A History of Agriculture in India v1.c21.s2: Agriculture
A History of Agriculture in India v1.c21.s2
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Agriculture
v1.c21.s2.1
A crop-cutting instrument with two holes, the like of which has been known from China, indicates that cultivation was practised here (Fig. 118). No direct evidence of cereals grown by the Neolithic Kashmiris has come forth, but seeds of weeds, like *Lithospermum arvense*, species of *Trifolium*, *Lotus corniculatus* and other species of *Lotus*, *Medicago denticulata* and *M. falcata*, and species of *Ipomoea* and *Euphorbia* have been recovered (Fig. 120). Most of these are weeds occurring in cultivated fields, dry pastures and wastelands, and are usually associated with the cultivation of wheat and barley.
v1.c21.s2.2
Recent pollen analyses carried out in the Haigam Lake, not far away from this site, reveal that the origin of cultivation in the valley started within the blue pine forests which were cleared by the Neolithic man. The climate was much cooler than at present. Subsequent clearances were confined to the broad-leaved forests of oaks and alders which had replaced the conifers. Tree pollen rapidly declines after cutting of the forest-trees, and in its place there is a sharp rise in the pollen of herbaceous plants and the emergence of new weeds which are associated with the cultivation of crops. The cultivation was of a shifting type.
v1.c21.s2.3
Shifting Cultivation. *Jhuming*, or shifting cultivation, is still practised by the tribals in the hilly areas of Assam, Manipur, Tripura, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Orissa. It is estimated that 338,502 hectares of land was subjected to shifting cultivation in Orissa and 27,287 hectares in Assam (1966).
v1.c21.s2.4
Sinha thus describes *penda*, or shifting cultivation, practised by the Maria Gonds of the Abujhmar Hills: "The cultural pattern of the Hill Maria centres around the principal subsistence economy of *penda*, shifting cultivation. The technology of shifting cultivation is intimately adjusted to the ecology of Abujhmar Hills."
v1.c21.s2.5
The *penda* cultivation begins with the felling of trees at a site decided upon by the village elders at a ceremony after the harvest festival, *kaqsar*. The villagers start felling trees after a communal ceremony at the *penda* plot. There is no formal allotment of land, but villagers divide the land by mutual discussion, the size of each plot depending on the number of persons in the household to be fed and capable of doing a full day's work with axe and hoe.
v1.c21.s2.6
Disputes are practically unknown even today in the Abujhmar Hills, as there is ample land for all. Each *penda* is cultivated for two years, and each year the villagers cultivate a new *penda* and an old *penda*. The conventional cycle of forest regeneration of the Hill Maria is about 18 years.
v1.c21.s2.7
After the initial operations of clearing, the Hill Marias get ready to set fire to their dried plots. They have the practical knowledge of the local climate, and schedule their firing operations in such a way that the fields receive the monsoon showers within a week.
v1.c21.s2.8
The village leader goes to the field to start the forest fire and immediately after that each villager sets fire to his respective field. Sowing starts by the third week of June immediately after the break of the monsoon and the date of the first sowing is decided by the headman in consultation with the elders.
v1.c21.s2.9
Immediately after the completion of sowing, and sometimes in between sowing, the whole *penda* is fenced by wooden logs and bamboos. This is the communal work of all the able-bodied members of the village. The crops cultivated in the *penda* include millets, pulses, small-sized maize, chilli, oilseeds, sweet-potato, arum, pulses and beans. Rice is grown only in semi-permanent or permanent plots near the streams.
v1.c21.s2.10
Every phase of *penda* cultivation is marked by some rituals. There are rituals for the choice of the *penda* site, the first felling of trees, the first sowing, the harvesting and the eating of the first crops. The *penda* land is considered to be the land of the clan god. When the new grains of the crop concerned have been garnered, the village headman of each village sends word to the *pen-waddai*, or clan-priest, who worships the clan god at his shrine, *pen-rawar*.
v1.c21.s2.11
Apart from the fact that there is adequate land on the Abujhmar Hills for penda cultivation, the collecting and hunting of forest products and animals are an important source of food. Among the forest plants and products, nuts of the siari, green mango, sulphi-juice, mahua flower and seeds, young bamboo shoots and seeds, and various kinds of roots and tubers, and mushrooms are important.
v1.c21.s2.12
Hunting, an exclusively male occupation, is more popular at the foothills than on the hilltops. Community hunting is generally organized between the harvesting and sowing seasons, the principal game being various types of deer. They also hunt peafowl, jungle fowl and hare. They show a remarkable knowledge of the habits and habitats of the various game animals and birds.
v1.c21.s2.13
Fishing, on a small scale, is done quite extensively in the hill streams throughout the region. Fishing-rods, various types of bamboo and cane cages and traps are the main fishing-tools.
v1.c21.s2.14
While the purely hunting-fishing-gathering economy of the Onge of Little Andaman sustains a total tribal population of about 150 today with a density of 0.56 per square mile (1.45 per square kilometre) and an average family size of 3.06 only, the shifting cultivator Hill Maria Gonds of the Abujhmar Hills have a density of about 9.³ per square mile (24 per square kilometre).²
v1.c21.s2.15
² Surajit Sinha, Primitive Hunters, Shifting Cultivators, The Times of India Annual, 1974