S.C. Roy and Socio-Religious Dimension of the Oraon Worldview

Roy wrote his book applying an anthropological approach. In this approach, the tribal religion and its connection with social aspects or institutions is understood and explained through rites, rituals, and beliefs around natural objects (Chakraborty 2018).

7.1.1 Institution of Pahan

In theory, the community is represented by the panch (village elders); it constitutes the priesthood; but in practise only one or other of the elders of the village or clan proficient in the ritual practices conducts the sacrificial rites in the presence of the panch. In case of offering sacrifices to village deities, a priest or priests are appointed or elected by the Oraon village community. In Oraon religion, the propitiation or worship is really congregational. The village deities receive periodical propitiation from the appointed priest, the pahan (or baiga in some villages). This pahan or baiga may have one or two assistants namely panb- hara, pujar, tahalu, susari, or murgipakoa. Presence of representatives of people of the vil­lage is mandatory on the occasion of propitiation. The office of pahan is hereditary in some villages while in others it changes at an interval of three years. In Oraon belief the selection of pahan is done by deities themselves. Bachelors of Oraon are not eligible to be elected as pahan, as the marriage of pahan with his wife (pahanain) has to be celebrated at the end of sarhul festival every year in the month of April.

The institution of pahan plays an important role in offering sacrifices and performing different rituals on various occasions. These offerings are made to the deities and other supernatural powers which are embedded in their life cycle rituals and festivals.

7.1.2 Socio-Religious Rites and Ceremonies

For maintaining friendly relationships with the unknown supernatural powers (explained in the form of deities and spiritual beings or spirits) the Oraon have different ways of offerings and sacrifices on different occasions. Their special life cycle occasions like birth, childhood, puberty, marriage, and death are marked with different rites and ceremonies to protect themselves from unknown supernatural risks and dangers and to have a better economic life during the year.

7.1.2.1 Birth and Childhood Ceremonies

Ceremonies related to birth and infancy start right from the time of pregnancy of an Oraon woman. She is barred to go out of the house in night; she has to cover herself with cloth while going out in day time in order to be protected from mischievous spirits. Pregnant woman’s parental family perform jodakamna (literarily the wish for both) ceremony to appease khunt bhuts and worship deities in their village with a view to protect both the unborn baby in the womb and expectant mother (for the first time). During delivery and thereafter pollution is observed.

In some villages until the danda-katta ceremony is performed, the new born is not taken out of the house due to the fear of evil spirits and evil eyes. In this ceremony either on the eighth or ninth day after birth a professional spirit doctor or an Oraon man who knows the ceremonial process is called upon to perform elaborate rituals of cutting the evil teeth so that evil spirits and evil eyes keep a distance from the new born. The danda-katta ceremony is followed by ‘name giving’ ceremony known as name-pinjna. The time period to perform this ceremony differs from fortnight to six months or even a year after birth. Till the cer­emony the child is called by the name of the day he or she was born, like Etwa for a male or Etwaria for a female child born on Sunday; Mangra and Mangri for male and female child respectively born on Tuesday. If the child is born on some festive days then they are called after the name of that particular festival. For example, if a child is born on Karam festival, he/she gets the name Karma if a male or Karmi if female. Traditionally, the child naming ceremony involves an unmarried Oraon boy or village gorait³ for shaving the head. A small amount of hair is left out on the head at crown position and shaved hair is thrown into a water tank or running stream nearby with a belief that the hair meets the hair of the future spouse.

An Oraon girl gets her nose pierced at the age of five or six years by some older girl or by a goldsmith. There is no special ceremony or feast for nose-piercing unlike the ear-piercing. At the age of seven or eight, the Oraon girl gets a tattoo on her forehead and temple for the first time by a Malar woman⁴ which later on is elaborated at the gap of four to five years. There are also some other rituals like cicatrisation which has social context rather than any religious significance.

