==============+========
District. | Number.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~+~~~~~~~~
Dehra Dûn | 127
Sahâranpur | 4,203
Muzaffarnagar | 4,920
Meerut | 10,224
Bulandshahr | 7,977
Aligarh | 12,278
Mathura | 6,263
Agra | 10,573
Farrukhâbâd | 291
Mainpuri | 1,111
Etâwah | 573
Etah | 4,265
Bareilly | 1,996
Bijnor | 3,476
Budâun | 2,107
Morâdâbâd | 3,380
Shâhjahânpur | 350
Pilibhît | 595
Cawnpur | 418
Fatehpur | 297
Bânda | 63
Hamîrpur | 78
Allahâbâd | 370
Jhânsi | 442
Jâlaun | 99
Lalitpur | 6
Benares | 46
Ghâzipur | 25
Ballia | 265
Gorakhpur | 6
Azamgarh | 2
Tarâi | 664
Lucknow | 1,405
Unâo | 20
Râê Bareli | 55
Sîtapur | 219
Hardoi | 18
Kheri | 211
Faizâbâd | 62
Gonda | 17
Bahrâich | 244
Sultânpur | 95
Partâbgarh | 9
Bârabanki | 272
+~~~~~~~
Total | 80,147
==============+=======
Biloch, Baloch, Biluch.—Identified by Professor Max Müller [114] with
the Sanskrit mlechchha, “a foreigner, outcast, non-Aryan.”—The
enumeration at the last Census has failed to discriminate between two
different though probably originally-allied races—the ordinary Biloch
and the predatory Biloch or Rind of the Districts of the Upper Duâb.
Another theory of the origin of the name is given by Colonel Möckler in
a paper published in the Proceedings of the Asiatic Society of Bengal
for 1893:—
“This paper is mainly concerned with the Rind, one of the tribes or
clans inhabiting Balochistân. Their name signifies ‘a turbulent,
reckless, daring man.’ They have never acknowledged the authority of
any ruler in the country. They claim to be the true Baloch, and assert
that they originally came from ‘Alaf,’ which is supposed by themselves
and most other people to be Haleb or Aleppo, in Syria. They say that
they are Arabs of the tribe of Quraish, and were driven out from Alaf
by Yezîd I., for assisting Husain, the martyr nephew of the Prophet
Muhammad in 61 Hijrah. The author shows, however, from some Arab
authorities that the Baloch were established in Makran more than a
century before the commencement of the Muhammadan era, certainly so if,
as Firdusi relates, Naushirwân punished them in Makran in 550 A.D., and
still more certainly that they were located there within 22 years after
its commencement, and that therefore, if the Rinds left Aleppo in the
time of Yezîd I., about 61 H., the Baloch were in Makran before that
date. But it is doubtful whether the Rinds ever came from Aleppo, or
that they are Baloch at all. It is much more probable that they are the
descendants of a certain Al Harith Al ‘Alafi, that is of Harith of the
‘Alafi tribe, and of the Kahtanic stock of Arabs. He was the father of
two men, who, according to Tabary, in a blood feud killed an officer
who had been appointed by Al Hajjâj, the Governor of Irâq, to the
charge of Makran, in 65 Hijrah. They had come from ‘Uman, and after the
murder took possession of Makran. Subsequently, about 86 Hijrah, they
retired before a punitive force of Al Hajjâj into Sindh, where their
name is conspicuous in the annals of the country for the next 200 years
or so. This, and other facts, show that the Rinds really are of Arab
descent, but that they did not come from Aleppo, but are descended from
a man of the ‘Alafi tribe who came from ‘Uman; and that they are not of
the Quraish but the Kahtan stock. On account of their undoubted Arab
descent, the Rinds are held in very high respect by the other clans of
Baluchistân who, therefore, all claim to be related to them, through
one Jalâl Khân, an ancestor of the Rinds. Among the sons of this Jalâl,
Makran is said to have been divided after the death of Al Hajjâj. With
regard to the name Baloch, Colonel Möckler suggests its identity with
the Gedrosii of the Greeks. He says that the Baloch themselves explain
their name by the phrase ‘Baloch Badroch’ (or Badrosh). Here bad means
‘evil,’ and roch or rosh means ‘day.’ In Pahlavi or Zend gad is
synonymous with bad; therefore Badrosh = gadrosh or gadros, whence the
Greek Gedrosii. By the interchange of the liquids r and l, badroch
would become badloch, out of which the d must naturally drop leaving
the Baloch = the Gadrosii, or on the other hand, the proverbial
expression (Badroch Baloch) may have been current in the time of the
Greeks in the form of Baloch Gadrosh, and the Greeks confused the
epithet with the name.
“The latter would then be derived from Belus, King of Babylon, a
derivation which is adopted by Professor Rawlinson.”
