History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v5.c74.105

v5.c74.105

The result of this teaching of the Purāṇas was that the brāhmaṇas at Gayā became a guild or a close corporation and the Gayāwals resent the intrusion of an outsider. Disputes between Gayāwals and outside priests and cases of Gayāwals have come before the courts and have gone up even to the Privy Council in England. It has been a usage for orthodox Hindu pilgrims going to Gayā to shave themselves at the river called Punpun,1315a then on arrival at Gayā to worship the feet of one of the Gayāwal brāhmaṇas. The Gayāwal himself or his agent takes the pilgrim to the sacred spots (Vedīs) in and around Gayā. The priest is paid a fat fee near the Akṣaya-vaṭa and the Gayāwal puts a garland of flowers on the folded hands of the pilgrim and pronounces the word 'suphala' and utters a blessing that the pilgrim's ancestors would go to heaven on account of the pilgrim's visit to Gayā. In order to keep this business in their own families the Gayāwals have adopted loose and peculiar customs. If a Gayāwal is sonless he makes a gift of his office (called *gūdī* or *gaddī*) to another Gayāwal, who describes himself as the adopted son of the Gayāwal making the gift. There is no real adoption in the strict sense. Therefore, the so called adopted son retains his rights in the family of birth, he is not severed from his natural family and it is not rare to find that one Gayāwal claims to have succeeded to four *gādīs* (i. e. claims to be the son adopted by several persons simultaneously). The Gayāwals have got books in which they enter the names and addresses of their clients, who sign such entries and enjoin upon their descendants to make members of that particular Gayāwal family their *gurus* whenever they might visit Gayā. Thus large incomes and properties come to the hands of the Gayāwals. They send their agents throughout India, who bring as many pilgrims as possible. In *Lachman Lal v. Kanhaya Lal* the Privy¹³¹⁶ Council had to deal with the case of a Gayāwal who claimed to be an adopted son without loss of his interest in the property of the natural family on the ground of these peculiar practices of the Gayāwals and that claim was upheld. In *Lachman Lal v. Baldeo Lal*¹³¹⁷ the Patna High Court gives a brief summary of the origin, history and customs of the Gayāwals, remarks that though in former times there were several hundred families of Gayāwals their number is now reduced to about 150, that the Gayāwals so-called *gaddī* is not a hereditary office, but only a business to which a good-will is attached. The Calcutta High Court decided in *Dwarkanath Misser*¹³¹⁸ *v. Rampertab Misser* that persons who require religious ceremonies to be performed for their benefit are at liberty to choose the priest by whom they shall be performed, that plaintiffs are not entitled to a declaration that they along with defendants are exclusively entitled to officiate as priests when pilgrims, on their way to the holy city of Gaya, perform the śrāddha ceremony of their ancestors on the bank of the sacred river Punpun, and that the plaintiffs could be given a declaration that they are entitled to officiate as priests for such pilgrims as may choose to employ them for the purpose of religious ceremonies and that the defendants are not entitled to prevent the plaintiffs from the exercise of their calling. In *Narayan Lal*¹³¹⁹ *v. Chulhan Lal* the Calcutta High Court decided how the books containing the names and addresses of pilgrims kept by a joint family of Gayāwals were to be divided at the time of the partition of all the properties of the family.