Rautia or Routia Community : History ,Traditions, Marriage, Religion, Festivals, Customs, Superstitions and Cultural Beliefs

I am Damodar Singh ,belong to the RAUTIA or ROUTIA community of India. The objective of this blog is to archive any history related to this group of peoples. After lots of searching on internet and asking among community, i get very less information. Particularly on internet, like Wikipedia has very general information and the Christians Joshua project also have some surveys and maps for their own mission. These people mostly found in Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, West Bengal, Assam. Then i check the Gazetteer of each state and came to know that these peoples are identified and have considered in Other backward class of peoples but the information about them still not satisfactory. After Independence Hindu personal laws was introduced like Hindu Marriage act, Hindu succession act, Hindu adoption act etc. and later all castes of hindus are protected under one umbrella.

After more searching on internet i get to know about the books "The Tribes and Castes of Bengal: Ethnographic Glossary, volume 2" by Sir Herbert Hope Risley. This was published in 1892 and printed by Bengal secretariat press in 1891. "The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India: Ethnographic Glossary" by Robert Vane Russell and Rai Bhadur Hiralal was published in 1916. The first book has more information than the later book and is more or less same. Lets see the observations of Risley on Rautia peoples in late nineteen century.

Rautia, a landholding and cultivating caste of Chota Nagpur. The name Rautia suggests some connection with Rajputs, and Mr. Beames has noticed that the cognate term Raut is used in some districts to denote an inferior Rajput. In the time of the Emperor Jahangir some Rautias were serving as sentinels in the fort at Gwalior when Maharaja Durjan Sha of Chota Nagpur was imprisoned there for failure to pay his tribute to Dehli. During his confinement the Rautias treated the Raja kindly, and he repaid their good offices on his release by giving them lands in pargana Panari of Lohardaga. Further grants of villages, groups of villages, and entire parganas were afterwards made to them in jagir, and many of these are in existence at the present day. The titles of Baraik, Gaunjhu, and Kotwar were at the same time conferred upon them.

Internal structure

The Rautias are divided into two endogamous sub-castes- Bargohri and Chhot-gohri. The origin of this division is obscure. The Rautias themselves tell an absurd story to account for it. They say that the Bar-gohris were the first to arrive in their present habitat. When the Chhot-gohris came they were asked with what cooking pots and on what fire-places they had cooked their food after the Bar-gohris had started. On their replying that they had used the pots and fire-places left behind by the Bar-gohris, but had cleaned them, the latter straightway took offence, and from that time forth have refused to eat cooked food (kachi) with the Chhot-gohri. Following the analogy of similar schisms in castes formerly united, it seems more likely either that the Chhot-gohri were the first settlers and were outcasted for some such breach of caste rules as people are apt to commit, or to be taxed with committing, when they settle in outlandish parts of the country, or that the Chhot-gohri are the offspring of alliances between the Bar-gohri and women of inferior caste or purity of lineage. At the present day the Chhot-gohri eat fowls and wild pig and drink spirits, all of which things are forbidden for members of the higher group.

Within each sub-caste we find a group called Berra Rautia, who are admittedly descendants of Rautias by concubines of other castes. Although not strictly endogamous, the Berras observe certain special restrictions in the matter of marriage.

Both sub-castes have a long list of sections (paris or got). The fact that the list contains totemistic, eponymous, and territorial names, tells on the whole in favour of the view that the Rautias are people of mixed descent. The rule that the totem is taboo to its bearers seems only to apply to the animal-totems, which may be named, but not killed or eaten; for a Rautia of the sword or axe groups is not forbidden to use those weapons, nor is a man of the Kasi group forbidden to touch the grass from which his section is supposed to be descended.

The section name goes by the male side, and the prohibition attached to it affects only a man's own section and does not prevent him from marrying a woman belonging to the same section as his mother. This simple rule of exogamy is therefore supplemented by a table of prohibited degrees made up, like our own, by enumerating the individual relatives whom a man may not marry, and not, as is more usual, by prohibiting intermarriage with certain large classes of relations or with the descendants within certain degrees of particular relations.

