Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Dacoity in India: Investigating Thievery and Banditry in the British Raj’s Jewel

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Asia-Pacific Security Challenges

Abstract

Despite continued anti-banditry efforts, the problem of dacoity persists in India today. Although it has a long history in the subcontinent, relatively little quantitative work has been done on the topic. Using official crime data published by the Government of India and information in the Census of India, this study seeks to evaluate the impact of state-level factors on the prevalence of dacoit crimes in India using multilevel modeling. Certain state-level characteristics do, with statistical significance, impact the prevalence of dacoit crimes in India. Using this analysis as a framework, this study evaluates the importance of characteristics within Indian society that allow the practice of dacoity to continue in quite large numbers. The study seeks to provide Indian decision-makers with new insight to evaluate potential mechanisms to finally bring this century-old criminal activity to an end. By understanding what characteristics increase the likelihood of dacoity, decision-makers will be better positioned to shape effective tools for countering these actions. This research impacts the greater region, not just India. Banditry has a rich and lucrative history throughout South Asia. An empirical study in Indian banditry can provide insights for other states to counter their manifestations of the same problem.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
eBook
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    For further justification of this phenomenon, see: (Omari 2015).

  2. 2.

    In line with this past research, the current study also includes descriptive statistics of the Dacoity variable, as shown in Table 2.

  3. 3.

    For more detail on the dacoit intelligence system in Pakistan, please see: (Sahito et al. 2009, pg. 307–308).

  4. 4.

    For the full sampling strategy of the Census of India, please refer to: http://censusindia.gov.in/Vital_Statistics/SRS/Sample_Registration_System.aspx#3 (Ministry of Home Affairs).

  5. 5.

    This assumption was verified using a test for overdispersion in the R statistical analysis platform.

  6. 6.

    Due to the non-significant nature of the findings, the exact coefficient is not meaningful to the discussion. Instead, the almost significant association is of importance for future work on this topic. However, regression coefficients can be found in Table 3.

References

  • Agnihotri VK (2012, Autumn) How India chooses its head of state. Canad Parliament Rev:40–48

    Google Scholar 

  • Aly A (2014) Moral disengagement and building resilience to violent extremism: An education intervention. Stud Confl Terror 37(4):369–385

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Anderson S (1997) A study of crime in rural Scotland. The Scottish Office, Edinburgh

    Google Scholar 

  • Arnold D (1979) Dacoty and rural crime in Madras, 1860–1940. J Peasant Stud 6(2):140–167

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Aust R, Simmons J (2002) Rural crime: England and Wales. Home Off Stat Bull:01/02

    Google Scholar 

  • Baldwin J, Bottoms AE (1976) The urban criminal. Tavistock Publications, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Barclay E, Donnermeyer JF, Jobes PC (2004) The dark side of gemeinshaft: criminality within rural communities. Crime Prev Commun Saf Int J 6(3):7–22

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bernard TJ (1981) Distinction between conflict and radical criminology. J Crim Law Criminol 72(1):362–379

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bhalotra S, Clots-Figueras I, Cassan G, Iyer L (2014) Religion, politician identity and development outcomes: evidence from India. J Econ Behav Organ 104:4–17

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bhukya B (2007) ‘Delinquent subjects’: dacoity and the creation of a surveillance society in Hyderabad state. Indian Econ Soc Hist Rev 44(2):179–212

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Braithwaite J, Biles D (1979) On being unemployed and being a victim of crime. Aust J Soc Issue 14(3):192–200

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Brass PR (2003) The production of Hindu-Muslim violence in India. University of Washington Press, Seattle

    Google Scholar 

  • Brooks R (2009) Researching democracy and terrorism: how political access affects militant activity. Secur Stud 18:756–788

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Carter TJ, Clelland D (1979) A neo-marxian critique, formulation and test of juvenile dispositions as a function of social class. Soc Probl 27(1):96–108

