Editing Thuggee (section)

==History==
[[File:Thugs About To Strangle Traveller.jpg|right|thumb|A watercolour by an unknown Indian artist from the early 19th century purporting to show a group of Thugs in the process of distracting a traveller on a highway in India while he is about to be strangled with a [[Strangling#Ligature strangulation|ligature]].]]
[[File:Thugs Strangling Traveller.jpg|thumb|250px|alt=See caption|Watercolour (1837) by unknown artist of three Thugs strangling a traveller; one holds his feet, another his hands and a third tightens the ligature around his neck. Created in [[Lucknow]], based on descriptions from imprisoned Thuggee leaders (Dash, 2005)]]
[[File:Thugs_and_poisoners.jpg|thumb|''Hindoo thugs and poisoners'' - By Mr. W. Carpenter]]

=== Origins ===
There were numerous traditions about their origin: 
* One theory stated the Thuggee existed back to 1760. Based on genealogies which were recounted by some thugs, historian [[Mike Dash]] stated that the origin of the Thuggee can be dated back to the second half of the 17th century. A general consensus among them was that they originated in Delhi. A Thuggee named Gholam Hossyn who was caught in early 1800s stated that his accomplices believed that thugs had existed since the time of [[Alexander the Great]]. Another tradition among Thugs who lived in the early 1800s stated that they had lived in Delhi till the time of [[Akbar]] and consisted of seven great [[Muslim]] clans, although they had [[Hindu]] names, during the period. After one of them killed a favoured slave of Akbar, they left Delhi for other regions to avoid being targeted by the emperor.<ref name="Mike Dash 28, 36 & 37"/> 
* The earliest known reference to the Thugs as a band or fraternity, rather than ordinary thieves, is found in Ziau-d din Barni's ''History of Firoz Shah'' (written about 1356).<ref name="brit">{{cite web|url=http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/594263/thug|title=Thug – Indian bandit|website=Britannica.com|access-date=1 October 2017}}</ref> He narrated an incident of the sultan [[Jalal-ud-din Khalji]] having arrested 1,000 Thugs, and expelling them to the [[Gauḍa (city)|Lakhnauti]].<ref name="Martine van Woerkens 2002 110">{{cite book|author=Martine van Woerkens|title=The Strangled Traveler: Colonial Imaginings and the Thugs of India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5HPc_EgwUg8C&pg=PA110|year=2002|publisher=University of Chicago Press|isbn=9780226850856|page=110}}</ref> At first, Jalal-ud-din took a lenient attitude towards the Thuggees as he thought he could make them obedient with a softer approach. However, this approach proved counter productive according to modern historian Syama Prasad Basu, and encouraged insolence towards the Sultan.<ref name="Rise and Fall of Khilji Imperialism; 33">{{cite book |author1=Syama Prasad Basu |title=Rise and Fall of Khilji Imperialism |date=1963 |publisher=U. N. Dhur |series=History of the Khilji rulers of India, 1290-1320. |page=33 }}</ref>
* [[Donald Friell McLeod]] theorised the Thuggee members originated from some Muslim tribes formed from those who fled Delhi after murdering a physician. Another source traced it to some great Muslim families who fled after murdering a favored slave of Akbar.<ref name="Mike Dash 28, 36 & 37">{{cite book|first=Mike|last=Dash|title=Thuggee: Banditry and the British in Early Nineteenth-Century India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0XMfasdSA9EC&pg=PA36|date=3 February 2011|publisher=Granta|pages=28, 36 & 37|isbn=978-1-84708-473-6}}</ref> According to this view, the original Muslim Thugs spread Thuggee amongst Hindus.{{sfn|Wagner|2007|pp=154-155}}
* Another tradition preserved by the Thuggee clan members stated that they were [[Kanjar]]s or descended from those who worked in the Mughal camps.{{sfn|Wagner|2007|p=92}} <ref name="Martine van Woerkens 136">{{cite book|author=Martine van Woerkens|title=The Strangled Traveler: Colonial Imaginings and the Thugs of India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EiSYciTbyc4C&pg=PA136|date=3 February 2011|publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]]|page=136|isbn=978-0-226-85086-3}}</ref><ref name="Mike Dash 37">{{cite book|first=Mike|last=Dash|title=Thuggee: Banditry and the British in Early Nineteenth-Century India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0XMfasdSA9EC&pg=PA37|date=3 February 2011|publisher=Granta|page=37|isbn=9781847084736}}</ref> A Thuggee member has testified that some of his predecessors were forced to disguise themselves as members of the Kanjar tribe after fleeing Delhi, although they were originally descended from certain [[Caste system among South Asian Muslims|high-caste Muslim]] tribes. The said Thuggee, however, stated that their claimed descent was unverified and that some of them may be partially descended from the lower castes who worked in the [[Mughal army]]'s camps. However, Mike Dash stated that the Thuggee's claim of being closed to outsiders is contradicted by the fact that people of all backgrounds were allowed to join them by the early 19th century according to available evidence.<ref name="Mike Dash 37"/> A Brahmin Thuggee who was interrogated by British Raj counselor [[William Henry Sleeman]] referred to the Muslim Thuggees as [[Kanjar]] tribesmen. However, another member of Thuggee refuted this.<ref name="Martine van Woerkens 136"/>
* [[Donald Friell McLeod]], Lieutenant Governor of [[Punjab Province (British India)|Punjab Province]], who led the campaign against them in the [[Rajputana Agency]], recorded the traditions of their origins. According to them, they were originally Muslims and were taught Thuggee by the deity [[Devi]] or Bhavani. They then joined the [[Lodha people]] and migrated to Delhi, where 84 tribes—which were a part of all the criminal clans of India—also became a part of the Thugs. A physician who belonged to these 84 tribes gained prominence after curing a royal elephant and was murdered by other Thugs. A schism developed and they left Delhi, which in turn resulted in the existence of seven Muslim tribes. According to McLeod, these tribes were named Bhyns, Bursot, Kachinee, Hutar, Kathur Gugra, Behleem and Ganoo. According to him, the thugs from Delhi were separated into more than 12 "classes".{{sfn|Wagner|2007|p=112}}

