Thugees & Dacoits

   “As a thag lures a pilgrim with laddus sweet with wine
    Makes him drunk and trusting takes his money and his life;
    Just so, Honeybee Hari takes our love by deceit”
    Surdas (1478-1583)

You might need to be on your guard when you see a yellow handkerchief. A Thug may be lying in wait.

Kali exemplifies why Bengal has become well known for some really intense religious expressions. Kali demands sacrifice. Although goats were acceptable, humans are the ultimate gift to Kali Mata. Since Kali is adorned with a necklace of severed human heads, it is only fitting that live or dead real human heads be presented to her.

According to very conservative estimates, there are at least 100 human sacrifices presented to Kali every year.

Reported incidents are best viewed through the prism of the Cockroach Rule: for every one that you catch, there are a hundred more in hiding out of sight.

Animal & human sacrifices are performed to please Kali. She is the goddess of the dacoits, who believe that they will be saved by the grace of Kali.

Everyone in Calcutta knows that on the eve of Kali Puja that it is wise to keep one's children indoors, even in the 21st century. Over the centuries, a band of Kali devotees came into prominence called the Thugs.

Two million killings & counting

The Guinness Book of World Records credits the thugees with over two million killings. The Thuggee cult of murdered killed & robbed travellers, whether alone or in caravans. The thugs are regarded as a secret society or the world’s first mafia family. Highly organized, Thugs belonged to a fraternity with specific jargon Ramasi & thier own communication signals.

Recruitment of Thuggee assassins was hereditary. Fathers handed over their legacy to their sons. Gurus formally train new recruits who did not have a hereditary lineage. Thugs were so idolized that others would simply replicate the actions of Thuggees in the hope that they would be noticed or recruited.

A typical night-time thugee strangling their victims during the night.
Confessions of a Thug 1839, Taylor, Philip Meadows.

Thuggee or tuggee (Hindi: Nepali ठग्गी ṭhaggī; Urdu: ٹھگ‎; Sanskrit: sthaga; 
Sindhi: ٺوڳي، ٺڳ‎; Kannada: ಠಕ್ಕ thakka) were the acts of Thugs, an organised gang 
of professional robbers and murderers. 
Thugs travelled in groups across the Indian sub-continent for six hundred years.
Wikipedia

Three Thug gang members restrain and strangle a sleeping traveler. Columbia University

Assassin's Creed

The Thuggee code of ethics forbade the killing of fakirs, musicians, dancers, sweepers, oil vendors, carpenters, blacksmiths, maimed or leprous persons, Ganges water-carriers, and women.

The strongest rule of the brotherhood was the prohibition of the shedding of blood. The Thuggees believed that goddess Kali taught their forefathers to strangle with a noose, in order to kill without permitting the flowing of blood. All victims of the Thuggee were sacrificed to Kali.

 No organized cult of killers has ever murdered as many people as the Thuggee. 
 In the 1830s this Indian secret society strangled upward of 30,000 native people & 
 travelers as a sacrifice to their goddess Kali, the "Dark Mother," the Hindu Triple 
 Goddess of creation, preservation, and destruction. 
 The name Thuggee comes from the Sanskrit sthaga, "deceiver."

Group of Thugs around 1894

Thugs were male. Around their tenth birthday, the sons of Thugs would be invited to witness their first murder from a distance. Gradually, they could strive to achieve the rank of bhuttote, or strangler. While Thuggee membership was for life, wives & daughters of Thugs never knew the truth about their males.

Extreme secrecy combined with their mastery of murder made the Thugs the deadliest secret society in all of history.

In the early 19th century they were credited with 40,000 deaths annually. As the cult operated for more than 500 years before formal records were kept, the true number of victims is impossible to determine.

      Founded:  Before 1356
      Named after:  Hindi word for deceit
      Founding location:  Central India
      Years active:  At least 450 years
      Territory:  Indian subcontinent
      Criminal activities:  Murder, robbery
      Wikipedia

Though the Thuggees were originally from Muslim tribes, not only Muslims, but also, Hindu, & Sikhs were thuggees.

All Thugs worshipped the goddess Kali. Ritualistic killings were in her honour.

Thuggees at a shrine of Kali

It did not matter that Islam forbids idolatry. Poor farmers & rich noblemen, upstanding & respectable citizens in their communities were also thugs.

The Thuggees avoided spilling blood to appease Kali. Their method of choice strangulation with a yellow rumal, cummerbund or handkerchief. Then bury the corpse. A portion of their loot was donated to temples.

To take advantage of their victims, the Thugs would join travellers & gain their 
confidence; this would allow them to surprise and strangle the travellers with 
a handkerchief or noose. They would then rob and bury their victims. This led to the 
Thugs being called Phansigar (English: using a noose), a term more commonly used 
in southern India. 
Wikipedia

Thuggee rites included sugar sacrifices & axe-worshipping ceremonies to honour Kali. Thuggee superstitions extended to an. obsession with an intricate array of omens which guided them on their raids.

Breaking wind, during an expedition, was inauspicious. Therefore, five blows of a shoe inflicted upon the head of the offender mitigated the offense to the goddess Kali.

