06-01-180

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EASTERN HIND.

　The number of people of the Kumbhr or Kumhr, i.e., Potter caste in the Central Provinces, was, according to the Census of 1891, 102,682, and in Berar 22,465. Of these, only those of Chhindwara, Chanda, Bhandara and Buldana were returned as speaking a separate tribal dialect. The Kumbhrs of the first two of these districts and of Buldana speak corrupt forms of Bundl, Marh, or Telugu. In Bhandara, out of 2,750 Kumbhrs only 30 were returned as speaking a form of Marh, but an examination of the specimens shows that the Bhandara Kumbhr is really, like Marr and Pwr, a form of Baghl very strongly affected by Marh. As in the case of the two dialects just mentioned, the Agent case with n is used before the past tenses of Baghl verbs.

　It will be sufficient to give a short specimen of this jargon.