Life as a Dalit: Views from the Bottom on Caste in India [1 ed.] 8132111230, 9788132111238

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Life as a Dalit

Life as a Dalit Views from the Bo om on Caste in India

Edited by

Subhadra Mitra Channa Joan P. Mencher

Copyright © Subhadra Mitra Channa and Joan P. Mencher, 2013 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. First published in 2013 by SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd B1/I-1 Mohan Cooperative Industrial Area Mathura Road, New Delhi 110 044, India www.sagepub.in SAGE Publications Inc 2455 Teller Road Thousand Oaks, California 91320, USA SAGE Publications Ltd 1 Oliver’s Yard, 55 City Road London EC1Y 1SP, United Kingdom SAGE Publications Asia-Pacific Pte Ltd 33 Pekin Street #02-01 Far East Square Singapore 048763 Published by Vivek Mehra for SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd, Phototypeset in 10/13 Palatino by RECTO Graphics and printed at Saurabh Printers Pvt Ltd, New Delhi. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Available

ISBN: 978-81-321-1123-8 (HB) The SAGE Team: Shambhu Sahu, Dhurjjati Sarma, and Nand Kumar Jha

To Dr B.R. Ambedkar and the Dalits of India

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Contents

Acknowledgments Introduction—Looking Up at Caste: Discrimination in  Everyday Life in India Subhadra Mitra Channa

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SECTION I Theorizing Marginality Chapter 1 The Caste System Upside Down Joan P. Mencher Chapter 2 Atrocities and Segregation in an Urban Social Structure Nandu Ram Chapter 3 Continuity and Change in “Ex-Untouchable” Community of South India Joan P. Mencher Chapter 4 A Reading of “Untouchable”: The Autobiography of an Indian Outcaste Subhadra Mitra Channa Chapter 5 On Being an Untouchable in India: A Materialist Perspective Joan P. Mencher Chapter 6 Conversion of Upper Castes into Lower Castes: A Process of Asprashyeekaran Shyamlal

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Chapter 7 Dalits to Benefit from Globalization Lessons from the Past for the Present A. Ramaiah

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Section II Doing Fieldwork among the Dalits Chapter 8 Viewing Hierarchy from the Bottom Up Joan P. Mencher

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Chapter 9 Becoming a Dhobi Subhadra Mitra Channa

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Section III Religion and Gender Chapter 10 Dancing the Goddess: Possession and Caste Karin Kapadia

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Chapter 11 The Bible and Dalits James Massey

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Chapter 12 Rediscovering God: Iyothee Thassar and Emancipatory Buddhism G. Aloysius Chapter 13 Religion, Social Space, and Identity: The Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha and the Making of Cultural Boundaries in Twentieth Century Kerala P. Sanal Mohan

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Chapter 14 Dalit Women Part 1 Dalit Women in Struggle: Transforming Pain into Power Ruth Manorama Part 2 Commentary on Ruth Manorama’s Presentation at the  Fourth World Conference on Women, 1995, Beijing Subhadra Mitra Channa Part 3 Excerpts Bama Chapter 15 Caste and Gender: Understanding Dynamics of Power and Violence Kalpana Kannabiran and Vasanth Kannabiran

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Section IV Fighting the System: Dalit Responses to Oppression Chapter 16 Climax! The Encounter of Dalits and Hindus Vasant Moon

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Chapter 17 Theyyam Myth: An Embodiment of Protest J.J. Pallath

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Chapter 18 Documenting Dissent Badri Narayan

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Chapter 19 The Satnamis of Chhattisgarh Saurabh Dube

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Chapter 20 Does Replication Mean Consensus? Dissenting the Hegemony by “Untouchable” Scheduled Castes in Karnataka, South India G.K. Karanth Chapter 21 Reservations and New Caste Alliances in India Walter Fernandes

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Conclusions Joan P. Mencher

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About the Editors and Contributors Index

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Acknowledgments

Subhadra Mitra Channa would like to acknowledge all her Dhobi fictive kin who made a difference in her outlook on life as also the numerous poor and deprived people she met on her many field trips who showed that life at the bottom is also worth living and enjoying. She would like to thank all those who offered a meal and a pot of tea, even when they were living on the edge of hunger and opened her eyes to the immense generosity and love of people living on the margins of society. She would like to acknowledge her daughters for making life a wonderful experience. Also a debt of gratitude to my student Dr Antu Saha for helping out in editing and various tasks related to the production of this volume. And last but not least my dogs Kaju, Caesar, and CoCo who prevented me from ever going into a depression. Dr Joan Mencher wishes to thank all those who helped her in her attempts to foreground the issues raised in this volume, especially the Dalits; who from 1963 on helped her to understand their lives and those who asked her to “tell people about us, tell our story for us. Let people everywhere know about our situation.” From the time she worked in the village near Chennai, she felt accepted by the Dalits in ways which made her feel deeply committed to offer whatever help she could in their struggles, not only materially but also in terms of attaining social equality at every level. All of her writings about Indian Dalits are dedicated to the memory of the Dalits (still living or having passed away, especially Damodaran and Govindan) from Maduramangalam as well as to the many other Dalits who she came to know in other villages.

Introduction Looking Up at Caste: Discrimination in Everyday Life in India Subhadra Mitra Channa

LOOKING UP The title of this volume has a purpose; it explicates the wisdom that things are understood in perspective rather than as “things in themselves.” The same object, event, or as here, an institution such as caste, may appear differently to different observers and actors depending upon their location and hierarchical position as Chatterjee (1993: 180) has clearly summarized. The strategic implication of location is now well-recognized and forms the key focus of this volume that makes an attempt to look at caste from the bottom, from the privileged location of the lowest rungs of hierarchy than from the top. It also wishes to make observations and inferences not from a positivist value-neutral stand but a specifically stated human rights perspective that recognizes some categories as victims and others as perpetrators of discrimination and even violence on others. This volume may thus form an effective critique of some of the existing views on caste. It takes the phenomenological stand that reality is better understood when constructed out of experience rather than uninvolved observation. Both the editors have contributed papers in this volume that explicitly state how their worldview changed when they participated in social interactive situations with those who belong to the lowest rung of the caste hierarchy. Mencher specifically mentions as to how as a non-Hindu she was made to stand outside Brahmin households while collecting data, sometimes in the rain and sometimes in the hot sun. Channa mentions her dismay at being exposed to blatant practices of untouchability in the heart of Delhi, the capital of India.

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Moving away from an Indological point of view these essays are directed toward a project of “recreating selves” to empathize with the marginal and the oppressed. Whether one does it through one’s own life experience or through one’s intellectual theorizing, it is all about presenting a view of society from the bottom-up. Only such a point of view is privileged to be accepted as a tool for making a dream of a just society possible. At successive levels of social development we have witnessed the failure of science, the failure of technology, and now the failure of economic globalization to improve the lives of the marginal. The development of a critical social science and a theory that incorporates the voices and visions of those at the bottom may be a more effective tool directed toward internal rather than external reforms; in other words to bring about a change in mindset. This is all the more significant as the failure of externally imposed policies is self-evident.

SOCIAL REALITY OF THE INDIAN NATION Ambedkar had expressed doubt while presenting the Indian Constitution, that while on paper the Constitution was framed keeping democratic values and social justice in mind and promised equality and dignity for all citizens of India, whether the social climate would enable such a nondiscriminatory situation to actually emerge. He was speaking from his own experience as the member of one of the lowest social groups in India, the untouchables. Unfortunately the post-Independence scenario of the last more than six decades that has seen the Indian democracy mature indicates that his apprehensions were correct. At the three levels of social justice, political equality, and intellectual domain we find that those marginal to mainstream societies are yet to find equality. One cannot negate the fact that in the course of time a great deal of transformation has occurred both from top in terms of changing political structures and from the bottom in terms of increasing levels of consciousness as corroborated by most of the papers in this volume. Yet the gains are more substantive in the successful development of effective critiques of the existing situation than they have in changing actual life situation of the people; in other words a discourse has been built up but actual practice is yet to be effectively implemented. In rural and even urban areas, poor and marginal communities are routinely subjected to torture and humility (Narula 1999). The daily newspapers are full of stories of rape, killing, and torture of untouchables in various parts of India. The Human Rights Report published by the Indian Social Institute in New Delhi routinely reports such atrocities. In modern Indian society, we have emerging Dalit middle classes who have money, education, and power but who are still fighting for social acceptability. At the political level, Dalit leadership is yet to

Introduction

be accepted by the non-Dalit masses and the leaders are not on sure footing in terms of self-realization and confidence. The meteoric ascent of Mayawati, who became the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, the most populous state in India, but lost her position just as she was about to create an all-India impact, is to be pondered upon. There is certainly doubt as to what extent the general public is ready to accept a Dalit leader on merit rather than on mere caste considerations. In the academic sphere too, neither syllabus nor teaching material reflects in any way that Dalits are regarded as a significant part of Indian society. The most debilitating experience that almost all Dalits have to go through is the rejection by civil society in general. There are many instances when even after attaining the highest offices Dalits have to face humiliation in personal lives. A certain news item brought to light the case of a high court judge of upper caste who, before taking up office, had his official rooms purified with Ganga water because the previous incumbent on the same post was a Dalit. Even if people of “liberal” views accept their colleagues of low castes, almost everyone would protest if their children opted to marry a Dalit. In schools and colleges, the Dalit students are often socially boycotted and may have to form their own groups. Even in a liberal campus like that of the University of Delhi, hostels are clearly divided on caste lines. It is also a truism that the upper castes and classes are more prone to believing that the problem just does not exist! Rege (2006: 2) raises an important lacuna in public thinking when she writes, “As an upper caste, middle class student on campus, I recall being part of a group that thought discussions about caste to be retrograde.” What is lacking in Indian society is a sense of social justice. People are bogged down by rituals and blindly follow norms and fail to recognize the day-to-day injustice being perpetuated in the name of tradition. Yet spiritual leaders from Buddha to Swami Vivekananda have all spoken against the caste system and its justification in the name of religion. Swami Vivekananda (Complete Works, vol. V, p. 198) had denounced the caste system as incompatible with the notion of India’s progress and had predicted that it would crumble before the advent of progressive ideas. Kothari (1997: 53) raises doubts about the present leadership and India’s parliamentary democracy when he says that the demands for reform for social justice are coming more from “the poor and oppressed, the Dalits and the tribals and also from the youth all over the country, more than from urbanite middle classes and the upper rural strata, is asking from us who are committed to civil liberties and democratic rights, something far more fundamental than we are used to.” He is of the opinion that once ascending to power, people of all strata assume an elitist attitude that overlooks the bottom layers, projecting an elitist

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view of the Indian Nation. Thus Kothari (ibid.) urges us to, “. . . rethink our conceptions of national unity, regional and ethnic diversity, and the just and humane demands of people who have lost confidence in a New Delhi based conception of a nation-state in relation to which they have for long felt powerless and alienated.”

THE EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM The untouchable leaders like Periyar and Jyotiba Phule, and spiritual leaders like Vivekananda had all placed great faith in modern education to provide the light to dispel the ignorance on which caste discriminations are based. Yet modern India does not show much in the way of progressive education that lacks any ethical or moral paradigms and has failed to inculcate the notions of human rights and justice. In India traditionally all intellectual activities were restricted to members of certain caste groups. They formed a small elite section on top of the Varna hierarchy and not even all Brahmans were included. The ritual performing Brahmans were placed lower than the Shastris who carried out the reading of texts, mostly in Sanskrit. The other community most involved with literacy was the Kayasthas of North and Eastern India who were clerks and record keepers of the feudal nobility including the Moguls. Thus when colonization brought in new forms of learning outside of the Sanskritic texts, it was a natural transition for these communities to be the first to make the transition into Western forms of learning and we find that even today the intellectual sections are dominated by Brahmans and Kayasthas, especially in the North and Eastern India, and also in the South. Thus the new generations of other caste groups who could notionally take advantage of the new caste-free system of education were hindered by their structural position and cultural inability to participate in educational programs. They simply lacked the resources, both material and symbolic, to take advantage of the new education. Only a few in the first generation were able to match the extraordinary achievement of B.R. Ambedkar. The lack of participation of Dalits in the formative years of the Indian educational institutions is quite clearly visible. The Brahman and upper-caste elite had imposed their own views of Indian society onto the masses including the now defunct Aryan theory of the Indian caste system (Trautmann 1997). For Dumont to emphasize that caste is a part of religion and religious beliefs is to overlook the actual nature of religion in India where it has been almost universally recognized that the beliefs and values of the upper castes are definitely different from those at the margins of society.

Introduction

Such upper-caste and elitist intellectualism, however, continued to be at the center of the pedagogical commitments and even today, in the curriculum of Indian universities, the study of caste has been synonymous with the uppercaste and elitist view of caste (Rodrigues 2003). Most works included in the syllabi represent mainstream upper-caste Hindu ideologies and points of view.1 Rege (2006: 2) writes, “The marginalization of the non-brahmanical perspective and experience in the institutionalised scholarship on caste has blurred our understanding of the relations between structural continuities and contemporary change in the social institution of caste.” Dalit studies are not an intrinsic part of any sociology course and if at all represented in the syllabus, are treated as additional reading material and not a core dimension of caste studies or study of Indian society. The Dalits are also not proportionately represented among the teaching faculties. The need to radically transform syllabus in Indian universities has rarely been felt and most of it still follows a colonial pattern from the time the subject was established in Indian universities. The earlier scholars in spite of their immense scholarship have not displayed much radical social critical judgment. The works of Ambedkar for example have never been part of mainstream sociology courses but a field set apart. Yet it is in the college and university setting that one looks toward academic leadership to support the emerging Dalit voices. It is pertinent to emphasize like Deshpande that the system is also blind to its shortcomings, “it does not seem to miss what it is missing” (2003: 177). Deshpande also observes quite correctly that the location of caste in religion and “other worldly” preoccupations such as dharma and karma has situated theoretical concerns away from ground realities and most importantly away from a human rights perspective. It is therefore significant that most papers in this volume specifically target these principles and provide effective critiques of not only values such as dharma, karma, and rebirth but also of sociological principles such as sanskritization (see Shyamlal and Sanal Mohan, this volume). In about fifty years after India’s Independence, some Dalit scholars who have made it to the top of the educational hierarchy like Sukhdev Thorat, who became the Chairperson of the University Grants Commission (UGC), have taken cognizance of this glaring discrepancy. Under the guidance of the UGC, funding was allotted to various departments to set up centers for the study of social exclusion and inclusion, to take care of the historical neglect of study of Dalit and other marginal groups in India. But again as I have mentioned such studies are additional and not core or central to the curriculum. For example one cannot study Indian sociology without reference to Louis Dumont and M.N. Srinivas, but Ambedkar may remain optional.

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DALIT SCHOLARSHIP A significant aspect of the discourse on caste studies in India, especially of such that occupy bottom rungs of the hierarchy of castes, has been about not only the status of the caste/castes studied, but of the caste/class of the person who has made the study. The substantive critique developed by the so-called “Dalit”2 scholars and such scholars who identify for one reason or the other with the marginal and the downtrodden has been that the analysis and understanding of caste has emphasized as well as prioritized the upper-caste and elite view. A major portion of this critique involves the so-called colonial buildup of knowledge and the administrative and intellectual machinery set in motion during the colonial regime. We must also agree with Haraway (1991: 43) that science is about “knowledge and power” in fact as Foucault has already made clear all knowledge is related to power. Thus all knowledge historically evolved has a “social context” Haraway (ibid.), and it is no more and no less visible in the buildup of knowledge about caste in India. More recent focus is by contemporary scholars based on ethnography and fieldwork among the Dalit communities3 in which anthropologists, both Indian and foreign, have played a considerable role, in foregrounding experiential reality as against textual renderings and explanations. A considerable contribution in this direction has been made by the experiential reality of the scholar himself/herself, such as the well-recognized works of Kancha Ilaiyah (1996), Vasant Moon (2001), Minakshi Moon and Urmila Pawar (2003), Mencher (1975), Omvedt (1994), and many others. The emergence of scholars from the Dalit communities has played a key role in transforming theoretical understanding and orientation. Issues of discrimination, mental and physical violence, and the forging of a common identity of the oppressed have replaced issues such as sacred hierarchy, purity and pollution, and jajmani. The Dalit psyche, their way of thinking and looking at the world and most importantly glimpses into their lives have formed a considerable portion of the literature coming out from Dalit pens. The people who were only passive objects of writing and scholarship have now become active agents for the production of knowledge about themselves and for developing a revolutionary scholarship directed toward changing society and not merely to satisfy curiosity about the “other.” Even scholars like Deliege (1997) who have worked within the materialist and reflexive framework that critiques impersonal structural theories are subject to criticism by insiders such as Karanth (this volume). At the level of reality one may read Hazari’s autobiography—excerpts of which one will find in this volume—about his secret love for a white woman and the natural end to the fantasy. From a poor untouchable boy from a dusty village in Uttar Pradesh, Hazari moves away into a different world, but leaves

Introduction

behind his impressions of a hard and marginalized existence where even his mere literacy provoked hostile reaction among the upper-caste villagers. But the emotions that he expresses, whether for his mother, his pet, or for a young woman he idealizes, makes one feel that the heart that beats in a Dalit body is the same as that in any other. A very important aspect of the critique as set in motion by the seminal paper published in Current Anthropology (1974), by Joan Mencher was the need to reformulate methodology and theoretical orientation. A trend at this time that moves away from elitist scholarship reflects the works of Marxist scholars in the seventies and subaltern historiographers like Ranajit Guha and is subsequently also realized in gendered historiography (Sangari and Vaid 1990; O’Hanlon 1997). The rising of the Dalit voices marks an exciting phase of social and intellectual transformation that reflects and encapsulates a very large universe of change and social reality, the transition of the world intellectual order from a “white and male” centric subject to a critical and shifting subject. Such is reflected in the philosophies of the twentieth century in the works of Foucault, Derrida, Bourdieu and others. Foucault’s (1976) basic argument that identities are situated within a field of discourse where the constellations of meaning attributed to that particular identity, even something as basic as “sex” is already specified and there is no social reality that is prior to such a discourse has been used by feminist to “deconstruct” the subject in sociological analysis (Moore 1994). The abstract theories of caste based on intellectual analysis can be then seen as produced by subjects who have been situated away from the real world of oppression and suffering from which the Dalit subject emerges. For persons like Louis Dumont (1970), M.N. Srinivas (1977) and Michael Moffat (1979) the caste system was not something that was experienced from a subject position at the bottom of Indian society. Thus textual norms like purity and pollution formed the key focal points of their analysis rather than the more subjective issues of suffering and marginalization. Scholars working on jajmani relationships, for example, failed to even mention the fact of agrestic slavery, a fact whose stark realism is brought out by Pallath (1995, also in this volume) and Sanal Mohan (this volume). Today there is substantive literature that explores the realities of Dalit life in India, and as is quite evident, such experiences need not be uniform. While Karanth’s paper focuses on several lower-caste groups and their interrelationship in Karnataka, that of Mencher (1980, also in this volume) describes untouchable castes in Kerala and Tamil Nadu where she has focused on the identity and meaning of being an untouchable and the vicious circle of a stigmatized identity tied to a subordinate economic position.

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A CRITICAL APPROACH TO HINDUISM AND IMPACT OF COLONIAL RULE The debate then centers on what is “Hindu religion?”—a debate that has raged around numerous publications on this topic, most of which has looked closely at the role of colonial rule in shaping present-day Hinduism and also the puritanical Brahmanism that has become its hallmark. The privileging of upper castes in the colonial buildup of knowledge and the construction of Hinduism as a Brahmanical religion has been a major topic of discussion among contemporary historians and anthropologists (Cohen 1990; O’Hanlon 1997; Dirks 2001; Trautmann 1997; Bayley 1988; Kaiwar 2003). The emergence of a mainstream Hinduism linked dangerously to a unified nationalist identity has endangered diversity of local traditions and indigenous worldviews in the subcontinent. This process has also marginalized those traditions that did not fall in with the elitist brand of Hinduism including many sects, like the Satnamis, discussed in this volume and elsewhere by Saurabh Dube. Even the Advaitic traditions professed by the Ramakrishna Mission profess a nonhierarchical and caste-free version of Hinduism (Mazumdar 2003: 227). The Tantric and Vaishnavite traditions popular in Bengal have also led many people to believe that Bengal is a caste-free society! It is certainly an area underrepresented in Dalit studies in spite of the very effective Nomo Shudra movement that took place there between 1923 and 1941 (Chatterjee 1993). Chatterjee (1993: 181) refers to Ramakant Chakraborty who had listed as many as fifty-six heterodox sects in Bengal alone, but although they began as heterodox, all of them gradually accepted caste norms. During colonial period, a section of people moved closer to a “refined” style of life, in imitation of Western values, the most notable example being of the rise of the bhadralok4 in Bengal. Much of it was done in the early nineteenth century to stake claims to high birth and legitimacy to rule at a time when the British in India were consolidating state power in collusion with local elite groups. Interestingly Susan Bayley (1999) has pointed out that to the feudal British such claims were actually more legitimate when backed by claims to “traditional” power than more modern basis of rational economic and political factors. Thus landowners and newly constituted gentry found out quite early that if they staked their claims based on traditional “caste” considerations they were more likely to be accepted than if they said that they had acquired these statuses by military or commercial acumen; hence the efforts to change lifestyles and invent genealogies that marked the nineteenth century when Indian society was undergoing a tumultuous period.5 The net result as recognized now by most authors was that high-caste status was often claimed and legitimized for those who managed to make it good in

Introduction

the political and economic hierarchy and those who were left at the margins were pushed into disreputable status like the so-called ex-criminal tribes. This of course was true the other way round too, that such communities that were so marginalized as to suffer extreme disabilities as the untouchables in the South and West of the country were in any way out of the race for power and continued to be marginalized. A very important result of the colonial impact was the creation of stereotypes of what was civilized and rightfully a prerogative of the upper castes/classes and what was not. Nicholas Dirks (2001: 164–66, passim) has discussed that how Brahmans who were close to the British in Madurai, in the late nineteenth century, supported the British decision to prohibit the annual hook swinging festival in Sholavandan by the then acting district magistrate of Madurai, L.C. Miller. Whereas a joint petition had been submitted in favor of the ritual by a combined representatives of many castes including Brahmans, those who were closer to Western values proclaimed such acts as “barbaric and non-Hindu.” In Bengal and other parts of India, practices such as “sati,” child marriage, and female infanticide were considered “barbaric” not as much as by the British but by the local intellectuals. The projection of a metaphysical, nonritualistic Hinduism, the Vedantic philosophy taken to the West by Swami Vivekananda is a far cry from the ritualistic Hinduism of the common people but much closer to a monotheistic and humane universal religion such as would be acceptable in the Western world. Thus slowly and spreading out from centers such as Bengal and the South, that were early to come under British influence an image of an upper-class Hinduism was built up. This elite Hinduism distanced itself from practices such as had marked many local and village communities relegating such to the “low castes” and being “uncivilized.”6 The attempted refinements were supported more and more by select Sanskritic texts and proclaimed an elitist Brahmanic or Reformist version of Hinduism that solely belonged to the literate elite of the emerging urban centers.7 For example animal sacrifice was an integral part of Kali and Durga Puja in Bengal. But in Delhi such was always looked upon with horror and never ever practiced by the Bengali population that had migrated to Delhi in the nineteenth century largely as literate employees of the British government or Western educated lawyers and doctors. Even in the city of Calcutta such practices were increasingly regarded as “rustic” and barbaric and are now practically nonexistent except in a few select shrines. Interestingly the Dalit leadership that began in the nineteenth century by stalwarts like Phule and Periyar looked down upon the “superstitions” of mainstream Hinduism and also included caste as part of the “barbaric” customs, something that no upper-caste Hindu reformer had done. It is true that followers of the Ramakrishna Mission do not overtly believe in caste but caste as

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such was never a matter of importance in the teachings of the order. Moreover the Tantric path followed by Sri Ramakrishna Paramhamsa, the teacher of Swami Vivekananda, who founded the order, anyway does not subscribe to Brahmanical caste norms. Ramakrishna had faced opposition from orthodox Hindus when he had ordained Narendra Nath Dutt, a Kayastha and nonbrahman (Shudra as per Bengali caste norms) as a monk.

CASTE VIOLENCE: PHYSICAL AND SYMBOLIC The important fact that emerges is the creation of clear stereotypes of “high” and “low” that was largely caste based. It is such cultural stereotypes more than any economic and political factors that still perpetuate caste values in the postmodern cities of India (Channa 2005). The clear cultural divide that emerged between “us” and “them” is what led many scholars of caste to reinterpret the caste system as divisive, especially drawing boundaries between the upper and the lower. It is in this context that Sanal Mohan (this volume) finds it expedient to analyze caste referring to the cultural school of Stuart Hall and one may extend the analysis to include the concept of “cultural arbitrariness” introduced by Bordieu and Passeron (1977) to justify elitism. It is this cultural and symbolic violence that has replaced actual physical violence and discrimination in the metropolitan cities although traditional violence too remains very much a part of the Dalit experience, especially in the rural areas. However, the emergence of the symbolic violence (Channa 2005) where metaphors and stereotypes that deride lower castes has not replaced physical violence, incidences of which remain numerous and for which one just has to open the morning newspaper. In fact atrocities against Dalits are so commonplace that they often fail to find a mention on the first page or raise any significant media coverage like in the Jessica Lal murder case. Hundreds of Dalit girls are routinely raped and even murdered and people just glance over such news at their breakfast table and move onto other more “interesting news.” No candle light vigils have been conducted by the elite of Indian society to commemorate women like Bhanwari Devi and the numerous nameless victims. As Nandu Ram has described in the paper reprinted in this volume, the incidences of violence have magnified in proportion to the demands made by the Dalits for their rights. The more the consciousness of the lower castes is developing, the more intensive is the confrontation between the upper and lower sections, a phenomenon that had become crystallized during what is now referred to in retrospect as the “Mandal era”8 during which times the clash of interest of the upper castes with the Dalit demands for implementation of their Constitutional rights rocked the nation and has now the long-term implication

Introduction

of fracturing of identity between the lower and upper castes. But this also had the political implications of the emergence of a unified Dalit front. In the political arena the emergence of the Bahujan Samaj Party and its key symbol in the person of Mayawati has given a boost to Dalit morale in northern India where Dalit political participation had lagged behind that in western and southern India. Certainly no upper-caste reformer, including Gandhi, had explicitly criticized the caste system as such although the horrors of untouchability had found a mention and been deplored. The values of caste are so deeply entrenched that even conversion to Christianity did not obliterate caste as among the Syrian Christians of Kerala (Sanal Mohan 2003, also in this volume). The story of the Aryan invasion and the subsequent formation of layers of Indian society (Trautmann 1997; Cohen 1990) has been discredited and so also the theorem put forward by one of the foremost scholars of this school of thought, Herbert Risely, that said, “The social position of a caste varies inversely as its nasal index” (1891: 253). The race theory of caste stands demolished and other racist hypotheses like the link of civilization to the whitening of skin (Trautmann 1997: 170) may look outlandish, but one cannot forget the deep-rooted prejudices regarding physical appearances that still exist in civil society in India. In day-to-day conversations it is not at all uncommon to come across phrases such as “dark like a Bhangi” or “ugly like a Chamar” in northern India. People still carry stereotypical images of the short, dark, and broad-nosed “untouchable” and the tall, fair-skinned aristocrat of high birth. Such is often also depicted in the visual media as well as carried in folklore and popular literature all across the country. Thus in northern India, the popular saying goes “Never trust a fair Chamar or a dark Brahmin” meaning thereby that they are of dubious parentage. During my fieldwork among the Dhobis in Delhi, I was often accosted with complaints from Dhobi youth who often told me that in schools and colleges even the teacher would come out with “You do not look like a dhobi!” “What does it mean to ’look like a dhobi’?” They used to ask me. “Does it mean we must look dark and ugly?” In this volume I have included my field experiences of working with the dhobis, an experience that changed my life and worldview to a very large extent. Without going into the debate on caste and race that died in the beginning of the twentieth century but left behind its imprint on Indian society one must say that in India culture has taken the place of biology in inscribing the bodies of people with their caste ranking (Channa 2003). Cultural prescription as to dress code and body language takes the place of nature in setting the low castes away from the high castes (Channa 2011). This has become an ultimate method of imposing humility on the lower castes,

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in a subtle and insidious manner. This is the kind of violence that is most difficult to get rid of because it is so difficult to locate.

THE STATE AND DALITS The hiatus between the state and the Dalits is manifested in a historical process that began during the colonial period and was symbolized in the Poona Pact. As of now, most Dalits we have met and talked feel betrayed by the national leadership and very few recognize any virtue in the Indian Nationalists, especially Gandhi and Nehru. Dalit intellectuals may not subscribe at least openly to such radical views yet the strong critical stand taken by them does challenge the upper-caste view of both definitions of Indian society and its social structure, thereby preparing the groundwork for a critical sociology expressed in many works, especially since the seventies. A very relevant issue raised by almost all Dalit leaders and scholars is the actual improvement in the condition of Dalits in post-Independence India after years of positive discrimination and laws banishing untouchability and discrimination against Dalits. This is the theme of several papers in this volume that not only questions the relevance of mere legislations in the absence of a consensual civil society but also raises important theoretical points. In fact one of the critical points raised by Deshpande (2003: 178) is the theoretical “invisibility” of the questions of marginality in sociological discourses on caste. He is particularly critical of the stance taken by most prominent sociologists to ignore the ground-level realities of caste inequalities that are thrown up by most data surveys such as the National Sample Survey Organisation. One of the central issues of contemporary debate has been the existence of caste structures and practice of untouchability in modern India. When a large delegation of Dalits took their claims to be included in the agenda of racism to the World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) held in Durban in 2001, the Government of India sent its official delegates to refute their claim. The plea taken was that caste was banned in India officially and that the Indian Constitution provides Constitutional safeguards to protect the interests of Dalits and as such it is not relevant to talk of caste in the same platform as race. Many intellectuals and sociologists supported the view that caste does not exist anymore as a religious and social disability and had taken on more of political overtones. I was present at the conference to see the vehement denial of the Dalits to such propositions to the extent that at some points there was threat of real physical violence and at least some of the more volatile Dalit workers were going to beat up the “government agents.” Posters and demonstrations put up at the venue of the WCAR depicted the plight of the Dalits and formed

Introduction

a strong counterstatement to what was being projected as the “official” version. The Dalits were in fact able to muster the support of a large section of the participants and a Dalit march that took place to the accompaniment of drums beaten by the untouchable drummers of South India found a huge section of people from across the world joining in. In the official Declaration, however, they were relegated to a brief mention (Channa 2005).

REINTERPRETING THEORY FROM A “BOTTOM UP” PERSPECTIVE While sociologists in India were preoccupied with the structural relevance of caste ignoring its lived realties, anthropological studies with greater orientation toward subjectivity moved toward a more “downtrodden” view of caste. In anthropology criticism of “transcendent objectivity” (Kleinmann 1995: 55) has been the rule rather than the exception since the turn of the eighties when scholars have turned toward an introspective intersubjective approach rather than one based on abstract generalizations. Mencher’s (1974) paper sets a trend that moves away from an abstract intellectualist view to what she prefers to call a materialist view of caste, a view she demonstrates is shared by her untouchable respondents as well. The bottom- up view of caste is methodologically more reflexive, which prioritizes experiential realities and the day-to-day lived realities of life as against abstract intellectualism. Thus while one may not disagree with Dumont’s opposition of purity and pollution and his statement that they are complementary to each other, his saying that the “impurity of the untouchable is conceptually inseparable from the purity of the Brahmin” in no way expresses the realities of what it means to be an untouchable, the pain, suffering, and humiliation involved as well as the protests and disagreements with the upper castes’ points of view. Kapadia (1995: 125, also in this volume) describes the feelings of the lower castes in Aruloor, a village in South India about purity and pollution as being very different from that of the Brahmans. The untouchables believe that real purity comes from devotion, bakti and is not related to the physical condition of one’s body. The Brahmins look with repugnance on possession rituals involving self-torture and “loss of control.” To them “this is not true Hindu religion.” Similar ideas are expressed in the performances of Dalits, like Theyyam (see Pallath and Mencher, this volume) or in their folklore and myths. Channa’s recreation of a Dalit autobiography gives a glimpse of the life of an untouchable as it was actually lived. Bama (reprinted in this volume) also makes the readers relive the lives of Dalit women through her powerful rendering of their everyday lives.

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Not all Dalits are able to express themselves in terms of conventional writing; yet, scholars have tried to give them “voice” by picking up their narratives and translating them for the benefit of a wider audience. Nandu Ram’s paper included in this volume follows directly the lead given by Mencher in her 1974 article (also in this volume) basing itself on ethnographic data collected from the Chamars of Agra. The important point raised by him in this article is to show how the Jatavs realized in terms of what may be called a “subaltern consciousness” that they could not achieve even partial social acceptance through economic and political means within the city’s social structure. The only ways out were through dissent and confrontation to the system itself, which in this case means the caste system or the folds of Hinduism expressed in conversions to Buddhism. This is an interesting antidote to what has been claimed by the historians such as O’Hanlon about the economic and political factors leading to actual crystallization of castes. Thus it must be noted that only groups not totally marginalized can achieve a degree of social acceptance through economic and social factors or it can also mean that the system had become more rigid in the postcolonial period. Sanal Mohan has pointed out in the essay published in this volume as to how the situation of caste in the body was perceived by the Dalit leader Yohannan, who prescribed bodily rituals to wash away the stigma of caste. Similarly Ambedkar too called upon the Dalits, especially the women to dress properly, to be neat, clean, and presentable (see Moon). The Dalit scholar’s answer to the “race science” hypothesis has often been on the lines of popular mythology and folklore of the Dalits where such a separation in terms of “race” is denied, to be substituted by stories of kinship and family ties with the upper castes that were broken by some unfortunate event (Deliege 1997: 127–36). For example, my work among the Dhobis indicated quite clearly that high caste’s explanations did not agree with their self-esteem that appeared to be quite high, a fact supported by other untouchable ethnographies (Pallath 1995: 106, also in this volume). For example, when I had asked some Dhobis as to why they did not use the services of the Brahman in their marriages and other lifecycle rituals the quick reply was, “We were created before the Brahman.” In an early and now less-cited work, Ambedkar too had refuted the racist claims of the upper castes by putting forward what he considered as his scientific theory about the status of the Shudras. In his book written in 1946, “Who were the Shudras? How they came to be the Fourth Varna in the Indo-Aryan Society?” Ambedkar uses the language of anthropometry and other devices used by the “race scientists” to prove his point that the entire concept of an Aryan race was false and he had the insight to show the interest of the white colonial rulers to use this “theory” for their own advantage. Basing himself on

Introduction

the theory of two categories of Aryans, Ambedkar believed that the Shudras were the non-Vedic Aryans and he attributes their downgradation from powerful kings to untouchables to the wrath incurred by them of the Brahmans who refused to perform their sacred thread ceremony leading to their exclusion from the “twice-born” category. However, this work of Ambedkar went into obscurity once he converted to Buddhism and left the folds of Hinduism altogether. But it is an important indicator of the fact that like most untouchables he had made a valiant attempt to prove his point that he was no different in bodily substance from the upper castes and the degradation was only a historical incident and not a matter of inherent religious substance, thereby providing a strong refutation of what Dumont said much later. The rigidity of the caste system and its ideological base has been critiqued in various ways by the lower castes and although Ambedkar opted to convert and make a radical break, others like Shyamlal have resorted to academic reinterpretations to prove their point. In an interesting thesis that turns Srinivas’s theory of Sanskritization on its head, Shyamlal introduces the concept of Asprashyeekaran (1997) that describes that conversion of higher castes into lower castes. In a section (reproduced in this volume) he finds ethnographic examples from Jodhpur to illustrate his thesis. However, the major weakness of this thesis that seeks to critique Sanskritization is that the process of Asprashyeekaran is individual or family-based, and does not describe group mobility of the type subsumed under Srinivas’s term. In factual terms the process of “losing caste” so to say has been recorded and has been happening from antiquity. But it has remained an individual and often involuntary process forced onto individuals for acts of transgression of caste norms or failure to adhere to moral duties. This concept does not have the theoretical sophistication and scope of Srinivas’s work. But the inclusion of this piece in this volume is an example of the manner in which Dalit scholars have launched attack on what they perceive to be an “elitist view of caste,” Srinivas’s work included. Another short piece of writing included along with this is an excerpt from the writings of a Dalit Christian from Punjab, Massey (1997) who has examined the word dal, as downtrodden and crushed, and its presence in the Bible. Although both these pieces are not theoretically sophisticated, they contain some valuable insight into the mindset of the Dalit writer, a need to universalize the experience of being Dalit and to assert that the Dalits are recognized and treated as not different from anyone else. The creation of texts to represent the bottom-up view uses both theory and experience as resources to engender the material and includes a range of expressions and rhetoric. But most have tried to dispel myths created by the upper-caste views. One kind are those that have attempted revised descriptions of ground-level realities of the caste situation regarding the status of

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reservations and facilities that exist on paper and in policies but do not always get translated into action like what Fernandes (this volume) has to say about the “hiatus between availability and access.” Fernandes is also able to counter often repeated arguments regarding positive discrimination by upper castes such as “the benefits go only to the creamy layer” by upholding the symbolic value of the success of a few for the majority, for example, the tremendous boost received by the untouchables of Uttar Pradesh by the images of Mayawati, the Dalit leader, a “sense of human identity.”9 Another upper-caste view supported by Western scholars such as Dumont and Moffat is that the lower castes too practice untouchability or subscribe to caste values. Again this has been hotly debated by scholars such as Karanth (this volume) who shows that “replication” of upper-caste institutional structures by lower castes is “a way of establishing an independent cultural identity as well as expressing dissent towards the hegemony of the dominant social order.” As a supportive argument one can mention that taking of upper-caste clan names such as “Sharma” and “Verma” by lower castes in northern India is an act of defiance by the lower castes and not something by which they want to camouflage their identity. These lower castes are often amused at the discomfiture of the upper castes at the confusion created by the “borrowing” of caste names. In fact many upper-caste persons have indicated their fear of the real danger involved in such borrowing of names “what if by mistake we marry our children to one of them.” From the point of view of the lower castes it is not that they want to pass off as Brahmans or upper castes but that they have an ideological difficulty with being “branded” by a name or to concede the “rights” of the upper castes to the use of certain titles. Theoretical issues are again raised by Saurabh Dube (2003, also in this volume) who uses the ethnography of the Satnamis of Chhattisgarh to “entangle the construction of ethnographic histories and the representation of untouchable pasts.” This paper documents the subaltern religious identity formed as a counter to the overarching religious and political dominations of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries of the Chamars perpetuated by the Marathas and only indirectly supported by the British East Indian Company. Dube uses the concept of “margins” as against the concept of bottom used in the earlier papers. Margins are creative as well as dynamic positions from where to formulate and reformulate one’s views and practices with respect to more centrally situated groups. From the filter of their marginal position the Chamars of this region use a new form of religion to critique both Hindu domination and their own position within the system. Interestingly the Satnami gurus from Balakdas onwards appropriate the symbols of domination of both the Brahman and the Kshatriya wearing the sacred thread, carrying weapons and riding an elephant. The mythic imagination of the untouchables thus synthesizes all available

Introduction

symbols of power and from their position the differences of one kind of powerholder from another, including the colonial powers, become blurred. This paper documents dissent but situates it within a fresh theoretical perspective. The concept of margins is critical of the theoretical elitism that always treats only the core as of importance and the rest as periphery. This concept gives agency to the edges that is missing in the more traditional concept of hierarchy.

THE ACTION ON GROUND: PROTESTS AND DISSENT The next set of papers focuses on the multifarious forms of protest and their historical and cultural roots. What are theoretically and ethnographically more interesting are the covert and innovative forms of protest that are simultaneously linked to concepts of self-respect and identity. Pallath (1995, also in this volume) describes the manner in which the myths of Theyyam rituals of the untouchable Pulayas of Northern Malabar serve to raise consciousness about their exploitation and protest against caste discrimination. Conversion has been the path of both protest and rediscovery of self-respect by the untouchables and in this they were led by the conversion of Ambedkar. The paper, written especially for this volume by Aloysius, researches the efforts made by untouchables prior to the historic process initiated by Ambedkar. This also indicates that protest and efforts by those at the bottom have not been lacking even in times prior to Ambedkar, for example, the Satnami movement documented by Dube and the traditional myths, folklore, and art forms of the Dalits. Iythee Thassar (1845–1914) is the forerunner of mass Buddhist conversions under Ambedkar, being the initiator of conversions among the Tamil untouchables some fifty years prior to his mass conversion event. An interesting aspect of the movement that finds similarity with the reformist works of early Dalit leaders such as Jyotiba Phule is that their agenda was not specifically Dalit but addressed toward reformation of society at large. Thus Aloysius (this volume) writes, “This movement, though basically a response of the Dalitsubaltern communities to the colonial contradictions, sought to embrace in the typical Buddhist fashion, the entire society.” This is an important indicator of the mindset of the lower-caste reformists prior to Ambedkar. People like the poets of the Bhakti movement, Guru Ravidas, Kabir, and later reformists like Jyotiba Phule and Iyothee Thassar, had a vision of a reformed society either by conversion to Buddhism or by a reformulation of Hinduism that would strike at the root of caste values itself. However, Ambedkar used caste to forge a movement that would unite the lower castes into a political identity. This he did after he became totally disillusioned with the idea of reform of Hindu caste society.

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Once caste became a means for political consciousness and unity, it became entrenched forever within the Indian polity as a factor of political mobilization (Mendlesohn and Vicziany 1998; Brass 1990). In the context of the newly developing political identities, the re-working and writing a new subaltern history is an important vehicle of self-assertion. Sanal Mohan’s paper (2005, also in this volume) describes the emergence and consequent reformulation of a Dalit movement in twentieth-century Kerala. This paper, like Mencher’s, affirms the existence of agrestic slavery among the untouchable castes and especially in Kerala. The fact of slavery as a part of the Hindu caste system has been ignored or overlooked by most scholars of the caste system, especially those who had praised it as a perfect system of economic interdependence. Once it is brought out that people were bought and sold like cattle and parents separated from their children and siblings sold separately, it throws a very different light on a system whose functionality had been the center of much academic discussion. The Dalit leader of the Kerala untouchables is first converted to a Christian, changing his name to Yohannan in the historical backdrop of large-scale conversions of Dalits that took place from the 1850s to the 1940s but broke away from the formal Church structure once he discovered that there were strong caste discriminations being practiced by it and took on the role of a prophet possessing already charismatic personal attributes. He became installed as a divinity among the local people, especially women, who exhibited a strong attraction for him. The paper discusses the installation of Yohannan into the consciousness of the Dalits as a mythical being and his exploits being rendered miraculous. As Sanal Mohan explains, “Yohannan set out to ’retrieve’ the history of the Travancore Dalits,” a process by which he actually set out to retrieve their present. We have seen this reconstruction of history and mythic pasts to have been a part of the repertoire of most Dalit groups to act as weapons by which they confronted the oppressors as well as adapted to their miserable conditions. A very interesting process is seen in this particular movement in that although it began as a movement that had its genesis in Christianity, with the advent of a democratic Indian state and the promises of positive discrimination, Yohannan became Kumara Gurudevan and his followers proclaimed themselves as a Hindu sect. The interface of the religious with the political is clearly demonstrated in this paper as redefinitions of boundaries happen not once but again and again in order to fulfill the social and political ambitions of an oppressed group through the medium of spirituality. The use of storytelling and folk enactments as vehicles to register dissent is the theme of the paper by Badri Narayan (2001, also in this volume) on the myth of Churhamal and Reshma and its enactment through the folk media of nautanki in Bihar set in the theater of caste struggles and hierarchies of a feudal

Introduction

order. The theme of the myth that is perceived as an affront by the upper-caste Bhumihars against the honor of their women and against their caste is often repeated by Dalits all over India, even though not quite so dramatically. It is well-recognized that upper-caste men always had access to women of the lower castes. Much work, both literary and scholarly, has existed on this theme that is oft-repeated and a recurrent theme in Dalit discourses. However, many Dalits feel that there is need to highlight the other highly socially stigmatized and abhorrent to the upper castes—the theme of the love of upper-caste women for lower-caste men. In classical Hinduism, in the Laws of Manu, it is a process of high defilement of caste ranking labeled as Pratiloma (against the hair), as against the socially acceptable and sanctioned process of Anuloma (in the direction of hair). In hierarchical terms it means that while upper-caste men can access lower-caste women, the reverse is a serious social offense and to be punished most severely. Such sentiments and norms are characteristics of all forms of hierarchy and strongly exhibited by racist societies. To Dalits, the love of a high-born woman for a handsome and sexual lowcaste man is a boost to their self-esteem and a fitting reply to the forcible exploitation of their women by the upper castes. As Rao (2003: 11) observes, “such complex set of fantasies of retribution” is Dalit men’s retribution for their emasculation by the inequalities perpetuated by society. The perceptual universe of the Dalits makes a villain out of the high-caste man who rapes an unwilling low-caste woman. The low-caste man’s relationship with the high-caste woman is on the other hand based on mutual understanding and not forced on the high-born woman who is in love with him, thus highlighting some of the specifically Dalit values, that is, the emphasis on individual sentiments such as love as against socially prescribed norms. For a group oppressed under social norms it is only understandable that they would give more emphasis to sentiments that break away from social barriers. Moreover it shows up the Dalits in a favorable light, where such unions are the result of purity of love as against the tyrannical exploitation of lower-caste women, who are forced into situations by their vulnerability and often contingent situations such as poverty. It is also a covert commentary on the effeminate nature of high-born men as against the masculinity of lowborn men who are toilers and also skilled in many arts and crafts (one may read Arundhati Roy’s God of Small Things). Interestingly in some of the versions recounted by the author, the lowborn youth even spurns the advances of the high-born girl, thus proving the self-esteem and righteousness of the lower castes even further (and this is always to be compared to the villainous and rapacious high-caste man in the minds of the lower castes). This piece also exhibits the seriousness with which history is reconstructed by the meticulous and complex genealogies that justify the low caste’s claims to a

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princely origin. Here again one is reminded of Ambedkar’s efforts based upon scientific evidence and scholarly quotations. A certain degree of individualism as contrasted to the greater conservatism of upper castes had been a highlight of Dalit self-perception and self-esteem, especially during the earlier phase of their protest. One is reminded of Periyar’s “self respect marriages” and Vasant Moon (2001) in his autobiography has also specifically mentioned the attempt of the Mahars for a unified identity by overriding subcaste considerations in marriage. Interestingly for the Mahars of the mid-twentieth century, it was political allegiance rather than caste that played a more important role in marriage. Moon mentions the case of a highly eligible Mahar youth who could find no girl to marry him in their caste because he became what the Mahars called “Harijan,” a follower of Gandhi. This indicates the strongly entrenched political values of identity with an independent untouchable movement led by untouchable leaders such as Phule, Periyar, and Ambedkar as against following what was perceived as upper-caste Hindu leadership symbolized by the Indian National Congress in the pre-Independence era. The fracturing of identity between “Harijan” and Dalit encapsulates what has been a long-standing political differentiation of the “radical” and “conservatives” within the untouchables themselves. The most radical manifestation of this divide between “The Hindus” and the Mahar untouchables is described in the excerpt from Vasant Moon’s autobiography included in this volume. Perhaps at a later stage the divide has become diluted to some extent but the confrontation of the two identities and the violence between them are illustrative of the militancy of the Dalit movement as it took shape in Maharashtra. A process that began in the colonial era has found culmination in the forging of all India Dalit political identities that today encompass most states of India. National-level parties espousing the Dalit cause like the Bahujan Samaj Party have given tremendous moral boost to the Dalit political activism. Large cadres of Dalit intellectuals are leading from the front and making their presence felt at every forum, in line with them are other academicians who identify with the Dalit cause without necessarily belonging to them. Thus Rege (2003: 98) is of the opinion that narrow identity politics based on experiential reality (of actually being a Dalit) can be overcome by the process of “reinvention” of one’s self. Often such reinvention can be an outcome of experience that need not be attributed to birth but to other forms of identification such as anthropological fieldwork. Thus the two papers included in this volume are of Mencher and Channa, on doing fieldwork in a Dalit community whose claims to “reinvention” of their selves are perhaps reflected in this volume itself. But it is not only in the present conditions and with education and attainment of high status that the Dalits have began to form a critique of the upper

Introduction

castes. The Dalit self-respect and Dalit worldview have mocked and ridiculed upper castes both overtly and covertly.

DALIT FEMINISM Jyotiba Phule was forthright in his criticism of the Brahmanical discrimination against women, especially widows. He considered the upper-caste woman/ widow as an object of pity. In fact the position of women and their agency has often been upheld by Dalit scholars and thinkers as an index of the Dalit’s social superiority to the high castes. The subjugation of upper-caste women and their pitiable condition subject to dowry, physical and mental abuse, and most importantly lack of agency has made many Dalit intellectuals and Dalit women themselves to project the relatively superior position of Dalit women “internal to their own caste as a criterion of Dalit superiority.” Ilaiha in his wellrecognized autobiography has also written “(a Dalit bahujan woman) does not have to address her husband in the way she would address a superior. In a situation of dispute, word in response to word, and abuse for abuse is the socially visible norm.” Most ethnographies support this view such as of SearleChatterjee (1981) and Channa (2001).10 Such points of view have led the Dalits to form an effective critique of “upper caste and middle class” feminism in India as insensitive and elitist in much the same way as in the world over the nonwhite and non-Western women have formed a critique of “white, middle class” feminism. In this volume we have included Ruth Manorama’s presentation on Dalit women at the Beijing Conference on women (along with a commentary by the editor). She is the representative of a new generation of educated, articulate, and activist Dalit women who have taken their own cause to the forefront. However, the excerpts from Bama’s autobiography (fictional) that follow Manorama’s piece reflect that untouchable women had agency and a capacity to fight back even when faced with the greatest odds. These women in Bama’s piece reflect a love for life and a capacity to enjoy themselves and thus counter the projection of Dalit women as only downtrodden and exploited. The monolithic projection of Dalit women’s oppression takes away for the reality of these women who not only can enjoy life to its fullest but also contribute to its reproduction in a very significant way. They are the midwives, the local healers, and field laborers, whose work supported most of society and whose indomitable will to live reproduces their own families and those of others. The mother and daughter duo of Vasanth and Kalpana Kaanabiran bring both experience and a nuanced understanding of the gender relations that inform the political and social hierarchies both within and between castes.

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They show how power is contested on the bodies of women, both high and low casted. But the low-caste woman always remains more vulnerable to actual violence and degradation, like being paraded naked through the village while high-caste women have to force themselves to support the misdeeds of their men, all in the name of duty and being “good women.” The shocking incidents of police partisanship and their deliberate mistreatment of Dalits, in collusion with upper-caste men show once again the collusions of various categories of power holders, with each other. As already pointed out by Nanduram (this volume) and supported by Kannabiran and Kannabiran, the atrocities against Dalits multiply in direct ratio to their moving up the social scale and coming in direct competition with the upper castes.

UNIVERSALIZATION OF MARGINALIZATION The most important theoretical point that emerges in these discussions is that we find that there are many similarities of the Dalits with other marginal groups such as the Blacks in the USA and Europe and other racial minorities such as the Etu of Japan. In fact most of them would like to understand the Dalit movement as a general sociological category rather than as historically peculiar or specific. On the other hand, many early Western and non-Dalit perspective which attempt to understand the caste system in terms of its own specificities are seen by the Dalits as diluting the universal characters of the Dalit experience in terms of suffering and human rights. A claim to universalization of the Dalit experience also enables the Dalits to achieve the political goal of taking their status to higher forums like at the WCAR, in Durban. On the other hand, if the Dalit experience is reduced to the specific one of caste they lose out on staking their claims against universal principles of human rights and ethics. The paper by Ramaiah, himself a young Dalit scholar, indicates the futuristic trends in Dalit thought and also reflects on the tenuous relationship that the Dalit movement has always had with the Left Front in India. For example, little attention has been paid to the Kerala Dalits because the Left ideology ignores caste in favor of class. Ramaiah chooses to strongly disagree with current especially Left-leaning sentiments in India regarding the repercussions of globalization and structural reforms. Whereas most Dalit intellectuals as also Left-leaning scholars are strongly opposed to the idea of globalization and structural reforms, Ramaiah points out that most of the losses visualized are either only true for much better off castes/classes such as business magnates and agriculturalists; even such apprehensions that the multinationals will not respect the positive discrimination practiced by the Indian state with respect to the Dalits. The simple fact that cannot be

Introduction

overlooked is that Dalits have benefited very little from such reservation policies in actual terms—a factual state very well demonstrated by the figures one can access.11 The liberalization policies could actually liberate the Dalits from traditional systems of oppression and prejudices that do not seem to be making their exit from Indian society. Ramaiah, who apparently represents a very small minority from among the Dalits themselves, makes a call to present generation of Dalits to “see how best they can use globalization as a means to draw global attention to protect their basic human rights as citizens of India and to have access to a decent means of livelihood and dignified social life.” But in spite of this the Dalit youth are moving toward integration into what they believe is a more open and liberal world system. It is another matter that many of them feel just the opposite that while they have still some control over the state they have no control over the global forces. Thus while reservation is being implemented even though slowly it is still a principle on which pressure tactics can be applied and caste remains integral to the inner politics of Indian society. Most also realize that they are not equipped to compete with the upper castes in “free and fair competition” advocated by the global culture. Dalits form a very small section of all areas where there is only free competition, including sports. In the major national teams of cricket, soccer, and tennis that need resources for training and patronage, there are hardly any Dalits who are to be found only in individual sports like athletics, boxing, etc. Their exclusion from team sports speaks for itself. Only a limited section of Dalits from the upper crust stand any chance of being absorbed into the international market. They are mostly first-generation learners and lack the sophistication and polish required for corporate offices. Most international recruiters are looking for qualities that are to be found in persons who have had elitist education. The education systems in India molded along the feudal lines provided by the British are neatly fractured along class lines. Whereas there are schools that provide education of a standard comparable to any developed country of the world, there are schools that cater to poor and underprivileged children that lack even facilities such as drinking water and blackboards. Many do not even have a proper roof over the children’s heads. The teachers employed in such schools are often totally indifferent to the education of children. They are especially discriminatory toward Dalit children. Even if some Dalit children manage to somehow get a degree they certainly lack exposure and attainments in the form of extra-curricular activities, fluency in foreign languages such as English and verbal skills that are required to get through to the foreign universities. Most would be happy even if they could get a seat through reservation in a local university. In fact education of any sort remains a distant dream even today for the large sections of Dalits who remain below the line of poverty. The homology of caste and class is so strong in India that Dalit can be almost talked of synonymously

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as poor. Disillusionment with all forms of political ideologies and policies is a common state of mind of all Dalits who have reached middle age. It is clear that more than sixty years after Independence, the Dalit as a category feel left out of both mainstream Indian culture as well as state political power. Moreover civil society in India is still entrenched in caste values. Some Dalit youth always mentioned that they would and some of them do have a much better life abroad as in the USA people “do not understand what caste is!” In fact even when they migrate to the USA, they face the same caste structure as in India at least from their fellow country persons. As pointed out by Mazumdar (2003: 240), the elite Indians still wish to maintain the Aryan model of racist identity. Even in the United States, Indo-Americans see themselves as a people who may “look black” but have nothing in common with people who are “racially black.” Thus migration to another country and exposure to a noncaste culture does nothing to erode the deep seated values of skin color and caste/race rankings.

CONCLUSION As a last reminder of what it means to be Dalit in India, on 15th of August 2005, a Dalit woman sarpanch was not allowed to hoist the Indian flag.12 To carry the examples further, news item in the “The Statesman” (May 31, 2012) reported, “Chandigarh, May 30: Five upper caste youth allegedly beat up a 23 year old Dalit and urinated on his face in a Haryana district after the latter refused to give in to their demand for free boiled eggs from his stall.” While this was reported in small prints on the front page with the detailed news at the back, one can compare the headlines in the same newspaper, after two days (The Statesman, June 02, 2012): “Ranvir Sena chief gunned down.” The so-called assassination of this upper-caste leader of the warlords of Bihar (for details see Badrinarayan’s paper in this volume) the entire state of Bihar had gone into a turmoil. This said leader was responsible for many murders of Dalits and specifically charged with (but not convicted) of massacre of 61 Dalits in Laxmanpur-Bath, 32 Dalits in Mianpur and 21 in Bathani (details in the same news item). Yet the commotion and protests at his death far exceeded that of the genocidal attacks on Dalits carried on by his organization. The battle fought between the upper and lower strata of society in India is still at a glaringly unequal footing. Statistics that talk about the number of high positions held by Dalits and their representation in jobs and status positions fail to mention the humiliations and constant peer rejection faced by a majority of them. Thus most Dalits feel that it is they who are in privileged position to express what it really means to be Dalit. As Massey (1997: 31) puts it, “the real beginning of the Dalit consciousness of

Introduction

their own state can be seen in the writings of the low-caste and Dalit saints themselves. According to a familiar saying in my mother tongue Panjabi, jis tan lage soi jane (the real pain is known only to the victim).”

NOTES  1. One may refer here to C. Wright Mills (1971) who was of the opinion that sociology of the positivist school was supportive of ruling class interests and the same is often directed against cultural anthropology of the colonial era.  2. Dalit, meaning crushed in Marathi and Hindi, is a term used by the lowest and oppressed castes as a self-reference. This term has a political significance as it represents the views of the downtrodden about themselves.  3. Oliver Mendelsohn and Marika Vicziany (1998) have given a good summary and criticism of the approaches of Moffat and Dumont in their book The Untouchables.  4. Bhadralok is a direct translation into Bengali of the concept of gentleman in English. It is not simply a linguistic translation but a cultural translation of whatever the term stands for in the British culture. Thus to be a bhadralok meant that one distances one self from all that is common and rustic. It includes manners of dress, speech, and also beliefs and morals.  5. This is an interesting quote form Dirks (2001: 223) that says “The commissioner reported that hundreds of petitions were received from different caste organizations, their weight alone amounting to one and a half maunds (about 120 pounds), claiming changes in nomenclature, demanding a higher place in order of precedence, and emphasizing affiliation to one of the three twice–born varnas.”  6. A relevant article in this context is Sumanta Bannerjee’s (1990) work on the division of high class/caste women in nineteenth-century Bengal from their rural counterparts by the Western educated upcoming gentry, the bhadralok.  7. For example, Brahmo Samaj, Arya Samaj, and the Vedantic philosophy of the Ramakrishan Mission. Much of this refined Hinduism appealed strongly to an international audience and an international image of Hinduism situated away from local traditions was built up and accepted widely in India by the elite.  8. During this period of 1990 the recommendations of a commission called the Mandal Commission named after the person who had chaired the Commission were implemented giving wider reservations to both scheduled castes and backward castes. This set off a spate of violent demonstrations by the upper castes especially students whose extreme form of protest resulted in self-immolation by a large number of young boys and girls. This period of violence precipitated what is now recognized as a polarization of castes in Indian politics, setting all high castes against the low castes.  9. See Mendelsohn and Vicziany (1998) for profiles and discussions on contemporary Dalit leadership. 10. An excellent compilation of papers on the issues of caste and gender are to be found in Rao (2003).

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11. A very good source is the Human Rights News published by the Indian Social Institute. 12. News item on front page of the Times of India, August 16, 2005.

REFERENCES Ambedkar, B.R. 1946. Who were the Shudras? How they came to be the fourth varna in the Indo-Aryan society? Bombay: Thacker and Co. Badri Narayan. 2001. Documenting dissent: Contesting fables contested memories and dalit political discourse. Shimla: Indian Institute of Advanced Studies Bayley, C.A. 1988. The new Cambridge history of India. In Indian society and the making of the British Empire, ed. C.A. Bayley. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bayley, Susan. 1999. The new Cambridge history of India: Caste, society and politics in India from the eighteenth century to the modern age. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bannerjee, Sumanta. 1990. Marginalisation of women’s popular culture in nineteenth century Bengal. In Recasting women: Essays in India’s colonial history, ed. Kumkum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press. Brass, Paul. 1990. The politics of India since independence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bordieu, Pierre and Jean-Claude Passeron. 1997. Reproduction in education, culture and society. London: SAGE Publications. Channa, Subhadra Mitra. 2001. The right to self-hood: The paradox of being a dalit woman. Social Action 51 (4): 337–52. ———. 2003. The crafting of human bodies and the racialization of caste in India. Ambedkar Journal of Social Development and Justice XI: 35–49. ———. 2005. Metaphors of race and caste-based discriminations against dalits and dalit women in India. In Resisting racism and xenophobia: Global perspectives on race, gender and human rights, ed. Faye V. Harrison, 49–66. USA: Alta Mira Publications. ———. 2011. Global economy and constructed social imagination: Intersection of aesthetics, race, gender and caste in South Asia. In Keynotes in anthropology, eds Peter Nas and Shiyuan Zhang Xiaomin, 84–100. China. Chatterjee, Partha. 1993. The nation and its fragments: Colonial and post colonial histories. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Cohen, Bernard S. 1996. Colonialism and its forms of knowledge: The British in India. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Deliege, Robert. 1997. The World of the “Untouchables”: Paraiyars of Tamil Nadu. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Deshpande, Satish. 2003. Caste inequality and Indian sociology: Question of disciplinary location. In The practice of sociology, ed. Maitrayee Chaudhuri, 177–221. New Delhi: Orient Longman. Dirks, Nicholas. 2001. Castes of mind: Colonialism and the making of modern India. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Introduction

Dumont, Louis. 1970 (1980 reprint). Homo hierarchicus: The caste system and its implications. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Foucault, Michel. 1976. The history of sexuality, vol. 1. New York: Pantheon. Haraway, Donna J. 1991. Simians, cyborgs, and women: The reinvention of nature. New York: Routledge. Ilaiah, Kancha. 1996. Why I am not a Hindu?: A Shudra critique of Hindutva culture, ideology and political economy. Calcutta: Saumya. Kaiwar, Vasant. 2003. The Aryan model of history and the oriental renaissance: The politics of identity in an age of revolutions, colonialisms and nationalism. In Antinomies of modernity: Essays on race, orient, nation, eds Vasant Kaiwar and Sucheta Mazumdar, 13–50. Durham and London: Duke University Press. Kapadia, Karin. 1995. Siva and her sisters: Gender, caste and class in rural South India. Boulder: Westview Press. Kleinmann, Arthur. 1995. Writing at the margin: Discourse between anthropology and medicine. Berkeley: University of California Press. Kothari, Rajni. 1997. Social policy, “Development” and democracy. In Social transformation in India: Essays in honour of prof., ed. I.P. Desai, 37–55. Jaipur: Rawat Publications. Massey, James. 1997. Downtrodden: The struggle of India’s dalits for identity, solidarity and liberation. Geneva: Risk Book Series. Mazumdar, Sucheta. 2003. The politics of religion and national origin: Rediscovering Hindu Indian identity in the United States. In Antinomies of modernity: Essays on race, orient, nation, eds Vasant Kaiwar and Sucheta Mazumdar, 223–60. Durham and London: Duke University Press. Mendelsohn, Oliver and Marika Vicziany. 1998. The untouchables: Subordination, poverty and the state in modern India. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press. Mencher, Joan. 1974. The caste system upside down, or the not-so-mysterious East. Current Anthropology 15 (4): 469–93. ———. 1975. Viewing hierarchy from the bottom up. In Encounter and experience: Personal accounts of fieldwork, eds Andre Beteille and T.N. Madan, 114–30. Delhi: Vikas Publishing House . ———. 1980. On being an untouchable in India: A materialist perspective. In Beyond the myths of culture: Essays in cultural materialism, ed. Eric B. Ross, 261–93. London: Academic Press. Mills, C. Wright. 1971. The sociological imagination. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Moffat, Michael. 1979. An untouchable community in South India: Structure and consensus. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Moon, Minakshi and Urmila Pawar. 2005. We made history, too: Women in the early untouchable movement. In Gender and caste, ed. Anupama Rao, 48–56. New Delhi: Kali for Women. Moon, Vasant. 2001. Growing up untouchable in India: A dalit autobiography, Trans. (from Marathi) Gail Omvedt. New Delhi: Vistaar Publications. Moore, Henrietta. 1994. A passion for difference: Essays in anthropology and gender. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Narula, Smita. 1999. Broken people: Caste violence against India’s “Untouchables”. New York, Washington, London, Brussels: Human Rights Watch.

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O’Hanlon, Rosalind. 1997. Cultures of rule, communities of resistance: Gender, discourses and tradition in recent South Asian Historiographies. In Identity, consciousness and the past: Forging of caste and community in India and Sri Lanka, ed. H.L. Seneviratne. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Pallath, J.J. 1995. Theyyam: An analytical study of the folk culture, wisdom and personality. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute. Rao, Anupama. 2003. Introduction. In Gender and caste, ed. Anupama Rao. New Delhi: Kali for Women. Rege, Sharmila. 2003. A dalit feminist standpoint. In Gender and caste, ed. Anupama Rao, 90–101. New Delhi: Kali for Women. ———. 2006. Introduction. In Writing caste/writing gender: Reading dalit women’s testimonies, ed. Sharmila Rege, 1–9. New Delhi: Zubaan (an imprint of Kali for Women). Risley, Herbert. 1891 (Reprint). The tribes and castes of Bengal. New Delhi: Rupa and Co. Rodrigues, Edward A. 2003. “Dalit” struggle for recognition within Indian sociology. In The Practice of Sociology, ed. Maitrayee Chaudhuri, 221–58. New Delhi: Orient Longman. Sangari, Kumkum and Sudesh Vaid. 1990, Recasting women: Essays in India’s colonial history. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press. Sanal-Mohan, P. 2005. Religion, social space and identity: The Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha and the making of cultural boundaries in twentieth century Kerala, South Asia. Journal of South Asian Studies XXVIII (1): 35–63. Scott, James C. 1985. Weapons of the weak: Everyday forms of peasant resistance. New Haven: Yale University Press. Searle-Chaterjee, Mary. 1981. Reversible sex roles: The special case of Benaras sweepers. Oxford: Pergamon Press. Shyamlal. 1997. From higher caste to lower caste: The process of Asprashyeekaran and the myth of Sanskritization. Jaipur: Rawat Publications. Srinivas, M.N. 1977. Social change in modern India. New Delhi: Orient Longman. Trautmann, Thomas R. 1997. Aryans and Britsh India. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Section I Theorizing Marginality

EDITORS’ NOTE In this section, a theoretical view has been introduced, namely a bottom-up as against a top-down, elitist subject position usually assumed by the social scientist. The papers in this section reflect on society and the perceptions and opinions, often manifested in action, of the bottom layer of society. They look at the query, “What it means to be an untouchable?” from a number of perspectives: the actual situation on ground, the way the Dalits situate themselves with respect to the rest of society and the negotiations for space and contestations that is a part of the creation of history.

Chapter 1

The Caste System Upside Down1 Joan P. Mencher

From the earliest writings on the subject until the present, with very few exceptions, the Indian caste system has been viewed—by lawmakers, writers of all vintages and points of view, and, in recent times, sociologists and anthropologists—from the top down. (B. R. Ambedkar, the writer of the Indian Constitution—an untouchable by birth—was one of the exceptions.) In this presentation, I want to view this system from a different vantage point and to show that there are important differences, both qualitative and quantitative, depending on one’s perspective. Looked at from the bottom up, the system has two striking features. First, from the point of view of people at the lowest end of the scale, caste has functioned (and continues to function) as a very effective system of economic exploitation. Second, one of the functions of the system has been to prevent the formation of social classes2 with any commonality of interest or unity of purpose. This latter function has clearly been one of the reasons for the persistence of the caste system and for the general failure of well-to-do leaders to do anything which would really break it down. I shall return to these points after presenting some views of Indian society expressed by social scientists (both Indian and Western) and discussing briefly the historical materials dealing with the untouchable or slave castes. The discussion here deals primarily with untouchable laborers, focusing mainly on the state of Tamil Nadu (formerly Madras), though some material from Kerala will also be included. Those groups traditionally regarded as untouchable, now known generally as Harijans (“God’s people”—a euphemism coined by Gandhi), are included with a few other groups of marginal status in the legal category of scheduled castes, constitutionally entitled to special considerations. The following quotation (Chandrasekhar 1972: xxiii) gives some indication of the importance of this group: “Of today’s world population of some 3.6 billion, about every seventh person is a citizen of India, 547 millions

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according to the latest census. And every seventh Indian is a Harijan or member of the Scheduled Castes—more than 85 million people.” Thus this group makes up a little over 2 percent of the total world population. My interest in this subject derives from research on problems of change and development over the past five years. Any attempt to get a full understanding of the change process requires knowledge about the political, social, and economic class structure of India, both today and in the past, as well as the ways in which economic power has functioned and continues to function. The relationship between the untouchables and higher castes and their attitudes toward each other appear to be of crucial importance in this context.

SOME VIEWS OF INDIAN SOCIETY It is difficult to disagree with Dumont (1970) in his view that Indian society has been permeated by the concept of hierarchy for at least the last 1,500–2,000 years. We have long been aware that hierarchy and hierarchical relationships became important as soon as stratified societies developed in the ancient Near East; and this development is clearly not restricted to India. Commenting on the nature of control in stratified societies, Harris (1971: 405–6) notes, Inequalities in the form of differential access to basic resources, asymmetrical redistribution of the producer’s surplus, lopsided workloads and consumption standards, present every state-level society with an unrelenting organizational challenge. . . . The evolutionary viability of the state rests in large measure on the perfection of institutional structures that protect the ruling class from confrontation with coalitions of alienated commoners. These structures fall into two basic categories: (a) institutions that control the content of ideology; and (b) institutions that physically suppress the subversive, rebellious, and revolutionary actions of alienated individuals and groups.

From the wealth of materials available on a worldwide basis, it is clear that in all stratified societies some people have been able to live lives of relative luxury and relative freedom from oppression while others, often a significantly large group, can be said to have been “exploited,” that is, made to live under conditions of relative deprivation in order to satisfy the needs of those at the top. For a long time, studies of India have focused on caste as a system of interdependence and reciprocity rather than one of exploitation. But it is hard to see it as being any more interdependent than any other stratification system. Indeed, looking at India from the viewpoint of the bottom layers of the hierarchy can shed a very different light on the way in which the social structure has functioned and on the forces that have kept it functioning. It can show in what ways

The Caste System Upside Down

Indian society, though superficially different from other stratified societies, also shares many things with traditional stratified societies the world over. Indian villages, as they exist today, and as they have existed as far back as our written records go, are far from being homogeneous units with a commonality of interests. Many writers on this subject have, however, stressed the point that caste in India is a highly developed and finely articulated arrangement for symbiosis, and that this is one of the features which make it “special” or “unique.” Thus Leach (1960: 5) describes caste as follows: Caste in my view denotes a particular species of structural organization indissolubly linked with what Dumont rightly insists is a Pan-Indian civilization. . . . A caste does not exist by itself. . . . It is clear that a caste can only be recognized in contrast to other castes with which its members are closely involved in a network of economic, political and ritual relationships. . . . The caste system is a system of labour division from which the element of competition among the workers has been largely exuded. Far more fundamental than an analysis which stressed hierarchy and exclusiveness of caste separation is the economic interdependence which stems from the patterning of the division of labour which is of a quite special type.

Leach states (p. 6) that while in a class-organized society “the members of the underprivileged group must compete among themselves for the favors of the elite,” the situation is reversed in a caste society since “members of the highstatus ‘dominant caste,’ to whom the low-status groups are bound, generally form a numerical majority and must compete among themselves for the services of individual members of the lower ‘castes’.” Taking as his example a few small low-caste groups that are in some demand because of their limited numbers, he notes that while today a major section of the people consists of landless laborers standing at the bottom of the hierarchy, these people are victims of economic insecurity not because of their positions in the caste system but because present conditions have turned them into an unemployed working class. Among these conditions, according to Leach and many others, are recent rapid population expansion and the fact that caste rules that formerly compelled the high-status landlords to support their low-status servitors have been progressively destroyed by arbitrary acts of liberal legislation over the past 30 years. These points are highly questionable. It is true that many landlords, fearing the possibility of tenancy laws giving rights to tenants, dispossessed some untouchable tenants in the early 1950s, but it is also clear that the vast majority of untouchables never had any tenancy rights to lose (see, for example, Aiyappan 1937, 1944, 1948; Beidelman 1959; Dubey and Mathur 1972; Hjejle 1967). Some Indian writers would support Leach’s point of view; thus, Iswaran (1966: 38) attempts to depict the traditional jajmani system as

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Joan P. Mencher

centered around the values of honour, pride and prestige. . . . It is characterized by the qualities of reciprocity and redistribution, harmony and cooperation. . . . The essence of the Aya [the Kanarese term for jajinani] system is that it obliterates the dichotomy between master and servant. . . . You are just what you are, and there is no external standard [see n. 3]3 by which you can feel the sense of “lower” or “higher.”

He sees as a central principle the idea of dharma or duty: “All the participants in the Aya system are unconsciously governed by the notion that it is their dharma to do this and thus and not otherwise.” This concept of dharma will be discussed later on, but I would point out here that it has been (and continues to be) used as an implement of repression and for maintaining unequal relationships and that many people at the bottom of the hierarchy have been and are aware of this. Clearly there is an exchange system in operation here, but to treat it as completely symmetrical for all parties concerned involves the risk not only of oversimplifying but also of idealizing. As Ambedkar (1968: 37) has said, . . . [the] Caste system is not merely division of labour. It is also a division of labourers. As an economic organization Caste is therefore a harmful institution, in as much as it involves the subordination of man’s natural powers and inclinations to the exigencies of social rules.

Iswaran speaks of the landowners’ coming forward with free services in times of extreme need or crisis, but to my informants, both young and old, this sounds like a fairy tale. It is worth noting that the one example Iswaran cites (p. 95), of a high-caste landlord giving away rice during a famine, was unusual enough to make headlines in the local press.4 These examples give some indication of the extent to which writers like Leach and Iswaran reflect the “official” view of the society as enunciated by the traditional elite. There appears to be considerable agreement on this point of view, which appears in a writing as early as the Laws of Manu (Basham 1959: 80; Bühler 1880), probably written down in the early centuries AD. It is well documented in early (see Dubois 1906) and later colonial reports (see Spear 1961: Chapters 21–23 and Bearce 1971 for discussion of such administrators as Sir Charles Metcalfe). Though the wording of it may vary, this point of view tends to emerge in conversations with unsophisticated high-caste people (it is usually masked or unconscious among the more sophisticated) as well as in anthropological writings. Both the traditional system and the changes currently going on appear quite different from the vantage point of the lowest castes. Much has been said, for example, about the “security” afforded by the caste system to each of the caste groups, but to a very large degree this argument looks at things

The Caste System Upside Down

from the viewpoint of the man at the top, or perhaps in the middle ranges. (The artisan castes, which are often pointed to, are all middle-range castes.) Furthermore, both today and in the past in much of India, all of the specialized castes taken together (smiths, washermen, barbers, potters, and so on) never constituted more than 10–15 percent of the total population (see, for example, Tables 1.1 and 1.2), and their traditional services alone never sustained them (Parvathamma 1969: 58–60). It is certainly correct to say that the lowest-ranking agricultural laborers could count on being employed (at least when there was work to do), but this is not to say that their position was secure or that they were content. We cannot judge past attitudes on the basis of people living today, but I frankly question Table 1.1: Caste Census Figures, Chingleput District, Madras, 1871

Caste Paraiyan

Number (rounded figures)

Proportion (%)

228,700

23

a

178,900

19

Vellalarbb

175,400

19

Shepherds

46,500

5

Vanniyar

Brahmans

34,300

4

Artisansc

23,800

3

Washermen

15,600

2

Toddy tappers

15,000

2

Barbers

9,400

1

Muslims

21,800

3

Others Total

92,300

19

940,700

100

Source: Census of India, Caste Census figures, Chingleput district, Madras, 1871. Note: For the district as a whole, the three largest caste groups account for 61 percent of the population. In any given village, between two and five castes normally account for 80 percent or more of the population; the service castes, plus barbers, washermen and others form a very small percentage. This situation can be better understood by reference to the family’s access to the means and results of production than by reference to caste alone. a There are no significant subcastes among the Vanniyars. In the past (prior to 1800), the Vanniyars were called Naickers in the area of present Chingleput, Gounders in North Arcot, and Padiyatchis in most of South Arcot (see Mencher 1974). There is a tendency for Naickers to marry only Naickers, but this primarily derives from the fact that one normally marries a person already related. Some marriage does occur, however, between members of the three named groups when they live in the same village and have known one another for a long time. b Vellalars include several subcastes, though it is rare to find more than one in a given village and usually attributable to migration during the British period or more recently. c Artisans here include blacksmiths, goldsmiths, carpenters, and stone-workers among others.

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Joan P. Mencher Table 1.2: Caste Census Figures, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh,a 1911 Number (in thousands)

Proportion (%)

Chamarb

6,100

13.0

Brahman

4,700

10.0

Caste

c

Ahir

3,900

8.0

Rajput

3,700

8.0

Weaversc

2,254

4.7

Kurmi

1,900

4.0

Pasib

1,300

2.8

Shaik

1,300

2.8

Bania

1,200

2.5

Lodha

1,100

2.3

Oil-pressers

958

2.0

Barbers

911

1.9

Washermen

724

1.5

Potters

725

1.5

Blacksmiths

588

1.2

Carpenters

600

1.2

Confectioners

301

0.6

Goldsmiths

267

0.6

Tailors

253

0.5

Brass- and coppersmiths....

200

0.4

94

0.2

Carriersb Others (Muslims and various small groups)

14,137

30.3

Total

47,212

100.0

Source: Census of India, Caste Census figures, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. Note: Here again (as in Table 1.1), the four largest castes account for a large proportion of the region’s population (39 percent). While these castes have many subcastes, they tend not to live in the same village unless the village is exceptionally large. a Figures for Agra, Oudh, Dehra Dun, Jhansi Jalaun, and Komaun. These areas are now for the most part incorporated into the state of Uttar Pradesh. We do not have caste-wise figures based on any of the modem states in North India. b Untouchable. c Includes three castes.

the high-caste point of view often put forth, namely that low-caste people have always accepted their position (expressed in such words as, “God has put me here, I must have done something bad in my past life, maybe next time I will be born higher”).

The Caste System Upside Down

It is quite clear that it was the superior economic and political power of the upper castes that kept the lower ones suppressed. The existence of numerous subcastes in some of the larger untouchable castes and the existence of a fairly large number of exceedingly small untouchable castes with limited specialized occupations scattered around in the countryside have often tended to confuse analysis of the functioning of the socioeconomic system in the past and today. Many observers have examined mainly the overt phenomenological level and thus have failed to see that, in broad terms, the system functioned to keep people separated from one another in a situation in which they were not allowed to own land (or at most, were given a few cents to cultivate). Several related facts that are often passed over need to be kept in mind. First of all, it is rare to find more than one subcaste of an untouchable caste in any village, or often in any subregion, and was even more so in pre-British times. Only a small number of castes account for by far the majority of the Harijan population in any given region (see Tables 1.1 and 1.2), and these tend to be concentrated in specific districts; thus the Pasi and the Chamar, the two main caste groups in Uttar Pradesh (representing 15 percent and 57 percent of the total scheduled caste population of the state, according to the 1961 census), are concentrated in different parts of the state. In some parts of India, the different tasks performed by untouchables are dispersed among a number of castes, whereas in other places, they are all performed by members of one caste. Thus in the area where I worked in Tamil Nadu there is only one untouchable caste, and members perform all of the various jobs, whereas in the area of Mysore State studied by Parvathamma, these jobs are performed by members of three or four untouchable groups.5 The distribution of the untouchable castes in India is quite uneven. Some of the groups are quite small and confined to specialized occupations like scavenging in small towns and cities or working as village midwives like the Hari in West Bengal. Others, like the Chamars, are very large and have numerous subcastes. The majority of Chamar subcastes, according to Briggs (1920: 7–8), are found in fairly well-defined areas, and these may be described as local groups. . . . Some sub-caste names . . . are specifically local; while other sub-caste names . . . point to definite geographical origins. There are good reasons for believing that the caste has received large recruitments from above. . . . The subjugation of tribe after tribe has been a recurring phenomenon in India . . . . Local history fully illustrates this fact.

Thus, the present-day Chamars, scattered as they are over a vast area in northern India, have probably been recruited from a number of tribes, local castes, and so on. Though known as leather workers, only a small proportion of

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the caste members actually do this work, and only a small proportion of their time has traditionally been spent in it, especially in rural areas. Indeed, in rural areas, the major function of the large untouchable castes both in the past and today has been to serve as a source of agricultural labor. The greatest concentration of these large untouchable castes was and is to be found in the irrigated wheat and rice regions of the Indo-Gangetic plain and in the coastal belts of the south. It is striking that these are also the areas which support the densest populations. For India as a whole, the percentage of “scheduled castes” was 14.69 percent in 1961, whereas for Madras State it was 18 percent and only three states ranked higher. As might be expected, the percentage of untouchables is much lower in the dry regions of India, where there is less need for a large number of extra hands at harvest time, and where either owner cultivation or cultivation by tenant families is the main pattern.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND It is important in this context to examine the historical background of the present situation on the subcontinent. This section is not meant to be exhaustive, but rather to give a general picture of the situation in a few selected areas of India in the period just prior to the British colonial takeover. It is intended primarily to explore the socioeconomic matrices in which the larger untouchable groups found themselves, focusing primarily on their relationship to the land. While knowledge about the proportions and socioeconomic position of untouchables in ancient and medieval India is limited, we do have a growing body of information for the period immediately preceding the creation of the British Raj. Thus, we have reports from early travelers from the Middle East, as well as some of the earlier Europeans who came for trade, on the extremely wretched position of the untouchables. There has been considerable controversy among historians whether or not the term “slavery” could be used to describe the situation of the untouchables during this period, but it is certainly clear that they suffered extreme economic privation. Habib (1963: 120–22), writing about northern India during the days of the Moghul empire, notes: ….there were those who were absolutely indigent in the fullest sense, the landless labourers. Members of the depressed castes not only undertook work considered abhorrent by the caste peasants, such as tannery, scavenging, etc., but were also in a large measure agricultural workers. . . . Thus Chamars and Dhanuks who had their own prescribed occupations, worked as agricultural labourers. . . . The Caste System seems to have worked in its inexorable way to create a fixed labour reserve force for agricultural production. Members of the low castes, assigned to the most

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menial and contemptible occupations, could never aspire to the status of peasants holding or cultivating land on their own.

He then goes on to remark: There is no direct evidence in contemporary literature about the status of the depressed castes. It is noteworthy however, that many divisions of these castes bear the names of higher castes (or clans or tribes), a fact which suggests that members of the lower castes so named were once the servants of the respective higher castes.

This same use of names was found in traditional Kerala, and even today it is common to find members of the Pulayan or Cheruman caste (one of the main untouchable castes in Kerala) listed in the voter registration records with their names preceded by the name of their former landlord family (probably at one time their owner). Even Marxist members of this caste sometimes identify themselves in this way, saying, for example, “ñaaiñaK-mana de cerumakkal” (“We are K house’s Cherumakkals”). Ayyer (1926: 208–14) wrote of Kerala: In Malabar, Cochin and Travancore slavery seems to have prevailed from a remote period. . . . These agrestic serfs continued to exist in a State of hereditary bondage, exposed to the caprice or at times to the brutality of the owner, and disposable according to his will and pleasure. . . . In account of the law of Castes, these slaves have all been engaged solely in field work . . . because they could not enter the houses of their masters . . . . As to the class of soil slaves the lowest were the Pulayans . . . . They were bought and sold like cattle and were often badly treated. The children of slaves did not belong to the father’s master, but were the property of the mother’s owner . . . in accordance with the custom of the Nayars, the principal slave holders of the country. One of the usual clauses in the deed of transfer of slaves was “you may sell him or kill him.”

Unni, who worked in central Kerala in the early 1950s, states (1959: 26), “My informants say that sale of Cherumas persisted, though as rare instances, into the close of the last century, and I could hear from them of a few specific instances.” For Madras State (now Tamil Nadu) there is considerable controversy about the position of untouchables in early days, but it is quite clear that when the British took over at the end of the eighteenth century their status was that of agrestic or field slaves (Mencher 1972a). They lived outside the main village in separate cheris or “colonies.” In the late eighteenth century, some of the Paraiyans (the largest of the untouchable groups in the state and the main

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group in the region where I worked) were attached to individual landlords, some to village communities, and others were unattached. According to Place (Firminger 1918: 153) writing about this region in 1795, “The labouring servants are for the most part pariars, who can by no means acquire property in land; and I have not met with an instance of their having done so.” While the history of agrestic servitude in Tamil Nadu is beyond the scope of this paper, one or two observations by Kumar (1965: 42–44) are relevant here: It is clear that at the beginning of the nineteenth century the pannaiyals (unfree labourers) in some Tamil areas were in a condition of servitude. They were born into servitude and they died in it. . . . They could not leave their master’s land; this was so generally recognized that in the early years the Collectors would help to catch runaway labourers . . . . Whether or not a pannaiyal might be sold independently of the land he tilled was a convention which varied from district to district in the early decades of the nineteenth century. . . . In Chingleput in 1819 these persons are not in any way attached to the land but are the property of the individual and may by him be called away.

In general, there was a close correlation between caste, status, and occupation in these regions (Beteille 1965b); thus in Chingleput district, traditionally almost all of the Paraiyans were agricultural laborers. It is important in this context to ask whether the dependent status of these Paraiyans implied any rights to cultivate the land or to share in the crop, as compared to the complete insecurity of employment of the wage laborer of today (Sastri 1937, 1955). Leach (quoted above) clearly assumes that such rights did exist, and this view is apparently shared by other writers. However, according to Kumar (pp. 191–92): . . .these rights were not invariably granted. The tied agricultural labourer did not always, or even generally, have the right to work on a particular plot of land, but he would be sold, of course, only to another landowner who could employ him; in this sense his livelihood was always secure. It is more important that he did not always have the right to work and earn; if his master could not employ him, he need not always pay him but could let him try to get some employment as a casual labourer. The issue would be raised presumably only when there was a failure of the crops, and it would be precisely at times like these, when his rights were most needed, that they were most insecure. Certainly in the famines in the early part of the [19th] century the agricultural labourers suffered the most, though within the group the casual workers may have been the worst hit.

Prior to the present century, among the Paraiyans who were attached to or belonged to each village, a few held certain village offices, such as that of vettiyan (who stayed in the fields and took charge of letting irrigation water into the fields in turn), the taliary (local policeman and tax collector), and the

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boundary man. These were offices which often subjected the individual to harsh conditions (for example, the vettiyan had to spend the night in the fields, catching whatever sleep he could). They were all jobs which could be done without coming into close physical contact with caste Hindus. Office holders either were paid from a common grain heap or received small contributions from all the landowners; occasionally they were given the use of small plots of land (Iyengar 1921; Bayley and Hudleston 1892). The exact number of vettiyans or taliarys varied from village to village, depending on the amount of land irrigated by tank or channel water. The village Paraiyans were also responsible for removing the carcasses of dead cattle, for assisting at non-Brahmanical funerals by drumming and performing other services, and for beating the drums at certain non-Brahmanical temple festivals. For these jobs they received small amounts of grain and enough toddy to keep them in a good mood while doing the work. The job of taliary or vettiyan or boundary man did supply the individual with some food, but it was never enough to provide for him and his family. Even the men who had these jobs had to work as laborers for landowning castes. Since independence in 1947, the government has taken over payment for the taliary, and over the years this salary has gone up. (Nowadays the taliary gets `70 per month.) In any case, slowly during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the agrestic slaves lost this status and became more like casual laborers. However, this did not always mean an economic loss. Though most of the untouchables still do not have any land, a few have managed to acquire some. Above all, they have acquired the possibility of striking for higher wages. While the evidence for the position of the untouchables prior to the British period, or during the early British period, is quite clear, it does not imply that today all landless laborers are untouchables. With the British suppression of the industrial revolution in India (by means of the forcible removal of capital resources and the stifling of the developing textile industry; see Mukherjee 1958) and the rapid increase in population from about 1860 onwards, we find today a large number of landless laborers coming from lower-ranking casteHindu communities and even from some of the higher-ranking castes (Beteille 1971; Mencher 1973, 1975a; Silverberg 1968). The implications for untouchables of this increase in the size of the rural proletariat (see Dandekar and Rath 1971), and the whole question of their emerging proletarianization, will be discussed below. Talking about the past, the obvious question that comes to mind when one considers the position of the untouchables is, “Why didn’t they revolt?” Moore (1967: 213), writing about traditional China, points out that “. . . the structure of the peasant society together with the weakness of the links that bound the peasantry and the upper classes, helped to explain why China was especially subject to peasant insurrections.” Certainly the caste system and the way in which the

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poorest laborers were divided from the peasantry has been a significant factor in the lower number of insurrections in traditional India. Nonetheless, when things got especially bad for the peasants, there were occasionally small-scale insurrections, some of which were of temporary benefit to untouchable laborers also. (This is not to assume that caste stratification is the only deterrent to the development of class conflict or “proletarian consciousness.” The vast literature on Latin America alone makes quite clear that many other factors can serve to prevent the development of class conflict, or even class consciousness, just as effectively as caste.) We have no idea how many unsuccessful (or maybe occasionally successful) rebellions there were in the past by untouchables, but it is possible that when they thought they had a chance to succeed, they tried. In South Malabar, K.R. Unni (personal communication) reports that at one time a group of Cherumans were able to get themselves raised in the official caste hierarchy by lending support to the Zamorin of Calicut in his fight against an inland ruling family. We have many more examples from recent times. Revolts against caste in precolonial times often took a religious form. That of the Lingayats in Mysore started as a revolt against Hinduism and caste divisions. Similarly, the sects formed as part of the fifteenth-century revivalism in northern India had as their leading idea the denial of caste barriers and of communal differences: “They provided the inspiration of two of the most powerful revolts against the Moghuls, viz., those of the Satnamis and the Sikhs” (Habib 1963: 332–33). These ties of caste and religious communities enlarged the scale of peasant uprisings, but, as Habib shows (p. 351), they also tended to obscure their class nature, since they included both the landed and the landless. The Sikh revolt, while essentially anticaste, ended up with a situation not essentially different from the traditional one. As shown by Saghir Ahmed, the Thugs of the nineteenth century, a group which recruited from a multitude of castes and formed egalitarian communities, was another revolt against the status quo (Gough 1972: 74). Gordon (1969: 403–29) also discusses the Thugs and the effect of the defeat of the Marathas by the British in 1803 on the development of such small-scale marauding groups. The failure of these uprisings obviously was due to the historical environment in which they occurred and to the fact that “neither new productive forces, nor new relations of production, nor a new class-force . . . existed in those days” (Tse-tung 1954: 75–76).

UNTOUCHABLE LABORERS IN PRESENT-DAY TAMIL NADU At this point, it may be helpful to look at the status of untouchables in greater depth by focusing on one particular part of the country. For this purpose, I have chosen Chingleput district of Tamil Nadu. The untouchable group to be

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discussed here are the Paraiyans (source of the English word “pariah”), who along with the Pallans and Chakkils form the bulk of the untouchable population of Tamil Nadu. (According to the 1961 census, their proportions of the total scheduled caste population of the state were: Paraiyans 59 percent, Pallans 21 percent, and Chakkilis 16 percent. The Pallans are mostly found in Tanjore district and the south and the Chakkilis in Coimbatore district.) In the southern half of Chingleput district, the Paraiyans as of 1871 made up close to 26 percent of the total population. According to a survey of 94 villages made in 1967, they accounted for 26.7 percent of the population. In Tamil Nadu, the highest percentage of untouchables is to be found in the biggest rice-producing regions. This is no coincidence; the majority are laborers in paddy fields. Of every 10,000 Paraiyans in Tamil Nadu, 6,551 are in the four major rice-producing districts (Census of India 1961). The exact caste composition varies considerably from one village to another throughout this region, though most villages have an untouchable cheri. In any case, there is always a colony within a mile of the village site. The ratio of the total population of the villages to the Paraiyan population also varies. One might expect off hand that this ratio would affect the position of the Paraiyans within the village, but it is certainly not the sole consideration. Other significant factors are (a) the amount of land owned by Paraiyans; (b) the degree of unity among the Paraiyans (which is of course sometimes affected by the ways in which they are manipulated by clever, well-to-do higher-caste politicians); (c) the political position of the leading caste-Hindu landlords; (d) the degree of unity among the economically and often numerically dominant caste villagers vis-à-vis the Paraiyans; (e) the extent to which the Paraiyans are actively supported by leftist political parties on a day-to-day basis; and ( f ) the extent to which landless laborers of other castes see themselves in competition with Paraiyans, as opposed to recognizing common class interests. A general picture of the current situation can be seen by looking briefly at some of the sample villages studied intensively as part of our current National Science Foundation (NSF) project (Table 1.3). None of the villages is on a main road, though all have bus routes passing through them as a result of the vast expansion of bus service in rural Chingleput. In Manjapalayam, the Pariayans mostly work as day laborers for Naickers. In Paccaiyur and Perumalpuram, a few Paraiyan families have large enough holdings to be independent; furthermore, the higher-caste landowners there employ some Paraiyans as sharecroppers. In Paccaiyur, about 4 percent of the land owned by the Mudaliars is cultivated by Paraiyans as sharecroppers on a 50–50 basis. Nearly 50 percent of the Mudaliars hire Paraiyans on an arrangement under which the Paraiyan takes complete charge of the land, the owner supplying the bullocks, seeds, and fertilizers, and gets 1/6 or less of the crop. In Chinnavur and Annur, the

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Joan P. Mencher Table 1.3: Percentages of Population and Land Ownership by Caste in Southern Chingleput Villages Village and total population Manjapalayam (1,362)

Paccaiyur (1,595)

Perumalpuram (1,597)

Chinnavur (617)

Annur (1,217)

Brahman:  Population  Land

9.0 23.0

– –

– –

– –

– –

Reddiar:  Population  Land

– –

– –

5.0 20.0

– –

20.0 29.6

Mudaliar:  Population  Land

– –

25.0 45.0

– –

18.0 28.0

4.0 8.5

Vanniyar:  Population  Land

67.0 61.0

11.0 18.0

46.0 28.0

27.0 24.0

– 1.0

Yadava:  Population  Land

– –

– –

11.0 7.0

– –

– 7.6

Nattar:  Population  Land

– –

– –

– –

– –

18.0 1.5

Paraiyan:  Population  Land

10.0 0.1

47.0 6.0

15.0 10.0

36.0 1.0

37.0 1.0

Caste

Note: These are five of the eight villages in our intensive study, and the figures are ours. All the villages have been given somewhat Tamil-sounding fictitious names; any resemblance to any villages that may exist bearing these names is purely coincidental. The land percentages do not add up for several reasons: (a) small amounts of land are owned by members of other small castes; (b) some land is owned by people in nearby villages (some of whom cultivate the land themselves); (c) some land is held by absentee landlords (primarily high-caste people), mostly in nearby or more distant towns; (d) land is held by temples or registered under the bhoodan board (mostly dry land, hard to cultivate); (e) we have not been able to account for all of the land. In Chinnavur, some land has been taken over by the river.

majority of Paraiyans are agricultural laborers, though a few are sharecroppers for absentee Mudaliars. Traditionally, Paraiyans dealt directly with members of higher castes (except for Brahmans), but they were expected to observe various proprieties in their presence. For example, they would not go beyond the verandah of a high-caste house, would not wear sandals or shirts in the presence of high-caste people, and in general would act obsequiously. This is now changing considerably, especially among the younger Paraiyan men and women, though there is considerable variation from village to village—depending on the degree of economic

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dependency of Paraiyans on the higher-caste villagers. To quote one of the students who worked on our project, comparing two villages in our sample: The Harijans in Annur are different from other places, especially from Gendur. In Gendur, since it is a small village with a low ayakat [irrigated area], the Harijans depend upon the villagers for their livelihood. Here it is a different case; since the village is big, with a bigger ayakat the village people have to depend upon the Harijans to carry out the agricultural work. So the Harijans need not depend upon a single employer. They are politically conscious. They even run a DMK-affiliated association in the name of M.G.R., a famous film star. . . . They ride a bicycle to see movies often and do not show any meek worship to the caste Hindus.

According to one of the rich men of this village, Times have changed. The poor do not show any respect to the rich. I cannot dismiss my padiyal without any reason. If I do so, he would abuse me in filthy language face to face. . . . The poor are not ignorant as they were. The political parties have taught them they are equal to the rich in society. So they have started developing a contempt for us.

Though this represents a challenge to the caste system, in another sense the system is becoming stronger. There is an increased awareness of one’s own group as a political entity and of the importance of “group solidarity.” While the pollution complex may be weakening, people make a distinction between doing away with untouchability as such and any more profound changes in the caste system. The Paraiyan is still at the bottom, even though an individual Harijan may have more money than an individual Naicker. The poor Naicker, like the poor white in the American South, still has the superiority of his caste to cling to. Certain changes were the direct result of government policies (see, for example, Beteille and Srinivas 1969; Chatterjee 1971; Mahar 1972; Sachchidananda 1969– 1970; Mencher 1974); thus, starting with the year after Indian Independence, Paraiyan children were no longer expected to sit separately in the schools, though they still do not play freely with caste-Hindu children outside school. In some villages, for school festivals as well as on some other occasions, the Paraiyans and other village members sit together nowadays, but this is not true in all villages. In none of these villages do the Paraiyans enter the main casteHindu temples, though they are free to enter any urban temple and theoretically (by law) have the right to enter their village temple. Several of the Paccaiyur Paraiyans reported that during the February 1967 election campaign, they were invited into the big Shaivite temple by the Congress Party candidate to hear a campaign speech by a former member of Parliament. This was told as a kind of

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ironically humorous incident, ending with the remark, “Well, we won’t get in there again until 1972.” (When the election was held a year earlier, in 1971, they were not invited back, presumably because the candidate in question did not run in this constituency.) As may be seen from the example quoted above for Annur, the increase of freedom for the Paraiyans in many villages is related to the impact of the modern political system. While they recognize that they may have little or no influence on the village councils (panchayats), they are aware of having some influence as a group (though not as individuals) when it comes to voting. Just as the higher-caste people know that they must manipulate the Paraiyan vote, the Paraiyan voter knows that he has something others want, that he has some power at least in numbers. Thus, as one young man said: All cheri people are going to vote for X this time. Last time we voted for Y, but didn’t do any good. Only one well has been built in the past 19 years, and occasionally they give some house-site. Once government sent books to the cheri people and other poor people, but the Pandiayat President didn’t give. He put them in a waste basket in his house. Once, the government offered cows to poor people, but asked the Panchayat for details and they said no one needs. In this way, they stop any help to us. So this time, we are not going to vote the same party. If any Paraiyan or poor Naicker on the Panchayat tries to help us, they are made to keep quiet. But, we will get rid of the President by vote.

Such attitudes may lead to action which will eventually result in changes in the system; if not, they may ultimately lead to other forms of protest, possibly more violent. At present, most of the Paraiyans, certainly all the younger people, are looking to the DMK Party to help them (see Mencher 1974). In the relationship between caste and politics in these villages, there are differences in the ways in which the politically important members of the caste group in power manipulate the Harijans in order to obtain benefits for themselves. In Manjapalayam, the Paraiyans are insignificant in numbers. The main danger from the point of view of the Naicker politicians, especially the panchayat president, is that they might unite with the poor Naickers. The president has managed to stop this in a number of ways. For one thing, there is a group of Naicker landless laborers who serve him as henchmen for various political purposes (mainly intimidating those who oppose him), in return for a supply of illicit liquor and other small payments. Taking advantage of the movement among Vanniyars aimed at asserting their position as Agnikula Kshatriyas (Rudolph and Rudolph 1967: 51), he has managed to make much of their superiority to Paraiyans and their need to keep together vis-à-vis others. He has further managed to keep the Paraiyans down by preventing them from obtaining any information about benefits available to them from the government.

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This only serves to raise his prestige among the poor Naickers. Although greater closeness has begun to develop between landless Naickers and Paraiyans, this has been held in check by the president’s clever manipulation of Naicker sentiment (see Mencher 1970). In Paccaiyur, the Paraiyans form a near majority. Clearly, there is a possibility in such a situation that they might come to have political power. The Mudaliars have managed to keep this from happening in several ways. First of all, they have taken advantage of the fact that there are now two Paraiyan colonies in this village. The old colony was extremely overcrowded, and around 1960, under heavy pressure from the Paraiyans and the Community Development Block, the Mudaliars agreed to let the Paraiyans build another colony at some distance from the traditional one. Though the Mudaliars were not eager at first to sanction the second colony, they have discovered that in some ways it has helped them to maintain political control of the village, since it is now easier to divide the Paraiyans. For example, recently the government gave two radios to the village, one for the main village and one for the Harijan colony. Since there are two colonies, the Harijans cannot agree on where it should be placed. As a result, the radio is still in the Block Development Office and the Harijans are fighting bitterly over it with one another instead of with the Mudaliars. Secondly, the Mudaliars have managed to buy off some of the potential Paraiyan leaders. (One was given a large loan from the agricultural bank, which he has never been pressed to repay.) Most significantly, they have managed to convince the Paraiyans that one cannot do anything politically without money or influence and that they (the Mudaliars of Paccaiyur) are very influential. To some extent this is true, but it has also served to keep Harijans from finding out what might be available to them from the government just for the asking. The Paccaiyur Mudaliars have been staunch supporters of the Congress Party; the Paraiyans, however, are politically fragmented. Those who believe the claims of the Mudaliars have supported Congress, whereas most of the younger men have joined the DMK in the hope that this more populist party will help them to escape the clutches of the Mudaliars. Of the few Paraiyans who have nonagricultural jobs in the nearby town of Kanchipuram, some have now decided that they cannot ever hope to get anything from the DMK and have become active communists. In Perumalpuram, the Paraiyans are not powerful. However, the Reddiars have used them to keep the poor Naickers down. Since the Naickers form a large majority in the village, and also own slightly more land than the Reddiars, they have always been a serious threat to Reddiar power. By managing to keep the Naickers divided and keeping the Paraiyans on their side, the Reddiars were able for a long time to maintain a precarious political supremacy (though this was finally upset by the elections of August 1970). In the process, they have helped the Paraiyans to some extent, but it is very limited, short-term

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help. A Harijan may get land on a sharecropping basis from a Reddiar, but the Reddiars do not help the Harijans educate their children or gain in political power.

SOME VIEWS OF UNTOUCHABLES There seem to be some important differences in the caste system, depending on the vantage point from which it is viewed. For one thing, those at the bottom appear to have a more explicitly materialistic view of the system and of their role in it than those at the top. This is not to deny that material and vested interests are the pivotal point for all, but simply to say that those at the bottom of the hierarchy have less need to rationalize its inequities. The notions of dharma and karma (or duty and fate) are more useful as rationalizations of the system from the viewpoint of high-caste people. Untouchables may accept these notions to some extent, but it is important to distinguish between the overt acceptance of such values and the holding of other values usually unexpressed to outsiders. When questioned about various caste practices, some Harijans at first say things like, “It is their right. We are untouchable.” But, when pressed, they offer explanations like, “They own all the land,” or “Even the poor Naickers have the support of the rich ones, none of us have much land,” or, as one girl put it, “We can’t ask them to do some work for us, no! Instead of that, those people only take work out of us, so naturally they are supposed to be higher than we are.” People also say, “Previously, if we made any complaint, they would simply refuse to allow us to work on their land; and then what to do, we will simply starve.” Some of the older men do occasionally express the overt values of the higher castes. For example, one of the respected elder men of the Manjapalayam colony often expressed certain of these traditional notions. On one occasion, when he was going around the village with his drum making an announcement about an auction, and on another when he was drumming for a funeral, he said: “This is our duty, it is the responsibility of Harijans to do this work.” Again, when seen taking a headload of paddy from fields at the harvest time, he commented that he was taking his accustomed small bunch from each acre of land to which he let the water from the irrigation channel. He went on to say, “It’s our right; we get rights in this, because we are vetityans.” On the other hand, this same man, 35 years ago, led a successful six-month work stoppage among the village Harijans. This was done in part to stop a quarrel among the Naickers, which was causing difficulties for the Harijans, and in part to get certain concessions for the Harijans. (It was only after this strike that they got their new colony site.6)

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I would like to suggest that, just as in any other situation of extreme economic oppression, one does not find recorded complaints by untouchables from earlier times not only because the vast majority were illiterate, but also because it was simply too dangerous to express any but the “official” line outside of one’s own community. It is clear that within the traditional village community, and even today in many instances, no one outside the community has been willing to listen. Food is another area where there is a dear dichotomy between the untouchables’ overt and covert values. In Manjapalayam, where untouchables constitute a small minority, when I first asked about beef-eating, they tried to avoid the subject. After a long time, and when they were convinced that I ate beef and that in my country it was quite common, and when one elderly man commented that he had a friend who had worked for Europeans and had seen them eat beef, things changed. They started talking about how much they enjoyed a good beef curry—especially if there was plenty of meat, and they didn’t have to use too much water. I was cautioned not to talk about it to the caste Hindus, and my Brahman assistant was taunted with such comments as, “I suppose you think we are bad, but see—she also eats it.” In some of the other villages I have worked in, however, where the untouchables constitute a far more significant proportion of the population, they were much freer in talking about beefeating. Many commented that beef was their favorite meat and talked with relish about how much one got for 8 annas in the market at Walajabad, and they were free in giving recipes for cooking beef. In one of the villages, about 15 years back, there was one Paraiyan who had earned his living solely as a butcher of beef. He is now dead, and the cost of beef is so high that no one in the village now can earn his living as a beef butcher. No one there feels bothered about eating beef, however, even though people say that it is one of the reasons higher-caste people look down on them. It has sometimes been said that their eating of carrion beef is the main reason untouchables have been stigmatized, but in our data from Tamil Nadu there is general agreement (a) that Paraiyans never eat beef from animals that had died of disease (except perhaps during a severe famine), but only from those that had died of old age or by an accident, and (b) that even such beef accounted for only a small part of the beef eaten. Caste Hindus are just as critical of Muslims who eat beef, but, as I have been told, “We don’t have any rules about them. The rules must have been made before there were Muslims.” The free attitude of the Paraiyans to eating beef is illustrated by a story told to me by a young man of this community with an M.A. in social work who helped me collect some of the Tamil Nadu data. Because his father is a railway employee and they live in government quarters where 99 percent of the people

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belong to higher castes, his immediate family does not eat beef. His father’s sister, who lives in their native place, was amused at this and at his “not keeping to their own ways.” One day she gave him a curry which tasted slightly strange, but she told him the flavor was baby goat. He ate it and enjoyed it. Three days later, she told him he had eaten beef, and all his relatives seemed to be amused at this. The point is that while high-caste values may be overtly sanctioned in the presence of powerful high-caste people, this does not mean that they were ever held by low-caste people in private. As noted above, the position of untouchables in a village is subject to the political manipulations of members of the dominant caste, who often try to keep political and economic control by dividing untouchables among themselves and maintaining the traditional barriers between untouchables and poor higher-caste Hindus. For example, a well-to-do Naicker may flatter a poor Naicker about his caste, make comments to him that would make him jealous of anything given by the government to untouchables, or give him preference in hiring. A variety of prejudices, accepted and often spread unconsciously by government officials, bolster up this preferential treatment. A typical example of this is the following rather ambivalent statement by an agricultural officer: See, Harijans, of course, . . . they won’t work hard. See, in any walk of life if one has got that hard-working nature, he can come up. . . . It is not the case of all people. Especially poor Harijans. Why, we have another community people, called Naickers. Whenever we have those people for some job . . . the owners need not be there, whereas in the case of these Harijans they always expect the owner to be there to watch him. I don’t think anything is wanting on the part of the government, especially for Harijans. They have all facilities. . . . Of course it will take some time. . . . Still, in some villages . . . these Harijans are slaves. . . . It will take some time, but government is giving all facilities.

The Harijans, on the other hand, especially those who have some education or work experience outside the village context, are now beginning to see that they may be able to gain some political power by virtue of their numbers, and political parties are beginning to take advantage of this. In the Kanchipuram area, where they are the main agricultural labor group, in 1969 an important state legislator belonging to the DMK Party (which had not done too well in that region among higher-caste people) lent his support and indirectly that of his party to a successful strike for higher wages among the untouchables (Mencher 1975a). The untouchables are also beginning to take advantage of situations where they are in a numerical majority. Thus, in a village near one of the villages in our sample, in July 1970, a Paraiyan was elected president of the panchayat. (This was made possible in part by a change in the method for

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electing the president; formerly it had been done by the members of the council, but in 1970 the entire village voted directly.) This man, who with his brothers owned about nine acres of land, was able to finance his own campaign. In his own words: I do not depend upon others for my livelihood, that is why I was able to become the President. . . . Reddy community’s cruelty towards my community has made me to rebel against them. For the past 10 years I used to oppose everything done by Reddiars. If at least one Harijan from a Panchayat is like me in economic status, I am sure that every Panchayat will have a Harijan president. Here the colony votes outnumber the village votes. Some other caste people also worked for me. Some of the Harijans who were padiyals [permanent, tied laborers], though favoring me, voted against me under intimidation. . . . Being a staunch DMK man, I have helped some of my caste-people to get free pattas [titles to land] and house-sites.

In Tanjore, the largest rice-producing district in the state, in those taluks where almost all of the wage laborers are Harijans, it has been particularly easy for political parties, especially the Communist Party of India, Marxist, to organize them against the landowners. Beteille (1972) notes that elsewhere they have not only found it difficult to isolate the pure wage laborers from sharecroppers and small owners, but having isolated the “exploited class” they have been bedeviled by the distinctions within it between Harijans and caste Hindus. It seems quite likely that over the next couple of years, battles between Harijans and landowners (like the one in December 1968 in Tanjore, where landowners burned down a Harijan colony, killing 42 women, children, and old men; see Shivaraman 1972) will continue, though probably with less killings. It is far harder to predict whether the caste-Hindu (in Chingleput, primarily Naicker) and untouchable landless laborers will unite (Beteille 1965a, 1972). In this connection, it is worth noting that in 1935, Ambedkar, writing about the prospects for socialism in India, said (pp. 35–37): . . . it is obvious that the economic reform contemplated by the Socialists cannot come about unless there is a revolution resulting in the seizure of power. That seizure of power must be by a proletariat. . . . Can it be said that the proletariat of India, poor as it is, recognize no distinctions except that of the rich and the poor? Can it be said that the poor in India recognize no such distinctions of caste or creed, high or low? . . . How can there be a revolution if the proletariat cannot present a united front? The social order prevalent in India is a matter which a Socialist must deal with, that unless he does so he cannot achieve his revolution and that if he does achieve it as a result of good fortune he will be compelled to take account of caste after revolution if he does not take account of it before revolution.

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CONCLUSIONS It is true that there are changes going on in India today, and certainly some of these have affected the social system. One meets today in India, as well as abroad, many Indians who with all sincerity will state that the caste system no longer operates, at least in the cities. (This is much like the white liberal New Yorker’s seeing no discrimination against blacks.) It is significant that none of the persons who have said this to me is a member of the lowest castes. If people of the untouchable castes were to speak out on such a question, I suspect that the majority would agree with Parvathainma, who is a British-trained social anthropologist (head of the Department of Sociology in Mysore) from an untouchable caste (quoted by Isaacs 1965: 135–36): When I first cam back here I found it difficult to rent a house. Everywhere they would ask my caste when I was renting. Then I learned that a doctor in Bangalore had a house here. I went to see him and offered 60 rupees rent for a house that normally gets only 45 rupees. He wrote out a letter of agreement, it was all ready, and then he asked me if I was a Lingayat. I said, true to my conscience, no, I was Scheduled Caste. Then he said he would not rent to me . . . and this was a doctor, educated in England. . . . I don’t see any end to all of this in the next two hundred years unless there is some kind of violent revolution, and I have no idea if such a thing is possible. The government provides benefits and this is an encouraging thing [but] the caste Hindus are jealous and resentful.

There is some good evidence that, at least in some parts of the country, casteHindu and Harijan landless laborers are beginning to unite, at present primarily in the arena of political activity or the related arena of labor-union activity (Srinivas 1966, Mencher 1975a, 1977). In Kerala, labor-union membership is primarily recruited on the basis of class affiliation. It is clear that if the caste-Hindu and untouchable landless laborers should unite, one of the structurally most useful purposes of the caste system would be threatened. As I have suggested, the caste system has functioned to prevent the formation of social classes with commonality of interests or purpose. In other words, caste derives its viability from its partial masking of extreme socioeconomic differences.7 One of the most serious distortions in the understanding of Indian society has been the overriding importance given to the concept of caste. As Beteille (1969: 18) points out, When the basic groups in a social system are defined as being non-antagonistic very little room is left for the analysis of either conflict or change. In fact, this conception of Indian society is only one stop short of the popular nineteenth century view of it as integrated, harmonious and unchanging.

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Beteille also notes (pp. 29–30) that what has been lacking in studies of Indian society is a comprehensive framework for the study of interests (such as the one Dumont has developed to study values), but that there is a certain utopian element in Dumont’s insistence on the universal significance of dharma. Looked at from the bottom up, the system can be seen as having functioned primarily as one of economic exploitation and not one wherein “every caste has its special privileges.” (It is true that an untouchable was often referred to as an “old son” of the landlord, but there does not seem to be any difference between this and the paternalism of the antebellum South in the United States.) Certainly there was in the traditional system some sort of harmony, but it was based on a balance of forces which kept the men at the bottom so isolated that they could not effectively unite for the purpose of changing the system. Those with greater wealth and political power could more readily unite whenever they deemed it necessary. The upper groups were all part of larger interregional communication networks (Miller 1954; Steed 1969; Srinivas 1962: 59). The lower ones had a much narrower range of contacts. Even today, higher-caste leaders in the areas where I have worked in Tamil Nadu do their best to see that the Paraiyans have as little contact with non-village people (for example, Community Development personnel) as possible. Even where a caste-Hindu panchayat president has been elected by virtue of promises made to Paraiyans, he is determined that none of the Paraiyans shall have any direct dealings with the government (except possibly for people who are “eating out of the President’s pocket”). I do not want to give the impression that the untouchables are the only groups which have been subject to economic exploitation, indeed, what I am trying to show is that caste has functioned, both in the past and today, to keep the untouchables and the poor of other castes (who might be equally exploited) from uniting for the purpose of seeking improvements in their life. [Most of the other groups belong to low-ranked peasant castes, which cannot be discussed in detail here; see Mencher (1974).] The abundant attention given to caste, to the exclusion of class, is emphasized in another article by Beteille (1970: 138): . . .there is a whole range of Bengali terms . . . and their counterparts in other Indian languages which are directly relevant to the analysis of what sociologists understand by class. These constitute categories used by the villagers to define a significant part of their social universe, to identify themselves and others and to act in a variety of contexts on the basis of these identities.

These are not new terms. As opposed to caste terms, however, they have traditionally been used to denote groups that have no formal social (or, more importantly, political) structure. The very existence of such terms suggests that,

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at least on some level, there is an awareness of class identities among various groups in India. On the basis of the evidence given above, it seems reasonable to suggest that the great emphasis placed on caste by people of wealth, power, or influence has been in part an attempt to prevent the recognition, or even perhaps the conscious development, of organized class-based groups in Indian society. As the original article was published in Current Anthropology, it included a number of people’s comments on the article and then my answers. In this section, I summarize those replies that will be useful to round out my discussion. I begin with my discussion of class. As I used it in this article and as I use it in the other articles which appear in this volume, I am using the concept of class in a Marxist sense of access to and control over the means of production. A distinction is also made throughout my writing, including this article and later material, between class consciousness or the awareness of class, and the recognition of class. When I discuss the formation of “social classes” with a commonality of interest or unity of purpose, this refers to class consciousness, not the empirical fact of the existence of classes. The related term “exploitation” I use to refer to the extraction of labor from the Dalits without adequate compensation. Several of the commentators seem to have missed the point that the vast majority of Dalits in many parts of India, and certainly in Tamil Nadu where most of my work on this issue was done, do not have any specialized tasks that grant them benefits, but rather constitute a vast army of landless or semilandless laborers needed for paddy cultivation. It was not my intention to say that caste alone prevented self-conscious social classes from developing, but rather that it was a significant factor in this process. In many ways this statement of mine was anticipated by Dr Ambedkar in his book The Annihilation of Caste. Caste has often been manipulated by the well-off of higher castes to keep their own poor from uniting with Dalits for pay increases and other things. An extremely important point, that bears emphasizing over and over again, is that those at the bottom of most hierarchies do not believe their situation to be legitimate. In the Indian situation, research since the time this article was written clearly indicates that there were more rebellions of diverse types than were covered in the literature available to me in 1974. Indeed, what I was arguing was that for the most part it was sheer physical force, or fear of force, or fear that their children would suffer, that served to keep down rebellions or fights. I noted in 1974, and it is still visible 30 years later, how the rural elites manage to form alliances when they fear the power of the Dalits, and how they have and continue to create dissension between backward classes and Dalits. Clearly, an in-depth analysis of the agrarian situation involves looking at all of the poor as well as the handicaps faced by Dalits, which are social as well as economic. Some of these issues are discussed in greater detail in my articles later in this book.

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The situation in 2006: It is not feasible nor desirable to rewrite this article to reflect the present-day situation. Over the past 35 years, not only have I learned a great deal more about the situation facing Dalits both in rural and urban areas, but I have also been involved with NGOs that are working with Dalits, especially Dalit women, in both Tamil Nadu and Kerala. What is distressing is the extent to which the conditions described in this article, and in several others which appear later in this book but were written in the 1960s through the early 1980s, persist even in the twenty-first century. In my concluding chapter I will mention some of these in more detail.

NOTES 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

The original work in Tamil Nadu was supported by a postdoctoral fellowship from the National Science Foundation in 1962–64. In 1967, while in India on a grant to Columbia University from the National Institute of Mental Health, I did further work among Harijans and on the relationship between agriculture and social structure in Chingleput district, Tamil Nadu. My most recent research is part of a comparative study on problems of socioeconomic structure and development in Madras and Kerala conducted as part of a joint Columbia University–Delhi School of Planning and Architecture project, supported by an NSF grant to Columbia University. I am extremely grateful to T. Chandran, Chandramohan, P. Sivanandan, and T. Arterburn for their help in the field and to Jane Hurwitz for her help with data analysis. I would also like to thank F. C. Southworth and C. Parvathamma for their many helpful suggestions. However, I alone am responsible for the statements made here. I use “class” in the Marxian sense and adopt the Marxian conflict model throughout. Because this paper is not intended to be an analysis of these concepts, I have not considered it necessary to spell out their implications. It has been pointed out to me that this is actually not quite true in Mysore. While there could be jajmani relationships between an untouchable cultivator and a carpenter or blacksmith, there could not be any with a barber or washerman. Thus, an untouchable would certainly be aware of “higher or lower” in jajmani relationships, since he would be prohibited from any such relations involving contact (even indirect contact, as in the case of the washerman). It is true that when the untouchable caste is small and the landowning caste large, a paternalistic relationship may exist such that the landowning family may help a particular family whose services they require. Thus, Parvathamma (personal communication) notes that the wedding of an untouchable in the village she studied in Mysore State was completely handled by caste Hindus, as the untouchable family was one of two or three such families in the village. Where untouchables are numerically dominant, this is not likely to occur. Many of these tasks are not time-consuming, and none provides a significant proportion of the livelihood of any of the families concerned. It is almost as if an incoming

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6.