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chamlin MB, Cochran JK (2004) An excursus on the population size-crime relationship. West Criminol Rev 5(2):119–130

    Google Scholar 

  • Chaubey R (2006) Dominance and retaliation in the informal structure of authority: a comparative study of Madhya Pradesh and Bihar. Technical report, Crisis states programme: Development research centre

    Google Scholar 

  • Clarke RV, Cornish DB (1985) Modeling offenders’ decisions: a framework for research and policy. Crim Justice 6:147–185

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cohen LE, Felson M (1979) Social change and crime rate trends: a routine activity approach. Am Sociol Rev 44:588–608

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cole JH, Gramajo AM (2009) Homicide rates in a cross-section of countries: evidence and interpretations. Popul Dev Rev 35:749–776

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dalmiya V (2001) Loving paradoxes: a feminist reclamation of the goddess Kali. Hypatia 15(1):125–150

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dash M (2005) Thug: the true story of India’s murderous cult. Granta Books, London

    Google Scholar 

  • De R (2014) Rebellion, dacoity, and equality: the emergence of the constitutional field in postcolonial India. Comparat Stud South Asia Afr Middle East 34(2):260–278

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Denoeux G, Carter L (2009) Guide to the drivers of violent extremism. Technical report, United States Agency for International Development

    Google Scholar 

  • Department of Defense (2015) Department of defense dictionary of military and associated terms, 8 November 2010 (As Amended Through 15 March 2015). Defense Technical Information Center. Url: www.dtic.mil/doctrine/new pubs/jp1 02.pdf

  • Felson M (1998) Crime and everyday life, 2nd edn. Pine Forge Press, Thousand Oaks

    Google Scholar 

  • Finch WH, Bolin JE, Kelley K (2014) Multilevel modeling using R. CRC Press, Boca Raton

    Google Scholar 

  • Flamm MW (2005) Law and Order: street crime, civil unrest, and the crisis of liberalism in the 1960s. Columbia University Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Floris GA (1962) A note on dacoits in India. Comp Stud Soc Hist 4(4):467–472

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gok O (2002) Structural disadvantage, Terrorism, and Non-Terrorist Violent Crime in Turkey. PhD thesis, University of Cincinnati

    Google Scholar 

  • Government of India: Ministry of Human Resource Development (2014) Education for all: towards quality with equity. Technical report, Government of India: Ministry of Human Resource Development, New Delhi, India

    Google Scholar 

  • Hayes AF (2006) A primer on multilevel modeling. Hum Commun Res 32:385–410

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hearing Before the Committee on Foreign Relations: United States Senate (2005) Combating terrorism through education: the near east and south Asian experience. U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC

    Google Scholar 

  • Hnatkovska V, Lahiri A (2013) The rural-urban divide in India. Technical report, International Growth Centre

    Google Scholar 

  • Human Rights Law Network (n.d.). State of Orissa vs. Prabhat Kumar Sahoo. Human Rights Law Network. Url: http://www.hrln.org/hrln/criminal-justice/pils-a-cases/102-state-of-orissa-vs-prabhat-kumar-sahoo.html

  • Iyer S, Joshi S (2013) Missing women and India’s religious demography. J South Asian Dev 8(3):301–331

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Iyer S, Shrivastava A (2015) Religious riots and electoral politics in India. Technical report, Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit (Institute for the Study of Labor)

    Google Scholar 

  • Iyer L, Mani A, Mishra P, Topalova P (2010) Political representation and crime: evidence from India. Working Paper

    Google Scholar 

  • Justino P (2015) Civil unrest and government transfers in India. Technical report, Institute of Development Studies

    Google Scholar 

  • Kausar Z (2006) Communal riots in India: Hindu-Muslim conflict and resolution. J Muslim Minor Affair 26(3):353–370

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Khandekar S (2013) Dacoits: a farewell to arms. India Today. Url: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/dacoit-leader-malkhan-singh-and-his-gang-surrender-before-madhya-pradesh-cm-arjun-singh/1/391849.html