Marriage

Girls are married either as infants or adults, usually between the ages of eight and eighteen. Sexual license before marriage is not openly recognized, as it is among the aborigines of Chota Nagpur ; but I am informed that grown-up girls enjoy considerable liberty in this respect, it being understood that in case of pregnancy a husband will be at once forthcoming. In theory polygamy is allowed without any restriction being laid on the number of wives or any antecedent condition being insisted on, such as that the first wife must be barren or be inflicted with an incurable disease in order to entitle her husband to take another wife. In actual life, however, it is unusual to find a man with more than three or four wives. One simple reason for this is that few men can afford to keep many wives or have house-room to accommodate them, as by universal custom each wife must have a separate room.

A widow is allowed to marry again by the sagai form, and it is considered right for her to marry her late husband's younger brother. Under no circumstances can she marry the elder brother. If she marries an outsider, her late husband's brother, father, or uncle have the right to the custody of all her children, both male and female. In any case she acquires no rights in her late husband's property, the whole of which passes to his eldest son, subject to certain obligations to provide, by way of main- tenance, for younger brothers. If a widow marries her late husband's younger brother, her children by him are not deemed the children of her first husband, nor have they any rights in respect of his property.

The ritual used at the marriage of a widow is very simple. Five married women whose husbands are living take a sari, a pair of lac bracelets, and a little vermilion (sindur) to the bridegroom and get him to touch each article. They then return to the bride, attire her in the sari and bracelets, and daub the vermilion on her forehead. As in the case of a regular marriage, the proceedings conclude with a feast to the friends and relatives of the newly- married couple.

Marriages are arranged by the parents or guardians of the parties, who have no freedom of choice in the matter. Professional marriage-brokers are unknown. The first offer is made by the father of the bridegroom, and a bride-price (dali taka), varying according to the means of the bridegroom's parents, is paid to the parents of the bride, by whom it is retained. No portion of the bride-price becomes the special property of the bride.

Succession

The Mitakshara commentary, which forms the personal law of most Hindus in Lohardaga, does not apply to Rautias, who are governed by special customs of their own. The eldest son by a regularly-married (bihai) wife inherits the whole of his father's property, subject to the obligation of creating maintenance grants in favour of his younger brothers. These grants are not equal in value, but are supposed to decrease in the order of age of the grantees, so that each younger brother gets a smaller grant than his immediate elder, and so on. Instances, however, have occurred among the Bar-gohri Rautias in which, with the consent of the eldest son, an entire property has been equally divided. Sons by a sagai wife are included in this arrangement, but get smaller grants than sons by a bihai wife. The rule that sons by a bihai wife take precedence of sons by a sagai wife is subject to the important exception that an elder brother's widow, though married by the sagai form, ranks in all respects as a bihai wife, and her sons have the full rights of succession to their father. This principle was affirmed by the Civil Courts in a case which occurred a few years ago. One of the Rautia Baraiks of Basia died leaving a widow and infant son; the widow married in the sagai form her late husband's younger brother, who was already married to a bihai wife. Both of the wives bore sons, the sagai wife a few months earlier than the bihai wife. Meanwhile the infant son of the original proprietor died: the whole property passed to his brother, and on his death was disputed between his sons. It was held that the son of the sagai wife, being the eldest, was entitled to succeed under the custom of the caste, and that the son of the bihai wife had only a right to maintenance. It will be seen from this instance that a brother excludes a widow from succession. The latter is in fact entitled only to maintenance, and may forfeit even that by misconduct or infringement of caste rules. Brothers and uncles, or their descendants, exclude daughters and their descendants. Succession indeed is strictly agnatic throughout; the eldest male, of the eldest line taking the entire inheritance subject to the obligation to provide maintenance for relatives within certain degrees on a scale progressively diminishing in relation to the age and propinquity in relationship of the claimants. The distinction between ancestral and self-acquired property, which has acquired such prominence in the standard Hindu law, does not seem to be very clearly recognized in the customary law of the Rautias. I gather, however, that such property is not subject to the rule of primogeniture, but is ordinarily divided equally among the male descendants.