=== 16th century onwards ===
[[File:Group of Thugs (From a Photograph).jpg|thumb|Group of Thugs (From a Photograph)]]

In the 16th century [[Surdas]], in his allegorical couplet, mentioned robbers called "thags" who would lure victims into their clutches to kill them and steal their property. [[Ibn Battuta]], on his way to [[Calicut]] from Delhi as an envoy to [[Yuan dynasty|China]], was attacked by bandits, who probably were thugs.<ref>{{harvnb|Dunn|2005|p=215}}; {{harvnb|Gibb|Beckingham|1994|p=777 Vol. 4}}</ref> The [[Janamsakhis]] used the term thag to refer to a robber who used to lure pilgrims. [[Jean de Thévenot]] in his 1665 account referred to a band of robbers who used a "certain Slip with a running noose" to strangle their victims. [[John Fryer (FRS)|John Fryer]] also mentions a similar method of strangling used by robbers from [[Surat]] whom he saw being given capital punishment by the [[Mughal Empire|Mughals]] in 1675. He mentioned that three of them were relatives, which [[Kim A. Wagner]] notices is similar to the Thugs who were thought to have engaged in this as a family profession. A decree issued by [[Aurangzeb]] in 1672 refers to a similar method and uses the term "Phansigar".{{sfn|Wagner|2007|p=26-28}}

The [[garrote]] is often depicted as a weapon of the Thuggee.<ref name="Popplewell1995">{{cite book|author=Richard James Popplewell|title=Intelligence and imperial defence: British intelligence and the defence of the Indian Empire, 1904–1924|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=H44J2uDSE2cC&pg=PA11|access-date=16 April 2011|year=1995|publisher=Frank Cass|isbn=978-0-7146-4580-3|page=11}}</ref><ref name="GreshWeinberg2008">{{cite book|first1=Lois H.|last1=Gresh|first2=Robert|last2=Weinberg|title=Why Did It Have To Be Snakes: From Science to the Supernatural, The Many Mysteries of Indiana Jones|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tAc7BESPBYkC&pg=PA104|access-date=16 April 2011|date=4 April 2008|publisher=John Wiley and Sons|isbn=978-0-470-22556-1|pages=104–107}}</ref> Other evidences suggest that the [[katar (dagger)]] was their personal status weapon, the Thuggee wore this weapon proudly across their chest. Early references to Thugs reported they committed their strangulation murders with nooses of rope or [[catgut]], but later they adopted the use of a length of cloth that could be used as a sash or scarf, and thus more easily concealed.<ref name="mikedash">[[Mike Dash|Dash, Mike]] ''Thug: the true story of India's murderous cult'' {{ISBN|1-86207-604-9}}, 2005</ref> This cloth is sometimes described as a [[rumāl]] (head covering or kerchief), translated as "yellow scarf"; "yellow", in this case, may refer to a natural cream or khaki colour rather than bright yellow.