7.

group, possibly a small untouchable caste from another region, or a former tribe, was offered some small task like playing the pipes at some festival so that it might “have its place” in the community. It is interesting that one of Parvathamma’s castes is called Talawari and is associated with watch-and-ward activities. This is the name for one of the traditional jobs or positions (taliary) held by one to four members of the Paraiyan group in every Tamil village (see Note 6). It is striking that this man changed his behavior as he aged, but not that uncommon. The younger men in his colony resent his present stand, but rationalize it in such terms as: “What can you expect? He is old and he wants to please everyone. He had his time. But we do not accept these things.” The long-standing discussion of the cross-cultural applicability of caste as a concept is beyond the scope of the present inquiry. The reader is referred to the numerous articles that have appeared over the years in Contributions to Indian Sociology and to Berreman (1960, 1967a, 1967b, 1972). For the present discussion, it suffices to say that I would agree more with the point of view commonly associated with Berreman than with that of Dumont (see Mencher 1974). It is also not possible in this paper to discuss the factors responsible for the creation and maintenance of the Indian caste system.

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Mencher, Joan P. 1975a. “Agricultural Labour Movements in Their Socio-Economic and Ecological Context: Tamilnadu and Kerala,” in Culture and Society Festschrift for Prof. Aiyappan. Edited by B.N. Nair, 240–66. New Delhi: Thomson Press. ———. 1975b. “Viewing hierarchy from the bottom up,” in Anthropological field work. Edited by Andre Beteille and T.N. Madan, 120–40. New Delhi: Vikas. ———. 1975c. “Problems in analyzing rural class structure: A case study from South India.” Economic and Political Weekly IX: 1495–1503. ———. 1977. “Agricultural labor unions: Some socio-economic and political considerations,” in The New Wind: Changing Identities in South Asia. Edited by K. David, 309–335. The Hague: Mouton. Michaelson, Karen L. 1972. “Class, Caste and network in suburban Bombay.” Western Canadian Journal of Anthropology, Fall, 84–93. Miller, B.D. 1969. “Revitalization movements: Theory and practice (as evidenced among the Buddhists of Maharashtra),” in Anthropology and archaeology: Essays in commemoration of Verrier Elwin, 1902–64. Edited by M.C. Pradhan, R.D. Singh, P.K. Misra, and D.B. Sastry, 108–26. New Delhi: Asia House. Miller, E.J. 1954. “Caste and territory in Malabar.” American Anthropologist 56: 410–20. Miller, Robert J. 1966. “Button, button . . . great tradition, little tradition, what tradition?” Anthropological Quarterly 39: 26–42. Moore, Barrington, Jr. 1967. Social origins of dictatorship and democracy. Boston: Beacon Press. Mukherjee, Ramkrishna. 1958. The rise and fall of the East India Company. Berlin: VEB DeutscherVerlag der Wissenschaften. Nehru, Jawaharlal. 1946. The discovery of India. New York: John Day. Nicholas, Ralph W. 1968. “Structures of politics in the villages of southern Asia,” in Structure and change in Indian society. Edited by Milton Singer and Bernard S. Cohn, 243–54. Chicago: Aldine. Ollman, Bertell. 1971. Alienation: Marx’s conception of man in capitalist society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Opler, M.E. 1959. “Factors of tradition and change in a local election in rural India,” in Leadership and political institutions in India. Edited by Richard L. Park and Irene Tinker. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Orenstein, Henry. 1965. Gaon: Conflict and cohesion in an Indian village. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Parry, J.P. 1970. “The Kali dilemma.” Contributions to Indian Sociology, n.s., 4: 84–103. Parvathamma, C. 1969. “The logic and limits of tradition and economy in village India.” Indian Journal of Social Research 10 (1): 55–70. Planning Commission, Government of India. 1967. Regional variations in social development and levels of living. Volume 1. New Delhi: Publications Division, Government of India. Raju Kumar, M.D. 1974. “Struggles for rights during later Chola period.” Social Scientist 18–19: 29–35. Rakshit, H.K. (ed.). 1972. Newsletter of the Anthropological Survey of India. Vol. 1(3). Calcutta: Anthropological Survey of India.

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Ramachandran, V.G. 1972. “Untouchability and protective discrimination,” in Minorities and the law. Edited by Mohammed Iman under the auspices of the Indian Law Institute. New Delhi, Bombay: N.M. Tripathi Private Limited. Rudolph, Lloyd I. and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph. 1967. The modernity of tradition. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. Ruyle, Eugene E. 1971. The political economy of the Japanese ghetto. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia University, New York, N.Y. Sachchidananda. 1969–70. Studies of scheduled castes with special reference to change. Paper presented at the Indian Council of Social Science Research conference on the present status of research in the social sciences. Sastri, K.A.N. 1937. The Coles. 2 volumes. Madras: Madras University Press. ———. 1955. A history of South India. Madras: Oxford University Press. Schneider, David M. 1968. American kinship: A cultural account. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall. Shivaraman, Mythily. 1972. “Thanjavur: Rumblings of class struggle in Tamil Nadu.” Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars 4 (1). (Reprinted in Imperialism and revolution in South Asia Edited by Kathleen Gough and Hari P. Sharma, 246–64. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1973.) Silverberg, James (ed.). 1968. Social mobility in the caste system in India. The Hague: Mouton. Sivertsen, Dagfinn. 1963. When caste barriers fall. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Spear, Thomas George Percival. 1961. India: A modern history. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Srinivas, M.N. 1962. Caste in modern India and other essays. Bombay: Asia Publishing House. ———. 1966. Social change in modern India. Berkeley: University of California Press. Srinivas, M.N. and A. Shah. 1965. The myth of the self-sufficient village. Economic and Political Weekly 1. Steed, G.P. 1969. Caste and kinship in rural Gujarat: The social use of space. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia University, New York, N.Y. Tambiah, S.J. 1973. “From varna to caste through mixed unions,” in The character of kinship. Edited by Jack Goody, 191–230, 492. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Unni, K.R. 1959. Caste in South Malabar. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, Baroda, India. Washbrook, David. 1973. “Country politics: Madras 1880 to 1930.” Modern Asian Studies 7: 475–531. Weiner, Myron. 1967. Party building in a new nation: The Indian National Congress. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Zamora, Mario D. 1963. “The Panchayat: A study of the changing village council with special reference to Senapur, Uttar Pradesh, India.” Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.

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Zamora, Mario D. 1967. “Politics and planned change: The case of a North Indian village,” in Studies in Philippine anthropology. Edited by Mario D. Zamora. Quezon City: Alemar-Phoenix. ———. 1971. “Political change and response in an Indian village: The panchayat,” in Themes in culture: Essays in honor of Morris Edward Opler. Edited by Mario D. Zamora, J. Michael Mahar, and Henry Orenstein. Quezon City: Kayumanggi. Zelliot, Eleanor. 1972. “Gandhi and Ambedkar: A study in leadership,” in The untouchables in contemporary India. Edited by J. M. Mahar. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Chapter 2

Atrocities and Segregation in an Urban Social Structure* Nandu Ram

Atrocities on weaker sections, especially the Scheduled Castes, Tribes, and neoBuddhists (if the misnomer is accepted any way), have become almost a regular feature of rural life in India. Every day we come across, through daily newspapers and other media, a number of incidents of beating, torture, arson, usurpation, molestation, rape, and killing of these people by caste Hindus and others in villages. As a result, the Scheduled Castes and Buddhists (converted from the scheduled castes) are compelled to migrate in large numbers from some parts of the country to the nearby towns and cities in search of livelihood, shelter, and social security. But increasingly such atrocities are spreading to the towns and cities such as Agra, Lucknow, and Muzaffarnagar in UP and Amrawati and Aurangabad in Maharashtra. Although the magnitudes of atrocities committed on these people may be less in urban areas than in villages, it is an undisputed fact that the phenomenon has become institutionalized in Indian society as a whole. Generally, atrocities are caused by disputes over the distribution and possession of surplus lands and wages, water, and other scarce resources. I have said elsewhere (Ram 1977: 111–32) that the conflicts between the scheduled and non-scheduled castes and the resultant atrocities on the former occur within the frame of the structural boundary of castes in villages. The atrocities are inflicted on the marginal castes when they prove to be weak in their conflict with the upper castes. The incidents of atrocities are caused due to their refusal to perform the age-old caste-based works and their subordinate social-economic status that prevents retaliation. This is also true, to some extent, in the case * The author acknowledges financial support provided by the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi for a short field-trip to visit the mohallas affected by atrocities in Agra city.

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of atrocities committed on them in urban areas where the issues may not be identical, though the nature and extent of their assertions for their right may be similar. Social scientists have generally ignored these happenings in pursuit of abstract theoretical knowledge. Keeping aside the general apathy of social sciences, popular articles have appeared in magazines and newspapers in recent times that at least highlight some facts about atrocities. The Government of India, also through its agencies of the Commissioner for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and the National Commission for the Castes and Schedule, has been collecting statistics about atrocities on these castes and communities. However, all such monologues try to portray the atrocities committed on the Scheduled Castes and other weaker sections sometimes as “caste war” or conflict or violence (Abraham 1978; Bose 1985: 180–211), or “class war,” not “atrocities against the Harijans”—the class conflict (Sinha 1977: 2037–39) and other times as an amalgamation of both (Chittaranjan 1978: 3–6; Verghese 1978: 2–3; Dhar et al. 1982: 102–13). The Seminar (November, 1979), a monthly magazine of symposium also brought out a special issue on the “Harijans” and nearly half the articles focused on atrocities—some treating them as caste phenomena and others as class phenomena. One of the articles in this volume writes, “As soon as the case (of atrocities) comes to light, investigations begin, politicians, journalists and other teams visit the place of occurrence; it is published and political advantage is taken of it by Opposition Parties. After a few days public interest in the case diminishes and the outrage is forgotten” (Sachchidanand 1979: 33). Yet, none of the above mentioned articles have really touched upon the real genesis of the problem. These have failed to incorporate the views of those who are at the bottom of the scale of atrocities inflicted in different situations. Besides the plausibility of a number of explanations, the phenomenon of atrocities undoubtedly gets apprehended in the wake of political interference. Much of the impassioned utterances of political leaders apportioning blame on their opponents for incidents of organized violence and tyranny against Harijans are mere political chicanery. Instead of examining in depth the none too recent problem as manifestation of gross social injustice and insecurity inherent in the system itself, what they are debating is their role as being pro-Harijans or antiHarijans. (Sachchidanand 1988: 46)

Further, analyzing atrocities as violence, Sachchidanand (ibid.: 40) states, The machinery of law and order and the caste system supported by the scriptures, which are supposed to order the file of citizens and protect them, are themselves important instruments of exploitation and violence. . . . In more cases than not, administration and the police encouraged and abetted acts of violence by wealthy and powerful people against the poor and the weak.

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We intend to analyze in this chapter, the phenomenon of atrocities in an altogether different framework. In our analysis the atrocities are neither sui generis nor isolated acts but are inevitable products of hierarchical social structure and in-built social segregation against the disadvantaged sections of the population, especially the Scheduled Castes and the Buddhists. We subscribe to the view that such inherent hierarchies release certain latent forces from amongst the disadvantaged sections. Such forces either try to acquire appropriate positions in the existing social structure itself or make effort to bring certain fundamental changes in the structure of social relationships, which may accommodate their interests too. Finally, we have tried to locate certain stimuli, which encourage such forces to become operative at the level of confrontation rather than cooperation.

THE PERSPECTIVE The perspective or framework developed here derives inspiration mainly from two major considerations. One acknowledges that social realities persisting all over India have been varying in nature across time and space; in other words, oppression has not always been completely successful in its mission of silencing the oppressed (if at all this is possible). Thus the Dalit experience has on occasions been allowed space for advancing views from the bottom. Secondly, one must realize that although the views from the bottom have struggled time and again, though not in a well-organized fashion, to catch the limelight, they have been resented openly or otherwise even within the rubric of the social sciences. For instance, Ambedkar tried perhaps for the first time in modern period to present systematically the bottom views about the Indian social reality (see Mencher 1974: 471). Through all his academic and nonacademic contributions he subscribed to such views but these were bitterly criticized especially by his political opponents without producing any substantial counterviews. The views from the bottom, thus, are of those whose status and power located them at the lower level in the traditional society. Since they occupied low caste and class statuses, their views were either undermined or twisted conveniently, or were resented and suppressed as and when they tried to get abroad and make their way (Moore 1967: 334–37). Stretching the argument further to the phenomenon of atrocities Ambedkar opined as early as in the beginning of 1947 that so long the caste system existed, the Scheduled Castes and other weaker sections would be subjected to atrocities, antagonism, and hostility of caste Hindus (Ambedkar 1979: 381–449). But his views also were not given serious attention either by the caste Hindu politicians or academicians for the simple reasons that they went against the vested interests and values of those in power.

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Such views are kept in abeyance even today and are often sidelined and accused of being sectarian, partisan, and endangering the national integrity. But apart from the monochromatic charges, the bottom views certainly have a point to make in that they are, in actuality, the views of a larger section of the society. For instance, the Dalit Panthers while defining the Dalits count not only Scheduled Castes and Tribes and neo-Buddhists as Dalits, but the entire toiling masses—industrial workers, farm laborers, landless tenants, poor peasants—all of whom are not drawn from scheduled castes (Oommen 1984: 45–61). This indicates that social boundaries and identities may be defined differently by different sections of the society, especially as they represent varying social experiences. Since the bottom sections definitely represent a large section of population in the country, any theorization of Indian social reality vis-à-vis the power hierarchies and the genesis, causes, and extent of atrocities committed on the weaker sections ought to reorient itself and incorporate the views from the bottom for its viable generalization. In India and elsewhere, attempts to theorize a social reality rely generally on the dominant mode mistakenly regarded as representative of the entire social reality. In doing so, the other recurrent modes of thought unsupported by the dominant ones are undermined as these are considered to be not contributing much to such theorization. But such modes of thought undoubtedly shape the dominant one at least indirectly if not directly, for they provoke reactionary statements. The charges of unacceptability against the bottom views have been framed by invoking subjectivity and political self-interest. Attempts to systematize the bottom views may be charged with being methodologically weak as against the elitist and often Indologically inspired theories of caste. Charges of subjectivity are usually leveled especially when a researcher himself/herself bears such views or belongs to a Dalit group. But counterpoising the same charge against the top views we can say that in want of a complete objectivity in social sciences both views have to meet ultimately the same fate. Further, the bottom views being the views of the majority are closer to the social reality by keeping in accord the views of the larger society as against the small percentage of elite intellectuals. Finally, it may perhaps be too early at this point to argue for a comparative perspective rather than adopting a dialectic viewpoint—either views from the bottom or up—for a better appreciation of Indian social reality. However, the bottom views are fairly justified to be given a legitimate space on the cognitive map of social reality in India. Our present analysis of atrocities committed on the Scheduled Castes and the Buddhists has been done keeping in mind the bottom-up perspective, looking at the atrocities from the point of view of the victims rather than society at large.

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THE DATA The data used in this chapter is mostly qualitative in nature. It pertains to the structure of social relationships, in-built social segregations and interplay of both in a city. The atrocities committed on the Jatavs (Scheduled Castes and the Buddhists) of Agra in 1978 have been recorded extensively but are briefly presented here due to paucity of space. The source of data is based on the short fieldwork, made in February 1978 in the Jatavs’ mohallas (clusters of houses) that were affected by the atrocities. Views and opinions of persons from different walks of life—ranging from rickshaw-pullers and other manual workers, craftsmen, and manufacturers to the professionals, and the Boudha Bhikhus (Buddhist monks)—were recorded. A few organizers and leaders of the Ambedkar Jayanti (birthday) processions, the initial target of attack, were also contacted and intensively interviewed. Besides, the opinions expressed in the forms of appeals, news items, and reports of the entire incidents published in various newspapers, magazines, and government reports, have also been utilized. A number of cases of atrocities of criminal nature and also of looting, arson, and vandalism had been registered by the local police authority in the district court against a large number of the Jatavs and their leaders. The hearings of these cases were on at the time fieldwork was conducted. Besides, the state government had instituted a one-man enquiry committee to look into the matter. Since the data collected did not encompass the entire case up to the end, the analysis presented here does not give the complete outcome of the entire incidents. The purpose of this chapter is not to go into the judicial procedure or the political outcome but to concentrate on the genesis of the problem and analyze it from the perspective of the existing social conditions of the city at that point of time. To do this we must first look briefly at the social structure of the city and place of the Jatavs therein. The following description is set in the seventies and must be understood in that context.

THE SOCIAL POSITION OF THE JATAVS The Jatavs live segregated in caste blocks, a fact observed by other anthropologists who have worked in this area (Lynch 1974b: 449). Given the marginal status of the Jatavs in the local caste hierarchy, it is to be expected that these mohallas are located in low-lying areas in the city some of them at the outskirts, and near drainage and ditches and there is an unhygienic atmosphere in them. The location and settlement of the Jatavs in Agra reflects the situation of low castes in most other cities of India where they are condemned to live in the

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worst parts of the cities under fairly inhuman conditions (D’Souza 1978: 219–40; Malik 1979). However, the economy of shoe-manufacturing which once linked them with the international market has internally fractured them into at least two classes: bara aadmi (big men—factory owners, politicians, and bureaucrats) and karigars (craftsmen and poor workers). Inequality among the Jatavs is also visible from the low level of literacy and educational achievement of a majority of them. About two-thirds of their population is unemployed or underemployed. Thus, there exist two types of inequalities: structural inequality between the Jatavs and caste Hindus borne out of social structure of the city itself and quasistructural inequality between the better-off Jatavs and the less advantaged ones, though both of them occupy low status in the larger structure of the city. They also remain on the whole an “urban proletariat” (Lynch 1974a: 35). Moreover the middlemen from the upper castes, Muslims, and Sikhs now take away the lion’s share of the profit from the shoe industry (Lynch 1981: 1952). However, by the 1970s, social inequality had been replaced, at least in principle, by a notion of equality enshrined in the Indian Constitution. Although such notion of equality had not so far been translated into practice yet it aroused aspirations of the people of different castes and communities to compete with one another. I do not intend to map out here any viable scale of social equality qua inequality on which the aspirations and, consequently, efforts of people of the different castes and communities can be measured. Instead, I subscribe here to the view that the members of a caste lower in the scale (rank) aspire for and try to equate with status of people of the immediately higher caste. Sometimes, they also try to reach at par with rank of the highest castes (even of the dominant castes, see Srinivas 1966: 1–45, 151–152; 1987: 96–115) found in their region and also the highest varna, if the varna model is tenable at all. But in so doing the internal differences are emphasized for whenever a person or family acquires social equality in relation to higher castes, they keep considerable distance from their own caste and other lower castes because the very system of caste is based on graded inequalities among different castes. I have noted elsewhere (Ram 1976) that some members of the Scheduled Castes believe in an absolute social equality, which in their view is possible only in a communist society or Buddhist socioreligious system. However, an absolute or a relative social equality could be acquired only if there are enough avenues open and a status is sought outside the caste system. The majority of Jatavs in Agra city have opted for the second avenue—the Buddhist socioreligious system to achieve social status equal with that of others outside the castefold as it is established that equality can never be achieved from within the caste system (Ambedkar 1979: 47).

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The caste system has been termed as the “primordial” category(ies) associated with ties of “birth and blood” (Rosenthal 1970: 11) as compared to the presumably more open category of class. In Agra city we have presence of both caste and class, the latter being based on more modern criteria of economy and political power. However, for the Jatavs any attempt to move from caste to class has failed. Most of the Jatavs migrated to Agra about a century ago, from nearby rural areas to the city in search of stable livelihood, social security, and a better or perhaps an equal social status. Initially, they sought their livelihood under some patronage and later started their own business enterprises—mostly of shoe-manufacturing as it was compatible with their traditional occupation as leather workers. As the shoe industry was a thriving industry, some of them managed to do well and after consolidating their economic positions they started influencing the city politics not only in the form of vote banks but also by taking up active political roles in the city; as Corporators and Members of Parliament and State Legislature. With such transformations in economic and political position the Jatavs as a community had tried time and again to enhance their status in the caste hierarchy first through sanskritization (participating in the Arya Samaj movement and by claiming status of the Kshatriya caste), occupational mobility, and then political participation and educational achievement. While attempts at sanskritization were discarded quite early, they soon realized that even other channels of status mobility proved to be nonproductive, at least in their case. As a result of moving into the city, they had undergone occupational mobility from landless agricultural laborers dealing with raw leather to vending and handling mechanically processed leather and setting up factories and shops. Other changes comprized of taking up government jobs as well as political participation in the city political organizations. Their overall mobility ultimately pushed them into reacting against their segregation and downgraded status and in intensifying their efforts for social equality. Lynch (1974a, 1974b) has noted that it was the processes of occupational mobility and political participation and not the process of sanskritization (Srinivas 1966: 1–45) that helped the Jatavs of Agra in demanding and to some extent getting social acceptance. Lynch has not denied the social segregation practiced against them though he observes that it was receding, if not in internal social relationships like marriage, but in external relationships like business dealings. In other words, the Jatavs, after coming out of their utter degradation in the villages were able to get advantage of a more dynamic situation in the city. They were given better place depending upon their economic position and political influence although it always remained marginal to the core of the caste elite. The entire process of social and economic transformation of Agra’s Jatavs made it clear both to them and to the observers that neither an absolute nor

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a relative social equality was possible for them even in an urban social situation. That such a situation was universal in India can be verified by looking at a number of studies of the different Scheduled Castes in other cities (Berreman 1979: 124–54; Malik 1979; D’Souza 1978: 219–40). Thus the Jatavs witnessed continuation of the traditional nature of Indian urbanism, though perhaps initially they would have hoped for complete absence of social inequality or it prevailing in milder form in urban centers. Not only in India, but complete social equality is a distant dream even in the most industrialized societies of the world although the nature of social inequality is obviously different there (Béteille 1974: 362–80). Social segregation may, however, be reduced by overcoming one’s caste or ethnic identity by economic mobility and political participation. But again this is possible only at the individual and not at the group level. In the case of the Scheduled Castes, suppressing their caste identity and the adoption and percolation of an altogether new identity even at the individual level is not that easy as there always remains a danger of disclosure at any point of time and then facing more severe social segregation than ever. Thus passive modes of bypassing caste discrimination remain impossible and unattainable. This lesson was well learned by the Jatavs of Agra city. They realized through their numerous experiences of both formal and informal situations that social equality could be achieved not through the gradual process of co-option or consensus but by the assertion for their rights and, if necessary, through confrontation with the traditional power holders. Consequently, they started building up strong and effective organizations in which their economic position, political consciousness, and unconditional faith in Ambedkar’s ideology and Buddhist thought played the pivotal role. Thus the Jatavs attempted to break into the system from a platform of equality and conflict rather than passive manipulation. With this background we shall analyze below the cases of physical atrocities committed on the Jatavs in 1978 in Agra city. These cases of atrocities were specific to the situation of the city and digressed from the kind of segregation and material issues present in the village. Rather, these were rooted in the realization of self-respect on part of the Jatavs, their urge for acquiring social equality and the continued intolerance of the upper castes to these attempts.

THE TRAUMA OF ATROCITIES Most of the scheduled castes and the Buddhists (converts) in the country celebrate April 14—the solemn occasion of birth anniversary of late Babasaheb Dr Ambedkar, perhaps the greatest emancipator of the downtrodden ever born

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in modern India. They have been celebrating it since 1957, just a year after his death, to mark their unity, consciousness, and assertion of their rights besides paying homage to their mentor. On this day, processions are taken out through a number of locations in a city. Such an occasion in 1978 witnessed a chain of traumatic atrocities inflicted on the Jatavs of Agra city. I shall briefly present an actual account based on my observations of the genesis and escalation of a particular event. On April 14, 1978 the Jatavs of Agra city took out a Shobha Yatra (a long procession with great pomp and show) in the late evening for paying homage to Dr Ambedkar. The civil authorities had made arrangements to maintain law and order during this event. The procession, duly sanctioned by the city administration, started at 8.00 p.m. from the locality known as Tila Sheikh Mannu—a mohalla densely populated by the Jatavs—and was to return to the place of its origin after covering more than 20 places and mohallas in the city. Soon after its origin, the procession got swelled up by the conjoining of a large number of tolis (small processions with floats) sponsored by different mohallas as it proceeded. The procession was marching ahead with large-sized photographs of Lord Buddha and Babasaheb Dr Ambedkar enthroned on the back of elephants, and with glittering lights and placards in hands of the marchers. The participants were singing songs and chanting slogans about the Buddha and Ambedkar to demonstrate their unity and awareness of the rights of the Scheduled Castes. Around 11 o’clock in the night when the tail end of the procession reached near Rawatpada—a mohalla populated by caste Hindus, mainly the merchants, some miscreants hurled a shoe, a few stones, and a wooden log at it, from the roof top of the three-storied Bansal Building to express their undisguised hostility. At this some young participants reacted and took it as a serious offence and disgraceful act against the Buddha and Ambedkar. They requested the police authorities to round up the miscreants but the police stood there merely as onlookers. As a result, these young men showed their token resentment by stamping on the pavements and shouting slogans at the top of their voices. Meanwhile, the main organizers of the procession tried to control the situation and directed the march to go to their destiny without any further incidents. The procession terminated at 10.00 a.m. the next morning. On the following day, the procession was condemned by an angry demonstration of caste Hindus, mainly the shopkeepers of Rawatpada who lodged an FIR with the local police, approached the city administration, and demanded a complete ban on the Jatavs’ processions in future via that locality. They demanded compensations for getting their shops smashed and property looted and destroyed. They also insisted that the Jatav offenders be rounded up and maximum penalties awarded to the miscreants. On the other side, the Jatav leaders had marathon meetings both among themselves and also with the administration between

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April 16 and 22 and demanded a judicial inquiry of the incident that took place on April 14. They also demanded administrative action against the culprits and an assurance from the administration in respect of not getting their processions disturbed in future. On the passive response from the administration, they decided to hold a silent procession on April 23 up to the Bungalow of the District Magistrate via Rawatpada to apprise him of the reality and persuade him to concede their demands. They wanted to register their protest against the mischievous acts done by caste Hindus on April 14 and 15. After long discussions with the administration the leaders got the permission for the protest march. There were conflicting versions—the administrative version was that it gave permission to hold the procession by avoiding the Rawatpada; the leaders’ version was that there was no such binding in the permission except their assurance given to the administration to persuade the marchers to avoid Rawatpada. They assured the civic authorities about avoidance of any untoward happenings from their side. They also sought a clear commitment from the administration (which it could not give) to see that nothing should happen from the side of caste Hindus. These versions caused tension between the administration and the leaders of the Dalit groups. The silent procession of men and women, young and children, and the aged persons with black ribbons on their shoulders and placards in hands thus marched on April 23 under heavy police guards, having been permitted by the administration to do so. They were demanding the setting up of a judicial inquiry into the incidents of April 14, punishment to the culprits and protection of their rights. As the procession reached again near the Bansal Building at Chhippitola Road, it was verbally declared by the police as illegal and was not allowed to proceed via Rawatpada. After some discussion with and persuading the police, the procession marched ahead. When it reached at the crossing of Rawatpada, it was held up again and was not allowed to move ahead. Thereafter, the participants insisted on their rights to march through Rawatpada. During the discussion between their leaders and the police, a large crowd of several thousand people began to challenge the marchers from the front. The anti-marchers were shouting provocative slogans and threatening the marchers to face the consequences. They also started throwing brickbats and pouring hot water from the balcony of their houses over the procession. As a result, the people in the procession became restless but the anti-marchers and the heavy police guards from both the front and back surrounded them. Simultaneously, the police declared the procession as illegal and resorted to lathi (stick) charge, lobbed tear gas shells, and firing (Report 1978: 144). The Jatavs were sandwiched and started searching for a route for escape. As they tried to escape, they were chased and beaten up by the police and antisocial elements. A large

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number of them were seriously injured and their leaders were arrested. The entire episode is remembered even today by the Jatavs of Agra as a repetition of the historic firing at the Jallianwala Bagh in Punjab during the struggle for national freedom. Then, the third and the last but the most treacherous phase of the atrocities started from April 24 and continued till May 1 (the international Labor Day). The Jatavs adopted a strategy of the Satyagraha (agitation for truth) by peacefully violating 144 Criminal Procedure Code and courting arrest at the collectorate to press for release of their leaders, punishing the real culprits, and suspending the police involved in the lathi charge and in the firing. Hundreds of them were arrested during this period and held up for hours inside the police stations. Meanwhile, some heated discussions were going on between their leaders who were not yet arrested and the police authority. But once again, the police resorted to lathi charge on these people and chased them away from the collectorate. Simultaneously, the police entered the Jatavs’ mohallas spread almost all over the city. Certain Jatav-populated mohallas like Chakkipat, Sunderpada, Gyaspura, Jagdishpura, Gummat, Lohamandi, and so on, were made the main target of atrocities, ransack, arson, looting, and firing. Since the young people from these mohallas were assembled at the collectorate demonstrating, mostly women, children, and old persons were tortured. According to one estimate, eleven persons were killed and hundreds were seriously injured and arrested. Their properties worth many hundreds of thousands of rupees were looted and destroyed. “Generally, when an unruly mob commits acts of arson, the targets normally are government properties and those belonging to well-to-do sections. But it is somewhat curious to note that in this case, the houses burnt were small hutments belonging to poor labour class and shoe makers” (Report 1978: 145). It was a real Jatav hunt as even the pedestrians on the road were identified with their caste, beaten up, and arrested by the police and the Provincial Auxiliary Corps (P.A.C.). During the entire period of atrocities and outrages the Jatavs were given a partisan treatment by the administration and no proper medical facilities were provided to them. Instead the injured persons were kept under the strict vigilance of police in the hospitals. Conversely, hundreds of men and women from among them were charged with false cases. However, taking cognizance of the political potential of the situation, a number of politicians from ruling as well as Opposition Parties functioning at both the State and the Centre rushed to Agra city and consoled the victims with high assurances. The government also provided to them, though in a step-motherly fashion, some token relief measures and instituted a one-man judicial inquiry commission. But in no way, the government efforts proved to be sufficient to the irreparable damage to the self

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and social identity, honor, personal belongings, and so on, of the Agra’s Jatavs caused by atrocities and outrages committed on them by caste Hindus in connivance with the police authority and the city administration.

THE EMERGING ISSUES The incidents of atrocities and outrages against the Jatavs of Agra city as documented here raise certain basic issues pertaining to the structural placement of the Scheduled Castes and efforts made by them to improve their status in the Indian society. Some of these issues are: Does an urban social structure in India really imbibe in it any modern attributes of social status? Is there any forward shift in the outlook of caste Hindus and others toward the Scheduled Castes and the Buddhists in cities? Why does a consensus model fail to accord social status to the Scheduled Castes which they deserve by any parameter of status determination in a relatively modernized society? What are the forces which help the Scheduled Castes in cities (but not in villages) to unite against their oppression and prepare them to confront the oppressive forces? And finally, why are the police and the civil administration more hostile than caste Hindus and others against the Scheduled Castes and the Buddhists in cities, although in the villages too they align with the upper castes? We shall try to examine below these and some other related issues.

EMERGENCE OF THE JATAVS AS A FORCE The Jatavs were a caste group with the traditional occupation of dealing with leather; they were also the single largest community in Agra city. When shoemanufacturing became an industry they were able to consolidate their economic position by monopolizing the shoe-manufacturing industry and thus getting linked with the international market. They were in the initial phases greatly influenced by the proselytizing spirit of the Arya Samaj through its emphasis on status determination on the basis of one’s karma (deeds). Inspired by the doctrine of karma they made claims to the status of a twice-born caste— the Kshatriya, the symbol of power and bravery. Their economic dominance inspired them in legitimizing their claim as they could assert that they had achieved karma. But both their newly acquired economic affluence and attempts at sanskritization antagonized their day-to-day relations with caste Hindus and others in the city. This aggravated further when in the middle of the present century they discarded sanskritization and adopted politics as an alternate avenue for their social mobility.

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The upper castes now feel that the Jatavs and the Buddhists are negating the very ethos of Hinduism by challenging the caste system and eroding the overall sociopolitical dominance of the upper castes and classes in the city. Caste Hindus, in the words of Lynch (1981: 1952) “feel that Jatavs, as untouchables, are getting not only out of place but also out of hand...they are, therefore, both a potent political presence, and a major threat and source of strain to upper castes?” Thus it could be clearly observed that since the Jatavs have emerged now as a strong social force in the city through their economic consolidation and political mobilization, they have been subjected to escalating atrocities from the upper castes and the cases of atrocities committed on them in 1978 may be regarded as the climax of that.

AMBEDKAR’S IDEOLOGY AND DINT OF BUDDHISM Ambedkar stands as a great source of inspiration for the downtrodden and as a promise of salvation for all their sufferings, in modern India. His ideology derives from equality, fraternity, and social justice. By transmitting his ideology at least notionally to the downtrodden people, he taught them to get educated, get united, and then to agitate for their rights. Besides, Ambedkar himself fought throughout his life for dignified positions to be accorded to the marginal in society. In doing this he installed his religious Guru—the Buddha as the greatest champion of the most degraded people and always sought inspiration from him. Toward the end of his life he embraced Buddhism along with hundreds of thousands of his followers and opened the doors of Buddhist conversion for millions of the downtrodden. Thus, Ambedkar remains the major source of inspiration for the Scheduled Castes and the marginal like the Jatavs; “Ambedkar’s teachings, as well as his example, have also encouraged them to fight for their rights and fight back when attacked” (Lynch 1981: 1954). Lynch (1974a: 137–65) has further observed a “thread of three strands” through which the Jatavs of Agra have tied up their relations with Ambedkar’s ideology and Buddhism. These are actual or historical contacts, structural positions, and cultural continuities. Historically, they stood with Ambedkar by accepting him as their (and thereby of all the scheduled castes in the country) undisputed leader when he was pleading for the case of the Indian untouchables in the Round Table Conferences. Besides, they happen to be the receivers of his personal messages for unity and agitation and have been bearing on the torch of Buddhism—first in 1946 and then a few months before his death in 1956 when he visited Agra city. Secondly, Ambedkar himself being an untouchable had borne all social disabilities which the untouchables throughout the

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country and the Jatavs in Agra have been suffering from centuries. However, with his own efforts and an exceptionally brilliant academic and political career, Ambedkar acquired the national status of an untouchable leader besides that of a revolutionary. He demolished Hindu philosophy and provided a counterideology of his own. Finally, the Jatavs of Agra have fortified their relations to Ambedkar (and Buddhism) through the heroic and religious cultural traditions. Ambedkar’s life struggle is internalized by the Jatavs, like the other Scheduled Castes, through varieties of heroic musical songs and ballads. The religion embraced by him falls in the saintly but revolutionary tradition of northern India (Lynch 1974a: 142). Besides, there is a more significant reason for affiliation of the Jatavs with Ambedkar and Buddhism. In addition to his dictum to get educated, united, and to agitate, Ambedkar’s ideology provides them a political means to achieve their ends while Buddhism opens a new vista to escape from the “stigmatised identity” (Berreman 1979: 164–77) as it provides an egalitarian value system as opposed to the essentially hierarchical structure of Hindu social system. Most Jatavs in Agra city believe in Ambedkar’s ideology and Buddhist religion and have displayed the photographs of both of them in their houses, shops and other premises. Most of them have embraced Buddhism officially or unofficially. Dozens of Buddha vihars (Buddhist shrines) and statues of the Buddha and Ambedkar installed in their mohallas and other public places are clear indication of their faith. They celebrate the major dates relating to the lives and deaths of the Buddha and Ambedkar and on such occasions they exhibit their reverence, with full faith and grandeur, to both their mentors. Thus, it was their mental transformation brought about through the teachings of both Ambedkar and Buddha that gave the self-confidence and courage to retaliate violently in 1978 against the caste Hindus’ show of disrespect to their idols. Questions, then, posed from the bottom side are: Why do the caste Hindus and others living in the neighborhoods and even the city administration generally dominated by upper-caste people become hostile and antagonistic with the Scheduled Castes and the Buddhists especially when the latter assert for their rights? Why does the notion of social equality fail to translate its principle into practice? And finally why do the Scheduled Castes, the Buddhists, and other weaker sections have become convinced that confrontation rather than consensus is the only path for getting distributive justice in the society? I do not wish to pass here any implicit or explicit judgment on such issues. Instead, I simply suggest that the answers to these and several other similar questions lie in the nature of social hierarchy itself and not in the attitudes and behavior of any of the people, which may be conveniently identified by outsiders as partisan.

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POLITICS OF EMANCIPATION AND ROLE OF THE BETTER-OFF JATAVS At the time when this study was done, the caste system dominated the city of Agra, even though with the economic prosperity of the Jatavs, there were discrepancies between the caste and class structure of the city. The existing hierarchy was prone to retaliation to any effort by the Jatavs to upset the status quo. The Jatavs on the other hand were not comfortable with the existing status hierarchy especially as they were convinced that they too had sufficient money and political power to challenge it. Moreover, after consolidating their economic position and getting politicized through their political organization (RPI) the Jatavs actively participated in the civic polity. Lynch (1974a: 66–128) has referred to such politics as the “politics of untouchability” which, in his opinion, is ...a phrase which itself gives some clue, to the contradiction that underlies it. Essentially, it is the contradiction of groups traditionally defined and accepted as powerless pariahs with groups traditionally defined and accepted as powered gentry. This contradiction is occurring in a new field of interaction where individuals, not groups, are defined as equal and have equal rights to the sources of power.

It is true that in the “post-independence” period the Jatavs have emerged as a vital force in the social and political structures of the city though they also ally with other political parties dominated mainly by caste Hindus and others. But in actuality, they have been involved in preparing themselves as a dominant and separate political entity. Thus, it can be said that their politics is really the “politics of emancipation” and not the “politics of untouchability” as termed by Lynch (ibid.) because they are now concerned not with annihilation of their social disabilities nor with the caste system as such but with the acquisition of an equal status outside of the caste system in the modern civil society. However, these efforts are thwarted through atrocities committed on them by caste Hindus and others as was done in 1978. It cannot be denied that there exists a quasi-structured inequality between the politicians and the masses, bureaucrats and common people, and between rich and poor among the Jatavs in Agra. No doubt, one finds individual differences in styles of living and social relations among the Jatavs. But interestingly enough, these differences do not matter at all at the group level because the Jatavs as a community tend to exhibit their unity and militancy against the violent action of upper-caste Hindus and civil and police authorities when atrocities are committed on them. This was so because theirs was not a protest against any immediate exploiting class or individuals; rather, it was a manifestation of their rejection of social inequality as an ideology (emanated from caste

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system and Hinduism). In their collective action, the Jatavs from all walks of life—literate and illiterate, rich and poor, employed and unemployed, and supporters of different political parties—fought together. In fact, the acts of atrocities committed on them in 1978 have united them more and generated an unbreakable confidence among them to meet successfully any such situation in future.

CONCLUSION The phenomenon of atrocities inflicted on the Scheduled Castes and the Buddhists in Agra city in 1978 has been analyzed by incorporating the views from the bottom, that is, how the victims perceived the atrocities. The analysis accepts the Jatavs as victims and at the receiving end for this is how they perceive the social situation. It is quite obvious that the description of events would have been quite different if narrated by a member of the upper caste. Thus at the theoretical level it is conceded as mentioned in the beginning of the paper that descriptions of social events are subjective in nature. The Jatavs feel that their actions were subjected to a violent reaction by the upper castes because they challenged the existing dominance of the caste Hindus in the city social structure. It also indicates how the city as a whole including the civil and law enforcement authorities collectively took action against the Jatavs. Generally when there is a conflict between two groups the police intervene to maintain the law and order situation. It also takes some punitive measures against the culprits. But it has been observed here that in the case of the Jatavs and the Buddhists in Agra city the police and the city administration were neutral in the initial phase. Later on, they appeared as main inflictor of atrocities and the caste Hindus appeared to give latent support to the police and civic authorities. Thus, in the event of their conflict or confrontation with caste Hindus, it appears that the Scheduled Castes and other weaker sections are isolated and made target of atrocities by even the police and the civil administration. There appears to be a collusion between the power holders at various level of society that includes the administration and legal and police mechanisms. This situation is generalized in all hierarchical societies and even in the USA, the African Americans are usually subjected to abuse even by the law enforcers. Thus both state and civic mechanisms are not above partisan action and are driven by the same values as the rest of society. The reasons why the Jatavs in the city were able to organize while their counterparts in the villages are not able to consolidate is firstly the improved economic and political power, secondly their access to education and communication, and thirdly their numerical strength. Being educated they could

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assimilate more easily the doctrine of Ambedkar and also reject the traditional religion. More importantly in this paper the thrust of the description and analysis is based on data collected from the bottom layer of society and a conscious effort has been made to bring out a “bottoms up” view of events.

REFERENCES Abraham, A.S. 1978. “Caste war in the villages: The challenges of modernization.” Times of India, August 14. Ambedkar, B.R. 1979. Annihilation of caste: With a reply to Mahatma Gandhi (First published in 1936). Reprinted in Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and speeches, vol. 1. Bombay: Government of Maharashtra. ———. 1979. States and Minorities (First published by Thakkar Publishers, Bombay in 1947). Reprinted in Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches, vol. 1. Bombay: Government of Maharashtra. Berreman, G.D. 1979. “Self, situation and escape from stigmatized ethnic identity.” In Caste and other inequalities: Essays on inequality, ed. G.D. Berreman, 164–77. Meerut: Folklore Institute. Béteille, André. 1974. “The decline of social inequality.” In Social inequality, ed. André Béteille, 362–80. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. Bose, P.K. 1985. “Mobility and conflict: Social roots of caste violence in Bihar.” In Caste, caste conflict and reservation, eds. I.P Desai et al., 180–200. New Delhi: Ajanta Publications. Census. 1971. Census of India (Uttar Pradesh) part II-C (I), Social and cultural tables. New Delhi: Government of India. Chittaranjan, C.M. 1978. “Beyond caste conflict.” Mainstream 16(32), April 8. D’Souza, V.S. 1978. “Does urbanism desegregate Scheduled Castes? Evidence form a district in Punjab.” In Process and institution in urban India, ed. Satish Sabharwal, 219–39. New Delhi: Vikas Publishing House. Dhar, Hiranmay et al. 1982. “Caste and Polity in Bihar.” In Land, caste and politics in Indian states, ed. Gail Omvedt, 102–13. Delhi: Authors Guild Publications. Khanna, Girija and Mariamma A. Varghese. 1978. Indian women today. New Delhi: Vikas Publishing House. Kolenda, Pauline M. 1978. Caste in contemporary India: Beyond organic solidarity. California: The Benjamin Cummings Publishers. Lynch, Owen M. 1974a. Politics of untouchability. Delhi: National (First published by Columbia University Press in 1969). ———. 1974b “The Politics of untouchability: A case from Agra.” In Urban sociology in India, ed. M.S.A. Rao, 443–70. New Delhi: Orient Longman. ———. 1981. “Rioting as rational action: An interpretation of the April 1978 riots in Agra.” Economic and Political Weekly 16(48): 1951–56. Malik, Suneila. 1979. Social integration of scheduled castes. New Delhi: Abhinav Publications.

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Mencher, Joan P. 1974. “The caste system upside down, or the not-so-mysterious East.” Current Anthropology 15(4): 469–93. Moore, Barrington Jr. 1967. Social origins of dictatorship and democracy: Lords and peasants in the making of the modern world. Boston: Beacon Press. Oommen, T.K. 1984. “Sources of deprivation and styles of protest: the case of the Dalits in India.” Contributions to Indian Sociology 18(1): 45–61. Ram, Nandu. 1976. Social mobility and status identification among the scheduled caste government employees in Kanpur city. Unpublished PhD thesis, IIT Kanpur. ———. 1977. “Social mobility and social conflict in rural Uttar Pradesh.” Indian Anthropologist 7(2): 111–32. Report. 1978. Report of the commissioner for scheduled castes and scheduled tribes (1977–78), Part I, Government of India, New Delhi. Rosenthal, Franz. 1970. Knowledge triumphant: The concept of knowledge in Medieval Islam. Leiden: E.J. Brill. Sachchidananda. 1979. The harijan elite:Aa study of their status, networks, mobility and role in social transformation. Faridabad: Thomson Press. ———. 1988. Social change in village India. New Delhi: Concept Pub. Co. Sinha, Arun. 1977. “Class War, Not ‘Atrocities against Harijans’.” Economic and Political Weekly 12(50): 2037. Srinivas, Mysore Narasimhachar. 1966. Social change in modern India. Berkeley: University of California Press. ———. 1987. The dominant caste and other essays. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Verghese, B.G. 1978. “Caste, Class Factor.” Monthly Public Opinion Survey 23(12): 2–3.

Chapter 3

Continuity and Change in “Ex-Untouchable” Community of South India Joan P. Mencher

Anthropological studies in South India have focused largely on the higher castes, or on the lower castes from the vantage point of the higher, even though the traditional system and ongoing changes often appear very different when seen from below. A few notable exceptions include Aiyappan’s work among the Nayadis and Tiyyars (1937, 1944, 1948, and 1965). The present study concentrates on those aspects of the past and present that affect the role of the Paraiyans, a caste whose name has become synonymous with “Untouchable” in the English variant “pariah.” The spelling of Paraiyan adopted here follows that used in the 1961 Census of India, although many variants appear in earlier accounts. During the past few decades, members of this caste have stopped using their traditional name, due to its derogatory associations, and prefer to call themselves Harijan, or Adi-Dravidas which means original Dravidians. The latter term is based on the belief that the Paraiyans were the original settlers of the land, later displaced by those who imposed the caste system upon them. Although Thurston (1909) speaks of many subcastes among the Paraiyans, most of the names that he cites are probably regional variants rather than an indication of distinctive divisions. (In the area where this research was conducted only two small subcastes were found apart from the major grouping. These subcastes were the Paraiyan washermen and a type of priest, or pujari, who served the Paraiyan community.) In 1961, the Paraiyans constituted 58.65 percent of the Scheduled Caste population in Madras State, with the highest incidence of Paraiyans to be found in Chingleput District, the site of this study. In Chingleput, where Paraiyans constitute almost one-third of the population, and in other rice-producing areas

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in the broader region of Tamil Nadu, the Paraiyans and other Scheduled Castes provide most of the agricultural labor. Since few Paraiyans follow any other occupation, this study will examine their role in rural communities based on a detailed investigation of one village, supplemented with material from a second village, census data for the entire district, and incidental information from student investigators conducting an independent survey of ninety-six other villages. Although much has been said about the “security” afforded by the caste system to the lower groups (see especially Ishwaran 1966), interpretations of this kind tend to express the viewpoint of the man at the top, or in the middle ranges of the caste hierarchy. While it is true that the Paraiyans have always had a secure place within the traditional social structure, such “security” does not mean that they liked their role, or even that they accepted it. In modern times many question the not uncommon high-caste belief that the lower castes are resigned to their lowly status. Although such expressions as, “God has put me here, I must have done something bad in my past life, maybe next time I will be born higher,” undoubtedly occur, one suspects there has always been considerable hostility and resentment toward those higher in the social structure. Contemporary changes to be considered in this analysis of the social forces impinging upon the Paraiyans include the commercialization of traditionally caste-linked occupations, the decrease in the number of castes represented in village communities, and the slow breakdown of caste prerogatives. Also examined are the effects of the introduction of Western political institutions, especially political parties and an electoral system based on universal franchise, and the success or failure of government programs to assist Harijans. Among the many problems to be explored in this study is the vital one of modern legislation, particularly laws affecting land tenancy and the abolition of untouchability, which has begun to have an effect on conditions throughout the area, though slowly and often indirectly. The effect on village Paraiyans perhaps has not been as great as the legislators’ idealistic expectations. There exist various ways of circumventing the laws and the Paraiyans’ condition is subject to many forces outside the province of the law. As will be seen below, in spite of all the changes currently being attempted, and in spite of the Harijans’ slowly developing awareness of their new powers and opportunities, actual change up to the early seventies has been very limited. The Paraiyans, with the Pallans and Chakkilis, form the bulk of the Untouchable population of Madras State (now Tamil Nadu). The Pallans are found only in the southernmost districts, and the Chakkilis largely in Coimbatore District. Consequently, in the region of northern Madras under discussion, the Paraiyans are the main Untouchable group. Despite considerable controversy about their position in earlier times, when the British took over in the

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nineteenth century, the Paraiyans’ status as categorized by Ellis and others (e.g., Bayley and Hudleston 1892) was that of agrestic slaves bound to the soil. Treated as Untouchable by all caste Hindus, and even by many other semiuntouchable castes such as Ambattan (barbers) and Wannan (washermen), the Paraiyans lived outside the main village in separate cheris or Harijan hamlets. The cheris were generally located on the least desirable lands, such as areas subject to flooding by the monsoon. Often overcrowded, they rarely possessed such rudimentary sanitary facilities as a clean source of drinking water. As late as 1970, when the Paraiyans spoke of the ur or village they excluded themselves and their own residential area. In the past, some Paraiyans were owned by individual landlords, some by a village community, and others were “free.” Records tell of Paraiyans who, in times of severe scarcity, sold their brothers, sisters, and even themselves into slavery. According to Place, writing in 1795: The labouring servants are for the most part pariars, who can by no means acquire property in land; and I have not met with an instance of their having done so. They receive wages, partly in money and partly in those fees…called callovassum, and if not the slaves of the meerassadars, renew their service every year. (Firminger 1918: 153)

Dharma Kumar’s study of agrestic servitude in Tamil Nadu contains one or two observations relevant here. She notes: ….it is clear that at the beginning of the nineteenth century the pannaiyals (unfree laborers] in some Tamil areas were in a condition of servitude. They were born into servitude, and they died in it. . . . They could not leave their master’s land; this was so generally recognized that in the early years the Collectors would help to catch runaway labourers. . . .Whether or not a pannaiyal might be sold independently of the land he tilled was a convention which varied from district to district in the early decades of the nineteenth century. In South Arcot the “slaves” could be sold to anyone and to an “alien village,” but this was rare. . . . Pallans and Paraiyans did enter into a contract of slavery, in return for maintenance throughout their lives; they could be sold, though not to distant parts of the country but actual sales were rare. . . . In Chingleput in 1819 “these persons are not in any way attached to the land but are the property of the individual and may by him be called away…[1965: 42–44]

This was not part of the caste system, nor was it simply indentured servitude, though many instances of the latter also occurred among Paraiyans. Kumar notes further that “unfree labourers were frequently concentrated in the irrigated areas,” and correlates this with the greater demand for labor in these areas (1965: 60–61). Economic factors of this kind probably accounted in

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part for the high concentration of Paraiyans and Pallans in wet rice areas where their role in the economy was analogous to that of field slaves in the American South before the Civil War, though the masters did not have any control over Paraiyan mating. Furthermore, not all of the Paraiyans were linked to the land in the same way. Kumar’s study also helps clarify a question commonly asked regarding those Paraiyans who were tied to specific land: Did “serfs” of this kind have any rights to cultivate the land or to share in the crop? Indeed some anthropologists (Leach 1960: 6) assume the existence of such rights, and others have suggested that these “serfs” were not subject to the insecurity of employment of today’s wage laborer. Kumar, however, points out that: these rights were not invariably granted... . The tied agricultural laborer did not always have the right to work and earn; if his master could not employ him, he need not always pay him but could let him try to get some employment as a casual laborer. The issue would be raised presumably at times like these when his rights were most needed, that they were most insecure. (1965: 191)

There is also evidence that before the twentieth century some Paraiyans were “attached” or belonged to certain villages where they held low-status village offices. Such offices included that of the vettiyan who was in charge of regulating the use of irrigation water in the fields; the taliary, a local policeman who had jurisdiction over certain minor offences, and escorted travelers from one village to another; and the boundary man, who kept track of village boundary markers and gave evidence in land disputes. These offices required the use of brute force, or subjected the individual to harsh conditions (the vettiyan often spent the night in the fields, catching whatever sleep he could). These were also the jobs which could be done without coming close to caste Hindus. Circumstantial evidence as well as latter-day practice suggests that the Paraiyans’ traditional role as “village policemen” did not bring them directly into contact with high castes. Even with intermediate castes they came into contact only rarely in this capacity and contact was mostly with outsiders. The Paraiyans who did this sort of work were usually attached to the village, not to any one family. They were either paid from a common grain heap, or else received small contributions from all the landowners in the village. Occasionally they were given the temporary use of land, usually non-irrigated, which belonged ultimately to the village. The Paraiyans were also responsible for the removal of dead cattle. Paraiyans were called to assist at non-Brahman funerals by drumming and performing other services, and to beat the drums at certain non-Brahman temple festivals. The performance of such tasks required little in the way of special skills. The jobs ran in certain families, though often one son in a family

Continuity and Change in “Ex-Untouchable” Community of South India

might have had the exclusive right to this work. It is uncertain whether the Paraiyans who held these jobs were also agrestic slaves, or had a slightly higher status. Slowly, during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the agrestic slave status gave way to that of casual laborer, a change that might or might not have resulted in insecurity of employment and economic loss. During the same period, a few Paraiyans managed to acquire a little land, since it was no longer possible to prohibit such ownership. It is not clear just how this land was obtained. Possibly, some Paraiyans took up uncultivated land, abandoned after the terrible depredations of Hyder Ali and several years of drought—land that the British wanted to push back into cultivation. In some instances, land allotted to a Paraiyan working as vettiyan might have become his freehold when ryotwari tenancy was introduced in the mid-nineteenth century.

PARAIYANS AFTER INDEPENDENCE Before looking at the Paraiyans’ situation in the context of specific villages, it may be useful to look briefly at their position and that of other Scheduled Castes as reported in the Madras census. Returns from as early as 1931 reveal that the percentage of Scheduled Castes in the Madras population has been consistently higher than in India as a whole. In 1951, while the all-India figure of Scheduled Castes was 14.69 percent, the Madras figure was 18.01 percent—only three states ranked higher than Madras. In the rural areas of Madras, according to the 1961 census, about 21 percent of the population consisted of Scheduled Castes. In Chingleput District, where this study was conducted, the figure was close to 32 percent. While Chingleput ranked highest in the state in the percentage of Scheduled Castes in its population, there exist a larger number of Harijans in the neighboring districts of Tanjore and South Arcot due to the greater size of their total populations. The rural Harijans’ dependence on agriculture as their major source of employment, and the modest size of their landholdings, may be seen in Tables 3.1 and 3.2. This dependence is reflected in the concentration of Scheduled Castes in the Palar—South Penner and Cauvery divisions, major rice-producing areas, where many field hands are required to tend the paddy lands. Most of this labor is provided by the Scheduled Castes. The 1961 distribution of Paraiyans, who constitute 58.65 percent of the Madras Scheduled Caste population, reflects their primary reliance on this kind of employment, in that 6,551 of every 10,000 Paraiyans live in the rice-producing districts of this region: Chingleput, South Ascot, North Ascot, and Tanjore.

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Joan P. Mencher Table 3.1: Distribution of Employment per 10,000 in Madras Rural Population 1961 Scheduled castes

General population

Landholder

1,786

2,530

Agricultural Laborer

2,452

1,082

1,310

1,351

Non-worker (mostly women, children, and the aged) Others

Source: Census of India, 1961, Vol. IX, Madras Part V-A (I) Scheduled Castes and Tribes (Report & Tables) 1964, Madras Government Press. Table 3.2: Size of Landholdings per 10,000 Cultivating Households, Madras State, 1961 Scheduled castes

General population

Less than 1 acre

2,442

1,461

1.0–2.4

4,190

3,331

2.5–4.9

2,248

2,551

5–9.9

874

1,685

10–29.9

201

861

Over 30

10

110

Unspecified

35

21

Source: Census of India, 1961, Vol. IX, Madras Part V-A (I) Scheduled Castes and Tribes (Report & Tables) 1964, Madras Government Press.

Throughout the region, most villages have a cheri or Harijan hamlet within a mile of the village site. Occasionally a cheri might serve two or more small villages, but in any case there usually is a cheri nearby. The caste composition of villages in this area is quite varied as is the ratio of Scheduled Castes to other castes represented in the population of the region. Variations of the latter kind may be seen in Table 3.3 in which the primary site of this study is designated as Village MM. While the ratio of Paraiyan to upper castes (shown in Table 3.3) is an important variable in the determination of the Paraiyan’s position in any given community, other factors influence the allocation and exercise of power, and related matters. For example, the degree of unity among Paraiyans in a cheri, and the degree of unity among the dominant castes in the village that they serve, may be more important than sheer numbers in determining the nature of intercaste relations. In some cases the attitudes of leading caste Hindu landlords are a critical factor. The amount of land owned by Paraiyans may also affect such relations.

Continuity and Change in “Ex-Untouchable” Community of South India Table 3.3: 1961 Population of Village MM and Surrounding Villages

Area in square miles

Number of households

Total population

Scheduled caste

Scheduled caste percentage of total population

1

2.25

245

1094

308

28%

2

1.83

141

627

221

35%

3

0.99

114

521

–

–

4

2.01

205

939

531

56%

5

2.21

180

774

121

15%

6

1.80

121

536

150

25%

7

1.30

173

719

63

8

1.94

344

1432

283

19%

MM

3.52

354

1327

131

9%

8.7%

Source: Census of India, 1961, Vol. IX, Madras, Part X-VI, District Census Handbook, Chingleput Vol. 11, 1965.

ANALYSIS OF THE PARAIYANS’ POSITION The major directions of change in the 1960s and the principal forces affecting Paraiyans in rural areas can be described despite the complexity of a system undergoing transition at uneven rates, and the welter of data available on the subject. The analysis here will concentrate on changes in the relationships between Paraiyans and the higher castes, as well as on the economic status of the Paraiyans themselves. Since most of the Paraiyans reside and work in rural communities, the analysis focuses on two villages in particular, situated in the Chingleput District, designated henceforth as MM and MG which have not yet felt the direct impact of industrialization. MM is about forty miles from Madras City and thirteen miles from the temple city of Kanchipuram. MG is eight miles on the other side of Kanchipuram and fifty-five miles from Madras City. Neither MM nor MG is on the main road though both are intersected by bus routes. An important contrast between the two villages was that Brahmans constituted about 10 percent of MM’s population, while there were no Brahmans in MG. It is important to distinguish between Brahman and non-Brahman villages in Tamil Nadu. Brahmans, for the most part, tend to live in villages where they are in sufficient number to form a real community. In such villages, which have a Brahman street or agraharam, the Naickers (or their counterparts, the Padiyachis in South Arcot, and in North Arcot, the Gounders) have been the link between Paraiyans and Brahmans. Indeed, in the past, Paraiyans never worked directly

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for Brahmans. A Naicker, on the other hand, might employ a Paraiyan as a field laborer, or under certain circumstances might have given land to a Paraiyan on a sharecropping basis. On occasion, a Naicker sharecropping with a Brahman might employ a Paraiyan day laborer, this being as close as the Untouchable ever came to the Brahman. The force of this tradition continued to be felt in 1967 by many Paraiyans including one informant of village MM who described the situation in the following words: We can’t go on that street [the Brahman street]. One has to get bullock and all, if he is doing varam (working as a sharecropper] for a man, also even if working as a coolie [day laborer]. Now sometimes we go on that street, but they don’t like it, and Iyers won’t hire us. [The term Iyer, more properly Shaivite Brahman, is used by the local Paraiyans for all Brahmans.]

At the same time, however, one Paraiyan in the same village was holding a half-acre on varam from a Brahman, and more significantly, several of the younger Brahmans were saying that they would employ Paraiyans after the death of their elders. Traditionally, the Paraiyans were not supposed to sit on top of a bullock cart when carrying paddy through a village street. By 1967 many Paraiyans did this in MM, though older men often dismounted when nearing the Brahman Street or the houses of prestigious Naickers. Similarly, although Paraiyans were not allowed to walk down the main Brahman Street in the past, by the 1960s, younger men would walk on this Street but the older men and women still avoided it. The gap between the Paraiyans and other villagers can in part be measured by their mutual lack of knowledge about other castes. Many Paraiyans in MM could not recognize all of the Brahmans in the village, and vice versa. A Brahman assistant in this research noted with surprise that the Paraiyans in MM were unaware of the difference between Vaishnavite and Shaivite Brahmans in Tamilnadu. The division of the Vaishnavite Brahmans into two major subgroups, the Tengalais and Vadagalais, was also unknown to the Paraiyans— despite the fact that in MM the Brahman residential area was clearly divided, one half being Tengalais and the other Vadagalais. Considerable ignorance prevailed also on both sides regarding caste-linked customs and worldviews. Rather than emulating the Brahmans, the Paraiyans would make fun of special Brahman customs, as exemplified by their teasing of a project assistant about the Brahman custom of giving a dowry. They would say: We buy the cow [i.e., we pay for the girl]. We have self-respect, but with you people, the cow itself [meaning the girl’s father] gives money. Out of the total population of 1,362 in the village of MM in 1963 (author’s census), there were 127 Brahmans, 912 Naickers (numerically the largest caste in

Continuity and Change in “Ex-Untouchable” Community of South India

Chingleput District), and 139 Paraiyans. The Paraiyans owned less than 1 percent of the total agricultural land, the Brahmans about 25 percent, and Naickers most of the rest. The largest portion of Brahman land was sharecropped by Naickers, or cultivated by Naicker day laborers. The Paraiyans for the most part worked as day laborers for Naickers, or as sharecroppers on a 50–50 basis. However, only 16 acres, less than 1 percent of the cultivated land, were sharecropped by Paraiyans. None of the MM Paraiyans worked outside the village. One young Paraiyan man of MM worked as a permanent servant on a yearly salary for a fairly affluent Naicker family. Two others received a small amount of paddy from the cultivators for their work regulating irrigation water as vettiyans, another worked as a taliary, village watchman, for a government salary of about forty-seven rupees a month. One man, who had served in the army in Assam, was retired in 1967 on a very small pension. Although a few Paraiyans owned small plots of land, none could subsist without supplementary employment. In the village of MG, a few Paraiyan families held sufficient landholdings to be independent. In the village of MG, out of the total population of 1,582 (1961 census), 47 percent were Paraiyan, about 35 percent belonged to the Mudaliar caste (high-ranking, non-Brahman agriculturalists), 10 percent were Naickers, and there were a few other small castes. Despite their higher percentage of population, Paraiyans in MG owned only 6 percent of the total agricultural land, including 4 percent of the total irrigated land, in the village. About 1960, after a visit to the village by Vinoba Bhave, an additional 82.58 acres, constituting 5.6 percent of the total cultivable land, were donated by the village to the Bhoodan Board for distribution to the poor. Characteristics of such situations were: this land was dry, non-irrigated, about one-and-a-half miles from the village site that had been set aside for use by the entire village as grazing land. As of 1963, some of the land had been given in usufruct, under the board’s ownership, to Harijans and other poor people. This arrangement was a source of controversy as the Harijans felt they should have received papers giving them clear title to the land. In addition to this common grazing area, there was some government land in the village that was not cultivated by anyone. The Harijans were trying to get it; indeed a few were surreptitiously cultivating about twenty acres of it, but the caste Hindus were seeking to retain its use as a grazing area for their cattle. In October 1970, close to 100 acres of this land were given to landless Harijans, under an order from the Collector of the District. The village Mudaliars were prepared for this, however. There were already talks that the Harijans would have to get credit to farm the land. It was anticipated that they would get into debt, and the land would go to some Mudaliar. The only way to avoid this

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would be through long-term government loans in kind, or possibly a government-built tube well to irrigate the land. These were under consideration in the early 1970s. In the village MG, Harijans as sharecroppers, cultivated 3 or 4 percent of the land, owned by Mudaliars. The remainder of the sharecropping was done with Naickers and other caste Hindus. On the other hand, nearly 50 percent of the Mudaliars hired Harijans on al-varam (literally man-varam). Under this arrangement, a man is hired for a year at a time. He takes complete charge of the landlord’s land. He is responsible for irrigating the field on time and similar activities. The landlord supplies the bullocks, the seeds, and whatever fertilizer is used. This type of work is done mainly by Harijans, since it is considered somewhat demeaning for a Naicker. Under al-varam the man who does the work gets one-sixth or less of the crop. Some men work long intervals on alvaram for a particular landlord; other landlords prefer to switch the men around from time to time, using the threat of firing as a means of control. The al-varam method of sharecropping is not practiced in MM. Until a decade ago, the village of MG had only one cheri, which became crowded. Around 1960, heavy pressure from the local Harijans and officials of the community development block forced the Mudaliars to allow the Harijans to build another hamlet on a dry area across some paddy fields from the traditional site. Because block development officials administered this project, the houses were not built too close together. While a Harijan family might be entitled to a house site in the cheri, the expense of building a house had to be borne by the family. According to one man who had recently built a simple mud house with thatch roof, it cost about `300 ($40) for all of the materials. This is a considerable expense for a poor man, and often involves getting deeply into debt. This debt in turn might delay a son’s marriage for several years. Partly for this reason, as of 1967, not all of the men allotted space in the new cheri had built their houses. Those who had settled in the new site included a majority of the men with non-agricultural jobs and those employed outside the village. The latter group included a number of men employed in the town of Kanchipuram: for example, two who worked for a large landowner there, two others who worked in factories and another who worked as a helper on a truck. It seemed that several of the non-agriculturists worked in a local brick factory owned by one of the village Mudaliars. Since these men were paid in cash, they may have possessed the money needed to build a new house, whereas many of those without such employment were forced to remain in the old cheri for lack of funds. Although the Mudaliars of MG are a high-ranking, non-Brahman caste, in the past they dealt directly with the Paraiyans, unlike Paraiyan–Brahman relations in MM. The Paraiyans, however, were expected to observe various proprieties

Continuity and Change in “Ex-Untouchable” Community of South India

and to maintain an obsequious manner in the presence of Mudaliars. For example, Paraiyans did not venture beyond the verandah of a Mudaliar house, nor did they wear sandals or a shirt in the presence of a Mudaliar. In the 1960s, such restrictions were relaxed to a much greater degree in MG than in interaction between Paraiyans and Brahmans in MM. In MG, the Paraiyans, especially the younger ones, almost seemed to be proud of annoying the Mudaliar landowners. The marked contrast between these two villages regarding relations between Paraiyan and upper castes may be due in part to the tradition of direct contact between Paraiyan and Mudaliar, and the fact that Paraiyans constitute the largest caste group in MG. In MM, if one compares the generation of Paraiyan men over forty-five with those now in their twenties, the difference in attitudes is striking. Despite individual variations, one can see among the younger men a desire to ignore traditional attitudes, to “go wherever we want to,” and to “talk up” to the Naickers. In one instance, a young Paraiyan from the MM cheri was threatened with a beating by Naickers in a nearby village, when he rode down one of their main streets on a bicycle. A month later, his mother’s elder brother’s son, who was a relative traditionally expected to “protect” him, threatened to beat up one of the offending Naickers at a temple festival held in MM. While aggression in this episode was limited to verbal abuse of the Naicker, this incident shows that a Paraiyan is able to censure publicly a member of a higher caste—and occasionally get away with it. In the past, though there may have been more than one unsuccessful or semi-successful attempt at revolt by an entire colony, it was harder for Paraiyans openly to express resentment about the way they were treated. Rebellion was dangerous for an individual man, who was more likely to get drunk, maybe beat his wife, fight with his friends, or just act “lazy.” The Paraiyans did exercise a minimal type of control over the excesses of landlords and a higher caste person through the latter’s fear of the Paraiyan’s knowledge of “black magic.” This was more prevalent in Kerala where higher caste Nayars literally could kill a Paraiyan for “polluting” a Nayar. (For an example of partial social control through fear of magic, see Mencher 1964a.) In many ways the younger men have resented the attitude of their elders, who have tended to be more afraid of the higher-caste people and reluctant to risk offending them. The older men have taken the attitude: “Why go where we are not wanted, why give them any reason to talk badly about us?” The younger men have not accepted this attitude, and to some extent, they have been supported by some of the younger Naicker men. For example, in 1967, a Paraiyan man was playing cards with a Naicker man on a Naicker street, something that would not have occurred fifteen years ago. A quarrel broke out between them, and the two began throwing objects at each other. While other Naickers tried to

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break up the fight, they did not take sides in the issue, preferring to consider it an argument between two individuals, who were both wrong. Today, a young man from the MM cheri might feel far freer to answer back in kind to a Naicker. One Paraiyan youth told this story: I work for M. Naicker. I am responsible and take care of his lands [on varam]. I take my own water. One night I went to run water on my land. I opened [the sluice] and went to sleep. Then some Naicker came out and took the water. Then, I disconnected his line and took. He started to call me some language and to fight. Again he connected and I disconnected. Then other Naickers came. They started saying, “Oh, he is a. . . . Previously they didn’t even have drinking water, now they are so proud.” Then one of them said, “Oh, he has the support of some Naickers, that is why he can talk so boldly.” Then they left. According to informants of both castes, such fights simply could not have happened in the past. The occurrence of conflicts of this kind in recent years is indicative of other changes in intercaste relations. Previously, Paraiyan boys were afraid to go about wearing decent clothes, even if they could afford them. As of 1970 they would do so, even though behind their backs some people would talk about their being unduly proud. Whether changes of this kind might eventually result in extensive change is hard to say. In MM, a Paraiyan Panchayat member from a neighboring village (identified as village No. 4 in Table 3.2) was heard to say, In our village, we are in a majority, and some of us have property, so we can be more bold. Money and strength count for much as do people’s attitude. But in the village of MM people like this [pointing to one of the elders] are holding others up.

Intervillage variations of this kind were frequently noted by other villagers. Mudaliars of MG often contrasted the Paraiyans of their village with those of an adjacent village that had almost the same caste composition, and with whom MG villagers often married. According to the Mudaliars, the Paraiyans in the adjacent village were not insolent and their general behavior was better than that of the MG Paraiyans. On the other hand, the Paraiyans of MG viewed the Mudaliars of the adjacent village as being better in their treatment of Paraiyans. They also claimed that the Paraiyans in the other village were able to earn more, and the number of well-to-do Paraiyans there was greater than in MG. Both points of view turned out to be true. The superior position of the Paraiyans in the adjacent village, and the more relaxed state of Mudaliar–Paraiyan relations there, appears to be due in part to the presence of several well-to-do and able Paraiyans who act as spokesmen for their caste fellows. These Paraiyans were also more united than the ones in MG, an important variable discussed at greater length below.

Continuity and Change in “Ex-Untouchable” Community of South India

To some extent, the caste structure itself is changing. While some traditional roles have not changed, an example of the process of transformation and the tenacity of tradition may be seen in the case of a leading Naicker family in MM, whose head died a few years ago. This family was formerly considered to be the most important in the village, and during all non-Brahman festivals and other special occasions, the lower castes were expected to come first to their house to pay homage. In the early 1950s, however, this custom began to be discontinued by Paraiyan drummers, as well as barbers and washermen. Some years later, the head of this Naicker family decided not to patronize these people. He hired someone else to irrigate his fields. He took his laundry to a nearby town, and had his hair cut there. When he died these service castes exercised their traditional prerogatives by refusing to bury him until his widow paid a “fine” to the Paraiyan in charge of irrigation, and to the washerman and the barber. Another case in point: Traditionally in MM there were four Paraiyan men in charge of the irrigation tank; at one juncture, two of the men who held this post decided not to work, since they were too old. The other two tried to carry on alone, but they could not cope with all the work; there was nothing the village people could do about it, except to steal irrigation water at night when they needed it. In earlier times, the villagers would have had more control over the Paraiyans: either the first two men would not have been allowed to retire, or others would have been forced to help with the work. The older Paraiyans say that no one really wants to do this kind of work, since it involves the vettiyan in fights between various landowners, and the pay is not enough for the labor involved. In the first case the commercialization of traditional occupations enabled the family to manage without the services of the village barber or washerman for twelve years. When the need arose for a burial, tradition prevailed. However, it is conceivable that even in life crisis ceremonies, dependence on other castes will diminish. For instance, a trained government midwife, from the recently created health center in MM, who serves all castes, including the Paraiyans, is supplanting the barber woman’s role of midwife. Some lessening of the dependence on traditional reciprocal relationships, though varying from village to village, has fostered a tendency in this region for members of service castes to go to larger towns. In the city of Kanchipuram, washermen, blacksmiths, and carpenters of village origin have undertaken commercial ventures based on their traditional skills. This change had a profound effect on the Paraiyans. In town, the Paraiyans and the caste Hindus patronize the same shop, and deal with the same people on a cash basis. It also has profound implications for village social structure in that it indicates a tendency in the direction of reducing the rural population to two major groups—landlords (both large and small) and landless agricultural laborers (see Mencher 1964b).

65

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Joan P. Mencher Table 3.4: Proportionate Increase in Scheduled Caste Population between 1931 and 1961 in Some of the Villages Surrounding MM 1961 Village

Total population

Scheduled castes 169

1931 %

Total population

Scheduled castes

%

21.0

1094

308

28

1.

771

3.

331

2

.6

521

–

–

4.

491

252

51.0

939

531

56

6.

417

68

16.0

536

150

25

8.

1,230

111

9.0

1,432

283

19

MM

1,070

103

9.6

1,327

131

9

Source: 1931 data from the Census of India, 1931. 1961 data from the Census of India, 1961, Vol. IX, Madras, Part X-VI, District Census Handbook Chingleput Vol. 11, 1965. Madras Government Press.

Table 3.4 indicates a somewhat disproportionate increase in the Paralyan population in a few of the villages around MM, but not in all. In the 1970s, there had been no change in attitudes toward intermarriage, although extramarital affairs do occur across caste lines. According to elderly informants, liaisons of this kind also existed in the past. Then, as today, everyone criticized such relationships, but they were tolerated as long as violence did not erupt. These affairs were not viewed as a threat to caste endogamy as the relationships were considered to be transitory and illegal. The women involved need not be of a lower caste. Indeed, the majority of instances noted in MM involved Paraiyan men with Naicker women. Traditional attitudes regarding inter-dining continued to prevail in most situations with occasional exceptions in public tea rooms or during political campaigns. Although minor changes in interpersonal relations indicated that the former pollution complex was weakening, a clear distinction remained between eradicating untouchability as such, and the retention of caste distinctions. Even though an individual Paraiyan might have more money than an individual Naicker, the Naicker, like the white in the American South, was still clinging to the superiority of his caste. In both MG and MM, the Paraiyans in the 1960s did not exercise their legal right to enter the main village temples dedicated to Perumal or Ishwaraswami. However, during the February, 1967 election campaign, several MG Paraiyans reported being invited into the Ishwaraswami temple by the Congress candidate to hear a campaign speech by a former Member of Parliament. This was told with a humorous air, concluded with the remark, “Well, we won’t get in there again until the next election.”

Continuity and Change in “Ex-Untouchable” Community of South India Table 3.5: Distribution of Literates by Age in Madras State, 1961 Census

Age

General population (%)

Adi-Dravida (%)

Paraiyan (%)

 5–9

34.6

23

22

10–14

51

31

29

15–19

44

26

21

20–29

38

20

17

30–44

34

16

14

Source: Derived from tables appearing in Census of India, 1961, Vol. IX, Madras Part V-A (I) Scheduled Castes and Tribes (Report & Tables), 1964. Madras Government Press.

In 1971 they were not invited in, since it was assumed to be a foregone conclusion that they would vote against the Mudaliars anyhow. Education is one of the major forces affecting intercaste relations and many other aspects of the Paraiyan’s life. One measure of the substantial increase in education in Madras since Independence appears in Table 3.5. While the 1961 census material presented above indicates that the percentage of literate Adi-Dravida, or Scheduled Castes, has almost doubled in the past generation, their literacy rate remains far below that of the general population at all age levels. The discrepancy between the literacy rates given for Paraiyans and Adi-Dravidas may be due to the common practice of many semi-educated Paraiyans identifying themselves as Adi-Dravidas. An examination of the educational level of literates reported in the 1961 Madras census reveals that at the primary level the Paraiyans compare favorably with the general population at both the state and district levels. Beyond the primary level, however, the educational attainments of the Paraiyans are way below that of the general population, especially in urban areas where a very high percentage of the population consists of Brahmans. The almost identical figures for the Paraiyans and the general population of Chingleput District, reflect the fact that Paraiyans constitute almost one-third of the district population. This close correspondence may also be due in part to the widespread acceptance by Paraiyans of education as a way out of their traditional position, in contrast to the Naickers, the largest caste in Chingleput, who tend to place little value on education beyond mere literacy. The latter view is most prevalent among Naickers with small landholdings. In the village of MM the percentage of Paraiyan children in primary school is at least as high as that of the Naickers and there is little to distinguish the Paraiyans from the other castes in the school setting. As a direct result of government policy, initiated in 1948, Paraiyan children are no longer expected to sit separately in school. However, as late as the 1960s, it was rare for a Paraiyan

67

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Joan P. Mencher

child to play with a Naicker child away from school. Unlike in MM, where Naicker children were occasionally seen in the Paraiyan cheri, children from other castes were never found in the cheri of MG. In the village of MG, while the percentage of educated Paraiyans was far smaller than in MM, the MG group included several high school graduates and a few advanced students who were likely to graduate in the late 1960s. Although Paraiyan parents in MG also viewed education as a way out of the system, they were reluctant to send their children to a school dominated by Mudaliar children whose superior status was reflected in the markedly better quality of their clothing. Another inhibiting factor was that Paraiyan students had to walk through the upper-caste section of the village in order to reach the school. Although Paraiyans and other villagers had begun sitting together at school festivals in some villages, this was not common to all villages. Even though they might sit among the caste Hindu women, the older Paraiyan women tend to be somewhat afraid of them. This is related to their economic dependency, and is not seen as much among younger women (see Table 3.6). Table 3.6: Male and Female Literacy Rates, Madras State, 1961 General population

Scheduled castes

Male (%)

Female (%)

Male (%)

Female (%)

Chingleput District

46.6

17.6

25.5

6.5

State

51.6

21.1

27.5

6.7

Source: Derived from tables appearing in Census of India, 1961, Vol. IX, Madras Part V-A (ii, p. 37), Scheduled Castes and Tribes (Report & Tables), 1964. Madras Government Press.

Among the boys, the question remains: Education for what? Though some are completing their education through high school, the problem is: What comes next? In many cases, they do not have the necessary information about government grants for Harijans, or even if they do, they cannot afford the clothes, books, and food necessary for schooling away from the village. Teacher training, which lasts only two years, is the only practical step for the majority of Paraiyan boys who by some miracle manage to complete high school. The loosening of caste-based restrictions on the Paraiyans is one of the many consequences of the modern political system. On the other hand, the increased awareness of one’s own group as a political entity, and the importance of group solidarity, has served to strengthen other aspects of the caste system. While Paraiyans recognize that only in rare instances are they likely to control village panchyats, or councils, they have become aware of the influence that can be exerted through caste- based bloc voting. As one Paraiyan youth of MM said:

Continuity and Change in “Ex-Untouchable” Community of South India

All cheri people are going to vote for X this time. Last time we voted for Y, but it didn’t do any good. Only one well has been built in the past ten years, and occasionally they give some house-site. Once government sent books to the cheri people and other poor people, but the Panchayat president didn’t give. He put them in a waste basket in his house. Once, the government offered cows to poor cheri people, but asked panchayat for details and they said no one needs. In this way, they stop any help to us. So this time, we are not going to vote the same party. If any Harijan or poor Naicker on panchayat tries to help us, they are made to keep quiet. But, we will get rid of the president by vote.

This attitude—that the vote can be used to further Paraiyan interests— may bring about profound changes in the long run, though in 1970, the same Panchayat president, “Y,” was again elected in MM by a considerable margin which included a large number of cheri votes from people economically dependent on him. In MM, the Naickers are split between two major political parties, Old Congress and the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK). Most of the more orthodox Naickers belong to Old Congress, whereas the younger, more radical ones belong to the DMK, which gained control of the Madras State government in 1967. Although most of the older Paraiyans supported Old Congress earlier, since 1967, at least in MM, more and more have been siding with the DMK. The competition for Paraiyan votes between Naicker supporters of these opposing parties provided the Paraiyans of MM with greater political leverage than their caste fellows in villages where the upper castes belong to only one party. In a village like MG, with its large Paraiyan population, the village council has been composed of three Mudaliars, two Naickers, one carpenter, and four Paraiyans. In this situation the Mudaliars have had to remain united, and maintain a coalition with the Naickers and/or carpenter, in order to keep the Paraiyans from gaining the majority. The Mudaliars have also aided the Paraiyans in an effort to convince them that they have more to gain by keeping the Mudaliars in power than by direct exercise of political authority. As in MM, most of the older Paraiyans belong to Old Congress, the party of the Mudaliars in this region, whereas some of the younger ones support DMK. Such cleavages and the absence of unity among the Paraiyan leaders of MG, are also used to advantage by the Mudaliars. There is a growing tendency for people with common economic interests to join forces politically. For example, the poor, landless Naicker may have more in common with the Paraiyan than with the wealthy members of his own caste. While some of the poorer Naickers resent government concessions to Paraiyans, their resentment is often not as strong as that of wealthier Naickers who also possess the power to thwart government programs aimed at improving the lot of the Harijan.

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The ultimate resolution of the many problems confronting the Paraiyans, and other Untouchable castes, is dependent in large measure upon the overall economic development of the region. To the poor villager, regardless of caste, the need to acquire land to cultivate is of primary importance—there is not enough land to satisfy the needs of the low-caste Hindus, let alone the Paraiyans. In this sense, the Paraiyan’s problem in the village is the problem of the rural proletariat everywhere, with the added stigma of untouchability.

NOTE This paper is based on research conducted in Madras State in 1963 as a postdoctoral fellow of the National Science Foundation. The collection of additional data and the writing of this paper were done while the author was the codirector of a project dealing with aspects of continuity and change in India sponsored by the National institute of Mental Health and Columbia University. The author would like to express her gratitude to the people residing in the Untouchable quarter of the sample villages, and to Professor F.C. Southworth for his many useful comments.

REFERENCES Aiyappan, A. 1937. Social and physical anthropology of the Nayadis of Malabar. Madras: Printed by the Superindentent, Government Press. ———. 1944. Iravas and culture change. Madras: Printed by the Superintendent, Government Press. ———. 1948. Report on the Socio-economic Conditions of the Tribes and Backward Castes of Madras Province. Madras. ———. 1965. Social revolution in a Kerala village: A study in culture change. Bombay: Asia Publishing House. Bayley, W. Henry, and W. Hudleston. 1892. Papers on Mirasi right selected from the records of government. Madras. Firminger, W.K. (ed.). 1918. Fifth report from the select committee on the affairs of the East India Company. Vol. 3. Calcutta: R. Cambray. Ishwaran, K. 1966. Tradition and economy in village India. New York: Humanities Press, Inc. Kumar, Dharma. 1965. Land and caste in South India; Agricultural labour in the Madras presidency during the nineteenth century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Leach, E.R. 1960. “Introduction.” In Aspects of caste in South India Ceylon and Northwest Pakistan, ed. E.R. Leach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mencher, Joan P. 1964a. Possession, dance, and religion in North Malabar, Kerala, India, to be published in the Collected Papers of the VII International Congress of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences, Moscow.

Continuity and Change in “Ex-Untouchable” Community of South India

Mencher, Joan P. 1964b. Aspects of continuity and change in a Tamil village. Paper read at the meeting of the American Anthropological Association, November, 1964, in Detroit. (Revised version published in Aspects of Continuity and Change in South Asia, edited by K. Ishwaran.) Thurston, Edgar. 1909. Castes and tribes of southern India. 7 volumes. Madras: Government Press.

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Chapter 4

A Reading of “Untouchable”: The Autobiography of an Indian Outcaste Subhadra Mitra Channa

The authorship of this paper is mostly that of Hazari, the author of the remarkable book that I came across suddenly while browsing through a dusty library shelf. My attempt here is only to familiarize the reader with his life that is both ordinary and extraordinary. In many respects it represents the lives of millions of untouchables in India, their stories of poverty, deprivation, and humiliation. In another way it also tells the story of one who managed to rise above his karma and break away from the stereotypical life of his community and find a new life on distant shores. It is the former aspect that is relevant for this volume for we are trying to get a glimpse into the lives of those who live on the margins of society and more importantly how they look at the world. The setting is in British India in a dusty village in Moradabad in what is today known as Uttar Pradesh. This is a Hindi speaking region and represents much of mainstream Indian culture. Although untouchability was practiced it did not take on such harsh form as in the West and South of India. This book appears to have been written for a Western audience and although it reflects the marginality of the author’s existence it does not have the political consciousness or resentment exhibited by Dalit activists of later years. In fact the author is completely unaware of the Dalit movement that probably had not even taken shape during the period in which this book is set. He was around 8–9 years old in 1914 and the book ends when he is in his early twenties. The Dalit movement had begun to take shape in the southern region and the Bombay Presidency in the early part of the twentieth century (Omvedt 1994), but poor untouchables in northern India were quite unaware of it. The ambiguity of his nationalist sentiments are, however, very interesting as although he is touched by the fact of his “slavery,” a term popular in the political language of those times yet the only

A Reading of “Untouchable”

rewarding and pleasant experience he has ever had are with the British. The book clearly demonstrates what Omvedt (1994: 88) observed: by and large caste channeled workers to segmented labour markets…with the lowest castes, especially Dalits, also mobile but so greatly impoverished and exploited as to find it very hard to benefit from such mobility. Our livelihood came from the work we did in the town cleaning the market, disposing of the dead animals, and above all, looking after the rich Hindu and Muslim households where women are kept in Purdah. As regards the dead animals, we watched in the same way as the vulture watches, there is no difference between the vulture and the sweeper in this respect. As soon as an animal such as a cow, horse or goat died, we brought it to a field to skin it. We took the meat for cooking and eating, and the skin when dry to be sold. We left the carcass for the vultures to clean, and, when the vultures had finished, we collected the bones, which we sold. (Hazari 1969)

Although his community lived in a cluster away from the main village they were an integral part of the social life of the village and had key roles to play at the marriages and death rituals as well as other life cycle rituals for the upper castes. Although they received enough from the village to sustain their lives at the most basic minimum level (that is having a little food, some tattered clothes, and a roof over their heads) the aspiration of most untouchable men at that time period was to get employment with the British. The women who had greater cultural sensitivity sometimes had negative feelings. I am told that my grandmother was very upset before the marriage (of my father) because my mother’s people were employed by the English and she had never liked the white people, least of all the English. One cannot blame her for her dislike, for she knew something of the mutiny, and the now the railways were breaking up happy village life, and the new tax applied not only to the landlords but even to us, the untouchables. (Hazari 1969)

The British, however, did not discriminate between landlord and untouchables either in matters of tax or in other fields. They employed untouchables in their kitchen. In fact only Muslims and untouchables would cook for them as they ate all kinds of prohibited meats like chicken, beef, and pork. Hazari’s family took to going to Shimla in summer to work for the British civil servants. The British allowed them to play with their children and did not allow discrimination in the servant’s quarters. Also they paid well and were kind to loyal servants. However, since in those times the British moved between Shimla and Calcutta the servants had to wait without work for the period the employer family would go back to Calcutta. The English lady took a great liking to my mother; she employed her as a second maid to look after the children and taught her the duties of a children’s nurse.

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I must have been very happy, to, because the children were quite young and my mother was allowed to take me to play with them. (Hazari 1969)

We find that untouchable families such as that of Hazari loved to work with the British and that the entire childhood of Hazari moved from one employment with an English family to another till he came to be employed with a young British lecturer of Aligarh Muslim University that changed his entire life. Yet they were neither anti-Hindu nor in favor of the white people and regarded themselves as truly part of the Hindu village community. One day, I asked my grandmother to tell me how the white men came to India. She told me they came from the other side of the world and it was god’s will that they should come and govern India and take away all its riches. . . .  She told me stories from the Ramayana and the Gita, emphasizing that we untouchables were part of the Hindu community and that in ages past we had been honored by the incarnate Hindu gods, who ate from our hands. Later on, I found that, in most of the Hindu folktales, untouchables play their part; these tales are much quoted among our class to justify our existence, to raise our morale, and to show how, ethically, we should be content with our life. (Hazari 1969)

Unlike the untouchables in South India the untouchables in North India were not cut off from participation in Hindu religious life. In Hazari’s life we have the important role played by Yogi Ananda who belongs to the same caste as them (being a cousin of his grandmother) and who is revered as a sadhu by all concerned. Although it is mentioned that people came from faraway villages to meet Yogi Ananda it is not clear as to what caste these followers belong to. However, we are told that they were allowed to make sacrifices in the local Kali temple where they stood in the same line and offered prayers along with the upper castes. When we arrived at the town where the temple was located, we found several hundred more people who had come for this yearly festival of the Goddess Kali. Among the pilgrims were Hindus of all castes- merchants, silver smiths, landlords, and the Rajput- but the majority was of the low castes.

(It is possible that since blood sacrifice was performed at this temple it would be more people of low castes that visited. But certainly there is intermingling of the castes.) The attitude of the upper castes is also not too harsh although the practice of untouchability is very much present. We are given a small incidence about his traveling to the station with his father when a kind coachman gives him a lift in spite of protest form a Lala Sahib at whose feet he was made to sit. The coachman is able to persuade the Lala to let the child sit in the coach.

A Reading of “Untouchable”

There was no time for Lala Sahib to start a long discussion if he were to catch the train, so with a gesture of great benevolence, he allowed me to sit at his feet. There were three other passengers in the back, and, as the carriage moved on, the untouchables became the general topic of their conversation. Each one expressed his own view: one blamed the British rule for the change in attitude towards us, another pitied us that we were born untouchables. They agreed that, as all men were created by the same God, we should be treated with more consideration than we were. When we arrived at the station, the coach man helped me down, and Lala Sahib gave me half an anna to buy sweets.

In fact the most virulent practitioners of caste discrimination according to Hazari were the Anglo-Indians. Hazari’s father is treated badly by an AngloIndian family and thrown out without salary after being made to work very hard. A similar experience awaits Hazari after he grows up and is taken into service by an Anglo-Indian lady. It is such experiences that soon make Hazari grow up. By now, I began to realize my station in life. In India, where autumn and spring intermingle into a single season, the child of an untouchable is a father before he is a child. Childhood is not free from the worries of daily life, and now I was at an age when, as the eldest child of young family, I had to share in the responsibilities. (Hazari 1969)

Hazari’s statement reflects the life of many such children who have to share in the poverty of their parents and who take to doing menial and hard labor by the time they are hardly eight or nine years old. It is a fact that most of such children come from low-caste families and most often take on the occupation of their caste, like sweeping, washing clothes, making pots, or tanning leather. At the age of eight he got work to look after a dog belonging to an Englishman. My salary had not been sufficient to keep the whole family, and there was no work for my father. . . . The winter was very cold, with snow and east winds. The rooms that we had were very damp, for they were built with the back wall cut into the hillside. There were days when we could only get one meal, and that a very dry and poor one. We could not afford milk, butter, or meat. One night, when things were really desperate, my father asked me to see the head bearer the next morning and ask him if he could lend us a few rupees for a month or so. This I did, and the head bearer sent for my father. I suppose he thought I was too young to negotiate the loan. That evening, as I was coming home barefoot through the snow, I was worried and sad because I was not sure if the bearer would make the loan to my father. I was thinking too, of my mother, wondering how she was at that moment and whether she would live or die. (Hazari 1969)

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The life of grinding poverty, however, does not deter him from dreaming and in order to fulfill his dreams he persuades a Maulvi to take him into his school to learn reading and writing Urdu. I used to picture myself as a Babu going to the office every morning–in the big building on the mall in Shimla, where all the peons and office boys wore red coats with gold braid. Every winter, I would go down to Delhi, where it was warm. Delhi was a beautiful city with shops full of gold and silver, silks and Kashmiri shawls, which filled my imagination. These childish fancies only enhanced my power of working and to learn my lessons. (Hazari 1969)

However, becoming literate and to be able to read and write does not enhance his social status with respect to the upper castes. Though I was treated with great respect in my community, when I went into the shopping center of the town, I was still the same untouchable who must give way to those of higher caste. The shopkeepers still threw the goods I bought either into my basket or the piece of cloth that I might carry for the purpose, and when they heard that I could read and write they were horrified. To them, it was abhorrent that untouchables should become Christians or refuse to work as sweepers, or that sweeper’s children should learn to read and write, and, above all, that they should read books like the Ramayana and actually know much of the Koran by heart. (Hazari 1969)

Things have not changed much even today when even well-qualified medical practitioners belonging to low castes are referred to as “quota” doctors and quite often patients prefer to see a doctor who they know is of high caste. Although low-caste colleagues are tolerated at the level of the office yet few are included in the circle of close friends and marriage to a person of low caste is still abhorrent to most Hindus, even the highly educated and liberated. There has been some debate as to the position of women among the Dalits. Some accounts like that of Moon, indicate that Dalit women in the Mahar community had a better position than women of upper castes in terms of their participation in public forums and having independent voices to assert their identity in spite of poverty. But Hazari’s life does not indicate that there was anything positive in the lives of women except for hard toil and a passive voiceless existence. We read about Hazari’s stepmother who allowed his father to marry again because her children did not survive. The rest of her life was devoted to taking care of the family house and saving money while the rest of the family went to the hills to work for the government officials. Hazari’s own mother is seen as bearing a child almost every year and working hard along with her husband at the same time. The picture of devoted women, wives, and mothers is clear in this autobiography yet the girl child is not welcome.

A Reading of “Untouchable”

The position of the female child in our community, which is not very different from that in any other Hindu community, is an unfavourable one. In the distant past, it had been the custom to bury any surplus female child at birth. The method was to put the child in an earthen pot, cover the opening, and bury the pot. This practice has been discontinued during the last few centuries, and it is now an inherited memory that lingers in the villages. But the fact remains that we still do not appreciate the birth of a female child. I suppose the reason for this is that they are a liability as regards their marriage and the special care needed to protect them morally. …  Whatever the causes, the fact remained that my sister was not looked upon with much favour. If she had died in infancy, the family would have been glad. But she was a healthy child and became a source of worry to the family. (Hazari 1969)

There is also the nameless young girl to whom he is betrothed but he breaks off the marriage and she is married to his younger brother instead. The girl is passive and unidentified; he has not even seen her. No specific reasons are given for breaking off the marriage but to save the honor of the girl’s and the boy’s families she is married to his younger brother. There have been arguments to support the observation that Dalit women have higher position in their own society as compared to upper-caste women and my fieldwork (Channa 2001) also indicates that the female children among the dhobi group had a relatively high position because of the contribution they made to the household economy. In Hazari’s case we see that they do not have any household-based craft or specialization to which the women can contribute, yet the economic contribution of the women is very high. The low position of the girl child thus reflects cultural preference and not economic rationality, a fact that must be considered whenever we come across cross-cultural situations. An important even in his life is when he falls in love and that too to a young English girl in whose service he is employed in picturesque Kashmir. The hopelessness of the situation is not lost and the feeling is never verbalized. But from the point of view of Hazari there is a hope that there is some reciprocation. On the way home, there was a bridge spanning the canal. She stopped on the bridge without a word, so I stopped beside her and looked at the calm water of the canal, shining between the gigantic Chenar trees. In the distance, a phonogram was playing, and the music floated over the water. We stood for a long time without saying a word, I think the parting was disturbing her. There was something she was trying to express. It might have been just a fancy of her own or it may have been the subconscious knowledge of her attendant’s consuming passion that was affecting her on this calm and beautiful night. It seemed to me that we stood there for ages, neither of us daring to break the magic spell of night and music. (Hazari 1969)

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One aspect becomes clear from this narration that at no point of time did Hazari consider himself to be different from any other human being; the very fact that he looked at a young English girl and felt love and desire for her indicates that his self-evaluation set him apart or gave him an esteem that critiqued the point of view that bracketed him as an untouchable. He even dared to hope that she understood and did not abhor his sentiment. Perhaps he was different as we see from his rebellion against marrying a girl from his own community. In later life he takes certain strong decisions that take him away from his family and his community. He takes up work with an English professor of Aligarh Muslim University who not only encourages him to learn English and get an education but also in the end sends him off to Paris for a better life. It is evident that certain humiliations that were accepted stoically by other members of his caste were unacceptable to him. His evaluation of his own self did not make him feel that he was less than anyone and it is this that ultimately drove him away from his family and community. He writes with regard to the employment he took with a young Bengali woman, the wife of a highly placed officer. Although I accepted the low wages and the long hours, I did not keep the job for more than a few weeks. One day, my mistress called me to say that I had deceived her with regard my caste. She had found out that my father was working as a sweeper, while, by name, she had thought I was a Hindu of the caste of a watercarrier. She gave me my wages to date and dismissed me. This was a great blow to me in more than one respect. She had never asked me about my caste I had thought her intelligent and educated enough not to bother about her servants’ caste or creed. Did the words of Congress mean nothing? It simply did not make sense to me. But I was not there to argue, and I came out of her room with feelings of loathing not only for my caste but for all men. The only thought that came into my mind was a couplet, which was a kind of motto in our family: The one everlasting who provides for the living Also provides for the burial of the dead But the memory of my shame was not easily washed away, even by Mother Ganges. When I told my parents of my dismissal, they took it in their usual philosophical manner and quoted the same couplet. To them, it seemed nothing more than if I had told them that I had lost an anna. At this time, I began to realize that my parents had never really understood me and that this gap between us had grown wider with the years and with my marriage. I now began to live a lonely life in the midst of my own people and friends. (Hazari 1969)

It was these feelings that drove him further and further away from his family and community till a point comes when he converts to Islam. At a time when

A Reading of “Untouchable”

he is in service of Mr Newman a teacher at Aligarh Muslim University, he falls seriously ill. During the first few days of my illness, all I knew was that someone was always at my bedside. It was very difficult to say who they were; they might have been friends or servants, but, whoever they were, they cared for me. When the crises were over, my first thoughts were of my mother, for we had been very good friends and companions, not only in our home life but in our work. Soon these sentiments gave place to a realization of the care that was given to me by others, most of whom were Muslims. They gave me not the slightest cause to think that I was an outcaste. (Hazari 1969)

Soon afterwards we are told that he converts to being a Muslim. But again we find that there is little change inside and he finds it difficult to believe some teachings of Islam inside his heart. My conversion did not cause any spiritual change within me, but the difference it made to me in the outside world, not only in Aligarh but where ever I went there after, was like coming into day light from the darkness. Every door was now open to me, and, for the next few months, I became not only a part of the Muslim community but a part of Aligarh itself.

But his family continues to live in poverty and wretchedness. About the death of his younger brother from pneumonia he writes The first news I heard was that, after my brother’s burial, the grave had been opened by a wolf and the body taken away. The next morning, some people found his few pieces of clothing in a field. In my imagination, I could see the wolf’s teeth biting into my brother’s young body-those little hands and feet, the lips that had once uttered the name of “brother”. It tore my heart to think that his delicate features, with the sweetest of smiles, had not only passed from the world, but had been ravaged by a wild beast.  As I imagined, he had died of pneumonia. My parents had not troubled to send for a doctor, but had given him herbal medicine and promised the goddess a fat pig on his recovery. Yet, with all this horror, my family was not really any more sorry than they would have been at the death of my great grandfather. (Hazari 1969)

This small extract reflects on many things. Firstly we understand the social and material deprivation of the untouchables. Like other Hindus they cannot cremate the body for neither are they allowed nor they have the resources to arrange for wood and the expensive paraphernalia of a Hindu cremation. Even the burial is shabbily done without any gravestone so that the body is easily snatched by wild beasts, the burial grounds for the untouchables being as far away from the village as possible.

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But even graver is the passive acceptance by the family of their misfortune. It is this passivity of his family and indeed of his entire community that drives Hazari away from them. It also explains the mindset that had led centuries of oppression to go on without active protest because everything was accepted in the name of karma. Here we truly discover how religion had been used to blind people to the injustice of their daily existence. And for many untouchables like Hazari, conversion, even if it touched only the surface of their existence was the only way out. Toward the end of the book we find Hazari sailing away to Paris to begin a new life. Since there was no biographical sketch in this book I do not know who he became and what was his later life like. Obviously he must have attained high education. But one thing is clear that he did not become a leader of his community like Ambedkar or Vasant Moon. His dissociation seems to have been complete as he ends his biography when he is still a very young man. It seems that he abandons altogether the label “untouchable” that is the title of the book; so that after his departure from India he considers himself no longer an untouchable. Thus it is not the story of a man who has a political point of view or who rises above his station to turn back and do something for his community. In this way he represents the many more untouchables of India who having attained higher social status turn their backs on their fellow untouchables. This is the reason why we find an emerging class differentiation among the Dalits of modern India, a cleavage that might convert them into two different castes once again.

REFERENCES Channa, S.M. 2001. “The right to selfhood: The paradox of being a dalit woman.” Social Action 51(4): 337–51. Hazari. 1951. An Indian outcaste: The autobiography of an untouchable. London: Bannisdale Press. (Reprint 1969. New York: Praeger Publications. Omvedt, Gail. 1994. Dalits and the democratic revolution: Dr. Ambedkar and the dalit movement in colonial India. New Delhi: SAGE Publications.

Chapter 5

On Being an Untouchable in India: A Materialist Perspective* Joan P. Mencher

INTRODUCTION It is rare to find a sociological description or a historical account of any highly stratified society written from the viewpoint of members of the lowest stratum. An account of Indian society written from this point of view might be useful not only in throwing light on the circumstances of life of a considerable portion of India’s population, but also in providing a balance to a large body of sociological writings on India, which focus on relatively high-ranking groups, or individuals in high positions. Though this has never been the main focus of my work, due to a chain of circumstances during my first period of fieldwork in Tamilnadu1 I became personally involved with the Paraiyans (an untouchable caste).2 From that point on, while not losing sight of broader problems of development, I have tried to pay special attention to the Harijans,3 and the roles in which they have been cast, and have cast themselves, in the present and in the future. In this chapter, I want to focus on the question of identity as it relates to uneducated, untouchable landless laborer (though I will also mention briefly other landless laborers and educated untouchables). What does it mean to be an untouchable? What are the socioeconomic and political forces that dominate an untouchable’s life? What does it mean to be considered polluting, and what are some of the forces maintaining and forces opposing untouchability? I will suggest that the untouchable today is caught in a circular situation: Without radical reform that eliminates economic barriers, there can be no change in their * From Beyond the Myths of Culture: Essays in Cultural Materialism. Copyright 1980 by Academic Press Inc.

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position; yet without a change in the stigmatized aspect of their identity, it is exceedingly difficult for any radical economic change to take place. Indian society is extremely stratified, with 42 percent of the population too poor to afford the minimum necessary calories for healthy living, let alone adequate shelter or health care, and 5 percent of the population enjoying 22 percent of the national income (Dandekar and Rath 1971: 31, 36–38). According to the demographer Chandrasekhar (1972: xxiii), about 14 percent of the Indian population consists of scheduled castes (85 million people), the majority of whom belong to a few of the major untouchable castes on the subcontinent.4 More than 75 percent of this population is engaged in agriculture (Dubey and Mathur 1972: 165). Close to 9001 of this 85 million people belong to the segment of the population too poor to afford the minimum necessary calories. In another paper (Mencher 1974), I have discussed the question whether this segment of the poor ever had a better position in Indian society, and have shown from historical documents that it appears they rarely did. It is striking that in the 1961 census, although only 16.7 percent of the total population was counted as being solely agricultural laborers, 34.5 percent of scheduled caste members were in this category. In other words, one third of the agricultural workers in the country in 1961 belonged to scheduled castes (Dubey and Mathur 1972: 165). (If anything, these 1961 figures are on the low side, since they tend to ignore people who were primarily laborers, but also owned small plots of land.) For the rest of the poor, the position of those belonging to higher castes in pre-British days was often somewhat better. As a result of the breakup of many traditional industries during the first half of the nineteenth century, the concomitant suppression of the industrial revolution in India (by means of the forcible removal of capital resources and the stifling of the developing textile industry), and the rapid increase in population from 1860 onward, without the availability of industrial jobs, we find today a large number of landless laborers coming from lower-ranking caste Hindu communities, and even from some of the higher castes. The relationship between untouchable landless labor and the rest of the rural poor is dealt with below. Furthermore, it should be noted that: (a) From the point of view of the people at the bottom, the caste system has functioned and continues to function as a very effective method of economic exploitation; (b) both in the past and today, one of the latent functions of the caste system has clearly been to prevent the formation of social classes with any commonality of interest or unity of function (Mencher 1974). In present-day India, this function of the caste system has undoubtedly been one of the reasons for its persistence, and for the extent to which well-to-do Hindu leaders have avoided doing things that could substantially lessen the impact of caste, though officially they condemn caste. In other words, caste is still very useful. This point will be discussed in detail.

On Being an Untouchable in India

After a brief description of the present position of the untouchable landless laborer in India (based primarily on detailed data from Madras and Kerala, but drawing as well on the works of others and newspaper reports), a number of related problems are discussed. First of all, I raise the question of group identity, of what Berreman (1971) calls “stigmatized identity,” and the extent to which people belonging to stigmatized groups accept or reject the definition of themselves held by others. Second, I want to briefly explore in what ways the position of the untouchable landless or semi-landed laborer differs from that of the caste Hindu. To what extent and how have they been kept divided from one another, and under what circumstances are they now beginning to unite? A related question will be this: To what extent has class identity begun to override caste, and to what extent are the two compartmentalized into different arenas of life? Is there any correlation between the overriding of caste differences (or in some cases religious differences), and the development and incorporation of leftist ideology? Would it be possible for the strong sense of identification of the individual with the total society (which is reported for socialist states like Cuba or China) to develop, as long as there are so many barriers between people in South Asian society? Some brief comments will also be necessary about the fate of individual members of untouchable castes when they gain in political power, when they get educated, or when they enter government service. Each of these topics could be an essay in its own right, just as this presentation must leave out much that would go into each such essay. The common factor in all these topics is the focus on aspects of identity that distinguish the man at the bottom from those above him, in spite of shared regional identity, religion, language, or other aspects of culture.

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE HARIJAN POPULATION Untouchable Landless Laborers The distribution of the untouchable castes in India is quite uneven. Some of the groups are quite small in number, and confined to specialized occupations. Others are very large in number. Among the numerous untouchable castes, it is rare to find more than one subcaste in any village, or often in any subregion. Among the untouchable castes, only a small number account for the majority of the Harijan population in any given region and these tend to be concentrated in specific districts. The greatest concentration was and is to be found in the irrigated wheat and rice regions of the Indo-Gangetic plain and the coastal belts of the south. For India as a whole, the percentage was 14.69 in 1961, whereas

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for Madras State it was 18 percent with only three states ranking higher—West Bengal, Punjab, and Uttar Pradesh (Mencher 1974). For Kerala, the percentage of untouchable population is considerably lower, that is 8.49 percent, but part of the reason for this is that many untouchables in Malabar converted to Islam and (in the south) to Christianity. Furthermore, the figure for central Kerala and Kuttanad, the main rice-producing parts of the state, is higher than the general state average. For Tamilnadu, the highest percentage of the untouchable population is to be found in the main riceproducing districts of the state: Chingleput, South Arcot, North Arcot, and Tanjore. In Chingleput District, the Paraiyans constitute about 26 percent of the total population (Mencher 1974). By far the majority of these Paraiyans are agricultural laborers. A few also own or work as 50–50 sharecroppers on small plots of land; a few work as sharecroppers on somewhat large holdings of 2–3 acres; an even smaller number own enough to be self-sufficient or even to occasionally employ others (apart from the few women needed by everyone for transplanting). One rarely finds a man who is actually well-off; indeed, we did not encounter a single such case in any of the eight villages studied intensively in our project, or in any of the neighboring villages. The percentage of land owned by Harijans in the eight villages studied in our project varied from about 0.1 percent to about 6.0 percent. However, even those who own some land usually have a problem of getting water. In the eight villages, only one Harijan was able to get a government loan for a tube well. In some of the villages Harijans work as untied laborers, in some as tied laborers for particular landlords, and in some on what is called alvaram, whereby a man gets one measure of paddy for every six obtained by the landlord. This is most popular in villages that have many tube wells, requiring constant supervision by the same man. On the whole, the bound or tied laborers are paid a lower wage than those who are free to pick and choose. In this area, the main way one gets to be a tied laborer or padiyal is by debt bondage: When a man is in debt, he is expected to work only for the man who has given him the loan, unless he has no need for workers on a particular day. The extent to which this occurs varies from village to village even within small areas. It relates to a number of factors, including the extent to which other non-Harijans form a significant part of the landless labor pool, the details of land tenure in the particular village, and other sources of income for the poor. In a large number of villages in central Kerala there are tied laborers, not only among the large untouchable caste of Cheruman or Cherumakkal, but also among Muslims and some of the lower semi-untouchable castes. There, the main factor influencing the amount of tied labor is the possibility of alternative employment for even a small segment of the population. A related factor seems to be the extent of development of agricultural labor unions (cf. Mencher 1975).

On Being an Untouchable in India

While not all of the landless laborers are by any means untouchables, it is certainly clear that being an untouchable carries additional burdens along with it. In a sample of five villages in Chingleput District studied in 1967, 85 percent of the Paraiyans had less than one acre of land, and derived their main income from agricultural labor whereas this was the case with only 56 percent of the Naickers, the other large agricultural community in this region (Mencher 1978: 136). In a larger sample of eight villages surveyed in 1971, 94 percent of the Paraiyans owned one acre or less; 54 percent of Naickers owned one acre or less; and 66 percent of the total population including Harijans and Naickers owned one acre or less of land. In the village in Kerala where I was working in 1971, none of the Cherumakkal families owned over one acre of land, whereas among other castes that furnish agricultural laborers, there are a sizeable number of people having modest though adequate landholdings. In general, many villages in Kerala have a few Harijans who own a little over one acre of land (and it must be noted here that the administrative unit called a village typically includes a very large geographic area, and often upwards of 10,000 people). Nonetheless, the vast majority of Harijans in Kerala are landless, apart from a few cents of land (1 cent = 0.01 acre) around their house site (P. Sivanandan, personal communication, based on doctoral dissertation in progress, Department of Economics, University of Kerala). Thus it should be clear from the outset that a very high percentage of rural Harijans belong to the lowest social class in the economic system. Having established this, I should like to explore two related matters: (a) the concept of stigmatized identity as it relates to the Harijans in the areas I have studied; (b) the forces reinforcing these stigmatized identities; the forces pushing toward the maintenance of caste distinctions in the face of a growing proletarian consciousness; and on the other side, the forces leading to a breakdown of stigmatized identities and ultimately toward the recognition of social classes. The concept of sociological identity has been particularly elaborated upon in materials dealing with various ethnic groups in the United States, as well as in discussions of racial groups. It is not possible to go into a discussion of that vast literature here, but I would like to point to two aspects of the question: (a) How others see members of another group; (b) how members of a group see themselves. I am primarily concerned with the latter aspect. In a study of Puerto Rican Americans, Fitzpatrick has referred to identity as: those points of reference whereby persons (or a group) define themselves in relation to the world and to other people: an awareness of persons (or a group) of who they are and where they belong . . . the problem of identity has another dimension, It is related to the sense of group solidarity in the acceptance of certain values, goals, or meanings. (Fitzpatrick 1971: 7241)

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What do we mean by stigmatized identity? Berreman, in an excellent discussion of stigmatized ethnic identity, points out: First, that stigmatized ethnic identity is experienced as oppression. It is a human day-to-day experience of degradation and exploitation, not simply an abstract concept. Second, that people resent that identity and that experience regardless of the rationalizations offered for it. Third, that people continually attempt to resist, escape, alleviate or change that identity and that experience. Fourth, how people respond to stigmatized ethnic identity depends upon their definitions of themselves, of others, and of the situations in which they interact. (1971: 10–11)

He then goes on to state: It is not consensus on the legitimacy of systems of oppression which enables them to continue, but agreement on who has the power, and when and under what circumstances and with what effect it is likely to be used. . . . People cease to get along in stratified societies when this crucial agreement changes or is challenged . . . resistance to stigmatized ethnic identity . . . is an intrinsic and inescapable feature of systems incorporating such identity. (1971: 10–11)

How does this stigmatized ethnic identity function in Tamilnadu and Kerala villages today? In Tamilnadu, it is immediately obvious that the Paraiyans are singled out from others, because their houses are set apart in a different part of the village. The untouchable cheri, or colony (as it is often called), is anywhere from a short distance across a field or a road to 2.4 km (1.5 miles) from the main village site. Even where it is close geographically, it is clearly thought of as “separate” from the village. Untouchables themselves speak of going to the village, and use the term ur (“village”) to refer to everyone else except themselves. Likewise, villagers refer to Harijans by a number of terms, the most polite and acceptable (to the Harijans themselves) being “colony people,” or Harijans (see Southworth 1974). Being physically separated means that much of daily life is conducted apart. Once a man’s work is finished, he returns to his dwelling area and spends most of the remaining part of the day there. When there is no work in the fields, most of a man’s time in the village is spent in his dwelling area. In Kerala, the situation is more complex. Usually the untouchables are located on hilly, dry land formerly owned by the high-caste landlord to whom they were attached. Nowadays, each family has its own 10 cents of land (0.1 acre)

On Being an Untouchable in India

as a result of the new land legislation, though it is sometimes too rocky to be used for cultivation. Many of the Harijans do not have any water at all nearby, which means that even water for drinking or cooking must be carried a long distance, usually uphill. Untouchables are usually found in several distinct clusters, rather than in a single distinct area as in Tamilnadu. One also finds other families scattered among the Cherumakkal, and the Cherumakkal themselves might be scattered through the geographic area called a village. This correlates with the pattern of dwellings, each in its own separate compound, commonly found in Kerala (Mencher 1966: 146). In Kerala, one also finds a number of other untouchable castes, which are insignificant demographically speaking, though socially they have been used to keep people apart (Mencher 1974). However, there is one other very large semi-untouchable group in Kerala, the Izhavas or Tiyyars. They are actually the largest Hindu group in the state, accounting for close to 27 percent of the total population (Mencher 1966: 158). It is this group that was the original spearhead of anticaste agitation in Kerala in the 1930s. Traditionally, there have been (and to some extent there continue to be) a large number of overt ways in which a man or his family’s stigmatized identity is made evident, ways in which the untouchable landless laborer—and even the rare better-off untouchable—was singled out and made aware of how he was considered inferior to the poor of higher castes. They were not allowed to bathe in the same bathing pools as higher-caste people, to take their water from the same well or pond, to walk down the street of the highest castes (in many cases), or in some cases to even follow in the footsteps of a higher-caste person. They were clearly not allowed inside the houses of higher-caste people. In both Tamilnadu and Kerala, they were neither allowed to cover the upper part of their body, nor to wear footgear.

Land Tenure In the Tamil villages we worked in, we found a very small percentage of land given on 50–50 sharecropping to Harijans, much less than the amount given to higher-caste landless families. A number of rationalizations are given for this. Perhaps the most common is the stereotyped view that Harijans are not as enterprising or as hard-working and devoted agriculturalists as higher-caste people. Yet we found in one village, where the landowners did not get along well with the poor caste Hindu group (who elsewhere are the main tenant caste), that the landowners were full of praise for the Harijans as tenants. In other words, where the landowners need the Harijans to control other poor,

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they are considered excellent tenants. It is clear that their work habits are not the main reason why there are few Harijan tenants in Chingleput District. Perhaps the main reason why Harijans seldom become tenants in this area is that the vast majorities are too poor to have the necessary equipment. They do not have any bullocks or plows. In addition, some caste Hindus feel that having a Harijan tenant might bring them in too close contact with Harijans. This explanation is most commonly given by Brahmans, who traditionally never had direct contact with untouchables but always used intermediaries.

In the Schools According to the Harijan Welfare Department, 28 percent of all pupils in the first three grades of school are Harijans, but as one goes higher the numbers drop appreciably. This fits well with our data. Harijans are often more eager to send their small children to school than some of the poor higher-caste people, since the Harijans see education as a way around the caste system. (I return to a discussion of educated Harijans later on.) Yet, in looking at the “failures” from the local school, it is easy to see how they are distributed (see Tables 5.1 and 5.2). Table 5.1: Pachaiyur Union Higher Elementary School: Attendance and Failures (1969–1970)

Total students Class

Backward communitiesa

Harijans

Forward communitiesb

Attending

Failing

Attending

Failing

Attending

Failing

Attending

Failing

I

51

11

20

8

27

2

4

1

II

58

24

22

16

32

6

4

2

III

49

22

22

17

25

5

2

–

IV

40

12

9

7

23

5

8

–

V

43

13

10

6

26

7

7

–

VI

42

15

6

4

32

9

4

2

VII

21

10

2

1

16

9

3

–

VIII

31

7

4

3

17

4

10

–

Total

335

114

95

62

198

47

42

5

Source: Author. Note: (a) Backward communities include: Vanniyars (Naickers, Gounders, or Padiyachis) Thambirans, Yadavas, and a few other groups, which are entitled to certain privileges because they are considered to be backwards in relation to others. (Formerly Chingleput Vanniyars were called Naickers, and those of North Arcots were called Gounders, while those of South Arcot were called Padiyachis. These groups moved around a great deal during the 19th century.) (b) Forward communities include such castes as Brahman, Mudaliar, Reddiar, and so on.

On Being an Untouchable in India Table 5.2: Percentage of Failures up to End of Class VIII (Pachiyur Elementary School) Total students

Harijans

Backward community

Forward community

34%

65%

24%

12%

Source: Author.

It is immediately obvious that Harijans constitute most of the failures. The headmaster gives the usual explanations, familiar to most Americans as the explanations offered for failures of ghetto children in the United States: lack of attendance, lack of parental interest, and lack of care and attention in studies. In one village high school, perhaps an extreme case, Harijan failures were common in all classes, but no Harijan student was ever allowed to pass the 10th standard (i.e., to enter the final year of high school) until 1971. Several students failed repeatedly in the 10th standard, until they gave up the attempt. It almost seemed as if the teachers did not want to give Harijans a chance at the Secondary School Leaving Certificate (SSLC) examination (which is under state government control, and therefore outside the influence of local teachers). Though an extreme case, one does often find continual discouragement of Harijan students by caste Hindu teachers. But this is no explanation for the failures in the early grades. In the early grades other factors seem to dominate. To begin with, children of six or seven years of age may be expected to help look after younger siblings along with their studies. Since there is rarely a nursery attached to the school, this often means that at least some of the Harijan students will end up taking many days off from school. Furthermore, many of the parents find providing adequate clothes for small children an additional burden for the family. The students themselves rarely have any place to sit and study at home. If they were allowed to sit and study in the school building at night, the situation might be helped, but this would require electrifying the schools and paying someone to supervise study halls. And of course, it would only help those students who live near enough to come in the dark. Free lunches have sometimes helped to keep these students in the school, but have not helped with the problem of studying. If a Harijan child does manage to complete his SSLC and wants to go for higher education, he still has several hurdles to get over. This is particularly true in Tamilnadu. Often village officers and local school officials make it difficult for a child to get the necessary certificates by saying that his family is poor and has less than the minimum amount of land required in order to qualify for a government scholarship to college. Indeed, many village officers advise Harijan parents that it is not good to send their children for higher education. In the colleges, one often finds that all of the reserved seats are not filled. The facile explanation usually given by higher-caste officials was that there were

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no qualified candidates, but we have been told by people involved in Harijan welfare that this is not true. First of all, there are a number of ways in which colleges can manage to manipulate selections so that not all of the seats are filled. Second, the reservation of seats was originally meant to allow students who had slightly lower marks coming from scheduled castes to enter the college but, in actual fact, this is rarely done. Furthermore, because the vast majority of the Harijan students belong to the lowest socioeconomic group, many cannot afford college even if they get a scholarship. The scholarships at best only provide for free tuition and boarding and lodging. They do not give money for transportation from home to school, for clothes, for sundry items like toothpaste, or for postage to write an occasional letter home. Yet for a family living close to the survival level, it is hard enough to manage without an income from a teenaged son, and to have to provide him with even `15 a month is impossible.