7.1.2.2 Marriage Ceremony

Marriage ceremony in traditional Oraon community is considered essential. No bachelor or maiden is known among them. Even most of the Oraon deities are believed to have at least a consort and the Oraon celebrate the marriage ceremony for their water tank and fruit trees as well.

Adult marriage is the rule in the community. The young men and women were allowed free sex in the past. They could choose their spouse by themselves and their choice was communicated to the elders or parents through their friends or relatives. Boys used to get married at least after eighteen or nineteen years of age and girls not before the age of fif­teen years. However, there is restriction on having a sexual relationship in the same gotra (totemic clan), but it is not condemned and the punishment for this was to organise a feast for the community or sacrifice a white cock to Dharmesh, the Supreme God. In Oraon tribe it is believed that when the rice with turmeric powder is thrown on the newly wedded couple, their premarital sins get expiated.

In practise now-a-days Oraon people consider three generations bar to the marriage between the members of different gotras. In addition to this, the children of two broth­ers or two sisters cannot marry each other. It is also followed among the Oraon that even though fathers are different but mother is the same, and children sucked milk from the same breasts, so they can not marry each other if they belong to opposite sex. Similarly, the marriage between two families is barred if there is ceremonial friendship between the elders of the house. However, after permanent migration of one of the families the restriction is relaxed. Village endogamy is rather infrequent among them. The Oraon do not marry their eldest child to the eldest child of another man. For breaking any rule related to forbidden marriage, punishment is decided by the panch. In the case of marriage between an Oraon and a non-Oraon, the punishment given to the Oraon offender is excommunication from the Oraon tribe until the non-Oraon partner gives up. Although monogamy rule prevails among Oraon, in case of no child from the first wife, a man can have a second wife. Ghar- damad (a male who lives in his in-law’s house) tradition also prevails, but the damad does not enjoy right on bhuinhari land (land that belongs to bhuinhar as he is not from the line­age).

Marriage in Oraon tradition is full of rites and rituals, and involves the kinsmen and gifts for them at various occasions, especially for women participants in the ceremony.

Marriage is a very long drawn out procedure. Every ceremony involves rituals where they seek blessings of the spirits, especially the ancestor spirits. Huge feasts for community people or close relatives are organised on many occasions at both bride and bridegroom houses. Roy explained each ritual with minute details starting from approaching the agua (go-between) of the boy's family to the girl family after the Karam festival in the month of Bhado (August-September).

There are various rituals involved in marriage, such as observing the omens, making offerings to deities and spirits as per the customs of different ceremonies, involvement of pahan and gorait and other community members, deciding on the marriage date and fixing the bride price before the actual wedding ceremony. The articles involved in marriage are generally the easily available ones made up of paddy straw, earthen pots, buckets, and some grains. The Oraon observe many omens during khed-norhna (feet washing ceremony), espe­cially watching the light of the earthen lamp during dinner. If the lamp goes out, the nego­tiation is immediately broken off as it is considered the sign of death of any partner. Apart from this, during the dinner when the boy’s relatives stay at the girl’s house if some earthen vessels get broken, a branch or tree falls down without any high wind inside the premises of the girl’s house, or an oil-pot gets overturned then negotiation is called off considering these events as bad omens. At the end of the lagan bandhi (fixation of date for the marriage) ceremony, panch from both the sides sit together to finalise the customary bride price and the number of clothes to be given to the bride’s people. In the early 20th century the bride price was different in each parha (a confederacy of several Oraon villages; the whole tribe is divided into 40 parhas) which varied from Rs.7/- or Rs.9/- to Rs.25/-. If high bride price is demanded then the boy's side negotiate it by citing the examples of those brides who go with a lower bride price. Panch has no right to intervene in matters of clothes demanded from the girl’s side and generally boy’s people meet the demands.

7.1.2.3 Death Ceremonies

The ceremonies related to the death in Oraon community depend upon the season of the year when death occurs. If a person dies in between the sprouting of the new paddy seed­lings and its harvest, i.e. in between June and November, the dead body is temporarily buried in the masan and then before the harbora ceremony it is taken out and cremated permanently. Apart from this if a person dies before the setting of the monsoon rains his or her corpse is cremated only once.

