KASHMIR STATE MEMORANDUM.
129
19. The annual consumption of the ganja or locally known gard bhang (chura charas) is
about 63 maunds, or, in other words, the entire quautity thus manufactured is locally
consumed.
20. The gard bhang as produced in this province is of inferior quality, and being not
liked by the people in British India its smuggling is of rare occurrence, or in fact I cannot
quote a single case of this nature.
21. In the present year lessee, on account of damage done to the hemp plant by the
recent flood, could not produce more than 35 maunds, and he had therefore purchased the
Yarkand charas passing through Kashmir to meet the local requirements by mixing the
Yarkand charas with the local produce, foreign produce being not liked by the consumers,
generally.
22. Green or dry leaves of bhang are not sold for drinking and smoking. Bhang is
very seldom used in this province for drinking and it is not at all used for smoking, and the
people drinking it, whose number can hardly be more than 200, clean the dry leaves in their
houses and roast them a little. A few dry leaves are put in a koondi with some black-pepper
to prepare a fluid, and sometimes sugar also is mixed to make the liquid sweet to the taste.
There is no prohibition for possession of the bhang leaves in any quantity.
23. Bhang is also used in the preparation of majum, which is eaten to some extent by the
Hindustanis and well-to-do Kashmiris.
24. The quantity of majum does not exceed one maund a year.
25. Majum is manufactured by slightly boiling leaves, which are taken out of water and
put into hot ghi; ghi possessing narcotic properties when mixed with ata and sugar makes
majum for eating, but there are no habitual eaters of majum.
26. Cultivation of hemp in this province is only impossible on the hills; and, excepting
the stony lands, it can be cultivated throughout the province; but on account of the wild hemp,
the growth of which is abundant throughout Kashmir proper, cultivation of the plant does not
prevail at all, though not prohibited by the State.
27. Higher up the river in the three tahsils of the Anantnag district and in the Nagam
tahsil of the Srinagar district the hemp plant is cut by the zemindars of the neighbouring
villages in the month of Kartik, lessee on behalf of the State, when hemp and manufacture of
ganja are auctioned, receiving leaves of the plant in full and half of the fibre, the rest half of
the fibre and the twigs going to the zemindars in lieu of their wages.
28. Ganja does keep good with ordinary care in skins of sheep at most for two years after
which it quite loses its effect, and no measure can prevent its deterioration. If not carefully
kept free from wet and atmosphere, it loses its effect earlier than this.
29. Fakirs and a few Musalmans and Pandits of the Srinagar city and towns smoke
gard bhang (chura charas).
30. The villagers are not accustomed to these drugs.
31. The total number of persons who do smoke ganja is in this province approximately
2,000, and including the people of British India, the servants of visitors in spring, and the
fakirs visiting the country on pilgrimage, the number may fairly be taken as 2,500, and they
can be classed as follows:—
Habitual moderate consumers, each consuming as an average about 1/5 tola per diem,
costing about one pice Kham
2,000
Habitual excessive consumers, each consuming as an average about 1 tola per diem,
costing 3 pice
50
Occasional moderate consumers, each consuming as an average about one masha
400
Occasional excessive consumers, each consuming about 3/4 tola, costing 2 pice and a pie
50
Bhang is believed to be an astringent and anti-rheumatic also.
32. The consumers are generally of low classes, Muhammadan and Hindu fakirs and a
few notoriously bad characters, though well-to-do persons, mostly illiterate, idleness leading
them to the practice of consuming gard bhang, and they are generally grown-up men.
33. The use of the hemp drug as a habit is doubtless injurious mentally and physically,
but there are other stimulants which are in no way less injurious than these drugs. The use of
bhang for drinking, which is in no way stimulant, is of course most injurious, making the
consumers lazy, coward, and senseless when taken in excess.
34. Bhang is considered as digestive, but I have seen cases in which consumers being
intoxicated ate much, and the result was on the contrary just the reverse, causing indigestion
and leading to frenzy.
35. It is easier than opium to break off the habit of smoking ganja or gard bhang as
locally known, and the habit of consuming the same is due to bad company and idleness, which
may gradually develop into the excessive, though moderate in the beginning. Considering
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