QUESTIONS OF HARIJAN IDENTITY Other Ways of Indicating Stigmatized Identity There are numerous ways in which villagers make Harijans aware of their peculiar and stigmatized identity. Let me just list a few of the ways that have been observed by my assistants or myself in Tamilnadu and Kerala: (a) It is very common for people to object to Harijans appearing in public wearing clean clothes, sandals, or pressed shirts (and they often make their feelings known with disapproving looks, or comments such as “Who do they think they are?”). (b) Harijan laborers are commonly ordered to walk alongside a bullock cart, instead of riding on it, when passing through a village—even in the side streets. (c) Harijan messengers are often ordered to dismount from a bicycle when they go from one village to another, even when on panchayat business (the panchayat is an elected village council). (d) In one Kerala village, Harijan laborers were obliged to take their meals sitting on the road outside their employer’s compound. (e) In Tamilnadu, high-caste people will not enter the cheri, but will stand outside and shout for a person to come, in order to avoid pollution. ( f ) In one Tamil village, when Harijans who lacked a decent source of water near their colony began to take water from a nearby pump set, the high-caste owner of the pump set put cow dung in the water to prevent this. (g) In central Kerala, Harijans (as well as other low-caste people) still use certain special forms of address, and special demeaning ways of referring to themselves (such as adlyan [“slave”] instead of nyaan [“I”]), in talking with some of the older Nayars and Nambudiris. (h) Harijans are commonly excluded from entry into local temples

On Being an Untouchable in India

(in spite of laws to the contrary), and in Kerala they are excluded from private temples and bathing pools which are however open to all high-caste people. Even though there exists legislation against these practices, the high-caste landowner has the weapon of economic sanctions to use against any offenders of traditional caste regulations: He simply does not hire the offending laborer. An example from one of our villages in Tamilnadu might make it clear how this operated: The bus stop at Pachaiyur gives an interesting picture. Many, belonging to various castes, might be waiting for the bus. But, excepting Mudaliars (the main high caste in the region) none can be found at the bus stop. As soon as the bus arrives, from nowhere a crowd arrives consisting of different lower-caste men. I found out that lower-caste men, instead of waiting at the bus stop, wait in nearby places unseen and when the bus comes, they make their appearance because they do not want to be seen with Mudaliars, or rather, because the Mudaliars do not want to be seen among lower-caste people at the bus stand. . . . Even in the bus they sit separately, and elder Harijans prefer to stand. . . . Even in the reading room and in the rice mill, lower-caste men would be seen at one place and Mudaliars at another side. . . . There is a local prostitute in Pachaiyur. Naickers and Pillais see that no Mudaliar is there when they go (from field notes of a project assistant). While this picture does not hold true for all villages, it certainly does apply to many, at least in Tamilnadu. In Kerala, it is somewhat different because of the strength of the Marxists. At least in public, Harijans will not avoid being seen close to higher-caste people, and even orthodox higher-caste people will normally hide any aversions they might have.

The Self-concept: Are We Really Polluting? Do Harijans accept this picture of untouchables as “polluting,” or as somehow deserving of being stigmatized? I have discussed this in greater detail elsewhere (Mencher 1974), but would like to reiterate some of the most important points; it is clear to me that those at the bottom have a more materialistic view of the system and of their role in it than those at the top. Indeed, many of them state this explicitly. Obviously, material and vested interests are a pivotal point for all, but people at the bottom do not need to rationalize its inequities. To a man at the top, it is comforting to view himself as privileged because of his deeds in a past existence, his karma, or because of his “caste duty” or dharma, and thus to feel free to continue to exploit the lower-caste people who serve him. However, this does not imply that the lower-caste people have internalized these values. It is important to distinguish between the overt acceptance

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of such values and the holding of contrary covert opinions (which are often unexpressed to outsiders). When I asked for reasons why things are the way they are, especially if no high-caste person from the village was around, I was invariably given explanations like: “They own all the land” or “Even the poor Naickers have the support of the rich people of their own jail,” or as one Harijan girl put it: “We can’t ask them to work for us, no! Instead of that, those people only take work out of us, so naturally they are supposed to be higher than we are.” Others spoke explicitly of the power (Tamil: adikaram) of the highercaste people to coerce those of lower caste. Apart from the fact that literacy was very uncommon, one did not find records of complaints from untouchables in earlier times because it was simply too dangerous to express any but the “official” view outside of one’s own community. In any case, who was there to listen to or do anything? When it came to food, there again was a clear dichotomy between the untouchables’ private values and the “official” ones of the larger society. Many spoke to me about how much they preferred beef to any other kind of meat, and how much they could buy for half a rupee in the nearby market town. In one of the villages where I worked, there had been a Paraiyan who actually earned his living about 20 years back as a full-time butcher. A personal incident told to me by one of my research assistants gives some idea of the attitudes of Paraiyans toward the eating of beef. He is a young man with a Master’s degree in social work, who had not lived in his village apart from occasional holiday visits. His father was a railway employee, and they had lived in government quarters, where most of their neighbors were higher-caste people. As a result his immediate family had given up eating beef. His father’s sister, who lived in their native place, was quite amused at his attitude toward beef eating, and at his breaking with traditional ways. One day when he was visiting their village, she gave him a curry that tasted slightly strange to him; she told him it was baby goat. A few days later, she revealed to him that he had eaten beef, and all of his relatives had a good laugh at his expense. The point of this incident is to indicate the difference in the attitude toward beef eating among Paraiyans in private, as opposed to the attitudes that they must pretend to have while dealing with higher-caste people. My assistant’s father had given it up, not because he did not like beef, but because he was “passing” among higher-caste people, or at least was trying not to call attention to his untouchable status. In relation to stigmatized identity, I am trying to say that while low-caste people are hurt badly and suffer from being stigmatized, that is not the same as saying that their own self-image, their own picture of their customs or habits, is a bad one. My assistant and I made a recording in one Madras village that illustrates this point very clearly. I was sitting on a stone at the edge of the village.

On Being an Untouchable in India

A Mudaliar lady from the next village was also sitting there, because she had come to watch some laborers harvest her fields and thresh the paddy in the village where I was staying. One Paraiyan girl, Mallika, and her friends came by and stopped to chat. We asked her to sit down, but she refused, saying, “I am not supposed to sit with the person who is sitting there.” I asked the Mudaliar lady why. The Mudaliar lady replied, “We don’t object, they just have a feeling that we might object, but it is not that we actually object now.” Mallika got incensed when the Mudaliar lady said this, and the instant she finished talking she replied, “Don’t say that.” Then turning to us, she said, “In front of you they wouldn’t say anything if we sit, but afterwards, when they go back, she would say ‘I can’t stay there, Harijans, they are very bold. They come and sit alongside, right next to us.’” (Mallika did a bright and saucy imitation of how the Mudaliar lady would talk to others if she (Mallika) were to actually sit down.) The Mudaliar lady blinked, and didn’t say a single word after this. Later, when we interviewed this same girl along with several other Harijans, she explained: “They don’t eat meat, that is why they say we are not supposed to go near them. They say that if we touch them, then when they go back home, scorpions will bite them. I don’t believe it, but they say like that. . . . They are always in the shade, they don’t need meat for strength. They need only milk.”

Touchable Landless Laborers The previous examples give some indication of what stigmatized identity means to a Harijan in terms of his everyday existence. A question that needs to be answered in this context is, how different is the daily life of a non-Harijan landless laborer? That is, if we consider the person who is in the same economic position as the Harijan, how much better is his life by virtue of his identity being un-stigmatized? Does he derive tangible benefits from being “touchable,” or is membership in a touchable caste largely of psychological value? For the northern part of Tamilnadu, the majority of non-untouchable landless laborers belong to the Vanniyar (or in Chingleput District, the Naicker) caste. It is not clear what their position was earlier, but around 1871, when we have a fairly detailed caste census, more than two thirds of them were small farmers or peasant proprietors (Kumar 1965: 59). Many were tenant farmers in addition. Between 1871 and the mid-twentieth century, with rapid population expansion, a tendency for the concentration of land- holdings, and the development of capitalist farming, a considerable percentage became landless laborers (with either no land, or tiny plots unable to sustain their families). Another group became landless laborers in the l950s when many landowners, fearful

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of tenancy laws giving permanent rights to tenants, took back their land and started farming it directly with hired labor. There are also a number of other smaller castes in Chingleput that provide bodies for the agricultural labor market. This includes some former semimigratory tribal groups like the Irula, a few members of former toddy-tapping communities (these are not numerous in the northern part of Tamilnadu), and impoverished higher-caste Mudaliars—though most of this latter group prefer doing manual labor away from their native villages if they have to do it, so as to maintain their family’s prestige in the village. There are certain economic advantages members of these other communities have over the poor Harijans. For example, poor Irula females often are employed a few hours a day in homes of Mudaliars as maidservants, or even more often, a poor Mudaliar woman might work for a rich Mudaliar family. Men from Vanniyar and Mudaliar families get taken on as temporary tenants more often than Harijan men. And a rich Mudaliar is far more likely to employ a landless Mudaliar as his overseer to supervise his agricultural operations, than a Harijan. Nonetheless, the majority of landless caste Hindu laborers are not able to take advantage of their higher caste. For this majority there is a striking resemblance to poor white families in parts of the American south—for the most part as poor as the Harijan, clinging to the caste status or sense of superiority (in the American south based on their skin color), in a situation where in actual fact they might have more to gain in the long run from joining together on the basis of social class.

The Role of Stigmatized Identity in Inhibiting Class Consciousness In the 1970s, every untouchable landless laborer belonged to or identified with a caste, and also (to a greater or lesser extent) with a social class. It is crucial, in examining the development of class consciousness or proletarianization in South India, to explore in depth the factors leading to the overriding of caste, and the factors leading to its perpetuation and maintenance. The cases to be presented next provide support for the hypothesis that well-to-do upper-caste leaders have behaved in such a way as to lead poorer members of their own castes to believe that the benefits of upper-caste status are greater than they really are. It would appear that it is to the benefit of such leaders to maintain caste as a going concern, and to keep the poorer members of their own group unaware of any benefits they might obtain from joining with Harijans on the basis of common class identity. Thus I am arguing that stigmatized identity

On Being an Untouchable in India

plays a crucial role in inhibiting the development of class consciousness; it can be used to mask common class interests.

CASES: SOME TAMIL VILLAGES IN OUR SAMPLE The first village to be discussed, Manjapalayalam, consists of approximately 9 percent Brahman, 67 percent Naicker, and 10 percent Paraiyan households; 23 percent of the land is owned by Brahmans, 61 percent by Naickers, 0.1 percent by Harijans, and the remainder by the village temple and absentee landlords. Among the Naickers, over half have 1 acre or less land, and an additional 23 percent have under 3 acres. Six Naicker households and one Brahman household own over 25 acres of land each. The Panchayat president, a Naicker, is the wealthiest man in the village, owning land considerably above the legal limit, and deriving income from various legal and illegal sources. Clearly, it would not be in the interests of the president, or the other well-todo Naickers or Brahmans, for the poor members of the Naicker caste to join with the Harijans (who are all poor) and agitate for higher wages or express any of their dissatisfactions with their “lot in life.” In various ways the poor Naickers are prevented from seeing common interests with Harijans as advantageous to them. When convenient, they are flattered into thinking that they are somehow better people than the Harijans. This will be done by the well-placed comment by leaders, the shouting of abuse at a passing Harijan, or the occasional buying of alcoholic drinks for Naicker laborers. These and a number of other devices are used to keep landless Naickers from focusing attention on the rather striking discrepancies between themselves and the rich Naickers. In recent years, there has been an elaboration of a Naicker festival associated with a particular goddess (Draupadi), involving ritual fire-walking— performed by Naicker men only—which among other functions provides all Naickers with a glorious past, thus emphasizing their separateness from all others. Financed by collections from all Naickers in the area—poor as well as rich—but managed by the Manjapalayalam president, the function gave the poorer Naickers a feeling of being “supported” by their wealthier caste fellows, without the latter really having to do anything to improve the circumstances of life for the laborers. (Indeed, according to rumor, the president, in 1967, managed to get almost an entire cartload of paddy for himself out of what was collected for the festival.) In another village, Perumalpuram, until recently the Paraiyans had been used by the Reddiars to keep the more numerous Naickers down. By taking advantage of splits among the Naickers, and by giving preferences to Paraiyans over Naickers, they provided some help for the Paraiyans, but it was only a

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short-term help. A Harijan might get land on a sharecropping basis from a Reddiar (though most did not), but the Reddiars were not helping them to gain in political power or to increase their wages. In August 1970, the Naickers, led by one rich caste fellow, managed to get together on the basis of their antiReddiar and anti-Harijan feeling, and capture the panchayat presidentship. Here, as in the first village, the landowners have very successfully managed to keep the laborers in different camps. In yet another village, Kamallur, where the Harijans are large in number, they managed to run a candidate for the presidency. The wealthy higher-caste candidate managed to get the polling booths set up so that the Harijans voted in one area across the railway tracks, whereas all the other villagers had to vote at one place in the center of the village. Thus, they were able to intimidate any villager who might have wanted to vote for the poor Harijan candidate and against the rich caste Hindu candidate. In this village, there are a large number of poor caste Hindus, and the landowning people are most concerned about keeping them from joining with the Harijans. Because these Harijans have a few educated people in their midst and are followers of the late Dr Ambedkar, they are considered troublesome by the better-off villagers. In Chinnavur, another Tamil village, the Mudaliars make a point of always talking about how the Naickers are much better workers than the Paraiyans. (In this village, the Mudaliars account for 18 percent of the population, the Naickers for 27 percent and the Paraiyans for 36 percent.) Recently, when there was a program to distribute government land to the poor, the Mudaliar president, in league with the Naickers, managed to see to it that none of the Harijans got any land, and that all went to a selected number of poor caste Hindus. We recorded a revealing conversation on the road one evening between the panchayat president and the leader of the Naickers (himself a middle-sized landowner), in which they were talking about how to keep the Harijans from obtaining some desperately needed house-site land, which had been promised to them by the government under an official policy of giving title to Harijans on poromboke (government) land. In this village, a big point is made to keep the poor Irulas (a semitribal group) separated from the Harijans by the Mudaliars, by allowing the Irula women to work inside Mudaliar houses as maidservants. Traditionally these people were only allowed in houses to catch rats, snakes, or scorpions, and never worked for villagers. The allotment of land has been one of the major programs for improving the economic status of Scheduled Castes. However, the rule in Tamilnadu State was adjusted to provide that anyone having under 2.5 acres of wet land or 5 acres of dry land (even if it was irrigated by a tube well and got three crops a year) was eligible for land allotment. In this way, the panchayat presidents in several of our sample villages managed to see to it that the majority of surplus

On Being an Untouchable in India

government land went to caste Hindus, normally those who belonged to the president’s caste. According to the Commission for Scheduled Castes and Tribes, 17,410 acres were distributed in Tamilnadu (Dubey and Mathur 1972: 167), but from the information we have obtained, it seems unlikely that much of this land actually went to Harijans.

TWO EXAMPLES OF CHANGE Perhaps my point might become clearer by looking at two situations in Tamilnadu where some changes have started to occur. One is that of a Harijan who managed to become a panchayat president in spite of opposition by the economically dominant Reddiars, with the support of poor Yadavas (shepherds) and poor Chettiar shopkeepers. The second is that of a Harijan converted to Christianity who is the president of a small-town agriculturalists’ association, which embraces a number of nearby villages, including one in our sample. I think the words of the Harijan president himself are far more eloquent than any I could produce, so let me quote his own statements (translated into Indian English): My birthplace is Ceylon. My father worked as a gangman in the railway in Ceylon. He earned a good amount of money and saved it for the future. He retired when I was 15 and joined the army. He used to send money to the village and my mother saved. We worked in the fields and only used what we earned. My father managed to buy 7½ acres of land in the village and I earned 1½ by coolie work. I did not study much, only to fifth standard in Ceylon. I can read and write Tamil. We have 5 acres wet land and 4 dry all together. My younger brother works in a factory in Madras and sends some money. Thus, I and my family including my brothers do not depend much on others for our livelihood. We work on our land and also sometimes go for coolie work. But not depending on others much, that is why I was able to become the President. I have been connected with the village panchayat for a long time. I wanted to contest the election even in 1965. At that time, only panchayat membership votes for the president election. A Reddiar was able to buy votes and I could not contest. In 1970, I decided to become the president.  There was no risk or fear in standing for the election, since they changed and had direct voting for president. 1 have got enough Harijan votes to defeat anyone. If at least one Harijan from a panchayat is like me in economic status, I am sure that every panchayat will have a Harijan president, bringing all the colony votes which outnumber the village votes.  Other caste people like Yadavas and Chettiars worked for me. Only some Mudaliars joined with Reddiars. I even expected a wider majority than I got. They threatened some Harijans who were pudiyals under them to vote against me. These Harijans, though they favor me, voted against me under intimidation. For

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every small thing I do, I face stiff opposition from Reddiars and I do not get open support from some of my caste-people. Most of them are coolies and they have to depend upon Reddiars to live. . . . They hesitate to come out openly to my support lest they would be deprived of their livelihood.  Reddi community’s cruelty towards my community has made me to rebel against them. In my village, there is very much discrimination against my community. Formerly Harijans should not even walk in the road. So, for the past 10 years I used to oppose everything done by Reddiars.  The Reddiars oppose me in every step. They try their level best to defeat my proposals, and unnecessarily drag my caste people into trouble and bring the police to arrest them for petty things. . . . I have to spend out of my pocket to get Harijans out on bail. They mockingly say to Harijans, “You have voted for him! Let him help you come out from the police station.”  I am not rich. I had to spend `200 for my election by mortgaging a piece of land.  Government officials show no discrimination to me. But I cannot entertain them as other panchayat presidents do. Since I am a Harijan they hesitate to enter my house and I have to choose a public place to talk with them, whenever the people such as the Grama Sevak, Revenue Inspector, A.E.O., etc., come. They avoid coming to my village, instead they ask me to meet them in their offices.  In 1958, a Reddiar gave away a portion of house-ground for a public road. They insisted Harijans should not use that road. I appealed in civil court. They went to High Court. At last a judgment came in my favor. When road-work started Reddiars did not allow workers to proceed. After I became president, in November 1970, I went to collector and asked for help since he is also a Harijan. He was moved by my story and gave suitable orders. I brought a constable and the work was done. Now, one Reddi whose house adjoins the road has constructed a thatched shed to prevent my caste-men from walking through. Again it is in Court.  When I walk in the road I am abused by the Reddiar women in filthy language. Since they are women, I am not able to say anything. When I have to visit some houses in connection with panchayat work, I am made to stand outside the house for a long time, and even when I talk with them they do not show any respect and their language is deplorable. But, I do not mind these things. . . . As long as I get support from my people, I will be president. When I filed my nomination for presidentship, I was asked to withdraw from the contest. V. Reddiar asked me to become vice president like before, but I rejected his suggestion. The Reddiar said that a Harijan should not be such a prominent person and that I will not get cooperation from the village people. When V. was the president he made a big fraud. A well was sanctioned for the Harijans but he had it dug in the village instead. When it was dug, I objected and asked my people to take water. Then I reported the matter to the Harijan welfare board and they sent one official to the village. I then asked one of the women to take water in front of the official, but she was afraid. Then I had to give a blow to one woman and make her to take water. Then every woman from the colony went and took water. After that, the villagers petitioned the police saying that I made trouble, but they didn’t get anywhere. Later on, the villagers began to dirty the well water with cow dung and other dirty things. Finally they gave up. Now the well is used only by Harijans.

On Being an Untouchable in India

A second man, Appadurai, is the president of an association called the Agriculturalists’ Association in a small town. This association is mainly concerned with helping the agricultural laborers and small farmers use the various things made available to the poor by the government. Durai is a Harijan converted to Christianity, and educated up to intermediate (second year at college) in a school at the Kolar Gold Fields, where his father was employed as a coolie. He was formerly a Marxist, but now works for the DMK (The Dravida Munnetra Kazhakam or “Dravidam Progressive Party,” a major political party in Tamilnadu which was in power from 1967 until the imposition of President’s Rule in 1976). He is financially independent, earning a small amount of money from the association; his wife is employed as a headmistress of a higher elementary school. When he visits villages, his expenses are met by the farmers and coolies. Let me quote my student assistant: He will move closely with villagers, sleep on the floor, even to just take boiled groundnuts and a cup of tea as his night food. When he visits a cheri, he says “I am one among you,” because he was a Harijan before. He is helped in Annur by one Mudaliar, T.M., who is vice-president of the association. He has a command among police personnel, and ignorant villagers who have trouble with rich landlords seek his help. If village big shots have a poor man arrested and remanded in the police station, he immediately brings them out on bail and helps in the court room. He especially helps poor Harijans or Vettaikarans. But, he is clever. One poor Reddiar farmer did not pay his dues on a government loan. He was a man who had not voted for the present panchayat president. So, the village munsjff (a local official) took away his one pair of cattle. Appadurai was informed and he sent a taxi and brought the poor Reddiar to the town. In front of the Tahsildar, he proved it as a case of enmity, and freed the man as well as his cattle. If a poor person is harassed, he sends a taxi from the town, even though he himself might have used a cycle or bus. Taxi-traveling is felt as a luxury by the poor villager, and in doing that he gets a feeling he is on a par with the rich.  He has formed a Harijan milk society. Seventy-five Harijan households joined. After they collected the money, the panchayat president and the munsiff did some mischief. They went and told the colony people that “there is no society like this, they are only cheating you.” Then the concerned people met with Appadurai and T.M. Mudaliar and they arranged for a public meeting along with the Panchayat Union Chairman, one DMK party Chairman, and several other locally important people. One Mudaliar from another Agricultural Association assured the people that the society would come into being, and that they should not listen to the President’s propaganda. The initiative to form the society had occurred before the panchayat elections, but after the elections they wanted to destroy it because they felt the Harijans were too insolent. After that, those two went to the record office and by bribing one clerk managed to get him to say that no application had been submitted. Then, T.M. Mudaliar was able to show that the application had been

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sent by registered post. Now Appadurai has again applied for an order to start the society, and it should be under way soon.

What are the forces working against stigmatized caste identities, and in favor of class? Clearly, stigmatized caste identity cannot be overridden unless there is some sort of conscious effort, either on the part of villagers or outsiders. In Kerala there have been a large number of forces operating in this direction, though perhaps the most important has been a tradition of 30 to 40 years of Communist ideology. Thus, in one Kerala village where I worked in 1971, we were told that Harijan youngsters had begun to attend the local school, and strict observance of pollution rules was challenged about 50 years ago, under the influence of a young Marxist (who later became a Member of Parliament). According to one of my assistants, a young man with a Master’s degree in economics who comes from a Harijan family in Quilon District of Travancore: 20 years ago, the influence of Communism brought a new shape to the life of my village. Some of the high-caste Nairs became the spokesmen of this new ideology. My father and uncles also joined them. They, the leaders of all castes, conducted meetings in Pulaya houses, slept in Paraya houses, etc. This phenomenon actually swept away the caste feeling in my village, especially untouchability. I have gone to the homes of many high-caste friends, and they come to my house also and accept food. We have many Nair friends who come to my family house, take food and sleep overnight.

In Kerala, there is considerable difference between different regions in the extent to which importance is given to caste distinctions in daily life—or to put it another way, in the extent to which class identity overrides caste. This is not to say that caste has no function in areas where class considerations dominate, but rather that the sphere of caste identity is more limited. Thus, even where class tends to dominate, marriages are mostly arranged within the same caste, and each caste group tends to have its own specialties in cooking as well as a number of particular customs of its own. However, there is the kind of free mingling described above—at least among members of the same social class. On the whole, the most conservative region is in central Kerala, the area of our project research, though even here one does not encounter the kind of political manipulation of stigmatized identity that is characteristic of politics in other parts of India. In part, this difference may be due to a more conscious commitment to socialism in Kerala, at least a verbal commitment, or at least to a greater sophistication among rural people. Many writers have attempted to equate political party membership in Kerala with caste, but on the basis of my own work there (from 1958 on), I believe that class has been the main determining factor—with the exception of two specific groups: Nairsot central Kerala

On Being an Untouchable in India

and Christians. Members of both these groups have traditionally been associated predominantly with the Congress Party, regardless of their socioeconomic class. Even among the Nairs, class factors have probably been more dominant in Trichur District than in Palghat District. And C. Fuller, a British social anthropologist who worked among Christians in Travancore, reported (personal discussion) that in 1972 class was clearly dominant among Christians. There have been many reasons for the persistence of caste distinctions in central Kerala, including the following factors: 1. By the end of the nineteenth century, Travancore had already become a region of peasant proprietorship, Cochin had developed a combined pattern of peasant proprietorship and absentee landlordism, whereas Malabar was primarily an absentee landlord tract. In Malabar until the late 1960s and to some extent in Cochin, landownership was concentrated in the hands of superior caste households and Hindu temples (Varghese 1970: 217–18). 2. Central Kerala has been a Namboodiri Brahman stronghold, with the result that caste feelings were exacerbated in the region. The Namboodiris and a few select, large Nayar households continued to be rich and powerful landlords until relatively recently. Even now, a Harijan living on land that according to the 1970 land reform laws now belongs to him, will refer to himself as “K-de mana Cherumakkal,” that is “Cherumakkal of K house,” his very identity being tied up with that of his recent landlord and former (prior to the mid-nineteenth century) owner. The question of agrestic servitude in Kerala has been dealt with in two other papers (Mencher and Unni 1973; Mencher 1974). It is clear that it was most prominent in central Kerala, the main rice region of the state apart from Kuttanad. In Kerala, as changes have come about in the old landlord–tenant relationships, there has been a profound change in the practice of caste. For example, in the part of Travancore from which my assistant comes, along with profound changes in intercaste behavior, labor union activity is exceedingly important and productive, with each political party supporting its own agricultural laborers’ union. In the central Kerala area where I have worked recently, the only political party to support such a union was the CPM (Communist Party [Marxist]), and it has not yet been effective. The main determinant of wages has been the extent to which alternative sources of employment exist—for example, if the village is near enough to a small town that has a match factory (see Mencher 1975). One still finds in villages in the Trichur–Paighat area that low-caste people are not officially allowed to use tanks or bathing pools owned by high-caste

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families. In one village, some low-caste people described their courage to us in taking their baths in a tank owned by a high-caste Nayar late at night. In another village, my assistant recounts the following story: One Telugu Chettiar came from . . . (a distant town) to sell cloth. He went to take a bath in the tank. One man, realizing he wasn’t a Nayar, asked who he was. He said that he is a Chettiar from . . . come for selling clothes. The old man said: “This tank is not for any Chettiar or Cherumakkal.” His tone was not quite so rough as in the old days. The Chettiar asked if the clothes sold were acceptable or not, or would there not be any pollution in wearing clothes sold by a Chettiar. The Nayar blinked and went away.

According to several informants, along with the freedom struggle and communism, the teachings of Sree Narayana Guru helped to form a social opinion among the educated people against the evils of untouchability. The leftist social leaders who later were to become the spokesmen of Communist ideology condemned the evils of untouchability. They also tried to help laborers to come out of the clutches of their employers and go for work anywhere. Another reason why untouchability has gone down in Kerala, is that before it was based on the power of the big taravads (traditional Nair households). Now they are partitioned and have lost their power; things are changing. No family managed to keep a large number of agricultural laborers. According to one informant, this is perhaps the biggest factor leading to its maintenance still: “Because it is illegal to enter the house or compound of someone without permission, the control of the house is still preserved as before. So, employees may be served food in separate places in the house. This is especially true in central Kerala.” It is clear that the process of transition from a man’s identifying primarily with his caste to his identifying primarily with a social class, that is, the development of class consciousness, is still going on in Kerala—more advanced in some areas, slowly emerging in others. Age is an important element here. Older impoverished high-caste people tend to cling to their caste. The younger people, especially the literate, tend to be more practical and to be less concerned about status. Between 1962, when I previously worked in Kerala, and 1971 when I again worked there, I was struck by a major change in this regard. In 1962, there was a tremendous sense of hopelessness. In 1971, even though things have been materially worse in some ways, there was a sense of excitement about the possibility of transforming the society. The situation in Tamilnadu is somewhat different. In rural areas of Chingleput District, especially southern Chingleput, the DMK has made a concerted effort to appeal to landless laborers, especially untouchables; this effort is in many ways similar to that made by the communists in Kerala. In this part of Chingleput, the

On Being an Untouchable in India

area where our project has been located, they have made considerable efforts to override caste and to present themselves as being the helpers of the poor. Thus, leaders will go personally to the cheri, take food there, and in general let it be known that they are on the Harijans’ side. In Chinnavur, the DMK leader who lost in the panchayat elections allows Harijans everywhere in his house, pays them a higher wage than other Mudaliars, and moves freely with them. Likewise, in Manjapalayam, the Naicker who ran against the present president, a man whose father-in-law is a DMK legislator, has made a point of eating in Harijan homes. Their antireligious stance has also been of help in this regard. It is hard to predict whether or not they will be able to maintain this image. A year before the last panchayat elections, that is in the fall of 1969, another DMK MLA (Member of the Legislative Assembly, the state legislative body) did come to the support of a strike by agricultural laborers, mostly Harijans, in one subregion where the party was not completely sure of their success, since the area had previously supplied a well-known Congress Member of Parliament. In this strike the Harijans succeeded in raising the harvest wage. On the other hand, the DMK failed to help out in another strike by Harijans elsewhere in the district, where the wages were actually lower. However, this was just after the assembly elections, and maybe the party workers were tired (Mencher 1975).

THE EDUCATED UNTOUCHABLE What happens to the identity of the educated, employed untouchable? Where does he stand, how can he work? Harold Isaacs has dealt with some aspects of this question in his well-known book (1965). What I want to look at very briefly here is the educated untouchable in government service, or working in villages where they are subject to the constraints of caste, and where they identify classwise with some segment of the middle class. A few concrete cases might help to clarify the questions being raised here. It was quite striking to me how the two educated Harijan postgraduate students working on our project had to hide their caste most of the time while in strange villages. Let me quote some relevant comments from their notes: When I was in Chinnavur, if anybody inquired about my caste I told them daringly that I belong to Harijan community, because there my work was to collect data only in the colony. Also I was not residing alone, renting a house in the village. I was staying with the American professors. My stay at Pachaiyur was in the temple officer’s rest house. My colleague told me that the executive officer had specifically asked him not to give equal place to Harijans inside the rest house, since it will affect his post if other higher officials happen to see a Harijan sitting and talking inside the rest house. My colleague also asked me not to reveal my

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caste to anyone since I stay in that place. If I tell I belong to such and such a caste, I would not have been given a chance to get a rented house in the village. Hence hiding my caste became my practice. In Manjapalayalam, a Naicker maidservant asked my caste. I said I was an Arcot Mudaliar. After a couple of days the primary health center doctor said to me, “I thought you belonged to my caste, now I know.” (He is a Mudaliar.) I kept mum. In most villages, I tried my best to avoid the persons asking about my caste just for the sake of my work. I felt much for the position of the persons who are somewhat educated and scattered in society. In Chinnavur, the village President knew about my caste. He said he was very happy to see educated persons from my community, but always he talked to me in English, never in Tamil. When there was a possibility I might have to stay on in the village after everyone else left, he did not come forward to arrange for my meals or anything. He never encouraged my entering his house.

In one critical situation, my Malayalee assistant was saved from a potentially difficult situation by his hesitancy: One day I was interviewing an old Nair man. At first he welcomed me and answered all questions. I could understand that he is a pure orthodox Hindu. I felt strange. Suddenly, he asked: “What is your swajanmam?”—meaning “own caste” literally. I was perplexed, since it is not the usual word for caste. Usually we say “jail.” I just repeated “swajanmam?” But he thought I was saying “own caste,” meaning his own caste. Immediately after this, he ordered a cup of coffee for me. I hesitated to have it, but he insisted, so I took it. Yet, in this same village, I was staying with a Nayar family. They knew my caste, yet they behaved towards me with no ill-feeling. They were actually sorry when I left. In V. Namboodiri pad’s house, they knew my caste, but they insisted that I visit there and come inside and be given coffee. I don’t know if they would show such behaviour to an educated native. They do not want to create any ill-feeling among people who come from other villages, especially when an effort is being made to eradicate untouchability. In this village, one Mannan (a particular low-caste) is an M.A. holder. He is the only person among the low-caste so much educated. If he is invited by some highcaste person here, he will be given a chair and coffee and they will talk freely. But if he is invited for a marriage, then he would be expected to be treated like any other low-caste person. So they avoid such occasions even if they are invited.

What about government officers? Let us look at one case: Raghavan is gram sevak (village-level worker) in Pachaiyur. In fact, it is his main headquarters, but he is forced to stay in the nearby town of Kancheepuram, because if he lived in the village, people would find out his caste too easily. In the village one cannot move with the villagers without revealing one’s caste. He argues that if his caste were known, even the present work he is doing could not be done; he would not be welcome in the village. A few influential people know his caste, but they have kept quiet. Raghavan said to my student assistant:

On Being an Untouchable in India

Whoever he may be, a Harijan will be looked upon with contempt; even Jagjivan Ram, the Union Minister, would face the same insult in a village. . . . The highercaste people with good enough economic position are having the opinion that family planning is not for them, and they point out colony people and ask me to give such propaganda to them. . . . I have to face my unfavorable situations when I approach the colony people for the use and necessity for family planning. (Will you say your caste?) No, if the colony people know about my community, it might spread. I do not want to hide my caste from anybody, only for my profession I have to hide my caste. . . . If a high Scheduled Caste official takes interest in the welfare of the Harijans he is not given proper place in the society. . . . Each Scheduled Caste person has to take his own interest for the improvement of himself. He should have enough courage to fight with the society to make him one with the forward community. If such a person happens to reveal his community to them he will not be given equal place with them. . . . Untouchability cannot be wiped off completely. It will prevail in one shape or another. . . . If a Harijan is educated he can stand on his own leg and he won’t feel guilty when he moves with other persons. If he is given proper education then naturally his economic background is increased and there is a chance for the improvement of his future generation. 1 am the only SSLC (high-school graduate) from my village colony.

Within government service an educated untouchable is limited in what he can do for his community, or even for individual members of his own community. As one man put it: I am governed by government rules, so what to do? I can only talk to MLAs (Members of the Legislative Assembly). They say—what I say is good, but because of party discipline they haven’t the courage to do anything. For everything else, members of one party are all one, but if it involves something for Harijans, then it is different. That is why Dr. Ambedkar fought for separate electorates. Ambedkar said that the Scheduled Caste man should be elected by his own people only, and not by the general public. Now, if a Scheduled Caste man wants to contest even for a reserved seat, if he is a militant man, fighting for his own community he can’t succeed, because he has to be elected by the general public. Men who come up have always to depend on caste Hindu men, so they can’t be too bold. At one point, I suggested that if you want to change things on the lower level, then at least one year in five, the panchayat president should be a Harijan, and one year in five the chairman of the panchayat union should be a Harijan. Even if he is a poor man, or even if he is a dummy, he can’t do that much harm in one year, but knowing that he has the right to such power can make a difference in how he behaves, and also in how others think about him.  But, even then, there are limitations. In one region, at one time, I was in a position to make four panchayat unions, over which I had jurisdiction, hold Harijan days once a month. Officially, it was there in the law that it should be held regularly, but most people just fill in that it was done. But, when I was in that position, I decided that I would do what was allowed under the law for my own people.

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And I sent word that once a month, I would hold a Harijan day in such and such a place and that on this occasion, I would distribute land to needy Harijans, government land that was not being cultivated. And I organized several camps. Then, one time, I decided to have a big meeting, and I asked several MLAs to come, and many people came. And we had a celebration. Then I spoke. I said: “Suppose someone from India is in the UN, and he talks up about the way people are treated in South Africa, or racial treatment in the United States, where they treat their black people very badly. And suppose the man next to him turns and asks: ‘And how do you treat your Harijan brothers?’ What could he say? Should we not put an end to all this?” I was surrounded by village officers, panchayat presidents, and all sorts of people. And I got a good response. But, after I spoke and the crowd dispersed, one Scheduled Caste MLA rushed up to me and he said to me: “You should not have spoken like that. It might have made the village Harijans feel good to hear you, but you should have thought of what will happen to them. When they get back to their villages, the various village officers will only take it out on our brothers. It is good to speak up, but as long as they have the power in the village, it will not do much good.” I had asked the crowd: “Are we not ashamed to fight for someone else, should we not eliminate untouchability here in India?” But he maintained that when these people get back to their village, they will only be laughed at and made to feel worse. So, I learned a lesson and after that I tried to do what I could, but didn’t simply speak up boldly like that.  Very often, it is assumed by caste Hindus that any Harijan government officer must be stupid, that he would not have got his job if there were not reserved posts. This is not to argue against the reservation of positions, because it is quite clear that deserving Harijans in many instances would not have got their jobs unless there had been reserved posts. A former high officer in the Directorate of Harijan Welfare in Madras, himself a Harijan, has explained to me at great length how hard it is to get deserving Harijan students into reserved seats in colleges, even though they might have excellent marks. Although the reserved seats are made available by law, he has explained that there are serious faults in the enforcement mechanism, so that he often had to apply considerable pressure to get colleges to honor their commitments to accept Harijans, and even then they did not accept as many eligible ones as they were required to by law.

This officer also pointed out several other interesting and related facts. One, which is most significant, is that the reservation of seats at the PUC level (first year of college) does not state that 16 percent of the Harijan students be admitted to the science section, 16 percent to the humanities, and 16 percent to the social sciences. As a result it is extremely difficult to get Harijan students into the science line. Yet, without getting into the science line in the PUC, the student will not be eligible for admission to the agricultural college, medical school, dental school, engineering school, and so on. Thus, being stopped at the PUC level often means that there are not enough candidates applying later on for the professional schools.

On Being an Untouchable in India

The usual excuse given for not putting more Harijans into the science line is that their marks are not high enough. But this is often self-defeating. One of the purposes of reserved seats is to allow students with lower marks to enter a given course. In many instances, the reason for the poorer marks may be related to poor instruction at the high-school level, since many of the Harijan students come from corporation or public high schools, whereas many of the caste Hindu students come from private high schools that provide better teaching in smaller classes. There are other problems later on, when it comes to recruitment. As one officer explained to me: There is this process of cyclic rotation. So, if an organization has 100 jobs, then when one becomes vacant, it might be reserved for a Harijan, then the next five positions must be filled by others, before it is again the turn to fill by a Harijan. So, if it is 1 in 6 (he said the ratio differed from place to place) and there are 100 jobs, and it takes time for jobs to become vacant, then it means it will take at least 100 years before you get 16 percent of the jobs held by Harijans. If they are really sincere about filling up 16 percent of the seats by Harijans, then they should declare a moratorium and for 3 years, hire only Harijans. Even if the man they hire is a dummy, it will not matter. Because if the remaining 84 percent is really intelligent and efficient, 16 percent inefficient will not make that much difference. I am not arguing that the 16 percent would be inefficient, but simply to answer their argument that all Harijans are inefficient. I think 84 percent efficiency is way beyond what any department has nowadays anyhow.

It was also explained that at times when there is massive hiring, there often are not enough candidates because of the problems in the colleges. Thus, one highly placed Harijan officer in the Agriculture Department explained to me in relation to an incident when his department was hiring a large number of young recent graduates: I could have hired Harijans up to the quota, but I wasn’t able to because there weren’t enough candidates. In the agriculture college, they reserve 18 percent of the seats for Harijans, but just like the caste Hindu students, out of say 18 admitted in a year, only 10 are there by the senior year. From all communities, so many either fail, or drop out for one reason or another. Actually, they should take the 18 percent from people below the average, and consider brilliant Harijan students as part of the general quota. That would increase the number of Harijans, but they do not do that. Anyhow, I was not able to hire as many Harijans as I wanted to. Now, that means that it will probably be 50 or 100 years before the Harijan quota is filled. It is not every day that we have so many openings.

If an educated Harijan has a government job, he cannot really become a rallying point or a leader for Harijan protest, because as a government servant he is

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subject to restraints on his participation in political or even quasi-political activities. This has often served to erect a barrier between the educated, governmentemployed Harijans and the rest of the community. Harijans rarely have much scope for entering business. With the rare exception of Jyoti Venkatachalam who, notably, started a most successful pickle business, one would have to search far and wide to find Harijan entrepreneurs. This is not surprising. First of all they have had, at least until very recently, no access to sources of finance or to the types of experience that provide training for would-be entrepreneurs. In a table on caste background of medium and small-scale entrepreneurs in Tamilnadu by Milton Singer (1972: 300), it is striking that none belongs to Scheduled Castes, though there are a few from the Naicker caste (the other large laboring caste in the Chingleput District). It is clear that an educated, middle-class untouchable can merge with the urban middle class in a number of ways. Yet this does definitely involve being divorced from his own community. Another quote from my Tamil assistant illustrates this: My father migrated to Madras after my birth and that of my two younger sisters. Since we could not get decent accommodation in a Hindu house, we stayed in a Muslim area as a tenant. Then, after some time we moved to a decent house where forward community people resided. But the owner of the house belonged to our community.  I was sent to a good school. I have been told by my father that our community was Adi-Dravida. A few of my own community people were also studying in the school. They were not given a seat in the front row because they were not clean. When I talked with them, some of my other classmates, the caste Hindus, used to discourage me, saying that they are Paraiyans. I asked them why, what is wrong if they are Paraiyans. (I had not realized that I was also Paraiyan.) They said, the Paraiyan will eat mattukari (beef) and they won’t have a bath daily. I had been given a front seat in our class, thinking I was a Christian.  On the same day I approached my father asking why the Paraiyans are unclean and eat beef. He was shocked and laughed at me for a while. Then he cleared the fact that I am also from Paraiyan community. I asked him, “If that is so why I am daily taking bath and not taking beef?” He replied: “My grandfather used to take beef but when he was staying in a hostel he stopped taking.” So, I am not taking it because they are not preparing it in our house. He said, “It is good to take bath daily.”  One day I got a call from the school office to fill in the school final record book. Then the clerk came to know that I am Adi-Dravida. He didn’t believe it and sent for my father. Later on I found out that he didn’t believe me because I am not residing in a cheri.

In the 1970s, it was clear that perhaps the most critical function of stigmatized identity lied in its power to prevent the formation of class consciousness, and as

On Being an Untouchable in India

a consequence the formation of such things as active agricultural labor unions that would function on the basis of class interest. The material from Tamilnadu shows a very close link between the manipulative behavior of powerful highercaste politicians and middle or well-to-do landowners, and the maintenance of maximal social isolation of different segments of the labor force. This also shows up in the correlation between the extent of labor union activity and the overriding of caste distinctions on the most intimate level in Kerala. Beteille (1971a) notes that it has not only been difficult for labor unions to isolate the pure wage laborers from sharecroppers and small owners, but having isolated the “exploited class” they have been bedeviled by the distinction within it between Harijans and caste Hindus. Beteille’s description of the eastern part of the old delta of Tanjore is also relevant to my main point since, as he shows, this is the only part of Tanjore (and possibly one of the few areas in the whole state of Tamilnadu) where the Harijans constituted the whole labor force, and therefore the distinction between caste and class was irrelevant. It is worth noting, however, that the members of higher castes in this area, all of whom were middle or large landholders, were forced to unite among themselves, overriding caste distinctions on many levels, in order to protect their common property interests. Such alliances also exist (at least potentially) in other areas, though as long as the laborers do not unite, they remain dormant.

CONCLUSIONS I have tried in this chapter to bring together a somewhat heterogeneous body of facts, all of which seem to me to bear on the question of the identity of Harijans, the bottom seventh of India’s population. It is clear that as long as the stigmatized aspect of their identity remains, a truly socialist state will be difficult to achieve. As Dr Ambedkar noted back in 1935: How can there be a revolution if the proletariat cannot present a united front? . . . the social order prevalent in India is a matter which a socialist must deal with . . . unless he does so he cannot achieve his revolution . . . if he does achieve it as a result of good fortune he will have to grapple with it if he wishes to realize his ideal. . . . He will be compelled to take account of caste after revolution if he does not take account of it before revolution. (1968: 36–37)

It is striking that in the years since this chapter was first written, especially from the mid-1970s on, there has been a noticeable increase in the number of atrocities committed against untouchables. Some have argued that the increase is only in the number brought to public attention, and certainly more are being written about in newspapers today in India than 20 years ago. Even allowing

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for this, it is clear that there still has been a definite increase in the number and scope of actual atrocities as well. This has been especially striking in states such as Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, and Gujarat, but there have also been some incidents reported in southeastern India (Andhra Pradesh and Tamilnadu). In part, the reason for the increase has been the fact that there have been legislations passed by various governments (central and state) at different times over the past 6–7 years that the Harijans eventually came to know about. Demands for justice to which they considered themselves entitled have had the function of focusing the resentment and hatred on the local landlords, who often had the ear of the local police even though higher officials might not have concurred. In the majority of the incidents that I have read of in the papers, the perpetrators of the atrocities got off either with no punishment, or else fairly leniently (compared with the treatment expected for the crimes in question). Nonetheless, there has been a growing outcry on the part of many people that something must be done. Furthermore, there is increased awareness, on the part of many people, of the close connection between caste and class in the rural areas, at least at the bottom of the hierarchy. It now seems fairly self-evident that any kind of meaningful transformation of the Indian social system cannot occur unless society comes to terms with caste, and with the close connections between caste and class. It is quite striking to me that the two states in India where there have not been consistent atrocities reported on Harijans have been Kerala and West Bengal, where class ideology is more overt, and where the better-off would have reason to fear protests by non-Harijans of their own social class if Harijans were singled out for anything. This is not to say that the conditions of life for Harijans in Kerala are particularly pleasant. By far the vast majority live under conditions of extreme poverty, and are personally conscious of their caste position. But the basis for their plight today is that the vast majority in rural areas are agricultural laborers and in urban areas common coolies, and not their caste per se. Statistically, they may appear to be materially worse off than other agricultural laborers, but that is mostly a heritage of the past. Most of the Harijans interviewed in Kerala in 1975–76, and again in the summer of 1977, clearly saw their misery as part of their class position, and as shared with non-Harijans in the same situation. This growth of class consciousness is probably the result of many years of hard grassroots work by the Communist party starting in the early 1940s, and enhanced in recent years by the massive increase in literacy among the agricultural laborers in Kerala. What the future will bring is hard to predict, but at the moment, the main focus of the movement for change is in the north Indian Hindi-speaking belt. The fate of the untouchables there will largely influence the fate of those in other regions.

On Being an Untouchable in India

This chapter provides a direct and clear picture of untouchable identity, which is at variance with traditional myths. The symbolic status of pollution has rated highly in anthropological discourse, and it is clear that there continues to be such a focus, both among observers and among many segments of the Indian upper castes. The question remains “why?” It would be beyond the scope of this paper to present a full analysis of the scholarly establishment in the United States and elsewhere, but the reasons appear to be rooted in part in elite attitudes about those at the bottom of the socioeconomic hierarchy, the same kind of elite attitudes that, in the United States, bred the “Culture of Poverty” concept and related ideology. It would not be very difficult to find situations in which the very same informants who spoke to me so freely about their views of the system would oblige someone who appeared to have power by presenting the official view of the system. All of them knew it well, and had learned what to say in the same way that inferiors the world over learn the official line. However, there is no question that there are serious barriers between Harijans and others. I have noted elsewhere that while I was working on an article about Harijans, a Brahman friend asked my help in meeting some Harijans. As he put it: “One needs connections to meet these people.” It is clear that one not only needs connections, but also needs to convince them that one is on their side completely. Unless that is done, they are not going to risk saying what they really feel. It is striking to what extent even leftist social scientists, both Indian and foreign, have accepted the standard views of caste. They may criticize it and claim that it must be given up, but it is accepted by all. It is my impression that this is, at least in part, related to Marx’s own writing on India. Marx never had the opportunity to visit India, and thus his views of the system were of necessity based on what he read. And there was nothing for him to read that challenged the system. By his time there were social reformers, but none of them was questioning the fact that the caste system and pollution regulations were based on critical symbolic factors, or that the lowly accepted their position as being based on their previous misdeeds in another life. The reformers wanted to remove the disabilities of the poor and the untouchables, but never questioned the foundations of the system. They certainly never provided a milieu in which village untouchables could openly question the status quo. As a result, many distortions crept into Marx’s writings, which have been accepted until today by many orthodox leftists (who, of course, come from elite groups). What people so often fail to understand is the extent to which power relations dominate life in Indian villages. Fear of oppression and of the use of brute force has dominated people’s minds and hearts much more than appears in traditional pictures of Indian village life. As noted above, even today many of the perpetrators of violence against Harijans rarely are punished, and, in fact,

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they often include the local police. If this is true now, one can easily imagine the situation of untouchables in the past, in a village dominated by one or two wealthy landlord families. Even where the landlord may appear cordial and sympathetic, village Harijans know how easily friendliness has turned to hate and oppression elsewhere, and carefully control their behavior. Thus, one could say that an additional reason why some social scientists continue to advance the myth of caste is that they so strongly expect to find what others have found, and do not allow for the possibility that their informants may have more than one level of awareness of power relations. This is, of course, not a total explanation, and I hope to be able to explore this question in greater detail in work now in preparation. (The 10–15 percent of educated well-to-do Indians [maybe 100 to 150 million people] does not appear to be worrying about such a catastrophe. There is a growing tendency to “blame the victims” for their situation. What will happen is anyone’s guess. A great deal depends on things that could happen on the planet as a whole. What will global warming do to India? And especially what will it do for the Dalits at the bottom of the social network chains?)

NOTES 1.

2.

3.

The original work in Tamilnadu was supported by an NSF postdoctoral fellowship in 1962–1964. Subsequently, in 1967, while in India on a grant to Columbia from the NIMH, further work was done on the complex relationship between agriculture and social structure in Tamilnadu. The current comparative research, which focuses on problems of social structure and development, has been conducted as part of a joint Columbia University-Delhi School of Planning and Architecture project supported by an NSF grant to Columbia University. This chapter is based on summer of 1972. It is a revised version of an article that originally appeared in the Research Abstracts Quarterly of the Indian Council of Social Science Research, Vol. 3 (2 and 3), and is printed with their permission. It is difficult to decide which term to use. Harijan is often preferred by villagers; untouchable or Scheduled Caste by the educated. In order to differentiate some of the major groups, it is also sometimes useful to use specific caste names (Paraiyan, Chamar, etc.). I have taken the liberty in this chapter of using sometimes one, sometimes the other, because it seems to me truer to real-life usage, and makes reading less repetitious. I hope that no one will be offended by my usage. I have not mentioned any of the small untouchable groups in Kerala or Madras by name, since they are not likely to be recognized by readers unfamiliar with the local scene. In 1963, when I started working for the first time in Tamilnadu (after having worked in Kerala in 1958–1960 and in 1962), the Harijans in the first village I worked in, Manjapalayalam, went out of their way to help me with my work. At that time, I was doing a collection for the Museum of Natural History in New York in addition to

On Being an Untouchable in India

4.

my main work, and they offered me all possible help with this also. They made me feel always welcome in the colony, especially after a long or trying day. It was the one place I could, in some way, relax and feel at home, and this helped to transform my time there into a deeply satisfying personal experience. When I left promised to help find a way for some of the Harijan girls to go on with their studies and, largely through the help of friends in Madras managed to secure scholarships for four of the girls. The oldest of these girls has now finished high school, and is studying to be a secretary. Because they knew the Harijans were my close friends, people in the village came to identify me with them, and when I returned to live in the village in 1967, there was a considerable amount of antagonism toward me, especially on the part of some of the wealthier Naickers. Perhaps this helped me to become more acutely aware of the position of Harijans and the quality of their life. Though I have since worked in two other Tamil villages, and have had student assistants working in many others, it was this initial experience that started me looking at problems of Indian society from the bottom up. The term Scheduled Castes has been called a bit of legal jargon developed by the British, for it was the British who drew up the list of castes so designated. The list obviously includes the main large untouchable castes of India: caste clusters such as the Paraiyans, Chamars, Mahars, etc. However, included in the category of Scheduled Castes are others that (at least according to some scholars) should not be classified with the untouchables. The Rajbhansis of Bengal constitute such a case. In any case, I have used data for Scheduled Castes, when referring to published census reports, because that is what is available. (For a good discussion, see Dushkin 1972.)

REFERENCES Aiyappan. A. 1963. Social revolution in a Kerala village: A study in culture change. New York: Asia Publishing House. Alexander, K.C. 1968. Changing status of Pulaya Harijans of Kerala. Economic and Political Weekly, Special No.: 1071–75. Ambedkar, B.R. 1935/1968. Annihilation of caste. Jullundur City (Punjab): Bheem Patrika Publications. ———. 1948. The untouchables. New Delhi: Amrit Book Company. Berreman, Gerald. 1960. Caste in India and the United States. American Journal of Sociology 66: 120–27. ———. 1967a. Stratification, pluralism and interaction: A comparative analysis of caste. In Caste and race: Comparative approaches, eds A. de Reuck and J. Knight, 45–73. Boston: Little, Brown. ———. 1967b. Caste as social process. Southwestern Journal of Anthropology 23: 351–370. ———. 1971. Self, situation and escape from stigmatized ethic identity. Paper presented at 70th Meeting of the American Anthropological Association. ———. 1972a. Race, caste and other invidious distinctions in social stratification. Race. Special Issue: Race and Stratification 13 (W. G. Runciman, ed.).

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Berreman, Gerald. 1972b. A Brahmanical view of caste: Louis Dumont’s Homo Hierarchicus. Contributions to Indian Sociology V: 16–23. Beteille, A. l965a. The future of the backward classes: The competing demands of status and power. Perspectives: Supplement to the Indian Journal of Public Administration: 1–39. ———. 1965b. Caste, class and power: Changing patterns of stratification in a Tanjore village. Berkeley: University of California Press. ———. (ed.) 1969. Social inequality, selected readings. Harmondswôrth: Penguin. ———. 1970. Inequality in practice and principle. Mimeo. University of Delhi. ———. 1971a. Agrarian relations in Tanjore district, South India. Manuscript. University of Delhi. ———. 1971b. Class structure in an agrarian society: The case of Jotadars. Mimeo. University of Delhi. Beteille, A., and M.N. Srinivas. 1969. The Harijans of India. In Castes old and new, ed. A. Beteille. New York: Asia Publishing House. Chandrasekhar, S. 1972. Personal perspectives on untouchability. In The untouchables in contemporary India, ed. J.M. Mahar, i–xxviii. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. Chatterjee, B.B. 1971. Impact of social legislation on social change. Calcutta: The Minerva Associates. Dandekar, V.M. and N. Rath. 1971. Poverty in India. Economic and Political Weekly VI: 25–48. Dubey, S.N. and V. Mathur. 1972. Welfare programmes for scheduled castes: Context and administration. Economic and Political Weekly VII: 165–76. Dumont, L. 1970. Homo Hierarchicus. London: Widenfeld and Nicolson. Dupuis, 1960. Madraset le nord du Coromandel. Paris: Librairied’Ameriqueetd’Orient, A. Maisonneuve. Dushkin, L. 1972. Scheduled caste politics. In The untouchables in contemporary India, ed. J.M. Mahar, 227–317. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. Fitzpatrick, J. 1971. Puerto Rican Americans. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall. Government of India. 1932. Census of India, 1931: Depressed Classes, Vol. XIV. New Delhi: Government Press. Habib, Irfan. 1963. The agrarian system of Mughal India (1556–1707). New York: Asia Publishing House. Isaacs, H.R. 1965. India’s ex-untouchables. New York: John Day. Krishnan, T.N. 1972. Taxation of property and net wealth in India. Economic and Political Weekly VII: 21. Kumar, Dharma. 1965. Land and caste in South India. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mahar, J.M. 1972. The untouchables in contemporary India. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. Mencher, Joan P. 1966. Kerala and Madras: A comparative study of ecology and social structure. Ethnology 5: 135–71. ———. 1970a. A Tamil village: Changing socioeconomic structure in Madras State. In Aspects of continuity and change in India, ed. K. lswaran, 197–218. New York: Columbia University Press. .

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Mencher, Joan P. 1970b. Change agents and villagers: An analysis of their relationship and the role of class values. Economic and Political Weekly of Bombay V: 1187–97. ———. 1972. Continuity and change in an ex-untouchable community of South India. In The untouchables in contemporary India, ed. J.M. Mahar, 37–56. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. ———. 1974. The caste system upside down: Or the not-so-mysterious east. Current Anthropology 15(4): 469–94. ———. 1975. Agricultural labour movements in their socio-political and ecological context: Tamil Nadu and Kerala. In Culture and society: A festschrift for Dr. Aiyappan, ed. B.S. Nair, 240–66. New Delhi: Thomas Press. ———. 1978. Agriculture and social structure in Tamil Nadu: Past origins, present transformations, and future prospects. Durham: Carolina Academic Press. Mencher, J. and K. Raman Unni. 1973. Anthropological research in Kerala: Past achievements, and future needs. Indian Council of Social Science Abstracts Quarterly 2(3): 143–68. Moore, B., Jr. 1966. Social origins of dictatorship and democracy. Boston: Beacon Press. Saberwal, S. 1972. The reserved constituency: Candidates and consequences. Economic and Political Weekly VII: 71–80. Shivaraman, M. 1972. Thanjavur, rumblings of class struggle in Tamil Nadu. South Asia in Turmoil. Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars 4(1), Winter. Singer, M. 1972. When a great tradition modernizes. New York: Pracger. Sonachalam, K.S. 1970. Land reforms in Tamil Nadu. New Delhi: Oxford and IBH. Southworth, F.C. 1974. Linguistic masks for power: Some relationships between semantic and social change. Anthropological Linguistics 16: 177–91. Srinivas, M.N. 1962. Caste in modern India and other essays. New York: Asia Publishing House. ———. 1966. Social change in modern India. Berkeley: University of California Press. Suresh, Chandra. 1972. Harijans need assistance, not pity. Times of India, New Delhi. Unni, K.R. 1959. Caste in South Malabar. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Baroda. Varghese, T.C. 1970. Agrarian change and economic consequences: Land tenures in Kerala, 1850–1960. Bombay: Allied Publishers.

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Chapter 6

Conversion of Upper Castes into Lower Castes: A Process of Asprashyeekaran* Shyamlal

All studies on social mobility are confined to upward mobility available to underprivileged groups, most particularly the lower castes. During the fifties, sixties, and seventies of the twentieth century, a number of sociologists,1 viz., M.N. Srinivas, Bernard S. Cohn, F.G. Bailey, S.L. Kalia, P.M. Mahar, D. Chanana, Ramratan, H.A. Gould, A.P. Barnabas, S. Patwardhan, Shyamlal and a few others had reported, through their research studies, the change in the social structure and mobility, pattern of the scheduled castes/tribes in the various regions of India. Asprashyeekaran or downward mobility as it exists among the Hindus and non-Hindus has not been studied by social scientists in general and sociologists and social anthropologists in particular. Obviously no sociological information is available on different aspects of the downward mobility among the Hindu castes, particularly among the higher castes.

PROCESS OF ASPRASHYEEKARAN An upper-caste person who converts himself to an untouchable caste and changes his identity had to be formally incorporated and admitted into that new untouchable caste. Normally, under the traditional setup the untouchables place a great premium on the purity of blood and excommunicate an untouchable having matrimonial relations with persons of other castes. But under extraordinary circumstances, it appears that they have their own cultural * Excerpted and adapted from the book From Higher Castes to Lower Castes: The Process of Asprashyeekaran and the Myth of Sanskrtization, 1997, Jaipur, Rawat Publications.

Conversion of Upper Castes into Lower Castes

devices and procedures of incorporating or converting non-members to their castes. The process adopted by the Chamars, the Bhalahis, the Mahars, and the Bairwas, while converting upper caste persons to their own castes, is discussed below.

Conversion to the Chamar Caste Ramesh Chandra Gunarthi describes succinctly how outsiders were admitted to Chamar caste in Rajasthan about 40 years ago. In the traditional set up, a ceremony was performed to seal admission of the outsiders to the Chamar caste. The high-caste person who intended to become Chamar had to lie down under a cot in the presence of the caste gathering. The five Panch (members of the caste panchayat) of the Chamar caste sat on the cot and took bath one by one. At the end of this ceremony, the newcomer became the conferred member of the Chamar caste.2

Conversion to the Balahi Caste Like Chamars and Bhangis, new accretion from higher castes was always welcome to the Balahi caste. R.V. Russell and Hiralal, Superintendents of Ethnography, Central Provinces of India, in 1916, have described in detail how a man who wanted to become a Balahi had to undergo certain rites of admission. They describe the process as follows: The head and face of the neophyte are shaved clean, and he is made to lie on the ground under a string-cot; a number of the Balahi sit on this and wash themselves, letting the water drip from their bodies on to the man below until he is well-drenched. The converted man then gives a feast to the caste-fellows, and is considered to have become a Balahi (Russell and Hiralal 1916). Like Russell and Hiralal, Stephen Fuchs has also referred to the occurrence of conversion of high-caste people into Balahi caste in Madhya Pradesh and has mentioned the reasons. Elaborating the factors, Fuchs wrote: The usual applicants are persons who have lost all their relatives and caste fellows in a village and consequently have associated with the Balahis; or they have been expelled from their own caste and, for certain reasons, are unable to gain readmission. Instead of remaining outcastes forever they prefer to join the Balahi community. Others may have fallen in love with a Balahi woman, or a girl or woman of a higher caste may have been seduced by a Balahi. In the latter case the woman is never taken back by her community and is therefore obliged to join the Balahis. Such cases are relatively frequent. (Fuchs 1966)

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He further remarked: Almost in every village there are persons who have joined the Balahi caste for one or the other reason. In a village near Khandwa, for instance, a young Rajput widow had a love affair with her Balahi servant. Not able to remarry in her own caste, she preferred to give up her property and caste to marry her Balahi lover. The pair was forced by the enraged relatives of the woman to leave the village and to settle at some other place.

Conversion to the Mahar Caste Some idea of conversion and admission of higher-caste persons to the Mahars, with consequent change of identity, may also be obtained from the following description given by Russell and Hiralal in their book The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India: When an outsider is to be received into the community all the hair on his face is shaved, being wetted with the urine of a boy belonging to the group to which he seeks admission.3

Conversion to Bairwa Caste The Bairwas of Rajasthan also adopted a procedure basically similar to that of the Bhangis while assimilating upper-caste persons. The Bairwas have evolved a separate centralized sociopolitical organization of their own, called “Chorasi Panchayat” (caste meeting body) which deals with caste conversion, change of identity and admission of non-Bairwas into the Bairwa caste fold. The Sarpanch of the organization conducts the proceedings. At least one person from each of the 84 villages in which Bairwas are found in this region is expected to attend the meeting and the non-Bairwa who intends to become a Bairwa has to throw a feast to the people.4 The above examples cite instances of a process that may have been operating in India for a long time.

MOTIVATING FACTORS IN ASPRASHYEEKARAN The basic question in the functioning of the caste system in India is: Was there any possibility of changing from higher to lower caste in olden times?

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Was any such case ever reported in ancient, medieval, or British periods? Has any scholar cited any example of lowering the status of a higher caste? This author’s contention is that it had happened in the past and has been happening even today in the Hindu society. However, the object of this paper is not to present systematically evidence to support the view that there had been downward social mobility in every period of Indian history. I shall only cite a few instances of Asprashyeekaran of high castes in ancient and medieval India while paying greater attention to the period immediately before and after the establishment of the British rule. The Asprashyeekaran of high castes appears to be a complex problem. Racial invasions and Muslim rulers in different periods have left their imprint on the caste system. Hence, there is a need for a historical perspective for understanding the Asprashyeekaran of higher castes in India. S.V. Ketkar, analyzing the caste system and the social life of the people in India during the third century, found that a person could not go into a higher caste, but could move down from a high station. He could lose his caste status and could mingle with persons of lower castes (Ketkar 1908). He further says there are many castes who suffered in status “on account of their mixing with low castes or of neglect of sacred rites.”5 Ketlar’s statement points out that Asprashyeekaran is not just a recent phenomenon in India. On the contrary, it was present during all the ages of Indian history. In the following paragraphs, some important factors that led to downward mobility in Indian society have been discussed: What, then, are the causes of this downward mobility in Indian society? One important factor responsible for social degradation was outcasting. It affected individuals as well as groups. Breach of established social norms and usages was considered a social crime. Anyone who violated the approved societal norms was regarded guilty and forcibly declared an outcaste. Thus, not only the position of the outcaste persons was lowered but they were also prohibited from following their traditional occupations. Though only a small fraction of high-caste people was thus degraded, the degradation to lower caste often changed customs as well as the general culture. In his famous book, Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Abbe J.A. Dubois has also referred to the occurrence of social degradation of high castes and has pointed out how high castes were eventually merged into lower castes. Dubois states: “The Pariahs were most probably composed in the first instance of all the disreputable individuals of different classes of society, who, on account of various offenses, had forfeited their right to associate with respectable men. They formed a class apart.”6

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There has been conversion into not one untouchable caste but many untouchable castes in different regions. The early period of Rajasthan history, for instance, records instances of social degradation. The medieval period saw the fall of a section of a dominant caste of Rajputs in the Marwar State. Those Rajputs who were engaged in preparing arrows for Bhils and Meenas were outcasted and were called “Tirgars.”7 In course of time, Tirgars assumed a new lower-caste designation and the original caste name “Rajput” disappeared in practice. During his long stay in India since 1934, Fuchs was much interested in the untouchables and was able to meet many of them during his journey throughout India. He had placed on record what he observed in the form of customs and manners of the untouchables. Some idea of the social degradation and changes of identity and admission of higher castes into lower castes may be obtained from the following statement given by him in his book, At the Bottom of Indian Society: The Harijans and Other Low Castes about the leather-working caste of India. The leather-workers have always and everywhere freely admitted outsiders of higher castes into their ranks. Some came in small groups, like the Kalyans who were originally Bohras and Koris and Kols. He further remarks: Affiliations are suggested by such names as Kor-Chamars (weaver turned tanners), Chamar-Julahas (leather-workers tuned weavers), and Chamar-Koris. In Gorakhpur there are no Koris, only Kori-Chamars. The Karwals, a vagrant tribe are found also as a subcaste among the Chamars. The Darzis (tailors), the Banjaras, the Barhais (carpenters) and the Sonars (goldsmiths) each have a Chamar subcaste. The Kayasth-Mochis, who make sandals and harnesses, claim to be of Kayasth origin and state that the term “Mochi” refers merely to their present trade.8 Munshi Hardayal Singh also noted the social degradation of Inda Rajputs in Marwar State as early as 1891 (Singh 1891). In about 1406, Mandor, the then capital of Marwar was conquered by Jallalludeen Khilji from Padiyar Rajputs. The Muslim rulers harassed and tortured the Rajputs and some years later, the Inda Rajputs, another sect of Padiyar Rajputs, recaptured it from Khilji. Later on Mandor was given in dowry to Rao Chundajito whom they gave their daughters in marriage. This resulted in a lowering of their social position. Since then, some Padiyars merged with the lower castes. An example of this merger is a Lakitania Chamar, the son of Lakhaji Inda, who also merged voluntarily with Chamars. Another important factor that leads to downward mobility and social degradation in the Hindu society is the principle of ceremonial purity. As S.V. Ketkar pointed out in 1909: “A caste is . . . degraded by giving up . . . the traditional rules of purity surrounding dominant caste and by irregular conduct from their standard.”9

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With the development of new socioeconomic situations, social degradation also increased. We find that many Brahman castes in western India degraded themselves because of the use of meat and wine. Ketkar said In western India, some castes are degraded by the use of wine and meat and even by that of tobacco. Many Brahmin castes in certain localities have lost in status by using meat, which is used in those localities only by non-Brahmins. Many castes have been lowered in social scale by the customs of polygamy.10

Describing this trend of a downward social mobility process in Rajputana princely states, Ramesh Chandra Gunarthi mentions succinctly that many twice-born castes had fallen from high station on account of their neglect of sacred rites and rituals and deeds and merged among the Chamars. They also adopted the traditional occupation of this caste. Because of this age-old process, gotras of different higher castes are also found among the Chamars.11 The Bhakti cults of medieval India are also significant in this context. During the Bhakti movement, the idea of inequality based on caste was challenged. A few sects founded by lower-caste saints recruited followers from several higher castes in their early evangelical phase. Referring to the influence of Lalgir—one of the medieval saints of Bikaner State—on high-caste Hindus, M.A. Sherring wrote in 1881: “Nearly fifty years ago a Chamar, named, Lalgir founded a religious sect . . . to which high officials, Rajpoots and others . . . attached themselves.”12 Louis Dumont has also held that people converting to Bhakti sects in the past centuries have formed new castes. In such a movement, the direction of change will be toward a social degradation model rather than the Sanskritization model. The political system of pre-British India witnessed downward mobility for some strategically situated individuals and groups. I shall now turn briefly to a secondary source of downward mobility in that system—the king or other acknowledged political head of the region. The king had the power to promote and demote castes inhabiting his kingdom. For instance, Ballal Sen, the king of Bengal, in the twelfth century, enjoyed the power of elevating the rank of castes in his kingdom and degrading any one from his caste. In Vallabh Charita, it has been pointed out that Ballal Sen demoted the Sonar Banias to the status of an unclean caste.13 The power to promote or demote caste stemmed from the fact that a preBritish Indian king, Hindu or Muslim, stood at the apex of the caste system. The ranking of castes within the kingdom had the king’s consent and an individual, who had been turned out of the caste by his caste council for an offence, had always the right of appeal to the king and the latter had the power to examine

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the evidence and confirm or alter the verdict. Lt. Col. J. Manners Smith, resident of Nepal has also drawn attention to the same power enjoyed by the prime minister of Nepal. According to him, all questions involving social degradation or excommunication are to be decided by the courts and in all these the prime minister is the last court of appeal. A person of a higher class eating or having sexual intercourse with a member of the depressed classes shall lose caste and be incorporated with lower caste. A woman of higher position in social order having sexual intercourse with a man lower down in the list shall be degraded to the caste of the male.14 Degradation to a low caste is one of the five severe punishments that can be imposed. In the year 1820, W. Hamilton mentioned that a century ago members of the best families were degraded to a low caste by which they lost liberty and castes.15 Similar incidents have been reported by some other writers also from other parts of India, during the last few centuries or so. In 1883 S.C. Bose traced the demotion of a Brahman of Santipur belonging to eighteenth-century Nadia, who had sexual relation with a girl of low caste. They appealed to the Raja and afterwards to the Nawab, for restoration of caste, but in vain.16 Another important aspect of degradation is what is loosely called the “economic dimension.” More precisely, this refers to the “occupational demand” in trade or government or social organization. The occupation determines the social position of individuals and groups. G.W. Briggs noted this almost seventy years ago. He wrote: The Jatiya, for example, is of a higher physical type than some other sub-castes and of lighter complexion. The explanation in this case may be that some occupational demand drew Jats into this lower form of work, or more likely that pressure or penalty resulted in their degradation.17

A great deal of downward mobility and social degradation occurred because of illicit relations of Chamar women with persons of high castes. As a result of his historical research, Briggs has described the case of Jats, who were degraded in Uttar Pradesh because of this reason, in the sixteenth century. Jats’ degradation may be explained partly by the illicit relations of Chamar women with men of higher castes and partly by certain social and religious customs that prevailed extensively among them. Some Jatiyas claim to be the descendants of Jats. Many persons of this subcaste resemble these taller and fairer-complexioned neighbors.18 Subjugation of tribe after tribe has been a recurring phenomenon in India. These movements have occurred over wide areas in our country. Indian history

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illustrates this fact and we may picture the process of the rise and fall of tribes and classes under foreign and local waves of consequent invasions. Foreign invasions and local waves of conquest are significant in social degradation in another way. There is first of all the process of social degradation when a caste or section of a caste loses political power. It also thereby loses the traditional symbols of the higher status, namely, customs, rituals, and lifestyles of higher caste. In her study of a Tanjore village in Tamilnadu, Kathleen Gough reports the extinction of a royal family in 1855 and the subsequent downward mobility of its courtier families.19 In 1920, G.W. Briggs studied the Chamars in detail. Referring to Uttar Pradesh in the sixteenth century, Briggs reports that there were no Chamars in Gorakhpur district. The question arises: How did the Chamars emerge? Briggs suggests that some of the local groups of Chamars are of recent origin. There are good reasons for believing that this caste has received large recruitment from above (i.e., higher castes). We learn from the census of Marwar Report for 1891 that in Marwar, the erstwhile princely state, the Rajput Malis were comparatively large in number. The Rajputs bravely fought and defended their kingdom against the Muslim invaders. Eventually, the Muslim rulers defeated them. Because the Rajputs opposed the invaders with great heroism, valor, and ferocity, they were punished severely by the triumphant Muslims. In desperation, some of the Rajputs left their traditional caste and converted themselves voluntarily into the Mali caste to save themselves from Muslim atrocities. This process of conversion into Mali caste occurred gradually but it became intensified in the twelfth century when Prithviraj Chauhan—the last Hindu king of Delhi—bravely defended his kingdom but was defeated by Mohamad Ghauri—the Muslim invader. After the defeat of Chauhan, the Rajputs who were captured by the Muslim armies during the wars were forcibly converted to Mohammedanism. After they embraced the Islamic religion, they were called Ghauri Pathans. Some other Rajputs took shelter in other lower castes to conceal their Rajput status. In accepting the membership of different castes according to their convenience, the Rajputs saved their lives but lost their caste rank in social structure and assumed the occupation of the adopted castes. Many Rajputs merged with the Mali castes. The census officials have also traced the emergence and the development of Rajput Mali caste through the downfall of the Rajputs after the death of Prithiviraj Chauhan.20 At a meeting of the members of Rajput Malis held at Pushkar in Ajmer under the presidentship of one Mahadev, 22 reforms were unanimously passed for their caste in order to improve its status. These included a ban on the eating of meat, drinking of wine, killing of animals, and advocating widow remarriage.

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The Rajputs were not only converted into the Mali caste but were also converted into untouchable castes such as Chamars and Bhangis.21 Like Briggs, Ramesh Chandra Gunarthi also traces the origin of a new subChamar caste in Rajasthan in the fifteenth century. In Rajasthan, there was a thikana (fief) known as “Nimad.” Gunarthi comments that in 1412 (Vikram Samvant 1356) Maharana Ratan Singh attacked Nimad but was badly defeated. During the struggle, some of the soldiers were captured and were forced to weave cloth for the natives of Nimad. Weaving is the traditional occupation of a low caste known as Balai. Later on, they were called by the degraded name of “Nimad Balai.”22 Similar descriptions have been reported from other parts of India relating to the early period. H.P. Shastri cites an example from the history of Bengal. How, as a result of loss of political power, the Buddhists of Bengal were eventually demoted into low social status. According to Shastri: “The people of Bengal, who after the downfall of the Hindu rule did not accept either Brahmanism or Islam, but stuck to their old mode of worship, became the untouchables of today. History is not without such examples.”23 I shall briefly discuss the Chamars, Balais, Bhambis, and Meghwals of Rajasthan. In Rajasthan, from the early period, the traditional Chamars admitted outsiders into their fold. Gunarthi writes that for the Rajasthan region, the Chamars are grouped into two main categories—Adak and Sadak.24 The term “Adak” was used for the traditional Chamars in general, whereas the term “Sadak” was used particularly for those converted Chamars who were recruited in the Chamar castes from higher castes. This conversion is elaborated in Munshi Hardayal Singh’s description of how members of the Brahman, Rajput, Jat, and Charan castes in Rajasthan were lowered. Munshi Hardayal Singh says: In times past, when Marwar was troubled by foreign invaders, a large number of Rajputs, Jats and Charans joined the Bhambi caste and thus in course of time, there arose five subdivisions among the Bhambis which are as follows: (1) (2) (3) (4)

The Adu or unmixed Bhambis The Maru Bhambis comprising Rajputs The Bamnia Bhambis comprising Paliwal Brahmins The Jata Bhambis including Jats—1128 males and 1029 females have separately retained themselves under this head (5) The Charnia Bhambis including Charans25 It would thus be logical to say that in the case of Chamars, who seem to have been recruited in medieval times from several higher castes like Rajputs, Brahmins, Jats, and Charans, cultural differences exist between subcaste groups

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of Chamars in different parts of the country. In fact, the Chamars like Jata Bhambis, Bamnia Bhambis, and Charnia Bhambis in Rajasthan, do not intermarry between these subcastes. These groups are more conscious of maintaining their old traditions and customs. Not only this, there is also considerable diversity in dress habits between different Chamar groups. In 1891, when Hardayal Singh wrote about the Bhambi, Regar, Meghwal, and other castes of Marwar State, he observed: The first two divisions (the Adu or unmixed Bhambis and the Maru Bhambis) are very closely connected and intermarry, while the last two divisions only marry in their own communities respectively, the Bhambis are not allowed to wear gold and silver ornaments, but an exception is made in the case of head village Bhambi and his wife. There is striking peculiarity in the dress of men, but the Maru Bhambi women generally wear Ghagra or petticoat of country Chintz, while the Jata Bhamibs dress themselves like the Jat women and are distinguished from the latter only by the use of lac Churas instead of ivory ones. The women of the Charnia Bhambis wear dress of yellow colour like the Charan women.26

Similar incidents have been reported from some other parts of Rajputana princely states during the last eighty years or so. Munshi Govind Saran Sardar, superintendent, Census Operation, Jaipur State, in 1911, has mentioned that Meghwal admitted people of higher castes into their caste.27 Like Munshi Hardayal Singh and Munshi Govind Sarana Sardar, P. J. Mead and G. L. Macgregor, in-charge, Census Operation, Bombay Presidency, in 1911, have also drawn attention to the fact that Bhangis of Bombay are admixture of outcastes. Bhangis are found in all parts of the presidency. As a caste of scavengers and sweepers they are the dregs of Hindu society and contain an admixture of outcastes who have fallen to this level owing to offences against the social code of the higher castes. Being open to continual recruitment in this fashion, their customs are confused and uncertain.28 Among the Bhangis of Jodhpur, the beginning of the de-sanskritization process can be traced back to as early as 1880. Contact with the Jamadar, an officer of the Nagarpalika, who used to be a Muslim or high-caste Hindu in the pre-independence era led to close association between the Bhangis and the upper castes. The interaction of Muslims and Bhangis came initially through the Niwargar Muslims (weaver caste). Later, it gradually spread through the high-caste Hindu population, whom the Bhangis served under the jajaman-kamin relationship. The case of Asil Ali, a Muslim Niwargar of Ganglaw Talab, situated about 4 km from Ghantagbar, is particularly illustrative. Ali, posted at Ghantaghar, was serving as Jamadar in a Nagarpalika in Jodhpur. He was a rich and handsome

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married young man of about 32 years of age. An unmarried Bhangi woman named Sita used to sweep the Ghantaghar area under his supervision. Sita fell in love with Ali. The Muslim Niwargars and Bhangis, being two separate caste groups, marriage between them was not permitted. The former are a respected group in Jodhpur and the latter are regarded as untouchables. When the Bhangis came to know of the illicit relation between Ali and Sita, they seriously opposed it and threatened to kill Ali. Ali not only openly admitted the fact of his relationship with Sita but also defended his relationship with a lower-caste woman. Ali accepted Sita as his wife in the presence of the Bhangis and converted himself to a Bhangi of the Chanwaria gotra. He and his wife Sita started living in Lakharon-ka-Bass, a Bhangi bustee. Nobody in the Muslim community was agitated about this marriage between a higher-caste and a lower-caste individual, major reason being that Ali himself openly accepted the woman belonging to the Bhangi caste. Ali became the first reference individual for Bhangis in Jodhpur. Ali and Sita had one son and one daughter, none of whom are alive. At present, they have five grandsons. The incidence of conversion from upper-caste Hindus was greater than from Muslims and other untouchable castes. A number of Bhangis of Jodhpur whom the author met emphasized the fact that it was the higher-caste persons who, at several places and in greater numbers, had, for some reason or other, got converted to the Bhangi caste, though they accepted, in principle, that converts were also from Muslims. Though both the high- and low-caste Hindus considered themselves superior to the Bhangis under certain circumstances, they got converted to the Bhangi caste. In the course of the author’s fieldwork, not a single case was reported where the converted Bhangis wanted to revert to their original caste. In any case, they could not do so as the concerned community had first excommunicated and then refused them readmission into their communities. Now, we discuss the actual cases of de-Sanskritization, which were collected from Jodhpur, Jaipur, Chittorgarh, Banswara, Bhilwara, Jaore, Barmer, Bikaner, and Ajmer districts of Rajasthan. These cases were all well-known and were often quoted by Bhangis in that area. It may be noted here that, initially, some Bhangis felt shy or, in a few cases, were even alarmed when asked to narrate the tales of their change of caste identity, but later on, they yielded to the persistent requests of the author when they were assured that it would be used for academic purposes only. Information relating to such cases was supplemented by information collected from responsible persons or those with whom the Bhangis or the converts themselves had talks about the change of identity. Details of a few converted persons and recognized unions between high-caste men and Bhangi women in Jodhpur will illustrate the way conversion operates (names of persons are fictitious).

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Gyani was a young widow. After the death of her husband, she lived alone. She used to sweep the airmen quarters. After a few months, Gyani fell in love with Shankaranand, a resident of Uttar Pradesh. He was a young and unmarried man of 30 years, and belonged to the Brahman caste. They never lived openly as husband and wife, but their relationship was known to all. One night, when Shankaranand was sleeping with Gyani at her house, neighbors encircled the house and caught them. Shankaranand immediately confessed his crime. The matter was reported to the panchayat, which summoned a meeting the next day. Opinion in this matter was unanimous that, since Shankaranand had enjoyed the favors of Gyani for a long period, he had no right to leave her alone. Consequently, Shankaranand accepted Gyani as his wife and converted himself to a Bhangi of the Barshah gotra. The second case of such a marriage in Jodhpur is between a Muslim Sipahi and a Bhangi woman. After prolonged illness, Ramkishen died leaving behind his widow, Laxmi, and three young sons. During her husband’s illness, Laxmi used to hire a taxi, whose driver was an unmarried Muslim Sipahi by caste. They came close to each other and eventually fell in love. Salman Sipahi not only admitted the fact of his relationship with a Bhangi woman but also defended his relations with her. When the Bhangis of Jodhpur came to know about it, they opposed it vehemently. Ultimately, Salman accepted Laxmi as his wife and got himself converted to a Bhangi of Kalyani gotra. The third case of Bhangiization is from the Bhambhi and Meghwal castes— the “elevated” untouchables in Jodhpur. During the great famine of Vikram Samvat 1956 some low-caste persons from the rural areas converted themselves voluntarily to the Bhangi caste to save their lives. Bhola Ram and Dhula Ram were Bhambi and Meghwal respectively. Both these castes were almost equal socially. Bhola and Dhula Ram renounced their castes and converted themselves to Bhangi Gund and Lakhan gotras respectively, and later on they married Bhangi women in Jodhpur. At present, their family members live in Bhangi bustees (slums). Yet another case is that of Alok Nath of Jodhpur, who was reportedly a Brahman of Vyas gotra. He was the first Brahman to be converted to the Bhangi fold. He was influenced by the Arya Samaj. Because of his involvement with the Bhangi reform activities, Alok Nath was expelled by his family and ex- communicated. It then became a major problem for him to survive. At this juncture, the Bhangis who had already accepted him as one of their own came to his rescue. They offered one of their daughters in marriage to Alok Nath. In due course he got himself converted to the Bhangi fold and was admitted therein. After conversion, he was allocated the Shandar gotra. The most significant thing, which may be mentioned here, is that the same person later on became the chief preceptor of a sect, which today has hundreds of Bhangi disciples.

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Cases of conversion and change of caste identity were reported from Banswara district also, which is a predominately tribal area. Around the time of the famine in 1956, a Bhil couple came to the Bhangi bustee of Banswara from a neighboring village. At a time when the tribals were nearly perishing, the Bhil boy got protection, was brought up by the Bhangis, and was subsequently admitted to the Bhangi fold. Later on, he was married to Neethi, a sweeper woman of Kalingara, Banswara. The case of conversion and change of caste identity so far discussed are primary data; cases from secondary sources were also equally complete in details. Roopa, from village Godwal in Jalore district who was converted to the Bhangi community, was of Rajput ancestry. Her father was a landlord and Karma, a Bhangi of the same village, used to serve their family. Karma developed a relationship with Roopa, but had a problem. Another landlord of Godwal who was Rajput by caste, used to harass the untouchables of the village. Karma, an untouchable Bhangi, afraid of the landlord, ran away along with Roopa to Jodhpur for protection. Roopa and Karma got married in Jodhpur and, in 1980, Roopa was converted to the Bhangi fold, and allocated the Bagala gotra. In another instance, Charan Dass, a Bhangi of Panwar gotra, who was living in a community consisting of families of different castes, developed an illicit relationship with a married Nai woman—Deepa. The lovers ran away to Jaipur, but Deepa’s husband Laxman Nai lodged an FIR against Charan Dass. Deepa and Charan Dass were arrested and the Nai community excommunicated Deepa, who, in course of time, got herself formally converted to the Bhangi community and changed her identity accordingly.

BHANGI CONVERTS IN GOVERNMENT JOBS In Nagarpalikas of Rajasthan There is evidence of high-caste appointments into menial positions in society. It appears that in early 1952, a nagarpalika in Jodhpur appointed a high-caste Hindu as scavenger. From then on, eight more persons were added to the official roll. These high caste Bhangis swept and cleaned the public streets and there was no objection or resistance from other castes to their indulging in this sort of work. In Nagaur also, a few high-caste Hindus got appointed as scavengers in early 1987. However, here the Bhangis lodged a protest that these high-caste Bhangis were not doing the scavenging work for which they were appointed. The complaint fell on deaf ears.

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In Northern Railway Workshop, Jodhpur In 1989, the Northern Railway Workshop, Jodhpur, employed formally, for the first time, six high-caste Hindus, tribals, and Muslims as sweepers. Over the past four decades or so, the demand for Bhangi jobs appears to have increased slightly with the Hindus and non-Hindus of Jodhpur. All high-caste converted Bhangis sit with the other Bhangis and often share bidis and tea, as well as eat cooked food. They also show deference where it is due. Likewise, the Bhangis treat the high-caste converts as they treat the other Bhangis. The main factor that has helped in integrating and bringing the high-caste Bhangis with other Bhangis is the fact that the upper-caste Bhangis are formally employed as Bhangis. The high-caste Bhangis do the scavenging, sweeping and dealing of streets, cleaning of drains and gutters of workshops, and disposing of dumps. All these are low-status jobs which take the high-caste persons to the level of the lowest, the Bhangi caste. In the past, the high-caste Hindus and non-Hindus had preserved their caste-based occupations. Now, in the changing circumstances of economic deprivation, they are being compelled to undertake menial jobs. For instance, a Goswami Bhangi informant told: These days, it is very difficult to get a government job very easily. I am economically very poor. How long I will remain out of job. In order to acquire the job I have even readily accepted the scavenging job. I am doing this job with hope that very soon I will get a promotion.

A Muslim convert to the Bhangi caste explained: Before accepting the scavenging job, I was serving in a private concern in Jodhpur as a temporary employee. When applications were called for my father, who serves in the Northern Railway Workshop, urged me to submit my forms too. When I got selected, I joined with great hesitation and shame. Now, I am doing this work without much regret.

Motivating Factors in Bhangiization There are some important factors responsible for the de-Sanskritization and change of identity from the high castes to the Bhangi caste. The high castes considered their communities to be very sacred. They believed in the purity of blood. Love affairs, entanglements, or marriages with untouchables were considered to be heinous crimes, but whenever a high-caste boy or girl had an affair with a Bhangi she/he was both turned out from the family and ex-communicated from

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the community, such excommunicated persons were later incorporated into the Bhangi community. The Vyas Brahmans traditionally considered themselves a very pure and clean community and retained a great amount of orthodoxy and rigidity in their caste rules. They strictly adhered to commensal rules and if there was a case of one of their members taking food with a Bhangi or even mixing with them, the community would excommunicate the person concerned, who would, in course of time, be absorbed in the Bhangi fold. At the persuasion of the Arya Samaj of Jodhpur, a young Vyas boy, Shyam, started social reform activities among the Bhangis. Consequently, he started taking food at the hands of the Bhangis which made him lose his caste. The third factor responsible for deSanskritization was the moral support and protection given to starving people and orphans by the Bhangis. This seems to be particularly true of castes such as the Keers and tribes such as the Bhils. For instance, when the parents of Neeraj Keer died and he became an orphan, the Bhangis fed and took care of him. A potent source of de-Sanskritization in British India was the preponderance of famines. The famines were not limited to any particular part of Rajputana but spread everywhere. They constituted an important, though not the only, spur to de-Sanskritization. During the famine of Vikram Samvat 1956, the rural population suffered terrible privations and vast multitudes perished. Whole families and dhanis were wiped out. In order to save their lives, a few individuals from rural areas had to move to Jodhpur town. Their extreme poverty and hunger took them to Bhangi colonies, where they were given food and succor. As time went by, these people were converted to Bhangis. Another factor, which seems to have been responsible for de-Sanskritization is that higher and technical education conferred a high official status on a few selected Bhangis. In course of the author’s fieldwork among the Bhangis, this fact was stated by a noted Bhangi teacher and social worker from Bhilwara and by an eminent Bhangi doctor from Jodhpur. In these two cases, marriage between Bhangi boys and girls of upper castes were solemnized under Arya Samaj rites. Lastly, unemployment among both the educated and uneducated Indian youth, overgrowth of population, economic crisis and constraints, limited number of job opportunities in government sectors are all significant factors in contributing to the decline in prestige of purely traditional occupations. Similar conditions exist in other developing countries, but what is unique to the Indian situation is that all those high castes who have accepted scavenging jobs as the primary source of their income are poor and their conditions are hardly better than those of the Bhangis. Under these circumstances, scavenging jobs provide not only a source of livelihood but economic security also.

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It would be significant here to add that in some such cases, the various types of government facilities such as medical, loan and housing facilities, free pass (in the case of Railway sweepers), government accommodation to Bhangi employees in nagarpalikas, Railways, and other departments, appear to have attracted high-caste persons to get converted to the Bhangi fold. In the light of these facts, it would not be unscientific to interpret that high-caste Bhangis working in the nagarpalikas and Railways have begun to gradually project a positive Bhangi image and are also generally known as Bhangis. Bhangis also considered it a great threat for the entire Bhangi community to locate jobs for their unemployed brethren in their own traditional caste-based occupation. They would like to go away from such occupations.

THE TREND A caste has its own self-image and identity, on the basis of which it considers itself historically as well as socioculturally distinct from other castes, and tenaciously sticks to and justifies this identity, despite various changes taking place in its life. It is this sense of identity, which is basic for the survival of a caste. There exists a vast body of data on cultural dynamics among untouchable castes which discusses various aspects of cultural and social changes and the factors responsible for them. However, such studies generally do not seem to relate the change of the identity of a caste. As stated earlier, during the last few decades, a number of scholars have analyzed the changeover from lower to higher caste model of life, viewed within the conceptual framework of Sanskritization. Even though there exist some studies on the change in the lower castes of Rajasthan, the de-Sanskritization and Bhangiization of uppercaste identity into the Bhangi caste has remained totally untouched. It may be noted that this change of identity from upper caste to lower status throws significant light on the course of history of Rajasthan. At the same time, at the macrocosmic level, it has significant bearing on the understanding of some aspects of the Indian civilization, where the process of fission and fusion of the various castes and cultural groups have been making an impact on the homogeneity of the population.

NOTES 1.

For details, see, M.N. Srinivas, Religion and Society among the Coorgs of South India, London, Oxford University Press, 1952, and Social Change in Modern India, New Delhi, Orient Longman, 1957; B.S. Cohn, “The Changing Status of a Depressed Caste” in

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 2.  3.  4.  5.  6.

McKim Marriott (ed.), Village India, Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 1955; F.G. Bailey, Caste and the Economic Frontier, London, Oxford University Press, 1958; S.L. Kalia, “Sanskritization and Tribalization” in Bulletin of Tribal Research Institute, Chindwara, vol. 2 1959, 33–34; P.M. Mahar, “Changing Religious Practices of an Untouchable Caste” in Economic Development and Cultural Change, vol. VIII (3), 1960, 279–87; D. Chananna, “Sanskritization, Westernization and India’s North-West” in Economic Weekly, vol. XIII (9), March 4, 1961, 409–14; Ram Ratan, “The Changing religion of the Bhangis of Delhi: A Case of Sanskritization” in L.P. Vidyarthi (ed.) Aspects of Religion in Indian Soceity, Meerut, Kedarnath Ramnath, 1961; H.A. Gould, “Sanscritization and Westernization: A Dynamic View,” in Economic Weekly, vol. III (25), June 24, 1961, 949–50; A.P. Barnabas, “Sanskrtization” in Economic Weekly, vol. XIII, April 15, 1961, 613–18; S. Patwardhan, Change Among Indian Harijans, New Delhi, Orient Longman, 1973; Shyamlal, “Sanskritization and social change among the Bhangis in Jodhpur city: A case study” in the Indian Journal of Social Work, vol. 34 (1) 1973; “Conversion to Jainism” in Journal of Social Research, vol. 23 (1) March 1980, and the “Jain Movement and the Sico-religious Transformation of the Bahngis of Jodhpur rajasthan: A Study in Sociology of Religion” in the Indian Journal of Social Work, vol. LIII (1), 1992. R.C. Gunarthi, 1950, Rajasthani Jatio ki Khoj, Ajmer, Vedic Yantralai, 261. Russell and Hiralal, 141. This description is based on talks with Anubhav Bairwa to whom the author wishes to express his thanks. Ketkar, 108. In his famous book Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, which was first published in 1816 (reprint 1953, 53), from Oxford University Press, London, Abbe J.A. Dubois, a missionary of Paris Missionary Society, devoted a lengthy chapter to “The Lower Classes of Sudras.” Pauline Kolenda writes: There are various processes of downward mobility in the caste system. Some have already been implied. When a ruling group was conquered, it lost rank. Another process of downward mobility involves outcasting. Louis Dumont found that there was a segment of Pramalai Kallar (a dominant caste in parts of Madurai district ...). The group seemed to have been descendants of irregular unions, presumably marriages between a Kallar and a mate of lower caste.

Caste in Contemporary India: Beyond Organic Solidarity, Jaipur, 1984, 105. Report: Mardum Sumari, Raj Marwar, 1891, vol. II, Jodhpur Vidhyasala, 1895, 554. Fuchs, 1981, 197. Ibid. Ketkar, 21. R.C. Gunarthi, 261. M.A. Sherring, The Tribes and Castes of Rajasthan, Delhi, Cosmo Publications, 1974, 62. 13. Louis Dumont, quoted by Pauline Kolenda, Caste in Contemporary India Beyond Organic Solidarity, op.cit., 116.  7.  8.  9. 10. 11. 12.

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14. Lieut. Col. J. Manners-Smith, V.C., C.I.E., Resident of Nepal, quoted by O’ Malley, 457. 15 W. Hamilton, quoted by O’ Malley, 456. 16. S.C. Bose, quoted by O’ Malley, 453. 17. For details, see, G.W. Briggs, The Chamars, Calcutta, Association Press, 1920, 18. 18. Ibid. 19. Kathleen Aberle Gough, “Caste in a Tanjore Village” in E.R. Leach (ed.) Aspects of Caste in South India, Ceylon and North-West Pakistan, Cambridge, 1960, 31. 20. G. W. Briggs, op.cit., 17. 21. Ibid. 22. R.C. Gunarthi. 23. H.P. Shastri quoted by Narmadeshwar Prasad; The Myth of the Caste System, Patna, Samjna Prakashan, 1957, 46. 24. R.C. Gunarthi, op.cit., 267. 25. Munshi Hardayal Singh, Census Superintendent of Marwar, First Edition 1894, Second Edition 1990, Jodhpur, Book Treasure, 197. 26. Ibid. 27. For details, see, The Castes of Marwar (being Census Report of 1891). 28. P.J. Mead, and G. Macgregor, Laird, Census of India, 1911, Vol. II, Bombay, Part I, The Government Central Press, 1912, 233.

REFERENCES Bailey, F.G. 1958. Caste and the economic frontier. London: Oxford University Press. Barnabas, A.P. 1961. Sanskritization. The Economic Weekly XLII, April 15: 613–18. Briggs, Geo W. 1920. The Chamars. Calcutta: Association Press. Crook, W. 1896. The tribes and castes of N.W.P. and Oudh, vol. 1, Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing Press. Cohn, B.S. 1955. The changing status of a depressed caste in village India, ed. McKim Mariott. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Chanana, Devraj. 1961. Sanskritization, Westernization and India’s North-West. Economic Weekly VIII (9) March 4: 409–14. Chauhan, B.R. 1967. A Rajasthan Village. Delhi: Vikas Publishing House. Stephen Fuchs. 1966. The children of Hari: A study of the Nimar Balahis in Madhya Pradesh, India. Bombay: Thackar and Co. Fuchs, Stephen. 1981. At the Bottom of Indian Society: The Harijan and Other Lower Castes. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal. Gadgil, D.R. 1952. Poona: A Socio Economic Survey, Part II, Publication No. 25. Poona: Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics. Gould, H.A. 1961. Sanskritisation and Westernization: A Dynamic View. Economic Weekly III (25), June: 945‒50. Gunarthi, R.C. 1950. Rajasthani Jatio ki Khoj (in Hindi). Ajmer: Vedic Yantralaya. Issacs, R. Harold. 1965. India’s Ex-Untouchables. Bombay: Asia Publishing House.

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Kalia, S.L. 1959. Sanskritisation and Tribalization. Bulletin of Tribal Research Institute 2 (4): 3343. Ketkar, S.V. 1909. The history of caste in India, vol. I. Ithaca: Taylor and Carpenter. Lohia, B.L. 1954. Rajasthan ki Jatia (in Hindi). Calcutta: Hindi Sahitya Mandir, Bharatiya Sahitya Sadan. Mahar, Pauline M. 1960. Changing Religious Practices of an Untouchable Caste. Economic Development and Cultural Change VIII (3): 279‒87. O’ Malley, L.S.S. 1913. Census of India 1911, vol. V, part 1, 452. Patwardhan, Sunanda. 1973. Change among India’s Harijans. New Delhi: Orient Longman. Ram Ratan. 1961. The Changing Religion of the Bhangis of Delhi: A Caste of Sanskritisation. In Aspects of religion in Indian society, ed. L.P. Vidyarthi, 172–90. Agra: Kedarnath Ramnath. Russell, R.V. and Hiralal. 1916. The tribes and castes of the central province of India, vol. II, London: Macmillan & Co., 107–08. Singh, Munshi Hardyal. 1891. Mardum Sumari, Raj Marwar, vol. II, 554 and 583 (in Hindi). Marwar: State of Marwar Census Report. ———. 1990. The Castes of Marwar (Census Report of 1891), second edition, 197. Jodhpur: Jodhpur Government Press. Srinivas, M.N. 1952. Religion and society among the Coorgs of South India. London: Oxford University Press. ———. 1977. Social change in Modern India. New Delhi: Orient Longman. Shyamlal. 1973. Sanskritisation and Social Change among the Bhangis in Jodhpur City: A Case Study. The Indian Journal of Social Work 34 (1). ———. 1980. Conversion to Jainism. Journal of Social Research Vol. 23 (1) March. ———. 1921. Caste and political mobilization: The Bhangis. Jaipur: Panch Sheel Prakashan. ———. 1991. Origin of the Bhangi: A Hypotheses. The Eastern Anthropologist Vol. 44 June. ———. 1992. The Jain Movement and the Socio Religious Transformation of the Bhangis of Jodhpur, Rajasthan: A Study in Sociology of Religion. The Indian Journal of Social Work, Vol. LIII (I). Sahay, K.M. 1975. Eradication of Untouchability and Caste System. Journal of Social Research 18 (2).

Chapter 7

Dalits to Benefit from Globalization Lessons from the Past for the Present* A. Ramaiah

It is often argued that globalization as a process began in India only in the 1980s and more vigorously from 1991 onwards; however, one may comfortably conclude—considering its basic characteristics and the kind of impact it has been having on the lives of different sections of Indian people—that such a process had been there since long, even prior to India’s Independence. For the purpose of trade, a number of European companies had been to India during the colonial period. These include the English East India Company (1600 AD), the United East India Company of the Netherlands (1602 AD), the Dutch East India Company (1602 AD), the French East India Company (1664 AD), and the Swedish East India Company (1731 AD). It is a different matter that of all these companies, it was ultimately the British who established control over India and sustained their hold over India for centuries (see Majumdar et al. 1986: 625). The entry of these companies into India during pre-Independence period can be equated to that of the present day multinational companies popularly referred to as MNCs. Both seem to have the basic characteristics of globalization in terms of the process involved and the outcome emerged. Both the former and the latter came to India for trade and moneymaking and the latter is therefore often referred to as “neo-colonization.” The only major difference is that such colonizing countries were viewed as outsiders and exploiters and therefore there was resentment against them, but now not merely the British but also every possible country is welcome in the form of multinational companies with * The seminar was on “Economic Development of SCs and STs: A State Level Scenario” organized by Dr Ambedkar Institute of Social and Economic Change during March, 2004.

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strong State patronage. The crucial question now is, who benefited and who lost in both these periods of globalization? The response of the people of India to the pre-Independence globalization process has not been uniform from among all sections. While some sections opposed, others supported it overtly. Upper castes who were also upper class opposed it for protecting their economic interests, for perpetuating their hegemony over the labor of lower castes, and for maintaining their social supremacy within the caste order. Others did so mainly for assuming leadership for the country as a whole. But in the entire struggle, the concern for Dalits stood nowhere: neither in the agenda of the Indians who opposed the global force, nor in the agenda of the Indians who favored it. The Dalits were merely used by both for their own interests. When the British’s scientifically and technically advanced capital-intensive profit-oriented companies with their large-scale production started their trade and business in India, a number of Indian small and cottage industries were paralyzed. As a result hundreds of thousands of indigenous craftspersons and industrial workers were thrown out of work. While the owners of such industries were mostly the minority upper castes, those thrown out of employment were mostly the Dalits and Backward Castes who were employed at a lower level for meager salaries. At the same time, the British were willing to accommodate the Dalits in their institutions and establishments. This is evident from the fact that they recruited them not only in their army in large number, but also in other services. But the upper-caste soldiers in the British army refused to interact with the Dalit soldiers. This became a major concern for the British to maintain unity among its soldiers. As a result, they had to stop recruiting Dalits into their army from 1890. This was a major loss for the Dalit communities (Ambedkar 1993: 82–89). Though there was scope for more number of Dalits and Other Backward Castes (OBCs) getting employment in the European companies and institutions and that too for relatively high salary, the upper-caste fellow Indians, who were the landlords and owners of small- and large-scale industries, did not give them chance for such a possibility. To prevent Dalits getting employment in the British establishments and to protect their profit-oriented industries and institutions convincingly, the upper-caste Indians came out with an idea of “Nationalism,” and mobilized the majority of Indians including the Dalits and Backward Castes to fight against the British. They argued that as long as the British would be allowed to stay in India, the problems of Dalits and the OBCs could never be solved. Even Mahatma Gandhi who firmly believed in the concept of vasundharam kutumbakam (universal family and universal brotherhood) considered sending the

Dalits to Benefit from Globalization Lessons from the Past for the Present

British out of India to be his first priority rather than ensuring freedom to Dalits and the OBCs from his fellow Indians. The British came to India for the purpose of expanding their trade and enhancing their revenue. Obviously, their business ethics would not have permitted them to become philanthropist to help the Dalits and others living in similar conditions. Therefore, the changes they brought in with their positive actions may be viewed as nothing but the outcome of certain political compulsions. However, the “Indian side did not passively accept these changes but was an active partner, now appropriating and demanding more, now opposing and accommodating” (Aloysius 2000: 33). In this regard, one of the observations made by the first prime minister of India Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, who was also one of the active forerunners of India’s freedom struggle against the British, is worth quoting here: Foreign rule over a civilized community suffers from many disadvantages and many ills follow in its train. One of these disadvantages is that it has to rely on the less desirable elements in the population. The idealists, the proud, the sensitive, the self-respecting, those who care sufficiently for freedom and are not prepared to degrade themselves by an enforced submission to an alien authority, keep aloof or come into conflict with it. The proportion of careerists and opportunists in its ranks is much higher than it would normally be in a free country. (Nehru 1989: 493)

How true is the above observation of Nehru is evident from the fact that certain Indian moneyed castes and communities such as the Bhatias/Banias of Ahmedabad, Marwaris of Calcutta and Bombay, and Chettiars of south India were closer to the British at the time of freedom struggle to pursue their personal business interests, and in turn how they were used by the British to meet their ends. In this regard Gallagher and Robinson have argued: . . . because of their minority status some local business communities were suitable middlemen to support the colonial empires abroad. Because these businessmen belong to non-majority groups—and therefore were not an important military or demographic factor—many colonial governments supported these groups as their local suppliers, translators, informants etc. In this way, these groups are seen as “collaborators” and exploiters in Marxist as well as nationalist historiography. (see Oonk 2004)

But what is more surprising and shocking is the historical truth that a sizeable number of Indian feudal classes, mostly the upper castes, particularly from places like Bengal, who enjoyed all possible comfort, actively supported the cause of and remained loyal to the British for their own vested interests. For instance, the Government of British India observed:

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The Maharajah Scindia and other chiefs, unsolicited, have given prompt and powerful support to the Government and the, zamindars of the disturbed districts have protected British officers from violence, and exerted themselves to check disorder. Maharaja Scindia raised a force of 5000 compact and well- disciplined men out of his own revenue and placed them at the command of the British to suppress the (Indian Sepoy) mutiny. (Biswas 1997: 8)

To this timely help of the Maharaja and such other upper-caste Indians, the British has glorified them in the following words: “To remunerate these chieftains with becoming munificence, would be an act not only of justice but of prudence, for they have shown themselves able not only to appreciate the British rule, but support it sagaciously and courageously in times of peril” (Ibid: 9). Where has the upper-caste nationalism gone? Who can then be called as “insiders” and who as “outsiders?” If “nationalism” can permit the upper caste– upper class joining hands with the “oppressive outsiders” and that too for the purpose of accumulating undue wealth through antinational means, then such nationalism does not have any scope of preventing Dalits and such others from taking the support of the “outsiders” or of what may come through the process of globalization. After all, the Dalits resort to such options not for greed, but for protecting their lives and livelihood, and for their social dignity and democracy. Such an option becomes all the more inevitable for the Dalits particularly when the inhuman indignities and atrocities inflicted upon them are by their own fellow Indians. After all, no country including the British can be accused of having invaded India for the purpose of usurping Dalits’ property, because the Dalits hardly had any access to treasure or property. India’s wealth and valuable artifacts were under the control of the upper castes and upper-class communities. It was indeed this property that the British were taking away. The trade and business in India were again under their control. Moreover, the British never treated Dalits as untouchables; perhaps their faculty had not developed that way. In fact the exploitation of Dalits by the fellow upper-caste Indians is more severe than that of the British. Therefore, the entry of British was more painful to the upper castes and upper-class communities, as it took away the power they wielded over the rest of Indians. Thus freedom from the British was a dire need for these communities; not so much for the Dalits. The argument that the British were outsiders and unreliable ones and therefore had no right to do any business in India gives at the outset an impression that the Brahmans, Kshatriyas, and Vaishyas (together constituting 16 percent of the total Indian population) were the original inhabitants of India. Are these ruling castes the original inhabitants, in other words, the descendents of insiders? Mahatma Jyoti Rao Phule and many Western scholars have categorically

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indicated the foreign origin of these caste groups as Aryans of Central Asia who came to India in about 2500 BC (see Ghurye 1987: 163–64). Yet, the Dalits not only joined “India’s freedom struggle” but also helped these upper castes to become the rulers of India once again. They did so hoping that this section would be sincere in fulfilling its commitment to grant social freedom to them and to share India’s wealth among every section of India including Dalits and to make them all economically independent. But what happened after Independence?

PROMISES AND PERFORMANCES AFTER INDEPENDENCE This section is to review in brief the performance of the upper-caste leadership vis-à-vis its promises to Dalits, particularly during freedom struggle. As discussed above the upper-caste leadership opposed pre-Independence globalization promising rapid economic growth to promote the interests of Dalits and other vulnerable groups. More specifically, they spoke of due share in the national assets such as land and also better and permanent employment and dignified means of livelihood to Dalits. They also promised elimination of social evils such as untouchability and caste discrimination. It was mainly with these overarching slogans, the upper-caste “nationalists” mobilized the Dalits, OBCs, and tribals to fight against the British. The much-awaited freedom was won in 1947. But how far have those promises been fulfilled?

India’s Approach to Economic Development and Dalit Empowerment Though the Constitution of India reflects in its preamble and guiding principles the promises of the upper-caste leaders and the aspirations of Dalits and other vulnerable groups, how far the leaders respected their Constitutional obligations? What was the strategy they adopted to improve the economic status of the country in general and of the Dalits and Backward Castes in particular after Independence? On the eve of the departure of the British, on August 14, 1947, India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, declared that India’s task in the future included “the ending of poverty and ignorance and disease and inequality of opportunity.” But what went wrong when the time came to redeem the pledge and free people from want? Those who fought for Independence wanted to cash in on their sacrifices. Almost overnight they became a squabbling crowd of self-seekers, jostling each other for office or reward (Nayar 2000). What happened to the promises of these nationalists with regard to developing Dalits and Backward Castes (BCs) on par with them; in other words, bringing

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them to the “main stream?” While Mahatma Gandhi wanted to promote the labor-intensive small and cottage industries, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru opted for rapid industrialization to achieve faster economic growth. Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar, as an economist, opted for rapid industrialization and large-scale production, but with a precondition of nationalization of land, water, and key industries and distribution of land to the landless (see Das 1979; Thorat 1998). Ambedkar’s choice on rapid industrialization was not only to achieve faster economic growth, which he considered necessary for investing in social sectors like education and health, for effective future planning, and for ensuring greater control over the nation as a whole, but also to rescue the Dalits and BCs working as bonded laborers in small-scale industries of upper castes, and ensure them permanent employment in organized sectors with better salaries under special Constitutional provisions like the reservation policy. He hoped that such employment opportunities in large-scale industries, which were generally located in cities and suburban areas, would also attract Dalits to desert their oppressive villages and to settle in cities and towns where the problem of caste oppression and exploitation would be relatively less. Though Ambedkar was for industrialization, he was not for privatization. He was in favor of more and more public sector companies, institutions, and organizations where there is scope for implementing reservation policy. However, India, under the leadership of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, opted only for rapid industrialization and nationalization of key industries. He, however, did not give due importance to Ambedkar’s call for nationalization of land and water and distribution of land to the landless. Nehru’s choice on rapid industrialization, and that too heavy industries, was mainly to achieve faster economic growth which was considered necessary for the country that had just got political sovereignty and to become a strong and self-reliant India. India after Independence began nationalizing key industries and institutions such as chemicals, electric power, steel, transportation, life insurance, portions of the coal and textile industries, and banking. To prevent the entry of foreign or global trade and to promote the nationalized industries and institutions, India, on the one hand, levied high tariffs and imposed import restrictions, and on the other subsidized the nationalized firms, directed investment funds to them, and controlled both land use and many prices with a view to promoting these industries. Agriculture was not the priority. This was the approach followed till 1964 (Hambrock and Hauptamann 1999). Simultaneously India had also resorted to mechanization of agriculture and allied sectors. Tractors, harvesters, and other such machinery became very much a part of farming activities of landlords. But the often overlooked fact was the displacement of thousands of employees of small and cottage industries

Dalits to Benefit from Globalization Lessons from the Past for the Present

and those engaged in agriculture and allied activities as daily wage laborers as a result of rapid industrialization and mechanization of agriculture pursued by the Government of India. Most of them were obviously Dalits and BCs. In a way, the British legacy, which had almost all components of the present-day globalization, continued in Independent India too. Surprisingly, this time there emerged no overt protest against industrialization. One of the important reasons for the same could be that Nehru promoted, along with public sector companies, private companies as well. He was for mixed economy. With State patronage and protection from global competition, a few Indians emerged as big industrialists and powerful business giants capable of competing even in international market. Though they contributed in a big way for the economic and scientific advancement of India as a nation, it may be recalled that they also contributed to the misery of Dalits and Adivasis who were displaced from their own place of living due to industrialization. But the approach changed during 1966–71 under Prime Minister Mrs Indira Gandhi. Two major shifts took place: (a) priority to agriculture, instead of industry, which resulted in green revolution. Subsequently by mid-1970s, India became self-sufficient in food grain; and (b) further tightening of State control over every aspect of the economy, including nationalization of banks, restriction on foreign trade, imposition of price control on a wide range of products, and squeezing of foreign investment. Despite all such constrains, there was flow not only of foreign money and investment but also of foreign technology till that time. But with the implementation of the Foreign Exchange and Regulation Act (FERA) in 1973, such an inflow of foreign money and technology was restricted. However, the over-restrictive and often self-defeating nature of the regulatory framework became evident by the late 1960s and early 1970s. The approach of comprehensive planning also came under severe criticisms since many of the planned programs were not even implemented and even those implemented did not meet the desired targets. However, what may be noted is the fact that there was hardly any scope for green revolution making significant contribution to the development of Dalits since most them were landless wage laborers. Neither the Land Ceiling Act nor the Minimum Wage Act was implemented earnestly during this period for the Dalits to benefit from. From agriculture the focus was once again shifted to industry. India began encouraging foreign investment in the 1980s when it started liberalizing its trade through appropriate economic reforms and industrial and financial policies on the one hand, and subsidies, tax concessions, and the depreciation of currency on the other to encourage export. With these measures, Gross Domestic Product (GDP) rose from 3.5 percent per year during the 1970s to as

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high as 5 percent per year during the 1980s, though the problem of high tariff continued to remain a major hurdle in attracting foreign investment. In 1984 Shri Rajiv Gandhi, after becoming prime minister, introduced New Economic Policy which was an attempt toward liberalization of Indian economy, and more particularly toward enhancing industrial production. As a strategy to manage the crisis of balance of payments, the Narasimha Rao government accepted in July 1991 the International Monetary Fund–World Bank formula, also known as Structural Adjustment Policies (SAP) with their conditionality. “Fiscal austerity (through spending cuts and high interest rates), privatization and market liberalization are the central pillars of SAP” (Bharti 2004: 71). This was the second major economic reform program of the government, diverting its focus from agriculture to foreign trade and investment particularly in the field of electricity generation, oil industry, heavy industry, air transport, roads, and some telecommunications. It also introduced a number of incentive schemes for the purpose, including: significant reduction in the use of import licenses and tariffs (down to 150 percent from 400 percent), an elimination of subsidies for exports, and the introduction of a foreign-exchange market. Obtaining any license or permit to carry out import–export trade has become nonmandatory since April 1992. Except for a small list of imports and exports that are either regulated or banned, trade across nations has become almost free of import and export regulations from April 1, 1993. According to an estimate of World Trade Organization (WTO), the average import tariff of 71 percent in 1993 has come down to mere 40 percent in 1995. Moreover, with successive additional monetary reforms, the rupee can nearly be considered a fully convertible currency at market rates since 1995. It seems India is now a much more open economy (Hambrock and Hauptamann 1999). In this long process of shifting approaches, what has happened to the primary sector—agriculture and allied activities—and to the economic condition of people depending on it, mainly the Dalits? Of the three major sectors—agriculture (primary), manufacturing (secondary), and service (tertiary), majority of Indians (69 percent) still depend on agriculture and allied activities for their sustenance. India, despite being an agrarian economy—a highly labor-intensive economy—has ignored agriculture considerably over the years, and thus the share of agriculture in the country’s GDP has come down drastically from 56.89 percent in 1950 to mere 24.90 percent in 2000–01. On the contrary, the GDP share of industrial sector has gone up from mere 14.27 percent to 26.92 percent, and of service sector from 29.80 percent to as high as 48.18 percent (almost half of the GDP) during the same period. The fact that the percentage of workforce finding employment

Dalits to Benefit from Globalization Lessons from the Past for the Present

in agriculture has come down from 68.45 in 1983 to 59.84 in 1999–2000, the fact that employment in the manufacturing sector has gone up from 14.34 percent to 17.43 percent and the fact that the share of services sector from 17.21 percent to 22.74 percent during the same period further validates the government’s attraction toward the industrial and service sectors at the cost of agriculture sector which provided employment to a large majority of Indian workforce. Though the number of persons employed in the entire organized sectors including the IT sector accounted for 27.96 million in the year 2002, the quantum is mere oneeighth of those employed in agriculture sector. It seems, even by 2008, the IT sector would not have generated more than 2.1 million jobs which is not even a consolation for a country that adds annually around 8 million to its labor force. (see Guruswamy and Kaul 2000). Why has then the government not developed agriculture, instead actively promoted other sectors? It only reflects that the State is mainly for rapid economic growth, which is possible mainly through higher investment in secondary and tertiary sectors. Concern for enhancing the purchasing power of the poor or the Dalits seems to be not even its last priority. However, in what way is the State’s higher investment in agriculture going to help the Dalits when most of them are merely landless wage laborers? Landlessness has been one of the main factors responsible for the unchanging poor economic status of Dalits since Independence. An objective assessment of the following data vividly validates the above conclusion. Most of the Scheduled Castes (SCs) are landless wage laborers, depending mostly on agricultural and allied activities to eke out their livelihood. According to the 1991 Census, among the landless agricultural laborers the SCs constituted as high as 62.76 percent, and among the cultivators (those owning land) they constituted only 33.89 percent. But most of these cultivators are small and marginal farmers owning less than two acres of land (see Government of Madhya Pradesh 2002: 45). These data indicate the dire need of distributing land to the landless Dalits. What has been the government’s achievement in this regard so far? Till date 272 legislations regarding land reforms have been enacted. But except in Kerala and West Bengal, land reforms were successful in no state. As against the estimated 30 million hectares of available surplus land, only 75 lakh acres have been declared surplus so far. Out of this, it has taken the government 50 years to take possession of a mere 6.4 lakh acres and redistribute 5.2 lakh acres of it. And, still about 10 lakh acres remain in ineligible hands. Since 1961, despite a host of land reforms, a great many Dalits lost even the little land they had and had no choice but to join the rank of landless agricultural laborers. In 1961, 38 percent of Dalits were cultivators, but today only

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25 percent Dalits are cultivators. Today over 86 percent of Dalit/Scheduled Caste households are landless or near landless and 63 percent are wage-labor households (Sharma 2004: 151–52; also see Mahajan 2003: 51). The State’s concern for the cause of Dalits can be understood also from its financial outlays for their development. No doubt, the GDP has increased considerably over a period of time. But has the increase in GDP increased the financial outlay for the development of Dalits? It is only by adhering to such an approach that globalization can be of help to Dalits. The declining concern of the State for the deprived communities like the Dalits/SCs can be understood in terms of financial outlays earmarked for their development under special schemes like the Special Component Plan (SCP). Though as per the SCP, the State plan outlay for the SCs should be in proportion to the total SC population in that state, no state government adheres to such policies earnestly. For instance the average state plan outlay for the SCP among different states was only 11.58 percent, though the percentage of SC population in the country accounted for 16.48 percent during 1997–98. More alarming is the fact that out of the amount earmarked for the purpose nearly about 40 percent remained unspent during this period. The average State plan outlay for the year 1998–99 further came down to 11.11 percent, though the amount remained unspent decreased to 29 percent. A marginal increase is noticed in the average State plan outlay for the year 1999–2000 (13.57 percent), 2000–01 (12.76 percent), and 2001–02 (13.54 percent). However, a declining trend is noticed in the percentage of expenditure. In other words, in the amount actually spent out of the earmarked amount. For instance, though the percentage of expenditure out of the amount earmarked recorded a marginal decline initially from 71.27 percent during 1998–99 to 71.13 percent during 1999–2000, the decline was very high during 2000–01 with the percentage expenditure being merely 35.61 (Government of India 2002: 95–96). Though the government introduced a number of antipoverty schemes, including rural self-employment programs, only a small proportion of subsidies and such other benefits reached the poor. Much worse is the much ignored fact that in most cases even the money so spent does not reach the beneficiaries in its entirety. Most often the middlemen—whose role in the process is inevitable in view of high illiteracy and economic dependence among the SCs—eat away nearly half and sometimes the entire subsidy. In some cases even the concerned bank officials seem to have been involved in such illegal acts. These figures also reflect the fact that neither the Central nor the state governments, which have been under the control of the upper castes, are sincere in implementing policies that are meant to protect and promote the interests of the Dalits.

