Chasa, Orissa
This article is an extract from
THE TRIBES and CASTES of BENGAL. Ethnographic Glossary. Printed at the Bengal Secretariat Press. 1891. . |
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Chasa, Orissa
Origin and internal structure
The chief cultivating caste of Orissa, probably for the most part of non- Aryan descent. Chasas are divided into the following sub-castes :-Orhchasa or Mundi-Chasa, Benatiya, Chukuliya, and Sukuliya. The last-named group is a small one found along the sea-coast and mainly engaged in the manufacture of salt. The sections are shown in Appendix I. A man may not marry a woman belonging to his own section, or one who falls within the standard formula for reckoning prohibited degrees ca1¬ Calculated to three generations in the descending line. He may marry two sisters, but may not take to wife an elder sister after being already married to her younger sister. The Chasa caste is an exceedingly numerous one, and is probably made up in great measure of non-Aryan elements. In Orissa the caste system is said to be more loosely organised than in Bengal, and this makes it possible on the one hand for outsiders to be admitted into the CMsa caste, and on the other hand for wealthy OMsas, who give up ploughing with their own hands and assume the respectable title of Mahanti, to raise themselves to membership in the lower classes of Kayasths.
Marriages
Both adult and infant-marriage are recognised by the caste; but the latter is deemed the more respectable, and no one who could get his daughter married at the age of eight or nine years would allow her to remain without a husband until she reached years of puberty. The marriage ceremony is based upon the standard Hindu ritual, the binding portion being hatganthi or the tying together of the right hands of the couple with a wisp of kusa grass. Therc appears to be no positive rule either forbidding polygamy or setting any limit to the number of wives a man may have. Most chasas, however, are too poor to keep more than one wife, and a man only takes a second wife when the first is barren. A widow may marry again, and it is usunl for her to marry one Of the younger brothers of her late husband. Failing these, she may marry anyone not within the prohibited degrees. The ceremony differs from that used at the marriage of a virgin, in that the purely religious portion is omitted and the left hands of the couple (not the right) bound together with kusa. grass.
A woman may be divorced for unchastity, barrenness, or ill-temper. In all such oases she must be brought before a panchayat, at which her own relatives are called upon to be present, and the charge against her must be publicly discussed. If a divorce is granted, the husband is required to pay the woman a year's alimony in advance. Divorced wives may marry again by the form in use at the remarriage of widows.
Religion
Chasas are orthodox Hindus, and most of them belong to the. Vaishnava sect. They employ. Brahmans for religious and ceremonial purposes, but these priests are not received on equal terms by the Sadani Brahmans, who serve the Khandait and Karan castes. The dead are usually burned, but recourse is sometimes had to what seems to be the older rite of burial. In such cases the corpse is laid on its back, and offerings of boiled rice and fruit are placed with it in the grave. When a body is burned, the ashes are sometimes buried on the spot, and sometimes kept in an earthen vessel in order that they may be thrown into the Ganges when occasion serves. The sraddh ceremony is performed in the orthodox fashion.
Occupation
The great majority of the Chasas are engaged in agriculture, which they regard as the characteristic occupation of their caste, and only a few have taken to trade or service. Some of them hold service tenures, the rest being tlani or pahi raiyats and landless day-labourers. Socially they rank next to the Mali caste, and Brahmans will take water from their hands. The Goala and Bhandari are the lowest castes From whom Chasas will take sweetmeats. Cooked food they may eat only in Brahmans' houses, and they will also eat the leavings of members of that caste. There is nothing peculiar about their own diet, except that, like many other castes of aboriginal extraction, they eat the flesh of the wild boar. All fish, whether scaly or scaleless, are lawful food, except the sal fish, which is one of the totems of the caste.
The following statement shows the number and distribution of the Chasa caste in 1872 and 1881 :¬