During death rituals the community support the aggrieved family in the form of gifting paddy grains and pots of rice beer, accompanying them to masan with wooden sticks, car­rying the corpse and contributing towards community feast. Mahto (secular head of the village) and pahan receive honorarium from the bereaved family for performing different rituals and making offerings to the deities and spirits. There is only one case when Oraon mutilates the corpse. The case is the death of either a pregnant woman or during child birth. All the ceremony performed in this case is to scare away the churail (the spirit of the women who died during pregnancy or child birth) to return to her village. The corpse is not burnt in this case and is buried face downwards outside the village after sewing the eyes with thorns, pinning thorns into palms and soles, and breaking the hands and legs. When this corpse is carried away from the house mustard seeds are scattered all the way by a mati (spirit doctor) with incantations. They have a belief that marriage is an auspicious occasion and death an inauspicious occasion. So a reversal of order is followed. In weddings they use right hand and arua (raw) rice while in funerals the left hand and usna rice (rice from boiled paddy) are used.

7.1.2.4 Religious Feasts and Festivals

Rites, rituals, and festivals not only ensure individual and village safety and prosperity, but also social solidarity. Prosperity relates to their economic pursuits like food-gathering, hunting, cattle tending, and agriculture for which they appease and worship supernatural beings. Fishing is not among the main economic activities of the Oraon community but it is a sacred ceremony during the sarhul festival.

Originally, the sarhul or khaddi was a food gathering festival and later has been modi­fied with other rites connected with changing economic pursuits of the Oraon from food­gathers to hunters and then to a settled agriculturist over the course of time. There are two important food-gathering festivals, one is sarhul and the other one is phagu; the latter has been borrowed long ago from their neighbouring Hindu community. The Phagu festival is celebrated in the month of Phagun (February-March), which is not just the end month of a year, but also marks the beginning of New Year. In this festival Hindu land lords of the village also distribute snacks. The significance of Phagu to Oraon people is related to Phagu Sendra, the spring hunt. During the period from the first moon appearance in the month of Phagun till the night of the next full moon day, Dhangar Pahan (unmarried pahan) goes naked to ceremonially bathe Chandi (the deity of hunt) with a jug of water or goat’s milk. To keep the spirit quiet for the next year, the fowl is sacrificed after Loddo-Sendra⁵, the ceremonial hunting performed by young Oraons. It is customary to collect the dried corolla of the mahua flower only after the Phagu-Sendra. In some villages the edible herbs, flowers, and leaves are gathered after sarhul celebration and offered to Chala-Pachcho, the deity at Sarna first, before consumption.

In the month of Chait (March-April), when the varieties of trees blossom and edible leaves and tubers start sprouting, sarhul is celebrated. The Sarna and sal flowers are the essential element of this festival. This festival is also known as Khaddi, Khekel-benja, or the marriage of the mother earth. The day of the celebration differs from village to village. When elders notice the blossom in the trees of sal, the panch decide the day and the villagers are informed one or two weeks before about the celebration day through pahan or pujar (pahan’s assistant).

The festival rites and rituals involve participation of each household. From the day of announcement pahan, his wife, and pujar and his wife go to each family of the village to collect one paila (a wooden pot used to measure around one pound) of either marua (Eleusine ooracana) or paddy in the name of Chilgi-maiya (name of a spirit). Pahan, pujar, and mahato, with their wives, also participate in different rituals and offerings. Collected grains are sold and the money is used to pay the price of earthenware, knife, karchhul (ladle), and bainthi⁶ needed for the festival. It is also utilised to pay the gorait for playing instruments during celebration and in purchasing ingredients for preparing home-brewed rice beer at pahan’s house. People also donate rice to pahan during the three-day celebration of sarhul festival.

