Definition of "chunam"

The one Mr Cleveland and I inhabited was, as I have already observed, constructed of mud instead of chunam.

1808–1810, William Hickey, Memoirs of a Georgian Rake, Folio Society 1995, p. 226

In all the operations of chunam work, jaggery water, i. e. a solution of molasses or coarse sugar, is invariably added by the builders, and its use appears to have prevailed from the remotest ages.

1834, Rám Ráz, Essay on the Architecture of the Hindús, London: […] [F]or the Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland; by John William Parker, […], page 64

The floor of the room was of polished chunam, white as curds.

1888, Rudyard Kipling, “On the City Wall”, in In Black and White (A. H. Wheeler & Co.’s Indian Railway Library; no. 3), 5th edition, Allahabad: Messrs. A. H. Wheeler & Co.; London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, & Rivington, Ld., […], published 1890

Look at the flies. Look at the chunam coming off the walls.

1924 June 4, E[dward] M[organ] Forster, A Passage to India, London: Edward Arnold & Co.

A PUNT FOR SALE, thirty-four feet long, twelve feet broad, and three feet ten inches deep, chunamed, sheathed, and coppered, carries about fifteen tons.

The Sydney Morning Herald, Wednesday 8 March 1848