CH. VIII.] REPORT OF THE INDIAN HEMP DRUGS COMMISSION, 1893-94. 153
Little evidence of excessive use.
411. As regards the character of the habit, the smokers are for the most
part regular smokers, and the drinkers indulge
occasionally, and principally in the hot weather.
In these respects the habit resembles that of the civil population. It is natural
that excess should be comparatively uncommon in bodies of men living under
strict discipline. It has been found that even in the police, where the men have
more personal liberty, the use of hemp rarely obtrudes itself.
Use of the different drugs.
412.
The
habit of drinking bhang is more prevalent in the corps serving
in the north-western part of India, but it cannot be
said that smoking is more common in one part
than another. Charas is preferred in the comparatively small tract where it
is cheap and easily procurable, and ganja is used elsewhere. Smoking is
regarded as a protection against cold, and bhang drinking as a relief under
the distress of very hot weather. The habit, therefore, varies according as
regiments experience different conditions of climate, and it would seem that on
service the number of smokers increases. The preparation of the drink, how-
ever, takes time, and requires certain ingredients which on service may not be
obtainable. It is doubtful, therefore, if bhang drinking increases on service as
smoking does, but the practice of chewing or eating the drug in a simpler form
may very well take its place.
Use among principal castes of
sepoys.
413. The Sikhs drink bhang and do not smoke; but it is reported of more
than one Sikh regiment that the men do not
use any of the drugs. In one regiment they have
given up bhang for the good rum which the canteen supplies. The Gur-
khas also prefer liquor, and rarely use the hemp drugs. The habit would
seem to be more prevalent in the Gurkha regiments serving in Assam than
elsewhere, but uncommon even there. The Rajputs and Purbhias seem to be
more given to the drugs than other castes. There is some strictness among the
Muhammadans in some of the regiments of the north of India in regard to
both smoking and drinking of hemp; but in Madras they appear to have the
full proportion of smokers among them.
Evidence indicates decrease of
use in the army.
414. The very great majority of the replies state that the use of the
drugs is decreasing, and among the 38 which take
the opposite view, 13 do not refer to the troops,
but to the civil population. Some replies also are not very definite. There
are hardly more than 20 out of the 274 which can be said to be evidence
on the side of increase. The actual facts on which increase is alleged are not
often stated, but the commandant of a Bengal Cavalry regiment finds that 25
years ago not a man in the regiment used the drugs, while now some do, espe-
cially among the later enlisted men. The causes of increase, when they are stated,
which is very rarely, are the cheapness of the drugs as compared with
liquor, the speedy action and convenient form of charas, and the religious objec-
tion to the use of liquor. On the other hand, there is a strong body of evid-
ence on the side of decrease. The cause which appears most prominently in
the replies is the greater demand which service makes in these days on the time
and intelligence of the sepoy. He cannot spare the time to indulge in the
drugs, which involves the laborious preparation of bhang as drink, and the
period of listlessness and incapacity which follows an ill-regulated dose either
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