Boja
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| Kind | Drink |
|---|---|
| Part of the plant | Leaf |
| Country | India |
|---|---|
| Recorded in | Indian Hemp Drugs Commission |
| First recorded | 1894[1]: 157 |
| Still made | No longer made |
Boja was a fermented drink of jowari (sorghum) with bhang and nux vomica, made and sold in the Sholapur district of the Bombay Presidency in the 1890s. It was a gruel of jowari with "a comparatively small proportion of hemp and a little nux vomica". The Indian Hemp Drugs Commission wrote in 1894 that it seemed "to be little known elsewhere". After brewing it was kept for a day, then water was added and it was drunk. In 1891–92, 138,100 sers of it were consumed.[1]: 157
Making boja
Bhaskar Rao Ramchandra Heblikar, the deputy collector of Sholapur, gave the commission this method. Jowari was coarsely ground, soaked for a few hours and poured into boiling water. Bhang was warmed in an iron pan, powdered and put into the boiling jowari, with koshta, kolinjana and kuchla (nux vomica). When the mixture had boiled well it was taken off the fire, water was added and the liquid squeezed off was the boja.[2]: 49
The abkari inspector of Ahmednagar, Dadabhai Burjorjee Guzder, had heard of a "regular Government farm" for boja in Sholapur and attached a recipe. Roughly ground jowari was boiled and dried in the air. For four pailis of jowari, 22 tolas of kosht-kolanjan, two pounds of bhang, five tolas of dawna, 20 tolas of jowari shoots, five tolas of marwa and five tolas of kuchla went into a pot with it. The next day the mixture was called boja. Thirty sers of it took 15 sers of water and were filtered through cloth to make the drink.[3]: 102
The deputy collector of Bijapur described a longer process. Jowari flour was soaked overnight and boiled. Kosht-kolanjan (the roots of Costus arabicus), kuchla and bhang powder were mixed in, and some added powdered aconite root. This was dried in the shade and called kanya. A second preparation, mávyáche peith, was jowari soaked for 11 days until it sprouted, then dried and ground. The two were mixed and left to ferment in a large earthen vessel. A little of the result was mixed with water, strained and drunk, with no sugar or jaggery. He wrote that it had "a very sour smell", was drunk only in the hot season and was sold in earthen pots called moghas. Drinkers, he wrote, seldom left the shop until the intoxication passed. No licence to sell it had been granted in Bijapur. He heard of no one there who drank it.[4]: 94
Use
In Sholapur boja was sold in shops, like majum. Heblikar wrote that it was drunk by Mahars and other low castes and by few others. In his estimate the low classes in the cities who drank it made up about one per cent of the population.[2]: 49 In 1957 I. C. and R. N. Chopra wrote that in the Sholapur district an alcoholic drink called boja "used to be prepared" by fermenting jowar grains with cannabis and nux vomica seeds.[5]
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. I: Report. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. ch. VIII, "Extent of use and the manner and forms in which the hemp drugs are consumed", paras. 415–429, pp. 154–158 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Rao Bahadur Bhaskar Rao Ramchandra Heblikar, Brahmin, Deputy Collector, Sholapur". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. VII: Evidence of Witnesses from Bombay, Sind, Berar, Ajmere, Coorg, Baluchistan, and Burma. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. Bombay witness no. 27, pp. 48–51 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Dadabhai Burjorjee Guzder, Parsi, District Abkari Inspector, Ahmednagar". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. VII: Evidence of Witnesses from Bombay, Sind, Berar, Ajmere, Coorg, Baluchistan, and Burma. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. Bombay witness no. 47, pp. 100–105 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Memorandum on hemp drugs in Bombay, by the Hon'ble T. D. Mackenzie, Commissioner of Customs, Salt, Opium and Abkari". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. III: Appendices, Miscellaneous. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. pp. 88–102 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Chopra, I. C.; Chopra, R. N. (1957). "The use of the cannabis drugs in India". Bulletin on Narcotics (1). United Nations: 4–29.