  between  them,  it  may  be  due 
to  the  fact  that  the  latter,  being  of  more  independent 
character,  show  their  good  and  bad  qualities  with  less 
restraint. 

III.    HINDUS. 

There  is  not,  in  my  opinion,  much  which  is  peculiar 
or  interesting  about  the  Bakarganj  Hindus.  Most  of 
them  belong  to  the  Nama  Sudra  or  Chandal  caste, 
wliicli  is  especially  prevalent  in  the  northern  and  western 
parts  of  the  district  which  border  on  Faridpur.  They 
are  a  strong  and  hard-working   class,  and  are  sought 

^  According  to  the  census,  there  were  27,GG2  boatmen  (males  only). 

R 


258  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

after  as  roadmakers  and  diggers  of  tanks.  Tliey  are" 
ignorant  and  rather  stupid,  and  are  in  general  peace- 
able enongli,  but  occasionally  form  combinations  to 
resist  their  landlords.  They  practise  widow-marriage, 
or  at  least  often  live  in  adulterous  intercourse  with 
widows. 

There  are  comparatively  few  Brahmans  in  Bdkar- 
ganj ;  they  are  most  numerous  in  Idilpilr  and  Kotwali- 
para,  and  the  latter  is  noted  for  the  number  of  its 
pandits.  There  are  great  numbers  of  Kayasts/  and 
this  is  partly  due,  no  doubt,  to  the  fact  that  the  Chan- 
dradwip  Eajahs  were  of  this  caste.  To  the  same  cause 
is  also  due  the  circumstance  that  many  of  the  Kayasts 
are  of  very  good  family.  There  are  what  are  called 
Kulin  Kayasts;  and  the  Kayasts  of  Banaripara  and 
Gabha,  &c. — viz.,  the  Thakurtas,  the  Glioses,  and  the 
Guhas — rank  high  in  Hindu  society -both  in  Bdkarganj 
and  other  districts.  There  are  large  numbers  of  the 
Baidya  or  doctor  caste ;  hence  the  number  and  cele- 
brity of  the  kabirajes,  or  native  doctors,  in  the  dis- 
trict. No  doubt  the  large  number  of  Baidyas  is  in 
some  measure  due  to  the  prominence  in  the  last  cen- 
tury of  Rajah  Raj  Ballab  Sein.^ 

The  distinctions  of  caste  have  become  a  good  deal 
obliterated,  but  there  are  two  points  on  which  they 
are  still  immovable — marriage,  and  eating  and  drink- 
ing. It  is  still  impossible  for  a  Brd/hman  to  marry 
a  woman  of  any  other  caste,  or  to  eat  with  a  member 
of  a  different  caste.  Even  within  the  same  caste 
there   are    distinctions   in    this    matter,   some    families 

^  According  to  the  census,  there  are  27,395  Kayasts. 

2  I  find  there  was  another  Rajah  Raj  Ballab,  who  held  the  office  of  Ray 
Royan,  and  was  the  son  of  Dulabram.  Sir  Elijah  Impey  refers  to  him  in 
a  letter  of  20th  January  1776,  and  says  that  he  had  always  understood  the 
Company  was  much  indebted  to  Dulabram. 


THE  PEOPLE  OE  bAkARGANJ.  259 

refusing  to  associate  with  otlicrs,  tlioiigli  all  may 
belong  nominally  to  the  same  caste.  Hence  arise 
frequent  squabbles,  Avliich  occasionally  come  into  court, 
men  having  been  known  to  bring  actions  against 
their  neighbours  because  they  would  not  come  to  dine 
with  them.  The  ground  of  action  in  such  a  case 
was  that  by  the  refusal  the  neighbours  implied  that 
the  hosts  were  not  of  a  good  caste,  and  thereby 
libelled  them.  It  is  usual  to  speak  of  caste  as  an 
unmixed  evil,  but  it  has  its  advantages.  If  it 
represses  originality  and  invention  by  compelling  a 
man  to  adopt  his  father's  trade,  even  although  his 
natural  aptitudes  may  lie  in  another  direction ;  yet,  on 
the  other  hand,  it  fosters  hereditary  capabilities,  and 
checks  undue  competition.  It  may  also  be  said  to 
supply  the  place  of  national  pride  or  patriotism.  Un- 
doubtedly, too,  it  chimes  in  with  the  natural  temper 
and  disposition  of  the  Bengalis,  and  indeed  if  it  did 
not,  it  would  not  stand  a  day.  The  Bengali,  like  every 
Oriental,  likes  to  do  everything  just  as  his  father  and 
grandfather  did  it  Defore  him,  and  does  not  like  new- 
fangled ways. 

The  Brahma  Samdj  was  established  in  Barisjil  some 
fifteen  years  ago.''  It  has  a  church,  but  does  not 
flourish  as  it  did  formerly.  Many  educated  Hindus 
hold  the  opinions  professed  by  the  Samaj,  but  do  not 
avow  them  or  contribute  to  its  funds* 

IV.    BUDDHISTS. 

The  Buddhists  of  Bdkarganj  all  belong  to  the  Mug 
race,  and  reside  in  the  Sundarbans.  An  account  of 
them  has  been  given  in  chapter  v. 

1  Ashar  10,  1268,  or  1783  Sak  -  1861  a.d. 


2  6o  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 


V.   CHRISTIANS. 

The  number  of  Christians  in  B^karganj  is  stated  in 
the  Census  Report  to  be  4852.  The  number,  however, 
must  be  considerably  less  now,  as  the  Christians  were 
most  numerous  in  the  northern  part  of  the  district,  and 
especially  in  thanas  Gournadi  and  Kotwalipara.  Nearly 
the  whole  of  Kotwalij^ara  and  much  of  Gournadi  have 
now  been  transferred  to  Faridptir,  and  several  Christian 
villages  have  been  transferred  with  them.  It  is  probable, 
therefore,  that  the  Christian  population  of  Bdkarganj  is 
now  under  3000  persons.  The  number,  however,  is  still 
very  large  for  a  rural  district  in  Bengal,  and  shows  that 
missionaries  have  been  exceptionally  successful  in  Bdkar- 
ganj.  About  800  of  the  number  are  accounted  for  by 
the  existence  of  the  Portuguese  colony  at  Sibpilr.  These 
Christians  belong  to  the  Roman  Catholic  faith,  and  have 
been  described  at  p.  110. 

The  remaining  2200  or  so  reside  almost  entirely  in 
the  north  and  north-west  parts  of  the  district,  and  were 
originally,  almost  without  exception,  Chandals,  or  low- 
caste  Hindus.  I  believe  that  there  has  not  been  a  single 
instance  of  the  conversion  of  a  Mahomedan  inhabitant 
of  Bdkarganj,  so  that  the  Masalman  religion  is  as  great 
an  obstacle  to  Christian  missionaries  now  as  Fernandez 
and  Fonseca  found  it  nearly  280  years  ago.  Some  have 
ascribed  the  success  of  the  missionaries  in  the  north  of 
Bdkarganj  to  the  j^revious  existence  of  a  deistical  sect 
known  by  the  name  of  the  Karta  Bhojds,  or  worshippers 
of  the  Lord.  I  believe,  however,  that  it  was  the  oppres- 
sions of  the  landholders  and  their  agents  which  gave  the 
chief  impetus  to  the  movement,  and  that  Christianity 
recommended  itself  to  the  Chandals  by  its  socialistic  and 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  261 

iiisuiTcctionary  doctrines,  and  by  the  fact  that  tlie  Padre 
Saheb  or  missionary  presented  himself  in  some  measure 
as  a  bulwark  between  them  and  their  masters.  It  is  at 
least  certain  that  the  landholders  showed  at  one  time 
great  hostility  to  the  movement ;  and  as  one  of  the  most 
active  among  them  was  himself  a  Christian,  it  is  not 
likely  that  religious  bigotry  had  much  to  do  with  their 
conduct.  This  hostility  reached  its  culminating-point 
in  the  abduction  and  subsequent  confinement  of  some 
native  Christian  families  about  twenty  years  ago.  This 
led  to  a  trial,  known  as  the  Baropakhya  case,  which 
excited  a  large  amount  of  attention  in  the  district  and 
in  Calcutta,  and  also,  I  believe,  in  England.  It  was,  I 
believe,  true  in  the  main,  and  I  regret  to  say  that  the 
accused  were  acquitted  by  the  appellate  court. 

The  first  preaching  of  Christianity  in  the  district  took 
place  about  1830,  in  the  time  of  Mr  Garrett,  who  was 
Magistrate,  and  afterwards  Judge,  and  who  became  a 
Baptist  and  was  publicly  dipped  in  a  tank  at  Baris^l.  His 
•Nazir  or  Sheriff,  Mr  Parry,  was  an  active  preacher  for 
some  time,  and  was  afterwards  a  missionary  in  Jessore. 
He  was  succeeded,  I  believe,  by  a  Mr  Smith ;  and  after 
Mr  Smith  came  a  Mr  Sylvester  Bareiro,  who,  I  under- 
stand, originally  came  from  Chittagong,  and  was  school- 
master in  Barisdl  for  some  time.  Mr  Bareiro  was  greatly 
befriended  by  Mr  Sturt  (the  Collector,  who  was  after- 
wards degraded  on  account  of  defalcations  in  the  trea- 
sury), and  was  made  by  him  Superintendent  of  Stamps. 
He  was  a  Baptist  missionary  for  many  years,  but  was 
at  last  removed  on  a  charge  of  immorality.  He  then 
joined  the  Church  of  England,  and  set  up  an  oppo- 
sition mission,  which  still  exists,  and  has  a  consider- 
able number  of  adherents.  It  has  been  acknowledged 
and   subsidised  by  the  Bishop    of   Calcutta,  although, 


262  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

according  to  the  Baptists,  most  of  ]Mr  Bareiro's  ad- 
lierents  are  persons  wlio  have  deserted  from  or  been 
turned  out  of  their  Church.  Mr  Page  was  a  Baptist 
missionary  who  long  resided  in  Bakarganj  and  made 
many  converts.  The  late  Mr  Sale  also  resided  in  the 
district  for  many  years,  and  was  greatly  esteemed  by 
every  one  who  knew  him. 

The  principal  mission  stations  of  the  Baptists  are  at 
Ashkar  and  Dhanshar  in  the  Gournadi  thana.  Mr 
Bareiro's  church  is  at  Dhandhoba.  There  are  not  many 
cases  of  conversion  nowadays,  and  I  do  not  think  that 
the  missions  can  be  regarded  as  being  in  a  flourishing 
state.  The  impulse  which  once  led  many  to  become 
Christians  has  died  away,  and  the  missionaries  scarcely 
attempt  to  do  more  than  keep  together  the  converts 
they  have  already  made.  They  have  been  unable 
to  do  even  this,  for  many  have  relapsed  into  Hindu- 
ism. These  men  are  known  by  the  name  oi  pherti  or 
turn-aways,  and  I  have  met  several  in  the  bils.  One  of 
them  told  me  that  he  had  abandoned  Christianity  be-- 
cause  the  ten  commandments  were  too  hard  for  him. 
I  believe,  however,  that  in  most  cases  persons  have 
apostatised  in  order  to  get  back  into  society,  and 
i  especially  in  order  to  have  their  daughters  married.  Ac- 
cording to  law,  native  Christian  girls  cannot  marry  until 
they  are  thirteen  years  of  age,  and  as  this  is  later 
than  the  ordinary  age  for  marriage  among  the  Hindus, 
parents  complain  much  of  the  restriction. 

There  are  very  few  Christians  near  Barisdl,  and 
none  at  all  in  the  southern  thanas.  The  movement, 
in  fact,  has  been  from  first  to  last  exceedingly 
local  in  its  character,  and  has  been  confined  to  the 
swamps  of  Faridpur  and  north-east  Bdkarganj. 

I  do  not  think  that  the  native  Christians  are  at  all 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  263 

superior  to  Hindus  and  Maliomcdans  of  a  similar  class, 
but  native  gentlemen  have  told  mc  that  tliey  arc  more 
trutliful.^  "i'liey  are  generally  very  ignorant,  and  have 
still  a  hankering  after  Hindu  customs  and  amusements, 
such  as  boat-racing,  &c.  They  are  cultivators  and  fisher- 
men, and  in  the  cold  weather  they  migrate  to  various 
parts  of  the  district  and  work  at  road-making  and  the 
digging  of  tanks. 

Since  writing  this  account  of  the  Christians,  I  have 
found  in  the  India  Office  Library  a  volume  of  the 
"Calcutta  Christian  Observer"  for  1856,  which  con- 
tains a  full  account  of  the  Bdropakhya  case.  It  is 
in  the  form  of  a  review  of  a  pamphlet  by  Mr 
Underhill,  who  was  Secretary  to  the  Baptist  body, 
and  who  afterwards  took  a  leading  part  in  the  de- 
nunciation of  Governor  Eyre.  The  precise  date  of  the 
outrage  was  1st  July  1855  (C.  C.  0.,  vol.  xxv.  p.  397, 
1856). 

The  same  volume  contains  (p.  408  e^  aeq^  a  very  in- 
teresting account  of  the  sects  of  the  Karta  Bhojds  and 
of  the  Satya  Gurus,  apparently  from  the  pen  of  Dr 
Wenger,  and  as  it  incidentally  describes  the  origin  of 
Christianity  in  Bakarganj,  I  have  taken  the  liberty  of 
making  the  following  extract : — 

"  The  next  sect  is  that  of  the  Kartil  Bhojds  or  '  wor- 
shippers of  the  Lord.'  Many  of  its  members  were 
originally  Mahomedans.  All  of  them  profess  to  re- 
pudiate idolatry  and  caste  ;  but  their  moral  princijDles 
are  not  so  pure  as  was  at  flrst  supposed.  It  was  among 
adherents  of  this  sect  that  the  movement  in  Krishna- 

^  The  Hon.  F.  B.  Kemp  was  the  judge  who  heard  llie  appeal  iu 
the  Baropakhya  case.  On  l)eing  censured  for  releasing  the  accused  he 
wrote  a  defence  of  his  conduct,  in  which  he  gave  some  damaging  particulars 
about  the  morals  of  the  native  Christians. 


264  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

glmr  iu  favour  of  Christianity  originally  commenced;  and 
Krishna  Pdl,  the  first  convert  of  the  Baptist  Mission, 
is  believed  to  have  belonged  to  this  or  a  similar  sect 
before  he  began  to  listen  to  the  gospel.  An  opinion 
has  repeatedly  been  expressed  to  the  effect  that  the 
Kartd,  Bhojd,  sect  owes  its  origin  mainly  to  the  diffusion 
of  certain  frasfments  of  Christian  truth.  It  would  be 
difficult  to  produce  any  historical  evidence  in  support 
of  this  idea,  whilst  on  the  other  hand  there  is  much  in 
it  that  is  probable.  Is  it  not  possible  that  some  Chris- 
tian ceremonies  (such  as  might  be  noticed  by  any 
humble  native  observer)  may  have  been  blended  with 
some  elements  of  Mahomedanism  and  some  Shdktya 
rites  by  the  founder  or  founders  of  the  sect  ? 

"The  following  account  of  its  origin  is  from  the  pen  of 
an  anonymous  native  correspondent  of  the  '  Upadeshak,' 
and  appears  in  that  periodical  in  the  number  for  Novem- 
ber 1847.  The  writer  says  that  it  is  based  upon  in- 
formation derived  from  frequent  personal  intercourse 
with  Kartd,  Bhojds  and  others.  '  In  the  village  of  UM, 
on  the  western  bank  of  the  Ganges  (Bhagirathi  or 
Hooghly  ?),  there  lived  a  man  named  Mahadeb,  a  cul- 
tivator of  pdn  (usually  called  the  betel-leaf  plant).  He 
was  childless  ;  but  one  day  on  going  into  his  plantation 
of  pdn,  he  found  a  weeping  infant,  and  looking  ujDon 
it  as  a  gift  of  God,  determined  to  adopt  the  child  for 
his  own,  a  resolution  to  which  his  wife  gladly  assented. 
The  boy  grew  up,  but  being  somewhat  silly,  the  neigh- 
bours called  him  Oula.  *  For  some  years  he  assisted  his 
father  in  cultivating  and  selling  pdn ;  but  after  a  time 
he  ran  away,  dressed  only  in  the  tattered  garment  of 
a  devotee.  He  reapj^eared  on  the  eastern  bank  of  the 
river,  gave  himself  out  to  be  a  mahdpurush  (or  ''great 
man "  who  has  completely  subdued  the  senses),  or  at 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  265 

least  a  guru  (spiritual  teaclicr),  and  succeeded  in  gather- 
ing a  company  of  twenty-two  disciples.'  (The  names 
are  all  recorded,  but  need  not  be  repeated  here.)  '  The 
mantra  which  he  gave  them  w\as,  "  Satya  bala,  guru 
dhara,  sange  chala ; "  i.e.,  "  Speak  the  truth,  cleave  to 
the  teacher,  and  come  along  with  us."  After  this,  he 
took  them  Avitli  him  to  the  marshy  district,  near  the 
Sunderbuns,  where  he  set  up  as  a  worker  of  miracles, 
and  succeeded  in  deluding  many  people. 

" '  After  his  death,  some  of  his  twenty-two  disciples, 
imitating  his  example,  began  business  on  their  own 
account.  They  would  train  some  man  to  pretend  deaf- 
ness, until  any  sick  person  came  to  be  healed,  when,  on 
receiving  a  blow,  he  was  suddenly  to  speak.  They  would 
then  strike  the  sick  man  also,  and  tell  him,  "  You  see 
this  deaf  man  has  been  cured,  but  you  have  not  yet 
sufficient  faith,  therefore  you  cannot  be  cured  now.  Eat 
some  earth  from  under  this  tree,  come  every  year  to  the 
master's  house,  and  believe,  then  you  will  undoubtedly 
recover."  In  this  way  they  have  succeeded  in  deluding 
thousands.' 

"At  the  close  of  this  historical  account  the  customary 
prayer  of  the  Kart^  Bhojas  is  given.  As  it  is  very 
interesting,  and  infinitely  better  than  the  preceding 
narrative  would  lead  one  to  expect,  we  subjoin  it  here. 
After  a  brief  invocation  of  '  the  true  one  of  Shiva  and 
Eamballabh,'  it  goes  on  as  follows  :  '  It  is  unreason- 
able to  suppose  that  by  studying  any  shdstra  a  true 
knowledge  of  Thee  can  be  obtained,  for  in  the  difiierent 
shdstras  difierent  relifi^ions  are  tauo-ht.  Amongf  this 
diversity  of  religions  how  can  certainty  be  obtained  ? 
0  Lord,  we  are  ignorant  and  stupid ;  have  mercy  on  us, 
and  cause  us  to  understand  the  truth,  that  we  may  be 
comforted.     Further,  great  Lord,  keep  us  from  evil,  and 


266  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

grant  iis  willingness,  courage,  and  ability  to  do  good. 
If  sucli  be  Thy  pleasure,  let  it  be  accomplished.' 

"  A  similar  sect,  though  small,  and  confined  to  Eastern 
Bengal,  is  that  of  the  Satya  Gurus.  It  originated  about 
the  year  1804  with  a  native  who  read  the  gospel  narra- 
tive, and  even  had  some  personal  intercourse  with  the 
Serampore  missionaries,  but  who  was  animated  with  the 
spirit  of  Simon  Magus.  Giving  himself  out  to  be  a 
modern  incarnation  of  the  true  teacher,  Jesus  Christ, 
and  able  to  work  miracles,  he  succeeded  in  obtaining  a 
number  of  followers,  and  when  he  died  transmitted  his 
dignity  to  one  of  his  chief  disciples,  who  still  carries  on 
the  work  of  delusion.  In  this  case  the  origin  of  the 
sect  can  be  clearly  traced  back  to  the  indirect  influ- 
ence of  Christianity. 

"  In  other  parts  of  the  country,  men  rise  up  every  now 
and  then,  who,  professing  to  have  discovered  the  true 
way,  or  to  have  been  instructed  by  the  true  teacher, 
succeed  in  drawing  a  number  of  disciples  after  them. 
It  is  impossible  to  tell  how  much  or  how  little  floating 
rumours  regarding  the  gospel  of  Christ  may  have  to  do 
with  the  origin  of  these  sects.  They  are  generally 
characterised  by  a  repudiation  of  idols,  of  the  ministra- 
tions of  Brdhmans,  and  of  certain  restrictions  of  caste, 
and  thereby  in  some  measure  pave  the  way  for  the 
reception  of  the  gospel.  The  origin  of  the  native  Chris- 
tian community  in  the  Backergunje  district  supplies  an 
illustration  of  this  remark.  Kangd-li,  the  leader  of  the 
first  band  who  openly  embraced  Christianity  there,  had 
for  several  years  been  such  a  mahant  or  spiritual  guide 
of  numerous  disciples,  who  professed  to  obey  the  Satya 
Guru  or  true  teacher.  But  he  was  evidently  not 
satisfied  with  his  own  discoveries.  The  account  which 
he  himself  gave  afterwards  of  the  way  in  which  he  was 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAKARGANJ,  267 

first  led  to  Christianity,  certainly  shows  a  morbid  state 
of  the  nervous  system — probably  the  result  of  certain 
habits  frequently  found  among  Hindu  ascetics  —  but 
it  is  nevertheless  instructive.  According  to  the  impres- 
sion left  on  his  own  mind,  he  once,  whilst  laid  up  with 
a  dangerous  illness,  was  favoured  with  a  vision  or  visit 
from  a  resplendent  person,  who  told  him  that  ho  should 
recover  if  he  called  on  the  name  of  "  Eesoo.'  Accord- 
ingly he  did  j)ray  to  the  unknown  being  whose  name 
was  thus  communicated  to  him,  and  recovered.  Not 
only  so,  but  the  same  result  followed  from  such  prayer 
in  the  case  of  a  few  other  ^^ersons.  Some  time  after- 
wards he  met  with  a  man  who  was  returnino;  from  a 
market  with  a  book  in  his  hand.  On  inquiriug  after 
the  contents  of  the  book,  he  was  told  that  it  was  only 
a  book  about  '  Eesoo  Christ,'  and  that  he  was  welcome 
to  it  if  he  wished  to  have  it.  The  coincidence  of  the 
name  led  him  eagerly  to  accept  the  proferred  tract,  with 
the  contents  of  which  he  made  himself  acquainted — as 
far  as  he  could  comprehend  them — by  means  of  one  of 
his  disciples  who  was  able  to  read.  The  perusal  of  this 
tract  proved  to  be  the  first  dawn  of  Christian  truth 
breaking  in  upon  his  dark  mind.  He  succeeded  from 
time  to  time  in  obtaining  some  fresh  tracts,  and  at 
last  felt  a  strong  desire  to  seek  out  some  one  who  could 
tell  him  more  about  the  religion  of  Eesoo.  In  all 
these  endeavours  a  number  of  his  disciples  sympathised 
with  him.  Their  first  impulse  wtis  to  apply  to  the 
nearest  European  Government  officials  for  instruction, 
but  their  courage  failed  them,  and  at  length  they  were 
accidentally — or  rather  providentially — heard  of  and 
afterwards  met  with  by  itinerant  native  preachers  from 
Barisal.  Even  after  this  long  preparatory  process  liearly 
two  years   elapsed   before  they  could    make    up   their 


268  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

minds  to  embrace  Christianity  openly.  Such  is  the 
statement  made  by  Kdngdli  nearly  ten  years  ago.  Since 
then  many  of  those  who  were  first  have  become  last,  and 
the  last  first."  ^ 

VI.    OTHERS. 

There  are  a  few  Koches  in  the  Perozpiir  subdivision. 
They  appear  to  have  come  from  the  Madhupiir  jungle  in 
Dacca,  and  are  said  to  have  been  brought  in  by  the 
zamindars  to  act  as  fighting  men.  Their  weapons  used 
to  be  bows  and  arrows. 

Near  Barisill  there  is  a  small  colony  of  Bunas.  They 
support  themselves  by  agriculture,  and  by  selling  fire- 
wood. According  to  one  account,  they  were  brought  in 
by  the  indigo-planters  in  old  times ;  and  according  to 
another,  they  came  when  the  new  police  system  was 
introduced. 

There  are  a  few  men  from  Hill  Tipperah,  in  the 
jungles  of  Idilpur  (217,  according  to  census). 

At  Barisdl  there  are  a  few  Greek  and  Armenian  and 
other  Eurasian  families,  and  there  is  a  Jewish  shop- 
keeper. The  Portuguese  or  Feringhies  of  Sibpiir  have 
been  described  elsewhere. 

VII.    RESULTS   OF  THE  CENSUS. 

Unfortunately,  the  figures  given  in  the  Census  Report 
cannot  be  fully  made  use  of,  because  the  area  of  the  dis- 
trict and  the  arransfement  of  the  thanas  have  been 
altered  since  1872.     The  enumerators'  books  are  now  at 

^  "  Bengal  as  a  Field  of  Missions,"  by  Mr  Macleod  Wylie,  Calcutta,  1854, 
contains  at  p.  100  an  interesting  description  of  Bdkarganj  and  the  mission, 
written  by  Mr  Page.  Mr  Page  there  states  that  Mr  J.  Smith  was  the  first 
missionary,  and  that  Mr  Bareiro  was  sent  four  years  afterwards  from  Seram- 
pore  to  succeed  him  in  the  management  of  the  school.  Mr  Page  joined 
the  district  in  1848.  The  movement  seems  to  have  begun  in  Ramsiddhi, 
which  was  Kangali's  village. 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAKARGANJ.  269 

Barisdl,  and  they  arc,  I  believe,  being  collated  and  l:lieir 
details  broiiolit  into  accordance  with  the  new  bound- 

o 

aries.  When  this  has  been  done  we  shall  know  many 
interesting  particulars  regarding  the  relative  numbers  of 
the  various  Hindu  castes,  the  occupations  of  the  people, 
&c.     Meanwhile  I  proceed  to  note  a  few  general  facts. 

The  most  striking  results  of  the  Bengal  census  may 
be  said  to  be,  three  in  number.  The  first  is  the  dis- 
covery of  the  great  populousness  of  Bengal  as  compared 
with  former  estimates.^  The  second  is  the  discovery  of 
the  laro-e  extent  of  the  Mahomedan  element.^  The  third 
is  the  discovery  of  the  almost  total  absence  of  large 
towns.  Perhaps  to  these  we  might  add  a  fourth — 
namely,  the  discovery  of  the  c[uietness  and  ease  with 
which  a  census  can  be  taken. 

With  regard  to  the  third  of  these  results,  I  have 
pointed  out  in  the  chapter  on  Baris^l  that  even  the  few 
towns  which  exist  have  a  very  sparse  population,  and 
are  made  up  more  or  less  of  scattered  villages.^  The 
average  number  of  j^ersons  per  square  mile  in  Bdkar- 
ganj  was  482,  and  I  do  not  think  that  this  has  been 

^  The  total  population  of  Bengal  in  1872  was  66,856,859,  and  average 
per  square  mile  269,  or  more  than  double  the  average  rate  (110  per  square 
mile)  for  Scotland  (Census  Report).  In  Bengal  Proper  the  average  is  389 
per  square  mile. 

*  "  Total  number  of  Mahomedans,  20,664,775."  The  vast  majority  of 
these — namely,  1 7i  millions— are  found  in  Lower  Bengal ;  in  Behar  they 
hardly  number  more  than  2^  out  of  a  total  population  of  nearly  20  millions. 
In  Assam,  Cliota  Nagptir,  and  particularly  in  Orissa,  they  are  very  sparse. 
In  Assam,  indeed,  they  are  perhaps  more  numerous  than  might  have  been 
expected,  owing  chiefly  to  the  inclusion  in  that  province  of  the  district  of 
Goalpara,  which  ibrmerly  formed  part  of  Rangpiir.  Rangamati,  in  this 
district,  was  for  some  years  a  frontier  station  of  the  Moghals,  and  large 
numbers  of  the  Koches  and  other  aboriginal  tribes  seem  to  have  been  con- 
verted by  them  to  Isldm  (Census  Report). 

3  It  appears  from  Thucydides  that  the  population  in  ancient  Greece  was 
at  one  time  scattered  over  villages  as  it  now  is  in  Bengal,  and  that  Lacedoc- 
mon  adhered  to  this  custom  after  the  Greeks  in  other  parts  had  gathered 
themselves  into  cities :   /card  Ku'fxas  0^  rf  TraXattp  r-^s  'EXXaoof  TpoTTU)  oiKLaOelaa. 


2 7 o  n /STRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

materially  lessened  by  tlie  trausfer  of  Mdclaripiir.  The 
density  of  tlie  population  is  greatest  in  tlie  northern  and 
central  thanas,  and  least  in  the  south  of  the  district. 
The  most  thinly-peopled  thana  is  Khalsakhdli,  which 
contains  a  large  extent  of  Sundarban  forest.  In  it  the 
average  per  square  mile  is  only  122.  In  the  Patuya- 
khd,li  subdivision  (to  which  Khalsakhdli  belongs)  the 
average  is  287,  in  Perozpur  it  is  581,  and  in  the  Sadr 
subdivision  (Barisdl)  it  is  as  high  as  738.  The  lowest 
subdivision al  average  is  in  Dakhin  Shalibdzp{ir,  where 
it  is  270.  This  at  first  excites  surprise,  for  the 
greater  part  of  the  island  is  richly  cultivated,  and 
seems  in  the  northern  and  central  divisions  to  be  one 
continuous  garden  of  cocoa-nut  and  supari  trees,  and 
studded  with  homesteads.  Tlie  explanation,  however, 
is  simple  enough.  Much  of  the  south  of  the  island  is 
composed  of  newly-formed  chars  and  of  extensive  plains 
where  buffaloes  are  grazed,  and  which  are  almost 
uninhabited.  If  we  could  have  a  separate  census  of 
the  northern  half,  I  am  persuaded  that  the  population 
would  be  found  to  be  as  dense  as  that  of  almost  any 
other  part  of  the  district.  Here  I  should  note  that  when 
the  census  was  taken,  Dakhin  Shahbdzpur  was  divided 
into  two  thanas — viz.,  Daulat  Khan  and  Dhaniya  Maniya 
— and  that  their  boundaries  ran  from  north  to  south,  the 
east  side  of  the  island  beloni^insf  to  Daulat  Khan  and 
the  west  to  Dhaniya  Maniya.  Hence  each  had  about  an 
equal  share  of  the  cultivated  and  uncultivated  tracts, 
and  therefore  we  find  that  their  populations  were  very 
nearly  equal,  Daulat  Khan  having  a  population  of 
114,262,^    and    Dhaniya    Maniya    one    of    106,775, 

*  Even  this  slight  excess  may  be  accounted  for  by  the  fact  thai  it  includes 
the  population  of  the  to^vn  of  Daulat  Khan  and  that  of  the  island  of  Man- 
piira. 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAKARGANJ.  271 

the  total  population  of  the  subdivision  being  221,037. 
The  island,  however,  has  since  been  divided  from  east 
to  west,  Daulat  Khan  thana  containing  the  northern 
and  Barhanuddin  Hdt  the  southern  half;  and  if  the 
areas  are  made  nearly  equal,  there  can  be  no  doubt 
that  Daulat  Khan  will  have  much  the  largest  share  of 
the  population. 

Throughout  the  district  the  males  arc  slightly  in 
excess,  the  ratio  being  507  to  49 '3.  In  thanas 
Gournadi,  Kewari,  and  Jhalukdtti  the  women  are 
in  excess,  but  in  all  the  other  thanas  which  nov/ 
belong  to  Bdkarganj  they  are  in  a  minority,  except 
in  thana  Nalchiti,  where  the  proportions  of  the  sexes 
are  equal.  The  disproportion  of  males  is  greatest  in 
Patuyakhdli  subdivision,  where  the  ratio  is  52*6  to  47*4. 
In  thana  Khalsakhd^li,  already  mentioned,  there  are  56*2 
men  to  43 '8  women.  I  think  that  these  facts  are  very 
interesting,  for  tliey  concur  with  what  we  should 
expect  from  considering  the  nature  of  the  country  and 
of  native  society,  and  therefore  they  tend  to  show  that 
the  census  was  correctly  taken.  The  proportion  of 
Mahomedans  is  largest  in  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir,  where 
there  are  8  2 "8  Mahomedans  to  17 '2  Hindus.  In  Patuya- 
khdli  subdivision  the  proportion  is  80'8  to  18 '2  Hindus. 
The  remaining  1  per  cent,  consists  of  the  Mugs,  who  are 
Buddhists.  The  most  Mahomedan  thanas  in  the  dis- 
trict are  Dhaniya  Maniya  and  Gulsakhdli,  where  there  are 
86*4  Mahomedans  to  13 "6  Hindus.  We  thus  see  that 
the  Mahomedans  are  most  numerous  in  the  south  of 
the  district  and  in  the  islands.  The  Hindus  are  most 
numerous  in  the  north  and  west  of  the  district.  They 
are  especially  numerous  in  the  west,  where  there  is 
a  large  s(?ttlement  of  low-caste  Hindus.  This  Hindu 
element   extends    into    Faridpiir,  and  apparently  there 


2  7  2  DISTRICT  OF  bAkAR GANJ. 

is  sometliiiig  in  tlic  nature  of  the  country,  wliicli  con- 
sists for  the  most  part  of  immense  swamps,  which  has 
been  peculiarly  suitable  for  a  Hindu  population.  Per- 
haps the  large  quantity  of  fish  yielded  by  the  swamps 
has  attracted  them,  for  this  is  the  chief  animal 
food  of  Hindus,  and  to  this  day  most  fishermen  are 
Hindus.  I  am  inclined,  however,  to  think  that  no  one 
would  voluntarily  occupy  such  a  country.  In  the  rains 
the  country  is  almost  one  immense  lake,  in  which  the 
homesteads  of  the  ryots  appear  as  islands,  and  in  April 
and  May  it  consists  of  large  treeless  plains.  The 
villages  are  never  of  very  easy  access  ;  but  things  are  at 
their  worst  at  the  beginning  and  at  the  end  of  the  rains, 
for  then  there  is  neither  enough  water  for  boats  nor  suffi- 
cient dry  land  for  foot-travelling.  Add  to  this  that 
the  country  swarms  with  mosquitoes,  that  there  are 
numerous  poisonous  snakes,  and  that  the  ryots  often 
lose  their  crops  from  overflooding,  and  it  will  be  ad- 
mitted, I  think,  that  the  country  is  not  a  desirable 
residence.  It  seems,  therefore,  probable  that  these  low- 
caste  Hindus,  or  Chandals,  as  they  arc  called,  were 
driven  out  from  some  other  country,  or  that  they  left 
their  homes  in  order  to  be  free  from  oppression.  The 
following  account  is  given  by  Mr  Wells,  formerly  Magis- 
trate of  FarldpTir,  in  a  letter  published  in  the  Census 
Keport :  "The  dreary  and  unwholesome  swamps  of  the 
south  are  largely  peo2:)led  by  a  highly  interesting  Clian- 
dal  race.  These  Chandals  were  origiually  a  complete 
Hindu  community,  consisting  of  persons  of  all  castes 
from  the  Brdhman  downwards,  who,  on  having  the  mis- 
fortune to  be  cursed  in  a  body  by  a  vengeful  Brdhman 
of  unutterable  sanctity  in  Dacca,  quitted  their  ancestral 
homes  and  emigrated  bodily  to  the  southerif  wastes  of 
Farldpur,  Jessore,  and  Bdkarganj.      There  with  great 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ.  273 

perseverance  and  toil  they  raised  in  tlie  centre  of  tlie 
swamps  large  liillocks  from  twelve  to  twenty  feet  in  lieiglit, 
whereon  they  built  their  homesteads  in  the  dry  weather, 
in  order  to  preserve  their  cattle  and  goods  during  the 
high  inundations.  In  this  place  they  are  located  to  the 
present  day,  cultivating  the  swamps  with  rice  and  jute, 
and  carrying  on  the  occupations  of  fishing  and  bird- 
catching,  varied  with  mat  and  basket  weaving,  and  the 
cutting  of  grass  for  thatching  roofs  and  for  the  consump- 
tion of  their  cattle.  In  the  dry  weather  they  often 
suffer  considerably  from  scarcity  of  water^  and  at 
times  almost  die  from  thirst.  As  they  do  not  preserve 
water  in  tanks,  they  are  often  reduced  to  what  little 
they  may  have  kept  by  them  in  their  earthen 
vessels,  and  not  unfrequently  drink  it  when  it  has 
become  quite  thick  and  green.  In  the  rains  the  whole 
country  becomes  inundated ;  the  water  rises  over  ten 
feet,  and  leaves  their  artificial  mounds  like  so  many 
islands  in  a  huge  lake.  Locomotion  then  becomes  im-  ' 
possible  except  by  boat,  while  they  have  to  collect  all 
their  cattle  and  keep  them  in  their  homesteads,  feeding 
them  on  what  fodder  they  may  have  stored  up  during 
the  dry  season,  and  on  a  grass  which,  like  the  rice, 
grows  with  the  rise  of  the  water,  and  in  appearance 
very  much  'resembles  paddy.  These  cattle  have  often 
to  remain  for  weeks  standing  up  to  their  necks  in  water, 
and  as  their  food  has  to  be  stored  up  for  them  in  the 
homesteads,  they  are  fed  on  the  minimum  amount 
necessary  to  support  existence.  Consequently  by  the 
end  of  the  rainy  season  they  are  reduced  to  skeletons, 
and  very  many  die  in  the  process.  It  is  this  that 
renders  it  impossible  to  introduce  a  larger  and  less 
hardy  description  of  cattle.      Notwithstanding  all  the 


274  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

difficulties  this  Cliaiidal  community  have  to  contend 
against,  however,  they  are  strongly  attached  to  the 
home  of  their  adoption,  and  resist  all  inducements  to 
abandon  it.  Efforts,  for  example,  have  been  made  to 
transfer  some  of  them  to  the  Sunderbuns,  but  with  no 
measure  of  success.  They  prefer  remaining  in  the  i-egion 
to  which  they  have  adapted  themselves  perseveringly 
and  laboriously,  where  they  are  not  likely  to  be  envied 
their  lot,  and  where  they  can  dwell  together  a  distinct 
community  with  their  own  Brdhmans,  their  own  priests, 
castes,  and  traditions.  Their  occupations  and  their 
enforced  practice  of  going  about  in  boats  during  a  great 
portion  of  the  year  have  rendered  the  Chandals  a  hardy 
and  muscular  race,  while  they  present  a  favourable  con- 
trast to  their  uncursed  and  therefore  contemptuous 
neighbours  in  respect  of  ingenuousness  and  truthful- 
ness." 

The  Hindu  nature  of  the  population  of  this  part  of 
the  country  is  shown  by  the  figures  for  Kotwalipara,  a 
thana  which  has  been  nearly  all  transferred  to  Farldpiir. 
In  it  there  were  59,582  Hindus  against  23,122  Maho- 
medans.  Kewari  (now  Sarupkdtti)  is  the  only  thana 
in  Bdkarganj  where  the  Hindus  are  in  excess  of  the 
Mahomedans.  In  Jhalukdtti  they  are  nearly  half  the 
population. 

In  Patuyakhdli  subdivision  the  largest  proportion  of 
Hindus  is  found  in  thana  Baufal,  which  was  the  site  of 
the  old  capital  of  the  Eajahs  of  Chandradwip. 

There  were  in  1872  only  twenty-seven  EurojDeans  in 
Bdkarganj,  and  there  were  127  Eurasians.  There  are 
other  statements  in  the  Census  Report  showing  the 
numbers  of  the  aboriginal  tribes,  and  of  the  various 
castes,  &c.,  but  I  do  not  think  that  the  figures  are  cor- 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  BAKARGANJ.  275 

rcct,  aud  therefore  shall  not  make  use  of  tliem.  For 
example,  I  do  not  understand  the  entry  of  2785  Nats. 
Nor  do  I  thmk  it  likely  that  there  were  only  8989^ 
Brdhmans  in  Bilkarganj  and  30,338  in  Chittagong. 
The  classification  according  to  occupations  is  ad- 
mittedly imperfect.  The  number  of  persons  (males) 
engaged  in  agriculture  or  with  animals  is  put  down 
at  498,690,  and  475,477  of  them  are  said  to  be  culti- 
vators. 

Vital  Statistics. — Attempts  have  been  made  for 
some  time  to  record  the  deaths  all  over  the  district, 
but  the  machinery  employed  (the  village  chaukidars)  is 
altogether  inefficient,  and  the  results  are  totally  untrust- 
worthy. Although  no  official  has  ever  pretended  that 
the  returns  were  even  approximately  correct,  yet  some 
have  thought  that  the  system  should  be  kept  up,  as  it 
could  do  no  harm,  and  might  prepare  the  way  for  a  more 
perfect  registration.  This,  however,  seems  an  error.  It 
cannot  be  said  that  the  collection  and  tabulating  of 
worthless  statistics  do  no  harm.  Granted  that  nobody 
is  deceived  by  them,  still  their  collection  involves  some 
expense,  were  it  only  in  postage,  and  a  good  deal  of 
trouble,  and  it  tends  to  demoralise  every  one  who  has 
to  do  with  the  work.  Worst  of  all,  however,  it  brings 
statistics  into  contempt,  and  will  induce  people  to  dis- 
believe our  figures  long  after  they  have  become  trust- 
worthy. Even  now  natives,  as  a  general  rule,  do  not 
believe  in  the  results  of  the  census,  less,  I  think,  because 
they  know  of  inaccuracies  in  it,  than  because  a  long 


1  Especially  when  we  find  the  number  of  priests  or  imrohits  in  Bdkar- 
ganj  put  down  at  9450. 


276 


DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 


series  of  untrust worthy  returns  lias  made  them  regard 
figured  statements  of  all  kinds  with  suspicion.  It  is  to 
be  hoped,  therefore,  that  Government  will  abandon  the 
attempt  to  collect  vital  statistics  for  whole  districts, 
more  especially  as  the  last  Bengal  Administration  Re- 
port states  that  Sir  George  Campbell  had  come  to  the 
conclusion  that  the  attempt  was  "hopeless  at  present" 
(p.  199  of  Report  for  1873-74). 

The  returns  for  the  selected  areas  are  more  trust- 
worthy, though  even  they  are  not  yet  quite  satisfactory. 
There  are  four  such  areas  in  Bdkarganj — namely,  two 
town  areas  (Baris^l  and  Daulat  Khan)  and  two  rural 
areas  (Manpiira  and  Lakutia).  The  united  population 
of  the  first  two  is  given  at  14,224,  and  the  deaths  in 

1873  at  327,  or  22-98  per  1000.  The  population  of 
Barisdl  has  however  been  increased  since  1st  January 

1874  by  the  inclusion  of  additional  area.  The  popula- 
tion of  Manpura  and  Lakutia  is  given  at  13,652,  and 
the  deaths  at  291  in  1873,  or  21-31  per  1000. 


NoU. — The  statistics  of  population  given  at  p.  211  were  prepared  for  me 
in  the  CoUectorate,  but  the  details  leave  1133  unaccounted  for,  whereas  the 
column  "  Others,"  in  the  Census  Report,  only  gives  174.  The  fact  is,  I  am 
Borry  to  say,  that  owing  to  changes  of  boundaries  made  since  the  com- 
pletion of  the  census  I  am  not  able  to  state  with  accuracy  the  population 
of  the  district.  The  population  of  Bakarganj,  according  to  Mr  Beverley's 
Census  Report,  is  2,377,433,  which  are  divided  as  follows  : — 


Mahomedans, 
Hindus,  . 
Christians, 

1,540,965 
827,393 

4,852 

Buddhists, 

4,049 

Others,    . 

174 

2,377,433 
Since  then  Mddaripilr  subdivision  has  been  transferred  to  Farldpur.     Its 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  bAkARGANJ. 


277 


population,    according  to   the  census,  is   G63,043,  which   are  divided  as 
follows  :  — 


Mahomedans, 
Hindus, 
Christians, 
Others,   . 


Total, 


360,085 

290,540 

3,375 

43 

663.043 


But  this  total  cannot  be  deducted,  as  parts  of  thanas  Gournadi  and 
Kotwalipara  in  the  said  subdivision  were  not  included  in  the  transfer. 
Moreover,  a  corner  of  Farid])ur,  lying  east  of  the  Baleshwar  and  near  the 
mouth  of  the  Saldaha,  was  shortly  afterwards  included  in  Bakarganj.  The 
population  of  this  tract  was,  I  think,  about  10,000.  The  figures  in  the 
text  professed  to  take  account  of  these  changes,  but  the  above  remarks 
show  that  they  are  still  not  quite  accurate. 


(  278  ) 


CHAPTER    IX. 
PRODUCTIONS. 

Rice  is  the  staple  of  the  district  of  Bdkarganj,  and  the 
variety  of  it  which  is  most  cultivated  is  that  called 
aman.  Aman  rice  is  grown  all  over  Bakarganj,  wher- 
ever there  is  low  land.  In  the  Perozpiir  and  Patuya- 
khdli  subdivisions  very  little  of  any  other  kind  is  grown. 
The  ploughing  of  the  ground  commences  as  early  as  the 
latter  part  of  February  in  the  northern  parts  of  the  dis- 
trict, and  continues  in  the  south  as  late  as  the  beo-innino; 
of  September.  These  late  ploughings,  however,  are  of 
land  into  which  the  rice  is  to  be  transplanted.  The 
chief  ploughings  take  place  in  April  and  May.  They 
begin  earlier  in  the  northern  parts  of  the  district,  as  it 
is  the  first  to  be  flooded,  owing  to  the  lowness  of  much 
of  the  Gournadi  thana,  and  its  proximity  to  the  Arial 
Khan.  Cattle  are  generally  used  for  ploughing,  but  in 
Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir  and  the  south  of  the  district  bufialoes 
are  often  employed.  Aman  is  generally  transplanted, 
but  in  chars  and  other  places  it  is  sometimes  soAvn  broad- 
cast. It  is  not  un frequent,  especially  in  the  northern 
parts  of  the  district,  to  sow  aman  and  owsh — i.e.,  early 
rice — together.  It  is  not  usual  to  weed  aman,  and  the 
crop  gives  little  trouble  to  the  ryot  after  it  has  been 
transplanted.  The  process  of  transplanting,  however,  is 
a  very  laborious  one,  and  the  ryot  often  "  homeward 
plods  his  weary  way"  after  his  back  has  been  almost 


PR  OD  UCTIONS.  2  7  9 

broken  from  stooping  for  hours  amidst  mud  and  water, 
and  after  having  been  drenched  with  rain  two  or  three 
times  in  the  course  of  the  day. 

Irrigation  is  not  reguLarly  practised,  and  is  seldom 
needed ;  but  water  -  channels  are  frequently  dammed 
across  in  order  to  keep  the  water  in  the  paddy-fields. 
Also  the  water  is  often  drained  off  when  it  is  too  plenti- 
ful, and  to  effect  this  the  ryots  do  not  scruple  to  dig 
trenches  even  across  public  highways.  The  putting 
up  and  the  removal  of  the  dams,  or  hiincls,  as  they 
are  called,  are  frequent  sources  of  dispute  among  the 
villagers. 

Rice  is  often  damaged  by  insects,  and  loss  from  this 
cause  appears  to  be  especially  common  in  Dakhin  Shah- 
bd,zpiir.  Cloudy  weather  just  before  harvest  is  especially 
likely  to  breed  insects,  and  is  therefore  regarded  with 
great  alarm  by  the  ryots.  Rice-fields  near  rivers  are 
often  injured  by  crabs  and  river-turtle,  and  brushwood 
and  branches  of  the  date  palm  are  put  round  the  fields 
at  the  water's  edge  to  keep  those  animals  out.  In  a 
report  of  8th  August  1791  special  mention  is  made  of 
the  damage  caused  to  the  cultivated  lands  of  pargana 
Buzurgumedpiir  by  an  immense  quantity  of  crabs  being 
thrown  upon  them.  Wild  pigs  do  great  mischief  to 
standing  rice,  and  unfortunately  this  is  one  evil  against 
which  the  ryot  is  very  helpless.  He  does  not  usually 
possess  a  gun,  and  the  professional  palimns  or  shikar ies 
(sportsmen)  whom  he  sometimes  employs  find  it  difficult 
to  carry  on  their  handicraft,  owing  to  the  interference  of 
the  police  and  the  stringent  orders  about  licences  for 
carrying  arms.  It  is  a  common  practice  all  over  the 
district  for  the  ryots  to  erect  sheds,  raised  on  a  scaffold- 
ing of  bamboos,  in  their  fields  about  the  time  of  harvest, 
and  to  spend  their  nights  in  them,  in  order  to  scare 


/ 


28o  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

away  the  pigs.  These  sheds  are  called  Umgis,  and 
are  a  very  marked  feature  in  the  Bdkarganj  landscape, 
especially  where  there  is  any  jungle  in  the  neighbour- 
hood. The  ryots  also  make  gigantic  rattles  by  splitting 
a  bamboo  and  attaching  a  roj)e  to  one  of  the  limbs  at 
the  top  of  the  cleft.  In  Dakhin  Shahbd-zpiir  these 
rattles  may  be  heard  at  night  and  at  the  early  dawn 
going  off  with  a  noise  like  the  discharge  of  firearms. 
The  noise  is  made  by  the  ryots  in  the  tungis  pulling 
the  ropes  and  then  letting  them  go  again.  Buffaloes, 
wild  and  tame,  often  damage  the  crops,  and  cattle- 
trespass  is  a  perennial  source  of  dispute  among  neigh- 
bours. As  there  are  no  hedges  or  walls,  and  as  no 
land  is  reserved  as  pasturage  for  the  cattle,  it  can  easily 
be  understood  how  frequent  cattle  -  trespass  must  be. 
Broad  khdls  and  dones  are  not  sufiicient  protection,  for 
the  cattle  all  take  to  the  water  readily,  and  can  swim 
great  distances. 

Aman  is  generally  reckoned  as  yielding  twelve  anas, 
or  three-fourths  of  all  the  rice  grown  in  the  district. 
The  other  fourth  is  chiefly  made  up  by  owsh,  which  is 
grown  on  the  high  lands,  and  especially  in  the  northern 
parts  of  the  district.  There  is  also  a  little  horo  grown 
in  the  chars  and  bils  in  the  north  of  the  district.  Gour- 
nadi  and  Kotwalipara  (now  transferred  to  Farldpiir)  are 
the  chief  seats  of  this  cultivation.  Boro  is  sown  at  the 
end  of  the  rains,  when  the  waters  are  beginning  to 
recede.  It  is  sometimes  sown  broadcast,  but  is,  I  be- 
lieve, as  a  general  rule,  transplanted  like  aman.  The 
sowings  take  place  in  October,  the  transplanting  in 
December  and  January,  and  the  harvest  in  April.  Boro 
is  a  coarse  red  grain,  and  is  only  eaten  by  the  poorer 
classes.  It  is  prized  by  them  because  it  ripens  earlier 
in  the  year  (the  Bengali  year)   than  any  other  kind  of 


PR  OD  UCTIONS.  28 1 

paddy,  and  thus  gives  them  food  at  a  time  when  rice  is 
scarce.  Owsh  is  sown  in  Chait  and  Baisackh  (March  and 
April),  and  is  reaped  in  July  and  August. 

The  bulk  of  the  aman  harvest  takes  place  in  Agrdhan 
and  Pans — i.e.,  December  and  January — but  there  is 
some  which  ripens  as  early  as  Ashin,  and  hence  it  is 
called  Ashini  paddy.  It  is  common  to  name  rice  ac- 
cording to  the  month  it  ripens  in,  and  thus  we  have 
Ashini,  Kartik,  and  Agrahani  dhan,  the  last  being  by 
far  the  largest  in  quantity.  In  Dakhin  Shahbd,zpur  and 
some  other  parts  a  kind  of  aman  is  largely  grown 
which  is  called  Lakhydigi,  and  ripens  in  October.  It 
is  said  to  derive  its  name  from  its  being  ready  by 
the  time  of  the  Lakhy  puja.  On  the  occasion  of  the 
aman  harvest  there  is  a  great  festival  called  the  Navanna 
or  the  new  rice.  It  celebrates  the  first  eating  of  the 
new  crop.  It  is  a  movable  feast,  but  commonly  takes 
place  in  the  month  of  Agrdhan.  The  festival  is  primarily 
a  Hindu  one,  but  Mahomedans  celebrate  it  also.  It 
answers  to  the  harvest-home  or  vintage  feasts  of  other 
countries,  and  is  a  time  when  the  scattered  members  of 
families  and  distant  friends  meet  together.  It  is  not 
peculiar  to  Bdkarganj. 

The  average  produce  of  rice  per  bigha  (about  two- 
thirds  of  an  acre)  is  ten  wians  of  paddy,  representing 
about  six  mans  of  rice.  In  the  southern  parts  of  Bd- 
karganj  the  ryot  does  not  always,  or  even  generally, 
cut  his  own  rice.  Bands  of  reapers  come  down  from 
Faridpiir  and  other  northern  districts,  cut  the  paddy 
and  thresh  it  out  for  him.  They  are  liberally  jDaid, 
for  they  receive  one-sixth,  and  more  commonly  one-fifth 
of  the  produce  ;  formerly  they  received  one-fourth.  In 
the  north  of  the  district  paddy  is  often  threshed  out 
by  beating  it  against  a  plank,  but  in  the  south  this 


282  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

is  usually  done  by  cattle.     The  cattle  which  tread  out 
the  corn  arc  almost  always   unmuzzled,  which  shows 
that  the  practice  of  allowing  the  cattle  to  pull  at  the 
straws  occasionally  as  they  go  round  is  general  in  the 
East,  and  that  a  divine  precept  was  not  necessary  for 
its  observance.     The  ryots  also  tread  the  rice  out  w^itli 
\      their  feet  sometimes.     AVhen  paddy  is  cut  in  the  south 
I      of  the  district,  the  heads  only  of  the  grain  are  generally 
cut.     The  straw  is  left  on  the  ground  and  cut  at  a  later 
period.     This  is  done  because  the  load  to  be  carried  to 
I      the  threshing-floor  is  hereby  lightened,  and  because  the 
straw  w^ould  be  damaged  if  trodd'en  by  the  feet  of  the 
cattle.     The  Faridpur  reapers  come  down  in  Agr^han, 
or  December,  and  return  in  Magh,  or  February.     Early 
in  December  fleets  of  small  boats  may  be  seen  sailing 
down  with  the  north  wind  to  the  southern   parts    of 
Bdkarganj  ;  and  two  or  three  months  after,  they  return 
loaded   with  paddy.      Rice   is   sold   by    the   ryots   by 
measure,  though  in   the  bazdr  it  is  commonly  sold  by 
weight.     When  sold  in  the  husk — i.e.,  as  paddy— the 
measure  most  commonly  used  in  the  south  of  the  dis- 
trict  is   the  hudha.     This  consists    of  four   kdthis,  or 
baskets  of  thirty-two  sirs  each.     This  is  kachd  weight, 
and  is  equal  to  twenty-four  sirs  of  j9aM  weight.     The 
kdthi  is  a  basket  made  of  bent — i.e.,  cane.     In  the  north 
of  the  district  rice  is  generally  sold  by  the  hatha,  or 
1      basket  of  twenty  sirs.      It  thus  appears  that  though 
\     rice  be  generally  sold  by  measure,  yet  the  measure  is 
j     one  founded  upon  weight.     There  is  a  weight  in  much 
i     use  in  the  district  called  the  Sahebganj  or  Bdkarganj 
weight.     It  is  larger  than  even  the  paka  ordinary  weight, 
as  it  contains  ninety-six  tolas  to  the  sir. 

Paddy   is   sold  by  the   ryots    chiefly  to  paikdrs  or 
middlemen,  who  come  to  their  houses  or  to  the  local 


PR  OD  UCTIONS.  283 

markets  for  it.  Tlie  paikd-rs  arc  of  two  sorts — larofc 
and  small.  The  former,  who  arc  also  called  aratddrs 
or  brokers,  have  their  offices  at  the  princi23al  bazdrs, 
and  ship  the  rice  from  thence  to  Calcutta.  The  smaller 
paikdrs  are  called  farias,  and  their  business  faridmi. 
They  go  about  to  the  villages  and  to  the  petty  hdts 
to  buy  paddy  and  rice,  which  they  take  to  marts  such 
as  Bdkarganj,  Niamati,  and  Nalchiti.  Thus  these  marts 
are  not  fed  directly  from  the  threshing-floors ;  all  the 
little  hd,ts  in  the  country  are  feeders  to  them,  and  the 
marts  are  chiefly  entrepots  where  the  rice  brought  into 
the  village  markets  is  collected  and  eventually  shii^ped 
ofi"  to  Calcutta. 

A  good  deal  of  paddy  is  disposed  of  by  barter,  and 
goes  oE  in  this  Avay  to  supply  the  wants  of  less  grain- 
producing  districts.  Thus  in  the  cold  weather  boats 
come  from  Dacca  laden  with  earthen  pots.  These  the 
boatmen  sell  to  the  villagers  for  paddy,  filling  up  their 
boat  with  it  as  their  trade  progresses ;  and  eventually 
after  a  cruise  of  a  month  or  two,  they  return  to  their  homes 
with  a  cargo  of  paddy.  The  reason  why  this  trade  in 
pots  is  so  brisk  is  that  the  Bakarganj  earth  is  in  general 
saltish  and  not  suitable  for  pottery,  and  therefore  the 
inhabitants  have  to  depend  on  other  disti'icts  for  their 
supply  of  pots  for  household  purposes,  and  for  the 
making  of  molasses,  &c.  The  price  of  a  pot  is  ^qhq-  \ 
rally  its  contents  in  paddy.  The  husking  of  rice  is  \ 
generally  done  by  women,  and  is  probably  the  most 
laborious  task  they  have  to  perform.  Women  in  Bakar- 
ganj do  very  little  out-of-door  w^ork,  for  the  bulk  of  the 
population  is  Mahomedan,  and  that  too  of  a  rather 
strait  and  fanatical  sort.  Except  Avidows,  and  others 
who  have  no  man  to  help  them,  no  women,  or  at  least 
no   Mahomedan   women,   are   ever   seen  marketing  or 


2  84  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

working  in  tlie  fields.  I  liave  scarcely  ever  seen  women 
employed  as  reapers,  and  no  doubt  this  is  one  reason 
why  the  Bd-karganj  ryot  is  obliged  to  have  so  much  of 
his  crop  reaped  for  him.  It  is  too  much  for  him  and 
his  sons  to  reap  and  thresh  out  by  themselves,  and  they 
will  not  allow  their  womankind  to  help  them. 

Rice  Trade. — The  rice  export  trade  begins  in  No- 
vember and  continues  till  ]\Iarch.  The  principal  marts 
are  Bdkarganj  or  Sahebganj,  Nalchiti,  Jhaluk^tti,  and 
Niamati.  They  present  a  most  animated  appearance 
durinsf  the  rice  season,  for  boats  come  to  them  from  all 
parts  of  Bengal.  There  is  a  great  demand  for  silver 
during  the  rice  season,  and  the  local  treasury  is  soon 
cleared  by  the  presentation  of  currency  notes  and  sup- 
ply bills. 

It  is  a  curious  fact  that  though  Bdkarganj  is  a  great 
exporting  district,  it  also  imports  paddy  (during  the 
rains)  from  the  districts  of  Tipperah,  Mymcnsing,  and 
Sylhet.  The  chief  seats  of  this  import  trade  are  Jhalu- 
kdtti,  Babuganj,  and  Mirganj.  It  is  owsh  paddy  which 
is  thus  imported,  and  it  has  a  sale  because  it  comes  in 
at  a  time  when  aman  is  nearly  out  of  the  market.  The 
Bd-karganj  rice  is  of  superior  quality,  and  is  therefore 
exported  to  such  an  extent  that  a  sufficient  stock  of 
rice  does  not  remain  in  the  country  for  local  consump- 
tion, and  owsh  comes  in  from  the  eastern  districts  to 
supply  the  deficiency.  The  communication,  too,  be- 
tween Bdkarganj  and  Calcutta  is  so  exceptionally  easy, 
owino^  to  the  number  and  laro-eness  of  the  rivers,  that 
rice  readily  flows  out  of  the  district,  whereas  Tipperah 
and  other  eastern  districts  are  in  some  measure  shut 
out  from  the  Calcutta  market  by  their  remoteness  and 
defective  Avater  communication. 


PRODUCTIONS.  285 

The  price  of  rice  is  of  course  much  higher  now  than 
it  was  in  former  times.  On  9th  February  1797  the 
Collector  writes  to  the  Board  that  paddy  used  to  sell 
at  3  mans  the  rupee,  but  that  in  that  year  it  was 
selling  in  the  Idilpiir  pargana  at  8  mans  the  rupee. 
Paddy  is  generally  reckoned  nowadays  as  worth  R3.I 
per  man.  On  30th  January  1875  rice  was  selling  at 
BarisiU  at  the  rate  of  17  sirs  the  rupee  for  best  rice, 
and  21  sirs  the  rupee  for  common  rice.  A  man  of 
paddy,  or  40  sirs,  yields  about  30  sirs  of  rice. 

Betel-nut. — Next  to  rice,  betel-nut  is  the  most  im- 
portant staple  of  Bdkarganj.  It  is  grown  extensively 
in  Dakhin  Shahbazpur,  and  the  northern  and  eastern 
parts  of  the  district.  Indeed  nearly  every  homestead 
in  Bdkarganj  has  its  few  supari  or  betel-nut  trees  grow- 
ing round  it,  and  many  a  Brahman  or  Kayast  who  is 
unwilling  or  unable  to  supj)ort  himself  by  manual  or 
mental  labour  gets  his  living  by  the  produce  of  his 
betel-nut  orchard.  Betel-nuts  are  gathered  in  Octo- 
ber, and  the  trade  continues  for  a  considerable  part 
of  the  cold  weather.  The  chief  seats  of  the  trade 
are  Daulat  Khan,  Ld-lganj  in  Mendiganj,  and  Nal- 
chiti.  The  Mugs  and  Burmese,  and  even  a  few  China- 
men, come  to  Nalchiti  in  the  cold  weather  to  purchase 
betel-nuts  for  Arracan.  There  is  a  quarter  of  Nalchiti 
called  Mugpara  or  Mug  hamlet,  because  it  is  chiefly 
occupied  by  Mugs  engaged  in  the  betel-nut  trade,  and 
in  the  cold  weather  there  is  always  a  number  of  balam 
— ^.e.,  Mug — boats  moored  along  the  bank  there.  The 
betel-nuts  are  sometimes  conveyed  direct  from  Nalchiti 
to  Chittagong  and  Arracan  in  balam  boats,  but  more 
frequently,  I  believe,  they  are  transported  to  Calcutta 
and  shipped  thence  by  steamer. 


286  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

Betel-nuts  are  counted  by  tens  or  gds.  One  hundred 
gis — i.e.,  a  thousand  nuts — sell  for  from  three  to  four 
rupees.  A  betel-nut  tree  yields  about  a  hundred  nuts  a 
year,  and  is  reckoned  as  annually  worth  four  anas.  The 
annual  value  of  a  cocoa-nut  tree  is  reckoned  at  one 
rupee.  The  wood  of  the  betel -nut  tree  is  used  for 
planking,  and  it  is  also  used  for  bridges,  for  handrails, 
and  for  posts.  The  gathering  of  betel-nuts  is  often  a 
trade,  and  boys  and  men  of  light  weight  make  a  liveli- 
hood in  this  way.  Many  are  so  expert  that  they  will 
gather  the  fruit  of  a  grove  of  trees  without  ever  descend- 
ing. This  they  do  by  swaying  the  tree  on  which  they 
are,  and  passing  from  it  to  the  next  one.  The  usual 
payment  for  gathering  the  nuts  is  ten  nuts  a  tree,  and 
for  cocoa-nuts  one  nut  a  tree.  If,  however,  the  trees 
are  exceptionally  high,  the  payment  has  to  be  increased. 
The  fruit  of  two  hundred  betel  or  of  a  hundred  cocoa 
nut  trees  can  be  gathered  in  one  day.  Betel-nuts  are 
prepared  in  three  ways.  1st,  The  Mugari  supari,  so 
called  because  it  is  intended  for  the  Burmese  market. 
This  is  husked,  steeped  in  water,  washed,  and  dried. 
2d,  Tdtta  siqocms.  These  are  dried  in  the  husk.  3d, 
Maga  suparis.  These  are  steeped  in  the  husk.  The 
freight  for  a  cargo  of  suparis  (betel-nuts)  from  Ldlganj 
or  Nalchiti  to  Calcutta  is  usually  Rs.20  the  hundred 
mans. 

Cocoa-nuts. — A  large  quantity  of  cocoa-nuts  are  j^ro- 
duced  in  the  island  of  Dakhin  Shahbdzpur,  and  most 
homesteads  have  two  or  three  trees.  The  nuts  are 
largely  consumed  within  the  district,  but  a  consider- 
able quantity  is  exported,  and  there  is  a  local  manu- 
facture of  cocoa-nut  oil.  In  the  cold  weather  sloops 
come   over   to    Dakhin    Shahbdzpiir  from    Chittagong 


rR  OD  UCTIONS.  2  8  7 

laden   with   earth -oil,    and    take   away    cocoa-nuts   in 
exchane^e. 

