Part 16

Bant.--For the following account of the Bants I am mainly indebted to Mr. H. A. Stuart's description of them in the Manual of South Canara. The name Bant, pronounced Bunt, means in Tulu a powerful man or soldier, and indicates that the Bants were originally a military class corresponding to the Nayars of Malabar. The term Nadava instead of Bant in the northern portions of South Canara points, among other indications, to a territorial organisation by nads similar to that described by Mr. Logan as prevailing in Malabar. "The Nayars," he writes, "were, until the British occupied the country, the militia of the district. Originally they seem to have been organised into 'Six Hundreds,' and each six hundred seems to have had assigned to it the protection of all the people in a nad or country. The nad was in turn split up into taras, a Dravidian word signifying originally a foundation, the foundation of a house, hence applied collectively to a street, as in Tamil teru, in Telugu teruvu, and in Canarese and Tulu teravu. The tara was the Nayar territorial unit for civil purposes." It has been stated that "the Malabar Nair chieftain of old had his nad or barony, and his own military class; and the relics of this powerful feudal system still survive in the names of some of the taluks (divisions) of modern Malabar, and in the official designations of certain Nair families, whose men still come out with quaint-looking swords and shields to guard the person of the Zamorin on the occasion of the rice-throwing ceremony, which formally constitutes him the ruler of the land. Correspondingly, the Bants of the northern parts of Canara still answer to the territorial name of Nad Bants, or warriors of the nad or territory. It is necessary to explain that, in both ancient Keralam and Tulu, the functions of the great military and dominant classes were so distributed that only certain classes were bound to render military service to the ruling prince. The rest were lairds or squires, or gentleman farmers, or the labourers and artisans of their particular community, though all of them cultivated a love of manly sports." [98]

Few traces of any such organisation as has been indicated now prevail, great changes having been made when the Vijayanagar Government introduced, more than five hundred years ago, a system of administration under which the local Jain chiefs, though owing allegiance to an overlord, became more independent in their relations with the people of the country. Under the Bednur kings, and still more under the Mysore rule, the power of the chiefs was also swept away, but the old organisation was not reverted to.

The Bants are now the chief land-owning and cultivating class in South Canara, and are, with the exception of the Billavas or toddy-drawers, the most numerous caste in the district. "At the present day, the Bants of Canara are largely the independent and influential landed gentry, some would say, perhaps, the substantial yeomanry. They still retain their manly independence of character, their strong and well developed physique, and they still carry their heads with the same haughty toss as their forefathers did in the stirring fighting days when, as an old proverb had it, 'The slain rested in the yard of the slayer,' and when every warrior constantly carried his sword and shield. Both men and women of the Bant community are among the comeliest of Asiatic races, the men having high foreheads and well-turned aquiline noses."

In a note on the agricultural economy of South Canara, Rao Sahib T. Raghaviah writes [99] that "the ryot (cultivator) of South Canara loves to make his land look attractive, and every field is lined with the lovely areca, and the stately palm. The slopes adjoining the rich fields are studded with plantations of jack, mango, cashew, plantain and other fruit and shade trees, and the ryot would not even omit to daub his trees with the alternate white and red bands, with which the east coast women love to adorn a marriage house or temple wall. These, with the regularly laid out and carefully embanked water-courses and streams, lend an air of enchantment to the whole scene. The ignorance prevailing among the women of the richer section of the landed classes (on the east coast) is so great that it is not uncommon to ridicule a woman by saying that what she knows about paddy (rice) is that it grows on a tree. But, in a district like South Canara, the woman that does not know agriculture is the exception. I have often come across respectable women of the landed classes like the Bants, Shivallis, and Nairs, managing large landed estates as efficiently as men. The South Canara woman is born on the land, and lives on it. She knows when to sow, and when to reap; how much seed to sow, and how much labour to employ to plough, to weed, or to reap. She knows how to prepare her seed, and to cure her tobacco, to garner her grain, and to preserve her cucumbers through the coming monsoon. She knows further how to feed her cow, and to milk it, to treat it when sick, and to graze it when hale. She also knows how to make her manure, and how to use it without wasting a bit of it. She knows how to collect green leaves for her manure, and to help the fuel reserve on the hill slope above her house grow by a system of lopping the branches and leaving the standards. She knows also how to collect her areca nuts, and to prepare them for the market, and to collect her cocoanuts, and haggle for a high price for them with her customers. There is, in fact, not a single thing about agriculture which the South Canara man knows, and which the South Canara woman does not know. It is a common sight, as one passes through a paddy flat or along the adjoining slope, to see housewives bringing out handfuls of ashes collected in the oven over night, and depositing them at the root of the nearest fruit tree on their land."

