Chapter BATÁRA to BATTA of B by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

in the allowances received by all regimental officers serving at stations within a certain distance of the Presidency in Bengal (viz. Barrack-pore, Dumdum, Berhampore, and Dina-pore) caused an enduring bitterness against that upright ruler.

It is difficult to arrive at the origin of this word. There are, however several Hindi words in rural use, such as bhat, bhanta, ‘advances made to ploughmen without interest,’ and bhatta, bhanta, ‘ploughmen’s wages in kind,’ with which it is possibly connected. It has also been suggested, without much probability, that it may be allied to bahut, ‘much, excess,’ an idea entering into the meaning of both a and b. It is just possible that the familiar military use of the term in India may have been influenced by the existence of the European military term bât or bât-money. The latter is from bât, ‘a pack-saddle,’ [Late Lat. bastum], and implies an allowance for carrying baggage in the field. It will be seen that one writer below seems to confound the two words.

b. H. batta and batta: agio, or difference in exchange, discount on coins not current, or of short weight. We may notice that Sir H. Elliot does not recognize an absolute separation between the two senses of Batta. His definition runs thus: “Difference of exchange; anything extra; an extra allowance; discount on uncurrent, or short-weight coins; usually called Batta. The word has been supposed to be a corruption of Bharta, increase, but it is a pure Hindi vocable, and is more usually applied to discount than to premium.”—(Supp. Gloss. ii. 41.) [Platts, on the other hand, distinguishes the two words—Batta, Skt. vritta, ‘turned,’ or varta, ‘livelihood’—“Exchange, discount, difference of exchange, deduction, &c.,” and Bhatta, Skt. bhakta ‘allotted,’—“advances to ploughmen without interest; ploughman’s wages in kind.”] It will be seen that we have early Portuguese instances of the word apparently in both senses.

The most probable explanation is that the word (and I may add, the thing) originated in the Portuguese practice, and in the use of the Canarese word bhatta, Mahr, bhat, ‘rice’ in ‘the husk,’ called by the Portuguese bate and bata, for a maintenance allowance.

The word batty, for what is more generally called paddy, is or was commonly used by the English also in S. and W. India (see Linschoten, Lucena and Fryer quoted s.v. Paddy, and Wilson’s Glossary, s.v. Bhatta).

The practice of giving a special allowance for mantimento began from a very early date in the Indian history of the Portuguese, and it evidently became a recognised augmentation of pay, corresponding closely to our batta, whilst the quotation from Botelho below shows also that bata and mantimento were used, more or less interchangeably, for this allowance. The correspondence with our Anglo-Indian batta went very far, and a case singularly parallel to the discontent raised in the Indian army by the reduction of full-batta to half-batta is spoken of by Correa (iv. 256). The mantimento had been paid all the year round, but the Governor, Martin Afonso de Sousa, in 1542, “desiring,” says the historian, “a way to curry favour for himself, whilst going against the people and sending his soul to hell,” ordered that in future the mantimento should be paid only during the 6 months of Winter (i.e. of the rainy season), when the force was on shore, and not for the other 6 months when they were on board the cruisers, and received rations. This created great bitterness, perfectly analogous in depth and in expression to that entertained with regard to Lord W. Bentinck and Sir John Malcolm, in 1829. Correa’s utterance, just quoted, illustrates this, and a little lower down he adds: “And thus he took away from the troops the half of their mantimento (half their batta, in fact), and whether he did well or ill in that, he’ll find in the next world.”—(See also ibid. p. 430).

The following quotations illustrate the Portuguese practice from an early date:

1502.—“The Captain-major…between officers and men-at-arms, left 60 men (at Cochin), to whom the factor was to give their pay, and every month a cruzado of mantimento, and to the officers when on service 2 cruzados….”—Correä, i. 328.

1507.—(In establishing the settlement at Mozambique) “And the Captains took counsel among themselves, and from the money in the chest, paid the force each a cruzado a month for mantimento, with which the men greatly refreshed themselves….”—Ibid. 786.

1511.—“All the people who served in Malaca, whether by sea or by land, were paid their pay for six months in advance, and also received monthly two cruzados of mantimento, cash in hand” (i.e. they had double batta).—Ibid. ii. 267.

a.

1548.—“And for 2 ffarazes (see FARASH) 2 pardaos a month for the two and 4 tangas for bata.”…—S. Botelho, Tombo, 233. The editor thinks this is for bate, i.e. paddy. But even if so it is used exactly like batta or maintenance money. A following entry has: “To the constable 38,920 reis a year, in which is comprised maintenance (mantimento).”

1554.—An example of batee for rice will be found s. v. MOORAH.