SuGAn-CANE. — Next  to  betel- nut,  sugar-cane  is,  1 
think,  the  most  important  staple  of  Bdkarganj.  It  is 
grown  all  over  the  district  where  there  is  high  land. 
Hence,  as  the  banks  of  rivers  are  generally  high,  we 
find  that  sugar-cane  is  largely  cultivated  on  them.  The 
cultivation  of  the  sugar-cane  is  laborious  and  expensive. 
The  ground  requires  to  be  prepared  with  great  care ; 
the  plants  have  to  be  bought  in  the  market,  and  it  is 
many  months  before  the  outlay  can  be  reimbursed.  The 
landholders,  too,  generally  claim  an  exceptionally  high 
rate  of  rent  for  land  cultivated  in  sugar-cane.  The  mill 
for  expressing  the  juice  and  the  labour  for  working  it 
are  also  expensive.  Hence  it  is  very  common  for  sugar- 
cane to  be  grown  on  the  co-operative  principle,  several 
ryots  joining  in  the  speculation.  Bdkarganj  sugar  has 
a  high  reputation  in  Bengal,  and  Jabar  Amal  sugar  is 
considered  the  best  in  the  district.  Jabar  Amal,  which 
is  the  chief  seat  of  the  sugar  trade,  is  a  market  and 
village  on  the  Kacha,  in  the  Perozpiir  subdivision.  The  , 
raw  fruit  of  the  date-tree  is  eaten  and  the  juice  of  the  v 
tree  {tnri)  is  drunk  ;  it  is  also  used  as  a  sweetmeat  when 
inspissated  into  the  form  of  a  cake,  but  it  is  not  much 
used  for  making  sugar. 

Timber. — Next  to  rice,  betel-nut,  and  sugar-cane,  the 
most  important  products  of  the  district  are  probably 
timber  and  firewood.  These  are  chiefly  obtained  from 
the  Sundarban  tracts  in  the  south.  The  sundari  is  the  V 
most  valuable  tree,  as  it  is  universally  used  for  making 
boats.  Even  salwood  boats  have  the  parts  which  are 
under  water  made  of  sundari,  as  it  appears  to  be  the     ^ 


2  88  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

only  wood  wliicli  resists  the  saltness  of  the  water.  The 
sundari,  however,  is  by  no  means  the  most  common  tree 
in  the  Sundarbans.  The  kerua  is  the  prevailing  tree,  at 
least  on  the  chars  and  in  the  south-eastern  part  of  the 
district,  and  the  goma  and  bolye  are  also  common.  The 
kerua  and  goma  are  used  for  posts,  &c.,  and  the  bolye 
is  especially  valuable  for  its  inner  bark,  which  yields 
a  strong  fibre.  The  bolye  fibre  is  used  by  the  ryots 
instead  of  strinoj  when  makino;  the  roofs  of  their  houses, 
&c.,  and  it  is  also  twisted  in  tethering  ropes  for  cattle 
and  bufialoes.  The  ashes  of  the  bolye  contain  salt 
and  potash,  and  are  used  by  washermen  in  place  of 
soap. 

There  are  a  large  number  of  woodcutters  in  Bakar- 
ganj,  though  they  generally  combine  agriculture  with 
their  trade.  They  are  called  haiilies,  and  their  boats 
6c/w7i-boats.  These  are  strong  open  boats,  and  the 
sundari  logs  are  both  packed  into  them  and  lashed 
alongside.  Unfortunately,  the  sundari  is  so  heavy  that 
it  will  not  float.  It  is  unnecessary  to  describe  the 
woodcutter's  trade,  as  it  has  been  fully  done  by  Mr 
Westland.  The  chief  seats  of  the  timber  trade  are 
Jhalukdtti  alias  Maharajganj,  Gulsakhd-li,  AmtoUi,  and 
Nalchiti. 

Bent  or  cane  is  brought  from  the  Sundarbans,  and  is 
much  used  for  making  baskets,  &c.  The  golpatta  or 
wild  cocoa-nut  is  an  important  plant,  as  the  Mugs  and 
the  ryots  generally  in  the  south  of  the  district  thatch  their 
houses  with  it.     It  is  also  said  to  yield  excellent  toddy. 

The  bils  and  chars  yield  large  quantities  of  reeds  {nal, 
hogia,  &c.),  which  are  much  used  for  mat-making,  for 
the  roofs  of  boats,  &c.,  and  are  also  largely  exj)orted  to 
the  surrounding  districts. 

A  superior  kind  of  mat,  called  the  sitalpati,  is  made 


PRODUCTIONS.  289 

from  the  outer  covering  of  a  reed  called  the  parita. 
This  reed  has  a  branching  and  somewhat  shrubby  habit, 
and  grows  in  damp  places  near  homesteads.  It  does  not 
appear  to  be  really  wild,  at  all  events  it  is  regularly 
cultivated  by  the  ryots  just  as  san  or  thatching  grass 
is.  The  chief  workers  in  sltalj^ati  live  at  Eangasri 
and  Helancha  near  Bdkarganj,  and  it  is  there  that 
the  parita  is  most  common.  The  workmen  are  called 
paitiyas.^ 

Pan. — Pd-n  is  a  good  deal  cultivated  in  the  Gournadi 
and  Baufal  thanas,  and  in  the  Perozpiir  subdivision. 
The  Dacca  market  is  to  some  extent  supplied  from 
Gournadi.  Tarki,  in  that  thana,  is  the  chief  mart.  As 
it  is  necessary  that  the  pdn  should  arrive  fresh  at.  Dacca, 
pd,n-boatmen  were  long  celebrated,  and  I  believe  are  so 
still,  for  their  dexterity  as  oarsmen.  They  are,  I  believe, 
all  Hindus.  Pd-n-gardens  are  only  kept  by  Hindus — a 
curious  instance  of  conservatism,  for  Mahomedans  are  just 
as  fond  of  pdn  as  Hindus.  But  we  find  the  same  thing  in 
other  trades,  for  most  washermen,  carpenters,  and  barbers 
are  Hindus.     The  pan-gardens  belong  to  the  Baroi  caste. 

There  is  no  indigo  grown  in  the  district.  Some  fifty 
years  ago  it  was  cultivated,  and  the  remains  of  vats  may 
still  be  seen  at  Panchakaran  and  Khagasura.  These 
belonged  to  a  Mr  Nathaniel  Monro,  who  was,  I  believe, 
originally  employed  in  the  Salt  Department.  It  is  said 
that  the  brackishness  of  the  water  prevented  the  success 
of  the  manufacture. 

Scarcely  any  tobacco  is  grown  in  Bakarganj,  and  the 
requirements  of  the  district  are  supplied  from  Kangpiir 
and  Kuch  Behar. 

^  A  list  of  the  principal  Sundarban  trees  will  be  found  in  Gastrell's 
report. 


290  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

(Til  sesamum)  is  largely  cultivated,  and  the  amount 
of  production  appears  to  be  increasing.  It  is  grown  for 
the  sake  of  the  seeds,  from  which  an  oil  is  expressed, 
which  is  used  in  cooking  and  also  as  a  light.  It  is 
often  mixed  with  mustard  oil.  It  is  grown  in  the 
northern  parts  of  the  district,  and  also  in  thana  Mendi- 
ganj.  It  is  not  much  grown  in  the  south,  as  it  appears 
to  require  high  land,  free  from  inundation. 
/  Now  that  Mddaripur  has  been  transferred  to  Faridpiir, 

V  comparatively  little  jute  is  grown  in  the  district.  Some, 
however,  is  grown  in  Gournadi,  Mendiganj,  and  Dakhin 
Shahbdzpiir.  The  amount  of  cotton  grown  is  incon- 
siderable, and  is  all  consumed  within  the  district. 
Thana  Mendiganj  and  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir  are  the  prin- 
cipal localities  for  its  cultivation. 

Cold-weather  Crops. — The  cold- weather  crops,  the 
dhulat — i.e.,  dry  or  sandy  earth  crops,  as  they  are  called 
— are  not  so  important  in  Bdkarganj  as  they  are  in  the 
higher  and  drier  districts  of  Western  Bengal.  Never- 
theless, turmeric,  melons,  cucumbers,  &c.,  are  grown, 
especially  on  the  high  lands  and  chars.  Linseed  is 
grown  to  some  extent  in  Dakhin  Shahbdzpur.  San, 
for  making  hemp,  is  grown  on  the  chars  in  the  Arial- 
Khan,  &c.  It  is  stronger  than  jute,  and  is  used  for 
making  nets. 

Feuits,  &c. — Abundance  of  plantains,  tamarinds,  jdk 
fruit,  &c.,  are  produced,  but  the  plantains  are  generally 
of  rather  inferior  qualit}^  The  same  must  be  said  of 
the  mangoes,  of  which  a  great  quantity  are  produced  in 
thana  Gournadi.  A  few  limes  and  oranges  are  grown  in 
Mendiganj.  The  maiijit  or  Indian  madder  {Rubia 
cordifolia)  is  cultivated  in  Oozirpiir  and  Shikarpur  in 


PR  on  UCTIONS.  2  9 1 

the  Gournadi  thaiia,  and  the  produce  is  exported  to 
Calcutta.  It  is  said  to  be  a  very  profitable  crop,  and 
is  locally  known  by  the  name  of  malancha. 

GAb-tree.  —  The  gdb-tree  {Diosinjros  emhryoiDteris 
glutinifera)  is  very  important,  as  the  fruit  of  it  yields 
a  juice  which  is  used  for  caulking  boats.  It  is  a  hand- 
some tree,  with  dark  green  leaves,  and  a  compact  dome- 
shaped  habit.  It  does  not,  I  believe,  grow  wild  in  the 
Sundarbans,  but  is  commonly  seen  on  the  banks  of 
rivers  and  in  homesteads,  both  deserted  and  occupied. 
The  fruit  is  sold  by  the  score  or  by  the  basket.  Some- 
times there  is  a  scarcity,  and  then  the  price  of  the  fruit 
is  eight  anas,  or  even  a  rupee  per  basket ;  generally  the 
price  is  from  two  to  four  anas  a  basket.  Gdb  is  applied 
to  boats  four  times  a  year,  except  in  the  case  of  Balam 
boats,  on  which  it  is  not  used  at  all.  The  caulkinof  of 
a  kos  boat  with  gcib  costs  from  two  to  three  rupees  a 
year.  About  1000  gdb  fruits  are  required  for  the 
caulking  of  an  ordinary-sized  boat.  Fishing-nets  are 
steeped  in  gdb  juice,  and  this  gives  them  their  black 
colour  and  also  preserves  them.  The  fruit,  which  is 
round,  and  when  ripe,  brown,  is  pounded  in  a  mortar 
or  dhenki,  then  water  is  added,  and  the  mixture  is 
heated  over  a  fire.  It  is  then  put  into  a  jar,  closed  so 
as  to  exclude  the  air  and  also  the  mosquitoes,  which 
are  fond  of  eating  it.  If  it  is  to  be  applied  to  boats, 
the  ashes  of  the  golpatti  or  of  any  jungle  are  mixed 
with  it.  It  is  customary  to  apply  fire  to  the  outside 
of  boats  before  the  gdb  juice  is  put  on,  in  order  to  kill 
the  worms. 

Mineral  Products. — The   only  mineral  product  is 
salt ;   but  the  Government  rules   about   salt,  and  the 


J 


292  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

scarcity  of  fuel,  do  not  admit  of  its  manufacture.  It  is 
obtained  from  the  sea,  and  can  also  be  extracted  from 
the  earth.  The  soil  of  new  formations  in  the  district  is 
impregnated  with  salt,  and  in  some  of  the  chars — for 
example,  in  parts  of  Dakhin  Shahbazpur — the  salt  efflor- 
escence is  sufficient  to  make  the  surface  of  the  soil  quite 
white,  as  if  covered  with  hoarfrost.  It  has  often  been 
supposed  that  the  illicit  manufacture  of  salt  is  common 
in  the  district,  and  this  has  led  to  a  stringent  system  of 
salt-passes,  &c.  It  is,  however,  impossible  that  the 
manufacture  can  take  place  on  a  large  scale,  for,  apart 
from  all  other  difficulties,  the  want  of  a  sufficient 
quantity  of  fuel  must  prevent  this.  It  is  on  the  chars 
that  the  soil  is  most  favourable  for  salt-making,  but 
these  are  now  highly  cultivated  in  most  parts,  and  there 
is  comparatively  little  jungle.  For  example,  there  is 
so  little  jungle  now  in  the  large  island  of  Dakhin  Shah- 
bdzpiir  that  there  are  no  tigers  in  it,  and  hardly  any 
leopards.  In  the  days  of  the  salt  manufacture  it  was 
the  jungle  on  the  chars  which  supplied  the  fuel,  and  it 
was  the  necessity,  imposed  by  the  manufacture,  of  keep- 
ing so  much  land  in  jungle  which  retarded  the  cultiva- 
tion of  the  chars  for  so  many  years.  No  doubt  salt 
is  illicitly  manufactured  for  domestic  consumption,  but 
such  proceedings  are  on  so  small  a  scale  as  almost  to 
defy  detection.  A  handful  of  earth  from  the  chars  will 
yield  enough  salt  for  a  meal.  The  ashes  of  the  branches 
of  the  cocoa-nut,  of  the  plaintain,  of  the  bamboo,  &c., 
yield  salt,  and  it  is  often  said  that  widows  and  other 
poor  people  who  live  far  inland  get  their  salt  from  the 
cocoa-nut  trees  in  their  homesteads. 

It  appears  strange  that  a  country  naturally  so  rich 
in  salt  as  Bdkarganj  should  have  to  depend  on  Europe 
for  the  supply  of  this  necessary;   and  it  is  to  be  hoped 


PRODUCTIONS.  293 

thcat  some  day  it  will  be  found  possible  to  manufacture 
it  locally,  or  at  least  nearer  home. 

Fish. — Bdkarganj    lias  always  been  famous  for  tlie 
number  and  excellence  of  its  fish,  and  fish  is  the  chief 
form  in  which  the  bulk  of  the  population  obtain  animal 
food.     Fish  is  exported  to  Calcutta  from  the  Kotwalipara 
bils    (now   mostly   transferred   to  Faridpiir),   and  this 
trade  is  the  chief  support  of  many  of  the  inhabitants  of 
those  swamps.     The  fish  are  conveyed  in  wells  at  the 
bottom  of  the  boats.     They  are  small-sized  fish,  and  be- 
long chiefly  to  the  species  called  the  Izoi  and  the  singJii. 
The  khcdtsa,  the  saiil,  the  gdzar,  tlie  fali,  the  magur,  and 
the  cliang  are  also  caught  in  the  bils  and  exported  to 
Calcutta.     The  Deputy-Magistrate  of  MMaripiir   once 
estimated  the   annual  value  of  the  export  at  betw^een 
Es.  15,000  and  Es.  16,000.     Upwards  of  fifty  species  of 
fish   are   enumerated  as   beinof   cauMit   in  the   district 
and  used  for  food.     The  best  known  are  the  hilsa,  the 
hhethi  or  horal,  the  rul,  the  pangds,  the  hodl,  the  Mtal, 
the  silon,  and  the  mango  fish.     This  last  is,  however, 
only  caught  in  the  rains,  and  is  smaller  than,  and  in 
every  respect  inferior  to,  the  mango  fish  of  the  Hughli. 
The  hilsa  has  given  its  name  to  one  of  the  largest  rivers 
in  the  district   (the    Ilsa    or    Hilsa),  between  Dakhin 
Shahbdzptir  and  the  mainland;  and  the  pangc4s  has  a 
river  named  after  it  in  the  Gournadi  thana.     The  hilsa 
is  sometimes  salted,  but  generally  it  is  either  eaten  fresh, 
or  dried  in  the  sun  without  the  use  of  any  salt.     The 
drying  of  fish  is  an  extensive  trade  in  parts  of  the  south 
of  the  district,   and  boats  come  from  Chittao-ono;  and 
Jessore  every  year  and  take  away  large  quantities  of 
siHJcis,  as  they  are  called.       In  general,  I  believe,  the 


294  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

drying  and  the  exporting  are  done  by  the  same  people — 
viz.,  the  boats'  crews. 

There  is  a  small  delicate  fish  called  the  hdns'pata,  or 
bamboo  leaf,  from  its  resemblance  to  that  leaf.  The  'puti 
and  the  young  puti,  called  the  titijuti,  and  the  isa  fish, 
are  largely  caught  in  the  paddy-fields  and  ditches.  Fish- 
fry  or  pona,  which  are  chiefly  the  young  of  the  said 
and  gdzar,  are  also  largely  caught  by  herd-boys  and 
others.  Chingris  or  prawns  are  caught  in  abundance 
during  the  cold  weather.  The  koi-fish,^  already  alluded 
to,  is  especially  prized  by  Hindus,  and  there  are  many 
who  do  not  care  for  any  fish  except  the  koi  and  the  bil- 
fish  allied  to  it.  It  is  made  into  soup,  and  is  thought  to 
be  very  nourishing.  The  koi  is  sold  by  number,  twenty 
kois  fetching  from  three  to  four  anas.  Fish,  when  sold 
on  the  large  scale,  are  sold  by  the  man,  and  the  price 
in  Dakhin  Shahbtizpiir  is  about  Rs.5  per  man.  The 
potha  deserves  mention  from  the  fact  that  it  is  a  poison- 
ous fish,  and  that  several  accidents  have  occurred  from 
eating  it.  It- is  a  thick  and  curiously-mottled  fish,  and 
is  common  in  the  bazars,  as  it  is  prized  by  the  poorer 
classes  for  its  oily  richness.  It  has  sometimes  been  pro- 
posed to  prohibit  the  sale  of  it,  l)ut  such  a  measure  would 
be  of  no  avail,  as  it  would  not  prevent  people  from  catch- 
ing it  for  their  own  use.  The  poison  is  contained,  I 
believe,  near  the  ventral  fin,  and  this  part  should  be  cut 
out  before  the  fish  is  cooked. 

Fish  Oil. — Many  ryots  make  an  oil  for  lighting  their 
houses  from  decomposed  fish,  but  the  oil  is  not  an  article 
of  trade. 

Fish  are  caught  by  nets,  by  cages,  and  by  hooks. 

'  This  fisli  is  able  to  propel  itselt  a  considerable  distance  across  country. 


PRODUCTIONS.  29s 

According  to  the  census,  tlierc  are  17,G07  fishermen 
(males  only)  in  Biikarganj.  Most  of  them  are  Hindus, 
and  belong  to  the  Jaliya  or  Kaibart  castes.  The  fish- 
mongers— i.e.,  those  who  buy  fish  from  the  fishermen 
and  retail  it  to  the  public — are  generally  Mahomedans, 
and  belong  to  a  class  called  Nikaris  and  also  Sikdars. 
There  are  several  families  of  them  near  Barisdl.  They 
are  a  class  by  themselves,  and  are  looked  down  upon  by 
other  Mahomedans,  who  will  not  intermarry  with  them. 
There  is  no  close  season  in  Bdkarganj,  and  no  precau- 
tions are  taken  to  preserve  the  fish  in  the  rivers.  It  is 
customary  to  stock  tanks  with  fish,  and  the  right  of 
fishing  in  them  is  jealously  guarded.  It  is  common  to 
see  bamboos  stuck  here  and  there  in  a  tank  with  the  ob- 
ject of  preventing  night-poaching,  the  stakes  preventing 
the  throwing  of  nets.  During  the  rains  trenches  are  cut 
between  the  tanks  and  rivers,  so  as  to  allow  fresh  water 
and  fish  to  enter  the  tanks.  Tanks  are  often  let  for  the 
sake  of  the  fishing,  and  yield  a  considerable  sum.  There 
are  several  valuable  tanks  in  Kewari  than  a,  and  the  Ba- 
risd,l  municipality  have  lately  derived  a  small  revenue 
from  the  letting  of  the  rod-fishing  in  the  public  tanks. 
Fishing  is  a  very  favourite  amusement  of  the  Bengalis, 
and  is  dignified  by  them  with  the  name  of  shihar.  There 
are  only  four  fisheries  belonging  to  Government,  and 
none  of  them  is  of  much  value. 

Notwithstanding  the  apparently  great  abundance  of 
fish,  natives  are  frequently  heard  to  complain  of  their 
scarcity  and  dearness.  This  is  especially  the  case  in  the 
south  of  the  district,  though  from  the  number  and  large- 
ness of  the  rivers  there,  one  would  have  thought  that 
fish  would  have  been  most  plentiful.  This  complaint  is 
partially  explained  by  the  circumstance  that  professional 
fishermen,  like  other  Hindus,  are  somewhat  scarce  in  the 


296  DISTRICT  OF  BAkARGANJ. 

south  of  the  district.  The  best  explanation,  however,  is 
that  by  far  the  largest  proportion  of  the  fish  caught  in 
the  district  is  never  brought  to  market,  as  it  is  taken  by 
peasants  and  other  amateur  fishermen  for  their  own 
consumption.  Every  ryot,  young  and  old,  is  something 
of  an  angler,  and  his  inexhaustible  patience,  and  abun- 
dance of  leisure  at  certain  seasons,  well  fit  him  for  the 
occupation. 


(  297  ) 


CHAPTER   X. 

MANUFACTURES  AND  PRICES. 
I.  MANUFACTURES. 

Bakarganj  is  not  at  all  a  manufacturing  district. 
There  are  no  mills  or  other  large  works,  and  the  great 
bulk  of  the  people  are  engaged  in  agriculture.  In  old 
times  the  district  was  a  very  important  seat  of  the  salt 
manufacture ;  many  descendants  of  the  salt  molunghees 
still  reside  in  it,  and  the  names  Baipari,  G61dar,  Jama- 
dar,  have  become  patronymics  in  many  families,  especi- 
ally in  Dakhin  Shahbdzpur,  from  their  having  been  at 
one  time  connected  with  the  salt  trade.  The  introduc- 
tion of  Liverpool  salt,  and  the  cultivation  of  the  islands 
and  chars,  have  put  an  end  to  this  industry.  A  few 
Mahomedan  families  in  the  village  of  Bilgaon,  near 
Palardi  police  station,  make  a  little  country  paper,  but 
it  is  very  coarse,  and  the  trade  is  dying  out.  Chalas 
or  ghani  bags  are  made  by  the  Kapali  caste  in  Patihar 
and  other  villages  of  the  Gournadi  thana,  and  these  have 
a  good  sale  among  the  sugarmakers,  &c.  Opposite  Nal- 
chiti,  at  a  place  called  Kalupara,  or  Oilman's  hamlet,  a 
good  deal  of  mustard  oil  is  made,  the  seed  being  brought 
from  the  north  of  the  district.  The  production  of  sugar  at 
Jabar  Amal,  &c.,  has  already  been  referred  to.  Sitalpati 
mats  are  made  at  Chirapara,  Rangasri,  and  Helancha ; 
and  hogla  mats  are  made  in  great  quantities  all  over 
the  district.     Cocoa-nut  oil  is  made  at  Daulat  Khan,  Nal- 


298  DISTRICT  OF  dAkARGANJ. 

cLiti,  &c.  Lime  is  made  from  sliells  at  Chawalak^tti 
and  other  places  in  the  hils,  for  home  consumption  only. 
Uzirpiir  and  its  neighbourhood  have  a  local  reputation  for 
the  making  of  ddos  and  other  iron  implements.  Large 
jars  for  holding  rice,  &c.,  are  made  at  Madupur,  near 
Nalchiti,  and  pots  and  dishes  are  made  by  potters  at 
various  places  in  the  Kotwali  thana,  &c.  Nets  are  made 
at  Ghanteshwar.  Perhaps  one  of  the  most  skilled  crafts 
in  the  district  is  boat-making.  This  is  carried  on  at 
Deljaikh^li  and  Shampiir  in  the  Mendiganj  thana,  where 
the  best  k6s  boats  are  made ;  at  Ghanteshwar,  near 
AgarpTir,  where  the  best  fjansways  are  made ;  and  at 
Barsald.tti  in  the  Perozpiir  thana.  At  this  last  place 
very  large  cargo-boats  are  made.  A  few  canoes  are 
hollowed  out  of  kerua  wood  by  the  Mugs  in  the 
Sundarbans,  and  dinghis  of  sundari  wood  are  made 
all  over  the  district,  but  especially  at  Jhalukd,ttL  Kali- 
ganj,  B^karganj,  Phalagar,  are  also  boat-building  places. 
There  are  weavers  in  the  district,  both  Hindus  and 
Mahomedans,  but  their  trade  is  not  a  profitable  one. 
The  census  gives  the  large  number  of  14,146  weavers 
(males  only).  Brick-making  is  carried  on  to  a  consider- 
able extent  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Barisil. 

The  largest  workshop  in  the  district  is  the  Barisd,! 
Jail,  but  it  does  not  produce  anything  worthy  of  much 
notice.  It  may  be  remarked  that  dexterity  with  the 
fingers  is  much  more  characteristic  of  the  Hindu  than 
of  the  Mahomedan  population,  and  that  ai5  B^karganj 
is  pre-eminently  a  Mahornedan  district,  much  artistic 
skill  is  not  to  be  looked  for.  I  have  no  doubt  that  the 
superior  dexterity  of  the  Hindu  is  in  great  measure  to 
be  explained  by  the  doctrine  of  hereditary  aptitudes, 
as  the  system  of  caste  makes  generation  after  generation 
follow  the  same  trade. 


MANUFACTURES  AND  PRICES.  299 


II.    PEICES,  ETC. 

The  sul^jcct  of  prices  is  one  about  which  it  is  difficult 
to  give  precise  information.  It  is  sufficiently  established 
that  there  has  been  a  considerable  rise  of  prices  within 
the  last  eighty  years,  and  probably  this  rise  has  been 
most  marked  during  the  last  decade,  but  I  cannot 
exhibit  it  step  by  step.  All  I  shall  attempt  to  do  will 
be  to  give  a  few  facts,  which  I  have  collected  from  the 
official  records  and  other  sources. 

In  1790  the  average  earnings  of  a  blacksmith  were 
reckoned  to  be  Rs.3  a  month,  and  in  1796  the  manjhis 
of  the  patrol-boats  received  Rs.4,  and  the  rowers  Ils.3 
per  month.  (It  must  be  remembered  that  the  rupees 
were  sicca.)  This  was,  I  fancy,  butter  than  the  ordinary 
pay  of  boatmen,  and  was  given  proljably  on  account  of 
the  danger  of  the  service.  In  the  statement  of  the  ddh 
establishment,  30th  August  1809,  the  pay  of  the  manj- 
his is  reckoned  at  Rs.3,  and  that  of  the  rowers  and 
the  hire  of  the  boat  at  Pt3.2-8  a  month.  In  1802  the 
wages  of  spearmen  (employed  in  the  escort  of  treasure, 
&c.)  were  Ils.2-8  a  month.  In  old  times  the  prisoners 
in  the  jail  did  their  own  marketing,  and  received  a 
certain  amount  of  cowries  daily  for  this  j)ur2:»ose.  In 
1805  the  daily  allowance  to  each  prisoner  was  three 
puns  of  cowries,  equal  to  about  three-fourths  of  an  an;i. 
Their  monthly  expenditure  per  head  was  reckoned  at 
about  Rs.l-G,  of  which  1.5  anas  went  for  the  purchase  of 
rice.  Of  course  this  did  not  include  the  charges  for 
guarding,  for  lights,  for  medicine,  or  for  blankets. 
There  is  a  letter  from  Mr  Collector  Armstrong,  dated 
9th  February  1707,  in  which  he  says  that  in  tlie  ldil[>ur 
pargana  paddy  used  to  sell  at  threat  lu-'mnds  Ibr  (he  rupee;, 


300  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

and  was  then  considered  cheap,  but  that  at  the  time  of 
his  writing  it  was  selling  at  the  rate  of  eight  maunds 
for  the  rupee.  (The  maund  was  of  82  sicca  weight.) 
In  1807  bamboos  sold  at  Ks.3  the  100,  and  in  1820  they 
sold  at  Rs.4  the  100.  Lime  was  Rs.35the  100  maunds, 
and  iron  was  Rs.6  the  maund. 

On  19th  March  1811  the  Collector  writes  that  "the 
price  of  rice  has  risen  to  a  very  unusual  height ;  instead 
of  one  man  for  a  rupee,  it  is  now  twenty-five  sirs."  On 
27th  March  1824  the  price  of  salt  is  said  to  be  Rs.4-8 
per  man  when  bought  in  quantities  larger  than  a  man, 
and  Rs.5  a  man  for  smaller  quantities,  so  that  the  price 
was  then  about  the  same  as  now. 

In  a  letter  of  29th  August  1799  it  is  reported  that, 
there  was  not  a  sicca  rupee  in  Bdkarganj.  I  presume 
there  were  Arcot  and  other  rupees.  The  copper  coinage 
was  not  introduced  till  1814. 

In  1861  paddy  sold  at  one  man  and  at  36  sirs 
for  the  rupee,  and  rice  at  26  sirs  for  the  rupee.  Sugar- 
cane sold  at  64  stems  for  the  rupee,  or  about  the  same 
as  now.  Raw  sugar  sold  at  10  sirs  for  the  rupee,  and 
milk  at  12  sirs.  In  1866  the  price  of  rice  rose  on  ac- 
count of  the  Orissa  famine,  and  was  15  sirs  for  the 
rupee  in  January,  and  even,  it  is  said,  as  high  as  8|-  sirs 
in  October.  The  average  price  for  the  year  is  given  at 
12  sirs  for  the  rupee.  On  30th  January  1875  the  price 
of  good  rice  in  the  Barisdl  bazdr  was  1 7  sirs  the  rupee, 
and  of  inferior  kinds  21  sirs  for  the  rupee.  At  the 
same  time  salt  was  selling  at  2  anas  a  sir,  and  firewood 
at  100  sirs  a  rupee. 

Freights  to  Calcutta  vary  from  Rs.20  to  Rs.30  the 
100  mans.  Often  goods  are  shipped  on  co-operative 
principle,  the  mahajan  or  shipper  and  the  boatmen 
dividing  the  profit.     When  this  is  done,  the  mahajan 


MANUFACTURES  AND  PRICES.  301 

generally  gets  8  anas  or  onc-lialf  of  the  profit,  and 
the  other  half  is  divided  among  the  manjhi  and  his 
boatmen,  he  getting  10  anas  and  the  boatmen  G  anas. 
When  boatmen  receive  wages,  they  are  also  fed  by  the 
maDJhi.  It  is  very  difficult  to  make  any  statement 
regarding  the  rates  of  rent  paid  by  cultivators.  A  fact 
is  always  a  difficult  thing  to  lay  hold  of — it  is  so  slip- 
j)ery,  and  has  so  many  sides  to  it ;  but  this  is  especially 
difficult  when  the  question  is  one  of  prices,  or  of 
cognate  matters,  as  so  many  theories  and  prejudices 
and  interests  are  intertwined  with  it.  However,  I  may 
state  that  the  general  rate  of  rent  for  rice-land  seems  to 
be  about  a  rupee  a  bigha.  Homestead-land  and  sugar- 
cane-land, or  any  land  cultivated  in  a  particular  crop, 
generally  lets  at  a  much  higher  rate  of  rent. 


(    302    ) 


PART  IIL 
CHAPTER   XL 

ENGLISH  ADAIINISTRATION. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  Bdkarganj  early  attracted  the 
attention  of  the  English  on  account  of  its  facilities  for 
trade.  It  has  always  been  productive  of  rice,  and  in 
the  old  days  of  the  salt  monopoly  it  was  perhaps  even 
more  important  in  the  eyes  of  the  Government  on  ac- 
count of  the  salt  manufactured  in  it.  Selimdbdd  was 
long  a  chief  seat  of  this  manufacture,  and  I  have  else- 
where noticed  Mr  Barwell's  (the  Chief  of  Dacca)  dealings 
Avith  the  salt-farm  of  this  pargana  and  of  Dakhin  Shah- 
bdzpiir.  There  was  also  some  exportation  of  lime  from 
the  district  before  the  Sylhet  lime  quarries  were  worked, 
or  at  least  before  their  produce  was  readily  available 
for  the  Calcutta  market.  The  lime  was  shell-lime,  and 
was  made  by  burning  the  shells  found  in  the  bils  and 
swamps.  The  rivers  of  the  district  were  also  then,  as 
now,  th,e  highway  of  communication  between  Calcutta 
and  Dacca  and  the  other  eastern  districts.  More  than  a 
hundred  years  ago  the  bazdr  of  Bdkarganj  was  spoken  of 
as  being  a  place  of  great  trade;  and  as  the  letter  in  which 
this  is  mentioned  gives  an  interesting,  though  rather 
painful,  representation  of  the  state  of  matters  in  the  dis- 
trict in  those  days,  I  shall  here  give  it  in  its  entirety. 


ENGLISH  ADMINISTRATION.  303 

The  letter  was  written  by  one  Sergeant  Brcgo  from 
Bd/karganj,  on  25tli  May  1762,  and  was  addressed  to  tlic 
Governor  (Mr  Vansittart).  It  is  printed  at  p.  Ill  of 
vol.  ii.  of  Vansittart's  ''Narrative"  (London,  1766). 

"  The  situation  of  affairs  at  this  place  obliges  me  to 
apply  to  your  Honour  for  instructions  for  my  further 
proceedings. 

"  My  instructions  which  I  brought  here  were,  that  in 
case  any  Europeans  or  their  servants  committed  any 
disorders,  they  were  to  be  sent  to  Calcutta,  notwithstand- 
ing any  pretences  they  shall  make  for  so  doing. 

"  Notwithstanding  the  rigour  of  these  orders,  I  have 
ever  made  it  my  business  (when  anything  trifling  hap- 
pened) to  endeavour  by  gentle  means  to  persuade  the 
gentlemen's  several  gomastahs  here  to  act  in  a  peaceable 
manner,  which,  although  repeated  several  times,  has  had 
no  effect,  but,  on  the  contrary,  has  occasioned  their  writ- 
ing complaints  of  me  to  their  respective  masters  that  I 
obstructed  them  in  their  business  and  ill-used  them ; 
and  in  return  I  have  received  menacing  letters  from 
several  gentlemen,  threatening,  if  I  interfere  with  their 
servants,  to  use  such  measures  as  I  may  repent ;  nor" 
have  the  gentlemen  only  done  this,  their  very  gomastahs 
have  made  it  public  here,  that  in  case  I  stop  them  in 
any  proceeding,  they  will  use  the  same  methods  ;  for  the 
truth  of  which  I  liave  good  proofs. 

"  Now,  sir,  I  am  to  inform  you  what  I  have  obstructed 
them  in.  This  place  was  of  great  trade  formerly,  but 
now  brought  to  nothing  by  the  following  practices. 
A  gentleman  sends  a  gomastah  here  to  buy  or  sell ;  he 
immediately  looks  upon  himself  as  sufficient  to  force 
every  inhabitant  either  to  buy  his  goods  or  sell  him 
theirs,  and  on  refusal  (in  case  of  non- capacity)  a  flogging 
or  confinement  immediately  ensues.    This  is  not  suffi- 


304  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

cient  even  wlien  willing,  but  a  second  force  is  made  use 
of,  which  is  to  engross  the  different  branches  of  trade  to 
themselves  and  not  to  suffer  any  persons  to  buy  or  sell 
the  articles  they  trade  in,  and  if  the  country-people  do 
it,  then  a  repetition  of  their  authority  is  put  in  practice ; 
and  agaiii,  what  things  they  purchase,  they  think  the 
least  they  can  do  is  to  take  them  for  a  considerable  deal 
less  than  another  merchant,  and  oftentimes  refuse  paying 
that,  and  my  interfering  causes  an  immediate  complaint. 
This  and  many  other  oppressions,  more  than  can  be 
related,  which  are  daily  used  by  the  Bengal  gomastahs, 
is  the  reason  that  this  place  is  growing  destitute  of 
inhabitants.  Every  day  numbers  leave  the  town  to 
seek  a  residence  more  safe,  and  the  very  markets,  which 
before  afforded  plenty,  do  hardly  now  produce  any- 
thing of  use,  their  peons  being  allowed  to  force  poor 
people,  and  if  the  zamindar  tries  to  prevent  it,  he  is 
threatened  to  be  used  in  the  same  manner. 

"  Before,  justice  was  given  in  the  j^ublic  cutchery, 
but  now  every  gomastah  is  become  a  judge,  and  every 
one's  house  a  cutchery  ;  they  even  pass  sentences  on  the 
zamindars  themselves,  and  draw  money  from  them  by 
pretended  injuries,  such  as  a  quarrel  with  some  of  their 
peons,  or  their  having,  as  they  assert,  stole  something, 
which  is  more  likely  to  have  been  taken  by  their  own 
people;  but  allowing  they  were  robbed,  I  believe  no 
gomastah's  authority  extends  so  far  as  to  take  his  own 
satisfaction  on  the  Government. 

"  Having  thus  far  acquainted  your  Honour  with  the 
behaviour  of  the  gomastahs  here,  I  am  to  request  your 
Honour's  interest,  that  in  case  I  am  to  put  your  orders 
into  execution,  I  may  be  borne  harmless  therein.  Now 
I  beg  leave  to  conclude,  being,  with  all  respect,"  &c. 

An  extract  from  this  letter  is  given  in  a  note  to  Mr 


ENGLISH  ADMINISTRATION.  305 

Mill's  "History  of  India,"  vol.  iii.  p.  330  (ed.  1830)  ; 
but  Mr  Mill  wrongly  describes  it  as  a  letter  written  to 
tbe  Nawab  by  one  of  his  officers.  In  fiict  the  letter  was 
written  to  Mr  Vansittart  by  an  officer  whom  he  had  sent 
down  with  six  sepoys  to  Bdkarganj  at  the  request  of  the 
Nawab,  and  in  order  to  assist  the  zamindar  of  Edkarganj. 
This  circumstance  raises  the  importance  of  the  letter  by 
showing  that  its  representations  come  from  one  holding 
a  presumably  independent  position,  and  not  from  one  of 
Mir  Kassim's  servants.  The  letter,  however,  not  only 
shows  the  distracted  condition  of  the  country,  but  also 
the  feebleness  of  the  remedies  applied.  It  almost  pro- 
vokes a  smile  to  find  Mr  Vansittart  unable  to  do  any- 
thing more  vigorous  than  to  send  a  common  sergeant 
(apparently,  from  his  name,  not  even  a  European)  with 
six  sepoys  to  a  large  mart  like  Bdkarganj,  when  such 
oj)pressions  were  going  on.  The  orders,  too,  which  were 
given  to  the  poor  sergeant — viz.,  to  deport  the  Europeans 
and  their  servants  to  Calcutta — seem  ludicrously  out  of 
kee]3ing  with  the  means  of  coercion  placed  at  his  dis- 
posal, and  justify  Macaulay's  remark,  that  Vansittart> 
with  fair  intentions,  was  a  feeble  and  inefficient  ruler. 

The  following  extract  from  a  letter  of  the  Nawab  (Mir 
Kassim)  to  Mr  Vansittart  gives  another  picture  of  the 
state  of  matters.  It  appears  to  have  been  written  on 
26tli  December  1762,  and  is  printed  at  p.  167  of  the 
2d  volume  of  Vansittart 's  "  Narrative  :  "  — 

"As  the  Company's  gomastahs  make  salt  at  Sundeep, 
&c.,  I  desire  you  wall  write  to  them  not  to  make  any 
more  there,  but,  like  other  merchants,  to  purchase  it 
from  the  molunghies  at  the  market  price. 

"In   the   parganas  of  Gopalpur  and   Dakhanbdrpur 

[Dakhin  Shahbazpiir],  and  other  districts  where  salt  is 

made,  the  people  of  the  Company's  factory  work  the  salt- 

u 


3o6  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

paus;  aud  they  take  possession  of  all  the  salt  whicli  the 
molungliies  of  other  parganas  have  made,  by  which 
means  I  suffer  a  very  great  loss.  Moreover,  they  oblige 
the  ryots  to  receive  money  from  them  for  purchasing  rice, 
and  by  force  and  violence  they  take  more  than  the  mar- 
ket price  affords,  and  the  ryots  all  run  away  on  account 
of  these  oppressions.  For  many  years  it  has  been  cus- 
tomary for  the  Cashmere  merchants  to  advance  money 
at  Sunderbund,  and  provide  molungliies  to  work  the 
salt-paus  there  :  they  paid  the  rents  for  the  salt-pans  at 
the  several  parganas;  and  the  duties  on  the  salt,  which 
were  paid  at  Burry-saul  Chokey,  belonging  to  the  Shah- 
bunder,  amounted  to  near  Es. 30,000.  At  present  the 
people  of  the  factory  have  dispossessed  the  Cashmere 
merchants,  and  have  appropriated  all  the  salt  to  them- 
selves." 

In  Long's  'SSelections,"  p.  55,  there  is  an  extract 
from  the  Government  Consultations,  dated  12th  February 
1755,  stating  that  several  boats  loaded  with  rice  had 
been  stopped  at  Bdkarganj  by  an  order  from  Dacca 
(apparently  issued  by  Eajah  Raj  Ballab),  and  that  the 
stoppage  had  occasioned  a  great  scarcity  and  dearness 
of  grain  in  Calcutta.  In  consequence  of  this  stoppage 
a  Lieutenant  Harding  was  sent  with  a  small  party  of 
troops  to  clear  the  boats  and  take  them  under  his  pro- 
tection. When  the  great  famine  of  1770  took  place, 
help  was  sought  for  from  Biikargauj,^  just  as  in  the 

^  It  is  mentioned  in  a  memorandum  by  Sir  George  Campbell  that  a 
gentleman  was  despatched  from  Dacca  to  B4karganj  in  1770  to  purchase 
grain.  The  fullest  reference  to  the  subject,  however,  is  to  be  found  in 
Hunter's  "  Rural  Annals,"  Appendix  B,  jj.  407,  &c,  Mr  Sumner  was  the 
gentleman  deputed  (p.  419,  Consultation  of  3d  April  1770).  33,913  mans 
had  arrived  from  Bakarganj  (p.  412).  The  rice  from  Barkerganje  (sic),  Mr 
Becher  observed,  arrived  at  a  most  critical  time  ;  and  *'  the  Company- 
has  reaped  a  considerable  benefit  by  the  measure,  ■which  proved  a  general 
relief  to  the  immediate  dependants  on  the  English  here  [Murshiddbdd], 


ENGLISH  A  DMINISTRA  TION.  3 o  7 

famiue  of  1873-74  it  was  regarded  as  tlie  chief  source 
from  wliicli  the  distressed  districts  were  to  be  supplied. 

Probably  the  Portuguese  were  the  first  Europeans  or 
quasi-Euroj^eaus  who  engaged  in  the  Bdkarganj  trade. 
They  came  from  Bandel  and  Goa,  and  settled  at  Siljpur, 
about  five  miles  from  Bdkarganj,  towards  the  middle  of 
the  last  century.  As  I  have  stated  in  another  chapter, 
the  Portuo-uese  had  dealino-s  with  the  district  of  a  less 
peaceful  character — namely,  in  the  beginning  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  when  Sebastian  Gonzales  and  other 
Portuguese  pirates  came  from  Chittagong  and  else- 
where, and  in  conjunction  with  the  Burmese  or  Mugs, 
plundered  the  Sundarbans  and  the  islands  in  the  Meghna. 
The  first  British  settler  in  the  district  was  apparently  a 
Scotchman,  named  William  Eobinson,  who  established 
himself  at  Madhupiir,  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Baroikaran 
and  Nalchiti,  in  1766,  and  lived  there  for  about  thirty 
years.  He  described  himself  in  1794  as  having  em- 
barked on  board  the  ship  "Falmouth"  in  1765,  and  as 
having  been  cast  ashore  east  of  Saugor  Sands  in  June 
1766,  from  whence  he  had  come  ujd  to  Madhupur  by  boat, 
and  had  been  engao-ed  in  trade  there  ever  since.  His 
descendants  still  reside  in  the  district,  and  his  tomb  is 
still  to  be  seen  in  Barisdl,  in  Mr  Pereira's  compound. 
There  was  also  a  Mr  Frazer,  who  described  himself  in 
1794  as  having  been  for  ten  years  at  Baroikaran  in  the 
employment'  of  Mr  Gill. 

In  these  days  Nalchiti,  which  is  now  so  large  a  mart, 
does  not  appear  to  have  existed,  or  at  least  it  was  less 

and  tended  to  preserve  order  and  regularity ;  otherwise  the  greatest  con- 
fusion must  have  ensued."  Rs. 60,000  were  given  to  the  Dacca  Council  for 
the  purchase  of  grain.  If  this  were  all  the  money  spent  at  Bakarganj,  the 
arrangement  must  have  been  very  successful,  for  on  1st  February  1771 
tlie  committee  report  that  the  sale  of  the  Bakarganj  rice  produced  a  profit 
of  Rs.67,593  (Appendix  B,  p.  419). 


3o8  DISTRICJ-  OF  BAkARGANJ. 

important  than  its  neighbour  Baroikaran,  which  is  now 
almost  deserted.  Local  tradition  points  to  Baroikaran 
as  the  old  headquarters  of  the  district,  and  this  is  sup- 
ported by  a  reference  in  the  decree  for  the  resumption 
of  Baroikaran  char  to  a  piece  of  land  therein  which 
had  originally  been  Mr  Christopher  Keating's  cutchery. 
This  is  the  Mr  Keating  of  Hunter's  "  Annals,"  who, 
before  he  went  to  Birbhiim,  was  Civil  Judge  of  Bdkarganj 
in  1785.  The  ancient  imjDortance  of  Baroikaran  is  also 
shown  by  the  fact  that  it  was  the  site  of  the  police 
station,  whicli  was  not  removed  from  it  to  Nalchiti  until 
1824. 

Dacoits. — The  great  trade  of  Bdkarganj,  and  the 
facilities  for  escape  offered  by  its  rivers  and  jungles, 
rendered  it  a  favourite  haunt  of  dacoits  or  gang-robbers, 
and  the  English  Government  was  early  obliged  to  take 
notice  of  their  depredations.  As  far  back  as  1764  we 
find  that  an  English  gentleman  named  ]\Ir  Rose  was 
murdered  by  dacoits  nearBdkarganj,  and  that  the  Nawab 
of  Murshid{ibd,d  was  called  upon  to  make  the  land- 
holder refund  the  money  and  goods  plundered,  and  to 
take  such  vigorous  measures  that  the  parts  might  be 
entirely  cleared  of  robbers  and  murderers  (Long's 
"Selections,"  p.  361.  See  also  pp.  382,  383,  and 
385).  The  letter  about  Mr  Rose  given  at  p.  361  of 
Long's  "  Selections  "  is  in  answer  to  one  from  the  Gover- 
nor, dated  14th  November  1764.  The  latter  is  inter- 
esting as  a  recognition  of  the  practice  of  impaling,  the 
Nawab  being  requested  to  order  the  Naib  of  Dacca  to 
impale  the  robbers.  I  therefore  quote  it  in  full:  "I 
have  already  by  word  of  mouth  represented  to  you, 
that  as  Mr  Rose,  an  English  gentleman,  was  travelling 
in  a  boat  with  some  money  and  goods,  the  boat-people 


ENGLISH  ADMINISTRATION.  309 

murdered  liim  near  Bakargauj  and  carried  away  the 
money  and  goods,  and  took  shelter  in  the  zamindari  of 
Sitaram.  In  order  to  inquire  into  this  affair,  I  sent  an 
Engli.slinian  to  tlie  said  zamindar,  but  he  woukl  not 
regard  liim,  I  have  therefore  enclosed  for  your  obser- 
vation an  account  of  the  money  and  goods  that  were 
plundered,  and  request  that  you  will  write  an  order  to 
the  Naib  of  Dacca  to  make  the  zamindar  refund,  and 
inflict  such  punishment  on  him  as  may  prevent  all  such 
proceedings  in  future.  The  number  of  murderers  and 
robbers  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Bdckerganje  is  daily 
increasing,  insomuch  that  trading  people  are  now  afraid 
to  pass  backwards  and  forwards,  wherefore  I  request 
that  you  will  give  orders  to  the  Naib  of  Dacca  to  send 
some  of  the  factory  sepoys  along  with  some  of  his 
own  people  to  apprehend  the  said  murderers  and  impale 
them,  which  will  be  very  serviceable  to  traders."  Mr 
Eose  is  elsewhere  called  Captain  John  Rose  and  also 
Mr  Ross,  and  apparently  it  was  his  own  boatmen 
who  murdered  him.  The  whole  of  his  property,  in- 
cluding Rs.5800  in  cash,  was  estimated  at  Rs.  13,000. 
Among  his  property  were  four  slaves,  who  were  reckoned 
altogether  as  worth  only  Rs.240.  Other  instances  of 
the  depredations  of  dacoits  are  given  in  Seton-Karr's 
"Selections,"  p.  269  et  seq.  In  1788  they  killed  a  Mr 
Burgh  between  Kulpadi  and  Gournadi. 

They  also  attacked  Mr  Willis,  the  Collector  of  Sylhet, 
on  his  way  through  the  district,  and  he  had  to  run  his 
boat  ashore  in  order  to  escape  from  them.  In  a  private 
letter  printed  at  p.  273  of  Seton-Karr's  "  Selections " 
the  writer  says,  "  I  am  happy  to  tell  you  that  most  of 
the  dacoits  who  attacked  Mr  Willis  in  the  Sundarbans 
have  been  taken.  It  appears  they  have  been  rov- 
ing about    the  Sundarban  rivers  for  eighteen    months 


3IO  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

without  any  settled  habitation.  They  were  chased  by 
some  armed  boats,  fitted  out  by  Mr  Day  for  the  ex- 
press purpose,  below  the  island  Siindeep,  almost  out  at 
sea ;  and  duriug  the  chase  the  pursuers  and  pursued 
were  all  nearly  swallowed  up  by  the  high  bore  of  the 
Meofhna.  There  was  skirmishincr  from  time  to  time  for 
a  day  and  a  half  before  the  dacoits  surrendered.  They 
have  since  been  brought  to  Dacca,  and  it  is  to  be  hoped 
that  their  fate  will  be  an  example  and  terror  to  others." 

One  Mahomed  Hayat,  a  notorious  dacoit,  was  sen- 
tenced by  the  Naib  Nazim  to  perpetual  imprisonment 
in  1790.  The  Governor-General  ordered  that  he  should 
be  transjDorted  to  the  Prince  of  Wales  Island.  He  re- 
turned in  1806. 

I  have  noticed  these  dacoities  here,  because  it  was 
apparently  in  consequence  of  them  that  Government 
first  took  active  measures  for  the  administration  of  the 
district.  An  officer  was  appointed,  called  the  Commis- 
sioner of  the  Sundarbans,  who  had  his  headquarters  at 
Bakarganj.  Unfortunately  the  Bdkarganj  magisterial 
records  do  not  extend  farther  back  than  1792,  and  I  am 
unable  to  say  at  what  date  the  office  of  Commissioner 
was  established.  Apparently  Mr  Lodge  was  the  first 
Commissioner  ;  he  was  succeeded  in  1790  by  j\Ir  Hynd- 
man  ("  Calcutta  Gazette,"  16th  December  1790),  and 
the  latter  by  Mr  Middleton.^  At  a  still  earlier  date, 
however,  there  was  a  civil  judge,  first  at  Baroikaran 
and   afterwards   at   Bdkarganj.      The   first  judge    was 


^  The  "  Calcutta  Gazette"  of  Gth  December  1792  contains  tlie  following 
announcement  :  "  The  Governor-General  in  Council  has  been  pleased  to 
appoint  Mr  Samuel  Middleton  Commissioner  in  the  Sundarbans  for  sup- 
pressing the  depredations  of  dacoits,  in  the  room  of  Mr  William  Ilynd- 
man  deceased." 

The  same  paper  contains  the  announcement  of  the  death  of  Mr  H^'nd- 
man,  "  lately  at  Bdkarganj." 


ENGLISH  A  D MINIS TRA  TION.  3  r  i 

apparently  Mr  AVrouglitoii.  lie  acted  in  1782,  and  got 
into  trouble  with  Mr  Holland,  the  Chief  of  Dacca,  about 
the  execution  of  a  process.  The  Governor  (Warren 
Hastings)  ordered  him  to  be  brought  to  trial  about  this, 
but  I  do  not  know  what  was  the  result.  He  was  suc- 
ceeded by  Mr  Keating,  who  was  apparently  succeeded 
by  Mr  Lodge.  These  facts  are  taken  from  some  papers 
lent  me  by  the  Board  of  Revenue.  Mr  Lodge  also  held 
the  office  of  Collector  of  Buzurgumedpiir,  which  was  a 
zila  or  collectorate  district  long  before  Biikarganj.  It 
appears  from  a  letter  of  Mr  Lodge,  dated  12th  August 
1786,  which  is  preserved  in  the  office  of  the  Board  of 
Revenue,  that  the  parganas  of  Chandradwip,  Selimdbdd, 
Jaffirdbdd,  Syedpiir,  Arangpiir,  and  Azimpiir  were 
attached  to  the  zila  of  Buzurgumedpiir.  Buzurgumed- 
piir apparently  remained  a  separate  charge  till  1787, 
when  it  was  annexed  to  the  Collectorate  of  Dacca 
(Seton-Karr's  Selections,  p.  185). 


(    312     ) 


CHAPTER  XII. 

REVENUE   ADMINISTRATION. 

I  HAVE  said  that  the  magisterial  records  of  Bd,kargaiij 
do  not  extend  farther  back  than  1792.  The  CoUectorate 
records  are  not  much  okler,  the  earliest  being  a  letter 
dated  6th  January  1790,  which  recommends  the  making 
of  advances  to  the  proprietors  on  account  of  the  severe 
famine  of  1787.  It  should  also  be  noticed  that  the  early 
CoUectorate  records  are  merely  copies,  the  originals  being 
at  Dacca.  The  copies  were  obtained  by  Mr  Hunter,  the 
first  Collector  of  Bdkarganj,  who  came  to  Barisdl  in  1817 
(see  his  letter  to  Board,  24th  March  1819).  They  are 
not  always  perfect,  and  contain  lacunae  as  well  as  errors ; 
but,  on  the  other  hand,  they  are  probably  in  better 
preservation  and  more  legible  than  the  originals  now 
are. 

Next  to  the  formation  of  the  Permanent  Settlement, 
the  most  important  event  in  the  history  of  Bd,karganj 
during  the  last  century  was  probably  the  famine  of 
1787.  This  appears  to  have  caused  a  very  great  loss  of 
life,  especially  in  the  northern  parts  of  the  district.  It 
was  the  result  of  floods,  not  of  drought ;  and  indeed  it 
may  be  said  that  the  destruction  of  the  crops  by  floods  is 
the  only  possible  cause  of  an  extensive  famine  in  Bd,kar- 
ganj.  The  country  is  so  well  watered  that  it  is  little 
in  need  of  irrigation,  and  should  the  rain  fail,  enough 
water  is  brought  into  the  southern  parts  of  the  districts 


REVENUE  ADMINISTRATION.  313 

by  the  tides  in  some  measure  to  supply  its  place.  I  have 
not  been  able  to  find  any  detailed  descrijDtion  of  the  famine, 
but  the  following  reference  to  it  is  made  by  Mr  Douglas 
in  a  letter  to  the  Board  of  Eevenue,  dated  6tli  April  1790. 
The  occasion  of  Mr  Douglas's  writing  was  his  having  ^ 
to  report  on  the  proposals  for  the  Decennial  Settlement 
of  the  district.  "However  unwilling  I  am,"  he  writes, 
"  to  animadvert  on  Mr  Day's  proposed  plan  of  a  ten  years' 
settlement,  yet  a  regard  for  my  own  character,  and  from 
a  perfect  conviction  that  I  cannot  conclude  the  Settle- 
ment with  many  of  the  mahals  at  the  jama  recom- 
mended by  him,  impels  me  to  deliver  my  sentiments 
freely  on  the  subject,  relying  on  the  Board's  candour 
for  putting  a  favourable  construction  on  the  motives 
by  which  I  am  actuated.  It  is  necessary  to  observe 
that  Mr  Day  did  not  send  down  his  proposed  plan  of 
settlement  for  upwards  of  six  months  after  this  district 
[Dacca  Jaldlpiir,  which  included  Faridpiir  and  Bakar- 
ganj]  had  been  visited  by  the  most  dreadful  calamity 
ever  remembered  by  the  oldest  inhabitant  of  the  dis- 
trict, and  which  deprived  it  (by  Mr  Day's  calcula- 
tion) of  upwards  of  GO, 000  of  its  inhabitants,  who 
either  miserably  perished,  or  were  reduced  to  the 
painful  necessity  of  forsaking  their  habitations  in 
search  of  a  precarious  subsistence.  Mr  Day  visited 
some  of  the  parganas  when  the  famine  raged 
with  the  greatest  violence,  and  had  ocular  proofs 
of  the  extreme  misery  to  which  the  wretched  in- 
habitants were  reduced.  He  saw  the  parganas  inun- 
dated, whole  crops  destroyed,  and  cultivation  totally 
neglected.  He  had  the  mortification  of  beholding 
hundreds  of  the  poor  wretched  inhabitants  daily  dying 
without  the  means  of  aflbrding  them  the  smallest  relief. 
After  a  local  investigation  of  the  cruel  efi'ects  of  the 


3t4  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

iiiimdation,  after  a  full  conviction  of  the  very  heavy 
loss  many  of  the  principal  parganas  sustained  both  in 
their  inhabitants  and  crops,  and  the  consequent  decline  of 
cultivation,  it  is  a  matter  of  great  surprise  that  Mr  Day 
should,  in  many  of  the  parganas  which  had  suffered 
so  materially  by  the  inundation  and  loss  of  tenants, 
recommend  an  increase  to  be  taken  in  the  ensuing  year's 
Settlement.  That  gentleman  observes  that  his  plan  was 
founded  on  the  *  Idea  of  a  Ten  Years'  Bandobast.'  Ad- 
mitting of  this,  can  it  be  supposed  that  districts  which 
had  been  deprived  of  one-half  of  their  natural  resources, 
could  in  the  short  period  of  one  year  so  far  recover  as  to 
yield  the  customary  revenue,  much  less  bear  an  increase 
which  would  have  added  to  the  miseries  they  had 
already  suffered,  and  in  all  probability  have  obliged 
the  remaining  ryots  to  desert  their  habitations  and  seek 
refug-e  in  more  favourable  districts  ?  " 

Elsewhere  the  Collector  reports  of  the  pargana  Idilpur, 
that  he  has  been  told  from  respectable  authority  that  the 
northern  part  of  this  zamindari  lost  three-fourths  of  its 
inhabitants  in  the  dreadful  calamity  of  1194  B.s.  (1787). 
It  will  be  seen  that  Mr  Douglas's  words,  "  the  most 
dreadful  calamity  ever  remembered  by  the  oldest  inha- 
bitant of  the  district,"  imply  that  Bdkarganj  did  not 
sufier  from  the  celebrated  famine  of  1770,  which  deso- 
lated so  many  districts  in  Bengal. 

The  famine  of  1787  no  doubt  chiefly  affected  the 
northern  and  eastern  parts  of  the  district,  and  the  more 
westerly  and  central  portions  probably  escaped  in  great 
measure,  for  then,  as  now,  the  northern  and  eastern  parts 
were  especially  exposed  to  being  flooded.  They  are  the 
first  to  feel  the  effects  of  the  risings  of  the  rivers,  and 
they  are  full  of  low-lying  lands  and  swamps.  A  great 
part  of  Farldptir  and  of  the  Gournadi  thana  consists  of 


REVENUE  ADMINISTRATION.  315 

swamps,  and  it  is  seldom  that  a  year  passes  without 
their  suffering  some  loss  from  iloocls. 

The  early  Collectorate  records  are  chiefly  occupied  with 
the  preparations  for  the  Permanent  Settlement.  I  have 
inserted  in  the  Appendix  the  most  important  of  them. 
As  a  general  rule,  the  correspondence  is  of  an  uninter- 
esting character,  and  it  is  only  rarely  that  one  comes 
upon  anything  worthy  of  being  quoted. 

It  is  evident  enough  that  the  system  of  collecting  the 
revenues  before  the  Permanent  Settlement  was  a  very 
hand-to-mouth  one,  and  that  everything  depended  on 
the  personal  qualities  of  the  Collector  and  his  subordi- 
nates. Estates  were  let  in  farm  from  year  to  year,  and 
if  the  farmers,  as  was  often  the  case,  fell  into  arrears, 
they  were  imprisoned,  or  their  farms  were  placed  under 
the  management  of  a  sazawal  or  other  Government  officer. 
The  following  extract  from  a  Collector's  letter,  dated  8  th 
October  1790,  gives  some  hint  of  the  state  of  matters: 
"  The  Board  observing  in  almost  all  the  accounts  jama 
hharacli,  a  charge  made  for  diet  to  prisoners,  desire  to  be 
informed  of  what  description  they  are,  and  upon  what 
grounds  the  charo-e  is  admitted  into  the  sazawal's  ac- 

o  o 

count.  This  is  an  allowance  for  diet  made  to  ryots  and 
others  who,  upon  proving  refractory  or  dilatory  in  pay- 
ing their  rents,  are  put  under  restraint  or  confined  for  a 
time  in  the  sazawal's  [house  ?].  They  have  no  other  means 
of  subsistence.  It  amounts  in  all  the  accounts  to  about 
Es.lO  or  Es.l2  for  the  whole  year."  In  another  letter 
(14th  July  1790)  the  Collector  writes,  "I  have  confined 
the  farmer  for  the  balance  due  on  account  of  mahai  [fish  | 
and  hajantri  [music]  mahals,  and  trust  to  recover  the 
same  in  a  few^days."  A  letter  of  19th  July  1790  notices 
the  depredations  of  wild  elephants  in  Kassimpiir  and 
Bhowal,  and  reports  that  Birmohan  is  infested  with  tigers. 


3i6  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

and  that  the  Collector  has  in  vain  entleavoured  to  en- 
courage the  tiger-killers  to  repair  to  the  pargana.  On 
9th  August  1790  the  Collector  reports  that  he  has, 
agreeably  to  the  Governor- General's  orders,  done  away 
with  the  gdzar  duty — z.e.,  duty  on  washermen.  It 
yielded  only  Es.60  a  year,  which  seems  to  show  that 
washermen  were  even  more  scarce  in  the  district  in 
former  times  than  they  are  now. 

There  were  other  malials  belonging  to  the  sayer,  such 
as  the  diimdari,  which  was  collected  from  bird-catchers, 
monkey  and  bear  dancers,  faqirs,  snake-dancers,  con- 
jurors, &c.  (9th  August  1790).  This  farm  yielded  in  one 
year  Rs.  1444,  and  the  bajantri  or  music  farm  yielded  as 
much  as  Rs.3102.  There  was  another  farm,  called 
onushrat  kotivali,  which  was  composed  of  collections  from 
artificers — i.e.,  brickmakers,  &c,  Piinya  charges,  or  the 
charges  for  the  ceremonial  of  the  first  receipt  of  rent  for 
the  year,  were  disallowed  by  the  Board,  though  the  Col- 
lector says  they  were  invariably  incurred  and  included 
under  the  head  of  chakia  expenses  (12th'  April  1792). 
In  another  letter  the  Collector  writes  about  the  charge 
for  guarding  treasure :  "  Your  Board  deem  the  sum  of 
Rs.550  on  account  harhandazes  excessive,  and  expect  I 
will  considerably  reduce  them.  I  trust  you  will  deem 
this  sum  indispensable,  when  you  are  informed  that  the 
barkandazes  are  entertained  as  guards  over  the  Mofussil 
cutchery  and  treasure ;  that  they  always  escort  the  re- 
venues to  my  treasury  ;  that  for  that  jnu-pose  it  requires 
a  strong  guard  to  prevent  the  boats  conveying  the  trea- 
sure from  being  plundered  by  the  dacoits  who  infest  the 
Meghna  river.  Were  not  the  barkandazes  regularly  kept 
at  the  Mofussil  treasury,  it  would  be  liable  to  be  attacked 
and  robbed  by  the  dacoits  who  inhabit  the  Sundarbans, 
to  which  Selimdbdd  pargana  is  adjoining,  and  indeed 


REVENUE  ADMI NISTRATI ON.  317 

forms  part  of  the  Sundarljans.     The  cstablislicd  rate  of 
boat-liirc  from  Selimdbdd  to  Dacca  is  Es.9." 

A  letter  of  IGtli  February  1792  records  an  attempted 
insurrection  of  one  Bolaki  Shall,  a  faqir,  who  had  col-  S 
lected  an  armed  force,  and  proclaimed  to  his  followers 
that  the  reign  of  the  Feringhies  or  Europeans  was  at 
an  end.  He  was  said  to  have  erected  a  fort  at  Suban- 
dia;  and  a  revenue  peon  who  was  seized  by  him  re- 
ported that  he  saw  at  his  place  seven  cannon,  twelve 
ginjals,  and  five  or  six  muskets,  two  spears,  and  two 
men  employed  in  making  gunpowder.  A  Naib  and 
forty-eight  sepoys  were  sent  to  apprehend  him.  I  have 
been  told  that  it  was  this  faqir  who  removed  the  old 
cannon  wliich  used  to  lie  in  Sujdbdd  Fort. 