Dalits to Benefit from Globalization Lessons from the Past for the Present

Beneficiaries of State’s Employment Opportunities: Dalits or Others Even after more than five decades, the State has not filled required percentage of posts with Dalits/SCs. Due to reservation, a negligible percentage of Dalits has become IAS and IPS officers. But compared to the percentage of upper castes, the percentage representation of Dalits in the top-level government positions is much less. Though the Constitution of free India provides reservation for the SCs, Dalits, and BCs in employment, which castes and communities have actually benefited since Independence: Dalits or the upper castes? The data in Table 7.1 indicate very clearly that the only community which has benefited so much since India’s Independence is the Brahman community, not even Rajput or Maratha. The population of Brahmans before Independence (in 1935) was only 3.5 percent. In about 42 years after Independence, that is, by 1989, their population increased to 5.20 percent. But their share in Class I service which was only 3 percent in 1935 increased to as high as 70.20 percent. In contrast, the population of SCs, STs, and BCs (backward castes) together was as high as 64 percent in 1935 and their share in Class I service was just 1 percent (one percent only). Despite a number of Constitutional safeguards, special Table 7.1: Percentage Population of Castes/Communities and Their Share in Class I Service (in Government/non-Government) in 1935 and 1989 1935 Castes Kayasth Musalman Christian

1989

Population (%)

Share in services (%)

Population (%)

Share in services (%) 7.00

0.85

40.00

1.03

21.00

35.00

10.13*

3.20

4.00

15.00

2.08

1.00

Brahmins (Tyagi Bhumihari)

3.5

3.00

5.20

70.20

Rajput

2.5

2.00

3.80

1.70

Baniya (Arora Khatri)

1.20

1.00

1.78

3.50

Sikh

1.40

1.60

1.60

1.90

Other (Maratha Jaat)

1.60

0.9

5.50

2.50

64.00

1.00

68.85

8.00

Dalit (SCs, STs, and Backward)

Source: Government of India (1998), Report of National Commission for SCs 1996–97 and 1997–98, Fourth Report, Vol. I: 16. Note: * The sudden reduction in the Muslim population in India from 35 percent in 1935 to mere 10.3 percent in 1989 was the result of a large section of Muslim population shifting to Pakistan during Partisan in 1947.

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Commissions and other establishments at different levels, those, including political leaders, entrusted with the task of ensuring them due representation in government jobs did not or could not carry out their responsibilities effectively and earnestly. The share of the SCs, STs, and OBCs in Class 1 Service in 1989 was only 8 percent although their population constituted as high as 68.8 percent of the total. Another indicator to understand the government’s commitment to ensure due share of employment opportunities to different castes and communities is the representation of these castes and communities as teachers in Social Science and Science faculty in universities. As evident from Table 7.2, out of more than 150 universities studied, the representation of Minority, SC/ST, and OBC teachers in 1998 in the Social Science faculty was as low as merely 1.7 percent, 1.2 percent, and 6.8 percent though they constituted as high as about 11 percent, 22.5 percent, and 52 percent respectively of the total Indian population. The situation is much worse in the case of Science faculty. But the representation of upper castes that constitute only 17.58 percent (as per the Mandal Commission Report) is as high as 90.30 percent in Social Science faculty and 94 percent in Science faculty. These data reiterate the lack of will on the part of the upper caste–managed government. Table 7.2: Percentage of Minority, SC/ST, OBC, and Upper-caste Teachers in Social Science and Science Faculties in More Than 150 Indian Universities Category

Social science faculty

Science faculty

Minority

1.7

3.2

SC/ST

1.2

0.5

OBC

6.8

2.3

90.3

94.01

Upper Caste

Source: Government of India (1998), Report of National Commission for SCs 1996–97 and 1997–98, Fourth Report, Vol. I: 14.

Dalits: Victims of Globalization or State’s Development Initiatives One of the frequently advanced criticisms against globalization is that it has led, through its “development projects,” to the displacement of a large number of Dalits and tribals not only from their place of habitat but also from their means of livelihood. Such criticism is obviously only partially valid in view of the fact that globalization along with neo-liberalization, as formally understood, began only in the 1990s, whereas the process of Dalits and tribals being displaced and dispossessed began as early as 1950 due to massive industrialization that

Dalits to Benefit from Globalization Lessons from the Past for the Present

the government resorted to soon after Independence. The immense damage caused to the lives and livelihood of tribals of Jadugoda of Eastern Singhbhum, Jharkhand since 1967 by the Government of India’s mining project, viz. the Uranium Corporation of India, is no less than any possible damage one can think of due to globalization. Similarly the “contribution” of the forest department of the Government of India is no less. In its recent press release, the Jana Sangharsh Morcha, an affiliation of 15 mass organizations working among the tribals of Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, has expressed its anguish over the State-sponsored human rights violations against the innocent tribals of Madhya Pradesh in the following words: In the districts of Burhanpur, Damoh and especially in Betul the forest, police and revenue officials enter in one or other tribal villages every other day in the dark cover of night. They beat tribal women, misbehave with them and often put them in overnight illegal confinement without the knowledge of their husbands. In Betul, on the intervening night of 4th and 5th July they razed Bhandarpaani, a tribal hamlet under Chopana police station. In the incident they took away 73 tribal women and men, including children in their illegal confinement. Many of the women were taken away in the absence of their husbands. The poor tribes lost everything but for the clothes on their body. In the evening of July 9th, Danwakheda village was destroyed and the forest department without the knowledge of their husbands took two tribal women away. Recently on 17th July a team of 50 police, forest & revenue personnel team entered Ghorpadmal village under Mohda police station. They dragged tribal women out of their houses; misbehaved with them and later abused and terrorized the villagers. To cover up the incident the police has registered false cases of dacoity against 13 tribals.

In the words of the noted novelist turned activist Arundhati Roy, the damage that the state has caused the tribals can be expressed: A government’s victims are not only those that it kills and imprisons. Those who are displaced and dispossessed and sentenced to a lifetime of starvation and deprivation must count among them too. Millions of people have been dispossessed by “development” projects. In the past 55 years, Big Dams alone have displaced between 33 million and 55 million people in India. They have no recourse to justice. In the last two years there has been a series of incidents when police have opened fire on peaceful protestors, most of them Adivasi and Dalit. When it comes to the poor, and in particular Dalit and Adivasi communities, they get killed for encroaching on forest land, and killed when they’re trying to protect forest land from encroachments—by dams, mines, steel plants and other development projects, In almost every instance in which the police opened fire, the government’s strategy has been to say the firing was provoked by an act of violence. Those who have been fired upon are immediately called militants. (Roy 2004)

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The above observation reiterates the fact that a large number of Dalits, Adivasis, and the landless BCs being thrown out of their basic means of sustenance (employment) and from their place of living is not something that is happening only due to globalization. This has been part of India’s development initiatives since Independence. It is only that the process has become accelerated by the interference of the global economic institutions like WTO and World Bank.

Change in Upper Castes’ Attitude Since Independence, foreign or global money and technology have been flowing into Indian economy and making its impact on the market and culture of consumption. Lakhs of upper-caste professionals and technocrats who received professional education in India at cheaper rates have gone global. They have settled forever in Europe and America for higher salaries and perks. Thousands of upper-caste NGOs have been receiving millions of foreign money to fulfill their cherished dreams. All these in fact have led to polarization of national wealth and honor by the minority upper-caste groups. And this process has been very rapid since India’s Independence. Though all these have been very much the characteristics of globalization, the Indian elite never opposed it till recent years. But why only now? Those opposing globalization in the interests of Dalits are perhaps under the impression that by not allowing the entry of foreign companies and institutions till 1991, the State has only protected the interests of Dalits. However, the protective and socialist policies of the State have benefited both the Dalits and the upper castes. While the Dalits could improve their educational status, and a negligible percentage of them could even become IAS and IPS officers using State’s special provisions like the reservation policy, the upper-caste Hindus also could enhance their economic status through their profit-driven industries and institutions using State’s special polices against the entry of multinational companies and institutions. However, such benefits came to only a chosen few and most, including the lower rung of the lower castes, were left out of it including reaping the benefits of reservations. Though there has been exchange of goods and services, and scientific knowledge between India and other nations all these years, which is also the characteristic of globalization, why are the upper-caste industrialists suddenly opposed to such a process? The main and the only reason one can think of for the same is that till recent past what had been allowed to come to India was mostly money, material, modern goods and values and science and technology. And with the State protection against the global market competition, all these

Dalits to Benefit from Globalization Lessons from the Past for the Present

could help the upper castes to run their industries and business profitably and comfortably all along. But now, a number of MNCs themselves have started coming to India offering high salaries and perks to Indian technocrats and laborers. Besides, varieties of quality products have started coming to Indian market at a cheaper rate. These developments have indeed become a threat to the very survival of private companies. Unable to face such competitions from the MNCs, many Indian private companies have already become the victims, and many others giving up the hope of survival. Therefore, the Indian companies, which are at the verge of extinction, have started raising voice against the entry of MNCs into India. Though the employees of these companies feel that they have not been treated fairly, their companies have been successful enough to divert their energies against globalization, particularly against the entry of MNCs and other such organizations. In this way these companies have been successful in mobilizing not only their employees but also the people in general to protest against globalization for the survival and revival of their own companies and to retain and regain control over their cheap labor force as it happened during pre-Independence era. Globalization is also argued to be the main cause for the failure of Indian public sector enterprises. This accusation seems to contradict the popular image of upper caste as efficient and meritorious professionals. The Dalits are never preferred for such positions as if they were ever inefficient. This is the reason why we are yet to accept reservation for higher positions. Mainly the meritorious upper-caste professionals and technocrats manage the public enterprises. They make decisions. Dalits’ participation in the decision-making process is very marginal; most often nil. Yet the performance of public enterprises has been very poor. It may be noted that nearly 20 percent of India’s GDP was controlled by the relatively inefficient public enterprises. This was another important factor dragging India’s economic growth considerably (Hambrock and Hauptamann 1999). What does this failure of public enterprises really reflect? One can think of two possible options: (a) It reflects that most of those upper castes holding key positions are inefficient, and (b) they never liked the public sector enterprises to function efficiently since it employed Dalits under the reservation policy. One of the senior IAS officers who held key positions in managing public sector enterprises observed in a seminar held recently at University of Mumbai that it was due to the reason cited later. All these data overtly portray the yawning gap between the promises made at the time of Independence and the performance till date of the trusted upper-caste leadership. This also indicates the fact that the upper castes in power—except for a few exceptionally liberal-minded and committed individuals like Justice Krishna Iyer, the then SC and ST Commissioner B.D. Sharma and a few others—never wanted these deprived and discriminated castes even to experience freedom.

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Gandhi once observed, Unless the capitalists of India help to avert that tragedy (the British’s economic imperialism through rapid industrialisation) by becoming trustees of the welfare of the masses, and by devoting their talents not to amassing wealth for themselves but to the service of the masses in an altruistic spirit, they will end either by destroying the masses or being destroyed by them. (Gandhi 1928: 422)

Despite such warning by a person no less than Gandhi, there seems no sign of the ruling castes paying due attention to the cause of Dalits. When such has been their attitude, how can Dalits have faith in the upper-caste leadership and their promises, which they repeat in every election?

Need and Scope for Dalits Going beyond State Measures As evident from the above conclusions, even over fifty years of affirmative action, implementation of a number of special programs, and judicial activism to uphold the ideals of Indian Constitution have failed to bring any substantial positive change either in the living condition of Dalits or in the mindset of upper-caste Indians. Then why do not the Dalits seek justice going beyond State measures? The performance of the upper castes as rulers of India since Independence seems to suggest that the Dalits should not be content only with the State measures. It also seems to suggest that they should advance their interests adopting other means such as globalization. After all, globalization also talks of the poor and the marginalized. In any case, going beyond State measures does not mean going against the State if one may interpret it that way. Dalits should actively probe the various possibilities of optimally using globalization to accomplish their hitherto unfulfilled aspirations. The opponents of globalization seem to undermine the fact that social and economic justice, and more specifically a due share of employment opportunities both in government and in private firms and institutions, can be achieved not only through reservation policy but also through political power, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) way. As long as organizations function within the State and with the State protection—legal and political—the State can exercise considerable influence over such organizations to consider the development of social sector. They also seem to disagree that reservation in private sector is something within the reach of the oppressed groups. Taking examples from the US where the Supreme Court has now appointed the colored people as judges and heads of military forces, it is argued that such appointments have become a reality not through reservation quota, but simply because the president has found it politically necessary. Today the highest paid private TV personality in the US is a black woman. If

Dalits to Benefit from Globalization Lessons from the Past for the Present

all these have been possible in the US, why does one doubt such a possibility in India (see Omvedt 2004)? Shri K.R. Narayanan became the President of India despite being a Dalit, not because of reservation but due to political compulsion. Shri Sushilkumar Shinde has become the Chief Minister of Maharashtra despite being a Dalit, not because of reservation but again due to political compulsion. Even BJP and Shiv Sena kind of political parties have given top positions to Dalits for the same reason. It is high time that Dalits aimed at such option rather than relying only on reservation kind of a measure. It may be noted that taking advantage of globalization hundreds of Dalits and BCs have found jobs (since mid-l990s) in Europe and America for a salary that they could never even dream of in India, although the merit of such Indians is always questioned by the fellow upper castes. This has been possible for the Dalits because the “outsiders” are mainly for talents, not for identifying one’s lower-caste background and selectively ignoring him, as happens in India in most cases. Another frequently posed question is, “What benefits do the Dalits from rural area will get due to globalization?” An objective question to answer this would be, “What benefits have the rural Dalits got before globalization?” As seen before, there has hardly been any substantial change in their economic and social status till date. Today it is due to globalization that even a small village is connected globally through telephone and even computers have reached villages. Dalit parents are able to be in touch with their children who have moved to Dubai and other countries as manual laborers and professionals through telephone, though they, as “untouchables” have no access to walk in the main street of their own village where the caste Hindus reside. This situation is very common in villages of Tamil Nadu in south India. It is true that the gap between the rich and the poor is widening. But on what grounds can one attribute the growing gap to globalization only? In fact this is something that has been happening since Independence. The entry of MNCs is in fact an opportunity for Dalits to prove their worth as these are more likely to be free from caste prejudice. Profit being their ultimate motive they look not for upper caste talents, but for talents per se. In a fair competition, at least the convent-educated Dalits have the scope to enter into the Indian-based prestigious foreign educational and professional institutions. This has not been possible till date in the Indian-managed private institutions. Such opportunities have helped the Dalits to realize not only their worth but also the politics behind their imposed untouchable identity. Finding lucrative jobs in developed countries has been the domain of upper castes till recently. But with internet, another contribution of globalization, even Dalits have begun to gain access to such avenues. This is not to ignore the fact that even the outsiders often come under the influence of the prejudiced upper-caste Indians, who, for historical reasons, have had the opportunity of establishing contact with them

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much earlier and have sustained their contact for much longer period for their sustained economic and career prospects. But with the outsiders, there is scope for sensitizing them on the caste issue and their need to recognize diversity as a means to enjoy the support of majority Indians. Yet another accusation against globalization is that Dalits will lose whatever they have gained. After all, what did Dalits lose in the pre-Independence globalization, particularly due to the British’s business and trade in India? Dalits lost nothing. The fact, they had nothing to lose. They only gained. They gained access to education and dignified employment, which were denied by their fellow Indians who controlled these sectors all along. In British India, the Dalits (Chamars) involved in shoe-making and other related works could export their leather goods and became economically very rich (Lynch). Similarly the then Dalits, Chanan (Nadar) of Tamil Nadu exported their palm tree products such as jaggery (gud) and became very rich. They became so powerful that they could completely detach themselves from their untouchable identity. They are no more untouchables. Moreover, to lose something due to globalization, the Dalits must have gained something in the absence of globalization. What have they gained vis-à-vis others since Independence? With more and more MNCs coming to India, there is every possibility of mushrooming of more and more schools, colleges, and professional and technical institutions of high standard. Similarly there is scope for expanding quality health care facilities. The argument that the poor/Dalits cannot afford quality education and health care facilities that come through globalization (as these would be relatively more costly) does not seem valid since this has been the experience of Indian poor/Dalits from 1950 till date. As it stands today, educational institutions and health care facilities of high standard are very limited in number and are accessible mostly to the 20 percent Indian elite who constitutes mostly the upper castes/class. The expansion of such facilities is bound to happen. The establishment of railways, post, and telegraph and opening up of many educational institutions of high standard in British India by the British are the standing testimonies to such possibilities. It was these institutions that opened up education to the Dalits. It is therefore certain that with globalization there is scope for even Dalits getting access to education and health care facilities of high standard. These things will happen not because the MNCs are committed to the educational advancement of Dalits, though one cannot rule out such a possibility. It will happen because there is a possibility of negotiating with them to recognize diversity not only in admission to educational institutions but also in appointment in their establishments, and in their economic development activities. It will happen because of competition between Indian institutions and foreign ones on the one hand and among foreign companies on the other. The declining price of certain goods such as mobile/cell phone and cars, which had been the status symbols of upper castes/class till

Dalits to Benefit from Globalization Lessons from the Past for the Present

recently is the witness. It is a common sight in Delhi to see even rickshaw pullers with their mobile phones. This will happen also because the MNCs and their establishments would be much more open, compared to the companies and establishments of fellow upper-caste Indians who prefer employing them only as sweepers and peons despite having the required credentials. Moreover, with globalization the Indian government would be compelled to deal firmly with humiliating and dehumanizing practice of manual scavenging. Already the Sulabh organization has made great strides in this direction. Higher salaries and other incentives to such jobs would also become inevitable. This in turn would automatically encourage even other caste groups to take up such occupations as it has been happening in developed countries. Indian upper castes have no problem working as sweepers and cleaners in developed nations. With globalization there is high scope for such defiling occupations being mechanized. Such mechanization, no doubt, may render many Dalits unemployed, but change is never possible without any loss. After all, what will be lost is not the job alone, but indignity and social stigma as well. Gradually such a process could even break the link between caste and occupation, and redeem the Dalits forever from their centuries-old bondage of social stigma as untouchables. There is hope that globalization will end caste one day and fulfill Dalit dreams of living in a free and democratic society (Jadhav 2004). The process of globalization has helped even Dalits to start their own NGOs, educational institutions, and training centers of high standard. These organizations have been doing a commendable job in sensitizing people the world over and globalizing Dalit concerns. It is due to globalization that the Dalits could take their issues to Durban and other countries and seek justice even from international organizations like the United Nations (Channa 2005). Perhaps those Indians opposing globalization seem to undermine its scope of uprooting centuries of economic hegemony of the upper castes, which has been one of the most important factors responsible for the perpetual misery of policies that would make private industries, institutions, and organizations accept affirmative action policies. Dalits have nothing to lose. If at all they do, it would be their misery; it would be their humiliation and social stigma.

REFERENCES Aloysius, G. 2000. Nationalism without a Nation in India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press Ambedkar, B.R. 1993. Writings and Speeches, vol. 12. Government of Maharashtra, Bombay. Bharti, A.K. 2004. Globalisation, communalism and Dalits. In Unquiet worlds: Dalit voices and visions, ed. Mukul Sharma. New Delhi: Heinrich Boll Foundation. Biswas, A.K. 1997. Sepby Mutiny 1857–58 and Indian Perfidy. New Delhi: Blumoon Books.

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Channa, Subhadra Mitra. 2005. Metaphors of caste and caste based discriminations against Dalit and Dalit women in India. In Resisting racism and xenophobia, global perspectives on race, gender and human rights, ed. Faye Harrison, 49‒67. New York: Alta Mira Press. Cooper, R.N. 2004. A false alarm: Overcoming globalisation’s discontents. Foreign Affairs, January, February 2004. Das, Bagwan. 1979. Thus Spoke Ambedkar, Vol. 3. Bangalore: Ambedkar Sahitya Prashana. Deshpande, S. 2003. Contemporary India: A Sociological View. New Delhi: Viking. Gandhi, M.K. 1928. Result of Exploitation, Young India. Ahmadabad: Navajivan Trust. Government of India. 2002. Annual Report 2001–2002. Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, New Delhi. Government of Madha Pradesh. 2002. The Bhopal Document: Charting a new course for Dalits for the 21st century, Bhopal. Ghurye, G.S. 1987. Caste and Race in India. Bombay: Popular Prakashan. Guruswamy, M. and Kaul, A. 2004. Farm sector: Another food crisis ahead. Business Line, Internet Edition, January 28. Hambrock, J. and Hauptamann, S. 1999. Industrialization in India. Student Economic Review, University of Dublin, Trinity College. Available at http://www.tcd.ie/ Economics/SER/archive/1999/essay20.html. Jãdhav, N. 2004. Dalit Dreams. Times of India. January 16. Available at http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/Dalit-Dreams/articleshow/425683.cms. Mahajan, Ulka 2003. Dalits and land, land, People centred advocacy series. National Centre for Advocacy Studies. Majumdar, R.C., Raychaudhuri H.C., and Kalikinkar, Datta. 1986. An advanced history of India. Madras: Macmillan India Ltd. Mungekar, B.L. 2004. India’s economic reforms and the Dalits: An Ambedkarian perspective. Mumbai: Dr. Ambedkar Institute of Social and Economic Change. Nayar, Kuldip 2000. Between the lines: Why did we falter? Deccan Herald, August 16. Nehru, Jawaharlal. 1989. The Discovery of India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Omvedt, Gail. 2004. Reservation in private sector. Available at www.ambedkar.org (accessed on April 6). Kapila, Uma, ed. 2003. Indian economy since independence. New Delhi: Academic Foundation. Oonk, Gijsbert. 2004, Industrialisation in India, 1850–1947: Three variations in the emergence of indigenous industrialists. Paper presented at www.kun.nl/posthumus/researchlprograrnmes/Paper_Oonk.doc. March 25. Roy, Arundhati. 2004. Do turkeys enjoy thanksgiving? Online edition of India’s National Newspaper, Sunday, January 18. Scholte, J.A. 2000. Globalisation: A critical introduction. London: Palgrave. Sharma, M. 2004. Unquiet Worlds: Dalit Voices and Visions. New Delhi: Heinrich Boll Foundation India. Thorat, S.K. 1998. Ambedkar’s role in economic planning and water policy. New Delhi: Shipra Publication. Throat, S.K. and Deshpande, R.S. 1999. Caste and labour market discrimination. Indian Journal of Labour Economics 42(4) October–December. ———. 2004. It is the remedy for market discrimination. The Economic Times, New Delhi, March 26, 36.

Section II Doing Fieldwork among the Dalits

EDITORS’ NOTE In this section that consists of only two papers, the editors to the volume have explained how they managed to acquire a subjective position that made them see the world from a Dalit perspective. This is also a critical methodological perspective that opposes the viewpoint of distancing one’s self from the field, for the sake of “objectivity.” We support the view that love for people you work with is the one single stimulant for an incisive analysis, for it is closest to the ground-level realities and the worldviews of those who are being represented. The purpose of introducing this section is also to explain why some anthropological papers, not written by Dalits, have been included in this volume. The explanation is obvious. Not all Dalits are scholars and not all can even read or write. The anthropologist goes to the field to collect the narratives of such people to present them to the world. Of course such a view is not unbiased and the methodological discourses currently ongoing in anthropology do raise the pertinence of such representation. But we must accept that this is ultimately the only way in which illiterates and nonwriters can make themselves heard.

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It was therefore considered also important to let the readers know the transformations that the writers, especially the editors to this volume, underwent as a result of their fieldwork with the Dalits. It is of course up to the readers to judge them and this is only one way of exposing the bias that, as we understand, cannot be totally eliminated from any anthropological work. This is also to acknowledge the “situatedness” of the point of view foregrounded in this volume.

Chapter 8

Viewing Hierarchy from the Bottom Up* Joan P. Mencher

In what follows, I describe some of my experiences as a fieldworker in three villages (though I focus mainly on one) in Chingleput district, Tamil Nadu, where I worked in 1963, in 1967, and in 1970. I shall try first to show how, apart from my main research focus (on ecological problems in relation to social structure), I slowly began to be pushed into the position of viewing social hierarchy from the bottom up, as it were. I shall also try to show how I gained meaningful insights into the society and culture that I was studying, as a result of those personal experiences. The traditional view of Indian social structure, which appears codified as early as the law of Manu, assumes that hierarchy is accepted by all as an inevitable part of human existence. It assumes that each person accepts his niche and his relationship to others above and below him, and believes that he is in that position because of his actions in former lives. Hierarchy in Indian society is considered to be essentially ritual. Many modern sociological writers reflect a related or similar point of view, the best known being Dumont (1970). I have dealt with the theoretical aspects of this question in three papers, two already in print (1972, 1973) and the third forthcoming. What I have tried to show is that this is a distortion of reality, since it represents a one-sided view of social processes, a view which is essentially from the top down. In this paper I would like to give some indication of the types of experiences I had, the types of data that have helped to mould my alternative viewpoint, and to show how this viewpoint grew as I came to understand the ways of thinking and feeling of the new friends I made. * Excerpted from Andre Beteille and T.N. Madan (eds). 1975. Encounter and experience: Personal accounts of fieldwork. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

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When I went to Tamil Nadu it was after having done fieldwork in Kerala (in 1958–60 and 1962). During my first fieldwork in Kerala, I had concentrated on a study of the social structure of the matrilineal Nayar community, focusing on aspects of child rearing. It gradually became clear to me that if I wanted to understand traditional Nayar social structure, it was necessary to also learn something about the Namboodiri Brahmans, the group at the top of the traditional Kerala hierarchy. Therefore I decided, in 1962, before starting work on a larger project, that I would do a brief study of the Namboodiris. My work among the Namboodiris brought me up against a number of serious constraints, and made me aware, on a personal level, what it was like to be considered polluting. My work involved sampling the range of orthodoxy: from families that invited me into their houses, and even into their kitchens, to households where I had to stand in the courtyard with an umbrella over my head to protect myself from the hot sun or pouring rain while I tried somehow to take notes. I kept on with the work for a number of reasons: partly because I wanted the data, but also because I became aware that in this way I could learn to a slight extent what it might be like to be an untouchable. I mention all this because I am convinced it must have had some sort of an impact on my later work in Tamil Nadu, though not consciously. Indeed, it was only while putting my thoughts together about how I went about studying hierarchy from the bottom that I retraced my steps and began to understand the importance of these early experiences. When I went to my first village in Tamil Nadu in 1963 I wanted a village in which paddy was the main crop, which had a large range of castes (one of the common requirements of anthropologist working in the early sixties), and which was located in Chingleput district. (Most of the work up to that time had been done in Tanjore, and Chingleput was the second largest producer of rice in the state.) There was an additional criterion: I wanted a village with a separate house available for rent, so that I could run my own household, be free to invite people of all communities to visit me to talk, and be close to village people without imposing too much on them. After visiting several villages I was taken to one, which I have called Manjapalayam, where I was told there was a seldom-used temple rest house in the agraharam (Brahman residential area) that I could rent. It seemed an excellent arrangement. When I asked about being able to have all villagers visit me there I was assured that I was free to have visitors. The house itself bisected the agraharam, dividing it between the two major groups (the Vadagalais and Tengalais) of Shri Vaishnava Brahmans. The front verandah was used during the day for two elementary school classes, but we could close the doors and windows in that direction if we had to.

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And having the children on the verandah provided an unexpected opportunity to observe interaction among children of all social groups. Soon after getting settled in the village, my assistant and I began taking a house-to-house census in the agraharam. It seemed to be a good way of introducing myself to people, especially the women. When I had gotten to know everyone there and had made a few friends, I started working in other parts of the village. One morning we decided to go to the cheri (Harijan residential area), since we had not even seen it yet. When we went, there were only a few women, one or two elderly men, and the village taliary (a local policeman who has jurisdiction over certain minor offences, is in charge of tax collection, and transports books for higher-caste officials), who had just returned from doing some work for the village munsif. The taliary and one of the older men immediately understood the kind of information I was trying to get, and started helping me collect it from several households. Very few non-Harijans come to the cheri, and the people there were extremely happy to have two visitors. They invited us back and gave us both an overwhelming feeling being welcome.

THE HARIJAN POINT OF VIEW We began going there more often, first to complete the census, and later because we found that we could learn a great deal from them about village social structure. Talking with them had become cemented by bonds of friendship because, frankly, we found ourselves relaxing more in the cheri. One of the old men—his face appears on the cover of a book edited by Michael Mahar (The Untouchables in Contemporary India, 1972) used to tease me that I came there for enjoyment because the villagers had no sense of humor and did not know how to laugh. While I do not accept that stereotype, it was certainly clear to me that we went there to relax. Eventually, as we became accepted there (despite their teasing of my assistant, who was an urban Brahman), they began to talk to us about how things looked from their point of view. It became clear to me that things just did not look the same from the bottom of a hierarchical system as from the top, or even from the middle. My full understanding of this came gradually and slowly. But I became aware, almost from the beginning, that no one there accepted the high-caste view of themselves (cheri-dwellers) as polluting. A number of things helped to make this clear to me. Almost from the beginning some of the Harijans started teasing my assistant about Brahman customs, and letting her know that she was especially privileged in being allowed to move freely in the cheri. They told us with a laugh about the village people’s belief that if a Harijan touched the water in the village tank, black and yellow eggs would grow in it. The story was concluded with the statement: “We don’t

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go near it, at least in daylight, because after all they are the ones who give us work. But at night, if we should be passing by the tank on our way from the fields, and if we are thirsty, we simply use it. They only say like that to make us afraid.” The theme that appears here that one must be careful of one’s behavior with one’s employers, or with anyone who has power (atikaaram), appeared in a variety of comments made by Harijans of all ages, both male and female. For example, in another village, a man made the following comment about relations between Harijans and landowning Mudaliars: We are dependent upon them. If we talk without respect and say vaadaa, poodaa (very informal forms for “come,” “go”—instead of the polite vaanga, poonga) they will ask, “Stupid, have you come for harvesting?” So we simply stand in front of them with folded veshti (with the dhoti folded up to show respect) and folded hands. Otherwise, they will say, “See, he is an arrogant fellow,” and might even bring the police to beat us.

Another man from the same village made a similar comment: If they scold us, we never say anything. We simply stand there without talking. We can’t give any reply to their questions. If a big man says, “How much work have you done so far?” we simply say we are working. Then, he may say, “You son of a thief, what work did you do?” and curse us. We just stand silently, because he has the power. If we argue, he will send us away without work, without livelihood. So, what can we do?

Though of course they never discussed the system as such, in their own indirect way they made it clear how things were perceived. This was quite evident in comments such as the following: We are the workers, if we sit in front of them, they will say, “See, how insolent they are. They dare to sit with us. They are Paraiyans, they are the workers; How dare they sit with us?” Then, they will hesitate to call us for work and we will starve.

The following two illustrative comments also deal with status differences: They are one jati, we are another jati. They are higher, they are called Mudaliars. We cannot make them do any work for us, no! Instead of that, those people only take work out of us, so naturally they are supposed to be higher than we are. If we all had land then we would not be lower. They say we should not touch them because we eat beef . . . but there will be no strength in the body without eating beef. They sit in a house, drink milk and eat

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rice. We have to eat everything to make our bodies strong in order to do the harvesting. . . . When I say kari (liquid meat preparation) I mean beef kari. That is the only kind I like.

Power was also discussed in contexts other than employment: If one of us makes a mistake and gets caught, they will see that we are given a good beating or even are taken by the police, but if one of them does something they will find some way to hide it and save their skin. That is because they have the contacts and influence.

On the other hand, it was also made clear that many of the Harijans saw the system as beginning to change slightly. Thus, one man pointed out: “Previously we could not build this type of pillar for a house even in the cheri. We couldn’t do it because they had the atikaaram. Now they can’t stop us if we can afford to build it.” What seemed most striking to me was that most of the Harijans I got to know tended to describe their relations with higher-caste people in terms of power (mostly atikaaram), both economic (in terms of who employs whom, or their dependency on the landed for employment) and political (in terms of authority and the ability to punish). The contexts in which these comments were made varied considerably. Sometimes it was after a man had been scolded by a higher-caste person, sometimes in the evening after a hard day’s work, or when they were complaining to me about their employers. At times their comments were totally unexpected; as for example when they were explaining their customs to me (as illustrated by some of the above quotations). Occasionally, after one of their comments, I asked why the higher-caste people have all the power, or why they themselves did not have any land. The answers fell into two categories. Most of the replies were of the type “That is how it is” or “They are lucky” or “It is the will of God.” Occasionally I was told, “We originally owned the land, but the others came and took it from us. We are Adi-Dravidas (original Dravidians).” Rarely, especially among young people, the comment was added, “. . . but we will have our time. They can’t go on having it forever.” The only person who seemed to accept the idea of his position being the result of his karma or dharma, and who really worried about such things as how the higher-caste people would think about him was one of the older men in the first village I worked in. At first I assumed, on the basis of my reading, that here was evidence regarding culture change. I thought that, being old, he represented a former viewpoint, and that his attitude could be adequately explained that way. Only much later did I learn that this same man had, in his twenties, led a successful work stoppage that lasted for six months, and had forced the villagers to grant the Harijans a number of concessions. I then realized that it

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was not a difference between generations, but a case of a man making his peace with society before death. Perhaps this is not a complete explanation, but it is certainly clear that he had not viewed the system as immutable when he led his rebellion.

SOME OTHER POINTS OF VIEW As I became more and more friendly with the Harijans it became clear to me that my relationship with them might create some degree of resentment among the other villagers. The Brahmans in the agraharam where I was living were divided in their opinions. Some of the more orthodox were disturbed about our being so friendly with untouchables, inviting them to visit us to talk after finishing their work in the fields, and in general by our being treated as friends by them. But others among the Brahmans, especially some of the women, continued to be quite friendly and informative. Several of these women explained to me how they really wanted to treat the Paraiyans differently, but felt that if they did, they would be ostracized by others. (Incidentally, it was comments like these, made in a variety of circumstances about a wide range of things that made me seriously question the stereotyped notion that women are conservative forces. I suspect that in many instances women would be much freer if they could find any way to manage it at all.) However, some of the Brahmans were quite distressed by my closeness with the Harijans. If my major focus of research had been to do an intensive study of Brahman life and ritual, I am sure that my visits to the cheri would have interfered. Since the larger focus of my study did not require that kind of information, I found that my involvement with the Harijans brought me many unexpected rewards, both personally (in terms of basic human relationships of friendship), and from the sociological point of view (in terms of learning better the mechanisms of prejudice, and how the system of social stratification is rationalized by those higher up in the hierarchy). For many people who disapproved, this was the opportunity to explain why they disapproved. A number of people made such comments as: “I would be friendly with them but they are so dirty, they don’t bath daily,” or “It is only because they are uneducated that we don’t move freely with them. After all, in offices in Madras city one doesn’t ask a man’s caste.” Other, less sophisticated, villagers would simply complain about what the world was coming to. Still others among the Brahmans went out of their way to tell me about their own customs, almost as if they were trying to woo me away from my Harijan friends.

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Among the members of the large low-ranking non-Brahman caste in the village, the reaction was different. This caste accounts for sixty-seven percent of the village, and includes among its members a wide range of socioeconomic classes. It was among a few of the wealthy members of this community that opposition to my working closely with Harijans was centered. This opposition was mainly expressed in the form of hostile comments to Harijans who came to visit with us. Later on, when through some friends I arranged for one of the Harijan girls to go to a school in Madras city (because she would have been married at twelve and stopped her education otherwise), the reaction of members of this large non-Brahman caste was expressed by heated remarks about the uselessness of education for Harijans and for females. (Parenthetically, it should be noted that in this community few girls had ever completed high school.) I do not want to give a wrong impression however. There was in that village a vocal and significant progressive group which was friendlier to the Harijans, and which were warm and friendly toward me as a result of my closeness with them. Indeed, as a result of their coming to me and explaining to me the background of the existing situation and the ways in which things were beginning to change, I was able to get a clearer picture of the forces of change in the village.

HIERARCHY AS SEEN FROM THE BOTTOM Between 1963 and 1967, when I again worked in Tamil villages, I kept in close touch with some of my Harijan friends by mail. In 1967, I was asked to write an article on Harijans for a book on untouchables in contemporary India. I made several visits to Manjapalayam, and also asked several of my Harijan friends from there to come to talk to me in Madras. They were delighted that something was being written about them. Indeed one of the younger men begged me to say everything: “Even if you tell some of the bad things about us, like jealousy, tell it all, so that people will know.” While I was working on this article, a Brahman researcher, knowing of my work, asked my help in interviewing some Harijans. As he put it, “one needs connections to meet these people.” This stray comment brought into focus the extent to which barriers exist between different social strata, and led me to recognize some of the forces that interfere with the breaking down of those barriers, even when individuals concerned might want to. At what time did I become consciously aware of studying hierarchy from the bottom up? It is difficult to say exactly. One of the differences between the fieldwork approach and that of the sociologist doing a large-scale survey is that

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in fieldwork one has to follow unexpected turns. Thus, my attempt to see the situation from the point of view of people at the bottom was something that emerged slowly as a result of my personal encounters with specific people in Manjapalayam. But I still remember when it all began to make sense to me and to sink in. When I left Manjapalayam in 1963 to go to West Bengal, I spent several days in Madras city getting my things in order. During that time, some of the people from the Manjapalayam cheri came to Madras. Only one elderly man had ever been to Madras city before and the others were enormously curious to see the place, and to see me off on the train to Calcutta. It was quite an experience to see the city through their eyes. And I slowly began to understand the realities of being poor, barely educated, strangers, and untouchables. One night they went to a film. When it was over, it was dark and very few buses were running, so they had to walk back to the place where they were staying. Nothing eventful happened, but the following day they told me just how scared they had been. “We look like villagers. Suppose some policeman had seen us and checked. We didn’t have much money on us. And suppose that man whose house we were staying at had closed things up, then we might have been taken to the jail. We were thinking about all those things as we walked home and we felt so frightened.” I cannot point to any specific incident during their brief stay in Madras, but I can never forget my thoughts as I travelled through two days and nights to Calcutta, thinking about how very different any stratified society looks depending on one’s vantage point. How difficult it is if one is at the bottom of the system. Most of the data I had collected were the routine type of information mentioned in Béteille’s essay (1975). Yet, I think that having come to look at hierarchical situations from the point of view of those at the bottom has enabled me to slowly develop a different perspective about the role of power and power relations.

A PRACTICAL PROBLEM AND ITS CONSEQUENCES One of the kinds of tribulations of fieldwork involves the details of one’s own living. In Manjapalayam, one serious problem was our water supply. Because the village is located in an area of poor underground water facilities it has always had difficulty obtaining adequate drinking water. The main village obtains its drinking water from a tank located within the village site. In theory it is a protected water tank (i.e., no one is supposed to wash pots or clothes in it, to urinate near it, or to wash their cattle in it), but in fact all of these activities went on daily and quite openly. Perhaps because of my own urban ways,

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or perhaps because I had experienced some stomach trouble, I found myself unable to adjust to the idea of using that water. In the village area there were two wells with good water. One belonged to the nearby primary health center, one to the cheri. During my first stay in the village in 1963, I was able to arrange with a friendly caste-Hindu farmer (a man who had himself a small holding, and also cultivated four acres as a sharecropper) to bring me water twice a day on a bullock-cart. This was enough for my household of three (a young man who managed our household, my research assistant, and myself). Though the villagers thought I was crazy not to use the pond water, they accepted it with good grace. After all, foreigners (like me) and city people (like my assistant) are a bit odd anyhow. And if they can afford to pay for water, why should anyone object? But, when I returned to work there in 1967, the water business constituted more of a problem. At that time we were not living in the agraharam, but in a carpenter’s house on the road leading out of the village. That house provided us with more room. And since by then I was married, and my husband was with me, I needed more room. Our caste-Hindu waterman was unfortunately too busy at that time to bring us water. And no one else from the village volunteered to do that work, even though we were willing to pay for it. One of the young men in the cheri offered to help us to get water. He was hoping to be married in June, and saw the water job as a way to earn some of the extra money he would need to finance his marriage. (In this area, Harijans pay a small bride-price to the girl’s family at the time of a marriage.) His younger brother agreed to help us in with the water, and we adjusted by arranging to get our water very early in the morning and late at night, when they returned from the fields. Since they were Harijans, they did not feel free to take water from the Primary Health Center well (though legally they could, since it was government property). Also, the cheri well was closer to the village than the health center well. So, we started getting Harijan water. While this was clearly against the value system of the village, we decided to go ahead and take the consequences. We knew that the villagers would not be happy, but since we lived near the edge of the village, we expected them to make allowances. Soon after we started, our house-owner came to us to complain about our having Harijans in the house. We reminded him that we had told him from the very beginning that we wanted a house of our own so that we could have people of all castes come to visit us. It was interesting to see his reaction. It was clear that to him, people of all castes simply had not included the Harijans, even though he knew that the Harijans had been especially friendly to me in 1963, and that nothing had happened to lessen my friendship with them. After a long discussion, he left, clearly unhappy about our having Harijans in the house, but also not willing to lose the rent. While I felt sorry to have to

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make him unhappy, this incident again served to underscore to me just how much the Harijans were viewed as apart from the mainstream of village life. This incident also demonstrated again the flexibility of some of the women, as a few of the Brahman women made a point of letting me know how distressed they were that their own water supply was not clean, and how they would be quite willing to use cheri well water if only it was closer (we still had to use a bullock-cart to get it), and if only people would not talk badly of them. What was clear to me was that at least some people in higher positions in the system recognized something dehumanizing about automatically labeling everything from the cheri as polluting. But on the other hand, the structure (in this case the village caste structure) made it difficult for behavior to change. This sort of effect of structure on behavior clearly operates in all stratified societies. It was clear that in my relations with Harijans, I was violating some of the values of the people among whom I was living. On the other hand, it was also clear that not all of the villagers disapproved of my behavior. Indeed, one of the unexpected results of my becoming so friendly with the Harijans was that while it closed the doors to certain individuals, it opened the doors to others. There were a significant number of Brahmans and others who made a point of coming to me and talking to me in considerable detail about things going on in the village, about stresses and strains, and also about forces pressing for the elimination of some of the traditional abuses. What impressed me (though in a way it was obvious) was that the people who wanted change were not the most powerful, but rather the members of the opposition faction, or the women. In the 1960s, these people viewed the position of the Harijans as somehow tied up with the status quo. For the others, those people who objected strongly to my behavior, it also became important to try to educate me. Through this “education” I was also able to learn much about the village. Thus, I was able to learn about the views of not only those at the bottom, but also those at the top. And it slowly became possible for me not only to learn about each party, but also about how they behaved in the presence of one another. I remember one of the richest nonBrahmans, who was upset by my friendship with the Harijans, sitting on his verandah and talking to me, and pointing out how much he liked the Harijans. He made a big point of going over to one Harijan man and touching his arm as is done between friends. The Harijan man stood there silently, not daring to open his mouth in the presence of such a well-to-do and powerful higher-caste employer. At another time, when a similar incident occurred in the presence of a landless laborer of the same higher caste, the Harijan in question was not so silent. He commented: “He is just as poor as I. So what is the difference?” The higher-caste man was forced to agree.

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SOME EXPERIENCES IN OTHER TAMIL VILLAGES After completing my work in Manjapalayam in 1967, I moved to another Tamil village. Since at that time I was collecting data on agricultural development, I wanted to live in a village where the physical conditions necessary for the use of high-yielding variety seeds existed. The new village I moved to was ideal from that point of view, because it was in an area where pump sets were most effective. This new village also proved to be helpful to me in learning more about Harijans, though I personally never became identified with them as I had been in Manjapalayam. This village had two cheris, since a new cheri had been formed about five years previously, by people who were finding the old cheri too crowded. Here, though over fifty percent of the population belonged to one Harijan caste, the village was clearly dominated by the well-to-do higher-caste landowners. In Pachaiyur I was more restricted in my relations with the Harijans since my house, again a temple rest house, was this time within the confines of the temple compound. Thus, even if I wanted to bring anyone home to talk, it was not possible, because the Harijans were afraid of angering their higher-caste employers. Once an educated and landowning Harijan did visit us, but it was clear that he was asserting his position as a slightly educated man, who had been away in the army. The Harijans laughed about the temple in a cynical manner, saying: “They invited us in at the time of the last elections, we won’t get in there till the next election.” Perhaps the most important thing I learned in this village was the extent to which the upper-caste people were able to manipulate the Harijans, even when the latter were in the majority. Of course, having two cheris made it even easier, since it made it possible for the village leaders to pit one group against the other. Even more striking was the way in which potential Harijan leaders were co-opted, and in effect led away from their natural constituency. For example, the panchayat vice president, a Harijan, elected in 1970, was said by all to be “eating out of the hand” of the higher-caste president. In 1970, I went to work in a third village in Tamil Nadu. This was a somewhat smaller village though the cheri constituted about one-third of the village. Here, because I was living in a real house (not associated with a temple), I could again have people visit me more freely, I was also able to get to know the Harijans better for another reason. At that time, I had a young educated research assistant helping on the project, who happened to be a Harijan himself. Having him working with us enabled me to learn even more about the Harijans than I might have otherwise. A second important factor was that there were two young Harijan women, of about eighteen or nineteen years of age, who became exceptionally friendly

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with me and who were determined that I learn all about their life. It was during our stay in this village that I learned all about their attitudes toward beefeating (which they regarded as the only really good kind of curry), and their explanation (as opposed to the Sanskritic one) why high-caste people don’t eat it. “They sit in the shade all day and don’t do any hard work. So, they don’t need to eat beef. For them buttermilk is enough. . . . They do not have to be strong.” It was in this village that it became increasingly clear to me how, for the Harijans both old and young, the exploitative aspect of hierarchy was what seemed most relevant, not the “to each his own” aspect. I did not once in my time in any of these villages hear from Harijans the usual rationalizations of inequality in terms of Hindu religion, or in terms of social harmony. To them it was all quite clearly a system in which some people worked harder than others, and in which those who were rich and powerful remained so, and obviously had no intention of relinquishing their prerogatives voluntarily. If because of outside employment (the army, or in Ceylon, etc.) a family did manage to obtain enough land to be economically free of the higher castes, one normally found either of two behavior patterns in evidence. Either the man would try to use this economic base to gain some political power in the village, and to become a Harijan leader in opposition to the richer landowners (see Mencher 1973). Or else the man might become a kind of pawn in the hands of higher-caste people who would flatter him, and make him feel that he was really their equal and superior to other Harijans. Such men were described by other Harijans as “eating out of the hand of XYZ.” The few people who have become leaders of their own community have had to face tremendous problems. (I have discussed this in detail in the paper referred to above.) As Beteille points out, perhaps the main advantage of intensive fieldwork is that it enables us to get a picture of “the community in the round.” If one lives in a given locale for some time, one begins to be able to differentiate more clearly between stereotype and fact, between first impressions and detailed knowledge. And people slowly come to change in what they say to you. I have found time after time, that as people got to know me better, as they found out that they could trust me not to repeat what they told me to others, and as they came to understand, at least a little bit, why I was studying them, at least some people would begin to show me another side of themselves. Not only another side of their personal life, but also to let me know how they really visualized relations between people, or things going on in the village. If one is really careful in documenting one’s data collection, and if the data include not only what people say they do, but detailed descriptions of what they actually do, it becomes possible from anthropological fieldwork to develop what has been called an etic description of a social system. Harris (1971: 149)

Viewing Hierarchy from the Bottom Up

has described etic phenomena as “those that are identifiable and studied independently of the native’s cultural judgments.” Thus, on the basis of fieldwork, one can compare the views of members of each segment of the society (the emic views) with the etic view, as established by the social scientist. Yet we have no fixed procedures for doing fieldwork. Traditionally social anthropologists have been told that they must try to live as members of the society being studied. As much as possible, you must appear to belong. Yet, no highly-educated person is ever mistaken for a villager. What is perhaps most important is that one should try not to offend the values of the people being studied. Yet even that can be complicated in a highly stratified society, especially in one undergoing change. The present discussion indicates some of the problems one encounters if one tries to study hierarchy from the bottom up, and the fact that no wholly satisfactory solution of these inherent problems is likely to be found. Obviously, different people solve these problems in diverse ways. In my own case, I found that I personally could work best in a situation where my own attitudes and views were most clearly explicit, and where I did move freely with all communities One of the things which I believe made it easier for some of the higher-caste people to accept my behavior was that I was willing to speak frankly about hierarchy in the United States, about the extent to which inequalities exist there, and about how hard it has been to make any changes. Working in a society different from one’s own presents both advantages and disadvantages. One clear advantage is that one is not expected to know all the rules immediately. And one can ask naive questions that are not tolerated from an insider. I know this, because of work I did as an investigator on a study among middle-class urban New Yorkers to support myself while writing my doctoral dissertation. Often, one fails to notice things that an outsider will be struck by immediately. On the other hand, as an outsider one may also miss clues or insights only available to the insider. Having an educated research assistant living with me almost as a sister, and working with me in my data collection, helped me to bridge the gap of my being a foreigner to the villagers, though I had to be careful to see that what I learned was not solely the viewpoint of my assistant. To that extent, I had to do certain work alone, and I had my assistant do some work without my being present. Having over the years had different assistants, of different castes and backgrounds, I have been able to add to my knowledge of the interaction between villagers and outsiders. It would obviously be wrong to think that an anthropologist learns only from personal experiences with people. Like any other fieldworker, my work involved the collection of large amounts of detailed data about the villages where I have worked: details about actual day-to-day life of people, about the

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mechanics of cultivation, etc. But what I have tried to describe here are some of the more personal aspects of fieldwork, and how in the course of it one thing can lead to another.

NOTE Fieldwork in 1963 in Tamil Nadu was supported by a National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellowship, fieldwork in 1966–67 by a National Institute of Mental Health grant to Columbia University, and fieldwork in 1970–71 by a National Science Foundationsponsored joint research project between Columbia University and the School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi.

REFERENCES Beteille, Andre. 1975. The Tribulations of Fieldwork. In Encounter and Experience: Personal Accounts of Fieldwork, eds Andre Beteille and T.N. Madan, 99‒113. Honolulu: The University Press of Hawaii. Dumont, Louis. 1970. Homo hierarchicus: An essay on the caste system. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Harris, Marvin. 1971. Culture, man, and nature: An introduction to general anthropology. New York: Crowell. Mencher, Joan. P. 1972. Continuity and Change in an Ex-Untouchab1e Community of South India. In The untouchables in contemporary India, ed. M. Mahar, 37‒56. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. ———. 1973. Groups and self-identification: The view from the bottom. Research Abstracts Quarterly (ICSSR), 2, 3. (Also to appear in a volume on problems of identity in South Asian untries edited by Dennis Dalton.) ———. 1974. The caste system upside down: Or the not so mysterious East. Current Anthropology 15(4). Mahar, J. Michael, and S. Chandrasekhar. 1972. The untouchables in contemporary India. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Chapter 9

Becoming a Dhobi Subhadra Mitra Channa

ENTERING THE WORLD OF DISCRIMINATION My first entry into the world of the dhobis was without any thought about discrimination or the political aspects of caste. As a fresh graduate wanting to do research I was lured by fact that they provided an almost ideal anthropological field, an intermarrying community of just about hundred families and nearly all of them located in the same geographical area. My interests at that time centered on economic anthropology and the transition from a precapitalist economy based on a caste-based traditional occupation to an urban marketbased economy was the focus of my research. The harsh reality of caste discrimination was something to which I had little exposure as it had no bearing to my everyday life. As my family was both upper caste and liberal in its outlook, caste was hardly ever a topic of discussion. I grew up without any reference to concepts of purity and pollution or untouchability and no restrictions on food and drink had ever been imposed on us within the home. I could not therefore comprehend in the initial phase of my fieldwork certain obvious references to untouchability that were made both within and outside of my field. Firstly several persons of my own discipline asked me as to why I had chosen to work on the dhobis, that I should have looked for some “better field area.” It was then as also now considered very respectable to work in a tribal group that is considered to be outside of caste society but rarely if ever students opted for work among low castes.1 Only later I realized that to some of them at least the problems might be stemming from commensality restrictions, as many would have grown up in families where they would be admonished for eating and drinking at the houses of untouchables. To others the field area was not exciting enough or romantic enough as befits anthropology students. In the 1970s, we were still taught about the colonial anthropologists’ exotic ethnographies about colorful tribal people.

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Such colorfulness was certainly lacking in the neighborhood “dhobi” who was an essential part of every household. In fact I drew quite a bit of ridicule from most quarters for wanting to work on the “dhobis,” who are taken for granted, considered of least “research value” like the mongrels one finds on the streets of Indian cities.

THE ENTRY INTO THE FIELD My life, however, changed as I entered the squalor of the dhobi katras, congested living quarters occupied by them in the old city of Delhi. This particular geographical location was in what is known as the Walled city of Delhi or the Delhi that existed before its expansion into New Delhi during the colonial phase, latter being often referred to as Lutyen’s Delhi. The walls and gates of this planned city were built by Emperor Shahjehan and were overlooked by the magnificent Red Fort. The layout conformed to the values prevailing at that time that included segregation of the low castes that were clustered into neighborhoods referred as katras. Unlike the spacious living quarters or havelis of the elite where each house had its private courtyard and large spacious living rooms, often ten to fifteen in number, the katras of the dhobis consisted of a common courtyard and tiny tenements of never more than two to three small rooms, surrounding this courtyard. The entire space of the katra was often equivalent to the single house of a rich person. On any normal day when one entered this katra through a narrow lane, one would come upon a large number of persons occupying the courtyard including children playing and men chatting and women engaged in household work like washing or cooking. Each katra had a common set of toilets built near the entrance and often a tube well that was used by everyone. I entered this world as a person with no exposure at all to such kind of living. At the same time, in that time period, I must have been equally incongruous to the dhobis. My introduction as a person “studying” and wanting to write a “book” (I could find no better word to translate a PhD thesis) was taken with amusement by the older generation who thought that I was hanging around only to earn some money. The younger generation was more receptive and this is the reason that on my fist visit I found myself surrounded by a group of young people, mostly but not all boys, who were at various stages of their education. My first interview was conducted in a small room on the first floor in one of the houses in a katra and I was surrounded by a number of young boys and girls, some of whom were going to schools and colleges. In that very first interview that was a collective affair I realized the resentment they felt toward the elite. Some of them were critical of the Western clothes worn by the girls from upper-class families.

Becoming a Dhobi

They tell us that we have no honor but these people have no shame. They wear improper clothes and behave in manner that is not befitting of “good” girls. Because they have money they feel they can get away with anything but it is our girls who have decency and shame. Even when they go to school and college they behave properly. We are poor but we know the difference between good and bad.

This undercurrent of resentment and contempt for the “spoiled rich” came out many times in snatches of conversations. One woman once told me, “Only those who have a car under their bottom are human. We who are poor have no humanity, we are like chattel.” There has been some debate as to the manner in which the lower castes accept their status, that is, if they consider it justified that they are marginal and low in hierarchy. My experience of the dhobis never confirmed an attitude where they accepted their lowliness with equanimity. There was both resentment as well as a critical assessment of the upper castes and classes. There was an overwhelming feeling of moral superiority as compared to the rich. The concept of honor or izzat was very strong and most young women went around dressed in very modest clothes, often with their heads covered. Even today the same norms hold and one will not find a woman from a lower caste working in a public place wearing clothes that would attract attention. In fact at that time they criticized the upper-class girls for their Western clothes and “liberated” way of life. Many young boys told me, “It is because they have money, they can do as they like. But these elite girls have no shame of modesty, like our sisters.” To some extent I had to present myself to suit their sense of values. This was deception of a kind (as I did wear Western clothes in other contexts) that I took pains to wear clothes as near their sense of honor as possible. In my own way this was as near to going “native” as was done by the Western anthropologists when they lived with the so-called tribes. However, I was not particularly successful in this. Before embarking on fieldwork I was instructed by my supervisor to go simply dressed to field. I took his advice to heart and wore the simplest cotton clothes, no makeup and no jewelry. Very soon I was asked “Are you a Christian?” I was quite taken aback and said that I was a Hindu like them. “But then why do you not wear nice clothes (meaning colorful) and ornaments and make up as befits a married Hindu woman.” I looked around at the other young married women, their big bindis, colorful clothes, glass bangles, and often gold and silver jewellery as well and realized how outlandish I must have been looking in my plain salwar kameez, no makeup, and no jewelry look. It certainly corroborated the suspicion they had, that I was very poor. Many of the older people, especially women, looked contemptuously at me for “wandering around aimlessly” and not finding “better employment.”

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In another way it helped them to get more familiar with me as they could not put me in a “upper caste/class” slot, for I did not conform to any of their stereotypes of being one. The only time I came to their katra, in a car with my husband, most of them failed to recognize me and some asked me quite hesitantly the next day “if I was the same person?” I found myself quite embarrassed to say that “yes, it was me.” What intrigued them most was not just the fact that I was pursuing some kind of higher education but that I was left to move around independently by my husband and affinal family. This brings us to the interesting variation in the opinion of the dhobis and of the others, mainly upper castes, about the “freedom” of the dhobi women. While to the other castes the dhobi women appeared independent and “free” (not always in a positive sense), to the dhobis their women never went to any public place alone. Thus they were even more “confined” than the upper-caste women. Since dhobi women do go from house to house and also stand in public places to iron clothes and also go to the ghats (washing areas) on the river banks to assist in washing and spreading of clothes, it might appear strange that they are not considered independent and least of all “free” to move around since apparently they move around all the time. To understand this one must consider the manner in which dhobis consider the separation between the domestic and the public. The work of washing clothes and ironing is considered their household work (ghar ka kaam); any movement associated with it is also within the range of the domestic or ghar. Thus whenever asked, the women would reply we do ghar ka kaam meaning helping in washing and ironing of clothes. No dhobi woman meant by “household” work that of only looking after house and children including cooking and cleaning, a normal assumption of an upper-caste housewife. Thus all the places that this ghar ka kaam took her were seen as within decent limits of the domestic or traditional work. “Outside” would mean an office or a place of public domain or one that belonged to the men, including schools and colleges. Thus my movements were classified as into the public domain and therefore great praises were showered on my husband for “allowing” me such freedom. Many of the more traditional and older people attributed it to my “poverty” (assumed) that compelled me to “go around” in an unproductive business of “inking paper” (kagaz kaala karna). At the same time as I have mentioned, it obliterated the “distance” between me and them; I was one of “them” not those, the upper strata of people. My age and sex did not entitle me to much respect but the fact that I had a husband and a child did protect me as I was seen as “respectable,” even though somewhat “different.” Another unspoken bewilderment was regarding the fact that I ate and drank in their houses. Again to me it was automatic to ask for a glass of water on a hot

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summer day or to say, “Yes” whenever I was asked to eat. This was in accordance with instructions from my teachers to not refuse any food or water in the field as it might “hurt sentiments.” But I was sometimes wondering at their reluctance at times or asking a second time if I really would drink water. Only putting it in context of their untouchable existence was I able to understand why they either thought I was too poor or a Christian to be sitting around with them and also eating and drinking in their homes. My position was thus anomalous and sometimes suspicious, for in the 1970s, and perhaps even now, it would be considered quite inappropriate by the dhobis, that a woman from any respectable family would sit around day after day in their neighborhood and interact with them. However, the bonds of empathy soon developed and whatever they may have thought of me in private, I became an easy part of their lives. I became a confidante of the young women and of the young men as well. They often spoke to me about their doubts, their sufferings, and their internal domestic conflicts. In the process I found myself changing, of getting to know a side of society that had remained unknown till then. Some of it became a relationship of affection and friendship but what had affected me most at that time was the daily struggle of these people in the face of poverty and discrimination. I also learnt that marginal people have their ways of overcoming their handicaps of poverty and discrimination by building up their own contra-culture of resistance. Such resistance exists in their day-to-day language, folklore, and symbolic representation of the “other” even when it does not erupt in visible protest. The sentiments of “shared oppression” are a powerful mode of overcoming the crushing humiliations of day-to-day existence. As soon as the dhobis became accustomed to my presence among them they began to regard me as one of them, as one of their own since I was regarded as poor and “going from house to house” to earn a living. The women would share with me their problems and I would try as much as possible to empathize. One man told me with his eyes full of tears how I “looked just like his mother.” I began to resemble many dead and living kin. It seemed that I had truly “become a dhobi.” It was this feeling that changed my worldview for ever for I had begun to look at the world not from somewhere in the middle but from the bottom upwards. I knew what it meant to sit hungry, to be humiliated in school and college and most importantly to know that those who professed that they were superior were just as human and as vulnerable as anyone else. The dhobis told me that superiority lay in one’s character and moral self and not in swanky cars and fashionable clothes. Not one of them believed that they were actually ritually inferior or degraded beings. They understood perfectly the politics of discrimination and the power of controlling resources. They believed in the messages of Sufism and a religion of love and

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equality. From a person who went as a scholar to study them I became a student myself; a student of life as it is lived from behind a veil of discrimination, a life of courage and struggle and not giving up.

BEING POOR AND MARGINALIZED On an average, money was in short supply in the seventies, especially for those who were still working as dhobis. Apart from the clothes from client households that hardly fetched them any money, few dhobi households had access to commercial clientele like hotels to make a living beyond minimal survival needs. The household work was taken on more for the perks than for the money it fetched them. The long-term hereditary relationships ensured some fringe benefits like interest-free loans, old clothes and books for the children, and an occasional bonanza in the form of an old cycle or piece of furniture. Moreover the dhobis wore the clothes that came to them for cleaning, supporting a popular saying: “The King’s headgear is the dhobi’s loin cloth.” But there was little cash income. Poverty was a way of life and there never was anything to fall back upon. While doing household budgets I found that they had no savings and no security. I remember sitting in the house of a young woman on a hot summer afternoon when she had cooked the rice but could not eat as she was waiting for her minor son to return from collecting money from some clients so that some vegetables could be bought and the meal completed. It was 2’o clock and the meal was yet a long way away. And the dhobis take only two meals a day; there is little by way of titbits in between. Poverty, disease, and death are constant companions and many informants passed away while I was still doing fieldwork. I remember the anguish of a young couple with whom I had developed great affection, when they lost their first baby because of dehydration. The helplessness of the young parents, their inability to provide for adequate medical care, and ignorance as to how to look after the baby was a part of the overall feelings of marginalization. Most young women asked me many questions as to how to take care of their babies and most of them expressed their helplessness to take proper care of the children as most of their time was spent in earning a few rupees by which the home fires could be lit. The older people had a stoic attitude toward bringing up children. In the life histories I collected of older women the mortality rates were tragically high. With expressionless faces they narrated the loss of most living children. The population had managed to remain low because of high rates of infant mortality.

Becoming a Dhobi

The most recurrent complaint of young mothers was that their mothers-inlaw did not allow them to look after their children but to spend all their time doing household work or ironing clothes, both being lumped under, ghar ka kaam. There was a lot of heartbreak when a young child died allegedly due to neglect. The older generation of dhobi women took childbirth and death in their stride. Very few children survived and there were frequent unfulfilled pregnancies. By the time a woman reached middle age like around forty, her body was racked with multiple pregnancies, miscarriages, too much hard work and stress. Most of them had tuberculosis and many reproductive tract disorders.

THE CHANGING WORLD OF THE DHOBIS The 1970s was an exciting time to do fieldwork when a separation had started taking place within the older and younger generations of the dhobis. The latter were the first generation to have received formal education from among this group. At that time, going to college was confined only to boys though some girls went to school at least up to the middle level. The girls were educated with only two goals in mind, that they will be able to write letters and that they will be able to marry an educated boy. The younger women had begun to imbibe values of beauty and of child care, two major transformations in values. The young people of that time were resenting the inscription of caste on their bodies. They wanted to break away from this, to look good, have few children and take care of them properly, to devote time to child care and the care of their own bodies. At the time when my fieldwork was conducted the relationship between the households and the dhobis was still largely hereditary. Since both the dhobis and the population of upper castes like the baniyas2 were residents of this old city for several hundred years, the traditional jajmani kind of relationship was still continuing. The dhobi was regarded as an extended kin and older dhobis would be called by respectful kin terms such as chacha (father’s younger brother) or bua (father’s sister) by the children of the house and by the lowerstatus members like a new daughter-in-law. However, they could only enter the front or back portion of the house but could get nowhere near the interior or kitchen areas. The kinship relation also bound them in many ways and one was that they could never demand a rational price for the work they did. But the security and the fact that the client was a person they could appeal to in time of need and an inertia regarding the traditional relationship made most dhobis knowingly accept rates that they knew were too little. The older generation of that time were happy with their work pattern that gave them “independence” and liberty to work in their own style and pace,

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white collar work was regarded as gulami (slavery), where one had to work under the supervision and dictates of a boss. The younger ones, especially those getting education, would sometimes refer to their elders as boorish and speak disparagingly about their drinking habits. But at the same time they realized that even if they did manage to get jobs and earn some money, they would still not get acceptance in upper-caste society. Students going to college would often tell me how no one from upper castes included them in their peer group interactions. During my visits to their katras I rarely found anyone from any upper caste/class visiting them or interacting with them as friends. This was true for even those rare households that had moved up the social and economic ladder like one family that owned a tire shop in that area and were quite well-off as compared to their community. The son of this well-to-do family got married to a girl from the same community (biradari) who was illiterate and whose parents were poor dhobis like anyone else. The only way in which the groom could climb the social ladder was to modernize his bride the best he could. So when I went to greet her she demurely folded her hand in a namaste but her husband scolded her saying “Now learn to be modern. Shake hands with madam.” I had to shake a shyly offered hand from behind a thick bridal veil. I wonder how much more “modern” she became in subsequent time.

THE WORLD AS VIEWED FROM THE BOTTOM As has been reiterated in many of the papers in this volume (see Mencher, Nandu Ram, Sanal Mohan, and Badri Narayan), the people at the bottom have a different way of understanding their own degradation form that of the upper castes. While many upper-caste people regularly justify the miserable conditions of the life of the untouchables as a result of “those people’s past deeds” meaning past births, I almost never came across a lower-caste person, no matter how old or illiterate, who endorsed this view. They were always quick to retort that they were as good as anyone else, may be better. Again those who perform a particular occupation need not always share the sentiments of upper castes that the occupation is polluting or degrading. Pride in their traditional occupation and skills was a part of the self-consciousness of the older generation of dhobis but the younger ones were subject to greater insecurity and had less confidence in the traditional ways. During the time of my fieldwork the identity of the dhobis was primarily Hindu and Scheduled Caste. Yet, they were quite unperturbed by the fact that the Brahman did not attend to their weddings. “We were created before the Brahmans” was the answer I had received when I enquired as to why the Brahman did not serve them. A question that of course I need not have asked

Becoming a Dhobi

as it is common knowledge that Brahman priests do not serve untouchables and low castes. In a newspaper article I read that Harijans in Kota district of Rajasthan have become literate in Vedic texts to perform the Hindu rituals for their community. As per the news item (Statesman 2005), “At present, there are close to a dozen Harijan priests in the city and they have encouraged others to take up priesthood as a profession. Now, these Harijan priests proudly conduct marriages and other auspicious actions for their community.” As compared to the defiance of the dhobis at the time of my fieldwork, this action to me seems more regressive. It indicates that the Harijans in this context are more eager to prove their Hindu identity by taking on the rituals of upper-caste Hindus while the dhobis were quite happy to do things their own way and did not feel deprived. The focus of their rituals was on community relationships more than on chanting of incomprehensible mantras. Whenever a marriage or even death ceremony took place, drinking and feasting were key activities. The dhobis justified the key role played by alcohol in their culture by their work pattern and the need they felt for social cohesion and warmth of relationships. They were not apologetic and the difference between them and the upper castes was accepted as both inevitable and at least from their point of view nonhierarchical. Because of their poverty and also the requirements of a life of hard work, the only proper nutrition was obtained by eating those parts of the animals like hooves and heads of goats that the upper castes did no eat. Most of the upper castes in North India are vegetarian especially those living near the dhobis in their katras. The dhobis defended the eating of meat and drinking of liquor as essential for survival in their kind of work. “Let these upper castes work in water the whole day and do backbreaking labor and not drink” was mouthed by many. This is line which Mencher (1975) has reported in her paper (see also Bama, in this volume). They also had a collective weapon of having their own worldview about the so-called elite and upper classes of people. Like most other authors in this volume I too believe that those at the bottom certainly do not share the perceptions of those on top and certainly do not believe that they are inferior in any way. Not only did the dhobis have a sense of moral superiority as discussed, they also had their own weapons to counter the hegemony of the dominant groups. The most potent was their access to the inner sanctums of the households where on a regular basis, the dhoban or the woman of the dhobi households would go to collect dirty clothes and also deliver them after laundry. At such times she had enough time to sit and talk about the neighbors to the mistress of the house. The upper-caste women led relatively confined lives as they were not allowed to roam around freely like the dhoban, whose task gave her the largess of the entire neighborhood. Starved of entertainment3 these women would offer

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the dhoban a glass of hot tea and snacks and then enquire about everything that was happening around and every bit of juicy information. The dhoban too hugely enjoyed her power based upon her information picked up on her houseto-house visits. Also, importantly, many of these women ironed clothes the whole day situated at strategic locations. Standing at the street corner they were observant of everything that was happening around. Who was visiting whom? Which girls were secretly meeting their boyfriends down the street? Which house emanated sounds of quarreling between mother-in-law and daughterin-law? How much dowry had been paid for a daughter’s marriage and so on and so forth? Anyone wanting information on any intimate aspect of another household would normally approach the dhoban or the barber. In fact the role of the dhoban, generally for information on women and that of the barber, for information on men, has been accepted to such an extent that people relied on these two for verifying marriage proposals. The barber was used as a go-between and negotiator for marriages and the dhoban, who was restricted in her movements to the neighborhood, could not play this role; she, however, acted as an important provider of information of prospective matches. The dhobis have a code that they imprint with black ink on the clothes of each household as identification. Often these codes or symbols would reflect some detail about the house like the number of daughters or the presence of a gadget like a car. The dhobis often made fun of households and peculiar symbols would indicate “a household whose daughter ran away before marriage” or a household “whose daughter-in-law was barren.” They have accurate assessment about hidden characteristics of a household like their economic status or their spending habits or their cleanliness from the nature and types of clothes that come to be washed. An apparently rich household whose clothes appeared few and shabby was kanjoos or miserly. A household that put out too lavish clothes for ironing or washing were spendthrifts. A housewife who took care to get her linen laundered regularly was good and one who let them become too dirty was slovenly.

IS THERE ONLY ONE HINDUISM? Another debate raised often is regarding the compliance of untouchables and lower castes to higher Hindu values. When asked most dhobis told me that they did not wash clothes of untouchables like bhangis (sweeper caste believed to be lower in ritual status than the dhobis). One woman even told me that “you cannot swallow a fly if you see it.” But many also told me that they do not always ask the caste of the person who gives them the clothes, especially

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“who knows the caste of any one in a hotel or hospital?” Their deference to caste values is also due to their fear of losing the upper-caste clients. The sense of dependency mentioned by Mencher (1975) and fear of losing livelihood often leads the lower castes to mouth agreement to upper-caste values. But at heart they do not care. It is the lower castes that often dwell upon higher Hindu philosophies like the soul having no caste or sex. They also both ridicule and care little about Brahmanical traditions of purity and pollution. But on the other hand it would be erroneous to say that they have no sense of hierarchy. They do recognize class but to what extent they actually pay deference to it is not easy to ascertain. Certainly I found a lot of defiance and counterattack from their side. In private they rarely spoke with respect about anyone who may be powerful or rich. In terms of religious values I found the dhobis following a Sufi or humanistic religion, in the seventies, but today they prefer to overtly subscribe to more Hindu values as an aftermath of the Hindutva movement sweeping the country from the nineties onwards. The most preferred place of worship for them was the mazar (shrine) of Sufi saint Nizamuddin Auliya. Whenever there was a happy occasion or a wish to be fulfilled they would offer a goat sacrifice at the mazar. At the time of marriage two goats, one each for the bride and groom were offered. All dhobi households in the old city had an alcove in the wall, the symbol of Sufism. Each evening a lamp would be lit there. Celebrations of Hindu festivals like Holi and Deepawali and even Karva Chauth were performed with gusto. But a most popular mode of worship was jagaran or a night-long vigil of singing songs in praise of goddess Durga. However the persons who sang these songs were either of low caste or Muslims. The distance between Hindu and Muslim dhobis was less than that between the dhobis and high-caste Hindus. In fact most upper castes would consider the dhobis to be nearer to Muslims than to upper-caste Hindus because of their habits of eating meat and marrying within a closed circle. Thus one may again go back to a question raised and debated again and again as to who is a Hindu and what is Hinduism? Certainly it is not a monolithic structure and more importantly it has an identity besides that of the Brahman. There are numerous groups like the dhobis all over India who regard themselves as Hindus yet would hardly consider the Brahman or the performance of Vedic rituals as central or even necessary to their identity as Hindus (Kapadia 1995 and in this volume). Also, Hinduism itself provides an alternate version of spirituality based on the immortal soul that has neither caste nor sex. Even textual Hinduism regards caste as a this-worldly thing and not something one needs to reach salvation. There is no need to be born into an upper caste to be able to reach God as the paths of bhakti (devotion) are open to all. It is this

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faith that keeps the marginal groups outside of caste hierarchy going on in their belief in a non-hierarchical and benign God.

THE DALIT MOVEMENT AND THE DHOBIS I have mentioned earlier that the seventies were an interesting time to work in this field area; the reason being that I could clearly see the transformations in thinking and lifestyle that were creeping in due to the effects of urbanization and formal education. In this context it would be appropriate to comment on the various debates regarding the Dalits’ worldview and values that have occupied academicians. Omvedt (1994) has summed up the circumstances leading to the precipitation of the Dalit movement in Maharashtra situating it in a specific community and region and a time period. It is important to understand that the Dalits are a product of historical time and space. Instead of debating about whether they are this or that, one should, like Omvedt, attempt to analyze why they are what they are and what makes them think the way they do. And both of these are situated in an interactive time and space. Thus while the Dalit movement emerged out of a confluence of historical situations the fact that the dhobis were yet to identify themselves as a political community was also a situational phenomenon. But one critical difference that I find was that the Mahars had entered into secular occupations as factory workers in a large way. In fact the Dalit movement in the Western region had begun as a labor movement. The dhobis on the other hand were and are still deeply entrenched in their castebased traditional occupation. This itself indicates the time lag for a marginal community as the dhobis since the upper castes of India and also the lower castes in some favored areas like Maharashtra had begun getting educated at least one generation ago (Moon 2001). The dhobis were seemingly unaware of the Dalit movement and did not show any signs of political consciousness. The overall moods were of either acceptance or despondence but defiance had not yet crept in. The identity of being dhobi was important to them as it provided a kind of social security. They were struggling to live with this identity as best as they could since the community provided shelter and security. Their economy was viable as the urban life provided them with sufficient avenues of subsistence existence though none for growth. The dilemma at that time laid more with the educated and aspirant youth who had seen and who desired another life but realized the insecurity and marginality of the existence as dhobis in nontraditional occupations. It was a world to which they had only partial entry for even if they became bank clerks, they realized that they would have restricted entry into the social

Becoming a Dhobi

life of their upper-caste colleagues. At the same time they may lose out on the cooperation of their own community that was a source of valuable support in their struggles of day-to-day existence. If they remained poor and marginal in their traditional occupation and life style, they at least had the support of their community and the security of “shared oppression.” If they broke away they became individuals who would have to find their own footing in a hostile and uncertain world. At that time this was the dilemma that a majority of the youth were facing and therefore I came across very little of the jubilation and aspiration for a better life at the collective level as I read in the autobiography of Vasant Moon. There was an element of “psychic mobility,” an unrealizable level of aspiration, not as much for money as for acceptance into high-class society. Many youth sported fashionable hairstyles and clothes, trying to copy recent superstars of the Hindi screen but they knew in their hearts and also overtly that social acceptance was at best only marginal. Many of them did have some upper-caste friends from relatively poor families but they could never be part of what in the college or in social circles is known as an “elite group.” Even the relatively rich persons had to be content with being bigwigs only within the community, as outside they were still the “others.”

SECURITY OF THE BIRADARI The closed-in living quarters of the dhobis, the Katras, as I have described them, were also a place of security for them. There was a complete sense of belonging within the katra, and it was very difficult to tell who belonged to which household as almost all activities were located in the courtyard. The only time household members segregated was to take their meals at the respective hearths. No one locked their rooms and children were left to be taken care of collectively. Privacy, a value so dear to the Western people was completely lacking among them. They were happy to sleep, eat, and relax in each other’s company and no one wanted to live in a closed house whose walls kept out their fellow kin and community members. With the dhobis I learnt that human companionship was a person’s greatest asset and unity was much more valuable than competition. What seemed to me to be overcrowding was looked upon by them as comforting. An interesting hypothesis that came upon me while I was working with my field data was that the relative security of the dhobis in their traditional occupation was a contributing factor to their relative conservatism including, as I have explained, their reluctance to assume a Dalit identity. Few of the older generation and many of the younger generation also were willing to give up

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their traditional occupation. The reason was that although the caste values of purity and pollution that made the services of the dhobi essential in a traditional upper-caste household were getting eroded there were many avenues in the fast urbanizing and growing metropolis of Delhi that provided alternate and lucrative sources of income for the dhobis. There was a mushrooming of cheaper hotels that needed to have their linen washed; hospitals also had the same requirement. The seventies saw a boom in the export of clothes to foreign markets and the “Export houses” needed the dhobi to wash, iron, and “finish” their products. There were other bulk clientele like army and police uniforms and music bands. Moreover as long as they stayed within the biradari that included their occupation, they were secure that they “belonged” somewhere and were not lost in the impersonal anonymity of the urban city that was growing at a very fast pace, even then.

THE REALITY OF CONTINUED DISCRIMINATION Many years later, in 2007–08, I went back to these people to do a restudy. I was surprised to see that little had changed on the surface. Some katras in Old Delhi had been demolished but many still remained. The houses looked the same but inside there were some transformations. There were televisions and refrigerators in most houses, as were washing machines and driers. The lamp in the ala had been replaced with pictures of Hindu gods and goddesses. They were now more conscious about projecting a Hindu identity and moving further away from their closeness to the Muslim dhobis, whose numbers and katras seemed to have diminished. Yet in spite of some superficial changes, my visit to them in 2007–08 showed that their hopes had by and large not been achieved. It was shocking for me to see that most women, now in their forties looked as haggard, as emaciated and weather-beaten as their mothers and aunts must have looked in the seventies. Many of them must have been children or young girls at that time, but they had not achieved what they wanted to. Their lives were still etched on their bodies and it was mostly a story of a hard life. It is difficult to ascribe it only to lack of money; it is more like a caste-linked lifestyle, values, and priorities that are yet to change. The physical basis of their community, the katras were also under threat from the rapidly urbanizing city. The heavy commercialization of this area made demands that the katras be annihilated to make way for urban commercial structures. The market was swallowing up the housing of the poor and many dhobis were being forced out of their traditional dwellings into unattractive

Becoming a Dhobi

tenements of high-rise pigeonhole flats at various places other than Old Delhi. I visited their new settlements across the river Jamuna in what was then an up and coming residential area (now a thriving satellite city) and found that the old pattern of communal living was being repeated. As far as possible a cluster of households shifted into adjacent quarters so that their relationship networks were maintained. Although their economic status may have improved, their lifestyle had undergone very little visible change. The houses were overcrowded and congested as they always were. But at least some women appeared to be more educated, though dressed more or less similarly as in the past. I met the daughter-in-law of my earlier informant who had given up her job as a schoolteacher to look after her baby boy. This was indeed a great change in mindset as earlier child care was given least priority, while the mother toiled in ironing clothes. But the work of ironing was still being done and quite often by men rather than women. There were some avenues of attaining aspirations as I was told that the sons of one dhobi were champion wrestlers, who had participated in tournaments abroad and won many prizes. Body-building, a favorite occupation of the dhobis in traditional times is now emerging as one avenue where they can get into the mainstream, as sports is emerging as a high-profile social activity. But even now there is a gradation in sports activities, and wrestling, indulged in by rural and low-caste youths is among the least prestigious ones. But one thing was clear that they were surer of their identity and although they recognized the still existing prejudices, they are not ready to give up their traditional occupation easily. It is this occupation that in the urban milieu still provides them with strength and it is the strength of money. There is plenty of opportunity in the modern economy for washing of clothes to be lucrative. The economic basis of their identity, that simultaneously acts as a social disadvantage, has somewhat stifled the dhobi’s political consciousness. Those who have managed to get away and get good jobs are slowly trying to cut themselves off, but with little success. Confusion rather than clarity seems to be the order of the day. And it is confusion for me as well. Where do I stand? I still feel a great sense of bonding whenever I see a dhobi or a dhoban; they are in the anthropological sense of the term, “my people.” But have I really become a dhobi? My sharing of their lives has been virtual, not real. I have neither starved, nor stood for hours in the burning sun to wash clothes. I have not lived in congested overheated houses with children crawling all over. Therefore I would still privilege persons like Vasant Moon who have lived the life of a Dalit to speak about it. I stand at the margins of this existence, having taken a peep yet not really crossing the threshold. This is the limits of an anthropological fieldwork and one has no option but to accept it.

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NOTES 1. 2.

3.

Apart from me, the only other PhD dissertation till date, on a low caste was one done on the sweeper caste. Baniyas are the caste of trades and shopkeepers and they constitute the native population of Delhi, along with the Brahmins and the Kayasthas and the low castes and the Muslims. This demography, however, is now almost completely transformed with Delhi being populated by a largely cosmopolitan crowd. In those days the television had not attained the status is has now. It was mostly black and white and carried only state-run programs.

REFERENCES Kapadia, Karin. 1995. Siva and her sisters. Boulder: Westview Press. Mencher, Joan P. 1975. On being an untouchable in India: A Marxist Prespective. In Beyond the myths of culture: Essays in cultural materialism, ed. Eric B. Ross. New York: Academic Press. Moon, Vasant. 2001. Growing up untouchable in India. New Delhi: Vistaar Publication. Omvedt, Gail. 1994. Dalits and the democratic revolution. New Delhi: SAGE Publications. The Statesman, December 30, 2005, New Delhi.

Section III Religion and Gender

EDITORS’ NOTE In this section we have included those papers that mount an intellectual criticism against the upper castes, not only in praxis but in theory as well. There is an attempt to reverse the symbolic violence of control over intellectual resources and the privilege to the “analysts” while the others remain as informants or data. The Dalits present their own analysis of society, its hierarchies, and what they perceive has been the historical misrepresentation of the Dalits. They counter the stereotypes and the upper-class historiography, coming out with a perspective that is firmly situated at the bottom, therefore privileged to be “non-ideological.”

Chapter 10

Dancing the Goddess: Possession and Caste* Karin Kapadia

Yes isn’t it strange how the Sami comes only to those two women, the wives of the muppans? We must be made of lesser stuff, that’s why she never possesses any of us! Pandaiyee (Pallar)

Unlike belief in the evil eye (dirusbti) which is pervasive in all the castes, the phenomenon of possession (pudiccikkiradu) exhibits a distinct caste and gender differential. My argument here will focus primarily on the implications of this caste and gender differential. However, an intriguing class differential also emerges, especially in relation to the identity of those who become possessed by the Supreme Goddess. I will first argue that the phenomenon of possession, in its various manifestations, provides further evidence for my claim that the lower castes do not share upper-caste assumptions regarding ritual purity. Although the uppercaste religious ethos, embodied in the practices of the Brahmans and Chettiars, emphasizes ritual purity and the necessity for the correct performance of ritual, the emphasis of the religious ethos of the Muthurajahs and Pallars is not on ritualism but on devotion. This lower-caste ethos claims that a supreme deity like Mariyamman or Murugan will only possess a person if that person—who is usually male—has “purity of heart” and true devotional love for the deity. Ritual purity is of secondary importance: It is merely necessary so that the person can be a fit vehicle for the deity. Consequently, certain simple measures (involving vegetarianism, chastity, and extreme cleanliness) are taken by the person seeking to be possessed. But it is devotion—bakti—that counts above all. * Excerpted from Karin Kapadia. 1995. Siva and Her Sisters: Gender, Caste and Class in Rural South India. Boulder: Westview Press.

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However, though the lower castes do not share conventional upper-caste assumptions regarding the primacy of ritual purity, such purity is a means to an end, not an ultimate principle, in both groups. The lower castes also believe that one must be pure to be possessed by the deity but though their notion of purity includes Brahman-style ritual purity, this is not what it stresses. Instead, the stress is on bakti-style purity of heart. The influence of bakti, or devotional Hinduism, is so pervasive in Tamilnadu that even many Brahmans would probably agree with the lower castes that devotion counts above all else. However, Brahmans generally express their devotion in a controlled, ritualistic manner. This allows the lower castes to argue—as they do in Aruloor—that Brahmans lack the humility and self-abandonment required for “true” religious devotion. Thus, what is essentially a difference of emphasis between lower- and uppercaste religious ethos is sharply stressed and rephrased in lower-caste discourse so that it is perceived as a dichotomy between the “true devotion” of the lower castes and the “mere ritualism” of the upper castes. The religious discourse of the lower castes rejects the claims of the higher castes. It claims—and regularly demonstrates—that Deity descends to possess those of the most humble caste because Deity is concerned not with any temporal purity hierarchy but rather with devotion, love, and purity of heart—values that the ideology of caste hierarchy entirely discounts.

TYPES OF POSSESSION The state of possession (“pudiccikkiradu,” “being caught”) is well known in Aruloor and occurs frequently in a multitude of forms. It is, however, not a commonplace state, and whenever it occurs, it evokes great interest and often (in a benign possession) deep respect. Possession is, very broadly, of two sorts: either possession by a benign deity (sami) or possession by a demon or evil spirit (pey). The first evokes respect; the second, fear. Lingustically, the two categories are clearly distinguished by the upper castes (Brahmans and Chettiars). They use the term “pudiccikkiradu” (“catches”) for possession by an evil spirit but the term “vandudu” (“comes”) for possession by a benign deity. So a benign deity “comes” to a person, but a demon “catches” a person. However, the lower castes (Pallars, CPs, and Muthurajas) distinguish far less sharply between the two terms, for they speak of both benign and malign spirits, “catching” a person. They also use the term “adradu” (“dances”) and speak of both evil ghosts and benign deities “dancing” when they are in possession of someone. Finally, like the upper castes, they also use the term “comes”

Dancing the Goddess

(vandudu) for benign possession. This means that the lower castes use all three terms for benign possession, but the upper castes use only one, namely “comes.” As we will see, this difference is directly related to the religious styles adopted by the upper and lower castes. Although benign and malign possessions constitute the two principal categories of possession, each has further subdivisions. I will primarily focus on the various forms of benign possession. First, I will briefly note what the various categories are; they are quite clearly delineated and differentiated in non-Brahman discourse but sometimes get blurred from one category into another in practice. Following the local description, they are as follows: 1. The state of temporary possession or spontaneous possession by either a benign deity or an evil spirit. 2. Institutionalized possession or hierarchized, inherited possession by benign deities, which has considerable political importance. 3. Possession by a benign deity while “putting alaku” (“alaku podradu”) that is, “wearing” various metal objects pierced through one’s body.

WOMEN AND TEMPORARY POSSESSION Significantly, temporary possession is considered unimportant, particularly in comparison with institutionalized possession. This is because it is of short duration, because it is not hereditary, and possibly because it affects women, too. It appears that the fact that women can have it automatically devalues this category of possession. Further, it is usually women, not men, who are believed to be spontaneously possessed by evil spirits. It was felt that women were more liable to be possessed by pey “because” as a Pallar informant explained, “they are weak and cannot resist the pey, as men can. That’s why it’s usually women who are possessed by pey at festival, not men.” She added, “A person is always possessed by a pey of the opposite sex for male pey desire to possess women while female pey desire to possess men.” For this reason, pey are regarded as the sexual partners of those whom they possess. Both Muthurajah and Pallar informants agreed on this. However, among upwardly mobile lower castes, the Brahmanical view that women are more vulnerable to possession by pey because they are “less pure” than men also existed. In this upper-caste perspective, women are less frequently possessed by benign deities because they are impure beings, being polluted by menstruation.

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INSTITUTIONALIZED POSSESSION Because this kind of possession is hierarchized and inherited from father to son, I have called it “institutionalized possession” (as Dumont also did; see Dumont 1986). By “hierarchized” I mean that both deities and possessed are ranked. The higher deities are incarnated in the wealthiest men, and the lower deities are incarnated in less wealthy men. The Muthurajah caste are, by far, the biggest caste group in Aruloor. At a major festival in the Muthurajah Three Streets, I saw the clearest manifestation of institutionalized possession. Several important and wealthy men of this caste were hereditary sami-adi (god-dancers). In contrast, in the Pallar street in 1987, there was only one hereditary sami-adi left. “Sami-adi” is the term used for a man who has inherited the ability to be possessed by a deity. These possessions normally occur at the annual festivals of the deities concerned, when, by possessing the sami-adis, the deities manifest themselves. The ability to be possessed confers great prestige because it indicates the superior moral virtue and purity of the person who is possessed. Consequently, to be a sami-adi is to have considerable status in one’s community. Further, as we shall see, the institutionalized possession embodied in the tradition of the sami-adi provides a focus for local rivalries and power politics.

DIVINE GRACE AND WEALTH The most significant aspect of sami adradu (god-dancing) or institutionalized possession is the striking fact that there is a close correspondence between economic wealth and divine possession. In short, social status and divine grace appear to go together. Ganesan, the sami-adi of Mariyamman, the supreme deity, God Herself, was the richest man in the Three Streets, possessing more land than anyone else (about twenty acres). The hereditary position of samiadi had been in Ganesan’s family for several generations, so, too, had their dominant economic power. Ganesan was a quiet, reserved man, but he could afford to maintain a low profile because everyone in the ur (community) knew he was a man not only of great wealth but also blessed with the special grace of Mariyamman; he was her chosen vehicle, her sami-adi. The other three goddancers of the “watchman” gods were also landed and comparatively wealthy. Several Muthurajahs in the upwardly mobile Three Streets were still very poor. None of them was a sami-adi. In the Pallar ur, too, the very significant fact of this correspondence between earthly power and divine grace was equally apparent, but there, it was publicly commented on and sneered at, the Pallars being more brutally frank than the Muthurajahs.

Dancing the Goddess

POSSESSION IN THE PALLAR STREET In the Pallar street, the only sami-adi left was Ramaiah, the elderly sami-adi of Mariyamman. At the head of the street stood the goddess’s temple, and ten years earlier, this street had been called Mariamman Koil (Temple) Street. Here, too, the sami-adi-ship had passed from generation to generation, and the family of Mariyamman’s sami-adi was one of the two or three wealthiest in the community. Ramaiah was a well-built, grey haired man in his sixties. He showed little interest in the legends of Mariyamman and did not seem to know much about them. His lack of interest cannot be faulted perhaps, for all the other sami-adiships in the Pallar street had become defunct. No sami-adradu (god-dancing) had occurred in Periyar Street for more than fifteen years, it was said. This may have been due to the ascendance, in the previous 10 years or so, of Pechimuthu, a man of considerable wealth and great influence. As a very active member of the atheistic DMK party, he not only got himself elected as Ward Member for the street but was also vice president of the Aruloor Town Panchayat. But Pechimuthu had always shared power with another street-boss, Mani. Apparently not so atheistic, Mani took an interest in organizing the major Pallar religious festivals. Mani, Pechimuthu, and Ramaiah (the sami-adi) were, in fact, the hereditary muppan (three leaders) of the street. Traditionally, Pallar communities had had three village headmen, who, in turn, had two assistants. So these three were the modern triumvirate, though Ramaiah was much less important than the other two. Obviously, neither Pechimuthu nor his wife could be possessed by a deity, given his affiliation and prominence in a political party dedicated to atheism. Nor did Mani ever become possessed. But, most strikingly, the wives of both Mani and Ramaiah became regularly possessed, both of them by the Great Goddess herself. For instance, Valliammal, Ramaiah’s wife, had very recently become possessed when she learned of the “uncleanliness” of a woman recovering from chicken pox. An infuriated “Marlyamman” had warned the woman’s husband that they would be punished if they did not perform the necessary purification rituals following recovery from the disease. Valliammal may have been worried about the spread of infection to her neighboring house. Meanwhile, sharp-voiced Sellaiyee, the wife of Mani, ensured that she was “possessed” by Mariyamman at every festival. I use quote marks here because my Pallar women friends effectively did so when they sneered about Sellaiyee’s divine shenanigans. Faith in the divine possession of the wives of the two muppan was virtually nonexistent; skepticism abounded. A discussion on the issue with Marudambal on her open porch became an open, satiric attack on the two self-proclaimed vehicles of the goddess. Marudambal, who was in her fifties, was generally on her porch when not at work in the fields. She was both a noted satirist and an

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acute commentator on the social scene in the Pallar street. She had just heard about Valliammal’s outburst “as Mariyamman” and promptly reenacted it for us. “Hooo!” Marudambal-as-Valliammal cried: “Haaa! You filthy man! You unclean thing! You refuse to give me the offerings that are my due, do you? You refuse to purify your wife? Repent, wretch, or I’ll punish you both: go to Samayapuram without delay, or else! Hooo! Haaa!” Ending her performance to applause, Marudarnbal described how the frightened young man had fallen to his knees in front of Valliammal and promised to take his wife to Samayapuram at once. Her appreciative female audience laughed, and at this open display of contempt for the “false” Mariyammans, Pandaiyee, a quiet woman, gathered her courage and called out from in front of her house across the street, “Yes, isn’t it strange how the Sami comes only to those two women, the wives of the muppans? We must be made of lesser stuff, that’s why she never possesses any of us!” Marudambal gave a delighted cackle and shouted back: “Oh yes! Of course the Sami only possesses the muppans’ families! What’d the Sami want with us?” Her irony was not lost on the members of her audience, who chuckled and grinned knowingly. They had had to put up with—and show respect to—Valliammal (now in her late sixties) and Sellaiyee (now in her fifties) for many years. It was a pleasure to get a dig at their “divine” cavorting. I was told that when Sellaiyee became “possessed by Mariyai” at the Somavararn festival and threw out her hands and swayed from side to side, the other Pallar women were so exasperated by her “performances” that not one moved to catch her. “And she’d have fallen in the mud—it had been raining—if her own daughters hadn’t rushed to catch her. No one else could be bothered!” Pallar skepticism with regard to possession is wide-ranging, for several Pallar women were also contemptuous of the possessed Pallar men who took part in the festival for the goddess Periakka on Panguni Uttiram day in 1987, as we shall see.

POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS Possession, in the non-Brahman context, is essentially an exhibition, or display. It is a manifestation of a deity’s power and grace. It is also a demonstration of the possessed person’s claim to moral status in a society where moral status carries an enormous value. Further, possession, in this context, is generally a demonstration of the social prestige of a caste-group and is testimony to the ability of the group to cooperate and to organize. In other words, alakupossession, which is “large-scale” possession because it normally consists of at least four or five men becoming possessed by a prominent deity, is a very major public event. The audience forms the largest part of the alaku procession as it

Dancing the Goddess

winds its way around the village. Demonstrating the religiosity and the organizational strength of the caste concerned, the event embodies a public political claim to both ritual status and social status. Thus, the alaku-procession is implicitly a political demonstration; in the subtle cultural contestation that continues between castes in Aruloor, it issues a caveat to other castes while it simultaneously provides a powerful rallying point for its own members. I will now turn to the phenomenon of the lower-caste affiliation of virtually all forms of possession. In investigating why it is primarily the lower castes who become possessed, I will also show what Savitripatti meant when she stated that “only the Sudra” (non-Brahmans) had the courage to wear alaku.

POSSESSION AND CASTE The Upper-Caste View The last fire-walking (ti-midi) event in Aruloor had occurred more than fifty years ago. In the agrakaram (Brahman street), Savitripatti was one of the few old people who remembered it. A huge pit, measuring more than twenty feet in length and six feet in breadth, had been dug at the bottom of the agrakaram, just outside it. The pit’s location was significant, indicating the permission and approval of the Brahmans, while distancing them from the pit because it was not actually in their street. Also, it stood at the road entrance to the Brahmanic Siva Temple; therefore, the temple’s approval was indicated as well. This was the only occasion on which Savitripatti ever saw ti-midi—and she never forgot it. Normally, fire-walking is done at noon, when it is hottest, “in order to make it even more gruelling,” said Siva. But the historic Aruloor firewalking had occurred at night. Savitripatti remembered it vividly: Praying to Draupadi, the patron-goddess of firewalkers, many, many Sudra were possessed and walked across the coals, fiery-hot in the night. It was unforgettable: I saw little children, grasping the hand of mother or father, walk across, entirely unhurt and even babies were carried across, in the arms of their mothers. Throngs of people went across, all praying all unscathed. I was deeply impressed. No, no Brahmans walked—we lack the courage. These people, the Kudiyanar [Muthurajah] and other Sudra have far more courage than us—that’s why it’s only they who pierce themselves with alaku.

Savitripatti’s assertion was certainly considered true by most Aruloor inhabitants, for her exact words were used by the Muthurajahs themselves: “We have more courage than the Brahmans!” But they also added what she would certainly not have said: “We have more true devotion to God! That’s where our

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courage comes from. The Brahmans are only words and pretence—they claim to be the most religious of all, but have you ever seen a Brahman ‘put’ alaku? No—because they never do. They—and the Chettiars, who are like them—have no true faith in God.” That was how both Muthurajahs and Pallars explained the fact that possession was essentially a lower-caste phenomenon. A Pallar woman put it this way: “We have true feeling for God so She comes to us readily. The Brahmans don’t really love God, they only pretend to: It’s a business proposition for them.” But the upper-caste gloss on this was very different. As Palani Chettiar said, “It’s their style of worship, that’s all. We don’t believe in such an extrovert style. We believe that God is within us and that God responds to true devotion. But our style is quiet and restrained—we disapprove of throwing yourself around and losing control of yourself there’s no need for all that.” Palani Chettiar was implying more than that the lower castes (kil-jadi) had just a different style; he was indicating that although the Chettiars (and Brahmans) chose the path of self-control, the lower castes chose the opposite path of the complete abandonment of control. Significantly, the body symbolism of both groups is consistent with their religious ethos. The self-control of the upper castes is displayed in their bodily immunity to penetration and possession by external beings, while the opposite is true of the lower castes. These differences correspond to the attitudes of the two groups to ritual pollution and to emotional self-control. Thus, the lower castes saw their “abandonment” as a surrendering of self to possession by God, but to the Chettiars and Brahmans, this was dangerously close to “mere” abandonment and “mere” freedom from restraint. It was dangerously close to anarchy. Both the social position and the style of life of the communities concerned is therefore mirrored in their modes of possession. The Pallars have a comparatively more egalitarian relationship between the sexes because Pallar women support their families as much as Pallar men do. Consequently, unlike highcaste women, Pallar women were possessed in public, both in Aruloor and in Mallarchipuram. Possession, as Palani Chettiar critically implied, allows the individual to briefly throw off social restraints and norms “because he is possessed by the Goddess.” This public display of otherwise “uncouth” and wild behavior is cherished by the lower castes, which normally have to behave cautiously and deferentially, even today, in the presence of their landlords and paymasters. The Muthurajahs are currently upwardly mobile, which partly explains the complete exclusion of women from their possession festival and reflects the fact that Muthurajah women are being increasingly secluded. But the Muthurajahs, though caste-Hindus and not “untouchables,” rank only just above the Pallar in the village hierarchy; consequently, they, too, seemed to exult in the brief throwing off of social bonds.

Dancing the Goddess

Both Chettiars and Brahmans told me that they had never heard of a caste member who had “worn” alaku—it was just not the “done thing.” As Devayanai Chettiar, the refined and gentle wife of Aruloor’s richest Chettiar, said, “Wearing alaku is lower-caste behavior—that’s why no Chettiar would ever do it. Yes, there may well be Chettiars who have been possessed by God, but this would happen quietly, with no great fuss.” She had, however, heard of a young male relative who had carried pal-kodam (a milk-pot, to “bathe” the deity’s image with, at the end) in order to obtain a son, but this was a most rare occurrence. With the Brahmans, too, I was told that alaku-“wearing” was never done “because you don’t need that kind of exhibitionism if you are genuinely devoted to God.” But from Devraj Aiyar, one of the two Pancangam Aiyar who ministered to the lower castes, I learned that his son-in-law had promised to carry pal-kavadi (milk-pots hanging from a wooden frame) for Murugan “because his only son was dangerously ill.” The boy had improved, and so his father (Devraj Aiyar’s son-in-law) had fulfilled his vow by walking with lowercaste devotees in their festival procession to Murugan’s shrine in his village. Uma my Brahman friend, was extremely surprised to learn of this and stated that it was the first case of a Brahman carrying pal kavadi that she had ever heard of. When pressed, Devraj Aiyar also admitted: “Yes, it’s very rare for Brahmans to do this, but in his village the Brahmans do carry pal-kodam from time to time. But they would never pierce themselves with alaku.” This brings me to the arguments of Fuller (1988) and Parry (1994) regarding the relation between the religious ideologies of high and low castes. Fuller, finding that Brahmanic religion denies that non-Brahmans have any meaningful existence in the world, argues that complementary hierarchical relationships are actually negated by the model of the Brahmans’ ideal society, symbolized by the Sanskritic deities (Fuller 1988: 34). He observes, “In opposition to this, village deities symbolize the hierarchical interdependence of caste. . . . Thus it is not Sanskritic, but village deities—mainly worshipped by the low castes—who provide the model of and for a hierarchical world” (Fuller 1988: 35). I disagree. My arguments throughout this chapter have stressed that no such validation of hierarchic values is provided by lower-caste religion. On the contrary, through its very emphatic insistence on the primacy of religious possession and on the preeminence of devotion and “purity of heart,” not purity of caste, this religious ethos implicitly challenges caste values, a challenge that becomes entirely explicit in the discourse of the enormously popular Sabarimalai pilgrimage. Parry’s examination of spirit possession and exorcism (1994) comes to a conclusion that is very similar to Fuller’s, for he says: “For the exorcists and the victims the whole procedure must be authenticated by the Brahman’s authority. . . . As with the set of ideas which accounts for who gets possessed in the first place. The hierarchical order is thus resoundingly validated by the tenets of

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those it demeans.” In Tamilnadu, however, no Brahman priest would even go near an exorcism of an “untouchable” who was possessed by a malign spirit. In Aruloor, and very widely in Tamilnadu, Brahman priests have nothing whatsoever to do with the exorcism of spirits afflicting the lower and the “untouchable” castes. Instead, both low-caste Hindus, such as the Muthurajahs, and “untouchables” such as the Pallars, are served by low-caste mantiravadi (diviners) and udukkai-drum beaters who specialize in the exorcism of pey and dealings with the spirit-world. It may be true that for much of North India, exorcisms have to be validated by Brahman priests, but this is simply not true of the ethnography of Tamilnadu. Clearly, the positions of Brahman priests in North amid South India differ considerably in this regard: Consequently, lower-caste spirit possession and exorcism in Tamilnadu do not authenticate the hierarchical order; they form a universe that is entirely separate from the sphere of Brahman activity.

POSSESSION AND BELIEF The upper castes were not very enthusiastic about the possession-practices of the lower castes, particularly their wounding of the body and spectacular alakuwearing. However, no Brahmans or Chettiars ever said that they thought that the lower castes were faking their possession; rather, they evinced interest in and respect for the practices. So it is ironical that it was in the very lowest caste, the Pallars, that skepticism about possession was revealed on a mass scale. In April 1987, on Panguni Uttiram day, the Pallars celebrated their Periakka festival: The feet of all the possessed men and the sole woman (Sellaiyee, Mani’s wife) involved were duly washed with water by women onlookers in the Pallar street, who fell at their feet in ritual worship. Several months later, however, when inquiring whether the festival would recur in a year’s time, I was startled to be scornfully told by several Pallar women that all the possessed participants in the Periakka festival had been humbugs. These “humbugs” included not only the man who had carried Periakka’s karagam (sacred pot) and been possessed by the goddess herself but even the man who, possessed by the warrior-god Madurai-veeran, had stood on a knifeedge throughout the procession. At the time of the festival, I clearly remembered being told that his ability to stand for hours on a knife-edge, without cutting his feet, was “proof” of the deity’s power. But now, a very different perspective was being presented. One woman said, “It’s easy enough to stand on the aruvaledge because it’s very blunt and broad and rusty. They don’t sharpen it, that’s the trick—they just stand on the mottai [blunt] edge. So it’s not a miracle at all!’ In effect, these women were saying that every Pallar who had become possessed that day had faked it. “Look at Angaras, drunk every day! D’you think a

Dancing the Goddess

sami would think him fit to possess? Of course not, not a drunken rascal like him. Yet he was ‘possessed’—and we all had to bow to him!” The women argued that not a single man—and certainly not Sellaiyee, the sole woman—had been worthy of receiving a deity because all the men were drunkards or blackguards and Sellaiyee was an arrogant, conceited fraud. I was stunned because the event had been the grandest religious celebration in the Pallar street in one and a half years, and at the time, it had evoked a most enthusiastic response. The extreme skepticism and outright disbelief expressed here were, however, typical of the Pallars. They were, on all occasions, more willing to talk openly than any upper caste, whether the subject was their neighbor’s sexual misdemeanors or faked religious possession. This skepticism is a striking example of how ideas and beliefs change with context even within the same caste. In some contexts, the Pallars appeared to believe in the possession of their sami-adi. They had seemed to do so, for example, when they had knelt in the street in front of them. But in other contexts, they were skeptical of these possessions. Further, they did not disbelieve in possession altogether, for they had been very impressed by the possessions of those who had “worn” alaku at the big Murugan festival. Rather, they seemed to think that the particular possessions exhibited by their kin and neighbors, in their own street, might have been fraudulent. It is also significant that these criticisms were only voiced long after the event. Similarly, in the Three Streets, some Muthurajahs did not believe, in the possessions of their institutional god-dancers either; otherwise, they would not have threatened to smash Mariyamman’s karagam if the rival faction organized a karagam festival. Yet these Muthurajahs visited temples and performed religious rites, too.

POSSESSION AND GENDER One of the most striking contrasts between Brahmanical religion and popular, lower-caste non-Brahman religion is the radical difference in their understandings of the nature of Mariyamman, the Great Goddess. Mariyamman is normally understood to be unmarried: in the Brahninical view, this automatically makes her an “angry,” sexually overheated goddess who is unable to “cool” herself because she lacks a divine husband with whom to have sexual intercourse. This view is prominent in the myths of Meenakshi of Madurai (another form of Sakti/Parvati), who is described as having been angry and uncontrolled until she was subdued by and married to Sundaresvarar (Siva) (see Fuller 1980). However, contrary to this view, in the non-Brahman perspective, Mariyamman does not need a male god to control her. For non-Brahmans, Mariyamman is not, like Meenakshi, merely a most powerful consort of Siva. She is entirely

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“complete,” for she is the Supreme Deity herself. In local myths, she may or may not have a husband (he is usually called Vembadian in Aruloor), but he is, in any case, entirely subordinate to her. She is the autonomous ruling power of the universe—and she is, to people in Aruloor, as infinitely wise as she is powerful. We will have no difficulty in understanding this female representation of Supreme Deity if we do not essentialize gender. For in the popular, common understanding of God in Aruloor, God/Mariyamman is female in her powers but also male in her infinite wisdom. She is supremely wise, beneficent, good, and tender—though she is also angry with sinners and destroys the wicked. She is God Herself—both female and implicitly male. So, she, too, is androgynous in gender, just as Sanskritic Divinity in its wholeness, in the unity of Siva and Sakti, is represented as being androgynous. And just as Tamil men are, when they are divinely possessed. Thus, the preeminent iconic form of this discourse is the androgynous Deity. The Brahmanical image of Siva-as-Half-Woman implicitly underlies the possession discourses of Aruloor’s upwardly mobile castes. But Siva Ardhanari is replaced in the religion of lower-caste Tamils by the icon of the Great Goddess, Mariyamman, who by her autonomous and absolute power, implicitly shows that she unites both infinite “male” Wisdom and inexhaustible “female” Energy. In both Brahmanical and lower-caste discourses, “God” is androgynous and doubly gendered. With the Brahmanized groups, the stress is on God’s “maleness,” but what Aruloor’s lower castes celebrate and sing is the “femaleness” of God.

REFERENCES Dumont, Louis. 1986. A South Indian Subcaste. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Fuller, C.J. 1980. The Divine couple’s relationship in a South Indian temple. History of Religions 19: 321–48. ———. 1988. The Hindu pantheon and the legitimation of hierarchy. Man (n.s.) 23: 19–39. Parry, Jonathan P. 1994. Death in Banaras. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Chapter 11

The Bible and Dalits* James Massey

In his Hindi translation of the New Testament in the early 1960s Yesu Das Tewari used the term Dalit, to render the Greek word tethrausmenoi (“oppressed” or “downtrodden”) in Luke’s account (4: 18–19) of the sermon at the synagogue in Nazareth in which Jesus proclaimed the “year of the Lord’s favour” and declared his own jubilee ministry of bringing good news to the poor (din jano), release to the captives (bandio), recovery of sight to the blind (andon) and liberation to the oppressed (dalito). Subsequent Hindi translators of the New Testament have followed this lead, which has helped to popularize the term among Christian groups who are fighting for the rights of the Dalits. An intriguing connection has also been drawn between the Sanskrit root dal, which we mentioned earlier, and the Hebrew root dal, whose meaning is to hang down, to be languid, weakened, low, and feeble. Because Sanskrit and Hebrew belong to two different linguistic families—the Indo-Germanic and the Semitic—some scholars would describe the linguistic connection between the two roots as mere coincidence. Be that as it may, a reading of some of the fifty or so passages in which the Hebrew root dal appears in the biblical literature can shed some fascinating light on the situation of Dalits in India today. The fact that Indian biblical scholars, translators, and interpreters have not previously taken note of the parallel between what the Old Testament is talking about and the workings of the caste system can be explained by the contextual nature of all biblical interpretation. The training of these Indian scholars has been European, particularly British; and whatever concern they have shown for relating the biblical message to the Indian context has largely been limited to what are considered the great world religions of India. For most part they have ignored the context of the masses of Indian people, which the Dalit concern addresses.

* Excerpted from 1997 Downtrodden: The Struggle of India’s Dalits for Identity, Solidarity and Liberation, W.C.C. Publications, Geneva, Risk book Series.

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While dal in the Old Testament is often understood as “poor” merely in terms of the economic status of certain people, some interpreters have gone beyond this in an attempt to understand the situation more deeply. For example in an essay on the term “poor” in The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, C.U. Wolf writes: They are those whose prosperity and social status have been reduced. In this respect they are the opposite of the rich (Exodus 23: 3; 30: 15; Leviticus 14: 21; Proverbs 22: 16). In physical strength, in psychological ability, they are also impaired and helpless (Job 34: 28; Psalm 82: 3; Jeremiah 40: 7; 52: 16). The important point made here by Wolf can also be applied to the situation of Dalits in India. That is, the dal are not only economically and physically poor or weak, but they are poor in their “psychological ability”; indeed, their being has been “impaired” to such an extent that they have become “helpless.” If we turn now to some of the texts themselves, we may perhaps deepen our understanding of both the biblical context and its application to the situation in India. We shall divide this brief selection into four points, citing a number of texts in each case (using the English of the New Revised Standard Version and italicizing the word used to translate the root dal). (1) The existence of “Dalits” was part and parcel of the life of the people of the Old Testament. Both the presence of and the concern for the Dalits were not merely abstract matters of sociological or economic fact, but part of the total reality of life which one encounters every day. Exodus 30: 15 provides that “the rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less, than the half-shekel, when you bring this offering to the Lord to make atonement for your lives.” In the long speech with which he concludes his defense of himself, Job says: “If I have withheld anything that the poor desired, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fall . . . then let my shoulder blade fall from my shoulder, and let my arm be broken from its socket” (Job 31: 16–22). And Psalm 82, a plea for justice attributed to Asaph, urges: “Give justice to the weak and the orphan; maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked” (vv. 3–4). (2) As part of everyday life, the reality of dal has different shades of meaning. A literal, descriptive sense of the word is found in Genesis 41: 19, where Pharaoh tells Joseph of his dream, which foretold famine in Egypt: “Then seven other cows came up . . ., poor, very ugly and thin. Never had I seen such ugly ones in all the land of Egypt.” The word can also describe someone’s physical appearance. For example, in the horrifying story of the rape by David’s son

The Bible and Dalits

Amnon of his half-sister Tamar (2 Samuel 13), the scheming Jonadab plants the idea of how to attack Tamar by asking the lovesick Amnon, “O son of the king, why are you so haggard morning after morning?” (v. 4). The book of Ruth uses the term in the economic sense, when Boaz says to Ruth, who has sought his protection, “May you be blessed by the Lord, my daughter . . .; you have not gone after young men, whether poor or rich” (3: 10). A political connotation of the term is evident in 2 Samuel 3: 1: “There was a long war between the house of Saul and the house of David; David grew stronger and stronger, while the house of Saul became weaker and weaker.” In other passages, one finds an even stronger link between the status of the poor and political power. Proverbs 28: 3 says that “a ruler who oppresses the poor is a beating rain that leaves no food”; verse 15 of the same chapter adds: “like a roaring lion or a charging bear is a wicked ruler over a poor people.” More positively, Proverbs 29: 14 links the qualification of a good ruler with the justice he renders to the “Dalits”: “If a king judges the poor with equity, his throne will be established forever.” Finally, there are some passages that establish a direct relationship between God and the Dalits. Isaiah’s song of praise to the wonderful works of the Lord (Ch. 25) includes these words: “You have been a refuge to the poor, a refuge to the needy in their distress, a shelter from the rainstorm and a shade from the heat” (v. 4). A similar theme is found in one of the psalms of David, which begins, “Happy are those who consider the poor the Lord delivers them in the day of-trouble” (Ps.: 41:1). (3) The existence of “Dalits” is the consequence of forces and processes in society which have affected certain people. Several of the Old Testament passages which go into the question of how people become “Dalits” take the form of tragic laments sung on their behalf: They will give back the fruit of their toil, and will not swallow it down; from the profit of their trading they will get no enjoyment. For they have crushed and abandoned the poor; they have seized a house that they did not build. (Job 20: l8f.) Do not remember against us the iniquities of our ancestors; let your compassion come speedily to meet us, for we are brought very low. (Psalm 79: 8)

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Those who oppress the poor insult their Maker, but those who are kind to the needy honour him. (Proverbs 14: 31) Lord, do your eyes not took for truth? You have struck them, but they feel no anguish; you have consumed them, but they have refused to take correction. They have made their faces harder than rock; they have refused to turn back. Then I said, “These are only the poor, they have no sense; for they do not know the way of the Lord, the law of their God.” (Jeremiah 5: 3–4) Here we have cited a few of the passages in the Old Testament in which the term dal is used for a section of the people of God. Many other incidents and stories in the Bible disclose the process by which certain people have been reduced to a state of “dalitness.” Perhaps the earliest direct biblical reference to the idea that certain occupations are lower than others—and thus to the evil of untouchability—is found in Genesis 46: 34, where Joseph tells his brothers that all shepherds are abhorrent to the Egyptians. Subsequently, the account beginning in Exodus 1: 8 records how the Egyptians tried to turn this shepherd community into a community of nonentities by forcing on them “every kind of field labour” (Exodus 1: 13). Later, when under Moses’ leadership God liberated this untouchable shepherd community, they in turn treated other communities more ruthlessly, reducing them to a state of “dalitness.” A number of Old Testament stories illustrate this. For example, the book of Joshua tells how the Gibeonites were forced to become “hewers of wood and drawers of water” for the Israelites (9: 27). The book of Judges illustrates more prevalent means of reducing defeated people: communities such as the Canaanites and the Amorites were obliged to do forced labor for the Israelites (cf. Judges 1: 28, 30, 35). The passages cited above further testify to the ongoing oppression against “Dalits.” The verses from Job 20 are part of a longer narrative in which Zophar, one of Job’s friends, makes some observations about the wickedness of the powerful oppressors and their methods of oppressing others, including the poor

The Bible and Dalits

(dalim). Verse 19 makes special reference to the oppression which the Dalits must submit to: they are left alone after being crushed, and even their houses are taken over by the oppressors. The prophet Amos names these oppressors more explicitly. Denouncing the wealthy people of Israel, he says that they “trample the head of the poor into the dust of the earth” (2: 7). Even rich women play the role of oppressors against the dalim (4: 1). The prophet speaks to them in scathing terms on behalf of the Dalits: Hear this, you that trample on the needy, and bring to ruin the poor (ani) of the land, saying, “When the new moon be over, so that we may sell grain; and the sabbath, so that we may offer wheat for sale? We will make the ephah small and the shekel great, And practise deceit with false balances. Buying the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, and selling the sweepings of wheat. (Amos 8: 4–6) How low a level the Dalits had reached in Amos’s day is evident from this passage: one could even buy and sell them like commodities, for a few silver coins. In the second passage quoted earlier, the Psalmist addresses his whole community as Dalit. This is like saying, “The whole of the Indian Christian community is composed of Dalits”—a point to which we shall return in greater detail in a subsequent chapter. Of course the Psalmist says that his community’s sinking to this low estate is a result of the past collective sins of their ancestors. In the passage from Proverbs 14, the author identifies God the Creator with the treatment of the Dalits: to oppress the community of the dal he says, is tantamount to oppressing and insulting God himself. Perhaps the most poignant reality of “dalitness” is evident in the final passage quoted above from Jeremiah: the difficulty of changing their state. One may even beat them, but they feel no pain. So unconsciously have they accepted their Dalit state that there is almost no way for them to be restored: this is the bitter truth in Jeremiah’s words, “these are only dalim, they have no sense.” To what extent is this the case with the majority of Dalits in India today? (4) Some passages link the present plight of the Dalits with a messianic message of hope.

