Kondaikatti.—The name of a sub-division of Vellālas, meaning those who tie the whole mass of hair of the head (kondai) in a knot on the top of the head, as opposed to the kudumi or knot at the back of the partially shaved head.
Kondaita.—A sub-division of Doluva.
Kondaiyamkottai.—A sub-division of Maravan.
Kondalar.—Recorded, in the Madras Census Report, 1901, as a sub-caste of Vellāla. Kondalam means women’s hair or a kind of dance, and it is possible that the name was returned by people of the Dēva-dāsi caste, who are rising in the social scale, and becoming absorbed in the Vellāla caste. Kondali, of doubtful meaning, has been returned by cultivators and agricultural labourers in North Arcot.
Kondh.—In the Administration Report of the Ganjam Agency, 1902–3, Mr. C. B. Cotterell writes that Kondh is an exact transliteration from the vernacular, and he knows of no reason, either sentimental or etymological, for keeping such spelling as Khond.
It is noted, in the Madras Census Report, 1891, that “the Khonds inhabit the hill tracts of Ganjam and parts of Vizagapatam, and are found also in Bengal and the Central Provinces. They call themselves Kui, a name identical with the Koi or Koya of the Godāvari agency and the south of the Jeypore Zemindāri. The Telugu people call them Kōtuvāndlu. The origin of the name Khond is doubtful, but Macpherson is, I think, right in deriving it from Telugu Konda, a hill. There is a tribe in Vizagapatam called Konda Dora or Konda Kāpu, and these people are also frequently called Kōtuvāndlu. All these names are derivatives of the root kô or kû, a mountain. The number of sub-divisions returned is 58. The list includes many names of other castes, a fact which must be in part ascribed to the impossibility of distinguishing the true Khonds from persons returned as Kondavāndlu, Kondalu, Kōtuvāndlu, etc., terms which mean simply highlanders, and are applicable to all the hill tribes. For example, 12,164 Pānos have returned their main caste as Khond.”
In a note on the Kui, Kandhī, or Khond language, Mr. G. A. Grierson writes as follows.[154] “The Kandhs or Khonds are a Dravidian tribe in the hills of Orissa and neighbouring districts. The tribe is commonly known under the name of Khond. The Oriyās call them Kandhs, and the Telugu people Gōnds or Kōds. The name which they use themselves is Ku, and their language should accordingly be denominated Kui. The word Ku is probably related to Kōī, one of the names by which the Gōnds used to denote themselves. The Kōī dialect of Gōndi is, however, quite different from Kui. The Khonds live in the midst of the Oriyā territory. Their habitat is the hills separating the districts of Ganjam and Vizagapatam in the Madras Presidency, and continuing northwards into the Orissa Tributary States, Bōd, Daspalla, and Nayagarh, and, crossing the Mahānadi, into Angul and the Khondmals. The Khond area further extends into the Central Provinces, covering the northern part Kalahandi, and the south of Patna. Kui is surrounded on all sides by Oriyā. Towards the south it extends towards the confines of the Telugu territory. The language varies locally, all over this area. The differences are not, however, great, though a man from one part of the country often experiences difficulty in understanding the Kui spoken in other parts. There are two principal dialects, one eastern, spoken in Gumsur and the adjoining parts of Bengal, and one western, spoken in Chinna Kimedi. In the north, Kui has come under the influence of the neighbouring Aryan forms of speech, and a specimen forwarded from the Patna State was written in Oriyā with a slight admixture of Chattisgarhī. The number of Kandhs returned at the census of 1891 was 627,388. The language returns, however, give a much smaller figure. The reason is that many Kandhs have abandoned their native speech.”