 A woman may be divorced for adultery or for eating with a member of another caste. For lighter offences than these, separation is the only punishment awarded; and in that case the husband is bound to maintain his wife. A divorced woman may not marry again. If she lives with a man, she ranks as a concubine and her children are illegitimate.

The ceremony performed at the marriage of a virgin bride contains several features of a primitive and non-Aryan character. In the first instance, both parties go through the form of marriage to a mango tree (amba biha). The essential and binding portions of the ritual are the knotting together of the clothes of the bride and bridegroom and sindurdan, which is effected by smearing on the bride's forehead a drop of blood drawn from the little finger of the bridegroom, and vice versa. Sakadwipi Brahmans officiate, and offerings are made to Gauri and Ganesa.

Step-sons are not entitled to maintenance from the estate of their step-father. Owing, however, to the fact that a widow may marry her late husband's younger brother and may not marry his eldest brother, it happens that a large proportion of the step-sons among the Rautias are really the heirs to the estates of which their step-fathers happen for the time being to be in charge. A ghar dijua, or son-in-law who lives with his wife in his father-in-law's household, retains his claims on his natural father's property, but acquires no right to a maintenance grant from his father-in-law's estate.

Adoption is unknown a circumstance from which we may either infer that the Rautias are free from the curse of childlessness, so common in the higher ranks of Hindus, or that one of the inducements to adopt sons has been removed by the rule regarding land referred to in the next paragraph.

In the event of a Rautia dying without male heirs, his immovable property reverts to his superior landlord or the legal representative of the person by whom the land was originally granted. In such cases the landlord is expected to make some small provision for the maintenance of the females of the family. His movable property goes to the person who performs his funeral rites.

An elder brother can transfer to a younger brother all his rights in the family property, but the effect of such a transfer is limited to his own lifetime, and does not curtail the rights of his son, who will succeed, in preference to the uncle on attaining his majority.

Religion

The religion of the Rautias may best be described as a mixture of the primitive animism characteristic of the Religion. aboriginal races and the debased form of Hinduism which has been disseminated in Chota Nagpur by a class of Brahmans markedly inferior in point of learning and ceremonial purity to those who stand forth as the representatives of the caste in the great centres of Hindu civilization. Among the Bar-gohri Rautiás many have of late years become Kabirpanthis; the rest, with most of the Chhot-gohri and the Berrás of both sub-castes, are Rámáyat Vaishnavas. A few only have adopted the tenets of the Saiva sects. Rama, Ganesa, Mahadeva, and Gauri are the favourite deities, whose worship is conducted by Sakadwipi Brahmans more or less in the orthodox fashion. Behind the fairly definite personalities of these greater gods there loom in the background, through a fog of ignorance and superstition, the dim shapes of Bar-pahár (the Marang Buru or mountain of the Mundas); Bura-buri, the supposed ancestors of mankind; the seven sisters who scatter cholera, smallpox, and cattle-plague abroad; Goraiá, the village god-a sort of rural Terminus; and the myriad demons with which the imagination of the Kolhs peoples the trees, rocks, streams, and fields of its surroundings.

To Bar-pahár are offered he-buffaloes, rams, he-goats, fowls, milk, flowers, and sweetmeats; the animals in each case being given some rice to chew and decked with garlands of flowers before being sacrificed. When offered in pursuance of a special vow, the animal is called charáol, and is slain in the early morning in the sarná or sacred grove outside the village; rice, ghi, molasses, vermilion, flowers, and bel leaves being presented at the same time. No female may be present at the ceremony. The carcase of the victim is distributed among the worshippers, but no part of it may be taken into the village, and it is cooked and eaten on the spot, even the remnants being buried in the sarná at the end of the feast. The head is eaten by the man who made the vow and the members of his family, but no others share in it, owing to the belief that whoever partakes of the head would thereby render himself liable to perform a similar pujá.