The worst portent was the cry of a baby owl. This understood to signal impending disaster. Everyone would pack up & return home.

Thugees distracting their victims

The word "Thuggee" derives from the Hindi ठग (ṭhag), which means "deceiver". 
Related words are the verb thugna ("to deceive"), 
from the Sanskrit स्थग (sthaga "cunning, sly, fraudulent") &  
स्थगति (sthagati, "he conceals").  
This term, describing the murder & robbery of travellers, is popular in South Asia 
& particularly India.
Wikipedia

Non-Thuggees regarded Thugees as having a sacred mission. Except for the British, Thugs were usually not hunted by authorities. Even the British found little help from the locals due to their fears and superstitions about the cult.

Ziau-d din Barni’s History of Firoz Shah circa 1356, describes of how a thousand Thugs caught in Delhi were deported out of Delhi by boats to Lakhnauti.

Dacoits: Kali's bandits

Robbers living in forests would habitually of worship Dacoit Kali before a sortie. Their temples were normally situated away from civilized localities. They were also pirates who infested the Ganges between Calcutta and Burhampore. In modern India, the dacoity have had a large impact in the Morena and Chambal regions in Madhya Pradesh.

A dacoit with gun

The word "dacoity", the anglicized version of the Hindustani word ḍakaitī 
(historically spelled dakaitee, Hindi डकैती or Urdu ڈکیتی or Bengali ডাকাতি, or 
 Odiya ଡକାୟତି ), comes from ḍākū (historically spelled dakoo, Hindi: डाकू, 
 Urdu: ڈاکو, meaning "armed robber") or Bengali ḍakat (ডাকাত, or Odiya ଡକାୟତି).
 In Urdu, ḍākū ڈاکو is singular and ḍakait ڈکیت plural for bandits. 
 The crime of banditry is known as dakaitee ڈکیتی.
 In Hindi dacoity (Hindi: डकैती ḍakaitī, Urdu: ڈکیتی ḍakaitī, Bengali: ডাকাতি ḍakati, 
 or Odiya ଡକାୟତି) means "armed robbery". 
 In Tamil Nadu, the crime of banditry is known as "Dakalti".
 The term dacoit (Hindi: डकैत ḍakait, Urdu: ڈکیت ḍakait, Bengali: ডাকাত ḍākāt , 
 or Odiya ଡକାୟତି) means "a bandit", according to the OED ("A member of a class of robbers
 in India and Burma, who plunder in armed bands.")
 Wikipedia

Dacoits existed in Burma as well as in India. Rudyard Kipling's fictional Private Mulvaney hunted Burmese dacoits in The Taking of Lungtungpen. Sax Rohmer's criminal mastermind Dr. Fu Manchu's henchmne were Burmese dacoits.

Indian police forces use "Known Dacoit" (K.D.) as a label to classify criminals.

Popular Kali image

Appeasing Kali

Thugees derived their -raison d'être_ from appeasing Kali. Thugs believed they had a positive role in saving human lives. without their sacred service, Kali might destroy all humankind.

 "It is God who kills, but Bhowanee has [a] name for it."
 "God is all in all, for good and evil."
 "God has appointed blood for [Bhowanee's] food, saying 'khoon tum khao': 
 feed thou upon blood. In my opinion it is very bad, but what can she do, 
 being ordered to subsist upon blood!"

"Bhowanee is happy and more so in proportion to the blood that is shed."
Wikipedia

The British East India Company outlawed Thuggery through the Thuggee and Dacoity Suppression Acts, 1836–48. Primarily as a result of the efforts of William Sleeman, overt Thuggery was eradicated from British India

Why learn about Kali?

     Lest Satan should get an advantage of us: for we are not ignorant of his devices.
     2 Cor 2:11, KJV

Much of the modern church, has been ignorant of Kali's schemes. This article & those to follow are a brief description of Kali, a history of her workings & her devastating worldwide impact.

For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh:
(For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God 
to the pulling down of strong holds;) 5Casting down imaginations, and 
every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and 
bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ; 
And having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience, 
when your obedience is fulfilled.
2 Cor 10:3-6, KJV

We're called to educate ourselves

My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, 
I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten 
the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.
Hos 4:6

We need not have any fear: the Son of Man did not use His Son of Man override.

There is no fear in love [dread does not exist]. But perfect (complete, full-grown) 
love drives out fear, because fear involves [the expectation of divine] punishment, 
so the one who is afraid [of God’s judgment] is not perfected in love [has not grown 
into a sufficient understanding of God’s love].
1 John 4:18 (AMP)

Such hope [in God’s promises] never disappoints us, because God’s love 
has been abundantly poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit 
who was given to us.
Romans 5:5 (AMP)

The Kali Series, Article 2.3

Based on Unmasking & Dethroning the goddess Kali by Jeshu Das, Calcutta, India

Bonus videos

The Deceivers

Trailer

Indiana Jones & the Temple of Doom

Indy drinking Kali's blood

Thuggee fight part 1

Thugee fight part 2

Thugge fight part 3
The thug ritual

The Thugees: The world's first Mafia or The world's deadliest secet society?