The Gazetteers Department

The stimulants and narcotics in use in the district of Yavatmal in pre-prohibition days were fermented and distilled drinks. Intoxicating drinks were distilled from dates and raisins. But the chief alcoholic drink in use was the liquor made from the flavour of the mahuva (Bassia Latifolia) trees. To improve its flavour or colour, different varieties of fruits, flowers or herbs were sometimes added to the simple liquor. It was generally drunk in taverns and licensed booths. Except the high caste Hindus others drank on occasions, more or less frequently. They were of two classes, roughly speaking. The respectable customers who used to come to the taverns and the poorer classes who were served liquor as they come in an open space outside. Besides what was drunk publicly in the liquor shops, country-made spirits were consumed privately by some persons in their own houses. At public dinners of some low castes of Hindus, liquor was served to both men and women towards the close of the entertainment.

Three preparations from hemp, bhang or ambadi (cannabis indica), that is bhang, yakut and ganja were in use. Bluing was made from the leaves, flowers and seeds of the plant, first baked over lire and then ground very fine. The intoxicating power depended to a great extent on the fineness of the powder. According to the taste and means of the consumer, dry rose petals, almonds, cardamoms, pepper and other spices were pounded and mixed with the powder. The whole was again ground with wafer or milk, sweetened with sugar and strained through a cloth and the preparation was ready to be taken. In the hot season and throughout the year on holidays and festivals bhang was generally drunk, but only a few people took it regularly. In small quantities it had a cooling effect, is slightly intoxicating and simultaneously causing a keen feeling for hunger.

The dried hemp plant which has flowered and from which the resin had not been removed is called ganja. As a rule ganja smokers were to be found at temples or shrines, religious mendicants and a lower order of Brahmans being the main addicts. The plant washed four or five times, dried and mixed with tobacco was smoked in whiffs about every half hour by the addict. Its effects were sudden and strong. Opium used either as a drug or a narcotic was administered in several ways. It was rolled into a pill and swallowed or dissolved in water and drunk and smoked in a special preparation.

Of the non-prohibited articles, tobacco, betel or areca nut, tea and coffee and such other drinks have become popular enough and are indulged in all over the district more in urban and less in rural areas.

Tobacco is consumed in three ways. It is chewed, it is smoked and it is taken in the form of snuff. The practice of chewing tobacco either plain or in combination with the betel-leaf, areca-nut and calcium is common among all, Hindus and Muslims, men and women. Tobacco is smoked in pipes or in bidis and by the more fashionable in cigarettes. Two kinds of pipes are in general use, the long-stemmed hukka or hubble-bubble in which smoke is cooled as it is inhaled through water and the short almost stemless cilim where the smoke is sucked through a wet cloth piece wrapped at its bottom. Tobacco to be smoked in the hukka is known as gudakhu which is specially processed with molasses and water. It is used by a better class of people. Women seldom smoke a pipe but among many working and cultivating class women bidis are popular.

Tea from Assam, Darjeeling and Nilgiri tea gardens and blends and varieties of black tea of various brands and marks and their mixtures are in general use. Tea drinking has become very common in the middle class families and the artisan classes including mechanics, drivers and other manual workers. It has become a habit with the cultivating classes also. Tea with milk and sugar is taken early in the morning and also in the afternoon. The elite drink it as a hot brew or infusion poured into a cup from a teapot adding milk and sugar to taste. The commoner usually has it as a composite drink while some have it as a decoction of tea powder, mixing pepper and dry ginger or cinnamon in it to cure indigestion. Coffee also is making headway as an alternate drink and is particularly a favourite among those who come from South India. Cold drinks or sarbat are used casually, more on ceremonial occasions among the middle class families. Aerated waters are not now confined to towns alone, where tea, coffee, lassi and sarbat are available in tea shops and restaurants. Ovaltine and cocoa and Bournvita are also served if specially ordered. These are considered healthy drinks and are slowly entering the house-holds of the sophisticated as several baby foods.

The habit of smoking is spreading among the young even in schools and colleges to an alarming extent, in spite of the expert medical opinion that it tends to develop cancer.

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