  • Kingdon GG (2007) The progress of school education in India. Technical report, Global Poverty Research Group, Oxford, UK

    Google Scholar 

  • Lapsia TP (2015) Impact of the “Nirbhaya” rape case: isolated phenomenon or social change?. Honors Scholar Theses Paper 453, pp 1–60

    Google Scholar 

  • Łaszkiewicz E (2013) Sample size and structure for multilevel modelling: Monte Carlo investigation for the balanced design. Quantitat Method Econ XIV(2):19–28

    Google Scholar 

  • LearnAboutGuns.com (2008) Indian women granted gun permits to fend off armed robbers. LearnAboutGuns. Url: http://www.learnaboutguns.com/2008/05/27/indian-women-granted-gun-permits-to-fend-off-armed-robbers/

  • Lilly JR, Cullen FT, Ball RA (2015) Criminological theory: conext and consequences, 6th edn. Sage, Thousand Oaks

    Google Scholar 

  • Maas CJM, Hox JJ (2005) Sufficient sample sizes for multilevel modeling. Methodology 1(3):86–92

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Marsden SV (2017) Reintegrating extremists: deradicalisation and desistance. Palgrave Macmillan, London

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Martin SL, Tsui AO, Maitra K, Marineshaw R (1999) Domestic violence in Northern India. Am J Epidemiol 150(4):417–426

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • May DC, Herbert J, Cline K, Nellis A (2011) Predictors as fear and risk of terrorism in a rural state. Int J Rural Criminol 1(1):1–22

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McGowan W (2016) Critical terrorism studies, victimisation, and policy rele-vance: compromising politics or challenging hegemony? Crit Stud Terrorism 9(1):12–32

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Melliana A, Setyorini Y, Eko H, Rosi S, Purhadi (2013) The comparison of generalized poisson regression and negative binomial regression methods in overcoming overdispersion. Int J Scient Technol Res 2(8):255–258

    Google Scholar 

  • Ministry of Home Affairs (n.d.) Sample registration. Government of India: Ministry of Home Affairs. Url: http://censusindia.gov.in/VitalStatistics/SRS/SampleRegistration System.aspx#3

  • Mitra A, Ray D (2014) Implications of an economic theory of conflict: Hindu-Muslim violence in India. J Polit Econ 122(4):719–765

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Narang M (2014) Understanding social and legal impacts of Nirbhaya movement, India (2012). Int J Dev Res 4(6):1212–1219

    Google Scholar 

  • Nath SB (1969) Bandits in India: an analysis of two and a half decades. Criminology 6(4):58–67

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nolan JJ III (2004) Establishing the statistical relationship between population size and UCR crime rate: its impact and implications. J Crim Just 32:547–555

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Omari HK (2015) Religious extremism: a threat to interfaith dialogue. BEST Int J Human Arts Med Sci 3(1):29–42

    Google Scholar 

  • Onuoha FC (2014) Why do youth join Boko Haram? Technical report, United States Institute of Peace

    Google Scholar 

  • Onwudiwe ID (2007) The place of criminology in the study of terrorism: implications for homeland security. Afr J Criminol Justice Stud 3(1):50–94

    Google Scholar 

  • PTI (2016) Muzaffarnagar: five Bangladeshi nationals convicted for dacoity. The Indian Express. Url: http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-news-india/muzaffarnagar-five-bangladeshi-nationals-convicted-for-dacoity-2798461/

  • Putnam CS (2011) The Thugs of India. Url: https://www.damninteresting.com/the-thugs-of-india/

  • Quinney R (1970) The social reality of crime. Little Brown, Boston

    Google Scholar 

  • Quinney R (1977) Class, state and crime: on the theory and practice of criminal justice. McKay Co., New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Rajeshwari B (2004) Communal riots in India: a chronology (1947–2003). Technical report, Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies

    Google Scholar 

  • Rapoport DC (1984) Fear and trembling: Terrorism in three religious traditions. Am Polit Sci Rev 78(3):658–677