It  was  part  of  the  arrangements  of  the  Permanent 
Settlement  that  the  zamindars  should  give  their  ryots 
pattas  or  leases,  and  Mr  Douglas  was  called  on  to 
report  what  progress  had  been  made  in  this  matter. 
On  6th  December  1792  he  reports  as  follows  : — 

"  Some  zamindars  object  to  giving  pottahs.  The  zamin- 
dar  of  Nurallapiir  says  that,  by  the  ancient  custom  of  the 
country,  pottahs  are  not  granted  to  the  old-established 
ryots,  that  they  paid  according  to  the  rates  fixed  on 
their  respective  villages,  or  by  a  measurement.  That 
any  new  ryots  delivering  in  proposals  for  cultivating 
jungle-lands,  to  such  ryots  pottahs  are  granted,  and 
they  paid  according  to  the  quantity  of  land  they 
annually  cultivated.  Others,  again,  do  not  take  out  pot- 
tahs for  cultivating  the  jungle-lands,  the  demands  from 
them  are  regulated  according  to  the  rates  paid  by  other 
ryots  who  cultivate  jungle-lands.  That  ever  since  the 
commencement  of  the  current  year  he  has  been  busily 
engaged  in  drawing  out  pottahs,  framing  accounts  in 
conformity  to  the  regulations ;  but  his  lands  are  much 


3i8  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

scattered.  He  finds  it  extremely  difficult  to  carry  into 
immediate  effect  the  orders  of  Government.  Besides, 
tlie  old-established  ryots  obstinately  oppose  the  receipt 
of  pottahs,  and  threaten  to  leave  their  lands. 

"The  zamindars  of  Easulpiir,  Baikanthpiir,  Sultand,- 
bad,  Ratandi  Kalikapur,  have  delivered  in  similar  re- 
presentations with  the  above.  As  it  appeared  to  me 
very  extraordinary  that  any  ryot  should  object  to  the 
receipt  of  pottahs  which  would  secure  him  from  any 
arljitrary  demands,  I  called  several  of  them  before  me 
to  state  their  grounds  of  objection,  which  they  did  as 
follows :  That  they  enjoyed  the  same  lands  possessed 
by  their  forefathers ;  that  they  cultivate  the  same,  and 
pay  the  same  revenue ;  that  their  ancestors  never 
received  pottahs ;  that  their  acceptance  of  them  would 
be  disgraceful,  as  it  would  betray  a  mutual  want  of 
confidence  on  their  and  the  zamindar's  part ;  that  they 
should  lose  the  honorary  title  of  being  called  old-estab- 
lished ryots,  and  thereby  become  degraded  by  being- 
styled  new  ryots.  When  I  consider  the  prejudices  of 
this  people — how  bigoted  they  are  to  old-established 
customs,  and  how  extremely  averse  they  are  to  any 
innovation  which  militates  against  former  usage — I  am 
the  less  surprised  at  the  objection  started  by  the  ryots 
for  receiving  pottahs;  but  being  convinced  it  will 
ultimately  redound  to  their  ease,  comfort,  and  benefit, 
by  carrying  into  effect  the  regulation,  I  have  again 
issued  peremptory  orders  to  the  landholders  for  grant- 
ing pottahs  to  every  description  of  ryots,  and  directed 
those  who  have  not  yet  delivered  to  me  forms  of  pot- 
tahs, to  do  so  immediately.  Many  of  the  landholders 
have  granted  pottahs  to  their  ryots,  according  to  the 
forms  approved  by  me." 

There  are  a  few  letters  among  the  records  about  the 


REVENUE  ADMINISI^RATION.  319 

A^eavcrs  and  tlie  salt  manufacture.  One  forwards  a  peti- 
tion from  some  ryots  in  Rajnagar  complaining  that  the 
Commercial  Tiesident  at  Lakliypiir  forces  advances  on 
them  as  weavers,  although,  in  fiict,  they  never  had 
woven  anything.  Another  letter,  dated  2d  October 
1790,  states  that  the  ryots  are  seized  by  the  agents  of 
the  Salt  Department  to  act  as  smiths,  and  that  not  only 
were  they  seized,  but  they  were  made  to  pay  piadgan, 
or  the  fees  of  the  piada  who  seized  them  !  This  piad- 
gan is  a  well-known  zamindari  charge  in  the  present 
day,  and  is  one  which  must  strike  even  the  apathetic 
Bengali  with  a  sense  of  injustice.  It  seems  so  iniquit- 
ous first  to  drag  a  man  away  from  his  home,  and  then 
to  make  him  pay  for  the  outrage  which  has  been  com- 
mitted on  him. 

Bdkarganj  was,  as  I  have  said,  a  great  seat  of  the 
salt  manufacture.  The  establishments  on  the  islands  of 
Hattia  and  Dakhin  Shahbd-zpiir  were  managed  from 
Noakhali,  or  Bhulua,  as  it  is  also  called  ;  but  that  in 
Selimdbad,  &c.,  was  managed  from  Jhalukdtti,  which 
appears  to  be  identical  with  Rai  Mongal,  and  also  with 
Jainagar.  The  last-mentioned  place  was  situated  near 
the  Ghosal  Rajah's  seat  at  Gurudham.     The  name  of  Mr  / 

Ewart,  who  figures  in  Mr  Westland's  "  Jessore,"  is  still         v 
remembered  at  Jhalukdtti.     He  had  a  lar^e  house  there, 
and  is  said  to  have  been  so  magnificent  as  to  have  had 
a  European  baker  and  a  European  barber. 

As  appears  to  have  l)een  the  case  everywhere,  the  salt 
manufacture  in  Bdkarganj  led  to  oppressions  and  law- 
lessness, and  to  consequent  disputes  between  the  salt 
officers  and  the  Magistrates.  In  1826  the  Magistrate  of 
Bdkarganj  was  called  upon  by  the  Board  of  Customs, 
salt  and  opium,  to  state  the  result  of  the  suits  brouglit 
by  and  against  the  salt  officers,  and  replied  as  follows  : 

/      /  V, 


3  2  0  BIS  TRICT  OF  bAKA  R  GA  NJ. 

"  I  beg  leave  to  state  tliat  the  issue  of  the  suits  siuce 
my  taking  charge  of  this  district  has  been  generally 
proved  against  the  salt  oflQ.cers  for  atrocities  and  oppres- 
sion of  every  description,  and  I  do  not  hesitate  in  giving 
my  ojDinion  tliat  the  greatest  coercion  is  had  recourse  to 
in  order  to  force  advances  on  the  moluughies  by  the 
haiparies  or  salt  contractors,  many  of  whom  have  been 
found  guilty  and  punished,  and  nine  have  been  lately 
committed  for  trial  before  the  Judge  of  Circuit,  con- 
victed, and  sentenced  to  seven  and  six  years'  imprison- 
ment, besides  many  who  have  been  punished  both  by 
the  former  Magistrates  and  also  by  the  Court  of  Circuit " 
(12th  June  1826). 

The  remissions  made  to  the  zamindars  of  Dakhin 
Shahbdzpur  and  Selimdbdd  and  other  places,  on  account 
of  lands  used  for  the  salt  manufacture,  were  a  fruitful 
source  of  correspondence  at  various  times  (see  an  ela- 
borate report  by  Mr  Collector  Sutherland,  13  th  June 
1866). 

The  first  Collector  of  Bdkarganj  was  Mr  Day.  He 
was  succeeded  by  Mr  Douglas,  who  made  the  Permanent 
Settlement,  and  then  followed  Messrs  Thompson,  Arm- 
strong, and  Massie.  All  these,  however,  and  their 
successors  up  to  1817,  resided  at  Dacca,  and  scarcely 
ever  visited  Bdkarganj.  Mr  Hunter,  the  first  indepen- 
dent Collector  of  Bdkarganj,  received  charge  of  his  office 
on  8th  December  1817.  The  CoUectorate  was  established 
partly  from  an  idea  that  the  cultivation  of  the  Sundar- 
bans  would  thereby  be  facilitated,  and  a23parently  Mr 
Hunter  was  chosen  on  account  of  his  supposed  aptitude 
for  such  duty.  (He  was  one  of  those  who  afterwards 
set  about  reclaiming  Saugor  Island.) 

Bdkarganj  was  not,  however,  entirely  without  resident 
revenue  officers  before  Mr  Hunter's    arrival.     In  1814 


REVENUE  ADMINISTRATION.  321 

there  was  an  Assistant-Collector  at  BaristU  who  had 
charge  of  tlio  treasury,  and  who,  I  believe,  also  tried 
summary  suits  for  rent.  He  was  subordinate  to  the 
Collector  of  Daccn,  but  (dso  corresponded  directly  with 
Calcutta.  There  was  a  similar  officer  at  Faridpur. 
The  first  officer  appears  to  have  been  Mr  E.  Bagge.  Ho 
was  succeeded  by  ]\Ir  E.  Lee  Warner,  and  he  in  his  turn 
was  succeeded  by  Mr  Pigou  and  by  Mr  Frazer.  It  was 
Mr  Frazer  who  g'ave  over  charoe  to  Mr  Hunter.  These 
Assistant-Collectors  were  also  assistants  to  the  Mai^is- 
trate. 

On  18  th  April  1818  Mr  Hunter  sent  a  list  of  the 
establishment  proposed  by  him  for  the  collectorship, 
and  this  was  corrected  by  a  subsequent  letter  dated 
27tli  May.  His  pay  was  Es.l500,  and  the  cost  of  the 
proposed  establishment  Avas,  including  this,  Es.2458  a 
month. 

Mr  Hunter  remained  in  charge  of  the  Collectorate  till 
Gtli  November  1819,  when  he  made  over  charge  to  ]\Ir 
Barlow,  who  was  succeeded  on  5th  April  1820  by  Mr 
Lara.  Mr  Hunter,  however,  took  charge  again  on 
30th  October  1820,  but  finally  made  over  charge  to  Mr 
Maxwell  on  22d  January  1821. 

Ml  Hunter  was  engaged  actively  in  collecting  informa- 
tion about  the  chars  or  alluvial  formations  which  had  been 
formed  since  the  time  of  the  Permanent  Settlement, 
for  this  was  the  time  of  resumptions.  He  visited  the 
remote  parts  of  the  district,  including  the  island  of 
Kukri  Mukri,  and  he  employed  a  Mr  Jackson  to  make 
a  sort  of  survey  of  the  Sundarbans. 

After  the  Permanent  Settlement  was  fairly  completed, 
the  Avork  of  the  Collectorate  became  tolerably  easy,  and 
consisted  chiefly  in  the  trial  of  rent  suits.  After  the  pass- 
ing of  Regulation  11  of  1819,  the  work  of  resumption 


3 2  2  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

became  considerable,  and  tlie  number  of  islands  and 
chars  resumed  in  the  district  was  very  large.  These 
resumptions  also  led  to  numerous  Government  suits, 
which  the  Collector  had  to  look  after.  Notwithstanding 
this,  it  is  probable  that  a  Collector's  work  continued  to 
be  tolerably  light  until  the  passing  of  Act  10  of  1859, 
and  the  subsequent  combination  of  the  offices  of  Collec- 
tor and  Magistrate. 


(  323   ) 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

Fli OGRESS  OF  THE  CRLMINAL  ADMINISTRATION 
AND  GENERAL  HISTORY. 

The  Civil  Judges  of  Bdkarganj  Iiad,  I  believe,  magiste- 
rial powers  also.  I  do  not  know  tlie  exact  nature  of  tlie 
office  of  Commissioner  of  Bdkarganj,  but  I  believe  he 
had  at  first  only  preventive  powers,  and  did  not  acquire 
judicial  powers  until  1794.  These  seem  to  have  been 
conferred  by  the  repealed  Eegulatiou  9  of  1793,  the  pre- 
amble to  which  gives  a  resume  of  the  various  judicial 
systems.  The  same  Regulation  (sect.  40)  makes  Bdkar- 
ganj  one  of  the  stations  of  the  Dacca  Court  of  Circuit. 
The  office  of  Commissioner  was  abolished  by  Regulation 
7  of  1797,  which  divided  Dacca  Jaldlpur  into  two  divi- 
sions— "the  northern  to  be  denominated  the  zila  of 
Dacca  Jaldlpur  [now  Faridpiir],  and  the  southern  divi- 
sion the  zila  of  Bdkarganj."  Section  1  states  that  one 
object  of  the  Regulation  is  "to  provide  for  the  more 
effectual  administration  of  justice  in  the  Sundarbanstind 
the  district  adjacent,  heretofore  included  in  the  juris- 
diction of  the  Commissioner  of  Bilkarganj,  who  was  in- 
vested with  the  powers  of  a  Magistrate,  but  was  not 
authorised  to  exercise  any  civil  jurisdiction." 

Mr  Middleton  is  said  to  have  removed  the  offices 
from  Baroikaran  to  Bakarganj.  Probably  this  was 
in  1792,  when  he  was  appointed  Commissioner.  Mr 
Middleton  remained  at  Bdkarganj   till  1800,  when  he 


324  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

was  succeeded  by  ]\Ir  Spedding,  wlio  agaiu  was  suc- 
ceeded by  Mr  "Wiiitle  who  removed  (1801)  the  offices  to 
Barisdl.  Mr  Middle tou  does  not  appear  to  have  been  a 
very  efficient  officer,  and  more  than  once  incurred  the 
censure  of  Government.  Indeed,  if  he  had  been  a  good 
officer,  it  is  not  likely  that  he  would  have  been  sent  to  so 
disagreeable  a  place  as  Bd,karganj,  or  kept  there  so  long  as 
eight  years.  One  of  Mr  Middleton's  most  extraordinary 
proceedings  was  his  sending  one  Alliar  Khan,  a  notori- 
ous f/oi«c/a  or  informer,  to  the  island  of  Dakhin  Shahbaz- 
piir  with  a  general  warrant  to  arrest  dacoits  and  suspicious 
characters.  I  believe  this  was  done  in  consequence  of  a 
Mr  Paliologus,  the  servant  of  a  Mr  Demetrius,  a  Greek 
salt  merchant,  having  been  speared  and  killed  by  dacoits 
while  in  the  island.  Alliar  Khan  brouf^ht  in  no  less  than 
314  persons  to  Bdkarganj  (see  letter  of  2 2d  January 
1801),  and  Mr  Middleton's  successor  was  a  good  deal 
puzzled  to  know  what  to  do  with  them.  However,  this 
happened  near  the  end  of  i\Ir  Middleton's  tenure  of  office, 
and  Ave  must  not  be  too  hard  on  a  man  who  had  breathed 
for  eight  years  an  atmosphere  which  makes  one  feel  as  if 
only  "  half-alive  "  (letter  of  Mr  Wintle).  The  Govern- 
ment of  the  day  took  a  lenient  view  of  the  case,  and 
ascribed  Mr  Middleton's  action  entirely  to  liis  zeal  for 
the  public  service  (5th  March  1801). 

In  these  early  days  ships  came  up  to  Bdkarganj  and 
traded  there  in  rice.  Mention  is  made  in  the  records  of 
the  "  Eliza,"  which  was  at  Bakarganj  in  August  1794,  and 
of  the  brig  "  Maria,"  which  was  there  on  26th  November 
1808.  The  Civil  Surgeon,  Mr  Harper,  appears  to  have 
been  in  partnership  with  Mr  Gill  as  a  boatbuilder,  and  to 
have  employed  (in  1794)  a  Frenchman  named  AutoinPiaji. 
In  consequence  probably  of  the  famine  of  1787,  Govern- 
ment took  to  storing  rice  at  Bdkargauj,  and  had  fifty- 


GENERAL  HISTORY.  325 

two  golalis  or  granaries  there.  It  may  be  noted  that  in 
former  times  Government  had  no  scruple  whatever  in 
carrying  out  a  policy  which  was  considered  by  many 
so  monstrous  in  1873-74,  and  that  there  arc  several 
instances  in  the  official  records,  and  in  Seton-Karr's 
"Selections,"  of  Governments  stopping  the  exportation 
of  grain. 

Formerly  it  was  the  custom  to  execute  criminals  at 
the  scene  of  their  crime,  and  such  an  execution  took 
place  at  Earn  Prasad  Hdt  on  7th  July  1794.  It  seems 
also  to  have  been  the  idea  to  make  executions  as 
public  as  possible,  instead  of,  as  now,  hiding  them  from 
the  public  eye.  I  find  an  instance  of  a  hanging  which 
took  place  at  Bdkarganj  at  one  o'clock  in  the  day. 

There  is  nothing  in  the  records  to  shoAV  the  kind  of  life 
led  by  the  officers  at  Bdkarganj.  The  society  was  very 
small — apparently  Messrs  Middleton  and  Harper  were  the 
only  English  officers  of  their  day  ;  and  the  only  fact  of 
interest  that  I  have  been  able  to  discover  is  that  Mr 
Middleton's  wife  resided  with  him  at  Bdkarganj.  On 
8th  April  1795  the  Nizamat  Adalat  sent  Mr  Middleton  a 
cat-o'-nine -tails,  and  informed  him  that  he  would  be  fur- 
nished with  a  new  cat  whenever  the  one  now  sent  to  him 
became  unserviceable. 

The  town  of  Bdkarganj  stands  on  a  small  river  called 
the  Srimantapiir  kh^l.  The  situation  can  never  have 
been  very  healthy  or  pleasant,  and  it  became  worse  in 
consequence  of  the  formation  of  a  char  in  front  of  the 
cutcheries.  Its  advantages  were  that  it  Avas  central, 
that  it  had  a  large  market,  and  that  it  was  near  the 
Golabari,  where  tlie  tahsildar  of  Buzurgumedpur  had 
his  cutchery,  and  the  Portuguese  settlement  of  Sibpiir. 
Very  few  remains  of  the  old  buildings  now  exist.  The 
cutcheries  appear  to  have  been  situated  where  the  thana 


326  DISTRIOT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

now  is,  and  there  is  still  a  brick  terrace  there.  The  jail 
was  higher  up  the  khiil,  and  on  the  bank  of  a  small 
stream  which  is  still  called  the  Jailkhana  khd-l.  There 
was  a  good  deal  of  correspondence  about  the  change 
of  site.  Mr  Middleton  recommended  Mohanganj,  but 
eventually  Barisal  was  fixed  upon.  A  letter  of  the 
Nizamat  Adalat,  dated  1st  May  1801,  directs  the 
Magistrate  to  remove  to  BarisiU,  which  was  the  place 
recommended  by  the  Dacca  Court  of  Circuit.  See  also 
letter  of  29th  April  1801  to  the  Governor-General.  It 
must,  I  think,  be  admitted  that  the  new  site  was  well 
chosen,  and  that  it  has  stood  the  test  of  time  very  well, 
as  Barisdl  is  about  the  healthiest  and  most  conveniently 
situated  town  in  the  district. 

There  are  two  orders  of  Circuit  Judges  preserved 
among  the  records,  which  are  worth  quoting  for  their 
singularity.  One  is  an  order  of  Mr  Bayard,  dated  26tli 
December  1800,  directing  that  three  men  should  be 
imprisoned  for  fifteen  days  for  "  declining  to  come  to 
my  assistance  in  an  embarrassing  situation  when  re- 
quired, and  refusing  me  those  attentions  which  as  a 
Judge  of  Circuit  I  have  a  right  to  command  from  all  de- 
scriptions of  persons  in  travelling  through  this  district." 
Another  is  a  similar  order  of  Mr  Crisp,  dated  27th 
July  1800,  directing  that  some  palki-bearers  be  im- 
prisoned for  fifteen  days  for  contempt  of  court,  in  re- 
fusing to  associate  with  other  bearers  who  had  carried 
him  to  the  jail. 

The  great  point  looked  to  in  the  commencement  of 
the  Bdkarganj  criminal  jurisdiction  was  the  suppression 
of  dacoities.  There  were  fourteen  stations  and  fourteen 
boats,  and  the  river  patrol  was  the  subject  of  much 
correspondence.  It  is  certain  that  the  Magistrates  had 
very  daring  dacoits  to  deal  with.    Two  of  them — viz., 


GENERAL  HISTORY.  327 

Mahomed  Hayat  and  Ainudccu  Sikdar — were  men  of 
property,  and  were  ringleaders  or  sardar  dacoits.  They 
Avere  transported  and  then*  hinds  confiscated — a  measure 
which  led  to  almost  endless  correspondence  on  the 
Collectorate  side,  as  the  zamindars  and  the  dacoits' 
families  concealed  the  ownership  of  the  lands,  so  that 
it  was  exceedingly  difficult  to  identify  them. 

1  can  find  nothing  remarkable  in  the  early  official 
history  of  Bakarganj.  None  of  the  Magistrates  appear 
to  have  been  above  the  average  in  point  of  ability.  I  am 
afraid,  indeed,  that  Bdkarganj  has  been  from  the  earliest 
times  what  a  friend  of  mine  once  called  it,  "  the  dust- 
bin of  Bengal,"  and  that  no  officer  was  sent  to  it  except 
as  a  punishment,  or  because  he  was  not  thought  good 
enough  for  a  better  district.  Mr  Garrett,  writing  to  the 
Secretary  to  Government  in  1827,  says,  "I  scarcely 
think  there  is  any  need  of  expatiating  to  you  on  the 
circumstances  of  this  district,  its  situation,  the  litigious 
character  of  the  inhabitants,  and  the  general  dislike 
evinced  by  the  gentlemen  of  the  service  to  accept  the 
situation  of  Judge  and  Magistrate  of  Bakarganj.  The 
last  confirmed  Judge  who  joined  this  station  was  Mr  A. 
Mackenzie.  This  gentleman  quitted  it  in  1817,  since 
which  period  there  has  been  a  succession  of  officiating 
Magistrates.  Though  no  less  than  four  gentlemen  were 
fully  appointed,  none  of  them  ever  joined.  The  pre- 
judice agaiust  this  place  is  not  without  foundation;  the  A 
duties  are  certainly  laborious,  and  the  climate  bad."  M 
There  is  a  report  by  Mr  Gardner  on  the  police  system, 
dated  19tli  February  1805,  from  v/liich  it  appears  that 
the  total  annual  cost  of  the  police  was  Rs.33,3G0.  At 
that  time  Gournadi  was  not  under  Bdkarganj,  it  having 
been  transferred  in  1806,  nor  was  Idilpur  pargana  a 
part  of  the  district.      On  the  other  hand,  Kacliua  (now 


328  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

ill  Jessore)  belonged  to  Bdkarganj,  and  also  Hattia  and 
Dakliin  Shalibdzpur.  The  latter  islands  belonged  to 
Bd,karganj  up  to  1822,  wlien  they  were  transferred  to 
the  newly-established  district  of  Noakhdli.  Dakhin 
Shahbazpiir  was  retransferred  to  Bakarganj  in  1869. 
In  course  of  time  various  changes  were  made  in  police 
arrangements.  Thus  tlianas  Kotwalipara  and  Mirza- 
ganj  were  established  in  1812,  the  Kotwali  or  Barisal 
thana  was  established  in  1820  (it  had  hitherto  been 
part  of  Bakainagar  thana),  and  the  Baroikaran  thana 
was  removed  in  1824  to  Nalchiti. 

In  February  1812  there  was  a  serious  outbreak  in  the 
jail  during  the  magistracy  of  Mr  Battye,  and  twelve  pri- 
soners were  shot  before  it  was  suppressed.  Mr  Battye 
was  attacked  on  this  occasion,  and  was  only  saved  by 
the  bravery  and  self-devotion  of  one  of  the  sej^oy  guard. 
In  September  1817  the  Magistrate  reports  the  occur- 
rence of  an  epidemic  (cholera  ?),  and  on  28  th  February 
1818  the  cholera  morbus  is  reported  to  have  reappeared.^ 
On  IGth  April  1820  the  Magistrate  asks  for  cholera 
medicines,  and  says  that  the  disease  is  very  prevalent  in 
every  part  of  the  district.  On  6th  May  1822  cholera  is 
reported  to  l)e  prevalent.  It  again  broke  out  in  August 
1825,  and  this  was  its  most  deadly  manifestation ; 
24,960  persons  are  said  to  have  died  of  it  in  the  district, 
besides  90  wlio  died  in  jail — total,  25,050.  All  these 
deaths  are  said  to  have  occurred  between  22d  August 
and  10th  September,  within  which  short  time  twenty 
women  performed  sati.  On  19th  August  1820  the 
Magistrate   forwards  Rs.268,  collected   as   a   contribu- 

1  In  the  "Lettres  edifiautes  "  there  is  a  letter  from  a  Pere  Papiii,  dated 
Bengal,  18th  December  1709,  in  which  he  refers  to  the  mordechin  (?)  or 
cholera  morbus  as  being  common  in  the  country.  He  says  the  native  treat- 
ment for  it  was  to  keep  the  patient  from  drinking  water  and  to  burn  the 
soles  of  the  feet. 


GENERAL  HISTORY.  329 

tion  towcards  a  monumcnfc  of  Warren  Hastings,  late 
Governor-General  of  India. 

The  great  event  in  tlie  history  of  the  district  in  this 
century  \Yas  the  inundation  of  the  6th  June  1822,  which 
is  still  well  remembered  hy  the  people  as  the  hanya  or 
flood  of  1229  B.s.  It  was  this  inundation  which  s^Yept 
over  the  island  of  Hattia,  in  the  Noakhdli  district,  and 
destroyed  nearly  every  inhabitant.  ]\Ir  Cardew  was  Col- 
lector of  Bd,karganj  at  the  time,  and  on  9th  June  1822 
he  reported  as  follows  :  "  It  is  my  painful  duty  to  re- 
port, for  the  information  of  the  Board,  the  dreadful  state 
to  which  this  district  has  been  reduced  by  a  most  violent 
hurricane  and  inundation,  which  has  exteijded  its  rav- 
ages through  the  whole  district.  This  office  was  many 
feet  under  water,  and  I  am  sorry  to  say  that  a  great  part 
of  the  records  have  been  swept  away,  including  the 
whole  of  the  kanungo's  papers,  the  Bliulua  papers,  and 
the  greatest  part  of  the  stamps.  In  fact,  the  mischief 
has  been  so  great  that  as  yet  I  am  unable  to  state  what 
has  actually  taken  place.  On  the  6th  I  held  a  sale  for 
arrears  of  revenue,  which  I  was  unable  to  complete." 
Mr  Cardew  adds  that  as  the  whole  of  the  amlahs'  pro- 
perty had  been  destroyed,  he  had  advanced  them  two 
months'  pay  as  liawalat.  A  ruhahari  or  vernacular  pro- 
ceeding was  drawn  up  about  the  affair.  It  recorded  that 
"  on  the  6th  June  a  sale  of  estates  was  fixed,  and  some 
mahals  were  disposed  of.  In  the  evening  of  that  day  it 
began  to  blow  violently,  and  soon  after  the  waters  rose 
to  a  dreadful  height,  so  that  to  escape  with  life  became 
difficult.     The  destruction  was  terrible,  &c. 

"On  the  9th  June  the  hurricane  became  less  violent, 
and  the  river  subsided.  A  little  after  this  time  the  ser- 
ishtadar,  &c.,  came  into  the  Presence  and  stated  what 
had  happened  in  their  offices.     It  was  then  impossible 


330  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

to  hold  cutclieiy ;  but  tlie  acting  Collector  proceeded 
witli  the  above-named  officers  to  the  office,  when  he  found 
that  about  four  feet  of  water  had  risen  in  the  cutchery, 
and  that  many  bags  of  papers  had  been  carried  out  of 
the  office,  while  others  were  scattered  about  wet  and 
covered  with  mud,  and  that  some  almiralis  had  been 
driven  from  their  places."  A  rubakari,  drawn  up  on  the 
18th  July  1822,  gave  lengthy  details  of  the  papers  which 
had  been  lost.  Unfortunately,  neither  of  the  above  ruba- 
karis  has  been  preserved,  and  I  have  only  seen  a  con- 
densed abstract  of  the  first  of  them.  39,940  persons— 
namely,  20,125  males  and  19,815  females — are  said  to 
have  lost  their  lives  in  the  inundation.  In  Khalsakhd,li 
tliana  alone  22,422  lives  are  said  to  have  been  lost,  and 
10,984  in  Baufal ;  and  according  to  my  notes,  the  deaths 
in  these  thanas  are  not  included  in  the  total  of  39,940. 
Also  98,834  cattle  are  said  to  have  been  lost,  and 
Rs.  1,3 26, 69 1-1 1-8  of  projDerty  are  said  to  have  been 
destroyed;  but  Mr  Collector  Phillips  very  reasonably 
objects  to  a  list  which  professes  to  give  even  anas  and 
gandas.  A  letter  dated  9th  July  1822  gives  transla- 
tions of  the  reports  of  the  darogahs.  The  Baufal  daro- 
gah's  report  was  as  follows:  "At  midday  on  the  6th 
June  1822  a  storm  commenced,  and  increased  by  degrees. 
After  nine  o'clock  at  night  it  was  so  violent  that  men, 
cattle,  and  property  were  washed  away.  Many  persons 
were  drowned,  and  some  having  got  on  choppers  [roofs 
of  houses],  were  driven  from  one  village  to  another. 
Others  ascended  large  trees  and  remained  there  all 
night.  Next  morning  it  decreased,  but  the  storm  con- 
tinued for  seven  or  eight  days.  Sir,  having  made  in- 
quiries in  this  thana,  I  have  ascertained  that  there  are 
sixty-three  villages  ;  in  those  situated  in  the  eastern  part, 
on  the  other  side  of  the  large  river,  many  men,  cattle, 


GENERAL  HISTORY.  331 

aud  property  were  destroyed.  In  the  western  side  of 
the  thaua  the  inundation  was  less.  It  is  difficult  to  find 
out  the  names  in  a  short  time,  hut  1)y  inquiries  it  has 
come  to  my  knowledge  that  in  the  villages  within  this 
thana  4932  men  and  6052  women — in  all,  10,984  per- 
sons— and  9700  bullocks  were  drowned;  besides  which, 
the  property  of  the  population  has  been  destroyed  to  an 
amount  that  is  impossible  to  guess." 

The  notice  that  the  storm  began  at  Baufal  at  midday 
is  interesting,  as  it  shows  how  long  the  storm  took  to 
travel  from  Baufal  to  Barisdl,  where  the  storm  com- 
menced in  the  evening.  Baufal  is  south-south-east  of 
Barisdl,  and  from  the  fact  that  it  and  Khalsakhdli  thana 
and  the  islands  in  the  Meghna  suffered  most,  it  appears 
that  the  storm  came  from  the  south-east.  '*  I  am  happy 
to  say  that  the  effects  of  the  late  inundation  have  not  been 
so  severely  felt  by  the  district  in  general  as  I  had  at  first 
supposed.  To  the  west  and  north-west  there  was  very 
little  water.  The  thanas  of  Tagra  [now  Perozpur], 
Kachua  [now  in  Jessore],  Baroikaran,  and  Burirh^t  have 
suffered  only  from  the  violence  of  the  wind.  The  chief 
brunt  of  the  inundation  appears  to  have  ftillen  on  the 
thanas  Chandia  [Dakhin  Shahbazpur,]  Khalsakhd,li,  Bau- 
fal, Bakainagar  [in  which  Barisd,l  was  situated],  and 
Mendiganj  "  (21st  June  1822).  The  Collector  also  adds 
that  he  has  great  pleasure  in  being  able  to  inform  the 
Government  that  rice,  which  was  a  few  days  ago  selling 
in  the  bazar  at  the  enormous  rate  of  ten  sirs  of  sixty 
sicca  weight  per  rupee,  has  been  reduced  to  very  nearly 
its  former  price,  and  that  this  has  been  occasioned  by 
4he  meritorious  and  active  exertions  of  Mr  Dawes,  the 
acting  Magistrate  of  the  city  of  Dacca,  in  inducing  the 
merchants  of  the  district  to  forward  supplies.  Govern- 
ment took  notice  of  the  catastrophe,  and  sent  in  rice 


3  3  2  DISTRICT  OF  bAkAR  GANJ. 

tlirougli  tlie  great  house  of  Palmer  &  Co.  A  committee 
^vas  also  formed  in  Calcutta,  which  despatched  a  Major 
Stewart  to  distribute  relief.  Rice  was  also  received  from 
Jessore,  from  the  assistant  to  the  salt  agent.  On  9tli 
July  the  Collector  reports  that  constant  suj^plies  of  grain 
arrive  from  Dacca  and  elsewhere,  and  that  the  station 
and  the  neighbourhood  continue  healthy.  On  lltli 
August  he  reports  that  rice  and  other  necessaries  are 
procurable  in  Barisdl  and  the  neighbourhood  at  lower 
rates  than  those  stated  in  the  invoice  from  Messrs  Pal- 
mer &  Co.  No  details  appear  to  have  been  ever  given 
of  the  loss  of  life  in  Manpura  and  the  other  islands,  but 
the  Collector  writes  that  most  of  the  inhabitants  of  Man- 
pura and  the  other  islands  had  been  swept  into  eternity. 
With  regard  to  the  jail,  the  Magistrate  writes  on  25th 
June  1822  that  he  had  great  difficulty  in  procuring  food 
for  the  prisoners  until  the  arrival  of  the  very  opportune 
supplies  from  Dacca  and  Narainganj,  and  that  he  had  been 
obliged  to  feed  the  prisoners  upon  damaged  rice.  How- 
ever, no  evil  effects  had  followed,  and  the  jail  had  never 
been  healthier,  there  being  only  one  man  in  hospital.'^ 

The  following  notice  of  the  inundation  appears  in 
the  "Asiatic  Journal"  for  1822,  p.  620:  "A  most 
violent  storm  burst  over  Calcutta  on  the  night  of 
Friday  last  [7th  June],  which  must  have  disturbed  the 
sleep  of  the  soundest.  The  furious  peals  of  crashing 
thunder  reverberating  immediately  overhead  were  truly 
appalling,  and  in  the  pauses  between  each  peal  of  the^ 
'  artillery  of  heaven '  the  mind  naturally  reverted  to  the 
thousands  who  were  exposed  to  the  utmost  terrors  of 
the  tempest  on  the  great  deep.     Accounts  from  Dina- 

^  The  Barisdl  gale  is  marked  on  Piddington's  chart,  vol.  xvi.  A.  S.  J.,  1847; 
see  also  liis  "Sailor's  Horn-Book,"  pp.  57,  59.  The  storm  was  too  far  at 
the  head  of  the  Bay  to  come  in  the  track  of  ships. 


GENERAL  HISTORY.  333 

piir  mentiou  tliat  boats  without  number  liave  been  lost 
in  the  Ganges,  and  that  the  Patna  .'^hores  were  covered 
with  wrecks.  Several  lives  must  have  been  lost,  thoufdi 
no  particulars  have  yet  reached  us.  In  the  lower  pro- 
vinces the  hopes  of  the  indigo-planters  have  been  bitterly 
disappointed.  These,  however,  are  but  trivial  effects 
of  the  late  storm  in  comparison  with  the  tremendous 
detail  of  devastation  and  misery  which  it  is  our  pain- 
ful duty  to  notice.  What  are  w^e  to  expect  from  the 
next  shipping  accounts,  when  we  arc  told  that  in  one 
place  on  the  land  100,000  lives  have  been  lost  ?  It  is 
truly  dreadful  to  think  of  such  a  terrible  misfortune. 
The  source  of  our  intelligence  upon  this  melancholy 
occasion  is  from  the  following  extract  of  a  letter  from 
Jessore :  '  Ten  days  ago  my  indigo  prospects  were  pro- 
mising beyond  anything  I  could  have  calculated  upon  ; 
since  that  period  the  most  violent  hurricane  ever  remem- 
bered in  this  quarter,  accompanied  with  a  deluge  of 
rain,  has  destroyed  full  one- half  of  our  plants,  and 
rendered  the  recovery  of  a  great  part  of  the  remainder 
precarious.  The  storm  lasted  forty-eight  hours,  and 
swept  houses  and  everything  before  it.  Many  trees 
were  torn  up  by  the  roots  and  carried  to  a  distance  of 
several  feet.  I  never  witnessed  such  a  scene  of  devasta- 
tion as  this  place  presented.  The  rain  continued  almost 
without  intermission  for  four  days  after  the  storm  had 
ceased,  so  that  the  whole  country  is  under  water,  I 
have  just  seen  a  letter  from  the  acting  Magistrate  of 
Barisdl,  about  120  miles  to  the  eastward  of  this  station, 
detailino'  the  effects  of  the  late  storm,  which  commenced 
there  on  the  afternoon  of  the  7th.  I  scarcely  ever  per- 
used a  more  melancholy  account.  Baris^l  is  situated 
on  the  banks  of  the  j\Ieghna,  which  river,  from  the  fury 
of  the  winds,  broke  over  its  boundaries  in  every  direc- 


334  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

tioD,  and  inundated  the  whole  country  to  an  alarming 
depth.  Tlie  river  rose  so  rapidly  that  on  the  8th,  at 
night,  they  had  upwards  of  five  feet  of  w^ater  in  their 
houses,  and  the  current  was  so  strong  that  the  doors 
and  windows  were  burst  open,  and  a  regular  rush  of 
water  set  in  through  the  houses.  This  gentleman 
says  he  contrived  to  get  two  palanquins  to  the  top  of 
his  house,  and  retreated  thither  with  his  wdfe  and 
children  as  a  last  resort.  The  registrar  and  doctor's 
houses  were  carried  away,  or  at  least  fell  in  from  the 
violence  of  the  storm.  Nearly  the  whole  property  of 
the  residents  of  the  station  was  destroyed.  Had  this 
been  the  extent  of  the  damage,  however,  it  would  have 
been  of  little  consequence,  comparatively  speaking;  but 
alas  1  the  sufferings  of  the  native  inhabitants  are  not  to 
be  described.  No  fewer  than  one  lac  of  lives  are  said 
to  have  been  lost  on  this  occasion,  together  with  the 
whole  of  the  cattle  and  grain  of  every  description,  both 
in  store  and  what  was  on  the  ground.  The  dead  bodies 
were  floating  in  every  direction,  and  carried  witli  the 
current  through  the  houses.  The  writer  states  that  no 
rice  was  to  be  procured  even  for  the  prisoners,  and  that 
lie  felt  he  would  be  obliged  to  release  them  from  jail, 
otherwise  they  must  starve.  From  what  information  he 
could  obtain,  he  believed  that  the  district  could  not  supply 
food  for  ten  days'  consumption  to  the  inhabitants  who 
had  escaped  this  dreadful  visitation.  I  should  think  the 
writer  meant  to  include  in  the  lac  the  lives  of  the  cattle 
lost,  although  I  should  certainly  infer  from  the  letter 
that  100,000  human  beings  perished.  I  have  not  heard 
whether  the  storm  reached  beyond  this  district  to  the 
northward  and  westward.' " 

A  meeting  for  the  relief  of  the  distress  in  Bdkarganj 
was  held  in  the   Calcutta  Town   Hall   on  tlie  19th  of 


GENERAL  HISTORY.  335 

June,  and  another  on  tlie  2 2d  idem,  A  suljseription  was 
opened,  and  eventually  upwards  of  Rs.  18,000  were  col- 
lected. (According  to  the  latest  reports  of  the  com- 
mittee, Rs.  18,433  sicca.)  Major  Stewart  volunteered  his 
services,  and  was  sent  to  Bakarganj  to  distribute  relief 
The  "  Calcutta  Monthly  Journal,"  speaking  of  his  having 
finished  the  good  work  upon  which  he  had  entered  with 
such  ^philanthropic  alacrity,  says  that  the  zeal  and  judg- 
ment displayed  by  him  in  its  performance  reflected  on 
him  the  highest  honour. 

In  the  "Calcutta  Journal"  for  1822  (p.  192)  the 
followinor  curious  incident  is  mentioned  :  "  One  of  our 
correspondents  mentions  that  at  Ratandi  he  saw  a  child, 
who  being  only  a  few  weeks  old,  his  curiosity  was 
excited  to  know  how  it  had  been  preserved  during  the 
tempest  and  inundation.  In  reply  to  his  inquiries,  he 
was  told  that  it  was  born  in  a  tree  when  the  whole 
surface  of  the  country  was  covered  with  water ;  and  its 
mother  was  thcji  questioned,  and  corroborated  this  tale. 
The  surprise  of  the  inquirer  was  still  further  increased, 
however,  when  he  came  to  learn  that  so  far  from  this 
being  a  singular  event,  there  were  from  thirty  to  forty 
females,  some  of  whom  having  reached  the  period  of 
natural  delivery,  but  many  more  having  the  birth  acce- 
lerated by  terror  and  alarm,  who  gave  birth  to  their 
infants  in  this  dreadful  situation,  and  yet  so  providen- 
tially is  the  wind  tempered  to  the  shorn  lamb,  that  most 
of  these  individuals  with  their  offspring  lived,  present- 
ing a  picture  of  misery  and  distress  unprecedented,  we 
believe,  even  in  the  imagination  of  the  painter  or  the 
poet,  and  certainly  without  a  parallel,  as  far  as  we  re- 
member, either  in  ftible  or  in  history. 

"The  serv^ant  of  a  gentleman  in  Calcutta,  whose  family 
live  at  Hattia,  says  that  out  of  four  brothers  and  their 


336  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

families  only  one  of  tlie  brothers  Wcas  found  after  the 
storm  and  inundation,  and  he  was  blown  across  the  river 
to  the  northward  upon  the  top  of  a  chopper"  (roof). 

The  following  appears  in  Sandeman's  "  Selections," 
dated  Thursday,  June  20,  1822:  "On  Sunday  last  w^e 
received  an  account  of  the  awful  calamity  with  which 
the  civil  station  of  Burrisol  has  been  afflicted.  It  is 
brief,  but  the  facts  are  of  the  most  melancholy  descrip- 
tion, and  require  not  detail  to  awaken  feelings  of  the 
liveliest  pity  and  commiseration.  The  sufferings  of 
thousands — men,  women,  and  children — during  the  ter- 
rible night  of  the  storm  must  have  been  truly  dreadful. 

"  The  storm  commenced  on  the  evening  of  the  6th, 
and  before  midnight  the  body  of  water  had  overtopped 
the  Bund,  which  runs  along  the  margin  of  the  river,  and 
w\as  approaching  the  gentlemen's  houses  rapidly.  Mr 
Cardew,  the  Registrar,^  had  just  sufficient  time  to  send 
a  palanquin  with  some  food  in  it  to  the  top  of  the  house 
for  his  wife.  Immediately  after,  his  dining-room  was 
three  feet  deep  in  water,  the  current  carrying  everything 
before  it  with  irresistible  violence.  In  another  house  there 
was  five  feet  water  in  the  dining-room,  and  dead  bodies, 
washed  from  the  native  huts,  floating  about  the  room, 
in  which  only  a  few  hours  before  dinner  had  been  served. 
One  thousand  lives  were  lost  in  the  bazdr  alone,  and  the 
loss  throuo-hout  the  district  is  not  to  be  calculated.  A 
famine  was  apprehended  as  inevitable.  No  provisions 
were  procurable  for  the  prisoners,  in  consequence  of 
which  they  were  released  on  the  second  day."^ 

It  was  probably  the  inundation  which  induced  Govern- 
ment to  build  new  cutcheries  at  Barisdl.  Formerly  the 
Magistrate  held  cutchery  in  his  own  house,  and  received 

1  lie  was  acting  Collector  and  Magistrate. 

"  The  criminal  prisoners,  at  all  events,  were  not  released. 


GENERAL  HISTORY.  337 

an  allowance  on  this  account.  This  arrangement  con- 
tinued to  1829.  (See  letters  of  May  25,  June  20, 
1826,  &c.) 

Mr  Garrett  appears  to  have  been  the  first  Magistrate 
who  did  much  for  the  improvement  of  Barisdl.  He  was 
Magistrate  from  1827  to  1830,  when  he  asked  to  be  re- 
lieved, saying  that  he  had  been  three  and  a  half  years  at 
Barisal,  and  that  he  could  not  work  so  hard  as  formerly. 
He  appears  to  have  been  the  first  ofiicer  who  established 
a  school  (31st  March  1828),  and  he  also  dug  tanks  and 
made  other  improvements.  Government  assigned  to 
him  Rs.  1500,  and  Rs.925  were  subscribed  in  the  district 
for  improvements  at  Barisdl.  In  his  time  there  were 
only  three  roads  in  the  district — one  of  four  miles,  and 
two  of  two  miles  in  length  (5th  June  1830).  On  15th 
March  1828  he  recommended  the  removal  of  the  Gour- 
nadi  police  station  to  its  present  position  at  Palardi. 
Mr  Garrett,  I  believe,  left  the  district  for  a  time,  but  ho 
did  not  finally  quit  it  till  May  1832  ;  so  that  he  must 
have  spent  about  five  years  in  it.  He  acted  as  Judge  as 
well  as  Magistrate.  What  partly  led  to  his  departure 
was,  I  believe,  that  he  became  a  Baptist,  and  insisted 
upon  being  baptized  in  a  tank  in  the  station.  Plis  nazir, 
Mr  Parry  (he  was  dewani  or  judge's  nazir),  was  one  of 
the  first  to  preach  Christianity  to  the  natives.  Mr 
Parry  afterwards  became  a  regular  missionary  and  went 
to  Jessore.  The  practice  of  sati  was  abolished  in  Mr 
Garrett's  time,  and  on  1st  March  1830  he  writes,  "I 
am  heartily  thankful  that  the  horrible  practice  of  suttee 
has  been  put  a  stop  to.  It  has  been  attended  with  no 
trouble,  I  am  happy  to  say,  in  this  jurisdiction.  It  must 
be  a  great  ease  of  mind  to  all  magistrates."  In  a  pre- 
vious letter,  dated  17th  August  1829,  he  writes,  "The 
business  is  often  harassing,  but  the  subject  most  painful 


338  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

to  me  is  the  frequency  of  suttee.  The  number  that  have 
taken  place  this  year  up  to  the  end  of  July  amount  to 
sixteen.  I  was  induced  the  other  day,  thinking  it  my 
duty,  to  be  present  at  one  not  very  far  from  here,  con- 
ceiving I  might  possibly  do  some  good,  but  I  regret 
to  say  it  was  not  in  my  power,  the  poor  creature 
appearing  perfectly  determined."  For  several  years 
previous  to  the  abolition  of  sati.  Government  had 
been  endeavouring  to  check  its  occurrence  ;  and  on  14tli 
December  1818,  Mr  Harrington,  the  Magistrate,  reports 
that  satis  have  diminished  since  the  Government  orders 
of  4th  October  1814.  It  w\as  the  practice  to  have  re- 
ports from  the  police  of  the  number  of  satis  in  their 
jurisdictions.  In  1825,  the  year  of  the  cholera,  there 
were  as  many  as  sixty- three  ;  in  1824  there  were  twenty- 
three  satis;  in  1826,  forty-five;  and  in  1827,  twenty- 
nine. 

Among  the  East  India  papers  in  the  Indian  Library 
there  is  a  volume  on  the  subject  of  Hindu  widows,  and 
it  gives  some  curious  statistics  about  satis.  The  details 
of  the  Bdkarganj  cases  for  1824  and  1825  are  given  in  it. 
Of  the  sixty-three  cases  in  1825,  it  is  recorded  that  in 
twenty- three  cases  the  husbands  were  rich,  and  that  in  the 
others  they  were  poor.  One  case  was  what  was  called  anu- 
maran — i.e.,  the  husband  died  away  from  the  wife,  who 
burnt  herself  along  with  two  strings  of  beads  which  had 
belonged  to  him.  On  an  average,  the  widows  in  the 
sixty- three  cases  were  middle-aged  ;  one  was  over  ninety, 
and  only  one  was  under  twenty  years  of  age.  Satis  were 
singularly  few  in  Dacca.  In  Dacca  city  and  Dacca  JaUl- 
piir  districts  the  numbers  were  as  follows :  Dacca  city, 
1823,  fourteen;  1824,  seven;  1825,  eighteen;  1826, 
twelve.  Dacca  Jalalpur,  1823,  two;  1824,  two;  1825, 
two;  1826,  three. 


GENERAL  HISTORY.  339 

Tlio  explanation  seems  to  be  that  Mr  Cracroft,  the 
Judge  of  the  Dacca  Circuit,  ruled  that  persons  of  the  v 
Baidya  caste  were  not  entitled  to  the  privilege  of  sati. 
The  relations  of  a  Baidya  wido^Y  appealed  to  the  Nizamat 
Addlat  ao-ainst  this  rulinor,  and  the  court  ordered  that  the 
widow  should  be  allowed  to  burn  herself.  (It  was  a  case 
of  anu7naran.)  However,  I  am  glad  to  say  that  the 
delay  had  a  good  effect,  and  that  the  Magistrate  (Mr 
Morrison)  was  able  to  report  that  the  widow  had  changed 
her  mind.  The  volume  contains  some  curious  corre- 
spondence between  Mr  Cracroft  and  the  Judges  of  the 
Nizamat.  ! 

In  1845  there  was  a  notable  case  of  embezzlement  in 
the  treasury.  Mr  Sturt  was  then  Collector ;  he  appears 
to  have  been  a  careless  and  indolent  officer,  and  to  have 
left  everything  to  his  subordinates.  The  result  was  that 
in  August  1845  he  had  to  report  that  some  Rs. 50,000 
were  missing  from  the  treasury,  and  that  the  treasurer 
had  absconded.  A  lengthened  investigation  took  place, 
first  by  the  Commissioner,  and  afterwards  by  Messrs 
Ricketts  &  Samuells,  of  which  the  upshot  Avas  that  Mr 
Sturt  was  degraded,  and  the  treasurer  brought  to  trial 
and  sentenced  to,  I  believe,  seven  years'  imprisonment. 
A  portion  of  the  money  embezzled  was  realised  from  the 
treasurer's  securities,  who  were  entirely  ruined.  I  be- 
lieve Mr  Sturt  was  originally  in  the  navy.  He  married 
a  native  lady,  and  used  to  give  great  entertainments, 
and  even  to  have  the  swinging  festival — i.e.,  the  charah 
puja — celebrated  in  front  of  his  house. 

A  remarkable  crime  was  committed  in  Bakarganj  in 
1847.  Kali  Prasad  Kanjhi  Lall,  the  gomasta  or  servant 
of  an  indigo-planter  named  Dunlop,  whose  factories  were 
situated  in  the  Mulfatganj  thana,  was  attacked  by  the 
ryots  and  carried  off  in  a  boat  to  the  south  of  tlie  dis- 


340  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

trict,  and  finally  murdered  at  Maudobi,  in  tlie  south  of 
Khalsaklidli  tliana.  It  is  said  that  the  body  was  cut  in 
pieces  and  thrown  into  the  sea ;  hence  the  proverbial 
expression  of  making  a  Kanjhi  Lall  of  one's  enemy. 
(See  Magistrate's  letters  of  20th  February  and  20th  July 
1847.)  The  reasons  for  Kanjhi  Lall's  being  carried  off 
were  that  Dudhu  Mia,  the  head  of  the  Ferazis,  whose 
residence  was  at  Sibchar,  in  the  Mulfatganj  thana,  had 
disputes  with  Mr  Dunlop,  and  that  the  ryots  considered 
that  Kanjhi  Lall  oppressed  them.  Mr  Dunlop's  factory 
at  Panchchur  was  burnt  at  this  time.  Although  Bjikar- 
ganj  was  the  scene  of  the  murder,  neither  Kanjhi  Lall 
nor  his  murderers  were  connected  with  the  district.  The 
circumstances  of  the  attack  on  Mr  Dunlop's  factory, 
which  occurred  on  5th  December  1846,  are  fully  detailed 
iu  the  printed  report  of  the  trial  of  the  rioters.  Dudhu 
Mia  was  tried  before  Mr  Swetenham,  Judge  of  Faridpiir, 
and  convicted,  but  was  acquitted  by  the  Nizamat  Ad^- 
lat.  (See  also  Mr  Latour's  evidence  before  the  Indigo 
Commission.) 

The  Indian  mutiny  had  little  oi-  no  effect  on  the  dis- 
trict, and,  as  far  as  I  am  aware,  the  inhabitants  showed 
no  signs  of  sympathy  with  it. 

As  there  are  no  indigo-factories  in  the  district,  there 
was  no  agitation  at  the  time  when  the  ryots  of  Nadiya 
and  Jessore  threw  off  the  cultivation  of  indigo. 

In  1865  cattle  disease  broke  out  very  severely  in  Bak- 
arganj,  and  some  40,000  cattle  are  said  to  have  j)erished. 
The  disease  entered  from  Jessore,  and  was  most  severe 
in  the  Perozpur  subdivision.  It  is  said  that  13,199 
cattle  died  in  Tagra  thana  (Perozjjur)  alone.  (See  Mr 
Sutherland's  letter  of  14th  September  1865  ;  also  see 
Selections  from  Government  Records  (Bengal),  No.  43, 
1869.) 


GENERAL  HISTORY.  341 

lu  1869  an  income-tax  assessor  was  beaten  in  Dakhin 
Sliahb^zpur,  but  I  believe  the  attack  was  caused  by  his 
own  misconduct. 

Of  late  years  the  rent  question  has  excited  a  good 
deal  of  attention,  and  there  has  been  a  considerable 
degree  of  bad  feeling  between  the  ryots  and  zamindars, 
but  without  any  important  outbreak. 

The  census  of  1872  was  taken  without  the  least 
attempt  at  disturbance.  It  was  commenced  on  the  15th 
of  January,  and  nearly  completed  in  twenty -four  hours. 

During  the  present  century  the  district  has  undergone 
many  changes  in  its  administration  and  in  its  boundaries. 
In  1815  or  1816  its  area  was  enlarged  on  the  north  b}^  the 
addition  of  the  Idilpiir  pargana,  which  was  then  trans- 
ferred to  it  from  the  jurisdiction  of  the  city  of  Dacca. 
Lately  this  arrangement  has  been  reversed,  by  the  trans- 
fer of  the  pargana,  together  with  the  Mddaripur  sub- 
division, to  Faridpiir. 

In  1822  the  islands  of  Hattia  and  Dakhin  Shahbd,zpur 
were  transferred  from  Bdkarganj  and  included  in  the 
newly-created  district  of  Noakh^li.  In  1869  Dakhin 
Shahbdzpiir  was  retransferred  to  Bdkarganj,  ^^artly  be- 
cause the  Titulia  is  a  less  formidable  river  than  the 
Meghna,  but  chiefly  because  the  civil  and  criminal 
jurisdictions  were  thereby  made  conterminous,  for  the 
Munsif  of  Dakhin  Shahbazpur  had  always  been  sub- 
ordinate to  the  Judge  of  Bc4karganj.  For  many  years, 
indeed,  the  munsif  held  his  court  on  the  mainland,  in 
thana  Mendiganj  ;  and  it  is  only  for  about  twenty  years 
that  his  court  has  been  held  at  Daulat  Khan. 

In  1863,  or  thereabouts,  Kachua  police  station  and 
that  portion  of  Bakarganj  which  lay  east  of  the  Balesh- 
war  were  transferred  to  Jessore,  and  annexed  to  the 
newly- created  subdivision  of  Baghahdt. 


342 


DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 


In  1873  the  area  of  the  district  was  greatly  circum- 
scribed by  the  transfer  to  Faridpiir  of  the  whole  of  the 
Mddaripiir  subdivision,  with  the  exception  of  thana 
Gournadi.  On  the  other  hand,  a  small  portion  of 
Faridpiir  was  transferred  to  Bakarganj,  and  included  in 
Perozpiir.  Unfortunately  these  changes  were  made 
after  the  completion  of  the  census,  and  have  thrown 
considerable  confusion  into  its  results. 

At  present  the  district  of  Bjlkarganj  is  divided  into 
four  subdivisions,  as  follows  : — 


Subdivisions. 

1.  Barisalor  Sadr 

2.  Dakhin  Shalibazpur 

3.  Perozpiir       .     .     . 

4.  Patuyakhali      .     . 


Thanas. 

'Barisal, 

Gournadi, 

Nalchiti, 

Jhalukatti, 

Mendigaiij, 

Pakarganj, 

Daulat  Khan, 

Barhanuddin  Howaladar 
Hat, 

Perozjjiir, 

Sarupkatti, 

Matbaria, 

Mirzaganj, 
I  Gdlsakbali, 
I  Kbalsakhali  or 

Galacbipa, 


Population  of 
Subdivi&ious. 


711,180  (?) 


221,037 


363,426  (?) 


•  418,747 


The  boundaries  of  the  subdivisions  are  detailed  in  the 
"  Calcutta  Gazette." 

Dakhin  Shahb^zptir  is  the  oldest  of  the  four  sub- 
divisions, and  indeed  is  one  of  the  oldest  in  Bengal, 
having  been  established  in  1845.  It  owes  this  distinc- 
tion to  its  insular  position,  and  to  its  importance  in 
connection  with  the  salt  manufacture. 

The  Perozpiir  subdivision  was  established  in  1859. 
Its  headquarters  are  somewhat  unfortunately  situated, 
as  they  are  now  on  the  extreme  verge  of  the  jurisdic- 
tion. Their  position  was  more  central  before  the  transfer 
of  Kachua  and  Morrellganj  to  Jessore. 


GENERAL  HISTORY,  343 

Patuyaklidli  was  established   in  July  1871.     It  iu- 
cludes  the  greater  part  of  the  south  of  the  district. 


STATISTICS   OF    CIVIL   JUSTICE. 

In  1873,  12,149  suits  were  instituted  in  the  regular 
courts,  and  12,746  were  disposed  of;  1185  were  in- 
stituted in  the  Small  Cause  Courts,  and  1201  disposed  of. 
Value  of  suits  instituted  in  1873,  Es.l, 152,451.  The 
number  of  rent  suits  instituted  was  7680,  and  of  the 
Small  Cause  Court  class  of  cases,  3675.  Altogether 
there  were  13,334  institutions,  and  13,947  disposals  in 
1873.  There  were  49  suits  for  the  enforcement  of 
matrimonial  rights.  Of  the  13,947  institutions,  3396 
were  withdrawn,  compromised,  &c.  ;  7401  were  disposed 
of  exparte,  and  3150  were  contested.  3540  decrees 
were  wholly,  and  8525  were  partially,  executed;  and 
the  total  amount  realised  was  Es. 4 2 7, 2 3 3.  427  de- 
crees were  satisfied  without  execution,  and  Es. 25,1 13 
realised. 

There  is  a  Civil  and  Sessions  Judge  at  Barisal,  and 
an  additional  judge  visits  it  occasionally.  In  1873 
there  were  eleven  munsifs  employed  in  the  district. 
The  total  cost  of  the  Civil  Courts  for  the  year  was  esti- 
mated at  Es.l 28, 525,  and  the  realisations  from  stamps 
and  court  fees  were  157,476,  so  that  there  was  a  surplus 
of  Es.29,000  (nearly).  It  must  be  remembered  that 
Mddaripiir  is  included  in  all  these  statistics.  There  are 
generally  two  subordinate  judges  at  Baristil.  One  or 
more  munsifs  are  stationed  at  each  of  the  subdivisions, 
and  two  or  more  at  Barisdl. 

The  average  duration  of  contested  cases  before  the 
munsifs  is  said  to  be  three  and  a  half  months.  (See 
High  Court's  Eeport  on  Civil  Courts  for  1873.) 


344  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

STATISTICS    OF    REGISTEA.TION. 

The  number  of  deeds  registered  in  Bdkarganj  is  in- 
ordinately large,  and  in  order  to  cope  with  it  a  number 
of  rural  registrars  have  been  appointed.  In  1873  there 
were  altogether  thirteen  registration  offices,  and  25,200 
deeds  were  registered  affecting  immovable  joroperty ; 
17,693  were  deeds  in  which  registration  was  compulsory, 
and  7517  in  which  it  was  approved.  The  total  value  of 
property  transferred  was  twenty-three  lacs,  and  the  total 
amount  of  fees  realised  Rs.  15,449.  Of  the  compulsory 
deeds  no  less  than  10,658  were  perpetual  leases,  and 
5123  were  temporary  leases.  In  the  same  year  2140 
deeds  affecting  movable  property  were  registered.  The 
total  receipts  of  the  department  were  Rs.30,758,  and 
the  expenditure  was  Rs.  19,625. 

The  above  information  has  been  taken  from  the  Bengal 
Administration  Report  for  1873-74,  and  the  tables  there 
given  show,  moreover,  that  the  receipts  in  Bd^karganj 
were  larger  than  in  any  other  district,  that  the  number 
of  registration  offices  was  greater  than  in  any  district 
except  the  Twenty-four  Parganas,  and  that  the  number- 
of  compulsory  registrations  was  greater  than  in  any 
district  except  Chittagong.  I  must  again  remind  my 
readers,  however,  that  the  figures  include  Mddariplir. 

SURVEYS. 

The  district  has  been  trigonometrically  surveyed,  and 
there  are  now  two  towers  in  it — viz.,  one  at  Gangaptir 
in  the  Mendiganj  thana,  and  another  at  Bhattra  in 
Gournadi.  There  was  a  third  at  Khalishpur,  but  it 
has  been  carried  away  by  the  river. 

The  revenue  and  topographical  survey  of  the  district 
was  completed  in  1863. 


(  345   ) 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

POLICE     SYSTEM. 

This  has  already  been  touclied  upon  in  the  chapter  on  the 
criminal  administration.  Bdkarganj  has  been  from  the 
earliest  times  a  troublesome  district  for  the  police ;  and 
the  Magistrates'  records  are  full  of  reports  of  crimes,  and 
of  the  inefficiency  of  the  efforts  to  stop  them.  It  has 
been  said  in  one  account  of  the  district  that  dacoity  was 
put  down  in  Bd-karganj  in  18 14  ;^  but  this  statement  seems 
to  have  been  j)remature,  for  later  on  a  magistrate  rej)orts 
that  there  were  at  least  thirty-one  dacoities  in  the  dis- 
trict in  1816.  It  is  probable  that  our  Hindu  and 
Mahomedan  predecessors  had  also  trouble  in  putting 
down  crime  in  Bdkarganj,  and  indeed  there  are  allu- 
sions to  the  prevalence  of  river-dacoity  in  the  letters  of 
the  Jesuit  priests  who  visited  the  country  in  1599  and 
1600.     Two  causes   contributed  to   the  existence  and 

^  On  29tli  November  1814  tlie  Goverumeut  of  India  wrote  as  follows  to 
the  Court  of  Directors  : — 

"  The  Sunderbuns  having  been  ordinarily  regarded  as  the  natural  harbour 
of  dacoits,  it  will  be  particularly  satisfactory  to  your  Honourable  Court  to 
observe  the  progress  made  in  the  suppression  of  gang-robbery  in  that  part 
of  the  country.  We  cannot  deny  ourselves  the  gratification  of  transcribing 
the  following  passage  from  the  letter  of  the  Judge  of  Circuit  on  that 
subject  :  '  It  does  not  occur  to  me  as  necessary  to  offer  any  further  obser- 
vations on  the  state  of  the  Buckergunge  district.  It  appears  to  be  in  that 
state  of  security  from  violent  depredation  which  a  few  years  back  it 
would,  perhaps,  have  been  considered  a  vain  hope  that  it  could  ever  arrive 
at ;  and  with  respect  to  offences  of  other  descriptions,  they  do  not  appear 
materially  to  prevail.'" — Judicial  Letter  from  Bengal,  India  Office  Library. 


346  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

continuance  of  dacoity  and  other  serious  ciimes  in  the 
district.  In  the  first  place,  the  district  was  in  old  times 
chiefly  composed  of  jungle  tracts  such  as  the  Sundarbans, 
&c.,  and  it  was  therefore  such  an  unpopular  place  of  resi- 
dence that  almost  no  one  resorted  to  it  except  criminals 
and  men  of  bad  character  or  desperate  fortunes.  Hence 
the  district  had  to  a  certain  extent  a  criminal  po- 
pulation to  start  with ;  and  these  people  continued 
and  flourished  in  it,  because  the  configuration  of  the 
country  was  eminently  favourable  to  the  commission 
of  crime  with  impunity,  and  because  it  was  at  the  same 
time  the  highway  of  communication  between  the  eastern 
districts  and  Calcutta.  In  old  times  a  strong  force  of 
patrol-boats  was  kept  up  in  order  to  guard  the  rivers ; 
and  the  records  are  full  of  suggestions  from  the  Magis- 
trates, the  Courts  of  Circuit,  and  the  Nizamat  Ad^lat 
about  the  best  way  of  employing  these  boats,  &c.  In 
1818  there  were  fourteen  patrol-boats,  with  fourteen 
manjhis  and  168  rowers — i.e.,  there  were  one  manjhi 
and  twelve  rowers  to  each  boat.  The  manjhis  got 
Es.4  a  month,  and  the  rowers  Es.3,  so  that  the  monthly 
cost  was  Es.560. 

In  1812  there  were  eleven  thanas  or  police  stations. 
The  Magistrate's  letter  of  8  th  February  1812  refers  to 
the  establishment  of  a  twelfth  thana — viz.,  Mirzaganj — 
which  shows  that  cultivation  and  population  had  been 
increasing  in  the  south  of  the  district.  The  same  letter 
mentions  that  Gournadi  was  transferred  to  the  Bdkar- 
ganj  district  in  1807,  and  recommends  that  Nalchira — 
i.e.,  I  presume,  the  present  Agarpur  outpost — be  trans- 
ferred to  Mendiganj.  In  Mr  Sutherland's  account  of 
the  district  an  extract  is  given  from  a  magistrate's 
letter,  dated  20th  February  1811,  showing  the  names 
and  positions  at  that  time  of  the  eleven  thanas.     The 


POLICE  SYSTEM.  347 

list  there  given  singularly  illustrates  the  changes  which 
have  taken  place  in  the  administration,  for  the  sites 
of  six  of  the  thanas  have  been  changed  since  then, 
and  a  seventh — viz.,  Kachua — has  been  transferred  to 
Jessore  and  reduced  to  an  out^DOst. 

