an, and known as Deokia, fetches an earthen vessel from
the potter, and this is worshipped with offerings of turmeric and
rice, and a cotton thread is tied round it. Formerly it is said they
worshipped the spent bullets picked up after a battle, and especially
any which had been extracted from the body of a wounded person.

3. Funeral rites.

When a man is about to die they take him down from his cot and lay
him on the ground with his head in the lap of a relative. The dead
are buried, a person of importance being carried to the grave in a
sitting posture, while others are laid out in the ordinary manner. A
woman is buried in a green cloth and a breast-cloth. When the corpse
has been prepared for the funeral they take some liquor, and after a
few drops have been poured into the mouth of the corpse the assembled
persons drink the rest. While following to the grave they beat drums
and play on musical instruments and sing religious songs; and if a
man dies during the night, since he is not buried till the morning,
they sit in the house playing and singing for the remaining hours of
darkness. The object of this custom must presumably be to keep away
evil spirits. After the funeral each man places a leafy branch of
some tree or shrub on the grave, and on the thirteenth day they put
food before a cow and also throw some on to the roof of the house as
a portion for the crows.

Beldar

List of Paragraphs

1. _General notice._
2. _Beldars of the northern Districts._
3. _Odias of Chhattisgarh._
4. _Other Chhattisgarhi Beldars._
5. _Munurwar and Telenga._
6. _Vaddar._
7. _Pathrot._
8. _Takari._

1. General notice.

_Beldar, [254] Od, Sonkar, Raj, Larhia, Karigar, Matkuda, Chunkar,
Munurwar, Thapatkari, Vaddar, Pathrot, Takari._--The term Beldar
is generically applied to a number of occupational groups of more
or less diverse origin, who work as masons or navvies, build the
earthen embankments of tanks or fields, carry lime and bricks and
in former times refined salt. Beldar means one who carries a _bel_,
a hoe or mattock. In 1911 a total of 25,000 Beldars were returned
from the Central Provinces, being most numerous in the Nimar, Wardha,
Nagpur, Chanda and Raipur districts. The Nunia, Murha and Sansia
(Uriya) castes, which have been treated in separate articles, are
also frequently known as Beldar, and cannot be clearly distinguished
from the main cast