91
Gosains, fakirs and bairagis belong to class ( b ).
Middle class people belong to class ( c).
Gosains and other wandering tribes belong to
class (d) .
28. Habitual consumers spend about half an
anna for the use of this drug. Habitual exces-
sive consumers spend an anna per day.
29. Ganja is generally smoked with tobacco.
Habitual excessive consumers who consider
smoking ganja by itself a light intoxicant, mix
it with dhatura, bachnag, arsenic, and kuchla.
30. Gosains, bairagis and labourers generally
use it in company. Only middle-class men, who
get addicted to it through want of self-control or
through their association with classes of persons
above-mentioned, generally use it in solitude.
Females never use it excepting those abandoned
characters who generally follow some of these
bairagis and other wandering tribes as their con-
cubines. Children seldom use it but only those
of the above class of population who find it
within their easy reach and who take it from the
example of their fathers.
31. The habit is easily formed with asso-
ciation of persons who use these drugs ; but it
necessarily shows weak character and want of
self-control. It is generally difficult to break
off when once addicted to it, by reason of its pro-
ducing deleterious effects on the mind if not
taken and indulged in for any length of time.
It has necessarily a tendency for the moderate
habit to develop into the excessive.
32. It is not used here in these provinces for
religious purposes.
33. The consumption of each of these drugs is
looked down upon by the people. It is consider-
ed immoral in the social scale. Generally all
sorts of vices are looked down upon by the better
classes of society, and as this is a narcotic that
is generally used by the lower classes of people,
and as its consumption is necessarily very generally
associated with bad characters, and also as
the smoking of this drug has a tendency to make
its victims demoralised and lose much of their
mental vigour, the habit is looked down upon by
the people. No classes of persons here worship
the hemp plant.
34. It would be considered a hardship for some
days, as it would tend to make them uneasy and
unnerved, and they say it would altogether dis-
incline them to work. This will be the case with
habitual smokers. But the occasional smokers
can throw off the habit without considering it a
serious privation.
35. It would not be feasible to prohibit bhang
and ganja. Charas, which is a greater intoxicant,
may be prohibited. In the case of labourers and
wage-earners, Gonds and others, there are reasons
to believe that the prohibition of this drug would
necessarily bring about illicit consumption. The
smoking of it is, they say, necessary in the case
of labourers to give them staying-power. It is
not like madak, which makes its victims disinclined
to work. Its prohibition would of course produce
discontent among the labouring class. Even now,
as far as I can make out, the severe restrictions
imposed upon it afford cause for discontent among
them. But the discontent cannot under any cir-
cumstances amount to a political danger, but it
would, I suppose, create a social danger, inasmuch
as people would then take to opium, which, being
along with wine the sole intoxicant, might rise
in value, and would thus deprive their families
Vol. vi.
and children of the necessaries of life by spending
an increased amount on such luxuries.
36. We have reasons to believe that alcohol is
not being substituted for any of these drugs. The
consumers of alcohol and ganja form different
classes by themselves.
37. The smoking of charas is more intoxicating
and dangerous than the smoking of ganja. It is
a more wild intoxicant.
38. The effects of flat ganja are more intoxicat-
ing than either chur or round ganja. The effect
varies with the classes of consumers: the effect
produced in the case of occasional smokers will be
greater than in the case of habitual smokers.
39. The smoking of ganja is more injurious
than either drinking or eating it. They say the
smoking of it has a very irritating effect, while
the drinking of it has a soothing effect; and so
it is that bhang has come to be used as a beverage
on fast days to alleviate the heat caused in the
system by abstention from food.
40. Native doctors sometimes use bhang as an
antidote against dysentery, of course with an
admixture of some ingredients. Some of them
use it as a health restorer or tonic. They say it
gives strength and matter. It is called vijaya in
Sanskrit, meaning the conqueror of health. It
is generally used in the case of cattle to remove
the effects of fatigue, and also as a medicine in
some diseases peculiar to cattle.
41. The moderate use of bhang is beneficial in
its effects, but not so in the case of ganja and
charas. People who use it extol it as a great
digestive. No doubt in the case of labourers it
gives them staying-power under severe exertion
or exposure, and it does alleviate fatigue. It also
acts as a febrifuge or preventive of disease in
malarious and unhealthy tracts. Pilgrims and
wanderers generally use it for these purposes. It
is the occasional moderate use which may bring
on all these results, but eventually the habit has
a tendency to drift into the excessive, and then
it spoils health.
42. The occasional moderate use of the drug
does not injure health. I have seen many persons
given to this vice good and strong.
43. Moderate consumers give no trouble.
44. Only a moderate use of the drug in the case
of habitual consumers brings on a feeling of re-
freshment. It produces, they say, very little
intoxication. It creates appetite. The effect,
they say, lasts for three hours. Want of subse-
quent gratification does produce longing and
uneasiness.
45. The habitual moderate use of these drugs
does produce noxious effects, but not to the
extent produced by consumption of opium and.
madak. A moderate use, as far as I have been
able to make out, does not deteriorate the physical
strength of a man to any very large extent; but
it necessarily destroys his mental equilibrium.
For some time it helps digestion, but when the
habit becomes settled, it begins to produce noxious
effects, and in some few instances causes loss of
appetite. It does not cause dysentery, but in
a few cases helps to produce symptoms of asthma
after a course of years of regular habit. This
has been the case in my own cart-driver. I
don't know if the consumption of ganja has a
necessary effect of demoralizing a man, but my
experience goes to show that generally persons
given to ganja smoking are persons who lead
an immoral life. In many cases it gives an