When a buffalo is sacrificed, the Rautias do not eat the flesh them- selves, but leave the carcase to the Mundas, Kharias, and other beef- eating folk who may happen to be present.

To the seven sisters (devis) and their brother Bhairo a rude shrine (devigarhi) is erected in the centre of every village, consisting of a raised plinth five cubits square covered by a tiled or thatched roof resting on six posts of gulaichi trees (Plumeria). In the middle of the plinth, on a line running north and south, stand seven little mounds of dried mud, representing the seven god- desses, while a smaller mound on one side stands for Bhairo. In front of the Devigarhi, at some ten or fifteen cubits distance, is a larger mound representing Goraiyá, the village god, to whom pigs are sacrificed by the village priest (páhan) and by men of the Dosádh caste. Regarding the names and functions of the seven sisters there seems to be much uncertainty. Some Rautias enumerate the following:-

Burhiá Mái or Sitalá. Kankárin Mái.

Káli Mái.

Kuleswari Mái.

Bágheswari Mái. Mareswari Mái Dulhári Mái.

Others substitute Jwálá-mukhi, Vindhyabásini, Málat Mái, and Joginiá Mái for the last four. Jwálá-mukhi is a place of pilgrimage in the Lower Himalayas north of the Panjáb, where inflammable gas issues from the ground and is believed to be the fire created by Parbati when she desired to become a sati. Vindhyabásini is a common title of Sitalá Devi, who presides over small-pox throughout Northern India. I cannot find out which sisters are supposed to be responsible for cholera and cattle-plague. Kuleshwari (kultiger' in Mundári) and Bágheswari apparently have to do with the tiger. He-goats, flowers, fruit, and bel leaves are offered to the seven sisters in front of the devi-gurhi. and children are present at the worship. A Sakadwipi Brahman presides, but does not slay the victims.

Festivals

The following are the festivals observed by the Rautias :- 

(1) Nawa Khani-eating new rice with milk, molasses, and ghi. On the 12th of the light half of Bhádon (middle of September) and the 15th of the light half of Aghan (middle of November). These periods correspond respectively to the harvesting of the low land and high land rice crops.

(2) Jitia parab.-On the 8th of the dark half of Asin (end of September). The females of the village, after fasting a day. bring a twig from a jitia pipal tree (Ficus religiosa) and an ear of rice, and plant them in the courtyard of a house, usually that of the chief man of the village. Vermilion, area or rice husked without boiling, flowers, and sweetmeats, are offered to the twig. Dancing, singing, and processions of various kinds follow, and in the morning, after watching the twigs all night, the women offer mánr or rice gruel to their deceased ancestors.

(3) Dasahara-corresponding to the Devi-pujá and Vijayá dasmi of the Hindus.-On the 10th of the light half of Asin (early in October).

(4) Debathan-a fast, followed by eating various kinds of boiled fruit and roots-observed only by bachelors and spinsters on the eleventh of the light half of Kartik (middle of November).

(5) Ganesh Chauth.-On the 4th of the dark half of Mágh (middle of January). An image of Ganesa is made out of cow-dung and is worshipped with laddus or cakes of til, legends being recited at the same time.

(6) Phagua corresponding to the Holi of the Hindus.-On the 15th of the light half of Phagun (middle of March), when ancestors are propitiated.

(7) Karma.-On the 11th of the light half of Bhádon (begin- ning of September). This festival is similar to the Jitiá, except that a branch of a karam tree (Nauclea cordifolia) is planted in the court- yard and the fasting is not continuous as in the Jitiya Parab.

The foregoing festivals are observed by all Rautias. The more Hinduised members of the caste add to them the Rath-jatrá, the Janmashtami, the Rámnabami, and the Ind Parab.