[[File:Thugs Blinding and Mutilating Traveller.JPG|thumb|250px|alt=See caption|Sketch by the same artist of a group of Thugs stabbing the eyes of murdered travellers before throwing the bodies into a well.]]

The Thuggees preferred to use the method of strangulation in order to take advantage of loopholes in civil law which persisted from the times of the [[Mughal Empire]], which ruled most of India from the 1500s.<ref name="mikedash"/> For a murderer to be sentenced to death, he or she must have shed the blood of their victim. Those who murdered but did not shed blood might face imprisonment, hard labor and paying a penalty—but they would not risk execution.{{citation needed|date=July 2024}}

The "River Thugs" preyed upon people including Hindu pilgrims travelling using the [[Ganga]] river and became mostly active during the winter like their compatriots from Murnae, [[Bundelkhand]] and [[Awadh]]. Their dialect of Ramasee differed from the one used by their compatriots on land and used boats taken on lease from their builders or from a jemadar called Khuruck Baboo. Sleeman states that they tapped three times to give the signal to murder which they always committed during the day. To avoid detection of a corpse, they broke its back and threw it in the river to be eaten by crocodiles and only robbed money or jewels.<ref>{{cite book|first=Mike|last=Dash|title=Thuggee: Banditry and the British in Early Nineteenth-Century India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0XMfasdSA9EC&pg=PA247|date=3 February 2011|publisher=Granta|page=247; 248; 249|isbn=9781847084736}}</ref>

===British suppression===
{{See also|Thuggee and Dacoity Suppression Acts, 1836–48}}
[[File:The_Thugs_of_India_-_Halt_at_the_Shrine_of_Ganesh,_by_August_Schoefft,_ca.1841.jpg|thumb|The Thugs of India: ''Halt at the Shrine of Ganesh'', by August Schoefft, c.1841]]
[[File:Thuggees typically strangled their victims during the night, image from ‘Confessions of a Thug’.jpg|thumb|Thugs typically strangled their victims during the night, image from ''[[Confessions of a Thug (novel)|Confessions of a Thug]]'' (1839), by [[Philip Meadows Taylor]]]]
The British found out about them in [[Southern India]] for the first time in 1807, while in [[North India|Northern India]] they were discovered in 1809 with an effort to suppress them being carried out from 1809 to 1812.{{sfn|Wagner|2007|pp=7-8}}

[[File:William-Henry-Sleeman.jpg|thumb|alt=Portrait of a middle-aged man in uniform|[[William Henry Sleeman]], superintendent of the Thuggee and Dacoity Department]]

After a dispute developed between the [[Zamindar]] official named Tejun with a Thuggee named Ghasee Ram in 1812, the latter took refuge with his family under another landlord called Laljee. Tejun in turn revealed the thugs of Sindouse to Nathaniel Halhed.{{sfn|Wagner|2007|p=167}} Thomas Perry, the magistrate of [[Etawah]], assembled some soldiers of the [[East India Company]] under the command of Halheld in 1812 to suppress the Thugs.<ref>{{cite book|first=Mike|last=Dash|title=Thuggee: Banditry and the British in Early Nineteenth-Century India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0XMfasdSA9EC&pg=PA44|date=3 February 2011|publisher=Granta|page=193|isbn=9781847084736}}</ref> Laljee and his forces including over 100 Thugs were defeated, with the village of Murnae, a headquarter of the Thugs, destroyed and burnt by the Company soldiers.<ref>{{cite book|first=Mike|last=Dash|title=Thuggee: Banditry and the British in Early Nineteenth-Century India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0XMfasdSA9EC&pg=PA48|date=3 February 2011|publisher=Granta|page=48|isbn=9781847084736}}</ref> Laljee fled to [[Rampura, Jalaun|Rampura]] and the southern banks of [[Sindh River]] but was caught by the Marathas who turned him over to the company.<ref>{{cite book|first=Mike|last=Dash|title=Thuggee: Banditry and the British in Early Nineteenth-Century India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0XMfasdSA9EC&pg=PA49|date=3 February 2011|publisher=Granta|page=49|isbn=9781847084736}}</ref>{{sfn|Wagner|2007|p=168}}