Most of the Bants are Hindus by religion, and rank as Sudras, but about ten thousand of them are Jains. Probably they originally assumed Jainism as a fashionable addition to the ancestral demon worship, to which they all still adhere, whether they profess to be Vaishnavites, Saivites, or Jains. It is probable that, during the political supremacy of the Jains, a much larger proportion of the Bants professed adherence to that religion than now-a-days.

There are four principal sub-divisions of the caste, viz., Masadika, who are the ordinary Bants of Tuluva; Nadava or Nad, who speak Canarese, and are found in the northern part of South Canara; the Parivara, who do not follow the aliya santana system of inheritance; and the Jains. Members of these sub-divisions may not intermarry, but instances have occurred of marriage between members of the Masadika and Nad sub-divisions.

Nothing very definite is known of the origin of the Bants, but Tuluva seems, in the early centuries of the Christian era, to have had kings who apparently were sometimes independent and sometimes feudatories of overlords, such as the Pallavas, the early Kadambas, the early Chalukyans, the later Kadambas, the western Chalukyans, the Kalachurians, and the Hoysal Ballals. This indicates a constant state of fighting, which would account for an important class of the population being known as Bantaru or warriors; and, as a matter of course, they succeeded in becoming the owners of all the land which did not fall to the share of the priestly class, the Brahmans. Ancient inscriptions speak of kings of Tuluva, and the Bairasu Wodears of Karakal, whose inscriptions have been found at Kalasa as early as the twelfth century, may have exercised power throughout Tuluva or the greater part of it. But, when the Vijayanagar dynasty became the overlords of Canara in 1336, there were then existing a number of minor chiefs who had probably been in power long before, and the numerous titles still remaining among the Bants and Jains, and the local dignities known as Pattam and Gadi, point to the existence from very early times of a number of more or less powerful local chieftains. The system peculiar to the west coast under which all property vests in females, and is managed by the seniors of the family, was also favourable to the continuance of large landed properties, and it is probable that it is only within comparatively recent times that sub-division of landed property became anything like as common as it is now. All the Bants, except the Parivara and a few Jains follow this aliya santana system of inheritance, [100] a survival of a time when the military followers of conquering invaders or local chiefs married women of the local land-owning classes, and the most important male members of the family were usually absent in camp or at court, while the women remained at the family house on the estate, and managed the farms. The titles and the pattams or dignities have always been held by the male members, but, as they also go with the landed property, they necessarily devolve on the sister's son of a deceased holder, whence has arisen the name aliya santana, which means sister's son lineage. A story is embodied in local traditions, attributing the origin of the system to the fiat of a king named Bhutal Pandya, until whose time makkala santana, or inheritance from father to son, generally obtained. "It is said that the maternal uncle of this prince, called Deva Pandya, wanted to launch his newly constructed ships with valuable cargo in them, when Kundodara, king of demons demanded a human sacrifice. Deva Pandya asked his wife's permission to offer one of his sons, but she refused, while his sister Satyavati offered her son Jaya Pandya for the purpose. Kundodara, discovering in the child signs of future greatness, waived the sacrifice, and permitted the ships to sail. He then took the child, restored to him his father's kingdom of Jayantika, and gave him the name of Bhutal Pandya. Subsequently, when some of the ships brought immense wealth, the demon again appeared, and demanded of Deva Pandya another human sacrifice. On the latter again consulting his wife, she refused to comply with the request, and publicly renounced her title and that of her children to the valuable property brought in the ships. Kundodara then demanded the Deva Pandya to disinherit his sons of the wealth which had been brought in the ships, as also of the kingdom, and to bestow all on his sister's son, Jaya or Bhutal Pandya. This was accordingly done. And, as this prince inherited his kingdom from his maternal uncle and not from his father, he ruled that his own example should be followed by his subjects, and it was thus that the aliya santana law was established about A.D. 77." [101]

It is noted by Mr. L. Moore [102] that various judicial decisions relating to the aliya santana system are based to a great extent on a book termed Aliya Santanada Kattu Kattale, which was alleged to be the work of Bhutala Pandiya, who, according to Dr. Whitley Stokes, the learned scholar who edited the first volume of the Madras High Court Reports, lived about A.D. 78, but which is in reality a very recent forgery compiled about 1840. As to this, Dr. A. C. Burnell observes as follows in a note in his law of partition and succession. "One patent imposture yet accepted by the Courts as evidence is the Aliya Santanada Kattu Kattale, a falsified account of the customs of South Canara. Silly as many Indian books are, a more childish or foolish tract it would be impossible to discover; it is about as much worthy of notice in a law court as 'Jack the Giant Killer.' That it is a recent forgery is certain.... The origin of the book in its present state is well-known; it is satisfactorily traced to two notorious forgers and scoundrels about thirty years ago, and all copies have been made from the one they produced. I have enquired in vain for an old manuscript, and am informed, on the best authority, that not one exists. A number of recent manuscripts are to be found, but they all differ essentially one from another. A more clumsy imposture it would be hard to find, but it has proved a mischievous one in South Canara, and threatens to render a large amount of property quite valueless. The forgers knew the people they had to deal with, the Bants, and, by inserting a course that families which did not follow the Aliya Santana shall become extinct, have effectually prevented an application for legislative interference, though the poor superstitious folk would willingly (it is said) have the custom abolished." [103]