Disposal of the dead

The dead are usually disposed of by burning, except in the case of Kabirpanthi Rautias, who are buried standing upright and facing to the north. In the former case the corpse, covered with a new cloth, is taken to the place of cremation (masan) and there shaved, bathed, and clothed in a new waistcloth and sheet. If the body be that of a woman whose husband is alive, it is bathed, anointed with oil, and dressed in a new sari. In the case of a widow the oiling is omitted. The corpse is then placed on the funeral pile with the head to the north, and the chief mourner, lighting a torch made of five dry twigs of a bel tree tied to the end of a bit of wood and soaked in ghi, walks round the pile seven times, applies the torch to the mouth of the deceased, and then sets fire to the pile. Before doing so however, he takes a portion of the sheet in which the corpse is dressed and wraps up in it a knife or a piece of iron. This piece of cloth must be kept for ten days. After the body has been consumed, the ashes are collected in a new earthen vessel (ghanti). On returning home the mourners wash their feet with water previously placed for them outside the house. Inside the courtyard a shallow brass dish (tháli) is laid ready with leaves of the tulsi (Ocymum sanctum) and kareli (Momordica charantia), one pice, and a vessel of water. Some person, not a member of the family, pours a little water into the hand of each mourner, who drinks it off. For ten days after the cremation the ashes of the deceased (santh) are hung up in the vessel in which they were placed. During this time the chief mourner must make daily libations to the ashes, and must keep on his person the piece of sheet and the iron already referred to. He may not change his clothes, sleep on a bed, or eat salt, and he can only take one meal a day, which he must cook himself. 

At the end of this time the ashes are either buried at the masna, or, where the family are wealthy enough to undertake the journey, are kept for transport to Benares or Gya. On the tenth day he and the other relatives bathe, shave, anoint themselves with a mixture of oil and oil-cake, and put on clean clothes. The chief mourner also offers to the deceased ten cakes (pinda) made of rice, milk, linseed, barley, and honey. On the eleventh day the regular sráddh ceremony is performed with the assistance of a Kanaujia, or, failing him, of a Sakadwipi Brahman who mutters unintelligble nonsense, supposed to be Vedic texts, and the Kantáha or Mahabrahman is fed and receives presents. On the twelfth day Sakadwipi Brahmans and friends of different castes are entertained, and one pinda is offered in order that the deceased may be united to the company of ancestors. On the thirteenth day relatives are fed and final purification is obtained. The anniversary of the death is celebrated only once (barkhi sraddh). While this is going on no marriage can take place in the family; and in order to avoid this inconvenience the barkhi sráddh is often performed some months before a year has elapsed from the time of death. Offerings to ancestors in general (tarpan) are made through the agency of Brahmans on the 15th of the dark half of Asin (end of September), and by the people themselves at the Nawá Kháni, Jitiá, and Phaguá festivals. Childless relatives, lepers, persons who die a violent death, and women who die in child-birth, get only one pinda, and are not counted as ancestors. Lepers are usually buried.

Ceremonies

The Rautias do not perform any of the ceremonies usual among other castes during pregnancy. At child-birth assistance is rendered by the Kusrain or Dagrin, who cuts the umbilical cord. The ceremonies of chhatthi, barhi, and ekaisi are performed on the sixth, twelfth, and twenty-first days after birth. If the child is born under an unlucky star (asubh lagan), a fourth ceremony, called Jataisi, is added on the twenty- seventh day, at which Brahmans are fed, and Gauri, Ganesa, Mahadeo, and the Kul devatas or family gods worshipped. The father of the child does not lie up after its birth, or give up his ordinary occupations, but he is supposed to contract impurity (chhutka) by reason of the event, and must keep away from his neighbours until after the sixth day, when, if a poor man, he is purified by bathing and by giving a feast to his relatives and to Brahmans. The richer a man is, the longer is his term of impurity. Tolerably well-to-do Rautias remain impure till the twelfth day, while the wealthier of the castes cannot get purified till the twenty-first.

