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result from excess in liquor, such as physical and
domestic ruin. I have seen actually more cases of
ruin from liquor than from ganja, but as the con-
sumers of liquor are far more numerous the pro-
portionate injury would tell against ganja.
Question 45.—I can now mention two or three
cases in which ganja smokers have died of con-
sumption and acute dysentery. These persons
had both the diseases. Consumption consists in
spitting of blood, a step higher than asthma.
Question 46.—My statement that the excessive
use of ganja is a fruitful source of insanity is
intended to be qualified by the following sentence.
What I mean is that insanity is frequently attri-
buted to the excessive use of ganja. I was much
struck by the Lunatic Asylum returns about ganja,
but I doubted if the histories of the insanes had
been fully enquired into. I meet so few people
insane, in whose case insanity has been caused by
ganja, in the villages, that I wonder how so
large a proportion of insanity in the Lunatic
Asylum is ascribed to ganja. I have no other
reason for doubting these statistics. I know parts
of East Bengal and Malda. There are asylums to
my knowledge at Alipur, Berhampur, and Dacca.
My knowledge is therefore limited.
Question 59.—My view is that we should try
to raise the revenue on the drug rather by the
duty than by license fees, because the latter are
regulated by an uncertain method. As little as
possible of the revenue should be derived from
license fees.
I would ascertain local option through pan-
chayats. Of course we are obliged to consult
municipalities by Government orders. The pan-
chayats which exist under the Chaukidari Act
would answer the purpose. Their opinion should
be furnished to the Magistrate, and the District
Boards need not be consulted. There are three to
five members in each village panchayat. Their
opinions could not always be taken as representing
the wishes of the people, but it could generally be
accepted, and there is no better means available.
The members of the panchayats are nominated by
the Magistrate without consulting the villagers;
but the law has been lately modified to admit of
the Magistrate consulting the villagers. No one
is, under present conditions, willing to serve on the
panchayat, because it is an unpaid office involving
considerable trouble.
65. Evidence of BABU BRAJA DURLABH HAZARA, Kayasth, Deputy Magistrate and
Deputy Collector, Howrah.
1. I have had contact, but not frequently or
very recently, with people using these drugs.
I
have little experience in charas.
2. Ganja, siddhi, and charas are the names
current.
3. A stray plant here or there is found to grow
spontaneously anywhere. I could not say where
spontaneous growth is abundant.
10. So far as I know they are a special class.
16. I think ganja, charas and siddhi can be pre-
pared wherever they may be grown.
18. I know ganja deteriorates by keeping. As it
gradually loses strength in time, it may also lose
it quite. How long it will keep good with ordinary
care, I am not able to say. The causes of dete-
rioration are damp and exposure; other causes might
contribute. Any measures that will remove these
causes may check the deterioration. I don't be-
lieve deterioration can be prevented altogether. A
certain quantity of ganja was kept in the Howrah
Treasury (of which I am in charge) for custody,
when it was found to possess a strong smell. The
ganja was cultivated at Sibpur. The officer from
whom it was received reported that the ganja was
of a good quality. It was examined after some
time, and many officers declared that it possessed
little or no narcotic property. It lost also the
strength of its smell.
19. Ganja is mostly smoked. I have heard that
it is sometimes reduced to powder or paste and
eaten.
20. Up-country
men are
first-rate
ganja
smokers. Bengali Brahmins, who are cooks, will
rank next. The former are, I believe, wholesale
ganja smokers.
24. All classes and about 15 per centum of the
people drink bhang. The practice of eating and
drinking bhang extends all over Bengal. The
practice is most prevalent among up-country
people.
25. The use of ganja and bhang is, I believe,
on the increase. People of slight moral strength
take to these temporary stimulants in order to
muffle their anxieties or remedy their every-day
physical complaints. They are deluded of course
by a false hope. It is the intoxicating property
which is in request.
27. (a) These are middle class up-country men
who take to ganja as a luxurious stimulant and a
successful time-killer.
(b) These are the tariwallas, carriage and
cart drivers, coolies and durwans, and Bengali
cooks. They want apparently to make their
temper rough and rude. But they take to the
drugs mostly whimsically. They begin in the
company of veteran old smokers, and they keep it
up as an incentive and support to their habits
which are as a rule immoral.
30. Excessive smokers prefer solitude to smoke
ganja. They will not suffer their chillum to go
round. Moderate ganja smokers prefer to smoke
in company. Ganja smoking is mainly confined
to the male sex. Youth is the more proper time
for it.
Children of 14 or 15 have been found to
smoke ganja. The habit is hardly given up so
long as the lips are quick.
31. I cannot say anything specially about ganja,
but judging from the fact that most intoxicants
are easily liked and soon indulged in, I should say
that the habit of consuming ganja is easily formed
and hardly given up, and that there is a tendency
in it to make the habit excessive.
32. I know only of one custom, which is a
socio-religious one, in regard to siddhi. It is
exercised on the Bijaya, i.e., the last or the
parting day of the Durga Puja. The goddess
Durga is worshipped for three days. On the
morning of the fourth, the parting day, some puja
is made also. She is given some "cold" food,
after partaking of which in the morning she is
supposed to leave the house of her father (the
house of the worshipper) for that of her husband
Siva. She is worshipped generally in an idol
which is plunged in waters at evening. On her
departure, and, specially and tangibly, on the
destruction of her image, people are supposed to