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Finally, we may look at a few texts which may be said to contain a “messianic” message because they point to a future liberation for the Dalits. But if he is poor and cannot afford so much, he shall take one male lamb for a guilt offerings to be elevated, to make atonement on his behalf, and one-tenth of an ephah of choice flour mixed with oil for a grain offering and a log of oil; also two turtle doves or two pigeons such as he can afford, one for sin offering and the other for a burnt offering (Leviticus 14: 2I f.; see also Lev. 5: 7; 12: 8; Luke 2: 22–24). A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse. and a branch shall grow out of his roots. The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him . . . His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide by what his ears hear: but with righteousness he shall judge the poor. and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked. Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist, and faithfulness the belt around his loins. (Isaiah 11: 1–5) On that day you shall not be put to shame because of all the deeds by which you have rebelled against me; for then I will remove from your midst your proudly exultant one, and you shall no longer be haughty in my holy mountain. For I will leave in the midst of you a people humble and lowly. They shall seek refuge in the name of the Lord. (Zephaniah 3: 1l–12) The passage from Leviticus refers to an offering which was to be made as a sign of recovery or cleanliness by a person who had suffered leprosy. According to the Mosaic law, such a person was considered as unclean or “untouchable”; the word used in Hebrew for such a person in Leviticus 14: 21 is dal. Reading these verses from Leviticus 14 alongside Leviticus 5: 7 and 12: 8, we find that a poor person who has committed a sin but cannot offer a standard offering for

The Bible and Dalits

it may also bring “two turtle doves or two pigeons” (5: 7). The same is also the case for a poor woman who is considered unclean or untouchable for a certain period after bearing a child. If she cannot afford a standard offering for her purification, she may also offer two turtle doves or two pigeons (12: 8). Thus an ordinary poor person, a poor woman after childbirth and a person afflicted with leprosy are all considered on the same level—and these are all dal. From the passage in Luke 2 we learn that Mary, the mother of Jesus, offered two turtle doves for her purification after the birth of Jesus. This offering of Mary brings her Son closer to complete solidarity with the Dalits of this world. The second passage cited above, from Isaiah II, is one of the prophecies which has been taken to refer to the coming of the Messiah, fulfilled in Jesus Christ (cf. Acts 13: 221; Rom. 15: 7–13). St Paul says in Romans 15: 12 that this “root of Jesse” will enable people who are considered “Gentiles” or “pagan” (those who are outside the chosen race) to glorify God, and he will rule over them as well. Isaiah II gives a summary of the divine kingdom of the future on this earth. The one who rules this divine kingdom will be the just ruler, who will not judge by what he sees or hears, but will judge the dalim with righteousness. The point is that from the beginning God’s plan for the liberation of human beings included especially the liberation of Dalits. In the third passage, quoted from the prophet Zephaniah, the prophet hints at the entire liberation of the Dalits. In that final liberated state, the meaning of the term Dalit will change. Its negative connotation will turn into a positive one. Believers and true followers of God will be known as ani wadal (humble and lowly). So, according to the prophet Zephaniah, a time will come when not only people who consider themselves in our context as Dalit will be wholly liberated, but even the term Dalit itself will be “liberated” and given new meaning.

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Chapter 12

Rediscovering God: Iyothee Thassar and Emancipatory Buddhism G. Aloysius

The single most consciously designed, consistently worked out, thoroughly debated and well-publicized case of the Dalit-subaltern collective emergence in religio-cultural subjectivity in modern India is, of course, the movement led by Ambedkar in 1956.1 The dimension of self-emergence whether manifested or implied in this collective act of the Dalit-subalterns, in all its intensity, is conceptualized in the by now well-known saying of Ambedkar, “I therefore solemnly assure you that though I have been born a Hindu, I will not die a Hindu” (Sangharakshita 1986: 61) and later, “I renounce Hinduism which is harmful for humanity, and the advancement and benefit of humanity because it is based on inequality and adopt Buddhism as my religion”(Ibid: 40). Here, in this public rite of passage to religious adulthood, the Buddhism of yore was sought to be revived not in its “purity,” but instead, retaining and valorizing the core egalitarian-rational message of the Buddha, in the changed social and political circumstances. Moving away from the traditional sectarianisms of Hinayana and Mahayana, a Navayana (alternatively called “engaged Buddhism”) was posited as the “new vehicle” of religio-social self-expression and emergence of the caste-oppressed masses. Such a dynamic reconstruction unlike in the other religions neither distorts the Buddha’s message nor its historical tradition. On the contrary, it has been mandated by the Buddha himself. The unparalleled yet uncontested advice of the Great Teacher is that one ought not to accept anything merely on the authority of anyone even if it be that of the Buddha himself, but to investigate it with one’s own reason and to accept it only if found truthful to experience and beneficial to humanity. If the historical Buddha condemned ascriptive discrimination and emphasized moral conduct in the context of rising Brahmanism, the contemporary Buddha too, positively abhors and repudiates the system and spirit of colonially valorized caste; and he has made the fraternal and egalitarian

Rediscovering God

transformation of the social world as his foremost mission.2 The spirit of fraternal egalitarianism and that of rational-scientific enquiry, both premised upon the ever-changing nature of all reality, as his core message, make the Buddha, the “enlightened one” of the modern times and the message, the call of the authentic “enlightenment” for the whole of humanity. In his new incarnation, the caste-oppressed common people of India have found an authentic and liberating modernity, and in his message a route to their own subjectivity and identity. The historic act of 1956, however, is to be seen as the culmination of a whole series of collective search of about a century in different parts of the subcontinent. The details of these early, multiple, and scattered quests have not been properly documented, much less researched and their implication even less realized.3 The most significant of such forerunners is a group of Dalit-subalterns of the southern India, centered around one Iyothee Thassar (1845–1914), a Tamil savant, Siddha medical practitioner and sociopolitical activist some fifty years before the mass diksha at Nagpur. The story of the Dalit-subaltern thrust, toward an inclusive religio-cultural subjectivity, affecting also, the conceptualization and configuration of the larger polity and society at least of the Tamil cultural region, has been documented and interpreted in detail elsewhere.4 And this is not to be repeated here. Only a few salient points of emergence, illustrative of the general pattern laid out in the previous section, and as expressed in the thought, articulation, and activity of Iyothee Thassar, will be highlighted. In brief, the modern Tamil Buddhism became a reality with the formation of Sakaya (and later South Indian) Buddhist Society in 1898 under the charismatic leadership of Iyothee Thassar with the support and encouragement of Colonel Olcott of the Theosophical Society. The movement did not take much time to capture the imagination of the Dalit-subaltern communities in the northern—Chinglepet, Madras, Arcot, Kolar, Bangalore and Hubli—districts of the Madras Presidency and also to spread overseas to Burma, Sri Lanka, Fiji, Malaysia, and South Africa where the subaltern Tamils had migrated as laborers. In these far and near places, branch societies were established, viyarams constructed and new socioreligious communities formed. A regular weekly journal Tamilan published by Iyothee Thassar from the headquarters in Madras knit the different communities together. Socioreligious and polemical tracts proliferated from the pen of the Pundit and his colleagues and were distributed in thousands. The Buddhist Press and the Gautama Press in Madras and the Siddahartha Press later in Kolar Gold Fields became the rallying point for the propagation of the new social and religious worldview and ideology. The movement, though basically a response of the Dalit-subaltern communities to the colonial contradictions, sought to embrace in the typical Buddhist fashion, the entire society. The associates of Iyothee Thassar were drawn from all castes

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and communities as well as different walks of life. The movement was multipronged in its ideological thrust: attempted a systematic and historical deconstruction of the dominant Hindu religious premises, esoteric interpretations and exclusivist cultural practices; proposed a compassionate and all-embracing alternate worldview; and sought to drastically revise and modernize the textual as well as traditional Buddhist religio-cultural practices. The substantial issues of this ideological and organizational intervention included struggle against the social irrationalities of valorized Brahmanism, casteism and religionism, rediscovery of the original and casteless Tamil/Dravidian or Buddhist identity, construction of a rational-religious philosophy and practice and a reinterpretation of the subcontinent’s religio-cultural history. The movement flourished and peaked during the second and the third decades of the previous century. However, with the ascendancy of the political, through devolution of power in subsequent years, its trajectory became refracted from the religio-cultural; and in the forties, Tamil Buddhism largely transformed itself into the foundation of the emergent Dravidian Nationalist Movement as well as the Ambedkarite political formations such as the Labour and Republican Parties.5 Iyothee Thassar and his colleagues, though belonging to the Parayar caste which came to be considered and treated as one of the lowest and most polluting, had been, as many such others, partially and unequally inserted within the Tamil Vaishnava tradition. Through their traditional knowledge as well as formal training in the Tamil language and literature they had access to its religio-philosophical lore, the most important of which was Advaita in its local version. Their first faltering steps in modern organization for self-emergence were around this concept of Advaita, the formation of the Advaidhananda Saba at the Nilgiris. The group, however, interpreted the “classical” and orthodox concept in a modern and heterodox manner as an expression of their own existential aspiration and hope. The theory of non-differentiation was applied to the discriminatory social reality and it was argued that caste differentiation had no basis in reality and that humanity is non-differentiated. This was against the orthodox view that differential natural elements dominate the different caste/ varna groups.6 In 1892, on invitation, Iyothee Thassar participated in the annual conference of the Madras Mahajana Sabha, as a representative of the Parayar community, and pleaded for democratization of the traditional religion: “We have heard that God and temples are common for all castes of the world. If that is so, why people of this community following Vaishnava or Saivite tradition cannot be allowed to enter Vishnu or Shiv temples. By so allowing them, won’t they prosper through mutual love and the religions also be strengthened?” Like so many similarly positioned Dalit-subaltern ideologues, Iyothee Thassar too started within the religiously given and moved more than half way toward cooperation with the

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religiously entrenched. The expectation was that with the new organizations such as the Indian National Congress and the Madras Mahajana Sabha, modernity has dawned in the subcontinent and the attitudes and orientations of the leaders at least would have changed towards universal inclusion. In fact one of the objectives of the Advaidhananda Sabha was to arrest the growing exodus to “other” religions. His loyalty, attachment, and commitment to the religion of his birth received an instantaneous and rude shock at that moment. As he continues to report, “Then immediately all of them unanimously stood up and started shouting that they should not be so allowed within temples. Then the delegate from Tanjore, Mr Siva Rama Sastri stood up and objected that for your community we have given gods like Madurai Veeran, Katteri, and Karuppannan; and gods like Shiva or Vishnu do not belong to you!” The rejection was swift, unanimous, and unwavering. Rejection however did not have the desired effect of subduing the dalitsubalterns. Under the new circumstances it only served to radicalize them. Iyothee Thassar set out to think of the reason behind such a vociferous and almost violent resistance from the entrenched castes. Sustained investigation into history, culture, and literature brought him to the conclusion that the unanimous reaction on the part of the Brahmanized was not because of any meaningful notion of purity–pollution, or such other presumably religious practices, but it was because of the Buddhism of yore. The untouchables being outcastes in the literal sense of existing outside the caste system, really had been followers of the casteless and morally unified path of the Buddha; and that the Parayars, as one of the few communities that had held on longer to the teachings of the Buddha, became the most shunned, hated, and even feared of all communities. The Brahmin–Parayar social standoff is thus seen as due to their contradictory religio-ideological commitments. Resistance to their templeentry by the Brahmans was again because of the fear that the Parayars might recognize “their god” within, and claim their lost right and status in religion.7 In confirmation of this historical insight, Iyothee Thassar observed that in several temple festivals of the Tamil cultural region (perhaps elsewhere also), the Parayars who are normally considered as polluting are given symbolic preeminent status in recognition of their earlier dominance and prominence in the sacred realm. This concrete “historical” discovery based on the bitter personal experience of rejection led Iyothee Thassar to move on to a more generalized understanding of history and culture in the subcontinent: that what appears today as tradition in the realms of culture and religion is not the genuine truth of history, instead a distorted picture. The earlier intellectual-moral consensus under the integrated influence of Buddhism has been sabotaged from within and the meanings of religious beliefs and practices came to be distorted beyond recognition.

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The agency responsible for such a phenomenon came from without. They are the same social groups who today cling on to and justify their sectional and ascriptive privileges in the name of religion. This understanding became the master key to deconstruct the current symbols, rituals, beliefs, and practices; reinterpret and also reconstruct the entire past in the course of self-emergence; and erect a new sacred canopy. It was a eureka moment for the small band of men gathered around Iyothee Thassar. For, with this new insight, the puzzles of history, at least most of them seemed to fall in place. The innumerable popular religious myths, beliefs, and practices and the general folk and oral traditions of the subcontinent, appearing to be connected to one another and adding up to a meaningful coherence only through Sanskritic-Shasthraic Brahmanism, now looked different from this new angle. All these were indeed grounded in an earlier and morally universal-truthful unity of Buddhism. Further research on the Tibetan, Burmese, and Ceylonese popular religious lore and practices with assistance from the visiting bhikkus and scholars, the study of the Pali language, Tamil philological investigations and a reading of the Madras-based Orientalists led to the confirmation, elaboration, and enrichment of Iyothee Thassar’s interpretative writings. This was a collective retracing of steps in folk memory and history in search of the original, authentic, and hence the genuine; and in the context, the Pundit and his colleagues legitimately argued that their turn toward Buddhism was indeed a return and in no sense a rupture with history or “conversion” in the usual sense of the term. It was a rediscovery and a self-recognition; it was also the first step in reclaiming their lost subjectivity. It was a turning away from bondage to freedom, from darkness to light. It was on such an understanding of continuity in culture and history that Colonel Olcott of the Theosophical Society came forward to assist the group. If authenticity is fundamental to the experience of subjectivity, then adherence to the repeated saying of Iyothee Thassar becomes crucial to the process of emergence: that one ought to retrace cognitively the path, through which one became degraded, in the instance, a religiously legitimated untouchable; and having epistemologically and historically deconstructed one’s current status, one could then turn to the ethical steps to be taken in the same direction to regain one’s self. This obviously is a confrontational as well as creative process. Iyothee Thassar is advocating a form of social catharsis (Freud) or critique of ideology (Marx) or critical hermeneutics (Habermas), as the first inevitable step towards Dalit-subaltern emancipation, which at the same time would engender a morally unified larger society. It is a collective social psychoanalytical process of “going back” whose function in the emergence of the suppressed groups is indispensable. As a pragmatist and an existentially rooted intellectual Iyothee Thassar did comprehend and even support the impulse and the need of the vast number of

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people taking to the shorter and easier route of emancipation, that is, conversion to another and more conducive religio-cultural weltanschauung. However, as a critical, creative, and socially responsible ideologue he insisted on the ideal and authentic course of cognition and action to be followed in which the individual, sectional, and societal liberative processes coincided. Thus liberation and the emergent subjectivity of individuals and sections will also become sustainable through the new moral consensus in culture. Indeed it was this emphasis on the authentic and the ideal, implying a certain puritanism and a good measure of change in attitude and conduct that prevented Iyothee Thassar’s formulation from becoming popular. But again it is for that very reason the message is special and insightful as a future trajectory. Iyothee Thassar’s formulation of and turning toward Tamil Buddhism, though owes much to his personal scholarship as well as leadership, was a collective and consultative process. In the newly burgeoning urban space of Madras scores of Dalit-subalterns conscious of their representative character had gathered together to make up their mind collectively about their religiocultural future and decided to appeal to Colonel Olcott for help in the matter. Such an autonomous step did not go unchallenged not only by the Brahmans but also a section of Dalit-subalterns themselves. The controversy was carried on in the newspapers and the confrontation continued all through the initial stages of the movement. Certainly concerted action by the Dalit-subalterns, taking advantage of the colonially erected umbrella of juridical modernity, but independent of the dominant-traditional leadership was a new and daring phenomenon and as such was resented and the supporting individuals were charged with abetment. Ever since he turned to Buddhism in 1890, till his death in 1914, Iyothee Thassar had to continuously explain, interpret, and justify his formulation of the new rational religion not only to his many adversaries but also to his numerous followers and sympathizers. This very process, carried through the medium of the journal Tamilan and scores of booklets, helped in the clarification and reasoning out of beliefs and practices, but also strengthened the collective resolve of the emerging group to forge ahead in their chosen path. The comprehensive and collective hermeneutical exercise led by Iyothee Thassar gave the participants a new confidence vis-à-vis the traditional religious interpreters. The Dalit-subalterns everywhere, particularly in Chennai, Kolar, Bangalore, and Thiruppathur engaged themselves in polemics and controversies concerning the meaning of terms such as God, religion, morality, and also of the popular religio-cultural practices. In turn both the Brahmanized and the Christians accused them of having turned godless at the instance of their material wellbeing through education and employment. The Dalit-subalterns’ incomplete immersion within the Brahmanical religion gave them access to the historically suppressed meanings and distorted practices. The situation however

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was complicated by the fact that the Europeans were also spreading a hegemonic Judeo-Christian version of God and religion. In such a context, the specific thrust of these emerging groups, informed and inspired with the Buddhist message and sources, was to offer an alternative and authentically indigenous meaning to the native religio-cultural universe. The controversy around the term “God” is the best example. In the colonially surcharged atmosphere of the late nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries, the debate centered around theism and atheism, monotheism and polytheism, and image-worship and imageless-worship mainly within the Western cultural framework. In all these, the Nationalists who were revalorizing Brahmanical Hinduism were on the defensive while simultaneously transforming their own notions to conform to the Western and Judeo-Christian mode. The nascent group, however, came up with a new meaning and interpretation of God, which was at once rationally acceptable and authentically Indian. Accordingly, in India, the term refers primarily in the plural, to those men and women, who through their own morally right conduct toward their fellowmen and the society at large, have become immortalized in history and beacon of light for subsequent generations; as an ideal, the term also is an invitation to all, to similarly raise themselves morally to the status of the Divine; veneration of these gods is neither out of fear nor for favor but a celebratory remembrance to strengthen one’s own resolve to become like them; and that the homage paid to the images particularly during the festivals should not be confused with worship in the established sense. Within such a discourse it is possible to discover elements of a religion that is at once collective-ethical and rational-transcendental. The discourse on God is but one among the several, successfully elaborated by Iyothee Thassar. In the course of collective self-emergence and if religion was not to be opium, hermeneutics alone was not enough; the harsh realities of economy and politics need to be intercepted and reoriented. Hermeneutics must be a guide to action. Action was initiated first in the realm of the critical. The mysterious and the miraculous as demonstrations of divine agency, have always been the weapon of the religiously dominant to keep in abeyance the mass-agency of the common people. The occurrence of these had become rather frequent in the early twentieth century. The members of the group took it up as part of their religious duty to visit and examine the reported miraculous events and debunk and explain the truth behind them: milk-drinking idols, fire-walking and hook-swinging were performed in non-religious context to highlight the human skills involved in these for the education of the gullible. Under the leadership of Iyothee Thassar new forms of birth, marriage and death ceremonies, collective festivals, worship-patterns, and elementary moral code, duly rationalized and democratized were developed for the use of the emergent ideological community.

Rediscovering God

The general tendency in these religious reforms was in the direction of simplification, avoidance of the priestly domination, and pragmatic flexibility. Membership to this community was open to all and sundry with this basic condition, however, that the aspirants ought to renounce the alien and hence harmful social belief and practice of ascriptive discrimination—caste. The Buddha and his message as developed over the centuries within the arts, literature, culture, and the medical practices of the Tamil region, in its specificity was retrieved and projected through the journal and a series of pamphlets. The Buddha of the modern Tamil Buddhist configuration, expressive of the identity and subjectivity of the Dalit-subalterns was neither fully revivalist nor orientalist nor indeed ahistorical. The person and message of the historical Buddha suffused with all that is best in Tamil culture and history was critically resurrected through the agency of the Dalit-subalterns for the emulation of all. In the secular spheres the thrust was toward education, diversification of occupation, share in the bureaucratic employment, and political representation which was the same as for all similarly positioned social groups across the country. While the worldly objective of earning more money to eat, clothe, and in general live better was very important, the underlying ideological premises of experience of freedom, equality and self-respect were paramount in the calculations of the newly enlightened. Iyothee Thassar with the help of Colonel Olcott set up five schools in the city specifically for the Dalit-subalterns. It was from these schools that the first generation of leaders and ideologues emerged. The importance of literacy as the cure for ignorance and knowledge of medicine for bodily pain has been well-recognized within the Buddhist traditions and the same looms large and developed highly within the cultural universe of the Tamils. Elements of language and elementary principles of morality are learnt simultaneously in the Tamil tradition; similarly the practice of the TamilSiddha medicine goes hand in hand with a critique of ascriptive discriminations. These, in popular memory as well as in academic conclusions, owe to the labor of the ancient Tamil Buddhists. The vast and more than two millenniaold living tradition was traversed and explored by Iyothee Thassar to produce source materials for constructing the modern version of the Tamil Buddhism. The late colonial period witnessed a proliferation of organizations with the declared objective of the uplift of the “depressed classes,” in the spheres both of the sacred and the secular. These organizations were manned exclusively by the so-called upper castes; their goals were defined and prioritized by them; and in these, the Dalit-subalterns figured merely as the mute recipients of some fringe benefits, in lieu of the social change they expected and demanded. Iyothee Thassar consciously and consistently rejected these apparently benevolent interventions on behalf of the marginalized castes: he condemned them in

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unambiguous terms, that these were but efforts by the dominant caste people, at new methods of profit-making in the name and at the expense of the Dalitsubalterns; he also pointed out that whenever the Dalit-subalterns took initiative and looked up to them for support on specific issues, they had backed out and betrayed the people; more generally he argued that genuine uplift is always self-uplift and that no one can uplift another, for if one can so uplift, one can also pull down the other. He proceeded further with a remarkable insight that any ameliorative efforts for a group of people, having identified and isolated them as “depressed classes” would defeat the very purpose and have the opposite result of confirming them in the state of being depressed almost permanently. Iyothee Thassar challenged the very notion of the “depressed classes” and demanded to know in what sense the Dalit-subalterns were more depressed than the Brahmanized castes of his day, except for the fact that the latter willfully and systematically suppressed the former. He found the Brahmanized and the Brahmanical mentally, morally, and culturally more depressed and even demented as they were clinging on to anachronistic beliefs and obscurantist practices. In comparison to them he found the missionaries and even the colonial government, well-meaning in their ameliorative efforts. Iyothee Thassar elaborated that since it was through their inhuman caste/varna scheme and spirit that the Dalit-subalterns were depressed, the greatest help and support they could render was to put an end to the devious system and thus cease to be an obstacle in the way of freedom and liberty. He however could recognize, appreciate and cooperate with several “upper” caste individuals who showed signs of renouncing caste in public life. Emergence in subjectivity was not a simple and unreflexive activity for Iyothee Thassar and he relentlessly exposed hypocrisy whenever he confronted it in the public sphere whether sacred or secular. Appeals were made to the larger society, to the leaders of other religions and the opinion-makers in general to read the signs of the times, recognize the anachronistic nature of caste discrimination, give up caste beliefs and practices and join the struggle of the emerging Buddhists. Representations were made to the colonial government on various issues connected with the secular emergence of the Dalit-subalterns. Infringement of rights was not to go unchallenged anymore. The issues of injustice to the Dalit-subalterns, when brought to the notice, were taken up with the authorities. The newfound medium of print was exploited effectively in order to highlight, publicize, and rectify wrongs committed against the Dalit-subalterns, gaining further self-confidence and authority in the process. The medium was also used for communication as well as communion in the construction of the new symbolic world.8

Rediscovering God

For the small band of ideologues, emergence in and through Tamil Buddhism was not a single-stroke affair, but a continuous and relentless struggle. It was a struggle to maintain as well as to carry forward the process of emergence. Retaining the Dalit-subaltern subjectivity and agency in the face of formidable opposition was a perennial problem. In the wake of a general renaissance of Buddhism, many and sundry came forward in the recovery and reestablishment of the teachings of the Buddha, even in partnership with the nascent group. However, in explicating the essence of the message, the difference of opinion ran wide and deep along the expected caste lines. Iyothee Thassar and his colleagues insisted that renunciation of caste as ascriptive discrimination, a life based on right mind, speech, and conduct understood in a uniform sense across castes and all-embracing egalitarian compassion are the non-negotiable of the Buddha’s teaching. At this, many returned to set up counter and competing Buddhas and resuscitate alternative Buddhisms that would not demand any change or sacrifice. In addition to the traditional religious practice of turning the Buddha into one of the numerous avatars of Hinduism, Iyothee Thassar had to contend with “atheistic” and “scientific” Buddhisms being propagated among the Dalit-subalterns. Generally too, during the late colonial period Buddhism was taking shape as yet another religion in the commonly understood sense with a sacred language, canonical texts, a priesthood with interpretative authority, and a prescriptive set of rituals and practices. The bhikkus who came from different parts of the world, often at the invitation of Iyothee Thassar had the tendency to conduct themselves in the manner of priests of other religions, overriding or denying the hard-won subjectivity and agency of the common people. When the latter resisted, the new casteless Buddhism was isolated as spurious and not in tune with Tradition. Iyothee Thassar time and again had to explain that Buddhism was not a religion like any other, that by subjecting himself and his message to the rational criterion, the Buddha had undercut the very principle and formation of orthodoxy and that the role of the Bhikkus was not parallel to that of the purohits and priests. And even when the traditional elite was constrained to acquiesce to the egalitarian presence of the Dalit-subalterns in the civic-public sphere, resentment against their initiative in the world of the religio-cultural continued for long. Finally, if struggle for modern subjectivity is also a quest for a collective identity, then the emancipatory project of Tamil Buddhism has also something to offer. Under the colonially valorized Brahmanical casteism, the dalit-subalterns were considered an inferior form of beings incapable of self-reflexivity, articulation, and autonomous self-actualization. If self-respect and dignity were demanded as rights for the country as a whole, it was not considered a logical necessity to assure equality for all within. The right for self-representation by

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Dalit-subalterns as having a stake in the creation of a casteless society was bitterly challenged and resisted. In the name of a newly discovered “inclusive Hinduism” they would have to accept the status of being represented by others. The rhetorical question has been: Can the subalterns speak? The Dalitsubalterns accordingly were given a name, an identity: the avarnas, the Shudras and the ati-shudras, the untouchables, the depressed classes, the Panchamas, and the outcastes. In the Tamil region, they were referred to also by their individual caste-names. However, in modernity a given identity based on a single or multiple objective cultural markers is a misnomer and no identity. Under the specific circumstances of modernity, the element of voluntariness and subjectivity enters the construction of identities, making it a process of self-identification; a self-directed and determined act or a series of acts. The Dalit-subalterns, therefore, of the northern Thamizhagam in the course of their self-emergence, were also in search of a name and identity. Iyothee Thassar repeated time and again that the names given by the opponents are degrading, signify an inferior status and that the emerging group ought to reject them. For there were some even within the subaltern groups who presumably for tactical reasons argued for continuance of the given identity but with a different connotation. But Iyothee Thassar pointed out that the new emergence from passivity to activity or subjectivity requires the rejection of the externally imposed identity indicating the newly acquired/achieved status equal respect and dignity. What is however remarkable with the position of Iyothee Thassar on this question of identity for the Dalit-subalterns is that he insisted on an open-ended identity, an identity in which theoretically and ideologically everybody is welcome within the fold, provided of course, one abides by the basic precondition of giving up the belief in and practice of ascriptive discrimination—caste. He even had a bitter controversy with R. Srinivasan, another wellknown leader of the dalit-subalterns, also a relative of his. The latter argued that they all were the degraded Paraiahs, while the former asserted that they were the dignified Tamils, the original and casteless, and that the rest merely half, that is, casteized Tamils. Iyothee Thassar also suggested that they were Dravidians, but more precisely, non-caste Dravidians. Either as a Tamil or as a Dravidian, castelessness, however, is the most crucial component of one’s own self-identification. And since the ascriptive, discriminatory, and degrading caste-identity is “other-determined,” the now freely chosen self-identification will be conduct-based and egalitarian; and in contrast to the other-imposed insulatory identity, self-identification will be open-ended, that is, ideologicalspiritual and potentially universal. Since this is all Buddhism is about, the Dalitsubalterns above everything else are Buddhist.

Rediscovering God

CONCLUSION In the wake of modernity, the numerous oppressed groups of the subcontinent have been shaking off their sociocultural passivity and political stupors imposed from without, by the religion-legitimated caste/varna, and are struggling to emerge in the public-political sphere. Their emergence, conditioned by their existential circumstances, though fragmented, has been multifaceted. The above narrative has highlighted the religio-cultural dimension of the situation, identifying four strains within it: strategic acquiescence, defiant reconstruction, crossing over to another, and total exit. Of these, the first and the last options have not been problematized as they are not significant for the purpose on hand, which is to underscore the closest approximation to the theoretical ideal. And of the remaining second and the third, defiant reconstruction of the given religio-cultural universe has been elaborated at length and valorized not only as the model best approximating the theoretical passage to modernity but also as that which assures continuity with tradition, as recovery of self, individual, and corporate. Iyothee Thassar’s emancipatory project of Buddhism, perhaps as of several such others yet to be researched and interpreted, illustrates well both the theoretical paradigm and the historical pattern, delineated above.

NOTES 1.

2.

3.

4. 5. 6. 7.

Though there is no dearth of literature on the topic, narratives and interpretations from a proper perspective have not been many. Sangharakshita (1986) and G. Omvedt (2003) are the most readable accounts. There have been different evaluations of the Buddha’s attitude toward caste by the Orientalists. The Buddha certainly derided ascriptive discrimination and preached and practiced castelessness; on the other hand he emphasized the importance of morally right conduct in individuals. Herein lies the core of modernity whish the Dalit-subalterns have appropriated in their discourse. These have been surveyed, classified and to an extent interpreted in skeletal form in G. Aloysius (1998). See P. V. Bapat (1971) and G. Omvedt (2003). See also S. Jondhale and J. Beltz (ed.) 2004. The following account is based on my book (1998). For detailed references and documentation see this work. This paragraph is taken from G. Aloysius (2000a). Such an interpretation was not however unique to Iyothee Thassar, but could be found within several other similarly positioned groups, see Ayrookuzhiel (1996). Iyothee Thassar`s studies in history led him to conclude that the temple-tradition in India originally had belonged to Buddhism and subsequently been taken over by Brahminism. Though the latter had transformed its substance, most of its forms

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8.

have been kept and continued. Here IyotheeThassar merely recalls and deploys an insight prevalent among the early historians of India. See below for elaboration on the theme of distortion in Indian history. For the theoretical significance of the development and spread of language and communication in creating a larger and egalitarian political community, see, E. Gellner (1983), B. Anderson (1993) and K. Deutch (1953).

REFERENCES Aloysius, G. 1997. Nationalism without a nation in India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. ———. 1998. Religion as emancipatory identity: A Buddhist movement among the Tamils under colonialism. New Delhi: New Age International Publishers. ———. 2000. Caste in and above history. In Nation and national identity in South Asia, eds S.L. Sharma and T.K. Oommen, 151–74. Hyderabad: Orient Longman. ———. 2000a. Transcendence in modern Tamil Buddhism. Religion and Society 47 (2): 35–50. Ambedkar, B.R. 1945. What Congress and Gandhi have done to the untouchables. Bombay: Thacker & Co. Anderson, B. 1993. Imagined communities. London: Verso Editions. Ayrookuzhiel, Abraham. 1996. Chinna Pulayan: The dalit teacher of Sankaracharya. In The emerging Dalit identity, ed. W. Fernandez, 63–80. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute. Babb, Lawrence A., 1972, The Satnamis: Political involvement of a religious movement. In The untouchables in contemporary India, ed. M.J. Mahar, 143–52. Arizona: The University of Arizona Press. Baird, Robert D. ed. 1981. Religion in modern India. Delhi: Manohar Publications. Banerjee, Sumanta. 1999. Aulchand to Sati Ma: Institutionalising the syncretist KartaBhaja sect in 19th century Bengal. In Organisational and institutional aspects of Indian religious movements, ed. J.T. O’Connell, 180–214. Delhi: Manohar Publications. Bapat, P.V. 2500 Years of Buddhism. New Delhi: Government of India. Bayly, Susan. 1988. Indian society and the making of the British empire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Berger, Peter. The social reality of religion. London: Faber and Faber. Bocock, Robert and Kenneth Thomson, eds. 1985. Religion and ideology. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Campbell, Colin. 1999. The Easternisation of the West. In New religious movements: Challenge and response, eds B. Wilson and J. Cresswell, 35–48. London: Routledge. Capps, Walter H. 1987. Society and religion. In The encyclopedia of religion, vol. 13, ed. M. Eliade, 375–85. New York: Macmillan. Chadwick, Owen. 1985. The secularization of the European mind in the nineteenth century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chakravarthi, Uma. 2004. Is Buddhism the answer to Brahminical patriarchy? In Reconstructing the World: B. R. Ambedkar and Buddhism in India, 186–202, eds S. Jondhale and J. Beltz. New Delhi: Oxford University Press.

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Dangle, Arjun, ed. 1994, Poisoned bread. Hyderabad: Orient Longman. Deo, Fanindam. 1999. Institutional and organisational aspects of Mahima Dharma. In Organisational and Institutional Aspects of Indian Religious Movements, ed. J.T. O’Connell, 137–52. New Delhi: Manohar Publications. Deutsch, K. 1953. Nationalism and social communication. Massachusetts: MIT Press. Dharmatheertha, Swami. 1941. The menace of Hindu imperialism. Lahore: Har Bhagawan. Dube, Saurabh and Ishita Banerjee Dube. 2003. Spectres of conversion: Transformations of caste and sect in India. In Religious Conversion in India: Modes, Motivations and Meanings, eds R. Robinson and S. Clarke, 222–54. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Eggleton, Martin. 2002. Belonging to a cult or new religious movement: Act of free will or form of mind control. In Religious Conversion: Contemporary Practices and Controversies, eds C. Lamb and M.D. Bryant, 263–77. London: Cassell. Fabian, Johannes. 1979. The anthropology of religious movements: From explanation to interpretation. Social Research 46 (1): 4–35. Fuchs, Stephen. 1965. Rebellious prophets: A study of messianic movements in Indian religions. New York: Asia Publishing House. Farquar, J.N. 1967. Modern religious movements in India. Delhi: Munshilal Manoharlal. Ferguson, Harvie. 2000. Modernity and subjectivity. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia. Fernandez, James. 1979. On the notion of religious movements. Social Research 46 (1): 36–62. Forrester, Duncan B. 1980. Caste and christianity: Attitudes and policies on caste of AngloSaxon Protestant missions in India. London: Curzon Press. ———. 1991. The depressed classes and conversion to Christianity. In Religion in South Asia: Religious Conversion and Religious Revival Movements in South Asia in Medieval and Modern Times, ed. G.A. Oddie, 65–94. New Delhi: Manohar Publications. Foucault, Michael. 1980. Power/Knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings, 1972– 1977. New York: Pantheon Books. ———. 1988. Politics, philosophy, culture: Interviews and other writings, 1977–1984. New York: Routledge. Fox, Richard. 1989. Gandhian utopia. Boston: Beacon Press. Fuchs, Stephen. 1965. Rebellious prophets: A study of Messianic movements in Indian religions. Bombay: Asia Publishing House. Fuller, Chris. 1989. British India or traditional India? Land caste and power. In South Asia, eds H. Alavi and J. Harriss. New York: Monthly Review Press. Geertz, Clifford. 1973. Interpretation of cultures. New York: Basic Books. Gellner, Ernest. 1983. Nation and nationalism. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Gerth, H.H. and C. Wright Mills, eds. 1958. From Max Weber: Essays in sociology. New York: Oxford University Press. Gladstone, J.W. 1984. Protestant Christianity and people’s movements in Kerala. Trivandrum: The Seminary Publications. Gordon, J. 1973. Provincial politics and Indian nationalism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Guru, Gopal. 1999. The dalit movement in mainstream sociology. In Dalits in modern India, ed. S.M. Michael. New Delhi: Vistaar Publications.

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Hardiman, David. 2003. Assertion, conversion and Indian nationalism. In Religious conversion in India, ed. Robinson Rowena and S. Clarke, 255–84. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Jeffrey, Robin. 1976. Temple entry movement in Travancore (1860–1940). Social Scientist IV(8): 3–27. Jondhale, S., and J. Beltz. 2004. Reconstructing the world: B.R. Ambedkar and Buddhism in India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Jones, Kenneth W. 1989. Socio-religious reform movements in British India. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Juergensmeyer, Mark. 1982. Religion as social vision; The movement against untouchability in 20th century. Berkely: University of California Press. Khan, Mumtaz Ali. 1983. Mass conversions of Meenakshipuram: A sociological enquiry. Bangalore: Christian Institute for the Study of Religion and Society. Kooiman, Dick. 1989. Conversion and social equality in India: The London Missionary Society in South Travancore in the 19th Century. Delhi: Manohar Publications. Kumar, Awadesh. 1985. Religious protest and status improvement: A case study of Satnamis of Chhattisgarh. In Struggle for status, eds P.N. Pimpley and S.K. Sharma, 102–25. Delhi: B.R. Publishing Corporation. Lanternari, Vittorio. 1963. The religion of the oppressed. London: MacGibbon & Kee. Lanternari, Vittorio. 1974. Nativistic and socio-religious movements: A reconsideration. Comparative Studies in History and Society 16(4): 483–503. Lokenatha (Salvatore). 1936. Buddhism will make you free. Panadura (Ceylon): The Harijan Publishing Society. Madan, T.N. 1992. Religion in India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Manickam, Sundararaj. 1977. The social setting and impact of Wesleyan Methodist Missionaries on the Trichy–Tanjore diocese with special reference to Harijan communities of the mass movement area 1820–1947. Wisebaden: Francy Stemer Verlag. Marshall, P.J., ed. 1970. The British discovery of Hinduism in the 18th century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Martin, David. 1978. A general theory of secularization. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Marx, Karl. 1973. Surveys from exile. Hammondsworth: Penguin. MacIntyre, A. 1967. Secularisation and moral change. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mohan, Sanal. 1999. Dalit discourse and the evolving new self: Contest and strategies. Review of Development and Change IV (1): 1–24. Mol, Hans. 1976. Identity and the sacred: A sketch for a new social-scientific theory of religion. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. More, J.B.P. 1993. Tamil Muslims and Non-Brahmin atheists, 1925–1940. Contribution to Indian sociology. 27: 83–103. Murvar, Vatro. 1979. Integrative and revolutionary capabilities of religion. Sociological Inquiry 49(1&2): 74–86. ———. 1975. Towards a sociological theory of religious movements. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 14: 229–56. Narasu, Lakshmi. 2002. The religion of the modern Buddhist. New Delhi: Wordsmith. ———. 1985. Essence of Buddhism. New Delhi: Asian Educational Services. Nisbet, Robert. 1987. Sociology and religion. In Encyclopedia of religion, vol. 13, ed. M. Eliade, 385–93. New York: Macmillan.

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Nisbet, Robert. 1970. The sociological tradition. New York: Macmillan. Oddie, G.A. 1969. Protestant missions, caste and social change in India 1850–1914. IESHR VI (3): 259–91. ———. 1975. Christian conversion in the Telugu country 1860–1900: A case study of one Protestant movement in the Godavari-Krishna delta IESHR XII (1): 61–79. ———. 1979. Social protest in India: British Protestant missionaries and social reforms 1850– 1900. Delhi: Manohar Publications. ———, ed. 1991. Religion in South Asia, religious conversion and revival movements in South Asia in medieval and modern times. Delhi: Manohar Publications. Omvedt, Gail. 2003. Buddhism in India. New Delhi: SAGE Publications. Oommen, George. 1996. Dalit conversion and social protest in Travancore, 1854–1890. Bangalore Theological Forum. XXVII (3&4): 69–84. Otto, Maduro. 1979. Religion and social conflicts. Maryknoll: Orbis Books. Pandian, M.S.S. 1991. Colonialism, nationalism and legitimation: An essay on Vaikundaswamy cult in Travancore. Working Paper. Madras Institute of Development Studies, Madras. Paramarthalingham, C. 1995. Social reform movements in Tamil Nadu. Madurai: Rajakumari Publications. Picket, W.J. 1933. Christian mass movements in India. Cincinnati: The Abingdon Press. Pillai, P. Chidambaram. 1933. Right of temple entry. Nagarcoil: P. Chidambaram. Pinch, William Ralph. 1930. Being Vaishnava becoming Kshatrya: Culture, belief and identity in North India 1800–1840. Unpublished M.A. thesis submitted to University of Virginia. Rajamani, C. 1991. The cult of Muthukuttyswamy. Unpublished M.A. thesis submitted to Serampore University. Rao, Seshagiri K.L. 1999. Conversion: A Hindu/Gandhian perspective. In Religious conversion: Contemporary practices and controversies, eds C. Lamb and M.D. Bryant, 136–50. London: Cassell. Ravindran, T.K. 1980. Eight furlongs to freedom. New Delhi: Light and Life Publishers. Robertson, Roland. 1970. The sociological interpretation of religion. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Robinson, Gnana, ed. 1998. Religions of the marginalised. Bangalore: Union Theological College. Robinson, Ronald. 1972. Non-European foundations of European imperialism. In Studies in the theory of imperialism, eds R. Owen and B. Sutcliff, 117–40. London: Longman. Samuel, V.T. 1977. One caste, one religion, one God. New Delhi: Sterling Publishers. Sangharakshita. 1986. Ambedkar and Buddhism. Glasgow: Windhorse Publications. Schroeder, Ralph. 1992. Max Weber and the sociology of culture. London: SAGE Publications. Seal, Anil. 1968. The emergence of Indian nationalism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sharma, Arvind. 1986. New Hindu religious movements in India. In New religious movements and rapid social change, ed. James A. Beckford, 220–39. London: Unesco/SAGE Publications. Siegal, Paul N. 1986. The meek and the militant: Religion and power across the world. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Srinivas, M.N. 1966. Social change in modern India. Hyderabad: Orient Longman.

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Tartakov, Gary. 2003. B.R. Ambedkar and the Navayana Diksha. In Religious Conversion in India: Modes, Motivations and Meanings, eds R. Robinson and S. Clarke, 192–215. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Taylor, Charles. 1992. Sources of self: The making of the modern identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Thapar, Romila. 1989. Imagined religious communities? Modern Asian Studies 23 (2): 209–31. Thomas, M.M. 1981. Religion and revolt of the oppressed. Delhi: ISPCK. Touraine, Alan. 1985. An introduction to the study of social movements. Social Forces 52 (4): 748–87. Turner, Bryan S. 1983. Religion and social theory. London: Heinemann Educational Books. Wallis, Roy. 2003. Three types of religious movements. In Cults and new religious movements, ed. L.L. Dawson, 36–58. Oxford: Blackwell. Wallis Roy and Steve Bruce. 1992. Secularisation: The orthodox model. In Religion and modernisation, ed. Steve Bruce, 8–30. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Washbrook, David. 1993. Land and labour in late eighteenth century: The golden age of the Paraiah? In Dalit movements and meanings of labour in India, ed. P. Robb, 68–86. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Waterhouse, Eric S. 1958. Secularism. In Encyclopedia of religion and ethics, vol. XI, ed. James Hastings, 347–50. New York: T & T Clark. Weber, Max. 1958. Religion of India: Hinduism and Buddhism. Illinois: Glencoe. ———. 1966. The sociology of religion. London: Social Science Paperbacks. Webster, John C.B. 1994. The dalit Christians. New Delhi: ISPCK. ———. 1999. Leadership in a rural dalit conversion movement. In Organisational and Institutional Aspects of Indian Religious Movements, ed. J.T. O’Connell, 96–114. New New Delhi: Manohar Publishers. Weiner, Myron. 1990. The child and the state. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Wilkinson, T.S., and M.M. Thomas. 1974. Ambedkar and the neo-Buddhist movement. Bangalore: Christian Institute for the Study of Religion and Society. Wilson, Bryan R. 1982. Religion in sociological perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ———. 1987. Secularisation. In The encyclopedia of religion, vol. 13, ed. Mircea Eliade, 159–65. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company. Wilson, Bryan and Jamie Cresswell. 1999. New religious movements. London: Routledge. Zelliot, Eleanor. 1979. The Indian rediscovery of Buddhism (1855–1956). In Studies in Pali and Buddhism, ed. A.K. Narain, 389–406. Delhi: B.R. Publishing Corporation.

Chapter 13

Religion, Social Space, and Identity: The Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha and the Making of Cultural Boundaries in Twentieth Century Kerala*1 P. Sanal Mohan

This paper seeks to analyze one of the social movements of twentieth-century Kerala that tried to engage with the problems of material and spiritual progress in the context of modernity by investigating the rise of the Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha (hereafter PRDS). The movement originated within the framework of missionary Christianity, but moved beyond the limits of the missionary project and eventually offered a critique of it. The introductory part of the paper discusses the social and economic transformation of the erstwhile Travancore State during the colonial period, focusing on the transformation of the local caste structure. The problem of colonial modernity is then dealt with, as the issues analyzed in the paper bear testimony to the transformation that modernity brought about. This is followed by discussions on the problems of caste, Christianity, and the transformation of Dalit (formerly untouchable) communities in Travancore. Issues such as myths and histories of appropriation, notions of history, and new bodily and physical practices, along with questions of identity formation, are taken up later on to delineate the trajectories of change.

* Reprinted from Journal of South Asian Studies, n.s. XXVIII (1), April, 2005.

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INTRODUCTION Before we can effectively analyze the problems of social change and reforms in modern Kerala, we need to investigate the changes that took place in the forces and relations of production in Travancore during the nineteenth century, for these changes were instrumental in transforming the status of the “slave” castes that form the major concern of the paper. Down to the nineteenth century, all land in Kerala not owned by the state was the property of big landlord families and temples. With the Maharaja of Travancore’s Pandarappattom proclamation of 1865 giving proprietary rights to cultivators, there emerged a middle-stratum peasantry drawn mainly from the upper castes but including a substantial number of low-caste Ezhavas. But these changes had only marginal effects on the untouchable castes of Travancore, who were in the main the actual tillers of the soil. On the contrary, the lower castes, particularly the Pulayas and Parayas, were reduced to the state of agrestic slaves—a form of labor relations having a long history in Travancore (Saradamoni 1980). The situation began to change under colonialism, however. During the latter part of the nineteenth century, there was a significant capitalist expansion of the agrarian sector, characterized by the development of plantations (Varghese 1970). Large tracts of forestlands were cleared for the commercial cultivation of coffee, tea, and rubber (Raman 1991). Additionally, the import of foreign capital (ibid.) boosted existing regional trade in primary products by financing the development of new ports, markets, and other facilities that incorporated Travancore into the growing international network of exchange. As a result the local commodity chain expanded,2 transforming all spheres of economic production. This nineteenth century commercial economy was the starting point for Travancore’s modernization. The term modernity was developed to describe the processes of transformation that the Western world underwent in modem times. It is generally thought of as a phenomenon that enables individuals to decide their lives and actions in a rational sovereign way3—a phenomenon that creates both new subjectivities and objects. Modernity establishes structural preconditions that allow people to interact differently from their traditional practices in new “secular” spaces providing them with new social possibilities. Nevertheless, the question has to be asked: Is there a singular definition of modernity such as this applicable to all historical contexts? Following Mitchell, I shall argue that in fact many of the canons of modernity were set in the colonial locations of the world.4 European imperialism and colonialism brought about a radical reconstitution of indigenous societies, and critical scholarship has already established the heterogeneity of such transformations (although the

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transnational expansion of capitalism tended to homogenize them) (Chatterjee 1999). Through globalization in its imperialist phase, India and other nonWestern societies came to be exposed to nationalism, new forms of economic and social organization, deepening urbanization, transnational movements of human beings and materials, and notions of equality, justice and progress (Giddens 1990). In certain situations traditional sources were deployed in the work of redefining these societies. Yet there were also distinct differences in the way modernity was experienced in Europe and in the colonies, and some scholars have theorized that they represent a separate form. Terms such as “modernity at large,” “vernacular modernity,” and “colonial modernity” have been suggested to explain this phenomenon.5 In real life, the rationality and autonomy promised by modernity is articulated through the ambiguous and hybrid social relations and practices that come into being. This situation of ambiguity and hybridity was very much the experience of the lower castes in Kerala in the context of modernity. The transformation that Dalit castes such as the Pulayas and the Parayas have undergone, and their claims to public space and the emerging public sphere, is located against this background. In the changing context, these were the new critical resources that became available to the lower castes to refashion their social selves. The experiences of the Ezhavas as theorized in contemporary scholarship offers some directions on the general transformation of Kerala society. The Sree Narayana Dharma Paripalana Yogam (SNDP) movement of the Ezhavas was a pioneering social movement that embraced progress and modernity as a means of caste mobilizatlon.6 At the same time the movement co-opted and reinterpreted Vedantic tradition and made it part of their project. Reworked Vedantism helped the founder of the SNDP, Sree Narayana Guru, evolve a reformist monotheism to replace the worship of traditional “inferior” gods. And we find similar reformist trends in other parts of South India. While some movements tried to fashion new subjectivities by reinterpreting traditional resources, others such as the Dravidian movements in Tamil Nadu, which tried to reorganize Tamil society on the basis of a principle of “self-respect,” rejected the traditional resources as hegemonic. Then again, in many parts of South India the lower-caste movements drew their sustenance from the ideas and practices of Christian missionaries. It has been argued that the “untouchables” rather than challenging the oppressive social order—turned out to be its faithful agents and reproduced the hierarchy among themselves (Moffat 1977). In exploring the complexities of the subaltern social world, a dominant section of scholars have become caught up in the Sanskritization paradigm which denies agency to the lower castes (Deliege 1997: 8). Other studies, however, try to explain the lower-caste experience of dominance and subordination by

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showing how they have manipulated the very institutions and symbols that define their subordination to forge new social relations based on the principles of honor, respect, and autonomy (Moss 1994).7 In particular, this scholarship seeks to treat the religious life of the lower castes as meaningful and authentic and not merely as a recourse “to obtain something from the gods” (Deliege 1997: 9). In our analysis of the experiences of the PRDS we take issue with those existing discourses that deny the agency of lower castes and reproduce the Sanskritization paradigm. Instead, we emphasize the new mentality of the people as a key to understanding their agency by attributing authenticity to it.

CHRISTIANITY, DALITS, AND THE MISSIONARY INTERFACE Legend has it that St Thomas the Apostle arrived on the Malabar Coast in 52 CE, and converted high-ranking Namboothiri Brahmans to Christianity.8 Whatever the truth of this claim, it is clear that Christianity in the shape of the Syrian Church was well-established in Kerala by the early centuries of the Common Era long before the coming of the Portuguese in the early sixteenth century. Nevertheless Portuguese power and Catholic zeal netted many new converts among the fisherfolk of the coastal regions. A third wave of Christian expansion occurred under the auspices of the Protestant-based missionary societies such as the London Missionary Society (LMS), the Church Missionary Society (CMS), and the Basel Mission during the nineteenth century.9 The Protestant missionaries mainly targeted people belonging to the lower castes, who were seen as victims of Hindu oppression and “idolatry” and thus vulnerable to persuasion. As we shall see, this strategy had enormous social repercussions.10 Within the caste social order of Kerala, the Syrian Christians followed the social practices of the Hindu upper castes and their social world was not very different from the latter’s, as their legends of high-caste origins attest.11 Indeed the agriculturalists among them owned many untouchable slave laborers. Clearly this social milieu did not favor the development of an anti-caste movement. On the other hand, the low castes in Kerala had every reason to want to improve their social station. Colonial accounts refer to the Pulayas, the Parayas and similar castes as “slave castes” whose members were “bought and sold along with land” (Adam 1840: 122–29). Indeed, surviving records of these transactions indicate that owners had the right to kill any slaves they did not wish to sell. “Kill you may, kill or sell you may” was apparently the dictum. Being that they were chattels, the low castes did not generally have the benefit of a stable family environment, and oral narratives available in missionary records show how they lived in constant fear of impending separation.12 The Pulayas

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and Parayas of nineteenth-century Kerala were an alienated people desperately eager to improve their lot. Before looking at how they attempted to do this, we need to say something about the pre-colonial system of slavery that prevailed in Travancore/Kerala. That there was definitely a pre-colonial understanding of slavery as a mode of appropriating labor is attested to by pre-colonial documents that speak of adiyayma or “the state of being a slave.”13 Moreover caste oral traditions—songs— as well as missionary accounts referred to earlier, provide abundant evidence of the brutal nature of the system. For example we learn that the slaves used to practice many of the strategies which James C. Scott calls the “weapons of the weak” in an effort to ameliorate their situation. One was simply to run away from their cruel masters—hundreds of such runaway slaves being found later living in the eastern plantation hills (Baker 1862: 22). Other strategies resembled the “foot dragging, dissimulation, false compliance, pilfering, feigned ignorance, slander, arson [and] sabotage” that Scott has written about in the context of Southeast Asia (Scott 1986: 29).14 Again, some of the Travancore slaves tried sorcery and witchcraft against cruel upper-caste Nair and Syrian Christian landlords and there were several instances of slaves pilfering the crops at night, particularly during lean seasons (Koshy 1857). Yet from the second half of the nineteenth century the LMS and CMS missionaries began to objectify slaves differently from other dominant social actors in Travancore. As well, their exhaustive documentation of slavery made it visible in the public domain in Travancore for the first time, and provided the raw material for the creation of a new set of challenging tropes about Indian “slavery.” Missionary records speak of the consciousness-raising that resulted from the interaction of the missionaries with the lower-caste slave population, and record the Church’s efforts to liberate the slaves by purchasing them from the landlords.15 In the context of the discourse on colonial modernity, we could say that these lower-caste people began to have a critical understanding of their social location which created a repertoire of resources they were able to harness—along with the social memory of slavery—to mobilize for the purpose of securing a just place in the emerging modern polity. From the 1850s until the 1940s there was a substantial increase in the membership of Dalits in the Anglican Church that forced it to engage with the question of caste (TCDR 1905). For instance, the missionaries felt obliged to provide the Dalits with sufficient functional literacy in the vernacular to enable them to read the scriptures in translation. Paternalistic though this initiative was in conception it proved an experience of great importance for the Dalits, who by the early decades of the twentieth century had reached the threshold of literacy and

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were starting to use standard Malayalam instead of the colloquial caste-specific variant of the language that they had employed for centuries.16 The spread of literacy among those who joined the missions helped them initially to compose simple prayers, using intermittently metaphors that were familiar to them and ideas recycled from the primers then in vogue for teaching the lower castes. The latter included ethical precepts to be aimed at everyday life, such as truthful behavior, gentle manner and speech, and cleanliness. Dalit Christians evidently showed a great deal of interest in learning, for missionary accounts report that at night in the villages it was not unusual to hear men, women, and children chanting prayers and sometimes even reading from the scriptures.17 Again, in mission centers whose congregations comprised mainly lower-caste persons, missionaries were encouraged to appoint literates from among the former as teachers. These native intermediaries would often deploy Biblical themes such as liberation from bondage and the hope of salvation in their instruction. Needless to say such aspirations and self-images found a ready audience (TCDR 1905: 1912). As one missionary recalled: We found a little congregation, all assembled with the teacher, one of their class. As we were late, we found that the prayer book service was over and the teacher was about to begin his sermon. He took the text Revelation XXI—“I saw a new heaven and a new earth”—but I soon understood the reason and saw its appropriateness. It was during the Onam festival that it happened. The application of the Onam myth to, the Christian hope is evident and was well made by the teacher.18

Likewise the Christian concept of “sin” had a deep impact,19 particularly on local conceptions of theft. Many Dalits who joined the Church became so disciplined by the notion of sin that when harvest time came round they could not bring themselves to keep for their own use even the odd grains of paddy that became stuck to their clothing?20 External changes followed too. Dalits began, through contact with the missionaries, to order their everyday lives according to Western notions of time rather than according to the daily rituals of the fields. Specifically their sense of time began to be influenced by the Christian-imposed routines of daily prayer and night classes organized in the villages by the missionaries.21 Similarly Pulaya and Paraya slaves who owned “barely any clothing save the leaves around their loin[s]” began to appear at the night schools as “new creations, neat and clean” provided by the missionaries. The near ethnographic reporting of the Sunday congregations in missionary journals reveals a story of lowercaste bodies increasingly disciplined by dress codes.22 And food habits were sanitized too. Many of the low castes ate the meat of dead animals and other refuse. But Dalits who joined the missions generally stopped eating “unclean food,”(TCDR 1912) although some low-caste

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congregationalists continued to eat things the missionaries found to be despicable out of necessity.23 By the twentieth century this transformation had progressed so far, in fact, that hygiene, with an emphasis on health care, began to be invoked to justify the exclusion of low-caste people from the church congregations.24 Meanwhile, though, the missionaries felt it necessary to “sanitise” the physical and interactive spaces of the lower castes. The Dalits were helped to construct better huts using more durable building materials such as sunbaked bricks. To emphasize the “civilisational” nature of this project, missionary journals carried contrasting photographs of lower-caste Christians in white clothes with neat, oiled, and combed hair standing proudly in front of newly built brick huts with half-naked lower-caste non-Christian men in loincloths with unkempt hair pictured against a background of thatch and coconut leaf dwellings, the latter usually captioned—lest the reader had any doubts—Pulayahs or Out Castes in Travancore.25 By the beginning of the twentieth century there had developed an open contest for the bodies and souls of the lower castes within the Church. This led to the development of various movements, some initially supported by the Church and others evolving as independent initiatives.26 But meanwhile a separate movement of Dalits, the Sadhu Jana Paripalana Sangham under the leadership of Ayyankali, had begun working in Travancore with the backing of both Christian and Hindu Dalits.27 The PRDS later joined this movement. In the following section we analyze the contribution of the PRDS in Travancore in the early decades of the twentieth century as a religious movement combining both material and spiritual aspects.

THE MAKING OF A PROPHET: YOHANNAN’S CAREER The founder of the PRDS, Poyikayil Yohannan, belonged to the Paraya caste. His parents were laborers attached to a Syrian Christian landlord family belonging to the Marthomite Church. He had been named Kumaran by his parents, but at age five he was baptized, and thereafter went by his Christian name, Yohannan.28 Like any other child of the agrestic slave castes, he was expected to perform daily chores on the landlord’s estate, such as herding cattle and working in the paddy fields. As he grew up, Yohannan began to attend the conventions of the missionaries. This was a time when central Travancore was passing through a phase of Christian “revitalisation” movements.29 Yohannan was moved by the Christian message and became a devoted follower of the missionaries. He was articulate, and had a talent for composing lively verses. Then two incidents radicalized him. One was the forced disinterment of a Dalit Christian; the other was the

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Church’s opposition to the proposed marriage of a Syrian Christian woman to a Dalit Christian man. These incidents focused his mind on the caste prejudices that riddled the Church. Yohannan broke with the formal Church structure and struck out on his own as an itinerant preacher implanting the message of the Bible in and around the villages of Tiruvalla. He soon attracted a small group of followers.30 The missionaries were piqued but impressed by his charisma. Poikayil Yohannan was a Paraya convert who left the CMS to join the Marthomite Church and left that church for the Brethren, from where he seceded and became an independent preacher. He attracted a number of followers. He was a fine looking man and many found power in his preaching. At one time, he contented himself with producing in his hearer, in some particular person, an intense conviction of sin and after that conviction of salvation.31 Indeed, the missionaries suspected that his speeches and entreaties on the subjects of sin and salvation were part of some “esoteric system”—one that he unfolded secretly at midnight gatherings in lonely jungles. For instance, it was known that those who accept his teachings undertook certain vows, and that the generality of his followers regarded him as not only a recipient of divine revelation but as a true prophet. As for Yohannan himself, he not only accepted these accolades but offered an ingenious explanation drawn from his Christian education to account for his prophethood: In the New Testament are certain Epistles by St Paul and others. To whom did St Paul write this Epistles? [sic] To the Romans, Corinthians, etc. There was not one written to the Pulayas of Travancore. Therefore, there is no revelation in those Epistles for you, but only for the Romans, Corinthians, etc. The revelation to you Pulayas of Travancore is through me.32 This led him, by logical stages, to critique the Bible itself. The Bible was not relevant to Dalits, he argued, because there was no reference to them in the book. How could they justify reading it when it contained not a word about Travancore? Hearing this, his audience reputedly dropped their copies of the Bible, one of which Yohannan picked up and burnt.33 The claim of personal revelation immediately raised Yohannan’s status. In challenging the power of the Church hierarchy on the basis of the possession of esoteric knowledge on social and spiritual questions,34 he not only put himself at odds with the missionaries, but asserted a claim to precedence over them. They were mere agents of a Church; he was a prophet doing the will of God. Deeply worried by this challenge, the missionaries sent their men clandestinely to Yohannan’s meetings to spy on the preacher and report back to them.35 Their characterizations of the movement followed largely the representational strategies we have come to associate with the production of colonial “knowledge” vis-à-vis subjected peoples.

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Thus it was reported that Yohannan used to freely discuss with the Dalits matters such as their slave past and their continuing economic bondage,36 and that he dabbled in black magic and witchcraft. As might be expected the teaching is filled with gross extravagances and the midnight meetings are marked by various extravagances—swoons, fits, contortions, wild laughter, dancing, and the like—the characteristics in fact, of that primitive animism which Yohannan’s followers quitted at their conversion. Johannan seems himself to have degenerated into a megalomaniac, giving himself out to be some great one. He bewitched the poor people who regarded him as the power of God, which is called great.37 Uncomfortable with Yohannan’s spiritual claims, the missionaries tried to undercut his stature by projecting him as a deluded renegade bent on bewitching the poor. Yet it is fundamental to our understanding of the later history of the movement and the transformation of his popular image as a prophet to realize that many poor people in Travancore considered Yohannan to be in touch with the power of God. He came to be worshipped even before his death, and later on the perception of his divinity became entrenched and ritualized.38 However, during his lifetime, Yohannan, while projecting the prophetic aura and divinity of a redeemer, existed mostly in a liminal Christian space, transgressing Biblical themes and teachings but not formally breaking away from the Christian life-world. Not surprisingly the CMS hierarchy rapidly came to the conclusion that something needed to be done to stamp out the “heretical blasphemy” of “Paraya Christian heretical teacher Poikayil Yohannan.”39 Yet while they justified this campaign by invoking the long history of fighting heresy throughout the Christian world, they found it convenient to strike back using the techniques and metaphors of Yohanna himself40 which were found to be more effective in getting through to the Dalits than those of the missionaries. But the problem here was Yohanna’s perceived divinity. Even the Bishop of the Travancore and Cochin Diocese of the Anglican Church recognized that people saw him as a savior and followed him because they believed his authority came from “the high.” Putting this in the language of Charles Taylor, we could say that the prophetic image of Yohannan was produced by the “social imaginary” of the people who came to believe in him.41 However, as Taylor further argues, social imaginaries are a common property. In the case of Travancore, it was largely the Christian habitus of the people that provided the space for the circulation and sustenance of Yohannan’s prophetic Image.42 The missionaries were right to see this as a potential threat. In reading about Rasputin the Russian monk who was an indirect cause of the recent revolution, one can’t help thinking of another prophet, in this diocese.

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His religious and philosophical themes based on his alleged authority from High, and on the “cleansing” of the world from its sins through him, attracted a throng of disciples, especially female disciples, and opened a wide arena for the gratification of his propensities.43 As an accredited prophet, Yohannan had the potential to create a revolution unparalleled in the rural history of Travancore. He took his authority from God and made it locally relevant through a reinterpretation of Christian themes. He would “cleanse” the world of Travancore of its sins.44 This association of the divine and the mundane won him a large number of disciples, particularly female disciples, among them some lowercaste “Bible women” who had been instrumental in taking the message of the Gospels to the households of Christians as well as upper-caste Hindus by distributing pamphlets, flysheets, and similar printed materials. Just as the work of the Bible women had helped to win people over to Christianity, so the female disciples of Yohannan gave the new sect access to a broader constituency through their interactions with lower-caste families who professed other religions. In many cases it was women who were initially attracted to the PRDS, and missionary documents speak of instances of CMS teachers being prevailed on by their wives to leave the CMS and join Yohannan’s movement.45 On many occasions, too, women were instrumental in defending the movement from assaults by the upper castes and saving Yohannan and other leaders from physical harm. On one such occasion a woman follower died repelling an attack by high-caste hirelings. And later a number of women came forward to work as Upadeshinis or female pastors of the PRDS. Finally, after the death of Yohannan, his daughter took on the role of a spirit medium and began making speeches in what was believed to be Yohannan’s voice, and his wife continued the practice until her death in 1982. Thus it is important to ask why the new movement was attractive to women. One reason could have been the succor that the new sect offered to oppressed lower-caste women, given that its peculiar discourses objectified sufferings that were very much a part of their gendered lives. Another reason could be that the PRDS in certain ways gave agency to lower-caste women, and an entrée to the public sphere that was created by the movement.46 Nevertheless the PRDS did not confine itself to the sphere of material deprivation and exploitation alone. On the contrary, it addressed the problems of the spiritual realm as well. Its great achievement was to coalesce elements of modernity with certain notions of the traditional shared life-world of the lower castes, by which means the Dalits’ experience of slavery, their Adi-Dravida past, and the religious notion of Prathyaksha (revelation), were made part of modernity.47

Religion, Social Space, and Identity

The slave experience assumed significance as the central theme of the “Raksha Nirnaya Yogam” or the “Convention to Determine Salvation.”48 The “Raksha Nirnayam” is the process by which people are initiated into the new Sabba. According to oral tradition, during Yohannan’ s lifetime it lasted for about a month, but today it lasts for a week, comprising conventions and prayers and discourses on slavery in the course of which Yohannan reveals himself to be the God who has come to redeem them from suffering. During one of these early conventions, Yohannan disclosed/revealed to the community the need for a “Plan Kettidam” or “Planned Building,” a secure structure that would be constructed in accordance with God’s design for the salvation of Dalits.49 You must construct a building with four frontispieces. It should be a threestoried building. You should consecrate me on the topmost floor in a glass case. On the ground floor should be the throne with barbed fencing. When the time and hour comes I would ascend from the western poika with plough, clad in kachathorth and sporting a thoppipala (a cap made of the soft portion of areca leaves). Keep hot water, incha (fibre of a creeper used to rub the body) and soap for me to bath and white clothes to wear. I would open the building with the golden key. All the buildings of the world will be shaken severely in the whirlwind. But the plan keuidum, should provide refuge to those escaping from the severely shaken structures.50

Such rituals and tropes were decisive in constructing the prophetic image of Yohannan.

NEW MYTHS AND HISTORIES OF APPROPRIATION Since Yohannan’s death his followers have displaced the PRDS history from its context and erased selectively to construct a mythical history, which continues to be considered authentic. We would contextualize myth, following Roland Barthes, as a semiotic system that generates its own language.51 In the context of the PRDS, the new myths created about Yohannan spawned a liturgical language and theology that over time has helped to enshrine his image as a savior of the oppressed. Biographies of Yohannan privilege the mythical accounts, but at the same time they are pulled apart by tensions between the content and the form.52 Hagiographic as they are, they desire to be located within the domain of history, as the movement itself had initiated a discourse of history. The debates on “the content of the form” in historical narrative could be stretched to include the problems thrown up by biographical writings that try to place themselves in the “authentic” domain of history. There is a concern

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with real events but at the same time we come across the deployment of imaginary events that the narrator itself or herself invents. It is necessary in this context to consider the fact that there are multiple ways in which history can be represented.53 Similarly, it is important to think of a possibility of conceiving “a history of symbols and signs engendering foreseeable developments, even though it brings into play structural combinations of limited number” as LeviStrauss has argued.54 Indeed, Levi-Strauss refuses to accept that there is any real distinction between the historical knowledge provided by the historical method privileged in Western discourse and the mythic lore of savage communities.55 In the context of the present study these insights are important because the PRDS tried to engender new symbols and signs that show features of cultural combinations. The writing of biographies and the circulation of stories about the founder were instrumental in solidifying the new symbols and rituals. Equally important was the already mentioned desire to engage with the history of lower castes as well as reforming their social practices. It is in the light of these debates that we would situate the exercise of creating histories initiated by movement in the genre of biographies. True, many of these biographies are hagiographies lurking on the outer fringes of historiography.56 In hagiographies combination of acts, places, and themes indicates a particular structure that refers not just primarily to “what took place”—as does history—but to “what is exemplary.”57 In analyzing the process by which Yohannan became the one who “stands beyond history”—became Gurudevan—we need to bear in mind that the public image of his figure was, and still continues to be, worked out endlessly by his people. Gurus, it is said, negotiate with the cosmic and social order to define the boundaries and orchestrate the constructions of the new communities that evolve out of historic processes.58 While they lie outside the pale of history (as history is normally understood), they display a remarkable ability to make histories of such experiences. It was in 1910 that Yohannan gave a name to his new sect. Before then his followers had been known variously as poikekuttar (people of poika) or as Appachan Sabhakkar (people of Appachan’s Church).59 The immediate context for the “naming” of the sect was Yohannan’s trial for treason at Changanassery. In the course of the trial he was asked who he was and what his group was called. He replied that it was called the “Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha.”60 In narratives of the PRDS, fights between Yohannan and his opponents are the stuff of a local historical tradition which has become part of the movement’s collective consciousness.61 Certeau refers to instances in hagiographical discourses where the saint-hero battles with social figures symbolizing the Devil. The darker and more apocalyptic the scene, the more the saint triumphs through his armory of miracles.62 Most of the confrontations between Dalits and

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upper castes in Travancore were on questions of admission to schools and entry into public space. Yohannan’s movement shows that entry into the religious realm was another important site. Today these events are recalled in a mythical manner that proclaims the miraculous nature of Yohannan’s life, for example, with reference to his several amazing escapes from assassination. And the birth of Yohannan is recounted in a manner that recalls the Immaculate Conception of Jesus. We read that as a sleeping infant, he escaped unhurt from the ministrations of a colony of black ants. We are told that on another day, he removed the dirt and soil from his mother’s body after she had returned from a day’s work, simply by touching her. It is said that he flaunted caste rules even when still a child, and wrote the word “God” in spread-out rice when he was initiated into writing. Much is made, too, of the time when, while in the midst of plowing a field, he broke the yoke to demonstrate symbolically to his friends the sufferings of their ancestors who in the old days had been harnessed to the plow like so many draught animals.63 Finally, Yohannan’s numerous interventions in eviction cases involving lower-caste peasants are recast in a mythological vein that stresses his promise to the evicted peasants that he would lead them to a “heaven” where deception never existed.64 When Yohannan died on June 29, 1939 his funeral was attended by thousands of grief-stricken followers. The funeral service was conducted in the Christian manner, with offering up of congregational prayers.65 After the service the congregation did not disperse, but moved towards the burial site. They waited to see if the prophecy of the founder of the Sabha, that he would come back to life again—as Jesus had—was fulfilled. He did not. Nevertheless the biographers of Yohannan have made much of an incident that occurred on 18 Mithunam (July 2, 1939), the second day of the funeral. Yohannan’s daughter, Sara, adopting her father’s mannerisms, spoke up. She told the people assembled there that Yohannan had not departed but had returned to their midst through her in order to deliver to them his promise of salvation.66 Initially the followers were shocked to hear a woman speaking in the manner of the revered Yohannan. Yohannan’s elder daughter’s husband, Porambunkal Daniel, gave vent to this outrage by caning Sara. She fell, unconscious. When she woke up some time later, her “possession” was gone. Thereafter she never again acted as spirit medium.67 However, while the spirit of Yohannan never spoke through Sara again, a few days later it took possession of one of his other relatives, Ettupara Kunju. This episode happened at a place called Thrikkodithanam not far away from Eraviperoor, which was the headquarters of the Sabha.68 Seemingly in a trance, Ettupara mimicked Yohannan just as Sara had done. This time, though, people

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began to believe that it was actually the soul of Yohannan that was speaking. Then on the fortieth day after Yohannan’s death, when people were assembled at Sabba headquarters for a memorial service, his second wife Janamma also spoke in the guise of Yohannan. She proclaimed that Yohannan had not deserted his followers and would continue to direct the operations of the PRDS. Hearing this, Simon John Njaliyakuzhi, the new president of the Sabha, exclaimed: “our Man has not gone any where and he has come back!”69 This imprimatur bolstered Janamma’s position and eroded the standing of Ettupara Kunju who was forced to leave Thrikkodithanam. Afterwards he attempted to set up a rival ministry among the followers of the Sabha near the plantation town of Mundakkayam.70 Meanwhile Janamma’s spirit-medium speeches became anticipated events within the community. During these spirit speeches, Janamma would go down amidst the people, leaving her special seat, and would wipe away their streaming tears of ecstatic joy with a handkerchief. Such meetings thereafter came to be known as “tear wiping meetings.”71 Added significance was given to Janamma’s spirit-medium performances by the fact that she spoke from the center of the Sabha where the founder’s body was buried. This came to be viewed as a sacred place and central point of the emerging sacred geography of the movement. Yet others in the movement also periodically took on Yohannan’s personality through the phenomenon of spirit speech. They included Sebaloon of Mundathanm, Iyyali Joseph, Philippose Karimbanakkuzhi, and Kanichukualm Joseph. The speeches given through this medium by Philippose Karimbanakkuzhi are particularly important, because he tried to derive ideas from Yohannan’s discourses and interpret them. For instance, Karimbanakkuzhi Philippose proclaimed that it was not the spirit of Yohannan speaking through him, but God himself. Furthermore, he announced that Yohannan had been sent to liberate the descendents of the slaves from the toils of Protestant Christianity! As a result, the followers of this segment of the PRDS have come to believe that even though it was Poyikayil Yohannan who revealed to them the theme of “orphaned children,” it was Karimbanakkuzhi Philippose who gave them the “word and promise” of eventual salvation from the harshness of slavery.72 It is important to observe here the merging of miracles and reality. It is not my intention to counterpose myth to reality to arrive at any validation of the former. The miracles of Yohannan are recalled in the context of the practice of faith healing, which prevailed among various Christian sects, and which Yohannan used in an effective manner to reach out to his people.73 After Yohannan’s time the language of myths and miracles resurfaced as the most powerful instrument of the PRDS via the phenomenon of Yohannan’s spirit speaking through his wife. In this phase in its history, the PRDS faced a

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combined assault—from the locally dominant social forces and, at one remove, from the governing bureaucracy of the new nation-state of India. The Hindu reformists were trying to influence the movement and things looked promising for them in 1950 when one section of the PRDS decided to revert to Hinduism. At this point the role of nation-state became important because people wanted to negotiate with it to secure their share of modern social goods. The biographies of Yohannan written so far show two major trends. The first trend is to deploy mythical categories to highlight the divinity of the founder of the movement. This fitted with the expectation prevalent among the lower castes, in the wake of the missionary propaganda, of a millennial transformation through prophetic intervention.74 In this mode what is created is a “sublime” text uncontaminated by the facts of Yohannan’s material life. The other trend is the writing of more conventional biographies with details of the life experiences of the founder and matter-of-fact description. 75 Biographies are considered to be constructions that involve power/knowledge.76 And this is true of both the genres of biographies mentioned above— even and perhaps especially in the case of the former genre since it appealed directly to the Dalits’ repertoire of collective memory. In sum, what we have here is an assemblage of jumbled fact and fiction, which in serious social science enquiry cannot be counterposed. There were contests over the meanings involved in this process of creating a “social memory” for the PRDS, even during the lifetime of its founder. In 1921, Yohannan was nominated to the Sri Moolam Praja Sabha, the popular legislative assembly of Travancore. In the debates and discussions of the assembly he constantly referred to the problems facing the Dalits. He demanded the granting of land, the extension on generous terms of agricultural credit, the right to a free education, and provision for noon meals for lower-caste children. He demanded, in short, material and cultural goods that would enable these marginalized people to have a decent life.77 Today his followers recall the demands articulated by Yohannan in his speeches in the legislative assembly as a sort of prophecy. In the reformulation of the PRDS that took place in the I950s, Yohannan was transformed into a more mythical figure—as Kumara Gurudevan. New portraits of Yohannan came to be placed at the headquarters of the PRDS and supplied to PRDS followers, signifying his godliness. In the place of his photograph, new imaginary portraits replete with saintly halo were produced and came to be accepted as true images of the founder. Subsequently Yohannan’s mother came to be worshipped too, and a haloed image of her was also created. Eventually she was accorded the status of the Mother of God. This was followed by the deification of his wife and sons.

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RECONSTITUTING HISTORY One of Yohannan’s major concerns was the absence of any valid history of the exploited and oppressed lower castes in Kerala. In one of his verses he lamented: I behold the histories of many races. Every history in Kerala was searched for the story of my race. But there was none on the earth to write the story of my race.78 Accordingly, Yohannan set out to “retrieve” the history of the Travancore Dalits. But this was no idle nostalgic quest on the PRDS leader’s part, but rather a way in his eyes of bringing them back to the active field of the present. A people who lacked a valid knowledge of their past, he believed, could not imagine a better future. In order to have a program for the present, one needed both to have recourse to a conceptualized past, and be oriented toward the future. This was the direction in which Yohannan’s conceptualization of history developed—toward resolving the problem of ignorance. In several key verses he articulated the idea that ajnanam (ignorance) should be pierced through with the “sword of knowledge.” But knowledge, he thought, could only emerge from a proper understanding of history; thus his desire to retrieve the narrative of the Dalit past, and reconstruct it in a new form. His was a transhistorical project. At the same time it is important to see the dynamics of myth in the making of this tradition within the PRDS movement that considers historical information as a vital component. Indeed it may be suggested that this mythical mould is something that is still available and present in the discourses of the PRDS. The seamless past is harnessed in the imagining of the history of the Adi-Dravidas— the preferred nomenclature for Dalits—in some of the early statements attributed to Yohannan. Viewed in this context, the historical accounts he projected were subversive in nature. In his reconstruction of Adi-Dravidas history, Yohannan began with the notion that the region had once enjoyed a period of social equality free from caste distinctions and practices.79 The Adi-Dravidas in this period were a race, Yohannan asserted, that had reached the zenith of material and spiritual development. One feature of this was their untrammeled monotheism. However, at some point there occurred an influx of Aryans who exploited the kindness shown to them by the king of the Adi-Dravidas. They gradually implanted their ideology and in the process the Adi-Dravidas became marginalized. Significantly this fall from grace is also associated with the bodily impurity of women who are said to have been the first to succumb to the strategies of the Aryans.80

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Alternatively, in other versions of the story, the fall is explained with reference to the skills possessed by the Dalits in respect of wetland paddy cultivation, which made them socially indispensable to the upper classes. Here, it is said, was the origin of their chattel slavery. The problem of Dalit slavery in Travancore occupied much of the thoughts of Yohannan, and features extensively in his discourses. But the PRDS approach to the question is at odds with the dominant theories that seek to associate enslavement with caste dharma. For Yohannan a recalling of the experiences of slavery in its entirety was necessary to initiate the emancipatory program. Hence certain experiences of slavery were instantly recounted and so kept alive. Here is a typical narrative: Once, three young children were orphaned as the landlord sold their parents. Thus the unity of the family and souls were broken. Waiting all through, in the absence of their parents the children searched for food and shelter. Unable to find anyone, the elder child tried to console the younger ones. At last they found shelter beneath a big tree. While the two young children slept out of hunger and fatigue the elder one prayed to gods of the forests and told their stories to the wild animals. Far above the sky was a female hawk flying and he repeated his tale of sorrow to it. After some time the female hawk came and settled down along with the children. It was God himself who descended in the form of the female hawk. She consoled the children and gave the promise and the word that she would come back to redeem them as and when the time came. And then she disappeared.81 Here the separation brought about by the slave transaction and its effects were reworked to suit the needs of the movement. One of the themes that dominated the conventions of the PRDS right from the very beginning was the “subject of the descendants of slaves,” and the movement projected itself as a vehicle to bring together those who had been separated by the harsh practices of slavery.82

THE BODY AND PHYSICAL CLEANLINESS: RECONSTITUTING THE SELF In the reformist discourses of the twentieth century one of the central themes is the reform/reformulation of the body and the self. The body and self are now considered in social theory as an integral part of society.83 Yohannan grasped this intuitively. He once proclaimed that “I annihilated caste in my body; now you have to realize it.84 Here the annihilation of caste is directly linked to its power over, and subjection of, the human body.”85

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Accordingly, Yohannan made the cleanliness of the body an integral part of the practices of the movement and fundamental to his project of emancipation.86 The Dalits were told to use large quantities of water and leaves for cleaning after defecation, and shown how to build simple but serviceable toilets.87 From time to time, under Yohannan’s direction, groups of Dalits were taken to riverbanks and instructed how to use oil and soap to bathe. Importantly, they were also urged to dress modestly in clean white clothes.88 In Travancore society the question of dress and particularly the custom of nadar (women covering their breasts in the manner of upper castes) had long been a cause of controversy.89 Theoretically, in Travancore, Dalits and other low castes were barred from wearing white. Yohannan’s insistence on his followers wearing white attire subverted that symbolic order. Similarly, the PRDS leaders forbade the consumption of liquor and the chewing of betel leaves, and made a taboo of beef-eating. Also forbidden was the practice of kanam for marriage,90 the wearing of ornaments, and speaking while cooking. Women were asked to keep their heads always covered. Last but not the least, Yohannan encouraged his followers to greet one another with folded hands whenever they met. As one of his biographies points out, this simple ritual helped, in conjunction with the above-mentioned changes, to distinguish his sect from the rest of society. “As a result of it they became distinct from other unities, with their teeth shining without betel stains, clean clothes and shining bright faces signifying the purity of mind.”91

IDENTITY AND BOUNDARY: CONTESTS WITHIN THE PRDS In this final part of the article we examine the process by which a new collective identity for the followers of the PRDS was constituted. As Stuart Hall has argued, identity is a concept that operates “under erasure,” in the interval between reversal and emergence; an idea which cannot be thought about in conventional ways, but without which certain key questions cannot be thought about at all.92 On the other hand, identity formation is central to questions of politics and agency, and “identity politics.”93 For Hall, though, identity formation is a process never completed—always “in process.” It is a process, he says, of articulation, a suturing, an over-determination, not a subsumption.94 What demands our critical engagement here are the elements with which identities are formed. In most cases the process involves elements of the past being appropriated and reworked. But the availability of such traditions and their elements will vary according to context. In the case of the Dalits belonging

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to the PRDS, identity formation went hand in hand with the deliberation of social boundaries. Caste society revolved around the binary of “we” and “they.” Yet this division was never static and its boundaries were forever shifting across space and time. During the colonial period a clear distinction emerged between Dalit Christians and Syrian Christians; likewise Christian Dalits became estranged from their neighbors (TCDR 1910). In the twentieth century, however, Dalit leaders began to attack these distinctions, which hampered the political mobilization of the Dalits around questions of access to public space, economic development, and civil rights. Slowly but surely, a new mentality took hold that worked against the notion of caste even as it rejected the oppression that was endemic to the caste structure. Traditionally social groups were always referred to, in official and unofficial discourse, by their respective caste names. The twentieth century saw efforts across communities to transcend this stereotyping by imagining new megacategories. At the same time certain low castes adopted new names that did not carry pejorative associations. For instance the Pulayas designated themselves Cheramars, signifying putative descent from the historical Cheras, while the Parayas became Sambavas, signifying a pure Saivite connection (Ayyankali 1989: 212). However, we also find the process of erasure at work in this context. Decades after they had come into general use, some Dalits were raising doubts about the value of these new names. Social categories are always in the process of construction. This was the general situation, then, when the Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha was formed. The PRDS tried to break the caste mould and introduce new categories, and to this end slavery was re-theorized by the movement as an experiential category rather than a socioeconomic one. But even more crucial to the PRDS search for a new Dalit identity was religion. In a petition to the Dewan of Travancore in 1926, the sect members referred to themselves as a people who had been enslaved in this country for quite a long time, and least endowed with education and landed property, belonging to Parayas, Pulayas and Kizhakke Pulayar [eastern Pulayas]. We have come together in the light of the Holy Bible comprising of nearly 10,000 people with the name Prathayaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha.95

Christian affiliation was a particularly useful new marker of identity because—in theory at least—the Christian worldview is egalitarian and anticaste. The prophetic tradition that Yohannan developed had the power to inscribe a new identity on the people who believed in him. Nevertheless, the period after the death of the founder witnessed a gradual resurfacing of the

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older caste identities within the new quasi-sectarian framework set up by Yohannan. Before the formal constitution of the organizational structure of the PRDS, there did not exist any similar structure to bind the people together. The creation of a formal Sabha allowed the Dalits to contest with other Christian denominations and gave them a platform for their social demands. During the first half of the twentieth century the PRDS remained outside the pale of the dominant Churches but within the symbolic world of Christianity. Although its reformist stance put it at odds with many of the theories and practices of the mainstream Church, it shared with them a common Christian eschatology.96 For example, Yohannan’s teachings comfortably embraced the Christian concepts of sin, eternal damnation, the wrath of God, the promise of salvation through the resurrected Christ, and the mystic unity of the Holy Trinity.97 Even before the drastic changes of 1950, there were efforts to turn the PRDS into a community with a distinct identity. In April 1947, Yohannan’s wife informed the followers in a spirit-medium speech that they should become the Yohannan community, after the founder: I made you one caste, which had been drawn from various castes, and established a Sabha for you. That is the seat of those who do not have caste, and group rivalries. Henceforth you will be known in a new name, that’s what Johannar community is. The state and government could recognize you in that name.98

Subsequently a petition to this effect was submitted to Travancore’s Dewan, Sir C.P. Ramaswamy Iyer. The petition also included demands for jobs and education, such as soon to be guaranteed in the Indian Constitution of 1950 for the country’s scheduled castes and tribes—but not, significantly, for Dalit Christians. This denial of the benefits of reservation remained a major problem for all Dalits professing religions other than Hinduism until, in the course of time, they were extended to Dalit Sikhs and Dalit Buddhists.99 The advent in 1950 of an Indian state committed to positive discrimination led to a sudden change in the ideas and practices of the movement, which by then had come under the control of Yohannan’s wife. Instead of Christian themes, Hindu mythology came to be adopted as the subject of discourse. Similarly, Yohannan himself disappeared and in his place Kumara Gurudevan came into being.100 This transformation was followed by a total reconstitution of the rituals, sermons, prayers, and dress codes of the movement. Finally Janamma announced that the PRDS had become a sect of Hinduism.101 Janamma’s announcement does not appear to have been preceded by long periods of thinking and study as we find in many conversion movements. It may be recalled here that when Protestant missionaries started their work among

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the lower castes in Travancore they wanted the lower-caste catechumens to learn the catechism properly before being baptized. Likewise, the most famous modern mass conversion movement of Dalits, which took place under the leadership of Dr Ambedkar, was preceded by nearly two decades of intense learning and research on Buddhism in particular—but also other religious traditions such as Islam, Christianity, and Sikhism—as possible alternative religions for the Dalit masses.102 In 1935 Ambedkar proclaimed his intention to convert from Hinduism to some other religion at a conference held at Yeola (near Nasik in Maharashtra), but only in 1956 did he feel that his community—the Mahars— was ready to convert.103 The act of mass conversion—to Buddhism—that took place in Nagpur on October 14–15, 1956 was a culmination for Ambedkar of half a lifetime wrestling with religious questions.104 Nowadays, therefore, members of the PRDS call themselves “Hindus.” It is perhaps important in this context to remember that in his lifetime Yohannan never felt the need to define his movement formally as either Christian or Hindu in the conventional sense of these terms. As I have suggested earlier, in the absence of rigid classification the movement could claim a liminal space that was free from the questions of governance that we find in the categorization of people for governmental purposes, which forced the PRDS movement after 1947 to define itself in terms of religious categorization—a labeling that ultimately became a fetter on the liberationist agenda of the movement.

CONCLUSION In this paper I have been trying to consider some of the most crucial problems that were instrumental in redefining the social selves of Dalit communities such as the Pulayas, Parayas, and Kuravas of Travancore, Kerala. It was colonial modernity that provided the matrix for transformation which led to the creation of these new social selves. Although efforts to explore and theorize similar movements elsewhere in India have led to the emergence of other concepts and categories useful to explaining the social transformation of the lower casts, I argue in this paper that with respect to the PRDS movement, such models—including “Sanskritization”—have only limited value or no value at all. In fact the man intention of this paper was to seek answers to questions about the interface of colonialism and lower castes by following a different trajectory—one that values the mentality of the lower castes. It is in this context that the missionary interaction with the Dalit communities from the second half of the nineteenth century is considered in the paper. The communities such as Pulayas and Parayas were referred to as slave castes in these writings and this

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continued until the early decades of the twentieth century. Through various disciplinary mechanisms the missionaries were successful in transforming the lower castes and in course of time they evolved as socially presentable selves. This particular transformation is crucial for it engulfed both the religious and secular realm with equal force. In the case of the PRDS the vital question was to challenge the prevailing structures of caste inequality within the Church that led to the radical reformulation of their social world. The reformulation of the self-image of the lower castes projected by Yohannan involved traversing the difficulties of the caste-slavery complex and the issue of “salvation,” which had both spiritual and secular connotations. This was achieved by the creation of a new identity through education, social reform, and other civilizational achievements including ownership of property. These matters preoccupy the members of the PRDS even today. Thus the experience of the PRDS in the twentieth century remains pertinent to the larger question of colonial modernity. I have argued that movements like the PRDS cannot be understood outside the complexities of colonial modernity that provided space for hybridities to evolve and flourish. Yohannan’s movement took up the project of fashioning the Dalit self and sought its legitimization in the collective memory of Dalits as well as in his own notions of their history. This I consider unique to the PRDS movement— hat it provided room for an emancipatory discourse. Of course the movement derived resources from the Bible even as it provided a critique of it, but it also drew on the social memory of the lower castes to provide an alternative worldview to the community of followers. This new worldview was oriented toward the possibilities opened up by modern education and the acquisition of new skills. The new institutional spaces opened up by colonial modernity, and which were becoming accessible to the lower castes in Travancore, provided the context for the refashioning of the Dalit self. As Stuart Hall has argued, identification is a process that operates across difference, entailing discursive work.105 The problems of the “binding and marking of symbolic boundaries,” and the “production of frontier effects” were very much part of the experiences of Dalits in the first half of the twentieth century. It was in their mobilization and the quest for social development that the new elements of identity were thought of. Similarly, these mobilizations led them to negotiate with the state, and they learned to make use of the already available space of the legislature in Travancore to present their grievances. All this had an impact on their collective imagination of identity. For example, in the Travancore legislature the representatives of various Dalit communities could air only the grievances of their respective communities. But when Yohannan raised the issues of the lower castes it was observed that he spoke for all the lower-caste order rather than for a particular caste. One of the reasons

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could have been that his movement included people from various lower castes who were slowly but surely being transformed into a “community” through intermarriage and the bonding effects of PRDS membership.

NOTES 1.

2.

3.

4. 5. 6.

7. 8.

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Conference of Subaltern Historians in 1998. I am grateful to Gautam Bhadra, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Gyan Pandey and Susie Tharu for their valuable interventions. Thanks are also due to Nizar Ahmad, T.M. Yesudasan, Partha Chatterjee, Anjan Ghosh, Dwaipayan Bhattacharyya, and Raziuddin Aquil. A stimulating and prolonged discussion with Saurabh Dube helped me to reconsider some of the problems posed in the paper. Commodity chain refers to the tree-like interconnections between different commodities at the level of production and exchange. For more details see Dunn (1989: 30). Modernity is central to theorization in contemporary social thinking, as it encompasses the entirety of humanity in one way or another. Theorization on modernity tries to provide a vision for the future, although there are several critiques to such positions. There are those holding philosophical positions who still believe in the rational understanding of the world. For a critical engagement with the problems of modernity, see Habermas (1993). For an extremely engaging discussion on these questions, see Mithchell (2000). For details see Appadurai (1997); Chakrabarty (2001); Chatterjee (1997); Chatterjee (2000). There is a growing body of social science literature on the Ezhavas and the reform movement SNDP. In the recent book on social mobility in Kerala, Filippo Osella and Caroline Osella have argued that ‘modernity together with a generalized commitment to progress, appears as integral to Ezhavas’ self-defined identities, embedded in community identity’ that was forged through the long process of reforms and mobilization. For details see Osella and Osella (2002: 9). Also see Moss (1994a). It is to be observed that Christianity has its presence in various denominations in Kerala. The traditional Syrian Christian Church which claimed the heritage of Eastern Christianity under the spiritual guidance of the ‘Jacobite’ patriarchs of Antioch could be considered the most ancient church in Kerala. With the coming of the Portuguese, most of the traditional church was forced to accept the Catholic Church hierarchy, but one group of the Syrian Christians resisted this and reverted to their traditional Eastern faith after taking an oath at Mattancherry at Cochin while holding a rope tied to a granite cross known as the Koonen Cross. In the nineteenth century with the coming of Protestant missions, first the Anglican Church and then various other Protestant sects became established. In the twentieth century the Salvation Army and Plymouth Brethren arrived followed by the various Pentecostal churches. From the mid nineteenth century missions were active among the lower castes and by the last decades of the nineteenth century

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 9. 10.

11.

12.

13. 14.

15. 16.

17.

18.

converts from the lower castes had become a distinct community although they remained within different denominations. But in the early decades of the twentieth century different caste orders were set up in response to discrimination within the church. The Syrian Christians are considered as part of traditional elite society in Kerala. For details of Church history and sects, see Augur (1903); Bayley (1992: 241–320); Viswanathan (1995); Mathew (1993). In order to understand caste within Christianity, see Koshy (1968) and Forrester (1980). For details of the work of the Basel Mission in Malabar see Raina (1988). The Church Missionary Society in Travancore was initially a Mission of Help to the Syrian Christians. They began to work among lower castes only after the formal break with the Syrian Christians in 1836. The Syrian Christians were for all practical purposes treated on a par with the upper castes. Their political position began to change from the late nineteenth century due to the emergence of new socio-economic forces. But their worldview and perception of caste structure, notions of purity, pollution and caste hierarchy remain the same today. The Travancore and Cochin Diocesan Record of 1912 carried the story of an exslave named Kumaran who was sold at the age of 10 or 12 from Pandalam in the south to Kanjirappaally in the plantation district for `14. For details see Travancore and Cochin Diocesan Record (TCDR) (1905); TCDR (1912); Hawksworth (1853). For some documents that speak of the sale of slaves, see Nair (1999: 74–75, 77) and Rajan Gurukkal, ‘On Grandhavari’, p. 8. See also Scott and Tria (1986: 5–35). The notion of weapons of the weak is used here as the situation is qualitatively different from what David Ludden refers to in his study on South Indian agrarian economy. When he deals with the question of dominance what comes out as striking is the active moments of resistance offered by the Palla and Shannar lower caste laboring people, with the former in certain instances referred to as slaves. In the example of Travancore we hardly come across active moments of resistance in the early or mid-nineteenth century involving villagers and townspeople. For details see Ludden (1989: 188–96). The First Part of Cottayam Report, Acc. No. 91, 0 1/2, Special Collections, Birmingham University, pp. 64, 82, 87. The significance of the use of language in another missionary context is discussed in Joel Robbins, ‘God is Nothing but Talk: Modernity, Language, and Prayer in a Papua New Guinea Society’, in American Anthropologist, Vol. 103, no. 4 (Dec. 2001), pp. 901–12. Madras Church Missionary Record, Vol. XVIL (1850), p. 285. This familiarity with language and Biblical knowledge helped create a class of intellectuals who articulated many of the current social problems in the religious idiom. The Church Missionary Intelligencer, a missionary journal, noted in 1864 the case of a runaway slave of Western Pulaya origin who had been baptized as Xavier, working among Eastern Pulayas as a teacher. Quoted in J.W. Gladstone, Protestant Christianity and Peoples Movement in Kerala 1850–1936 (Trivandrum: Seminary Publication, 1984), pp. 117–18. Ibid., 69–70. Onam is the traditional harvest festival that is celebrated in the month of August.

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19. George Matthan, ‘Slaves Of Travancore, Annual Report, Madras and South Indian’, Proceedings Of the Church Missionary Society 1856–57. Matthan reported the case of a youth crying at the time of prayer repenting of his sins when he understood that Christ died for his sins. See also ‘Extracts from the Journal of Rev. Oomen Mamen for the Half Year ending December 31, 1856’, in Madras Church Missionary Record, Vol. XXIV, no. 5 (May 1857), p. 127. 20. ‘Rev. Koshy’s Journal’, pp. 138–41. 21. P.C. Joseph, The Economic and Social Environment Of the Church in North Travancore and Cochin (Kottayam: CMS College Kottayam, 1938), pp. 18–19. See also Proceedings of the Church Missionary Society for Africa and the East. FiftySixth Year. 1854–55, p. 126. 22. ‘Journal of J. Tharian for the Half Year ending December 31, 1856’, in Church Missionary Record, Vol. XXIV, no. 5 (May 1857) p. 141; and Baker Jr., The Hill Arrians of Travancore, p. 26. 23. Joseph, The Economic and Social Environment of the Church, pp. 20–21. 24. Deepika (April 11, 1910). The observation was made in relation to the controversy in the Anglican Church regarding the seating arrangement of Dalit and upper caste Christians. It was observed that ‘if not caste at least one should consider cleanliness as health sciences advise’. 25. George Parker, ‘The Challenge of a Mass Movement: The Problems it Brings to a Society’, in The Chronicle of the London Missionary Society (o.s.) Vol. LXXII, (n.s.) Vol. XXIV, p. 212. For details on the photographic representation of colonial subjects see Sujith Kumar Parayil, ‘Photography and Colonial Modernity in Keralam’, in Manas Ray (ed.), Space, Sexuality and Post Colonial Cultures (Calcutta: 2003), pp. 97–120. 26. TCDR, Vol. XXIII, no. 5 (Oct. 1913), pp. 99–105. This organization was called Sadhu Jana Kristhiya Sangham(Poor Christians’ Association) in the manner of Ayyankali’s Sadhu Jana Paripalana Sangham (Association for the Protection of Poor People). Ayyankali was the most important Dalit leader of modern Kerala. 27. Ibid. 28. Vijayan Kangazha, Sree Kumara Gurudevan: Biography (Trichur: 1978), p. 8. 29. Revival movements were popular in the central Travancore area from 1873 onwards. The last one was in 1906–07. For details see The CMS Mission in Travancore and Cochin (London: Church Missionary Society, 1915), p. 24. 30. TCDR, Vol. XXIV (Feb. 1914), p. 15. 31. Ibid. 32. Quoted in ibid. 33. This conference was held at Vakathanam. This news spread far and wide, and the next day there was confrontation at the conference venue, but as Yohannan’s people were also prepared to meet the eventuality it did notspiral into a big confrontation. For details see Samiti, Sree Kumara Gurudevan, p. 47. 34. TCDR, Vol. XXIX, no. 6 (Dec. 1919), p. 95. Yohannan’s speeches also criticized the practices of Syrian Christians,so that the upper castes began to fear he was plotting a breakdown of the existing social order. They, too, used to sendpeople to report on what was discussed at Yohannan’s meetings. 35. ‘Travancore and Cochin Mission Annual Report for 1916’, in TCDR, Vol. XXVII, no. 3 (May 1917), pp. 44–5.

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36. Ibid. 37. Ibid. 38. In 1950 with the change of faith, one section of his followers under the leadership of his second wife, Janamma, broke away and became the official PRDS. Yohannan’s biography was reinscribed under the new name Kumara Gurudevan. 39. The ‘Travancore and Cochin Diocesan Report’ carried brief reports of blasphemy from other mission centres like Uganda in Africa. For details see TCDR, Vol. XXVII, no. 1 (Jan. 1919), pp. 19–20. 40. Ibid. 41. Charles Taylor, ‘Modern Social Imaginaries’, in Public Culture, Vol. 14, no. 1 (Winter 2002), p. 106. 42. The term ‘habitus’ is used here in the sense in which Pierre Bourdieu introduced it in The Logic Of Practice. Fordetails, see Pierre Bourdieu, The Logic of Practice (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1980), pp. 52–5. Mostpeople who joined the movement of Yohannan were from various Christian denominations and they were verymuch aware of the Biblical prophetic tradition. 43. TCDR, Vol. XXVII, no. 8 (May 1917), p. 35. 44. Ibid. 45. Travancore and Cochin Mission Progress Report 1915, p. 14. 46. In the latter half of the twentieth century there was a substantial decline in the predominance of female pastors, although women are still in the committees of the PRDS. 47. According to the teachings of the PRDS, Dalits became slaves when there was no prathyakshata or revelation. Inorder to escape from slavery they took refuge in Christian and Hindu rituals—baptism and ‘Suddhi’ respectively—that did not clean them. Yohannan believed that prathyakshata was a concept capable of resolving the crisis thatindividuals in society faced in the context of slavery. 48. Samiti, Sree Kumara Gurudevan, pp. 50–54. 49. Ibid. 50. Ibid. 51. Roland Barthes, Mythologies (London: 1989), pp. 117–74. See also Claude LeviStrauss, Structural Anthropology 2 (London: Penguin Books, 1977). 52. Hayden White, The Content Of the Form: Narrative Discourse and Historical Representation (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992). See also Roland Barthes, ‘This Discourse Of History’, in The Rustle Of Language (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), pp. 127–40. 53. Ibid., p. 35. 54. Levi-Strauss, Structural Anthropology 2, p. 16. 55. White, The Content Of the Form, p. 34. 56. For a theoretical discussion on the hagiographies of saints, see Michel de Certeau, The Writing Of History(New York: Columbia University Press, 1988), pp. 269–83. 57. Ibid., p. 270. 58. Saurabh Dube, ‘Myths, Symbols and Community: Satnampanth of Chhattisgarh’, in Partha Chatterjee and Gyanendra Pandey (eds), Subaltern Studies, Vol. VII (Delhi: OUP, 1992), p. 134.

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59. Kangazha, Sree Kumara Gurudevan: Biography, pp. 19–23. Yohannan was affectionately called Appachan meaning father. 60. Ibid. One interpretation of the name of the PRDS is that it is the church that provides visible salvation. The other is that the invisible God has appeared to the church, and the third is the idea that the church believes only in visible salvation. See Rev. P.C. Joseph, Poykayil Sree Kumara Guru, Jeevithavum Darshanavum (Thiruvalla: Christian Literature Society, 1994), p. 62. 61. Prominent among them were ‘Vakathanam Lahala’, ‘Mundakkayam Atilahala’, ‘Vellinadi Samaram’, ‘Kozhikkuchira Lahala of 1912–13,’ and ‘Mangalam Atilahala’. In all cases Yohannan and his followers escaped with minor casualties. Only in one instance did a Dalit woman die. 62. Certeau, The Writing Of History, p. 273. 63. Ibid., p. 31. 64. Kangazha, Sree Kumara Gurudevan: Biography, pp. 17–18. 65. Interview with J. John at Eraviperoor, 18 Sept. 2001. 66. Baby and Babu Rajan, Thiruvithamkur Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha Charithram Poykayil Yohannanu Shesham (Ettumanoor: 1994), p. 14. 67. Ibid. 68. Ettupara Kunju was one of the early supporters of the Sabha and had had a close association with Yohannan. The people’s faith in Ettupara Kunju’s words grew as his speeches included new themes and songs probably based on those of Yohannan. 69. Rajan, Thiruvithamkur Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha Charithram Poykayil Yohannanu Shesham, p. 15. 70. Later Ettupara Kunju lost his followers and became an exile of sorts. 71. Rajan, Thiruvithamkur Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha Charithram Poykayil Yohannanu Shesham, p. 15. 72. Ibid. 73. On one occasion when Yohannan was preaching at Kulathur, he was informed of a woman who had been paralyzed. Yohannan cured her when she was brought to him. In the same way he cured a man who was bed-ridden due to a serious illness. There is also a legend of his healing a madman. 74. Here I am referring to the mentality of people who have been overwhelmed by prophetic pronouncements. This was largely a result of the religious ideas that people had and which was decisive in determining their worldview. The mentality and religious ideas of an individual in relation to the society in which he/she lived have been excellently analyzed in Carlo Ginsburg, The Cheese and the Worms: The Cosmos Of a Sixteenth Century Miller (London: 1981). 75. Yohannan’s first marriage was in 1907 to Maria from which he had four children who remained obscure. His second marriage was in 1925 to Janamma, which bore two children. Some of his biographies downplay the fact that he was married and led an ordinary life, as by then the narrative mould had shifted to mythology. It was his second wife and their sons who took over the leadership of the sect after Yohannan’s death. Yohannan died in 1939, aged 61. For details see Rajan, Thiruvithamkur Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha Charithram Poykayil Yohannanu Shesham.

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76. Thomas Soderqvist, ‘Biography or Ethnobiography or Both? Embodied Reflexibility and the Deconstruction of Knowledge-Power’, in Frederick Steier (ed.), Research and Reflexivity (New Delhi: Sage, 1991), pp. 143–62. 77. ‘Proceedings of the Sree Mulam Popular Assembly, Seventeenth Session, 2 March 1921’, pp. 12, 31–2. I am thankful to Dr James Chiriyankandath for providing me with copies of the Proceedings. 78. Sree Kumara Gurudeva Geethangal (Eraviperoor: n.d.), p. 41. 79. Grantha Rachana Samiti, Sree Kumara Gurudevan (Kottayam: 1983), pp. 12–18. 80. For details see ibid., and participant observation of the ritual discourses during Rakshanirnayam and the memorial day of Yohannan. The discourses develop the theme of a glorious Adi-Dravida past and the later fall and enslavement as ritually significant. 81. Samiti, Sree Kumara Gurudevan, pp. 19–20. 82. Joseph, Poykayil Sree Kumara Guru, pp. 60–4. 83. In contemporary social theory the human body assumes significance particularly when colonial transformation is analysed. For details see John and Jean Comaroff, Ethnography and Historical Imagination (Oxford: Westview Press, 1992), pp. 69–94. 84. Jnanopadesam, Poykayil Kumara Guru Devan (PRDS), p. 31. 85. For an interesting argument about caste and body, see Partha Chatterjee, ‘Caste and Subaltern Consciousness’, in Ranajit Guha (ed.), Subaltern Studies, Vol. VI (Delhi: OUP, 1999), p. 21. 86. An instance in which Yohannan himself cleaned the house and bathed the children of lower caste parents who had gone to work for landlords is recalled emotionally in the movement’s ritual discourses and biographies. 87. Kangazha, Sree Kumara Gurudevan: Biography, pp. 31–3. 88. Ibid. 89. For details see Robert L. Hardgrave Jr., The Nadars Of Tamilnad: The Political Culture of a Community in Change (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969), pp. 55–70. 90. Kanam is the money paid to the bridegroom’s parents by the bride’s parents. 91. Kangazha, Sree Kumara Gurudevan Biography, and field data. 92. Stuart Hall, ‘Introduction: Who Needs Identity?’, in Stuart Hall and Paul Du Gay (eds), Questions Of Cultural Identity (London: Sage, 1996), p. 2. 93. Ibid. 94. Ibid, p. 3. 95. Rajan, Thiruvithamkur Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha Charithram Poykayil Yohannanu Shesham, p. 29. 96. Jnanopadesam: Poykayil Kumara Guru Devan, p. 20. 97. Rajan, Thiruvithamkur Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha Charithram Poykayil Yohannanu Shesham, p. 29. 98. Ibid., p. 71. 99. The Sikhs were given scheduled caste status in 1956 and Buddhistsin 1990. For details on the socio-legal aspects of the reservation policy in India, see Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities. Law and the Backward Classes in India (Delhi: OUP, 1984), p. 305. For details on Dalit Christians, see Lancy Lobo, ‘Visions,

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100. 101. 102.

103. 104. 105.

Illusions and Dilemmas Of Dalit Christians in India’, in Ghanashyam Shah (ed.), Dalit Identity and Politics (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2001), pp. 242–57. Rajan, Thiruvithamkur Prathyaksha RakshaDaiva Sabha Charithram Poykayil Yohannanu Shesham, pp. 122–3. The members of PRDS assumed Hindu names instead of their Christians ones. For detailed information on the movement of Ambedkar see Eleanor Zelliot, From Untouchable to Dalit (Delhi: Manohar, 1992). Also see Gail Omvedt, Dalits and the Democratic Revolution: Dr Ambedkar and the Dalit Movement in Colonial India (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 1994). For an understanding of the contemporary debates on culture and subordination in the context of Dalit experience, see Ghanashyam Shah (ed.), Dalit Identity and Politics (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2001). Zelliot, From Untouchable to Dalit, p. 133. Ibid., p. 137. Hall, Introduction: Who Needs Identity?, p. 3

REFERENCES Adam, William, and Thomas Fowell Buxton. 1840. The Law and Custom Of Slavery in British India: In a Series Of Letters to Thomas Fowell Buxton, Esq. London: Smith Elder and Co. Corn Hill. Appadurai, Arjun. 1997. Modernity at large, cultural dimensions of globalization. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Augur, C.M. 1903. Church history of Travancore. Madras: Asian Education Services. Ayyankali, C. 1989. Abhimanyu. Trivandrum: Department of Cultural Publications, Government of Kerala. Baker Junior, Rev. Henry. 1862. The Hill Arrians Of Travancore and the Progress Of Christianity Among Them. London: Wertheim Macintosh & Hunt. Bayley, Susan. 1992. Saints, Godesses, and King: Muslims and Christians in South Indian Society, 1700–1900. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chakrabarty, Dipesh. 2001. Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Chatterjee, Partha. 1997. Our Modernity, SEPHIS-CODESRIA Lecture No. 1 (Rotterdam). ———. 1999. Anderson’s Utopia. Diacritics 29 (4) (Winter): 128–34. ———. 2000. Two poets of death: On civil and political society in the non-Christian world. In Questions of modernity, contradictions in modernity, vol. II, ed. Timothy Mitchell, 35–40. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Deliege, Robert. 1997. The world of the untouchables: Paraiyars of Tamil Nadu. Trans. David Philips. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Dunn, Christopher Chase. 1989. Global formation: Structure of the world economy. London: Basil Blackwell. Fuller, C.J. 1992. Kerala Christians and the caste system. In Social stratification, ed. Dipanker Gupta, 195–212. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Giddens, Anthony. 1990. The consequences of modernity. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

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Hawksworth, Rev. J. June 14, 1853, C.I. 2/07/19, Special collections, Birmingham University. Forrester, Duncan B. 1980. Caste and Christianity: Attitudes and policies on caste of AngloSaxon Protestant missions in India. London: Curzon Press. Habermas, Jurgen. 1993. The philosophical discourses of modernity. Massachusetts: The MIT Press. Koshy, Ninan. 1857. Journal for Quarter ending September 30, 1856. Madras Church Missionary Record XXIV (5) (May): 138–141. ———. 1968. Caste in Kerala Churches. Bangalore: Christian Institute for the Study of Religion and Society. Ludden, David. 1989. Peasant history in South India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Mathew, Biju. 1993. Strategies of identity: The case of the Syrian Christians of Kerala. Unpublished M. Phil dissertation. Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam. Mitchell, Timothy. 2000. The stage of modernity. In Questions of modernity, contradictions in modernity, vol. II, ed. Timothy Mitchell, 1–7. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Moffat, M. 1977. An untouchable community in South India: Structure and consensus. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Moss, David. 1994. Idioms of subordination and styles of protest among Christian and Hindu Harijan castes in Tamil Nadu. Contributions to Indian Sociology 28 (1) (n.s.): 67–106. ———. 1994a. Catholic saints and the Hindu village pantheon in rural Tamil Nadu, India. Man: The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Society 29 (June) (n.s.): 301–32. Nair, P. Unnikrishnan. 1999. Thiruvalla Grandhavari II. Kottayam: School of Social Sciences. Osella, Filippo, and Caroline Osella. 2002. Social mobility in Kerala: Modernity and identity in conflict. London: Pluto Press. Raina, C.R. 1988. Basel mission and social change in Malabar. Unpublished M. Phil dissertation, University of Calicut. Raman, Ravi. 1991. Labour under imperial hegemony: The case of tea plantation in South India 1914–1941. In The South Indian economy: Agrarian change, industrial structure and state policy, c.1914–1947, ed. S. Bhattacharya, 243–67. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Saradamoni, K. 1980. Emergence Of a slave caste; Pulayas of Kerala. Delhi: Peoples Publishing House. Scott, James, C. 1986. Weapons of the weak: Everyday forms of peasant resistance. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Scott, James C. and Benedict J. Tria, eds. 1986. Everyday forms of peasant resistance in SouthEast Asia. London: Frank Cass. T.C. Varghese. 1970. Agrarian change and economic consequences: Land tenures in Kerala 1850–1960. Bombay: Allied Publishers. Travancore and Cochin Diocesan Record XV (3) (May 1905): 42–43. Travancore and Cochin Diocesan Record XXII (4) (August 1912): 86. Travancore and Cochin Diocesan Record XX (1) (February 1910): 13–15. Viswanathan, Susan. 1995. The Christianity of Kerala: History, belief and rituals among the Yakoba. Madras: Oxford University Press.

Chapter 14

Dalit Women PART 1 Dalit Women in Struggle: Transforming Pain into Power* Ruth Manorama

INTRODUCTION The Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948 proclaims that all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. Apart from the right to life, liberty, and security of person and property rights, the Universal Declaration gives the call for securing the valuable right to education, essential for the full development of the human personality. Several international covenants have followed the Universal Declaration, chief among them being the International Covenant for Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The Constitution of India has been patterned in keeping with the lofty aspirations which have been embodied in the above international instruments to secure and safeguard the rights of all sections of the citizens of the country. Racial discrimination on the basis of caste system is probably the longest surviving hierarchical system in existence in the world today. It is strengthened, supported, and perpetuated by religious sanctions; in due course it assumed the * Presented at the International Seminar on Dalit Women: Life, Struggles and Aspirations, held at the NGO Forum: Fourth World Conference on Women ’95, Beijing, China (Pamphlet distributed by Ruth Manorama at the World Conference Against Racism [WCAR] Durban 2001).

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ugly form of untouchability resulting in deprivation of basic civil and human rights to large sections of indigenous people. Poverty coupled with illiteracy aggravated this dehumanizing process over centuries. Indian society was stratified into four varnas. According to the Purusha Myth, God created the four varnas: the Brahmin (the priestly caste) from the head, the Kshatriya (warrior caste) from his arms, the Vaishya (trading and artisans) from his thighs and the Sudra from his feet. Some of whom are beyond the play of caste and are known as untouchables, they have been described variously as Avarna (colored), Antyaja (lowborn) Hum Sudra, Panchamas (fifth order).

WHO ARE DALITS? Dalits are the indigenous people of India comprising 200 million and they form one-third majority in Indian population. Dalit means “oppressed”/broken in many Indian languages. Understood as embodying a sense of being oppressed and therefore the need to revolt against oppression, Dalit implies double oppression in social and economic terms of the low caste. The word Dalit thus became a symbol of assertive pride and resistance to the linked oppressions of caste and class. They are exclusively known as Schedule Caste, listed for socioeconomic uplift under the State policy of protective discrimination. Historical evidence points to the fact that Dalits were the original inhabitants of India which is being actively and even aggressively articulated and reaffirmed today amidst both national and international forums to establish the self-identity and to empower the powerless Dalits in their struggles for liberation. Dalits are a heterogeneous people even in the same region in terms of ethnic roots, cultural identity, and other material conditions. They still preserve distinct ethnic and religious cultural heritage in various degrees despite their absorption into Sanskritic Hinduism and other religions. Today’s Dalit literature and movements have inherited traditional values, which shows their deep yearning and aspiration for human equality, human dignity, and justice. Its details can boast of Dalit identity, culture, and past heritage. Today their predicament can be described in terms of a lost humanity, a dispossessed community, and living in segregated condition. Continuous economic exploitation and sociocultural oppressions have rendered them politically voiceless. At the level of consciousness, the sense of “no person” and “powerlessness” has permeated every aspect of their life.

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PLIGHT OF DALITS A large-scale violation perpetrated on Dalits involve burning of homes and fields, murder, torture and beating women, molestation and raping of women, deaths in lockup and custody, and others. These occur in spite of constitutional guarantees abolishing untouchability. Victims of bonded labor, child labor, prostitution and devadasi come largely from Dalit communities. Dalit live in separate colonies and far away from the caste Hindus locality. They do not have access to public well to draw water or to public eating places. They have separate glasses for drinking tea or coffee at the village restaurants. They cannot enter the Hindu temples and worship as other Hindus do. Intercaste marriages are prohibited both by religion (Hindu) and practice.

VIOLENCE AGAINST DALITS Atrocities against Dalits basically arise in this context of “keeping Dalits” in their place “within the social hierarchy mediated by caste and untouchability.” The growing self-awareness/assertion and self-reliance of Dalits promoted by the educational-economical development programs of the state and other institutions, progressive Dalit renascent ideologies and participation in Dalit struggles threaten the vested interests/privileges of the hitherto dominant non-Dalit castes. Rising consciousness of Dalits and the resistance on wide range of issues such as the distribution of surplus land, minimum wages, dignity and justice have led to brutal caste violence against Dalits and Dalit women in particular. The two Civil Rights Acts, that is, Protection of Civil Rights Act 1955/1976 and the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989, derived from the Constitution, largely remain ineffective in their implementation because of the lack of political will on the part of the Government, lack of commitment of upper-caste bureaucrats to social justice, the lack of vigilance committees of citizens to monitor the implementing process and lack of statutory powers of the SC/ST Commission for directly punishing the perpetrators of crimes against Dalits.

PUBLIC HEARING ON “ATROCITIES ON DALITS” In a recently conducted public hearing on the atrocities on Dalit women by Women’s Voice and Asian Women Human Rights Council, at Bangalore, India (March 1994), several Dalit women all over the country deposed before the eminent Judges publicly voiced out the crimes perpetrated on them.

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An incident in a Kolar village, Bendigere, in Belgaum district in Karnataka where Dalit young men were made to eat human excreta, caste carnage in Fatehpur, several acts of violence and arson that rocked the seven districts of Marathwada under the pretext of renaming of Marathwada University in Maharastra, umpteen number of cases of atrocities in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh and perpetual dedication of Dalit women as Devadasis and Basvis under the guise of religious practices in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, are question marks in a society’s conscience and civilization and on all tall claims of equality and justice that we proudly make. These occur inspite of constitutional guarantees abolishing untouchability. The frequency of such barbaric acts and the geographical distances between their occurrences show that these are neither localised nor individual acts of perversion but concrete signs of an oppressive and inhuman social attitude that persists after decades of efforts and social transformation. (Deccan Herald 1994)

After hearing the cases of atrocities against Dalits the pronouncement of people’s verdict clearly concluded by saying, But we want to emphasize and say that each event of violence against the Dalits cannot be considered as isolated case. On a careful analysis of the pattern of atrocities on Dalits all over the country, we find that they are not reflection of isolated incidents, but they reveal a gross, systematic violence by the Indian State against Dalits, a pattern of repression which clearly fits into the definition of genocide—a crime against humanity.

SITUATION OF DALIT WOMEN Dalit women are referred to as “Dalit among the Dalits” or “downtrodden among the downtrodden” because they are thrice alienated on the basis of their class (poor), caste (outcaste), and gender. Women of Dalit communities may be the biggest examples of marginalization. They are the ones who are most vulnerable victims of repression and of discrimination. The oppression of Dalit women echo issues such as state violence, denial of land rights, social and legal discrimination, infringement on civil liberties, inferior status, dehumanizing living and working conditions, total impoverishment, malnourishment, bad health conditions, the adverse effect of various contraceptives and newly invented family planning devices in violation of their bodies, their status of illiteracy and ignorance, social ostracism and untouchability maintained by Hinduism and other religions (such as Christianity).