[The ordinary Biloch.] 2. Of the ordinary Biloch Mr. Ibbetson writes
[115]:—“The Biloch presents in many respects a very strong contrast
with his neighbour, the Pathân. The political organisation of each is
tribal: but while the one yields a very large measure of obedience to a
chief who is a sort of limited monarch, the other recognises no
authority save that of a council of the tribe. Both have most of the
virtues and many of the vices peculiar to a wild and semi-civilized
life. To both hospitality is a sacred duty and the safety of the guest
inviolable; both look upon the exaction of blood for blood as the first
duty of man; both strictly follow a code of honour of their own, though
one very different from that of modern Europe; both believe in one God
whose name is Allâh, and whose Prophet is Muhammad. But the one attacks
his enemy from in front, the other from behind; the one is bound by his
promise, the other by his interests; in short the Biloch is less
turbulent, less treacherous, less blood-thirsty, and less fanatical
than the Pathân; he has less of God in his creed, and less of the devil
in his nature. His frame is shorter and more spare and wiry than that
of his neighbour to the north, though generations of independence have
given to him a bold and manly bearing. Frank and open in his manners
and without servility, fairly truthful when not corrupted by our
Courts, faithful to his word, temperate and enduring, and looking upon
courage as the highest virtue, the true Biloch of the Derajât frontier
is one of the pleasantest men we have to deal with in the Panjâb. As a
revenue-payer he is not so satisfactory, his want of industry and the
pride which looks upon manual labour as degrading, making him but a
poor husbandman. He is an expert rider; horse-racing is his national
amusement, and the Biloch breed of horses is celebrated throughout
Northern India. He is a thief by tradition and descent; but he has
become much more honest under the civilising influences of our rule.
3. “His face is long and oval, his features finely cut, and his nose
aquiline; he wears his hair long and usually in oily curls, and lets
his beard and whiskers grow, and he is very filthy in person,
considering cleanliness as a mark of effeminacy. He usually carries a
sword, knife and shield, he wears a smock frock reaching to his heels
and pleated about the waist, loose drawers and a long cotton scarf: and
all these must be as white or as near it as dirt will allow of,
insomuch that he will not enter our army because he would there be
obliged to wear a coloured uniform. His wife wears a sheet over her
head, a long sort of nightgown reaching to her ankles, and wide
drawers; her clothes may be red or white; and she plaits her hair in a
long queue. As the true Biloch is nomad in his habits, he does not
seclude his women, but he is extremely jealous of female honour. In
cases of detected adultery the man is killed, and the woman hangs
herself by order. Even on the war trail the women and children of his
enemy are safe from him. The Biloch of the Hills lives in huts or
temporary camps, and wanders with his herds from place to place. In the
plains he has settled in small villages; but the houses are of the
poorest possible description. When a male child is born to him, ass’s
dung in water, symbolical of pertinacity, is dropped from the point of
a sword into his mouth before he is given the breast. A tally of lives
is kept between the various tribes or families; but when the account
grows complicated it can be settled by betrothals, or even by payment
of cattle. The rules of inheritance do not follow the Islâmic law, but
tend to keep the property in the family by confining succession to
agnates; though some of the more leading and educated men are said to
be trying to introduce the Muhammadan laws of inheritance into their
tribes. The Biloch are nominally Musalmân, but singularly ignorant of
their religion and neglectful of its rites and observances; and though
they once called themselves, and were called by old historians ‘friends
of Ali,’ and though, if their account of their rejection from Arabia be
true, they must have been originally Shiahs, they now belong, almost
without exception, to the Sunni sect. Like many other Musalmân tribes
of the frontier they claim to be Quraishi Arabs by origin, while some
hold them to be of Turkomân stock: their customs are said to support
the latter theory; their features certainly favour the former.”
[The criminal Biloch of the North-Western Provinces.] 4. In the
Muzaffarnagar District they are also known as Rind. “They originally
emigrated from the Panjâb; that they are professional thieves of a
dangerous character is now well established. They depart on their
predatory tours assuming the character of faqîrs, physicians, and
teachers of the Qurân, and carry on their depredations at great
distances as far southward as Ajmere and westward as Lahore. Some few
in the Muzaffarnagar District have acquired landed property; but the
rest may be said to have no ostensible means of livelihood and to be
habitual absentees. Their mode of robbery is not by violence, but by
picking locks with needles. One thief makes an entry, receiving
two-thirds of the property as his share, while his confederate, who
sits outside to watch, receives one-third.” [116] The same people there
called Biloch are found in Ambâla and Karnâl. “During the rainy season
the whole country is inundated for months. A more suitable stronghold
for a criminal tribe could not be imagined. They are almost certainly
of true Biloch origin, and still give their tribal names as Rind,
Lashari, Jatoi, and Korai. But they are by their habits quite distinct
from both the land-owning Biloch and the camel-driver, who is so
commonly called Biloch simply because he is a camel-driver. They are
described as coarse-looking men of a dark colour, living in a separate
quarter, and with nothing to distinguish them from the scavenger caste
except a profusion of stolen ornaments and similar property. They say
that their ancestors once lived beyond Kasûr, in the Lahore District,
but were driven out on account of their marauding habits. The men still
keep camels and cultivate a little land as their ostensible occupation;
but during a great part of the year they leave the women, who are
strictly secluded at home, and wander about disguised as Fakîrs or as
butchers in search of sheep for sale, extending their excursions to
great distances, and apparently to almost all parts of India.” [117]