British authorities had occasionally captured and prosecuted Thugs, circulating information about these cases in newsletters or the journal ''Asiatick Researches'' of [[The Asiatic Society]]. However, Sleeman seems to have been the first to realize that information obtained from one group of stranglers might be used to track and identify other thugs in a different district. His first major breakthrough was the capture of "Feringhea" (also known as Syeed Amir Ali, Khuda Buksh, Deahuct Undun and Daviga Persaud<ref name="David Scott Katsan 2006 141"/>), who was persuaded to [[Turn state's evidence|turn King's evidence]]. (Feringhea's story was the basis of the successful 1839 novel ''[[Confessions of a Thug (novel)|Confessions of a Thug]]''). Feringhea brought Sleeman to a mass grave with a hundred bodies, told him the circumstances of the murders and named the Thugs who had committed them.<ref name=Twain>{{cite book
|url=http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2895
|title= Following the Equator
|access-date= 27 February 2011
|last= Twain
|first= Mark
|author-link= Samuel Clemens
|date= 18 August 2006
|format=ASCII
|publisher=Project Gutenberg
}}</ref>

After initial investigations confirmed what Feringhea had said, Sleeman began an extensive campaign using [[Offender profiling|profiling]] and intelligence. Sleeman was made superintendent of the [[Thuggee and Dacoity Department]] in 1835, an organ of the Indian government first established by the [[East India Company]] in 1830.<ref>{{cite book|first=Giriraj|last=Shah|title=Image Makers: An Attitudinal Study of Indian Police|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0sHAmkBpUoIC&pg=PA52|access-date=15 September 2019|date=1 January 1993|publisher=Abhinav Publications|isbn=978-81-7017-295-6|page=52}}</ref> ([[Dacoity]] referred to organised [[banditry]], distinguished from thugs most notably by its open practice and due to the fact that murder was not an intrinsic element of their ''modus operandi''.) Sleeman developed elaborate intelligence techniques that pre-dated similar methods in Europe and the US by decades.<ref name="mikedash" /> During the 1830s, the thugs were targeted for eradication by the [[Governor-General of India]], [[Lord William Bentinck]], and his chief captain, [[William Henry Sleeman]].{{citation needed|date=July 2024}}

Records were made in which the accused were given prisoner numbers, against which their names, residences, fellow thugs, and the criminal acts for which they were blamed were also noted. Many thugs' names were similar; they often lacked surnames since the Thuggee naming convention was to use the names of their tribes, castes and job assignments in the gangs. Accurate recording was also difficult because the thugs adopted many aliases, with both Muslim and Hindu thugs often posing as members of the other religion. By the testimony from a Thuggee named Ghulam Hussain, Hindu and Muslim Thuggees avoided eating together, such was not the case for drinking and smoking.<ref name="Mike Dash 193"/><ref name="David Scott Katsan 2006 141"/>