The  old  police  stations  were  all  placed  on  the  banks 
of  the  large  rivers,  as  the  chief  object  had  in  view  was 
the  suppression  of  river-dacoities.  Inland  places  were 
thought  to  be  less  in  need  of  protection,  and  were  left 
to  shift  for  themselves.  I  do  not  wish  to  pass  the  least 
censure  on  this  arrangement,  which  was  undoubtedly 
the  best  possible,  and  was  also  recommended  by  the  fact 
that  it  was  necessary  that  the  police  stations  should  be 
on  the  banks  of  rivers,  as  these  were  then  the  only 
means  of  internal  communication.  I  would  only  observe, 
that  as  there  were  then  no  subdivisions,  and  not  even 
any  village  chaukidars,^  the  zamindars  and  ryots  must 
have  been  left  very  much  to  themselves,  and  that  it  is 
to  their  credit  that  they  seem  to  have  managed  to  get 
on  pretty  well  together. 

At  present  there  are  fifteen  thanas  and  ten  (?)  out- 
posts in  the  district.  In  the  Barisdl  or  Sadr  subdivision 
there  are  six  thanas — viz.,  Gournadi,  Barisdl  or  the  Kot- 
wali,  Nalchiti,  Jhalukdtti,  Mendiganj,  and  Bdkarganj. 
Gournadi  has  been  lately  transferred  to  the  Sadr  subdivi- 
sion from  Mddaripiir.  Its  outpost  of  Agarpur  had  been 
some  time  previously  placed  under  the  Barisd-l  thana. 
Nalchiti  and  Jhalukdtti  are  too  near  one  another,  but  it  is 
difficult  and  expensive  to  make  alterations  of  sites.  Men- 
diganj has  under  it  the  outpost  of  Srird-mpur.  The  station 
of  Mendiganj  is  now  at  Pd,tarh^t,  but  it  has  been  j)roposed 
to  remove  it  to  AUiganj.      Bdkarganj,  which  is  by  the 

^  Mr  M'Neil  tells  us  iu  his  report  that  there  were  no  village  chaukidars 
in  Bakargaiij  iu  1818. 


348  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

country-people  often  Ccalled  Angaria/  from  the  circum- 
stance of  the  station's  formerly  having  been  there,  has 
an  outpost  called  Niamati. 

Perozpur  subdivision  contains  the  three  thanas  of 
Perozpiir  (formerly  Tagra),  Sarupkatti,  and  Matbdria. 
Perozpur  has  subordinate  to  it  the  outposts  of  Nazirpur 
and  Bhandaria.  Sarupkdtti  is  a  new  thana,  and  is  in 
part  composed  of  the  old  thana  Kewaria. 

Patuyakhali  contains  the  thanas  of  Mirzaganj,  Griilsa- 
klidli,  Khalsakhd,li  or  Galachipa,  and  Baufal.  Gulsa- 
kh^li  contains  the  outpost  of  Phuljhuri,  and  Khalsakhdli 
contains  that  of  Chalitabunia. 

Dakhin  Shahl^dzpur  contains  two  thanas — viz.,  Daulat 
Khan  and  Barhanuddin's  Hat — and  the  three  outposts 
of  Ghazipiir,  Tamizuddin,  and  Taltali.  The  first  two 
outposts  belong  to  Daulat  Khan  and  the  last  to  Bar- 
hanuddin.  These  statements  must,  however,  be  taken 
with  reservation,  for  the  thana  arrangements  of  the  dis- 
trict have  long  been  in  a  confused  state,  and  I  do  not 
know  if  they  have  yet  received  their  final  adjustment. 
The  Daulat  Khan  thana  was  formerly  at  Chandia,  and 
hence  the  thana  is  often  called  by  that  name. 

In  1873  there  were  626  policemen  of  all  grades  in  the 
district,  and  the  total  cost  of  the  police  administration 
was  Rs.  119,438.  The  force  consisted  of  1  district 
superintendent,  1  assistant-superintendent,  6  inspectors, 
24  sub-inspectors,  I'o  head  constables,  and  518  con- 
stables. Two  of  the  force  were  Europeans,  3  Eurasians, 
and  621  were  natives  of  India.  Divided  according  to 
religion,  there  were  16  Christians,  170  Mahomedans, 
and  440  Hindus.  The  above  cost  of  the  police  is  much 
greater  than  it  was  in  old  times ;  for  instance,  in  1805, 

'  Angaria  seems  an  old  name,  and  appears  to  be  marked  on  De  Blaev's 
map. 


POLICE  SYS 7 EM.  349 

when  Mr  Gardner  conld  report  that  the  total  cost  of 
the  police  was  Ks.33,361.  But  in  those  days  there  were 
no  district  and  assistant  superintendents,  and  no  inspec- 
tors, scarcely  any  travelling  expenses,  and  no  officer,  I 
believe,  receiving  more  than  Es.l5  or  Es.20  a  month. 
The  figures  for  1873  also  include  the  jail  and  treasury 
guards  and  their  pay,  and  are  for  the  district  before  the 
transfer  of  Mddaripur. 

In-old  times  the  constables,  or  harkandazes,  as  they  were 
called,  got  only  Es.3  a  month,  now  they  get  Es.6  and 
Es.7  and  upwards,  and  the  superior  officers  receive  sala- 
ries ranging  from  Es.  10  to  Es.200  a  month.  Still  it  is 
true,  I  regret  to  say,  that  it  is  almost  impossible  for  a 
policeman  to  live  on  his  pay.  The  expenses  of  living 
and  travelling  have  greatly  increased,  and  at  the  same 
time  so  much  more  is  expected  of  the  police. 

Undoubtedly  the  police  system  is  the  opprobrium  of 
our  administration,  and  I  fear  that  it  will  continue  to  be 
so.  A  larger  expenditure  of  money  would  do  much  to  im- 
prove matters,  especially  in  the  direction  of  supplying 
the  inferior  police  with  adequate  means  of  locomotion ; 
but  even  this  would  not  do  everything.  The  number 
of  village  chaukidars  in  Bdkarganj  in  1873  is  said  to 
have  been  5172,  and  their  emoluments  to  have  been 
Es.  186,192.  There  are  municipal  police  in  Barisdl, 
Nalchiti,  Jhalukd-tti,  Perozpiir,  Baufal,  Bakarganj,  and 
Daulat  Khan. 

In  1873  there  were  5793  cases  cognisable  by  the 
police  reported.  2952  were  declared  false,  and  only  in 
596  were  convictions  obtained.  In  the  same  year  there 
were  8031  non-cognisable  cases:  processes  were  issued 
against  6077  persons;  3220  appeared,  and  1910  were 
convicted.  The  proportion  of  convicted  to  the  popula- 
tion was  about  1  to  1244. 


350  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

The  number  of  arrests  by  the  police  in  1873  was  1504, 
and  by  orders  of  the  Magistrate  1405.  1426  persons 
were  convicted  by  the  Magistrate,  and  100  by  the  Court 
of  Sessions.  1202  were  acquitted  by  the  Magistrate,  and 
108  by  the  Court  of  Sessions.  Percentage  of  acquittals 
was  about  46.  In  the  same  year  Es.28,765  worth  of 
property  was  stolen,  and  Es.6002  recovered. 

There  were  twenty  cases  of  murder. 

The  return  of  unnatural  and  accidental  deaths  in  1873 
is  as  follows :  Suicides,  61;  drownings,  622;^  snake- 
bite, 217;  tigers,  leopards,  &c.,  52;  alligators,  48; 
other  causes,  ^"J -."^  total,  1042. 

1  The  greatest  number  of  cases  of  drowning  are  of  children,  and  take 
place  in  the  moats  which  surround  the  homesteads.  Cases  of  drowning 
and  also  of  snake-bite  are  most  common  in  the  rains. 

2  Of  "  other  causes,"  10  were  lightning,  and  SS'Talls  from  trees. 

There  were  also  during  the  year  64  cases  of  homicide,  and  five  persons 
were  hanged. 


(  351  ) 


CHAPTER    XV. 

THE  JAIL. 

The  jail  Avas  origiually  at  Bd-karganj,  the  old  head- 
quarters of  the  district,  and  for  some  time  was  under 
the  Naib  Nazim,  who  managed  it  through  n,fcmjdar.  The 
oldest  letter  in  the  Magistrate's  office  (27th  October 
1792)  refers  to  the  prisoners  confined  by  the  Naib 
Nazim,  and  the  next  oldest,  dated  23d  November  idem, 
enjoins  that  the  prisoners  should  be  supplied  with 
blankets.  The  jail  was  situated  on  the  banks  of  the 
Srimantapur  or  Bakargauj  creek,  a  little  higher  up  than 
the  cutcheries,  and  a  small  stream  which  flows  into  the 
creek  here  is  still  known  by  the  name  of  the  Jailkhana 
khal.  It  appears  from  a  petition  of  one  Panchanand 
Datt  of  Rangasri,  forwarded  by  the  Board  of  Revenue  on 
17th  April  1802,  that  Mr  Lodge,  the  Judge,  had  built  a 
jail  on  his  taluq  of  Bista  Narain  Datt  in  1193  b.s. 
(1786),  but  I  presume  this  was  only  a  civil  jail.  On  3d 
April  1793  Mr  Middleton,  the  Magistrate,  was  called  upon 
for  a  list  of  prisoners  suitable  to  be  sent  to  the  Anda- 
mans.  By  this  time  the  Magistrate  had  charge  of  the 
jail  under  the  control  of  the  Nizamat  Ada! at.  From  a 
letter  of  the  Nizamat  Adalat,  dated  15th  October  1795, 
it  appears  that  the  prisoners  had  been  deprived  of  the 
use  of  tobacco,  but  that  as  the  want  of  it  had  proved  in- 
jurious, they  were  to  be  allowed  to  have  it  again.  The 
jail  at  Bdkarganj  proved  very  unhealthy,  and  Mr  Wintle 


3 5 2  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

mentions  in  a  letter  of  7tli  September  1801  that  242  pri- 
soners liad  died  in  it  in  the  last  twelve  months.  He  does 
not  mention  what  proportion  this  bore  to  the  number  who 
were  confined  during  the  year,  but  it  must  have  been 
about  one-third,  as  he  states  that  the  number  of  the  pri- 
soners at  the  time  he  was  writing  was  750.  The  jail 
was  a  thatched  one,  and  was  of  course  insecure.  There 
are  two  letters  from  the  Nizamat  Adalat,  dated  23d 
April  and  15th  May  1795,  about  the  tattooing  of  pri- 
soners, and  directing  that  this  sliould  be  done  on  the 
forehead.  Only  the  life-prisoners  were  tattooed,  and  the 
object  was  to  facilitate  recapture  in  the  event  of  their 
escape.  The  jail  was  removed  to  Barisd^l  in  1801.  A 
kacha-paha  jail  —  i.e.,  a  jail  with  a  thatched  roof 
and  brick  walls — was  erected  there  by  the  Magistrate, 
Mr  Gardner,  in  1804.  It  was  flued,  was  surrounded 
by  an  outer  wall,  had  a  bomb-proof  dungeon,  and  was 
calculated  to  hold  800  prisoners,  and  yet  only  cost 
Es.2302-5-9.  The  amount  sanctioned  for  its  construction 
was  Es. 368 1-3-7.  The  lime  with  which  it  was  constructed 
was  brought  from  Sylhet.  The  following  description  of 
the  jail  is  given  in  the  estimate  :  "Account  of  expenses 
attending  the  erection  of  a  foujdari  jail  at  Barisdl  zila, 
Bdkarganj,  consisting  of  apartments  for  800  prisoners, 
packa-walled,  well  raised  and  flued,  an  infirmary  very 
highly  raised,  completely  packa,  beamed  and  terraced, 
a  bomb-proof  dungeon,  and  two  guard-rooms,  the  whole 
enclosed  with  a  surrounding  packa  wall  twelve  feet  in 
height,  and  four  packa  sentry-boxes  at  the  corners 
thereof."  This  jail,  however,  did  not  last  long,  or  at 
least  was  found  insufficient,  for  in  1812  the  prisoners 
broke  out  and  burnt  the  roof,  and  in  1817  the  jail  was 
replaced  in  whole  or  in  part  by  a  masonry  building, 
erected  under  the  superintendence  of  Mr  Gardner,  the 


THE  JAIL.  353 

Civil  Surgeon.  The  amount  sanctioned  for  its  construc- 
tion was  Ks.35,119.  It  was  reported  to  be  completed  on 
20tli  September  1817,  and  the  surrounding  wall  was 
finished  in  the  following  year.  In  a  report  of  Mr  Lee 
Warner  (the  Magistrate),  dated  18th  April  1818,  it  is 
stated  that  the  criminal  jail  was  built  in  1816,  the  sur- 
rounding wall  in  1818,  the  hospital  in  1811,  and  the 
magazine  in  1802.  The  prisoners  seem  always  to  have 
been  more  numerous  in  the  early  days  of  our  adminis- 
tration than  they  now  are.  Probably  this  was  owing  to 
the  greater  number  of  dacoities  in  those  days,  and  to  the 
more  ready  seizure  of  suspected  persons.  Something  also 
was  due  to  the  delay  in  the  jail-deliveries,  owing  to  the 
Judges  coming  on  circuit  only  once  a  quarter.  In  1806 
Mr  Oswald  whites  that  there  are  seldom  few^er  than 
from  800  to  900  prisoners  in  confinement.  This  was 
on  1st  February,  and  on  12th  July  of  the  same  year 
the  Magistrate  writes  that  the  jail  is  not  capable  of  con- 
taining more  than  700  prisoners,  and  there  are  above 
750.  In  the  same  letter  he  sj^eaks  of  an  additional  jail 
which  is  to  be  built,  and  which,  like  the  present,  will 
have  the  walls  of  brick  and  mortar,  and  the  roof  thatched. 
The  number  of  persons  imprisoned  for  debt  was  much 
greater  formerly  than  now,  when  indeed  the  civil  jail  is 
often  altogether  empty.  In  1806  the  Magistrate  writes 
that  there  are  seldom  more  than  sixty  or  eighty  persons 
in  the  debtors'  jail.  On  7th  May  1807  an  estimate  is 
given  for  repairing  the  jail.  Bundles  of  straw  are  esti- 
mated at  Es.4  a  thousand,  and  bamboos  at  Ks.3  a  hun- 
dred. On  15th  May  1819  there  were  as  many  as  982 
prisoners  in  the  jail,  and  the  Magistrate  considered  that 
it  was  capable  of  holdiug  2000.  In  1873  the  average 
strength  of  the  jail,  including  the  lockups,  was  only 
520,  of  whom  only  6^  were  females.    It  must  be  remem- 


354  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

bered,  however,  that  the  number  of  prisoners  in  the 
Bdkarganj  jail  is  now  systematically  kept  down  by  trans- 
fers, and  that  no  life-prisoners  are  allowed  to  remain  in  it. 
Prisoners  were  occasionally  transferred  in  old  times,  and 
I  find  that  in  February  1809  two  hundred  were  sent  to 
Dacca,  but  there  were  no  rules  on  the  subject,  and  pro- 
bably they  were  only  sent  away  when  there  was  an 
unusual  pressure.  The  prisons  also  were  for  a  long  time 
burdened  with  the  life  and  long-term  prisoners  who  had 
been  sentenced  by  the  Nawab  Nazim,  and  as  late  as  25tli 
June  1819  a  list  had  to  be  made  out  of  such  prisoners. 

The  jDrisoners  used  to  do  their  own  marketing,  and  for 
this  purpose  they  were  paid  in  cowries,  which  were  dis- 
tributed by  a  foddar  monthly,  and  for  which  he  was 
reimbursed  at  the  current  rate  of  exchange  (31st  Decem- 
ber 1811).  He  got  a  daily  list  of  the  prisoners  before  he 
distributed  the  diet-money.  On  26tli  Aj)ril  1820  the 
poddar  is  described  as  getting  two  puns  of  cowries  per 
rupee  as  his  remuneration.  In  1805  the  allowance  to 
each  prisoner  was  three  puns  of  cowries,  or  about  three- 
fourths  of  an  ana,  each  day.  Some  remarks  appear  to 
have  been  made  about  the  allowances  to  the  prisoners 
being  excessive,  and  on  15th  August  1805  Mr  Oswald 
writes  as  follows  :  "The  observations  of  the  third  Judge 
of  the  Murshiddbdd  Court  of  Circuit,  regarding  the 
cheapness  of  living  and  the  low  w\ages  of  labour  in  that 
division,  do  not  appear  to  me  applicable  to  this  station, 
where  the  ordinary  or  average  price  of  rice  is  fourteen 
anas  a  maund,  of  sixty  sicca  weight  to  the  seer,  and  where 
the  wages  of  the  most  common  labour  are  in  general  six 
puns,  and  never  less  than  five  puns  of  cowries  per  diem. 
Allowing  each  convict  one  and  a  half  seers  of  rice  a  day, 
of  the  above-mentioned  weight,  or  forty-five  seers  a  month, 
it  will  be  found  that  his  expenditure  in  the  article  of 


THE  JAIL.  355 

rice  aloue  amounts  to  fifteen  anas  a  mouth — ratlier  more 
than  two-tliirds  of  liis  wliole  allowance.  Witli  the 
remaining  third  he  has  to  purchase  fuel  and  cooking- 
utensils  to  dress  his  victuals,  a  little  salt  to  season 
them,  and  to  provide  himself  with  clothing."  ^  In  the 
year  1811  the  total  cost  for  the  prisoners'  food  was 
Rs.9253-15-4  (sicca). 

From  a  letter  written  in  1809  in  appears  that  pre- 
vious to  that  date  there  was  no  separate  accommodation 
for  females. 

Apparently  the  prisoners  were  chiefly  employed  in 
road-making,  and  in  a  letter  written  in  1815  it  is  said 
that  prisoners  were  not  formerly  exempted  from  labour 
on  the  Sundays. 

On  16th  February  1812,  at  11  "15  a.m.,  there  was  an 
outbreak  in  the  jail,  in  which  Mr  Batty e,  the  Magistrate, 
nearly  lost  his  life,  and  Avas  only  saved  by  the  devotion 
of  his  subadar.  (At  that  time  both  the.  jail  and  the 
treasury  were  guarded  by  a  detachment  of  the  Provin- 
cial Battalion.)  The  prisoners  set  fire  to  the  thatched 
roof  of  the  jail  and  attacked  Mr  Batty e.  The  subadar 
flung  himself  in  between  the  Magistrate  and  his  assail- 
ant, and  was  cut  desperately  over  the  head.  The  suba- 
dar, the  havildar,  five  sepoys,  and  one  barkandaz  were 
wounded,  and  twelve  prisoners  were  shot  before  the 
riot  could  be  cpielled.  In  the  newspaper  account  of  the 
great  cyclone  of  1822,  j)ublished  in  Mr  Sandeman's 
"  Selections,"  it  is  said  that  the  prisoners  were  released 
on  the  second  day  afterwards  for  want  of  food.  From 
the  official  reports,  however,  it  appears  that  this  state- 
ment is  incorrect. 


*  In  1803  it  is  reported  that  4000  kalmns  of  cowries  were  required  each 
month  for  the  prisoners,  and  that  they  had  to  be  collected  from  all  parts 
of  the  district. 


356  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

The  land  originally  taken  up  for  the  jail  and  for  the 
Provincial  Battalion,  and  which  is  still  in  the  possession 
of  Government,  lies  in  the  middle  of  the  Barisd-1  town, 
and  amounts  to  about  nine  kanis,  or  between  forty  and 
fifty  bighas.  It  is  held  on  a  permanent  lease  from  the 
Rahamatpiir  Chakrabarties,  and  the  rate  of  rent  is  only 
Rs.5  a  kani,  though  the  land  is  worth  very  much  more 
at  the  present  day.  The  Rs.5  are  sicca,  and  the  old 
rent  in  sicca  rupees  was  Rs.45-5.  It  is  now  Rs.48-5-4. 
The  j)olice  lines  are  situated  on  this  land,  and  another 
portion  islet  out  to  householders,  and  yields  about  Rs.96 
a  year.  Another  small  portion  in  a  corner  of  the  jail 
garden  has  been  let  to  a  shopkeeper  as  a  woodyard  for 
Rs.48-5-4,  so  that  in  reality  the  jail  site  may  be  con- 
sidered as  rent-free. 

The  Barisdl  jail  has  always  been  damp  and  unhealthy. 
This  is  partly  owing  to  its  position,  and  partly  to  defects 
in  its  construction.  It  is  nearly  surrounded  by  a  tidal 
khd,l,  and  the  water  is  close  to  the  surface  throughout 
the  jail  compound.  The  amount  of  garden-ground  is 
also  very  limited.  It  is  a  curious  fact  that  the  proper 
mode  of  building  a  jail  for  Bdkarganj  seems  to  have 
been  best  understood  when  the  first  one  was  built,  and 
to  have  been  lost  sight  of  afterwards.  At  least  the 
hospital,  which  was  built  in  1811,  if  not  earlier,  is  by 
far  the  driest  building  in  the  jail,  a  circumstance  which 
is  due  to  its  being  raised  on  arches,  through  which  the 
air  can  freely  circulate.  Of  late  a  good  deal  has  been 
done  to  improve  the  jail,  and  the  erection  of  double- 
storied  wards  and  of  arched  floors  has  been  commenced. 
Some  solitary  cells  have  also  been  built.  The  jail  has 
three  lockups  attached  to  it — viz.,  those  at  Perozpur, 
Patuyakhdli,  and  Daulat  Khan,  though  the  prisoners 
from  the  last  have  l^ecn  temporarily  sent  to  Noakhdli. 


THE  JAIL.  35  7 

Tile  prisoners  arc  employed  in  Ijrick-niaking,  in  weav- 
ing, and  in  making  mats  and  chairs,  but  there  is  nothing 
special  in  the  industries  of  the  jail.  The  great  majority 
of  the  prisoners  are  Mahomedans. 

In  1873  the  average  daily  number  of  prisoners  was 
520.  This,  however,  includes  those  in  the  subdivisional 
lockups.  The  average  mortality  for  the  ten  years  end- 
ing 1873  was  12'22  per  cent.,  which  of  course  is  very 
high. 


(  358   ) 


CHAPTER     XVI. 

EDUCATION. 

I  CANNOT  pretend  to  treat  of  this  important  subject  as 
it  deserves,  and  must  refer  the  reader  to  the  educational 
reports,  &c.,  for  fuller  information.  The  first  attempt,  I 
believe,  to  introduce  English  education  into  the  district 
was  made  by  the  Magistrate,  Mr  Garrett,  about  1830. 
Mr  Sherring,  however,  in  his  "History  of  Protestant 
Missions,"  says  that  a  school  was  established  at  Barisd-l 
by  the  Serdmpur  missionaries  in  1829.  The  lease  for 
the  present  site  of  the  Barisd.1  school  was  obtained  by 
Mr  Sturt  in  1842,  and  the  school  was  made  a  Govern- 
ment institution  a  few  years  later.  The  school  is  what 
is  called  a  higher  English  school,  and  is  a  very  good 
one  of  its  class.  It  has  an  average  daily  attendance  of 
278  boys.  There  is  a  vernacular  school  adjoining  it. 
There  is  also  a  so-called  higher  class  school  at  Basanda, 
but  it  does  not  really  pre^^are  boys  for  the  entrance  ex- 
amination. Basanda  is  a  small  village  about  two  miles 
from  Jhalukdtti ;  and  it  would  be  better  if  the  school 
were  removed  to  Jhalukatti,  and  the  latter  made  the 
seat  of  a  deputy-magistracy  and  of  a  munsif's  court. 
There  is  a  middle-class  English  school  at  the  headquarters 
of  each  subdivision,  but  I  do  not  think  that  any  of  these 
can  be  said  to  be  in  a  very  efficient  condition.  The 
best  of  them  (and  the  remark  is  also  applicable  to  the 
Barisjll  sclioo])  is  still  more  or  less  of  an  exotic,  for  it  is 


1 


EDUCATION.  359 

mainly  attended  by  the  cliildreu  of  professional  men, 
who  are  only  temporary  residents  in  the  neighbourhood. 
Altogether,  there  were  in  the  year  ending  31st  March 
1874,  365  schools  nndcr  inspection  in  the  district,  and 
12,110  pupils,  so  that  about  7  per  1000  of  the  population 
were  at  school.  The  number  of  Hindus  was,  however, 
disproportionately  larger,  for  though  they  only  form  about 
a  third  of  the  population,  there  were  (in  round  numbers) 
7500  Hindus  at  school,  against  4600  Mahomedans. 
This,  of  course,  is  in  great  measure  explained  by  the 
fact  that  the  Mahomedans  chiefly  belong  to  the  poorer 
classes,  and  are  least  numerous  in  the  towns  and  bazd^rs. 
Something,  however,  is  due  to  Mahomedan  pride  and 
apathy,  and  to  their  preference  for  a  home  education  and 
Arabic  studies. 

Female  Education. — This  has  made  very  little  pro- 
gress as  yet.  There  is  a  pretty  good  girls'  school  at 
Barisdl,  and  there  are  one  or  two  in  other  parts  of  the 
district,  but  they  have  not  yet  taken  firm  root.  In 
some  of  the  primary  schools  girls  and  boys  are  taught 
together.  Hinduism,  Mahomedanism,  and  early  mar- 
riage are  commonly  said  to  be  the  great  obstacles  to 
female  education,  and  I  have  no  wish  to  deny  their 
influence.  I  am  sorry,  however,  to  say  that  the  Feringhi 
Christians  of  Sibpur  are  almost  as  unwilling  to  send  their 
daughters  to  school  as  any  Hindus  are.  No  doubt  the 
difficulty  of  getting  about,  especially  in  the  rains,  is  a 
great  drawback  to  the  success  of  schools,  and,  physically 
speaking,  the  children  are  perhaps  better  at  home.  Of 
late  years  a  great  stir  has  been  made  about  primary 
education,  and  many  new  'patsalas  or  primary  schools 
have  been  established,  and  many  old  ones  have  been 
subsidised.     No  doubt  good  has  been  done,  and  the  very 


J 


360  DISTRICT"  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

agitation  of  tlie  subject  has  had  a  quickening  effect  on 
the  bucolic  mind  ;  but  in  the  south  of  the  district,  where 
80  per  cent,  of  the  inhabitants  are  Mahomedans,  the 
experiment  has  been  a  failure.  The  peasants  do  not 
care  for  education ;  and  besides,  they  need  their  chil- 
dren to  gather  their  betel-nuts,  to  row  their  boats,  and 
above  all  to  herd  their  cattle. 

The  worst  of  the  change  which  has  been  effected  is 
that  in  very  many  cases  the  villagers  have  given  up 
payiug  fees  to  the  village  teacher,  as  he  now  gets  paid 
by  Government.  In  fact,  therefore,  the  teacher's  posi- 
tion has  not  been  improved,  there  having  been  only  a 
change  of  paymasters.  The  fact  is,  I  believe,  as  I  have 
stated  it,  and  I  confess  that  it  is  one  for  which  it  is  not 
easy  to  see  a  remedy. 

The  accompanying  table,  which  is  taken  from  the 
inspector's  report,  gives  many  particulars  of  the  state  of 
education  in  the  district  in  1873-74.  In  the  same  year 
the  receipts,  including  grants  from  provincial  revenues 
and  Rs.9872  of  subscrij^tions,  were  Rs.44,941,  and  the 
expenditure  was  Rs.44,280.^ 

^  The  early  state  of  Bakarganj  in  regard  to  education  is  described  in  Mr 
Adam's  Report  on  Education  in  Bengal,  1835. 


EDUCATION. 


361 


H 

HI 

< 

a 

0 

•BJatnO                           1            i    :                                    1   i  " «             :        :  1  0    1 

■suBpBuitnBijnui                1         '     •                              ^"Sl?            •       • 

a. 

10                                                   «  00  CO  =               0 

■snptrtjj                                 '-'   1                               5J5Sm          *"       : 

o> 

■suBHSUtlO                       1            •    :                                  to    1    :  00              :        : 

2: 

?sig  atn  no  s^uapnqg  jo  ib^ox  puBaf) 

N                                                             »~  •*  I-  0                  0 
CM                                                             CO  0  m  CO                  00 

t                                                       ^  CO  l^  >0                                 ; 

0 

■8no!?Tii!jsui  jo  ib;ox  pnB.t£) 

1-1      .                                                  CI  00  •i*  -^t                 to           . 
CO 

CO 

« 
z; 

2  a 

H  0 

eg 

< 

Religion  of 

Students  as 

on  31st 

March. 

•s.iaqio               1            :    :                                     :    :co    1              :        •  |  co 

■snBpBniniBqni\[                  j    :                                  :""g             :       :  1" 

1                                                                   CC  CO  t-              10              1  00 

•snpnijj                         :   :                                  :  S  S  0          '^       •     15 

•euBnsuqo     .1        :  :                         ■  :  •  •         •     •  I  : 

Number  of 

Students 

on  the 

31st  March 

learning — 

•^tno  jE[nDBn.i9A                  :   :                                   i  S  ii »          **       : 

s 

01 

aSBnSuB'UBOisst^JOV  1            :    i                                     i    :    :  io              :       : 

0 

■qsiiSna             1            •    :                                  '•%'•'•            •'       :   1  2 

■aDUBpuaiiv  A»!a  s^B.iaAV                     :    :                                  :S  — S           "       :  1^ 

HOJBK  5SIS  aqjtio                 1            .    .                                     -SSS           S        -lo 
snoa  at(}  no  s?napn5s  JO  .laqmuN    |           •    •                                  .(n-oo                    .  |  co 

•snoiininsni  JO  .iaqmn>j           |            ■    •                                    :"*'*§           "        IIS 

to 

!S 

0 
H 

b 

a 

Q 
•< 

Religion  of 

Students  as 

on  31st 

March. 

■S-13'nO               i            :    :                                     :    :    :"              i        •  |  co 

1                                                                                       to  t-'*                                       .    t^ 

■suBpisramBqiin                  |    !                                  •'"33S             :       :     S 

1                                                                                                     CO                                        1   CO 

to  U2  05  CO                  .0                  1   00 

•snpm.n                i  ;                     ^%B%       "     -Is 

•suB!5S!.iqo           1            i    :"                                     :    :    :»             :        :  |  » 

Number  of 

Students 

on  the 

31st  March 

learnings 

•jfino  jBinoBuja;^                -1                                : 5  S  ^          S       :  1 S 

1                                                                                    i-l  to                                    1  go 

•aSBnguBiiBOissBiov              :   i                                S  S '"'  2             :       :     " 

•qsiiSna             1           :    :                                 ^  S  ^    =             •       =   |  § 

0  CO  C  00                  to                  it! 
i-l  TJ«                                        1  CO 

•qo.n!W  ?si8  am  no               1           ..                                 gS^S          S:|S 
siioH  sqj  no  s?n.5pn5g  jo  .laqmnN   |            •    •                                    2  -  §                    '  1  SJ 

•snonrnnsui  JO  jaqmn^j                      ;   j                                 .'"  — J^^          '^       :     S 

0 
H 
H 

X 

s 

0 
0 

Religion  of 

Students  as 

on  31st 

March. 

•B.ia'HO              i            :   ;                                   i    •   i   :             1       i  1    :    | 

■snBpBniraT!qni\[ 

'^   ;                                ^   l^   \            :       :\° 

•snpuiH             1         "^    =                                i    i^    :             :       •   1^ 

•sniiijsuqg            |            i   i                                   to    :    :    :             :       :  1  'o 

Number  of 

Students 

on  the 

31st  March 

learning — 

•Xino  jBiuoBnaaA     1         ?<    :                                  :   i "    :             :       :     2 

a3un3nBiiB0!SST![0v  1            :    :                                  So   :    :    :             :        :  1 

s 

•qsnSaa                          :    ;                                  M    1    I   :             •        •' 

i 

"aouBpna^iv  ^U'^d  82B.iaAV                 ^    :                                "    : "   :             •       • 

CO 

•f-iSI  na-iKK  isigain  uo           1         fi    .                                S    :2    :            :       :  |S 
SIPH  8'H  "0  s^uapmg  JO  .laqtanfj   I                '                                  co    ■—    •             •       •  |  «3 

snotiniiisui  JO  .laqran^j          |          <-<    ':                                i-"    -co    |             :       :  I  >» 

Si 

tn  t< 

-( a 

X 

Normal  Schools— 

For  Masters 

For  Mistresses     ... 

Schools  op  Art. 

Other  Technical 
Schools. 

Schools  for  Roys— 

Higher  English  ... 
Middle  English    ... 
Middle  Vernacular 
Lower  Vernacular 

Schools  for  0  irls— 

For  Natives 

For  Europeans  and 
other  foreign  races 

Total    ... 

(  362 


CHAPTER  XVIL 

ROADS  AND  COMMUNICATIONS. 

Sabhi  Khan  (see  p.  48)  was  probably  the  first  road- 
maker  in  tlie  district.  His  roads,  or  jangjils,  as  they 
are  called,  are  to  be  found  in  the  northern  and  north- 
western parts  of  the  district,  especially  in  thanas  Gour- 
nadi  and  Kotwalipara  (now  transferred  to  Faridpur). 
Thoy  were  very  broad  and  high,  and  though  now  broken 
and  even  obliterated  in  many  places,  they  are  still  used 
by  the  country-people.  A  section  of  one  of  these  may 
be  seen  near  the  Palardi  police  station,  and  it  has  been 
made  part  of  the  modern  road  from  Barisd^l  to  Gournadi. 
Sabhi  Khan  was  in  all  probability  a  man  of  energy 
and  public  spirit,  and  I  have  no  wish  to  depreciate 
unduly  his  merit,  or  that  of  the  other  Mahomedans  of 
like  stamp  who  made  roads  in  Bengal  in  the  old  days 
of  the  Moglial  empire.  I  am  not  sure,  however,  that 
the  decay  of  his  roads  is  not  a  proof  of  the  compara- 
tive uselessness  of  merely  individual  effort,  and  of  the 
evanescent  character  of  improvement  for  which  the  time 
is  not  ripe.  I  suspect  that  Sabhi  Khan's  jangdls  would 
never  have  fallen  into  decay  if  they  had  been  really 
wanted.  At  least  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  they  could 
become  covered  with  jungle  if  people  were  daily  in  the 
habit  of  traversing  them.  Probably  many  of  the  old 
Mahomedan  roads  were  made  for  military  purposes,  and 
their  usefulness  ceased  when  these  purposes  had  been 


ROADS  AND  COMMUNICATIONS.  363 

accomplislicd.^  It  is  but  fair  to  notice  tliat  Sablii  Khan, 
on  making  liis  roads,  appears  to  have  made  provision 
for  the  physical  and  spiritual  wants  of  wayfarers,  for  he 
dug  tanks  by  the  roadside  at  Sabhi  Khan's  Pdr  and 
elsewhere,  and  he  erected  a  handsome  mosque  at  Ram- 
siddhi.  Of  course  I  cannot  positively  say  that  the  tanks 
and  mosque  were  made  by  him,  for  natives  have  a  habit 
of  ascribing  every  improvement  to  one  distinguished  man. 
Major  Rennel  in  his  "  Memoir  on  Roads  in  Bengal " 
has  given  a  list  of  routes  in  Bdkarganj,  and  his  map 
(republished  by  Colonel  Gastrell)  shows  a  road  passing 
from  Bdkarganj  to  Kotarhdt,  Sutaluri,  Gournadi,  and 
then  across  the  swamps  to  Khulna  and  Maxadpiir.  No 
doubt  this  route  is  in  part  composed  of  Sabhi  Khan's 
jaugdl,  but  I  suspect  that  much  of  it  was  merely  a  track 
across  country,  and  only  open  in  the  cold  season,  or 
rather  just  before  the  rains ;  for  thanas  Gournadi  and 
Kotwalipara,  and  indeed  B^karganj  generally,  are  most 
traversable  in  the  months  of  April  and  May.  K6tarhd,t 
is  now  a  deserted  place,  but  the  name  seems  to  imply 
that  it  was  once  a  place  of  importance,  and  there  are 
remains  of  an  old  road  (now  repaired)  which  led  from  it 
to  Bd,karganj  in  the  days  when  the  latter  was  the  head- 
quarters of  the  district.  In  old  times  there  was  a 
munsif's  court  at  Kotarhdt.  Sutaluri,  as  the  name 
implies,  was  an  old  seat,  I  believe,  of  the  weaving  or 
of  the  thread  trade.  It  is  situated  on  the  road  from 
Barisdl  to  Jhalukdtti,  and  is  near  Gurudham.  It  still 
contains  some  ornamented  ruins,  and  there  is  a  mat 
or  funeral  monument  in  it,  which,  though  the  top  has 

1  One  great  cause  of  the  destruction  of  the  Maboiuedan  roads  was  the 
absence  of  sufficient  water-way.  Lime  and  skilled  labour  were  scarce,  and 
hence,  though  large  bridges  were  put  up  here  and  there  at  important  places, 
there  were  few  or  no  culverts,  and  tlie  height  of  the  earth-way  was  the 
chief  thing  relied  on  for  resistance  to  the  floods. 


364  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

fallen  off,  is  still,  I  believe,  tlie  loftiest  structure  in  the 
district. 

Tlie  oldest  roads  made  during  the  English  adminis- 
tration were  probably  those  leading  from  Bdkarganj  to 
Sibpiir,  and  to  the  Golabari  and  K6tarhdt.  The  Sibpur 
road  is  about  five  miles  lonor,  and  still  is  in  tolerable 
rej^air,  and  has  several  bridges.  The  headquarters  of 
the  district  were  removed  to  Barisdl  in  1801,  and  the 
oldest  road  in  that  neighbourhood,  I  believe,  is  one 
which  led  from  Barisdl  to  a  market  (now  deserted) 
known  as  the  Khazanchi's  (treasurer)  Hdt.  It  is  about 
four  miles  long,  and  has  been  repaired,  and  is  now 
known  as  the  Daj^dapia  road.  It  is  part  of  the  road 
to  Bdkarganj.  The  road  from  Barisdl  to  Madliabpd,sha 
(about  seven  miles)  is  also  an  old  one,  and  is  due  to  the 
liberality  of  a  Hindu  lady  (Parbati  Chaudharine). 

The  following  remarks  on  roads,  &c.,  in  Bdkarganj 
appear  in  a  volume  entitled  "  East  India  Affairs,"  and 
printed  by  order  of  the  House  of  Commons,  1819  : 
"The  nullahs  and  ditches  which  intersect  the  town 
of  Barisd;!  require  deepening  to  admit  the  tide  and  carry 
off  the  stagnaut  water.  The  only  road  about  the  station 
has  been  lately  repaired,  and  the  prisoners  are  now 
engaged  in  making  bricks  to  lay  on  it.  A  road  is 
intended  to  be  made  near  the  station,  by  which  much 
jungle  will  be  cleared.  A  road  from  Barisjll  to  Gour- 
nadi,  which  is  on  the  route  to  Dacca,  w^ould  be  very 
advantageous,  merchants  being  at  present  2^1'evented 
from  resorting  to  Barisal  from  apprehensions  of  the  risk 
attendant  on  navio-atina;  the  larore  rivers  between  it  and 
Dacca."  ^ 

The  road  which  J\Ir  Sage  desiderated  so  long  ago  has 

1  Mr  Sage,  in  Appendix  E   to  Superintendent  of  Police's  Reports,  IStli 
May  1816,  p.  239. 


I 


ROADS  AND  COMMUNICATIONS.  365 

ouly  recently  been  made.  It  is  very  useful  for  foot- 
passengers,  but  is  not  adapted  for  carriages.  None  of 
the  district  roads,  indeed,  are  readily  traversable  by  carts, 
and  it  is  not  necessary  that  they  should.  The  rivers 
will  always  furnish  the  readiest  mode  of  transporting 
heavy  goods.  There  are  perhaps  some  forty  or  fifty 
carts  in  or  about  Barisdl,  and  there  are  a  considerable 
number  in  Dakliin  Shahbd.zp\ir  (where  the  ryots  use 
them  to  bring  home  their  grain  from  the  fields),  but, 
speaking  generally,  there  are  no  carts  in  Bdkarganj. 
The  numerous  rivers  and  klidls  in  the  district,  and  con- 
sequently the  great  number  of  ferries  or  expensive 
bridges  required  in  order  to  make  the  roads  suitable 
for  carriage  traffic,  are  a  most  insuperable  obstacle  to 
the  making  of  carriage-roads. 

The  road  to  Gournadi  goes  vid  Lakutia,  and  consists 
so  far  of  a  very  good  road,  made  by  Ram  Chandra  Rai, 
zamindar  of  Lakutia.  This  same  gentleman  also  made  a 
very  good  khal  for  boats  alongside  of  the  road.  The 
other  principal  roads  are  Barisdl  to  Jhalukdtti,  Barisdl  to 
Nalchiti,  Barisd^l  to  Bdkarganj,  and  Barisdl  to  Tdltolli. 

Of  subdivisions,  Dakhin  Shahbdzpiir  is  the  one  which 
4S  best  supplied  with  roads.  There  are  a  road  and  canal 
across  the  island  from  Bliola  to  Daulat  Khan,  and  there 
are  footpaths  to  Ghazipiir,  Dhaniya  Maniya  police  sta- 
tion. In  Perozpur  subdivision  there  is  a  towing-path, 
and  a  road  from  Kumarkhdli  to  Raierkiltti.  In  Patuya- 
khdli  there  are  no  roads,  except  a  footpath  for  a  few 
miles  along  the  bank  of  the  Patuyakhdli  don. 

It  has  often  been  said  that  every  man  in  Bdkarganj 
has  his  boat,  and  that  roads  are  not  required.  This, 
however,  is  a  mistake.  It  is  very  far  from  being  the 
case  that  every  ryot  has  his  boat,  and  even  those  who 
have,  often  find  it  much  quicker  and  easier  to  walk  than 


366  niSTRICl'  OF  bAkARGANJ, 

to  row  ao-aiust  the  tide,  &c.  Women  and  children  also 
often  travel,  and  they  neither  have  boats  nor  can  they 
afford  to  hire  them.  The  amount  of  walking  which  is 
done  in  the  district  is  in  fact  very  great,  especially  in 
the  dry  season.  In  some  large  tracts  of  the  district — the 
island  of  Dakliin  Shalibazpur,  for  instance — there  are  no 
rivers,  and  consequently  hardly  any  boats,  and  nearly 
everybody  walks.  Eoads,  then,  are  wanted  in  the  dis- 
trict, but  they  should  be  merely  raised  footpaths,  and, 
above  all,  the  khdls  which  intersect  them  should  be 
bridged.  For  this  purpose  wooden  bridges,  and  even 
bamboo  bridges,  are  quite  sufficient.  The  number  of 
bamboo  bridges,  or  didrs,  as  they  are  called  in  the  dis- 
trict, is  very  great.  Every  village  has  two  or  three, 
and  in  some  parts  every  homestead  has  one. 

Towing-paths  also  are  much  required,  especially  on 
the  highway  from  Barisal  to  Calcutta,  and  I  am  glad  to 
say  that  these  have  been  in  part  supplied.  There  are  no 
towing-paths  in  the  Sundarbans,  and  navigation  there  is 
almost  entirely  dependent  on  the  tides. 

Not  much  has  yet  been  done  towards  the  canalisation 
of  the  district.  However,  channels  have-  been  made 
from  Bhola  to  Daulat  Khan,  and  from  Barisdl  to  La- 
kutia.     The  Jhalukdtti  khal  has  been  deepened,  &c. 

Now  that  the  road  cess  has  been  introduced  in  the 
district,  we  may  expect  that  many  canals  and  roads  will 
be  made. 

The  Government  ferries  are  Kahamatpur,  Dwarika, 
and  Shikarp^ir,  on  the  road  to  Gournadi ;  Jagua,  on  the 
road  to  Nalchiti ;  and  Kalijiri,  on  the  road  to  Jhalukdtti. 
There  are  also  ferries  at  Perozpiir  station,  and  between 
Daulat  Khan  and  Hattia,  and  Tamizudin  and  Maiipiira. 
The  Barisal  town  ferry  belongs  to  the  town  committee. 
There  are  numerous  private  ferries. 


I 


(  3^7  ) 


CHAPTER  XVIII. 

barisAl. 

BarisAl,  the  largest  town  in  the  district,  and  the  seat  of 
the  principal  courts,  is  situated  on  the  right  or  west 
bank  of  the  Barisdl  river,^  and  is  183  miles  nearly  due 
east  from  Calcutta,  and  about  75  miles  south  of  Dacca. 
It  is,  however,  only  accessible  by  water  from  either  of 
these  places,  and  the  voyage  from  Barisdl  to  Calcutta 
occupies  from  four  to  seven  days,  and  from  Barisdl  to 
Dacca  about  three  days.  Barisd,!  did  not  become  the 
seat  of  the  courts  till  1801,  but  Kennel's  map  shows  that 
it  was  a  place  of  some  consequence  many  years  before 
that  time.  I  have  also  quoted  in  another  chapter  a  re- 
mark of  Mir  Kassim,  which  shows  that  Barisdl  was  an 
important  salt  cliauki,  or  place  where  the  salt  tax  was 
paid,'  in  the  middle  of  the  last  century.  In  Kennel's 
time  the  town  seems  to  have  been  conhned  to  the  south 
side  of  the  Jailkhana  khdl.  The  town  is  composed  of 
the  five  villages  of  Barisal,  Bogura,  Amanatganj,  Ali- 
kandi,  and  Kaunia.  The  village  of  Barisd>l  is  a  very 
small  one,  and  lies  in  a  pargana  of  its  own  called  the 
Gird-i-Bandar,  which  appears  to  have  been  formed  out  of 
pargana  Chaudradwip  as  a  site  for  the  baz^r.  The 
English  church  and  the  principal  public  offices  are  situ- 

^  I  believe  the  proper  name  of  the  river  is  the  Kirttankhola,  thougli  I 
never  heard  it  called  so. 


368  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

ated  in  Barisdl  proper.  These  offices  consist  of  tlie  civil 
and  criminal  courts,  tlie  Collectorate,  the  registration 
office,  &c. 

The  present  dimensions  of  the  town  are  of  recent 
origin,  it  having  been  enlarged  with  the  view  of  mak- 
ing it  a  more  suitable  basis  for  the  registration  of  vital 
statistics,  and  also  in  order  to  increase  the  collections 
from  the  taxes.  Formerly  only  portions  of  some  of  the 
five  villages  I  have  named  were  included  in  the  town, 
but  now  they  have  been  entirely  incorporated.  This 
has  given  a  survey  boundary  for  an  arbitrary  one,  and 
has  enabled  us  to  know  the  area  of  the  town  with  some 
exactitude.  From  the  survey  papers  it  appears  that  the 
area  is  nearly  six  square  miles  (5  square  miles,  588 
acres).  The  population  within  these  limits  appears  to 
be  13,332,  including  1124  of  a  boat  population.  The 
population  therefore  is  very  sparse  for  a  town,  being  only 
about  2000  to  the  square  mile,  or  about  four  times  the 
prevalent  rate  (482  to  the  square  mile)  in  the  district. 
The  fact  is  that  great  part  of  the  so-called  town  consists 
of  scattered  villages,  interspersed  with  trees  and  gardens, 
and  even  rice-fields.  In  truth  it  may  be  said  that, 
w^ith  the  exception  of  the  bazdr,  every  house  in  Barisdl 
is  more  or  less  a  rus  in  urhe.  I  believe  that  the  towns 
in  other  Bengal  districts  are  similarly  constituted. 
When,  therefore,  it  is  justly  stated  in  the  Bengal  Ad- 
ministration Eeport  for  1872-73  that  "the  absence  of 
large  towns  is  one  of  the  most  remarkable  statistical  fea- 
tures in  Bengal,"  and  reference  is  made  to  "  Rangpiir, 
the  capital  of  the  great  district  of  Rangpiir,  containing 
only  6100  souls,  and  to  Jessore  8152,  each  of  these  dis- 
tricts having  a  population  of  over  two  millions,"  these 
facts,  extraordinary  as  they  are,  do  not  bring  out  the 
whole  singularity  of  the  case.    For  even  these  petty 


BARISAl.  369 

towns  have  their  populations  distributed  over  wide  areas, 
and  are  "  half  town  and  half  country." 

More  than  half  of  the  inhabitants  of  Barisdl  arc 
Mahomedans,  and  the  other  half  are  Hindus,  with  the 
exception  of  about  150  Christians.  The  place  has  no 
manufactures  and  no  trade,  except  that  it  is  to  some 
extent  an  entrepot  for  cloth  from  Calcutta,  which  is  dis- 
tributed from  Barisdl  over  the  district.  There  are  one 
bazd,r  and  two  markets,  one  for  fish  and  one  for  general 
produce.  The  latter  is  held  on  Tuesdays  and  Saturdays. 
Barisdl  is  a  calling-place  for  steamers,  and  its  river  is 
navigable  by  them  all  the  year  round.  It  contains  an 
English  church  (built  in  1845),  a  Baptist  chapel,  a 
Brahma  Samaj  meeting-house,  three  akras  —  namely, 
two  of  Madan  Mohan  and  one  of  Jagannath — five  'kali- 
haris,  and  five  manashas,  though  only  one  of  the  latter 
is  in  a  separate  building.  The  Maliomedans  have  one 
mosque  and  three  or  four  places  of  prayer.  There  are 
a  charitable  dispensary,  estaljlished  in  1847;  a  public 
library,  founded  by  Mr  Kemp  (now  a  Judge  of  the  High 
Court)  in  1855  ;  a  large  civil  and  criminal  jail,  &c.  There 
are  a  very  good  English  school,'  a  vernacular  school,  a 
normal  school,  a  girls'  school,  and  one  or  two  pdtsdlas. 
There  are  two  printing-presses — viz.,  the  Purna  Chan- 
drodai  and  the  Satya  Prakcish.  Four  newspapers  are 
published  at  it — viz.,  the  "  Barisdl  Bartabaha,"  the  "  Hit- 
sadini,"  the  "Bala  Pvaujika,"  and  the  "  Satya  Prakdsh." 
There  are  a  burial-ground  for  Christians,  one  for  Malio- 
medans, and  a  burning  ghat  for  Hindus. 

The  town    is    largely   occupied  by   the    professional 
classes,  such  as  pleaders  and  attorneys,  and  their  servants. 


^  The  present  sclioolliouse 
was  formerly  inhabited  by 
July  1836. 


4 


ise  is,  I  believe,  an  escheat  to  Government.     It  / 

Dr  Spencer,  who  cununitteJ  suicide  in  it  on  2Uth         / 


2  A 


370  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

They  are  only  temporary  residents,  and  hence  at  times, 
when  the  courts  are  closed — such,  for  example,  as  the 
Durga  puja  holidays — the  town  is  almost  deserted.  As 
the  pleaders  and  shopkeepers  do  not  make  the  town 
their  home,  there  are  comj)arativcly  very  few  women  in 
it,  and  even  of  these  a  large  proportion  are  professional 
prostitutes.  This  puts  the  climax  to  the  facts  above 
mentioned  about  the  paucity  of  towns  in  Bengal,  and 
shows  how  the  genius  of  the  people  is  opposed  to  agglo- 
meration in  great  centres  ;  for  not  only  are  the  towns 
few  in  number  and  small  in  point  of  population,  and 
that  too  not  closely  packed  together,  but  there  is  hardly 
any  home-life  in  those  parts  of  the  towns,  such  as  the 
bazdr,  &c.,  where  houses  are  contiguous  enough  to  form 
streets. 

The  affairs  of  the  town  are  managed  by  a  town 
committee  appointed  under  Act  6  of  1868  (Bengal 
Code).  There  are  3042  holdings,  and  these,  for  taxa- 
tion and  other  purj^oses,  are  arranged  in  ten  wards. 
The  income  of  the  committee  is  about  Bs.7000  a 
year,  Rs.6000  of  which  are  derived  from  the  tax  on 
houses  (at  the  rate  of  three  anas  a  month),  Rs.600 
from  the  town  ferry,  and  the  remainder  from  the 
cattle-pounds,  proceeds  of  fishing  licences  in  the  tanks, 
&c.  The  committee  also  generally  receive  a  grant  from 
the  road  fund.  In  1814,  522  houses  were  assessed 
to  the  chaukidari  tax,  the  monthly  collections  were 
Es.65,  and  there  were  17  chaukidars.  In  1819  there 
were  only  378  houses  assessed,  and  the  monthly  collec- 
tions were  only  Rs.46  (M.  28,  5,  19).  There  were  then 
/  13  chaukidars  at  Rs.3  a  month,  and  a  dafadar  at  Es.6. 

V        j  In  1820  there  were  1316  houses  in   the  to^vn  (M.  4,  7, 
V^srMT'  20).     In  1826,  564  houses  were  assessed.     The  Magis- 
trate's cutchery  was  not  finished  till  1830,  and  p>revious 


i 


barisAl. 


371 


to  that  time  the  Maoistrate  held  his  court  in  his  own 
house,  and  got  an  allowance  of  Ks.40  a  month  on  this 
account  (M.  letter,  1826).  In  1827,  Es.l500  were  given 
by  Government  and  Es.925  subscribed  for  improve- 
ments in  the  town,  and  some  tanks  were  dug  in  con- 
sequence, &c.  I  do  not  know  when  the  present  Barisdl 
band  was  made,  but  it  is  mentioned  incidentally  by  Mr 
Chapman,  in  a  letter  dated  2 2d  May  1819,  that  he  had 
left  court  at  about  5  p.m.,  and  that  on  returninir  from  his 
ride  he  was  walking  on  the  bank  of  the  river  with  three 
other  gentlemen.  The  letter  I  have  quoted  describes  a 
mutiny  which  had  arisen  among  the  sepoys  of  the  Pro- 
vincial Battalion  owing  to  one  of  their  number  having 
been  put  in  irons. 

On  25th  February  1833  the  Magistrate  refers  to  the 
bad  repute  of  Barisdl  for  unhealthiness,  and  says  that  a 
fire  which  occurred  in  the  town  showed  by  removing  the 
houses  the  bad  state  of  the  sanatation.  The  town  now 
has  tolerably  wide  and  straight  streets,  and  clearly  it 
owes  them  to  English  influences,  for  natives,  when  left 
to  themselves,  have  no  idea  of  keeping  highways  clear  of 
houses. 

Barisal  has  for  a  considerable  time  been  diluviating, 
and  it  appears  that  within  the  last  twenty  years  about  a 
third  of  the  bazar  portion  has  been  washed  away.  There 
is  a  report  of  6th  December  1854  on  the  subject,  and 
there  is  a  map,  made  in  1857,  and  now  in  the  possession 
of  the  town  committee,  which  shows,  by  comparison  with 
the  present  state  of  the  town,  the  amount  of  land  which 
has  been  carried  away. 


(  37^ 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

GENERAL    REMARKS. 

On  reviewing  tlie  liistory  of  Bdkarganj  for  the  last 
eighty  years,  it  seems  impossible  to  deny  tliat  some  im- 
provements liave  been  effected.  Gang-robbery  lias  been 
in  a  great  measure  suppressed,  and  the  cases  wliicli  still 
occur  seldom  exhibit  the  circumstances  of  atrocious 
cruelty  which  used  to  characterise  the  crime.  Widow- 
burnings  have  ceased,  affrays  have  become  less  frecjuent 
and  less  bloody,  and  the  wrongful  confinement  of  the 
peasantry  and  other  acts  of  high-handed  oj)pression 
have  become  comparatively  rare.  The  rights  of  land- 
lords and  tenants  have  been  defined,  extensive  tracts  of 
country  have  been  brought  into  cultivation,  and  trade 
and  population  have  largely  increased.  School  educa- 
tion has  been  introduced,  and  has  made  some  progress ; 
and  there  has  been,  I  think,  some  change  even  in  the 
character  of  the  people,  who  no  longer  deserve  the  sweeping- 
terms  of  reprobation  employed  by  Mr  Wintle  in  1802. 

As  regards  the  cause  of  these  improvements,  I  think 
that  every  unprejudiced  person  must  acknowledge  that 
they  are  mainly  due  to  the  introduction  of  the  English 
Government.  That  this  has  been  the  chief  cause  seems 
evident  from  the  fact  that  it  is  the  only  important 
change  which  has  taken  place  in  the  country  during  the 
last  two  hundred  years.  If,  then,  the  English  Govern- 
ment has  not  been  the  cause  of  the  improvements  which 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  373 

we  see,  why  ditl  they  not  occur  at  an  earlier  period  ? 
If  other  things  were  the  same  then,  and  tlie  form  of 
government  was  not  worse,  why  was  it  that  much  of 
the  country  was  a  jungle,  that  the  rivers  and  creeks 
were  full  of  piratical  boats,  and  that  life  and  property 
were  e very w^h  ere  insecure  ? 

It  is  natural  that  enthusiastic  Bengalis  should  regret 
the  days  of  their  native  kings,  when  Bdkarganj  was 
ruled  by  a  Rajah  of  Chandrae! vvip,  and  Jessore  had  a 
prince  who  was  powerful  or  audacious  enough  to  dis- 
pute the  supremacy  of  the  Emperor  of  Delhi.  But,  in 
sober  truth,  there  seems  little  reason  to  regret  the  ex- 
tinction of  any  of  the  Hindu  dynasties.  Taken  at  their 
best,  they  seem  to  have  been  chiefly  beneficial  to  idle 
Brdhmans,  and  other  unproductive  classes.  There  is 
no  evidence  that  any  one  of  the  Chandradwip  Rajahs 
was  a  man  of  superior  ability  or  virtue ;  and  we  know 
that  one  of  them  was. insane,  and  that  the  last  lineal 
representative  of  the  family  w^as  an  ignorant  voluptuar)^ 
Pratdpdditya,  the  King  of  Chandecan  or  Jessore,  and 
the  most  famous  and  powerful  of  the  so-called  "  twelve 
suns  of  Bengal,"  seems,  from  his  biography,  to  have 
been  a  brutal  tyrant  who  fell  into  his  proper  place  w^hen 
his  conquerors  shut  him  up  in  an  iron  cage. 

We  may  also  remind  our  Hindu  friends  that  nine  out 
of  the  twelve  above-mentioned  luminaries  are  described 
by  the  Jesuit  priests  as  being  Mahomedans.  Until 
lately  we  had  a  good  illustration  of  the  working  of  a 
petty  Hindu  kingdom  in  the  native  state  of  Kuch 
Behar.  The  Rajah  of  this  little  country  was  not,  it  is 
true,  independent  after  the  treaty  with  the  British 
Government  in  1773,  l)ut  he  enjoyed  considerable  free- 
dom of  action,  and  we  may  judge  from  the  way  in 
which  he   used  it  how  he  would  have  acted  if  he  had 


374  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

been  totally  uncontrolled.  Now  it  was  my  fortune 
some  years  ago  to  be  stationed  at  Kueli  Behar  for  many 
months,  so  tliat  I  bad  an  opportunity  of  studying  its 
history  in  the  old  records,  &e.,  and  I  can  confidently 
state  that  the  condition  of  the  worst-administered  dis- 
trict in  Bengal  is  better  than  that  of  Kuch  Behar  under 
its  native  Eajahs.  The  most  famous  of  the  ancestors 
(Harendra  Narain)  of  the  present  Rajah,  and  the  one 
who,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  seemed  to  be  most  highly 
thought  of  by  the  native  amlah,  was  a  debauchee  and 
a  murderer,  who  only  escaped  punishment  from  the  un- 
willino-ness  of  the  Governor- General  of  the  day  to  inter- 
fere  in  the  internal  afi'airs  of  the  country.  Not  many 
years  ago  there  was  a  native  Eajah  of  Jyntia  in  Syl- 
liet,  and  he  lost  his  territories  (in  1835)  partly  from 
long  misgovernment,  and  partly  because  he  was  believed 
to  have  connived  at  the  kidnapping  of  four  British  sub- 
jects for  the  purposes  of  a  human  sacrifice.  Another 
Rajah  with  whom  I  was  acquainted,  and  who,  though 
not  really  independent,  claimed  certain  privileges  and 
the  possession  of  a  quasi-sovereignty  over  the  neighbour- 
ing hill-tribes — I  refer  to  the  Rajah  of  Susang  in  Mymen- 
sino- — made  use  of  the  latter  in  his  quarrels  with  other 
zamindars,  and  tried  to  screen  them  when  they  had 
committed  a  diabolical  outrage  on  a  Bengali  house- 
hold, and  had  murdered  a  whole  family — man,  woman, 
and  child — of  fifteen  or  sixteen  persons. 

One  of  the  best-known  instances  of  a  modern  Hindu 
kingdom  in  Bengal  is  the  territory  which  used  to  be 
known  as  Independent  Tipperah,  but  which  is  now 
ofiicially  designated  Hill  Tipperah.  There  is  now  a 
political  agent  at  Agartolla,  the  capital  of  the  state,  and 
things  have  perhaps  improved,  but  some  years  ago 
Ti^^perah  was  the  resort  of  all  the  fugitives  from  justice 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  375 

belonging  to  the  neigiibouring  districts.  I  remember 
also  that  wlien,  some  fifteen  or  sixteen  years  ago,  a 
boundary  dispute  was  decided  against  the  Eajah,  and 
a  tract  of  country  which  he  claimed  was  declared  to 
belong  to  the  district  of  Sylhet,  he  revenged  himself 
by  burning  the  villages  in  question,  and  l)y  carry ing 
off  the  inhabitants  into  his  own  dominions.  Another 
instance  of  a  Hindu,  or  at  least  a  semi-Hindu  state,  is 
to  be  found  in  the  country  of  Manipur,  and  I  can  testify 
from  personal  observation  that  things  are  not  in  a  very 
flourishing  or  progressive  state  in  that  territory. 

AVith  more  reason  the  Mahomedan  part  of  the  popu- 
lation, and  even  the  inhabitants  generally  of  Eastern 
Bengal,  may  regret  the  days  of  the  Nawabs  and  their 
deputies,  for  there  was  a  vigour  and  a  power  of  organisa- 
tion- among  the  Mahomedan  rulers  which  were  wanting 
among  the  Hindu  princelings.  We  see  the  difference 
between  them  in  the  way  in  which  they  treated 
the  Arracanese  invasion.  The  Hindus  were  unequal 
to  the  contest,  and  fled  under  the  pretext  of  avoiding 
contamination ;  the  Mohamedans,  on  the  other  hand, 
took  the  more  manly  course  of  grasping  their  nettle, 
established  themselves  at  Dacca,  Avhere  tlie  danger  was 
greatest,  raised  and  maintained  a  fleet,  and  swept  the 
rivers  and  their  estuaries  clear  of  the  Arracanese  and 
the  Portuguese  pirates.  Bengalis,  indeed,  and  esj^ecially 
those  of  Eastern  Bengal,  have  much  reason  to  be  thank- 
ful to  the  Maliomedans,  for  it  is  to  them  that  they  owe 
in  great  measure  their  preservation  from  the  Burmese. 
But  for  the  concjuest  by  the  Mahomedans  of  Sandwip 
and  Chittagong,  it  is  probable  that  much  of  what  is  now 
known  as  Eastern  Bengal  would  have  been  a  portion, 
and  a  deserted  and  despised  portion,  of  tlie  kingdom  of 
Arracan  or  Burmah. 


