North Avadh
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| North Avadh | |
|---|---|
| HistoricalGrown here in the past; no recent record either way | |
| Location | |
| Coordinates | 27.68, 81.34 |
| Gene Pool | South Asian Gene Pool |
| Country | India |
| Provinces/States | Uttar Pradesh |
| Area | 19,300 km² |
| Primary Rivers | Ghaghra |
| Growing history | |
| Grown | 1883[1]–1894[1] |
| Earlier names | Kheri, Bahraich and Gonda districts of Oudh |
| Conservation | |
| Populations | none documented yet |
North Avadh is a historical landrace cannabis growing region in northern Uttar Pradesh, India, on the plain below the Nepal border. It is drawn on Lakhimpur Kheri, Bahraich, Shravasti, Balrampur and Gonda districts and on the Biswan tahsil of Sitapur, less the strip along the border that belongs to the Western Terai. In the 1880s and 1890s this ground lay in the Kheri, Bahraich, Gonda and Sitapur districts of Oudh. The excise department of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh and witnesses before the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission described hemp growing wild there in abundance. The owners and occupiers of the land collected and stored the plant for sale as bhang and Gonda, Bahraich and Kheri were among the chief districts from which bhang was exported.[1][2][3]
Ganja had once been cultivated in Sitapur and Kheri, but by 1893 a witness before the Commission said that the cultivation had disappeared from Oudh.[4]
Geography
Lakhimpur Kheri is the largest district in Uttar Pradesh, with an area of 7,680 km². It lies in the Terai lowlands at the foot of the Himalayas; the Mohan river divides it from Nepal on the north and the Kauriala from Bahraich on the east.[5] Bahraich shares an international border with Nepal and the north of the district is Tarai covered by dense natural forest; the Sarju and the Ghaghra are its main rivers.[6] The town of Balrampur stands on the Rapti. Balrampur was a tahsil of Gonda under British rule and became a district of its own on 25 May 1997.[7] Gonda's main rivers are the Ghaghra, the Saryu and the Tedhi.[8] Biswan is one of the seven tahsils of Sitapur.[9]
The Commission drew the northern edge of the "central belt", where it did not think the plant grew wild, through Sitapur to Bahramghat on the Ghaghra and then along the course of that river. North of the line it found the spontaneous growth abundant.[1] Witnesses put the growth in damp ground. W. P. Harrison, Deputy Commissioner of Kheri, found it in and near the Terai part of Bahraich and Kheri, dense near the villages and cattle-yards.[3] Pandit Mewaram, a retired Deputy Collector who had worked about eighteen years as an excise officer and deputy collector, said that rain harmed the plant, so the lessees cut the bhang from February to May, before the rains began.[10]
Cultivation history
Excise reports
When the Government of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh had the growth of bhang inquired into in 1883, Kheri, Bahraich and Gonda were among fourteen districts where the hemp plant grew wild and was made into bhang.[1] In his memorandum for the Commission, the Commissioner of Excise, T. Stoker, placed Gonda, Bahraich and Kheri among the districts where the plant grew "absolutely wild in great profusion".[11] They were among the chief districts that exported bhang. Contractors from other districts sent agents to buy it direct from the owners or occupiers of the land, who collected and stored the plant.[2] Stoker added that some of the bhang from Gonda and Bahraich was grown on the Nepal side of the border, where Nepalese officials were said to take a duty of one or two annas a maund and that the plant was treated there in the same way as in British villages.[12]
The flowers of the wild female plant were also gathered in Kheri and smoked as ganja. Stoker sent a specimen to the Commission: it was the unprepared, fertilised flower, locally smoked but of very inferior quality and with no commercial value.[13]
The Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94
Kheri. Harrison had spent two years in Kheri, where the plant grew spontaneously "to a great extent", after more than three years in Bahraich, where "a great deal of bhang" grew the same way. He knew of no cultivation and bhang was made in the district to a considerable extent.[3] Mewaram named villages in Kheri where it was abundant, among them Majhgain, Kheirigarh, Singahi, Tikonia and Dhonrahra. He said that hemp was not cultivated there and that all the hemp the district had was wild.[10] The tahsildar of Lakhimpur, Mohamed Salamatullah, said that only bhang was prepared in the district, from a plant that grew wild in its northern part.[14] Thakur Balbhaddar Singh, talukdar of Mahewa, found ganja and bhang growing wild in abundance in his villages and elsewhere in Kheri and in Nighasan tahsil.[15]
Bahraich. Mewaram named Nanpara and Bhinga in Bahraich.[10] F. W. Brownrigg, Deputy Commissioner of Sultanpur, said that bhang was exported from Gonda and Bahraich, chiefly from Balrampur and Tulsipur in Gonda and from Nanpara, Charda and Bhoundi in Bahraich.[16]
Gonda and Balrampur. F. Barrow, Deputy Commissioner of Gonda, said that in the north of the district the plant was often left to grow in large patches, especially around village sites. The villagers told him that they had no use for it and burned it as a weed; he had no doubt that the plant was sold as bhang to the contractors.[17] J. Cockburn, an assistant sub-deputy opium agent who had served in twelve districts of the provinces, said that the best bhang came from Gonda, from the banks of the Rapti in the Balrampur estate. In his account the wild plant covered "hundreds of square miles of waste" in Kheri, Bahraich, Gonda and the districts to the east.[18]
Sitapur. Mewaram named the Biswan tahsil of Sitapur among the places where the plant was abundant.[10] Sita Ram Bhagova, a Brahmin of the district, had wild hemp in his zamindari villages. He found it abundant in the lowlands throughout Sitapur and said that the wild growth had shrunk as more land was brought under cultivation.[19]
Former ganja
The Commission found some evidence that ganja had been cultivated in a few districts of Oudh until it was suppressed by authority. One witness named Sitapur, Lakhimpur and Kheri as districts where ganja had formerly been cultivated and said that it had now disappeared from Oudh.[4] That witness, Radha Kishun, a Lucknow drug contractor, said that the ganja called hatayal had once been made in Sitapur and Lakhimpur but had been given up long before.[20] The Commission traced the name of the Mahadeva ganja to a place in Barabanki where it had formerly been cultivated: see Mahadeva.[4]
Gorakhpur and Basti
East of Gonda, the districts of Basti and Gorakhpur were described in the same terms. Stoker listed both among the districts of profuse wild growth and of bhang export.[11][2] Mazhar Subhan, a medical practitioner of Gorakhpur, said that the plant grew spontaneously in both districts and abundantly in the Mahrayganj tahsil of Gorakhpur.[21] They lie outside the region's border.
