Punkah
A punkah (Hindi: पङ्खा, pangkhā) is a type of fan used since the early 500 B.C.. The word pankha originated from pankh, the wings of a bird which produce a draft when flapped.
In its original sense in South Asia, punkah typically describes a handheld fan made from a single frond of palmyra palm or a woven square of bamboo strips, rattan or other plant fibre, that can be rotated or fanned. These are called punkah in Hindustani. These small handheld devices are still used by millions when ceiling fans stop working during frequent power outages.
In the colonial age, the word came to be used in a special sense by Anglo-Indians in British India for a large swinging fan, fixed to the ceiling, and pulled by a coolie, called the punkawallah, during the hot weather. The date of this invention is not known, but it was familiar to the Arabs as early as the 8th century. It was not commonly used in India before the end of the 18th century.
The electric fan largely supplanted it in barracks and other large buildings at the beginning of the 20th century.
The term was carried over to punkah louvre, to refer to the outlet for cool air in aircraft, particularly those over the passenger seats.
References
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Media related to punkah at Wikimedia Commons 
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.