As a custom similar to aliya santana prevails in Malabar, it no doubt originated before Tuluva and Kerala were separated. The small body of Parivara Bants, and the few Jain Bants that do not follow the aliya santana system, are probably the descendants of a few families who allowed their religious conversion to Hinduism or Jainism to have more effect on their social relations than was commonly the case. Now that the ideas regarding marriage among the Bants are in practice assimilated to a great extent to those of most other people, the national rule of inheritance is a cause of much heart-burning and quarrelling, fathers always endeavouring to benefit their own offspring at the cost of the estate. A change would be gladly welcomed by many, but vested interests in property constitute an almost insuperable obstacle.

The Bants do not usually object to the use of animal food, except, of course, the flesh of the cow, and they do not as a rule wear the sacred thread. But there are some families of position called Ballals, amongst whom heads of families abstain from animal food, and wear the sacred thread. These neither eat nor intermarry with the ordinary Bants. The origin of the Ballals is explained by a proverb, which says that when a Bant becomes powerful, he becomes a Ballal. Those who have the dignity called Pattam, and the heads of certain families, known as Shettivalas or Heggades, also wear the sacred thread, and are usually managers or mukhtesars of the temples and bhutasthans or demon shrines within the area over which, in former days, they are said to have exercised a more extended jurisdiction, dealing not only with caste disputes, but settling numerous civil and criminal matters. The Jain Bants are strict vegetarians, and they abstain from the use of alcoholic liquors, the consumption of which is permitted among other Bants, though the practice is not common. The Jain Bants avoid taking food after sunset.

The more well-to-do Bants usually occupy substantial houses on their estates, in many of which there is much fine wood-work, and, in some cases, the pillars of the porches and verandahs, and the doorways are artistically and elaborately carved. These houses have been described as being well built, thatched with palm, and generally prettily situated with beautiful scenic prospects stretching away on all sides.

The Bants have not as a rule largely availed themselves of European education, and consequently there are but few of them in the Government service, but among these few some have attained to high office, and been much respected. As is often the case among high spirited people of primitive modes of thought, party and faction feeling run high, and jealousy and disputes about landed property often lead to hasty acts of violence. Now-a-days, however, the last class of disputes more frequently lead to protracted litigation in the Courts.

The Bants are fond of out-door sports, football and buffalo-racing being amongst their favourite amusements. But the most popular of all is cock-fighting. Every Bant, who is not a Jain, takes an interest in this sport, and large assemblages of cocks are found at every fair and festival throughout South Canara. "The outsider," it has been said, [104] "cannot fail to be struck with the tremendous excitement that attends a village fair in South Canara. Large numbers of cocks are displayed for sale, and groups of excited people may be seen huddled together, bending down with intense eagerness to watch every detail in the progress of a combat between two celebrated village game-cocks." Cock fights on an elaborate scale take place on the day after the Dipavali, Sankaranthi or Vinayakachathurthi, and Gokalashtami festivals, outside the village boundary. At Hiriadaka, in October, 1907, more than a hundred birds were tethered by the leg to the scrub jungle composed of the evergreen shrub Ixora coccinea, or carried in the arms of their owners or youngsters. Only males, from the town and surrounding villages, were witnesses of the spectacle. The tethered birds, if within range of each other, excited by the constant crowing and turmoil, indulged in an impromptu fight. Grains of rice and water were poured into the mouths and over the heads of the birds before the fight, and after each round. The birds were armed with cunningly devised steel spurs, constituting a battery of variously curved and sinuous weapons. It is believed that the Bhuta (demon) is appeased, if the blood from the wounds drops on the ground. The men, whose duty it is to separate the birds at the end of a round, sometimes receive nasty wounds from the spurs. The tail feathers of a wounded bird are lifted up, and a palm leaf fan or towel is waved to and fro over the cloacal orifice to revive it. The owner of a victorious bird becomes the possessor of the vanquished bird, dead or alive. At an exhibition of the products of South Canara, during a recent visit of the Governor of Madras to Mangalore, a collection of spurs was exhibited in the class "household implements."