The Nagas

Hill Peoples of Northeast India

Project Introduction The Naga Database

published - extracts on Nagas from 'Assam Administration Report'

caption: Naga Hills district
caption: Relations with Tributary States and Frontier Affairs
caption: Arms Act
medium: reports
production:
date: 1890
production:
date: 1891
text: 32. The following statement gives the arms statistics for the year:-
text: Angami_______Lhota_______Kacha________Kuki________Mikir_&_Cachari
_____________________________________________________plainsmen
------------------------------------------------------------------
New_Renewed__New_Renewed__New_Renewed__New_Renewed__New_Renewed
------------------------------------------------------------------
106__165_______2____17_____23____21_____39____56_____23___235
------------------------------------------------------------------
________________________New______Renewed
______________Total_____193________494
________________________----------------
________Grand_Total_____687
________________________---
text: Of the 494 licenses issued during 1889 all were renewed during 1890, a result better than that attained during the previous year. 687 licenses in all were issued during the year. Of these 192 were new licenses. Of the new licenses, 106 were issued to Angamis. These new licenses do not, however, represent any appreciable increase in the number of guns in the district, as they were nearly all given for guns which had been in their owners' possession for some years, but which were first produced for registration during 1890. Permits to buy new guns are given to Nagas only in exceptional cases. No new license was given for any gun produced for the first time for registration without a prosecution under the Arms Act, except in the cases of Mikirs and Cacharis.
text: During the year there were 109 cases under the Arms Act in which 175 persons were punished, fines being inflicted to the amount of Rs.1,233. These fines were in nearly all cases paid away as rewards to the persons through whose instrumentality concealed guns were brought up for registration. Our Angami interpreters were specially keen in hunting up unlicensed guns and most of the guns brought in were brought in by them. During the present year, 1891, all concealed guns that are found are being confiscated and the owners punished under the Arms Act.
text: Towards the end of 1890 a rifle of the 44th Gurkha Regiment which was stolen in 1888 was recovered in the Kuki country through information given by a Khonoma trader. The thief, a Gurkhali resident in Kohima, as well as two Kohima men who bought the rifle from him, have been brought to trial and punished with imprisonment. The rifle had been skilfully converted into a muzzle-loader by a Kuki blacksmith.
text: Gunpowder is obtained from Golaghat from the licensed vendors there under order of the Deputy-Commissioner endorsed on the pass.
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