_Chamar, Chambhar._ [440]--The caste of tanners and menial labourers
of northern India. In the Central Provinces the Chamars numbered about
900,000 persons in 1911. They are the third caste in the Province in
numerical strength, being exceeded by the Gonds and Kunbis. About
600,000 persons, or two-thirds of the total strength of the caste
in the Province, belong to the Chhattisgarh Division and adjacent
Feudatory States. Here the Chamars have to some extent emancipated
themselves from their servile status and have become cultivators, and
occasionally even malguzars or landed proprietors; and between them
and the Hindus a bitter and long-standing feud is in progress. Outside
Chhattisgarh the Chamars are found in most of the Hindi-speaking
Districts whose population has been recruited from northern and
central India, and here they are perhaps the most debased class of
the community, consigned to the lowest of menial tasks, and their
spirit broken by generations of servitude. In the Maratha country the
place of the Chamars is taken by the Mehras or Mahars. In the whole
of India the Chamars are about eleven millions strong, and are the
largest caste with the exception of the Brahmans. The name is derived
from the Sanskrit Charmakara, a worker in leather; and, according
to classical tradition, the Chamar is the offspring of a Chandal or
sweeper woman by a man of the fisher caste. [441] The superior physical
type of the Chamar has been noticed in several localities. Thus in
the Kanara District of Bombay [442] the Chamar women are said to be
famed for their beauty of face and figure, and there it is stated
that the Padminis or perfect type of women, middle-sized with fine
features, black lustrous hair and eyes, full breasts and slim waists,
[443] are all Chamarins. Sir D. Ibbetson writes [444] that their women
are celebrated for beauty, and loss of caste is often attributed to
too great a partiality for a Chamarin. In Chhattisgarh the Chamars
are generally of fine stature and fair complexion; some of them are
lighter in colour than the Chhattisgarhi Brahmans, and it is on record
that a European officer mistook a Chamar for a Eurasian and addressed
him in English. This, however, is by no means universally the case,
and Sir H. Risley considers [445] that "The average Chamar is hardly
distinguishable in point of features, stature or complexion from the
members of those non-Aryan races from whose ranks we should primarily
expect the profession of leather-dressers to be recruited." Again, Sir
Henry Elliot, writing of the Chamars of the North-Western Provinces,
says: "Chamars are reputed to be a dark race, and a fair Chamar is
said to be as rare an object as a black Brahman:
Karia Brahman, gor Chamar,
Inke sath na utariye par,
that is, 'Do not cross a river in the same boat with a black Brahman
or a fair Chamar,' both being of evil omen." The latter description
would certainly apply to the Chamars of the Central Provinces outside
the Chhattisgarh Districts, but hardly to the caste as a whole within
that area. No satisfactory explanation has been offered of this
distinction of appearance of some groups of Chamars. It is possible
that the Chamars of certain localities may be the descendants of a
race from the north-west, conquered and enslaved by a later wave of
immigrants; or that their physical development may owe something to
adult marriage and a flesh diet, even though consisting largely of
carrion. It may be noticed that the sweepers, who eat the broken food
from the tables of the Europeans and wealthy natives, are sometimes
stronger and better built than the average Hindu. Similarly, the
Kasais or Muhammadan butchers are proverbially strong and lusty. But
no evidence is forthcoming in support of such conjectures, and the
problem is likely to remain insoluble.
"The Chamars," Sir H. Risley states, [446] "trace their own pedigree
to Ravi or Rai Das, the famous disciple of Ramanand at the end
of the fourteenth century, and whenever a Chamar is asked what
he is, he replies a Ravi Das. Another tradition current among them
alleges that their original ancestor was the youngest of four Brahman
brethren who went to bathe in a river and found a cow struggling in a
quicksand. They sent the youngest brother in to rescue the animal, but
before he could get to the spot it had been drowned. He was compelled,
therefore, by his brothers to remove the carcase, and after he had
done this they turned him out of their caste and gave him the name
of Chamar." Other legends are related by Mr. Crooke in his article
on the caste.