THE PEOPLE

HOME LIFE.

Canda is predominantly a rural and a forest district, and that character determines the nature of its villages and the pattern of residential accommodation of its population. The villages of the district are of two distinct types, the Gond villages of the former Zamindars, known as malguzars and the Khalsa cultivators. The latter type of village usually stands on a knoll, shaded by groves of mango or tamarind trees and contains about 100 houses with a population of about 500 to 600. In the Wardha valley at the end of the rains, its little cluster of brown thatched roofs is seen across the undulating fields of jowar, cotton and sesame. In every field a little mala (platform), roofed with a bamboo mat rises above the greenness, from the interior of which a rakhvala (watchman) hurls abuse and occasionally stones at marauding birds. Along the village boundaries run strips of low scrub-jungle which serve as grazing grounds for the village cattle. In the Wainganga valley, the jowar is replaced by green-gold stretches of rice, the fields are not very extensive and the strips of jungle heavier, almost suggesting a resemblance of forest clearing. The village is built along a straggling, ill-kept street. For the sake of shade and coolness, the houses are built to face north or east and so lie at all. angles to the street, presenting an end or a back-wall to it, as often as a front verandah. The Mahar quarter is usually a little apart.

The houses of the malguzars and better class of their tenants are built of unbaked bricks and mud-plastered. Sometimes the walls are whitewashed and the roof tiled. In the northern tahsils, many malguzars have adopted what is called the sondi style of building. It consists of a strong square-room, having thick clay walls without windows, roofed over with planks which receive a thick clay coating on the top. Over this a light second storey is built. Verandahs enclose the sides. The doorway of the central room called the sondi projects from the wall and being small and low, can be readily closed with brick slabs shaped to fit it. In case of fire, all valuables are hastily thrown into this room as, when the doorway is closed, it is practically fire-proof. By the sides of the sondi are kothris or receptacles of grain which open in the central room. Grain can be poured into them from the top and when full they are closed with earth. The house usually has a courtyard surrounded by a high mud wall, against the sides of which are gothas (cattle-sheds), rooms for implements and grain stocks. On either side of the gateway are rooms which serve as the malguzar's sitting-room where informal village councils were held or as guest-rooms for such travellers as could claim his hospitality. Houses of poorer tenants and cultivators are mud walled and occasionally of wattle and daub. They usually contain one large central room and the roof of thatch or bamboo matting is extended to cover verandahs, which when enclosed, form additional rooms for cooking and sleeping. The front verandah is usually kept open.

Furniture in such housts is scanty, consisting of a few palangs (cots) strung with rope made of palasa-root fibre, hemp or sunn  grass. Stones for grinding and an ukhal for husking rice are provided. Earthenware jars of various sizes are used to keep pulses, tamarind, chillis, and grain for immediate use. The roof is garnished with all sorts of farming tools and from it hang dandis or bamboo poles suspended with a string from which is festooned the family bedding in the daytime. Along the mud walls are niches in which lamps and various oddments for household use are placed and in one arranged as a shrine are the family gods. Cooking, drinking and water-storing utensils in poor families are all earthenware. In well-to-do families they are of brass, copper or bell-metal. But practically every one has a lota and one cooking pot and cover of brass. In better class houses modem furniture like chairs, tables, harmoniums, and radio sets are found. By way of public buildings in villages, there are the temples of Siva, and Maruti. These are the meeting-places of the village-folk.

Old houses were built with the idea of providing shelter and safety while modern designs and constructions are particular about principles of convenience, economy, health and sanitation with the necessary safety. The richer classes now go in for independent cottages and bungalows with accommodation generally consisting of a verandah, a drawing or sitting-room, two or three extra rooms to be used as bedrooms, guest room, study room, a kitchen, a parlour, pantry or store-room and an independent bath and w. c. There is a small garden around and a garage. But in Candrapur such houses are very few and in urban areas only.

The following Table gives the number of houses put to different uses as per the 1961 Census.

TABLE No. 17

HOUSES AND THE USES TO WHICH THEY ARE PUT, CHANDRAPUR
DISTRICT, 1961

TABLE No. 17-contd.

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