ABSTRACT
The chief city of the Peshwas during all the palmy period of the Maratha empire, it was captured by the British in 1818 and its fall practically meant the disappearance of the independent Maratha power. At least three-quarters of the Mahars in Poona City are of the class, drawn to the city by the chance of work, going backward and forward to their villages constantly, and being in every sense strangers and pilgrims. The fact of being a watandar Mahar, that is to say a Mahar whose family has landed rights and duties in a village, is a source of pride, and binds a man and his family to his original village by a very firm tie. He may sell his watan rights, but his status among his fellow caste-men is much lowered by this, and he becomes homeless and landless, looked down upon wherever he goes.