Hunting is no longer the primary livelihood of the Oraon tribe. It is organised during the festival to perform magic associated with the belief of obtaining a good harvest of rice. There are three major hunting festivals of Oraon; first is the Phagu Sendra or spring hunt­ing, second is the Bisu-Sikar or summer hunting, and the third one is called the Jeth-Sikar

Social Dimension of Faith and Beliefs of the Oraon or rainy-season hunting. Like every other festival, hunting festivals are also followed by jatra. A large gathering at Jeth-jatra (jatra in the month of Jeth or May-June) is considered a sign of abundant harvest in the coming season. These jatras, parha flags, etc. are symbols of their social bonds.

The festival connected with cattle is the sohorai, which is long borrowed by the Oraon from the ahir caste; ahir also have borrowed the Oraon custom of jatra and perform a reunion dance at the end of the festival. The sohorai festival is celebrated in the evening of the new moon day of the Kartik (October-November) month. At the end of the ceremonial function of this festival the appointed ahir present rice beer as a tribute to the villagers which he receives from some Oraon families. This is a ceremonial part; otherwise they enjoy the privileges of free brewing.

In the month of Asarh (June-July), the principal agricultural festival hariari is celebrated when paddy, marua (Eleusine ooracana), and gondli (Panicum miliare) start germinating and the whole area looks like a green carpet. Only after celebrating the common hariari festival an Oraon can do the transplantation in his fields and also perform the private hariari ritual by offering sacrifices to the ancestors and khunt spirit. The date of the com­mon hariari ritual is decided by village elders and announced through gorait. Like other festivals, women are not allowed to have sacrificial meat except unmarried girls, if meat is brought home. This is followed by kadlota, an agricultural festival, when rice-plants start bearing paddy grains; and marua (Eleusine ooracana), gora (Panicum miliare) are about to be harvested. The aim of the festival is to ward off the evil eye and evil attention of spirits on crops standing in the fields. On the next day of Kadlota, the Karam is celebrated. The Karam is the festival of women and specially of the maidens. But married daughters also come to their parent’s house to celebrate this festival. Many maidens in the preceding nine days of the festival keep sprinkling water on the barley seeds for germination in their dor­mitories and avoid having any flesh, fish or crab, during this period. This is the principal Karam festival and other forms of Karam festival are also celebrated at different Oraon vil­lages. Some of them are Dasai Karam celebrated on the full moon day of Dushara, a Hindu festival; Sohorai Karam in connection with sohorai festival, and Jitia Karam during jitia festival. The Oraon also celebrate Burhi Karam once in three years or in case of drought or pandemic. Old women take part in it. Burhi Karam is celebrated like the main Karam festival with the exception that no telling of stories by pahan or any elder in order to omit the epidemic disease takes place.

The jitia⁷ festival, a festival of mothers, although borrowed from the Hindu community, is celebrated after 12 days of Karam festival. It is not regarded as a common festival; rather women celebrate it in groups at someone's house or in a courtyard area in turns. However, in many villages, in this festival rice gruel is offered to the ancestor spirits of the family in the individual houses separately. In this festival only a Brahman priest is called to perform the ritual and tell the jitia story at night.

The dhanbuni puja, the local name for the sowing festival, is celebrated in a few Oraon villages along with the bangari (marriage ceremony of paddy seedlings), the marriage of the paddy seedlings at the time of transplantation. The festival for eating the new rice, Nawa Khani is one of the important festivals celebrated only among the Oraon without inclusion of any other villagers. The festival is marked with chiura (flattened rice) making by pahan or pujari’s wife at home with the upland rice collected by their husband from the neighbouring village. This is shared with all the prominent Oraon elders of the villages along with rice

beer and after that individual household celebrates this festival by making chiura at their own home and sharing it with rice beer with Oraon friends, neighbours and relatives (Roy & Haddon 1915). The last agricultural festival is the kharapuja or kharihani (threshing floor) puja, celebrated in the month of Aghan (November-December) as the festival of the threshing floor. An Oraon prepares their own threshing floor only after pahan has prepared his own threshing floor and the community khara puja is performed in the village. After pahan, bhuinhar family of the village and then each khunt perform the kharapuja at own khunt’s threshing floor by sacrificing fowls to khunt spirits. The threshing floor is prepared by cleaning some tanr or some waste land or rocky land with cow dung diluted water.