When a child is six months old, its first meal of rice is com- memorated-the ceremony of munghuti, followed by mundan or tonsure. The effect of this latter rite is to remove from the mother the last traces of the pollution of child-birth, and to qualify to eat flesh and to worship the family gods. Karnabedh, the boring of a boy's ears by the village barber, is done between the ages of six and fourteen, and is deemed to admit a boy among the grown men of the caste. Kabirpanthi members of the Bar- gohri sub-caste assume the sacred thread (janeo) when initiated into the tenets of the sect. The thread so worn is a Chhatri janeo, which differs from a Brahman's in the form of the knot with which it is tied.

Superstitions

The Rautias, though less plagued by the terrors of the unseen world than are the Mundas and Oraons, have certain superstitions which are worth recording, Women who die in child-birth, persons killed by a tiger, and all ojhas or exorcists, are liable after death to reappear as bhuts, or malevolent ghosts, and give trouble to the living. In such cases an exorcist (ojha or mati) is called in to identify the spirit at work, and to appease it by gifts of money, goats, fowls, or pigs. Usually the spirit is got rid of in a few months, but some are specially persistent and require annual worship to induce them to remain quiet. Spirits of this type, who were great exorcists or otherwise men of note during their life-time, often extend their influence over several families, and eventually attain the rank of a tribal god.

Babu Rakhal Das Haldar, Manager of the Chutia Nagpur estate, gives the following instance of exorcism from his personal experience. In December 1884, when the Manager was in camp at the foot of the Báragáin hills in Lohardaga, a Kurmi woman of Kukui was killed by a tiger, and the tiger-demon in her form was supposed to be haunting the village. An ojha who was sent for to lay the ghost, took a young man to represent the tiger- demon, and after certain incantations put him into a kind of mes- meric condition, in which he romped about on all fours, and generally demeaned himself like a tiger. A rope was then tied round his loins and he was dragged to a cross-road, where the violent fit passed off and he became insensible. In this condition he remained until the ojha recited certain mantras and threw rice on him, when he regained his senses, and the demon was pronounced to have quitted the village.

Occupation

Rautias believe military service to have been their original occupation, but this is little more than a distant memory of times long past, and at the present day most members of the caste in Lohardaga are settled agriculturists. The chief men of the caste hold tatuks, jágirs, baraik grants, and similar tenures paying quit-rents direct to the Maharaja of Chutia Nagpur, while the rank and file are raiyats paying light rents and possessing occupancy rights. A few only are found in the comparatively reduced position of tenants of raja's lands at full rents. In many of the tenures and occupancy holdings khuntkati rights, entitling the tenant to hold at a low quit-rent, are claimed ; while others are korkar, paying only one-half of the standard rates of rent.

Social status

Socially the caste ranks fairly high, and Brahmans will take water and sweetmeats from their hands.Bar-gohri Rautias will not eat cooked food, smoke, or drink with any but members of their own sub-caste; but they will take sweetmeats from Brahmans, Rajputs, and Srawaks. Chhot-gohris are equally particular about cooked food, but will take water and sweetmeats from, and will smoke with, Bhogtas, Ahirs, Jhoras, and Bhuyias. They also drink spirits and fermented liquors, and eat wild pigs and fowls, all of which are forbidden for the Bar-gohri sub-caste.

Representative assembly

The Chhot-gohri Rautias have a representative assembly (mandli) for groups of from five to fifteen villages, which decides questions of caste usage. Each village sends one member to the mandli, which is presided over by an official called mahant, whose office is hereditary. When the mahant is a minor, his duties are carried on by an adult member of his family or by any Rautia unanimously chosen for this purpose by the mandli. The orders of the mandli are enforced by fines, by refusing to eat and drink with the offender, and by depriving him of the services of the barber and washerman of the caste. Certain acts entailing ceremonial impurity, such as accidentally killing a cow or having incestuous intercourse (gotra-badh) with a woman of the same gotra, admit of being atoned for by giving a feast to Brahmans and the caste brethren. But the wilful slaughter of a cow, the repetition of the offence of gotra-badh, and the cardinal sin of eating with a person of low caste, cannot be expiated, and in such extreme cases the offender is turned out of the caste. The Bar-gohri have no standing assembly, and panchayats are summoned to deal with caste questions as occasion requires.

