CH. V.] REPORT OF THE INDIAN HEMP DRUGS COMMISSION, 1893-94.
83
new seed. The soil on which the plant is grown in Dewas is described as "dry,
stony, elevated loam." In these States the cultivation is not carried on by any
particular class, but it would appear that in Rewah the Kachis alone undertake
the industry.
The Political Agent of Bhopawar gives the following description of the
desultory kind of cultivation employed in that part of Central India: "Hemp
seed is sown in poppy or maize fields. When the plant is above two-and-a-
half feet high, the main stem is split near the root and a piece of tile thrust
in. This prevents the plant from setting seed freely and makes the tops fit for
ganja. When particularly strong ganja is required, each hemp plant is watered
once with half a tola of opium dissolved in water. The cultivators believe that by
transplanting the young plant into the mouth of a dead venomous snake (cobra
preferred) the ganja becomes unusually strong." The Commission have heard
of the extirpation of male plants in the cultivation of the Gwalior State, and
the same information is furnished by Mr. Gopal Ram in the appendix to the
North-Western Provinces memorandum. The latter authority also mentions that
the crop is irrigated, and that "some cultivators sow wheat in the ganja fields
in the months of October and November." The cultivation covers the season
from July to December.
Baroda.
216. No details are furnished in the State report, but the cultivation is of very
small extent, and it may be confidently assumed
that its methods are the same as those of the Guja-
rat Division of Bombay, with which the greater part of the Baroda territory is
intermingled.
Kashmir.
217. The State report would show that there is no cultivation in Kashmir.
Dr. Royle's "Fibrous Plants of India" and the refer-
ences to the hemp plant in "Punjab Products"
have been consulted without finding any definite statement to contradict this in-
formation. In the latter work both the bhang and "fibre" sent from Kashmir and
Ladakh to the Punjab Exhibition are mentioned, but they may very well have
been the produce of the wild growth. Dr. Watt refers in his "Hemp or Canna-
bis sativa"
to cultivation of the plant in Kashmir, but without mentioning
his authority. Dr. Royle's abstract of information at page 327 states: "All
along the Himalayas, that is, in Nepal, in Kumaon, in Garhwal, and up to
the newly acquired hills of the Punjab, at elevations of from 3,000 and 4,000 to
7,000 feet hemp is cultivated by the hillmen." Beyond this point westward his
information does not go. There is a curious statement by the Governor of
Kashmir that "almost all wild hemp, whch is called talia in the Punjab, and is
generally female plants in the above-mentioned tahsils, is used for the preparation
of ganja locally known by name gard bhang (chura charas)." The meaning is not
clear; but the preponderance of the female plants, if it is the fact, indicates
either some peculiarity in the environment of the plant in these regions or tend-
ing by man.
Nepal.
Mr. Hodgson—Page 323 of Dr.
Royle's "Fibrous Plants of India."
218. The answers to the Commission's questions furnished by the Nepal
Darbar would lead to the belief that cultivation is very
uncommon, and only carried on in a desultory way
by consumers of the narcotics. But in Dr. Royle's
"Fibrous Plants of India" will be found at page