The danda-katta ceremony is an important part of Oraon rites and rituals in almost every occasion like birth, marriage, and death of an individual; it is performed during each festival and community feasts as well. Secondly karsa-dance⁸ which is a symbol of prosper­ity, happiness, and social solidarity is performed in festivals and also at individual’s critical life events. For the periodic community festivals like sarhul, kadlota, khairhani, kariari, etc., as a custom, pahan provides rice and home-brewed rice beer for the sacrificial ceremonies and the feast.

7.1.3 Deities and Spirits

All spirits and deities are categorised into ten different classes of supernatural powers in Oraon religion. The supernatural world arranged in a hierarchical order by the Oraon con­sists of objectifying the impersonal forces of nature, personifying the supernatural entities, and, most importantly, individualising it.

The highest status of divinity is ascribed to Dharmesh⁹, and the Oraon regard Him as Creator of universe, and Author, Preserver, Controller, and Punisher of all those that exist in the universe, either visible or invisible; men, gods, and spirits. Various classes of spirits are associated with different rites on the occasion of important life-cycle stages of an Oran’s life and also during the festivals. For example, danda-katta (name of a ritual) is performed only for Dharmesh during festival and other occasions to ward off the evil and mischievous spirits. Many festivals are specially related to a particular class of spirits. Annual harbora (bone immersion) ceremony is very important for ancestor spirits for their inclusion into the community of the Pach-Balar (the group of ancestral spirits). In this ceremony the bones of dead in the course of the year are ceremonially drowned in the clan kundi¹⁰ (burial ground). Before this ceremony, the corpse is buried either in the village masan (burial ground) or bari land (kitchen garden) attached to the deceased’s house or inside an extra hut. Influence of outside culture can be noticed in the division of ancestor spirit into beneficent and maleficent categories, throwing out the bones into pool of water, and putting up the pulkhi (memorial stone slabs), because at some point of time in the past all departed souls (included in Pach- Balar^ were regarded as mischievous by them. In the beneficent category they consider spir­its of persons who died naturally; and in maleficent category specifically spirits of women who died during pregnancy or child-birth are included.

The spirit class consists of village deities, and spirits have special significance as they have special sacred places in the villages. Chala Pachcho or Sarna Burhia (old lady of the grove) or Jhakra Burhia¹¹ comes first to whom pahan offers periodical sacrifices. The first fruit of the fields is also shared with Sarna Burhia. She occupies a special compartment, called Chala-Kutti in pahan’s house. Every Oraon village has a special sacred grove of sal trees (Shorea robusta) for this deity.

Many of these village spirits like Pat or Pat Raja, Darha, Darha-Deswali, Mahadania, Devi Mai, and Mahadeo¹² are related to the protection of villagers from sickness, epidem­ics, and other calamities. Roy has mentioned that the notion of the main spirit and minor spirits vary from village to village, and accordingly, rituals are performed. In villages hav­ing Darha-Deswali as leader spirit, a portion of upland plot, called as Darha-tonka or Darha-tanr¹³, situated near the boundary of that village, is cultivated to meet the sacrificial expenses of the spirit. The rest of the land is left fallow. The Oraon believe that displeasure of Darha causes harm to men and cattle, and to pacify it expensive and elaborate sacrificial rituals are performed. However, delay in sacrifices to Pugri Bhut¹⁴ or visit by witches is also believed to cause epidemics in the village. A dreadly spirit known as Mahadania is also a village spirit which is offered sacrifices periodically. In the past, even human sacrifices were made to this spirit in case of famine or drought.