It has been noted that “the character of the Khonds varies as much as their language. Where there has been much contact with the plains, it is not as favourable as elsewhere. As a rule, they may be taken to be a bold, and fitfully laborious mountain peasantry of simple, but not undignified manners; upright in their conduct; sincere in their superstitions; proud of their position as landholders; and tenacious of their rights. The Linepada Khonds affect manners like Uriyas, and, among other things, will not eat pork (the flesh of wild pigs excepted). The Khond villages have quite the appearance of Uriya villages, the houses are built with mud walls, a thing unknown with Khonds in other parts of the Māliahs; and there is also much neat garden cultivation, which is rare elsewhere, probably because the produce thereof would be appropriated by the Uriyas. In 1902, the Linepada Muttah (settlement) presented the unusual spectacle of a Khond ruler as Dolabēhara, as well as Moliko, with the Uriya Paiks really at his beck and call. In some places, the most valuable portions of the land have passed into the possession of Sondis and low-country sowcars (money-lenders), who have pandered to the Khonds by advancing them money, the greater portion of which has been expended in drink, the repayment being exacted in land. Except in the Goomsur Māliahs, paddy (rice) cultivation is not extensively carried on by the Khonds; elsewhere it is chiefly in the hands of the Uriyas. The Khonds take little trouble in raising their crops. The result is that, except in the Goomsur Māliahs, where they grow crops to sell in the market for profit, we find a poverty-stricken race, possessing hardly any agricultural stock, and no signs of affluence. In Kimedi, however, they are beginning to follow the example of Goomsur, and doubtless their material prosperity would much increase if some check could be devised to save them from the Uriyas and Sondis, who are steadily acquiring all the wet land, and utilising the Khonds merely as cultivators.”
It is noted by Mr. F. Fawcett (1902)[155] that “up to within fifteen years ago, the Khônds of the Ganjam hills would not engage in any ordinary labour. They would not, for example, carry even the smallest article of the district officer’s luggage. Elephants were accordingly provided by Government for carriage of tents and all camp luggage. But there has come a change, and, within the last ten years or so, the Khônds have taken to work in the ordinary way. Within the last few years, for the first time, the Khônds have been emigrating to Assam, to work in the tea-gardens. Accurate figures are not available, but the estimate of the best authority gives the number as about 3,000. This emigration is now stopped by edict. Of course, they do not set out, and go of their own accord. They are taken. The strange thing is that they go willingly.” It was enacted, in an order of Government, in 1901,[156] that “in exercise of the power conferred by section 3 of the Assam Labour and Emigration Act, 1901, and with the previous sanction of the Governor-General in Council, the Governor in Council is pleased to prohibit absolutely all persons from recruiting, engaging, inducing, or assisting any Native of India to emigrate from the tracts known as the scheduled districts in the district of Ganjam to any labour district of Assam.”
In 1908, the Madras Government approved of certain proposals made by the Collector of Ganjam for utilising the services of the Kondhs in the conservancy of the forests in the Pondakhol Agency. The following is a summary of these proposals.[157] The chief difficulty to be contended against in Pondakhol is podu cultivation. This cultivation is not only devastating the hill tops and upper slopes, which should be kept well covered to preserve water for the upper reaches of the Rushikulya river, the chief source of irrigation in Ganjam, but is also the origin of most of the forest fires that rage throughout Pondakhol in the hot weather. The District Forest Officer, in discussing matters with the Kondhs, was told by some of the villagers that they would forego poduing if they had cattle to plough the lands in the plains and valleys. The supply of buffaloes would form the compensation for a right relinquished. The next aim should be to give the people work in the non-cultivation season, which is from the middle of January to the middle of July. This luckily coincides with the fire season. There is an abundance of useful work that the Kondhs can be engaged in, e.g., rendering the demarcation lines permanent, making fire lines, constructing roads, and building inspection sheds. The question arises as to how the Khonds should be repaid for their labour. Money is of little use to them in this out-of-the-way part of the country, and, if they got it, they would probably go to Surada to get drunk on it. It would be better to pay them in food-grain and cloths, and for this purpose departmental shops, and a regular system of accounts, such as are in force among the Chenchus in Kurnool, would be necessary.