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Raudenbush SW, Bryk AS (2002) Hierarchical linear models: applications and data analysis methods, 2nd edn. Sage, Thousand Oaks

    Google Scholar 

  • Robinson N (2013) Structure matters: The impact of court structure on the Indian and U.S. supreme courts. Am J Comp Law 61(1):101–138

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rosenfeld R, Fornango R (2007) The impact of economic conditions on robbery and property crime: the role of consumer sentiment. Criminology 45(4):735–769

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rushby K (2002) Children of Kali: through India in search of bandits, the Thug Cult, and the British Raj. Walker Publishing Company, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Sahito IH, Farooq M, Chandio AA (2009) Dacoity as an organized crime: a case study of Sindh province. Pak J Soc Sci 29(2):301–312

    Google Scholar 

  • Scacco A (2008) Who riots? explaining individual participation in ethnic violence. Working Paper

    Google Scholar 

  • Shah G (1993) Image makers: an attitudinal study of Indian Police. Abhinav Publications, New Delhi

    Google Scholar 

  • Shankar S (2013) Thugs and bandits: life and law in colonial and epicolonial india. Biograph Interdiscip Quart 36(1):97–123

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sheikh NS (2009) Body count: a quantitative review of political violence across world civilizations. Technical report, The Royal Aal Al-Bayyt Institute for Islamic Thought, Jordan

    Google Scholar 

  • South Asia Research Hub (2011) Social science research in India: a mapping report. Technical report, South Asia Research Hub

    Google Scholar 

  • Special Fast Track Court of New Delhi (2012) State Vs. Ram Singh and another. Technical report, Special Fast Track Court of New Delhi

    Google Scholar 

  • Supreme Court of India (2007) OMA @ Omprakash & Anr. Versus State of Tamil Nadu. Technical report, Court Appeal No. 143

    Google Scholar 

  • Supreme Court of India (2015) Manmeet Singh Alias Goldie Vs. State of Punjab. Technical report, ILC-2015-SC-CRL-MAR-11

    Google Scholar 

  • Wagner KA (2004) The deconstructed stranglers: a reassessment of thuggee. Modern Asian Stud 38(4):931–963

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wagner KA (2007) Thuggee: Banditry and the British in early nineteenth-century India. Palgrave Macmillan, New York

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Wang P (2010) The crime-terror nexus: transformation, alliance, convergence. Asian Soc Sci 6(6):11–20

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Weaver MA (1996) India’s Bandit Queen. The Atlantic. Retrieved December 11, 2016. Url.: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1996/11/indias-bandit-queen/304890

  • Wheatley J (2008) Losing your audience: desistance from terrorism in Egypt after Luxor. Dyn Asymmet Conflict 1(3):250–268

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • White House (2011) Strategy to combat transnational organized crime. Technical report, White House

    Google Scholar 

  • Woltman H, Feldstain A, MacKay JC, Rocchi M (2012) An introduction to hierarchical linear modeling. Tutor Quant Methods Psychol 8(1):52–69

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Criminology and Justice Studies, University of Massachusetts, Lowell, 113 Wilder Street, Suite 400, Lowell, MA, 01854, USA

    Jared Romeo Dmello

  2. Center for Criminal Justice Research, California State University at San Bernardino, 5500 University Parkway, San Bernardino, CA, 92407, USA

    Jared Romeo Dmello

Authors
  1. Jared Romeo Dmello
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jared Romeo Dmello .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Leicester, Leicester, United Kingdom

    Anthony J. Masys

  2. National Police Agency, China

    Leo S.F. Lin

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2018 Springer International Publishing AG

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Dmello, J.R. (2018). Dacoity in India: Investigating Thievery and Banditry in the British Raj’s Jewel. In: Masys, A., Lin, L. (eds) Asia-Pacific Security Challenges. Advanced Sciences and Technologies for Security Applications. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-61729-9_13

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation