Traditional Village of Uttarakhand: An in-depth study (Part- III)

Author: Kiran Yadav and Dr. Neelam Bhardwaj

GBPUAT, Pantnagar

Note: The description given here is based on the actual study conducted in one of the remote villages of district Nainital. Only a part of the whole study is given here. The second author is the Professor, in Department of Agricultural Communication at GBPUAT, and the study was conducted in her guidance.

Dress and language

          The people of hill areas wear traditional dresses on special occasions. Men commonly wear pajama and kurta but now a days pant, shirts are common in use. While women wear saree and blouse. During occasions like marriage, namkaran sanskar, pooja, katha etc. women necessarily wear a special dress known as 'Pichhora' (a type of dupatta, which is in two colours with yellow background and red dots). Earlier, Haldi (turmeric) was used for the yellow colour along with vermillion for red colour. Now days, readymade fancy pichhoras are very common. A big nath (nose ring) is also popular and common among women. Nath is considered as the symbol of their prosperity. While working, women tie their sarees in such a way that it is hardly exposed to dirt and does not hinder their work. Young boys and girls started wearing jeans, T-shirts and salwar- kameez respectively. Kumauni is the common dialect in the village but young girls and boys speak Hindi too. Since the researcher was an outsider and she did not know how to speak in Kumauni the people interacted with her in Hindi.

Food habits

          Rice, wheat and pulses are commonly used food grains. Women mostly cook daal-bhatt (pulse-rice) early in the morning. Sometimes roti (wheat bread) and sabzi (vegetables) is also cooked with or in place of daal-bhatt, afterwards they either move to the fields for work or to the forest for collecting firewood, fodder etc. the food prepared in the morning is used for both breakfast and lunch. There is no separate shop for vegetables. Vegetables are generally sold at the same shop where other goods are sold. During different seasons brinjal, pumpkin, potato, bottle guard, chilly, lai-leaf and gaderi (locally available vegetables) etc. are grown in by the women in their small kitchen gardens.

          Most of the villagers including some of the young girls and almost all the women are non-vegetarian. Occasionally they cook mutton, chicken and eggs at their homes. Some housewives in the village are purely vegetarian in food habit while their male members have to use separate utensils to prepare non-vegetarian dishes. Some of the elderly women and widows of the village usually do not eat meat, eggs, garlic, onion and some of the specific pulses like 'maas ki daal' (Urad) and vegetables like brinjal. Tea is mostly used drink among the villagers. Tea is popularly called as 'Adrak-paani' by the villagers. About 4-5 cups of tea is consumed everyday by an individual at each household.