376  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

It  must  be  admitted,  also,  that  Eastern  Bengal  (though 
not  that  part  of  it  which  forms  the  district  of  Bakarganj) 
has  declined  in  importance,  if  not  in  prosperity,  since  the 
English  conquest.  Dacca  is  no  longer  the  seat  of  a  great 
trade,  and  j^resents  the  melancholy  appearance  of  a  de- 
cayed city.  Various  reasons  may  be  assigned  for  this, 
but  the  principal  one  of  course  is  the  destruction  of  the 
weaving  interests  by  the  importation  of  Manchester 
goods.  English  power  also  was  not  always  as  beneficent 
as  it  now  is,  and  there  was  a  time  when  our  English 
laws,  and  still  more  our  English  desire  to  make  rapid 
fortunes,  wrought  sad  havoc  in  Eastern  Bengal.  This 
was  the  time  of  the  outrages  and  tyrannies  at  the  Bakar- 
ganj bazdr  referred  to  in  a  former  chapter,  and  which 
exhibited  what  Lord  Macaulay  has  called  "  that  most 
frightful  of  all  spectacles,  the  strength  of  civilisation 
without  its  mercy."  This  probably  was  the  most  un- 
happy period  in  the  modern  history  of  Bengal.  There 
Avere  abuses  under  the  Hindu  i^ulers,  and  also  under  the 
Mahomedan  governors,  but  we  suspect  that  the  thirty 
years  before  the  Permanent  Settlement  were  more  acute 
in  their  misery  than  any  which  had  gone  before.  It  says 
much  for  the  vigour  of  our  Government  that  we  have 
been  able  not  only  to  heal  the  wounds  inflicted  in  that 
terrible  time,  but  also  to  raise  the  body  politic  to  a 
higher  stage  of  health  and  wellbeing.^      Perhaps  some 

^  "  It  must  give  pain  to  an  Englishman  to  have  reason  to  think  that  since 
the  accession  of  the  Company  to  tlie  Dewanny,  the  condition  of  the  people 
of  this  country  has  been  worse  than  it  was  before  ;  and  yet  I  am  afraid  that 
the  fact  is  undoubted,  and  I  believe  has  proceeded  from  the  following 
causes  :  The  mode  of  providing  the  Company's  investment ;  the  exporta- 
tion of  specie,  instead  of  importing  a  large  sum  annually  ;  the  strictness 
that  has  been  observed  in  the  collections  ;  the  endeavours  of  all  concerned 
to  gain  credit  by  an  increase  of  revenue  during  the  time  of  their  being  in 
situations,  without  sufficiently  attending  to  what  future  consequences  might 
be  expected  from  such  a  measure  ;  the  errors  that  subsist  in  the  manner 


I 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  377 

will  say  that  I  am  attributing  too  mucli  importance  to 
administrative  action,  and  tliey  may  be  disposed  to  re- 
mind me  of  the  dictum  of  Mr  Buckle,  that  governments 
can  do  but  little  towards  the  advancement  of  a  country. 
But,  in  the  first  place,  if  the  fact  really  be  that  Bengal 
owes  much  of  its  progress  to  the  English  administration, 
it  cannot  be  set  aside  in  favour  of  the  notion  of  any 
individual  writer,  however  eminent ;  aiid  secondly,  I  think 
I  can  show  that  there  is  no  contradiction  in  the  matter. 
Mr  Buckle,  in  saying  that  governments  have  not  done 
much  for  civilisation,  is  not  referring  to  governments 
composed  of  foreigners.  He  begins  his  arguments  by 
the  following  remark  :  "In  the  first  place,  we  have  the 
obvious  consideration,  that  the  rulers  of  a  country  have, 
under  ordinary  circumstances,  always  been  the  inhabi- 
tants of  that  country,  nurtured  by  its  literature,  bred  to 
its  traditions,  and  imbibing  its  prejudices.  Such  men 
are  at  best  only  the  creatures  of  the  age,  never  its  cre- 
ators. Their  measures  are  the  icsult  of  social  progress, 
not  the  cause  of  it"  (vol.  i.  p.  250). 

It  is  plain,  therefore,  that  his  argument  does  not  ap- 
ply to  the  case  of  our  Indian  Government.  He  would 
not,  I  think,  have  denied  that  it  might  exercise  great 
influence  over  the  civilisation  of  Bengal,  any  more  than 
he  would  have  denied  that  the  Roman  or  the  Norman 
government  of  England  had  powerfully  afiected  the  con- 
dition of  that  country. 


of  making  the  collections,  particularly  by  the  employment  of  amils- 
These  appear  to  me  the  principal  causes  -why  this  fine  country,  -which 
flourished  under  the  most  despotic  and  arbitrary  government,  is  verging 
towards  its  ruin,  wliile  the  English  have  really  so  large  a  share  in  the  ad- 
ministration." (Extract  of  letter  of  Mr  Becher  to  the  President,  dated 
24th  May  1769,  quoted  by  Sir  Philip  Francis  in  a  paper  printed  at  p. 
931  of  the  Ninth  Eeport  of  the  House  of  Commons.  See  note  about  famine 
of  1770  in  Appendix  for  a  notice  of  Mr  Becher.) 


378  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

Two  circumstances  in  the  ^Drogress  wliicli  BdkargaDJ 
lias  made  under  Englisli  rule  appear  to  me  to  Ije  deserv- 
ing of  attention.  The  first  is  that  the  non-official  Eng- 
lishman, or  interloper,  as  he  used  to  be  called,  has  had 
very  little  to  do  with  it.  I  do  iiot  mean  to  say  that  the 
district  has  not  been  largely  influenced  by  Calcutta 
merchants,  nor  that  English  literature  has  not  produced 
a  perceptible  effect  on  its  educated  classes.  I  only  wish 
to  point  out  that  hardly  any  non- official  Englishmen 
have  resided  in  the  district  as  indigo-planters  or  traders, 
as  has  been  the  case  in  the  neighbouring  districts  of 
Faridpur  and  Jessore.  Opinions  will  difier  about  the 
effect  of  the  absence  of  these  classes,  and  some  will  think 
it  has  been  a  great  loss  to  the  district.  Still  it  cannot 
be  denied  that  the  peasantry  of  Bakarganj,  or,  in  other 
words,  four-fifths  of  the  population,  are  at  least  as  com- 
fortable as  those  of  Jessore  or  Nadiya,  and  that  they 
have  therefore  done  very  well  without  indigo.  For  my 
own  part,  I  consider  that  Bdkarganj  is  to  be  cougratu- 
lated  on  its  escape  from  a  class  of  residents  who  were 
not  subject  to  the  same  laws  as  the  rest  of  the  com- 
munity.'^ Almost  the  only  non-official  English  resi- 
dents whom  the  district  has  had  have  been  the  Baptist 
missionaries,  and  they  did  not  enter  it  till  1830. 
Their  influence  has  been  almost  entirely  confined  to  its 
north-west  corner,  but  there  it  has,  I  think,  l^een  very 
beneficial.  At  least  I  am  sure  that  the  presence  in  the 
district  for  many  years  of  a  man  so  simple  and  gentle- 
hearted  as  the  late  Mr  Sale  must  have  done  good,  and  I 
know  that  he  was  esteemed  by  all  the  natives  who  knew 

1  At  the  time  of  the  Indigo  Commission  (1860)  Morrellgaiij  was  included 
in  Bakarganj,  and  Mr  Monell's  evidence  (answer  2390,  p.  234)  gives  a 
curious  picture  of  the  al)horrence  which  liis  ryots  had  for  the  cultivation 
of  indigo.  The  same  evidence  gives  some  interesting  details  ahout  the 
cultivation  of  the  Sundarbans. 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  379 

him.  His  predecessor,  Mr  Page,  was  a  man  of  much 
vigour  and  energy,  and  exercised  great  inliuence  over 
his  flock. 

The  second  circumstance  is  that  few  if  any  of  the 
Bdkarganj  officials  appear  to  have  been  men  of  great 
ability,  and  that  none  of  them  has  left  any  deep  impres- 
sion of  himself  on  the  district.  Mr  Douglas,  who  made 
the  Permanent  Settlement,  was  a  man  of  exceptional 
breadth  of  view  and  humanity,  and  Mr  Massie  seems  to 
have  been  energetic  and  able  ;  but  they  lived  at  Dacca, 
and  were  thus  too  far  away  to  exercise  much  influence. 
None  of  the  other  early  Magistrates  or  Collectors  appears 
to  have  risen  much  above  mediocrity,  and  there  is  at 
least  no  one  who  stands  out  in  the  manner  in  which  Mr 
Westland  has  made  Messrs  Henckell  and  Eocke  to  stand 
out  in  the  early  history  of  Jessore ;  though,  indeed, 
even  with  regard  to  Mr  Henckell,  one  has  a  suspicion 
that  he  was  more  energetic  than  prudent,  and  that  his 
schemes  for  the  reformation  of  the  salt  administration, 
&c.,  ended  in  failure.  Certainly  his  plan  for  cultivating 
the  Sundarbans  appears  to  have  brought  loss  to  Govern- 
ment, and  to  have  embroiled  him  with  the  zamindars. 

The  names  of  the  older  officers  have  quite  gone  out 
of  the  memories  of  the  Bdkarganj  people.  The  name 
of  Mr  Batty e,  who  was  Magistrate  in  1811,  survives 
officially  from  his  having  built  a  bridge,  and  from  aii 
outbreak  in  the  jail  having  occurred  in  his  time.  It 
appears  also  from  a  letter  of  the  Court  of  Directors  that 
he  was  very  successful  in  putting  down  dacoity.  Mr 
Chapman,  who  was  Magistrate  in  1819,  is  remembered 
from  his  connection  with  the  burial  -  ground,  which 
appears  to  have  been  formed  by  him,  and  from  his  name 
having  been  given  to  a  tank  which  is  said  to  yield 
the  best  drinking  -  water  in  Barisal.     Mr   Garrett  was 


38o  DISTRIC2'  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

au  active  and  public-spirited  officer,  and  is  remembered 
for  the  improvements  lie  made  in  the  town,  and  for  his 
liaving  assisted  in  the  formation  of  the  first  English 
school.  The  name  of  Mr  Shawe,  who  was  Magistrate  in 
1845,  and  who  at  a  later  period  became  Judge  of  Sylhet, 
is  remembered  on  account  of  his  activity  in  road- making, 
and  of  his  having  ])uilt  the  English  church  ;  wliile  his 
contemporary,  Mr  Sturt,  is  remembered  for  the  extrava- 
gance of  his  entertainments,  the  defalcations  which 
occurred  in  his  treasury,  and  above  all,  ^^erhaps,  for  the 
great  eclat  with  which  on  one  occasion  he  had  the  Kali 
puja  celebrated  in  the  l^azdr  as  a  means  of  averting  the 
cholera. 

Another  officer  (Mr  Morris  Beaufort)  is  remembered 
on  account  of  his  having  sentenced  a  notoriously  oppres- 
sive zamindar  to  a  term  of  imprisonment,  and  then 
compelled  him  to  work  at  the  road  leading  from  the 
Magistrate's  house  to  the  cutchery.  The  path  is  to  this 
day  known  by  the  name  of  Nil  Kanth  Eai's  road. 

Perhaps  the  names  which  linger  longest  in  the  memo- 
ries of  the  people  are  those  of  the  Settlement  officers,  for 
they  are  intertwined  with  their  dearest  interests.  I 
have  referred  in  another  chapter  to  the  great  fame  in 
the  eastern  districts  of  Sir  Henry  Pdcketts.  Similarly 
Mr  Dampier's  name  will  long  remain  in  the  island 
of  Sandwip  on  account  of  his  settlement  of  it,  while 
that  of  his  assistant,  Sir  Frederick  Halliday,  is  remem- 
bered in  Noaklidli  for  his  settlement  of  the  island  of 
Hattia,  &c. 

In  Bdkarganj  one  of  the  most  noted  names  among 
those  of  Settlement  officers  is  that  of  Mr  James  Eeilly, 
who  settled  the  large  Government  estate  of  Tushkhd-li, 
and  who  was  in  fact  Collector  of  the  district  during  the 
incumbency  of  Mr  Reid. 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  381 

Of  late  years  I  do  uofc  know  that  auy  name  has  been 
more  widely  known  among  the  people  than  that  of  one 
who  was  never  anything  higher  than  an  unco ven anted 
Deputy-Collector  and  Deputy-Magistrate.  I  refer  to  the 
late  Babu  Dinu  Bandhu  Maulik,  who  lield  office  in  the 
district  for  several  years,  and  acquired  a  great  influence 
over  the  peoj^le.  He  left  the  impress  of  himself  on 
nearly  every  department  of  the  administration,  but  was 
especially  famed  as  a  good  police-magistrate.  So  useful 
was  he  that  he  never  could  get  leave  of  absence,  and  I 
think  it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  his  premature  death, 
when  only  about  thirty -four  years  of  age,  was  in  a 
great  measure  owing  to  overwork.  Curiously  enough  ^ 
this  man,  who  was  so  popular  with  the  natives,  and 
Avho  also  did  so  much  good  service,  was  far  from  being 
esteemed  by  some  of  the  higher  authorities,  and  more 
than  once  narrowly  escaped  dismissal.  '^ 

In  the  above  review  I  am,  of  course,  only  speaking  of 
officials.  If  I  were  to  mention  non-officials,  there  are  at 
least  two  who  have  exercised  more  influence  than  any 
judge  or  magistrate.  I  refer  to  the  Mahomedan  preach- 
ers named  Keramat  Ali  and  Dudliu  Mia.  The  name  of  the 
latter  is  widely  known,  and  he  and  his  father,  Shariyat- 
oolah,  may  be  called  the  founders  of  the  sect  of  Ferazis. 
Dudhu  Mia's  character,  however,  was  stained  with  vices, 
and  I  am  not  prepared  to  say  that  his  influence  has  been 
beneficial.  On  the  other  hand,  from  all  that  I  have 
heard,  Keramat  Ali,  who  was  a  native  of  Juanptir,  was 
a  man  of  a  very  pure  and  disinterested  character,  and 
did  much  good  by  preaching  sound  morality.  He  has 
certainly  exercised  much  more  influence  over  the  com- 
mon people  than  Kesliab  Chandra  Sein,  and  I  should 
think  that  he  was  the  truer  and  more  modest  man  of 
the  two. 


382  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

Religion. — The  mention  of  tliese  two  men  brings  me 
to  tlie  consideration  of  religion,  and  of  the  possibility  of 
the  country's  ever  becoming  Christianised.  At  present, 
as  we  have  seen,  two-thirds  of  the  population  are  Maho- 
medans,  and  I  cannot  say  that  there  seems  any  likeli- 
hood of  their  soon  throwino-  off  the  shackles  of  their  faith. 
Some  might  even  say  that  there  is  an  appearance  of 
their  wishino-  to  draw  them  tio;hter,  for  Feraziism  is 
undoubtedly  a  puritanical  movement,  and  an  endeavour 
to  return  to  the  supposed  greater  strictness  of  the  primi- 
tive Church.  But  such  movements  may  indicate  fear 
rather  than  strength,  and  may  testify  to  a  dying  out  of 
Mahomedan  faith,  just  as  the  spread  of  Ultramontanism 
is  significant  of  the  vogue  of  infidelity.  However,  the 
great  body  of  the  peasantry  seem  to  be  still  sincerely 
attached  to  their  religion,  which  after  all  does  not  inter- 
fere much  with  their  life,  nor  call  upon  them  for  any 
important  sacrifices,  except  in  the  month  of  fasting. 
Singularly  enough,  the  educated  Mahomedans  do  not  ex- 
hibit any  signs  of  scepticism,  and  appear  to  reverence  their 
Koran  almost  as  much  as  their  more  ignorant  brethren. 
If  the  fact  be  so,  it  is  not  a  little  strange,  for  the  Koran 
is,  at  least  in  Sale's  translation,  such  an  unintelligible 
and  wearisome  book,  that  it  is  difficult  to  imagine  how 
any  intellectual  person  can  believe  it  to  contain  a  divine 
message.  The  number  of  educated  Mahomedans,  how- 
ever, is  very  small,  and  I  have  had  little  opj^ortunity  of 
judging  of  their  real  sentiments.  It  may  be,  therefore, 
that  free-thought  has  made  more  progress  among  them 
than  I  am  aware  of. 

Among  the  Hindus  the  prevailing  worships  are  those 
of  Kali,  or  Durga,  and  Vishnu.  The  worship  of  Siva  is 
comparatively  rare.  The  common  peojDle  are  consider- 
ably addicted  to  idolatry,  and  are  fond,  especially  the 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  383 

womankind  of  tlicm,  of  worsliipping  sacred  trees,  &c. 
I  have  seen  a  tree  near  Sarupkiltti  almost  covered  with 
hair,  which  had  been  hnng  np  by  parents  in  fulfilment 
of  vows  that  if  their  child  recovered  they  would  cut  off 
his  hair,  and  make  a  votive  offering  of  it  to  the  tree,  or 
rather,  I  suppose,  to  the  goddess  who  was  believed  to 
reside  there.  The  educated  Hindus  have  for  the  most 
part  lost  all  faith  in  their  religion,  and  are  deists  or 
atheists.  Many  of  them  reject  the  doctrine  of  a  future 
life.  The  organisation  of  the  Brahma  Samaj,  however, 
is  not  making  much  progress,  and  many  Hindus  seem 
inclined  now  to  draw  back  and  to  return  to  the  customs 
of  their  country,  even  where  they  are  tinged  with  idola- 
trous associations.  Christianity  is  not  making  any  pro- 
gress in  the  district,  and  I  do  not  see  the  least  likelihood 
of  its  ever  becoming  the  prevalent  religion.  Although 
there  is  an  English  church  at  Barisdl,  there  is  no  resident 
clergyman,  and  the  spiritual  wants  of  the  members  of 
the  church  are  attended  to  by  the  Dacca  chaplain,  who 
visits  the  place  once  a  cparter.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  in 
time  the  principle  of  disestablishment  will  be  at  least 
partially  carried  out  in  Bengal,  and  that  people  who  arc 
so  very  "  churchy "  that  they  cannot  enter  a  Baptist 
chapel  will  not  be  indulged  at  the  public  expense  in  their 
exclusivism. 

Considerable  as  has  been  the  progress  of  the  Bengal 
districts  under  English  rule,  it  would  doubtless  have 
been  much  greater  under  more  favourable  circumstances. 
Probably  the  frequent  changes  of  officers  have  been  the 
greatest  obstacle  to  improvement.  A  gentleman  who 
has  resided  in  Barisal  for  about  five-and- twenty  years 
tells  me  that  during  that  time  he  successively  served 
under  twenty-four  Collectors  of  the  district  and  nine 
Commissioners  of  the   division.     Biikarganj    has   been 


^384  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

worse  off  in  this  respect  than  otlier  districts,  for  it  has 
generally  been  disliked  as  a  residence,  and  therefore  most 
officers  who  have  been  appointed  to  it  have  tried  to  get 
away  as  soon  as  possible.  Other  districts,  however, 
have  not  beeii-much  more  fortunate.  Dr  Taylor,  in  his 
"  Topography  of  Dacca,"  tells  us  that  "  from  the  year 
1781  to  1839  fifty-nine  civil  servants  have  filled  the 
office  of  magistrate,  but  of  this  number  thirty  have  only 
been  in  temporary  charge  ;  the  average  duration,  there- 
fore, of  each  Magistrate's  appointment  has  been  two 
years,  the  longest  period  four  years  and  twenty-seven 
days.  The  number  of  Collectors  for  the  same  time  was 
tliirty;seven ;  twenty  of  this  number  have  been  acting 
Collectors  :  the  longest  period  for  which  a  permanent 
Collector  has  held  office  is  six  years  and  forty-five  days." 
Nor  is  it  only  the  Collectors  and  Magistrates  who  have 
been  frequently  changed.  Transfers  have  been  quite  as  rife 
among  the  subdivisional  officers,  the  dej)uty-magistrates 
and  deputy- collectors,  the  police  officers,  &c.  At  one 
time  the  Board  of  Eevenue  went  so  far  as  to  pass  an 
order  that  no  native  ministerial  officer  should  remain 
in  the  same  district  more  than  three  years.  The  result 
of  this  notable  order  (which  was  passed  with  the  idea  of 
diminishing  corruption)  was  that  poorly  -  paid  natives 
were  driven  from  their  homes,  and  subjected  to  much 
expense  and  inconvenience,  and  that  hardly  any  one 
remained  in  a  district  office  who  had  local  experience,  or 
who  could  help  his  newly-arrived  Collector  out  of  a  dif- 
ficulty. At  length,  after  much  heart-burning  and  dis- 
tress had  been  occasioned,  and  after  the  efficiency  of 
many  offices  had  been  crippled,  the  Board  were  pleased 
to  place  the  order  in  abeyance,  though  I  am  not  aware 
that  it  has  been  formally  cancelled.  Attempts  have  been 
made  of  late  years  to  diminish  the  frequency  of  transfers. 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  385 

Lilt  tliey  have  not  been  very  successful,  and  in  fact  the 
inherent  difficulties  of  the  matter  are  too  great  to  admit 
of  the  hope  that  they  will  ever  be  overcome  so  long  as 
the  administration  is  in  the  hands  of  foreiirners. 

In  the  report  on  the   administration -j^f  Bengal  for 
1872-73,  Sir  George  Campbell  writes  as  follows  :  "It 
must  be  admitted  that  in  the  inferior  grades  of  the  ser- 
vice, covenanted  and  uncovenanted,  permanency  has  not 
yet  been  attained.    The  present  leave  and  service  rules 
are  so  favourable  to  change,  the  varieties  of  climate  and 
of  amenities  or  disamenities  in  Bennjal  stations  afford 
such  temptations  to  seek  change,  the  habit  of  going  fre- 
quently to  Europe  has  so  much  grown  among  the  European 
servants  of  Government,  and  so  many  of  the  native  ser- 
vants so  persistently  strive  by  every  device  to  avoid  and 
get  rid  of  out-of-the-way  and  disagreeable  stations,  that 
it  is  very  hard  indeed  for  those  who  administer  so  great 
a  government  with  such  a  mass  of  Government  servants 
to  hold  its  own  against  so  many  who,  for  one  reason  or 
other,    seek    change.      So   many   interests   are    set  in 
motion,  that  it  is  a  matter  of  extreme  difficulty  to  avoid 
the  necessity  of  making  several  changes  when  a  vacancy 
occurs  before  things  settle  down.     It  is,  in  fact,  a  sort 
of  game  of  chess,  as  it  were,  in  which  the  Government 
is  very  unequally  pitted  against  a  great  many  players, 
and  it  is  hardly  possible  to  give  to  each  move  the  atten- 
tion and  the  calculation  of  contingencies  which  is  neces- 
sary to  avoid  being  taken  at  a  disadvantage  by  one  or 
other  of  them.     The  Lieutenant-Governor  has  been,  he 
may  say,  shocked  to  find  how  many  changes  have  oc- 
curred during  the  year  among  the  subdivisional   and 
other  subordinate  officials  of  some  districts,  in  spite  of 
all  his  stru2fo;les  to  avoid  chano^e." 

In  the  above  extract  the  Lieutenant-Governor  deals 

2b 


386  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

only  witli  changes  among  the  subordinate  officers.  But 
the  changes  among  the  heads  of  great  departments 
are  nearly  quite  as  frequent,  and  are  more  injuri- 
ous to  the  public  service.  The  Governors-General, 
the  Lieutenant  -  Governors,  the  Judges  of  the  High 
Court  and  of  the  District  Courts,  and  the  Commis- 
sioners follow  one  another  in  rapid  succession,  and 
hence  there  is  great  want  of  stability  in  our  adminis- 
tration. 

One  effect  of  such  frequent  changes  is  to  give  an  air 
of  grandeur  and  solidity  to  everything  in  the  country 
which  is  permanent.  Victor  Hugo  somewhere  remarks, 
that  whatever  was  the  real  character  of  Louis  XIV., 
he  acquired  a  semblance  of  greatness  from  the  mere 
length  of  his  reign,  and  from  his  thus  presenting  an 
appearance  of  immobility  amidst  the  revolutions  and 
chanojes  of  the  kino-doms  around  him.  Li  like  man- 
ner,  amidst  the  incessant  flux  of  our  administration, 
the  inert  Bengali  landowner,  living  from  youth  to 
agje  in  his  ancestral  home,  and  distributino^  a  rude  and 
unequal  justice  among  his  tenantry,  or  the  village 
watchman  going  the  rounds  of  his  native  hamlet  year 
after  year,  forms  a  not  unimposing  picture  of  steadiness 
and  uniformity. 

The  moral  which  these  facts  teach  seems  to  be,  that 
we  should  endeavour  to  place  the  internal  administra- 
tion of  the  country  as  much  as  possible  in  the  hands  of 
natives.  And  in  doing  so,  we  should,  I  think,  not  only 
appoint  Bengalis  to  ap^Dointments  in  Bengal,  but  should, 
other  things  being  equal,  give  the  preference  to  inhabi- 
tants of  the  district,  and  even  of  the  subdivision,  in 
whicfr  the  vacancy  occurs.  Bengal  cannot  afford  to  be 
administered  by  foreigners,  and  the  inhabitants  of  one 
part  of  India  are  often   almost  as  much  foreigners  in 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  387 

another  part  of  it  as  Europeans  are.  A  Bengali  of 
Nadiya  or  Huglili  will  not  serve  in  Eastern  Bengal  for 
less  than  Rs.200  a  mouth,  but  the  same  man  would 
gladly  take  office  near  his  home  for  one-half  of  this 
amount.  Already  we  have  made  a  commencement 
towards  localising  the  administration  by  choosing  our 
rural  registrars  from  among  the  inhabitants  of  the 
registration  circle,  and  it  only  remains  to  give  them 
magisterial  powers.  Of  course  this  can  only  be  done 
gradually,  and  on  proof  of  the  fitness  of  each  ofiicer  to 
discharge  judicial  duties.  The  system  of  appointing 
honorary  magistrates,  and  of  thus  making  zamindars 
and  others  discharge  the  duties  of  country  justices  of 
the  peace,  has  been  lately  revived  in  Bengal,  and  has 
had  some  good  effect.  I  think,  however,  that  it  will 
not  become  really  successful  until  more  confidence  is 
placed  in  the  gentleniien  selected  for  the  duties,  and 
they  be  not  absolutely  deljarred  from  trying  cases 
occurring  in  their  own  estates.  At  present  the  more 
property  a  zamindar  has,  the  less  useful  is  he  as  an 
honorary  magistrate,  because  the  fewer  are  the  cases  in 
his  neighbourhood  which  he  is  supposed  competent  to 
try. 

Interesting  attempts  have  of  late  been  made  to  de- 
velop municipal  institutions,  and  to  form  what  have 
been  called  village  communes.  And  there  is  no  doubt 
that  this  is  eventually  the  direction  which  reform  in 
Bengal  will  assume.  The  days  of  individualism  ?lnd 
personal  government  seem,  to  be  over  in  that  country. 
We  have  got  beyond  the  days  of  the  strong  man  of 
Carlyle  and  the  Panjib,  who  is  to  put  everything  to 
rights  by  a  glance  of  his  eye.  Personal  governiT3i;ent  of 
this  kind  may  do  very  well  among  the  hill  tribes  and  in 
some  other  parts  of  India,  but  it  is  quite  out  of  date  in 


388  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

Bengal.^  A  late  Lieutenant-Governor,  wlio  was  endowed 
with  rare  energy  and  quickness,  but  who  came  to  Bengal 
with  notions  derived  from  less-advanced  parts  of  India, 
made  a  vigorous  attempt  to  establish  personal  govern- 
ment ;  but  though  his  intensity,  and  still  more  the 
strength  of  his  position,  enabled  him  to  make  himself 
felt  in  the  remotest  villages  of  his  government,  yet  no 
permanent  effect  was  produced.  Many  of  his  measures 
have  been  silently  abandoned  or  changed  by  his  suc- 
cessor ;  and  it  seems  to  me  that,  great  as  Sir  George 
Campbell's  abilities  undoubtedly  were,  the  chief  good 
effected  by  his  administration  was  the  demonstration 
it  afforded  of  the  hopelessness  of  any  merely  individual 
attcmjDt  to  counteract  a  national  will. 

No  doubt  it  seems  melancholy  to  some  that  the  days 
of  hero-worship  are  over.  They  have  trusted  that  some 
great  man  would  deliver  them  and  their  country  from 
the  evils  under  which  they  laboured,,  and  have  been 
disappointed  that  he  has  not  come.  Tennyson  has 
expressed  this  sentiment  of  sadness  at  the  growing  great- 
ness of  the  world  in  the  passage  where  he  speaks  of  the 

^  "  While  I  admit  tliat  tlie  abridgment  of  discretion  by  written  laws  is  to 
some  extent  an  evil — tliougli,  under  the  actual  circumstances  of  India,  an 
inevitable  evil — I  do  not  admit  the  proposition  which  is  sometimes 
advanced,  that  the  natives  of  India  dislike  the  abridgment  of  official 
discretion.  This  assertion  seems  to  me  not  only  unsupported  by  any 
evidence,  but  to  be  contrary  to  all  the  probabilities.  It  may  be  allowed 
that  in  some  cases  discretionary  government  is  absolutely  necessary  ;  but 
why  should  a  people,  which  measures  religious  zeal  and  personal  rank  and 
respectability  by  rigid  adherence  to  usage  and  custom,  have  a  fancy  for 
rapid  changes  in  the  actions  of  its  governors,  and  prefer  a  regimen  of 
discretion,  sometimes  close  upon  caprice,  to  a  regimen  of  law  ?  I  do  not 
profess  to  know  the  natives  of  this  country  as  well  as  others,  but  if  they 
are  to  be  judged  by  their  writings,  they  have  no  such  preference.  The 
educated  youth  of  India  certainly  affect  a  dislike  of  many  things  which 
they  do  not  care  about,  and  pretend  to  many  tastes  which  they  do  not  really 
share  ;  but  the  repugnance  which  they  invariably  profess  for  discretionary 
government  has  always  seemed  to  me  genuinely  hearty  and  sincere." — 
3f time's  Village  Comnmnities,  Appendix  I.  p.  215. 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  389 

iudivicliial  witliering  and  of  the  world  becoming  more  and 
more/  But,  in  fact,  the  complaint  is  a  somewJiat  idle  and 
querulous  one,  and  need  not  seriously  disturb  us.  True 
it  is,  that  as  the  world  advances,  its  dependence  upon 
any  individual  man  becomes  less  and  less  ;  but  when  wo 
consider  the  shortness  and  uncertainty  of  human  life, 
this  is  a  motive  for  rejoicing  rather  than  for  sorrow. 
It  is  better  that  nowadays,  if  a  great  man  die,  he  leaves 
five  hundred  as  good  as  he,  than  that,  as  when  Charle- 
magne or  Akbar  died,  there  should  be  no  one  to  fill  the 
void.  Nor  need  we  fear  that  the  individual  must  ivither, 
for  the  world  is  made  up  of  units ;  and  no  assemblage 
of  withered  individuals,  however  great,  will  ever  make 
a  prosperous  world.  If,  then,  the  Avorld  is  to  wax  greater 
and  greater,  as  apparently  it  will,  individuals  must  rise 
higher  and  higher,  though  at  the  same  time  the  absolute 
importance  of  any  one  of  them  must  diminish. 

Although  we  feel  assured  that  some  reform  in  which 
the  whole  country  takes  a  share  must  be  the  ultimate 
remedy  for  Bengal,  and  that  comparatively  little  can 
be  done  by  individuals,  yet  it  is  not  easy  to  predict  the 
form  which  the  change  will  take.  Some  have  thought 
of  reviving  the  village  system ;  but,  in  fact,  this  is  a 
system  which  never  had  a  vigorous  existence  in  Lower 
Bengal,  and  is  now  altogether  decayed.  The  village 
system,  of  which  we  hear  so  much,  may  work  well  in 
Madras  and  the  North- Western  Provinces,  but  in  Bengal 
it  seems  to  be  an  anachronism.  Besides,  it  is  a  Hindu 
institution,  and  therefore  we  cannot  expect  it  to  flourish 

1  "  Knowledge  comes,  but  wisdom  lingers,  and  I  linger  by  the  shore, 
And  the  individual  withers,  and  the  world  is  more  and  more. 
Knowledge  comes,  but  wisdom  lingers,  and  he  bears  a  laden  breast 
Full  of  sad  experience,  moving  toward  the  stillness  of  his  rest." 

The  words  are  those  of  a  man  who  has  been  soured  by  disappoiiilmcnt 
and  treachery,  and  are  quite  appropriate  in  his  mouth.  We  need  not  take 
them  to  be  expressive  of  the  poet's  own  sentiments. 


390  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

in  Mahomedau  districts  such  as  Bakarganj  and  the  other 
districts  of  Eastern  Bengal.  Villages  in  Bdkarganj  are 
very  different  from  villages  in  the  North-West,  or  even  in 
Western  Bengal.  The  houses  in  them  are  not  grouped 
together,  and  there  is  little  feeling  of  companionship 
among  the  different  householders.  The  old  village  boun- 
daries have  also  been  obliterated  in  many  cases  by  the 
formation  of  chars  or  by  diluviation.  There  is  certainly 
nothing  in  them  which  corresponds  to  the  organisation 
which  we  read  of  in  Elphinstone.  There  is  no  village 
accountant  or  village  barber,  nor  even  was  there  origin- 
ally any  village  watchman,  for  the  last  is  the  introduc- 
tion of  the  English  Government,  and  was  unknown  till 
the  last  fifty  or  sixty  years.  And  the  village  watchman, 
or  chaukidar,  as  he  is  called,  bears  traces  of  his  being  a 
new  institution  ;  for  we  often  find  that  he  does  not  even 
live  in  the  village  he  is  supposed  to  guard,  and  it  is 
with  great  difficulty  that  he  ever  gets  his  pay  from  the 
villagers. 

"  In  Backergunge  the  villages  are  more  scattered  and 
less  defined  than  in  Jessore  and  Faridpur ;  indeed  in 
many  parts  are  not  defined  at  all,  each  villager  having 
ordinarily  selected  as  the  site  for  his  house  the  spot 
which  appeared  to  him  to  be  most  eligible  in  relation  to 
his  agricultural  pursuits,  and  wholly  without  reference 
to  any  future  village  community.  This  want  of  defini- 
tion became  a  source  of  great  difficulty  when  compiling 
the  map  of  the  district  in  the  Surveyor-General's  office. 
It  was  often  impossible  to  say  whereabouts  to  fix  the 
dot  or  other  conventional  mark  to  designate  the  village." 
— GastrelVs  Report. 

Nor  is  there  any  feeling  of  local  patriotism  or  of 
fellowship  among  the  inhabitants  of  the  same  village. 
The  village  is  in  most  instances  of  too  recent  origin,  the 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  391 

houses  are  too  scattered,  and  ryots  migrate  too  readily 
from  one  village  to  another  to  admit  of  the  growth  of 
such  feelings.  Brjihmans  and  other  non-agricultural 
classes  live  for  generations  on  the  same  homesteads  ;  but, 
as  a  general  rule,  the  tenancy  of  cultivators  is  of  short 
duration,  and  I  think  that  if  the  ryots  of  a  village  were 
interrogated,  it  would  be  found  that  most  of  them  had 
been  settled  in  it  for  less  than  twelve  years.  Some 
villages  are  chiefly  inhabited  by  one  caste  or  profession. 
Thus  Kalasgram  is  full  of  Brdhmans,  Banaripara  is  full 
of  Kayasts,  and  Baukd,tti  has  for  generations  been  cele- 
brated for  the  number  of  its  thieves.  But,  as  a  general 
rule,  the  inhabitants  of  a  village  are  a  heterogeneous 
assemblage,  and  have  few  ties  with  one  another.  At 
least  one-half  of  them  are  generally  Mahomedans,  and 
the  remainder  is  composed  of  Hindus,  who  again  arc 
subdivided  into  castes  and  dais  wdiich  do  not  inter- 
mingle. The  land  of  a  village  does  not  belong  to  the 
village  community,  nor  are  there  any  waste  or  pasturage 
lands  in  which  all  the  villas-ers  and  no  others  can  share. 
The  occupancy  right  in  each  plot  generally  belongs  to  a 
ryot,  but  the  rights  of  receiving  rent,  &c.,  are  generally 
held  by  some  taluqdar  or  zamiudar  who  often  lives  a 
great  way  off. 

These  last  rights  are  not  always  or  even  generally 
vested  in  one  man,  so  that  the  inhabitants  of  a  village 
have  frequently  different  landlords  and  different  rates 
of  rent.  In  fact  it  may  be  said  that  they  have  often 
nothing  in  common  except  contiguity  of  residence,  and 
even  this  does  not  always  exist,  for  the  houses  in  a 
village  are  often  an  hour's  journey  apart  from  one 
another. 

Within  certain  limits  the  people  of  Bdkarganj  are 
great    travellers,    and    at   all   events   they   cannot   be 


392  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

described  as  never  losing  sigiit  of  their  native  village. 
The  absence  of  railways  or  steamboats  prevents  them 
from  undertaking  distant  journeys,  but  they  frequently 
visit  the  headquarters  of  their  district  to  look  after  their 
lawsuits,  to  consult  their  landlord's  agent,  &c. 

Their  relatives  and  friends  are  widely  scattered,  and 
the  facilities  for  locomotion  afforded  by  the  numerous 
rivers  and  the  general  possession  of  boats  are  so  great, 
especially  during  the  rains,  that  they  spend  much  time 
in  paying  visits  either  with  or  without  their  wives  and 
families.  Thus  a  man  w^ill  have  his  home  in  one  par- 
gana,  his  father-in-law's  in  a  second,  his  son-in-law's  in 
a  third,  and  almost  innumerable  uncles  and  cousins — 
dharam-'pitas  and  dliaram-ioutras — scattered  over  the 
country.  Every  now  and  then  one  of  his  friends  or 
relatives  gives  a  feast,  and  as  the  Bengali  ryot  is  gene- 
rally only  accountable  to  himself  for  the  employment  of 
his  time,  and  is  not  a  labourer  paid  by  the  day,  there  is 
nothing  to  hinder  him  from  accepting  the  invitation,  or 
from  spending  two  or  three  days  in  a  jaunt  with  his 
wife  and  children.  Owing  to  the  scarcity  of  land  in  the 
more  populous  parts  of  the  district,  and  to  the  posses- 
sion of  herds  of  buffaloes,  &c.,  it  is  no  uncommon  thing 
for  a  ryot  to  have  two  homesteads.  In  one  he  lives 
with  his  wife  and  family,  and  the  other,  called  his 
do-alia  hdri,  he  visits  during  the  cultivating  season, 
and  often  inhabits  for  two  or  three  months  at  a  time. 

For  all  these  reasons  I  think  it  will  be  impossible  to 
make  the  village  the  unit  of  administration,  and  that  it 
•will  be  necessary  to  take  something  wider,  such  as  the 
thana  or  the  regis,tration  circle. 

Destruction  of  Wild  Animals. — There  is  one  im- 
provement which  I  think  might  be  accomplished  without 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  393 

great  difficulty,  and  which  would  be  of  great  benefit  to 
the  people.  I  refer  to  the  destruction  of  tigers,  leopards, 
crocodiles,  and  other  wild  animals.  I  have  often  won- 
dered that  the  British  India  Association,  or  the  People's 
Association,  or  some  other  of  the  societies  which  Young 
Bengal  delights  to  form,  has  not  taken  in  hand  a  work 
so  simple  and  so  clearly  useful.  A  very  moderate 
amount  of  organisation  and  of  expense  might  suffice  to 
stamp  out  the  plague  of  noxious  animals  in  most  dis- 
tricts of  Bengal.  In  Bdkarganj  the  greatest  number  of 
deaths  by  carnivorous  animals  is  caused  by  crocodiles, 
and  yet,  strange  to  say,  no  reward  is  ordinarily  allo^ved 
by  Government  for  their  destruction.  There  is  said  to 
be  a  tril)e  of  men  in  the  Dacca  Division  whose  peculiar 
business  it  is  to  harpoon  crocodiles,  and  as  .Government 
has  not  thought  fit  to  undertake  the  task  of  extirpation, 
I  think  that  the  wealthy  zamindars  of  the  division 
could  not  do  better  than  employ  this  tribe  to  do  so.^ 
Tigers  and  leopards  are  numerous  in  Bdkarganj,  but  it 
is  somewhat  surprising  to  find  how  few  human  beings 
are  killed  by  them.  They  are  principally  destructive  to 
cattle  and  goats.  Yet  it  would  be  a  great  mistake  to 
suppose  that  because  tigers  and  leopards  only  kill  a  few 
men  in  the  year,  their  ravages  are  not  very  injurious  to 
the  community.  We  cannot  measure  the  harm  they  do 
by  the  number  of  human  beings  whom  they  kill  or 
wound.  The  distress  and  panic  which  they  cause,  and 
the  obstruction  which  they  ofi'er  to  the  performance  of 

1  The  chief  sufferers  from  alligators  are  women  and  children,  who  are 
struck  down  by  them  (the  alligator  is  said  to  knock  them  down  with  his 
tail)  when  bathing  or  Avhen  fetching  water,  and  who  have  not  the  strength 
or  the  presence  of  mind  to  recover  themselves.  'It  is  very  rarely  that 
Europeans  are  carried  off  by  them.  Colonel  Wilford,  however,  mentions 
("Asiatic  Kesearches,"  voL  xiv.)  that  Mr  B.  Plaistcd,  one  of  our  early  sur- 
veyors, was  carried  off  in  the  Sundarbans  by  an  alligator,  which  he  mistook 
for  the  rotten  trunk  of  a  tree. 


394  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

work,  are  evils  of  much  more  general  consequence. 
Thus  a  tiger  may  j)6rliaps  kill  only  one  man  in  a  vil- 
lage, but  the  terror  which  he  produces  will  spread  over 
a  whole  pargana,  and  prevent  people  from  travelling  at 
night,  delay  postal  communications,  &c.  So  the  fact  of 
a  crocodile's  being  seen  in  a  reach  of  the  river,  or  of  his 
having  carried  off,  or  attempted  to  carry  off,  any  one 
from  a  ghat,  will  produce  uneasiness  among  thousands 
of  bathers,  and  of  women  who  have  to  come  daily  to 
the  river  to  draw  Avater.  In  matters  of  this  kind  it  is 
the  indirect  effects  which  are  most  serious.  The  direct 
injury  inflicted  by  a  dacoity  may  not  be  very  great,  but 
the  indirect  effect  may  be  to  paralyse  the  trade  of  a 
large  bazdr. 

We  may  a|)ply  this  consideration  when  reflecting  on 
the  benefit  which  the  British  Government  conferred  on 
the  country  by  the  abolition  of  sati.  When  we  look  at 
the  returns  of  widow  -  burnings  from  the  various  dis- 
tricts, the  surprising  thing,  perhaps,  is  not  that  there 
were  so  many  cases,  but  that  there  were  so  few.  In 
Bdkarganj,  in  the  year  of  the  cholera  (1825),  when 
upwards  of  25,000  persons  died  in  a  few  months,  the 
total  amount  of  satis  was  only  sixty-three.  It  is  evi- 
dent, therefore,  that  the  great  majority  of  the  Hindu 
widows  abstained  from  the  rite.  But  this  must  not 
make  us  conclude  that  its  abolition  was  of  small  conse- 
quence. The  real  evil  of  it,  perhaps,  was  the  sickening 
dread  which  every  Hindu  wife,  and  all  who  loved  her, 
must  have  felt  whenever  her  husband  was  ill,  or  even 
when  she  was  given  in  marriage.  And,  perhaps,  worse 
than  even  this  must  have  been  the  loss  of  self-respect 
felt  by  every  Hindu  widow  who  could  not  bring  herself 
to  submit  to  being  burnt. 

Wild  pigs  are  extremely  destructive  to  the  crops,  and 


GENERAL  REMAKES.  395 

I  am  sorry  to  say  that  some  Englislimen  have  been  selfish 
enough  to  try  to  prevent  the  peasantry  from  kilUug  them. 
Of  late  years  the  sport  of  pig-sticking  has  been  revived 
in  the  district  of  Dacca,  and  I  have  been  creditably  in- 
formed that  the  Commissioner  and  the  Ma«:istrate  de- 
prived  many  of  the  native  shikaris  or  sportsmen  of  their 
guns,  on  the  pretext,  indeed,  that  there  was  danger  of 
their  being  used  in  affrays,  but  really  lest  the  pigs  should 
be  killed,  and  the  sport  of  the  gentlemen  thereby  inter- 
fered with/ 

Much  loss  of  life  is  caused  by  snake -bite,  and  as  no 
remedy  against  the  poison  has  yet  been  discovered,  it  is 
probable  that  the  only  thing  to  be  done  is  to  endeavour 
to  extirpate  snakes.  This,  however,  is  obviously  a  more 
difficult  and  expensive  work  than  the  extirpation  of  tigers 
and  crocodiles.  Government  already  has  moved  in  the 
matter,  and  a  small  reward  is  given  in  certain  places  for 
the  killing  of  the  cobra  de  capello. 

Note  to  General  Remarks. 

As  I  have  said  that  Bengal  cannot  afford  to  be  admini- 
stered by  foreigners,  it  may  perhaps  be  supposed  that  I 
am  one  of  those  who  advocate  the  immediate  abandon- 
ment of  India  by  Great  Britain.  Such,  however,  is  not 
the  case.     I  have  a  great  respect  for  Dr  Congreve,  and  I 

1  A  correspondent  of  the  "  Times  "  gravely  objected  a  year  or  two  ago  to  the 
destruction  of  tigers,  on  the  ground  that  it  interfered  with  sport  !  This  re- 
minds us  of  Gibbon's  note  about  Commodus  and  the  African  lions  :  "  The 
African  lions,  when  pressed  by  hunger,  infested  the  open  villages  and  culti- 
vated country  ;  and  they  infested  them  with  impunity.  The  royal  beast 
was  reserved  for  the  pleasures  of  the  emperor  and  the  capital ;  and  tlie 
unfortunate  peasant  who  killed  one  of  them,  though  in  his  own  defence, 
incurred  a  very  heavy  penalty.  This  extraordinary  game  law  was  mitigated 
by  Honorius,  and  finally  repealed  by  Justinian."  Bad  as  this  was,  it  was 
less  exclusive  in  its  selfishness  than  tlie  behaviour  of  some  of  our  modern 
sportsmen,  for  the  lion-fights  gave  pleasure  to  a  whole  capital. 


396  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

presume  every  one  must  admire  a  mau  Avho  has  made 
such  sacrifices  as  he  for  his  convictions,  but  I  think  that 
the  time  has  not  yet  come  for  the  step  he  recommends. 
Granted  that  we  wrongfully  got  possession  of  India,  still 
to  abandon  her  now  would  be  to  act  like  a  man-stealer 
who  should  kidnap  a  child,  and  then  in  a  fit  of  repent- 
ance abandon  him  in  a  tiger-jungle.  I  think  that  we 
should  look  forward  to  the  time  when  India  can  be  left 
to  herself,  and  that  we  should  hasten  its  coming  by  put- 
ting: the  internal  administration  more  and  more  into  the 
hands  of  natives.  For  example,  probably  nearly  all  the 
judicial  ofiices  in  Bengal  might  be  held  by  natives.  They 
will  work  for  less  pay  than  Europeans,  and  their  know- 
ledge of  the  language  and  customs  of  the  people,  and 
their  not  requiring  long  furloughs  to  Europe  in  order  to 
recruit  their  strength,  give  them  an  immense  advantage 
over  foreigners.  I  do  not  overlook  the  advantages  pos- 
sessed by  Europeans,  but  I  think  that  none  of  them 
counterbalances  the  superiority  of  the  Bengalis  in  the 
above-mentioned  points.^ 

I  would  suggest  also  that  no  more  appointments 
should  be  made  to  the  India  Civil  Service  as  at  pre- 
sent constituted,  or  at  least  that  the  number  should  be 
greatly  restricted.  Those  who  are  already  in  the  service 
must  be  provided  for  in  some  way  or  other,  but  I  think 
that  the  Government  is  only  making  additional  embar- 
rassments for  itself  by  bringing  more  young  men  into 
the  service.  Already  some  of  those  admitted  complain 
that  they  have  been  enticed  by  false  pretences. 


by  employing  natives,  Government  can  get  the  services  of  men  of  mature 
age.  It  does  not  seem  fitting  that  extensive  judicial  powers  should  be  ex- 
ercised by  persons  under  twenty-five  or  thirty  years  of  age. 


(  397  ) 


APPENDIX. 


(A.) 

I.— Four  Settlement  Reports  from  the  Collector  of  the 
Dacca  District,  dated  Gth  April,  5th  and  2Gtii  May 
1790,  AND  31ST  July  1792. 

To  the  Honouraltle  Charles  Stuaut,  President, 
aud  Members  of  the  Board  of  Reveuue, 

Fort  William. 

Gentlemen, — I  have  the  honour  of  j^our  letter  of  the  18th 
ultimo,  transmitting  for  my  information  and  guidance  a  copy  of  the 
Eesolution  of  liis  Lordshi^i  in  Council  respecting  the  future  settle- 
ment for  Bengal  for  the  period  of  ten  years,  and  directing  that  I 
proceed  Avith  all  practicable  despatch  to  make  the  settlement  of  the 
district  under  my  charge  in  the  manner  and  agreeable  to  the  prin- 
ciples therein  laid  down. 

You  also  enclose  for  my  information  extract  from  your  letter  to 
his  Lordship  in  Council,  alluded  to  in  the  7th  article  of  the  Eesohi- 
tions,  and  containing  your  opinion  relative  to  the  amount  of  the 
jamma  realisable '  from  my  district,  founded  on  the  information 
with  which  you  Avere  supplied  by  my  predecessor,  Mr  Day,  in 
answer  to  your  circular  letter  of  the  10th  August  1787,  directing  me 
to  refer  thereto  in  the  formation  of  the  ensuing  settlement  as  far  as 
the  suggestion  therein  contained  conform  with  the  Resolution  of  his 
Lordship  in  Council  now  communicated  to  me. 

You  further  enclose  me  copies  of  your  Resolutions,  and  those  of 
his  Lordship  in  Council,  to  the  Collectors  of  Bazhai  regarding  the 
ganjes,  bazdrs,  and  hauts  held  within  them,  to  which  you  desire  my 
particular  attention,  as  well  as  my  answer  to  the  several  queries 
therein  stated. 

You  also  desire  I  will  notify  to  the  landholders,  by  publishing  the 
same  at  the  several  cutcherries  of  my  district,  that  the  ensuing 
settlement  for  ten  years,  if  approved  by  the  Court  of  Directors,  will 


398  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

become  permanent,  and  no  alteration  take  place  at  the  expiration  of 
that  period. 

I  shall,  in  obedience  to  your  orders,  commence  on  the  Ten  Years' 
Settlement  with  the  least  possible  delay. 

As  Government's  motives  for  concluding  a  Makarrar  jumma  dus 
salali  is  to  secure  to  the  Honourable  Company  a  certain  fixed 
revenue  on  fair  and  equitable  rates,  and  to  afford  ease  and  give 
confidence  to  the  landholders,  their  under-renters,  and  ryots,  I 
think  it  a  duty  I  owe  my  employers,  myself,  and  the  proprietors  of 
the  lands,  and  those  under  themselves,  early  to  lay  before  the  Board 
my  sentiments  on  the  orders  transmitted  me. 

By  the  extract  of  your  letter  to  his  Lordship  in  Council,  dated 
the  14th  October  1788,  to  which  the  seven  articles  of  his  Lordship's 
Resolution  alluded,  it  should  seem  that  in  forming  the  ensuing  settle- 
ment I  am  to  be  guided  in  fixing  the  jumma  of  each  mahal  by  Mr 
Day's  plan  of  settlement  of  1195,  which  accompanied  his  letter  of 
the  17th  January  1788. 

However  unwilling  I  am  to  animadvert  on  Mr  Day's  proposed 
plan  of  a  Ten  Years'  Settlement,  yet  a  regard  for  my  own  character, 
and  from  a  perfect  conviction  that  I  cannot  conclude  the  settlement 
with  many  of  the  mahals  at  the  jumma  recommended  by  him, 
impels  me  to  deliver  my  sentiments  freely  on  the  subject,  relying 
on  the  Board's  candour  for  putting  a  favourable  construction  on  the 
motives  by  which  I  am  actuated. 

It  is  necessary  to  observe  that  Mr  Day  did  not  send  down  his 
proposed  plan  of  settlement  for  upwards  of  six  months  after  this 
district  had  been  visited  by  the  most  dreadful  calamity  ever  remem- 
bered by  the  oldest  inhabitant  of  the  district,  and  which  deprived  it 
(by  Mr  Day's  calculation)  of  upwards  of  60,000  of  its  inhabitants,  Avho 
either  miserably  perished,  or  were  reduced  to  the  painful  necessity 
of  forsaking  their  habitations  in  search  of  a  precarious  subsistence. 
Mr  Day  visited  some  of  the  pargannahs  where  the  famine  raged  with 
the  greatest  violence,  and  had  ocular  proofs  of  the  extreme  misery 
to  which  the  Avretched  inhabitants  were  reduced.  He  saw  the 
pargannahs  inundated,  whole  crops  destroyed,  and  cultivation  totally 
neglected.  He  had  the  mortification  of  beholding  hundreds  of  the 
poor  wretched  inhabitants  daily  dying  without  the  means  of  aff'ord- 
ing  them  the  smallest  relief.  After  a  local  investigation  of  the  cruel 
effects  of  the  inundation,  after  a  full  conviction  of  the  very  heavy 
loss  many  of  the  principal  pargannahs  sustained  both  in  its  inhabi- 
tants and  crops,  and  the  consecpient  decline  of  cultivation,  it  is  a 
matter  of  great  surprise  that  Mr  Day  should,  in  many  of  the  par- 
gannahs which  had  suffered  so  materially  by  the  inundation  and 
loss  of  tenants,  recommend  an  increase  to  be  taken  in  the  ensuing 
year's  settlement.  That  gentleman  observes  that  his  plan  -w'as 
founded  on  the  idea  of  a  Ten  Years'  Bandobast ;  admitting  of  this, 
can  it  be  supposed  that  districts  which  had  been  deprived  of  one-half 
of  their  natural  resources,  could  in  the  short  period  of  one  year  so 
far  recover  as  to  yield  the  customary  revenue,  much  less  bear  an 


APPENDIX.  399 

increase,  Avliicli  would  have  added  to  the  miseries  they  liad  already- 
suffered,  and  in  all  probability  have  obliged  the  remaining  ryots  to 
desert  their  habitations  and  seek  refuge  in  more  favourable  districts  1 
I  shall  now  proceed  to  point  out  to  the  Board  those  pargannahs 
which  I  am  well  satisfied  cannot  bear  the  jumma  of  1194,  but  where 
even  an  abatement  on  the  present  year's  assessment  will  be  abso- 
lutely necessary  in  some  of  them. 

1194.  Pargannah  Bajnagar. — Jurmna,  i?s.97,194-15-17-3. 

This  pargannah  Mr  Day  visited  in  person,  and  in  his  letter  to 
your  Board  under  date  the  20th  December  1787,  reporting  on  the 
state  of  the  district  and  the  effects  of  the  inundation,  observes  that 
this  pargannah  presented  such  a  scene  of  distress  as  he  never  before 
beheld,  the  land  being  then  totally  inundated,  the  country  not 
showing  the  least  appearance  of  cultivation,  and  the  inhabitants  in 
general  being  on  raised  stages.  He  at  the  same  time  expresses  his 
apprehension  that  Government  was  likely  to  experience  a  very 
heavy  loss  at  the  close  of  the  year  in  consequence  of  the  late 
calamity. 

Notwithstanding  the  wretched  state  in  which  Mr  Day  found  this 
pargannah,  yet  he  recommends  in  his  proposed  plan  that  the  settle- 
ment be  concluded  for  1195  on  the  jumma  of  1194. 

The  Board  acquiesce  in  Mr  Day's  proposal,  and  direct  him  to 
conclude  the  settlement  accordingl}^ 

The  Collector  in  consequence  called  upon  the  proprietors  to  enter 
into  engagements  on  the  proposed  terms,  Ixit  they  positively  declined, 
saying,  "  to  engage  at  the  rate  of  1 194  for  the  pai'gannah  of  Raj n agar 
and  Kartikpoor  would  be  subjecting  themselves  to  a  very  consider- 
able loss,  from  the  absolute  inability  of  the  lands  after  the  calamity 
which  attended  them  during  the  last  year." 

In  consequence  of  the  zemindars  declining  to  lease  their  lands  on 
the  terms  of  1194,  the  Board  direct  the  pargannah  to  be  adver- 
tised for  farm,  and  the  settlement  of  1195  to  be  tendered  to  the 
proprietors  at  the  amount  of  the  highest  offer. 

The  pargannah  was  accordingly  advertised  for  farm,  but  no  offers 
being  tendered,  the  Collector  on  the  4th  of  September  1788  trans- 
mitted the  proposals  of  the  zemindars  for  leasing  it  on  an  abate- 
ment from  the  jumma  of  1194  of  Rs. 36,404. 

The  Board  observe  in  their  reply,  under  date  the  23d  of  Sep- 
tember, that  "  the  offer  of  the  proprietors  of  this  mahal  being  ex- 
tremely disadvantageous — being  a  deduction  from  the  jumma  of  last 
year  of  no  less  a  sum  than  Rs.36,404 — we  cannot  accede  to  it.  We 
authorise  you,  however,  to  make  an  offer  of  it  to  the  proprietors  at 
the  remission  Rs.8934  from  the  jumma  of  1194,  that  in  the  event 
of  their  not  accepting  of  it,  the  mahal  be  held  khass." 

The  proprietors  having  refused  to  enter  into  engagements  on  the 
proffered  terms,  the  mahal  was  held  khass;  and  to  show  that  it 
was  little  capable  of  yielding  the  jumma  of  1194,  I  must  observe 


400  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

that  Government  sustained  a  loss  of  Rs.47,272.     This  balance  even 
exceeded  that  incurred  in  1194,  which  amounted  to  sicca  Rs.45,179. 

It  will  probably  be  remarked  that  the  settlement  has  not  been  con- 
cluded this  year  on  the  jumma  of  1194.  This  I  acknowledge,  but 
I  must  beg  leave  to  observe  that  an  abatement  of  Rs.8934  was 
allowed  in  Bozergomedpore,  and  a  further  sum  of  Rs.  13,791  in 
Kartikpore,  both  mahals  dependent  on  Rajnagar  ;  but  the  latter  sum 
cannot  be  considered  as  an  abatement  on  the  jumma  of  Rajnagar, 
for  supposing  Kartikpore  to  have  been  the  property  of  another 
person,  a  similar  deduction  must  have  been  granted  in  consideration 
of  the  dreadful  calamity  it  experienced  in  1194.  So  that,  in  fact,  the 
abatement  allowed  last  year  on  account  of  Rajnagar  was  the  remis- 
sion of  the  increase  laid  on  Bozergomedpore  in  1194,  being,  as  before 
stated,  Rs.8934;  and  the  late  Commissioner's  report  will  show  that 
this  abatement  was  very  inadequate  to  the  heavy  losses  sustained 
in  the  pargannah  in  the  two  preceding  years  both  in  its  crops  and 
inhabitants,  and  nothing  but  the  appreheusion  which  four  of  the 
proprietors  entertained  lest  the  proposals  made  to  your  Board  by 
Kebal  Ram,  the  remaining  proprietor,  Avould  have  been  accepted, 
could  have  induced  them  to  have  entered  into  engagements  on  such 
high  terms.  They  were  fearful,  in  the  event  of  Kebal  Ram  getting 
possession  of  the  land,  that  he  would  have  continued  in  the  entire 
management  and  control  of  the  zemindari  in  the  same  manner  as 
his  brother  Gopal  Krishna  had  done,  by  which  means  they  would 
have  been  totally  excluded  from  all  participation  or  concern  in  the 
lands. 

I  have  every  reason  to  apprehend  that  a  balance  will  be  incurred 
at  the  close  of  this  year  of  at  least  Rs.25,000.  That  the  zemindars 
have  collected  more  than  they  have  paid  into  the  Government  trea- 
sury is  beyond  all  doubt,  but  the  amount  appropriated  hy  them  for 
their  maintenance  does  not  amount  to  5  per  cent,  on  the  jumma 
of  the  zemindari.  The  profits  of  their  private  lands,  from  the  best 
information  I  have  received,  do  not  exceed  Rs.  15,000,  and  this  profit 
enjoyed  by  two  of  the  proprietors  only  to  whom  they  appertain. 

By  his  Lordship's  instructions  the  zemindars  are  to  enjoy  a  profit 
of  10  per  cent,  from  their  lands.  The  proprietors  of  Rajnagar  will 
cheerfully  relinquish  their  lands  on  these  terms  rather  than  engage 
on  the  jumma  of  1194.  They  are  men  of  rank  and  family,  and 
have  long  been  in  the  habit  of  living  splendidly  ;  and  should  they 
engage  on  the  jumma  of  last  year,  the  whole  of  the  profits  arising 
from  the  niz  taluks  will  not  be  sufficient  to  answer  the  dues  of 
Government ;  and  as  the  proprietors  have  no  other  resources  than 
their  lands,  they  must,  if  deprived  of  a  moderate  profit  from  such 
land,  be  reduced  to  extreme  indigence,  and  would  be  under  the  dis- 
graceful necessity  of  disposing  of  their  lands  for  a  subsistence.  For 
these  reasons,  and  in  order  to  secure  a  certain  revenue  to  Govern- 
ment, I  would  recommend  that  an  abatement  of  Rs.  20,000  be  allowed 
in  the  jumma  of  Rajnagar  for  three  years,  and  at  the  expiration  of 
which  the  same  be  resumed  on  a  rusud  jumma  of  three  years. 


APPENDIX.  40  r 


1194.  ranjannah  Kartikp'Ar. — JutiDiia,  i(*6'.25,791. 

This  pargannah  forms  a  part  of  the  zcniindari  of  liajnagar.  Mr 
Da3%  in  his  proposed  plans  of  settlement,  recommends  tliat  an 
increase  of  Rs.4000  be  laid  on  this  pargannah,  obs(!rving  that  ho 
had  no  doubt  of  the  ability  of  the  lands  to  this  addition  M-ithout 
subjecting  the  renters  to  any  additional  tax  above  what  they  have 
paid  for  some  years  back  to  the  zemindars. 

Had  my  predecessor  adverted  to  his  letter  under  date  the  20Lli 
December  1787,  Avritten  about  a  month  prior  to  the  transmission  of 
his  i^roposed  plan  of  settlement  for  1195,  I  humbly  conceive  he 
would  not  have  recommended  the  above  increase,  for  in  describing 
the  state  of  the  pargannali  he  makes  the  following  remarks  :  "  This 
mahal,  I  am  sorrj''  to  inform  the  Board,  has  suffered  in  an  equal 
degree  with  that  of  Rajnagar,  toAvhich  it  is  contiguous,  and  is  under 
charge  of  the  same  sazawal.  The  balance  due  from  it  to  the  end  of 
Kartik  is  lis.  11,200,  in  part  of  which  I  much  fear  very  little  will  be 
realised,  as  the  only  sources  left  in  the  pargannah  for  the  liquida- 
tion of  this,  as  well  as  the  remaining  kists,  are  the  boro  crops  and 
the  produce  of  betel-nut,  which,  from  the  proportion  I  am  informed 
they  bear  of  the  pargannah  resources,  will  scarcely  suffice  to  pay 
either  one  or  the  other,  and  a  consideriible  balance  is  of  course  to  be 
expected  from  this  mahal  at  the  end  of  the  year." 

What  Mr  Day  foretold  actually  happened,  for  at  the  close  of  the 
year  1194  a  balance  of  Rs.12,238  was  incurred. 

Again,  Mr  Day,  in  explanation  of  the  balance  exhibited  in  his 
touzi  account  for  Aghan,  transmitted  a  few  days  i)revious  to  his 
proposed  plan,  speaking  of  the  arrears  due  from  Kartikpur  and 
Rajnagar,  expresses  his  apprehension  of  realising  the  same,  owing 
to  the  unfavourable  state  of  the  lands  ;  and  that  the  general  failure 
of  the  crops,  together  with  the  loss  the  proprietors  have  experienced 
by  the  death  and  desertion  of  many  of  their  under-tenants,  he  much 
fears  will  put  it  totally  out  of  their  power  to  make  good  their 
engagements  with  Government  for  the  current  year,  a  circum- 
stance which  nothing  but  the  late  unfortunate  calamity  would  have 
prevented. 

Surely  after  the  deplorable  state  to  which  this  jiargannah  was 
reduced  by  a  total  loss  of  its  crops,  and  the  depreciation  of  many  of 
its  under-tenants  by  death  and  desertion,  it  could  ill  bear  the 
increase  recommended  by  Mr  Day.  A  loss  of  the  harvest  may  be 
only  considered  as  a  temporary  evil,  but  that  of  the  tillers  of  the 
ground  must  be  ever  looked  on  as  a  most  serious  loss,  and  nothing 
can  recover  a  district  labouring  under  such  misfortunes  but  great 
indulgence  and  much  time. 

The  Board,  in  their  answer  to  ]\Ir  Day's  recommendation,  seem  to 
think  that  the  pargannah  is  not  equal  to  the  increase,  for  they  say, 
"  You  will  call  upon  the  proprietors  for  the  ii^rease  you  have  pro- 
posed, or  for  such  as  may  appear  reasonable  and  can  be  levied  with- 

2  C 


402  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

out  distressing  tliem,  the  ryots  and  under-renters,  due  consideration 
liaving  also  been  had  to  the  hite  calamities  of  the  season." 

The  proprietors  being  called  upon  to  enter  into  engagements  in 
1195,  so  far  from  consenting  to  give  au  increase,  they  demand  a 
deduction  on  the  jumma  of  1194  of  Es.9791,  alleging  that  it  was 
altogether  out  of  their  power  to  subscribe  to  any  other  engagement 
Avithout  risking  the  loss  of  their  lands,  a  failure  on  their  part  being 
inevitable  from  the  positive  want  of  resources. 

Mr  Day,  in  his  letter  of  the  11th  July  1788,  appears  to  be  con- 
vinced that  this  raahal  was  not  equal  to  the  increase  proposed,  for, 
remarking  on  the  balance  of  1194  due  from  Rajnagar  and  Kartik- 
pur,  he  expresses  his  opinion  as  follows  :  '"I  was  an  eyewitness  of 
the  death  of  many  when  in  the  lands  in  the  month  of  Xovember 
last;  and  further,  that  many  of  the  poor  distressed  wretches  now 
daily  perishing  in  the  streets  of  Dacca  Avere  in  the  beginning  of  the 
year  inhabitants  of  those  mahals,  but  from  the  failure  of  their  crops, 
having  no  means  of  support  in  the  country,  came  to  the  capital  to 
seek  sustenance.  Such,  therefore,  being  the  state  of  these  lands, 
nearly  depopulated,  and  the  cultivation  decreased  of  course  in  pro- 
portion, I  cannot  but  consider  the  present  heavy  balance  due  from 
them  irrecoverable,  but  further  apprehend  a  considerable  deficiency 
in  the  ensuing  year's  revenue  to  be  unavoidable  if  an  abatement 
be  not  made  on  their  respective  jummas  on  renewing  the  settle- 
ment." 

