Behramji Malabari

Name: Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters—The Márwári
Author: Behramji Malabari

Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (1882)

Summary

“Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters—The Márwári”, published in 1882, is a work by Behramji Malabari. It explores elements such as Márwári, debtor and money.

Quotes from Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (Behramji Malabari)

Behramji Malabari, Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (1882)

“ In all his habits of life simplicity, that is, a love of cheapness, is the leading trait. He loves his holidays, and during the Holi the Márwári abandons himself to full indulgence of the senses, but he takes care that the carousals do not cost him much in money. "Anything but money, unless it is for me"—that is the Márwári's motto. The Márwári makes a good friend so far as his advice goes. He marries late in life, and makes a loving husband and father, so far as love is love without money. He is too fond of hoarding to part with anything unless forced to. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Behramji Malabari, Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (1882)

“ Thus lives the Márwári, buying and selling, lending and recovering, scheming, bullying, and going to court. His life is a continued struggle with his better part. But so successfully does he wrestle with himself, that before thirty he has ceased to be a human being. Before thirty he is a money-grubbing machine. He will do anything for money, get money from everything. He works greater havoc in the mofussil than in the Presidency towns. More minutes and reports have been written on the Márwári than on all the wild beasts and venemous reptiles put together. But the Márwári still flourishes. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Behramji Malabari, Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (1882)

“ The Márwári never deals in anything which will not bring at least cent, per cent, profit. One might ask how he can have the courage, though his conscience is up to it, to ask double for such articles as oil, rice, fuel, &c. Well, it is thus:—The Márwári buys his articles of the poorest quality at the cheapest market. He buys when things go merely for the asking. He buys in the lump, and charges a heavy discount. He keeps shop in a locality from which the nearest market measures by the mile. He sells his goods on credit, and, of course, in retail. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Behramji Malabari, Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (1882)

“ Meantime he looks upon himself as a lucky dog if he can have for his two meals what remains after the master has dined—barely enough to keep body and soul together. But the boy who, only a month ago, led the life of an infant epicure, indulging every pleasure and every liberty dear to childhood, repines not at the change that has come over his bright young life. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Behramji Malabari, Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (1882)

“ The Márwári will lend and sell on credit to the last pie compatible with safety. Infinite is his power of lending, so is his power of recovering. He manages to meet the debtor on pay day, on the very threshold of his office. He offers every facility to the debtor to earn money enough to repay. If the debtor seems to bear the Marwari's exactions with ease, he may be sure he will not be out of his debt. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Behramji Malabari, Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (1882)

“ He opens out new avenues of income for them. He sends some of them to factory work, others into domestic service. The Márwári does not scruple to put his victims to the vilest uses, so he can recover what he thinks to be his due. It is suspected that full half of the inmates of the brothels of Bombay are the victims of the Márwári's cruel persecutions, the female friends of the wretch who began his acquaintance with the Márwári with buying a pound of sugar on credit, and has ended that ill-fated acquaintance in the ruin of his manhood. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Behramji Malabari, Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (1882)

“ There is hope for the wildest scapegrace buried in debt, if he has not gone to the Márwári; but once in the Márwári's clutches, not the wealthiest and the goutiest uncle can save him. The man who has escaped the Márwári's grip with a whole coat on may fairly claim to be the Finance Minister of Turkey. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Behramji Malabari, Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (1882)

“ He weighs and measures as he likes, and the customer has only to smile and accept the article held out. His weights and measures are not of the latest make, and he often substitutes pieces of stone for standard weights. ”

Behramji Malabari

Summary

Quotes from Gujarát and the Gujarátis — Characters… (Behramji Malabari)

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