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Palanquin (Palki) a box-litter or sedan
for travelling in, with a pole projecting before and behind, which is
borne on the shoulders of two, four or even eight bearers of special caste
or class. The origin of the word is sanskrit
palayanka (a bed). Its pali
form is palanka and Hindi and Bangla, palki. The Portuguese
are said to have added a nasal termination to any of these words and called
it palanquin. There is a reference to palki in the ramayana.
ibn batuta
had personally used palki and so did the traveller of the same time, John
Maignolli (c 1350). Palki was one of the means for troop movements during
akbar's
reign and after.
It was a fashion on the part of the pre-modern aristocratic and
affluent people to move in palanquins, which were of many sizes
and designs. The smallest and most austere one was called doli,
which was borne by two persons only. The larger palanquins
were borne by four to eight persons.
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Palanquin
(early 19th century)
Courtesy: Peabody
Museum, USA |
The European traders in Bengal in the 17th and 18th centuries
extensively used palanquin in visiting hats and bazaars and also
in carrying their cargo. They got so much used to the palanquin mode of
transport that even a newcomer who joined as a writer in the company's
service at a very nominal salary indulged himself in buying a palki and
maintaining an establishment for it. This was identified as a problem
since the habit of a person to buy palki was something that could lead
to other pernicious habits. In response to the problem the Court of Directors
issued an order in 1758 that prohibited the writers from buying and maintaining
palanquins. The fact only indicates that palki was in those days what
a motor car is today. In the pre-steamer and railway era, even the governor
general often found it acceptable to move in palanquin.
In the early nineteenth century, the postal department
introduced stage palanquin for mail and passengers and the system continued
down to the later part of the nineteenth century. Long distance passengers
used to buy stage palki tickets from the post office. By the mid-nineteenth
century, the Europeans by and large stopped using palanquins. But until
the end of the nineteenth century, the babus and aristocratic natives
commonly used palanquins as their means of transport. The palanquin used
by rabindranath
tagore in his visits to his zamindari kachari at Shilaidaha
is still preserved there at the Tagore Kuthibari. The affluent people
normally owned palanquins, which were borne mainly by their slaves, and
the general people used it on hire.
With the abolition of slavery, the palki labours began to come from Bihar, Orissa, Chotanagpur and Central Provinces from the first quarter of the nineteenth century. Many santals sold their labour locally as palanquin bearers. They came from their homelands during the dry season and mostly left their spots on the onset of the monsoon rains. They had more or less fixed places to visit at the end of the rainy season every year and made their temporary huts at some public or private place.
Palanquin as a mode of transport began to decline from
the mid-nineteenth century when steamer and rail communications started
and general transportation began to improve. With the development of roads
and highways and increasing use of animal carts and carriages the palanquin
as a means of transport faced extinction. The introduction of rickshaw
in the 1930s had, in fact, ousted it from the urban areas. The ever expanding
communication network, introduction of motorised vehicles in land and
waters all over the country, and the popularity of pedalled rickshaw have
now made palki an institution of the past. [Sirajul Islam]
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