Mr  Day  with  great  propriety  might  have  added,  considering  the 
wretched  state  of  the  pargannah  and  the  miserable  situation  to 
which  the  few  remaining  ryots  were  reduced,  that  unless  an  abate- 
ment was  allowed  for  a  period  of  years  he  saw  no  prospect  of  this 
mahal's  recovering  the  heavy  losses  it  had  sustained  by  the  inun- 
dation. 

Mr  Day,  on  the  15th  of  the  same  month,  transmits  to  the  Board 
the  proposals  of  the  zemindars  of  Rajnagar,  Kartikpur,  and  Bozer- 
gomedpur  for  farming  their  mahals  in  1195.  The  former  they 
offered  to  take  on  a  deduction  on  the  jumma  of  1194  of  36,404.  On 
Kartikpur  they  demand  a  deduction  of  Rs.9991,  and  on  the  latter 
they  agree  to  an  increase  of  8934.  Mr  Day,  in  his  letter  which 
accompanied  these  proposals,  begs  to  call  the  Board's  attention  to 
them,  and  observes  "  that  the  immediate  loss  arising  in  the  two 
former  is  heavj',  but,  from  the  present  state  of  the  pargannah s,  does 
not  think  that  more  with  certainty,  or  without  endangering  a  greater 
loss  hereafter  to  Government,  can  be  obtained  from  them  than  what 
has  been  offered." 

Time  has  shown  that  Government  has  experienced  a  greater 
balance  than  the  abatement  required  by  the  zemindars. 

The  Board  in  their  orders  to  the  Collector,  under  date  12th  Sep- 
tember 1788,  speaking  of  Kartikpur,  made  the  following  remark: 
"  Considering  the  opinion  expressed  by  you  in  your  report  of  the 
17th  Janiuxry,  of  ability  of  the  lands  to  bear  an  increase  of  Rs.4000 
on  the  jumma  of  last  year,  and  also  your  recommendation  that  this 


APPENDIX.  403 

increase  should  be  levied  at  the  ensuing  settlement,  we  arc  altogether 
at  a  loss  to  account  for  your  having  submitted  to  us  witliout  comment 
proposals  from  the  proprietors  at  an  abatement  from  the  jumma  of 
1194  of  no  less  a  sum  than  lls.9991,  making  in  all  a  difference  in 
the  jumma  originally  recommended  by  you  of  13,791.  AVhilst  we 
regret  so  disadvantageous  a  proposal,  we  deem  it  highly  necessary, 
on  your  part,  that  you  should  furnish  us  with  the  fullest  explanation 
of  a  result  so  widely  different  from  Avhat  might  have  been  expected 
from  your  own  opinion  and  recommendation." 

Mr  Day,  in  answer  to  the  Board's  letter,  says,  "My  letter  of 
the  17th  July  has  already  pointed  out  that  these  lands  have  suf- 
fered afresh  in  the  loss  of  tlie  boro  crop,  which  misfortune  having 
befallen  them  subsequent  to  my  report  of  the  17th  January,  must 
have  added  to  the  distress  of  the  pargannah  and  its  inhabitants. 
This,  together  with  the  year  being  so  far  advanced,  no  doubt  in- 
fluenced the  proprietors  in  making  so  low  a  tender  from  the  original 
jumma." 

I  have  taken  the  liberty  of  submitting  the  above  extracts  to  the 
Board  to  show  the  impracticability  of  making  the  settlement  of  this 
mahal  upon  the  terms  proposed  by  Mr  Day,  and  the  Commissioner's 
report,  under  date  28th  October  last,  will  show  tliat  Government 
sustained  a  loss  in  1194  of  Bs.12,238,  and  in  119.5  the  enormous 
sum  of  16,205-2-12-2. 

The  Board  being  satisfied  of  the  inability  of  this  mahal,  sanctioned 
the  conclusion  of  the  settlement  with  the  proprietors  of  the  present 
year  on  an  abatement  of  the  jumma  of  1194  of  Rs.13,791,  and  even 
this  exceeded  the  assets  of  the  pargannah  in  1195  ;  and  from  what 
I  have  said  I  cannot  but  recommend  that  the  present  jumma  of 
1196  be  continued  for  three  years,  so  that  the  lands  may  recover 
themselves,  and  that  after  that  period  an  increase  of  5000  toe  put  on 
this  pargannah  on  a  rusud  jumma  of  three  years. 

1194.  Jaldlpil)'.— Jumma,  i?5.103,902-12-7-3. 

On  adverting  to  Mr  Day's  proposed  plan  of  settlement  for  1195, 
he  recommends  that  the  jumma  of  this  pargannah  for  1194  be  con- 
tinued for  two  years,  and  that  the  deduction  granted  in  1192, 
amounting  to  16,358,  be  resumed  the  two  following  years,  half 
in  each,  by  which  the  mahals  at  the  expiration  of  four  years  will 
stand  rated  and  yield  to  Government  the  jumma  of  1188.  He 
further  recommends  that  "  the  mode  of  talukdari  settlement  be 
continued,  or  that  the  mahal  be  let  to  farm."  Mr  Day  seems  to 
have  forgotten  the  loss  and  sufferings  this  pargannah  and  its  depen- 
dencies experienced,  and  the  misery  to  which  the  under-tenants 
were  reduced,  by  the  dreadful  calamity  of  1194,  or  he  Avould  not,  I 
humbly  conceive,  have  recommended  the  above  mode  of  assessment. 
His  letter  of  the  20th  December  1787  evinces  that  many  of  the 
principal  pargannahs  dependent  on  this  zemindari  were  nearly 
ruined  by  the  inundation.     In  speaking  of  the  pargannah  of  j\Ioha- 


404  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

butpur,  Naroollapur,  and  two  or  three  others,  he  observes,  "  This  year 
the  owsh  crop  in  these  pargannahs  appears  to  have  been  nearly 
wholly  destroyed,  and  that  of  the  anian  in  a  considerable  degree 
prevented.  The  loss,  therefore,  which  those  lands  have  sustained 
by  the  late  inundation  may  be  estimated  at  nearly  seven  anas 
proportion  of  its  grain  revenue.  Notwithstanding  this  heavy  loss, 
the  Arzamin  has  paid  up  his  revenue  in  full  to  the  end  of  Assin  ; 
but  in  doing  this  there  is  every  reason  to  believe  he  is  become  much 
in  advance  for  the  renters  to  liquidate  his  advances,  if  any  such  are 
due,  as  well  as  the  remainder  of  the  revenue  to  the  end  of  the  year. 
There  is  noAV  only  left  the  boro  crops  and  the  produce  of  the  betel- 
nut  plantations.  From  the  latter,  for  the  reason  assigned  in  my 
report  for  Eajnagar,  I  fear  little  is  expected." 

The  Board,  relying  on  the  accuracy  of  Mr  Day's  statement, 
authorise  the  continuation  of  the  assessment  of  1194,  and  direct 
that  the  same  mode  of  settlement  be  adopted.  A  sazawal  was  in 
consequence  intrusted  with  the  management  for  1195;  and  the 
Italance  incurred  that  year  being  25,999-14-17-3,  will  show  how  far 
Mr  Day  was  warranted  in  recommending  a  continuation  of  the 
jumma  of  1194.  The  causes  of  this  arrear  are  fully  stated  in  the 
late  Commissioner's  report,  transmitted  under  date  the  28th  Octo- 
ber, to  which  I  must  beg  leave  to  refer  the  Board. 

The  settlement  concluded  this  year  with  the  proprietors  is  an 
abatement  of  16,901-12-17-3  on  the  jumma  of  1194,  which  has  been 
sanctioned  by  his  Lordship  in  Council.  By  Mr  Day's  proposed 
plan,  this  abatement  must  not  only  be  resumed  at  the  ensuing 
settlement,  but  an  increase  of  8175  be  added  to  the  jumma. 

The  settlement  of  1197  must  therefore  stand  at  112,081-12-7-3, 
being  an  increase  upon  this  year's  jumma  of  Its.25, 080-12-17-3. 

To  satisfy  the  Board  of  the  total  impracticability  of  this  increase 
being  levied,  I  must  beg  to  make  the  following  remarks  in  addition 
to  Avhat  I  have  stated  in  my  report  of  the  balance  of  1194  and  the 
assets  of  1195. 

From  1191  to  1195  this  pargannah  was  held  khass,  and  suffered 
very  considerably  in  its  resources  by  the  loss  of  the  crops  and  in 
inhabitants  in  1194.  Notwithstanding  every  extortion  and  oppres- 
sion of  the  sazawal,  Government  sees  a  balance  at  the  close  of  the 
year  of  22,638-12-17-3,  although  it  appeared  on  examining  the 
sazawal'g  account  that  this  arrear  had  been  realised  by  him,  and 
Avhich  has  since  been  recovered ;  yet  my  report  will  also  show 
that  this  collection  did  not  arise  from  the  produce  of  the  lands 
solely,  but  from  a  sale  of  the  talukdar's  houses,  cattle,  implements 
of  husbandry,  and  their  private  lands.  Notwithstanding  these 
violent  measures  adopted  by  the  sazawal  realising  the  revenue, 
there  still  appeared  a  deficiency  at  the  close  of  the  year  of 
Ks.9956-6-10. 

The  zemindars,  in  order  to  encourage  cultivation,  and  to  recover 
the  lands  which  had  become  Avaste  by  the  death  and  desertion  of 
many  of  their  under-tenants  in  1194,  were  induced  to  let  them  out 


APPENDIX. 


4"5 


to  other  talukdars  at  a  reduced  rate.  Yet  notwitlistanding  the 
efforts  of  the  zemindars,  and  the  abatement  allowed  this  year  by 
Government,  there  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  the  assets  of  this 
district  are  not  equal  to  the  present  dues  of  Government.  The 
Security  is  greatly  in  advance  to  the  proprietors,  and  finding  on  a 
scrutiny  of  the  Moffossil  resources  that  they  fall  sliort  of  the  saddar 
jumma,  withholds  any  further  assistance,  and  solicits  an  examination 
of  the  Moffossil  receijjts ;  Ijut  as  he  became  respoiLsible  of  his  own 
accord  for  Government  dues,  I  shall  use  every  exertion  to  com})el 
him  to  fulfd  his  engagements,,  though  I  apprehend  there  will  be  a 
balance  at  the  close  of  the  year  of  lis.  4000  or  Rs.5000. 

Sensible  of  the  declining  state  of  Jaldlpi'ir  proper,  Bangrolah,  and 
Mohabutpur,  and  confident  that  this  zemindari  is  not  equal  to  the 
present  jumma,  I  am  induced  to  recommend  that  a  deduction  of 
Rs.TOOO  be  granted  on  it  at  the  concluding  the  settlement  for  the 
ensuing  year.  That  this  abatement  be  resumed  at  the  expiration 
of  three  years,  when  the  jumma  of  Rs.l200  will  stand  at  the  pre- 
sent year's  rate  of  assessment.  This  indulgence  will  not  only  prove 
beneficial  to  Government  in  securing  to  them  a  certain  and  regular 
payment  of  their  dues,  but  will  give  confidence  and  encouragement 
to  the  talukdars  and  ryots  to  exert  themselves  in  the  improvement 
and  cultivation  of  their  lands ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  should 
Government  be  disinclined  to  allow  of  the  above  abatement,  I 
apprehend  a  further  loss  will  be  experienced,  for  the  under-tenants 
finding  that  the  demands  of  Government  are  heavier  than  the 
earnings  of  their  labour  will  produce,  will  be  compelled  to  forsake 
their  habitation  and  retire  to  some  district  where  they  may  peaceably 
enjoy  the  fruits  of  their  industry. 

1194.  Edeeljmr.— Jumma,  S.  ^5.95,115. 

In  Mr  Day's  proposed  plan  of  settlement  for  1195  he  observes 
"  that  no  cause  can  be  traced  why  the  different  deductions  have  been 
granted,  and  as  Manek  Bose  has  had  it  in  farm  and  always  paid 
his  revenues  punctually,  I  should  suppose  he  would  have  no  objec- 
tion to  enter  into  engagements  as  heretofore  on  an  increased  jumma. 
I  would  therefore  recommend  that  at  the  ensuing  settlement  an 
increase  of  4885  be  laid  on,  fixing  the  jumma  at  one  lac  of  rupees." 

The  Board  approve  of  the  above-proposed  increase,  and  on 
account  of  the  notorious  bad  characters  of  the  zemindars,  direct  it 
to  be  continued  in  farm.  I  humbly  conceive  that  the  increase  pro- 
posed by  Mr  Day  was  made  without  duo  consideration  of  the  loss 
this  pargannah  sustained  in  its  crops  and.  inhabitants  by  the  dread- 
ful calamity  of  1194.  This  conjecture  is  confirmed  by  Manek 
Bose's  refusing  to  renew  engagements  in  1195,  unless  a  considerable 
abatement  was  allowed  him  on  the  jumma  of  1194.  In  consequence 
of  this  refusal  the  mahal  was  advertised  for  farm,  but  no  one  offer- 
ing for  the  same,  it  was  held  khass. 

The  Board,  in  their  letter  of  23d  of  September  1788,  make  the 


4o6  DISIRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

following  remark  :  "  Your  holding  this  m.ahal  khass  being  in  con- 
formity to  our  orders,  we  necessarily  approve  of  it,  but  cannot  help 
remarking  on  it  as  a  circumstance  somewhat  extraordinary,  that  no 
proposals  should  have  been  tendered  for  the  farm  of  a  pargannah  at 
the  jumma  of  1194,  which  you,  in  your  report  of  the  17th  January, 
deemed  capable  of  paying  an  increase  on  that  jumma  of  Rs.4885." 

At  the  close  of  the  Bengal  yeitr  1194  a  balance  was  incurred  in 
this  pargannah  of  25,128-11-15.  The  farmer  pleaded  total  in- 
ability to  discharge  this,  alleging  that  he  sustained  a  loss  equal  to 
that  sum.  However,  on  his  houses  and  effects  being  attached,  and 
himself  put  under  restraint,  he,  to  avoid  the  disgrace  of  having  his 
property  sold  at  public  auction,  discharged  the  balance  by  borrow- 
ing, and  mortgaging  his  houses ;  and  well  knowing  the  loss  the 
pargannah  sustained  in  its  resources  in  1194,  he  prudently  refused  to 
renew  engagements  for  1195  on  the  terms  of  the  preceding  year. 
The  late  Commissioner's  report  on  the  assets  of  1195  will  show 
that  the  causes  of  his  refusal  were  but  too  well  founded.  It 
will  further  show  that  Government  sustained  a  loss  that  year  of 
Es.  30,541-7-8. 

The  zemindars  having  for  a  period  of  years  been  deprived  of  the 
management  of  their  lands,  and  anxious  once  more  to  get  possession 
of  them,  entered  into  engagements  this  year  at  a  jumma  exceeding 
the  resources  of  the  Moffossil ;  security  being  taken  from  them 
for  the  regular  discharge  of  their  dues  is  the  reason  that  the 
revenues  have  to  this  period  been  paid  up  with  tolerable  punctuality, 
though  the  Security  has  declared  to  me  that  he  is  in  advance  to  the 
zemindars  upwards  of  Rs. 10,000.  The  proprietors  being  sensible 
of  their  inability  to  discharge  the  debt  contracted  with  the  Security, 
and  Avith  a  view  to  encourage  him  to  a  continuance  of  his  assistance, 
have  given  a  writing  purporting  that,  in  the  event  of  their  not  being 
able  to  liquidate  the  amount  advanced  by  him  on  their  account, 
they  will  sell  a  portion  of  their  lands  to  pay  the  same. 

By  Mr  Day's  proposed  plan  of  settlement  the  jumma  of  this 
pargannah  must  stand  rated  at  the  commencement  of  1197  at  sicca 
Ks.  100,000,  which  is  an  increase  of  the  present  year's  jumma  of 
Es.19,999,  and  an  excess  on  the  amount  paid  into  Government 
treasury  last  year  of  Rs. 35, 426-7-4. 

The  late  Commissioner's  report  will  full}^  show  that  the  par- 
gannah now  stands  overrated,  and  consequently  altogether  unable 
to  bear  the  excess  recommended.  Government  wish  to  secure  a  fair 
and  equitable  jumma,  and  his  Lordship  in  Council's  instructions 
evince  equal  anxiety  to  afford  the  landholders  a  reasonable  profit 
from  the  produce  of  their  lands. 

Although  confident  that  the  assets  of  the  pargannah  are  not  equal 
to  its  present  jumma,  yet  from  a  conviction  that  the  lands  are  cap- 
able of  great  improvement,  I  would  recommend  the  present  assess- 
ment to  be  continued  for  the  space  of  three  years. 

With  whom  to  conclude  the  settlement  is  a  matter  that  merits  the 
consideration  of  Government. 


APPENDIX.  407 

With  tlie  proprietors — I  iocar  they  will  not  engage  on  the  jumma  of 
last  year ;  but,  in  the  event  of  their  agreeing,  security  must  be  taken 
from  them,  or  the  regular  discharge  of  their  dues  will  be  precarious. 
They  are  many  in  number,  and  iu  needy  circumstances.  They  aro 
reputed  men  of  very  bad  character,  and  have  long  been  under  the 
stigma  of  entertaining  dacoits  in  their  pay.  One  of  them.  Ram 
Kantli,  was  confined  fur  near  six  yoars  in  the  Phouzdari  jail  of  Back- 
ergunge,  Dacca,  and  Moorshed/ibad,  for  abetting  and  participating  iu 
the  robljery  and  plunder  of  the  Company's  factory  at  Soonargunge. 

Should  it  be  farmed,  no  person,  I  apprehend,  will  agree  to  the 
terms  of  last  year,  and  at  the  same  time  allow  10  per  cent,  for  a 
provision  to  the  zemindars. 

The  present  Security,  who  is  Avell  acquainted  witli  the  pargannah, 
a  man  of  responsibility  and  fair  character,  having  for  a  series  of  years 
had  the  management  of  it,  has  otfered  to  farm  it  for  the  term  of  ten 
years  on  the  jumma  of  last  year  for  the  first  three  years,  and  then 
off'ers  an  increase  of  Rs.4000  for  the  remaining  seven  years,  provided 
he  be  not  obliged  to  pay  the  10  per  cent,  to  the  proprietors  ;  that  on 
the  event  of  his  being  necessitated  to  pay  the  10  per  cent.,  he  re- 
quests an  abatement  on  the  jumma  of  the  current  year  equal  to  the 
sum  to  be  allowed  the  zemindars  ;  that  at  the  expii-atiou  of  three 
years  he  will  give  an  increase  of  4000.  Considering  the  very  ruinous 
state  of  the  pargannah,  and  the  noted  bad  characters  of  the  proprie- 
tors, I  cannot  but  give  the  i^reference  to  farming  the  mahal ;  but 
should  his  Lordship  in  Council  not  approve  of  tliis  mode,  I  beg  to 
suggest  the  expediency  of  holding  the  pargannah  khass,  but  in 
doing  this  G-overnment  must  not  expect  to  realise  the  jumma  of  the 
present  year,  as  I  have  before  remarked  that  the  resources  of  the 
mahal  are  not  equal  to  that  assessment. 

I  have  been  told  from  respectable  authority  that  the  northern 
parts  of  the  zeraindari  lost  three-fourths  of  its  inhabitants  in  the 
dreadful  calamity  of  1194.  Much  time,  great  attention  and  indul- 
gence, and  regular  advances  of  takAvi  are  absolute  requisites  to 
restore  this  pargannah  to  any  degree  of  cultivation.  Tiie  loss  of 
inhabitants  must  almost  be  considered  as  irretrievable,  and  the  only 
mode  left  of  increasing  cultivation  is  by  granting  pecuniary  assistance 
and  giving  every  encouragement  to  the  remaining  husbandmen. 

I  trust  what  I  have  said  on  the  subject  of  the  state  and  capacity 
of  this  mahal  will  enable  your  Board  to  determine  on  a  mode  for  its 
future  management. 

1194.   Chandradeep. — Juvmia,  ivs.85,725. 

My  predecessor,  in  his  proposed  plan  of  settlement  for  1195,  re- 
commends an  increase  of  sicca  Es.  15,000  be  laid  on  this  mahal,  on  the 
plea  that  the  zemindar  enjoys  a  net  profit  equal  to  that  sum  from  the 
hissajat  lands,  besides  avowed  advantages  on  the  gross  realisation 
from  the  lands  on  which  the  present  jumma  is  assessed. 

The  Board,  at  the  same  time  they  approve  of  the  increase,  express 


4o8  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

tlieir  hope  that  it  will  not  be  productive  of  distress  to  the  zemindar 
or  his  family,  or  to  the  under-renters  or  ryots,  and  in  that  confidence 
they  direct  the  Collector  to  call  upon  the  zemindar  to  enter  to 
engagements  accordingly. 

Of  the  increase  recommended,  3000  was  secured  in  1195,  and  the 
additional  sum  of  Es.lOOO  laid  on  at  the  concluding  of  the  settlement 
for  the  current  year. 

The  proprietor  of  this  pargannah  is  a  youth  of  seventeen  years  of 
age,  but  as  no  attention  has  been  paid  to  his  education,  he  remains 
m  total  ignorance  of  the  minntise  of  the  Moffossil  collections.  His 
time  is  wholly  spent  in  the  luxuries  of  a  zenanah,  and  his  mother, 
wishing  to  continue  in  the  management  of  the  pargannah,  supplies 
him  with  the  means  of  gratifying  his  pleasures.  The  mother  entrusts 
the  executive  part  of  the  business  to  her  brother,  Avho  is  in  every 
respect  unfit  for  and  unworthy  of  the  office. 

With  care  and  good  management  an  increase  might  be  obtained 
from  this  pargannah,  and  to  effect  tliis  I  Avould  recommend  that  the, 
present  jumma  be  continued  for  one  year,  that  the  gomastas  report 
its  state  to  me,  and  that  according  to  such  information  the  settle- 
ment be  concluded  with  the  zemindar  on  a  fair  and  equitable  jumma 
for  the  remaining  nine  years. 

1194.  Narullapur. — Jximma,  i?a.  126,569. 

Mr  Day  in  his  plan,  speaking  of  this  mahal,  says,  "The  opportu- 
nity I  have  lately  had  of  ascertaining  with  some  degree  of  accuracy 
the  gross  amount  of  the  sum  annually  realised  from  a  part  of  this 
pargannah  (Hosseenpur  and  Hosseenshy)  leads  me  to  conclude  that 
the  jumma  of  which  the  pargannah  at  large  is  now  rated  is  by  no 
means  equal  to  its  ability,  and  that  the  balance  remaining  of  the 
deduction  of  1187  should  be  resumed  at  the  next  settlement.  This, 
however,  must  depend  on  the  truth  and  falsity  of  the  pleas  urged  by 
the  zemindar's  agents,  who  allege  that  the  impoverished  state  of 
Pautpossar  and  other  parts  of  his  district  renders  the  excess  of 
jumma,  which  appears  to  have  been  and  is  now  collected  from  the 
other  two  above  mentioned,  al)solutely  necessary  to  enable  them  to 
perform  their  engagements  with  Government.  I  would,  therefore, 
recommend  that  this  plea  of  the  bad  state  of  Pautpossar  be  inquired, 
into  previous  to  concluding  any  settlement  with  the  zemindars,  when, 
should  it  appear  to  be  false,  the  increase  before  proposed  should,  in 
my  opinion,  be  levied,  and  the  pargannah  will  then  stand  rated  at 
the  jumma  of  1179,  being  Rs.l36,G87-9-3." 

To  the  above  proposal  the  Board  make  the  following  reply  :  "  We 
direct  that  you  will  call  upon  the  zemindars  to  enter  into  engage- 
ments for  Hosseenpur  and  Hosseenshy,  with  the  increase  proposed  by 
you,  and  which  you  inform  us  you  have  ascertained  their  ability  to 
pay;  and  that  you  conclude  the  settlement  of  these  pargannahs 
accordingly.  In  respect  to  the  assessment  of  Pautpossar,  we  await 
your  report  on  the  result  of  the  investigation  now  making  into  the 


APPEAWIX. 


409 


alleged  losses  in  that  pargannali,  and  in  (jtlier  parts  of  Narullapiir, 
which  we  require  you  will  transmit  to  us  with  the  least  possible 
delay." 

The  zemindar's  naibs  being  called  upon  to  renew  engagements  for 
the  pargannahs  Hosseenpur,  Hosseenshy,  with  the  increase  proposed, 
observe  that  they  can  have  no  objection  to  an  increase  on  the  above 
pargannahs  ;  at  the  same  time  they  hope  tliat  equal  justice  will  be 
done  them  on  the  assessment  of  Pautpossar,  &c.  &c.,  in  which  case 
they  are  satisfied  and  ready  to  engage,  under  the  consideration 
that  Government  shall  not  insist  on  the  licpiidation  of  the  present 
balance,  in  which  case  a  renewal  of  engagements  on  their  j^art 
is  altogether  impossible  without  the  consent  of  their  principal, 
to  whom  they  shall  immediately  communicate  the  orders  now  re- 
ceived. 

The  agents'  answer  being  communicated  to  the  Board,  they  ap- 
prove of  the  settlement  of  Hosseenpur  and  Hosseenshy  at  the  increase 
agreed  on,  and  direct  that  Pautpossar  and  the  remaining  lands  be 
published  for  farm,  and  that  should  the  zemindar  decline  to  engage 
for  the  highest  amount  offered,  the  Collector  conclude  the  settle- 
ment with  the  farmer  offei'ing  the  same,  subject,  however,  in  either 
case  to  the  approbation  of  the  Governoi'-General  in  Council,  should 
any  remission  be  necessary  from  the  jumina  of  last  year. 

Pautpossar,  &c.,  pargannahs  were  in  consequence  advertised  for 
farm  ;  that  no  tender  being  made,  and  the  proprietors  requiring  the 
enormous  abatement  on  the  jumma  of  1194  of  Rs.41, 393-14-15-1, 
the  Board  directed,  under  date  the  23d  September  1788,  these 
mahals  to  be  held  khass. 

The  balance  due  to  Government  from  the  zemindari  at  the  close 
of  the  year  1194  stood  at  Rs.28,a20-10-12.  Of  this  arrear  the 
Board  recommend  to  his  Lordship  in  Council  a  remission  of  20,000, 
from  a  conviction  of  the  losses  sustained  in  the  pargannah.  His 
Lordship  consents  to  a  remission  of  half  the  balance,  provided  the 
zemindar  would  agree  to  discharge  the  remainder  in  the  course  of 
1195.  This  offer  the  proprietor  declined.  However,  the  amount 
has  since  been  recovered  from  him,  as  the  Board  remark  in  their 
letter  of  the  15th  May  last  that  they  shall  stop  the  same  from  his 
mosharah. 

In  1195  Pautpossar,  &c.,  being  held  khass,  Government  sustained 
a  balance  of  35,782-15-7-2. 

The  late  Commissioner's  report  will  show  that  these  pargannahs 
suffered  very  considerably  in  their  funds  during  the  dreadful  cala- 
mity of  1194,  and  that  the  settlement  con.cluded  with  the  proprietor 
for  the  current  year  exceeded  the  resources  of  the  pargannah  in  1195. 
I  cannot,  therefore,  but  earnestly  recommend  that  the  present  jumma, 
being  113,001,  be  continued,  and  the  settlement  be  concluded  with 
the  proprietor  for  the  term  of  three  years,  after  the  expiration  of 
which  an  increase  of  Es.5000  be  paid  on  a  rusud  jumma  of  three 
years. 


4IO  DISTRICT  OF  BAK A RGANJ. 


1194.  Russoolpilr. — Jumma,  7i*s.26,749-G-5. 

Mr  Day,  sensible  of  the  inability  of  the  mahal,  recommended  in 
liis  proposed  plan  of  settlement  for  1195  that  the  jumma  be  fixed  at 
lis. 22,000  ;  but  the  Board  disapproving  of  the  abatement  proposed, 
and  tlie  zemindars  refusing  to  renew  engagements  on  the  term  of 
1194,  tlie  Collector  was  directed  to  advertise  the  mahal  to  farm,  but 
no  tenders  being  made,  the  pargannah  was  held  khass.  The  balance 
sustained  in  1195  amounted  to  the  enormous  sum  of  15,817-9-17-2, 
and  in  1194  the  proprietors  fell  in  arrears  16,365-5-13-2,  the  particu- 
lars and  causes  of  which  are  fully  stated  in  the  Commissioner's  rejiort. 

The  settlement  for  the  current  year  was  concluded  Avith  the  pro- 
prietors at  the  jumma  of  Rs.  18,766,  and  the  sole  management  given 
to  one  of  the  partners  with  the  sanction  of  the  Board ;  and  I  have 
the  pleasure  to  observe  that,  by  the  mode  adopted,  the  revenues  have 
been  paid  with  great  punctuality.  And  if  I  might  presume  to  recom- 
mend, I  should  propose  the  management  be  continued  Avith  Zey 
Odeen ;  and  I  am  urged  to  this  recommendation  from  the  incapacity 
of  one  of  the  partners,  and  from  the  known  refractory  conduct  of  the 
other,  Avho  is  the  proprietor  of  the  five  and  three  anas  share  of  Edrok- 
piir.  The  Board  will  see  by  my  touzi  account  for  Phangoon  the  heavy 
balance  due  from  these  divisions,  and  the  steps  I  was  obliged  to 
adopt  in  consequence  of  the  contumacious  conduct  of  the  zemindar. 
Zq^Y  Odeen  is  a  mild  capable  man,  and  1  have  no  doubt  if  the  solo 
management  of  this  mahal  be  left  with  him  for  ten  years,  that  culti- 
vation will  lie  considerably  extended,  and  Government  revenues  in- 
creased in  proportion.  If  the  Board  should  approve  of  this  mode,  I 
beg  to  recommend  the  present  assessment  be  continued  for  three 
years,  at  the  expiration  of  which  period  an  increase  of  5000  be  taken 
on  a  rusud  of  two  years,  by  which  means  Government  jumma  will 
stand  in  1201  at  23,766,  which  is  an  excess  on  Mr  Day's  assessment 
of  Rs.  1766.  I  think  it  my  duty  to  observe  that  the  other  two  pro- 
prietors will  strenuously  oppose  Zey  Odeen's  being  vested  with  the 
sole  management,  but  whether  their  objections  are  to  be  admitted 
and  Government  dues  thereby  endangered,  must  be  determined  by 
the  Board.  I  shall  only  add,  that  in  the  event  of  the  sole  manage- 
ment devolving  on  Zey  Odeen,  he  should  enter  into  an  obligation  to 
divide  the  jorofits  equally  between  the  other  partners,  or  to  allow 
them  their  share  of  the  10  per  cent,  adjudged  to  the  zemindars  as 
their  proportion  of  the  ]\Ioff'ossil  funds. 

I  have  now,  gentlemen,  as  my  duty  required,  laid  before  you  the 
state  and  ability  of  the  princij^al  mahals  under  my  superintendence. 
If  for  the  reasons  adduced  you  deem  it  necessary  to  conclude  the 
settlements  on  the  terms  proposed  by  me,  I  request  to  be  furnished 
with  your  speedy  orders. 

I  shall  do  myself  the  honour  of  transmitting  you  my  remarks  in 
the  course  of  a  few  days  on  such  of  the  petty  mahals  which  in  my 


APPENDIX.  411 

judgment  are  not  capable  of  bearing  the  assessment  recommended  by 
Mr  Day. 

In  respect  to  your  queries  regarding  tlie  hauts  and  gunges,  I  shall 
reply  to  them  with  the  least  possible  delay. — I  have,  &c., 

(Signed)     W.  DoUGLAS,  Collector. 

Dacca,  Qth  April  1790. 


To  the  Houourable  Charles  Stuaut,  President, 
and  Members  of  the  Board  of  Revenue, 
Fort  William. 

Gentlemen, — I  am  now  to  reply  to  that  part  of  your  letter  of  18th 
February  which  respects  the  hauts,  bazaar,  and  gunges,  and  their 
attachment  and  separation  from  the  mahal  revenue. 

As  the  immediate  attachment  of  the  bazaars,  &c.,  would  have 
greatly  interrupted  the  collections  of  the  land  revenue,  which  must 
have  taken  place  by  deputing  persons  into  the  Moffossil  for  that  pur- 
pose, and  from  the  confusion  which  such  a  step  would  have  occa- 
sioned, I  judged  it  a  matter  of  expediency  to  postpone  the  attachment 
till  the  close  of  the  collections,  lest  the  Honourable  Comimny  should 
have  sustained  a  loss  in  the  collections  therebj'',  more  especiallj'-  as 
the  zemindars  and  renters  of  every  denomination  considered  them- 
selves as  entitled  to  the  profits  arising  from  them,  and  a  depreciation 
of  them  would  have  been  held  forth  as  a  plea  for  withholding 
balances  probably  to  a  considerable  amount. 

I  did  not  fail,  however,  to  institute  an  inquiry  into  the  several 
articles  of  sayer  collection,  as  directed  by  your  Board,  and  from  in- 
quiry I  perceive  that  the  sayer  collections  general  are  constituted  in 
this  district  under  the  name  of  mahals ;  for  instance,  the  tax  col- 
lected from  the  washerman  is  called  the  Gazzer-mahal,  that  from 
dried  fish  the  Mehai-mahal ;  and  so  of  others,  the  mahal  deriving  its 
name  generally  from  the  country  name  of  the  profession  or  article 
each  should  happen  to  bear. 

Here  it  is  necessary  to  observe  that  most  of  the  mahals  comprising 
the  sayer  are  either  included  in  the  Shire  Chundanah  or  Shaw- 
bunder. 

In  respect  to  the  advantages  or  disadvantages  to  be  expected  from 
the  continuance  or  discontinuance  of  them,  I  can  only  give  my  opi- 
nion, and  leave  the  result  to  you  for  determination. 

As  these  taxes  are  all,  exclusive  of  the  bazaars,  hauts,  and  gunges, 
wholly  separated  and  unconnected  with  the  land  revenue,  the  con- 
tinuance or  aboliti(jn  of  them  cannot  affect  any  other  jDersons  than 
those  immediately  employed  in  their  collection  or  from  whom  they 
are  levied ;  and  it  will  rest  with  Government  to  give  up  the  profits 
derived  from  them  by  their  discontinuance  ;  but  in  order  to  form  a 
judgment  of  the  expediency  of  such  measure,  a  particular  account  of 
the  mode  of  collecting  and  the  rate  of  taxation  is  necessary. 

As  far  as  I  have  been  able  to  learn,  they  are  in  general  of  the 
same  nature  as  taxes  on  the  same  articles  in  other  countries,  and  I 


4 1 2  DISTRICT  OF  bAkA  K  GANJ. 

am  inclined  to  tliink  they  arc  not  considered  as  oppressive  even  by 
the  natives  themselves,  excepting  a  few  in  this  district,  which  I 
shall  have  the  pleasure  of  recommending  to  the  Board  to  be  abolished 
in  the  course  of  making  the  present  year's  settlement. 

I  shall  not  therefore  take  on  me  to  recommend  their  discontinu- 
ance, whereby  the  Honourable  Company  must  sustain  considerable 
loss ;  while  at  the  same  time  the  benefits  arising  to  individuals  would 
scarcely  be  a  compensation  for  giving  up  so  much  revenue  which  is 
necessarily  appropriated  to  the  general  defence  of  the  State,  and  of 
the  benefits  of  which  every  individual  participates.  I  therefore  see 
no  reason  Avhy  professional  men,  tradesmen,  and  artificers  of  every 
kind  should  not  contribute  their  quota  to  such  a  useful  and  neces- 
sary purpose,  as  well  as  the  ryot  or  husbandman,  more  specially  in 
times  of  pressing  exigencies. 

The  mode  of  collection  and  rate  of  taxation  is,  I  perceive,  not 
very  well  defined,  and  is  in  some  measure  even  arbitrary.  I  should 
therefore  recommend  that  a  moderate  and  fixed  rate  of  taxation  be 
determined  on  by  the  Honourable  Board,  to  become  a  general  and 
permanent  rate,  to  be  adhered  to  strictly  in  all  instances,  and  every 
deviation  punished  exeraplarily ;  that  this  rate  should  be  published 
throughout  the  pargannahs,  and  the  Collector  directed  to  see  it  pro- 
perly executed,  which,  Avitli  a  proper  situation  of  the  jDersons  em- 
ployed in  the  detailed  parts,  might  have  a  very  salutary  effect, 
overrule  every  objection  to  the  nature  of  the  taxes,  and  secure  ease 
to  the  subject,  while  at  the  same  time  it  would  afi"ord  a  source  of 
revenue  to  Government. 

In  respect  to  the  bazaars,  hauts,  and  gunges,  I  conceive  them  to  be 
on  a  very  different  footing  from  the  sayer ;  and  here  I  beg  leave  to 
acknowledge  the  receipt  of  the  Board's  letters  of  the  19th  and  26th 
ultimo.  On  this  subject  I  have  carried  the  Board's  orders  into 
execution  in  attaching  all  bazaars,  gunges,  and  hauts,  whether 
situated  on  rent-free  lands  of  difi!erent  descriptions  or  otherwise,  and 
as  soon  as  I  receive  the  Mofi"ossil  accounts,  I  hope  to  be  able  to  pro- 
pose from  these  lights  a  plan  for  the  future  management  of  them;  at 
present  I  cannot  venture  to  hazard  a  conjecture.  I  beg  leave  to  sub- 
mit my  answers  to  the  several  cpieries  put  to  the  Behar  Collections : — 

Question  1. — Whether  in  admitting  the  rights  of  the  zemindars  to 
a  property  in  the  soil,  they  do  not  consider  the  gunges  and  bazaars 
as  much  a  part  of  that  property  as  any  part  of  the  lands  in  their 
possession  1 

Answer  1. — Admitting  the  right  of  the  zemindars  to  a  property 
in  the  soil,  I  certainly  consider  the  gunges  and  bazaars  as  much  a 
part  of  that  property  as  any  part  of  the  lands  in  their  possession, 

Q.  2. — If  they  do  not,  to  point  out  the  ground  of  the  distinction. 

A.  2. — The  former  being  admitted,  all  argument  respecting  the 
second  falls  to  the  ground. 

Q.  3. — To  report  whether  the  zemindars  claim  the  gunges  and 
bazaars  as  their  property,  and  whether  they  make  any,  and  what 
objection  to  the  separation  of  them. 


APPENDIX.  413 

A.  3. — The  zemindars  certainly  claim  the  giingos  and  bazaars  as 
their  property,  unanimously  o])ject  to  the  separation  of  them,  and 
have  delivered  in  a  petition  to  that  effect,  Avhich  goes  enclosed,  No.  1, 
Avitli  a  translation  stating  their  objections. 

Q.  4. — To  report  if  there  are  not  gunges,  bazaars,  hauts,  and  sayer 
in  the  lands  held  by  the  proprietors  of  altamghas  and  the  tenants 
of  jageers,  and  whether  persons  of  this  description  would  object  to 
the  separation  of  gunges,  &c.  &c.,  and  the  grounds  of  such  objec- 
tion. 

A.  4. — No  doubt  but  there  are  manj^  gunges,  bazaars,  and  hauts  in 
the  rent-free  lands,  and  the  proprietors  have  the  same  objection  as 
the  zemindars  to  their  separation  ;  they  claim  them  as  their  right 
held  under  certain  grants.  To  show  how  extremely  averse  the  pro- 
prietors of  charity  lands  are  to  the  separation,  I  must  beg  to  state 
the  remonstrance  of  a  respectable  old  man  who  holds  Narraingunge. 

"  I  hold  Narraingunge  in  virtue  of  a  sanad  granted  by  the  Company 
for  the  purpose  of  defra,ying  the  expenses  of  the  takoor,  for  feeding 
the  poor,  and  for  my  own  support.  To  this  day  the  gentlemen 
have  not  resumed  Debouter,  Bormouter,  Lackarage,  Aymah,  Piraun, 
and  Fakiraun  lands  of  ancient  establishment,  and  the  proprietors 
have  been  suffered  to  enjoy  them  unmolested.  I  have  been  an  old 
and  faithful  servant  of  the  Company,  and  have  held  Narraingunge 
these  thirty  years ;  and  now  that  I  am  Avorn  down  with  years  and 
infirmities,  and  have  no  other  means  of  support,  I  learn  that  a 
darogah  is  appointed  to  Narraingunge  to  attach  the  same.  This 
news  have  overwhelmed  me  with  grief,  and  as  I  am  too  ill  and  too 
Aveak  to  wait  on  you,  I  have  sent  my  son  to  you  to  represent  my 
miserable  situation.  He  Avill  show  you  my  sanad.  Let  me  beseech 
you  to  give  a  favourable  ear  to  his  representation ;  but  if  you  do 
not,  it  Avere  better  that  you  take  away  my  life,  or  expel  me  from  a 
district  Avhere  I  can  no  longer  remain  Avithout  incurring  shame, 
trouble,  and  infinite  distress.  Hundreds  of  beggars  \A\o  are  daily 
fed  by  me  are  clamorous  for  food,  and  you  have  not  only  deprived 
me  of  the  means  of  supplying  their  AA'ants,  but  shut  the  door  against 
my  performing  my  religious  rites  by  taking  possession  of  the  gunge." 

If  any  partial  deviation  from  a  general  rule  could  be  departed 
from,  it  ought  to  be  done  in  the  instance  of  this  man. 

He  served  the  Company  from  eleven  years  of  age,  and  held  the 
office  of  DeAvan  to  the  Dacca  Commercial  Kesident  for  eleven  years, 
the  duties  of  Avhich,  I  am  told,  he  executed  AA-ith  zeal,  integrity,  and 
credit  until  age  and  infirmities  compelled  him  to  relinquish  the 
station. 

There  are  several  petty  bazaars  in  this  district,  the  sole  profits  of 
Avhich  are  employed  in  defraying  the  expenses  of  different  musjeds 
and  takoors,  and  for  the  performance  of  religious  ceremonies.  The 
proprietors  of  these  have  resorted  to  me  in  croAvds,  and  are  become 
very  clamorous  in  consequence  of  the  late  orders,  and  declare  that 
attaching  their  bazaars  is  not  only  an  infringement  of  their  estab- 
lished rights,  but  strikes  at  the  fundamental  principles  of  their  reli- 


414 


DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 


gion,  as  tliey  are  now  deprived  of  the  sole  resource  by  which  they 
were  enabled  to  defray  the  necessary  establishment  of  officers  kept 
up  for  the  performance  of  their  religious  ceremonies ;  that  their 
houses  of  worship  must  noAV  be  shut  up,  and  their  priests  dismissed. 
They  freely  say  that  Government  had  better  deprive  them  of  their 
existence  than  prevent  the  performance  of  their  religious  rites. 

Your  Board  must  decide  how  far  these  representations  can  be 
[not  legible],  they  are  well  founded.  I  am  also  satisfied  that  the 
revenues  to  be  derived  from  them  will  be  absorbed  in  defraying  the 
establishment  necessary  to  be  entertained  for  collecting  the  same. 

His  Lordship  must  determine  how  far  bazaars  which  come  under 
the  above  description  can  in  justice  or  policy  be  resumed.  It  is 
only  for  me  humbly  to  observe,  that  by  suffering  them  to  continue 
in  the  hands  of  the  present  proj^rietors,  Government  will  afford  ease, 
comfort,  and  relief  to  many  hundreds  of  the  poor  inhabitants  who 
are  daily  supported  from  the  produce  of  them. 

Q.  5. — As  far  as  right  of  j^roperty  is  concerned,  to  discriminate 
between  the  rights  of  zemindars  and  those  of  jageerdars  and 
altamgadars,  in  case  objections  on  this  ground  should  arise  to  the 
separation  of  the  gunges,  &c.,  from  the  jurisdiction  of  the  latter. 

A.  5. — I  conceive  there  is  a  wide  distinction  between  the  property 
of  the  zemindars  and  altamgadars. 

The  former  is  liable  to  be  deprived  of  his  lands  in  the  event  of 
his  declining  to  renew  engagements  on  the  terms  proposed  by 
Government,  and  for  each  deprivation  he  receives  a  certain  stipend. 
Whereas  the  altamgadars  hold  their  lands  rent-free,  and  in  per- 
petuity. The  jageerdars,  again,  hold  theirs  on  a  different  tenure,  for 
on  the  death  of  the  proprietor  the  jageer  escheats  to  Government. 
Zemindars  can  have  no  claim  to  it,  he  having  received  an  abate- 
ment from  his  jumma  at  the  time  such  jageer  was  granted. 

Q.  6. — Whether  the  abuses  now  prevailing  in  the  gunges  are  of 
such  a  nature  as  not  to  be  corrected  by  rules  and  limitations  with- 
out taking  them  under  their  own  charge  1 

A.  6. — I  apprehend  the  abuses  are  of  such  a  nature  as  cannot  be 
corrected  but  by  taking  them  immediately  in  charge  for  Govern- 
ment. It  may  then  be  practicable,  by  proper  rules  and  limitations, 
with  diligent  and  active  officers. 

In  recommending  for  adoption  a  new  system,  which  is  likely  to 
affect  every  renter  in  the  country,  I  am  aware  that  much  caution, 
diligent  inquiry,  and  a  thorough  knowledge  of  existing  evils  are 
necessary,  and  that  great  changes  should  not  be  hastily  adopted ; 
yet,  from  the  nature  of  the  abuses  committed,  the  almost  impossi- 
bility of  detection,  particularly  in  the  [not  legible]  of  the  country, 
and  the  difficulty  of  obtaining  redress  and  retribution,  and  from  a 
persuasion  the  intended  change  will  be  attended  with  very  salu- 
tary effects,  every  exertion  shall  be  used  on  my  part  to  carry  his 
Lordship's  orders  into  immediate  and  effectual  execution,  and  I  shall 
endeavour  to  fulfil  the  wishes  of  Government  with  unremitted  zeal, 
activity,  and  integrity. 


APPENDIX. 


415 


I  beg  to  be  favoured  wiili  your  early  orders  respecting  abatement 
to  be  granted  the  zemindars  in  consideration  of  their  being  deprived 
of  the  gunge,  liaut,  bazaar  collections,  as  you  will  perceive  by  the 
petition  No.  1  that  they  have  refused  to  renew  engagement  unless 
some  compensation  be  made  them.  1  apprehend  that  any  farther 
delay  in  concluding  settlement  will  be  attended  with  a  serious  loss 
in  the  present  year's  revenue,  for  although  I  have  taken  every  pre- 
caution to  prevent  anticipation  of  the  revenues,  yet  the  zemindars 
will  endeavour  to  exceed  the  same,  and  clandestinely  collect. — I 
have,  &c. 

(Signed)    W.  Douglas,  Collector. 

Dacca,  5//t  Ma)j  17D0. 


To  the  Honoumljle  Charles  Stuart,  President, 

aud  Members  of  the  Board  of  Keveuue, 

Fort  AVilliam. 

Gentlemen, — I  have  the  honour  to  acknowledge  the  receipt  of 
your  secretary's  letter  of  the  14th  instant,  enclosing  copy  of  the  Reso- 
lutions of  the  Governor-General  in  Council  in  the  Revenue  Depart- 
ment, under  date  12th  May  1790,  revoking  the  16tli  article  of  the 
General  Regulations  for  the  Bengal  Settlement  passed  in  Council  on 
the  10th  February  last,  as  far  as  it  regards  who  are  actual  proprietors 
of  the  lands  composing  their  talooks,  with  the  exception  of  that  part 
of  it  which  prescribes  rules  for  fixing  the  amount  of  the  assessment 
to  be  imposed  upon  their  talooks,  and  directing  that  all  talookdars 
who  are  proprietors  of  the  soil  and  who  now  pay  their  rents  through 
the  mediation  of  a  zemindar  be  immediately  separated  from  the 
jurisdiction  and  authority  of  such  zemindar,  and  the  rents  of  the 
latter  be  adjusted,  exclusive  of  the  talooks  so  separated,  and  order- 
ing that  the  settlement  be  concluded  with  the  talookdars  themselves. 

As  the  measure  involves  a  cjuestion  of  considerable  magnitude,  as 
far  as  it  applies  to  the  district  in  my  charge,  and  the  persons  who 
are  the  immediate  objects  of  it,  I  conceive  it  becomes  a  point  of  duty 
in  me  to  take  this  early  opportunity  of  stating  to  your  Board  the 
advantages  or  disadvantages  which  are  likely  to  arise  from  an  adop- 
tion of  it  in  this  district,  as  far  as  my  local  knowledge  and  the 
incpiiries  I  have  hitherto  been  able  to  make  extend ;  and  in  doing 
this  I  rely  on  the  candour  of  the  Board  to  exempt  me  from  any 
intentional  inclination  of  opposing  measures  which  may  be  estab- 
lished for  the  general  benefit  of  the  country.  I  trust  the  unremitting 
zeal  and  attention  I  have  shown  in  endeavouriiig  to  carry  into 
execution  the  late  orders  of  Government  Avill  secure  me  from  any 
suspicion,  while  at  the  same  time  a  simple  statement  of  facts,  though 
they  may  operate  in  some  measure  against  the  intended  Regulation, 
becomes  in  me  an  indispensable  piece  of  duty,  as  the  ensuing  year's 
revenue  may  be  afi"ected  thereby. 

The  first  question  that  occurs  is,  What  is  a  talookdar,  and  what 
the  essentials  that  constitute  him  an  actual  proprietor  of  the  soil  ] 


41 6  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

As  I  was  not  satisfactorily  informed  on  this  subject,  I  recurred  to 
tlie  most  authentic  evidence,  written  or  verbal,  Avithin  my  reach, 
and  I  find  they  are  in  this  district  of  four  kinds,  besides  a  similar 
description  of  renter  called  a  howladar,  as  follows  : — 

1.  Junglehoory. — Previous  to  the  division  of  the  country  into  par- 
gannahs  and  tappahs,  and  fixed  what  is  called  the  tuxeembandy,  many 
persons  undertook  to  cultivate  jungle  and  waste  lands,  and  when  the 
tuxeembandy  was  made,  these  new-cultivated  lands  Avere  constituted 
talooks,  and  included  in  the  zummabandy  of  the  nearest  zemindar 
by  the  Government  of  that  time ;  and  if  any  increase  or  remission 
Avas  granted  the  zemindar,  a  proj^ortional  part  fell  to  the  talookdar. 
If  the  zemindar  withheld  from  the  talookdar  any  part  of  this,  he 
Avas  at  liberty  to  complain  to  the  GoA^ernment,  Avho  compelled  the 
zemindar  to  alloAV  the  talookdar  his  proportion  of  the  remission.  If 
the  talookdar  died  leaving  heirs,  they  got  possession  of  this  land  in  the 
same  manner  as  their  predecessor,  and  the  zemindar  had  nothing 
to  do  Avith  them,  but  receive  his  malgujari  agreeably  to  kistibandi; 
but  if  there  happened  to  be  no  heirs,  the  zemindar  Avas  the  manager 
for  the  behalf  of  Government. 

2.  Zur  Khorid. — The  talookdars  under  this  denomination  Avere  at 
liberty  to  sell  their  talooks  by  bill  of  sale,  Avith  or  Avithout  the  per- 
mission of  the  zemindar  ;  and  on  failure  of  heirs  the  zemindar  could 
take  possession,  and  sell  the  lands,  or  keep  them,  as  he  might  be 
inclined.  These  talookdars  Avere  subject  to  increase  or  entitled  to 
remissions  proportionately  Avith  the  zemindar,  agreeably  to  their 
respective  jumma. 

3.  Fattah  TalooMar. — The  zemindars  and  choAvdries  could  grant 
hereditary  talookdary  pattahs  to  any  person  for  lands  belonging  to 
themselves,  called  their  neez,  Avhether  cultiA^ated  or  uncultivated,  in 
Avhich  pattah  it  Avas  stipulated  that  the  talookdar  should  have  pos- 
session of  the  Avhole  lands  agreed  ujion,  and  that  the  management 
should  descend  to  his  heirs  for  ever ;  but  this  talookdar  could  neither 
sell  nor  make  over  by  deed  of  gift  the  lands  of  his  talook,  neither 
could  the  zemindar  dispose  of  it,  but  on  failure  of  issue  it  reverted 
to  the  zemindar.  Pattah  talookdars  Avere  subject  to  increase  and 
remission  along  Avith  the  zemindar. 

4.  Ausat  TalooMar,  or  talookdar  Avithin  talookdar,  is  the  same  in 
respect  to  a  talookdar  that  a  jer  khareed  talookdar  is  to  a  zemindar. 

5.  Hoivladar. — In  the  pargannah  of  Bickrampore  a  custom  prevails 
that  if  any  talookdar  sell  any  part  of  talook  to  another  person,  upon 
receiving  the  purchase  price  he  calls  him  a  hoAvladar  of  so  much 
land,  Avho  pays  his  rents  to  the  talookdar ;  but  if  any  dispute  arises 
betAveen  the  talookdar  and  hoAvladar,  he  can  get  his  howallah  sepa- 
rated from  this  talookdar  and  included  in  some  other  talookdary 
lands  ;  is  subject  to  increase  and  decrease  of  revenue  along  with  the 
other  renters,  and  the  property  is  hereditarj^  and  transferable. 

The  above  is  as  accurate  a  definition  of  the  different  talookdars  of 
this  district  as  I  have  been  able  to  procure,  and  it  remains  Avith  the 
Board  to  decide  Avhat  description  of  them,  or  Avhether  the  Avhole  are 


APPENDIX. 


417 


to  be  considered  as  having  an  actual  property  in  the  soil,  and  to  be 
separated  from  the  zemindars. 

The  number  of  talookdars  in  this  district  is  computed  to  be  up- 
wards of  20,000.  ]\Iany  i)argannahs  have  already  a  talookdary 
settlement,  the  zemindars  standing  between  them  and  Government 
in  the  light  of  tahsildars. 

I  am  authorised  by  the  Resolutions  of  the  Governor-General  in 
Council  to  appoint  tahsildars  in  those  jiargannahs  where  the  talooks 
are  too  numerous  to  receive  the  revenues  immediately  from  the 
talookdars.  This  mode  I  must  consequently  adopt  in  many  pargan- 
nahs,  but  in  doing  this  the  zemindars  will  murmur,  as  long  custom 
and  possession  have  given  them  a  sort  of  hereditary  claim  to  the 
management,  from  which  they  derive  pecuniary  advantages,  as  well 
as  influence  and  consequence.  The  new  tahsildars,  it  is  true,  can  for 
some  time  to  come  have  no  hereditary  claim,  though  there  is  no  doubt 
but  possession  may  at  some  future  period  give  them  a  handle  to  set 
up  pleas  of  the  same  kind.  Thus,  then,  a  new  set  of  men  will  be  set 
up  who  may  claim  property  to  which  they  have  no  title,  at  the  ex- 
pense of  those  who  are  already  admitted  to  possess  or  supposed  to 
have  a  right  in  the  soil. 

In  the  mahal  Katarabu  the  zemindars  have  not  a  foot  of  ground — 
all  talooliidary — yet  thej^  claim  a  right  to  the  lands,  and  are  allowed 
the  usual  russoom.  May  we  not  sujipose  them  to  have  been  origi- 
nally only  talookdars,  and  from  long  possession  have  set  up  hereditary 
claim  ?  And  may  we  not  also  from  thence  infer  that  our  talookdars 
may  have  a  sense  of  their  own  interests  sufficient  at  least  to  attempt 
a  similar  claim  1 

I  beg  to  subjoin  a  list  of  some  of  the  principal  zemindaries  of  this 
district,  showing  the  talookdary  jumma,  the  neez  jumma  of  the 
zemindars,  and  the  number  of  talookdars  in  each  zemindary  : — 


Crown  Lands. 

Talookdars' 
Jumma. 

Total  Jumma. 

No.  of  Ta- 
lookdiirs. 

Pargannah  Jalalpore 
Pargannah  Chandradeep 
Pargannah  Bickrampore 
Pargannah  Rajnagar,  &c. 
Tappeh  Mysurdee     . 
Pargannah  Essakabad    . 
Tappeh  Hydrabad    . 

11,000 
17,000 
2,010 
92,555 
4,000 
1,700 
1,237 

76,001 
72,725 
25,642 
20,118 
14,004 
2,000 
750 

87,001 

89,725 

27,652 

293,673 

18,004 

3,700 

1,985 

2148 
400 
268 
400 
5G1 
200 
200 

From  the  above  comparative  view  of  the  property  of  the  talook- 
dars and  zemindars,  it  appears  that  the  latter  possess  but  little  real 
property  of  their  own,  and  that  a  separation  of  the  talookdars  would 
reduce  many  of  them  from  affluent  circumstances  to  a  state  of  in- 
digence, and  the  titles  of  Eajah  and  Zemindars,  which  they  are 
allowed  to  enjoy,  will  become  a  mere  empty  name. 

To  ascertain  the  rights  and  tenures  of  such  a  number  of  talookdars 
as  20  000  must  take  up  a  great  deal  of  time,  and  cannot  be  accom- 

2  D 


4 1 8  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

plislied  in  less  than  two  or  three  years;  and  sensible  that  the 
revenues  of  the  current  year  must  sustain  considerable  loss  by  any 
further  delay  in  concluding  the  settlement,  and  anxious  to  prevent 
anticipation  of  collections  which  unavoidably  must  happen  by  any 
longer  procrastination,  notwithstanding  every  precaution  has  been 
taken  on  my  part  to  prevent  it,  I  cannot  but  earnestly  recommend 
that  engagements  be  entered  into  immediately  with  the  zemindars 
as  heretofore,  with  a  notification  of  their  agreeing  to  the  separation 
of  the  talookdars  whenever  Government  shall  think  proper  to  do  so, 
and  that  the  separation  from  their  authority  be  gradually  effected. 

There  can  be  no  inconvenience  in  adopting  this  mode,  as  the 
zemindars  are  obliged  to  state  the  sudder  jumma  levied  from  every 
talook,  mouza,  and  village  under  their  authority,  and  grant  pattahs 
to  the  talookdars,  by  which  means  illegal  exactions  will  be  pre- 
vented, and  the  talOokdar  will  have  it  in  his  option  to  continue 
under  the  authority  of  the  zemindars,  or  pay  his  revenues  directly 
to  the  Collector.  It  is  a  matter  of  doubt  with  me  Avhether,  by 
emancipating  the  talookdars  from  the  present  authority  and  juris- 
diction of  the  zemindars,  it  wall  free  them  from  the  exactions  they 
have  hitherto  been  subjected  to,  as,  considering  the  number  of  them, 
the  agency  of  tahsildars  Avill  be  necessary,  it  being  impossible  for  a 
Collector  to  treat  directly  with  20,000  or  30,000  different  renters, 
more  especially  when  his  time  is  fully  occupied  in  new  and  other  im- 
portant regulations,  and  I  am  not  sure  the  management  of  a  tahsildar 
is  preferable  to  that  of  a  zemindar ;  for  my  own  part  I  should  give 
the  latter  the  preference,  because  a  zemindar  may  entertain  hopes  of 
the  management  being  continued  to  him  from  good  behaviour,  but  a 
tahsildar  has  no  right  to  entertain  any  such  idea,  and  he  will,  look- 
ing to  the  present  moment  only,  endeavour  to  enrich  himself  at  the 
expense  of  those  who  are  placed  under  his  authority,  unless  indeed 
Government  choose  to  confirm  him  in  his  office,  for  a  space  of  time. 
There  is  another  inconvenience  attending  the  collection  of  a  tahsildar 
in  this  district,  which  I  believe  does  not  exist  in  any  other  to  so  great 
a  degree — namely,  the  dispersed  situation  of  the  lands.  The  lands 
of  a  talook  are  not  one  continued  spot  of  ground,  but  extend  through 
many  pargannahs  and  detached  in  small  and,  separate  parts,  and 
nothing  but  an  actual  measurement  of  the  whole  district  can  ascer- 
tain to  whom  the  property  belongs. 

The  zemindars,  feeling  their  interests  affected  by  the  new  regu- 
lations, will  endeavour  to  conceal,  combine  with,  and  connive  at  the 
concealment  of  others  ;  hence  a  defalcation  of  revenues,  endless  dis- 
putes, and  consequent  investigations  attended  with  expense,  will  be 
the  consequence,  and  I  am  convinced  nothing  but  an  actual  mea- 
surement of  the  whole  district  can  render  the  regulation  of  Govern- 
ment so  effective  as  they  could  wish.  Experience  proved  the  col- 
lections of  a  native  collector  to  be  defective,  and  tliis  induced  the 
sovereigns  of  this  coimtry  in  former  times  to  grant  lands  upon  lease 
to  the  inferior  renters  under  the  most  respectable  of  that  class  of 
people  now  denominated  zemindars,  for  management  and  collection, 


APPEND  J X.  419 

finding  the  inferior  landholders  too  numerous  and  too  distant  for 
receiving  their  collections  at  the  sudder,  and  the  collections  of  a 
tahsildar  too  defective  to  adopt  the  system  universally.  The  zemin- 
dars also  had  the  privilege  of  administering  justice  in  their  respec- 
tive jurisdictions,  acting  something  like  justices  of  the  peace  in  our 
own  country,  settling  trifling  disputes,  and  rendering  easy  and 
speedy  redress  to  the  injured  party,  which  Avould  have  been  rendered 
very  difficult  indeed  if  a  poor  man  has  a  travel  to  the  Huzzoor  and 
prefer  his  complaint  through  a  regiment  of  corrupt  mutsuddees, 
every  one  of  whom  must  have  been  bribed  before  he  could  obtain 
what  a  respectable  zemindar  could  have  granted  him  on  the  spot  in 
a  day's  attendance. 

The  powers  with  which  the  zemindar  was  invested,  I  believe  to 
have  given  rise  to  the  present  claims  of  the  zemindars  to  the  right 
of  having  the  talookdars  under  their  authority,  and  they  are  certainly 
not  entitled  to  complain,  if  upon  proof  of  ill-treatment  or  exactions, 
they  should  be  separated  from  them  ;  but  it  is,  I  think,  doubtful 
whether  the  appointment  of  tahsildars  is  calculated  to  remedy  the 
evil,  Avhile  at  the  same  time  it  aff"ords,  as  I  mentioned  before,  a 
handle  to  the  zemindars  to  combine  with  one  another,  and  with  ta- 
lookdars, to  conceal  lands  and  defraud  Government  of  its  just  dues. 

I  shall  conclude  with  observing  that  the  talookdars  whose  distance 
from  the  sudder  cutchery  is  considerable,  and  whose  revenues  do 
not  exceed  two,  four,  or  six  rupees  per  annum  {and  there  are  many 
such  in  this  district),  will  find  much  inconvenience  and  loss  of  time 
in  travelling  to  Dacca  with  their  monthly  instalments  of  two,  four, 
and  six  anas,  and  the  possibility  of  entertaining  vakeels  is  out  of 
the  question  from  the  amount.  The  jurisdiction  of  a  tahsildar  must 
extend  through  several  pargannahs,  and  include  these  distant  petty 
talookdars,  and  his  authority  over  them  must  be  very  inefficient  from 
their  separate  and  dispersed  situation,  and  hence  an  opportunity 
will  be  aflforded  for  collusion. 

W.  Douglas. 

Dacca,  tU  26th  May  1790. 


To  William  Cottper,  Esq.,  President,  aud 

Members  of  the  Bocard  of  Revenue, 

Fort  William. 

Gentlemen, — I  have  now  the  honour  to  transmit  to  you  the  pro- 
posed Novennial  Settlement  of  this  district,  commencing  with  the 
Bengali  year  1198  and  ending  with  120G,  for  your  information  and 
orders. 

As  in  my  letter  of  the  Sth  August  last  I  expressed  my  hopes 
that  the  increase  to  be  obtained  by  separating  the  talukdars  would 
equal  the  expense  of  the  tahsildari  establishment  required  for  this 
district,  but  as  my  expectations  have  not  been  realised  it  be- 
comes necessary  to  explain  to  you  the  causes  which  have  occurred 
to  frustrate  my  hopes  at  the  time  I  addressed  your  Board,  trans- 


420  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

mitting  for  approval  my  tahsildari  establishment.  I  conceived  that 
the  talukdars  of  the  following  mahals  would  be  entitled  to  separa- 
tion— viz.,  SelimAbad,  Chandradeep,  &c.,  Nazirpore,  Sultanabdd, 
and  Aurangpore — but  upon  investigating  into  their  right  to  that 
indulgence,  I  find  but  few  Avho  are  entitled  to  separation,  the  major 
part  of  them  holding  their  lands  on  similar  tenures  with  the  jungle- 
boory  talukdars  of  Bozergomedpur,  who  are  considered  as  lease- 
holders, and  therefore  continue  subject  to  the  authority  of  the  zemin- 
dars. Had  the  talukdars  of  the  pargannahs  above  mentioned  been 
separated,  I  am  confident  that  my  expectations  for  increase  would 
have  been  secured. 

