Medicine - Drugs > Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1894-1895 > Volume II
(136) Volume 2, Page 133
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FURTHER ENQUIRIES REGARDING THE ALLEGED HEMP DRUG CASES OF 1892. 133
Report of the Superintendent, Nagpur Asylum, on the hemp drug cases of 1892.
IN reply to your No. 2236
of 9th instant asking me for an expression of my own views
with regard to the history of the cases of insanty admitted into
the Asylum during the
year 1892, and in which cases the alleged cause of the insanity was
the immoderate use
of ganja or other preparation of Indian hemp, I may be permitted to
draw your attention
to the concluding paragraph of my letter No. 21 of 27th January
1894, in which I express-
ly stated that I had not been able at the time of writing to
formulate any decided opinion
as to the mental condition and causation of the insanity of the
cases admitted during
1892-93.
2. Since writing
the above I have endeavoured to study the mental condition of
the
six insanes admitted during 1892 and still in the Asylum, in which
the cause of the insani-
ty is alleged to have been the excessive use of ganja taken in some
form or other. I beg
to submit a few brief notes and comments on these cases.
3. I may note that,
although acute ganja intoxication and its detection,
symptoms,
&c., &c., are abundantly treated of in various medical
works, I am not myself acquainted
with any recent medical work which specifically treats of
types of insanity which are espe-
cially attributable to the habitual use of ganja or any of the
various preparations of Cannabis
indica or sativa and the differentiation of the symptoms
of these cases from other cases of
toxic insanity (alcoholic, opium, &c.), and, therefore, when
discussing the causation of the
mental aberration in any given case in which a history, which may
be true or may be ex-
aggerated, of having taken some preparation of Cannabis at
some previous period of their
lives is obtainable or suspected, it is necessary to avoid being
led away by the post hoc
ergo propter hoc fallacy—I mean that, although it is, no doubt,
exceedingly common to
meet with cases of chronic insanity associated with the frequent or
habitual use of ganja,
it is not therefore sufficient to assume from this alone without
the very clearest proof
(which proof must exclude every other probable cause) that the man
or woman is insane
because he or she has taken ganja or bhang at some time in his
life.
As a writer has pointed
out, a list of the number of cases in an Asylum in which a
history of ganja-smoking is alleged as a cause of the insanity in
the papers sent with the
lunatics often simply shows the number of lunatics in the Asylum
who have used ganja at
some period of their lives, moderately or immoderately, as the case
may be, and the causal
connection between the use of the intoxicant and the insanity is
not readily demonstrable.
1. Atmaram,
Soonar.—This man tells me that he has taken ganja since his
father died,
that is, about 9 or 10 years ago. He says that his father
occasionally took ganja. His
mother did not take ganja, but both his parents were in the habit
of drinking "daru" or
country spirit freely and habitually. An uncle (mother's brother)
also was a heavy drinker.
He himself cannot say why he commenced the habit of ganja-smoking,
but his usual allow-
ance was 2 chillums daily. In addition to the ganja-smoking he used
to drink ½ bottle of
"dobara" (or the 2nd distillation) daily. The average cost was 16
pice, and he says he
drank it because he felt tired after his day's work. In the hot
months he also used to
drink bhang mixed with sugar, 1 pice worth of each, and by his own
account he drank
this concoction 3 times in 5 months. He has been in Jail for
theft.
The papers that were sent
with him when he was admitted into Asylum state that his
insanity dates from the time he went to Jail, and the supposed
cause is "perhaps the use
of ganja."
Dajiba, a distant
relative (cousin) of Atmaram, told the Magistrate who was
deputed
to make a special enquiry into the antecedents of these cases, that
from an early age
Atmaram was "given up to vicious habits" and that "he used to smoke
ganja."
As a rule his behaviour
in the Asylum has been good. Once (in August 1892) he was
excited and destroyed a coat, and once again (in August 1893) he is
said to have become
very excited and abusive. Excepting on these two occasions he has
not shown any
violent or maniacal excitement.
34
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India Papers > Medicine - Drugs > Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1894-1895 > Volume II > (136) Volume 2, Page 133 |
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Description | Nagpur Lunatic Asylum, cont. |
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