There are also some special village spirits which are adopted by a particular village and periodical sacrifices are offered to them. Sometimes, Gairahi Bhut or Khunt Bhut or Manita Bhut (special spirit of individual family) is promoted as village spirit and the expense of offerings are derived from the Gairah Bhutaha Khet¹⁵ of that particular family. There are some minor spirits as believed by the Oraon who reside in the woods, rivers, streams, and along four boundaries of the village, and are called Garha-dhorha-chatur-siman¹⁶. Occasional sacrifices are offered to them.

Chandi is the deity of hunting and war; Achrael and Joda are the special spirits related to women. The sacrifices to Chandi are done only by unmarried male members in the month of Magh. Chandi appears in different forms on special occasions of offerings, and a pahan is not afraid of her different forms.

7.1.3.1 Achrael: The Special Spirit of Oraon Women

Achrael is the special spirit for women and is not represented by any image or symbol. Her worship is done once in one generation for the well-being of all females (married, unmarried, young, and old) of the family. All married daughters of that particular family (brother’s daughters, cousin’s daughters, and cousin sisters of the father’s side) attend this ritual along with their husbands. If any female is absent on that day, then a clod of earth is placed in the row to represent her. For unmarried daughters a clod of earth is also placed by their sides to represent their future husbands. The following morning all married women return to their houses. In some villages Achrael has a companion spirit called Joda and she is worshipped the following day for the well-being and happiness of the female members of the house.

7.1.3.2 Spirits Associated with Natural Objects and Community Symbols Certain totem symbols, village flags, village emblems, some particular natural objects like tree, tank, well, etc., certain musical instruments, and weapons are also treated as spirits in Oraon religion. In the past, few Oraon clan totem emblems received the honour of being the clan symbol of the bhuinhar of that particular village. For example, the ekka (tortoise) clan possesses wooden image of a tortoise; similarly, a village with original bhuinhars belong­ing to the lakra clan possess a wooden image of tiger. However, in recent years it changed to arbitrarily adopted emblems or the totems of the first Oraon settler of the village. It can be said that at a certain period in the past, Oraon religion was intimately associated with totemism, but now-a-days there is no evidence of religious observation of totemism apart from following the taboos attached with the clan totem.

Every village has a special pattern on its bairakh (flag) which is exclusively carried and unfurled at jatras¹⁷ by them. Whenever a fight occurs between two villages at any gathering or hunt, the Oraon believe that their bairakhs encourage them with a special sound and because of that village flags receive special offerings in a jatra meet. The wooden post near jatra ground, known as jatra khunta (the wooden post of religious significance in jatra place) also receives sacrifice of a fowl as a prayer to pass off jatra peacefully with no quar­rels and fights. Sometimes, a strong bamboo stump with good shape is carried along with a jatra flag to bring luck; it is treated as sacred in some Oraon villages because they believe that it is possessed by a strong ‘soul’.

Phallic and other sex emblems also have their place in Oraon religion; an emblem of female organ was seen in few Oraon dhumkurias (village dormitories or cultural centres). Although no religious or magical ceremonies are performed for these emblems, Oraon bachelors anoint their mandar-salas (pyramid shaped mounds of earth on some upland outside the village) with potni-mati (whitish clay) and perform ceremonial rites for Chandi spirit for her blessings of more male members in the tribe. There is another sacred emblem connected with dhumkurias, the Bull-Roarers, a wooden structure which first produces a low humming sound but soon rises to a muffled windy roaring noise. These structures are kept carefully at dhumkurias as a part of their ancient paraphernalia. It is believed that this sound scares away spirits which want to take part in their celebration and dance by possess­ing a person. Traditional Oraon ceremonially anoint every new purchased sword, shield, and musical instrument. Some even put turmeric water on new clothes before wearing them and this process is known as ‘marriage’ for that particular object. Especially for musical instruments, before using it in any ceremonial function, three vermilion marks are put on them by the women of the house on the belief that instruments produce good sound. Similar marriage ceremony is also observed before using a newly dug well or tank, taking fruit from a fruit garden, and transplanting paddy seedlings into rice-fields.