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The life of Dalit women is one of misery and agony. Dalit women were displaced from productive activity in the guise of development manifested in modernization and its technologies, computerization, option for various nuclear power plants and dam construction in the name of energy and power and urbanization. These development projects appropriated or destroyed the natural resource base. It decried women’s productivity by removing land, water, and forests from their management and control. While gender subordination and patriarchy are the oldest forms of oppression, they have taken a new and more violent form. Dalit women form the largest number of landless laborers who are paid low wages. Many are bonded laborers. They work under the most exploitative, dehumanizing, and unhealthy conditions usually as domestic workers, vegetable sellers, “beedi” makers and construction laborers. Neither their work nor wages are regularized. In addition, these women live in urban slums as squatters. The Dalit women embody the symbol of marginalization in our society. Their educational status is very low. “Rape and molestation are used as weapons of reprisal and to crush the morale of a section of the people,” says a former Chief Justice of India. New forms of sexual exploitation like Betalsseva (literally nude worship) and devadasi system are some religious rituals that victimize the Dalit women.

BREAKING THE CULTURE OF SILENCE: CREATING SPACE FOR UTTERANCE Even though the Dalit women are at the very bottom of the society and they are isolated, mostly living under impoverished situations, they have the capacity to love and struggle. They have immense potential of sensitivity to other’s need and for striving toward self-dignity. The lives of Dalit women have been characterized by “Culture of silence,” as they have lacked a political, economic, and social “space for utterance” for centuries. The issue of caste and the struggle of Dalit women has not been yet addressed seriously by women’s movement as well as by other movements, even though Dalits are there in different movement and in political parties.

ADVANCING THE STRUGGLE FORWARD With the growing fundamentalist, communalist, and casteist forces in India, it is essential to carry on the struggle forwards. Therefore Dalit women themselves have taken an initiative toward their emancipation and evolved strategies and

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plans to address their problems and the growing violence on Dalit communities. They are making efforts to build strong network among Dalit women’s groups all over the country. It is necessary to express that in the recent years in all the Dalit struggles throughout the country women have shown tremendous amount of courage, be it land issue, Anti-arrack Movement (in Andhra Pradesh) against atrocities and fought their issues quite heroically.

NATIONAL FEDERATION OF DALIT WOMEN National Federation of Dalit women is a dream, fulfilled after several years of continued efforts with the leadership of Dalit women to constitute a body, which would exclusively work for the Dalit women to address specifically their life, work, and struggle, formed on August 11, 1995. It is an autonomous, secular, democratic organization of Dalit women in India. Dalit women from all walks of life could become members and participate in its efforts in emancipation of Dalits. Dalit women view this formation in the larger context of historical struggles of Dalit all over the country to redeem their full dignity and particularly of the Dalit women. There is a tremendous task ahead for Dalit women to carry forward this new initiative, the first of its kind in the post-independent era of women’s movement as well in the post-Ambedkarite untouchable Liberation Movement in India. Some of the key programs which emerged are as follows: (a) Setting up a national-level Human Rights Commission (an independent body) on the atrocities against Dalits and Dalit women, (b) campaign committees at the state level, (c) education for Dalit women at all levels with supportive services like hostels, scholarship, and so on, (d) programs aimed at poverty alleviation such as reforms, economic alternatives, property and assets building for Dalit women, (e) fight against alcoholism, ( f ) a committee to deal with eradication of devadasi system, and (g) building up international solidarity and linkages with other discriminated groups.

DEMAND OF DALITS IS LIBERATION To conclude, the demand of Dalits is liberation. The model of development pursued in the past and in the independent India discriminates Dalits and it is hostile to their dignified existence. The system should recognize the Dalits’ right to live. They should get priority over all other issues. In place of treating them as crumbs and routinization and trivialization of all special plans for Dalits, the demand of Dalits is liberation. This is not a vague slogan. Its content

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needs to be spelt in terms of the entire life of Dalits. Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar, the leader of the Dalits of India, said that there are two enemies, “Caste ideology and capitalism.” We look for powerful assertion, alternatives, and a socialist perspective based on justice and equality. Dr Ambedkar’s slogan, “Educate, agitate, organise!” gains a new perspective in the emancipation of Dalits and Dalit women. He had said, “Battle is in the fullest sense of spiritual. . . . It is a battle for freedom, it is the battle for the reclamation of human personality.”

THE ROLE OF DALIT WOMEN The role of Dalit women is crucial and it is the center of Dalit liberation and Dalit identity, in the larger movement and struggle of the Dalits. The place of women in the Dalit vision is more than that of an equal partner with men and this must form the main path of alternative consciousness. In essence, the Dalit vision and alternative consciousness is primarily feminist, nonpatriarchal, nonhierarchical, and positively ecological. Dalit women all over the country need to stand up for freedom, inalienable right to human dignity and equal status with men and against other ills of the society. “We pledge ourselves to liberate all our people from the continuing bondage of poverty deprivation, suffering, gender and other discrimination”: President Nelson Mandela. To this end the Dalit women in India look towards international women solidarity and support.

PART 2 Commentary on Ruth Manorama’s Presentation at the Fourth World Conference on Women, 1995, Beijing Subhadra Mitra Channa

I met Ruth Manorama at the World Conference against Racism held in Durban in 2001. She appeared as a true leader as the large number of Dalit women, who were present at the conference were truly inspired by her leadership. We have

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reproduced here the brief presentation she had made at the Beijing Conference. Even though brief she has covered a wide range of both ideological as well as practical issues involving not only Dalit women, but also the marginalized in general. I thought it befitting that some commentary to highlight and elaborate on the issues raised by her would indicate the importance of this piece for the readers. To begin with, she has squarely placed the issue of the Dalits within the discourse of race and human rights violation. The debate of the similarity and dissimilarity between caste and race has been a major theoretical issue, one that gained prominence during the time of the Durban conference and has been dealt with by Channa (2005) in a paper that was also read at this conference and later published. The prominent supportive arguments for considering caste and race from the same platform can be summarized as: (1) Both are discriminatory on purely irrational, mythical, and inherited categories. (2) Unlike what is commonly supposed, race is not about discrimination on purely physical characteristics like skin color; one may for example take the discrimination of the British against the Irish and the differential treatment of the Chinese and the Japanese, where the latter are often treated as equal to the white, while the former as non-white. In a document that prescribed the characteristics to be used for racial discrimination by the South African apartheid regime (displayed in an exhibition at Durban), it was clearly mentioned that religious and cultural characteristics were to be included within the concept of race; thus Christian Lebanese were to be treated as white and the Muslim Lebanese as black. Thus race is not about skin color but about power relationships between the powerful and the dominated. (3) Even though caste is not about physical appearances ideally speaking, but about birth, yet there have been enough attempts to create a racial theory of caste by both scientists and laypersons. Thus the colonial literature is replete with the Aryan theory of caste and the works of administrators-cum-anthropologists like Herbert Risley did enough damage to create stereotypes of broad-nosed, dark-skinned, short-statured races that form the bottom layer of Indian caste system. (4) Civil society keeps both racism and casteism alive by the creation of stereotypes that are very similar across cultures; attributing characteristics such as laziness, lack of intelligence, and too much sexuality to the lower castes/races. Such stereotypes still abound in Indian society and in folk categories and are a form of “symbolic violence” directed against the marginalized.

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Thus both caste and race are similar in their approach and practices although they may overtly differ in the history of their ideologies; yet the outcome is the same and the sufferings identical. Both can be understood as human rights violation for the denial of dignity and a complete human identity to a section of society. Why are the very same people who profess a belief in human rights completely without pangs of conscience when they practice slavery or untouchability? It is because these people have been denied the status of complete human beings; this is a denial of personhood that underlies all forms of racial discriminations including that of caste. The Dalit leaders and all those who believed in a universal humanism that was truly directed at all human beings attempted to restore dignity and humanity to the downgraded. For example, beginning from the Bhakti movement to Phule, Periyar, and Ambedkar, regarded as true leaders of the Dalits in contemporary times, the attempt was to prove in one way or the other that those regarded as degraded were actually as human as anyone else. The collective attempt by the Dalits to reinstate their dignity, by claiming that they were the autochthones of India, uses the same weapon of history as was used against them in the era of the race sciences. As Omvedt (1994) has described, the Adi or original theory became a basis for Dalit movements in the initial phase itself. Thus in 1917 the term Adi-Andhra was coined and in the 1931 census, 665,000 persons had listed themselves as Adi-Andhra in the Madras Presidency. In Northern India the term Adi-Hindus became popular when Bhagya Reddy Varma founded the Adi Hindu Social Service League. In Punjab, the untouchables coined the term Ad-Dharmis for themselves. The main ideological weapon used by the Dalits was to claim that they being the original inhabitants had greater rights than the latecomers who were all invaders. In fact many of them even in the early period, before mass conversions took place, were not ready to identify themselves as Hindus, saying that they belonged to a religion prior to Vedic Hinduism brought by the Indo-Aryans. But certainly such claims were a way to reinstate their dignity and their status within Indian society and still many Dalits prefer this term. To some extent one may refer to Iravati Karve’s thesis about the origin of the caste system and also to the works of Sankalia, both of whom maintain that local and specialist artisans, craftspersons and nonagricultural economies may have been absorbed into the larger caste system as it developed from an agricultural economy and as power hierarchies were established by the warriors and the priests, such artisans may have been relegated to the bottom of the caste hierarchy. This is the reason why there is a lot of cultural difference between the upper castes and the lower castes; the latter sometimes appearing as different ethnic groups. While in some instances Dalits opt to follow the upper caste’s

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way of life to stake a claim to a higher social identity, some prefer to follow their own ways thus denying upper-caste hegemony. Manorama points to Dalit literature that is seen today by many Dalits as a voice of the oppressed and as a way to express themselves. The value of literature becomes all the more meaningful as Dalits till very recently had been denied the right to literacy; the very weapon of communication except through their oral traditions had been denied to them. Today the educated Dalits have found a voice through their literature. Dalit literature illustrates both the striving of the Dalits for an identity as well as their rising consciousness of the social injustice of their lives. Some of this literature indicates despair and some the staunch pragmatism, especially of the Dalit women, who more than anyone else realize that they have to live and make something out of the shattered fragments of their lives. Thus Punalekar (2001: 235) reproduces the words of a Murali (a Dalit caste) woman, who having sold her daughter into the flesh trade tells her not to cry for what has their God given them, no property, no land, no lineage but only a body which they must use if they have to survive. It is this bitter practicality that is the strength of the Dalit woman who is prepared to live no matter what the odds. Dalit women have suffered many forms of oppression and in most cases the oppression has not even been recognized. Thus upper-caste men have created stereotypes of Dalit women, as being hypersexual, as “enjoying” the company of upper-caste men and so on. So while they rape and molest these vulnerable women who work in the fields as agricultural labor, in factories as unorganized temporary hands and in the homes as domestics, there are few laws or social protection for them. The upper caste/class men keep their self-image of respectability by the stereotypical image that such women have no sense of honor or shame. In other words they do not feel dishonored if molested or raped. Against such models created by the exploiters, these women have their own worldview where they value the integrity of their body and mind above everything else. Most Dalit women have deep sense of honor and commitment to their families, perhaps much more than more privileged women. Yet even in civil society at large the rape of Dalit women finds only small print in the newspapers is dismissed as a “daily occurrence” and is never as important as the rape of a medical student from a middle-class family in Delhi or of a foreign tourist, that hog headlines. Most of the times such incidents go unreported and unnoticed. Against this background the women themselves have learnt to take care of their own bodies and minds. Dalit women treat their honor as very precious but they know that they themselves are the custodians of it. Thus from a young age they learn to be responsible and brave. Their stories of courage and intelligence almost always goes unsung but in rare cases we have mention made as in

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the excerpt from Moon’s autobiography in this volume where he has described the immense courage and determination of two teenaged Dalit girls against police brutality. Bama (2005: 75) describes the incident involving an elevenyear-old girl gone to collect twigs from the forest. Child that she is, she is able to recognize danger and do something about it. Thus to the numerous incidents of rape and molestation, that must be reported, we must not forget to write the stories of courage and intelligence, of situational commonsense that these women learn, in order to protect themselves from the predatory society, and against the many cases of violence, there are also many that are prevented, not by any law-keepers or state agencies, but by these women themselves. Dalit women are exceptional in that they have learnt to laugh and keep their sanity living lives that abound in violence and in being, under the burden of patriarchy, poverty and marginalization. Subject to multiple forms of discrimination, they are exemplary in their determination to live and in their zest for life. They would never take anything lying down. In their lives of marginalization and exploitation they have developed their own “weapons of the weak” with which they are able to demonstrate how they are true women of honor and respectability. What is important for the cause of Dalit women is that the women’s movement in India should look away from the interests of the middle-class women and realize the needs of women who are not privileged by birth or money. Although initially the women’s movement in India was primarily from the point of view and needs of upper crust of women in Indian society, from the seventies, many women have looked into the problems of the working-class women and into issues of informal sectors of the economy of which women, especially of the Dalit sections, for a major chunk (Menon 1999). It is here that Dalit women themselves are playing a crucial role (like Ruth Manorama herself). Although women played crucial roles in the Dalit movement and were participant to a very great extent in the labor movements and the Ambedkarite movement in the early part of the twentieth century, when talking or writing about Dalits, even the Dalit writers and those writing about them have not given them the coverage they deserve. The Dalit leaders had all along foregrounded their women as a critique of the oppressive attitude of the uppercaste men toward upper-caste women. The Dalit women had been given more respect within their own community as most Dalit families are jointly managed by the income of both men and women, the latter often playing the more crucial role as providers. But it is painful to see that when Dalit men become leaders their wives are relegated to the subordinate role alike all elite women. Yet Dalit

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women have stood alone and asserted for themselves even without the support of any men, from within or without. Efforts like those of Manorama to give a political identity to Dalit women would give them a platform that is essential for the Dalit women are special. They are not comparable to women of other groups. Here one must refer to the debate from within feminism that all women are not alike and the term “Woman” is not an undivided category. The theoretical and normative issues raised by women of “color” and women of the Third World countries need to be raised for the Dalit women also. The needs of the Dalit women can neither be theoretically merged with the issues of Dalits in general or of “Women” in general. The Dalit woman is an active subject. She is capable of redefining herself because of her keen understanding of her own position. Her survival capacities are very strong and Bama (2005) has written about her grandmother who, widowed at a young age, not only survives but brings up her daughters and is able to live a life of dignity. Even though they are poor they know how to survive using the barest means. Thus Paati (grandmother) collects the inedible (from upper-caste point of view) parts of animals like intestines and makes tasty dishes out of them. I have often seen while working among the dhobis how they are able to supplement their nutrition by boiling bones and hooves of goats and giving the broth to the pregnant mothers and also picking up such parts as are not eaten by the middle classes. The women have wide knowledge of herbs and traditional medicine and many Dalit women act as midwives for upper-caste women as well. The Dalit women having had to live close to nature and in conditions where they have to help themselves have developed a repertoire of knowledge and wisdom that is a great storehouse of assets for living. We give below excerpts from the work of Bama, a Dalit woman, whose narrative is an apt illustration of how a Dalit woman can be constituted as an active historical subject, a self-conscious entity who is keenly aware of her own self, identity, and exploitation. At the same time she is also aware of where the roots of her suffering lie, in the unjust social system. Although the State has given Dalit women reservations in many political bodies, especially the statutory Panchayats (under the 73rd Amendment Act), yet rarely are they accepted in these roles by the upper-caste men. Violence against office holders have been recorded from all across the country and here Manorama is justified in saying that the violence against Dalits is not to be treated as isolated incidences but as a collective action directed against a category and not individuals. The violence against women of exploited sections is a means of subjugating the entire community. It is to degrade the entire Dalit communities, to prove that they are subhuman, that there is both symbolic and physical rape committed on the bodies of their women. When a Dalit woman is

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raped, it is not a sexual act that is committed but an act of violation of human rights of an entire section of people. What is being asserted is not male superiority but caste and community superiority. The upper castes violate all norms of pollution when they touch the body of a Dalit woman, yet people who shun even the shadow of the Dalit feel no violation of their purity when they rape a Dalit woman. This in itself shows that the subjugation of the Dalits is not based on any criteria of religion or purity or pollution as the upper castes claim. It is a matter of exploitation and extraction of labor and services at the cheapest possible terms from the Dalits. It is a political and not a sexual matter. It is pure and simple violence and violation of human rights and dignity.

REFERENCES Bama. 2005. Sangati: Events, Trans. (from Tamil) Lakshmi Hölmstrom. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Channa, Subhadra Mitra. 2005. Metaphors of race and caste-based discriminations against dalits and dalit women in India. In Resisting racism and xenophobia: Global perspectives on race, gender and human rights, ed. Faye V. Harrison, 49–66. U.S.A.: Alta Mira Publications. Menon, Nivedita. 1999. Gender and politics in India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Omvedt, Gail. 1994. Dalits and the democratic revolution: Dr. Ambedkar and the dalit movement in colonial India. New Delhi: SAGE Publications. Punalekar, S.P. 2001. Dalit literature and dalit identity. In Dalit identity and politics, ed. Ghanshaym Shah. New Delhi: SAGE Publications.

PART 3* Excerpts Bama

My mind is crowded with many anecdotes: stories not only about the sorrows and tears of Dalit women, but also about their lively and rebellious culture, their eagerness not to let life crush or shatter them, but to swim vigorously against * Editor’s note: This section contains excerpts from Sangati by Bama, published with permission from Oxford University Press. The excerpts speak for themselves.

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the tide; about the self-confidence and self-respect that enables them to leap over threatening adversities by laughing at and ridiculing them; about their passion to live life with vitality; truth, and enjoyment; about their hard labor. I wanted to shout out these stories. I was eager that through them, everyone should know about us and our lives. Sangati grew out of the hope that the Dalit women who read it will rise up with fervor and walk toward victory as they begin their struggle as pioneers of a new Society

BEING A WOMAN Paatti, you said you were going to tell me why he is called Kaatturaasa, I reminded her. Look how I’m prattling on about something else. Yes, his mother was out one day, cutting grass for their cow. She was pregnant at that time, nearly full term. She went into labor then and there, and delivered the child straight away. She cut off the umbilical cord with the sickle she had taken with her to cut the grass, dug a hole and buried the placenta, and then walked home carrying her baby and her bundle of grass. It was only after that that they heated water and greeted and gave her a hot bath. That fellow who went by just now, he was that baby. That’s why they named him Kaatturaasa, king of the fields. ‘So how can one have a baby all by oneself, Paatti? Why did she have to go out to work when she was just due? Couldn’t she have stayed at home?’ If they stay at home, how are they going to get any food? Even their cows and calves will die of hunger then. And anyway, it wasn’t just her; more or less all the women in our street are the same. Even your mother spent all day transplanting in the Western fields and then went into labor just as she was grinding the masala for the evening meal. And that is how you were born. Then she went on, ‘We have to labour in the fields as hard as men do, and then on top of that, struggle to bear and raise our children. As for the men, their work ends when they’ve finished in the fields. If you are born into this world, it is best you were born a man. Born as women, what good do we get? We only toil in the fields and in the home until our very vaginas shrivel. Now run to your mother and ask her to plait your hair. Run! Paatti didn’t know how to make a plait. That’s why she sent me off to my mother after having picked the lice. As Paatti said, though, it is quite true that the women in our street led hard lives. That’s how it is from the time that they are very little. When they are infants in arms, they never let the boy babies cry. If a boy baby cries, he is instantly picked up and given milk. It is not so with the girls. Even with breastfeeding, it is the same story; a boy is breast-fed longer. With girls, they wean

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them quickly, making them forget the breast. If the boys catch an illness or a fever, they will run around and nurse them with the greatest care. If it’s a girl, they’ll do it half-heartedly. It’s the same when the children are a bit older, as well. Boys are given more respect. They’ll eat as much as they wish and run off to play. As for the girls, they must stay at home and keep on working all the time, cleaning vessels, drawing water, sweeping the house, gathering firewood, washing clothes, and so on. When all this is done, they will carry the tiny babies, minding them even when they go out to play. When they are playing too, girls must not play boy’s games. The boys won’t allow the girls to join in. Girls can play at cooking or getting married; they can play games with stones and shells such as thattaangal or thaayam. But if they go and play boys’ games like kabadi or marbles or chellaangucchi, they’ll get roundly abused. People will say, ‘Who does she think she is? She’s just like a donkey look. Look at the way she plays boys’ games.’ My Paatti too was no exception in all this. She cared for her grandsons much more than she cared for us. If she brought anything home when she returned from work, it was always the grandsons she called first. If she brought cucumbers, she scooped out all the seeds with her finger- nails, since she had no teeth, and gave them the remaining fruit. If she brought mangoes, we only got the skin, the stones and such; she gave the best pieces of fruit to the boys. Because we had no other way out, we picked up and ate the leftover skins. Paatti brought up and cared for her children by working as a kothachi, they say. This means that she had to go to the big landowners, ask them what sort of labor they needed in their fields, allocate the work among the women in our streets, and then go to work herself. Then in the evening she had to collect all the wages and distribute them. Because all the landowners belonged to the upper castes, their houses were at a great distance from our streets. Although she only needed to check once in the morning what sort of labor was needed, and then go back once in the evening to collect the wages, they used to make her walk up and down ten times a day, like a dog. Paatti kept a buffalo and a cow, both of which gave milk. Often when she went to pull up grass for the animals, or to gather firewood, she took me along with her. She always chattered on about all sorts of things during these times. Once when we were out gathering firewood, she told me, ‘Women should never come on their own to these parts. If upper-caste fellows clap eyes on you, you’re finished. They’ll drag you off and rape you, that’s for sure. If you go on a little further, there will be escaped criminals lurking in the plantations. They keep themselves well hidden. You must never let them see you either.’ When Paatti told me this, I was very frightened. I was thirteen at the time, and studying in the eighth class.

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‘Aren’t you scared yourself, Paatti? Come, let’s go home,’ I begged her. ‘Look, there are two of us, aren’t there? We’ll gather firewood a little longer, and then go back. You’re frightened because you are only a little girl. Do you know how many times I’ve gone alone to collect grass?’ ‘But aren’t you scared at such times, Paatti? What would you do if a poochandi or a thief came at you?’ When I asked her this, she relied, as she tied up all the firewood we had gathered with string, ‘You don’t know anything about me, really. Even the people of our Street don’t know me. I’m an orutthankaipattini, I’ve slept with only one man. I won’t allow any other fellow anywhere near me. They don’t know this, those whores of the Paraiya street who say all sorts of things about me, curse them! Wicked sluts, they can only say it behind my presence. Just ask them to say it to my face!’ She picked up the bundle and we walked home.

COMING OF AGE Two days later, Paatti came to our house and said to my mother, ‘Sevathi, tell this child Pathima to wear a half—sari from now on. It doesn’t look good for her to be sitting in a class with boys when her breasts have grown as big as kilaikkai pods. Yesterday when I was buying broken rice at the shop, her teacher—you know that Lourdes Raj teacher, di—called me aside and said, tell your granddaughter Pathima to come to school wearing a davani. And then off he went.’ When I heard what Paatti said, I retorted, ‘I won’t wear a davani. All the boys will tease me terribly. I’ll only wear a davani when I go to the ninth class.’ Paatti ticked me off bluntly. ‘You don’t know anything, di. Look at that fellow. Instead of teaching the pack of you, he looks at you from the corner of his eye, and then comes to me with his advice. Just wear a davani and go.’ Although I really wanted to wear a davani, I felt shy as well. I kept thinking and wondering what it would feel like to wear one (a half-sari). Meanwhile, Paatti and Amma chatted with each other. Paatti said, ‘Just see whether she doesn’t come of age in two, three months. Have you noticed the bloom on her face? As soon as she gets her periods, you stop her from studying, hand her over to some fellow or the other, and be at peace.’ ‘Her father won’t allow her to stop off now He wants her to study at least to the tenth. He says, we didn’t learn anything, and so we go to ruin. He says, let them at least get on in the world.’ Paatti was furious at this. ‘Have you any idea what that will mean? How are you going to keep a virgin girl at home and not get her married?’ Everyone will tittle-tattle about it. Keeping a young woman at home is like keeping a fire

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going in your belly. How long will you protect her, tell me? In my day, girls were married off even before they came of age. Paatti felt sad that when Mariamma came of age, we weren’t able to do anything special for her. ‘She sat inside the kuchulu for eight days, just for the show. Your mother cooked for her for a couple of days, and put twenty rupees and a couple of measures of rice in her hands. After that, my uncle’s children cooked for four more days. What can they afford, after all, poor things; they served her drumstick greens, and rasam, and a salt fish gravy.’ ‘But why did you let it go without any rites or rituals for her, Paatti?’ I asked. ‘Do you think it’s an easy thing to do, to keep these rituals? If you have a few coins in hand you can do it all. She herself pulled down the kuchulu on the eighth day, burnt it, and set off for work. Her mother went and died. Her father is a drunkard and goes off to his kept woman. He couldn’t care less for his children! He’s satisfied so long as his stomach is full.’ ‘Well, all right. But you said they used to sing and raise a kulavai to the girl. Do you remember that song, Paatti?’ ‘Even if there’s no kanji to eat, the women can never be stopped from singing loudly and ululating,’ Paatti said, as she began to sing. On Friday morning, at day—break She came of age, the people said. Her mother was delighted, her father too— Her uncles arrived, all in a row— Opened the cloth-shop and chose silk and gold Went upstairs to find the silk of their dreams The lower border with a row of swans The upper border with a row of clouds. The mountain wind can touch her if she bathes in the river The chill wind can touch her if she bathes in the pond So bathe her in water that is drawn from the well And wash her hair in a tub made of illuppai flowers. Shake her hair dry and comb it with gold. Toss her hair dry and comb it with silver, Comb her hair dry with a golden comb, And women, all together, raise a kulavai. ‘After every four lines there was a kulavai, an ululation,’ Paatti said. Then she added sorrowfully, ‘Daughter of a wretch, what good did it do her to come of age and become a pushpavati? The very next week she fell ill and took to her bed.’

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After she pulled down the kuchulu and burnt it, Mariamaa heard that the builders who were digging wells in those parts gave good wages. And so she went to work for them. Only youths and young girls were suited to that work. Even though it meant hard labor, the youngsters went to work there hoping to pick up a few coins which would help to fill their bellies. In this kind of work, the men climbed right inside the well, dug out the sides, and filled baskets with stone and rubble. The women had to go down, carry the baskets on their heads, bring them up and tip then out. It was the men’s job to blow up the rocks with dynamite, dig out the well, and build up its walls with cement. So they got the bigger wages. The women, in any case, whatever work they did, were paid less than the men. Even when they did the very same work, they were paid less. Even in the matter of tying up firewood bundles, the boys always got five or six rupees more. And if the girls tied up the bundles, but that boys actually sold them, they got the better price. Anyway, one day Mariamma was carrying away a basket of rubble like this when her foot slipped and she fell all the way down, basket and all. How she fell into such a deep well and still managed to survive was a miracle. There were no great wounds to her head, but ever bone in her body seemed to be crushed. They just rolled her into a palmyra mat, put her in a bullock cart, drove her to the free government hospital in the next town and admitted her there. As soon as we heard the news we all rushed there. Even Paatti came with us. There wasn’t a single one of us who didn’t weep when we saw her. You could only see Mariamma’s face. From her neck to her feet she was covered in plaster. She lay there unable even to roll from side to side. They told us that it would take at least a year for her to get up and walk about. After we Mariamma, we walked home along a path through the fields, talking amongst ourselves. Paatti said, ‘This reminds me of young fellow, just two weeks married, who was working on a well. He was blown up when they were laying the dynamite, and died, poor man then there was the other man who was lifting water from a well with a leather bucket, when the bullocks went mad, dragged him round and pushed him in. He was beaten about the face and head, and he too died.’ ‘Even last year, a couple of kids—both of them young girls—were helping to sow the fields with gram. They ate some of the gram, became violently sick, and then died.’ When Paatti said this, I questioned her, ‘How can people die from eating gram?’ ‘Of course they won’t die if they eat ordinary; plain gram. These landowners had mixed the seed-gram with all sorts of chemicals. Who knows, they might even have done it on purpose to stop the girls from eating the gram. At least they could have warned the girls, right in the beginning. And as for the poor

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fools, they should have stopped themselves because of the chemical smell. Instead they went and ate the gram on empty stomachs, they hadn’t had anything else to eat or drink that morning. They threw up violently, and lay down right there in the fields. Our people found them there when they went to start the ploughing, and brought them to this same hospital. That very evening they both died, and were brought home and buried. At least if you die a natural death you can hope to be buried with your whole body. If you die in hospital, it seems they cut out the brains and the kidney and the liver, stitch up everything with just the guts inside, and return the body tied up in a mat.’ We walked home for three miles, along the path through the fields. Suddenly there was a terrifying noise from somewhere. I was so frightened, even my insides were trembling. Paatti told me that there were jackals howling in the distance. Mariamma lay in her hospital bed, helpless and suffering for seven or eight months. Then at last she came home.

GETTING POSSESSED And even among women, I never heard of upper-caste women becoming possessed or dancing in a frenzy the peys always seem set on women from the Pallar, Paraiyar, Chakkiliyar, and Koravar communities. When I asked my mother about all this one day, she said, it is our women who go off on their own to work in the jungles and in the field. Those are the places where peys like to wander about. The peys catch the women when they are alone, without a circle of friends or relation. If they are menstruating, or if they are terrified in the first place, definitely the peys will catch hold of them. Of course peys would catch upper caste women, too, if they were to go out to work as we do. What do they care who it is? It’s just that they don’t catch men. And that’s because men don’t carry the same fear in their hearts. And they won’t catch women either, if they dare to walk past without fear. As I heard more and more about all this, I began to wonder if they really were peys. I wondered how it was possible for them to disguise themselves as women and then come and borrow jewellery. I told myself that Paatti must have made it all up. I wondered why peys were frightened of men. I asked myself whether in that case, any and every creature was afraid of men, too? According to my mother, if you have courage in your heart, you can live fearlessly. We need not fear peys and, what’s more, neither do we need to fear men. But now we are frightened of the dark of going anywhere alone; they create terrors for you on every side, and wherever you look.

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Once a girl comes of age she has no more freedom. They tell us all these stories, take away our freedom, and control our movements. And we too become frightened, we gaze about us in terror, we’re afraid of every little thing, we shiver, and die. It isn’t for nothing that they say to one who is terrified, that anything dark is a pey. If there isn’t courage in our hearts we lose our strength and become good for nothing. If we are brave enough, we can dare to accomplish anything we want. As I listened to more of these stories and thought about it all, I was convinced that it was all false. But at the same, I thought about the fact that only women— and Dalit women in particular—become possessed. And when I examined the lives of our women, I understood the reason. From the moment they wake up, they set to work both in their homes and in the fields. At home they are pestered by their husbands and children; in the fields there is back-breaking work besides the harassment of the landlord. When they come home in the evening, there is no time even to draw breath. And once they have collected water and firewood, cooked a kanji and fed their hungry husband and children, even then they can’t go to bed in peace and sleep until dawn. Night after night they must give in to their husband’s pleasure. Even if a woman‘s body is wracked with pain, the husband is bothered only with his own satisfaction. Women are overwhelmed and crushed by their own disgust, boredom, and exhaustion, because of all this. The stronger ones somehow manage to survive all this. The ones who don’t have the mental strength are totally oppressed; they succumb to mental ill-health and act as if they are possessed by peys. Our men don’t have the same problem. Even if they work really hard, they still have their freedom. They still control their women, rule over them, and find their pleasure. Within the home, they lay down the law; their word is scripture. I decided then that it is up to us to be aware of our situation, and not fool ourselves that we have been possessed by peys. We must be strong. We must show by our own resolute lives that we believe ardently in our independence. I told myself that we must never allow our minds to be worn out, damaged, and broken in the belief that this is our fate. Just as we work hard so long as there is strength in our bodies, so too, must we strengthen our hearts and minds in to survive.

VIOLENCE There were fights between husbands and wives in our streets, daily, just like this. One evening, after we had our kanji, we girls were playing a game where you had to cover your eyes and say, ‘Oh Rose, come softly, go gently.’ Suddenly a woman thudded past us, running as fast as she could. She was pregnant,

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besides. Right behind her, her husband came chasing, a stick of firewood in his hand. Luckily there were some men standing about in the chavadi, the community centre, who intervened and plucked away the firewood from the man’s hand. Even then he wouldn’t stop. He caught up with the woman and dragged her along by the hair, abusing her. ‘Where are you running away, di? Don’t think you’ll escape my hands, wherever you go, you slut! How dare you defy me!’ Because she was heavily pregnant, her whole stomach dragged on the earth as he pulled her along. Shocked at the sight, people shouted at him, ‘You brute, you animal, haven’t you got even a drop of human feeling or compassion in you? How can you torture her like that, without even caring that she’s pregnant?’ Instantly he replied, ‘If I let the whore go, she’ll surely run away.’ Then he lifted her by her hair and carried her off like that. She screamed, overcome by the pain of it. Even then, he wouldn’t let her go. He carried her home, just like that, flung her inside, locked the door, and beat her some more, the horrible wretch. Those of us who saw what was going on just wept. When people went to the girl’s parents and complained, they answered casually, as if it were an everyday affair, ‘This is the bridegroom she chose for herself. Did we arrange her marriage for her? When she ran away with him, she didn’t feel any pain, did she? Now she is being destroyed by him. So what can we do about it?’ The people who came spoke up, ‘There’s only one thing wrong the girl did, in any case, to deserve all this. She started all this fuss and argument by asking him to give her his wages. If the wretched fool had let him keep his wages and not asked, she wouldn’t have been beaten up in this shameful way.’ ‘If a man goes off with the money he has earned, drinks as much as he likes, and eats in coffee-stands and food-stalls, then how can a woman go out to work and, earn enough money to fill her children’s bellies and do whatever else is necessary in the house? How can she manage everything with just her wages?’ But what they said had no effect, so they went home. On the other hand, the quarrels between our neighbor Kaaliamma and her husband Chinnappan were quite comic. When I watched them, I wasn’t so disturbed inside myself. Because Kaaliamma was ready to fight, one to one, headon. Sometimes, she was the one who came out victorious. If he hit her, she was ready to strike him back. Perhaps because of this, their quarrels remained within the bounds of words. They seldom came to blows. One day, Chinnappan was sitting in front of their house, slicing up a bottlegourd. Kaaliamma, returning from her evening task of collecting water, came upon him like this, and immediately started ranting. ‘Look, I’ve stood in a mile-long queue until my legs grew numb, fought with those mundés there, and finally made it home with the water. And what about you? Here you are, calmly sitting down with the sorakkai; you haven’t even bothered to stoke the fire, and

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it’s burnt itself out. Why should I be the only person to take all this trouble? Don’t you think I could have cut up the sorakkai after I came home? I put the rice on to boil before I set out, and now it’s all burnt and spoilt. I too went; worked all day in the fields in the baking heat; I too came home half dead. But after that, just to make you a decent meal, I’ve had to rush about for firewood and water; I’ve even had to go to the shops. Can’t you realize that I’m only an ordinary woman? You went off like a big mudalaali and bathed in the lake, and sat down to slice your sorakkai.’ Still scolding she set the water pot from her hip very gently on to the ground; then lifted down the big mud pot from her head with a clang. Chinnappan was furious. He began to shout back at her. Here I am trying to help you out of sheer kindness, and all you can do complain. Just watch out that I don’t throw the vegetable slicer at you. At this point, Parvati Kizhavi intervened, saying, ‘Why do you quarrel with him, di when he’s only trying to help you?’ ‘I’ve had enough of his help, slicing vegetables, Paatti. I’ve spent whole day cleaning and toiling; I’ve brought home a big bundle of thorns and sticks. I lit the fire and set the rice to boil before going out, and now it is all spoilt. Now I have to light the hearth all over again. The wretched thorns and sticks are all green. My sides aches from blowing at them.’ Kaaliamma was trying to get the fire going again as she poured all this out. She was a sorry sight, surrounded by smoke as she struggled with fire. Chinnappan himself made another suggestion. ‘Ei, tha, pour a little kerosene on it, if you have any, it will catch straight away.’ ‘As if he’s kept aside a tin of kerosene, just so that I could pour it on, whenever I need to. Don’t even pretend to be a man when you go outside the house. I saved a hundred rupees bit by bit, the way an ant collects grains, and bought a chit. You took even that away, and all you did with it was to fill your belly and fart. Don’t you dare to talk. Just have the decency to return my money. Otherwise, you won’t know what hit you.’ She bent down and began to blow at the hearth. ‘Your money is worth the hair on the back of my legs, di. If come across any big money, I’ll throw it your way in a couple of days. You can catch it respectfully, from a distance.’ He finished slicing the sorakkai. Then he added, ‘You don’t even know how to light a fire and you claim to be a woman in this world.’ He lit a bidi for himself, and went off toward the chavadi. Now he would return just as she had finished cooking the rice, and was taking the curry off the fire, and he would eat until he could eat no, more. When I saw him swaggering off with the bidi in his mouth, I was full of anger, too. I scolded him silently, ‘Just look at him, useless man.’

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It was always like this in our streets. Although both men and women came home after a hard day’s work in the fields, the men went off straight away to the bazaar or the chavadi to while away their time, coming home only for their meal. But as for the women, from the minute they returned home they washed vessels, cleaned the house, collected water, gathered firewood, went to the shops to buy rice and other provisions, boiled some rice, made a kuzhambu or a kanji, fed husband and children before they could eat what was left over, and go to bed. Even if they lay down with bodies wracked with pain, they weren’t allowed to sleep. Whether she died or survived, he had to finish his business. When I thought about all this, I was often disgusted by this daily routine. Men at least, I thought, had a better time of it. Nowadays, when I reflect on how the men in our streets went about drinking and beating their wives, I wonder whether all that violence was because there was nowhere else for them to exert their male pride or to show off their authority. All that suppressed anger was vented when they came home and beat up their wives to a pulp. Even though they are male, because they are Dalits, they have to be like dogs with their tails rolled up when they are in the fields, and dealing with their landlords. There is no way they can show their strength in those circumstances. So they show it at home on their wives and children. But then, is it the fate of our women to be tormented both outside their houses and within? Thinking about it, I have to say that even if all women are slave to men, our women really are the worst sufferers. It is not the same for women of other castes and communities. Our women cannot bear the torment of upper-caste masters in the fields, and at home they cannot bear the violence of their husbands.

THEY AND US Besides all this, upper-caste women show us no pity or kindness either, if only as women to women, but treat us with contempt, as if are creatures of a different species, who have no sense of honor or self-respect. They themselves lead lives shut up inside their houses, eating, gossiping, and doing their husbands’ bidding, and then they treat us like this. God knows how they stay shut up within four walls, all twenty-four hours of the day. From this perspective, it seems to me that at least our women work hard and earn their own money, and have a few coins in their hand they don’t hold out their palms to their husbands for every little expense like those others. All the same, because of our caste and because of our poverty every fellow treats us with contempt. If ever there is a problem or a disturbance, everyone, starting

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with the police, chooses to blame and humiliate the women of our community. The government does not seem prepared to do anything to redress this. So we must take up the challenge ourselves. It’s like the proverb that says, if a man sees a terrified dog, he is bound to chase it. If we continue to be frightened, everyone will take advantage of us. If we stand up for ourselves without caring whether we die o survive, they’ll creep away with their tails between their legs. Another proverb says, so long as it is hidden in the earth, it claims to be big, but when you start peeling it, it’s nothing but skin. These fellows are just like that—like onions. They’ll shout themselves hoarse, making great claims. They’ll forbid us to speak a word. They’ll seethe like cobra and say that they alone own everything. But why should we hide our own skills and capabilities? We work just as hard as they do. Why, could even say we actually work harder. Ask them to do all that we do in a day—care for the children, look after the house, and do all the chores. They’ll collapse after a single day of it, and that will be the end of their big talk and their fat arses. But they are not going to think of all this easily nor by themselves. It is we who must uphold our rights. We must stand up for ourselves and declare that we too are human beings like everyone else. If we believe that someone else is going to come and uplift us, then we are doomed to remain where we are, forever. Upper-caste women give the superficial impression that they never quarrel amongst themselves nor with their husbands. They claim that it is only in our streets that there are fights and vulgar quarrels all the time. It is only when you go inside their homes that the real truth is revealed. It’s as the saying goes. It looks a stylish hair-knot, decorated with screwpine flowers; but it’s all lice and nits within. They submit to their husbands like cobras that shrink back into their boxes. And they have to do that. Because it is the money that he gives her that drives the cart. It’s because of this that she even stands and sits according to his orders. But in our streets, men and women both go out and earn. Most of the men, though, never give their wages to their women. It is the woman who looks, after everything in the house. So, on top of all this, why must she submit to being beaten and stamped upon for no rhyme or reason?—That’s why she quarrels with him. If he shows his strength of muscle, she reveals the sharpness of her tongue. Because she can’t hit him back, she curses him roundly. What else can she do? All the same, all our women are not like this. Most of them put up with all that violence and suffer a life of hellish torment. On the one side she is worn out with physical toil, on the other, she is beaten until she is left with only a half or a quarter life. I don’t know when we will be free of all this. We must somehow

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dare to take control of our lives. Then, as the proverb says, ‘Even the ocean will support us, if we only dare.’ The fights and quarrels in our streets always happen at dawn, or at dusk, when it is growing dark. When I asked myself why it was that in our streets there is so much commotion and such chaos just during those hours, I thought at first that it was because everyone was out at work during the rest of the time; quarrels broke out when they were all back and out on the streets. But gradually I came to understand the real reason. The women never got a proper night’s peace and quiet after working hard all day they had to pleasure their husbands whenever they demanded it so they never got any rest. Neither their bodies nor their minds felt rested when they woke up. Promptly they vented their irritation by quarrelling with everyone they met. And then after this bout of useless wrangling, they had to run to their work. When they come home after an arduous day’s toll, there is only more and unending work. From all sides they have to deal with the pestering of children and the anger and unfair domination of their husbands. Their lives are unceasingly tedious. When they are so frustrated by all this, they are driven to venting their bitterness by quarreling and shouting.

WOMEN’S SPACE It struck me that I should ask Irulaayi about Pecchiamma. I went to her as she was talking to my mother. I said, ‘Has that Pecchi from your Street really got married a second time? How come?’ ‘Who? You mean Karuppasaami’s daughter, Pecchi, don’t you? She finished with her first fellow, and then married Sudalaimaadan’s son, the one from the last street in the east side. Now she’s given him a child as well.’ Irulaayi spoke as if it were a perfectly normal thing to do. How can she marry a second time when her first husband is still alive? ‘O, it’s quite common with us. It’s only you Bible-people who can’t do it. We are Hindus. But even amongst us, it’s only the Pallar and Chakkili communities who can end one marriage and go and marry a second time. None of the other communities do it.’ ‘So tell me, how did this Pecchi end her marriage?’ ‘She was given away in marriage in the usual way, and she even had two children. The husband was always drunk. He couldn’t give her so much as a paisa for the household expenses. On top of that, he beat her up and snatched away all that she earned. How long was she to starve? Even if she were to put up with it, what about her little children? Worse still, the ugly fellow also had

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another woman. Not one of Pecchi’s things was safe in her own house. On top of all this, he pretty nearly killed her with his blows. The girl put up with it as long as she could, and at last went back to her father’s house.’ ‘So did she just stay there, and then get married again? ‘What she did was to ask her father to tell the naattaamai all that had happened, to say she couldn’t live with her husband anymore, and to arrange for a separation. The naattaamai called a meeting of the panchayat, and asked the husband and wife to come to it. And so they ended the marriage.’ ‘How exactly do they do it?’ I asked. ‘Why, in the usual way. The naattaamai asked Pecchi what the matter was. She told him how she suffered. She said how he listened only to his mistress, and tormented his wife and children, how he got drunk and behaved like a brute. She said she didn’t want to live with him anymore. So they agreed, and formally ended the marriage by deciding that the boy should stay with his father, and the girl with her mother.’ ‘So after that she was allowed to marry again, was she?’ ‘Yes, as you know Pecchi married again, and has another child as well. He hasn’t married again, though. He’s still going around with his mistress. And that boy, Kali, spends most of the time in Pecchi’s house. Well, I’m off. It’s getting dark.’ Irulaayi left soon after that. When I thought about all that she had told me. I was quite shocked. ‘But it seemed to me that it was a very good thing that some of our women had the option of ending their marriages. Because it meant a woman need not spend her entire life, burning and dying, with a man she dislikes, just because of this thing called marriage. But I also felt sad that Christian women didn’t have this chance. On the other hand, many upper-caste women would not even think of it in their wildest dreams. If a woman leaves her husband and chooses to live apart from him, people will keep on tormenting her and even drive her to her death. She has to accept that even if he is only a stone or blade of grass he is still her husband. I asked my mother, ‘Well, Ma, if Irulaayi’s story is to be believed, then a man also can decide to end a marriage if he can’t stand his wife, I suppose?’ ‘If even a woman has this chance, why shouldn’t a man have it? You just go and see what is happening in their streets. Lots of men finish off their marriages as fast as they can and start new ones. If you ask their women, they’ll say that the Bible-folk are definitely better off.’ Why do they say that? It looks as if they don’t realize how lucky they are. Tell them they should look around them. In every other community a tali round the neck is the end of the story. A woman is told she must stay with her husband until she dies and put up with every kind of torture. She can’t go

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back to her parent’s house. But she is not able to keep on suffering abuse in the house she has entered, either. Do you know how many women have committed suicide because they have no other go? And do you know how many women go on living like corpses, have actually been killed and their deaths passed off as suicide? Now, if they had a chance like this, they would leave those brutes and marry again if they wished to. Or live on their own. ‘That’s what you say. But you go and see what’s happening in our village among the Pallar and Chakkiliyar. More than half the time, it’s the man who cuts off his wife without a thought and marries again another. So, all this is actually more damaging to the women.’ On reflection, I had to agree. But I said, ‘It’s because he doesn’t like her that he ends the marriage, though. If a man doesn’t like you, how can you keep him tied up?’ Every Saturday evening we used to go together to bathe in the well in the fields. At the same time we used to take our dirty clothes, wash them, dry them out, and bring them home. It was all in preparation of going to church for the puusai on Sunday morning. So that was the one day in the week that we bathed. For us even a bath was like a special luxury. On most days, the women worked in the hot sun and then came home in the evening to their housework, so that they never had time to bathe in the well. When we were there to bathe, we dived into the water, jumping from the room above where the pump set was, and making a great splash. Then we swam about. When we were children, we all swam together making no difference between the boys and the girls. We swam under water and played games, chasing and catching each other. After we came of age, we women bathed separately. It was only women from the Palla, Paraiya, and Chakkili communities who bathed there. We never felt shy with each other, nor thought we were being immodest. We stripped off our clothes casually and went into the water. On that one day we washed our faces with that much turmeric. Once, about ten or twelve of us were bathing in Raasa Nayakkar’s well. There were four or five small children with us, too. I asked the rest, ‘The women from the other communities never come and swim here. Why is that?’ Othadipillai, who was already swimming in the water said, ‘But none of them know how to swim. And not only that, those people won’t bathe naked like this in front of each other. They always keep themselves under wraps as if their bodies are somehow different from ours.’ Kanniamma rebuked her. ‘You are a wicked old cunt. You are always going on about equal places for men and women. But how is it likely that those ladies will come and bathe in a well which lower castes use?’ Othadi retorted, ‘Ei, are all of us who bathe here shit-eating pigs, or what? In any case, who’s stopping them from going and bathing at a different well?’

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‘They are all scaredy-cats, di. They can’t swim at all, that’s the truth. They stay at home, get a couple of buckets of water which they dip into and pour over themselves little by little. God knows how they manage to bathe in such small, small amounts of water. How different it is to go right under the water like this!’ Purnam jumped in with a loud splash. Then Kovaalu Paatti who was cutting the grass along the edge of the well pointed out something else. She said, ‘There’s no space in our houses to have a bath. Where can we go and bathe, we who live in tiny huts where we cook, eat, curl up and sleep in the same small space? Leave that. Even when we have our babies, where’s the space to heat up a bit of water and pour it over ourselves? That’s why we always come to the well. In those ladies’ houses they’ve built different, different rooms to bathe, to shit or piss, and do whatever they like. So why should they come here?’ But Purnam would not agree. ‘Is that what you think, Kizhavi? But do they have the freedom to come and jump into the water and swim about as we do? They never get all this fun. God knows how they can stay indoors all twentyfour hours of the day, gazing at the walls. I certainly couldn’t do it, thayee.’

REFERENCES Bama. 2005. Sangati: Events. Trans. (from Tamil) Lakshmi Hölmstrom. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Deccan Herald. 1994. Editorial: Society’s shame. February l, Chennai.

GLOSSARY (FROM THE ORIGINAL TEXT) Chakkili or chakkiliyar: caste name Chattai: blouse or shirt Chavadi: marketplace Chellaangucchi: games played in villages Cholam: millet Devani: a half sari made up of a veil, blouse and skirt Kabadi: game played in village Kanji: thin gruel of rice or other grains or just the starchy water drained from cooked rice Kilaikkal: a fruit Kuchulu: a little hut built away from the household. When a girl comes of age, she is made to sit in this ‘hut’ where she is visited by friends or relatives. Kuzhanbu: meat or vegetables, cooked in a gravy, to be eaten with rice.

Dalit Women

Mudalaali: employer, proprietor Mundè : abusive reference to a widow Paatti: grandmother Pallar: caste name Poochandi: Bogey man Pushpavati: coming of age of a girl, literally, the day a girl blossoms Pusaai: in this context, a catholic mass Sorakkai: gourd Thaayam: games

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Chapter 15

Caste and Gender: Understanding Dynamics of Power and Violence* Kalpana Kannabiran and Vasanth Kannabiran

The recent incidents of upper-caste violence in Tsundur, Chilakurti, and Gokarajupalli force us to search for answers to questions that are crucial to the survival of disadvantaged groups: the scheduled castes and women especially. We need to understand how the caste question and the women’s question are intermeshed and how each of these can only be understood with reference to the other. In Tsundur in Guntur district, around noon on August 6, 1991, a mob of 400 persons belonging to the dominant landowning Reddi caste attacked Mala Dalits in the most brutal manner, killing eight persons and throwing the bodies into the Tungabhadra drain canal with the alleged connivance of the police. This was the culmination of a whole month of tension and relatively minor confrontations between the Reddis and the Dalits. (The Dalits involved in this incident are Malas. Tsundur also has a small community of Madigas as well as some other artisan castes. This confrontation divided the Dalits with the Malas being singled out by the Reddis.) On July 7, 1991 the foot of a Dalit boy, Ravi, accidentally touched a Reddi boy sitting in front of him in the cinema hall in Tsundur. Ravi, an M.A. student studying in Nagpur, apologized immediately but was roughed up by the Reddi boys sitting in front. This angered Ravi’s friends who repeated the same treatment on the Reddi boys. Ravi’s parents, both teachers, sensing trouble sent him away to Ongole. When the Reddis who came in search of Ravi found him missing, they held his father, Bhaskara Rao captive. Details * This essay was first published in the Economic and Political Weekly, September 14, 1991, immediately after three incidents of upper-caste violence in Andhra Pradesh, and subsequently republished in De-Eroticizing Assault: Essays on Modesty, Honour and Power, Calcutta: Street, 2002.

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of Ravi’s whereabouts were then forced out of Bhaskara Rao, and on the day Ravi was due to return from Ongole, the Reddis went to the railway station in a gang, chased him, beat him up brutally, forced brandy down his throat, took him to the police station and asked the circle inspector to register a case against him that he had misbehaved with women in a drunken state. Meanwhile in a parallel incident, Rajbabu, another Dalit boy was knifed in the arm by one Krishna Reddi because he was supposed to have grazed his body against two Reddi girls outside a cinema hall. The Dalit version is that these women were walking alongside him and Rajbabu turned around and looked at them. When Rajbabu’s friends took him to the police station and asked the circle inspector to register a case against Krishna Reddi, the circle inspector put the injured Rajbabu in the lockup and admitted Krishna Reddi in the hospital. A few days later, around July 12, the Mandal Revenue Officer offered to negotiate a settlement between the two groups and asked the Dalits to come to the police station the next day. When the Dalits went at the appointed time, they were bundled into a waiting police van and taken to Tenali, where they were produced before the magistrate on the charge that they had assaulted upper-caste people. Following this there was a social boycott of Mala Dalits in the village for close to a month. They therefore had to go to Tenali to buy their provisions and those who worked as agricultural laborers had to go to Ongole in search of work. During this period there was a police force of 60 led by a deputy superintendent of police (DSP) stationed in the village to “maintain peace.” On August 6, 1991, at about 11 a.m. the police suddenly entered the Mala Dalit houses. The women, fearing that the men would be attacked, asked them to run away from there. The men ran into the fields, where armed upper-caste Reddis were waiting for them. They were hacked to pieces. Some of them were thrown in nearby fields, while others were put into gunny sacks and thrown into the river. On the evening of August 6, the DSP issued a statement that all was peaceful in Tsundur. The fact of the massacre was kept sub rosa for over 24 hours and came to light only when some Dalit women stole out of the village and walked about 40 km to Guntur to report it to the district collector. After this incident, all the Dalits had to flee to Tenali where they were offered shelter in the Salvation Army Church. All the Mala Dalits of Tsundur were Christians by faith. Chilakurti is a small village in Nalgonda district, with approximately 2,500 households. On August 14, 1991, thirty-five-year-old Muthamma, a Golla by caste and an agricultural laborer was brutally beaten up by three Reddi goondas and paraded naked through the streets of the village, arrack being forced down her throat all the while. It was the day of the village shandy but nobody intervened or came to her rescue. The women unable to bear the sight went indoors and shut their doors. The men covered their eyes. One old man who tried to come forward and cover her with a cloth was also beaten up. It was only at the

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initiative of the agencies of the state, the district collector and police officials that this case was registered. For the villagers, this was not the first time this kind of thing had happened. Muthamma was only one of many victims. She was picked up because she was believed to have helped a Reddi girl elope with a Golla boy, while she herself denies the charge. That the girl who eloped had long had a relationship with this boy and that her family had got a pregnancy terminated in the sixth month was common knowledge in the village. In Krishna district, two Dalit youth were found dead under suspicious circumstances around August 24, 1991. The body of Srinivasa Rao of Gokarajupalli was found floating in a tank on August 3, but the first reports appeared on August 24, when the Dalits of Gokarajupalli who had fled to Kanchikacherla nearby to escape being attacked by upper-caste landlords brought it to the notice of the press. This was the second time Dalits of this “dalitwada” had to flee, the first time being when Chandra Rao, a Dalit boy was found murdered on January 16, 1989. A second incident reported on August 24 along with the death of Srinivasa Rao was the death of a Dalit boy who had allegedly teased an upper-caste girl, even though the boy’s mother had tendered an apology to the mother of the girl and admonished her son in public. In yet another incident, a Dalit rickshaw-puller was tortured by the police till he lost consciousness in Challapalli or Krishna district on a complaint made by two upper-caste women who had hired him, that he had stolen one of their anklets. The causes for the eruption of conflict are not immediate and spontaneous. In Tsundur, for instance, the mandal revenue office records show that although the Reddis are the landowners and are economically dominant, the Dalits have moved far ahead in the field of education and most of them work outside Tsundur. Only 20 percent of the Reddis’ land is cultivated by the Dalits. More than half the village is literate with an approximate balance between male and female literacy. Among these literates figure 10 to 20 Dalit postgraduates, dozens of Dalit graduates and roughly 200 Dalit matriculates. Compare these figures with the total absence of postgraduates and graduates among the Reddis. Being as qualified as they are, not all Dalits depend on the Reddis for work. At least 500 of them are employed in the South Central Railway as fitters, maintenance men, and in the telephone department. It is only a small proportion of Dalits who depend on tenant cultivation. The only fact in favor of the Reddis (caste status apart) is that they own 2,420 acres of land as against 78 acres owned by the Dalits. Even here, the land is divided among as many as 1,044 persons, the breakup being roughly as follows: 253 households with between 2.5 to 5 acres each and 84 households with an average of 12 acres each. Although no Dalit possesses more than a hectare of land, the Reddis can by no stretch be described as “big landowners.” Earlier instances

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of tension in this area resulted when the Dalits resisted attempts by the landlords to replace them as tenants employing landless upper-caste people instead (Indian Express 1991). The strength to do this resulted in no small measure from the real bargaining power that the Dalits had illustriously built for themselves. Further, the Tsundur Mandal Prajaparishad president was a Dalit belonging to the Congress I as were some others from neighboring areas. Not only had the Dalits excelled in education—a strong upper-caste preserve—they had also made inroads into the upper echelons of the Congress party at the local level thus appropriating yet another upper-caste preserve. A cursory look at these facts is enough to tell us that the cinema hall incident that triggered off the large-scale violence only detonated tension that had steadily accumulated over the years and was caused by the changing structure of relationships between upper and lower castes. It is important not to trivialize the issue by situating the entire confrontation and its genealogy within the cinema hall and within homogenizing notions of the “traditionally” oppressive relationships between upper castes and Dalits, thus viewing this structure in ahistorical and essentialist frameworks. The social relations of caste and gender are based on the exercise of power through the use of force. This power could have many dimensions: It can be simple and direct in its assertion; it can be complex in not permitting space for raising of issues outside the parameters it creates. But the most absolute exercise of power is that grievance or dissent is not even articulated. Articulating a grievance indicates a degree of political awareness of a wrong which the absolute exercise of power does not permit. So what we witness today in the increasing violence that enforces the maintenance of “order” in relations of caste and gender is the weakening of an absolute power that did not allow or permit space for the articulation or even the awareness of grievance or a sense of wrong and the consequent blurring of carefully drawn lines of demarcation. This blurring can occur in any arena of activity. Education is an important arena. In Tsundur especially, the higher levels of education among the Dalits in an important sense obliterated the distinction between them and the Reddis. Another is dress. An acknowledged source of irritation in Tsundur was the fact that Dalit boys now dressed extremely well, thus rejecting the traditional marker of status and caste. A bitter deadlock and siege of Dalits occurred in Orissa because a Dalit woman “dressed up well,” that is, she was neatly dressed and had oiled and combed her hair when she went to receive her wages. An ironic comment from the landlord that she had dressed like his women prompted all the Dalit women to go to work in their best clothes as a protest the next day. Predictably, the landlords again commented that they could now start taking the Dalit women home as their wives. The tension that broke out as a result was

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finally diffused by a truce between Kshatriya and Dalit men that the women in either community would not step into each other’s localities in future. Thus an encounter between a woman and a man of different castes is resolved by a truce between men of two castes—a truce that circumscribes the territorial space for women of both castes (it is significant here that while upper-caste women did not figure at all in the course of this conflict, a new space was demarcated and defined for them as well). Although this solution was accepted by Dalit women and adhered to by them for over a year, it raises several important questions for us. First of all this incident draws our attention to a crucial characteristic of caste—the mediation of intercaste relations through a redefinition of gendered spaces—and underscores the ways in which caste and gender are intermeshed rendering an un-gendered understanding of caste impossible. Gender within caste society is thus defined and structured in such a manner that the “manhood” of the caste is defined both by the degree of control men exercise over women and the degree of passivity of the women of the caste. By the same argument, demonstrating control by humiliating women of another caste is a certain way of reducing the “manhood” of those castes. This is why, while Muthamma was being paraded naked in the streets of Chilakurti, the men of her caste, who were unable to bear the sight and covered their eyes, were derided by the aggressors who said, “Open your eyes. Are there no men amongst you?” This insult is double-edged. On the one hand gender is defined by the capacity to aggress and appropriate the other. On the other hand the lower-caste man could only cover his eyes because the structure of relations in caste society castrates him through the expropriation of his women. It is painful, intensely so, to consider Muthamma’s torture and her public humiliation in being stripped and paraded through the village shandy; it is poignant to listen to accounts of the men averting their eyes or turning their backs on her nakedness while being accused of impotence by the aggressors. To add insult to injury visitors who flocked to the village on hearing of the incident self-righteously asked the men if they had lost their moustaches and whether there were no males left in the village. When the suggestion of taking upper-caste women as wives is made on the other hand it is enough provocation for Dalits everywhere to be massacred. Take the Bodi riots in Tamil Nadu for instance. Dalits organized themselves when a Dalit leader who organized a procession demanding higher wages was raped and killed by upper-caste landlords. At one of the public meetings organized to protest against this incident, a Dalit political leader is reported to have said, “What will happen if Dalit men should all marry upper caste women?” This led to great tension and the exacerbation of violence and caste riots all over the state with the lives of all Dalits thrown at risk. Many of them had to pledge

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themselves and their undying loyalty through written bonds to landlords’s families in order to safeguard their lives in the surrounding villages. The provocation for the upper-caste men who raped the Dalit leader was twofold: First, in demanding higher wages, she (and others with her) was clearly overstepping the limits of her caste status which was defined by passivity and submissiveness. Second, in making a public demand she was overstepping her limits and asserting herself in a gendered space—in this sense caste functions within a rigidly gendered space. But this gendered space has dimensions of caste and class which crucially structure the way in which women of different castes and classes experience gender. Inevitably, when women, especially those belonging to the lower castes confront their being policed by upper-caste men, rape is the ultimate punishment—for the women certainly, but more importantly and symbolically for the men. A mere suggestion of the kind made by the Dalit politician about marrying upper-caste women was enough to rouse upper-caste wrath to a degree that resulted in the loss of life and dispossession of hundreds of Dalits in Tamil Nadu. In Tsundur it provided a justification for police complicity in uppercaste violence and a mere allegation that Dalit boys had molested Reddi girls led to the registering of cases without verification. The onus of proof rested on the victim, the Dalit. A matter of further significance is that the initial complaints of the harassment were filed by Reddi men who claimed to be eyewitnesses and not by the women who were supposed to have been molested. At this point upper-caste women did not appear on the scene. Yet when after the massacre, 300 women of the upper castes marched in a procession in the streets of Tsundur declaring that their “modesty had been outraged” by Dalit men of Tsundur it served to justify, in retrospect, the prior massacre of the Dalits. The motivation behind this rare demonstration of collective action by upper-caste women needs little explanation; the primary duty of an upper-caste woman being to protect the life of her man and ensure his longevity, because her own social existence is defined by and hinges on his life. The Dalit woman can claim no such privilege since she can and has been expropriated by the upper-caste men as a matter of their right. There are countless examples of this expropriation. Let us look at just two such instances here. The first incident involves a Dalit woman from Orissa who was beaten up mercilessly by the landlord, because when he summoned her for some work, she was feeding her husband and said she would go after her husband had eaten. Her husband was beaten up too and life was made very difficult for both of them by the landlord, but they were forced to stay on there because they had nowhere to go to—also, perhaps, they knew that no matter where they went, things would not really be very different. A far more serious example, and one that is alarmingly on the increase in Andhra Pradesh, is that of the numerous instances of rape and

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sexual harassment of minor and adolescent Dalit girls in social welfare and missionary hostels by men in positions of power. What is really alarming here is the total failure of the government machinery in checking violence of this kind, and bringing the aggressors to book. The issue of power is brought sharply into focus here. The values and ideology deriving from their caste situation are so deeply internalized by women of the upper castes that what would normally, by upper-caste standards, be an unimaginable act, marching on the streets crying rape, now achieves respectability because upper-caste women are crying out in defense of their endangered chastity. The authenticity of the allegation is another matter. The more basic question is that to allow Dalits the privilege and protection of the state is to throw open the doors to the rape of the other castes. A powerful argument indeed! Streets are typically gendered spaces. While men and youth inhabit and use streets naturally and forcefully with a sense of belonging, notice how women scurry along, or often sidle along pavements fully conscious of its being alien, unfriendly territory. The only women who are relatively easy on the streets are vendors, prostitutes, and other women for whom the street is a site of work. Further, streets are gendered spaces that are mediated by caste. When Dalit women step onto the streets in protest, they are seen as transgressing their limits. When upper-caste women take to the streets in protest, their sense of wrong and their appropriation of public space is immediately legitimate. There is yet another dimension to the question of gendered spaces. Parading a woman in the streets with the use of force, among other things signals her “availability”; it is also a statement made about the character of women and therefore, the character of her caste; women being seen as bearers of tradition and protectors of the honor of the caste. Apart from the violence perpetrated on Muthamma, this incident must be seen as an assertion of power over all women in her caste. And the backward and scheduled-caste women in Chilakurti got the message right. They locked themselves indoors and hid knowing that the same thing could happen to them. It was also probably at a much deeper level a fear of being identified as “public women.” This is reminiscent of the processions in which “joginis” who are scheduled-caste “devadasis” in Andhra dance. While the upper-caste devadasis officiate at religious ceremonies and festivities, the scheduled-caste devadasis are indispensable to a funeral procession. They drink toddy and dance before the dead body. The fact that arrack was forced publicly down Muthamma’s throat could thus have had symbolic overtones. Was it her “availability” and her “public” nature that was being sought to be established, one wonders. So far we have been looking at how women’s complicity is established in the actions of a caste group and the manner in which her space is demarcated

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and defined by the men. A caste is chastised not just by the exercise of force or violence on the women of that caste but also by the use of violence on children. A violence that is also patriarchal and gendered. Consider for instance the case of Dalit children in Thanjavur who were electrocuted by the upper castes because they dared to play at the upper-caste well. What can be more brutal than the killing of unsuspecting children playing at a well in which the water was electrified? Who was the lesson aimed at? Brutality to any degree is condoned, tacitly, when the issue in question is the assertion by upper castes of absolute control over their territory. This assertion is blind—the difference between pests, animals, women, children, and Dalits is obliterated by its total neutrality. While landownership is a crucial determinant of caste relations, the lack of control over land does not deprive the upper castes of either their arrogance or their actual control. This was demonstrated for us in the Chilakurti case where Muthamma was beaten and paraded in the streets of the village by Reddi goondas who neither belonged originally to the village nor owned much land there. And yet it was their caste privilege that protected them. Finally we come to two extremely complex issues that a consideration of caste throws up. The first is the question of religious faith. While it might be simpler to view caste as a Hindu phenomenon, and resort to a conventional explanation that sees conversion as an escape from an oppressive reality, a look at the experience and social practice of other religious groups in India reemphasizes the resilience of caste, not as a religious institution but an institution that structures social relations irrespective of religious faith. This is even more relevant to the present discussion because the section of Dalits in Tsundur who were the target of attacks were all Christians. We will consider the case of a Dalit Christian woman who joined a convent in order to escape the oppression of belonging to a Dalit family in an upper-caste village, as well as that of being the eldest daughter in a family with a dozen odd children to be cared for and nurtured while the parents were away working in the fields. This woman ran away from home and registered herself as a novitiate with the hope that she could escape both caste and gender oppression within the security of the order. During the period of the novitiate training everyone was treated equally and all novitiates, irrespective of their socioeconomic background, were expected to do all kinds of work. Once they were through with their training, they were sent to the various centers where their work really began. It was here that the details of their family background, caste, and class began to play a major role in the kinds of work assigned to them, and the treatment meted out to them. Also, in an institution that rested on the vow of celibacy, younger nuns from poorer and more disadvantaged backgrounds were constantly open to the accusation of trying to attract the male priests who visited the center.

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Caste-based oppression within the church became so intolerable after a point that the Dalits moved out and formed an order of their own. The rigidity of caste is not restricted to this order. The segregation among some Protestant groups in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh is so great that they would rather intermarry with Hindus of their own caste than with Christians of another caste. Even during service in the church, some churches have separate enclosures for Dalits who have to stand through the service and receive communion only after the upper castes have left. And this is only to be expected. Christianity after all did not enter or flourish in a vacuum. The sociohistorical context that received the faith without doubt shaped and still shapes it. The large-scale conversion of Dalits to Christianity should be understood in terms that go beyond the oftrepeated statement that Christianity (or for that matter any religion) offers an escape from oppressive institutions. This issue is complex and difficult to articulate. The attempt here is not in any away to condone the evils of one faith but to point to the complexities of our social reality. At a more immediate level it is to say that what is relevant now is not a debate about the “value” of a faith but a comprehensive understanding of social practice. The second fact that is again very complex and difficult to articulate without being accused of crudity is the relationship that exists between low-caste men and upper-caste women. While it is common knowledge that in many areas where upper-caste men are away from home managing their businesses the women have sexual relationships with their men servants, this in itself does not run counter to the caste hierarchy because power and control is vested with the women by virtue of their caste status. It is only when the caste norms are openly flouted by elopement, pregnancy, or discovery, that punitive action becomes necessary. In Muthamma’s case the Reddi woman who eloped with the Golla man had had a long relationship with him. It became an issue only when they decided to elope. The problem of articulation (and indeed understanding) comes when Dalit men, having gained access to power, decide to adopt the methods of the upper castes in exercising this power. It is not uncommon to see Dalit boys molesting or passing derogatory remarks about upper-caste girls—the case of the Dalit boy in Krishna district cited at the beginning of this article is an example—thus getting their own back in threatening the manhood of their oppressors. This, it appears, is inevitable if the reversal of the power structure is restricted to an exchange in caste status without a radical redefinition of status, power, and hierarchy that challenges the very basis of caste and patriarchal structures, thus merely replicating the earlier pattern. What we must not lose sight of is the distinction between the violence that is a reaction and often a legitimate response to caste oppression and violence on women of another caste or community in

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order to attack or erode its sense of worth which is welded to these definitions of manhood. It is especially difficult to achieve this in a situation where political organization itself takes place within the ambit of the structures being challenged and where the focus of political action is the disability that characterizes the group. A revolutionary praxis, therefore, while striving toward the undermining of hierarchical structures, must be built on a recognition of caste and gender as twin mediators of oppression from the outset. Unless this is done we will just have the reality of Bodi repeat itself, with the oppressed—whether they are Dalits, minorities or women—undermining their own struggle.

REFERENCE Indian Express. 1991. August 20, 1991, Hyderabad edition.

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Section IV Fighting the System: Dalit Responses to Oppression

EDITORS’ NOTE The perspective that those at the bottom are only victims, passive, and weak is a view that also comes from the top. While one may agree with the Gramscian view of hegemony that power has a way of reproducing itself, it is wrong to suppose that those who do not have overt power are helpless or acquiesce quietly to their oppression. As the work of James Scott has shown, the apparently powerless do have their weapons to maneuver, if not actually fight overtly, the system of oppression. Michel Foucault, the twentieth-century philosopher who has analyzed brilliantly the nuances of power, has also shown that power manifests itself in multifaceted forms, not necessarily overtly coercive. In my experience of the Dalits, one aspect has always been clear, that they almost totally reject the worldview of the upper castes; they are not at all agreeable to viewing themselves as rightfully situated in a position that they deserve, a view strongly propagated from the top. Most of them are well aware of the basic Hindu philosophy that a soul has no caste or gender. Sometimes they are overtly critical of the Brahmanical understanding of what religion is about,

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putting forward a view that they have a better emotional understanding based on their love and spirituality as against the empty ritualism of the Brahmans. They are also aware that the work that they do is both essential and in many situations needs an amount of skill and training that is available only to them and which they treat as an asset. Even the lowliest shoe-mender recognizes the value of the work that he does and is well aware that society does not repay him in equivalent terms for his services. Apart from their worldview that itself serves as an effective critique of the social inequality and injustice suffered by them, there are overt ways of criticizing as well as actively providing a catharsis and coping mechanisms for suffering, especially through culturally produced collective actions. These often come out in the form of rituals and expressive modes such as dances, songs, and poetry. At times, they may take the form of social movements that imitate the imagery provided by the dominant culture or creatively produce its own counter-symbols. While many of these coping mechanisms may be only symbolic, they provide huge psychological and social support and may at times even take the path of violence. In this section, the papers describe some instances of such resistance movements and ideologies.

Chapter 16

Climax! The Encounter of Dalits and Hindus* Vasant Moon

Just as the climactic moment of a play comes in the middle section, so the Scheduled Caste Federation reached its moment of decision in 1946. In Nagpur, the Dalit movement had been a Mahar movement. Chambhars (Leatherworkers) and Mangs (Ropemakers also called Matangs) took part only as individuals. A Matang gentleman named Behade was on the executive committee of the Scheduled Caste Federation. Ramratan Janorkar of the Bhangi (Sweeper) community dedicated his life to the Ambedkar movement and also became a Buddhist. The Buddhist community in turn took him as one of theirs and made him the mayor of the Nagpur Corporation. If you go from Gandhi Bridge to Variety Square one shoe store stands in the row of shops with a photo of Ambedkar hung for all to see. This shop, owned by Mahadevrao Chakole, a Chambhar gentleman, was right next to our neighborhood. Since it was on the road going to the station, we began to feel an easy oneness with the Chakole family. When Babasaheb came to Nagpur he would inquire about him. It is said that he once visited the Chakole house. At a time when most of the Chambhars in Nagpur were in Congress, a man like Chakole was in the Ambedkar movement. Naturally we praised his courage for this. By 1946 Nagpur city was buzzing with movements. Not a day went by without meetings, rallies, gatherings. That was the year that Hindu–Mahar riots bloodied the atmosphere. The Ravishankar Shukla Congress Ministry had been established in the Central Provinces and Berar. Because Hindus dominated the police and other departments, whenever there arose the slightest sign of a riot, Mahar youth were put under house arrest. The battle drums of the satyagrah campaign against the Pune Pact sponsored by the Federation had not yet * From Vasant Moon, 2001, Growing Up Untouchable in India: A Dalit Autobiography, tr. From Marathi by Gail Omvedt, New Delhi, Vistaar Publications.

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subsided. The thunder of “Long live Ambedkar! Bhim Raj in a short while!” from the hundreds of satyagrahis taken in police vans along Jail Road could still almost be heard from afar. The disciples of Ambedkar had created a tremendous self-confidence in the Dalit community. For that matter, other communities also were awed by the Dalits. The office of the Scheduled Caste Federation for CP-Berar was on the first floor of a two-story house on the main road behind the Buti School. Dasharath Laxman Patil was the president, and Revaramji Kavade was secretary. The president of the city branch was Panjabrao Shambharkar. Ganpat Shambharkar was the scout master and captain of the Dal. Arguing that there should be a journal of the movement, Shri N. K. Tirpude begins a weekly called Arun (Dawn). Tirpude, Bhaurao Bozkar, and other activists, working under the leadership of Raosaheb Thavare, kept the independent Labour Party separate from the Federation, arguing that there should be an independent workers’ organization. Because of this, the Federation leaders began to suspect deliberate splits. It was the beginning of a storm that ended only when Raosaheb Thavare and his group left the Federation and joined Congress. Wrestling grounds existed in every community in Nagpur. All these grounds had their trainers, wrestling masters who were like bastions protecting the walls of the fortress of their neighborhoods. In Indora, four Ramas were famous. There was Boney Rama, an activist of the Bolshevik Party. After the 1946 rioting, when Chief Minister Ravishankar Shukla came to Indora for an enquiry into the violence, Boney Rama’s bold younger brother, a member of the Nagpur municipal corporation, grabbed the minister’s hat from his head and then gave it back to him, saying, “Shuklaji, here is your hat. Guard it well!” We thought this was a brave threat. The second Rama, who looked like coal and so was nicknamed Black Rama, was Rama Santu Vasnik. The third Rama was Brawling Rama, and the most famous of all the Ramas was Rogue Rama—Rama Rodge. He was the father of the activist Shrimati Chandrikabai Ramteke. He raised Chandrikabai from infancy to be robust and fearless like her father. Once, while she was coming home from school in the evening with her friends, some Romeo deliberately gave her a slap while going by on a bicycle. Chandrikabai and her friends grabbed him. Even with blustering efforts he could not get away from the grasp of her wrist. Shortly the youth of Indora gathered there and taught him a lesson in politeness. In 1946 the government proclaimed elections. At that time the Scheduled Caste Federation was the only party opposing the Congress in Nagpur. Other parties existed in name only. One woman representative was to be elected. The SCF candidate was Radhabai Kamble, the workers’ leader, who lived in

Climax! The Encounter of Dalits and Hindus

Bardi. Radhabai was adept in standing before thousands of people and delivering sledgehammer speeches like other leaders. Once while she was giving a speech, she declared in the heat of enthusiasm, “We will win our rights whatever happens. If they don’t give them to us we will grab them, take them by force, and snatch them away.” For the workers’ seat Sakharam Meshram was the Scheduled Caste Federation candidate. Rambhau Ruikar had been given the ticket for Congress. For the seat reserved for Untouchables, Congress had put up Hemchandra Khandekar, while the Federation had put up Sitaram Hadke. Since he said “Jay Bhim” to show his loyalty to Ambedkar, the Congress goons had given him a beating. However, neither Khandekar nor anyone wearing Congress caps had the guts to campaign in the Dalit neighborhoods. The Ambedkarite community had boycotted “Harijans,” completely barring them from dining or intermarrying with others. Many Congressite Mahars had to remain bachelors their whole life because of that. Meetings were held everywhere. Most of the Mahar communities were mill workers. If there was a strike in the mills, these Untouchable workers would leave Nagpur to search for work, so with the tactic of winning these elections this way by getting his main opponents out of the way, Ruikar called for a strike. The Federation leaders decided to defeat this call. Rekharam Kavade, Sitaram Hadke, Dasharath Padi, and all the activists girded their loins. Discussions began throughout the communities. The small garden of the Pacpavali was at that time used as an open field. It used to be called the Yadavrao Gaikwad Field. It was decided to have a procession starting from there on January 15, 1946. People gathered from all over Nagpur. Batches came from Bhankheda Pacpavali, Indora, and Bardi. The units of the Samata Sainik Dal gathered from places as far as Camelward, Dharampeth, Inamwada, Bardi, Dhantoli, and Pottertown. After the flag salute of the all, the troops left in disciplined ranks of four. When the parade of the Dal reached Ganjakhet, thousands of people, men and women, began to walk behind it. Ambedkar kaun hai? Dalitanka Raja hai! Leke rahenge, leke rahegne, ham apne hak leke rahenge! Who is Ambedkar? King of Dalits! We will take our rights, we will take our rights! With such a thunderstriking awe throughout Nagpur, the parade went through Gandhibag, Mahal, New Shukravari, and Bardi and finally dispersed at Kasturchan Park. Before a huge gathering Raosaheb Thavare, Radhabai Kamble, Revaram Kavade, and other leaders gave speeches. People returned to their houses filled with enthusiasm.

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Kuikar then proclaimed the workers’ strike. His goons went forth for battle, catching workers by ones and twos and beating them up. But the Ambedkarites decided to resist. The men went to work in gangs of twenty to twenty-five. The women determined to go to work in an organized manner. Every Mahar woman took with her a packet of chili powder, a potent weapon of stinging red fire, tied up in the end of her sari. Defense squads were formed from neighborhood to neighborhood. Training classes began in stick fighting and the use of cudgels. Girls also were taught. Trainers, gangsters, bandits, teachers, youths—all became one. The resolve to give a respond to atrocities grew firm. Some youth patrolled during the night. The election atmosphere in Nagpur became heated. A huge poster was pasted at Timki, proclaiming, “Maharon ke khunse holi khelenge” (We will play holi with the blood of Mahars). Due to the sentiment asserting, “Congress rule is our rule,” and with the newspapers systematically spreading the emotional propaganda that Ambedkar’s party opposed Independence, the Hindus decided to teach a lesson to the Mahars. People of Weaver, Farmer, and Writer castes from the Hindu communities stopped Mahar youth and beat them up when they could be caught alone. But no attacker had the courage to attack a group openly. The Hindu trainers had been keeping their eyes on the Mahar wrestlers. Similarly, the Mahar wrestlers took whatever opportunity they could to keep up with the news of the Hindu wrestlers. There was a famous Hindu wrestler named Pochamma living at Gaddi Godam Square. One day a Mahar–Hindu brawl started there, near a toddy shop. Wrestler Pochamma took the opportunity of attacking Ghanshyam Wrestler, and before Ghanshyam was aware of it, Pochamma had grabbed him with one hand and stabbed him in the waist with a knife held in the other. Fearing that Ghanshyam would die, Mango Wrestler and Raghunath Narale took their knives, and just as Shivaji had stabbed Afzal Khan, they split open Pochamma’s stomach. Pochamma died. Mango and Raghunath were arrested. Ghanshyam went into hiding. Unable to find him, the police harassed his friends and family. Nisar Ali, a Muslim lawyer who always helped the Mahars in legal matters as part of the friendly relationship between Mahars and Muslims, advised Ghanshyam to appear in court. Ghanshyam came before the magistrate in disguise. The police in the court failed to recognize Ghanshyam until he stood up before them and told them his name. While the case played out in court, the lawyers of the Mahar community and the activists stood behind their heroes. They collected money. By the time all the accused were released for lack of sufficient evidence, the atmosphere had to a large degree cooled off. After the election, though, quarrels on trivial issues continued to flare up and a big riot developed. On May 3, 1946, the Weavers and Farmers united and decided to attack. Five thousand thugs, with cudgels,

Climax! The Encounter of Dalits and Hindus

spears, and swords in hand, left for Golibar Square with the aim of attacking the Mahar settlement at Indora. At that time there was no sign of any government in Nagpur. The police were as if in hiding. Most of them were on duty at the voting centers. As the goons entered Pacpavali, the bands of Mahar youth took their own spears and swords and emerged from Bhankheda, Pavpavali, and Military Park. A deadly battle began. Harischand Sakhare, Ghanshyam Wrestler, Tulshiram Wrestler, and many other young men fought with little regard for their own life. The line of the Hindu goons edged ahead. A field lay in front of the Pacpavali police station, empty except for some low thickets. Realizing that the attack was coming on Indora, the four Ramas and five or six other athletes came together and stood at the crossing near Kamathi Road and one by one began to swing their swords. Seeing this manifestation of their readiness to fight, the Hindu goons coming toward them began to feel uncertain. They had also got the illusion that many people waited behind them, ready to attack, and they began to move backward, step-by-step. The goons who had entered Pacpavali to beat up people started to run wildly when they saw their companions retreating. Sampat Ram Teke and Husain Gajbhiye had been fighting for a long time. Witnessing their courage, the Hindu goons retreated. Sampat and Husain came after them. Just as their blows were about to fall on the goons before them, they stumbled in the drainage canal. The fleeing Bajiraos came back, and within a second both had become martyrs. While they were being beaten, the cries of “Jay Bhim! Victory to Ambedkar” coming from their mouths reached many nearby houses. After these events, a curfew was imposed. Everyone was forbidden to leave his house. The police began a search, entering house after house. But no curfew was imposed on the attacking community only for the Ambedkarites. The Mahar youth went underground. The aged and senior people who stayed in their houses were taken under arrest. Finally, the young girls, the married women, and the very old women and men who remained at their homes made some effort to come out, and the police began to fire on them. Ramdas Dongare, a young Federation activist, was fired upon the moment he left for the toilet; he lost his life. The news of the rioting spread to every nook and corner of Nagpur. All the neighborhoods of Ambedkarites went on the alert. The police began a close search of every house in Pacpavali. In one house, seeing two young girls, the police said, “We will inspect the house.” Two young Ambedkar girls with their life at stake and no men in the house—still they decided to face the situation. Two police and two women. The police showed no sign of leaving. The women said, “there is no one in the house.” The police said, “Come up on the roof.” Without any choice, the women climbed up. After about fifteen to twenty minutes they came back down. They tied their

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things together and departed. After realizing that those two policemen had not returned by evening, the police authorities began a search. Their corpses were found in a disordered state on the roof of that small house. An autopsy was done. It turned out that both deaths had occurred because their testicles had been crushed! In Colonel Park there were Hindu neighborhoods all around. Twenty-five to fifty Mahar houses lay on one side, but all the youth of that neighborhood were companions of Domaji Deshmukh Ustad, a Hindu wrestler. They told Doma Ustad that Hindu–Mahar quarrels should not spread into their neighborhood. “We have helped you in your fights. But if there is any stone-throwing at our community here, then beware. We will do whatever has to be done.” Doma Trainer listened to them. In Shaniwar near the Cotton Market, there were about twenty Mahar houses. All the families there were well-to-do. They locked up their houses and sought refuge with relatives in other neighborhoods. The Pottertown neighborhood was split into two sections by a road. Nearby lay a neighborhood famous for the kind of crime Doma Trainer had fought against in Colonel Park, and so this neighborhood had a feud going for generations with Colonel Park people. However, all the Hindus united against the Mahars, and three or four thousand goons came running to Pottertown with weapons and torches in their hands. Fago Ustad always kept his cudgel at close hand. That day he sat playing a flute. People began to flee one by one, saying, “Run, run!” Small boys and girls hid in neighbors’ houses. Fago Ustad thought for a minute. In front of him were fifteen or twenty youth with swords. Behind them, numerous thugs were standing ready with torches. Fago Ustad yelled his challenge—“Kids, get ready!”—and without waiting for anyone else he took his four-foot-long battle axe and attacked the sea before him. Just as Fago Ustad’s stick began to whirl, so the swords of the goons began to fall one by one. Seeing the fiery form of Fago Ustad, the crowd took a backward step and turned to set fire to one or two houses. Inspired by Fago’s courage, the Mahars of Potterçown came running from their houses. Mahars continued to go to work in the mills. In our neighborhood, around fifty youths took sticks in their hands and sallied forth. Just behind them, led by Radhabai Kamble, many women with chili powder tied in the folds of their saris came out. Beyond the Brahman and Marwari houses outside of the community was the Oil Pressers’ ward. But they did not have the courage to obstruct us. The factory area was separated from the square of the Cotton Market. The place where Mahatma Phule Market stands now was empty at that time. Beyond that lay the boundary of the mills. Once they crossed the Cotton Market Square, people were safe!

Climax! The Encounter of Dalits and Hindus

I and my childhood friend Balkrishna Gajbhiye were running behind the workers and youths. Balya was young in age but very daring. We were watching everything. People were walking by two stone archways. Opening the door of those parapets, fifteen to twenty Hindu goons suddenly came running with sticks. Varade, Gajbhiye, and everyone else were ready for them. One by one they each whirled their sticks; Balya and I threw stones from a distance. And seeing all this, the Hindu goons scattered. Some youths received a few blows, but the women safely reached the mills. By the time of the elections, a sort of war atmosphere had spread in all the Mahar neighborhoods. “Factories” were set up in every community to make weapons. In our neighborhood, Godbole’s house was a center where spears, cudgels, and swords were made, not only for our community but also for other neighborhoods. Abhiman Deshbhratar, a moneylender with a house spread out like a mansion, let his home be used for secret meetings. All the wrestlers, youth, old and wise men in the community came together and discussions began. Who should patrol the neighborhood, who should stay where, what to do—all these issues were decided. In front of Merchant Abhiman’s house was an extended veranda. The boys and girls of the community were called there, where Ustad Daji gave them training in wrestling and stick fighting. The cudgels and sticks began to spin. When the young boys’ class began, I learned a few of these techniques, but I could not assimilate very much of this knowledge. Young men patrolled the whole night. Rumors kept arising that tonight an attack would come from the neighboring Weavers’ community. The youth would sit at the place where the attack was expected with their weapons ready. However, up to the end, there was no attack. Only Ganpat Gajbhiye was stabbed when returning from work. The drums of the 1946 election began to sound. The names of the Ambedkarite voters had been entered in the lists of voting centers in the wrong neighborhoods. The Sadar votes were listed in Cameltown; Indora votes were in Mahalwar; this happened everywhere. Even then voters were brought out from every house. The youth took the voters and went in bands to the voting centers to cast their votes. At lndora the Hindu goons caused a tumult at the voting booths. The police fired a round. Ramdas Dongare, a young activist of the Samata Sainik Dal, fell victim to a bullet. On voting day, when it was learned that Indora had been attacked, many people of the community gathered. Youth of Inamwada, Shanivari, Dhantoli, and other neighborhoods came together and around five hundred people departed for Indora. I heard the story of that battle, after nearly a year, from Waman Rangari, who had taken part. He came one night to the Tar, the field in front of our settlement.

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“Waman, where have you been?” “It’s a long story you wouldn’t understand it. Aren’t you still a kid?” “Yes, but look, you are our trainer! Without you, who will teach us strategy?” Saying, “Okay sit down,” he gathered several schoolboys and sat with us on the Tar. The crowd wandering on the roads had quieted down. When the moon came into the sky and its clear, quiet light spread over all, there was no one to be seen even far away in the corners of the field. For many nights we had sat in that place or fallen asleep chatting under our blankets. Stories could be heard being told in neighboring houses. That day we listened to Waman tell his experiences. We responded just as everyone is supposed to do when a good epic is told, and he began. “We started out from Bardi. The people of Shanivari and Dhantoli had gathered there. We got the men from Inamwada. After that we collected those from Model Mill chawl and from Colonel Park and went ahead. We numbered around five hundred. By the time we reached Nawabpura, about a thousand had gathered, and we went forward chanting, “Long live Ambedkar! Bhim rule in a few days!” Our voters had been put on the voting lists of other communities. That was done deliberately. The people of Camel town were in Nawadpura and the Nawadpurites in Camel town. Because of that we had to escort everyone to their voting booths. By the time we had helped all these voters and reached Bhankheda, only about ten or twelve of us were left. There the people of the Military Park entered from Karhadkarpeth and forced their way in with axes. We shouted slogans. They shouted, “Jay Bhim!” The people of all our neighborhoods know each other!  We saw that a big procession of four to five thousand Hindus was going towards Military Park. We got the message that they had come into the neighborhoods near the police station. All of us entered the Military Park neighborhood from the railway tracks and compound. There we saw only women from house to house. The men had gone long distances to vote. Weapons were ready in the houses. The women gave us those swords and daggers. Taking these, we ran, and then all fled. Narayan Kirad got a sword cut. After that we hid for thirty days. A woman with a fifteen-day-old baby brought me food and gave me support.  After that I came to Bardi and stayed with Radhabai Kamble. From there I tame to the Model Mill quarters, where a thug named Atkya recognized me. He had seen me at Military Park. Our building was next to Colonel Park. Taking twenty to twenty-five goons -from there, Atkya was planning to come to beat me up. But his talk was overheard by a woman fruit seller named Baru. She came to the house in the evening when I was sleeping.  “Waman, get up! Atkya is coming with some people. Run,” she yelled. I got up and ran out in no time. Beside us was a big canal. I jumped over that canal and went into Colonel Park. There I met Janba Kamble. He said, “This neighborhood is

Climax! The Encounter of Dalits and Hindus

next to Hindus. It is not safe. You run and go to Camel town.” After that I reached Camel town. There I stayed for three or four months.

Even after Waman’s story was finished, we could not sleep. For a long time thoughts kept running through my mind. Everywhere was stability. Police whistles could be heard. Wouldn’t the police come to arrest Waman? I was looking for him in the distance. The railway engines were chugging along on the tracks, and in their whistles the police whistles had long since been absorbed. I looked to my side. Waman was snoring without a care in the world!

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Chapter 17

Theyyam Myth: An Embodiment of Protest* J.J. Pallath

Pulayas are aware that they are the original inhabitants of the place and this finds expression in their myths and rituals. They are also aware of their social oppression. The myths of Potten Theyyam and Pulimarijna Thondachan directly speak of social oppression. Pulaya’s strong resentment against the sexual exploitation of their women by the powerful and the high castes also finds its expression in their myths. The myth of the chemmanakli registers a direct attack on the powerful for exploiting their women. The high moral integrity of the Pulayas is depicted in the myth of Maruthiyodan Gurukal. To grasp the overwhelming obsession of Pulayas to express the protest against the social oppression, we should look at the terrible conditions of social oppression which they were subjected to in the pre-independent era, when untouchability was rigorously practiced.

THE WOEBEGONE CONDITION OF THE PULAYAS Summarized here below is the fieldwork data supported by Fr Taffrel (1981), the co-missionary and biographer of Fr Caironi, the founder of the Christian community which is known as Chirakkal Mission. Taffarel (1981: 38) says: They (Pulayas) were readily identifiable by their dark skin, their cringing submissiveness and their ragged dress. Their name expressed contamination which stained a high caste Hindu at the slightest contact with them. Even their footprints * From J.J. Pallath, 1995, Theyyam: An Analytical Study of Folk Culture, Wisdom and Personality. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute. Published with permission from the Indian Social Institute.

Theyyam Myth

in the soil could “defile” the high caste people. An untouchable was obliged to shrink back from the path of an approaching caste Hindu lest his shadow should fall across his route and defile him.

As reported by the elder informants, food and drinking water were another areas where the Pulayas suffered most. Though they were nonvegetarian, they practically lived on vegetarian meals, that is, just rice and chilly. Rice with water (kanji) was their food all the times of a day. In the house of the landlords where they worked, they were served only on the plantain leaves or in special mud vessels, called chatti or coconut shell (chirarta), which they were supposed to bring. They were supposed to keep the vessel in the courtyard and go away and wait at a prescribed distance until someone from the house put something in the chatti and went away to a prescribed un-polluting distance. “No Hindu should eat in the presence of the untouchables, drink water drawn from the well by an untouchable, use utensils polluted by his touch” (Taffrel 1981: 38). Drinking water was a great weapon with which the caste Hindus persecuted the untouchables. The Pulayas had their own wells for drinking water. It was said by several informants that the Pulayas were bought and sold in large groups during the celebration of the feast at Madi Kavu every year. It was a kind of group auctioning where women, children, the old and the adults were taken together by a joint family of that Illem. A young Pulaya was evaluated at the value of an ox. It is also said that the Madai Kavu originally belonged to the Pulayas, and was annexed by the high caste as usual is the case with most of the temples. That is the reason why the renowned temple even now is known as Kavu. There are some undeniable links with Pulayas and Madai Kavu. Even now the Pulaya chief (Polla) has some kind of rights (avakasam) in the Kavu, and thudi, the typical Putaya drum is required for the functions in the Kavu. For the celebration at the Puiayakottams oil lamp (déepam) has to be brought from the Madai Kavu. Informants say that generally all the temples are closed for the Pulayas, they can come up to a distance marked by a stone which is about three hundred meters away from the main entrance of the temple. “Pulaya’s body was polluting but not his coins as offering,” said many of the informants sarcastically. Pulaya women are dark in complexion, and are very beautiful. At the time of conversion the Pulaya woman whom the employer took a fancy to, might be kept at home during the night. The social custom of Malabar of that time allowed these practices, particularly with the Muslims who are allowed by religious laws to have several wives. It is said that the Pulaya hut (chala) had an extra “bed” always for the high caste, particularly for the Muslims. The Muslims do not find anything unusual about having children by Pulaya women. “. . . That was how

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a certain Muslim boasted to Fr. Caironi, that he had given the Church so many of his children born of the Pulaya women” (Taffrel 1981: 39). In areas where the Pulayas live among the Muslims, children of the same mother have fathers as “uppa” (Muslim father) and acha (Pulaya father) even now. The investigator himself had the experience of asking the father’s name of a smart looking Christian boy. There upon the boy’s face fell and his friend told me, “His father is not achan, but uppa.” The investigator is told that Pulaya women consider it even now quite prestigious to have an unofficial Muslim husband mainly for two reasons: first, it is recognition of her good looks; secondly, the Muslim will look after his child by her, and her, even though she is the official wife of another Pulaya. The official husband appears to be quite resigned to the fact of a Muslim sharing his wife, because he too gets fringe benefits of an economic nature. But is he really psychologically resigned? This is something we will discuss later in this chapter. Enough has been written about the economic exploitation of the Pulayas. Informants said that at the time of conversion all the Pulayas had to work compulsorily. Adults were given their wage only in the form of paddy and landlords made sure that it was just enough for the day. They had to unhusk it every day after a full day’s labor; thus their night meal was usually delayed. It was a life, which knew no leisure, elders recalled. During the off-season, they said that they really starved. The only way was, either to incur debt or to go to Coorg for work. Going to Coorg for work, informants said, exposed them to another world where the landlords were treating the laborers much better and paying them decent wages. At the time of conversion the Pulayas were not allowed to use cloth above their waist. They were not allowed new amenities such as umbrella, shirt, dhoti, and ornaments. An incident was narrated to the investigator that a Pulaya youth was beaten up by a high caste for using an umbrella and it was destroyed. Beating up Pulayas for trifling offences was normal; even killing a Pulaya went unnoticed. Killing and beating up Pulayas for sports were a practice of the time. Informants told the investigator that there were several cold-blooded murders of Pulayas. They named some of them. Killing of Pulayas was considered to be a right of the upper caste.

PULAYA’S MYTHS—A SYMBOLIC PROTEST AGAINST OPPRESSIVE SYSTEM We can say myths are legendary narratives, in the sense that they are as the point of transition between myth and history. Pulayas myths are quasi history of their protest against the social oppression. Myths express the aspirations of

Theyyam Myth

people and the collective ethos of society. The myths of the Pulayas are not different. Almost all the myths of the Pulayas embody their protest against their unjust social situation. Let us examine some of them.

Potten Theyyam Myth Potten means literally, “deaf and dumb,” “idiot,” “loafer,” and so on. The following is the myth of the Potten Theyyam. The mystic Brahman scholar, Sri Sankaracharaya was about to attain the highest stage of knowledge, “sarvajnapeedam” (throne of omniscience). As he was walking with his high-caste followers along a field, he saw a Pulaya untouchable (chandala), with his wife and eight children coming across. The Pulaya was carrying his children on his shoulders, hips, and hands. He had a toddy pot on his head. The Pulaya was walking toward the Brahmans without bothering about the pollution that he may cause them. The learned Sankara got annoyed and perturbed by the recalcitrant behavior of the Pulaya. He is said to have shouted and abused: You, chandala (lowborn) haven’t you the sense to recognise the learned from a distance Those who belong to any of the four castes, To sense the gait of a Brahmin instantaneously? You have no knowledge of timethe past, the present and the future. You have no caste! You are beyond law, You don’t wash,/You smell of fish and beef You are naturals! With no knowledge of God. You seem to be bent upon/Obstructing our path Abandon reckless venture! You ignoramus With no idea of higher knowledge. You, so mean, Devil of the first water Get out of the way/If you plan to defy You shall be treated/To a sound beating Don’t be standing on the path,/You evil minded man Thereupon the Pulaya picked up an argument with the learned Brahmin and defeated him. The Pulaya asks: I have children in my arms And a toddy pot (kalasam) on my head. Thorn and thicket on either side of path

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How, then, can we give way to you? When Chovar rides elephant, we ride buffalo Why do you then, speak of a caste-difference? When your body is cut what gushes out is blood, Which our body is cut what oozes out is blood Why do you then, speak of a caste-difference? When Chovar wears garland of lotus We wear garlands of flowers When Chovar dances bronze icon in hand We dance taking the “prawns-vessel.” The same rice you prepare and the same rice we boil Why do you then speak of caste-difference? When Chovar breaks the coconut and we break the coconut, The kernel we find is the same When you are poked and we are poked what we get is blood Why do you then speak of a caste-difference? The plantain grow in our filthy-yard becomes offering for your God. The Tulsi that grow in our garbage ground is offering for your God, where, then, is the difference, Chovare? (Translated from the folk songs that is recited during Potten Theyyam) The learned Sankara understands he is not ordinary Pulaya and realizing his mistake he falls at the feet of the Pulaya and asks for pardon. Thus the Brahman realizes the ultimate of all knowledge: that there is no caste distinction—all humans are equal.

Pulimarinjna Thondachan Pulimarinjna Thondachan is a legendary figure of the Pulayas. One day a Nair from a famous “tharavadu” at Kunjimangalam dreamt that he should get a Pulaya slave from Thiruvarkatukave, to cultivate his extensive paddy field. The Nair went to Thiruvarkatukave and asked the chief priest (pidaram) for a Pulaya woman to accompany him. Only Vellakkudi Chikurinji agreed to go with him. On reaching the tharavadu, she was first put up under a tree near the tharavadu and kanji was served in earthen vessel (chatti) and curry in coconut shell (chiratta) which she refused to take (these were the vessels used by the untouchables). Kunjambu Nair came to know about it and she was treated with respect and given kanji in brass vessel, plates used by the upper caste. When it was time for planting the paddy, the Nair got for her a companion named Pulaya Kurumpan. Kurinji at first did not receive him and gave him

Theyyam Myth

kanji outside her house. After some time their marriage was celebrated and a son was born to them. The child was named Kari. Kari showed a distaste for manual work at a young age itself. Kunjambu Nair understood that the Pulaya boy was meant for higher things. He was sent to be trained under Chembadar Gurukal. Later on he was sent to different Gurukals to complete his training in kalari and other martial arts. He learned all possible techniques (vidya) on earth and became a guru himself. It is at this time the king of the Allalam Nadu was possessed by an evil spirit and he became insane. Men of the royal court tried several exorcists to get the spirit out. Finally the court requested Kunjambu Nair to send Gurukal to drive away the evil spirit. Though at first he refused, on persuading he relented. The Gurukal was promised half the kingdom. On his way to the king the Gurukal had several trials by the Gurukals of Allalam Nadu, but he won them all over by his magic power. God and Goddess like Potten, Gulikan, and Kurathi tried their tricks on him, he silenced them too. In the process of driving away the spirits from the king, he in a dazed mood drank toddy (kalasam) from the hands of the Gurukal, which was resented by the people of the court and they decided to teach the Karikkurukkala lesson. They refused to comply with the agreement; instead they put up additional demands on the Gurukal that he should get the milk from a tiger. Gurukal who knew the technique of taking the form of animals (odimariyal) readily agreed to it. Before he assumed the form of a tiger he instructed his wife to sprinkle water on him with a broom when he comes in the form of a tiger, for that was the technique to get back to the human form. When he returned after fulfilling the promise, his wife did not do as she was instructed; instead, she got into the hut and hid herself, for she was utterly frightened seeing the deadly tiger. The Gurukal in the tiger form tried all tricks to get his wife to do what was required. At the end in sheer despair, the tiger got into the hut and killed his wife in anger and disappeared into the forest. After some time the king of Allalam Nadu became possessed by the evil spirit again. According to the rasi (astronomical calculations), it was found out that the spirit of the Gurukal possessed him. The king decided to worship the Gurukal by performing his Theyyam every year. This Theyyam is known as Pulimarijna Thondachan. As all legendary narratives are, Pulimarinjna Thodachan also is an amalgamation of two or three myths beautifully blended to convey one message. In this myth a pattern of protest is found. From the very beginning to the end the protest against the discrimination is focused through a chosen Pulaya woman Vellikudi Chikurinji and a chosen Pulaya Kari. The demand for justice is hesitantly and partially granted always to the oppressed as and when fresh opportunities

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arise. Finally when the Kari Gurukal was denied humanity, he does not take it submissively, he goes into the extreme violence of killing the agent that denied him humanity out of fear.

Chemmanakali The myth of Chemmanakali expresses the protest against the sexual exploitation of Pulaya women by the powerful and the high caste, especially the Muslims. The expression of aggression is extremely violent; and yet, as it were, to temper it, the Theyyams representing Muslim and the Pulaya woman are performed together as a note of reconciliation. In any case, the message is clear, that the Pulayas, though powerless, do not tolerate the exploitation of their women. Chemmanakali is not a Theyyam dance, but a kind of dance drama. This unique art of the Pulayas is a combination of two or three myths. It starts with the common immigration myth. The myth briefly goes like this: Annapurñeswariamma of Ariyar Nadu dreams of Kolath Nadu. She started in a ship with thousand sudra children, a thousand Konkani children, Choti children, Mavilar, Pallichammar, and Ezhillethammamar. Caught up in a typhoon the ship was about as to be wrecked. The captain of the ship found out through rasi that evil spirits such as Mari and Marimayam have taken possession of the ship. Some people got down at Anchuthengu. When the ship reached Azhikal, the ship (kappal) got further damaged and the oil lamp (nilavilaku) was thrown into the sea as an offering to save the people abroad. Thus all the people got down and ran helter-skelter, in different directions in total confusion. Some went out asking for clothes to cover their nakedness. Karakathiri Chotian Ambu travelled toward the west to the mountains and was spotted by Maylan Kannan, the supervisor of Devathiri Thampuran. On questioning, Chotian Ambu explained all that had happened and happily took up the work of cutting wood in to the forest to clear the field for cultivation. The work was done and the harvest that year was plentiful but the Thampuran did not give anything to the two who toiled for it. Disgruntled, as they were, they left the forest and came down to the fishermen at the Chala coast. Chotian Ambu went into the sea for fishing and caught a lot of fish with which both Kannan and Ambu went to the market. Both of them got fully drunk and while crossing a country bridge they fell down. Accusing each other, they fought between themselves and Chotian Ambu was stabbed to death. The wife of Chotian Ambu was at that time with child. Kannan took pity and started looking after her. While Kannan was away looking after the field, Mammu Mappila, an itinerant buyer and seller of dry coconut, fowls, and eggs,

Theyyam Myth

happened to come to Kannan’s hut. Seeing that Kannan was away in the forest he asked Mavilathi, whether he could “come at night” and she agreed to the request. Mappila came at night and slept with Mavilathi. The Ancestor Spirits and Tharavatu Daivamgal got annoyed and told Kannan in a dream that the Mappila is “eating up the cot and the bed.” At first Kannan did not take it seriously. When a second time it was told he understood it and took the sword and torch (chootu) and went home. On reaching home he recited the sleep-inducing mantra to put them to sleep; and by “lock opening mantra” he opened the door. He found that what he was told in the dream was true. He killed his wife and Mappila with one stroke of his sword (kathi) and set fire to the hut and reduced them to ashes. The spirits of Mappila and Mavilathi allying with the spirit of Chotian Ambu started attacking people, especially, the women. Through the rasi they came to know that these spirits should be appeased through perpetuating their kolam (effigy) through Theyyam dance. Unlike other spirits, these obey Pulaya Gurukal more than the magicians of other castes. The focus of the myth is the protest against the sexual exploitation of Pulaya women. The story reflects the general picture of Pulaya life. In the beginning of the immigration there was total confusion which was followed by economic exploitation of the Pulayas. The habit of the low-caste, drinking and quarrelling, is portrayed in the story. In short, the story reflects the entire Pulaya.

Maruthiyodan Gurukal The myth of the Maruthiyodan Gurukal speaks of the high moral uprightness of Pulayas as well as the craftiness and the wickedness of the high caste. Killing of outstanding Pulayas for sport was a custom of the time. But the integrity and courage of such people are celebrated through Theyyam. By a spontaneous folk device, the Theyyam, the Pulayas made eternal the memory of those whom the high caste tried to wipe out from their collective memory. Edakulam, Thalakkulam, Puthiyidam and Puthillem royal families did not have slaves (Pulayas) to work in the fields. The Puthillen Thampuran brought a slave; Kunjiviruthan from Chelerry Kooloth He was given special training in “kalari.” Cheriya kuttiak kamma, the royal Namboodiri girl fell in love with Kunjiviruthan. She tried in vain making advances several times but the Pulaya boy consistently refused. The repeated refusals made her angry and she decided to take revenge on him. She complained to her father that Kunjiviruthan tried to seduce her. On hearing this, Puthillem Thampuran decided to kill Kunjiviruthan. The Thampuran got around some Nairs and created a situation to pick up a fight with him. While Kunjiviruthan was measuring out rice the Thampuran went on

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finding fault with the measurement. Kunjiviruthan lost his temper and threw away the bushel; thereupon the Nairs pounced on him and killed him. That same night the Puthillem Thampuran was possessed by the spirit and be became mad. In the rasi it was found that it was the spirit of Kunjiviruthan that possessed him and they decided to worship him by his Theyyam. This Theyyam is known as Maruthiyodan Gurukal.

MYTH AND HISTORY We have said some time earlier that myths are quasi history, history defined as hagiography. In the case of Theyyam myths hagiography is formulated in the form of myth. We discuss briefly some of the examples of history in the sense of hagiography in Theyyam myths. In the legend of the origin of Kolathiri kingdom in North Malabar, it is said that three women—one shatriya and two sudras—came in a ship and got stranded in the sea. The king Cheraman Perumal married them all. The son of the shatriya woman was made king of Eli under the title of Elibhupan (king of Eli Kingdom) (Gopalakrishnan 1984: 355). Arrival of women in a ship is the common myth of the place and all the castes trace their relation to this immigration myth. In the history of British occupation of Malabar, there are battles in which British lost to the local combined force of Nairs and Muslims (Gopalakrishnan, 1984: 365f). In the myth of the Vattian Polla the combined forces of Nairs of Chirakkal and Muslims of Arakkal fighting against the British is described. In the battle the British lost to the local force due to the deceptive devices of the clever Pulaya, Vattian Polla who was leading the force. In the myth of the Potten Theyyam, the caste discrimination and the protest of the Pulaya against the discrimination is highlighted in reference to Sankaracharia, a historic figure. The Theyyam myth, thus, reflects the authentic history of Pulaya life and struggles.

CONCLUSION The four myths mentioned above are just representative myths chosen from the numerous myths of Pulayas which reflect the attitude of the Pulayas to their own life and people around them. Pulimarinjna Thondachan speaks of the very high self-esteem Pulayas maintained of themselves. It is not very unusual for a people who in their ordinary life never once experienced power and authority to live in such fantasy of authority. In the myth of Chemmanakali, they register resentment against the high caste and powerful people exploiting their women. The high

Theyyam Myth

moral integrity of the Pulaya is depicted in the myth of the Maruthiyodan Gurukal and he was prepared to pay the price for the stand he took. Potten Theyyam is the indisputable stand the Pulaya community took against caste discrimination and the expression of their condemnation of the pernicious caste system.

REFERENCES Gopalkrishnan, P.K. 1984. Cultural history of Kerala. Trivandrum: State Institute of Language. Tafarrel, Joseph. 1981. Missionary indeed. Tellicherry, Kerala: Fr Joseph Taffarel.

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Chapter 18

Documenting Dissent* Badri Narayan

I am the voice Crying in the night That cries endlessly And will not be consoled. Dennis Brutus1 Tiger, the king of the forest, is haunted by his memories. The other animals are afraid of him and he is fearful of his memories. At the dead of the night, when he is alone in his den, he suffers from insomnia. The offspring of the deer which he had devoured earlier haunt his memory. He recalls that the deer laugh at him behind his back, although they slink away in his presence. He is the king of the forest, but the birds peck at his back. So he tries to banish his memories. He wants to rule the forest but does not want to suffer the pain of his memories. The story I am going to narrate here has a close relation with the story of the deer and the tiger. This is the story of Chuharmal. This story is well known. The “nichli kaumen” (lower-caste people) of the Magahi and Bhojpuri regions of Bihar recite it as a folk ballad and perform it as a nautanki named “Rani Reshma Chuharmal Ka Khela.” Every year in the Chaityamah (Chaitya month) a fair is held at Charadih near Mokama in the yadgari (remembrance) of the Dusadh hero of this story. This story has many versions, most contesting one another. For the Dusadhs, it is a story of their glorious past and the rich traditions of their community. But the Bhumihars (upper castes) receive it as a conscious attempt by the lower castes to insult them. The manner in which the story is remembered by the Dusadhs makes it a constitutive element in their identity formation. The identity as a socially constructed domain might incorporate * Abstracted and Reprinted in revised version from Badri Narayan, Documenting Dissent: Contesting Fables, Contested Memories and Dalit Political Discourse, 2001, Indian Institute of Advanced Studies, Rashtrapati Niwas, Shimla.

Documenting Dissent

some of the variations in the text. The differences in the core of the narrative indicate the social locus, attitudes, beliefs, and social status of the narrators. It is a story of love between Chuharmal, a Dusadh chivalrous hero, and Rani Reshma, the beautiful daughter of the local Raja of Bhumihar caste. The story is now a bone of contention, an issue of conflict and violence between the Bhumihars and the lower castes of the region. Four caste riots in central Bihar, between l970 and 1990, were centered around this story. Chuharmal is a hero and a god of the lower castes in the region. The folk legend is a symbol of the victory of the Dusadhs over the Bhumihars. While feudal forces are trying to erase this story by the barrel of the gun, the lowercaste people struggle to save and preserve it. In the popular mind, the form of the story of Chuharmal has been undergoing a change. In l894 it was sung as the Pachara Geet by the Dusadh bhagut (the religious functionary of the Dusadhs to evoke the spirit of Chuharmal which would scare away the ghosts that harass people. Around 1938 when the folklorist of Arrah recorded “Rani Reshma Ka Geet” from the oral tradition, it turned into a Panwara (an eulogy) (Prasad, year not mentioned). In 1965, Samprati Aryani collected it as “Rani Reshma Ka Khela” (Aryani 1976). Today its most popular form is folk drama. Local dance parties present it in the marriage ceremonies and on other occasions. The story is narrated in the folk ballad form as well.

THE NARRATIVE OF EKAUNI KAND (THE INCIDENT AT EKAUNI) It was June 19, 1978. Near Daudnagar of Aurangabad district of Bihar a marriage party arrived at the house of Nonu Sahu in a village named Ekauni. A Nautanki (dance drama) was being performed in the village ground. The love scene of Reshma and Chuharmal had just started when a bullet was fired from amongst the spectators which penetrated the chest of the actor playing the role of Chuharmal. Someone shouted at the top of his voice: “Ee bak-bak band karhi re Sar” (Stop this nonsense)! And there followed a stampede among the spectators. This scene is not a part of any fiction; it is an event which occurred in the interior area of Aurangabad on June 19, 1978. Subsequently, two opposed groups were formed in the village. One group was led by the Bhumihars and the other comprised backward lower castes, viz. Bania, Koiri, Chamar, Dusadh, and others. This escalated tension and conflict between the residential areas: Bhumihar Tola, occupied by the Bhumihars and Purvi Tola, populated by the lower castes of the village. In fact the bullet was fired by a youth of the Bhumihar caste because Reshma, the heroine of the play, belonged to this caste.

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Bhumihar, a feudal upper caste of this area, perceived the drama as an insult to their caste because it lowers their social prestige and alters the superior hierarchical position of the Bhumihars. On the other hand, the lower castes adopted this particular version of the story as a memory of their protest against the feudal and elite classes of this region. Five murders took place during the aftermath of this incident in addition to many minor conflicts over a prolonged period. The manager of the Natak Mandali (the dance troupe) lodged an FIR (First Information Report) in the Daud Nagar police station on February 24, 1978. On February 2, 1978 the weekly paper Tataka, published from Arrah, carried a news report of this incident under the following heading: “Nacch mandali dwara Reshma-Chuharmal natak khelte wakt natak kalakar ki Bhumihar samanton dwara hatya” (Artist murdered by Bhumihars during the staging of drama Reshma and Chuharmal). The police maintained that the event was simply a murder case to be classified under law and order, which was a result of long-continuing caste tension. But according to the villagers the cause of the caste tension in the village was the drama of Chuharmal itself. This episode is imprinted as Ekauni Kand (Ekauni Incident) in the memory of the villagers. It is interesting to note that in the Bhojpur-Rohtas region—another region of Bihar characterized by caste tensions and land struggle—the events similar to Ekauni Kand have taken place. One such event occurred at Khutahan Bazar in the Tarari police station of Bhojpur. During a drama staged on the occasion of Dussehra (annual Hindu festival) a derogatory song sung by the sutradhar (narrator) provoked the elite classes of this region, leading to caste conflict and class tension in this qasba (district). The elite groups felt that these performances were raising the consciousness of the lower castes as many peoples’ theatre groups were active in this area. The ban enforced on the performance of such plays and the arrest of the groups performing them did not however stop them. The lower castes continued to stage these protest dramas, denigrating the upper castes in their narrative construction. Some incidents of oppressive attacks on the peoples’ theatre groups in the Bhojpur district of Bihar (1979–82) are shown in Table 18.1. Table 18.1: Cases of attacks on the progressive theatre groups Group

Place

Date

Oppressive forces

Yuva Niti

Khawaspur

5.6.79

Kunwar Sena*

Yuva Niti

Virampur

7.8.80

Feudal caste landlord

Jan Natya Manch

Kesath

3.9.80

Supporters of feudal criminals

Jan Sanskriti Manch

Bagain

16.8.82

Supporters of feudal criminals

Source: Morcha Lagta Natak, Rajesh Kumar/Arvind Kumar, Bhagalpur 1990. Note: *Kunwar Sena is the army of local landlords in the Bhojpur region.

Documenting Dissent

Similar incidents were also reported from the villages like Mahendra Bigaha (1976) and Phoolari (1988) in Aurangabad district of Bihar. It is usually the lower castes which are involved in natyamandali and nautanki companies and the irony is that they have to earn their livelihood by entertaining the very people who are opposed to the content of their plays (see Parmar 1975). For example, the manager of the “Nagesar” (name of the manager) dance troupe, among the most famous troupe in Bhojpur district, says, “Now we do not play drama of Reshma and Chuharmal. Feudal lords fire bullets during it.”2 Even then these dance groups continue their efforts for reliving the memory of Reshma and Chuharmal and the north-eastern part of Bihar is particularly influenced by this story, although it is narrated by different classes in different ways. Lower castes perceive the legend as part of their lived history. According to them, this was a real event that happened sometime in the past in their society. The upper castes want to escape from it, designating it as a mere myth or fabrication.

PERFORMANCE, REMEMBRANCE, AND BAN The following narrative is based on a question and answer session with the manager of the Nagesar dance troupe.3 A 6o clock evening sky! The moment is called “Godhuly” by educated and Sanskritized people but for the villagers it is Gadahber. We are talking to the manager of the Nagesar dance troupe. Occasionally the crowing of a cock draws our attention. Men, women, and children of the Tola (neighborhood) are sitting around us. Some of them are deeply immersed in our conversation. The rest look at us with unseeing eyes. Q: When they ban Chuharmal, what do you people do? Nagesar: We perform other plays. Although we prepare many other plays, we perform only the Drama of Sahlesas. They don’t object to it.4 We become stubborn. You ban one, we will perform another, you ban the second, we will perform yet another. But to perform even these plays, we have to request the babus (people of the higher castes). Q: Why do you want to perform these types of dramas only? Why don’t you perform any other dramas? Those too will earn you a living? Nagesar: We feel good playing them. We feel satisfied in performing the plays of Chuharmal and Sahles. Although stories of Sahles and Chuharmal are different but in our Bhojpuri Language the musical tunes of both are similar. We feel as if we are playing Chuharmal when we sing the rhythms of Sahles.

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Music and Meter Chuharmal Song Rama Ho Ram Man Hi Man Soche Chuharmal Ho Ram Kahan Se Alei Vipatiya Ho Ram Rama ho Ram! Aho Rama Devi Ke Sumirai Surama Chuharmal Ho Ram (From where has this calamity (the girl) come So is now thinking Chuharmal Disturbed as he is Now prays to Goddess.)

Sahles Song Rama ho Ram Morang Mein Rahai Sahles Ho Ram! Larai Phulwaria Mein Akhara Ho Ram Ram Ho Ram! Ahoram Devi Ke Sumirai Vir Sahles Ho Ram (In Morang lives the brave Sahels Who in two deeds passes his days; Wrestling in the rosy garden And worshipping the goddess he adores.)