Growing Areas
No growing areas documented yet.
Accessions
No accessions documented yet.
Recent news
No news items are recorded for this growing region yet.
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. I: Report. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. ch. III, "The existence, prevalence, and character of the spontaneous growth", paras. 41–44, pp. 23–24 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Memorandum on hemp drugs in the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, by Mr. T. Stoker, Commissioner of Excise". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. III: Appendices, Miscellaneous. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. para. 20, p. 28 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Lt.-Col. W. P. Harrison, Deputy Commissioner, Kheri". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. V: Evidence of Witnesses from North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Punjab. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. witness no. 18, p. 18 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. I: Report. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. ch. IV, "Extent of cultivation, and its tendency to increase or decrease", paras. 103–108, pp. 40–42 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ District Administration, Lakhimpur Kheri. "About District". District Lakhimpur Kheri, Government of Uttar Pradesh. Retrieved 20 October 2026.
- ↑ District Administration, Bahraich. "About District". District Bahraich, Government of Uttar Pradesh. Retrieved 20 October 2026.
- ↑ District Administration, Balrampur. "About District". District Balrampur, Government of Uttar Pradesh. Retrieved 20 October 2026.
- ↑ District Administration, Gonda. "About District". District Gonda, Government of Uttar Pradesh. Retrieved 20 October 2026.
- ↑ District Administration, Sitapur. "About District". District Sitapur, Government of Uttar Pradesh. Retrieved 20 October 2026.
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 10.3 Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Pandit Mewaram, Brahman, Retired Deputy Collector, Lakhimpur". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. V: Evidence of Witnesses from North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Punjab. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. witness no. 57, pp. 94–95 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ 11.0 11.1 Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Memorandum on hemp drugs in the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, by Mr. T. Stoker, Commissioner of Excise". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. III: Appendices, Miscellaneous. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. para. 8, p. 25 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Memorandum on hemp drugs in the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, by Mr. T. Stoker, Commissioner of Excise". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. III: Appendices, Miscellaneous. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. para. 19, p. 27 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Memorandum on hemp drugs in the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, by Mr. T. Stoker, Commissioner of Excise". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. III: Appendices, Miscellaneous. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. paras. 15–17, pp. 26–27 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Mohamed Salamatullah, Tahsildar, Lakhimpur, District Kheri". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. V: Evidence of Witnesses from North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Punjab. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. witness no. 59, p. 99 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Thakur Balbhaddar Singh, Talukdar of Mahewa, Gadhi Pershadpur, District Kheri". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. V: Evidence of Witnesses from North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Punjab. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. witness no. 214, p. 288 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Mr. F. W. Brownrigg, Officiating Deputy Commissioner, Sultanpur". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. V: Evidence of Witnesses from North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Punjab. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. witness no. 12, p. 12 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Lieutenant-Colonel F. Barrow, Deputy Commissioner, Gonda, Oudh". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. V: Evidence of Witnesses from North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Punjab. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. witness no. 19, p. 19 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Mr. J. Cockburn, Assistant Sub-Deputy Opium Agent, Meja Road, Allahabad District". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. V: Evidence of Witnesses from North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Punjab. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. witness no. 4, pp. 41–42 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Sita Ram Bhagova, Brahmin, District Sitapur". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. V: Evidence of Witnesses from North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Punjab. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. witness no. 197, p. 265 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Radha Kishun, late Drug Contractor, Lucknow". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. V: Evidence of Witnesses from North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Punjab. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. witness no. 247, p. 333 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Mazhar Subhan, Medical Practitioner, Gorakhpur". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. V: Evidence of Witnesses from North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Punjab. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. witness no. 131, p. 198 – via Internet Archive.