There are some trees considered sacred in Oraon religion which are not cut for use in making doors or as fuel-wood. Karam (Nauclea parvifolia) and Jitia Pipar (Ficus religiosa) trees are worshipped like neighbouring Hindu castes during Karam¹⁸ and Jitia festivals. Similarly, as neem (Azadirachta indica) wood are used in the rath (car) of Lord Jagannath, the tree is considered sacred though car festival is not their tradition. However, these taboos against trees are neglected by many due to economic stress. Sometimes, old trees of mahua (bassia latifolia) or mango are believed to be possessed by some spirits and they are also treated sacred by Oraon people. Bark, leaves, small branches, and accumulated water in tree trunks are used to cure diseases. In some Oraon villages cairn stones, known as Pathal Punji or Kudha Pakhna¹⁹, are seen along with pulkhi stones dedicated to ancestor spirits. These are built on the spots which are connected with some supernatural physical strength achieved by some Oraon people or where a tiger bites a person to death. Every passer-by puts a stone, twig, or dry leaf on these pebbles in order to suppress the spirit so that it can­not harm the passers-by. After a long time, the stack of these pebbles looks like the remains of human beings or their weapon and is regarded as sacred by Oraon. Sometimes, these stone objects are really the remains of some ancient Hindu temples and images of Hindu Gods. These are anointed with oil and vermillion occasionally.

The spirits of persons who met unnatural deaths (like women who died during child birth, a person who died due to starvation or by tiger) and certain water spirits known as Sat Bahini (seven sisters) along with stray disease causing spirits are called Bhulas (tramp spirits). These spirits are not entitled to religious rituals; but magical rites and exorcism are performed. The Oraon people believe that earth is full of spirits as the trees are full of leaves. So, they try to enter into a friendly relationship with disease causing spirits. In case an important spirit is offended and brings some disease, the sorcerer performs the magic to expel them.

Next comes the class of pugri bhuts and dain kuri (a female spirit) which are secretly adopted by some individuals for selfish and anti-social purposes. A pugri bhut is adopted by a wizard or dain kuri bhut by a witch. If a mati (spirit doctor or sorcerer) reveals the name of the bhut in case of frequent disease in a family or area then the village panch compel that particular person to provide asthan, a fixed seat, by planting a wooden peg. In case of more than one pugri bhut, incisions are marked on the wooden peg corresponding to each one.

The last one, i.e. the tenth class of spirit consists of the mysterious occult energies includ­ing the evil eye, evil mouth, evil influence, evil touch, and evil sound. Some plants and objects are believed to have some mysterious energies or manna. There is also a belief that an iron exposed during sun-eclipse, if worn, then lighting strokes and certain other calami­ties are averted.

7.1.4 Oraon’s Standard of Morality and Belief in a Supreme Deity

Among the Oraon, Dharmesh, the Supreme God is believed to be the guardian of morality and punishes with sickness, death, or other calamity for any violation. The Oraon’s stand­ard of morality is determined by their customs and tradition. The elders of each Oraon village and parha are the recognised custodians of their customs and traditions. According to the customary tribal code of morality, quarrelling with fellow tribes, seducing other’s wives, not paying one’s debts, etc. are offenses and violators are punished by Dharmesh. These customs also prescribe the expiation of certain offenses against social laws, e.g. the sacrificing of a white cock or white goat to Dharmesh. This code of morality has been highly influenced by contact with other cultures and standard of living practices, especially by the new generation. However, anti-social practices like causing harm to others with the help of maleficent magic or witchcraft is punished by expulsion from the community. A few years back the offender had to pay with his/her life for these crimes. The Oraon believe that people get punishment for their misdeeds in this life only, not in the after-life. However, in some cases they also believe that a son has to pay for the sins committed by his parents.

7.2