180 REPORT OF THE INDIAN HEMP DRUGS COMMISSION, 1893-94. [CH. X.
singers the drugs are used to clear the throat; and they are also alleged to
possess vermicide properties.
Cattle disease.
467. Regarding the use of hemp drugs in the treatment of cattle-disease, out
of a total of 1,193 witnesses, one-half give no infor-
mation; and of the rest rather over one-half speak to
the use of bhang alone, while the remainder speak generally of the use of both
ganja and bhang. A few witnesses speak only of the use of ganja, but that is main-
-y where bhang is not available. This use of the drugs is in evidence in all prov-
inces, though naturally to a less extent in Bombay and Madras than elsewhere,
and least of all in Burma. Among the diseases for which hemp drugs are
prescribed in native veterinary practice for cattle, horses, sheep, and occasionally
elephants may be mentioned colic, bowel-complaints, diarrhœa, sprains, con-
stipation, cow-pox, foot-and-mouth diseases, hoof disease, pneumonia, affections
of the throat, colds and coughs, quinsy, and rinderpest. Ganja is used to
extract worms in foot-sore diseases of cattle and to remove intestinal worms,
and is also burnt to disinfect sheepfolds. A very common use of the drugs is as
a tonic to produce condition, to make oxen fleet of foot, to relieve fatigue, and
to give staying power. Bhang is sometimes used to increase the flow of milk
in cows, and also to stupefy them when they refuse to be milked. The drug is
occasionally given to mares shortly before being covered, and it is also used
after delivery. Bhang mixed with salt is given to cattle as preventive against
purging, to which they are generally subject from feeding on the young shoots
of grass sprouting during the early part of the monsoon. Hemp drugs when
used for cattle disease are usually administered raw, but always admixed with other
ingredients, spices, salt, or gur. Occasionally bhang is first cooked in a metal
pot, then mixed with gur, when animals eat it readily, or it is forced down the
throat mixed with salt.
The use of hemp drugs for the treatment of cattle-diseases appears to be nearly
equally prevalent throughout Northern India. Mr. Driberg, Excise Commis-
sioner, Assam, in his oral evidence before the Commission said: "I have no
feeling that the Circular No. 28 of 1882 was necessary. I think it was issued
on insufficient information. I never push it forward. I have never seen the
stuff used for cattle; nor have I heard of its being used, except when the
use is thus pleaded in excuse." The Commission, while recognizing the
necessity of the popular use of the hemp drugs in veterinary practice, do not
find in the evidence any reason for thinking that the practice is more common
in Assam than elsewhere in the north of India.
The Commission have said all that it is necessary to say regarding the strictly
medicinal use of hemp drugs in the alleviation of human suffering and disease.
This is to be carefully distinguished from the popular use of the drugs by the
ordinary consumer, which it is now proposed to discuss. It is true that there are
points where the two uses can hardly be separated by a hard-and-fast line. The
medicinal use seems to merge sometimes into the popular use, where the drugs
are used, ostensibly at least, for purposes akin to medical. The popular impres-
sion of the drugs also must be influenced by their uses in medicine.
Is moderate use beneficial ?
468. It is natural that the people generally should associate certain beneficial
results with the use of hemp drugs, and that this
recognition should tend to encourage, and should be
urged in justification of, their moderate use. At the same time it is necessary to