BANDITS

Bandits by Eric Hobsbawm published by hachette, is a book on history of Bandits explaining their rise and expanse as a social phenomenon. If we see the profile of the author, he is one of the accomplished writer and historian and has produced major works like the Age of Revolution, the Age of Capital, the Age of Empire, the Age of Extremes, apart from several other books on social, political and economic aspects.

Banditry is an old phenomenon. Bandits came into limelight due to their relentless opposition to the authorities. India has long seen banditry phenomenon and were called as "Dasyu" which was a bit different from Dacoit. Colonel Sleeman has written good account of same in "A journey through the kingdom of Oude in 1849-1850". Even the Bollywood was fond of the topic which was mainstay of the films like Bandit Queen on the life of Phoolan Devi, Ganga ki Saugandh, Sholay and recently Paan Singh Tomar which has been played by Irrfan Khan. Mostly these movies are based on real character. Infact, the area around Chambal was nursery of Banditry with Chambal River ravines offering natural harbour. The author has visited continents and several countries in his study of bandits. He visited Columbia, China, Europe for getting real life experience of a band life and presented a portrait of bandit to explain them. The chapters are followed by detailed appendix and postscript to describe the mandatory details.

In chapter "Bandits, States and Power", the author has stated that Banditry as a phenomena cannot exist outside social, economic and political affairs. He adds that socially speaking, the history of Banditry falls into three parts: its birth, as pre-bandit societies come to form part of class and state societies; its transformations since the rise of capitalism, local and global, and lastly its long career under states and social regime. 

The word Bandit arises from Italian word Bandito meaning a man placed outside law. In Turkish, the term was Celalis and they were not in opposition to Ottoman Sultan but to reinforce his rule. The book recognises that even in the most formidable kingdom and empire, there were presence of bandits to some extent, and it was a mass phenomena and occurred frequently, mainly when power was unstable, absent or broken down.

In chapter 2, "What is social Banditry", the author states that social Banditry is one of the most universal social phenomena and uniformly distributed. He states that it occured in all type of human society between the evolutionary phase of tribal and kinship organisation, and modern, capitalist and industrial Society transition phase. All rural societies of the past or accustomed to periodic harvest, failures and natural crisis, which gave rise to situation like war and conquest and failure of and system. These situations led to emergence of Banditry if the government was weak or divided.

On the question of "who becomes a bandit", the author states that in many societies only few have freedom and most people are chained with a double chain of Lordship and Labour, which makes them victim of authority and coercion. Mostly bandits come from area where there is low labour demand and poors who are able body do not find work. In the chapter, the author describes the kind of bandit called as Hyuk, who were active in some parts of Hungry, they were attached to Lord and had obligation to maintain fighters and horses. Essentially, they were free and superior than rest of the peasants. However, one category of Bandits were free and were mainly robbers and enemies of Turks, resorting to guerilla resistance and liberation. They were free men but not free communities, cut from family and villages. For them death was equivalent of marriage. 

In the chapter, "The economics and politics of Banditry", the author discusses that the bandits collected resources by loot and consume locally produced food and drink. People provided them when in need and  they needed someone as intermediary to act as intermediary like in the case of kidnapping for arranging ransom. For, large bandit groups they were well integrated with the society. Mentioning a case from India, the author cites that Gajraj Dacoit in Gwalior, who was earlier practising as a monkey showman rose to the rank and was appointed as keeper of the Chambal and was considered as Robin Hood of Gwalior. He adds that British regime in India regularly recruited the bandits to escort for treasure to transport. 

On the aspect of "Bandit and revolution", the author writes at some point of time, the bandit has to choose whether to become a criminal or revolutionary as social banditry challenges the established order of class society. Sometimes the community of armed outlaw is so strong that they want to return to lawlessness as they are not adapt to regulated community life. Bandits and revolutionaries respect each other as outlaws with common enemies however, there is difference also among them which may be due to lifestyle of a band, which is not expected of comrades.

 In "Women and Banditry', the author states that the defence of 'honour' is one of the most cited motive that has led men into banditry in Mediterranean and Latin America. Infact, Phoolan Devi also became bandit due to the atrocity committed on her. The women also had linkage with banditry as a supporters and women became bandits themselves in China and Balkan. 

The book offers insight into a very reclusive topic which is not a prevalent practice now especially due to shift in peasant and pastoral economy. The life of Bandits was one of the interesting topic of discussion due to reclusive nature of the bandits and mystery and folklore surrounding their working. It is to the credit of Hobsbawm that he has presented the topic after researching it at global level with field visits and real life exmple rather than a table job. 

This book deserves a read if one is interested in the subject.