Rastogi
Rastogi
This section has been extracted from THE TRIBES and CASTES of BENGAL. Ethnographic Glossary. Printed at the Bengal Secretariat Press. 1891. . |
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A trading caste of Behar, usually engaged in selling cloth and money-lending, but sometimes also dealing in grain and native medicines. They practise two peculiar forms of petty money-lending by bahi, that is by entry in books of account without the security of a separate bond. These are known as augalti or ugahi and rozahi. Mr. Hoey givesl the following account of them :¬
"Augahi is lending of money to be repaid with interest at 20 per cent. in monthly instalments. Thus, if a Rastogi lends on the 1st January ten rupees, he receives one rupee on the first of each month for twelve months, and thereby realises twelve rupees, of which two rupees are interest. A Rastogi's auqahi bahi is a curiosity. It is ruled like a chess-board, but has twelve columns. As each month's instalment is realised, it is entered in a square until the twelve squares are filled. He generally keeps also a separate bahi, in which the principal is noted when lent. It may, however, be noted in the margin of his check-pattern account. Rosahi is money lent to be realised in daily instalments with interest at 25 per cent. 'l'hus, if a rupee be lent, one-half anna (taka 1'OS) will be realised daily. The account of this money is kept in a similar way, but the accouut-book will be ruled in lines of 40 squares. A Rastogi keeps his accounts by locality, that is, he has several kltets, as he calls them; one, say, is Saadatganj, another Hasanganj, a third Deori Agha Mil', and so on. Debtors are called asamis, and the amount to be collected is called lagan. A separate set of account-books is kept for each Met, and a servant (generally a Brahman on Rs. 3 per mensem) is employed to collect each khet."
Mr. Sherring mentions three sub-castes-Amethi, Indrapati, and Mauharia, which do not intermarry. Rastogis marry their daughters as infants, forbid widows to remarry, and do not recognize divorce. In matters of diet they affect to be extremely punctilious, and thus married women of the caste will not eat food that has been prepared, or even touched by their husbands.
The following statement shows the number and distribution of Rastogis in 1881. They were not returned separately in 1872 :¬
