Page:The Imperial Gazetteer of India - Volume 2 (2nd edition).pdf/376

 BHANDARA.

366

Mandla by Hatta and Kamtha. In i88i, 142,503 carts laden with and merchandise from the Chhatti'sgarh country paid duty at the toll gates on the Great Eastern Road. In 1877, the year of the grain

famine

in

week.

It

Southern India, as many as 36,000 carts paid toll in a single was mainly by this road that the plentiful food crops of

1876 and 1877 were made available for the famineand the Deccan. In 1881 there were Small country carts and pack-bullocks supply 58 miles of made roads. The rocky barriers in the the means of carrying on the existing traffic. bed of the Wainganga at Chichgaon, and in the bed of the Bagh at Chhatti'sgarh in

stricken tracts of Southern India

Satona, limit the water communication during the rains to the interior

The

of the District.

boats employed on these rivers consist of large

logs of teak scooped out

garh

now

District,

and lashed

The

Nagpur-Chhatti's-

(1883)

the District at Dhaivvara, by

^Vainganga. (fdk

together.

approaching completion, intersects the passing Bhandara town at a distance of 6^ miles. It enters

railway,

means of a

fine girder bridge across the

then proceeds to Tirora, Gondia (where there

It

is

a

bungalow), and Ambgaon, and passes through the Darckasa tunnel,

After leaving the hills, it near a beautiful waterfall. on the plains of Chhattisgarh at Dongargarh. In 1854, Bhandara was formed into a separate Adtninistration It is District of the British Government of the Central Provinces. administered by a Deputy Commissioner, with assistants and tahsUddrs. Revenue in 1868-69 Land revenue, ;^4o,894; stamps, ^3775 assessed taxes, ^5051; and forests, ^2553Lhe excise, ;^5592 settlement of land revenue for the District was concluded in 1867, and the low rate at which it was fixed has greatly encouraged cultivaThe payment is made by two instalments, in April and January. tion. In 1876-77, the total revenue amounted to ;^57,526, of which the land

750

feet long,

enters

.

—

—



1

revenue yielded ^'40,681. Total revenue in 1880-81, ^68,470, of which ^40,403 was derived from the land. Under the Maratha reign there were no established courts of law, but the pdtels administered

own idea of what was right. In succession determined the law to be followed. Suits exceedBoth ing ;j^ioo in value, however, generally came before the Raja. plaintiff and defendant paid to the Government a fee of one-fourth. Among the lower classes the heads of castes, styled setyds, and on an

justice according to their cases, the nationality

The plaintiff provided appeal an assembly of setyds, decided civil cases. victuals and tobacco, or if a Gond, liquor, for the court ; and an image of Mahadeva set upon a platform gave the sanctity of an oath to any statement there made. cation of goods,

Thieves and burglars were punished by

imprisonment

in

irons, or

confis-

detention in the stocks.

Second offences incurred mutilation of hands, nose, and fingers. Women who murdered their husbands generally had their noses