Sorcery

The services of the ojha are also called in to ascertain what spirit (bhut) or witch (dáin or bisahi) has caused a particular illness, and to prescribe the cure. On such occasions he comes after sun-down and demands a winnowing fan, a small earthen lamp, rags for a wick, a handful of arwa rice, and some oil. Having twisted a wick into the rude semblance of a hooded snake, the ojha lights his lamp and proceeds, by shaking the rice in the winnowing fan, to divine the name of the bhut or dain who is to blame. This point having been cleared up, he is presented with a fowl to be sacrified to his own birwat or ishta deva, and he then performs the ceremony of kat bandh, by which he binds the patient or his family to the spirit or witch. This is supposed to put matters in train towards recovery, and the ojha departs, receiving from the patient's family a promise of presents of goats, etc., in the event of the treatment proving successful. Rautiás are in great terror of witches, and believe, like many people, that they can act upon their victims through objects belonging to or intimately associated with them, such as bits of cut hair or nails; but no special care is taken to preserve or destroy such articles.

Dreams are believed to be caused by recently deceased relatives of the dreamer, who appear to him in sleep and complain of hunger and want of clothes, etc. Such importunate spirits are easily appeased by sending for a Brahman and giving him the things which have been demanded in the dream.

Among other curious superstitions may be noticed the notion that a woman in the early stages of pregnancy should not cross running water. The evil eye is believed in, but its influence is attributed to inordinate appetite on the part of the person who has overlooked any one. Its effects may be averted by mixing red mustard seeds and salt, waving the mixture round the head and then throwing it into the fire. To ward off the evil eye from the crops, a blackened earthen pot with rude devices scrawled on it in white paint is stuck up in the fields.

Oaths and ordeals are sometimes resorted to for the settlement of personal disputes and the decision of questions affecting caste. Ganges water, rice that has been offered to Jagannath, a mixture of rice and cow-dung or copper and tulsi leaves, are held in the hand and a solemn statement is made touching the matter in dispute. It is believed that some sort of misfortune will befall the person who under these circumstances speaks falsely, but the consequences of lying do not seem to be clearly defined. In former days a more severe test was in vogue: a ring was thrown into a deep pan of boiling ghi, and the person whose conduct was in question was required to take it out with his fingers.

Boys whose elder brothers have died in infancy are given opprobrious names, such as Akhaj, Bechan, Bechu (he who is for sale), Khudi, Chuni, Gandaur, Kinu, Lohar, Chamar, Dom or Doman, Mochi, Ghasi, Mahili (names of low castes). Girls are called by the feminine forms of these names-Akhji, Chamin, etc. Rautias do not follow the custom, common among the higher castes, of giving two names-one for ceremonial purposes and the other for common use.

Lucky days for ploughing are the 12th of the light half of Kartik and the 5th of the light half of Aghan for low rice lands (don), and the 1st of the dark half of Chait for high lands. The 3rd of the light half of Baisakh is good for sowing; but if there is early rain, a Brahman may be got to fix a lucky day before this date. For transplanting the rice seedlings a lucky day may be arranged by a Brahman at any time between the 2nd of the dark half of Asar and the 11th of the light half of Bhado. It is specially unlucky to plough during the Mrigdah or Nirbisra period, called Ambubachi in Bengal, when the sun is for three days in the Mrigasira constellation; during the Karam festival (10th-12th of light half of Bhado); and on the day of the Sarhul. 

Rain during the Mrigdah brings bad luck; but rainy weather, while the sun is in the Rohini or Swati constellation, betokens good fortune. When rice is transplanted, the village pahan performs the bangari puja to the god of the village. When a well is sunk a Brahman is consulted as to the site and the proper time for commencing work, and a pratishtha or dedicatory sacrifice is performed before the water is used.