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both of bhang and of ganja in mauza Bilap in
the district of Patna. There they were found
growing in poppy fields and also in small beds
prepared for them in a garden, and on both sides
of a raised aqueduct made for conducting water
from a well to adjacent fields. These plants also
seemed to have been regularly watered to help
their growth. The reason why the hemp plants
in this part of the country, whether growing
wild or illicitly
cultivated, as also those
in the Nepal territory, do not produce ganja
such as that imported from Rajshahi, is, I
apprehend, that the people here do not know the
secret that the formation of seeds in female plants
is prevented by the destruction of all the male
plants,* nor are there "Parkhias" or ganja doc-
tors in these places, who can distinguish the male
plants and destroy them in favour of the ganja-
producing plant.
A single plant growing wild or cultivated has
sometimes been found producing ganja; and this
must be, I think, owing to an absence of male
plant from the locality.
An illicit cultivator of one or two plants of
ganja adopts (though very rarely, and never
detected) a method illustrated below, which not
only cloaks his illicit proceedings, but also makes
the plant yield, it is said, ganja of a superior
quality.
Illustration.—When
a ganja plant
grows about a foot high, it is concealed with an
earthen pot placed over it with its mouth down-
ward, and raised about 8 or 9 inches high above
the ground, being supported on pegs fixed in the
ground, to which it is strongly fastened with
some string. Thus some space is left between
the pot and the ground for admission of air and
light necessary for the growth of the plant. The
ground round the plant is softened, weeded,
manured, and watered. Thus reared with care,
the plant, of which the growth is confined within
the space of the pot placed over it, with its
flowers, and branches spread around, takes a round
shape like that of a cabbage flower, and when
mature, is cut, dried and preserved for use.
The cultivation of ganja plant is confined to a
certain tract of land in Rajshahi designated
Balúchur, and is carried on under excise surveil-
lance. Fields for it are renovated every year by
the addition of fresh earth, kept chaumas, i.e.,
tilled occasionally during the four months of the
rainy season, weeded and manured with cow-dung,
oil-cakes, ashes and house refuse. Ganja is
transplanted. For this sake, in the month of
August, seeds are sown broadcast in the nursery
in which they sprout in a week, and after the
seedlings thus reared have gained strength which
takes not less than a week or two, they are
transplanted in the field prepared for them as
described above. If the rains are heavy in
August, the transplantation takes place in the
month of September. In order to prevent the
formation of seeds in the female plants, it is
necessary to destroy the male plants. There are
experts in Rajshahi called "Parkhias" or ganja
doctors who can distinguish one from the other
even in their early age. These men are employed
to uproot the latter and this is done twice or thrice
till all such plants have been weeded and destroyed.
The ground is again manured with cow-dung and
oil-cakes and the stems of the plants cleared.
Noxious plants are constantly uprooted until the
ganja plants mature. In December when the
plants attain the height of four or five feet, the
ground is irrigated, and ridges are opened and
manured again with oil-cakes, ashes and house re-
fuse. In January or February the crop is ready
and the harvest commences.
10. Ganja is not cultivated in Behar.
In
Rajshahi the ganja cultivators, I am informed, are
of the same classes as other cultivators.
11. Ganja is not cultivated in Behar, nor are
plants raised from the seed of the wild hemp.
12. I have no reason to suppose that the (so-
called) wild hemp is anywhere cultivated specially
for the production of ganja. I have already stated
that there are no "Parkhias" or ganja doctors
here; and as male and female plants both grow
promiscuously wild in several districts of this divi-
sion, ganja is not produced here—so much the
better for the excise revenue derived from this
head here.
13. I have already stated that ganja is not cul-
tivated in any of the districts in this division.
In the districts of Champaran, Saran, Darbhanga
and Muzaffarpur, there are high sandy lands
whereon hemp plant grows wild, and ganja can
therefore be produced without difficulty in these
districts; and in the south Gangetic districts
in which the plant does not spontaneously grow,
ganja can be produced, but with some difficulty
and at an unusually large outlay of money.
14. (a) Ganja and (b) charas are not manufac-
tured in any of the districts of the Patna Divi-
sion.
(c) Yes; bhang is manufactured by private
individuals partly for their own consumption
and greatly for their cattle. There are no statis-
tics in the office as to the quantity of bhang
gathered annually by the people; nor is the drug
openly manufactured and gathered by them
from which an approximate idea of the quantity
so gathered could be formed. It is, however,
presumed that 200 maunds of the drug is
annually manufactured and stored in the district,
viz.—
Maunds.
In Samastipur (where the plant grows
more abundantly than elsewhere)
100
In the remaining part of the district
100
TOTAL 200
15. Ganja and charas are used for smoking
only, and though they are not manufactured in
this district, I know how each is manufactured.
The harvest commences, in January or Feb-
ruary when the ganja is ready. The plants are
cut and divided into four or five parts and exposed
to the rays of the sun until the leaves wither,
when the stalks are spread on mats and prepared
into flat and round ganja; the first is so called
owing to the ganja assuming a flat shape from
being trampled upon while being dried, and the
second, from the shape which the rolling of each
branch and the simultaneous removal of the
thickest portion of wood give it. The third kind
of ganja is chur or rora. This consists of the
fragments of the leaves and flowers. (Chur in
the vernacular means fragments).
Charas is prepared in up-country and in Nepal.
In January when resin exudes from ganja flower
and leaves, the people engaged in the business go
early in the morning and walk in their ganja fields
with leathern garment on, and while they move
amidst the dew-bespangled plants, the resinous
exudation sticks to their garment which is daily
exposed to the rays of the sun and dried. This
process is repeated for several days till the garment
is thickly covered with this substance which is
* Dr. Prain in his definition of bhang and ganja states that male plants are destroyed; while people from whom I have
learned say that female plants are destroyed.