The campaign relied heavily on captured thugs who became informants. These informants were offered protection on the condition that they told everything that they knew. According to historian [[Mike Dash]], who used documents in the UK archives, suspects were subject to [[bench trial]]s before British judges. Though the trials were lacking by later standards (e.g., suspects were not allowed legal representation), they were conducted with care to protocols of the time. While most suspects were convicted, Dash notes that the courts genuinely seemed interested in finding the truth and rejected a minority of allegations due to mistaken identity or insufficient evidence. Even by later standards, Dash argues, the evidence of guilt for many thugs was often overwhelming.<ref name="mikedash" /> Because they used boats and disposed of their victims in rivers,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sleeman |first1=Sir William Henry |title=The Thugs or Phansigars of India: comprising a history of the rise and progress of that extraordinary fraternity of assassins; and a description of the system which it pursues, and of the measures which have been adopted by the supreme government of India for its suppression, Vol. 2 |date=1839 |publisher=Carey & Hart |page=159 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=07UiAAAAMAAJ&q=river+thugs&pg=PA159 |access-date=15 September 2019 |language=en}}</ref> the "River Thugs" were able to evade the British authorities for some time after their compatriots on land were suppressed. They were ultimately betrayed to the authorities by one of their compatriots, from Awadh. Forces under Sleeman's command hunted them down in 1836.<ref name="Mike Dash 249">{{cite book|first=Mike|last=Dash|title=Thuggee: Banditry and the British in Early Nineteenth-Century India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0XMfasdSA9EC&pg=PA249|date=3 February 2011|publisher=Granta|page=249|isbn=9781847084736}}</ref>

In 1870s the practice of thuggee was thought to have ceased. However, the history of Thuggee led to the [[Criminal Tribes Act]] (CTA) of 1871. Although the CTA was repealed at [[Partition of India|Indian independence]] in 1947, [[Denotified Tribes|tribes considered criminal]] still exist in India.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/hinduism/history/thugs.shtml |title=Thugs Traditional View |access-date=17 September 2007 |format=shtml |publisher=BBC |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20071017065206/http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/hinduism/history/thugs.shtml <!-- Bot retrieved archive --> |archive-date = 17 October 2007}}</ref><ref>[https://www.theguardian.com/books/2005/jun/11/featuresreviews.guardianreview3 Sinister sects: Thug, Mike Dash's investigation into the gangs who preyed on travellers in 19th-century India] by Kevin Rushby, ''[[The Guardian]]'', Saturday, 11 June 2005.</ref> The Thuggee and Dacoity Department remained in existence until 1904, when it was replaced by the [[Central Criminal Intelligence Department]] (CID).{{sfn|Rost|1911}}

In ''[[Following the Equator]]'', [[Mark Twain]] wrote about an 1839 government report by William Henry Sleeman:<ref name=Twain/>

{{Quote|There is one very striking thing which I wish to call attention to. You have surmised from the listed callings followed by the victims of the Thugs that nobody could travel the Indian roads unprotected and live to get through; that the Thugs respected no quality, no vocation, no religion, nobody; that they killed every unarmed man that came in their way. That is wholly true—with one reservation. In all the long file of Thug confessions an English traveller is mentioned but once—and this is what the Thug says of the circumstance:
{{Quote|"''He was on his way from [[Mhow]] to [[Bombay]]. We studiously avoided him. He proceeded next morning with a number of travellers who had sought his protection, and they took the road to [[Baroda]]''."}}

We do not know who he was; he flits across the page of this rusty old book and disappears in the obscurity beyond; but he is an impressive figure, moving through that valley of death serene and unafraid, clothed in the might of the English name.

We have now followed the big official book through, and we understand what Thuggee was, what a bloody terror it was, what a desolating scourge it was. In 1830 the English found this cancerous organization embedded in the vitals of the empire, doing its devastating work in secrecy, and assisted, protected, sheltered, and hidden by innumerable confederates—big and little native chiefs, customs officers, village officials, and native police, all ready to lie for it, and the mass of the people, through fear, persistently pretending to know nothing about its doings; and this condition of things had existed for generations, and was formidable with the sanctions of age and old custom. If ever there was an unpromising task, if ever there was a hopeless task in the world, surely it was offered here—the task of conquering Thuggee. But that little handful of English officials in India set their sturdy and confident grip upon it, and ripped it out, root and branch! How modest do Captain Vallancey's words sound now, when we read them again, knowing what we know:
{{Quote|"''The day that sees this far-spread evil completely eradicated from India, and known only in name, will greatly tend to immortalise British rule in the East''."}}

It would be hard to word a claim more modestly than that for this most noble work.|Chapter xlvi, conclusion}}