Memoir on Thar and

80. There is nothing on record to show why the Desert districts were thus dislocated; the
Oomerkote, Cheelar and Guddra districts are in every respect similar to those of the
Thurr, transferred to Kutch; caste, religion, natural antipathy to their Mahomedan rulers,
all combined to cement the unity of the inhabitants of the sand hills. However, in our
previous connection with the Desert and Parkur from Kutch, the remoteness, and still
more desert nature of the Oomerkote districts, had excluded them from immediate
connection with us; and while therefore the former connection between Kutch and the
Thurr and Parkur made it natural for the inhabitants to wish to be under Kutch on the one
hand, and disposed Colonel Roberts to gratify their wish on the other, it was hardly to be
expected that he would seek to bring under his control another extensive district, simply
from its analogy and contiguity to the district he was well acquainted with; with which he
had had little or no connection, and which, from its size and distance from Kutch, he
would have had great difficulty in managing from Bhooj. * The furthest point of the
Oomerkote Desert is about 250 miles from Bhooj; and while therefore the physical aspect
of the Oomerkote Desert, and its inhabitants, is analogous to the Thurr, it remains to be
demonstrated whether any better practical arrangement than that introduced could have
been or be devised for the administration thereof.
81. The districts thus placed under the Political Agent in Kutch, have already been
described in the preceding pages of this memoir. The population at that date was very
small, not exceeding, I should suppose, 30,000 souls, while the predatory life of many of
the inhabitants, and nomadic customs and habits of others, together with the blighting and
oppressive policy of the Ameer’s officers, had had a tendency to contract cultivation, and
make people depend on their herds and flocks for their livelihood.
82. The favorable reply returned to the petition of the chiefs and others, to be placed
under Kutch, as well as His Highness the Rao’s and other Jareja chiefs’ connection by
marriage with the Desert and Parkur inhabitants, which gave them some influence there,
together with the intimate acquaintance formerly obtained of the people and their country
by Colonel Roberts, and the cordiality existing between him and His Highness the Rao
and the leading chiefs in Kutch, all tended to aid and facilitate a satisfactory settlement of
all those questions of rights and immunities which beset the executive in newly acquired
territories; nor did present appearances belie the result.
83. I shall now proceed to notice, firstly, the steps taken to provide for the police of the
districts; and secondly, the arrangements entered into with the different chiefs and heads
of tribes, &c.
* If the whole of the Desert was under Bhooj, the nearest point of the district would be 80, and the furthest
about 250 miles from the European officer's head quarters. The same objection exists to the whole being
under Meerpoor, as the Oomerkote district now is; as in that case, the nearest point would be 80, and the
furthest about 200 miles from the European officer's head quarters; while, as at present arranged, the
distance of the Thurr and Parkur—which, being doubly populous as compared with the remainder of the
Desert, is of the most consequence,—is only on an average about 110 or 120 miles distant from Bhooj, and
50 or 60 from the centre of Wagur or eastern part of Kutch, where the European officer generally resides
for some mouths in the district season.
<strong>Memoir</strong> on the Thurr and Parkur Districts of Sind. Copyright © www.panhwar.com
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