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Webster 1913 Edition

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Noun.

[Hind.

nāyak

A chief; a leader; a Sepoy corporal.

Balfour (Cyc. of India).

naik ‎(plural naiks)

A lord or governor in South Asia.
An officer (equivalent to corporal) in a corps of Indian or Nepalese soldiers.
- 1888: Also, he had to keep his temper [...] especially once when he was abused by a Naik he had himself recruited from Isser Jang village — Rudyard Kipling, ‘Miss Youghal's Sais’, Plain Tales from the Hills (Folio Society 2007, p. 26)