NARRATIVE CONTEXT AND CONTESTING CLAIMS The backdrop to the Chuharmal story is the Tal area (a vast stretch of uninhabited cultivable land) of Mokama and Bhadha Badhaiyya situated at the boundary of Patna, Begusarai, and Nalanda districts of Bihar. Mokama is located in Bath subdivision of Patna district which is part of South Bihar. The district of Patna was constituted in the year 1865 from the then districts of Bihar and Tirhut. Mokama is situated in the Diyara (cultivable land along the banks of Ganga) land. The Ganga separates this region from Saran, Tirhut, and Darbhanga regions. There are three places with the name of Mokama: Mokama Junction, situated across the railway line, Jazira Mokama which is north of the railway station and the Mokama Khas situated near the village Chintamanchake. The land of this area is very fertile and suitable for growing rice and rabi crops but since

Documenting Dissent

the Tal is under water most of the time, only rabi crops are grown in it. A large number of landless laborers, mostly from the lower castes, come to this region to harvest the rabi crops. The Ganga is navigable throughout the year and has considerable boat traffic. This Aanchal (region) includes 58 villages with a total population of 171,443 with 89,626 males and 81,817 females (Census of India 1981). Some villages are dominated by the Bhumihars and other forward castes whereas some others are dominated by the OBCs and Scheduled Castes (SCs). The villages of Dharampur, Dariapur, and Gorhari contain 31 percent Schedule Caste population which is highest in the area. The SCs include Chamar/Mochi, Dusadh/Dhari/Dharli, Mushhar, Baniya, Dhobi, Pasi, Rajwar, Dome/Dhangad, Hari/Mehtar/Bhangee, and Bhogta castes. Dusadhs are the largest in number in the region among these castes. As per the narrative of the drama of Chuharmal, Reshma and Chuharmal hailed from this area. However, because of the domination of Bhumihars in this region the ban on the performance of this drama is almost as if it was official. The cultural meanings that inform the ban are as follows. First, because Reshma belonged to a rich Bhumihar-Kshatriya family of Mokama village and Chuharmal hailed from a family of the Dusadhs of the village of Anjani, it denigrates the upper castes, especially the Bhumihar caste. Second, there is a belief in blessing (vardan) of devi (goddess) that whosoever will sing the song of Reshma Chuharmal will be able to charm away the women of the area (similar to Pied Piper). There is a belief that the descendants of Reshma and Chuharmal live in this region even today. The narrative location of the characters of this drama may be shown as in Table 18.2. Table 18.2: Folk heroes, their castes, and geographical location Character

Area

Original caste

Ancestral link

Reshma

Mokama

Bhumihar-Kshatriya

(a) Ajab Singh (Brother) (b) Ranjit Singh (Father)

Chuharmal

Anjani Village

Dudhvanshi

(a) Bihari (Father) (b) Bansiram Sumra (Uncle)

Source: Babu Mahadev Prasad, Rani Reshma Chuharmal Ka Geet, Shri Loknath Pustakalaya, Calcutta, 19th Edition (year of publication not mentioned).

There is an interesting side to the caste titles of these folk characters. Those who were called Bhumihar-Kshatriya now call themselves Bhumihar-Brahmin, and those who were Dudhvanshi now call themselves Dusadh. The change in the caste title of the Bhumihar-Kshatriyas reflects their upward mobility. The change in the caste title of the Dudhvanshis, on the other hand, indicates a lowering of their caste status.

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The Dusadhs, who relate themselves with Chuharmal, have contesting claims about the historical past and identity. Some of them claim to be the descendants of Dushasana, one of the brothers of the Kaurava prince Duryodhana. Some others claim to be the offspring of Arjuna and Chitrangada (Sachidanand 1977). Some Dusadhs claim that they were “horn players” in the battle of Mahabharata (Yashoda Devi 1965). Others trace their lineage to Rahu (regarded as a superhuman being and a planet in Hindu mythology) (Crooke 1993). A larger group of Dusadhs under the leadership of the newly emerging Dusadh elite have begun to call themselves Gahlot Kshatriya. In the support of this claim, they narrate a definite genealogical connection to ancient Indian lineages, including that of Rama, the king of Ayodhya. The Dusadhs thus claim different origins that lead to contesting claims which are reflected at the level of mythical consciousness and also in the politics of caste mobility. Such contestations surfaced at the sixth conference of Dusadh Mahasabha held at Lahore on May 20–21, 1923 when some Dusadhs claimed to be Gahlots. This caused the conference to split into two groups one of which advertised in the papers that they had descended from Dushasan and others that they are descended from Rama. In 1932 the chasm between Dusadh Mahasabha and the Gahlots (who had formed a Gahlot Mahasabha) got widened and in 1935, Dusadh Mahasabha reacted firmly against an internal division claiming to be “Gahlot Rajputs.” Those who mobilized under the banner of Dusadh Mahasabha hated the name Gahlot and did not like to be known as Rajputs (ibid.). Thus many Dusadhs, as of now, refuse to be identified as Gahlot-Kshatriyas and claim to be the descendants of Dushashan and Rahu. The Dusadhs who take pride in their identity as Gaholt-Kshatriyas, on the other hand, are still treated as hina (of low origin) in the contemporary society. The Dusadhs of Mokama identify themselves with Rahu. The Nalanda Shabd Sagar, edited by Navalji, describes “Dusadh” as castes of Hindus who tame pigs and are of low origin, that is, Dusht, Adham, or Paji (all these three are derogatory terms that mean bad, low, and of bad character). Navalji was an upper-caste local who was initially involved in the Gandhian stream of the Congress during the colonial period. His dictionary reflects an upper-caste bias and his interpretation agitated the Dusadhs. After the publication of this dictionary many contemporary Dusadh leaders met the chief minister and the education minister of Bihar and presented a protest letter. They burnt many copies of the dictionary. As a result, the meaning of the word Dusadh was changed in the next edition of the dictionary. People of the Bhumihar caste in the areas adjoining Mokama assert that “Dusadh” is an “Apbhransh” (a distorted form) of the word “Dwisadhan.” It means the person who is born by the union of the male and the female of two

Documenting Dissent

different castes.5 Dusadhs, on the other hand, believe that the word “Dusadh” is a vulgarization of “Dusadhaya” which means one “who is difficult to defeat.”6 They also call themselves “Paswan,” that is, one who always stays close, that is, a guard or personal attendant of the king.7 Showing their closeness to the king they probably aspire to be free of their status of “Nirvasit Sudra.” This is a clear example of how in fragmented societies words and histories usually produce contesting meaning. The Dusadhs of Bengal, Bihar, and UP gave up this practice or rearing pigs in 1900 and reinterpreted it in a way that suited their emerging identity. They defend their link with pig rearing in three ways. First, their ancestors lived in Rajasthan and Rajputs traditionally both reared and hunted wild pigs. Second, the Dusadhs had little opportunity to follow their traditional occupation of Goraiti (keeping guard) when the zamindari system weakened; so to support their growing population they had to rear pigs and the third explanation given by the Dusadhs for this practice was that it was used “as a weapon for their protection from the Yavanas (Muslim invaders).” They say that their ancestors knew that pigs were believed to be untouchable animals by the Yavanas as per the Kuran Sharif (The Koran) and protected themselves from attack by the Muslims by keeping a pig at their door. They also say that the Yavanas used to kidnap Hindu girls. To protect them, the Dusadh women would wear a Tabeez (talisman) made of the pig bone and thus a new custom started. They draw upon the folk customs of the region to support this logic. They mention the custom of Kanyaprikshan which is a continuing feature of the marriage system practiced in parts of Bihar and eastern Uttar Pradesh in which the bhainsur (elder brother of the bridegroom) gives a dholna (an ornament made of copper and beaded with the bone of pig) to the bride to wear around her neck. By wearing this ornament the bride is saved from being raped by the Yavanas. Thus they believe that by rearing and looking after pigs the Dusadhs have protected the religion, the dignity, and the life and culture of the society (Yashodadevi, op cit). Although the Dusadhs make mutually conflicting claims about their identity, they reinterpret and thus subvert in this process the imputed meaning of certain terms, categories, and adjectives used to denote their community. The endeavor is to liberate their selves from the stigma of marginality and invent a positive image. Even if their past, as presented by themselves, were to be regarded as an “invented tradition” or an “imagined history,” the contesting nature of the consciousness in their identity formation is easily visible. It is said that in the process of the subaltern protest the phenomena of appropriation and subversion work together. Nevertheless, the subversion takes place in two ways. First,

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as they Sanskritize, they relate themselves to the symbols of Great Tradition. But, in the second instance, they also retain their Dusadh identity and cling on to their Dusadhyata (hard to be mastered or the ability to master the indomitable) and their Shaktisampannta (rich in might). They attempt to strengthen their Dusadh identity by eulogizing Dusadh heroes such as Rahu, Chuharmal, Kunwar Vijaymal, Sahles, Goraiyya, Bahar, Kulesh, Dholan, Bhimal, Narpati, and so on. As such, in the very attempt to Sanskritize, they underline their subaltern identity. The Bhumihars of this region on the other hand, construct their identity in terms of being a martial community. One of the stories of their “martial” past goes as follows. Once upon a time, the Muslims attacked a Dronbar (a Bhumihar clan) family and killed all its members except a child. A dai (nurse-maid) brought the child to the Chakbar (another Bhumihar clan) area. When the boy grew up the Chakbars attacked the Muslims, conquered their land, and donated it to the youth. Further, in the colonial period the Chakbars are said to have been a terror. They used to charge tax from the ships of the East India Company passing through their region.8 It is clear from these oral narrations that the Bhumihars, who live in clusters and own large landholdings, present themselves as the community which fought with the dominant powers of an era and defeated them. They like to project themselves as a caste which is proud of its present status and identity. At the same time, their community is not without sharp divisions within itself in terms of clans and their area of residence. Most Bhumihar landlords acquired land either by robbery or by the rise of tenancy, a substantial section corresponding roughly to the rich and middle peasantry—a veritable, if embryonic, Kulak class (the term “robber barons” is used for the landlords who were not part of the zamindari structure imposed by the Permanent Settlement, 1793). There were areas of low population density in the north western corner of the state, for instance the district of Purnia, which had low-yielding and malariainfested tracts of land. These areas lacked a well-established agrarian hierarchy and had only a formal and often symbolic governmental presence and a scattered and backward peasantry. The “robber barons” would terrorize these peasants and deprive them of their land, amassing huge estates going up to thousands of acres. (Some of these are even now kept intact through ingenious, illegal, and benami (in someone else’s name) transactions. The immense wealth, guns, and muscle power at the command of such landlords made them invaluable allies of politicians. This community is now at the forefront of the forces contesting for savarna (upper caste) supremacy in contemporary rural Bihar. Under the banner of Brahmrshi Sena, and more recently Ranbir Sena, they have attempted to crush the rising aspirations of the lower castes for social and economic equality.

Documenting Dissent

On the other hand, they have emerged as the leading opponents of the model of social justice proposed by the Mandal Commission. Ranbir Sena is named after “Ranbir Baba,” a Bhumihar of Gazipur who is said to have been the commander of a battalion of army of the local Raja. Under his efficient and ruthless leadership his battalion massacred an entire village of the Muslims. As a reward, the Raja granted him “zamindari” (feudal landowner ship) in Bhojpur. A Ranbir Sena activist of Arrah, who narrated the above story, says, “Unka nam lete hi bal dugna ho jata” (the moment we utter his name, our courage multiplies). It is interesting to note how this community has selected Baba Ranbir, a symbol of brutality, as an ideal of their present and future struggle for dominance. They regard this struggle as necessary and take this vow to carry it forward: Saugandh Baba Ranbir ki khate hain Hum Male maar bhagayenge. [We vow in the name of Baba Ranbir that we shall push the Male (a low caste) out forcefully.] On visiting Mokama, I was told by a middle-aged couple that in the fair organized by the Dusadhs only the lower-caste people could go. When I asked as to why the upper-caste people would not participate in the fair, the man lost his temper. Further conversation with the couple revealed that they were of the Bhumihar caste. This incident reveals as to how the legend of Reshma and Chuharmal has become a constitutive part of the identity of a caste/community and how the upper castes receive and respond to this story. The story of Reshma and Chuharmal is not a dead story. Its hero is alive even today in the memory of the people. The complex of Mokama Tal, located to the south of Mokama station at a distance of about 10–12 km, is a sacred place for the local people and a fair is held here in the name of Chuharmal every year for 2–3 days in the month of Chaitra. People in lakhs come here to worship the Dusadh hero. In a nearby village called Mor, a large statue of Chuharmal has been erected. During the harvesting season, the first crop is offered to Chuharmal. This is a standard ritual in the worship of Chuharmal, where the lower castes pray for the fulfillment of their wishes. They also indulge their festive spirit during the fair. They beat the Danka (a large drum) and some of them sing, dance, jump and play Gadaba (a group dance in which the participants beat on the sticks held by others). The oral traditions, festivity, and ritual continually revive the memory of the community (Michelet 1939). The story and the memory inherent in it are also

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a part of the everyday life of the Dusadhs in the region. To locate this story in the everyday life of the people, I closely observed the Dusadhs in Sahri village near Mokama. There are about 20 households in the village. I stayed with one of them, Ram Baran. Ram Baran is primarily an agricultural laborer but also has some katthas, which is one-twentieth of a bigha. I was an unknown person in the village although gradually all the villagers accepted me as a researcher working on the history of the Dusadhs. Some knowledgeable people in the village would happily tell me about their tradition. My experiences in the village are presented below in an episodic and fragmented form. Saguni is an old man of Dusadh Tola and is a gyani (an enlightened person). He is about 90 years old. His eyesight is weak but his memory and voice are quite sharp. He was a freedom fighter and he narrates that in 1942 when the freedom movement became very intense, a parallel Congress government ruled in the region. This was the time when the Dusadh laborers would on their own take their share of the agricultural yield and hand over the remaining share back to Bhumihar master. Whereas earlier the whole of the yield was required to be kept with the Bhumihar zamindar and the peasant would not get even their minimal share. He attributes a symbolic power to the name of Chuharmal. By uttering the name of Chuharmal Baba one acquired the strength to fight even a mighty enemy. The mother of Ram Baran says that Chuharmal is not yet dead He is immortal. He is blessed with immortality by the Goddess who presented him with a sword holding which he could not be defeated. He jumped into the Ganges River and sat himself on the bed of the Mother Ganga. He has left for Morang, the state of king Sahles. Today he lives there only. In the small courtyard of Ram Baran’s house there is a platform made of clay. Planted on it is a Tulsi plant. Etched on the platform with Geru (colored clay) is this legend: “Chuharmal ki jai” (victory to Chuharmal). In his small piece of land Ram Baran has planted black gram. This is the day when the gram is to be harvested. Throughout the night the laborers (mostly Dusadhs, Danger, Chamar, and other lower-caste people) have been busy cutting the gram, tying it into knots and carrying it to the harvesting ground. I go to the field with them. I hear such sounds as, “Vir Hanuman ki jai” (victory to brave Hanuman) and “Chuharmal Baba ki jai” (victory to Baba Chuharmal). Ram Baran says that when the load is very heavy we hail Bajrang Bali and Baba Chuharmal, and it becomes easy to lift the load. He adds that unholy spirits roam about the Tal at night and we have to work in the fields. But we are not afraid because Baba Chuharmal is always there to protect.

Documenting Dissent

In the village at the Kali Sthan (the temple of the goddess Kali) farmers gather every fortnight to sing kirtan (religious songs). On the evening of 15th, I joined them for a kirtan and Ram Baran was also there. They first sing a song in the praise of Lord Ganesh. The second song is a eulogy of Chuharmal in which the divine power of Chuharmal is described. Whenever there is a marriage, a gauna (arrival of a newly married couple) or the birth of a child, they go to Charadih, the place of Chuharmal, to seek his blessings. The Dusadhs of the region and other lower-caste people believe that Charadih, where the Chuharmal fair is held even today, is the place where Chuharmal had his akhara (the place where wrestlers practice their skills). Suresh Kurnar, who studied at the high school at Mokama and is 18 years old, says, “Bhumihars and Kurmis are the lords of the area but the Dusadhs are not inferior to them in bravery, character and patriotism. Chuharmal who belonged to our clan followed the religious path.”

MULTIPLE TEXTS A social text such as a rumor, gossip, story, or folklore multiplies manifold. The narrative identity of a community, culture, or nation is not a rigid structure; continuous contestation from within renders multiplicity a possibility. A story may transform itself into many stories. The tale of Reshma and Chuharmal is an instance of a text multiplying itself. Each new text contains a peculiar social meaning and manifests particular political positions. The multiplicity of the text indicates the manifold character of collective remembrance which is not a mechanical act but is a product of creative imagination. Remembrance is not just an individual phenomenon but is also social and is based on selective memory. Thus memory is not an innocent, univocal, and unified domain. That is why there are many versions of the story of Reshma and Chuharmal in Mokama and its neighboring areas. Some versions were collected by various ethnographers, that is, colonialists, natives, or other folklorists in different time frames. Then there are the versions collected by me during my field work in months April–June 1996. All these versions of the story reflect change, additions, and contestations at the level of the popular narrative. One of the most significant versions is the one told under the Narashanshi tradition of Indian Akhyan, later on transformed into Veer Gatha (tales of bravery). The Veer Gatha poetry usually developed under the medieval feudal and courtier patronage. This folk poetry in its form and structure contains both masculine logic and aesthetic sense. Therefore the heroes in these narratives conquer women and marry them. It is within this structural form that the space for the

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eulogization of the male hero develops. The story of Reshma and Chuharmal is told in this form in the popularly enacted dramas. It is in line with the logic of this form that Reshma is described in abusive and insulting language. In some lower castes’ narratives, the character assassination of the upper-caste heroine forms the base for the construction of the moral character of the hero. In the narrative of Reshma and Chuharmal, Reshma’s role has been highlighted in such a way that she comes across as a sexual and immoral person. Another reason for this negative depiction of Reshma may be that the lower castes take a vicarious revenge on the upper castes through this subversion of what normally would be an upper-caste view of a lower-caste woman. The rape and molestation of lower-caste women by the upper castes is an everyday affair in real life so the dramatization reverses the image, in the only form of protest that is available to the lower castes. When brute strength failed to erase this legend, a group of educated Bhumihar intellectuals attempted to project Chuharmal as a youth born in the Bhumihar caste. It was a strategy to reduce the insulting effect of this symbol for the Bhumihar caste. Baidya Nath Sharma, a Bhumihar scholar, wrote an article in Aryavart (December 7, 1980), a popular daily of Bihar. In this article titled “Lok Geeton Ke Charit Nayak: Baba Chuharmal” (the hero of the folklore of Baba Chuharmal), he wrote thus of Chuharmal: It is the popular belief that Baba Chuharmal was born in the Dusadh caste. But actually he was born about 400 years ago in a Bhumihar Brahmin family of Moladiar Tola. His real and original name was Chauhar Singh. He was the third child of his parents. He had vast landed property. He was still a child when he would astonish people with his enormous physical power and capabilities. His daily routine included serving distressed people and wrestling. In addition, he would be of service to the saints, visit temples and thakurbadis (small temples in the house) and take part in religious and spiritual discourses. Gradually his power and talent became well known in the area. Many people started visiting him seeking his blessings and to get relief from their pain and suffering. The poor and the dalits (the low caste people) formed the majority among these…. Daily in afternoon he...would go to Charadih and stay there till late hours.... When his father pressured him for marriage, he left his home. He starred an ashram on his ancestral land in Charadih where he trained his disciplines in wrestling, perform worship, and bathed in river Ganges at Mahadev Ghat Mokama after walking 5–6 miles. He also trained wrestlers at the Akhara (traditional wrestling institute) of Ajab Khan Pathan. It is said that Ajab Khan was a brave Pathan migrant. He had a palace at Mahadev Ghat where his family lived with him. He had a daughter called Reshma. Reshma was an innocent girl who got attracted to Chauhar Singh and made many attempts to draw his attention. Chauhar Singh treated her like a sister. Ajab Khan became suspicious of Chauhar Singh, because as soon as he arrived, Reshma would start roaming around him. Chauhar Singh felt unhappy at this

Documenting Dissent

suspicion and broke his relations with Ajab Khan. He stopped visiting the palace. On the other hand, Ajab Khan put restrictions on Reshma. This was a matter of great displeasure for Reshma, and one night she set out toward Charadih to meet Chauhar Singh. Soon Ajab Khan went with his army to fight Chauhar Singh but his army was defeated.  After the event, Chauhar Singh assembled his Dusadh followers and attained Samadhi (an ascetic mode of dying) in front of them. When she learnt of this, Reshma too sacrificed her life at the same place. From that day on Chauhar Singh became popular as Baba Chuharmal. His Harijan Dusadh followers began worshipping him at the place. Since then, he is worshipped as a god. Today Chauhar Singh (Chuharmal) is worshipped especially on the occasion of marriage and other such ceremonies by families of Bhumihar Brahmins of Moladiar Tola in Mokama.

The intellectuals and leaders of the Dusadh community registered a string protest against this version of the narrative. They accused the Bhumihars of distorting the legend of Chuharmal. Their protest reads follows: In the article “Lok Geeton Mein Baba Chuharmal,” published in the Aryavart (December 7, 1980), Dr Baidyanath Sharma had claimed that Baba Chuharmal was born in the Bhumihar caste. However, Shri Vilat Paswan Vihangam, Chairman of the Bihar Public Service Commission, Shrimati Yosoda Devi, President of Akhil Bharatiya Dusadh Seva Sangh, Shri B.P. Shastri, General Secretary of Sahles Chuharmal Chetana Samiti, Sri Brahma Dev Paswan, President, Baba Chuharmal Smarak Samiti have come up with many folkloristic proofs in the favor of the fact that Baba Chuharmal was born in the Dusadh caste, not in the Bhumihar caste. They said in the press note that on the basis of books like Rani Reshma– Chuharmal Drama (Loknath Pustakalya, Calcutta) by Shri Mahadev Prasad Singh, Rani Reshma–Chuharmal (Ram Dev Pustakalya and Library, Calcutta) by Shri Ayodhya Prasad Rai Patel, the novel Raja Sahles in Maithili by Mani Padam, the epic Jai Raja Sahles by Matinath Mishra, and A Peasant Life of Bihar by George Grierson, it is very much established that Chuharmal was born in Anjani village of south-east Munger district. His father was Biharimal, mother was Raghuni, brother was Dukha Ram, and nephew was Budhuwa Dusadh. He had studied in school and used to wrestle with his Bhumihar friend Ajab Singh. The sister of Ajab Singh was Reshma and his father was Ranjit Singh, local zamindar. Reshma was in love with Chuharmal, but Chuharmal treated her as a sister. Annoyed by his attitude, Reshma sent an army to fight against Chuharmal’s family. But the result was just the reverse of what she had expected. Because of the Rahupuja (the worship of Rahu) performed by Dusadhs, Baba Chuharmal escaped under the protection of their Isht Devi (goddess) while Reshma got burnt into ashes.

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Dusadhs of Mithila area, who regard Sahles as a hero and worship him, view Chuharmal as an antihero. In the story of Sahles which is staged in Mithila area, Sahles and Chuharmal are depicted as enemies. Chuharmal is said to be the nephew of Sahles. The cause of enmity can be gleaned from the following narrative. Chuharmal was appointed to a post in the palace of the king of Morang. But later, Sahles somehow managed to get the job. Chuharmal decided to take revenge from Sahles but unfortunately was killed by the latter. However in another narrative, popular among the Dusadhs of Madhubani and Rahika, the conflict between the two heroes is resolved. It describes both of them as being brave and belonging to the same caste. After the incident, the king of Morang granted the title of Raja to Sahles and that of Mahapour to Chuharmal. But Dusadhs of Magahi area talk of a deep emotional attachment between Sahles and Chuharmal. They say that Chuharmal is not dead. He had jumped into the Ganges and reached the Morang state of Sahles where he is alive even today. This is a unique situation in which the hero is worshipped but the antihero is also respected. It is also interesting to note that Chuharmal, who is a hero for the Dusadhs of Magahi area, becomes an antihero for the Dusadhs of Mithila. Thus the same myth can have contesting versions within the same caste. Nevertheless, even in the memory of the Dusadhs of Mithila area, Chuharmal is given a certain respectable status. As we have seen, although he is regarded as an antihero he is described as having received the title of Mahapaur. However, this title was given to him only after his defeat at the hands of Sahles and his subsequent death. Thus in their narrative Chuharmal enjoys only a secondary status. Here an interesting question arises: why does a caste-hero of one cultural region becomes an antihero in another cultural region of the same caste? Is it that the form of the myth undergoes a transformation with a change in the dialect from one region to another? Is it possible that at a certain point in its history in the folk memory the cultural identity of the area becomes more important than its caste-identity which is only a part of that larger identity? How are two mighty heroes from the same caste, who lived in two different cultural regions during the same period, to be related to each other? It might be that this is a question that the folk wisdom poses to itself. Folk wisdom might be faced with another question as well. Both the regions have to project their hero as being mightier than the hero of the other region. Hence one region shows the other hero to have been defeated and places its own hero on a high pedestal. Here in the cultural memory of the people of the Magadh and the Mithila regions their political memory acquires certain significance. Historically, Magadh was a large and important state, while Mithila was important because of its culture; politically it was not a very powerful state. So, in a narrative emanating from the Mithila region, there might be a tendency because of this to depict Magadh as a defeated power. One may attribute this

Documenting Dissent

to the fantasy and imagination of the people of a politically weaker region. Probably because of the same reason while narrating the cultural pride of the Mithila, all Maithili litterateurs place Sahles at a very high pedestal. The multiple narratives outlined above indicate various changes that have crept into the text. These changes may be projected in a table which portrays varying modes of telling the story of Chuharmal. These changes highlight some facts which may be seen in Table 18.3. It is curious that all those folklorists who were supporters of the Congress and were influenced by Gandhism used a derogatory language while talking about the lower castes. Pandit Ram Naresh Tripathi was inspired to write the Gram Sahitya by Gandhi’s belief that “India is the country of villages.” He had also written a poem in Hindi on Gandhi. Shiv Sahay Chaturvedi and others constituted a Braj Bhasha Academy for the collection of the folk literature of the Braj language in 1940. The academy also published a magazine called Braj Bharat. These also had a connection with Gandhism and the Congress. During this period most of the folklorists were of Pandit (Brahman) caste and felt flattered when their names were spoken with their titles. They would flaunt their identity of Pandit on their expeditions to collect folklore, even though this would make difficult their interaction with low and untouchable castes. However, there was another class of people who collected folk literature. They would go deep into the rural society and focused on the lower castes. These were committed folk activists whose books were published by Doodnath Press, Calcutta, Lok Nath Pustakalaya, Calcutta, Gaighat Press, Banaras, Sansar Press Arrah, and so on. These were cheaply produced books and were priced low. As these folklorists were not highly qualified, there were errors in their language and style. They were also not a part of any standardized tradition of collecting folk literature. For them folk literature was not an intellectual object received from an informant. Collecting folk literature was itself a cultural practice devoted to the understanding life of common people. They were neither the coworkers of an English Sahib nor the “Khaddar Dharis” (a section of people who would wear only cotton clothes out of devotion to Swadeshi) influenced by Gandhi who claimed to be exploring Gram Jivan (village life) nor were they folklorists engaged in research for government organizations. The name of Mahadev Prasad of Nachap is mentionable in this regard who had collected Lorikayan, Rani Reshma Chuharmal Ka Geet, and other folk legends in 1938. He belonged to that “other tradition” of folklorists who had collected Saaranga Sadabriksh, Nal Damayanti, Kunwar Vijayamal, Chuharmal ki katha, Sahles Ka Geet and so on. This tradition continues even today. Books on many folklores published by Loknath Pustakalaya, Calcutta are the result of collection by such collectors. These are available at low cost from footpaths in qasbas and melas. But these collectors are yet to be recognized in the history of folk literature.

331

Collected and compiled by

George A. Grierson

Ram Garib Chaube

Mahadeo Prasad

Nageshwar Prasad

Samprati Aryani

Date of publication

1882

1894

1938

1967

1971

Hero of a love story

Hero of love story

(a) A powerful spirit who chases away the evil spirits who harass people. (b) A powerful spirit who possesses a Bhagat. The Bhagat recites the Pachara song sings the glory of the Dusadh hero who married a Brahmin girl

First Thief

Legend of Chuharmal

Table 18.3: Changes in the text and image of folk hero Chuharmal

Dushadh

Dusadh

Caste Claims of Chuharmal

Died by taking Samadhi, Had killed his Gurubhai and was feeling guilty

Died while protect- a cow from a lion

Dusadh

Dusadh

No mention of his death. Dusadh He married Chandiya after the death of Ajab Singh and Reshma and led a happy life. But the episode of marriage with Chandiya was added in 19th edition

Killed by Sahles, another Dusadh hero of Mithila

Narrative about the death of Chuharmal

Ajab Singh, Reshma’s brother A Bhumihar

Brahmin Dusadh

Caste claims of Reshma and her landlord brother

From women in a village of Patna district

From a folk singer of kanoo caste at Panichak, a Brahmin dominated village of Patna district

As a panwara (folk ballad) sung by a Dushadh singer

From a myth

From a Bhangi in Mithila region

From whom and where the legend was collected

The author of this paper

The author of this paper

The author of this paper

The author of this paper

The author of this paper

1995

1995

1995

1995

1997

Never died

Hero of love story

Never died

An antihero who created Killed by Sahles trouble in Morang Raj. Would prevent Sahles from gathering revenue, but is not described as a thief

An antihero who created Killed by Sahles trouble in Morang Raj. Would prevent Sahles from gathering revenue, but is not described as a thief

A spirit who protected the fields from the thieves etc.

An evil power, a cowherd Killed by Raja of Mokama who used to uproot the grain field of peasants

Bhumihar hero of a love Died by taking Samadhi story, A person of high moral principles and devoted to the welfare of lower castes

Bhangi

Dusadh

Dusadh

Dusadh

Dusadh

Bhumihar

Ajab Singh, a Bhumihar

Ajab Singh, a Bhumihar

Ajab Singh, a Bhumihar

Ajab Singh, a Bhumihar

Ajab Singh, a Bhumihar

Reshma described as a daughter of a Muslim Pathan Ajab Khan

Bhangis of Mokama

From dusadhs of Madhubani and Tirhut

From dusadhs of Madhubani and Tirhut

A yadav folk singer of Bigusarai

From Bhumihar village near Badh

Source: Narayan, B. 2001. Documenting Dissent: Contesting Fables, Contested Memories and Dalit Political Discourse. Shimla: IIAS.

Baidya Nath Sharma

1980

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SUBALTERNITY AND MYTH MAKING: DENIAL DEFIANCE AND DEIFICATION The myth-making process of subaltern communities uses a different mechanism from that of the elites. Some of the personages who were established as evil by the great tradition were adopted as gods by the subalterns and are worshipped by them. Illustrating this point, Guha mentions that Rahu, who is a demon in the Samudra Manthan narrative of Mahabharata and an Evil Graha (planet) in astrology is worshipped by Dom, Dusadh, and Bhangi and Mang castes. This is a defiance of the dominant narrative “Dev Gatha” and the ritual world of the Brahmanical culture. It is important to note in this context that in the ritual tradition of the Dusadhs the Bhagat who performs the worship of Rahu belongs to the Dusadh caste only. In Baghelkhand region of Madhya Pradesh in Central India, especially in villages around Satna district, there is a Shanipujak (worshipper of Shani god) community. They are originally of Teli caste. Many villages have Shani god temples. The items which are used to worship Shani are related to their daily living. The iron used in boats, horse shoe, and so on, which is an important item in the ritual of Shani worship, is usually associated with the lower castes. Thus, an “evil power” like Shani is not only accepted and worshipped by certain communities, it also defines the religious identity of the many lower and subordinate castes. Dissidence with the classical or the great tradition is thus integral to their religious identity. Of the subaltern mentality which is reflected in the subaltern myth-making, defiance is one of the main constitutive elements. There may be multiple forms, methods, tools, and techniques to defy the authority. Denial, which is one of them, denies that reality which is dominant and exists in an authoritative form. Denial may take place in many ways. One of them is to imagine an alternative reality. In this construction of imagined reality, collective memory, history, and past play foundational role. Sometimes the weaker sections of the society do not appear in direct confrontation with the dominant authority and explore indirect ways of doing so. One of the powerful weapons in the hands of the elite to exercise power over the people is myths, symbols, rituals, and other such forms of symbolic power. They create and disseminate a universe of symbolic discourse and build a symbolic climate conducive to the exercise of their authority. Thus they try to dispossess the people of their instruments of symbolic construction. As such, going into the interiors of memory to build an imagined symbolic discourse by subaltern people should not be seen as betrayal of or escape from reality.

Documenting Dissent

The resort to memory and imagination is not always a “passive act.” Imagination is a reproductive and creative activity of mind. It may be seen in two parts, active and passive. Active imagination not only processes the existing reality but also explores an alternative world in fantasy and memory. It is the creative integrative nature of active imagination that shapes and transforms the living symbol. The physical forms in which active imagination reflects itself include writing, drawing, painting, sculpting, weaving, music, dancing, as well as creation of rituals and dramatic enactment, as described by Jung. The citation of a ritual by any group may be perceived as an active and conscious creative attempt of active imagination which at some stage may come into ethical confrontation with the available context. That is why creation of ritual is perceived as a rebellious act in the context of oppressed mentality. Another modality for defiance characteristic of subaltern people consists in the attempt to destroy or appropriate for themselves the symbols of the authority of those who dominate them. There may be multiple methods of distinction of such symbols. One of the creative methods of destruction of symbolic authority is the construction of an alternative symbolic authority. A dissenting view of history of the oppressed may be seen as a part of this construction. The lower-caste people attempted to defy the religious symbolic ritual system and hierarchy of gods perceived, constructed, and transmitted by Brahmanical power. They developed a series of “deified haves” as deities of their own in the course of history. Kalipada Mitra (1925) talked of “deified heroes” like Amar Singh, Sautan Khan, and Dina Badri who were worshipped by the Malaha of Monghyr. Crooke mentions deification of the notorious robbers in Bihar. According to him, Doms in Bihar worshipped Gandah, who is said to have been hanged for theft, and Shyam Singh who indulged in activities of a similar nature. Dusadhs worshipped famous criminals of their caste under the name of Gariaya, Sahles, and Karikh. There were further examples of Madhukar Sah, a noted outlaw, Mana, a thief, and Bhukhiya, a notorious criminal. Karudev and his brothers Balladh, Dulladh, and Tribhuvan were worshipped by Dhanuks and Nishadhs. Ajar Singh, Sangu Mandal, Sabal Pahaiwan, Jaguhraja. Dukhachariya, Latehar, Yasora, Budh Kumhar were other deified heroes worshipped by the lower castes. Garbhu Baba, Kambaha, Baklor Baba, Kasibaba were worshipped by Mallah, Bind, Ahir, and other lower castes of Bihar. Why did the Dusadh, Dom, and other lower castes start worshipping heroes who are mentioned as criminals in Crooke’s description? One may assume that through this act the lower-caste people reject the status of criminal given to their heroes by the authorities.

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Conditions of Deification The narratives that describe the life histories of such heroes contain some elements which seem to be an inherent part of the phenomenon of deification. For instance, (a) all the deified individuals were men; (b) they all belonged to the class to which their worshippers belonged; (c) all the deified heroes died in tragic fashion; (d) all of them were a victim of upper-caste oppression and injustice and fought against it; (e) tendency to deify those regarded as notorious robbers by the dominant castes; and (f) the deified heroes tend to defeat the rulers belonging to the dominant and upper castes.

Ritual of Defiance These cases of dedication present a ritual system which symbolizes defiance in the world of ritual. The non-Brahmanic character of the worship is clearly marked. While selecting the site for building the shrines of the deified heroes no special direction from the homestead is prescribed. They are found to have been built anywhere and everywhere. Whereas no Brahmanical temple can be built in the south of the village, as this quarter s regarded as the realm of Yama, the lord of death. The door of more respectable Hindu shrines flutes the cast, but in the case of deified heroes, this norm is neglected. The shrines of most of the deified heroes have no idol, no bell to scare vagrant ghosts. They are usually represented by a little heap of mud, called a Pindi, or at times by a brick placed on a raised mount, a log of wood, a hewn stone, or even an old image. The articles used in the rituals like wine, blood of animals, and so on also reflect their non Brahmanic character.

Subaltern Soteriology: A Trajectory of Identity In the eulogies of the hero in the Dusadh soteriology the narrative highlights that aspect of the character of the hero which symbolizes resistance to the dominant- and upper-caste oppressiveness. In most of Dusadh stories the image of lover appears to be secondary whereas that of the warrior enjoys the main focus. Another feature of subaltern soteriology is the construction of counternarratives. This contesting psyche is found to be active in opposition to the oppressiveness of the dominant force. There is also a tendency to regard as immortal those heroes which were killed by the elite forces. This is particularly

Documenting Dissent

true of Chuharmal who was blessed with immortality by the goddess. He jumped into the Ganges to join the Morang Desh of Sahles where he is alive even today. A similar living status is accorded to Sahles in many narratives. Further by attributing a high religious position to physically and spiritually strong mythological heroes, whose brave deeds are antisocial in view of the morality of the great tradition, the subaltern narrative questions the philosophical and ontological basis of the dominant culture. Thus a counter-mythological tradition is established in which symbols of resistance are assimilated in the genealogy of their symbolism. The myth of Chuharmal, however, differs from all other myths in that it is facing resistance by the hegemonic classes of society. It thus establishes itself as preeminently a subaltern myth. For it cannot easily be appropriated by the master narrative.

CONCLUSION In 1995, before parliamentary elections, Laloo Yadav went to Chuharmal fair and worshipped Chuharmal. Thus by trying to politically transform the power of the myth of Chuharmal, firmly residing in consciousness of lower castes, he tried to enlist support. Power has a dual relationship with memory. It wants to utilize collective memory but tries to demolish it when it turns against itself. However, people whose consciousness is the repository of this memory and whose struggles it at least partly represents, have an altogether different relationship with it.

APPENDIX About 40 percent of the total population in Ekauni village belongs to the Bhumihar caste and the remaining 60 percent includes Bania, Koiri, Yadav, Chamar, Dusadh, and other castes. In political and economic terms, this is a high-caste dominated region in which Bhumihars have major land holdings. The lower castes possess very little land. These castes are either small businessmen or those involved in traditional occupations. The Dusadh and Chamar landless laborers work on the land of the Bhumihars. Of service-class people, the majority comes from the high castes. The region, which includes the districts of Aurangabad, Jahanabad, Patna, and Gaya, is dominated by the Magahi culture, with Magahi as the leading dialect. The term Magahi emerged from “Magadhi” which denotes the Magadh region.

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As in many other parts of the country, Bihar’s society is divided and fragmented on the lines of caste, class, and religion. The caste dimensions and polarization are very much evident here. In Bihar the caste divisions are based on the traditional landowning structures and the division of wealth and occupations. The so-called forward castes predominantly consist of the Brahman, Bhumihar, Rajput, and Kayastha communities. Among these, the Bhumihars and Rajputs are the dominant landowning castes who once ruled various parts of the state. They constitute about 15 percent of the population. The middle castes, namely Yadav, Kurmi, and Koeri form about 18 percent, while lower castes comprise 32 percent. The middle and the lower caste together are classified as Other Backward Classes (OBCs). The OBCs thus constitute about half the population of the state. If we juxtapose the above demographic data with the pattern of landownership across the different castes, we get a picture of a society in which land, and consequently a disproportionately large concentration of agricultural wealth, continues to be owned by a relatively few landlords and large farmers. A majority of the people experience material deprivation. Their long history of subjugation and discrimination and their growing aspirations, restlessness, and assertiveness in the face of upper-caste groups’ unwillingness to relinquish their power and privilege, explain, to some extent, the growth of violence in Bihar. Only 5.7 percent of the people from the upper castes own no land. It can safely be assumed that those who do not own land are professionals belonging to the Brahmin and Kayastha castes or Bania traders. The upper castes include big landlords. There are 85 families spread across 18 districts of Bihar who own more than 500 acres of land. Additionally, 89.5 percent of the upper castes belong to the landlord and rich peasant category, while only 2.9 percent and 5.5 percent belong to the middle and poor peasant categories respectively. At the other end of the spectrum are the Dalits and tribals, 60.9 percent of whom own no land at all. They are often landless agricultural and urban laborers and artisans who perform some menial jobs. Some of these are marginal farmers who also work as part-time agricultural laborers, while a small proportion own less than 5 acres of land. Many are also seasonal migrants who travel as far as Punjab and Haryana in search of work. Dalits and tribals who own more than 10 acres of land are almost negligible. Between these two ends of the spectrum lie the middle and lower castes and the OBCs. Among the middle castes (Yadav Kurmi, Koeri, and others) 25.9 percent are landless and 66.4 percent are small farmers operating less than 5 acres. This is indicative of the differentiation in the peasantry among these caste groups; of the lower castes (Barhi, Dhanuk, Kahar, Kumhar Luhar, Tatwa, Teli) a little more than two-thirds are landless. Lower castes work as agricultural laborers, artisans, small traders, or in the service sector.

Documenting Dissent

Among the Muslims, 58.6 percent own no land. This section of Muslims consists of professionals, artisans, agricultural urban workers, and small to medium traders. Once again, a large proportion of them are marginal and small farmers (35.4 percent).

NOTES 1.

2. 3. 4.

5. 6. 7. 8.

Dennis Brutus is an eminent South African poet. I have taken this stanza from his poem “Land the Tree.” See Vagarth (1989), a collection of poems from six continents, published by Bharat Bhawan, Bhopal. Nagesar was a Chamar by caste. This conversation with Nagesar was recorded on September 8, 1994 at his residence in Garvasdeeh village in Bhojpur. Sahles is another important hero of Dusadhs. Dusadhs of Magadh and Bhojpuri regions believed that Chuharmal had not died. He is still alive. By the blessing of the Goddess he is immortal. He jumped in the Ganges and flowing with the river stream reached the kingdom of Raja Sahles which is imagined to be situated somewhere around Nepal border in Morang area. Dusadhs have a strong belief that Dusadhs ruled many places of Northern Bihar in the medieval period. The content of the Sahles drama is of a milder tone. It does not cause a very violent reaction from the upper castes. In the Drama of Sahles played by the Nagesar troupe, Chuharmal appeals as a nephewof Sahles for a very brief period. (It was played in Tendumi village in Bhojpuri on December 1, 1978). Interview recorded with Ramsingar Singh and Laxman Singh, older generation Bhumihars of Mokama, on September 11, 1996. Based on interview with Saguni, Rammuni, Ganesh, and Subaran of Begusarai, recorded at the Chuharmal fair, Charadih, April 14, 1996. Interview with Sanjay Paswan, an activist of Dalit Sena of Patna, April 10, 1996. As told in an interview by Kaushalji of Begusarai. Recorded on April 5, 1998.

REFERENCES Aryani, Samprati. 1976. Magahi bhasha aur sahitya. Patna: Bihar Rashtrabhasha Parishad. Census of India. 1981. District Census Hand Book, Government of India, Patna, First Edition, p. 34. Crooke, William. 1974 (reprint). Tribe and caste in north western India. vol. II. Delhi: Cosmo Publications.. Michelet, Jules. 1939. Histoire de la revolution Francoise, ed. Gerard Walter. Paris: Gallimard. Parmar, Shyam. 1975. Traditional folk media in India. New Delhi: Research Press. Prasad, Mahadeo (n. d.). Rani Reshma ka Geett. Calcutta: Loknath Press. Sachidanand. 1977. The Harijan elite: A study of their status, networks, mobility and role in social transformation. Delhi: Thomson Press. Yasoda Devi. 1965. Dusadh samaj : Ek samiksha. Patna: Kanak Press.

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Chapter 19

The Satnamis of Chhattisgarh Saurabh Dube

This chapter underscores a mutual logic shaping the construction of ethnographic histories and the representation of untouchable pasts as entangled endeavors.1 This shared logic is premised upon modes of reading and forms of writing in which categories of analysis and objects of understanding are not artificially separated from one another, particularly by stressing the latter over the former. Rather, concept and object are rendered as mutually constitutive elements, in this case within the fashioning of historical narratives. On the one hand, through this wider interplay, it is the questions asked and the categories chosen that shape the objects of inquiry, also configuring the matrices of relationships within which they are embedded. On the other hand, once there is a clear acknowledgement of the aggrandizing artifice of a meaning-legislative reason, the concepts elaborated and the narratives fashioned can also lead the objects of a singular consciousness being rendered as subjects with a different consciousness. Within the interstices of these movements, the entangled endeavors of ethnographic histories and untouchable pasts work to elaborate central analytical questions and key theoretical issues, featuring reasons of myth and rituals of history, colonial modernities and postcolonial traditions, contestations of authority and containments of power, and meanings of subalterns and margins of Hinduism. But before I turn to these themes that run as connected strands through this chapter, a brief introduction to the protagonists of this story is in order.

BRIEF BEGINNINGS Satnampanth was initiated in the early nineteenth century, by Ghasidas, a farm servant, primarily among the Chamars (etymologically, leather workers) of Chhattisgarh, a large cultural region bound through linguistic ties in southeastern Central Provinces (present-day Madhya Pradesh). This group formed

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a little less than one-fifth of the total population of Chhattisgarh.2 Most of its members either owned land or were sharecroppers and farm servants. Yet the ritual association of the Chamars with hides and carrion meant that the group and its members, collectively and personally, embodied the stigma of the death pollution of the sacred cow, locating the caste on the margins of the Hindu order. The Chamars—and a few hundred members of other castes— who joined Satnampanth now became Satnamis, offering a challenge to the intermeshed schemes of divine, ritual, and social hierarchies in Chhattisgarh. The Satnamis had to abstain from meat, liquor, tobacco, and certain vegetables and pulses. They were prohibited the use of cows, as opposed to bullocks, in any of their agricultural operations. There was a rejection of Hindu deities, idols, and temples within Satnampanth. The members were asked to believe only in a formless god, satnam (true name). There were to be no distinctions of caste within Satnampanth. With Ghasidas began a guru parampara (tradition) which was hereditary, and there developed in Satnampanth a stock of myths and rituals that were associated with the gurus. The subaltern religious formation combined in itself the features of a caste and the principles of a sect. These various moves in their special singularity and distinctive detail contested the tenor of ritual power and colonial authority in Chhattisgarh, but they also reproduced forms of inequality among the group. Indeed, these simultaneous processes were part of a wider logic. Over the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the Satnamis coped with shifts in the agrarian economy and changes in the relationships of power, negotiated various efforts to regulate the community, and drew upon symbols of power to question and challenge their subordination. At the same time, across this period, the Satnamis—who continue to be an important presence in Chhattisgarh—also elaborated schemes of meaning and power imbued with ambiguity, reworking patterns of domination within the community. The Satnamis have formed an internally differentiated community. The articulations of property, office, and gender have shaped patterns of authority among the group. After the establishment of new proprietary rights under the malguzari (village proprietor) settlement introduced by British administration in the 1860s, the Satnamis—along with the Chamars—constituted a little over one-fourth of the total tenant population of the districts of Bilaspur, Raipur, and Durg. The other members of the Satnami population stood on opposite ends in the agrarian hierarchy: a relatively small number of agricultural laborers and farm servants, and very few malguzars. The power of property was closely linked with the privileges of office. Important Satnami malguzars were not only tied to the family of the guru through bonds of kinship, but also occupied important positions within the organizational hierarchy of Satnampanth. The members of the guru family and the organizational hierarchy of Satnampanth,

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closely involved in questioning the subordination of Satnamis by dominant castes, also disciplined and regulated the community. These forms of power were compounded by critical differentials of gender within Satnamapanth. The embedding of specific practices of Satnami kinship in a wider system governed by patrilineal and patrivirilocal principles alongside a contradictory ordering of female sexuality within the group’s myths and rituals had very particular consequences. On the one hand, Satnami women earned a measure of autonomy and forms of flexibility to negotiate marriages and men in everyday arenas. On the other hand, there was a double-edged construction of the agency of Satnami woman, marking them with distinctly marginal attributes that spoke of an aggressive sexuality and a deviant femininity, and providing a means for their sexual exploitation by upper-caste men and members of the organizational hierarchy of Satnampanth.3 With this grim reminder of the need to guard against romanticizations of communities, I bring my introductory sketch of the Satnamis to its timely end.

HISTORICAL MARGINS The introduction has noted that margins do not merely refer to dispossessed peoples and subaltern groups, but also to social knowledge and historical endeavor that have been subordinated by the social sciences and normalized by the humanities. In other words, margins are fluid terrains that have come to be rendered as bounded arenas, but they are also porous borders that question the dominant claims of knowledge and power.4 In these overlapping but diverse senses, the untouchable pasts of the Satnamis and an ethnographic history of the community fit the bill of margins as an analytical perspective. The past few years have witnessed a vigorous debate around the question of the colonial origins of the categories of Hindu and Hinduism. While one set of scholars has seized upon etymological and philological issues to suggest that these categories are creations of colonial imaginings, the products of the nineteenth century, other historians and anthropologists have emphasized the precolonial basis of religious (and caste) categories which provided a means for colonial representations. Both sides have tended to privilege questions of the origins or foundations of these categories, and defined the meanings of Hindu and Hinduism rather exclusively in relation to other religions, mainly Islam.5 A history of the Satnamis constructed in an ethnographic grain serves to recast the debate around this question in terms of perspectives drawn from the pasts of a group who stood on the margins of these categories—categories that were elaborated within wider cultural processes defined by power. Here a focus on the multiple negotiations and interrogations, reworkings and challenges that went

The Satnamis of Chhattisgarh

into the production of different meanings of Hinduism—I speak not merely of the word, but equally of the social relationships made up of domination, subordination, and resistance that it describes—at once shows the limitations of a primary concern with the origins of the categories of Hindu and Hinduism and the dangers of reifying them as static entities.6 Through the filters of untouchable pasts, the categories of Hindu and Hinduism emerge as descriptive and analytical shorthands that make possible an understanding of the constantly changing patterns and fluid lived arrangements of religious meanings and ritual practices, which have variously elaborated and contested the mutually intermeshed divine, ritual, and social hierarchies of Hinduism under precolonial regimes, colonial rule, and independent states in South Asia (and beyond). From the perspectives of analytical margins, these categories are equally revealed as critical resources that were worked upon in selective and contending ways by various castes and communities in their articulations of religious and political identities, particularly in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. On the one hand, the growing rigidities of hierarchies of caste—particularly, the norms of purity and pollution—that worked against the Chamars in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries were not fabricated by the colonial regime. Rather these developments had their beginnings in precolonial Chhattisgarh ruled by the Marathas, only to be intensified further under colonial rule. These historical processes came to underlie the formation and elaboration of Satnampanth, a subaltern religious endeavor that fashioned its distinct identity by questioning the ritual power embedded within caste and by constructing hierarchies of otherness—and not merely the Other—within the Hindu social order in the nineteenth century. On the other hand, from the 1920s, as we shall see, the Satnamis went on to variously negotiate different constructions of the Hindu order under the regime of caste associations, within the wider context of culturally and politically constituted understandings of Hinduism by nationalists and social reformers. These dominant understandings of Hinduism were elaborated alongside measures constructed by the colonial government in relation to religious communities, and their negotiation by the Satnamis involved fashioning of novel identities, which had contradictory and unintended consequences for the group’s articulations of community and nation. Indeed, such critical implications of the meanings gleaned from margins also extend to other central questions in the history and ethnography of South Asia. It is often the case that studies of religion and ritual in South Asia tend to underplay considerations of political economy and concerns of state formation.7 At the same time, analyses that seek to redress this imbalance often privilege the determinations and transformations of economic structures and

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political processes, and render religion as epiphenomenal (or at any rate derivative upon the brute realities and underlying dynamics of political economy). The difficulties with both these procedures should be evident. The first veers toward bracketing religion from wider historical processes, implicitly casting it as a static repository of timeless traditions. The second tends toward reifying the abstract workings of subterranean structures, virtually exorcising the mediation and influence of religious meanings and historical practices upon processes of the past and the present. I have no ready solution to an enduring problem of social theory. Instead of a singular answer, what is offered here are working suggestions. If we dispense with overriding teleological schemes and overarching theoretical models, the linkages between the analytical arenas of political economy and religious formations do not appear as predetermined verities, but rather as complex connections and conjunctural relationships whose protean forms and emergent patterns need to be unraveled and specified in particular contexts and determinate domains. If we further acknowledge the enormous extent to which the archival record for South Asia in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was shaped by the preoccupation of the colonial state and indigenous regimes with the extraction of revenue and the maintenance of law and order, it becomes clear that the difficulties of tracing the interconnections between (heuristic fields of) political economy and (analytical configurations of) religion are further compounded by the idiosyncrasies and perversities of the archive, particularly regarding quotidian subaltern endeavors and untouchable religious initiatives. Once more, the perspectives drawn from untouchable pasts suggest other possibilities—at once theoretical in scope but modest in scale, astutely analytical in their efforts but acutely aware of their limits—of attending to changes and continuities in the domain of political economy while elaborating the fluid but constant interplay between cultural schemes, social relationships, religious meanings, and ritual power. Now such modes of analysis run through my wider renderings of the pasts of the Satnamis over the last two hundred years, quite as they inform my other projects of research and writing, including those represented in this book. A single example should suffice here. The formation of Satnampanth was informed by the wider context of Maratha rule (1742–1854) in Chhattisgarh, located within the broader processes of state formation and revenue practices in the region. We know that during the past few years imaginative historical accounts of economic and social institutions and processes in Maratha polities have revised our understanding of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries in India. The crude caricature of Maratha rule as a predatory empire of the saddle has been replaced by a nuanced picture which shows significant continuities between the Mughals and the Marathas, an expansion in agricultural production in Maratha territories, and a complex

The Satnamis of Chhattisgarh

and sophisticated system of revenue collection in the shaping of Maratha administration.8 Chhattisgarh as a frontier province within the Maratha dominions shared features of this wider picture, but the region also had its own peculiarities. The administrative measures of British superintendents who governed Chhattisgarh between 1818 and 1830 compounded these complexities. Satnampanth was a response to cultural and economic processes that had a contradictory dimension for the Chamars in the region. These processes allowed members of the group to establish their own villages and thereby to negotiate and partly escape the authority of upper-caste officials. But they also led to an increasing subordination and further marginalization of other Chamars in villages dominated by higher castes in the face of a growing rigidity of the norms of purity and pollution in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. As I have shown elsewhere, the formation of Satnampanth occurred within the interstices of two simultaneous movements: the processes of continuity and change at the frontier of Maratha polity and the Company’s dominions; and the centrality of conflict and innovation in the arena of popular religious practices.9 Indeed, it is the processes within political economy and the elaborations of state formation—both centering upon revenue practices—in Chhattisgarh that provide meaning to the symbolic construction of a subordinate religious initiative, which carved for itself a distinct religious identity in relation to the ritual power of the social and divine hierarchies within the caste order in the region. We have noted that Satnampanth has combined the features of a caste and a sect. The subaltern religious formation thus confounds the logical schemes of historians and anthropologists who generally conceive of caste and sect as binary categories, even as they include the possibility that sects “degenerate” into castes. This influential understanding is a legacy of Louis Dumont’s dominant model, which is based upon a Brahman householder’s construction of renunciation and asceticism (Dumont 1970a). The work of Richard Burgahart, Peter Van der Veer, and David Lorenzen has shown that this model tends to ignore the perspectives of the ascetic and the non-twice-born caste. It thereby overlooks the permeable boundaries of the householder and the renouncer, and the interpenetration in practice of principles of caste and sect.10 Such intertwining of the principles of these simultaneously distinct but overlapping categories has been evident in Satnampanth. I will elaborate these issues soon, but two points are pertinent here. It is not only that Satnampanth is a sectarian formation governed by an unalloyed logic of reconstituting the untouchable status of its members. It is also that the founder of this subaltern religious endeavor, Ghasidas, remained an ascetic householder guru; and from the time of his son, Balakdas, the guru as the head of the organizational hierarchy and the formal owner-proprietor of the village of Bhandar simultaneously embodied the truth

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of satnam and the symbolically constituted attributes of royalty of the raja and the dominant caste. Yet a wider cultural acceptance of such redrawn ritual boundaries is not merely rare but often quite impossible, particularly when the protagonists are overwhelmingly lower-caste men and women. It is a truism that the Satnamis functioned within the schemes of power of the caste order in Chhattisgarh. We know now that Louis Dumont’s vastly influential statement of the nature of caste society in South Asia encompasses power within the ritual hierarchy of purity and pollution and renders it epiphenomenal.11 More recent studies by Nicholas Dirks, Gloria Raheja, and Declan Quigley have opened up possibilities for discussions of the interplay between caste structure and ritual dominance: but they have all tended to locate power, virtually exclusively, in constructs of kingship and the dominant caste constituted by cultural, ideological, and ritual attributes.12 Here the very marginal status of the Satnamis—their lowly position in the ritual hierarchy of purity and pollution, and their exclusion from the web of relationships defined by service castes—suggests a rather different understanding of the nature of power in the caste order. An ethnographic history that draws upon Satnami myths and practices and the group’s oral accounts about the late colonial period reveals that the ritual hierarchy of purity and pollution and the ritual centrality of kingship and dominant caste(s) were both symbolic schemes that elaborated modes of domination and power. These intertwined hegemonic axes worked together to secure the subordination of the Satnamis and other lower-caste groups in Chhattisgarh, and—lest we forget—elsewhere in South Asia too. The perspectives of untouchable pasts also clarify that these symbolic schemes were further entangled with the signs and metaphors of colonial power. Indeed, the colonial presence in Chhattisgarh after the nineteenth century compounded the forms of ritual dominance in the caste order: the symbols and practices of colonial governance were reworked in quotidian arenas; the upper-caste malguzar came to be widely fashioned as the raja of the village; and there were novel articulations of ritual power in the elaborations of caste in village life. Clearly, there was much in the local configurations of dominance that was weighted against the Satnamis.13 The Satnamis negotiated and resisted these relations of power in diverse ways. The creation of Satnampanth initiated the challenge to ritual power within caste society in Chhattisgarh. The subaltern religious endeavor at once drew upon popular traditions and the ritual hierarchy of purity and pollution, rejected the divine and social hierarchies that centered on the Hindu pantheon, and repositioned the signs in a new matrix to question the ascribed ritual status of Chamars as lowly untouchables. At the same time, in the new sect, the rejection of distinctions of caste among its predominantly Chamar constituency and a few hundred Teli and Rawat members was accompanied by prohibitions that

The Satnamis of Chhattisgarh

governed the transactions with other castes, reproducing the significance of meanings and patterns of power embedded within the ritual schemes of the caste order. From the 1850s the formalization and elaboration of the organizational hierarchy of Satnampanth—presided over by the guru who combined the twin, inextricably bound characteristics of the raja and the embodiment of the truth of satnam—constituted an alternative to the formidable network of relationships of village proprietors and dominant landholding groups with service castes: but this organizational structure also worked together with other institutions of the Satnamis (particularly ramat, the tour of the guru) to provide the gurus with means of control over the community. In the latter part of the nineteenth century, the Satnamis responded to their expropriation and exploitation under the new system of proprietary rights and malguzari (village proprietor) settlement—established by the colonial regime in the 1860s—by deserting villages, continuing with the practice of lakhabata (the periodic redistribution of land) in Satnami villages, and revealing their solidarity in challenges to upper-caste malguzars over high rents and loss of land in the 1890s. The enduring contestations of power by the Satnamis continued to be rooted in familiar arenas. The Satnami structure of beliefs, modes of worship, and social organization allowed the group to negotiate and resist the principles of ritual subordination and forms of discrimination that pervaded everyday life. Here the repertoire of myths of the Satnamis powerfully elaborated the group’s imaginings of its heroic histories and current predicaments. For the purposes of the present discussion, these myths, a part of the community’s ongoing oral traditions, ordered the past of Satnampanth. The Satnami gurus underwent trials, overcame obstacles, and displaced figures of authority to define the boundary and orchestrate the symbolic construction of Satnampanth. The myths of community interrogated the intermeshed principles of the ritual hierarchy of purity and pollution, the ritually and culturally constituted centrality of kingship and landholding dominant castes, and the modes of power derived from colonial administration in the region.14 Finally, in the midst of efforts, often initiated by upper-caste benefactors, to recast the identity of the Satnamis along the lines of recently constructed authoritative blueprints of Hinduism in the 1920s and 1930s, the group fashioned distinctive uses for the key emphases of the Hinduism(s) on offer, and its reworkings of Hindu identities were accompanied by a challenge to the upper castes. Yet, these moves were predicated on the fact that the very making and elaboration of Satnampanth had carried forward the meanings embedded within the hierarchies and centers of ritual power in the caste order. Indeed, if the pasts of the Satnami reveal varieties of resistance, particularly in their refiguring of ritual forms and the fashioning of mythic meanings, it is also true that Satnami contestations, often conducted in a religious idiom, engaged with as well as subverted but equally contained and enabled by

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the hegemonic processes of caste and colonial power in Chhattisgarh. Against the lingering seductions of contemporary fables that feature relentless reifications of agency and increasing inflations of power, let me illustrate the key themes that I have discussed by turning to a tiny part of the wider body of the untouchable pasts and ethnographic histories at stake here.

ENGAGING STORIES Around 1850, after the death of Ghasidas, the guru gaddi (seat of guru) of Satnampanth came into the hands of Balakdas, the founder’s second son.15 Balakdas institutionalized the practices, defined the organizational hierarchy, and elaborated the regulations of Satnampanth. The first seat of the gurus was established in Bhandar. Ghasidas lived in the village during the last years of his life and cured and healed the bodies of Satnamis with amrit, water in which he had dipped his toe or thumb. Thus, Balakdas inherited a very considerable legacy of ritual power: the absence of idols of gods and goddesses in Satnampanth meant that the guru, the only anthropomorphic icon, had become the living symbol of worship and belief for the Satnamis. Here the darshan (vision) of the guru carried the substance of his authority and constituted a distinct mode of worship, and amrit purified and regenerated the bodies of Satnamis, continuously integrating them into Satnampanth. Balakdas also built upon this legacy. He institutionalized the practice of guru puja (worship of the guru) on the sacred dates of the Satnami ritual calendar—Dashehra, Bhad Aathon, and Maghi Puno—that attracted ever large numbers of Satnamis to Bhandar. Moreover, the tightening of the rules of consanguinity and commensality in Satnampanth under Balakdas further swelled the numbers of Satnamis who thronged to Bhandar, as pure pilgrims were joined by those of their impure brethren who had transgressed the norms of the caste-sect and now wished to reenter it by means of the guru. Finally, after the initiation of settlement operations and the grant of proprietary rights in the 1860s the guru became the owner-proprietor of Bhandar, which added further prestige to this preeminent site of Satnami pilgrimage. Through the many vicissitudes of quarrels within the guru family, the division of the gaddi (seat of the guru), and the acquisition of other villages by members of Ghasidas’s patrilineage, Bhandar remained the effective locus of ritual power of the Satnami guru. The story repeated itself with the institution of ramat (the tour of the gurus), which was the other means for the Satnamis of getting a darshan (vision) of the guru and obtaining amrit. In the true stories of the Satnamis, embodied in their myths and narrated in the course of conversations and discussions during my fieldwork, ramat was begun by Ghasidas but the practice was put on a

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sound organizational basis by Balakdas. Indeed, under Balakdas, the practice of ramat—which involved the gurus’ travels every year to different villages so that the Satnamis gained their darshan, while the gurus in turn settled matters involving the violation and transgression of norm of Satnampanth—was turned into an institutionalized work of considerable finesse, even a spectacle. Balakdas outraged the feelings of the Thakurs of Chhattisgarh, who fashioned themselves as a warrior caste, by going on tour riding an elephant and wearing the sacred thread. We know that in the hierarchies of the caste order, the use of elephants as modes of transport has been reserved for dominant castes, and the wearing of the sacred thread is a mark of twice-born castes. Balakdas’s appropriations here expropriated dominant groups of symbols that defined their authority through marks of exclusion and distinction, and also staged the spectacular in ramat, which stood fully institutionalized in the later decades of the second half of the nineteenth century. Actually, the major fortunes made by the gurus from the offerings of Satnamis in Bhandar and during ramat, combined with the acquisition of the proprietary rights of Bhandar and other villages, meant that regal attributes came to be attached to the Satnami guru. The guru was both on a par with, and shared aspects of, a raja admi (kingly person). The presence of a large house in Bhandar, the use of elephants, camels, and horses as modes of transport, and the keeping of armed retainers formed a part of this picture. Indeed, if Ghasidas was a guru in the manner of a miraculous ascetic householder, Balakdas was much more a figure in the mould of a conqueror who invested the seat of the Satnami guru with attributes of royalty for his successors to refine and elaborate. A photograph from the late nineteenth century shows a Satnami guru with his retinue and underscores the twin aspects of the guru’s authority: the provider of amrit and the raja-like figure with his retinue of advisors, bodyguards, soldiers, and a peon. The structure of the guru’s authority was further secured through the organizational hierarchy of Satnampanth. The foundations of this organizational structure lay in Ghasidas’s appointment of bhandaris in villages. Balakdas went on to considerably develop and formalize the structure which was later refined by his successors. The organizational hierarchy of Satnampanth extended from the gurus at the top, moving on to mahants, then to diwans, and finally down to bhandaris and sathidars in villages and to the bodyguards and peons in the guru’s entourage. The mahant represented the guru in a group of villages; the diwan was an advisor to the guru; the sathidar fetched Satnamis on ritual occasions and helped the bhandari within the village. By the late nineteenth century, Satnampanth had a firmly entrenched organizational hierarchy, which served as an alternate ritual and symbolic power center to dominant groups and their network of relationships with service castes.

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This organizational network contributed to Satnampanth combining the features of a caste and a sect. In brief, the guru regulated the prohibitions on food and controlled matters of marriage to maintain the boundedness of the Satnamis. In both these arenas, the rules of Satnampanth were tightened under Balakdas. A Satnami who broke the prohibitions and rules of commensality and consanguinity had to drink the guru’s amrit, make an offering of a coconut and money to him, and feed the other Satnamis within the village. The guru’s control was exercised through mahants, diwans, bhandaris, and sathidars. The Satnamis were simultaneously the incorporated members of a caste and the initiated followers of a sect. Among them, concerns of jati (caste) and panth (sect) were fused together to be closely regulated by the guru. By the middle of the nineteenth century specific symbolic markers defined the boundary of Satnampanth, and Balakdas added to this process of symbolic construction. The guru distributed the janeu (sacred thread), a sign of the twiceborn within the caste hierarchy, among the Satnamis. The appropriation of the sacred thread, which was worn by a male Satnami after he came of age and started following the rules of Satnampanth, challenged the upper-caste monopoly over a sign of ritual purity which was constitutive of their domination. Moreover, there is a further twist to this tale. Satnamis argue that the combination of janeu and kanthi—the string with wooden beads that was appropriated by Ghasidas from Kabirpanth and was worn by members of Satnampanth after their rite of initiation—distinguished them from Kabirpanthis and Vaishnavas (who wore the kanthi) and from Brahmans and other upper castes (who wore the janeu). Finally, in the second half of the nineteenth century the Satnamis elaborated another marker in the form of jait khambh (victory pillar), a high pole with a small white triangular flag on top. The jait khambh in each village reminded the Satnamis of their boundedness as a group. A symbol of the guru, the piece of white cloth was changed on the occasions of guru puja. The markers within Satnampanth underscored the centrality of the guru who was the representative of satnam. This past is played out in ever-interesting ways in the oral mythic tradition of the Satnamis. In the period unto the 1850s, Satnampanth was still marked by considerable fluidity, which is indexed by Satnami myths about Ghasidas that bear upon making of Satnampanth. Here if Ghasidas initiated Satnampanth on the command of Satnampurush, the embodiment of satnam, the guru also questioned and offered a challenge to Satnampurush. Indeed, Satnami myths, in tune with a specific logic of oral traditions, simultaneously distinguished between the figures of Ghasidas and Satnampurush but also conflated the identities of these divine beings through a metaphoric juxtaposition of their mythic attributes and ritual power. At the same time, Ghasidas’s encounters with the other major figures that populated the cosmic and social order were marked by a

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greater degree of caution. What was of essence here was a displacement of these figures, not by eclipsing them, but rather by demarcating their separate spheres of authority to constitute the emergent boundaries of Satnampanth. Thus, in his encounters with the Gond king of Sonakhan and angrez raja (English king) of Raipur, even as Ghasidas demonstrated his superior, just, and moral authority, he also humbly acceded to the unjust demands of these regal figures. Similarly, this demarcation of separate and complementary spheres of authority was also evident in Ghasidas’s encounter with Danteshwari Devi, the goddess to whom human sacrifices were made in the chiefdom of Bastar, only now it was worked out through a play upon configurations of affinal kinship in the cosmic order. These primary pasts that cautiously displaced mythic figures in the making of Satnampanth were to be replaced by rather more heroic histories as the sect acquired a firmer organizational and institutional basis in the second half of the nineteenth century. In the myths of the community, the sway of Satnampanth and the solidarity of the Satnamis are represented through Balakdas’s rounds of ramat, which are rendered as successful conquests, triumphs over rival figures of authority. The forms of the guru’s power are clear. Balakdas’s spectacular entourage consisted, on the one hand, of two mythic gladiators, who wielded swords and guns with equal ease, accompanied by four thousand other warriors, and, on the other hand, of a thousand sants (holy men) of Satnampanth. The guru himself rode on a decorated elephant, carrying a spear, a gun, and a sword: but Balakdas also wore the sacred thread across his chest, and a holy ash mark on his forehead. During his travels, cast in the myths as akin to the daura (official tours) of kings and colonial administrators, Balakdas left the imprint of his authority upon the rajas of feudatory states and the heads of rival ascetic orders, particularly the Bairagis and the Kabirpanthis. Indeed, the ritual and moral power wielded by Balakdas, a law unto himself, also articulated an alternative legality. The sacral authority of the Satnami guru was just and true, but it was embedded within the interiority of faith. The colonial government was unjust and untrue (and corrupt and ignorant), but its orders had to be obeyed. In the myths of Satnampanth, the early caution of Ghasidas in demarcating the boundaries of the sect was replaced by Balakdas’s more direct measures to vanquish rival figures of authority. Balakdas’s courage and recklessness bore the hallmark of a conqueror, bequeathing much to posterity. And so it was that in the repertoire of Satnami myths, even as narratives of heroic history came to be replaced by more fragmentary tales—of quarrels within the guru family, the division of the guru gaddi, and the increasing importance of women in the affairs of the guru family—the later gurus continued to retain their regal attributes.16 The major changes lay ahead, linked to the work of the newer forms of politics in the twentieth century.

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CONTENDING MODERNITIES Binary categories do not merely come in pairs. They also imply other homologous oppositions. The overarching opposition of tradition and modernity is often accompanied and animated—at the very least implicitly—by equally grand divisions between myth and history, ritual and reason, and magic and the modern. These binary schemes are actually rooted in reified representations of a singular modernity. They lie at the heart of the various traditions of social theory and political thought in Western and non-Western arenas. Elsewhere, I have questioned the persuasive power of such overriding oppositions in different institutional contexts, diverse intellectual domains.17 My purpose here is merely to point out that totalizing renderings of a singular modernity, by both its proponents and its critics, tend to remain trapped in self-representations of the idea of the modern. Understood as transformative processes featuring capital and consumption, industry and empire, nations and colonies, citizens and subjects, public spheres and private spaces, normalizing states and secular societies, and circumscribed religion(s) and disenchanted knowledge(s), the period since the seventeenth century has seen many modernities. These plural modernities have been deeply contradictory, decisively checkered, and densely ideological. They give a lie to the self-image of modernity—now understood as an ideological construct—as a self-realizing project of progress, a self-evident embodiment of development, and a self-contained incarnation of history. Of course, the image lives. Indeed, fabricating its reflection in the immaculate mirror of a reified West, this self-image elides the dark side of the looking glass of Enlightenment, endorses the white mythologies of post-Enlightenment representations, and ignores its own creations of the likeness of a singular tradition, the essential other of the modern. The past and the present of the nonWest, indeed of all that is not quite the authentic West—the enduring Third World and the erstwhile Second World, but equally an earlier Portugal and an anterior Spain—are cast as irremediably narrow illustrative material, the dark curiosities of a durable otherness or the modular forms of a universal history, which exemplify as exceptions and rules the Ur (root) passage from tradition to modernity. The binarism of social thought extends beyond the dichotomies of the traditional and the modern.18 It is not surprising, therefore, that all too often historical accounts, basing themselves upon classical social and political theory, set up an overarching opposition between state and community. What is missed out here are the many different ways in which the symbols and metaphors of the state and governance are drawn upon and imbricate themselves in the construction of communities, including communitarian fashioning of order and identities, legalities and pathologies. Rather than merely stressing the singular

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and the exceptional in untouchable pasts, it seems to me that a recognition of this interplay and interpenetration between symbols of state and forms of communities is critical for bids that seek to think through the aggrandizing analytics of overriding oppositions, posing as universal reason. And so, as this chapter draws to a close, I briefly turn to the fabrications of a colonial modernity and the makings of postcolonial traditions, involving a critical interface between state and community, in central India in twentieth century. We know of the vigorous politics of caste associations and movements that emerged in late-nineteenth-century India. The Satnamis were late entrants to this elaborate negotiation of colonial political forms and Indian structures of authority. It was, in fact, illiteracy among the group that created the cultural and discursive space for mediations of reform and change by those empowered by writing. These moves in turn found a niche in the structures of authority within Satnampanth. Thus, in the early 1920s a few influential Satnami mahants, who were also village proprietors, got together with Sunderlal Sharma, a local Brahman nationalist deeply influenced by the activities of the Arya Samaj, and G. A. Gavai, a leader of the Depressed Classes Association in the Central Provinces, to set up the Satnami Mahasabha. Soon the Mahasabha found a formidable ally in Baba Ramchandra, the former leader of the Awadh Kisan Sabha movement in the United Provinces countryside, and also enlisted the support of Agamdas, a guru of Satnampanth. The aim of this organization was to “reform” the Satnamis, and to participate in the organizational and constitutional politics within the region and in the Central Provinces. The activities of the Satnami Mahasbha led to the community’s participation in the elaboration of a contradictory and checkered colonial modernity. The initiatives of the Satnami Mahasabha, shaped by the interventions of powerful figures who stood outside the community, led to the reworking of Satnampanth in significant ways. First, under the auspices of the Mahasabha, the “traditional” symbols of Satnampanth were deployed to discredit and marginalize a section of the Satnami leadership that challenged the authority of the organization, and there were efforts to connect the janeu, kanthi, and jait khambh with the veneration of cows and a redefined and refurbished Hindu identity for the Satnamis. Second, in the period between 1926 and 1930, under the leadership of Baba Ramchandra, the Satnami Mahasabha drew upon the signs and resources of the language of law and order of colonial administration and the schemes of Brahmanical authority such as the Manusmriti, and situated them next to the symbols and figures of authority within Satnampanth to fashion a new legality, the true kanun (law) of Guru Ghasidas. Third, the casting of the activities of the Mahasabha in an idiom of law and command led to a restructuring of the organizational hierarchy of Satnampanth and a tightening of the institutional forms of the Satnami panchayat, bids to secure effective modes

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of intervention within the community. Here colonial administrative categories provided a blueprint for an enlargement of the earlier organizational structure with the introduction of new gradations in the ranks of mahants, where the rajmahants (a position created for the leaders of the Mahasabha) were followed by jila (district), tahsil, and sarkil (circle) mahants in a descending scale of jurisdiction, status, and power. The corollary to this was a more rationalized economy of power that replaced the somewhat fluid arrangements of the past in measures to choose the Satnami panchas at the level of the village, and in the constitution of the athgawana (committee of eight villages) which was a firm institutional form to settle matters that could not be settled by a Satnami panchayat within a village. Finally, the orientations of the members of the community were shaped within the crucible of these wider interventionist measures. They came to recognize the centrality of the newer idioms of legality, authority, and governance within the community as the altered organizational structure of Satnampanth was established by the middle of the 1930s, and the reworked categories of colonial law and administrative organization became enduring features of the efforts of the Mahasabha leaders to discipline and control the group. But once the authority of these leaders waned, the newer idioms and categories were deployed to construct other notions of order, legality, and deviance within the community. The Satnami response to Hindu impositions and strains in the activities of the Mahasabha took the form of their situating a rehearsal of some of the key texts of Hinduism—for example, the Gita and the Ramacharitmanas—alongside the kathas (stories) of the gurus in some of the group’s modes of worship. They also embarked on a spate of temple-building activity, which was defined by the group’s distinct ritual emphases and meant, for instance, that no idols of Hindu gods and goddesses were installed in these structures. These measures—two examples from a larger picture—simultaneously underscored the solidarity of the Satnamis and established the group’s claims of superiority over upper-caste Hindus.19 Such wide-ranging interplay between meaning and power among the Satnamis has continued into recent times. Some years ago, the internal conflicts between rival politicians and power brokers in the Congress (I) partyled Arjun Singh, a seasoned political leader from Madhya Pradesh, to sponsor a government initiative to celebrate Guru Ghasidas as a messiah of the poor and the downtrodden. This was part of a bid to counter the influence of politicians from Chhattisgarh in the party and the province, and to use the Scheduled Castes, particularly the Satnamis, as a political constituency. Guru Ghasidas was accorded the dignity of history when December 18, 1757 was declared as his date of birth to locate him in written and fixed, linear, and chronological time. The naming of a university in the town of Bilaspur after the guru was a recognition of Ghasidas’s immense knowledge and wisdom. But arguably the

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most major initiative here was the support extended by the state to a mela (fair) held at the village of Girod, the birthplace of Ghasidas, which has served to turn a small affair featuring a few hundred Satnamis into a mammoth event involving tens of thousands of members of the community. These state initiatives have led to unintended consequences for social organization among the Satnamis. The members of the community have found their own uses for the government sponsorship of Ghasidas. The written form and the printed word, marks of authority in local cultures still defined by attributes of orality, have been pressed into the service of the worship of the founding guru. Today, the recitation and rehearsal of these newly fashioned texts— part of a collective telling and listening to songs and stories within idioms of popular religious discourse—is increasingly situated alongside modern modes of orality, technically sophisticated aural and visual messages, to constitute novel forms and attributes of Ghasidas. Indeed, the guru has been accorded a novel centrality in the belief structures of the Satnamis. Even as fresh legends accrue around the figure of Ghasidas, the myths about the later gurus, particularly Balakdas, are slowly being erased from a once widely known picture to become more esoteric forms of knowledge. All this underlies novel processes of the constitution of truths and the fashioning of traditions among the community. Thus, recent years have witnessed an ever-widening spread of the performance of the Satnami ritual of chauka; on the one hand, the ritual has been steadily invested with ever-newer meanings as it has undergone innovations, modifications, and transformations at the hands of Satnami specialists of the sacred; and, on the other hand, its novel forms are elaborated as essential parts of a timeless tradition of the community. Similarly, there are fresh fabrications of communitarian forms of worship, an eclectic and redefined ordering of time that simultaneously draws upon Satnami myths and ritual calendar and on official histories and Hindu almanacs, and increasing investments in creative cultural imaginings of the meanings of the fair at Girod alongside other initiatives, variously shored up by the state, all of which refigure the senses of the self and solidarity of the community. In the midst of dominant interventions, the Satnamis continue to construct new meanings of the group’s pasts, boundaries, and identities.

CONCLUSION In bringing together untouchable pasts and ethnographic histories as entangled endeavors, my work draws upon and develops but also extends and exceeds several important studies of untouchables and untouchability. Most anthropological writings on the dynamics of untouchable groups are primarily based

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upon fieldwork, severally rooted in the ethnographic present. These studies have variously elaborated questions of changing customs and “sub-cultural” personhoods and issues of ideological innovation and religious resistance among Dalit communities.20 Marked by rather different points of entry, a great deal of historical work on untouchable and non-Brahman castes has discussed the caste movements launched by these groups, focusing on the organization and leadership of such initiatives, which in turn have left behind different bodies of written sources. These writings have revealed that untouchable and lower-caste endeavors played out the tensions and rivalries within caste society, where religion provided the means of negotiating an oppressive social order, and the forging of new caste ideologies involved a complex dialogue with the symbols and identities within popular traditions and local cultures (O’Hanlon 1985; Juergensmeyer 1982; Omvedt 1976; Irschick 1969; Zelliot 1970; Babb 1972).21 My work on untouchable pasts has taken up the salient emphases of this anthropological and historical scholarship on caste conflict and religious innovation, historical changes and ritual transformations in lower-caste arenas: but it has equally brought together varieties of both written sources and oral testimonies to discuss these issues over a much longer time period, also casting them in a dialogue with other critical questions. Indeed, distinct readings of archival and non-official sources in an ethnographic mode, the conduct of fieldwork in an engagement with the historical imagination, and considerations of wider theoretical issues in anthropology and history are inextricably bound to each other in this project, which addresses key analytical relationships between sect and caste, myth and history, religion and power, gender and order, community and hegemony, and resistance and domination over the last two hundred years, from the late eighteenth to the late twentieth centuries. Here the entangled endeavors of ethnographic histories and untouchable pasts unravel processes involving myths and the making of modernities, orality and the construction of histories, and writing and the fashioning of traditions to interrogate the place and persistence of binary categories—of modernity and tradition, state and community, rationality and ritual, and reason and emotion—within influential strands of social and political theory. Once more, these entangled endeavors question renderings of power as a totalized terrain, while avoiding seductions of staging the subaltern as the antidote to the terms of power.

NOTES 1.

The larger project is embodied in Dube (1998). It is also contained in different papers, cited at appropriate moments in this chapter.

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 2. Firm estimates of population in the region are available only from the 1860s. In 1866 the Chamars (and Satnamis) made for 362,032 of a total population of 2,103,165 in Chhattisgarh (Report of the Ethnological Committee 1867).  3. These conceptual themes are spelled out in dialogue with evidence in Dube, Untouchable Pasts.  4. See also the related discussion in the section on Contending Modernities.  5. Both sets of positions in this debate have been ably surveyed in a recent article by David Lorenzen. However, Lorenzen does not break with the earlier preoccupation with the origins of categories, and once more defines Hinduism in opposition to Islam (Lorenzen 1999).  6. A deeper and wider elaboration of these issues of the margins and meanings of Hinduism is contained in Dube, Untouchable Pasts.  7. It seems to me that the problem here is not one of an oversight on the part of a few studies of religion and ritual in South Asia. It has deeper methodological roots that go back to approaches in the history of religions that implicitly seek to explicate a universal grammar of religions, adducing parallels and similarities among rituals and ideologies, beliefs and practices to the neglect of processes of symbolic construction within wider relationships of power, and to the tendency in earlier ethnography of treating caste as primarily a matter of the endless play of the ritual hierarchy of purity and pollution, an ideology divorced from power. Individual works are too numerous to mention here, but for a “classic” that has exercised enormous influence upon the study of religion in South Asia through its demarcations of the separate domains of dharma (ideology) and artha (economic and political power) in the Hindu caste order, see Dumont (1970).  8. See particularly, Wink (1986); Gordon (1977) and Bayly (1988).  9. Dube, Untouchable Pasts. 10. Richard Burghart, “Renunciation in the religious traditions of South Asia”, Man (n.s.), 18, 1983, 635–653; Peter Van der Veer, Gods on Earth: The Management of Religious Experience in a North Indian Pilgrimage Centre (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1988); and David Lorenzen, “Traditions of non-caste Hinduism: The Kabirpanth”, Contributions to Indian Sociology (n.s.), 21, 1987, 263–283. 11. Dumont, Homo Hierarchicus. 12. Two clarifications are pertinent here. First, by making a case for certain shared orientations in the work of Dirks, Raheja, and Quigley, I am not denying that there are also important differences in their emphases. Second, my critical comments should not be allowed to obscure what I have learnt from these writings in my wider body of analyses. Dirks (1987); Raheja (1988); and Quigley (1993). 13. These themes of sects and asceticism and caste and power are discussed in much greater detail in Dube, Untouchable Pasts, but see also the section on Engaging Stories. 14. See Dube (1992). 15. This section takes up issues elaborated in greater detail—and somewhat differently—in Dube (1995) and Dube (1998). 16. On Satnami myths, see Dube (1992) and Dube (1998). 17. Dube (1998). 18. For distinct, recent questionings of the logic of binarism see, for example, Bhabha (1994) and Herzfeld (1997).

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19. These processes are elaborated in Dube (1993). 20. For example, Freeman (1979); Khare (1984); Vincentnathan (1993); Cohn (1987); Lynch (1969). More recent studies include Prakasam (1998); Deliège (1997); Viramma, Racine and Racine (1997); Siddharth Dube (1998); Mendelsohn and Vicziany (1998). 21. For a significant, recent study see Prashad (2000).

REFERENCES Babb, Lawrence A. 1972. The Satnamis—political involvement of a religious movement. In The untouchables in contemporary India, ed. Michael J. Mahar, 143–51. Tuscon: University of Arizona Press.. Bayly, Christopher 1988. Indian society and the making of the British empire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bhabha, Homi. 1994. The location of culture. London and New York: Routledge. Dirks, Nicholas. 1987. The hollow crown: Ethnohistory of an Indian kingdom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cohn, Bernard. 1987. An anthropologist among the historians and other essays. New New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 255–83. Deliège, Robert. 1997. The world of the “Untouchables”: Paraiyars of Tamil Nadu. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Dube, Saurabh. 1992. Myths, symbols and community: Satnampanth of Chhattisgarh. In Subaltern studies VII: Writings on South Asian history and society, eds Partha Chatterjee and Gyan Pandey, 121–56. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. ———. 1993. Idioms of authority and engendered agendas: The Satnami Mahasabha, Chhattisgarh, 1925–1950. The Indian Economic and Social History Review 30: 383–411. ———. 1995. Rite place, rite time: On the organization of the sacred in colonial central India. Calcutta Historical Review 17: 19–37. ———. 1998. Untouchable pasts: Religion, identity, and power among a central Indian community, 1780–1950. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. ———. 1998. In the land of poverty: Memoirs of an Indian family, 1947–97. London: Zed Press. Dumont, Louis. 1970. Homo hierarchicus: The caste system and its implications. London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson. ———. 1970a. World renunciation in Indian religions. In Religion/politics and history in India: Collected papers in Indian sociology, 33–60. Paris and the Hague: Mouton. Freeman, James M. 1979. Untouchable: An Indian life history. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Gordon, Stewart. 1977. The slow conquest. Modern Asian Studies 11: 1–40. Herzfeld, Michael. 1997. Cultural intimacy: Social poetics in the nation-state. London and New York: Routledge, 165–73. Irschick, Eugene. 1969. Politics and social conflict in South India: The non-Brahman movement and Tamil separatism 1916–1929. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.

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Juergensmeyer, Mark. 1982. Religion as social vision: The movement against untouchablity in twentieth-century Punjab. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Khare, R.S. 1984. The untouchable as himself: Ideology, identity and pragmatism among the Lucknow Chamars. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lorenzen, David. 1999. Who invented Hinduism? Comparative Studies in Society and History 41: 630–59. Lynch, Owen M. 1969. The politics of untouchability. New York: Columbia University Press. Mendelsohn, Oliver and Marika Vicziany. 1998. The untouchables: Subordination, poverty, and the state in modern India. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. O’Hanlon, Rosalind. 1985. Caste, conflict and ideology: Mahatma Jotirao Phule and low-caste protest in nineteenth century Maharashtra. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Omvedt, Gail. 1976. Cultural revolt in a colonial society: The non-Brahman movement in western India: 1873 to 1930. Bombay: Scientific Socialist Education Trust. Prakasam, Gnana. 1998. Social separatism: Scheduled castes and the caste system. Jaipur: Rawat Publications. Prashad, Vijay. 2000. Untouchable freedom: A social history of a dalit community. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Raheja, Gloria. 1988. The poison in the gift: Ritual, prestation, and dominant caste in a north Indian village. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Report of the Ethnological Committee, 1866–67. 1867. Nagpur: Central Provinces Government Press. Quigley, Declan. 1993. The interpretation of caste. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Vincentnathan, Lynn. 1993. Untouchable concepts of person and society. Contributions to Indian Sociology (n.s.) 27: 53–82. Viramma, Josiane Racine, and Jean-Luc Racine. 1997. Viramma, Life of an untouchable. Trans. Will Hobson. London: Verso. Wink, Andre. 1986. Land and sovereignty in India: Agrarian society and politics under the eighteenth century Maratha svarajya. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Zelliot, Eleanor. 1970. Learning the use of political means: the Mahars of Maharashtra. In Caste in Indian Politics, ed. Rajni Kothari, 29–69. New Delhi: Orient Longman.

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Chapter 20

Does Replication Mean Consensus? Dissenting the Hegemony by “Untouchable” Scheduled Castes in Karnataka, South India* G.K. Karanth

There has been a revival of interest in the culture and cultural autonomy among some of the very low castes in India, who for long have been subjected to the practices of Untouchability. The publication of an influential monograph by Michael Moffatt (1979) has provided a context to seek further evidence to or questioning the phenomenon of replication of the dominant social order within the “excluded” communities of the former Untouchables. Much of the literature pertains to the Tamil-speaking areas of India and elsewhere (e.g., Caplan 1980; Deliege 1988, 1992, 1993a, 1993b, 1994; Mosse 1986, 1994; McGilvray 1983; Vincent Nathan 1987) although there are contributions from the other parts of the subcontinent (e.g., Patwardhan 1973 and Gellner 1995). Despite the contiguity of the two states, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu have important differences in the manner in which the “social construction of subordination” (Mosse 1994) of the former Untouchable castes are obtained. Hence an attempt is made in this paper to draw together some empirical evidence from a Karnataka village, and concentrating on the theme of “replication and consensus.” The paper argues that by treating institutional similarities among the former Untouchable castes, scholars (e.g., Moffatt) tend to attribute a passive acceptance of low status by these castes. In contrast, the paper aims at showing how “replication” may be also seen as a way of establishing an independent cultural identity as well * Earlier Publication of the paper: ‘Replication or dissent? Culture and institutions among ‘Untouchable’ Scheduled Castes in Karnataka (2004) Contributions to Indian Sociology 38(1 & 2): 137–63.

Does Replication Mean Consensus?

as expressing dissent towards the hegemony of the dominant social order. Evidence from Karnataka is also meant to “extend” some of the conclusions that Mosse (1994) makes concerning the social construction of subordination and the strategies of social mobility among the Untouchable Scheduled Castes. In so doing, the paper points to the power of dominance of the upper castes in maintaining hegemony on the one hand, and the means (not without their weaknesses) which are at the disposal of the Untouchable Scheduled Castes to attempt a cultural autonomy, on the other.

REPLICATION AND CONSENSUS During the year 1972 Moffatt studied a village not very far from Madras city, and came to the conclusion that within the Untouchable communities there was a replication of the social order from which they were excluded. For him, replication is a recreation within themselves of “the entire set of institutions and of ranked relations from which they have been excluded by the higher castes by reasons of their extreme lowness” (1979: 5). Interestingly enough, such a replication takes place when these castes are excluded “for reason of their extreme collective impurity from particular relations with higher beings (both human and divine)” (ibid.: 4). In contrast, when they are included in other relations with these same higher beings, they complement the dominant social order. Following Dumont (1980) Moffatt finds a “criminal consensus from the top to the bottom of a local hierarchy, a consensus very much participated in by the Untouchables” which consists of “deeper and often unarticulated identities of cultural constructions” (ibid.: 3–4). He argues that when they complement, it is a weaker indicator of consensus, for they might be acting in accord with the definitions and norms of the total system because of the power of the higher castes. The stronger indicator is when they replicate. There are a few defects of the structural analysis of the Untouchable communities as reported by Moffatt, most of which are also summarized by Deliege (1992) and Mosse (1994). First, he groups all the Untouchable communities together, as if there is an adequate interaction among them so as to replicate something from which they have been excluded. In short, Moffatt makes an assumption that the different Untouchable castes have a horizontal solidarity sufficient to replicate that from which they have been excluded. Much of Deliege’s rejection of Moffatt’s hypothesis is grounded on the lack of evidence for such solidarity. To the extent there is an agreement among themselves about their status in relation to each other, one may accept the hypothesis of replication. What one finds is that there is no consensus among themselves as to who is higher and who is lower. Any claim for one’s status is normally in

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relation to what the higher castes consider them to be. So unclear is the relative ranking among the former Untouchable castes, as shall be shown below, that one usually finds each making a claim to a higher status than the other. Even if there is conventional ascription to a particular status vis-à-vis the others, it may not be conceded by those others, who in turn may claim an equal if not a higher status. Deliege (1992), however, found no evidence of interaction among some of the Untouchable communities, who claimed equal status by saying “we are all equal.” There is more to be said on Deliege’s interpretation of ethnographic material, but for the present it is necessary to recognize that the universe of the Untouchable communities generally tends to consist of elements that do not interact much with each other, especially since there is no clearly defined rules legitimizing the differential status between the different “Harijan” and the former Untouchable castes. Secondly, Moffatt begins with the assumption that there is a cultural consensus among the different castes despite the variations that there may be between them (1979: 3). Replication of the kind that Moffatt is pointing to does indeed take place also among the castes that are not Untouchable, who are not necessarily “excluded” in the sense that the ex-Untouchable castes are said to be. How does one explain the replication of social patterns among the several middle and low castes? If these castes are not excluded, in the sense that Moffatt uses the term, then what one should find is a complementarity. Despite complementarity, one finds replication as well; for example, religious institutions and temples, festivals and ritual specialists of their own. They too are found to be “included” and playing a part in the dominant social order and yet have institutions that are replicas of the social order in which they are found. In other words, what we find is different layers of inclusion and exclusion. An example is in order. In Nuliyur near Bellary in Karnataka (see, Devi, n.d.) several “clean” castes (e.g., non-Lingayat castes) have a set of their own service specialists who cater to the needs of the community. The specialists are barbers and washermen. These specialists are not engaged for their services by the dominant Lingayats in the village. The Lingayats, in turn, have their own service specialists from among the Lingayat castes, whom Gayathri Devi describes as converts to Veerasaivism. The former Untouchable castes of Chaluvadis and Madars are excluded from both the set of specialists, and yet do not have their own replication of specialists to serve their needs. Instead, they have to go to the nearest town to obtain these services. The point to be noted here is that there are different layers of inclusion and exclusion. When excluded, even the upper castes replicate, but replicate they do even when included. In other words, exclusion is not a precondition for replication, and therefore not a proper explanation. Even if excluded, certain other castes (notably the former Untouchable castes)

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do not always replicate, notwithstanding the riders that Moffatt has to offer: that is, sufficient numbers and adequate resources. The Chaluvadis and Madars of Nuliyur are a sizeable number both in households and population, many of whom own land. Yet they do not have institutions that are comparable to what is found in Endavur by Moffatt. Thirdly, the problem with the notion of “inclusion” and “exclusion” has been in treating them as being a mutually exclusive experience of certain castes. There are at least two features among the different ex-Untouchable castes, which render application of notions of “inclusion” and “exclusion” much more a complex phenomenon than Moffatt understands it. Let us first ask what makes up “inclusion?” Does inclusion of a few households from among the different Untouchable communities into the network of exchange of goods and service imply inclusion of the whole community or of a few households? Since, Moffatt, Deliege, and Mosse use the roles played by the different Untouchable castes either as evidence for or against the hypothesis of inclusion, exclusion, replication, and consensus, I am referring to the institution of jajmani relations. Rendering of services and supply of goods are customarily obligatory for different castes in most village communities. If one were to look at the system, all castes, including the former Untouchable castes have a role to play. The Untouchable castes are included in the sense that they have a role to play, while they are excluded in the sense that they do not receive services in turn from the other castes. One finds certain differences between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, in terms of inclusion and exclusion in the context of the village as a whole and the households in particular. In the old Mysore region it has not been in evidence that each land-owning upper-caste household had a household or family of the then Untouchable castes customarily assigned to serve in a range of contexts. This seem to be the case in Tamil Nadu, where every single Harijan household had an aiyavitu to which it was customarily assigned, in addition to their serving the village as a whole. The dominant castes in Karnataka did have an institution of hale maga under which a member from among the Untouchable castes customarily served the Okkaliga land-owning household (Srinivas 1955). But it is doubtful if each land-owning household among the dominant castes had one such hale maga in such a way that all the households of Harijan castes were accounted for in the Old Mysore region. The exception is to be found in the northern parts of Karnataka. In Jenubhavi (see Kumar n.d.) in Belgaum district and Nuliyur (see Devi n.d), each household of the service castes, whether or not they were formerly Untouchables, is assigned to a household among the other castes. The system is known as aya in the former and babathu in the latter village. What did exist in Karnataka, at least the old Mysore region, were a few village-oriented service specializations assigned to a few households of

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ex-Untouchable castes. While the patrons consisted of nearly all the landowning “high” castes, the specialists were from a few households of the respective castes. In other words, the service relationships did not “include” the entire population of the caste of specialists. Thus the village servant (thoti) came from two Madiga households in Rajapura, a village near Bangalore (see Karanth 1987). The rest of the Madiga households did not have any role to play in the village’s religious institutions. How does one treat the Madigas of Rajapura, especially when each of their households is not institutionally involved in any specific role? Are they to be seen as “included” in the sense Moffatt conceptualizes, since only two of the thirty odd households have a role to play in the village’s equivalent of jajmani relations, or “excluded” since a majority does not have a role to play? The same questions apply to Holeyas, another formerly Untouchable caste, among whom a few households serve as the village musicians. Even if one were to extend the notion of “inclusion” to these castes, it is necessary to take note of the difference in many other villages. In several villages in the region where no Madiga caste household lives, the office of thoti is taken up by the Holeyas. Likewise, the role of village musicians is not always reserved for the Holeyas, but in many villages of our study in Karnataka, the members of the barber caste, or Koravas, and Korachas take it up. The point I wish to make is that the so-called “inclusion” is not entirely in terms of the caste in question. The caste, in turn, has no exclusive claim to provide services, as in the case of Holeyas and Barber caste over village music. Further, if it was by virtue of being members of a caste that one is “included,” in return it is reasonable to expect that such a caste gets served by the other specialists as well. This is not true of not only the Holeya and Madiga but also of a few other specialists: the barber, washer man, and ironsmith. Exclusion of these castes has not resulted in replication. On the contrary both the cultural similarities and consensus are to be seen as a consequence of the “hegemony of the dominant social order.” And such hegemony applies more to the former Untouchable castes than the other middle and low castes, which too experience “inclusion” and “exclusion” in varying degrees. In turn, such a construct gives an opportunity to examine the ethnographic material, analyzed in a structural perspective or otherwise, with due respects to the historicity of the processes, accounting for the changes that are taking place in the social order. Finally, it also prevents the dismissal of the culture of the former Untouchables as being passively in consensus with the dominant social order whether included or excluded. For it may be argued that at least since the turn of this century, some former Untouchable castes have questioned or attempted to reassess the dominant social order, whatever the source of their inspiration. Had there been truly a consensus, they ought to have remained without such a “replication” as per the spirit of “exclusion.” By denying “inclusion” the dominant social order was

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implicitly not only defining the ritual impure status of these castes, but also suggesting that they did not need such an inclusion. The structural approach of Moffatt in studying the Untouchable communities of Tamil Nadu almost hides a paradox in the nature of social change that occurred in Tamil Nadu since the beginning of the century. Many of the dominant castes in Tamil Nadu were non-Brahmans who had taken an active role in the non-Brahman and Dravidian movements. They had questioned and rejected the Brahmanical supremacy and the cultural hegemony of a Brahmanical social order. Yet, in the villages where they subordinated other Untouchable castes there had been a replication of a social order, which was based on the principles of caste hierarchy, on purity and pollution notions. If indeed the non-Brahman castes had replicated a social order which they rejected, the evidence Moffatt presents points out to a replication that is complementary in nature. How does one explain the replication by the Untouchable castes? Which order were they excluded from leading to replication: the one rejected by the dominant landowning castes in the villages, or the one replicated by such castes? Finally, the notions of inclusion and exclusion, and the concomitant replication and consensus as outlined by Moffatt, or as critiqued by Deliege (1992 and 1993) blur an important change that is sweeping the countryside in India today. Whether or not there are similar or parallel institutions among the former Untouchable castes, a search for replication on the lines that Moffatt does, or on the lines that Deliege labors to refute, conceals the rejection of the caste ideology as imposed on the concerned caste. It is perhaps for this reason that Moffatt asserts that the Untouchables do not possess a subculture of their own and that they act in accordance with the idea of them being subordinate to the other castes in the dominant social order. It is also perhaps for this reason that Deliege makes sense out of the lack of interaction among the different Harijan communities (notably, the Pallars and Paraiyars) as being indicative of absence of hierarchy among them. I refer particularly to some of the comments Deliege makes in his English publications (1992 and 1994). Since certain evidences were not found among the Paraiyars of Vaighira Manickam and Alangkulam, whatever Moffatt said is argued to be not valid. He does not go beyond Valghira Manickam at the point of time, or go back into ethnographic history of the castes he is studying to assess the validity of the statements made by his informants. Early in his essay he takes note of the observations by Abbe Dubois, Brigs, Dube, Bhat on the divisions respectively within the “Pariahas,” Chamars, Madigas, and the Bhangis elsewhere. But as he proceeds analyzing his own ethnographic data he restricts himself to what his informants say. Instead, he observes that Moffatt’s epistemology fails to distinguish between the norm and the act, between the ideal and the actual practice. He too fails to differentiate between norm or ideal and the practice. To cite an example, he states: “Some Pallars claimed that they did

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not drink water from Paraiyars, but I have observed many instances of Pallars drinking a glass of water in Paraiyar house, including a Pallar woman who ‘had vehemently claimed’ earlier that she did not accept water from Paraiyars” (1992: 162). What in effect, Deliege does is to ignore the difference between the actual practice as observed (or narrated to him by his informants) on the one hand, and the ethnographic history of the communities in the region. Thus he too falls a victim of a lapse, which he finds in Moffatt, namely “relying chiefly on what people told” (Deliege 1993: 167). Even if the observed actual behavior does correspond to what people say, it is also necessary to examine the observed actions and stated opinions in the perspective of change over a period of time. To me this constitutes a major weakness in the refutation of Moffatt’s hypothesis by Deliege. It is the method with which Deliege refutes Moffatt that I am contesting and not his refutation of Moffatt’s hypotheses per se. Mosse (1994) is justified in refuting Moffatt on the grounds, among others, that his method is ahistorical. In a similar way Deliege’s method is ahistorical in the treatment of his ethnography, let alone using it to refute Moffatt. From what can be read in his English works on the theme we have neither a historical account of the Untouchable community nor a description of the social changes that have taken place over a period of time. What we do have, on the contrary, is an image of a community, which is basically divided into three: the Pallars (with whom the main actors of his observations are not in much interaction), the Hindu Paraiyars and the Catholic Paraiyars. These endogamous units are described as not hierarchically ordered, but that their members “even made considerable efforts to prevent inequality from arising within their own ranks” (Deliege 1992: 165, emphasis mine). What blurs the ethnographic vivacity in Deliege’s account of the communities he studies is not only his unwillingness to recognize the fact that people tried to conceal differences to proclaim equality amongst themselves but also his refusal to accept the divisions mentioned as being important since there had been no contact between them. I shall read the people’s efforts to conceal a difference as in essence a rejection of a dominant ideology governed by caste principles of superiority or inferiority, purity and impurity. The rejection is one of inequality amongst themselves, not of separation. A separation did exist, as Deliege recognizes, which in the modern context is not important for the castes. Similar claims for equality and orientation towards other castes are to be found among those in the dominant social order, whether they are non-Brahman or Brahman castes. To make the understanding further complicated we have inconsistencies in Deliege’s account of the material from Valghira Manickam: “Contacts with other Paraiyars (i.e., those from other grades) are extremely limited. Nonetheless, it was said that a Catholic Paraiyar can marry any other, and that all Paraiyars (including Hindu) were brothers” (ibid: 164, former parentheses and emphasis mine).

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Elsewhere Deliege informs us that Hindu and Catholic Paraiyars are “very close to each other, but do not intermarry” (1994: 126). The above questions arise because the discourse on “replication and consensus” hides the efforts on the part of former Untouchable castes elsewhere to forge a new identity of their own. Such an effort for a new identity fits the description of dominant social order as one comprising of a “hegemony” that is being dissented over the years. Let us turn to evidence from the Karnataka villages. In the following section, I shall first refer to the different Scheduled Castes who too are found in an asymmetrical inclusion and exclusion, and yet do not have a typical “replication” of the cultural institutions in the sense that Moffatt finds in Endavur. I shall then proceed to introduce the two ex-“Untouchable” castes, which continue to experience Untouchability in varying degrees.

THE “UNTOUCHABLE” SCHEDULED CASTES IN RAJAPURA It is evident from the above that there is a need to shift the discourse from replication and consensus to hegemony and dissent. Such a shift in orientation provides adequate room for dealing with historical changes, at least within the living memories, and points to the conception of self among the former Untouchable castes both in the past and present. The hegemony that is being referred to is that of the dominant social order. In most south Indian villages, this dominant social order is shaped by the local dominant castes. Despite the several criticisms leveled against the concept of dominant caste in India (see, e.g., Dube 1968; Gardner 1968, Oommen 1970, and Dumont 1980), the phenomenon of castes operating in rural society as dominant groups is well documented. In a recent statement on the concept, the author of the concept wrote, “the post-independent India, certainly at the regional if not state level, is an India of dominant castes” (Srinivas 1987: 11). At the risk of oversimplification, it may be stated that dominant castes prescribe and enforce locally a pattern of intercaste relationships. Such a pattern is not altogether at variance from what is found in the region. More specifically it regulates the internal social order of the village over which its dominance is in operation. These included ensuring that the different designated castes rendered the customary services to the other eligible castes under the jajmani system of exchange of services and goods; management of the use of common property resources, conducting the village community events such as the festival of the village deity, festival of the cattle, and so on, and in maintaining the relationship of the community with the external institutions and wider society at large.

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An important feature of the dominant castes in multi-caste villages has been that they usually provided for the other castes the model of upward social mobility. The means of social mobility could have been in terms of Sanskritization or through economic opportunities. In terms of Sanskritization the dominant castes themselves may have, as they usually had, their own reference model, which in turn became the model for the other castes. As a model in economic terms, it may be argued that it is usually the dominant castes that take first to the innovative methods of agriculture, education, and off-farm employment. Their success sets a model for the others to follow. Another important role that the dominant caste played was as arbitrators of disputes between individuals within a caste or between castes. While thus directing the village affairs the dominant caste usually derived the advantages for itself from the subordination of the others. It was, however, not always that a given caste held a decisive dominance: castes that were close to it in terms of numerical and economic preponderance always posed a challenge to the dominance by the other caste. Competition to dominance came from other upwardly mobile castes whose economic fortunes improved through land reforms, or purchase of land, urban education, employment, and the new economic and political opportunities. A typical response to the competition for, and challenge to dominance was by way of forging old or new alliances with the other subordinate castes, or a “withdrawal” (Barnett 1973) of the caste from exercising dominance. It is not suggested that castes, dominant or otherwise, had no factions within themselves. This is an appropriate place to introduce the concept of hegemony, and refer to the hegemony of the dominant castes. The usage of the concept of hegemony has been by and large in the context of classes, but is here used to refer to that of the dominant castes. By so doing, it is not suggested that caste and class are interchangeable. Considering the role and interests of the dominant castes in rural society it is possible to speak of the hegemony of the dominant castes: for in their doing what they do, they tend to establish a hegemony of the members of the caste to which they belong. According to Gramsci, the hegemony of the ruling class results not only from their domination over the material forces of production, but also by replicating the domination at the level of ideas. Thus the hegemony of the ruling class controls the “ideological” sectors of the society: culture, religion, education, and media (Femia 1975). Is it possible to apply the notion of hegemony to the consequences of dominance of a caste over the others in a village or a region? If so how and to what extent did the dominant caste establish hegemony over the others? It is argued here that dominant castes had, and continue to have even to this day, hegemony over the others. To illustrate this, I shall give an account of the lives of a few former Untouchable castes that are subjected to the dominance of a dominant Okkaliga caste in a Karnataka village. Given their sheer numbers, and the

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preponderance they have in terms of landownership, and the political representation in the region, they reproduce a hegemonic order over all the others in the village. Rajapura had twelve different castes during the years 1978–84, but by 1987 the number had been reduced to eleven. Okkaligas are the most numerous among them both in terms of households and population: 119 households and 721 persons during 1987. They owned 82.7 percent of the land. Okkaligas are a non-vegetarian caste, and are largely agriculturists. In most villages of Magadi Taluk, one among them held the hereditary office of the village headman (patel). They take pride in being agriculturists, and having maintained a minimum of “Gowda like” characters. The term “Gowda” may be seen as suffix of a caste name among Okkaligas, although others also use the term. However, when used as “Gowda like,” it stands for “rule by the headman and village elders to maintain a certain village culture and livelihood patterns irrespective of the caste of the headman.” It is useful in describing the cultural management in a village community. For instance it was not uncommon to find the former headman, and the patel to be questioned by a few fellow villagers as to why there had been no annual painting of the temple walls, why contributions of food and money had not been made by certain households for the different temple festivals, or the specialists had not been rendering their services properly. If the responses given by the leaders were not satisfactory, an adverse comment on their style of “Gowda like” is made. The expression is essentially cultural in connotation rather than economic or political. In their religious orientation, Okkaligas in this region are affiliated to both Vaishnava and Veerasaiva orders. For instance, their house-gods, names of persons, or the temples to which they were affiliated (“okkalu”) indicate the influence of both Veerasaivism and Vaishnavism. In either way, their models for religious behavior were of vegetarian upper castes (Brahmans or Veerasaivas). Most do not eat meat on Mondays while a few others did not eat it also on Saturdays. I am mentioning some of these features of Okkaligas, the dominant caste in Rajapura, because in turn such orientation becomes the model for the other “dependent” castes in the village. Thus the festival of Siva (Sivarathri) and of his vehicle Nandi (bull) is celebrated as a community affair, thereby indicating the Siva influence. All the other castes participate in the communal dining on the following day, and each makes a contribution towards the celebration of the festival. The only castes that were ritually superior to Okkaligas were the Lingayats (three households in 1981 and four during 1994–95) and three Marathas. Notwithstanding their higher ritual status their social and economic position in the village has been most fragile. The office of priests in two of the three temples in the villages is ideally hereditary. But during the past fifty-sixty years, they have been occupied by different persons. The older ones have had to move out

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owing to one or the other dispute with the dominant caste in the village. Two of the three Maratha households too have lost their land over a period of time since I first went to Rajapura, and it is now being expected by the local people that soon they too might migrate to Bangalore or elsewhere. Rajapura has five castes that are classified as Scheduled Castes in Karnataka: Lambanis, Oddas (Bovis), Koramas, Holeyas, and Madigas. A brief account of these castes is necessary to indicate that although not all of them are Untouchable castes, they too are in varying degrees of inclusion and exclusion in the cultural life of the village. The Koramas call themselves as Koramasettys, and are mainly engaged as basket makers. There were three households of their caste during 1978–81, which had become four by 1994–95 and had 23 persons. The Koramas did not have a traditional obligation either to the village or to the land-owning households of the different castes under jajmani networks of relations of exchange of goods and services (locally referred to as adade). Yet they did receive the services of the priest (both Lingayats and Okkaliga), barber, and smiths on payment of money. Oddas were seven households during 1978–81 and had risen to nine during 1944–95 with a population of 42 persons. They all belonged to the subcaste “Mannu Oddas,” meaning earth workers. As such they do not suffer Untouchability in the village, although the castes above them in hierarchy do not accept cooked food from them, that is, Okkaligas, Lingayats, Maratha, Achari (smith), Kumbara (potter), and Madivala (washermen). Into the Lingayat house they can enter, but not interiors of the house, such as the kitchen or shrine. A few women among them worked as “house maids” for wealthy Okkaliga landowners. Their work included fetching water from the well for bathing, washing vessels, and cleaning the house. With the exception of kitchen and innermost parts of the house, they entered all parts of the house of their employers. However, Oddas lead a marginal existence in Rajapura, a status born out of their low-caste status, and economic dependence on the other upper castes. They are not “included” in the network of added relations. Moreover they do not have enough numbers or resources to replicate the services within their caste. However, they are eligible to receive the services on cash payment to the barber, smith, and the priests, but not under the system of adade despite their landownership. Lambanis share a few features in common with the two other Scheduled Castes, namely Holeyas and Madigas, marking them off from the Korama and Odda castes. In the first place, they constitute a sizeable number both in terms of households and population. There were 14 households among them and a population of 43 during 1981, which had risen to 16 and 70 by 1995. Secondly, they too are treated with the same contempt or derogatory reference in intercaste attitudes by the upper castes, as meant for the Holeyas and Madigas. For instance, the general attitude is that “anything goes with Lambanis, that

Does Replication Mean Consensus?

which is considered to be amoral”; “the standards of sexual morality are too low among them”; “their women are tomboys”; and the like. Thirdly, unlike the Oddas and Koramas, the Lambanis constitute one of the main sources of agricultural labor for the landowners in the village, a thing in common with the Holeyas and Madigas. Indeed, long after many Odda and Korama men had stopped becoming attached as bonded laborers, the Lambanis had continued to work as bonded laborers. Finally, the Lambanis did have opportunities to be sought for support in political matters with much more rewards than the Korama and Oddas. For two successive terms a Lambani leader had been elected to the village Panchayat and the Mandal Panchayat during 1978 to 1990. The last mentioned aspect had become a source of frustration for the Holeyas and Madigas. There is a competition among the Lambani, Holeya, and Madiga castes for any of them to be sponsored by the dominant caste leaders as a Scheduled Caste candidate for local body’s elections. Just as the Okkaliga factions take a sharp turn during elections, so did the factions within these castes. One thing they do not share with the Holeyas and Madigas is that Lambanis are not treated as Untouchables. They entered the temples, were served by the local barber, smith, and priests, though not under the system of adade. Many men among the Okkaligas even partake food cooked by the Lambanis in their house on special occasions like weddings or a festival. The Lambanis do enter the houses of upper castes quite freely, within the accepted norms for any visitor of another caste. Lambanis have by and large remained free from the cultural influence of the upper castes, including that of Lingayats and Okkaligas. Liquor consumption is indiscreet and not concealed. Second, among the three castes, Lambanis are least Sanskritized, and show very little concern for Sanskritization. Their gods are the ones that were traditionally associated with the community, and have by and large retained their Lambani cultural identity: language, dress, and festivals. They have no role to play either in the adade system of exchange relations or in the village festivals, a feature they share with the Oddas and Koramas. Finally they too have a division within the caste, based on exogamous norms, but this is a division not restricted to the villages where they live. The caste leader among them is not only the priest but also was responsible for the internal organization of the caste. But he seems to be more loyal to the dominant caste than to the caste to which he belongs. I have attempted a brief account of these three Scheduled Castes who are not Untouchables with a few purposes. They also refer to themselves as Harijans, and are entitled to the protection guaranteed under the law applicable to the Scheduled Castes in Karnataka. Together, these three Scheduled Castes are found to be asymmetrical in regard to cultural inclusion and exclusion. They are excluded in the sense that they cannot be recipients of the services of priests,

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barber, smith, and washermen under the adade relations. They are excluded also in the sense that they have no role to play in the temples and village festivals. In contrast, they are included in the sense that they have always had access to the village water source and are allowed into the houses of the upper-caste persons. They took part in the village’s religious events like the rest and were served food along with the others in a communal dining, and so on. Further, irrespective of their inclusion or exclusion, they too have their caste headman, a person who usually officiates as a priest or as an assistant to a hired upper-caste priest, besides having their own internal divisions based on exogamous norms. What may be viewed as “replication” among them is not born out of being “excluded.” Neither is there exclusion in virtually every sphere of cultural and religious life of the dominant social order nor is there a replication virtually of every institution despite inclusion or exclusion. The Holeyas and Madigas also call themselves as Adi Dravida and Adi Karnataka, respectively. Unlike in the other villages of our study, they do not resent being referred to by their old caste name. They also describe themselves as Harijans, or “SCs.” However, they are particular in maintaining a distinct identity of their own, marking each off from the other (Holeya or Madiga). There is also an identity maintained in terms of their being Right- or Left-hand caste, for Holeya and Madiga respectively. Indeed there is a locally popular conception that the word “Harijan” applies to Holeyas and “Girijan” applies to Madigas, both of whom are Scheduled Castes according to them, Holeyas claim to be superior to the Madigas, a claim not conceded by the latter. Madigas were 27 households and 119 persons and Holeyas were 15 households and 64 persons. During the 1930s, Holeyas and Madigas had owned 40.00 and 51.11 acres of land. Holeyas as a caste had improved their landholding considerably in the decades to follow, while the Madigas had gradually lost in the same period. Considering the fact that both Holeyas and Madigas had alienated most of the land they had received as land grants in the intervening years, the improvement of Holeyas and the decline of the Madigas in landownership pattern speaks of their relative economic strengths and vulnerability in the village. While most of the prime land was held by the rest of the castes in the village lands such as irrigated or irrigable, adjoining or nearer the village site, fertile and so on the ones owned by Holeya or Madigas are usually former waste lands. I have known several “landowners” among Holeya and Madiga castes who did not even cultivate their lands because of the difficulty in access to the land both for themselves and for the cattle. Indeed to a majority of landowners among these castes, their landownership in the past was not without an obligation to the Okkaligas. In the first place, it was with their support and sponsorship that they had obtained these lands either under the different land grant

Does Replication Mean Consensus?

schemes or by gaining occupancy rights confirmed under the Land Reforms Act. Secondly, they had to depend on these landowners, usually from Okkaliga castes, for agricultural inputs, plough animals, and even credit. When institutional credit was available, it was usually with the help and sponsorship of the Okkaliga landowners, chiefly the leaders among them. In short, during the period prior to 1930s and until about 1970s, it was the patronage of the dominant castes, which had compelled the former Untouchable castes to accept their low status. The character of patronage was not only political and economic but also cultural. In more recent years this patronage has been more in terms of the distribution of benefits through the state’s welfare schemes. If they do culturally subordinate themselves to the social order enforced by the Okkaligas, it is because of their dependence on them for patronage in the modern and extra-cultural contexts. The state’s welfare schemes and development policies have provided an arena in which the dominant castes can play their role of patrons to the dependent castes in the modern and democratic contexts. It does not mean that either in the past or in the contemporary times dissent has not been expressed, or dominance of the Okkaligas and the social order, which they represent, not contested. An important reason why despite a relatively sizeable number, the Holeyas and Madigas (and we may include Lambanis also in this case) did not gain any degree of autonomy is that they neither possessed a ritual status comparable to the other castes nor an economic strength of their own. Mere possession of economic status as landowners did not compensate for the Madiga or Holeya the absence of a ritual status, which in their case was below the “touchability line.” For the Lambanis their cultural distinctiveness, which in a sense was outside that of the others in the village, was in the way especially since the others in the village did not favorably view that identity. Yet they did not have to experience untouchability like the Holeyas and Madigas. Although the Holeyas and Madigas were treated as “outcastes” their way of life was very much akin to that of the others in the village, particularly in cultural and religious terms. Yet they were the Untouchables, and not those who were culturally alien to the community as in the case of Lambanis.