Your  Board  will  perceive  in  my  account  settlement  that  the  lands 
of  sundry  talukdars  who  have  been  separated  from  different  par- 
gannahs remain  khas.  This  has  arisen  either  from  the  non-attend- 
ance of  some,  the  death  of  others,  or  because  their  jama  has  not 
been  finally  adjusted,  owing  to  the  difference  between  the  jama 
stated  in  the  accounts  delivered  in  by  the  zemindars  and  the  account 
declared  by  the  talukdars  to  have  been  annually  paid  by  them. 
However,  in  my  detailed  account  settlement,  which  I  shall  hereafter 
have  the  honour  of  laying  before  you,  I  hope  to  show  that  all  taluks 
now  held  khas  are  either  intrusted  with  their  respective  proprietors 
or  farmed  out,  and  in  settling  their  jama  I  trust  to  secure  some 
additional  increase  to  Government. 

The  zemindary  mahals  which  still  continue  khas  I  shall  have  the 
honour  to  report  upon  in  the  course  of  a  few  days. 

Your  Board  may  probably  observe  that  a  small  increase  has  been 
obtained  from  the  lands  of  the  zemindars.  To  this  I  reply,  that 
could  any  excess  have  been  obtained  from  them  without  endangering 
the  future  prosperity  of  the  district  it  should  have  been  effected  ; 
but  many  of  the  pargannahs  have  not  yet  recovered  the  losses  they 
suffered  in  the  direful  era  of  1194  by  a  deprivation  of  many  thou- 
sands of  ryots,  who  either  died  or  emigrated  in  that  year.  The 
Rajnagar  zemindary  is  a  melancholy  instance  of  the  truth  of 
this  assertion.  This  mahal  was  under  the  immediate  superinten- 
dence of  Mr  Thompson  for  two  years,  and  notwithstanding  every 
attention  was  bestowed,  and  every  encouragement  given,  yet  he 
found  it  impracticable  to  secure  the  former  jama.  In  1196  it  was 
found  necessary  to  allow  a  deduction  of  22,725,  In  1198  a  further 
abatement  of  Rs.  20,000  was  granted,  and  in  concluding  the  eight 
years'  settlement  the  further  sum  of  Rs.  6447-7-2-2  has  been  allowed, 
notwithstanding  the  sum  of  Rs.  15,860  was  added  to  the  zemindary 
by  a  resumption  of  the  profits  of  Pitambar  Sen's  neez  taluks.  Con- 
sequently if  that  sum  had  not  been  annexed  to  the  jama  of  the 
zemindary,  a  deduction  equal  to  its  amount  must  have  been  allowed. 
It  should  therefore  appear  that  in  the  sliort  space  of  four  years 
this  pargannah  has  declined  in  its  assets  in  the  enormous  sum  of 
Rs.  65,032-7-2-2. 

Great  difficulty  was  experienced  by  the  tahsildars  in  realising  the 
revenues  fi'om  the  talukdars,  owing  to  the  scattered  situation  of  the 


APPENDIX.  421 

lands  composing  the  pargannalis  under  my  superintendence.  To 
remove  this  inconvenience,  and  to  afford  ease  and  relief  to  tlie 
separated  talukdars,  I  propose,  with  your  sanction,  to  divide  the 
district  into  eight  com])uct  ziUahs,  and  to  phxce  the  same  under 
eight  tahsildars.  Should  your  Board  approve  of  this  measure,  I  will 
do  myself  the  pleasure  of  suhmitting  to  you  the  estahlishment 
necessary  for  carrying  this  plan  into  execution,  the  adojfting  of 
wliich  will  be  affording  great  relief  to  petty  talukdars,  many  of 
whom  have  to  travel  two  days'  journey  to  pay  montlily  the  trilling 
sum  of  Rs.2  or  3,  and  Government  revenues  Avill  be  realised  with 
greater  ease  and  punctuality. — I  have,  &c. 

(Signed)     W.  DOUGLAS,  Collector. 
Dacca,  the  Zlst  July  1792. 


II. — Letter  of  Mr  Massie  to  the  Board  of  Eevenue  about  the 
Permanent  Settlement,  dated  24th  March  1801. 

Gentlemen, — It  appearing  to  me,  that  in  consecpience  of  the 
Malguzai^i  lands  having  been  declared  by  the  existing  regulations 
responsible  for  such  arrears  as  might  become  due  to  Government 
therefrom,  sufficient  regard  was  not  paid  in  this  district  at  the  con- 
clusion of  the  Decennial  Settlement  to  the  ascertaining  and  record- 
ing the  names  of  the  actual  proprietors  of  such  lands  for  the  time 
being ;  in  consequence  of  which  the  Government  not  unfrequently 
suffers  losses  in  its  revenues  in  cases  where  the  proceeds  of  sales  of 
certain  lands  are  not  sufficient  to  answer  the  balances  due  from  such 
lands,  as  it  cannot  be  ascertained  Avhat  other  lands  the  defaulting 
proprietors  are  possessed  of;  and  individuals  are  often  unable  to 
recover  the  amount  of  their  just  demands  by  a  sale  of  lands  after 
decisions  have  been  passed  in  their  favour  by  the  courts  of  justice ; 
and  it  also  appearing  to  me  that  if  some  easy  and  effectual  mode  of 
ascertaining  and  recording  the  names  of  the  actual  proprietors  of 
lands  could  be  adopted,  it  would  be  attended  with  the  most  bene- 
ficial effects  as  well  to  Government  as  to  individuals,  I  therefore 
beg  leave  to  trouble  your  Board  with  a  few  remarks  on  this  subject 
for  your  consideration. 

2d.  Your  Board  will  be  pleased  to  observe  that  a  practice  has  pre- 
vailed in  this  district  from  time  immemorial,  and  still  prevails,  of 
conducting  all  the  affairs  of  an  estate  from  generation  to  generation 
in  the  name  of  the  original  proprietor  of  such  estate  or  some  fictitious 
name  formed  by  him,  under  which  cloak  the  actual  proprietors  for 
the  time  being  are  kept  concealed,  and  what  the  consequences  of 
such  concealment  are  I  have  stated  above.  But  before  I  proceed 
further,  I  deem  it  necessary  to  lay  before  your  Board  the  following 
extract  from  the  proceedings  held  in  this  office  at  the  time  of  the 
conclusion  of  the  Novennial  Settlement,  my  remarks  on  which  will, 
I  trust,  satisfy  your  Board  that  what  I  have  already  advanced  is 
not  incorrect,  nor  the  evil  complained  of  imaginary. 


42  2  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

Dacca  Jalalpuk,  Revenue  Cutchert,  t/te  20^/i  May  1791. 
This  being  the  day  fixed  on  for  commencing  the  settlement  for  nine 
years,  in  obedience  to  the  orders  of  the  Board  under  date  the  29th 
of  December  1790,  and  several  taluqdars  and  zamindars  being  in  at- 
tendance in  consequence  of  tlfe  advertisement  published  in 

.     The  Collector  commences  the  settlement  accor- 
dingly. 

Taluq  Hujuri,  Mirza  Jehan. — J.  ^s. 630-8. 

Eam  Sankar,  gomasta,  being  in  attendance,  gives  in  proposals  for 
the  ensuing  settlement.  He  is  informed  that  as  the  settlement  is  to 
be  made  for  nine  years,  he  must  give  an  increase  so  as  to  make  the 
jtxma  equal  to  Es.701.  He  acquiesces.  Resolved  the  terms  be 
accepted. 

Taluq  Hujuri,  Sib  Ram  Mullich. — J.  i2s.23. 

Dip  Chand,  proprietor,  enters  into  engagements  for  this  mahal 
upon  an  increase  of  Rs.2,  making  the  aggregate  Rs.25,     Accej^ted. 

Taluq  Hujuri,  Sib  Ram  Kalsi. — /.  Rs.Q. 

The  proprietor  delivers  in  proposals  with  an  increase  of  Rs.l, 
making  the  jama  7.     Accepted. 

Taluq  do.  {i.e.,  Hujuri),  Ram  Sanhar  Sein. — J.  Rs.28. 

Kowala  Kanth,  gomasta,  being  in  attendance,  delivers  in  proposals 
with  an  increase  of  Rs.2,  making  the  jama  Rs.lOO.     Accepted. 

Taluq  Putchlcoivl.—J.  ^s.  107-6. 

Ram  Nar  Singh,  gomasta,  being  in  attendance.  This  man  declines 
entering  into  engagements  on  the  terms  of  last  j^ear.  The  Board  to 
be  addressed.  Ordered  the  settlement  be  postponed  for  the  present. 
The  zamindar  having  acceded  to  the  terms  of  last  year,  it  becomes 
unnecessary  to  address  the  Board. 

Tahiq  Hujuri,  Birju  Sundar. — J.  iZs. 294-9-4-3. 

Ram  Sankar,  gomasta,  being  in  attendance,  gives  in  proposals  with 
an  increase  of  Rs.3-6-15-1,  making  the  jama  Rs.298.  The  vakil  re- 
presents that  his  constituent  holds  a  taluq  under  taluq  Baidinath, 
which  he  requests  may  be  separated  and  annexed  to  his  own. 

Accepted  for  this  taluq,  and  that  the  Board  be  addressed  on  the 
subject  of  the  latter  requisition. 

The  proprietor  of  Baidinath  being  in  attendance,  is  asked  whether 
he  has  any  valid  objections  to  make  to  the  separation  thereof  He 
replies  that  he  has  none  ;  but  he  observes,  that  as  some  of  the  taluqs 
under  him  are  ruined,  that  the  profitable  taluqs,  among  which  is  this 
one,  belonging  to  the  taluqdar  who  wishes  to  be  separated,  used  for- 
merly to  make  good  the  loss  he  sustained  upon  the  others,  conse- 
quently if  he  is  separated,  an  adequate  abatement  must  be  allowed 
him. 


APPEAWIX.  423 

Tahiq^  Hajari,  Ahul  Moolah. — /.  Rs.\'2b. 

Kislien  Mohan,  gomasta,  declines  entering  into  engagements  on  the 
terms  of  last  year,  though  a  deduction  has  been  allowed  tlieni  last 
year,  alleging  that  his  taluq  is  overrun  with  jungle  and  the  lands 
unfit  for  cultivation. 

Ordered.  The  Board  be  advised.  Unnecessary,  the  zamindar 
having  agreed  to  the  terms  of  last  year. 

Talaq  Sha  KhaUL—J.  BsAlS. 

This  taluq  stands  rated  in  1194  at  Es.l38.  An  increase  Avas 
obtained  in  1195  of  Es.40.  On  a  reference  to  Mr  Day's  plan,  the 
jama  of  1169  is  recommended  as  the  standard  for  the  conclusion  of 
the  settlement,  which  the  Board  approve  of.  It  appears,  therefore, 
that  the  present  jama  is  deficient  in  Es. 102-1-17-2.  The  A^akil 
therefore  is  desired  to  enter  into  engagements  with  that  increase. 
He  declines,  there  not  being  assets.  (The  zamindar's  terms  Avere 
afterAvards  acceded  to.) 

Taluq  Chand  Ram  Pahaz. — /.  RsA5-l-\0. 

Byjunnath,  gomasta,  delivers  in  proposals,  Avith  an  increase  of 
E3.4-8-IO,  making  the  jama  Es.50.     Accepted. 

3d.  The  foregoing  extract,  your  Board  Avill  be  pleased  to  observe, 
contains  one  day's  proceedings,  in  Avhich  only  the  name  of  one  j^ro- 
prietor  is  mentioned  as  being  in  attendance,  and  even  he  in  the  pre- 
A'ious  counterpart  proceedings  is  stated  to  be  a  gomasta. 

Mr  Massie  then  gives  specimens  of  some  of  the  tahuts,  thus  :  "  Mirza 
Jehan,  signed  by  Mirza  Jan,  by  the  pen  of  Eamraman  Naib,  gomasta. 
Taluq  Eam  Sankar  Sein,  by  the  pen  of  Kamla  Kanth  Sarrna,"  &c. 
&c.,  and  adds,  "From  these  signatures,  any  person  unacquainted 
Avith  the  practice  that  has  hitherto  prevailed  in  this  district,  Avould 
of  course  suppose  that  all  the  persons  named  as  the  proprietors 
thereby,  Avere  in  existence  at  the  time  of  the  conclusion  of  the  No- 
vennial Settlement,  and  that  the  several  gomastas  named  Avere 
appointed  by  them  to  enter  into  engagements  on  their  parts,  but  I 
must  observe  that  it  Avould  appear  there  Avere  then  no  such  persons 
as  Mirza  Jan,  Eam  Sankar  Sein,  Abul  Moolah,  Sha  Khalil." 

He  adds,  "With  regard  to  the  settlement  of  the  separated  taluqs, 
from  the  immensity  of  their  nund.ier,  the  proceedings  appear  to  have 
been  still  more  summary,  and  the  difficulty  of  finding  out  the  pro- 
prietors consequently  increased,  as  your  Board  Avill  perceive  from  the 
following  extract." 

He  then  gives  an  extract  in  Avhich  fifteen  taluqs  are  put  doAvn 
Avithout  any  proprietor  being  named,  the  note  aj^pended  being  merely 
that  Eam  Kanth,  gomasta,  enters  into  engagement  on  the  ]\Ittfussil 
jama. 


424  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 


III. — BaKARGANJ  in  1801,    BEING  A  LETTER  FROM  Mr  WiNTLE, 

DATED  7th  January  1802. 

In  obedience  to  the  orders  of  Government  of  the  29th  October 
last,  I  have  now  the  honour  to  forward  my  reply  to  the  interroga- 
tories therewith  transmitted.  I  fear  it  may  not  be  thought  so  full 
and  particular  in  some  points  as  perhaps  is  expected,  and  I  am 
sensible  that  it  does  not  contain  all  that  might  be  said  on  several 
questions  ;  but  as  an  apology  for  its  defects,  I  take  the  liberty  to 
state  that  I  have  had  but  little  time  since  I  was  nominated  to  this 
district  to  turn  my  mind  to  the  framing  of  Eegulations,  as  my  atten- 
tion has  been  fully  occupied  by  official  (and  in  some  measure 
extra)  business  ever  since  my  first  arrival  in  the  zillah.  When  I 
took  charge  of  the  office,  I  found  an  immense  accumulation  of  fouz- 
darry  business,  occasioned  by  my  predecessor's  sending  out  a  glrdwar 
Avho  apprehended  upwards  of  350  persons,  Avhose  examinations 
occupied  both  the  acting  register's  and  my  own  time  most  fully  for 
several  months.  Before  this  was  finished,  an  order  was  passed 
for  the  removal  of  the  sudder  station  to  Burrishol,  the  carrying 
Avhich  into  effect,  by  clearing  away  jungles,  erecting  jails,  buildings, 
&c.,  and  laying  out  a  new  town,  has  taken  uj)  all  the  time  and 
attention  I  could  spare  from  official  avocations  to  this  moment,  so 
that  though  I  have  had  every  inclination  to  take  minutes  and 
propose  amendments  where  I  found  the  Regulations  deficient,  I 
really  have  been  unable  to  find  time.  ...  I  however  hope  that 
the  reply,  though  deficient  in  some  points  from  being  written 
amongst  sundry  busy  employments  of  surveyor,  architect,  &c.,  in 
addition  to  my  judicial  avocations,  may  not  be  deemed  totally 
useless ;  and  that  your  Lordship  will  believe  my  greatest  wish  is  to 
give  satisfaction  to,  and  obtain  the  approbation  of  Government,  by 
a  faithful  and  diligent  discharge  of  my  public  duty. 

(Signed)     J.  Wintle,  Judge  and  Magistrate. 

Zillah  Backeugunge,  Itli  January  1802. 

Question  1. 

The  number  of  causes  depending  on  the  31st  December  1801  was 
as  follows,  viz. : — 

Befote  the  Judge    .  .  .  .  .  .117 

Before  the  Eegister  .  .  .  .  .315 

Before  the  Native  Commissioners  ....       1274 

Total        ......       1706 

Question  2. 

The  Civil  Courts  of  this  zillah  were  not  established  until  April 
1797.     The  number  of  causes  depending  at  the  end  of  each  year 


APPENDIX. 


425 


is  inserted  underneatli,  wliich  will  show  the  proportion  those  now 
depending  bear  to  former  years,  viz.  : — 


Before  the  Judge     ,     . 

Before  the  Register .     . 

Before  the  Native  Com-  | 

missioners      ,     . 

Total  of  each  year  .     . 

On  the  31st 
December. 

1798. 
On  the  31st 
December. 

1799. 
On  the  31st 
December. 

1800.        1        ISOl. 
On  the  31st   On  the  31st 
December.     December. 

276 
260 

133 

269 
290 

160 

220 
121 

759 

384 
40 

2461 

117 
315 

1274 

669 

719 

1100 

2885 

1706 

Question  3. 

The  number  of  causes  decided  in  the  past  year  (1801)  is  inserted 
below,  but  they  fall  short  of  what  may  be  decided  when  the  Judge 
holds  regular  courts.  The  Judge's  Court  w^as  not  opened  till  my 
arrival  on  the  25th  February,  as  I  was  not  allowed  to  leave  my 
former  station  for  some  months  after  my  appointment  to  this  zillah. 
From  May  to  September  inclusive  four  court  days  also  in  each 
month  Avere  lost  by  my  being  obliged  to  come  once  a  week  to  Bur- 
rishol  to  look  after  the  works  carrying  on  at  the  new  station.  The 
Judge's  Court  was,  besides,  shut  during  the  months  of  November 
and  December,  on  account  of  the  removal  of  the  station,  to  enable 
the  omlahs,  vakeels,  and  pleaders  to  erect  habitations  at  the  new  Resi- 
dence, and  to  give  time  for  removing  the  prisoners,  cutcheries,  &c. 
The  number  of  causes  decided  was  as  follows  ;  in  which  statement 
I  have  thought  it  proper,  for  the  information  of  Government,  to 
insert  causes  disposed  of  by  nonsuit,  &c.,  and  other  business  that  is 
not  brought  on  the  regular  file,  viz. : — 


Tried  hy  the  Judge. 

In  appeals  from  the  decision  of  the  Register     . 
In  appeals  from  the  decision  of  the  Native  Com- 
missioners      ..... 

Decreed  on  trial  .... 

Dismissed  on  nonsuit     .... 
Adjusted  by  Razeenoraali 


49 

3 

—  52 
46 

80 
10 

—  136 


Total 


188 


B^  the  Register. 

Decreed  on  trial 
Dismissed  on  nonsuit     . 
Adjusted  by  Razeenomah 

Total 


187 

146 

38 


371 


42  6  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

By  the  Native  Gommissioners. 

Decreed  on  trial  ....  63 

Dismissed  on  nonsuit     .  .  '.  .         2467 

Adjusted  by  Eazeenomali  .  .  .         1204 

Total  .  .  .  3734 

Remarlcs. — Besides  the  atove,  338  summary  causes,  according  to 
tlie  7tli  Eegulationof  1799,  49th  Regulation  of  1795,  and  6th  Regu- 
lation of  1800,  were  decided  by  the  Judge.  N.B. — The  number  of 
Commissioners  were  not  complete  previous  to  my  taking  charge. 

Question  4. 

The  number  of  causes  that  must  necessarily  be  depending  cannot 
be  stated  with  any  certainty,  because,  though  a  pretty  exact  calcula- 
tion may  be  made  of  the  number  that  ought  to  be  decided,  the 
question  must  in  a  great  measure  rest  on  the  number  of  suits  insti- 
tuted annually,  which  may  vary  exceedingly.  This  court  having 
been  estabHshed  but  a  few  years,  the  number  of  causes  filed  has 
annually  increased,  particularly  in  the  past  year,  and  may  still 
increase.  But  as  it  is  necessary  to  have  some  criterion  to  form  an 
opinion  upon,  I  think  the  past  year's  file  (or  1801)  the  properest  to 
go  by.  'Agreeable  to  that,  I  conceive  that,  supposing  the  three 
tribunals  to  be  regular  and  attentive  in  the  discharge  of  their  duty, 
there  must  yet  necessarily  be  about  the  under-mentioned  number  of 
causes  always  in  arrear,  or  nearly  six  months'  business — that  is  to 
say,  that  a  suitor  may  obtain  a  decision  in  six  months  from  the 
period  of  instituting  his  suit,  viz.  : — 

Before  tlie  Judge        .....  60 

Before  the  Register    .....  310 

Before  the  Native  Commissioners      .  .  .  900 

The  various  official  business  the  Judge  has  to  perform  prevents 
his  giving  his  attention  solely  to  the  decision  of  regular  suits.  The 
reason  of  the  number  of  causes  now  depending  not  being  reduced 
so  low  as  they  might  have  been  is  principally  to  be  ascrilDed  to  the 
causes  mentioned  in  the  answer  to  the  3d  question,  which,  how- 
ever, were  temporary,  and  not  likely  to  operate  hereafter. 

Question  7. 

Litigation  has  certainly  been  checked  by  the  establishment  of  the 
fees  and  stamp  duties  mentioned  in  this  question,  as  far  as  respects 
frivolous  and  unfounded  suits,  but  not  in  regard  to  real  causes  of 
action,  which  are  as  much  sued  for  as  ever.  I  do  not  think  the 
several  charges  attending  the  institution  of  lawsuits  too  considerable, 
as  far  as  relates  to  suits  for  large  demands ;  but  they  appear  in  many 
instances  to  be  too  heavy  on  suits  for  small  demands,  as  will  appear 
by  the  following  statement  on  a  demand  for  two  rupees,  which 
would  be  much  more  were  the  suit  for  landed  property.  This  the 
plaintiff  has  to  pay  to  Government  alone,  exclusive  of  the  expense 
of  serving  the  processes  before  his  cause  comes  to  be  tried,  though, 


APPENDIX.  427- 

it  is  true,  that  eventually  the  defendant  Avill  have  to  pay  it  in  addi- 
tion to  his  own  expenses,  viz.  : — 

Stamp  paper  for  plaint       .  .  .  .  0     4 

Fees  for  filing  ditto  .  .  .  .  0     2 

Stamp  paper  for  security  for  vakeel's  fees  .  0     4 

Fees  for  filing  ditto  .  .  .  .  0     8 

Stamp  paper  for  security  to  make  good  expenses  of  suit   0     4 

Fees  for  filing  ditto  .  .  .  .  0     8 

Fees  for  issuing  a  summons '  ,  .  .  0     8 

Stamp  paper  for  a  copy  of  defendant's  answers  .  0     4 

Stamp  paper  for  a  copy  of  rejoinder  .  .  0     4 

Stamp  paper  for  vakalant  namah  .  .  0     4 

Fees  for  filing  ditto  .  .  .  .  0     8 

Stamp  paper  for  petition  for  issuing  subpoenas  .  0     4 

Fees  for  filing  ditto  .  .  .  .  0     8 

Fees  for  three  witnesses      .  .  .  ,  18 

Issuing  subpoena     .  .  .  .  .  0     8 

Two  vouchers  (only)  .  .  .  .  10 


Total  .  .         Sicca  Rs.7     6 

To  suggest  the  means  by  which  the  expense  might  be  lessened  to 
the  individual,  without  subjecting  Government  to  much  loss  of 
revenue,  requires  some  consideration  and  more  time  to  arrange  than 
the  various  duties  I  have  at  present  on  my  hands  will  allow.  Here- 
after, when  I  have  more  leisure,  I  shall  offer  such  suggestions  on  this 
point  to  Government  as  may  ap2)ear  to  me  deserving  of  its  notice. 

Question  10. 

"The  vakeels  in  general,  I  believe,  discharge  their  duty  to  their 
clients  with  as  much  honour  and  fidelity  as  a  native  usually  pos- 
sesses. I  have  never  met  with  a  native,  high  or  low,  who  possessed 
much  of  the  first  quality,  and  their  portion  of  the  latter  is  but  small, 
as  far  as  seventeen  years'  intercourse  with  them  enables  me  to  judge. 

Question  14. 

There  are  several  private  schools  in  this  zillah,  Avhere  the  Hindu 
law  is  taught,  but  no  Mahomedan.  The  Brahmins,  avIio  are  at  the 
head  of  them,  either  have  rent-free  lands,  or  subsist  by  the  bounty 
of  their  students.  Some  of  them  also  receive  presents  for  perform- 
ing marriage  and  religious  ceremonies. 

Question  15. 

The  general  moral  character  of  the  inhabitants  of  this  district  (if 
I  may  be  allowed  to  use  the  expression)  is  at  the  lowest  pitch  of  in- 
famy ;  and  very  few  exceptions,  indeed,  to  this  character  are  to  be 
found.  There  is  no  species  of  fraud  or  villany  the  higher  classes  will 
not  be  guilty  of,  and  to  these  crimes  in  the  lower  classes  may  be 
added  murder,  robbery,  theft,  wounding,  &c.,  on  the  slightest  occa- 
sion. In  fact  it  is  hardly  going  too  far  in  asserting  that  the  whole 
of  the  inhabitants  of  this  district  are  dacoits  ;  for  the  lower  classes 
in  general  must  in  a  great  measure  support  themselves  in  that  man- 
ner, as  few  of  them  really  work  at  trades,  or  cultivate  sufficient  lands 
for  their  maintenance ;  and  the  zemindars  and  talookdars,  with  very 


/ 


42  8  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

few  exceptions,  undoubtedly  entertain  and  protect  dacoits  secretly, 
who  are  tlie  i^rincipal  actors  in  all  affrays  between  the  former  re- 
specting disputed  lands,  boundaries,  &c.  I  fear  the  system  of  law 
established  by  the  British  Government  has  not  had  much  effect  in 
improving  their  moral  character.  Fear  is  the  only  passion  that  can 
operate  to  any  purpose  with  the  natives  of  this  part  of  the  country ; 
they  may  be  restrained  from  committing  crimes  from  the  dread  of 
punishment,  but  I  apprehend  that  no  precept  or  example  Avill  ever 
induce  them  to  be  in  love  with  virtue  or  honesty,  from  their  purity 
only.     Strict  justice  and  rigorous  laws  can  alone  keep  them  in  order. 

Question  16. 

The  inhabitants  undoubtedly  consider  their  private  rights  and 
property  to  be  far  better  secured  by  the  present  constitution  of  the 
country  than  ever  they  were  under  the  Mogul  Government,  and  that 
they  are  not  liable  to  infringement  by  the  executive  authority  itself, 
by  the  executive  officers  of  Government,  or  by  individuals. 

Question  17. 

The  cultivation  and  population  of  this  district  are  in  a  state  of  im- 
l^rovemeut ;  but  from  all  I  can  learn  from  the  natives,  commerce  has 
declined,  the  principal  articles  of  which  formerly  consisted  of  salt 
and  cloth  ;  but  since  the  Honourable  Company  has  monopolised  the 
first,  and  made  advances  for  the  second,  many  individuals  have  given 
over  their  dealings.  Religious  buildings  are  less  frequently  erected ; 
and  for  domestic  purposes,  little  or  no  improvement  seems  to  have 
been  made  in  those  constructions.  The  natives  are  enemies  to  inno- 
vation, even  in  the  form  of  their  houses,  and  are  too  indolent  to  imi- 
tate neatness  or  taste.  The  grand  cause  of  the  decline  of  commerce 
and  religious  buildings  seems,  however,  to  arise  from  what  in  other 
countries  forms  not  only  the  strength,  but  tends  to  the  riches  and 
prosperity  of  the  State — increase  of  population.  In  this,  it  only 
operates  to  its  impoverishment,  if  the  opinions  of  the  natives  them- 
selves have  any  force  ;  for  they  say  that  when  the  population  Avas 
less,  their  ancestors  were  rich,  and  had  a  capital  which  could  be 
spared  for  the  purposes  of  commerce  and  the  erection  of  religious 
edifices ;  but  as  their  descendants  have  multiplied  so  much  of  late 
years,  such  sums,  divided  and  subdivided  amongst  them,  gives  to 
each  but  a  small  pittance,  and  has  destroyed  all  the  great  fortunes. 
From  my  own  observation  and  intercourse  with  the  natives,  I  believe 
there  is  some  truth  in  this  reasoning ;  and  unless  a  spirit  of  enter- 
prise and  honest  activity  can  be  infused  into  the  natives  at  large,  I 
see  no  means  of  their  becoming  either  richer  or  happier.  The  lower 
classes  of  natives  in  this  district  are  too  indolent  to  try  to  better  their 
situations  by  labour  and  exertion,  though  there  is  no  doubt  that  the 
lot  of  the  ryot,  labourer,  and  mechanic  has  considerably  improved 
under  the  English  Government.  My  opinion  respecting  the  popula- 
tion and  cultivation  of  the  district  is  founded  upon  inquiries  from 
the  natives  and  my  own  observation. 

Question  18. 

1  believe  the  inhabitants  of  this  district  are  perfectly  satisfied  with 


APPENDIX. 


429 


tlie  British  Government,  and  that  they  are  fully  aware  of  the  great 
freedom  they  enjoy  under  it,  iDeyond  what  they  could  ever  taste  under 
either  the  Mogul  or  Hindu  administrations. 

Question  19. 

The  present  system  of  police  is  in  general  well  calculated  to  en- 
sure the  apprehension  of  oifenders,  and  only  requires  some  additional 
rules,  Avhich  are  proposed  in  the  answer  to  cpiestion  33. 

Question  20. 

The  jDolice  establishments  of  this  district  are  not  adequate  to  the 
duties  required  of  them,  there  not  being  a  sufficient  number  of  than- 
nahs  at  present  to  admit  of  their  being  placed  at  ten  coss  from  each 
other,  agreeable  to  the  4th  section,  2d  Kegulation  of  1793,  some  of 
them  being  a  much  greater  distance  asunder.  They  appear  also  to 
have  been  in  the  first  instance  injudiciously  i:)laced,  and  not  so  dis- 
posed as  to  afford  security  to  the  district,  equal  to  what  the  actual 
number  of  stations  should  do.  Three  or  four  more  thannahs  will  be 
necessary,  which  I  shall  projiose  to  Government  as  soon  as  I  have 
leisure  to  prepare  a  new  arrangement  of  the  stations. 

Question  21. 

I  am  of  opinion  that  the  number  of  crimes  committed  annually 
has  diminished  in  the  past  year,  in  comparison  to  what  I  under- 
stand were  formerly  committed  ;  but  as  there  does  not  appear  to 
have  been  any  regular  account  kept  previous  to  my  appointment  to 
this  zillah  of  the  crimes  committed  Avithin  the  jurisdiction  of  each 
darogah,  it  is  not  an  easy  matter  to  assert  positively  Avhether  they 
have  annually  diminished  since  the  year  1793  or  not,  the  Adawlut 
Calendar  not  being  a  sufficient  criterion  to  judge  by  (particularly 
the  past  years,  Avhich  includes  many  crimes  committed  in  former 
years),  for  many  crimes  were  formerly,  and  are  still  sometimes  com- 
mitted, where  the  perpetrators  escape  being  apprehended  or  dis- 
covered. I  hoAvever  keep  a  regular  account  of  all  crimes  that  come  to 
my  knoAvledge  of  the  darogah's,  whether  the  parties  are  taken  or  not. 
An  account  of  the  number  of  trials  in  each  year  since  1797,  agreeable 
to  the  Calendai',  is  inserted  beloAV.  No  calendars  prior  to  that  year 
are  to  be  found  in  the  office.  The  second  sessions  of  the  last  year 
not  being  concluded,  the  first  sessions  only  is  inserted,  viz.  : — 


Crimes. 

1797. 

1798. 

1799. 

isoo. 

1801. 
1st  Sessions. 

Murder  ...... 

Dacoity  ...... 

Dacoity  and  murder 

Theft  _ 

Receiving  stolen  goods     . 

Bribery  ...... 

Perjury  ...... 

Forgery  ...... 

"Wounding       ..... 

Resistance  to  Court's  authority 

Total 

2 

11 

1 

2 

1 

0 

1 

19 
15 

7 
13 

22 
17 

9 
S 
1 

"s 

0 

22 
19 
8 
5 
1 
1 

1 

21 

39 

5 

4 

.•i 
12 
1 
0 
4 

20 

59 

C7 

57     1         95 

430  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 

Question  22. 

The  crimes  of  enormity  most  prevalent  in  this  district  are  murder ; 
dacoity,  with  murder ;  dacoity,  with  wounding  with  spears,  &c.  ;  da- 
coity  simple ;  dacoity,  and  burning  with  lighted  masdls ;  dacoity,  with 
putting  bamboos  to  the  back  and  chest  of  a  person,  and  drawing 
them  close  with  twisted  strings,  in  the  manner  of  a  vice,  until  he  is 
breathless,  and  sometimes  the  breastbone  or  ribs  are  broken ;  dacoity, 
with  putting  chilli  powder  (cayenne  pepper)  into  the  eyes,  mouth, 
nose,  and  ears, — all  these  for  the  purpose  of  extorting  confessions 
where  the  sufferers'  effects  are  kept  or  hid,  and  Avhich  are  usually 
inflicted  by  dacoits  at  the  time  of  committing  robberies ;  violent 
wounding  with  daos,  &c. ;  affrays  and  assaults. 

The  cause  of  the  prevalence  of  the  first  is  that  the  inhabitants  of 
this  zillah  in  general  are  of  the  lowest  class,  and  both  the  men  and 
women  are  extremely  passionate  in  their  dispositions,  and  loose  and 
profligate  in  their  manners.  Infidelity  on  the  part  of  the  women, 
and  jealousy  on  the  side  of  the  men,  most  frequently  are  the  occasion 
of  murders,  but  sometimes  a  dispute  about  a  kid  or  a  hooJca  is  suffi- 
cient for  that  purpose.  Passion  also  often  leads  to  the  commission 
of  self-murder,  which  is  more  frequent  in  this  zillah  than  in  any  part 
of  the  country  I  have  resided. 

Dacoity  (which  often  includes  many  crimes)  arises  from  two 
causes — viz.,  1st,  That  dacoits  consider  themselves  as  much  a  distinct 
caste  or  profession  as  any  other  caste  ;  and  it  is  very  common  for 
several  generations  to  be  dacoits.  I  have  heard  of  an  instance  of  a 
dacoit  recommending  to  his  son  at  the  foot  of  the  gallows  to  continue 
the  profession,  notwithstanding  his  own  ill-fate.  2d,  That  the  idle 
and  ill-disposed  begin  first  with  pilfering,  &c.,  and  gradually  advance 
from  one  enormity  to  another.     .  -  . 

Question  23. 

The  generality  of  the  inhabitants  of  this  district  do  not  keep  arms 
in  their  houses.  Such  respectable  persons  as  keep  arms  have  these 
for  defence  against  dacoits.  The  latter  have  the  largest  quantity  of 
arms.  They  consist  of  talwars,  spears,  bows  and  arrows,  raibdnses 
(a  long  iron,  somewhat  like  a  spit,  fixed  at  the  end  of  a  bamboo), 
kliangauns  (a  long  talwar),  bludgeons. 

Question  24. 

There  are  the  ruins  of  three  old  mud  forts — two  at  Sujabdd,  par- 
gana  Chandradwip,  and  one  at  SangrAm,  pargana  Uttar  ShahbAzpur 
— which  were  formerly  built  as  a  defence  against  the  incursions  of 
the  Mugs.  Some  old  cannon,  it  is  said,  are  there  remaining,  but  I 
have  not  had  time  to  visit  these  places. 

[Question  25  was  about  the  population.  Mr  Wintle  was  not  able 
to  answer  it,  but  thought  that  the  proportion  of  the  Hindus  to  the 
Mahomedans  was  10  to  6.] 

Question  26. 

There  is  no  person  of  rank  except  Rajah  Jai  Narain,  alias  Durga 
Koer  Narain  Kai,  late  zamindar  of  Chandradwip.  The  names  of  the 
most  respectable  persons  are  inserted  underneath,  but  none  of  these 


APPENDIX.  43  r 

have  more  than  twenty-five  or  thirty  followers.  They  never  appear 
to  go  abroad  with  more  than  three  or  four  barkandazes,  armed  with 
talwars  and  shields,  and  four  or  five  peons. 

1.  Mir  Hoosein  Uddin  Cliaudhari,  zamindar  of  tappa  Nazirpur. 

2.  Sib  jSTarain  Rai  Chaudhari,  zamindar  of  Selimdbad. 

3.  Mir  Asad  Ali  Chaudhari,  zamindar  of  Shaistdbdd. 

Eam  Dulab  Chakrabarti,  1  j.  i      i         m       i     i    • 

■r,i  •  T>        1  /^i    1      1     i-     J-  taluqdars,  Lhandradwip. 

Bhow^ani  Prasad  Chakrabarti,    J 

Kirti  Chandra  liai,  taluqdar,  Eatandi  Kalikaptir. 

Sib  Chandra  Rai  and  Kirti  Chandra  Eai,  taluqdars,  pargana 
Arangpur. 

Khaja  Mahomed  Dyom  and  Khaja  Chand,  taluqdars,  taluq  Salk- 
neenah. 

Bhowani  Prasad  Rai,  merchant  at  Sutaluri, 

Question  29. 

There  are  few  or  no  roads  besides  those  I  am  now  making  at 
Bariscil,  except  an  indifferent  one  at  Bakarganj,  about  four  miles 
long. 

Question  30. 

The  convicts  are  employed  from  sunrise  to  sunset  (two  hours  at 
noon  for  eating  excepted)  in  making  roads,  clearing  jungle,  digging 
tanks,  and  raising  the  ground  about  the  new  station. 

[In  reply  to  question  32,  Mr  Wintle  says  that  he  does  not  think 
commissions  should  be  issued  to  zamindars  and  others  to  act  as  jus- 
tices of  the  peace,  &c.  ;  and  in  reply  to  question  33  he  makes  many 
suggestions  about  the  appointment,  &c.,  of  village  chaukidars.] 

Question  34. 

The  tax  on  spirituous  liquors  has  certainly  rendered  drunkenness 
less  prevalent.  [Still  Mr  Wintle  thinks  drinking  has  become  more 
general  within  the  last  few  years.] 

Question  38. 

[Mr  Wintle  thinks  that  dacoits  and  thieves  have  increased  since 
the  abolition  of  the  Mahomedan  punishment  of  amputation.^] 

^  This  report  is  in  a  printed  volume  in  the  India  Office  Library.  IVfr  Wintle 
was  probably  a  better  magistrate  than  he  was  a  writer.  His  report  is  full  of 
tautology  ;  but  if  he  had  anything  to  do  with  the  choosing  of  Barisftl  as  a  site, 
and  if,  as  appears,  he  laid  out  the  town,  he  must  have  been  a  shrewd  executive 
officer. 

The  same  volume  contains  reports  from  the  Collectors,  but  Mr  Massie's  does 
not  contain  anything  of  special  interest.  He  states  that  in  1792  Mr  Douglas 
made  an  estimate  of  the  population  of  the  Dacca  District  (which  then  included 
Bdkarganj  and  Faridpiir),  and  that  it  came  to  938,712. 

Mr  Wintle  does  not  state  the  population,  but  it  appears  from  Mr  Adam's  Report 
on  Education  in  Bengal  that  it  was  afterwards  furnished,  for  he  states  the  popu- 
lation of  Bakarganj  in  1801  to  have  been  <J26,723,  and  that  Hindus  were  to  Ma- 
homedans  in  the  proportion  of  5  to  3. 

The  fort  of  Sangram  referred  to  in  answer  24  has  now  disappeared,  but  the  name 
is  still  known  in  the  Mendiganj  thana  (see  note,  p.  43).  From  answer  No.  2  it 
appears  that  Mr  AVintle  did  not  know  of  the  Civil  Court's  having  existed  in  1782 
(see  p.  311). 


432  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 


.     (B.) 

X   ITRACT   FROM   Mr   PeLLEW'S   ARTICLE   ON   THE   PHYSICAL 

Characteristics  of  Bakarganj. 

The  district  of  Backergunge  is  situated  wholly  within  the  lower 
Delta  of  the  Ganges — that  is  to  say,  in  that  part  of  the  Delta  where 
the  beds  of  the  watercourses  are  all  below  the  level  of  the  sea  at 
high  tide.  All  of  these  are  in  consequence  subject  to  tidal  influence, 
and  although  during  the  height  of  the  rains  the  water  does  not 
turn  in  the  princijjal  channels,  but  floAvs  constantly  towards  the  sea, 
it  rises  and  falls  as  considerably  as  in  the  dry  season.  Owing  to 
the  incessant  motion  of  the  water  at  a  considerable  velocity,  all  the 
channels  (which  are  innumerable)  are  kept  open  and  navigable  for 
boats  proportioned  to  their  size,  and  there  is  probably  no  part  of 
India  where  such  jierfect  access  by  water  to  every  part  of  the  district 
can  be  obtained.  The  district  is,  in  fact,  covered  with  a  network  of 
khdls  most  intricate  in  their  windings  and  intercommunications,  and 
apparently  Avithout  any  order  or  regularity.  But  although  in  a 
district  so  essentially  flat,  an  organised  system  of  natural  drainage 
would  scarcely  be  looked  for,  Ave  find  that  in  fact  the  Avhole  district, 
except  Avhere  the  great  Megna  and  Aryal  Khan  riA^er  have  obliterated 
the  old  features  of  the  country  by  recent  deposits  over  its  northern 
and  eastern  portions,  may  be  divided  into  distinct  drainage  districts, 
each  of  them  containing  corresponding  features. 

In  undulating  tracts  of  country  the  drainage  ordinarily  radiates 
from  elevated  centres  toAvards  the  circumjacent  coast-line.  In 
alluvial  formations,  on  the  contrary,  OAving  to  the  excess  of  deposit 
on  the  edges,  the  Avater  floAvs  iuAvards  from  an  elevated  surrounding 
and  enclosing  ridge  to  a  central  l)asin,  from  Avhence  it  is  conducted 
to  the  exterior  along  Avatercourses,  piercing  through  this  surround- 
ing ridge.  And  this  order  is  folloAved  not  merely  in  tidal  districts 
like  Backergunge,  but  in  all  alluAaal  formations,  hoAvever  elevated — 
as,  for  example,  in  Sylhet  [or  in  Behai'.] 

Each  of  the  drainage  circles  or  districts  of  Backergunge,  then,  pos- 
sesses its  central  basin  or  reservoir  of  sAvamp  towards  which  the 
surface  slopes  in  every  direction  from  the  exterior.  On  the  exterior 
edge  of  the  area,  Avhere  it  abuts  on  the  large  tidal  rivers  (which 
everyAvhere  divide  one  drainage  circle  from  another),  the  land  is  well 
raised  and  covered  AAdth  villages.  The  intermediate  space  is  covered 
with  rice  cultivation,  and  the  centre  is  a  lake  or  hed,  A^arying  in  size 
and  depth  Avith  the  season  of  the  year. 

From  points  not  very  far  from  the  centre  of  this  beel,  and  quite 
submerged  in  the  rains,  numerous  little  Avatercourses  proceed  in 
every  direction  toAA'-ards  the  edge.  These  can  only  be  recognised  by 
the  fact  that  a  current  floAvs  along  them,  and  by  the  narroAV  sub- 
merged rims  of  deposited  earth  which  enclose  them  on  either  side 


APPENDIX.  433 

and  partially  separate  them  from  the  beel  proper.  Beginning  almost 
in  nothing,  many  combine  to  form  others,  which,  though  still  within 
the  beel  and  with  banks  submerged  by  its  waters,  present  i^ore 
defined  features.  At  last,  by  the  coalescence  of  many,  a  waterc  arse 
is  formed,  with  banks  which,  though  but  a  few  feet  wide  and  si  ^ping 
rapidly  towards  the  beel-water,  are  yet  in  the  dry  season  above  the 
water.  After  further  convergence  of  such  channels,  we  find  ourselves 
(supposing  we  are  attempting  to  find  our  way  out  of  the  beel  by  water) 
in  a  kliAl  of  moderate  dimensions,  Avith  banks  which  are  not  sub- 
merged except  in  the  height  of  the  rains  ;  we  are  still  probably 
many  stages  from  the  great  rivers,  whose  banks  are  permanently 
above  the  water,  and  which  are  some  hundreds  of  yards  in  width. 
But  it  is  useless  to  particularise  further.  The  numerous  khdls 
Avhich  originate  in  the  depths  of  the  central  reservoir  terminate  in 
some  two  or  three  considerable  channels  which  open  into  the  cir- 
cumposed  main  watercourse.  Between  this  latter  and  the  beel 
there  is  no  water  communication  except  through  these  two  or  three 
channels  and  their  ramifications.  Even  if  a  short  cut  were  artifi- 
cially made  direct  into  the  beel,  it  would  in  a  few  rainy  seasons,  by 
sucking  in  at  the  ebb  tide  the  water  from  all  directions,  create  for 
itself  a  branched  system  of  terminations  under  water,  which  in  the 
dry  weather  would  be  exposed  to  view. 

The  whole  system  depends  on  the  principle  that  inundating 
waters,  if  in  a  condition  to  lay  down  deposit,  do  so  chiefly  upon 
their  actual  banks,  and  thus  tend  to  shut  themselves  off  from  the 
tract  of  submergeable  country  beyond.  As  the  banks  rise,  the  rush 
of  water  over  them  at  ebb  and  flood  is  intensified,  and  at  length 
bursts  open  channels  of  communication.  These  throw  up  enclosing 
banks  in  their  turn,  which  process  gives  birth  to  new  connecting  chan- 
nels piercing  these  new  banks,  and  the  process  is  repeated  till  the 
communicating  channels  become  so  small  as  scarcely  to  be  noticed. 

It  is  obvious  that  in  this  manner  the  drainage  of  flat  surfaces  is 
performed  in  the  most  effectual  manner.  In  undulating  or  moun- 
tainous countries  the  drainage  derives  sufl[icient  force  from  gravity 
to  maintain  the  channels  open,  but  in  alluvial  flats  the  slow  passage  of 
the  water  would  scarcely  suffice.  If  in  a  tidal  district  the  drainage 
channels  merely  flowed  from  the  interior  of  each  patch  of  land 
towards  the  circumference,  they  would  soon  fill  with  sediment 
brought  in  by  the  tide,  which  would  ebb  and  flow  in  them  with  but 
slight  velocity  ;  but  where  these  channels  are  the  only  means  of 
communication  between  two  considerable  bodies  of  water  constantly 
differing  from  each  other  in  level,  a  high  rate  of  speed  is  easily 
maintained. 

In  the  rainy  season  the  drainage  reservoirs  are  connected  much 
more  directly  with  the  exterior  than  during  the  remainder  of  the 
year.  The  water,  from  various  causes,  stands  at  an  average  at  least 
six  feet  higher  than  in  the  dry  season,  and  completely  submerges  all 
the  interior  articulations  of  the  system  of  relieving  channels.  Only 
the  larger  and  more  external  have  their  banks  above  thoAvater; 

2  E 


434  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

the  smaller  feeders  are  supplied  both  from  their  extremities  and 
over  their  own  banks.  The  greater  volume  of  water  which  then 
requires  passage  is  thus  amply  provided  for ;  whilst  in  the  dry 
weather,  when  the  drainage  volume  is  weak,  the  water  is  unable  on 
account  of  the  fall  in  its  level  to  leave  the  reservoir  except  through 
the  extreme  ends  of  very  small  channels.  The  banks  of  the  different 
classes  or  grades  of  channels,  each  in  turn,  begin  to  fulfil  their  pro- 
per functions,  as  the  level  decreases,  and  in  this  manner  the  water- 
way is  always  exactly  proportioned  to  the  volume  to  which  it  is 
required  to  give  passage. 

In  districts  of  alluvium  raised  above  tidal  influence  the  rise  and 
fall  of  the  rivers  during  the  rainy  season  produce  similar  effects. 
The  water  on  the  swamps  being  only  connected  with  these  by 
narroAv  channels  piercing  the  banks  of  the  rivers,  is  always,  unless 
the  river  remains  very  long  at  exactly  the  same  level,  either  above 
or  below  that  level,  and  the  channels  are  incessantly  occupied  in 
restoring  tlie  balance. 

The  swamps  or  drainage  reservoirs  are  themselves  an  interesting 
feature  in  the  physical  geography  of  Backergunge.  They  vary 
greatly  in  size,  in  accordance  with  the  area  of  the  tract  they  drain, 
and  the  amount  of  filling  tip  which  they  have  undergone.  In  the 
eastern  portion  of  the  district,  the  alluvium,  from  the  Megna  has 
completely  obliterated  the  whole  drainage  organisation,  which 
has  become  enveloped  in  one  uniform  mound  sloping  towards 
the  west,  and  forming  the  right  bank  of  this  immense  watercourse. 
In  the  western  portion  of  the  district  where  the  system  of  drain- 
age prevails  which  we  have  endeavoured  to  describe,  the  swamps 
during  the  rainy  season  fill  up  the  Avhole  of  each  drainage  tract, 
except  its  extreme  margin  and  the  banks  of  the  primary  channels 
which  penetrate  that  margin.  In  the  dry  weather  they  become 
reduced  to  the  extent  of  the  nucleus  or  central  portion  from  which 
the  relieving  channels  take  their  rise.  This  nucleus  is  often  of  con- 
siderable depth,  and  is  generally  covered  by  a  floating  surface  of 
matted  grass  and  earth  on  which  Nul,  Hoogla,  and  Koonda  reed 
sometimes  grow ;  at  other  places  it  is  covered  with  a  short,  coarse, 
but  very  green  grass,  abounding  in  snipe.  In  parts  Avhere  the  covering 
is  thick  enough  to  support  the  cultivators,  rice  is  sown  in  the  dry 
season.  It  is  dangerous  to  tread  on  this  shaking  surface  except 
where  the  straw  Iviras^  or  small  retaining  embankments  which  mark 
the  fields,  show  that  people  have  been  before.  Even  through  the 
midst  of  this  quaking  bog  the  small  ramifying  watercourses  are  to 
be  found,  and  on  their  margins,  though  two  or  three  feet  deep  under 
water,  a  firm  footing  is  generally  obtainable.  Their  beds  also  are 
ordinarily  composed  of  a  hard  mixture  of  sand  and  clay,  and  it  is 
only  in  the  interspaces  that  the  floating  surface  exists.  The  smaller 
beels  are  very  useful  as  village  boundaries.  The  inhabitants  on 
either  side  cultivate  as  far  as  they  prudently  can,  and  abandon  the 
centre  to  jungle  and  water-fowl. 

From  the  beel  on  every  side  the  country  rises  with  considerable 


APrKNDIX. 


435 


slope,  the  first  footing  being  generally  found  in  the  watercourses. 
The  drainage  towards  the  beel  is  along  successive  ten'aces  of  rice- 
fields,  each  a  few  inches  lower  than  the  next  above  it.  The  water 
is  retained  in  the  higher  ground  for  cultivation  by  means  of  the 
little  hiras  or  banks  (here  constructed  of  straw  as  well  as  earth) 
common  throughout  Bengal.  It  may  be  repeated  here  that  all  tlie 
surface  drainage  of  the  tract  surrounding  each  beel  flows  towards  it, 
and  never  into  the  penetrating  channels,  whose  banks  are  always 
higher  than  the  ground  outside,  and  always  slope  away  from  the 
channel. 

The  level  of  the  sea  at  the  head  of  the  Bay  of  Bengal,  and  on  the 
tidal  watercourses  of  the  Delta,  is  subject  to  a  considerable  annual 
alteration.  It  is  a  doubtful  point  whether  this  alteration  is  to  be 
attributed  to  the  influx  of  fresh  Avater  in  such  immense  quantities, 
or  to  the  banking  up  of  the  sea  by  the  south-west  monsoon.  As  the 
increased  elevation  occurs  during  the  rainy  season,  when  both  these 
influences  are  at  work,  it  is  extremely  difficult  to  decide  the  ques- 
tion, and  both  are  probably  concerned  in  the  result.  The  change 
of  level  is  not  confined  to  the  head  of  the  bay,  but  is  found  some 
distance  down  the  east  coast  of  India.  In  Backergunge  the  diff"erence 
in  mean  level  must  be  at  least  four  feet.  This  is  an  important 
point,  for,  as  the  whole  district  of  Backergunge  is  nearly  horizontal, 
the  water  at  high  tide  in  the  rainy  season  floods  nearly  the  whole 
of  it,  and  the  inhabitants  are  obliged  to  raise  their  houses  on 
mounds.  It  is  owing  to  this  alteration  in  the  level  of  the  tides, 
ratlier  than  to  the  mere  local  rainfall,  that  the  change  in  the  level 
of  the  beels  takes  place. 


(0.) 

I. — Prices. 

The  following  interesting  facts  regarding  prices  are  extracted  from 
a  manuscript  volume  in  the  India  Office  : — 

"Eice,  which  forty  years  ago  was  two  and  a  half  maunds  per 
arcoti  rupee,  is  now  "^[November  1800]  one  and  a  half  maunds  per 
arcot  rupee.  Salt,  which  at  the  same  period  was  one  arcot  rupee 
per  maund,  is  now  four  sicca  rupees  per  maund.     Oil,  Avhich  was 

^  The  arcot  rupee  seems  to  have  been  worth  about  one  per  cent,  more  than  the 
Government  rupee.  As  regards  the  price  of  salt  in  old  times,  see  Sir  Philip 
Francis'  letter  of  22d  January  1776,  where  he  says  that  the  Company  had  de- 
clared in  their  letter  of  20th  November  1767  that  they  had  rather  that  even  the 
duties  should  be  reduced  than  that  the  price  of  salt  to  the  consumer  should  ever 
exceed  Rs.  140  sicca  per  100  maunds. 


436  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

two  and  a  half  arcot  rupees  per  mauud,  is  now  four  arcot  rupees 
per  maund.  Other  articles  were  also  enhanced  in  price.  Gappas 
[cotton],  which  used  to  be  at  the  rate  of  from  four  to  five  puns  per 
sir,  was  last  year  at  six,  and  is  this  year  at  nine  puns.  Thread  of 
all  kinds,  excepting  the  finest,  is  much  dearer  now  than  formerly. 
In  1787  and  1788  a  great  number  of  spinners  died  of  famine;  this 
and  the  increased  price  of  necessaries  of  life  are  considered  as  the 
principal  cause  of  the  present  dearness  of  thread.  Labour  is  like- 
wise raised  ;  the  pay  of  a  weaver  forty  years  ago  was  from  one  to 
one  and  a  half  arcot  rupee,  and  of  a  journeyman  from  eight  anas  to 
twelve  anas  per  month.  The  pay  of  the  foi'mer  is  now  from  two  and 
a  half  arcot  rupees  to  three  and  a  half  arcot  rupees,  and  of  the  latter 
from  one  arcot  rupee  to  two  arcot  rupees.  Rent  also  is  said  to  be 
raised,  and  what  formerly  was  eight  anas  ^Qvpahhi  [a  little  less  than 
a  bigha]  is  now  twelve  anas." 

In  the  same  letter  reference  is  made  to  "  the  great  diminution  in 
the  demand  for  the  fabrics  of  this  province,  which  has  j^revailed 
since  the  commencement  of  the  present  war  in  Europe "  (Letter 
of  Mr  John  Taylor,  Commercial  Resident  at  Dacca,  dated  30th 
November  1800,  and  forwarded  to  the  Court  of  Directors  by  Com- 
mercial Letter  from  Bengal  dated  1st  December  1801).  Mr  Taylor 
gives  interesting  particulars  of  the  cultivation  of  cotton  and  of  the 
weaving  processes.  In  a  postscript,  dated  November  1801,  he 
states  that  the  population  of  the  city  of  Dacca  had  been  estimated 
by  the  Magistrate  to  be  200,000. 

Some  interesting  statistics  about  prices  will  be  found  in  appendix 
to  a  report  of  Board  of  Customs,  Salt  and  Opium,  26th  January 
1832  (Calcutta,  1833).     See  especially  p.  120. 


II. — India  Office  Records. 

The  India  Office  in  Westminster  contains  Revenue  Consultations 
of  the  Dacca  Factory  from  1736.  Many  papers  appear  to  be  Avant- 
ing,  and  those  which  remain  do  not  possess  much  interest,  as  they  are 
chiefly  taken  up  with  details  of  the  weaving  business  and  of  the 
Company's  investment.  Those  were  days  when,  as  Lord  Macaulay 
has  remarked,  "  the  ablest  servants  of  the  Company  were  busied 
only  about  invoices  and  bills  of  lading."  How  unprepared  we  were 
for  a  larger  conception  of  our  duties  is  shown  by  the  following 
extract  from  a  Dacca  minute  of  20th  July  1763,  which  was  written 
by  Messrs  Leycester  and  Senior  on  their  return  to  Dacca  after 
they  had  quitted  it  on  the  outbreak  of  the  war  with  Mir  Kassim  : 
"  Having  recovered  our  factory,  &c.,  with  the  assistance  of  the 
Meekly  detachment,  and  also  taken  possession  of  the  city,  the 
collections  and  the  revenue  of  so  large  a  district  is  an  important 
business  which  we  are  not  much  acquainted  with,  and  having  no 


APPENDIX.  437 

man  belonging  to  the  factory  equal  to  so  great  a  charge,  it  is 
agreed  to  call  on  the  officers  of  the  Government  to  resume  the  manage- 
ment of  their  several  offices  in  the  name  of  our  honourable  masters 
till  Ave  are  informed  from  the  President  and  Council  through  what 
channel  these  matters  are  in  future  to  pass." 

The  records  extend  from  173G  to  1763,  then  there  appears  to  be  a 
blank  up  to  1772,  when  we  have  the  report  of  the  Committee  of 
Circuit.  Then  come  the  reports  of  the  proceedings  of  the  Provincial 
Council,  which  commence  in  1774  and  go  down  to  1779.  The 
following  notes  are  arranged  chi'onologically,  and  contain  such  pas- 
sages as  appeared  to  me  of  interest,  especially  with  reference  to 
Bcikarganj : — 

August  1737. — Aga  Bdkar,  foujdar,  is  said  to  have  taken  Es.3000 
as  hush-money  from  the  chaudhari  of  a  pargana  in  connection  with 
a  theft  of  cloth  from  the  Jagdea  Factory. 

October  1737. — On  the  30th  ult.  and  1st  inst.  there  happened  a 
storm  here  and  in  the  adjacent  countries,  the  most  violent  that  has 
been  known  in  the  memory  of  man.  It  began  at  eleven  o'clock  of 
the  night,  and  blew  very  violent  from  north-east  till  seven  in  the 
morning,  when  it  returned  from  the  south-west  with  double  violence. 
This  storm  destroyed  almost  every  boat  and  vessel  that  was  on  the 
river,  and  ashore  blew  down  vast  numbers  of  buildings,  and  among 
the  rest  the  honourable  Company's  bungalows  that  were  for  the 
use  of  the  washermen  and  their  workmen  at  Tezgong  and  on  the 
wharf.  A  consultation  of  the  17th  idem  refers  to  information  hav- 
ing been  received  from  tlie  President  of  the  loss  of  several  of  the 
Company's  ships  in  the  hurricane. 

N.B. — This  is  the  storm  which  did  so  much  damage  in  Calcutta 
and  the  Sundarbans,  and  which  is  referred  to  in  the  '•'  Gentleman's 
Magazine"  for  1738-39.  See  "  Calcutta  Eeview"  for  March  1859, 
article  "  Gangetic  Delta." 

24^/i  November  1737. — Letter  from  Mr  Pomfret  of  Jagdea,  dated 
18th  idem,  stating  that  they  have  advice  that  the  Mugs  are  come  out 
in  great  numbers,  and  the  country  around  them  being  full  of  dacoits, 
who  have  already  done  considerable  mischief,  &c. 

Another  storm  took  place  on  31st  May  1739,  and  the  three  follow- 
ing days. 

December  1744. — Sergeant  Cooper  being  sent  with  30,000  arcot 
rupees  to  Jagdea,  reports  that  there  were  a  great  many  Mugs  in  the 
way.     Eesolved  to  send  him  all  the  European  soldiers  in  the  factory. 

hh  June  1745. — A  sloop  returning  from  Dacca  to  Calcutta  had 
been  attacked  by  dacoits  near  Serampore,  Avho  had  plundered  the 
crew  of  what  they  had  and  murdered  five  of  them,  after  having  cut 
the  rissincf,  sails,  cables,  &c.  Having  information  also  of  several 
sloops  and  boats  being  on  the  Avay  from  Calcutta  to  Dacca,  and  that 
as  the  ways  between  this  and  Bawkergange  (sic)  are  greatly  infested 
with  dacoits,  it  was  agreed  that  a  party  of  ten  men,  with  a  sergeant, 
corporal,  and  ten  Baxeries,  (?)  be  sent  down  as  far  as  Bawkergange, 
and  convey  hither  all  vessels  belonging  to  the  English. 


438  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

2>Qth  December  1745. ^Apprehensions  about  the  Mahrattas. 

January  1746. — Resolve  to  put  a  parapet  wall  round  the  factory 
as  a  protection  against  the  Mahrattas. 

1749. — Mr  Nicholas  Clerembault  became  chief.  He  had  joined  on 
9th  March  1744,  when  he  took  his  seat  as  the  youngest  of  Council. 

30f7i  December  1754. — Raj  Ballab  Duan  intimates  that  on  the 
change  of  the  head  Nabobship  of  Dacca,  which  is  now  in  the  name 
of  Muradda  Doulla,  he  expects  a  large  present,  and  even  hinted 
the  sum  of  Rs.  10,000.  Resolved  to  give  him  Rs.3000,  if  the  pay- 
ment is  absolutely  necessary. 

Ibtli  November  1755. — Nicholas  Clerembault,  Esq.,  chief  of  this 
factory,  departed  this  life  of  a  violent  fever.  Doubtless  this  is  the 
Columbo  Saheb  whose  tomb  Bishop  Heber  mentions. 

2?>d  October  1757. — Nabob  communicated  his  apprehensions  of 
his  safety. 

July  1763. — Council  had  fled  from  Dacca,  and  taken  up  their 
quarters  at  Luckypur. 

22d  July  1763. — Mir  Jaffar  Ali  Khan  proclaimed  Souba. 

We  now  come  to  the  report  of  the  Dacca  Committee  of  Circuit, 
1772,  which  is  in  a  separate  volume.  It  does  not,  however,  contain 
much  which  is  interesting.  There  is  a  long  re]iort  in  it,  dated  25th 
September  1772,  from  William  Makepeace  Thackeray,  about  the 
lime  quarries  in  Sylhet.  He  was  appointed  Collector  of  that  district 
on  10th  October  1772.  The  volume  also  contains  long  reports  of 
the  disp\ites  between  Gokal  Ghosal  and  the  zamindars  of  Sandwip, 
and  would  doubtless  be  very  interesting  to  any  one  writing  the  his- 
tory of  Chittagong  or  Noakhdli.  The  following  is  the  advertisement, 
dated  3d  October  1772,  which  the  Committee  of  Circuit  published 
when  they  proceeded  to  settle  the  land  revenue  : — 

"  Notice  is  hereby  given  that  the  lands  of  the  Dacca  District,  as  also 
those  of  Sylhet,  will  be  let  in  farm  for  the  term  of  five  years,  agree- 
able to  the  conditions  that  have  been  already  advertised ;  all  persons 
therefore  who  are  Avilling  to  farm,  and  can  produce  respectable 
securities,  are  directed  to  deliver  in  sealed  proposals  specifying  the 
amount  rent  they  offer  to  give  for  each  jDargana  separately."  It  will 
be  seen  from  this  that  the  claims  of  zamindars  and  taluqdars,  or  the 
rights  of  the  tenantry,  were  not  much  considered  in  those  days. 

\7th  February  1774. — Regulations  about  the  post  office. 

bth  April  1774. — Petition  from  Mani  Ram  Dabee,  son  of  Dyal  Chau- 
dhari,  claiming  Buzurgumedpur.  States  that  his  father  reclaimed  it 
from  jungle,  and  that  during  the  administration  of  Murshid  Kuli 
Khan,  Aga  B4kar  infamously  sent  people  to  seize"  on  the  daughter  of 
Dyal  Chaudhari,  whereon  he,'  being  driven  -to  the  greatest  pitch  of 
desperation,  relinquished  his  estate  and  eff'ects,  and  destroyed  all  the 
female  portion  of  his  family.  Petitioner  afterwards  tried  to  recover 
the  property,  but  was  thwarted  by  the  intrigues  of  Raj  Ballab's 
sons.  The  latter  replied,  saying  that  they  bought  the  property  in 
1167  from  Mirza  Mendi,  the  brother,  and  Mahomed  Sale,  the  son 


APPENDIX.  439 

of  Mahomed  Sadok,  who  was  son  of  Aga  Bakar.  They  add(;d 
that  in  1737  the  property  belonged  to  Udai  Eajah  and  Mahomed 
Eeza,  after  which  Aga  Bi'ikar  got  it,  and  recorded  the  estate  in  Ids 
son  Sadok's  name.     (This  is  the  name  in  the  old  Collectorate  papers.) 

