Talk:Trinath
Discussion page of Trinath
More actions
Talk
Discussion for: Trinath • View • Links • Related changes
Use this page for verification notes, disputes, and action items. Keep narrative content on the article.
Page scope
The page covers the deity Trinath and his worship, the Trinath mela, puja or seva of eastern Bengal, Assam and Odisha, with its Muslim form as Tinlakh Pir: the names, the founding accounts, the rite and its ganja, the Trinather panchali and its rival versions, the castes and districts where the worship spread, what colonial and Bengali observers said of it, its later history in Odisha and Assam, and its decline and present practice. Cannabis in Hindu worship as a whole is covered on Cannabis in Hinduism; the pipe on Chilam; Bengal on Cannabis in West Bengal and Cannabis in Bangladesh; the Commission on Indian Hemp Drugs Commission; the book that gives the cult its fullest modern study on Ganja matters (2026).
Data verification
Record source conflicts, dating problems and unresolved readings here. Keep narrative content on the article.
Discussion
Sources
- Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). Abhilas Chandra Mukerji's note on the origin and history of the worship (vol. III, pp. 253–254) is the earliest full account and the source of most later ones; Mukerji, an excise officer, put his own surmise about the founder's motive as a surmise ("may have also thought"). His evidence as witness no. 63 (vol. IV, p. 166) describes the puja; the heading of that evidence spells his name Mukerjee. The evidence of T. L. Jenkins (Dacca, witness no. 21, p. 58) and J. D. Anderson (Assam witness no. 4, p. 536) is cited directly. The Commission's own summary is ch. IX, paras. 436–438.
- Chattopadhyaya (2026), ch. 5, "A Subaltern Deity" (pp. 146–182), is the only book-length modern study used. The page quotes many Commission witnesses through his chapter, where the page number given is his; their opinions are their own and are attributed to them. His reading of the cult as a subaltern devotion is attributed to him.
- Wise (1883) wrote as a doctor at Dacca; his account (pp. 184–185) is abstracted from a lithographed panchali, and his judgements of the cult are quoted as his.
- Gupta (1909), Bikrampurer Itihas, pp. 372–373, in Bengali: the Bikrampur passage and the song signed by Ramai Fakir are read from the Digital Library of India scan. The scan's title page gives the Bengali year 1316, which runs from 1909 into 1910; the catalogue year 1909 is used.
- Chakraborty (2020) is based on two interviews recorded in July 2020 in the Barak Valley.
- Zakaria (2008) in Star Insight, the weekly magazine of The Daily Star, is a folklorist's field report from Kafur village on the Kumar river, Faridpur. The captured text of the article does not mention ganja; the page cites it only for the picture, the songs and the three offerings.
Founder and date
- Mukerji and the Commission give 1867; Raja Soshi Sikhareswar Roy's note of dissent gives 1869 and names the founder Annada Chandra; Wise gives Ananda Chunder Das. Mukerji's surname for the founder, Kali or Kailai, is kept as he printed it. Chattopadhyaya calls Ananda Chandra Kali the "most likely author" of the first panchali.
- The first edition of the panchali: Mukerji gives 1871 and a first printing of 1,000 copies; Chattopadhyaya, from the printed copies, gives 3 February 1872. Both are on the page.
Women
- Wise ("rarely present"), Mukerji (listening, not taking part; old Baishnavis sometimes smoking) and Jenkins (not taking part) differ from Chattopadhyaya's reading that the cult drew many women of oppressed castes. All four are given on the page.
Communities
- Wise names Chandals, Kaibarttas and Tiyars; Gupta names Namasudras and Jugis; Chattopadhyaya adds Mehtars. No source consulted ties the worship to the Rajbanshi; the page makes no such claim.
- The page does not equate the Chandals of Wise and Mukerji with the Namasudras of Gupta, though the two names are commonly linked in the history of the caste.
Gupta's song
- The song printed by Gupta gives the cost of the puja as five paisa. Wise, Mukerji and the panchali itself give three. The song is reported as printed.
Images
- The lead image is identified as Trinath by the photographer's own file name, "Trinath dev", taken at the Thanaghat temple in Mymensingh in October 2018. Chattopadhyaya notes that images of Trinath show the heads of the three gods in one body.