Zd  May  1774. — The  Calcutta  Council  rejected  the  claim  on  the 
ground,  first,  that  Dyal  Chaudhari  liad  been  regularly  dispossessed 
by  the  government  of  the  Nazira  for  rebellion;  and  secondly,  because 
Aga  Bj'ikar  was  regularly  ap|)ointed  to  the  zamindari  by  the  same 
reigning  government  about  thirty-three  years  ago,  in  the  light  of  a 
reward  for  his  services  in  reducing  the  rebellious  Dyal  Chaudhari. 
There  is  also  a  petition,  dated  Gth  May  1774,  from  ]\Iirza  Mendi 
and  Katissa  Khanam,  setting  forth  that  on  Aga  BAkar's  death  in 
1160,  Mahomed  Sadok  absconded,  upon  which  Raj  Ballab  confis- 
cated his  effects.  In  1164  Mahomed  Sadok  returned,  and  obtained 
the  wadadari  of  the  pargana  for  his  son,  Mahomed  Sale,  under  the 
seal  of  Nawab  Jaffar  Ali  Khan,  and  was  himself  reinstated  in  his 
zamindari.  In  1166  Mahomed  Sadok  died,  and  in  1167  Eaj  Ballab 
dispossessed  petitioners.     Apparently  this  petition  was  dismissed. 

SOi'A  June  1774. — Much  correspondence  about  char  Bhuta,  and 
reference  to  a  trial  about  it  in  Luckypur  Civil  Court  10th  June  1773. 

Idem. — Reference  to  Calcutta  about  an  order,  dated  17th  iMay 
1774,  directing  that  from  1st  July  1774  no  person  shall  be  allowed 
to  buy  or  sell  a  slave  who  is  not  such  already  by  former  legal 
purchase,  and  any  kazi  Avho  shall  grant  any  kaAvala  after  that  date 
for  the  sale  of  any  slave  whatever  shall  be  dismissed. 

The  Dacca  Council  Avrites,  "As  it  is  an  established  custom 
throughout  the  Dacca  districts  to  keep  in  bondage  the  offspring  of 
slaves  who  have  once  become  so,  agreed  that  we  address  the 
honourable  President  and  Council  of  Revenue,  requesting  to  be 
informed  Avhether  the  benefit  of  the  Regulation  is  to  be  extended 
to  the  future  offspring  of  such  persons  who  may  at  present  be  in 
slavery."  The  Calcutta  Council  replied  on  12th  July  as  follows: 
"  In  those  districts  where  slavery  is  a  general  usage,  or  in  any  way 
connected  with,  or  is  likely  to  have  an  influence  on  the  revenue, 
Avhich  we  are  informed  is  the  case  in  Sylhet,  and  may  be  so  in  the 
other,  especially  the  frontier  parts  of  your  division,  we  must  desire 
you  particularly  to  advise  us  what  is  the  usage,  and  every  circum- 
stance connected  with  it,  and  we  shall  then  give  you  such  direction 
as  we  may  judge  necessary;  but  considering  your  question  in  the 
meantime  in  the  light  of  a  general  j^roposition,  we  are  of  opinion 
that  the  right  of  masters  to  the  children  of  the  slaves  already  their 
property  cannot  legally  be  taken  from  them  in  the  first  generation, 
but  we  think  that'  this  right  cannot  and  ought  not  to  extend  farther, 
and  direct  that  you  do  make  publication  accordingly." 

hth  Jidtj  1774. — Severe  orders  from  Calcutta  against  the  impress-     ll 
ment  of  ryots  as  coolies  by  travellers.  ' ' 

llth  Juhj  1774. — Appointment  of  foujdars.  Boundaries  of 
Bakargaiij  thana — south,  Aurungab^d  pargana ;  north,  Sundarkul ; 
east,  JaUlpiir ;  west,  Syedpur  in  Dacca. 


44° 


DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 


2,0th  July  1774. — French  letter  from  M.  des  Granges,  reporting 
that  the  French  have  abandoned  then-  Dacca  factory. 

XZth  August  1774. — The  President  and  Council  of  Calcutta  send 
a  price-current  of  grain,  which  has  been  made  the  standard  for 
collecting  the  Government  duties  upon  throughout  the  provinces, 
from  which,  the  Collectors  have  been  informed,  they  are  not  on  any 
account  to  deviate.  The  standard  is  fixed  so  very  low  that  it  must 
remove  every  just  ground  of  complaint  from  the  rice  merchants. 

The  Government  duty  of  2|  per  cent,  was  to  be  levied  according 
to  this  standard,  which  was  to  be  current  over  Bengal,  Behar,  and 
Orissa.     I  give  the  more  important  items : — 


Mans. 

Sirs. 

Mans. 

Sfrs 

Horse  grain,  per  rup 

ee     1 

26 

Rice,  1st  sort,  per 

rupee 

1 

10 

Green  grain  {sona  mc 

'og), 

Rice,  2d  sort,     „ 

35 

1 

20 

per  rupee 

.    1 

10 

Rice,  3d  sort     „ 

J) 

1 

30 

Barley,  per  rnjiee 

.     2 

30 

Paddy     .          „ 

>) 

2 

20 

Ashar      ,,       ,, 

.     1 

20 

Mustard            „ 

)» 

1 

0 

Wheat     „        „ 

.     1 

10 

Til 

>» 

0 

30 

list  Aug^ist  1775. — Petition  from  Gopal  Kissen,  zamindar  of 
Buzurgumedpur,  asking  for  remission  of  the  'phanri  mahva  (called 
here  phannaly  mahva,  and  also  iianny  malwa),  on  the  ground  that 
it  had  been  abolished  when  taxes  on  grain  were  removed.  In  these 
proceedings  Ave  at  last  meet  with  an  explanation  of  the  term,  a  wit- 
ness stating  that  the  tax  was  a  duty  levied  on  grain,  timber,  and  all 
kinds  of  goods  under  transportation.  The  Calcutta  Council  relieved 
Gopal  Kissen  from  the  obligation  of  paying  it  (see  p.  100). 

1775. — Frequent  notices  of  a  Mr  Wood,  who  was  salt  agent  at 
Jainagar — i.e.,  Jhalukatti. 

18^A  January  1776. — Eeport  on  French  factories  states  that  the 
French  carry  on  a  trade  in  rice  and  cotton  thread  at  Bdkarganj, 
where  a  gomasta  resides  continually,  Avith  two  or  three  sepoys. 

29^A  July  1311.1. — Extract  from  Court  of  Directors'  letter  stating 
that  they  had  reA^oked  their  orders  to  let  the  lands  to  the  highest 
bidders,  and  signifying  their  pleasure  to  have  them  occupied  by  here- 
ditary zamindars.  Strict  orders  are  given  for  insisting  on  every 
zamindar  and  farmer  giving  leases  to  their  tenants. 

2l5^  Jidy  nil. — Eeport  on  the  arcot  rupee,  which  has  been 
"  the  only  specie  of  general  currency  in  this  country  time  out  of 
mind,  and  yet  they  never  Avere  coined  at  the  Dacca  mint."  x\lso 
send  proposals  for  the  settlement  of  the  Dacca  Province. 

Wth  July  1778. — Notice  of  declaration  of  Avar  betAveen  France 
and  England.  Flight  of  M.  Chevalier.  List  of  all  the  Europeans 
in  the  Dacca  Province.     The  total  is  about  fifty. 

%th  September  1778. — Mr  Hatch  claims  to  be  ]}\\t  in  charge  of 
Sylhet.     Mr  Holland  dissents,  and  supports  Lindsay. 

Complaint  of  ChandradAvip  zamindar  against  Baksh  Ali,  foujdar 
of  thana  Barisdl  (10  September  1779). 

19i:/i  November   1778,  Araiiginir. — Case   betAveen    taluqdars   and 


APPENDIX.  441 

zamindars.  Valcil  of  zamiiidars  states  a  division  took  place  in  1158, 
after  death  of  Janaki  Ballab,  into  four  equal  shares,  and  again  in 
1172.  This  -was  found  correct,  and  Board  ordered  taluqdars  to  pay 
the  shareholders. 

2d  September  1779. — Eemarks  of  Calcutta  Council  on  settlement 
of  Dacca  districts  for  1186 — i.e.,  liI9_^"We  particularly  enjoin 
you  never,  in  any  instance  whatever,  to  propose  any  abatement  of 
any  nature  whatever  unless  you  can  at  the  same  time  clearly  point 
out  how  such  deficiency  may  be  supplied.  In  short,  it  is  our  deter- 
mination that  the  Dacca  Division  shall  yield  to  the  Government  an 
annual  revenue  of  Ks. 2, 985, 549." 

There  is  also  a  separate  volume  giving  in  detail  the  settlement 
for  1184— i.e.,  1777. 

N.B. — The  Dacca  papers  contain  many  interesting  reports  about 
the  Jyntia  Eajah,  Sylhet,  Sandwip,  &c.  There  is  much  correspond- 
ence about  Sandwip  in  a  volume  for  1774,  but  by  far  the  fullest 
report  on  Sandwip  is  to  be  found  in  the  Bengal  Revenue  Council 
Reports  for  1780,  vol.  vi.  This  voluminous  report  extends  over 
491  paragraphs,  exclusive  of  appendices,  and  contains  a  genealogical 
table  of  the  Sandwip  zamindars,  and  a  statement  of  its  revenue 
from  as  far  back  as  10G9  A.H. — i.e.,  1662 — when  the  Moghals  first  got 
possession  of  it.  The  report  is  written  by  Mr  Jonathan  Duncan  (I 
presume  the  famous  Jonathan  Duncan  of  Benares  and  Bombay). 
He  was  sent  to  Sandwip  to  report  on  the  murder  of  one  Mahomed 
Kain,  and  lived  on  the  island  for  a  considerable  time. 


III. — Famines  of  1770  and  1787. 

Dr  Hunter  observes,  in  his  "  Annals  of  Rural  Bengal "  (p.  28), 
that  the  only  non-official  description  of  the  famine  of  1770  by  an  eye- 
witness is  a  metrical  one  ;  but,  in  fact,  there  is  a  tolerably  full  descrip- 
tion of  it  in  a  letter  in  the  "  Gentleman's  Magazine"  for  September 
1771,  vol.  xli.  p.  402.  The  letter  was  forAvarded  to  the  editor  by 
one  J.  C,  who  describes  himself  as  having  just  received  it  from  a 
very  worthy  friend  of  his  in  the  Company's  service  in  Calcutta.^ 
The  same  letter  appears  in  the  "Scots  Magazine  "for  September 
1771,  vol.  xxxiii.  p.  454  ;  and  there  are  also  references  to  the  subject 
at  pages  160  and  216  of  the  same  volume.  See  also  the  "  Gentleman's 
Magazine"  for  February  1772,  p.  69.  It  is  probably  to  the  above 
letter  that  Warren  Hastings  refers  to  when  he  speaks  of  the  eftects 
of  the  famine  having  been  made  known  "  to  the  public  \yj  laboured 
descriptions,  in  which  every  circumstance  of  fact  and  every  art  of 
languages  have  been  accumulated  to  raise  compassion,  and  to  excite 

1  Though  the  letter  is  from  a  Company's  servant,  it  is  non-ofRcial  in  the  sense 
in  which  Dr  Hunter  uses  the  word,  or  otherwise  Lord  Teignmouth's  verses  could 
not  be  called  nou-nfBcial. 


442  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

indignation  against  your  [the  Company's]  servants "  (Warren 
Hastings'  letter,  Appendix  G  of  Dr  Hunter's  Annals,  p.  380).  It 
would  appear,  however,  from  Charles  Grant's  "  Observations  on  the 
State  of  Society  in  Asia"  (General  Appendix,  No.  I.,  to  House  of 
Commons  Report  of  1833),  that  the  French  of  Chandarnagore  were 
the  first  to  accuse  the  English  of  being  the  authors  of  the  famine, 
and  probably  therefore  detailed  descriptions  of  it  are  to  be  found  in 
the  French  j^apers  of  that  period.  Mr  Grant  himself  gives  some 
particulars  of  the  famine.  His  paper  was  written  in  1792,  and  he 
tells  us  that  he  derived  his  information  partly  from  his  own  observa- 
tions and  partly  from  a  manuscript  account  by  Mr  Becher.  Mr 
Becher  was  then  resident  at  the  Durbar  (Murshldabdd),  and  was,  I 
presume,  the  person  quoted  by  Sir  Philip  Francis  {vide  note,  p.  376). 
Mr  Grant  says  Mr  Becher  saved  the  country  in  1770  by  laying  in 
60,000  mans  of  rice  for  the  use  of  the  army,  and  that  he  was  a 
man  noted  for  his  honesty  and  humanity.  "  His  anxiety  and  exer- 
tions for  alleviating  the  miseries  of  that  whole  period  ended  in  an 
illness  which  almost  cost  him  his  life.  Yet  on  his  return  to  England 
he  found  himself  traduced  as  the  author  of  the  famine."  Unfortu- 
nately the  charge  of  turning  the  public  distress  into  a  source  of  pri- 
vate profit  was  true  as  regards  some  servants  of  the  Company,  and 
Mr  Becher  had  only  himself  to  thank  for  the  odium  he  incurred, 
inasmuch  as  he  neglected  to  restrain  or  even  give  up  the  names  of 
those  who  had  through  their  native  servants  not  only  "  monopolised 
the  grain,  but  compelled  the  poor  ryots  to  sell  the  seed  requisite  for 
the  next  harvest."  (See  Court  of  Directors'  letter,  Appendix  B,  p. 
420,  Hunter's  Annals.) 

Notices  of  the  1787  famine  Avill  be  found  in  "  Calcutta  Gazettes  " 
of  20th  September  1787  and  27th  March  1788.  The  last  shows 
that  B^karganj  rice  was  sent  to  Dacca. 


IV. — Establishment  of  Civil  Courts  at  Bakarganj, 

At  p.  889  of  the  Sixth  Report  of  the  House  of  Commons  there 
is  printed  a  Revenue  Department  Consultation,  dated  6th  April 
1781,  which  gives  us  the  details  of  the  first  establishment  of  a  court 
of  civil  justice  at  BAkarganj.  The  following  is  an  extract  from  the 
preamble  :  "  The  Board,  taking  into  consideration  the  present  state 
of  the  administration  of  civil  and  criminal  justice  throughout  the 
provinces,  pass  the  following  resolution  :  That  to  remedy  the  incon- 
veniences occasioned  by  the  too  extensive  jurisdiction  of  the  Mofussil 
Dewanny  Adalats  established  by  the  Resolutions  of  28th  March 
1780,  and  thereby  promote  the  more  rapid  and  eff"ectual  administra- 
tion of  justice,  the  following  Courts  of  Civil  Justice,  including  those 
now  existing,  be  established  throughout  the  provinces."  Then  follow 
the  names  of  eighteen  courts,  among  which  Jessore  appears  under  the 


APPENDIX. 


443 


name  of  Aloorly.  The  boundaries  given  of  Bakargaiij  are  as  follows  : 
"  The  jurisdiction  of  Buckergunge  {sic),  consisting  of  that  portion  of 
the  Dacca  Province  lying  on  the  south-west  of  the  Ganges  or  Padnia 
and  the  Cally  Ganges,  and  to  the  west  of  the  Meghna  from  Chandpur 
to  the  sea;  having  as  its  western  limits  the  eastern  frontier  of 
Boosna  and  Jessore,  down  to  the  mouth  of  the  river  of  Raj  Mongal, 
including  also  all  the  islands  belonging  to  and  situated  on  the  coast 
of  the  Dacca  Province,  except  the  ])argana  of  Sandwip  and  its  de- 
pendencies." 

The  Eesolution  farther  directs  that  the  Civil  Judges  shall  have 
the  power  of  apprehending  dacoits,  &c.,  though  not  of  trying  them, 
and  that  the  Nawab  be  requested  to  withdraw  all  his  phousdars 
except  thephousdar  of  Hughli. 

The  above  orders  are  also  published  in  Colebrooke's  Digest,  vol.  iii. 


v.— Character  of  the  People. 

The  following  interesting  remarks  on  the  character  of  the  Bdkarganj 
population,  &c.,  are  taken  from  a  letter  by  Mr  Meredith  (?)  Parker, 
printed  in  the  appendix  to  Mr  Plowden's  salt  report.  Mr  Parker's 
letter  is  dated  15th  September  1832,  and  the  object  of  it  is  to 
rebut  the  assertion  that  the  molunghies  or  salt-makers  were  not 
free  agents  : — 

"  I  believe  I  am  w^ell  warranted  in  asserting  that  no  portion  of 
Lower  Bengal,  with  the  exception  perhaps  of  the  Nuddea  district, 
has  ever  been  considered  so  difficult  to  manage.  I  speak  with 
reference  to  matters  of  police,  as  the  Twenty-four  Parganas,  the 
Jessore  and  Bdkarganj  zillahs,  the  chars  and  islands  at  the 
mouth  of  the  Meghna  and  Chittagong,  but  more  esiDecially  the 
belt  of  cultivated  land  which  accompanies  or  invades  the  line  of 
the  Sundarbans  in  the  three  first-mentioned  districts.  It  need 
scarcely  be  observed  that  everywhere  people  dwelling  on  the  fron- 
tiers of  great  forests,  the  pioneers  before  whose  hatchets  these  forests 
recede,  people  who  dwell  in  islands  surrounded  by  broad  and 
dangerous  rivers,  or  on  the  sea-shore,  are  noted,  as  compared  with 
their  fellow-countrymen  in  other  j)arts  of  the  same  land,  for  hardi- 
hood and  roughness  of  character,  nor  am  I  inclined  to  believe  that 
Bengal  offers  any  exception  to  this  nearly  general  rule.  Now,  four- 
fifths  of  the  molunghies  belong  to  the  above  class,  and  certainly  no 
more  unfavourable  selection  could  be  made  for  trying  the  experi- 
ment of  coerced  labour  if  all  Bengal  had  been  searched  for  the 
purpose.  Attempts  at  coercion  which  might  bewilder  and  intimi- 
date the  c_[uiet  weavers  of  Dacca  or  Murshiddbdd,  would,  I  appre- 
hend, meet  with  a  very  difterent  reception  from  the  borderers  in 
the  Sundarbans  ;  the  woodcutters  and  fishermen  of  the  Twenty- 
four   Parganas,   Jessore,    and   Bakarganj  ;  the   ryots  of  Bhulloah 


444  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

[Noakhdli],  ever  braining  each  other  in  boundary  disputes ;  and  the 
litigious,  unmanageable  people  of  Chittagong.  For  my  own  part, 
had  I  a  pubHc  measure  of  an  unpopular  nature,  or  whicli  would  be 
considered  oppressive  by  the  rj^ots,  to  carry  into  effect,  I  confess 
I  should  prefer  being  appointed  to  make  the  experiment  in  any 
l^ortion  of  Bengal  rather  than  in  the  districts  I  have  adverted  to, 
and  I  believe  the  Magistrates  and  other  public  officers  who  have 
had  experience  of  them  would  agree  with  me  in  this  preference." 

In  the  same  letter  Mr  Parker  asserts  that  cultivation  is  essential 
to  the  salt  manufacture,  as  the  rice  straw  is  used  for  boiling  the 
water.  This  seems  too  strongly  put,  but  still  it  is  satisfactory  to 
know  that  there  is  not  necessarily  any  opposition  between  cultiva- 
tion and  salt-making.  We  may  therefore  hope  that  the  reclamation 
of  the  Sundarbans  and  the  chars  will  not  prevent  the  revival  of  the 
salt  trade. 


VI. — Dacoits. 


There  is  a  curious  passage  in  Mill's  "  Logic,"  where  he  speaks  of 
the  English  bringing  with  them  into  Bengal  the  phrase  "landed 
proprietor,"  and  of  the  confusion  which  it  led  them  into.  "They 
gave  an  absolute  right  to  one  who  had  only  a  limited  right,  from 
another,  because  he  had  not  an  absolute  right,  they  took  away  all 
right,  drove  whole  classes  of  men  to  ruin  and  despair,  filled  the 
country  ivith  banditti,  created  a  feeling  that  nothing  was  secure,  and 
produced,  with  the  best  intentions,  a  disorganisation  of  society 
which  had  not  been  produced  in  the  country  by  the  most  ruthless 
of  its  barbarous  invaders  "  (book  iv.  chap.  v.  Natural  History  of  the 
Variations  in  the  Meaning  of  Terms). 

This  passage  apparently  refers  to  the  formation  of  the  Per- 
manent Settlement,  and  makes  it  answerable  for  the  filling  of  the 
country  with  banditti.  But  as  regards  the  eastern  districts,  at  all 
events,  the  quotations  given  in  my  book  show  that  dacoity  flourished 
there  long  before  1790.  I  suspect  that  Mill  borrowed  the  illustra- 
tion from  his  father,  who  was  prejudiced  against  the  Permanent 
Settlement. 


VII. — Early  Travellers  in  Bengal. 

An  interesting  article  might  be  written  on  this  subject,  but  as  I 
am  only  dealing  with  the  history  of  one  district,  it  Avould  be  out  of 
place  for  me  to  go  into  much  detail.  With  the  help  of  my  friend 
Dr  Wise  I  have  searched  a  great  many  books  in  the  hope  of  finding 
some  particulars  about  early  Bdkarganj,  but  the  result  has  been 


APPENDIX.  445 

disappointing.  In  conducting  an  inquiry  of  this  kind,  one  is,  I  think, 
most  struck  with  the  tremendous  amount  of  waste  Avith  which  the 
carrying  on  of  the  worhl's  work  is  accompanied.  The  same  facts  ai-e 
repeated  in  scores  of  books  in  the  same  or  in  different  hTn-niao-es,  so 
that  about  nine-tenths  of  them  are  superfluous  ;  and  hardly  any  book 
can  be  found  which  goes  farther  than  its  neighbours,  or  gives  any 
information  which  is  novel  and  valuable.  The  earliest  European 
traveller  in  Bengal  appears  to  have  been  Varthema  (Vertomannus) 
of  Bologna,  who  was  in  Bengal  about  1507.  His  travels  have  been 
translated  for  the  Hakluyt  Society  (1SG3),  and  the  editor  discusses 
in  the  introduction  the  question  of  the  site  of  the  town  of  Bengala 
or  Banghella,  which  Varthema  describes  himself  as  having  visited. 
The  editor  supposes  that  it  was  situated  between  Ilattia  and  San- 
dwip,  and  it  has  occurred  to  me  that  perhaps  it  is  after  all  identical 
with  Fitch's  Bacola.  Le  Blanc  of  Marseilles,  wlio  was  in  Bengal 
some  ten  years  before  Fitch,  speaks  of  Bengala  as  being  the  principal 
town  of  Bengal,  but  adds  the  important  observation  that  the  native 
name  of  it  was  Batacouta.  Faria  y  Sousa,  and  perhaps  some  other 
writers,  seem  to  call  Bacola  sometimes  Baticala,^  which  is  very  near 
to  Le  Blanc's  word,  especially  when  we  consider  how  easily  t  may 
be  mistaken  for  an  I  in  printing  from  a  manuscript. 

Le  Blanc  must  have  been  in  Bengal  shortly  after  Caesar  Frede- 
rick, and,  curiously  enough,  he  too  was  forced  by  stress  of  weather 
to  land  at  Sandwip.  Unfortunately  Le  Blanc's  travels  were  not 
published  till  after  his  death,  and  perhaps  they  were  not  written 
down  till  long  after  his  return.  At  all  events,  they  contain  allusions 
to  things — e.g.,  the  reception  of  the  Jesuit  priests  by  the  King  of 
Chandecan,  which  did  not  take  place  till  some  twenty  years  after 
his  return  home. 

Another  early  traveller  in  Bengal  is  Sebastian  Manrique  (referred 
to  in  a  paper  by  Dr  Wise).  He  was  in  India  and  Arracan  from  1628 
to  1641,  in  the  capacity  of  an  Augustinian  missionary.  He  describes 
Shahbuzpur,  and  also  an  island  which  he  calls  Sagaldiva — i.e.,  he 
says,  all-rich.  He  says  that  these  islands  had  become  depopulated 
on  account  of  the  continual  wars  between  the  Portuguese,  the  Arra- 
canese,  and  the  Moghals.  He  also  describes  Sandwip,  and  gives  some 
particulars  about  Gonzales,  whom  he  calls  the  Portuguese  "  King 
of  Sundiva."  He  describes  the  Sundarbans  and  his  shipwreck  in 
the  neighbourhood,  but  unfortunately  I  am  not  sufficiently  acquainted 
with  Spanish  fully  to  understand  him. 

I  may  here  note  that  the  most  complete  list  of  early  works  on 
India  appears  to  be  that  given  in  Don  Antonio  de  Leon  Pinelo's 
work  entitled  "  Epitome  de  la  Bibliotheca  Oriental,"  &c.,  Madrid, 
1737. 

The  earliest  map  of  Bengal  appears  to  be  Gastaldi's  (1561).  A 
facsimile  of  it  is  given  in  the  Hakluyt  Society's  translation  of  ^^ar- 
thema's  Travels  (Dr  Badger's  introduction). 

^  There  was  also  a  Baticala  io  Canara  and  anotlier  iu  Cejilon. 


446  DISTRICT  OF  bAKARGANJ. 


YIIL— Francis  Fernandez. 

Francis  Fernandez  and  his  companion  Dominic  da  Sosa  were  the 
first  Jesuits  who  visited  Bengal,  and  they  probably  deserve  the 
honour  of  being  reckoned  the  iirst  missionaries  to  the  Bengalis. 
They  were  not,  however,  the  first  priests  in  the  country,  for  they 
found  a  curate  in  Gullp  on  their  arrival  in  May  1598,  This  Gullo 
appears  to  me  to  be  identical  with  Bandel,  which  last  was  a  name 
given  to  all  Portuguese  stations  in  Bengal.  Fernandez  describes  it 
as  being  210  miles  from  the  mouth  of  the  Ganges,  and  says  that  it 
took  them  eight  days  to  ascend  the  river  to  it.  Gullo  was  evidently 
one  of  the  earliest,  if  not  the  very  earliest  station  of  the  Portuguese 
in  Bengal,  and  so  we  know  was  Bandel,  the  church  bell  of  which 
bears  the  date  1599.  When  the  Jesuits  speak  of  their  church  at 
Chandecan  as  being  the  first  erected  by  their  order,  they  do  not 
thereby  deny  the  priority  of  that  of  Bandel.  Fernandez  and  his 
companion  stayed  at  Gullo  till  October,  and  they  employed  them- 
selves tliere  in  the  laudable  work  of  establishing  a  hospital,  which  I 
suppose  must  have  been  the  first  in  Bengal.  From  Gullo  they  went 
to  Chandecan,  and  stayed  there  till  December,  when  they  went  on 
to  Sripiir.  Fernandez  describes  Chandecan  as  lying  half  way  be- 
tween Porto  Grande  (Chittagong)  and  Porto  Piccolo  (Gullo  ?),  and 
says  that  the  king's  dominions  were  so  extensive  that  it  would  take 
fifteen  or  twenty  days  to  traverse  them.  He  adds,  that  it  has  a  great 
trade  in  bees'-wax,  which  is  produced  in  the  jungles,  so  that  there  were 
Sundarbans  then  also.  There  were  dacoits  also,  and  Fernandez  says 
they  encountered  great  dangers  from  them  and  from  tigers  on  the 
way  from  Gullo  to  Chandecan. 

Fernandez'  first  letter  was  written  from  Sripiir,  and  Avas  dated 
either  14th  or  19th  January  1599  (both  dates  are  given).  It  will 
be  found  at  length  in  the  edition  of  Pimenta's  letter  published  at 
Venice  in  1G02,  but  the  note  of  Aquaviva  prefixed  to  this  edition 
states  that  the  letter  was  originally  printed  in  Latin.  It  would 
seem,  therefore,  that  the  statement  in  my  text  (p.  29)  is  a  mis- 
take, and  that  tlie  missionaries  originally  wrote  in  Latin.  The  edi- 
tion states  on  the  titlepage  that  Pimenta's  letter  was  written  from 
Goa  on  25th  December  1598,  but  the  date  given  at  the  conclusion  of 
the  book  shows  that  98  is  a  mistake  for  99.  A  Portuguese  edition 
of  the  letter  was  published  at  Lisbon  in  1602.  There  is  a  short 
biography  of  Fernandez  in  Bartholom6  Alcazar's  "  Chronicle  of  the 
Jesuit  Worthies  of  the  Province  of  Toledo,"  Madrid,  1710.  From  it 
we  learn  that  Fernandez  was  born  at  a  place  called  La  Villa  de  Hu- 
erta,  near  Toledo,  and  that  he  entered  the  University  of  Alcala  in 
1570,  when  he  was  twenty  years  old.  He  arrived  in  Goa  in  1575, 
and  died  in  1602,  when  he  was  only  about  fifty-two,  though  Du  Jarric 
and  Alcazar  speak  of  him  as  being  weighed  down  by  years. 


APPENDIX.  447 


(D.) 

Two   Bakarganj   Cases. 

1.  Story  of  Karimuddin. 

I  ONLY  mention  this  story  to  show  to  what  desperate  lengths  Ben- 
galis will  occasionally  go  in  the  prosecution  of  their  revenge. 
Karimuddin  was  an  idle,  dissolute  fellow,  and  a  thief.  One  night 
he  Avas  seen  by  some  of  his  fellow-villagers  stealing  fish  from  their 
nets,  and  they  gave  him  chase  but  could  not  catch  him,  and  so  had 
to  content  themselves  with  giving  him  a  volley  of  abuse.  Kari- 
muddin resolved  to  be  revenged,  and  the  method  he  took  was  this. 
He  had  an  old  father  who  had  been  bedridden  for  tAvo  or  three 
years,  and  whom  he  felt  to  be  a  burden  to  him,  so  he  actually  took 
up  a  bludgeon  and  fractured  his  father's  skull,  and  then  hurried  in 
with  the  body  to  the  police  station  and  laid  a  charge  of  murder 
against  the  people  who  had  abused  him.  The  case  was  investigated, 
and  I  am  glad  to  say  that  the  truth  came  out,  and  that  Karimuddin 
was  transported  for  life. 

2.  Story  of  Jabar  Ula. 

Some  three  years  ago  there  was  a  Mahomedan  peasant,  named 
Jabar  Ula,  who  lived  with  his  wife  and  family  on  the  banks  of  the 
river  Meghna.  The  homestead  Avas  a  joint  one — that  is  to  say,  he 
and  his  family  lived  in  one  part  of  it,  and  another  family,  distantly 
related  to  his,  occupied  the  remainder.  The  lands  attached  to  the 
homestead  Avere  cultivated  in  common  by  the  tAvo  families,  an 
arrangement  Avhich  led  to  occasional  disputes  about  the  produce. 
One  day  Jabar  Ula  had  a  quarrel  Avith  a  Avoman  of  the  neighbouring 
family  about  the  diA-ision  of  a  quantity  of  sesame  or  oil  seeds  Avhich 
had  been  spread  out  to  dry  in  the  courtyard.  Jabar  Ula  Avanted  to 
carry  off  his  share,  and  the  Avoman  said  he  Avas  taking  more  than  he 
Avas  entitled  to.  I  suppose  she  used  her  tongue  pretty  freely,  for  at 
last  Jabar  Ula  got  so  angry  that  he  tried  to  strike  her,  and  in  doing 
so  he  happened  to  tAvitch  off  her  upper  garment.  She  rushed  off  to 
her  brothers,  Avho  had  just  come  in  from  the  field,  and  complained 
of  the  affront.  Her  two  brothers  at  once  came  into  the  courtyard, 
seized  Jabar  Ula,  and  gave  him  such  a  beating  that  he  at  last  fell 
doAvn  insensible.  Terrified  at  this,  the  two  lifted  him  up,  gave  him 
Avater,  and  finally  carried  him  into  his  house  and  laid  hmi  down  on 
his  bed.  Some  days  after  this  Jabar  Ula's  Avife  sent  Avord  by  the 
village  AA^atchman  to  the  police  station  that  her  husband  had  died  of 
his  beating,  and  that  the  murderers  had  broken  into  her  house  and 
carried  off  Uie  dead  body.  The  police  AA^ent  out  to  the  village, 
Avhich  was  a  good  way  off,  and  commenced  an  investigation.     No 


448  DISTRICT  OF  BAKARGANJ. 

trace  of  Jabar  Ula's  body  could  be  found,  and  his  widow  gave  a  cir- 
cumstantial account  to  the  police  of  how  her  husband  had  lain  insen- 
sible for  two  or  three  days  after  his  beating,  how  he  had  got  worse 
and  worse,  and  how  she  and  his  mother  had  watched  by  his  side  night 
after  night  until  he  died.  When  they  saw  that  all  was  over,  and 
that  they  were  widowed  and  childless,  the  two  women  gave  way  to 
their  grief,  and  broke  out  into  the  lamentable  cries  Avhich  Bengali 
women  use  on  such  occasions.  The  accused  heard  them,  iind  know- 
ing what  the  cries  meant,  and  that  there  was  no  safety  for  them  if 
Jabar  Ula's  body  remained  where  it  Avas,  and  if  the  marks  of  vio- 
lence on  it  were  seen  by  the  authorities,  they  broke  into  the  room, 
which  had  only  mat  walls,  and  carried  off  the  corpse.  The  widow- 
could  tell  no  more,  but  the  accused  were  now  arrested,  and  they 
told  the  rest  of  the  story.  They  acknowledged  to  the  police  that 
all  that  the  widow  had  said  was  true,  and  added  that  they  had  put 
the  body  on  board  of  a  small  boat,  rowed  out  to  the  middle  of  the 
stream,  which  was  there  two  or  three  miles  wide,  and  then  flung  the 
body  into  the  river.  On  this  they  were  sent  into  Barisdl  to  appear 
before  the  Magistrate,  and  I  well  recollect  that  their  confessions 
were  recorded  in  my  presence,  that  they  were  full  and  particular, 
and  that  each  prisoner  told  the  same  story.  The  case  was  made 
over  to  another  Magistrate,  who  examined  the  witnesses  and  then 
committed  the  accused  to  the  Court  of  Session  on  charges  of 
murder,  &c.  Before  the  trial  came  on  the  prisoners  said  to  their 
attorney  that  they  were  innocent  of  the  murder,  and  that  Jabar  Ula 
was  not  really  dead.  They,  however,  admitted  that  they  had  beaten 
him,  and  that  they  could  not  produce  him.  On  this  their  attorney 
advised  them  to  plead  guilty,  and  to  throw  themselves  on  the  mercy 
of  the  Court.  "  It  is  of  no  use,"  he  said,  "  for  you  to  deny  the 
crime  ;  you  can't  produce  Jabar  Ula,  and  you  have  no  witnesses 
who  can  say  where  he  is.  On  the  other  hand,  his  widow  and  his 
mother  are  prepared  to  swear  that  they  saw  him  die,  and  that  they 
saw  you  carry  ofl"  his  dead  body.  Your  best  plan  is  to  plead  guilty, 
and  to  plead  the  provocation  Jabar  Ula  had  given  by  insulting  your 
sister."  They  took  his  advice,  and  acknowledged  the  genuineness 
of  their  confessions  before  the  Magistrate.  The  witnesses  for  the 
prosecution  were  examined,  and  repeated  the  evidence  they  had 
given  before  the  Magistrate,  and  the  Judge  convicted  the  prisoners, 
but  passed  a  comparatively  light  sentence.  As  the  body  had  not 
been  found  he  acquitted  them  of  the  charge  of  murder,  and  sentenced 
them  to  six  months'  imprisonment  for  causing  grievous  hurt,  and 
six  months  for  concealment  of  evidence,  in  that  they  had  thrown  the 
body  into  the  river.  Altogether  they  got  a  year  apiece.  The  pri- 
soners went  to  jail,  and  made  no  appeal ;  but  some  seven  or  eight 
months  afterwards,  and  while  the  prisoners  were  serving  out  their 
time  in  Barisal  jail,  Ave  Avere  all  startled  by  a  rumour  that  Jabar  Ula 
had  turned  up,  alive  and  in  good  health.  It  was  true.  A  man  had 
come  to  a  country  market  to  make  some  purchases,  and  a  fellow- 
villager  had  recognised  him  as  Jabar  Ula.     He  had  changed  his 


APPENDIX. 


449 


name,  and  did  not  want  to  come  forward,  but  the  village  watchman 
insisted  on  taking  him  to  the  police  station.  There  he  acknowledged 
that  he  was  indeed  Jabar  Ula,  and  told  a  marvellous  story  to  account 
for  his  reappearance.  He  had  become  insensible  after  he  was  beaten, 
he  said,  and  remembered  nothing  farther  until  he  felt  a  gnawing 
sensation  in  his  back,  as  if  some  animal  were  biting  him.  This 
awoke  him,  and  he  found  that  he  was  lying  in  shallow  water  on  the 
edge  of  a  sandbank,  and  that  a  jackal  had  been  biting  him.  The 
animal  had  come  down  to  drink,  and  had  seen  Jabar  Ula  and 
thought  he  was  dead.  After  this  Jabar  Ula  saw  a  boat  passing  and 
hailed  it,  and  was  taken  by  it  into  the  district  of  Noakhali.  After 
that  he  lived  in  various  places,  but  always  in  hiding,  lest  he  should 
be  discovered  by  his  assailants  and  murdered  by  them.  We  tested 
his  story  by  sending  an  officer  with  him  to  make  inquu'ies  in  the 
various  places  he  had  visited.  The  result  did  not  corroborate  his 
story,  and  he  now  began  to  shuffle  about  the  names  of  the  places  he 
had  visited,  and  to  tell  conflicting  stories.  Among  other  things  he 
dropped  the.  story  of  the  jackal,  and  said  he  had  been  saved  by 
clutching  at  a  plantain-tree  which  was  floating  down  the  river.  He 
also  gave  up  the  story  of  his  having  been  taken  to  NoakliAli.  And 
now,  when  the  evidence  of  the  witnesses  in  the  Court  of  Session  was 
more  closely  examined,  it  was  found  that  the  women  of  Jabar  Ula's 
family  had  materially  altered  the  statements  they  made  to  the 
Magistrate.  Before  the  Magistrate  they  had  sworn  that  they  had 
seen  the  prisoners  carry  off"  the  dead  body  of  Jabar  Ula.  Before  the 
Judge  they  said  that  they  had  fallen  asleej),  worn  out  with  Avatching 
and  fatigue,  and  that  when  they  awoke  again  they  found  that  the 
body  was  gone.  Moreover,  it  was  clear  that  the  confessions  of  the 
prisoners  must  have  been  false,  at  least  in  part,  for  they  had 
said  that  they  had  flung  the  body  of  Jabar  Ula  into  the  middle 
of  the  Meghna,  and  it  is  utterly  impossible  that  he  could  ever 
have  been  saved  if  he  had  been  flung  in  there,  especially  when 
reduced  by  illness.  By  this  time  the  prisoners  had  heard  of  the 
reappearance  of  Jabar  Ula,  and  had  forwarded  petitions  declaratory 
of  their  innocence,  and  accusing  Jabar  Ula  and  his  family  of  getting 
up  a  false  case  against  them,  and  the  police  of  having  tortured  them 
into  confessing.  The  prisoners  were  now  sent  for,  and  they  made 
similar  statements  in  person,  and  no  doubt  these  were  the  real  cir- 
cumstances. Of  course  the  police  denied  that  they  had  used  any 
violence  to  the  prisoners,  and  it  was  impossible  to  get  proof  of  this 
so  long  after  the  occurrence ;  but  at  the  same  time  they  could  not 
get  out  of  the  difficulty  that  Jabar  Ula  was  alive,  and  that  if  the 
confessions  were  true  he  must  have  been  dead.  The  affair  was 
never  wholly  cleared  up,  but  no  doubt  remained  in  the  minds  of  the 
great  body  of  the  public  that  the  case  Avas  altogether  false  except 
as  regards  the  beating,  and  that  Jabar  Ula  had,  in  revenge  for  his 
thrashing,  slipped  away  in  the  night-time  and  hidden  himself  for 
months,  having  previously  arranged  Avith  his  Avifc  and  fruMids  that 

2  F 


45 o  DISTRICT  OF  bAkARGANJ. 

they  should  say  he  was  dead,  and  accuse  the  prisoners  of  having 
murdered  him. 

The  case  thus  remains  as  a  memorable  instance  of  the  lengths  to 
which  a  man  will  go  in  order  to  satisfy  his  revenge,  and  of  the 
danger  of  relying  too  much  on  confessions  of  guilt. 

Note. — It  seems  proper  to  add  that  I  was  so  convinced  of  the  innocence  of  the 
prisoners  in  this  case  that  I  took  upon  myself  to  release  them  in  anticipation  of 
the  orders  of  Government.  For  this  irregularity  I  vras  deservedly  censured,  and 
three  Judges  of  the  High  Court  afterwards  decided  that  there  vyas  no  ground  to 
interfere  with  the  original  conviction.  However,  the  prisoners  were  not  re-pre- 
sented before  the  High  Court,  and  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  general  opinion  in 
the  district  is  that  Jabar  Ula  never  was  flung  into  the  river. 


(E.) 

The  Language  of  the  District. 

Bengali  is  the  vernacular  of  Bdkarganj,  and  there  are  few  provincial 
peculiarities  except  in  pronunciation.  I  doubt  if  there  be  a  single 
word  whose  use  is  exclusively  confined  to  BAkarganj  ;  and  when  we 
reflect  how  modern  the  district  is,  and  what  violent  changes  of 
boundaries  it  has  undergone  during  its  short  life,  we  can  hardly 
expect  to  find  many  peculiarities  of  language  in  it.  In  all  the  dis- 
tricts of  Eastern  Bengal  we  find  a  gdod  many  Arabic  and  Persian 
words,  due  no  doubt  to  the  influence  of  the  Mahomedans.  These 
words  chiefly  relate  to  administration  and  jurisdiction,  but  some  of 
them  relate  to  the  arts  and  sciences,  and  to  domestic  life ;  and  it  is 
a  shrewd  remark  of  Kam  Kamal  Sen,  in  the  valuable  preface  to  his 
English  Bengali  Dictionary,  that  the  words  for  pen  and  paper  are 
of  Arabic  or  Persian  origin,  showing  that  the  Sanskrit-speaking 
people  did  not  know  how  to  make  paper. 

I  once  made  out  a  list  of  such  words  and  phrases  as  appeared  to 
me  to  be  peculiar  to  Bdkarganj,  and  sent  it  to  the  Commissioner  of 
Dacca,  but  I  am  not  aware  that  any  use  Avas  ever  made  of  it. 

Mr  Sutherland  has  given  an  interesting  list  at  p.  192  of  his 
report  on  Bdkarganj  (Principal  Heads  of  the  History  and  Statistics 
of  the  Dacca  Division,  Calcutta,  1868),  and  to  this  I  beg  to  refer  the 
reader.  The  following  words  and  expressions  are  all  I  can  give  at 
present : — 

Nishat  or  nisbafi,  a  brother-in-law  (Arabic). 

Kura,  a  bigha. 

Mora,  a  basket  of  paddy. 

Amiuni,  without  settlement. 

Badla,  to  work  for  another.  This  refers  to  an  interesting  usage 
of  villagers  mutually  assisting  one  another  by  giving  a  day's  plough- 


APPENDIX.  451 

ing  or  weeding.  (Sec  Mr  J.  Cockbnrn's  evidence,  ans.  -^58,  ]>.  31: 
of  evidence  taken  before  Indigo  Commission,  and  also  paragraph  09 
of  the  report,  18G0.) 

Bacjchar,  berm  of  road. 

Khola  (not  Icola,  as  in  Sutherland),  an  open  field. 

Char,  a  bamboo  or  supari  bridge. 

At,  tlie  raised  edge  of  a  moat. 

Wlien  a  boat  has  sunk,  boatmen  employ  the  euphemism  of  hhala 
haiache,  literally,  it  is  good. 

When  the  peasantry  take  to  firing  homesteads,  as  they  some- 
times do  in  a  dispute  about  rent  with  their  landlord,  they  aro 
graphically  described  as  setting  the  red  horse  a-running  (Idl  ghora 
dakran). 

There  is  a  curious  expression  for  a  mother-indaw  in  Bdkarganj. 
She  is  called  diwanji — i.e.,  diwan  or  manager.  Probably  tliis  is  in 
allusion  to  the  fact  that  she  is  generally  the  real  mistress  of  the 
liouse,  the  daughter-in-law  being  too  often  a  mere  child. 


(F.) 

Note  to  Page  75. 


I  HAVE  not  printed  the  song  about  Kamala  on  account  of  the  diffi- 
culty in  procuring  Bengali  types. 

Note  to  Page  112. 

I  believe  that  the  Mr  Thackeray  here  referred  to  was  not  the 
father  of  the  -novelist.  The  father  of  the  latter  appears  to  have 
been  a  Mr  Richmond  Thackeray,  who  died  in  1815. 


INDEX. 


AbaDkIrs,  what,  193 
Abda,  194 

Abdulapur,  tappa,  147 
Administration — 

Criminal,  323 

English,  302 

Hindu,  373 

Maliomedan,  375 

Eevenue,  312 
Agriculture,  220,  278 
Ahsanoolah,  Khajali,  115,   117,  123, 

14G,  157,  192 
Alia,  history  of  lease  of,  112 

river,  19 

Ainadilin  Sikdar,   notorious   dacoit, 

112,  327 
Al  Arfan,  Syed,  tradition  about,  244 
Alexander,  Mr,  report  on  Singhkhali 

case,  242 
Ali,  Karamat,  his  teaching,  255,  3S1 
Alinagar,  tappa,  143 
Alliar  Khan,  informer,  324,  424 
Alligators,  350,  393,  note 
Alluviation,  5,  432 
Aman  rice,  278,  280 
Amani  village,  13G 
Amua  don,  19 
Amusements,  native,  235 
Andarmanick  river,  IS 
Angaria  village,  348 
Animals,  destruction  of  Avild,  392 
Antiquities,  26 

Apostasies,  from  Christianity,  2G2 
Araugpiir,  pargana,  154,  440 
Arcot  rupees,  99,  435,  note,  440 


Arial  Khan  river,  16,  20,  21 
Armstrong,  Collector,  report  on  Buz- 
urguniedptir,  101  ;  on  Idilpur,  125 
Asman  Singh,  fate  of,  41 
Attaclied  estates,  189 
Aus  rice,  see  Owsh 
Ausat  taluqdar,  wliat,  41G 
AzimiJiir,  tappa,  148 

B 

BacolA,  sec  Bakla 

Baliadurpur,  tappa,  154 

Baidyas,  97,  258,  339 

Baikanthpi'ir,  pargana,  C9,  note 

Baisdia,  4,  IG 

Bakar,  Aga,  43,  119,  437,  438,  439 

Btlkarganj  bazdr,  284,  302,  30G,  note, 

324,  325,  437,  442 

Commissioner  of,  323 

District,  physical  characteristics 

of,  chap,  i.,432 
people  of,  211,  427,  443,  chap. 

viii.,  424 

thana,  347 

Bilkla,  2G,  30,  73,  78,  170,  179,  250 
Baleslnvar  river,  17 
Ballab,  Krishna,  74 

Raj,  95,   96,  99,  106,   119,  258, 

306,  438 
Bamna,  110,  156 
Bandel,  33,  106 
Bangrora,  i^ai-gana,  150 
Baptist  missions,  260 
Barbier,  P6rc,  quoted,  ISO 
Barbosa,  Edward,  sec  Preface,  i>.  xiii. 
Bareiro,  INIr,  2G1 


454 


INDEX. 


Barhunufldm  Hdt,  271,  348 
Barisiil  guns,  13,  168 

river,  17 

town,   94,    276,    306,    326,  367, 

383,  424 
Baroikaran,  307,  308 
Bdropakhya,  case  of,  261,  263 
Barwell,  Mr,  119,  121,  137 
Basauda,  school  at,  123,  358 

Seins  of,  203 

Battye,  Collector,  112;    Magistrate, 

163,  355,  379 
BatAvaras,  sec  Partitions 
Baufal  thana,  23,  171,  330,  348 
Beaufort,  Mr  Morris,  380 
Bebajias,  256 
Beclier,  Mr,  376,  442 
Bengal,  early  travellers  in,  444  and 

Preface 

Eastern,  253 

Bengala,  town  of,  445  and  Preface 

Bengalis,  character  of,  213 

Bensley,  Dr,  quoted,  12 

Betel-nuts,  285 

Betua  river,  140 

Beverley,  Mr,  on  preponderance  of 

Mahomedans,  247  ;  quoted,  276 
Bhangni  Naya  river,  16 
Bhashan  Titulia  fishery,  189 
Bhola  khdl,  20,  366 
Bibi  Chini,  mosque  at,  40 
Bigliai  river,  18 
Bikranmditya,  177 
Bils,  23,  432 

Birmolian,  pargana  and  tappa,  150 
Bishkhdli  don,  19 

river,  18 

Blochniann,  I'rofessor,  quoted,  27,  28, 

note,  173 
Boat-building,  298 
Boatmen,  257 
Boats,  jiatrol,  346 
Bolaki  Shah,  faqir,  317 
Boro  rice,  280,  403 
Boroda  Kanth  Rai,  155 
Boundaries,  1;  change  of,  341,  342 
Bowes,  Andrew,  29,  34 
Brahma  Samdj,  259,  383 
Brdhmans,  190,  258,  275,  391 


Brrihmuttar  lands,  210 
Buddhists,  Mugs  are,  259 
Buffaloes,  162;  sacrifice  of,  229,  note; 

used  for  ploughing,  278 
Bunas,  colony  of,  268 
Burke  quoted,  76,  193 
Buzurguniedpur,    pargana,    94,   193, 

279,  311,  420 

C 

Campbell,  Sir  George,  quoted,  276; 
opinion  on  transfers,  385  ;  results 
of  his  administration,  388 

Canals,  20,  366 

Cardew,  Collector,  report  on  inunda- 
tion, 329 

Carvalho  takes  Sandwip,  36 ;  his 
death,  178 

Cases,  criminal,  349 

Casperz,  Mr,  161 

Castes,  distinctions  of,  223,  257 

Catholics,  Roman,  106 

Cattle  disease,  340 

Census,  268,  270,  341 

Chalans,  custom  of,  213 

Chandals,  247,  257,  2G0,  272 

Chandecan,  29,  174 

Chandradwi]),  history  of,  70 

financial  history  of,  82 

l^artition  of,  89 

settlement  of,  407 

complaint  by  zamindar,  440 

Chapli,  162,  164 

Charcoal,  162 

Chars,  4 

Chattarji,  Ram  Dhan,  lease  to,  116 

Chaukidars,  village,  347,  390  ;  muni- 
cipal, 370 

Chittagong,  earthqviake  at,  14,  note 

Fernandez  killed  at,  33,  446 

Cholera,  328 

Chopa  island,  24,  165,  167 

Christians,  106,  260,  276,  382 

Circuit  judges,  326 

Civil  justice,  statistics  of,  343,  424 

Climate,  10 

Cocoa-nuts,  286 

Collectors,  320 

Commissioner  of  Sundarbans,  160, 310 


INDEX. 


455 


Comnninications,  362 

Congrcve,  Dr,  quoted,  395 

Coiistal)les,  pay  of,  349 

Conti,  Nicole,  sec  Preface 

Conversions  to  Christianity,  few  now- 
adays, 202 

Cornwallis,  Lord,  his  view  about 
Permanent  Settlement,  57,  58 

Cotton,  290 

Criminal  cases,  349 

Crops,  278,  290  ,' 

Cyclones,  40  / 

D 

Dacca  City,  248 

JaMlpur,  52,  note,  323,  338,  339, 

422 

Records,  436 

Dacoits,  308,  345,  430,  437,  444  ^ 
Dakhin   Shahbdzpiir,   pargana,    135, 
182 

subdivision,  270,  341,  342 

Daoud,  King,  177 

Daspilra,  Joar  Kasimnagar,  147 

Daulat  Khan,  270,  348 

Day,  Collector,  53,  310,  320,  398 

Deaths,  accidental,  350 

Debaikhali,  kos  bouts  made  at,  130 

Decennial  Settlement,  397 

Diluviation,  21,  61 

of  Baris^l,  371 

Diseases,  12 

Don,  definition  of,  18 

Douglas,  Collector,  52,   53,  64,  320, 

397-421 
Drinking,  231,  431 
Drowning,  cases  of,  350 
Dudhu  Mia,  254,  381  ^,ff 

E 

Earthquake  at  Chittagong,  14 

Education,  358 

Estates,  Government,  181 

large  and  small,  190,  note 

Europeans  in  Biikarganj,  274 

in  Dacca,  440 

Ewart,  salt  agent,  319 
Excise,  232 
Executions,  325 


F 


/ 


K^k-) 


^^» 


VlB-^^ 


Fairs,  244 

Famines,  314,  441 

Faria  y  Soiisa,  37 

Faridpiir,  237,  277,  281 

Fatlidbiid,  51 

Female  education,  359,  301 

Ferazis,  254 

Feringliies,  110 

Fernandez,  Francis,  29,  33,  174,  440 

Ferries,  105,  306 

Fish,  293 

Fisheries,  188 

Fishermen,  294 

Fitch,  Ralph,  73,  170  ^ 

Floods,  329      1^  :^l)  3,3^  *  n 

Fonseca,  29,  32,  175 

Forts,  mud,  40,  42,  430 

Frederick,  Caisar,  35 

French  factories,  441 

Fruits,  290 

G 

Gab-tree,  291 

Gambling,  236 

Ganges,  23,  note 

Ganja,  233 

Garrett,  Magistrate,  327,  337 

Garuria  Chaudharies,  153,  155 

Gastrell,  Colonel,  3,  390 

Ghani,  Khajah  Abdul,  116,  117 

Ghanteshwar,  boats  and  nets  made 

at,  298 
Ghosal  family,  119,  120,  438 
Gibbon  quoted,  395 
Gird-i-Bandar;  94 
Glanius,  his  voyage,  172 
Golabari,  95,  325 
Golpatta,  288 
Gomess,  Mr,  162 
Gonzales,  36 
Gopal  Kissen,  97,  98,  100,  154,  40(t, 

440 
Gouruadi,  21,  249,  364,  365 
Grant,  analysis  of  finances,  50 

Charles,  442 

Gulston  on  earthquakes,  14 
Guns,  Barisiil,  13,  108 


r 


456 


INDEX. 


H 

IIabibptjR,  pargana,  151 
Hastings,  Warren,  52,  311,  329 
Havili  SelimdMd,  123 

tappa,  124 

Ilayat,  Mahomed,  a  dacoit,  310,  327 

Henckell,  145,  379 

Hindus,  183,  257,  274 

Howaladar,  416 

Hunter,  Mr,  113,  114,  118,321 

Dr,  441 

Hurricane,  329 
Hyndman,  310 

I 

IdilpiJr,  copperplate  found  at,  38, 
173 

pargana,  125,  405 

Idrakpiir,  149 

Imamuddin,  zamindar,  132 

Impey,  Elijah,  101,  258,  note 

Income-tax  returns,  215 

India  Office  Records,  436 

Indigo,  289 

Indrapdsha,  42 

Insects,  damage  by,  279 

Inundation,  314,  329 

Islands,   3;    what   constitutes,    181, 

186 
Ismjiilptir,  a  name  of  Bdkla,  50 


Jabar  Ula,  story  of,  447 
Jaffar  Khan,  his  settlement,  51 
Jahapiir,  pargana,  148 
Jail,  298,  351 

Jalilpur,  pargana,  151,  403 
Jan,  Mirza,  135,  142 
Jangalhuri  taluqs,  101,  416 
Jarric,  Pierre  du,  33,  174 
Jasor  or  Jessore,  178 
Jhalukdtti  khdl,  20 

bazdr,  121,319 

Jute,  90 

K 

Kacha  river,  is 
Kachua,  27,  72,  171 
police  station,  341 


Kachu  Rai,  158 

Kadirdljild,  tappa,  148 

Kalijiri  river,  19 

Kalikapiir,  Ratandi,  132 

Kalisuri  fair,  245 

Kal  Megha,  202 

Kalmi  island,  144,  165 

Kaniala,  74 

Kdngdli,  266 

Kani,  a  measure,  92 

Kanjhi  Lai,  his  fate,  340 

Karamat  Ali,  255,  381 

Karimuddin,  storj'  of,  447 

Karsha  tenure,  196 

Kartd  Bhojds,  260,  263 

Kartikpur,  pargana,  401 

Kasimnagar,  147 

Kassim,  Mir,  52,  97,  305 

Kayasts,  258 

Keating,  Mr,  308,  311 

Khdls,  list  of  more  important,  20 

Khanja  Bahadur  Nagar,  147 

Khaprahhanga,  104 

Khazanclii,  Sarup  Chand,  case  of,  141 

Kiohering,  163,  note 

Kissen  Dass,  97 

Kistodebptir,  pargana,  143 

Koches  in  Perozpiir,  268 

Kutarhdt,  363 

KtikriMukri,  165,  ' 


Lakes,  23 

Lakliiraj  tenures,  209 

Lakutia  khdl,  20 

Lakutia  family,  93,  265,  276 

Land  measures,  92 

Land  tenures,  190 

Language  of  district,  450 

Le  Blanc,  445 

Lime,  298 

Lodge,  Mr,  310 

Long,  Rev.  J.,  306 

M 

Macaulay,  Lord,  7,  213,  217 
Mddaripur  subdivision,  276,  342 
Madder,  Indian,  290 


INDEX. 


457 


Madhabpdsha,  81,  364 

Magistrates,  327,  337 

Mahomedaiis,  2-lG,  209 

Mahrattas,  124,  437 

Maine,  Sir  Henry,  qnoted,  388,  note 

Maizardi,  pargana,  151 

Manptira  island,   139,   182,   194,  254, 

276,  332 
Manrique,  Sebastian,  445 
Manufactures,  297 
Marriages,  236 
Masjidbari,  old  mosque  at,  39 
Massie,   Collector,   54,   84,    89,    320, 

379,  421 
Maulik,  Dinu  Bandliu,  16,  381 
Meghna,  16,  139 
Mendiganj,  48 
Middleton,  INIr,  324 
MiU,  J.,  308 

J.  S.,  444 

Minerals,  291 

Mirza  Jan,  135,  142 

Missions,  262 

Morrell,  Messrs,  116,   161,  188,  243, 

378,  note 
Mozamdar,   Kali   Prasad,    Naib    of 

Buzurgumedpiir,  113 
Mud  forts,  40,  42,  430 
Mugs,  163,  252,^285 

N 
Nalchira,  131 
Nalchiti,  154,  283-285,  307 
Narainganj,  413 
Narullaplir,  pargana,  317,  408 
Navanua  festival,  281 
Nayabliangni  river,  16 
Nazirpiir,  tappa,  130 
Newspapers,  Barisdl,  369 
Nik^ris,  class  of  Mahomedans,  256, 

295 
Nolialia  river,  18 
Novennial  Settlement,  54,  419 


O 


Opium,  233 
Others,  268 
Owsb,  280,  284 


1» 
Paddy,  282  ;   imported  into  Bukar- 

ganj,  284 
Page,  Mr,  268,  note,  378 
Palardi,  21 
Piin,  228,  289 
Panabalia,  124 
Pdndab  river,  17 
Panioty,  Messrs,  87 
Parganas,  65 
Partitions — 

Buzurgumedpiir,  98 

Cliandradwip,  89 

Arangpur,  157 

Dakliili  Shabbiizpiir,  141 

Selimilbdd,  119 

Sultanabdd,  146 

Difficulty  in  making,  198 
Patarhdt,  130 
Patrol-boats,  346 
Pattas,  317 
Patuyaklidli,  215,  248 
Peasantry,  condition  of,  221,  222 
Peat,  attorney,  132,  note,  134 
Pellew,  Mr,  25,  432 
People,  211 

Permanent  Settlement,  52,  397,  421 
Phalaghar,  case  at,  207 
Pbanri  Malwa,  what,  100,  440 
Phuljhuri,  112,  117 
Pigs,  wild,  damage  done  by,  279,  395 
Pimenta,  Nicholas,  his  letters,   28, 

173,  446 
Pitambar  Sein,  97,  107 
Police,  345,  348 
Portuguese,  307 
Pottahs,  317 

Pratdpaditya,  77,  176,  373 
Prices,  285,  297,  354,  435,  440 
Prisoners,  number  of,  353,  357 
Productions,  278 
Prostitutes,  234,  246 

K 

liAHAMATPTfK,  20,  91 

Raikdtti,  121 

Kai,  Madhab  and  Nar  Naraiu,  122 

Raj  Chandra,  93 

Kam  Chamlra,  77 


458 


INDEX. 


Rainfall,  13 

Rajapiir,  fort  at,  42 

Ilaj  Ballab,  see  Ballab 

liajnagar,  pargana,  399 

Ram  Havi  char,  144 

Ramna-Bamna,  110 

Ramnagar,  pargana,  143 

Ramsiddhi,  40,  268 

Ramz;ln,  fast  of,  237 

Ramzanpur,  252 

Rasulpdr,  pargana,  149,  410 

Ratandi  Kalikapiir,  132,  335 

Reeds,  228 

Registration,  statistics  of,  344 

Religion,  382 

Rennel,  Major,  42,  163,  363 

Rent,  rates  of,  301 

Rent-free  tenures,  209,  413 

Resumed  estates,  187 

Revenue  administration,  312 

Rice,  279 

Riots,  237 

Roads,  362,  431 

Rocke,  Mr,  161 

Rupashia,  fort  at,  42 

Rural  registrars,  344,  387 

Ryots,  213,  220,  281,  318,  392 


S 

Sabhi  Khan,  40,  48,  362 
Sadok,  Mahomed,  44,  438,  439 
Sale,  Rev.  J.,  262,  278,,,.    -uf/' 
Salt  manufacture,  12i,  292,.319,  444 
Sandwip,  35,  170,  305,  441 
Sangrdm,  43,  note,  430 
Sati,  22'^37,  394   -b-v^ 
Sayer  dilties,  63,  411 
Schools,  358,  369,  427 
Scrafton,  Mr,  45 

Sein,    Ananda   Chandra,   report    on 
Manpriia,  180 

Pitambar,  97,  107 

Selimdbiid,  118,  249 

Havili,  123 

Settlements,  50,  397 
Shahlxizpur,  Dakhin,  135 

Uttar,  133 

I transfer  of,  341,  342 


Sliahzadpiir,  153 
Shaistdbdd,  115,  152 

pedigree  of  family,  159 

Shaistanagar,  153 

Ships,  324 

Sialghuni,  mosque  at,  40 

Sibpiir,  106,  364 

Sidam  Mia,  204 

Silva,  Domingo,  109 

Singhkhdli  case,  238 

Sitalpati,  288 

Slavery,  orders  of  Calcutta  Council 

about,  439 
Snakes,  350,  395 
S6ndrk6t,  42 

Spirits,  revenue  from,  233,  note. 
Srinagar  lakhiraj,  81 
Sripur,  29 

Srirampur,  pargana,  147 
Statistics,  vital,  274 

of  civil  justice,  343 

Storms,  329,  437 
Sturt,  Mr,  339,  380 
Subdivisions,  342,  347 
Subinfeudation,  192,  195 
Sugar-cane,  287 

Sujdbdd,  fort  at,  40,  41,  317,  430 
Sultandbiid,  pargana,  146 
Sundarbans,  24,   160,   109,  345,  «ofc, 

443 
Sundarkul,  24,  note,  20,  43,  70,  124 
Sunis,  sect  of  Mahomedans,  254 
Surveys,  344 
Sutaluri,  98,  363,  431 
Swamps,  23,  272,  432 
Syedptir,  pargana,  157,  239 


TAHlJTS,  nature  of,  63 
Taki  family,  158 
Taluqs,  63,  150,  151,  417 
Taluqdars,  55 

kinds  of,  415,^^0 

Taylor,  Dr,  44  255,  note,  384 
Tenures,  land,  190 
—  rent-free,  209 

under,  192 

Thanas,  346,  347 


INDEX. 


459 


Thompson,  Collector,  98 

Tides,  15 

Tigers,  395 

Til,  290 

Timber,  287 

Titulia  river,  IG 

Bhasluin,  iislicry,  189 

Tobacco,  234,  289 
Towns,  absence  of,  2(19,  368 
Transfers  of  oHicers,  384,  385 
Tushkhdli,  157,  188,  205 

U 
Udai  Narain,  79 


Valentyn,  43,  note 
Vansittart,  Mr,  303 
Varthema,  444 
Villages;  nature  of,  390 


W 

Wards,  Court  of,  estates  under,  189 

Weavers,  319 

Weights  and  measures,  282 

Wcnger,  Dr,  2C3 

Westland,  Mr,  62,  249 

Widows,  224,  338 

Wilford,  Colonel,  16,  note,  35,  393 

Wintle,  Mr,  11,  424 

Women,  Bengali,  224 

seclusion  of,  226,  283 

Woodcutters,  288 


Zamindars,    56,   61,   206,   417,  418, 

420 
ZiUs,  55,  56,  421 
Zimba  system,  200 


IRIsTEU  BV  DALLANTVNR,  HANSON  AND  ■ 
F.DINUC'ROH  AND  LONDON 


0  c 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  AT  LOS  ANGELES 

THE  UNIVERSITY  LIBRARY 

This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below 


W3G16 


N^A^^ 


tD-Offi 


m 


■$ 


11911 


%, 


^8  ^9T6 


Form  L-9 
2um-l,'«<U22) 


PLEASE  DO  NOT  REMOVE 
THIS  BOOK  CARD      ] 

1 


University  Research  Library