HEGEMONY, REPLICATION, AND DISSENT I shall now turn to describe some cultural features of Holeyas and Madigas which elsewhere have been viewed as replication, which I shall argue are direct influences of the dominant social order. Some of these and the expressed views as well as actions are also to be seen as strategies of dissenting the hegemony, for that is a first step in their social mobility. In short, I am inclined to view

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the new social construction of identity among the ex-Untouchable castes as an important strategy for social mobility among them. Its significance is that there is neither a nongovernment organization (NGO) raising consciousness of the ex-Untouchable castes nor a religious alternative that Christianity provided in Tamil Nadu as found by Mosse and Deliege. Two households among the Madigas and four households among the Holeyas have a traditional role to play in the village affairs. The former are the hereditary village servants, thotis, who render this service by rotation among themselves. Thoti’s duties in the past involved having to accompany the patel, village accountant and the other visiting officials from the government. They are expected to run errands for them and make formal announcements within the village. They had to be present in all the sittings of the council of elders in arbitrating disputes. The thoti is expected to know the boundary markings of agricultural land, and also take possession of stray cattle. In some sense his duties related to being a village watchman as well as messenger. Thotis also had certain other ritual roles: they buried the dead cattle, and played the musical instrument “thamate” during the village festivals. Between the two households, each renders the service in alternative years. In return for their services the thotis have been given a plot of land (thoti inam). They also annually receive a quantity of ragi (millet) and a bundle of straw from all the landowning households of the village. This payment is referred to as “acre rage,” since the quantity of grains given is in relation to the total land owned by the patron. Although in principle the payment in kind is to be made on the last day at the threshing floor, the day of kadegana, nearly all the service castes call on their patrons on any day that is convenient to them or the patrons to receive their payment. Reasons for this departure from the tradition are several. Not all the patrons have kadegana on the same day. It would be difficult for the service specialists to keep track of each patron’s harvest activities, who in any case may ask the specialists to approach them on another day. The specialists are also engaged in either harvesting in their own fields, or are hired as wage laborers and are therefore not free to go to the patrons on the designated day. But a most important reason why specialists avoid going on the last day at the threshing floor indicates a strategy of avoiding deprivation for them. The quality of grains separated from the sheaf on the last day is not the same as during the early days. This reason is to be noted as a strategy on the part of village service specialists as strategy to avoid having to receive poor quality of grain, which is what the institution of kadegana provided for. Following the abolition of the hereditary village offices during 1967, the thotis are not officially expected to serve the village in the manner they do now. Within the village, however, they are expected to serve the village as in the past, which may in part be explained as a result of “Gowda like.” It should be stated

Does Replication Mean Consensus?

that they are not happy in doing so, since the number of households who make the grain payment has been dwindling. But they are also aware that if they gave up the office, there are others within the caste that are willing to take it up. This is a tendency, which Mosse recognizes among the Harijans of lower grades in Alampuram to adopt abandoned service roles for the income or security, which they may provide (1994: 83). Continuation of the service does not indicate that they are in consensus with the cultural system. However, it should be pointed that the households serving as thotis do not experience any lower status within the Madiga community. On the contrary, they seem to derive a sense of importance within the caste by holding the position, which in Rajapura is symbolic for the caste (see Karanth 1987). Holeyas serve the village as musicians, both for auspicious and inauspicious events. The former included their playing instruments during the village festival, whenever a patron took out the procession of the images of gods of the three temples, and during weddings. The latter included their playing the instruments to accompany the procession of a dead body to the burial place. They served only the ritually upper castes, such as the Okkaligas, Marathas, Lingayats, Acharis (blacksmiths), and Kumbaras (potters) but not the rest. Nowadays they serve whoever pays them the cash whether during a wedding or a funeral procession. The exception is Madigas, whom they do not serve. In return for their service to the temples (i.e., the village) they received a measure of grain from the landowning households of all the castes other than landowners of the five Scheduled Castes. In the recent years, that is, since 1970s, they have also been retained as village musicians in a few other neighboring villages. Besides, they have also been hired in Magadi town and the surrounding villages to play music for weddings. Consequently the team of four to six Holeya musicians is found to be constantly away from the village, often much to chagrin of the patrons in Rajapura. The Acharis (blacksmiths) are the only specialists among the service castes who serve the Holeya and Madiga. In fact, there is a myth that the Acharis are the kinsmen of the Holeyas. A similar myth establishes a link between the Madigas and Madivalas (the washermen). The washermen, however, do not serve the two castes, neither for money nor under adade pattern of grain payment. The smith serves both Holeya and Madiga specialists, but does not accept any payment from them. In turn, the two sets of specialists serve the smiths without accepting any reward. The barber does not cut the hair of the persons of the two castes, nor does he play any ritual role for them. But he supplies the headband to the bride and bridegroom, for which he takes cash payment. A question raised earlier becomes pertinent again: do we consider the Holeya and Madiga as being included or excluded in the social and cultural order of society in Rajapura? Recall that it was only two and four households among

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the Holeya and Madiga respectively who had a role to play in the village festivals and the landowning high castes compensated them under the system of “adade.” The rest were excluded. These households did not come to occupy the offices they did by virtue of being members of any graded division among the caste. If any among them refused to continue to serve, others were in principle eligible to be commissioned. In this sense the two former “Untouchable” castes are no different from the other Scheduled Castes in the village, and a few others who are involved in the customary exchange of service relations (smiths, barber, washerman, etc.). That is, these castes are included in certain contexts and excluded in other contexts. Where excluded, they are found not to have replicated services among themselves in all respects. Madigas, for instance, are not required to render either “pure” or “impure” services to the Holeyas, although the former are ascribed a lower status. Kinsmen and women having specific roles to perform during the last rites of a deceased person, or at puberty, are prevalent between the two castes. But this is also applicable to the higher castes in the village. Contrary to the evidence from elsewhere (e.g., Raheja 1988; Mosse 1944) there is nothing to indicate a low status for such kin owing to their performing such roles or accepting gifts. On the contrary, it is considered to be an honor and a right. There are, for instance, a headman and a priest among the Madigas. The Holeyas do not have similar positions. The present headman and priest among the Madigas have not succeeded to the office on a hereditary or lineage principle. The person who was earlier the headman had left the village for a few years but returned later. Had the office been hereditary, one of his affinal relations ought to have succeeded to the office during his absence. Instead, the present headman who is a maternal kinsman had been chosen to succeed, and the decision was by the village leaders. Even after the former headman returned to the village, the incumbent did not hand over the office. Consequently the former officiates as the priest. The priest has often complained to the village’s headman and patel that he should be reinstated as the caste headman. It should be noted that the internal authority structure among Madigas was being replicated and arbitrated not by themselves, but the Okkaligas. It needs to be pointed out that the Madiga caste headman and the priest have very little to do in their offices as headman or priest. Almost all members take their disputes or matters vertically to the village leaders. If there were to be a dispute, the caste headman is also invited and consulted, but the decision is usually that of the village elders. Likewise the priest has a role to play only during the village festival, when the Madigas erect a temporary shrine to sacrifice the buffalo. Indeed, this is the only occasion when the two have any role to play in their caste affairs. On several occasions during the year when they need the services of a priest they hire the Okkaliga priest, who renders the purificatory or other rituals outside

Does Replication Mean Consensus?

their door step. The Okkaliga priest may not have served them in the past and it may have been a more recent phenomenon. However, had there been a priest with exclusive claims in the ritual activities, he or his successors should have made a claim for it, which does not seem to have happened. The internal organization of Holeyas and Madigas has as much elaboration as the other castes in the village. In the first place, there are subcastes within the Holeya and Madiga castes, which the members of respective castes acknowledge. The Holeyas listed their subcastes as Hagga Holeyas, Magga Holeyas, Thigala Holeyas, Gangadikara Holeyas, Karad Holeyas, Rampa Holeyas, and Dasa Holeyas. The Holeyas in Rajapura were all Karad Holeyas, and married within themselves. But they admitted that in recent years there had been difficulty in maintaining subcaste endogamy, and many preferred not to be worried about it if the match was good. But the practice was not what they were reporting. Nearly everyone was marrying from within his or her subcaste. Matchmaking involves as much detail as among any other castes: checking the past record of both the families in terms of subcaste, grade, compatibility of the names, incidence of marriages violating the traditional norms, and so on. This checking is known in the region as verifying the salavali. A man could marry his mother’s brother’s daughter or his father’s sister’s daughter. The notion of “a calf to be given in return for a cow” in marriages was very much predominant until recently. Both Holeyas and Madigas had several exogamous subdivisions among themselves. Some of the subdivisions among Holeyas were Belli, Kamba, Muchchala, Meenu, Mallu, Baragur, Thamman Kuppe, and Rampa. But for the Baragur and Thamman Kuppe divisions, the rest indicate objects (e.g., silver, pillar, lid, saw, etc.). Baragur and Thamman Kuppe indicate the origin of the group from a distinct territory. Similar subdivisions were also found among the Madigas, who listed four such grades. No particular subdivision within the two castes is designated to hold the office of village musicians (among Holeyas) and village servant. It was already pointed out that another, from a different subdivision, had replaced the Madiga headman. Likewise, when the former thoti had no male children to succeed, his two sons-in-law were given the rights. Had there been a norm that members of a particular subdivision were eligible to succeed to the office, there would have been many from his own subdivision (referred to as bedagu) who could have succeeded. In Rateyur in Mysore district, however, the headman and priest among the “Adi Karnatakas” (Holeyas, but they prefer to be called AKs or Harijans) were from specific subdivisions. The presiding deity of the priest’s kula (the term applicable for bedagu in Rajapura) was also one of the main gods for the caste as a whole (in addition to Maramma which all the other castes worshipped). There was not one headman, but each kula had a headman and the village elders in conducting the village

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festival consulted all of them. In Rateyur each caste is assigned a sum that is to be contributed towards the expenses of the village festival, and the Harijans also make their contribution. Indeed the sum assigned to them traditionally had been higher than that of Parivara Naikas, another caste in the village (see Charsley n.d.). The subdivisions were ranked and one way by which their relative status is to be ascertained is through the system of honoring each sub- division. During the weddings almost all castes in Rajapura have a practice of offering honors to the different caste representatives. A small ritual stage is erected, referred to as gadduge or hosage. As the guests pour milk into the joined hands of the bride and bridegroom, caste elders assemble at the Ladduge and call out the names of castes or different offices. Each caste headman or representative is offered a certain number of betel leaves and nuts. It is the order in which the castes are called out, and the number of betel leaves and nuts counted for each caste, division, and so on, which indicate their relative ranks. It is not only persons outside the caste who are honored but also the representatives or headmen of the different grades or subdivisions within the caste. However, the first to be called out are the headman of the village, headman of the region (Kaitmane yajamana) and the headman of the caste in this order. Although none among those present may have represented these offices, one of the guests will usually shout to say the offering has been acknowledged. After this the offerings are made to the different intra-subcaste divisions: the girl’s division gets the first offering, followed by the boy’s and both get equal number of betel leaves and nuts. The rest have their designated numbers and order in which they are called out. To my knowledge there has been no dispute about the relative status of the subdivisions ever registered in Rajapura. But this relative status has no other significance in their day-to-day life. In recent years I have found this ritual to go practically unnoticed by the guests. Are the subdivisions and their gradation based on the principles of a hierarchy? From the evidence available in Rajapura one could come to such a conclusion. Such a replication is not only among those excluded and included contextually (Holeyas and Madigas, or the former Untouchable castes) but also among the others who are “included” (Okkaligas, Lingayats, Marathas, Kumbaras, Koramas, Madivalas, Lambanis, and Oddas). In short there is nothing special about the Untouchable castes in exhibiting internal social organization among themselves. It is the hegemony of the dominant social order that needs to be taken note of in the context of internal organization of the caste. The village headman, the kattemane yajamana get their honors announced before the caste headman; the power and influence of the dominant social order, cuts across the internal hierarchy of former Untouchable castes. Thus, apparent replication here turns out to be another arena in which the caste’s autonomy is

Does Replication Mean Consensus?

undermined. Moreover, seeming replication of institutions within a caste does not mean that the caste and its members subscribe to the low status accorded to them in the village. On the contrary, replication can also be seen as a challenge to the dominant social order and efforts on their part to pursue that from which they are excluded. To substantiate this claim I shall illustrate a few examples. The first example pertains to competing claims for relative status between Holeyas and Madigas. The Holeyas claim to be higher because of several reasons: they do not eat beef and particularly not of the dead cow or buffalo. The thotis perform ritually impure services for the other castes while the Holeyas do not. Holeyas claim the “chaluvadi battalu,” which is in their possession, to be a symbol of their higher status. The Madigas, in turn have a myth to say how it was lost from them to the Holeyas. The Madiga headman questioned the claim for higher status by Holeyas: “If we are said to be lower, then the chaluvadi battalu ought to have been with us, for we are the lowest and serve all above us. We are the thotis, Holeyas are not. Yet they keep the chaluvadi battalu. Neither the territorial headman (Kattemane yajamana) is interested in resolving this nor the village headman.” However, a majority within his caste did not share the concern that this old man had. Most others were simply not bothered, and the younger ones among them were even unaware of all these claims and counterclaims. What was in evidence was that both Holeyas and Madigas maintained a relationship in such a way that status claims were not explicitly defined or contested. On the contrary, the thotis and the Holeya musicians had to play their instruments to a rhythmic beat. A few years ago, however, there had been a demonstration of claims and counterclaims, in which the Madigas had an upper hand. Until 1976, Holeyas and Madigas had separate wells from which they drew water. Neither caste is allowed to draw water from the wells used by the others in the village. It took an urban educated and employed youth of Madiga caste to organize a group of young men to fill with garbage the well meant for Holeyas and forcefully draw water from it. The Holeyas complained to the elders of the village, who advised that discrimination among themselves was not in keeping with the law in force. The Holeyas eventually conceded the right for “low caste Madigas to draw water” from a well which until then they had used exclusively. A few interesting questions arise out of this episode. A separation that had been maintained in regard to the drinking-water well reinforced a ritual separation between the two castes. But by rejecting the separation, one caste (Madigas) had not only claimed an equality with the other, but had demonstrated it by forcibly drawing water from the well which had been out of bounds for them until then. This points to not a replication of the ritual separation found in the dominant social order, but a rejection of it as applicable to themselves. However, by rejecting it they had not meant to approve the exclusion at the hands of higher

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castes in regard to access to drinking water. Their attempt to forcibly draw water was limited to the well meant exclusively for the Holeyas, and not for all the other castes above them in the dominant social order. Having heard of this episode, I had spoken to the youth who had organized the protest. He asserted that “between the two castes there were no differences” as a justification for his actions. He was asked why his actions did not apply to the discrimination meted out by the higher castes in the village with regard to water. He had not wanted to disturb the existing harmony in the village by trying to assert their position on par with the rest. Elsewhere I have cited his response: “After all, my people live here and I do not want to antagonize the members of the other castes. But I am hopeful that the Okkaligas will realize that the old order is changing and will stop treating us the way they are doing now” (Karanth 1981: 19). It is worthwhile also to note here that this youth’s elder brother is one of the thotis in the village who performs his duties even now, long after the abolition of the village hereditary offices. A further dimension of the episode is the role played by the members of the dominant caste. Had they wanted to maintain a separation between the two, they could have resisted the move by the Madigas. Instead, in keeping with their own political identities (they were supporters of the party in power then) and their political interests (Madigas have been their best allies, unlike the Holeyas) they gave their consent. By conceding the demand by the Madigas, the dominant caste had also strategically avoided the possibility of turning the protest against themselves. As long as their own interests were not being affected by the move to draw water from the Holeyas’ well, the Okkaligas took a generous view of the situation and sided with the Madigas. The political climate in the state and the country was also one, which favored the actions of the Madigas. My second example pertains to a religious practice among the Madigas of Rajapura, which has all the features of replication. But, as I shall point out, it also contains aspects of dissent. During the annual village festival most nonvegetarian castes make offerings of sacrifice of a goat or chicken to the presiding deity Hatti Mararnma. The Madigas traditionally offered a buffalo, but this is not acceptable to the dominant social order. There is also a custom that the meat is not cooked until the procession of the image passes through the different streets of the village. However, the procession does not enter the colonies where the Holeya and Madigas live. Moreover, whatever offerings they make is consecrated only after all the other castes have finished with their offerings. Usually this is early morning of the following day, since the festivities of procession is a night-long affair. By the time other castes have started feeding their guests, the Holeyas and Madigas only begin cooking food around that time. To avoid this they have found a way out. The two castes erect a small and temporary shrine within their respective keris, and by afternoon of the previous day they make

Does Replication Mean Consensus?

their offering to the image of Hatti Maramma. In the Madiga colony they sacrifice the buffalo and in Holeya colony they offer goats or chicken. The buffalo meat is also bought by the Holeyas from the Madigas although they do not like to admit this. Thus, much before the festivities in the village begin the women are in a position to start cooking and not wait until the next morning. My first impressions on learning of a separate shrine in the Madiga colony were one of replication. But after learning more about the humiliation of having to wait till the following morning to make their own offerings at the village shrine (which they still do), it began to appear that the makeshift shrine in the keri is a rejection of the dominant ideology. They wanted to carry on with the traditional practice of buffalo sacrifice notwithstanding the dominant social order’s definition of it as opposed to Hindu values, and therefore its practice within their colony. This is not a replication resulting from exclusion, but a reaffirmation of a cultural identity. The third example relates to the dissent that the ex-Untouchables express towards the low and humiliating status ascribed to them. If at all times they are unable to express it or accomplish redefinition of their status, it is due to a fear of antagonizing the dominant caste within the village or in the region. For, they are often dependent upon the leaders from the dominant caste for securing the benefits from the state, if not benefits from the landowning patrons within the village. The example I cite is also one in which the Madigas organized themselves for the first time against segregation. During 1980, a housing scheme for the weaker sections was being implemented. Several among the Holeya, Madiga, Lambani, Korama, and Oddas were also to benefit from the scheme, as well as the small and marginal farmers, widows, landless laborers, former bonded laborers, and so on from other castes. The process of identification itself was typical of dominant caste politics, by which many ineligible persons had been identified as beneficiaries. Let me delve more into the situation of Holeyas and Madigas who had to encounter at least four sets of problems. First, there had been many aspirants to be beneficiaries but they were told that the scheme was for all poor and weaker sections and not just for the Scheduled Castes. Secondly, the beneficiaries included mainly the known supporters of the ruling faction. Thirdly, the unsuccessful aspirants had been persuaded by the rival faction to make a petition to the officials of the department concerned. Consequently, there had been a delay in approving the list recommended by the ruling faction. The latter therefore feared that the officer concerned would not approve their list, especially since he was a Madiga by caste. He had one weakness in his present posting: he wanted to be posted in Bangalore city and could not afford to alienate the dominant caste, from amongst whom the elected Member of the Legislative Assembly was in the ruling party in the state. However, not knowing the mind and weakness

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of the official, the ruling faction encouraged the landowner in Rajapura whose land was to be acquired for housing purpose to go on an appeal to the court against the land acquisition. A stay order was granted, and the official in question was directed to examine the case by going on a “spot inspection.” During the course of all these developments, the Holeyas and Madigas had come to realize that in the new housing colony as proposed also they would be segregated from the beneficiaries among the other castes. When they learnt of the forthcoming “spot inspection” by the official who belonged to the same caste among them, a few Madigas decided to give him a separate reception in the village. They presented him with garlands and lemon, as is the traditional practice for welcoming a visiting official, as he was passing the entrance of the village. The official, not knowing the caste dynamics, accepted the offerings made to him. But he started shouting at them when one of the enthusiastic onlookers invited him for lunch with them in their ken. This was because, as is the convention, a lunch had been arranged in the house of the headman of the village, an Okkaliga, for the visiting officials. The enthusiastic Madigas had to listen to a small lecture by the official about intercaste harmony and the need to forget caste differences. Although they had gathered the courage to present themselves before the visiting officials to state what they thought was a wrong being committed against them by the dominant castes, they did not have the courage to contest the bureaucrat. Eventually the spot inspection was held, the writ petition by the landowner was withdrawn and the house sites were allotted to the beneficiaries according to the original proposal. Those who opposed the ruling faction and questioned the segregation learnt a bitter lesson: that, by opposing the ideas of segregation as prescribed by the dominant and ruling faction they are not likely to get what they want. It is necessary to recognize the implications for cultural definitions of Holeya and Madiga status to be something lower than the rest. Even though the demand for desegregated housing came as a result of factional rivalry among the Okkaligas, the occasion had given rise to a realization for the Okkaligas that the ex-Untouchables do not accept their status passively. I shall view the persistence of patron–client relationships involving the ex-Untouchable castes to be one of the main reasons for their submitting to the humiliating status, but not without rejection of the ideology that they are low or inferior. In Rajapura in particular they have allowed themselves to be subjected to the humiliations in shortsighted dependence upon the dominant castes for receiving the benefits from the state. An ideal alternative would have been the emergence of a person or a group of persons who would not only stand in opposition to the humiliation but also relate the castes with the outside world of “development” agencies and

Does Replication Mean Consensus?

institutions. Elsewhere the activists of Dalit Sangharsh Samiti (DSS) or any other caste association have been playing this role, and quite successfully but not so far in Rajapura. On the contrary one DSS worker with his base in a neighboring village is quite well-known among the Dalit activists in the region and is seen as a person of nuisance value by most, including those in Rajapura. One late night as I was concluding a session of discussion with a Holeya informant, a messenger from the neighboring village brought the news of a forthcoming meeting in that village. The DSS activist convened the meeting. My informant had been forthright and insightful in discussing the dominant caste attitudes and practices towards the ex-Untouchable castes of Rajapura until the arrival of the messenger. The embarrassment of my informant was clearly evident. For, not only many in Rajapura knew nothing of his involvement with the DSS leader in question, but also there had been a campaign against him. It was after much persuasion that he revealed the information about the meeting and his association with the DSS. His fear was that by disclosing his association with the DSS and the leader in question, he would antagonize the members of the dominant caste. It is instructive to note that he belonged to a faction opposed to the ruling faction in the village, and his political patrons were also from the dominant caste. I suspect the fear of antagonizing comes from his knowledge that no matter which faction he was in, the dissent against the hegemony would not be approved by either of them. With the three examples cited above, I have attempted to show that replication of internal organization within the caste is not peculiar to the exUntouchable castes whose inclusion or exclusion is ambiguous. Thus I have tried to show that replication is not merely a result of exclusion. Secondly, I have tried to show that what may appear to be replication is not indicative of consensus, which for Moffatt is a stronger indication of consensus. It is shown to be the contrary, namely a rejection of the dominant values and reaffirmation of one’s own cultural identity. Finally, these examples also go to show that the ex-Untouchables do not passively accept humiliation and subordinate status culturally ascribed to them. Instead they do attempt redefinition of their identities, and protest against the humiliation. The scope and relative success or failure of such protests depends largely upon their abilities to withstand the power of patronage, or acquire “patronage which is not patronizing” (Scott 1990: 197; Mosse 1994: 87). There are many instances, increasingly in recent years, of rejecting an ascribed low status by the ex-Untouchable castes. I shall describe a few to indicate the extent to which the dominant ideology, which constructed a low and humiliating identity for them, is defied, and rejected. Ever since the drinking-water hand pumps have been erected in different residential localities, it is not uncommon for high-caste women to fetch water from the pump located at the entrance of

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Holeya and Madiga colonies. The upper-caste women filling water into their vessels used to resent their vessels coming in contact with that of the Holeya or Madiga women. Some months ago, when there was an argument following the touching of vessels, the women of Holeya and Madiga asked all the uppercaste women to fetch water from hand pumps elsewhere and not to depend on the ones meant for Holeyas and Madigas. They were told, “if you want to keep your pots pure, go to the wells meant for your caste.” Nowadays, the uppercaste women wait until such a time when there are no other Holeya or Madiga women at the hand pump, for they are aware that they cannot enforce their will. As part of the terms of hiring agricultural laborers, the landowner used to serve one or two meals during the day. The ex-Untouchable caste laborers in the past had been complaining about the quality of food served, or the manner in which they were served: often it was stale food, and they had to bring their own plates. While at work, water to drink was poured to their mouth through a funnel made of a leaf lest the contact through water with the vessel and their mouth would pollute the vessel. In more recent years, the workers do not accept to work on the terms that meal is also served besides wages. They prefer to be paid separately towards their breakfast, lunch, and tea or coffee. Most Okkaligas in Rajapura believe that offering milk or milk-based food items to Holeya and Madiga would result in their cow or buffalo going sick. It was thus not uncommon to find a Holeya or Madiga squatting at the doorstep of a landowning Okkaliga during 1978–81, while the rest in the house sipped a tea or coffee. If the householder were considerate, a few betel leaves and nuts would be offered to him to compensate. Offering betel leaves and nuts may be seen as a way of substitution for tea or coffee. From the Okkaliga standpoint; this may be a fulfillment of responsibility and kindness within the constraints of caste inequalities. But, increasingly, the ex-Untouchable castes resent discrimination and humiliation of a tea or coffee not being offered on the grounds of their caste status being low. In more recent years I have noticed fewer Holeyas sitting at the doorsteps of Okkaliga landowners. Amongst those Holeya and Madiga who do sit there, most walk away from their posts the moment coffee or tea is announced or is being served. Their leaving the scene is to be understood as rejecting the idea that they are being left out while the others are being served a beverage. Many of them joke about the Okkaliga men who drink liquor in the local shop along with Holeya and Madigas, while refusing to offer coffee or tea at home. While these are some samples of their rejection of the notion that they are sources of pollution, there are also many occasions when the ex-Untouchables themselves show signs of their accepting a low status. To this day they have not attempted entering the temples and the tea shops, demanding service by

Does Replication Mean Consensus?

the barber in the village, or wanting to draw water from the well used by all the other castes. In short, rejection of the values that treat them as low has not been uniform, just as acceptance of these values has not been uniform.

CONCLUSIONS Current interest in the culture and cultural autonomy of the ex-Untouchable castes has tended to conclude that they passively accept a culturally subordinate status as ascribed to them. It has also been asserted that they replicate the institutions and values found in the dominant social order from which they are excluded, and thereby express a cultural consensus. Such a replication is seen as a stronger indicator of consensus (Moffatt 1973). The foregoing account of Scheduled Castes in Rajapura points to a contrary interpretation of the cultural similarities found among the ex-Untouchable castes with the castes that are not subjected to humiliation and subordination as are the former. It has been argued that not only “inclusion” and “exclusion” of the ex-Untouchable castes are ambiguous, but it is true of the others. Further, it has been argued that “exclusion” does not necessarily mean replication, and in turn replication does not mean consensus. On the contrary what may appear to be replication is often expression of reaffirming a cultural identity and rejection of the dominant values. Discourse on “replication and consensus” has tended to ignore the dissent by the ex-Untouchable castes. Absence of institutional replication was emphasized to be evidence against Moffatt’s findings in Tamil Nadu, rather than recognizing the dissent that the members of these castes had towards the dominant ideology of caste and hierarchy (e.g., Deliege). Evidence from Karnataka villages has been examined with a view to extend the discourse from “replication and consensus” to “hegemony and dissent.” Such a shift provides an opportunity to recognize the active role of the ex-Untouchable castes rather than treating them as passive participants in a dominant social order that ascribes them a low and subordinate status. With a few examples of dissent expressed and demonstrated by the ex-Untouchable castes of Karnataka, the paper demonstrates the use of shifting the discourse from replication and consensus to hegemony and dissent. The limited success that dissent and protest have in redefining their cultural identity has been attributed to persisting patron–client network of interdependence. It is necessary to identify the different forms of expressing their dissent and their limitations, for the ex-Untouchable castes in India today are seeking a patronage that does not reduce them as being culturally dependent population. The Dalit movement and Dalit literature are attempting such

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a cultural redefinition of their identity through rejection of the dominant ideology as well as economic and political empowerment. That is a theme in itself, which the discourse on replication and consensus nearly ignores.

NOTE This is a paper based on the ongoing collaborative research by a collaborative team of scholars of the Department of Sociology in the University of Glasgow, Glasgow, and the Institute for Social and Economic Change, Nagarabhavi, Bangalore (India). Although the material for the paper is drawn mainly from one of the villages studied by me over an extended period (1978–81, 1987, and 1994–95), it has gained by the data from several other villages in Karnataka studied by the members of the team. Grateful thanks are due to the following: Simon Charsley, E.G. Gayathri Devi, E.N. Ashok Kumar, and Neil Armstrong. The names of the villages and of persons that appear in the paper are pseudonyms. Sincere thanks are due to the Economic and Social Research Council (U.K.) for the financial support for the study (Project No. R000234468). Neither the Institute for Social and Economic Change, nor the Department of Sociology, Glasgow University is responsible for the views expressed in the paper.

REFERENCES Armstrong, N.A. Unpublished MS. The Adi Karnatakas of Mahepura: Searching a Way Ahead. Glasgow: Department of Sociology, Glasgow University. Barnett, S.A. 1973. The process of withdrawal in a South Indian caste. In Entrepreneurship and modernization of occupational cultures in South Asia, ed. Milton Singer, 179–204. Duke University. Caplan, L. 1980. Caste and castelessness among South Indian Christians. Contributions to Indian Sociology (n.s.) 14: 213–38. Charsley, S.R. 1996. Untouchability: What is in a name? Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 2(1): 1–23. ———. Unpublished MS. Harijans of Ratevur Glasgow. Glasgow: Department of Sociology, Glasgow University. Deliege, R. 1988. Les Paralyars du Tamil Nadu. Nettetal: Styler Verlag. ———. 1992. Replication and consensus: Untouchables, caste and ideology in India. Man. (n.s.) 27: 155–73. ———. 1993a. The myths of origin of the Indian untouchables. Man (n.s.) 28: 533–49. ———. 1993b. Le System des castes. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. ———. 1994. Caste without a system: A study of South Indian Harijans. In Contextualising caste: Post Dumontian approaches, eds Mary-Searle Chatterjee and Ursula Sharma. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers. Devi, Gayathri, K.G. Unpublished. Madars of Nulivur: Organizing for Whose Advantage? Glasgow: Department of Sociology, Glasgow University.

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Dube, S.C. 1968. Caste dominance and factionalism. Contributions to Indian Sociology, (n.s.) 2: 58–81. Dumont, L. 1980. Homo Hierarchicus. Chicago: Chicago University Press. Femia, Joseph. 1975. Hegemony and consciousness in the thought of Antonio Gramci. Political Studies 23: 29–44. Gardner, P.M. 1968. Dominance in India: A reappraisal. Contributions to Indian Sociology (n.s.) 2: 82–97. Géliner, D.N. 1995. Comment: Structure and consensus among “Untouchables” in South Aia. The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 1: 395–96. Karanth, G.K. 1981. Rural youth: A sociological study of a Karnataka village. New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company. ———. 1987. New technology and traditional rural institutions: The case of jajmani relations in South India. Economic and Political Weekly 22 (51). ———. 1992. Privatization of common property resources: Lessons from experience in rural Karnataka. Economic and Political Weekly 27 (31–32). ———. 1994. Unpublished. Mutual exchange labour in a changing agrarian economy. Bangalore: Institute for Social and Economic Change. ———. 1995a. Change and continuity in agrarian relations. New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company. ———. 1995b. Informal cooperation and formal cooperatives in rural Karnataka. In Finding the middle path, eds B.S. Baviskar and D.W. Attwood. Boulder, CA: Westview Press. Kumar, E.N. Ashok. (n.d.). Unpublished. Samagars of Jenubhavi: Upwardly mobile or class formation? Glasgow: Department of Sociology, Glasgow University. ———. (n.d.). Unpublished. Korachas of Dharmapura: Defining an identity. Glasgow: Department of Sociology, Glasgow University. McGilvray, D.B. 1983. Pariyar drummers of Sri Lanka: Consensus and constraint in an untouchable caste. American Ethnologist 10: 97–114. Moffatt, M. 1979. An untouchable community in South India: Structure and consensus. Princeton: The University Press. Mosse, David. 1986. Christianity, caste and Hinduism: Social organisation and religion in rural Ramnad. Oxford: Oxford University (D.Phil. thesis). ———. 1994. Idioms of Subordination and Styles of Protest among Christians and Hindu Harijan Castes in Tamil Nadu. Contributions to Indian Sociology (n.s.) 28 (1): 67–106. Nanjundayya, H.V. and L.K. Ananthakrishna Iyer. 1930. Mysore tribes and castes, vol. 2. Mysore: Mysore University Press. Oommen, T.K. 1970. The concept of dominant caste: Some queries. Contributions to Indian Sociology (n.s.) 4: 73–93. Patwardhan, S. 1973. Change among India’s Harijans: Maharashtra, a case study. New Delhi: Orient Longman. Raheja, G.G. 1988. The poison in the gift: Ritual, prestation, and the dominant caste in a North Indian village. Chicago: The University Press. Scott, James C. 1990. Weapons of the weak: Everyday forms of present resistance. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Srinivas, M.N. 1955. The social system of a Mysore village. In Village India, ed. McKim Marriot. Chicago: The University Press.

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Srinivas, M.N. 1959. The dominant caste in Rampura. American Anthropologist 61 (1): 1–16. ———. 1987. The dominant caste and other essays. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Vincent Nathan L. 1987. Harijan subculture and self-esteem management in a South Indian community. Madison: University of Wisconsin (Ph.D. thesis).

Chapter 21

Reservations and New Caste Alliances in India Walter Fernandes

The inclusion of the suggestion to extend the reservations to the private sector in the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) adds a new dimension to the debate on positive discrimination and focuses on two recent developments. The first is the debate on the need for reservations particularly in the light of the Supreme Court judgment on the “creamy layer” and the failure of the Indian Parliament to pass the Women’s Reservation Bill. The second is the caste alliances that symbolize a new power relationship between them. The demand for more concessions also symbolize the sense of identity and power that the subordinate castes are attempting to achieve by using the reservations as one of the tools. Though only a minority among them enjoys their benefits and demands their extension to the private sector, a section of the majority that is excluded from them feels a sense of power and identifies itself with its leaders. That is the reason why we ignore the question on the need for the reservations. We take it for granted and only ask whether as implemented today they can change an unjust system. In order to understand this issue we shall go back to their history and try to understand recent developments in its light. It is because we believe that while reservations have not achieved the objective of economic or social emancipation they have helped many Dalits to acquire a sense of human identity. That also explains why the reservations, especially their extension to the private sector are a threat to the powerful who resist them.

RESERVATIONS AS SHARING POWER The inclusion of the reservations in the CMP has to be understood in the context of recent changes in power relations resulting at least in part from positive

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discrimination. We attribute the political assertion of the Backwards to agricultural and other policies or to their getting elected to the legislature. Most Dalit leaders, on the contrary, who help their masses to assert their power, are those who have got the benefits of education or of reserved jobs. Some have tasted political power by getting elected to the State or Central legislature. The majority that remains poor aligns itself with the leaders in search of a new identity. We shall try to understand these issues by looking at positive discrimination in its totality. One does not have to repeat that the reservations had a political origin through the Poona Pact after Mahatma Gandhi’s refusal to concede a separate Dalit electorate. Religion was crucial to this political decision. The Indian National Congress was in competition with the Muslim League and needed numbers. After the Morley–Minto reforms conceded a separate Muslim electorate, many subalterns felt that they too could lay claim to this autonomous arrangement of a share in power independently of the dominant castes. So Dr B. R. Ambedkar demanded that Dalits be considered a minority and granted a separate electorate but the Mahatma needed their numbers in the Hindu fold to compete with the Muslim league. In the emotional context of his fast, the Dalits had no choice but to accept some reserved elective posts within the Hindu electorate (Dass 1996: 241–44). Thus, though extended also to the tribes, reservations were in reality a response to Dr B. R. Ambedkar. The dominant-class leaders who led the freedom struggle had very little understanding of tribal issues, so they simply extended to them the concessions granted to the Dalits. Tribal leaders were not demanding reservations but their right to a livelihood and an identity that the colonialist and his upper-class collaborators deprived them of by exercising monopoly over their lands and forests. Instead of rectifying this situation they were given concessions in education and jobs (Minz 1992: 360). Secondly, the reservation policy originated more out of the dominant-caste need for numbers and their fear that conversions to Christianity would deprive the Hindu electorate of the numbers it needed than as a response to subaltern demands. So the dominant castes tried to soothe Dalit feelings but did not yield to their demand to be treated as human. From it follows its welfare orientation, based not on the questioning of caste inequality or on the effort to change power relations but on the need to assimilate the subalterns with the dominant caste led “mainstream” (Dass 1996: 241–44). Recent developments have to be studied in this context. Some think that the welfare orientation of the reservations policy has stifled subaltern protest by coopting the Dalit and tribal elite into the dominant system while others are of the view that despite their welfare orientation the reservations have raised hopes of social transformation among the scheduled classes. Thus, though they were not aimed at changing the social structure and have benefited only a minority

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that threatens to monopolize them, reservations have also been instrumental in making many subalterns aware of their rights as citizens. They may not be able to acquire this right in the near future but their aspirations are clear. So they cannot be taken for granted. Also, the ongoing Dalit killings and atrocities against them can be situated in the context of the awareness that has grown among many Dalits about their rights though they may not acquire them. Even the demand for the extension of the reservations is not for power sharing alone but is also a reaction to the upper-class refusal to countenance structural change. A society reacts to external inputs according to its internal organization. Also the scheduled classes see their extension to the private sector as their only alternative in a society whose dominant classes continue to discriminate against them and refuse to treat them as equals. Since they are unable to compete with them as equals, they try to get a share in their power. A minority gets its economic benefits but the majority finds an identity through them. So they go beyond what those who formulated the policy intended it to be. So the two issues of stifling their protests and the subalterns gaining an identity are two sides of the same coin. In other words, while only a few get the benefits of the policy some Dalits use it as a tool of resistance, become aware of their power and gain a human identity and continue tribal and Dalit resistance to the changes that colonialism introduced in their societies. That is why the tribals did not want reservations but a right to their livelihood that was being alienated from them in order to change the economy to suit colonial needs (Rothermund 1992: 7–8).

DALIT RESISTANCE AND IDENTITY Thus there is much ambiguity in the reservation policy. Because of it Dalit reaction to it in the form of the identity search and recent caste alliances has been ambiguous. Some of those who get the benefits view them primarily as an economic measure and demand their extension to the private sector but many others including those who do not get these benefits are taking the reservations beyond the “creamy layer” that gets their benefits by using them not as a welfare measure but as a tool to develop a human identity. They view them as partial compensation for the discrimination they have suffered for centuries and as a tool to restore their dignity and identity that the dominant castes have denied them, as such a right. For example, one hears this assertion in the agitation for the inclusion of Dalit Christians in the Schedule. In their thinking more than an economic demand the Schedule is an identity issue meant to restore the dignity that they have been denied (Fernandes, 1994: 35–36).

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Their struggle is thus different also from that of the tribals many of whom are trying to protect their livelihood that is being alienated from them in the name of national development and are resisting their marginalization by displacement and other forms of alienation of their land, forest, and water resources. Their identity is closely linked to this livelihood, so in their struggles such as that for self-rule in Jharkhand, against displacement in Kashipur in Orissa, and for self-respect and autonomy in the Northeast they combine the protection of their livelihood and of their identity into one (Sen Gupta 1980). Dalit identity too is the main issue but their struggle is acquiring what the dominant castes have denied them by treating them as “untouchables.” So today they are searching for an identity based on self-respect as humans. A form it has taken is the decision of many of them to call themselves Dalits and proclaim that “Dalit is Dignified.” Thus, they give priority to dignity through a new identity over economic improvement (Fernandes 2003: 45–46). Such a search has a precedent in nineteenth and early twentieth century India when many Dalits attempted to change their social status through conversion to Christianity, Islam, and Sikhism. These conversions were at times a search for freedom from caste and at others for upward mobility. In either case it was a refusal to accept their status (Webster 1992). The foundation of the conversions and of their refusal to accept their low status is in the Bhakti movement that gave Dalits some hope of freedom within the Hindu fold. It variously took the form of a struggle for freedom from caste and for equality based not on work but on devotion to God. It was getting weak at the British arrival but had not yet died out fully. With some support, Dalits could have attained their objective of human equality (Fernandes 1996: 145–46). But colonialism is an economic enterprise of a foreigner controlling the masses through local colloborators in order to change the colonial economy to support the industrial revolution in the metropolitan country. The collaborators were invariably from the traditional dominant classes. So some scholars think that colonialism strengthened feudalism in the colony in order to support the birth of capitalism in the metropolitan country (Sarkar 1983). In colonial India most collaborators came from among the Brahmans as administrators, Kshatriyas as princes and other high-caste persons in the armed forces. At a crucial moment of the Bhakti movement the colonialist thus further strengthened the upper-caste collaborators through English education and administrative posts. That deprived the Dalits of the last hope of attaining equality within the Hindu fold. If they wanted freedom they had to search for it elsewhere (Fernandes 1996: 152–54). That is where other inputs and the weakening of the jajmani system came to their rescue. In this system land belonged to one caste but was divided between its families. A service-caste family was linked to each landowning family. The Dalits were mostly landless laborers in

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this labor exchange system. After the harvest, the landowning family distributed grains to each service-caste family its quantity depending on its status in the caste hierarchy. Thus jajmani provided the Dalits material security but not a social status. The caste system also provided to the middle castes, the possibility of struggling for upward mobility but the Dalits could not hope to improve their status within the system since they were powerless subordinates (Srinivas 1966: 18–19). That is where the Bhakti movement could have tilted the balance in favor of the Dalits but British inputs denied them an opportunity of change within the system. However, other colonial inputs opened up new possibilities. The colonialist needed land as a source of profit for the plantations and mines and to supply cheap raw material and capital for the British Industrial Revolution. He, therefore, enacted new land laws that recognized only individual ownership in order to make acquisitions easy. What was not individually owned was declared State property under the colonial principle of the State’s eminent domain (Ramanathan 1999: 19–20). So land was slowly transferred from the caste group to individuals, thus weakening the jajmani system. Dalits who had till then lived in its culture of labor exchange had now to negotiate as individuals with the landlord and accept the wages they offered. They thus lost the little security they had with no addition to their social status. Further impoverishment was its consequence and a large number of them became bonded laborers or went to other British colonies as indentured labor in slave-like conditions (Sen 1979: 8–12). The weakening of the jajmani system also freed them partially from the system that bound them. Some Dalits used it to improve their social and economic status by joining the British armed forces or getting economic security by commercializing their traditional products like alcohol; gained access to education to a limited extent; and demanded social freedom (Srinivas 1966). But most of them experienced greater impoverishment and deterioration of their social status. That is when religious change provided an alternative outside the system. Convinced that “saving souls” was their duty, Christian missionaries approached groups that gave them hope of conversion. Though most of them wanted only to “save souls,” a substantial minority from northern Europe that had been exposed to the egalitarian ideology of the eighteenth- and nineteenthcentury political revolutions and working-class movements viewed the caste system as the very antithesis of human equality and fought against it. Thus the missionary’s interest coincided with that of the Dalits since the latter perceived him as a preacher of equality (Grafe 1990: 93–94). Besides, Dalit conversions were not to Christianity alone. They joined any religion that they perceived as egalitarian. Dalits in East Punjab became Sikhs, those in West Punjab joined Islam and those in the neighboring western Uttar

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Pradesh joined Christian sects in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries since they perceived all three as egalitarian and joined the one they could approach easily (Sharma 1976: 219). Tribals too did the same and did not even exclude Hinduism. The Boro Assam converted both to Christianity and to a reformist Brahmo sect to which their leader, Kallicharan Brahma was introduced in Calcutta. They wanted to combine social reform with the protection of their identity and they felt that they could achieve it either through reformist Hinduism or Christianity (Roy 1995: 90–95). In practice Dalits have not attained equality in their new religious bodies because middle- and high-caste persons who had filled the social slots in them were not ready to accept the newcomers as equals. Also the economic status of a majority among them has not improved but conversion has given them a new self-image, a sense of self-worth and in some cases access to education (Fernandes 1996: 161–64). As a result of this self-image, many of them are active in some resistance movements and at times challenge their low-caste status. An example is the Bihar struggle in which the Marxist groups and the Dalit Sena fight on one side against the landowning high-caste armies (Louis 2000).

RESERVATIONS AND DOMINANT RESISTANCE This possibility is a threat to the classes with a vested interest in the unequal system. So most recent attacks on Christians are a dominant backlash against their resistance. As the report of the Independent Inquiry Commission says, most attacks against Christians took place in areas where struggles against land alienation or for better wages or protection of livelihood have been strong. These are also the districts with a substantial number of Christians. So attacks on the tribal and Dalit Christians were a way of telling them that the ruling class would not tolerate their resurgence but they focused on religion in order to get the support of the Hindu middle class and divide the poor (Fernandes 2003: 48–49). Thus one side of the coin is Dalit resurgence and the other is the recent dominant caste resistance to their awakening. Its examples are the Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh caste riots in the 1980s, opposition to the Mandal decision and the attacks on Christians in Gujarat in 1998. It has resulted from a major change that has occurred in the caste alliances because of planned development but to some extent it is also a continuation of the developments of the colonial age when the middle-caste groups came together at the regional level and formed broad alliances. With the improvement of communications and events such as the census operations, castes that had some mobility came together to form new regional-level alliances. Most Dalits and others who could not gain access to these inputs had no possibility of coming together. Thus communications in the

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colonial age went in favor mostly of groups from the middle castes that had the power to come together (Srinivas 1966: 20–22). This process has continued after independence but in a new form. The middle castes, some of whom are powerful but call themselves backwards, have got the benefits of what is called national development and would not like the subalterns to get a share of that power. The upper caste and class leaders who led the freedom movement wanted only to assimilate the Dalits in the dominant system and did not want any structural change but they also had a feeling of guilt about caste inequalities. Thus, the reservations that grew from it have a welfare mentality. However, the classes that have got the benefits of the postindependence policies have no guilt feelings. They need the subalterns as bonded laborers and low-paid agricultural workers who remain illiterate and do not protest against their exploitation. They do not even want their assimilation. This vested interest is combined with the new middle class that has become selfish because of consumerism and liberalization (Kothari 1991). Thus there is a close link between the new caste alliances and the postindependence development paradigm. According to estimates, the middle class has grown from around 30 millions in 1947 to more than 200 millions now. Most of them belong to the middle and upper castes (Desrochers 1997: 197). One does not accept the myth that all the Dalits and tribals are poor and all the dominant-caste persons are rich. The “creamy layer” among the latter is fairly well-off and many are poor among the former. We only state that the middle class belongs by and large to the middle and high castes and most Dalits and tribals are poor. Central to the contradiction between the social reality and the protective legislation that results in it is the ideology of the decision-makers or of the new bourgeoisie that led the freedom struggle and to whom power was transferred at independence. Equally important are the new capitalists who funded the movement and viewed it as a long-term investment in their own economic future in independent India (Shankardass 1982: 34–35). Most movement leaders were brought up on colonial values and viewed the Western form of development as the only one possible. They focused on modernization, infrastructure-building, and economic growth through capitalintensive inputs and sophisticated technology. They assumed that technology would solve the social problems of illiteracy, ill health, and unemployment. However, such inputs are accessible only to persons with high educational skills. The Scheduled Classes lacked them because of their limited access to schools but based on their development paradigm the decision-makers invested on the infrastructure on the assumption that making institutions available would ensure access to all. They hoped to control diseases by investing mostly on hospitals and overcome illiteracy by building educational institutions. In reality there is a hiatus between availability and access. Making institutions available

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does not guarantee access to them to groups that till then had been repressed by the dominant classes. A social environment has to be created in their favor but no effort was made to transform this social imbalance. So the social processes overtook their good intentions and functioned according to the principle that modernization introduced in an unequal society without transforming it, ensures the flow of benefits only to those who gain access to them and far from reducing inequalities, it intensifies them (Kurien 1996: 36–38). Reservations too made a system available without ensuring access to all. Those who gain access to schools can avail of reserved jobs. On the other side the dominant “backward” castes are getting stronger through planned development inputs such as the agricultural policy related components like irrigation and agricultural research in technologies meant mostly for the medium and big farmers. More often than not they go against the small and marginal farmers (Chandy 1993: 313–14). The “Backwards” prospered by gaining access to these inputs but their continuing prosperity depended on the poverty and cheap labor of the predominantly Dalit agricultural laborers. That built in them a vested interest in their poverty and powerlessness (Banerji 2000: 796). Because of this vested interest, any talk of the Dalits challenging “Backward” domination or demanding better wages or living conditions is a threat to them. They cannot let the Dalits be aware of their rights. Most recent attacks on the Dalits, whether against the reservations or on Christians in Gujarat, or the killings in Andhra Pradesh or Bihar are a result of this vested interest (Louis 2000: 231). That explains the atrocities against the Dalits. Their resistance takes also the form of anti-Dalit statements, a common one being that they are inefficient and that reservations are bringing down standards. That, for example, was the stand of the representative of the Confederation of Indian Industries in The Big Fight on NDTV 24×7 in July 2004 on reservations in the private sector. The present author has had many such experiences when he was on the recruitment panel of some autonomous bodies. Before the interviews some uppercaste panel members would complain about what they called three hours of low-level interviews. When questioned after the interviews they would reply that the standard was good, that the Dalits and tribals did not need reservations and that they were exploiting the reservation policy. Someone would then go back to their earlier statements and say that they did not need reservations because of their quality but because of the upper-caste attitude.

FROM CASTE TO CLASS Thus a major post-independence development is the slow evolution of caste into class. Not every member of the middle caste joins the middle class but a

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close link has been created between the two. The section that prospers through these inputs joins the middle class, develops a vested interest in its new status and resists Dalit mobility in order to protect its privileges. It demands reservations for the “backwards” in the private sector but opposes them for the Dalits for fear of their becoming a step in their emancipation. As among the Dalits so also among the high and middle castes, the majority identifies itself with the leaders in a show of solidarity because while moving the caste toward class they maintain also the caste identity in order to get emotional support from the majority. That is at the basis of the upper-caste resistance and of the ongoing impoverishment of the Dalits and tribals. Dominant resistance too has a parallel in the several developments of the colonial age. It arose partly from the fact that by the end of the nineteenth century some missionaries who had thought primarily of conversions began to give greater importance to the fight against social inequality. That became a threat to the middle-caste mirasdars or landowners. They also considered Christians impure because they ate meat and their transition rites of birth, marriage, and death were simple. So the mirasdars felt that they did not give importance to the community that included the past, the present, and the future (Hudson 1993). However, they felt greater threat to their power when in places like Chingleput in Tamil Nadu Dalits began to view conversion as freedom and invite missionaries to their area. This widespread movement aroused the hostility of the landlords who feared that with the bonded laborers attaining self-confidence through conversion, their superior economic and social status would collapse (Bailey 1989: 451). Elsewhere too, especially in Jharkhand, the landlords accused the missionary of fermenting disorder and agrarian unrest, forgetting that “the conversion was caused by agrarian unrest, but it was not at the bottom of the conflict as the landlords liked to maintain, thus turning the issue upside down” (Schverin 1987: 52). Today the same opposition has taken another form. In most cases the threat is felt directly and also the dominant caste response is violent. They do not view conversions alone as a threat. The very awakening caused by the political processes of the elections and by the sense of identity they acquire because of them and the reservations is a big enough threat to repress them. Religion functions only as an additional factor (Fernandes 2004: 49–50).

THE SEARCH FOR ALTERNATIVES The above analysis shows that the reservations should have provided equal opportunities to the communities that have been neglected for centuries but this objective of creating an egalitarian society has not been achieved because Indian

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society in general and its decision-makers in particular have been ambiguous on the issue of equality. Reservations offer the tribals and Dalits free education and jobs but the pattern of development deprives them of access to schools and alienates their livelihood from them. The literacy, health, mortality, and child labor data show that their situation has deteriorated. Thus though a minority has benefited from the policy it has not dealt with the basic issue of inequality. As a result, class and gender inequalities have been intensified. That is where one can ask whether this policy can ever become effective. It was a response to Dalit upsurge, not built on an effort to change an unjust system. So the concessions made to them lacked the potential to transform their unjust society. On the other side we have seen that the subalterns have responded according to the social environment at a given moment. Those who felt that they could not hope for any change in their society limited themselves to getting as many benefits as possible for themselves within the dominantcaste-controlled system. Others who felt that a human identity was more important than economic benefits have gone in the direction of a search for self-respect and a new self-image-based solution (Lobo 1996: 180–81). However, they cannot remain forever at the level of self-image but have to combine it with a higher social and economic status. In this context we ask whether the reservation policy can ever become effective. We believe that it cannot be fully effective without a shift of focus from availability to access. Without such a change, the dichotomy of some gaining access to the “mainstream” and being co-opted by it and others struggling against their subhuman condition will continue. This is the context of the search for solutions. In this search India can learn from the “Asian Tigers,” some of whom are presented to the world as a success story of capitalism and Mainland China as a case of “socialist success.” Studies indicate that their success lies in their approach to development. According to analysts like Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen (1989), for economic benefits to reach the masses not less that 10 percent of the gross national product (GNP) has to be invested in the social sector. In India it has mostly been below 5 percent and most of it has reached the middle and upper classes. The Asian Tigers of South and North Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia under Soekarno, Singapore and the two Chinas have done the opposite. In most cases the State supported the building of an infrastructure through the public or private sector but they also invested 8 percent to 15 percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) on the social components such as universal education, mass health, nutrition, and hygiene. They thus created a class of consumers and also ensured that the masses were qualified for jobs in the system and gained access to the benefits of economic growth (Colonel-Ferer 1998). Mainland China reduced inequalities through its focus on raising the masses from misery to poverty rather than on the prosperity of a few and provided to the masses access to educational, health, and other institutions.

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Malaysia’s Bhumiputra policy may have equal relevance to India’s reservation policy because it has gone beyond welfare to remedy the social and political causes of inequality. An important reason for this difference is their origin. Unlike the Indian policy that was an effort to co-opt the subalterns in the dominant-caste-dominated “mainstream,” Malaysia initiated it after the traumatic independence of Singapore in 1966 and the Malay-Chinese race riots of 1969. The decision-makers realized that these events were caused by the social injustice that the Malays suffered from. They formed 60 percent of the population, but people of Chinese origin controlled the economy and jobs were to a great extent cornered by persons of Indian descent. The Malays were excluded from the benefits of development. They were thus similar to the Indian Dalits but Malaysia did not stop at relief. It turned the Bhumiputra policy into a response not to the trauma of Singapore’s independence or the riots but to their causes. It combined an industrial with a social infrastructure. Unlike in India it did not limit reservations to the public sector but extended them also to the private sector at every level. Most importantly, Malaysia made a massive investment in their education, health, nutrition, and hygiene, thus preparing them for jobs and to the benefits of industry (Jomo 1998). The lesson that India needs to learn from the Asian Tigers is to look beyond the physical infrastructure and make massive investment in the social infrastructure of primary education, community health, nutrition, and hygiene. It can give the subalterns hope in their future. To make it effective an atmosphere has to be created that can force the dominant classes to share power with the subalterns and go beyond providing relief to a few. It is true, as we have seen above, that at times relief itself helps the subalterns to become aware of their rights. We also know that it also becomes a threat to the dominants and they react as they did in Gujarat in 1985 and 1998 and in other forms elsewhere. Reservations can also become a vested interest as long as access to them is limited to a few. This vicious circle can be broken not through relief but through a combination of economic, social, and political inputs.

CONCLUSION We have seen in this paper some new caste developments that have their basis in the reservation policy and the post-independence development paradigm. Based on the assumption that sophisticated technology and making institutions and systems available would ensure access to benefits to all the classes, the decision-makers invested in economic growth and industrial infrastructure. Also the reservations belong to the category of making a system available without creating conditions supportive of social transformation. That has made

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the upward mobility of a few middle castes possible but has extended the benefits to only a small minority among the Dalits. However, the hope of change and other processes such as the elections have helped many of their communities to acquire a human self-image and they have been demanding their rights. That has resulted in dominant backlash. Thus it is becoming increasingly clear that the reservation policy in its present form cannot lead the Dalits in the path of liberation. Ways have to be found of creating a social environment favorable to social transformation. We believe that a combination of social inputs with capital investment on the model of the Asian Tigers can be a step toward it.

REFERENCES Banerji, Rukmini. 2000. Poverty and primary schools: Field studies from Mumbai and Delhi. Economic and Political Weekly 35 (10), March 4: 795–802. Bailey, Susan. 1989. Saints, goddesses and kings: Muslims and Christians in South Indian society, 1700–1900. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chandy, K.T. 1993. Agricultural technology for small farmers. Social Action 43 (3) (July– September): 313–327. Colonel-Ferrer, Miriam. 1998. Emulating south-east Asian development: The neo-liberal tale of two studies. Paper presented at the International Conference Colonialism to Globalisation: Five Centuries after Vasco da Gama. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute, February 2–6. Dass, Bhagwan. 1996. Reservations today and tomorrow. In The emerging dalit identity: The re-awakening of the subalterns, ed. Walter Fernandes, 234–57. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute. Dreze, Jean and Amartya Sen. 1989. Hunger and public action. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Fernandes, Walter. 1994. Dalit Christians in Tamilnadu. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute (mimeo). ———. 1996. Conversion to Christianity, caste tension and search for a new identity in Tamil Nadu. In Dalit Christians in Tamilnadu, ed. Walter Fernadnes, 140–64. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute. ———. 2003. Dalits and recent attacks on the minorities. In Social exclusion, ed. A.K. Lal, 42–54. New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company. Grafe, Hugald. 1990. History of Christianity in India, vol. IV, part 2. Bangalore: Church History Association of India. Hudson, D. Dennis. 1993. The first protestant mission in India: Its social and religious developments. Sociological Bulletin 42 (1–2) (March–September): 37–63. Jomo, K.S. 1998. Emulating southeast Asian development: The neo-liberal tale of two studies. Paper presented at the International Conference Colonialism to Globalisation: Five Centuries After Vasco-da-Gama. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute, February 2–6. Kothari, Rajni. 1991. State and statelessness in our times. Economic and Political Weekly, 26 (11 and 12, annual number): 553–558.

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Kurien, C.T. 1996. Global capitalism and the Indian economy. New Delhi: Orient Longman. Lobo, Lancy. 1996. Dalit religious movements and dalit identity. In Dalit Christians in Tamilnadu, ed. Walter Fernandes, 166–83. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute. Louis, Prakash. 2000. Bihar: Class war spreads to new areas. Economic and Political Weekly, 35 (26), June 24: 2207–2211. Minz, Boniface. 1992. The Jharkhand movement. In National development and tribal deprivation, ed. Walter Fernandes, 345–71. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute . Ramanathan, Usha. 1999. Public purpose: Points for discussion. In The land acquisition (amendment) bill 1998, ed. Walter Fernandes, 19–24. New Delhi: Indian Social Institute. Rothermund, Dietmar. 1992. 500 years of colonialism, Social Action 42 (1) (January– March): 1–15. Roy, Ajay. 1995. The Boro imbroglio. Guwahati: Spectrum Publishers. Schverin, Detlef. 1987. The control of land and labour in Chotanagpur, 1853–1948. In Zamindars, mines and peasants: studies in the history of an Indian coalfield and its rural hinterland, eds Dietmar Rothermund and D.C. Wadhwa, 21–68. New Delhi: Manohar. Sarkar, Sumit. 1983. Modern India 1887–1947. New Delhi: Macmillan. Sen, Sunil. 1979. Agrarian relations in India 1793–1947. New Delhi: People’s Publishing House. Sen Gupta, Nirmal. 1980. Class and tribe in Jharkhand. Economic and Political Weekly, April 5: 664–671. Shankardass, Rani Dhavan. 1982. The first Congress raj. New Delhi: Macmillan. Sharma, Ursula. 1976. Status striving and striving to abolish status: The Arya Samaj and the low castes. Social Action 26 (3) (July–September): 219–226. Srinivas, M.N. 1966. Religion and society among the Coorgs of South India. Bombay: Asia Publishing House. Webster, John C.B. 1992. The Dalit Christians: A history. Delhi: Indian Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge.

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Concluding this book requires putting together many diverse strands as the papers in this volume cover a wide range of materials, covering both geographical and cultural regions in India as well as a diverse spectrum of thoughts, both theoretical and ethnographical. Theoretically it deals with the construction of social reality taking the subject position of the victims of inequality. Rather than dealing with the inequality merely as a social phenomenon at an analytical level, it tries to substantiate the experiential reality of being victimized. Taking untouchability as a central focus of the caste system, each of the chapter looks at the role played by caste and caste oppression and ways in which human beings have suffered from being treated as less than human. One major contribution of this book is to look at those at the bottom not as passive victims only but as active and creative subjects who, in spite of all odds, are still inspired to protest, to have their own point of view and have a positive self-image. Theoretically, in this book, by taking an alternate subject position to the one taken usually, that is of the upper caste, we have supported Foucault’s contention that a way of “seeing” is also a “way of not seeing” (Munro 1997: 6). Because a certain intellectual position sees caste in a certain way, it does not see it in another way; this volume shows that there is another way and maybe we shall learn more about the phenomenon by moving across the various points of view. At this point, Chatterjee’s (1993: 179–81, passim) critique of Dumont is extremely relevant, especially as it points to a “dominant” and “one-sided construction” of ideology. Stratification is not a phenomenon confined to caste society, but here it has taken the shape of a historical phenomenon that has its own characteristics though some of them may overlap with those of other similar phenomena such as racism (Channa 2005). Although caste has been treated synonymously with Hinduism, there is a debate, especially in postcolonial literature, about the monolithic construction of Hinduism as it is found in the colonial production of knowledge about Indian society. It is true that historically the South Asian region has seen the development of many diverse schools of thought both from within Hinduism and outside of it. New religious paths such as Buddhism,

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Jainism, and Sikhism rose specifically to criticize Brahmanical tenets and to emphasize a more humanistic view of society. The many sects of Vaishnavism that arose in the eastern part of the country (Sahajiya, Baul, Gosain, and so on), the varieties of Tantric Hindusim, the Bhakti cult that spread itself over nearly five hundred years from the twelfth century to the seventeenth century, were all striving for an end to the rigidities of a ritualistic religion that also treated humans as high or low. This region was also under prolonged Islamic rule and simultaneous with the Bhakti cult there was the spread of Sufism that found many followers among the deprived sections of society. The more modern reformist sects that came up during the colonial period, such as the Brahmo Samaj, Arya Samaj, and Radhaswamis were also critical of Brahmanical rituals and the caste system. In other words antiestablishment movements have had sway from very early times and yet the majority of people here still remain committed to the caste system At the end of the day, in the twenty-first century, most of India is still ruled by caste. Not only Hindus, even Muslims and Christian converts are seen to follow caste norms, especially the practice of untouchability quite rigorously. In post-Independence India, where the Constitution formally abolished caste and the practice of untouchability, the entire Indian democracy is by and large guided by caste principles. Some excellent analysis of this phenomenon has been done by many prominent sociologists and political scientists and it has not been the aim of this volume to discuss as to why caste persists and what role it plays in the Indian polity. In this volume we have focused more on the practice of untouchability and the response of the untouchables to the atrocities committed on them for centuries. Much of this response has been in the shape of consolidation of political power, though the politicization of caste is essentially a post-Independence phenomenon. In the pre-Independence era also, protests were taking a political turn, especially with the rise of Ambedkar as the leader of the untouchable and other oppressed groups.

EMERGENCE OF A DALIT POLITICAL IDENTITY It is interesting to note that even the Ambedkarite movement was initially more in the nature of a class struggle as it first emerged as a labor movement of the Mahars and other proletariat factory workers of the emerging industrial labor class. The initial definition of Dalits was not only to include the untouchable castes but all those belonging to the oppressed class as well. But it did not work that way. Even a person of Ambedkar’s stature, a person who gave India its Constitution is today recognized by most Indians as a leader of the Dalit castes alone. In his own lifetime Ambedkar failed to become a leader of the Indian

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masses, being reduced to a leader of the untouchables alone, that too mostly in Western India. The political disagreements between Gandhi and Ambedkar, especially over the Poona Pact, created a rift between Dalits and upper-caste Hindu nationalists, even during the nationalist movement. In his autobiography, Vasant Moon writes about the internal division between so-called “Harijans” and the “Dalits” meaning the followers of Gandhi from among the untouchables and the followers of Ambedkar, a division that often took the form of violent clashes. Due to this reason, the patriotism of the Dalits was often questioned, especially by the upper castes. This is one of the reasons why the Dalit movement failed to gain much ground immediately after Independence and Ambedkar failed to gain status as an all-India nationalist leader. In fact as pointed out by Mendelsohn and Vicziany (1998: 263), “Unless we count the emergence of Kanshi Ram and Mayawati in the 1990s there has been no dramatic moment for the Untouchables in all the years after the Poona Pact.” However, in our opinion the movement consolidated itself considerably and on an all-India level as an aftermath of the great commotion over the implementation of the Mandal Commission report. Even in the urban centers where caste was losing its prominence, at least in the public domain, it came back with a bang. Because the Dalits confronted the anti-Mandal activists squarely, and did not give up, the entire society, especially in the educational institutions, became divided on caste lines. What has really fed and sustained the Dalit movement has been the rise of Dalits to high positions in society as well as in the intellectual arena. Those with greater communication skills and education have come to the forefront to lead others of their community. At Durban, a group of drum-beaters were taken directly from the South of India and organized to beat drums in protest at the marches and demonstrations put up by their leaders. At the official level, the Indian state finds itself in an embarrassing situation as constitutionally caste is officially abolished, a stand that it took at the WCAR, in Durban in 2001. In the face of immense Dalit protests and organized exhibitions at the venue, the representatives for the government were red-faced while trying to assert that atrocities against Dalits were past history. The tension between government representatives and Dalit activists had taken the shape of an open confrontation even in Durban. Dalit protests had, however, taken more of a nonpolitical intellectual stand in the form of poems, literature, and even movies till the rise of Mayawati, who not only gave them a political identity along with Kanshi Ram but has been instrumental in reinstating Ambedkar. It is in the person of Mayawati that Ambedkar too is getting a status of leadership from all over India. Even today while he is very popular in the West, North, and Central India, he is still relatively unknown in the Eastern part of

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India. On April 14, 2008, the birthday celebration of Ambedkar, Mayawati, now the most powerful Dalit in India, inaugurated the Ambedkar Jayanti park in Lucknow, from now on to be regarded as a pilgrim spot for all Dalits. This was constructed at the cost of millions of rupees, and contains besides many fountains and decorative statues, the life-sized statues not only of Ambedkar, but of Mayawati and Kanshi Ram as well. While Kanshi Ram was the founder of the Bahujan Samaj Party, today the largest party of Dalits in northern India, it is the first time in the history of democratic India that a leader has put his/her statue in his/her lifetime. This was probably done only by the feudal lords of a bygone time. The defiance of Mayawati can be compared to the defiance of the Dalits that we have read about in many of the papers in this volume. As the violent reaction of the Jatavs in Agra (Nandu Ram, this volume) or the exhibitionism of the alaku wearers in Kapadia’s description of the Paliyan possession rituals (see chapter titled “Dancing the Goddess” in this volume), show, the Dalits’ reaction is only measurable or understandable in proportion to the pain suffered by them. The exhibitionism of Mayawati is only proportional to what she, a poor Dalit girl, must have suffered in her own period of growing up and getting an education. As pointed out by Nandu Ram and as substantiated by most newspaper reports of actual happenings, the atrocities against Dalits is rising in proportion to their demands for social justice. The more the Dalits try to raise their heads, the more brutally they are crushed. Many people give the plea that in urban cities caste is getting obliterated, but one only has to look into the casteism prevalent in hostels in the Universities of Delhi and institutions such as AIIMS (All India Institute of Medical Sciences) to realize that caste is anything but on its way out (see also Mendelsohn and Vicziany 1998). However, the kind of polarization that was envisaged between the Dalits and non-Dalits has not taken place and even Mayawati had to rope in the Brahmin votes in Uttar Pradesh to win an election. What one can foresee and what is happening is that in some areas and some communities, Dalits are emerging as a potent force. The process of consolidation is on and while on their way up some Dalit leaders may have to rely on upper-caste support to consolidate their position till such time as a larger number of Dalits form a class that is powerful. As of now if one sums up the total quantum of power that actual resides with the Dalits, it does not amount to much. On the other hand, upper-caste leaders, in what is known as “election strategy,” usually use the Dalits for their own political gains. It is still not time when a majority of them are able to exercise their political choice in an informed fashion. Moreover, although there are reserved constituencies that field only Dalit candidates, the electorate is of mixed caste

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and therefore it is not politically expedient for any Dalit leader to espouse the cause only of Dalits. Many of them are aspiring to emerge as national leaders and therefore may steer clear of controversial stands that may make them lose favor with the general electorate.

RESERVATIONS AND POSITIVE DISCRIMINATION This is an issue worth taking up at the end of this volume following the lead given by Fernandes (this volume). The entire Indian society is clearly fractured along the line of those for and those against reservation. Those against have the simple logic that one should, in this age of achievement, go strictly by merit. But the biggest question that one raises here is what constitutes merit? Is it only to be measured in terms of output or in terms of input versus output? For example, the kind of schooling, nutrition, and facilities that one gets as a child would normally determine, to a large extent, the kind of result that one procures in one’s examinations. The examination system that remains the only so-called reliable source of judging “merit” is itself a highly arbitrary and subjective manner of determining what is “merit.” It is a fact corroborated by many that all the students who perform brilliantly in examinations need not be great achievers or even show great professional skills. Moreover, given the fact that even now the majority of India’s Dalits are still among the poorest of Indians, there is very little chance that a Dalit child is able to get the same kind of facilities and resources as a non-Dalit child. For example, the conditions observed by Channa (1985) of the dhobis, overcrowding, lack of input from parents and peer group, noisy and uncomfortable surroundings, lack of privacy, even space to sit and study, poor school facilities and hostile teachers are all major deterrents for any normal child to underperform or even drop out of school. If a child manages even to pass under these circumstances, then it is reasonable to assume that the child must be of exceptional ability. One has only to read the autobiography of Vasant Moon (a part of which is reproduced in this volume) to realize how difficult it is for an underprivileged child to even procure basic education. It is still a fact that most school dropouts are of the Dalit castes; also those Dalits who do manage to do well are outstanding achievers like the ex-presidents of India, K.R. Narayanan and also Abdul Kalam. In a recent revisit to the field to restudy the dhobis, whom she had studied in the seventies, Channa found out that their condition was almost the same as before. While there is so much agitation in Delhi and elsewhere over the implementation of the Mandal Commission giving reservation to Dalits in

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educational institutions and in government jobs, she found that almost no one from among the dhobis has yet been a beneficiary of reservation. The reason given by the dhobis was exactly what it was 30 years back. Most dhobi children cannot even get the minimum qualification to qualify for educations of higher learning. Even today they drop out of schools because they face discrimination from the teachers and peer groups both. As of now there is not a single highly qualified person among them even though they live in the heart of the capital of India. It is thus a fact, looking at the statistics as well, that the benefits of reservation have not yet reached to many; yet it has reached some. The question that we may raise at this point of time is what benefit does the community receive, if some individuals get the benefit of reservation. It is certainly not easy to generalize. Sometimes an internal hierarchization is reported where the educated members cut themselves off from the rest of the community. Sometimes they may try to pull up others, especially other family members. But the practice of caste norms by everyone else makes the process of “cutting off” difficult, especially when it comes to marriage and other social relationships. On a positive side, one may assume that even if a few get the benefit, others will follow, if for no other reason, but by example. A second plea put forward by many upper-caste people is that of the “creamy layer.” Many would say, “but such and such is of our class and has got the same facilities, so why they should get reservation?” While it is understandable that with education being a scarce resource in an overpopulated country like India, many lower-middle–class and upper-caste students would be frustrated, yet one has to both historically contextualize the reservation issue and also think in terms of the tremendous morale boost the creamy layer provide to the poorer and less privileged sections of their own community. With the 73rd amendment to the Constitution, reservation was brought to the local governance, that is, the statutory panchayats in the year 1991–92. As with all such measures, there was stiff resistance from the upper castes. In many places the scheduled-caste person elected as chairperson was not allowed to function or use the premises of the office building; at other places such a person was even killed or tortured by the powerful, yet over a period of time the benefits of such reservation are likely to be felt. As put forward by an educated member of the Dalits, ...it is fair to say that reservations have ensured the first step towards equalityaccess. This is most visible in the political arena, where legislators from reserved constituencies and panchayats are immediately able to access the layers of state power. (www.Indiatogether.com, April, 2004)

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Such thinking may be too optimistic as reservations may still not allow a Dalit so elected to exercise his/her options because the more powerful sections would not allow or would make the person obey their wishes. Not surprisingly, this ongoing situation gives rise to another argument used in favor of dismantling reservations, that is, “efficacy”: it is often argued by highercaste people that reservations are not working, so why not get rid of them? This argument misses the premise of affirmative action. Affirmative actions of state policy are intended to ensure that access to public opportunities is not hijacked by the same prejudices that may prevail in the private relations of civil society.... Anger at reservations is common, but such anger may be better channeled when it is targeted at the real problem...(the) reservation of opportunities by custom are(a) larger phenomenon than reservations for a limited number of official positions). (www.Indiatogether.com, April, 2004)

Dr Narandra Jadhav, principal advisor and chief economist of the Reserve Bank of India, in an interview in 2005, made a number of important points that are relevant here. Noting that many people claim that Dalits are being pampered too much, he discusses the devious ways in which data is manipulated to show that ...reservations are being met even though they are not. In the annual reports of public institutions we are supposed to give a statement, how many vacancies... were filled by reservations. The organizations rarely give the breakup of class I, Class II, class III and Class IV vacancies. So you will see that in the class IV category (peons and cleaners)...100% are filled, while in class I jobs, 10% or less are filled. But the average looks all right, when you don’t give this break up. (Interview by Subranamiam Vincent, conducted in Ithaca, New York, October 15, 2005, Indiatogether.org.)

Another important point raised by Dr Jadhav is: Why should reservations be denied to people in the private sector? Dalits feel that this whole privatization thing is being done to deny them jobs in the future....  I am severely criticised because on the one hand I am defending globalization and privatization, but I am also defending reservations...the notion that efficiency is more among Brahmins and less among SCs and STs is itself flawed...I am saying that talent is independently distributed and you just need to be open minded to recognize that if a person has a Brahmin name and inefficient, that person is seen as inefficient individual, but if a dalit is inefficient they blame the caste.

In April 2008, the Supreme Court of India passed a landmark judgment clearing the way for 27 percent quota for Other Backward Castes or OBCs as they

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are referred to. While passing this judgment, Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan commented, “Reservations provide that extra advantage to those persons who without such support can forever only dream of university education without ever being able to realize it. This advantage is necessary.” However, for the first time, the “creamy layer” was excluded from any advantage of reservation. It also recommended a review of the Backward Castes to be made every five years. There continues to be raging debate on this issue. While most people from reserved categories welcome this judgment, many are piqued at the exclusion of the “creamy layer.” All along the Dalits have maintained that caste is not a class phenomenon and cannot be judged on the basis of economic criteria. Caste primarily refers to social disabilities and it has been put on record that even the highest-placed persons from the untouchable castes, such as Babu Jagjivan Ram, would not attend social functions like marriages in order not to create an embarrassing situation for themselves and their hosts. Quite recently it was reported that when an upper-caste high court judge was allotted a room earlier occupied by a Dalit person of the same rank, he had the room purified with cow-dung and Ganga water. One may of course then turn around and say, and it has been said, that in that case what benefit will reservations provide? The answer lies in that at least it will take care of one aspect of life. Secondly, in the public domain, if a person holds a high position, he/she at least reaps the benefit of that office. Another argument given by the Dalits against exclusion of the creamy layer from reservation is the historical fact that upper castes have held their advantages over thousands of generations. Why should not the Dalits have their advantage over at least a few generations? The argument is that even if some of them have a good position, they have come up from poor and disadvantaged backgrounds. It will take them a few generations to match the advantages of the upper castes. In our opinion positive discrimination is only minimally effectual if the question of abject poverty, lack of nutrition and infrastructural facilities are not taken into account. What benefits of reservation can be got by a child suffering from chronic protein malnutrition or severe anemia? How can a child, who has to spend almost five to six hours a day only to get a bucket of water or has to work in the fields to support a family, study and pass an examination as well? Even when they do get admission many cannot pass or do well because of discrimination and humiliation at every step. And even when they do well, they are stigmatized as having done well only because of reservation. Many patients do not even want to consult a doctor if he/she has a Dalit name because they feel that person has got this position only by reservation and not by merit. As Channa (2005) points out, they are often referred to as “quota doctors.” Even a brilliant Dalit, who may have done well entirely on her own merit is

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not believed to have done so. In fact, many brilliant students of the untouchable communities feel that reservations have done them more harm than good for it has taken away their merit and replaced it with what people regard as “charity.” It certainly will take a few more decades to really transform the position of the Dalits and till then positive discrimination gives some, if not total, advantage.

DALITS AND GLOBALIZATION There is a divergence of opinion among Dalits regarding the effects of globalization on their position. In an essay published in this volume, Ramaiah is in favor of globalization because he feels that at least globalization, in principle, is a caste-free system of open markets, where individualism rather than group identity is given recognition. The demand of Dalits to introduce reservation in the private sector would of course go against this sentiment and this would be contradictory to the very advantage that Dalits were perceiving in an open system free from all prejudices. More Dalits, however, are against privatization and globalization, and their arguments are similar to even the non-Dalits (including global intellectuals) who critique neoliberalism as a form of neo-imperialism. The specific fear of the Dalits is that if more and more sectors are turned over to the private domain, the benefits that they were getting under reservation would be denied to them. Secondly, in a situation of open competition, few Dalits with their poor background and lack of elite education would be able to compete with the young people of affluent backgrounds, with smarter personalities and communication skills. Since most corporate sector jobs require personality characters, such as proper dressing, ability to communicate in a foreign language, at least English and social skills, few Dalits would fit into the required profile. In the government sector that is noncompetitive to a larger extent, such considerations may be set aside in favor of a degree and paper qualifications. Thus most Dalits from less affluent background (and this is the norm, not an exception) do not even have the confidence to apply for jobs in the private sector. Most of them shy away, saying that they “cannot speak English” or cannot dress in high fashion. The perceived advantage of globalization is the introduction of a very large number of jobs in the semi-skilled and medium-qualification sector. Thus while dalits may not qualify for jobs requiring public dealing, they are quite often employed in the technical sectors. This is not to say that there is any inherent inability of the Dalits to perform in the private sector, but simply that because of their class position, they do not have the necessary “sophistication.”

Conclusions

As of now, the debate regarding globalization is in an inconclusive stage. But one observation comes to mind that Dalits in different subject positions view the process differently. Thus, while the ones in better class position such as Ramaiah may perceive greater advantage of globalization, a poorer man, aspiring to get the job of a peon in the public sector under the reserved category may not feel the same.

Globalization and Rural Life The process of globalization may be creating new jobs, but in the rural areas and even in some pockets of the urban areas it is depriving the earlier service castes of their livelihoods by taking away their resource base and also making redundant the traditional knowledge that they may have acquired over many generations. The introduction of new technology and the transfer of land and resources to the urban sector such as building factories are taking away the livelihoods of many who had earlier been dependent on these resources. In West Bengal, which is one of the Left-run states of India, there was raging controversy and protest over the transfer of prime agricultural land to the industrial group of the TATA’s for the manufacture of a small car. In fact, the next similar project of the West Bengal government of transfer of agricultural land in Nandigram became such a violent issue that it had to be shelved, but the violence still continues unabated between supporters of the CPM-led Left front government and the people who want to save the land. Although such projects are not explicitly directed against the low castes, yet given the class/ caste nexus in Indian society, it is always the lower castes that form the bulk of the landless laborers and unskilled work force (depending upon traditional knowledge) that are the biggest sufferers. In West Bengal for example, the state was providing some compensation (inadequate by all means) to the persons who had land in their name. But the real sufferers would be the landless sharecroppers, most of who had been working on a word-of-mouth understanding with their employers and have no written documents to prove their rights to any compensation whatsoever. Women are also the ones to suffer in such situations for they often do not have any proven legal rights to land or jobs, although they may be supported by some resources and even by some households and so on, in the traditional setup. But when modernization comes up, the new system is based on written and legal documentation, which is rarely available with the illiterate lower castes and women.

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There is considerable regional and state-wise variation in the ways in which public policies are affecting small, marginal, semi-landless and landless households in rural areas. This also differs by cropping pattern, internal migration patterns, local political history, and state government policies. Mencher’s work (1978, 1980, 1985, 1988), looking at small-scale cultivators doing sustainable agriculture in South India, makes it abundantly clear that official policy is in many ways working against these groups. Most of the NGOs she has been working with focus on alternatives to the official agricultural policies of the Government of India, which are deeply influenced by the United States model of agriculture as promulgated by the United States agricultural universities—which incidentally were instrumental in setting up almost all of the existing agricultural universities in India. This model is suitable for large-scale agriculture where it is taken as an industry. It is quite different in India where agriculture is part of a peasant life guided by traditions and division of labor and resources largely caste-based. Moreover, age-old ecological wisdom has directed a judicial and conservative use of resources suitable in an overpopulated countryside where humans and animals have to coexist on scarce availability of land, water, and fodder. While agriculture is a state rather than a central government issue, chief ministers and in many places, state agricultural ministers have gone along with the US model as well. Even though the chief minister of Andhra Pradesh lost the elections because he wanted to get rid of 10,000 small farmers to create “modern farms,” that state is still largely supporting the better-off farmers despite the fact that Andhra has some of the most innovative NGO programs for poor and Dalit women in all of India (for example the Deccan Development Society and several other groups with headquarters in Hyderabad). Even in Kerala, where the Left has a history of great militancy on issues of land reform, and (in past) on health care, the present emphasis on agriculture is on growing crops for the export market, and not on increasing people’s food security and self-sufficiency. I was told by members of a Kerala NGO, as well as many other people in the state, that most of the middle-size farmers have given up planting rice. This has not only created severe ecological problems, such as lowering the water table, but because the women (especially in Wayanad District) have lost their work in paddy cultivation, many of them have been forced to sell themselves into prostitution or take work in the pornographic film industry in order to support themselves and their families. Since most of the scheduled caste and tribal population figure among the poorest of the poor, they are especially vulnerable to such government policies. The focus on tourism by the State government in Kerala does not improve the situation for the Dalits, but relegates them to irregular low-level employment.

Conclusions

Several Dalit academics have spoken about how in Kerala (considered to be a more Left-oriented state), problems of Dalits and Scheduled Tribes have been ignored by all of the political parties, ranging from Congress in its various forms to the CPI(M) (personal communication by Dr P. Sivanandan, CDS, Trivandrum). The role of the upper castes in the CPI(M) and CPI has historical precedents, which continue into the twenty-first century with leaders bearing the savarna (high caste) names (Salimkumar 1999). Even the SNDP movement of the Ezhava or Tiyya community did not much help the lower-ranking Dalit communities, though it did lead to their being allowed to wear better clothes. Joan Mencher recalls talking to a group of Tiyya women about the Sri Narayana Guru movement. They were quite proud of the fact that they were finally able to move among Nayars and Namboodri Brahman women at meetings and so on. However, when asked about Pulaya and Cheruman women, who are ranked lower, and the privileges granted to them, there was a blank. Their ideal of improvement was their moving up, but did not include treating those under them (the really low scheduled castes) as human beings. In the rural society, the caste/class division is reflected in the lowest-caste groups, the Dalits being largely landless. They bear the brunt of every natural and man-made calamity. Deprived of the control over the most valuable resource, namely land, they are usually also deprived of water and fodder. In most villages in India, there is a clear physical division that is very open to observation that the poorest and most inhospitable part of the village is given to the Dalits to live. A practiced eye can at once identify the area designated for the Dalits, it would be overcrowded, in one corner, farthest away from the water sources and from the fertile land. Yet there is no village in India that does not depend on Dalit labor for cultivation and for Dalit’s control over the evil forces of the universe for cure and control of diseases and bad luck. The deities controlling some of the most dreaded diseases like cholera and small pox are always under jurisdiction of the untouchables. The indispensability of the Dalits in the rural economy becomes clear in the statement made by a Brahman woman to Channa, while she was doing fieldwork in a village in Garhwal in northern India, Nowadays, rice cultivation in these areas is suffering a lot as most of the untouchables who we used to employ to cultivate our fields are getting an education. If you educate ‘these people’ who will do the work in our fields? Padhlikhkar sahib ban jayenge to kaam kaun karega? (If they become sahibs after getting an education, who will do our work?)

In fact she cited the unavailability of labor as one of the reasons for a decline in agricultural activities. Another trend observed in the rural areas is that more Dalit students have motivation to go for higher studies, if they get the opportunity, than upper-caste

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children of landowning families. The landowners know that they have something to fall upon and they also feel that because of reservation they may not get a job in government. But more Dalit children are interested in getting an education because they feel if they can do even a little better, there is a chance for them to get a good job. This is very much the situation in Garhwal, where the social disabilities of the scheduled castes are the least. However, where the disabilities are very high, the Dalits, even if motivated for studies, may not actually make it, like the dhobi children in Delhi, who are humiliated and almost forced to drop out of their classes. In the rural and sometimes even in urban areas, many children are unable to study because of reasons of being forced to support parents in their traditional work, looking after younger siblings, taking care of household duties and so on. In this sense also the entire project of reservations falls through, since it is applied only at the higher levels. There is very little input at the lower levels, in primary education, where the worst facilities are provided by the state for children of depressed families. If globalization can usher in better facilities that would be equally distributed in the entire society then it might do some good. In many parts of India, rural children are getting the benefit of computer technology, communication networks and other facilities like cellular phones. Yet such technological inputs minus the required social transformation that would rid people of deep-seated prejudices will hardly benefit those at the bottom. In most cases they tend to deepen already existing rifts. Technological inputs also tend to benefit more the already powerful. Like, women tend to get excluded from modern medical treatments because they are more expensive. New gadgets are rarely handed over to women and many women are getting out of job as new technologies are introduced into agriculture. Even more dangerous is the use of machines that tend to replace human labor. In a country where a majority of people eke out a living as laborers, especially those at the bottom, redundancy may sound the death knell for them. Another negative aspect of globalization is that more and more resources are diverted to projects that have little use for local consumers but are meant for a global commercial market. Many local knowledge systems are getting eroded and getting replaced only inadequately, with the result that not only are these specialists losing their status, the communities are also not getting benefit, neither of the modern nor of the traditional sector, most acutely visible in the healthcare but also in the traditional modes of ecological adaptations. Local resources are continuously being replaced or diverted for markets to which local people have no access. With the call for privatization of resources, many marginal people who were being supported by community resources, are left with no means of sustenance.

Conclusions

In many villages, there was always some resource that was of use for the very marginal people to survive; if only at a marginal level. As privatization and the transfer of land for SEZs gobble these up, many are just left to starve and most comprise of the poorest Dalit sections of the population. Another important issue that goes against globalization is that it leads to a breakdown of community relationships. As Channa had pointed out in her thesis (Channa 1985), the “biradari” or the intermarrying community played an immense role in the lives of the poor dhobis, and gave them psychological, emotional, and economic support. Within their own hamlets, within their own settings, even when badly treated, they had a place where they belonged (see Vasant Moon’s autobiography). Except when they were sold into debt bondage, they were able to give one another solace and support when needed, at times of grave illness, death, childbirth, and so on. The traditional village setup with its jajmani relationship was exploitative but here were always the benevolent landlords who would be extending a helping hand to the Dalits who worked for them. I remember visiting the Dalit area in one Tamil village after the drought of 1967. All of the older people had starved themselves so that the younger ones would have a chance to work and bring in money. I was struck by their pride in recounting how they had sacrificed their own well-being for their working-age sons and daughters. However, as more and more of their resources are being transferred to the upper sections of society, by the building of dams, cutting down forests and general urbanization, there is a threat to the very base on which the communities thrived. When there is nothing for them to survive on, many are forced to migrate to urban areas to work in factories that pay barely minimum wages. Numerous NGOs are working with Dalits to help them create a situation where they can have economically viable and personally satisfying lives in their villages, yet they are fighting an uphill struggle against tremendous mainstream forces. One NGO network leader from Tamil Nadu told me that while visiting Pune he had met a group of young Tamil workers who had come from rural areas to the city for work. He discovered that they were living 6–8 to a room and did not earn enough to bring their wives or children to live with them. Their only entertainment was the local cinema, or occasionally visiting local prostitutes. When they visited their villages they would come in a clean white shirt and trousers, but could not bring much to their families except for HIV/AIDS which they had picked up from prostitutes. This is one aspect of globalization that is being rapidly felt all over the rural countryside in India. Elsewhere in India, for example in Madhya Pradesh, where the Narmada dam has displaced a very large number of tribals and Dalits to benefit rich people in the cities of Maharashtra and Gujarat, these people have not only

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lost their resources they have lost their community life as well. There are many dam projects that have received less public attention than Narmada, but that nevertheless have negatively affected the lives of the local people, most often the Dalits and the tribals. They are the first to be displaced and although some kind of rehabilitation packages is always promised, delivery of such promises is more often in the breach. Since most of these people are either landless or have very little in their name, they land up getting next to nothing in compensation, but they lose the support structure that they may have enjoyed for centuries. Communities are scattered and even family members may land up in different places. The common and free resources like the water from forest streams, the berries and roots and herbs that were used for both food and medicine and the warmth of shared evenings together are lost and so are the traditional knowledge systems that were based upon these resources. The impoverishment of these people is not simply an economic matter but encompasses their entire culture and way of life. From thriving communities that had evolved effective modes of adaptation to their surroundings, they become maladapted and rootless, often driven to petty crimes. Even where people have tried to help them profit from their knowledge of traditional medicines, it has been extremely difficult to keep wealthy entrepreneurs and pharmaceutical companies from taking advantage of them. While globalization has led to a very small elite cadre of Dalits getting highly educated and obtaining important positions, for the vast majority it has not helped at all. When I visited the villages where I had done fieldwork in the 1960s and 1970s, in 2007, I found that things had become much worse than what they were before, for most of the Dalits. For example, Dalit women in a group of neighboring Tamil Nadu villages had started to grow organic vegetables on unused village land (what social scientists and government documents call “common lands or waste lands”). In two or three villages the women’s selfhelp groups had invested in pump-sets to water their fields, and had started to plant food-producing tress that would protect the water table. Just as they had started to become self-reliant and had also considerably ecologically improved the area, the chief minister of the state decided that all this land, so-called stateowned, should be given over to companies. Industrialization rather than sustainable agriculture has become the new mantra for development. Such so-called development is particularly biased against women since they lose mutual support as they are turned into individual factory labor rather than community-based work groups engaged in traditional occupations like agriculture, horticulture, or even craft-making. When young girls go to work as factory labor, they are subjected to sexual harassment. Moreover since most of the work they get is in the unorganized sector, they may be turned out at any point of

Conclusions

time and may have no other recourse but to turn to prostitution. Obviously, changes today vary by group, by place and a large number of other factors, but it is obvious that the loss of community has hurt the women more than men, though the men too are suffering.

ISSUES OF GENDER The intersection of caste and gender has become important as these form the two axis of age-old forms of discrimination based on the arbitrary assumptions of “inherent and immutable” disabilities along with the third such form of discrimination, namely race. They condemn a person at birth to a life of discrimination irrespective of whatever other qualities a person may have. Yet, as pointed out by many scholars, Dalit women do not always lead a passive life of misery and domination. In spite of their subjugation by society at large and by their own poverty and internal patriarchy, they still emerge as “strong,” self– willed, and able to enjoy life on their own terms (see excerpts from Bama in this volume). Many Dalit women like Meenakshi Moon, Bama, and so on have come out with their own autobiographical or fictional biographical materials. The strength of Dalit women was made an issue even by Dalit leaders as early as Jyotiba Phule and even by Ambedkar. In their criticism of upper castes, the Dalit leadership had included the brahmanical patriarchy and the relative greater freedom of their own women. Yet, not everywhere the Dalit girls got a fair deal even from their own communities, like the practice of dedicating girls for temple service in the South or the practice of selling off their own women by Dalit men as reported by Kolenda. From around the mid-1960s, more and more material about and by Dalit women has been published. Kapadia (1993) has come out with an excellent ethnographic account of Dalit women of the Paliyan caste in Tamil Nadu. Based on anthropological field research, she has brought out the multiple facets of the lives of these women that complement much of what Bama has to say (see this volume). A very interesting observation made by Kapadia is how the non-Brahmans interpret the South Indian kinship system differently from the Brahmans, although both follow the norms of cross-cousin marriage. While Brahmans give it a hypergamous tilt by saying that a boy always marries the daughter of his father’s sister and by posing a male ego in defining marriage, the non-brahmins give it a sense of equality by always talking in terms of a female ego, by saying that a girl married her mother’s brother’s son. So in the case of the Brahmans it is the paternal relative, the father’s sister, who is given importance and in case of non-Brahmans, it is the maternal relative, the mother’s brother who becomes the wife-receiver, hence of superior rank according to Hindu norms. The latter

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position balances the patriarchy by giving more importance to the mother than the father. Thus most ethnographies (see Searle-Chatterjee 1981) have described the Dalit families as more equitable in terms of distribution of power. To understand the position of Dalit women, we have to situate them in relation to the men of their own caste group and the men of upper-caste groups. It is a paradox that while Dalit women enjoy relatively higher position with respect to the men of their own group, they are forever open to exploitation by men of the upper castes. Even Manu, the lawgiver, had sanctioned the access of all men from the upper castes to women of castes lower than their own, which completely excluded the men of the lowest rung to have monopoly even on the women of their own group. Even the most avid practitioners of caste pollution rules do not include sexual access; one of the most insidious dimension of the practice of untouchability leaves a woman’s body open to violation while forbidding her touch in any other form. One of the more shocking true incidences related by a Bengali Brahman woman goes like this. She narrated that sometime in her youth (around the 1940s) she was sharing a room with a Nayar girl from Kerala. One day this girl asked her, “My father is coming to see me, will you cook his dinner? You are a Brahmin,” “But why can you not cook for your father?” Because I am a Nayar and he is a Namboodri Brahmin. Closer in time is the case of Bhanwari Devi, an untouchable woman gangraped by several high caste men; initially let off by a district judge because he ruled that upper-caste men “would never touch an untouchable.” Women’s bodies have forever been the sites for contestation of power by men of different groups. The ravaging of the bodies of untouchable women, whether as blatant rape or institutionalized sexual access, like in Devadasi system’ is directed more at the men of these groups who are powerless to protect their women. It is the emasculation of Dalit men; that is the desired end and reflects also the “double standards” of upper-caste men, who need to control the sexuality of their own women, reducing them to anemic and passive “domestic” devis, while enjoying what they consider as the unbridled sexuality of the lower-caste women (Channa 2007). Such power play is what is reflected in the rape of women of “other groups” in case of war and conflict and also in the symbolic “rape of nations.” The men of Dalit groups, devoid of the power, economic as well as political/social enjoyed by upper-caste men, remain either on equal terms with their women as expression of a “shared oppression” or may take out their anger and frustration in domestic violence (see Bama in this volume). But Dalit women are certainly having more economic power, being equal earners with their men, and when time comes may come out stronger. There have been observations made by fieldworkers evaluating the implementation of the 73rd Amendment,

Conclusions

that Dalit women, when elected to office, showed more individuality and control than upper-caste women, who often remained in the shadows of their husbands. In his review of the State of Panchayats (2006–2007) the minister for Panchayati Raj, Mr Mani Shankar Aiyar stated (Mohapatra, 2008), Remarkably, the actual occupancy of seats by women belonging to these categories (Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes) substantially exceeds the percentage of reservation. For instance, in Karnataka, 46 percent and 65 percent respectively of SCs and STs elected to panchayats are women. Can there be a more telling evidence of women’s empowerment through Panchayati Raj, particularly of the poor and downtrodden?

Of course in his propagation of state propaganda, what the minister could not analyze was that these figures only represent already existing social conditions. It is because women already enjoy more power in these communities is that they can get elected to office and when in office operate independently. Of course there are regional and cultural differences in this respect also and as we all understand, Dalits are not a culturally homogenous group. But it is not to be doubted that Dalit women, used to toil and hardship and accustomed to taking decisions in their domestic affairs, come out much more strong in the public domain than their upper-caste counterparts, weighed down by centuries of “genteel” upbringing. In 1999, when the national Campaign for Dalit Human Rights was launched, one of the issues raised was the treatment of Dalit women (see National Campaign Manifesto, Dalit Human rights, Secundrabad, 1998). To a large extent this was a direct result of the protests raised by the women themselves at the Beijing Conference in 1995. It was inspiring to see the march for equal rights for Dalit women at that conference and to recognize that this was the first international conference where the issue was being raised (see the manifesto presented by Ruth Manorama in this volume). Other international delegates present at the venue also saw the march as the beginning of an international movement against the oppression of women (personal communication by Faye Harrison). At every national and international forum of Dalit protest, women play an important role. Moon’s autobiography too tells of Dalit women who were in the forefront of the labor movement in Maharshtra, even in the early part of the last century. Radhabai Kamble who was a worker in a cotton mill came to the forefront as a labor leader in the 1920s. She gave evidence before the Royal Commission of labor in 1929 (see Meenakshi Moon and Urmila Pawar 2005). At the WCAR women were seen playing a key role at the meetings and in the marches. All over India, Dalit women have had a similar experience; they have contributed immensely to the economy and have suffered exploitation and humiliation

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in return. Even in a relatively “enlightened” state like Kerala, that has the highest rate of literacy and the best sex ratio favoring women, the experience of Dalit women has not been any exception to the general norm (see Yasudasan 1999). Kerala has seen a large-scale conversion of Dalits to Christianity and many have had the benefit of missionary education, yet they still figure among the poorest in the region and have their villages away from the main roads and centers of power. Although India has seen many movements directed toward betterment of women, many of them during the colonial period, yet any social reformer has rarely addressed the problems specific to Dalit women unless they were themselves Dalits, like Ambedkar. In order to maintain the dignity of their communities, the sexual exploitation of their women has never been publicly acknowledged. Yet in literature, poetry and cinema, the theme has been portrayed powerfully. Indian feminism, spearheaded by westernized and upperclass women, too ignored largely the Dalit issue, being entangled in their own concerns, largely Western in nature. Rao (2003: 30) rightly puts it, “Exposing the limits of feminism’s capacity to represent women as somehow unmarked or disembodied from their caste or religious identity stands to throw feminism (and its conception of gender identity) into crises.” The upper-caste women’s goal of sexual liberty, for example, would make a mockery of the experiences of women sexually exploited for centuries. More and more literature about Dalit women is beginning to appear, written by educated Dalits, Indian social scientists, and foreign scholars. One of the most impactful of these writings is a life history of an elderly Tamil woman, authored by Viramma, Josiane Racine (a higher-caste Tamil woman) and JeanLuc Racine, originally in French, later translated into English. Viramma’s story clearly shows the sources of self-esteem, knowledge of the environment, of rituals, ceremonies and of people, and how despite not being their own masters they had a kind of strength which their daughters and daughters-in-law have failed to acquire. The following passage is illustrative. In Viramma’s generation, Paraiyar culture was totally shared by men and women alike. Today, the quest for a better economic fate and a less degraded social status calls for abandoning the very cultural practices which enriched Viramma’s character and wit and gave her freedom of speech…. But women engaged elsewhere in Dalit militant groups (or who have established themselves in the mainstream), combine the quest for emancipation with a renovated freedom of speech, perhaps more socio-political in character than cultural in content. (2005: 318)

In her work on the dhobis, Channa finds the same trend—that while they were still engaged in the traditional occupation, the women, by virtue of their important role in the process of washing and ironing clothes, were greatly

Conclusions

valued within the domestic economy. But as men began to get educated, they began to opt for more ornamental brides and also began to claim dowry. A Dalit man working in an office would not want a wife who would be working in a traditional occupation; thus she would be reduced to the role of a housewife and confined to the house. Moreover, as pointed out also by Kapadia, in their upward mobility, the Dalits often tend to copy the trends they see among the upper castes, and giving dowry is one of them. It is also considered more respectable if the women follow the model of demureness expected of uppercaste women. A central irony characterizes changes in Non-Brahmin marriage today: Those upwardly mobile salaried groups (within larger caste-groups) that marry in a ‘modern’ manner, for money and status rather than ‘for love of kin’, are precisely the social groups in which Non-Brahmin women are losing their traditionally high status. In rural Tamilnadu today, consequently, ‘modernity’ (nagarikam) and urbanization are not leading to the emancipation of women from patriarchal norms or to more options being made available to them but to precisely the opposite. (Kapadia, 1995: 46)

In fact when the upper castes tend to speak derogatorily about the low castes, one example is always given as to how the lower-caste women are aggressive, independent, and do not show deference to men. What some may see as a virtue, is relegated to lack of “refinement” by another set of people. Caste being something that draws a line between “us” and “them,” women tend to be taken as always (Unnitthan–Kumar 1997) as “boundary-markers”; and the strength of women has never been appreciated in any hierarchical culture. A different future for men and women in Indian society had been dreamt of by Periyar through his concept of “Self-respect Marriage” that had, “the imaginings of a different future, one where issues of caste, gender and sexuality could be reconfigured and rearranged for the mutual respect of men and women” (Rao 2003: 26). As it stands, the cultural stereotypes regarding Dalit women are penetrated into Indian society and intercaste marriages, especially marriages between upper castes and lower castes, are few and far between. Not only that in the rural areas such a marriage may still cal for stringent social measures.

CASTE AND THE INDIAN DIASPORA A sign of modernity can be seen in the many Indians settled abroad, what in India are referred to as NRIs (Nonresident Indians) and in sociological terms as

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diaspora. Along with other communities, a fairly large number of Dalits too have made it abroad. I reside in New York, and find that the way in which Dalits are treated and looked upon by other Indians in the diaspora shows considerable continuity with the situation in the subcontinent. While Dr Ambedkar’s birthday is celebrated annually at the Indian Consulate in New York, the only time I ever saw higher-caste Hindus attending this function was when Dr Narayanan (who belonged to an untouchable community in Kerala) was the Indian Ambassador, and he himself attended the function. While a number of higher-caste Indians attended Dr Narayanan’s talk, they disappeared afterwards when an informal reception was held with food provided by Ambedkar’s followers. Recently, there has been a well-publicized debate in California on the issue of how Hinduism should be depicted in school history textbook. According to the Wall Street Journal: History books are the biggest battlegrounds and groups vie for changes in elementary and secondary schools that cast their faith in a better light…. Hindu groups, in particular, have swamped California authorities with proposed revisions, which would delete or soften references to polytheism, the caste system and the inferior status of women in ancient India…. But then a strong objection to such changes arrived form a groups of U.S. scholars led by a Harvard Professor, Michael Witzel…according to Madhav Deshpande, a Sanskrit professor at the university of Michigan who is Hindu, Hinduism is polytheistic and linked to the caste system…. The (Hindu Education) Foundation’s contention that the caste system developed separately from Hinduism is incorrect because “in ancient texts there is no distinction between the religious and non-religious domains of life.”… Other Hindu groups…including members of the “untouchable” castes-entered the fray on Dr. Witzel’s behalf. The Dalit Freedom Network, an advocacy group for untouchables, wrote to the (California) education board that the proposed Vedic and Hindu Foundation changes reflect a view of Indian history that softens…the violent truth of caste based discriminations in India. (Golden 2006: AI)

While the California Department of Education ultimately accepted the U.S. Scholars’ recommendations, rejecting the changes proposed by the Hindu fundamentalist groups, that decision was challenged in a court case in the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of California, brought by the Hindu American Foundation as well as a brand new organization known as California Parents for the Equalization of Educational Materials (CAPEEM). While a large number of scholars in the United States, of Indian and other ancestry, have submitted an amicus curiae letter supporting the California Education Department’s decision, it is clear that such issues will continue to come up elsewhere, including other states (such as Texas) in the United States. Most of this results from the influence of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) among the Indian diaspora.

Conclusions

Many Indians staying in the USA tend to develop even more regressive values regarding Hinduism and caste practices than those staying in India because of their paranoia of “losing their culture.” Many parents send their children to RSS-backed organizations simply to “learn Hindi” and Indian customs but in turn the children get indoctrinated into hard-core religious fundamentalism. There is also the strong need to “keep to one’s community” and this further leads to Indians forming subgroups of culture that includes caste-based divisions. It is certain that westernization in any form, either when the Europeans came to India or when the Indians have now gone to settle in Western countries could bring about any fundamental changes in caste values. Although to a limited extent Indians may pretend that they do not care about caste while interacting with their Western friends and colleagues, at home and with their own community, caste still plays a fundamental role in defining the world of the Hindus. Most Hindus understand perfectly the symbolic manner in which caste is to be interpreted even when one is not talking about it. Like, occasionally one sees an advertisement for a bride or bridegroom in India or abroad or any other Indian weekly paper that says “caste/religion no bar.” Many higher-caste people take such advertisements to mean that the advertiser is either a low-caste person, or someone who has some fundamental disability, such as a divorcee or a physical handicap. Some may even go to the extent of writing, “caste no bar but scheduled castes please excuse.” Ultimately, however, one has to look elsewhere to understand why, and the answer perhaps lies in looking at another fundamental form of human exclusion, namely race.

CASTE, RACE, AND IDENTITY Caste, gender, and race share one thing in common—that they convert a socially conferred attribute to a “natural difference.” The reason why most Hindus cannot dissociate themselves and others from a caste identity is that they perceive of caste not as a social but as a “species” difference. Social constructionist theory raises some fundamental questions regarding “difference” that is demonstrable, not real but constructed; “who benefits? Whose interests are being furthered or protected by seeing the world this way than that?” (Munro 1997: 4). It is obvious that the caste system has persisted because it serves the interests of a majority of people or at least a majority of people who matter. However, this is not to say that those who believe in it, even from the top, do not subscribe to the views themselves and do not make sacrifices to follow the rules. The stringent norms that Brahmans impose on themselves are

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quite torturous to say the least. Channa, while doing fieldwork in a Haryana village, was told by Brahman women that, Our children remain hungry and thirsty all the time they attend school. They cannot drink water in school for caste norms are not imposed there and they are not sure that untouchable children are not drinking from the same taps. They cannot eat also because they share the class room space with untouchables.

Caste is best explained by the constitution of “jati” as explained by Inden. The most fundamental difference between caste and class is that in “jati” system there is no separation of the sacred from the secular. Thus material body and the non-material components that constitute the body, like occupation, the mode of worship, and so on cannot be separated. Thus the jati is embodied in the physical body that is in turn constituted of the earth where one is born, the food that one eats and the mantras that one chants. Thus while caste is a vague term, not indigenous, the term “jati” spells out clear regional and occupational differences. Thus a Brahman who chants the Vedas is different from a Brahman who performs rituals, and from a Brahmin who makes genealogies, and these do not intermarry. A Brahman born in Kashmir is different from a Brahman born in Gujarat and these too may not intermarry. A Brahman worshipping Shiva is different from a Brahman worshipping Vishnu and these too may not intermarry. Thus the bodily substances of the “jatis” differ fundamentally and do not match; therefore intermarriage produces inferior offspring. But the social interpretation is obviously that intermarriage obliterates the boundaries between the groups and they will cease to exist. But “differences” do not matter in themselves; they matter only in relation to each other. “In the fall of a fundamental approach to knowledge, we have witnessed a collapse in the stabilities produced by ‘hierarchy’ and are now experiencing a return to the ambiguities of ‘interaction’” (Munro 1997: 10). More than anywhere else, this principle makes itself manifest in caste relationships. To survive, the upper castes need the lower castes, for their purity can only be maintained by the impurity of the lower castes. The one reason why the lower castes are always more ready to challenge and leave the caste system is that they need it much less than the upper castes. For them it was at best only an economic security. As soon as economic alternatives were available, they challenged the system, historically evident in the rise of the Mahar movement in the wake of industrialization of the Maharashtra region (see Omvedt 1994). But for the upper castes, the collapse of the caste system would mean a fundamental shift in their own identity as “superior” beings. If an upper caste had to pick up night soil, wash menstrual clothes of others, skin animals and make leather goods, their fundamental body substance would change (that is

Conclusions

what they believe). Thus the most fundamental changes in caste system can only come about when this dependence is broken, like in the Sulabh movement of providing flush toilets in all public places that are hygienically maintained and do not require the demeaning and inhuman performances expected of the scavengers in the earlier system. Yet as the experience of Channa (1996) indicated, even when the economic dependency is broken, as in the case of the Meghwals of a village Ridmalsar in Bikaner, Rajasthan, the social interactions need not change dramatically. Ridmalsar contained within it a ready division of labor in which resources were separated from skills. Raw material, wool in this case, was provided by the other castes and Meghawals did the weaving. They were fully dependant upon the propertied castes for the supply of raw material and the finished products were also taken by them. There was no avenue for them to expand the marketability of their products. But the dependency relation changed with the advent of the Khadi Gramodyoga. The latter provided the traditional weavers with a regular employment. Raw material also came from the organization, and thus the relations started changing. The caste was linked to the open market, which provided an almost unlimited scope for expanding the horizon of one’s skills. The cyclic relationship of resource and the finished product in which the Meghwals were tied to the dominant castes was broken. The Khadi Gramodyoga, by both supplying the raw materials and marketing the finished products, changed the economic relations of the village. Has the upliftment in the economic status of the people changed their social status? Perhaps not. The practice of untouchability is not as marked as it used to be earlier but still the Meghwals are treated as low. In most villages of Rajasthan they are not permitted to draw water from the wells used by the upper castes. The upper castes always reacted very violently to any attempts by the Meghwals to show their equality. It is the same in almost every case. Most people, even urban and educated ones, want that the Dalits must “keep to their own place.” Thus the violence of caste is not necessarily in the form of open physical violence, it exists at an insidious level, expresses itself in many symbolic forms, for like race, it has invaded and colonized the minds of most people whose boundaries of identities cannot see beyond caste. One of the ways in which human rights are continuously violated is to deny that violation exists. The denial of discrimination and the assertion that race and caste are prejudicial to the development of civil society is widespread and stands in the way of removal of such prejudices, for then they become invisible. If one thinks that atrocity on the Dalits is a past phenomenon, just read about a report of a Dalit wedding that took place in the year 2008. A marriage procession of a Dalit bridegroom had to take place under heavy police guard!

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By closing our eyes to a phenomenon, we are parties to its perpetuation, for then it will never become a discourse but continue to exist innocuously at the level of the social subconscious. In this volume, by bringing forth some of the experiences and points of view of those at the bottom, we hope to create an awareness that caste is not inscribed in bodies but in the minds of the people. It is not something that we carry in our blood and flesh but something that has been inscribed socially and like all other social phenomenon, is capable of transformation. Historicization of caste by eminent scholars such as Romilla Thapar (1992) and D.D. Kosambiwa toward this end and so of course all other sociological analysis. But perhaps a look at hard reality rather than abstract theory is required for a change of mind. One must agree with Rege (2003: 90), “‘Experience’ thus becomes the base for personal politics as well as the only reliable methodological tool for defining oppression.” It only needs a discovery, namely that it is not real but a fictional attribute to which some people have ascribed a sacred reality for caste to evaporate, but then it may still take a very long time to unravel what has taken centuries to knit. It is too complex; manystranded and deeply ingrained to go away just like that. But we will wait!

REFERENCES Channa, Subhadra Mitra. 2007. The “Ideal Indian Woman”: Social imagination and lived realities. In Recent Studies on Indian Women, eds Kamal K. Mishra and Janet Lowry, 37–53. Jaipur: Rawat Publications. ———. 1996. Indian peasantry: Some analytical issues. In Peasants in Indian history, ed. V.K. Thakur, 51–62. Ranchi: Janaki Prakashan. ———. 2004. Globalization and modernity in India: A gendered critique. Urban Anthropology 33 (1): 37–71. ———. 2005. Metaphors of race and caste based discriminations against dalits and dalit women in India. In Resisting racism and xenophobia: Global perspectives on race, gender, and human rights, ed. Faye Harrison, 49–66. Walnut Creek, CA: Alta Mira Press. Chatterjee, Partha. 1993. The nation and its fragments. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Golden, Daniel. 2006. New battle ground in Text book wars: Religion in history. The Wall Street Journal. January 25. Hocart, A.M. 1950. Caste: A comparative study. London: Meuthen. Inden, Ronald B. 1976. Marriage and rank in Bengali culture: A history of caste and clan in middle period Bengal. Berkeley: University of California Press. Kannabiran, Vasanth and Kalpana Kannabiran. 2003. Citizenship and its discontent: A political history of women in Andhra. In Women of India: Colonial and post-colonial periods, ed. Bharati Ray, 564–83. New Delhi: SAGE Publications. Kapadia, Karin. 1995. Siva and her sisters: Gender, caste, and class in rural South India. Boulder, CA: Westview Press.

Conclusions

Mencher, Joan P. 1978. Agriculture and social structure in Tamil Nadu. Delhi: Allied Publishers. ———. 1980. The lessons and non-lessons of Kerala: Agricultural labourers and poverty. Economic and Political Weekly 15 (43): 1781–83. ———. 1988. Women’s work and poverty: Women’s contribution to household maintenance in South India. In A home divided: Women and income in the third world, eds D. Dwyer and J. Bruce, 99–119. Stanford: Stanford University Press. ———. 1985. Landless women agricultural laborers in India. In IRRI, Women in rice farming. Aldershot, England: Gower. Mendelsohn, Oliver and MarikaVicziany. 1998. The untouchables: Subordination, poverty and the state in modern India. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mohapatra, Satyen. 2008. Hindustan Times, April 25. New Delhi. Moon, Meenakshi and Urmila Pawar. 2003. We made history, too: Women in the early untouchable liberation movement. In Gender and Caste, ed. Anupama Rao, 48–56. New Delhi: Kali for Women. Moon, Vasant. 2001. Growing up untouchable in India: A dalit autobiography. Tr. (from Marathi) Gail Omvedt. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Munro, Rolland. 1997. Ideas of difference: Stability, social spaces and labour of division. In Ideas of difference, eds Kevin Heatherington and Rolland Munro, 3–24. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Omvedt, Gail. 1994. Dalits and the democratic revolution: Dr. Ambedkar and the dalit movement in colonial India. London: SAGE Publications. Rao, Anupama. 2003. Introduction. In Gender and caste, ed. Anupama Rao, 1–47. New Delhi: Kali for Women. Rege, Sharmila. 2003. A dalit feminist standpoint. In Gender and caste, ed. Anupama Rao, 90–101. New Delhi: Kali for Women. Salimkumar, C. 1999. Impact of approaches to studying and achievement motivation on achievement in Biology in relation with intelligence. Progress of Education 74 (3): 52–54. Searle-Chatterjee, Mary. 1981. Reversible sex roles: The special case of Benares sweepers. Oxford: Pergamon Press. Thapar, Romilla. 1992. Interpreting early India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Unnithan-Kumar, Maya. 1997. Identity, gender and poverty: New perspectives on caste and tribe in Rajasthan. Oxford: Berghahn Books. Viramma, Josiane Racine, and Jean-Luc Racine. 2005. Viramma, life of an untouchable. London: Verso. Yeasudasan, T.M. 1999. The poetic of integration and the politics of representation, and Ambedkarian reflection of fiction Keralam (Unpublished).

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About the Editors and Contributors EDITORS Subhadra Mitra Channa did her Ph.D. in Social Anthropology from the Department of Anthropology, Delhi University. She is presently a professor at the Department of Anthropology, University of Delhi. She has been a Fulbright Visiting Lecturer to the Auburn University, USA in 2003, a Visiting Professor to the Maison de Sciences l’Homme in Paris and at many Indian universities. She was the President of the Indian Anthropological Association for five years and has been the editor of the Journal of Indian Anthropologist, since 2000. She was a Scholar-in-Residence, for the teaching year 2008–2009, under the Fulbright programme at the University of South Carolina, USA, where she taught among other courses, one on Ethnicity and Race. She is also the Chair of the Commission on the Anthropology of Women, an international body and part of the International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences (IUAES). She was earlier Co-Chair along with Professor Faye Harrison (Chair) up to 2009. Her research interests focus largely on Dalits, gender, religion and cosmology, world view, and identity. Joan P. Mencher retired as Professor of Anthropology from the City University of New York’s Graduate Center, and Lehman College of the City University of New York. She is currently the Chair of an NGO called The Second Chance Foundation (TSCF), which works to support rural grassroots organizations in India and the United States which work with poor and small farmers on issues of sustainable agriculture. She has worked extensively in South India on issues of ecology, caste, land reform, agriculture, women, and related issues over the last half century, and has published widely both in the United States and in India on all of these subjects.

CONTRIBUTORS G. Aloysius has been a senior research scholar at the Academy of Third World Studies at the Jamia Islamia Islamia, New Delhi. He is an independent researcher and writer of repute.

About the Editors and Contributors

Bama is a well-known Dalit woman writer. Saurabh Dube is Professor of Social History at the University of Mexico. Walter Fernandes was the director of Indian Social Institute, Lodhi Estate. He ran a Jesuit institution in Kohima and is now running a research institute in Guwahati called the North Eastern Social Research Centre. Kalpana Kannabiran is a feminist writer and activist. Kalpana is the founder member of Asmita Resource Centre for Women, Hyderabad along with Vasanth Kannabiran. She is at present a senior Associate Professor at the National Academy of Legal Studies and Research, University of Law, Hyderabad. Vasanth Kannabiran is a feminist poet and worked on gender and development. She has been a teacher of English literature and co-author of We Were Making History and co-editor of Sarihaddulu Leni Sandhyalu with Kalpana Kannabiran. Karin Kapadia is an anthropologist who was at the London School of Economics and Social Sciences and was a Gender Advisor with the World Bank. She was an associate of the South Asian Studies Center, Oxford University and is now an independent scholar living in India. G.K. Karanth is Professor of Sociology, Head, Center for the Study of Social Change and Development, Institute for Social and Economic Change, Nagarbhavi, Bangalore. Ruth Manorama is a prominent woman Dalit activist who in 2005 was one of the 1,000 nominees for 1,000 women for the Nobel Peace Prize. She is the Founder Director of National Federation of Dalit Women. James Massey is a minister in the Church of North India and a former member of the National Commission for Minorities. P. Sanal Mohan was a fellow at the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta and is now Associate Professor at the School of Social Sciences, Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam. Vasant Moon was a well-known Ambedkarite scholar and Dalit activist holding a senior Indian Administrative position in the Government of India. He is no more.

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Badri Narayan is Professor of Social History and Anthropology at Govind Ballabh Pant Institute, Jhushi, Allahabad. He is also in charge of Manav Vikas Sanghrahalaya and Dalit Resource Centre, placed within the Institute. J.J. Pallath is the former Jesuit priest and well-known scholar and Director of Samskriti (Institute of Cultural Research and Action), Pariyaram, Kannur, Kerala. Nandu Ram (now retired) was Professor, Centre for the Study of Social Systems, J.N.U. and also holding Ambedkar Chair in Sociology. He was formerly Chair of the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences and Director General of Ambedkar Institute of Social Research, Madhya Pradesh. A. Ramaiah is Professor of Sociology at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences and presently also Director of the Centre for Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policy. He was also a Fulbright scholar. Shyamlal (now retired) was Professor of Sociology and former Vice Chancellor of Jaipur University.

Index abstract intellectualist view of caste, xxv Acharis, 375 Adi-Dravidas, 240 Advaita, 210 agrestic servitude in Tamil Nadu, 55 Ambedkar, B.R., xvi–xvii, xxvi–xxvii, xxxii, 23, 37, 140 ideology, 47–48 on Indian society, 37–38 Ambedkar Jayanti (birthday) processions, 39 Anglo-Indians, 75 animal sacrifice, xxi Annihilation of Caste, The, 26 antipoverty schemes, 144 Aryan invasion, xxiii Aryan race, xxvi Arya Samaj, 353 Arya Samaj movement, 41, 127 Asprashyeekaran (downward mobility), process of, xxvii, 116–118 after eating or having sexual intercourse with a member of depressed classes, 122 Bairwa caste, conversion to, 118 Balahi caste, conversion to, 117–118 Bhangis of Bombay, 125–131 Chamar caste, conversion to, 117 Chamars, Balais, Bhambis, and Meghwals of Rajasthan, 124–125 converting to Bhakti sects, 121 due to foreign invasions and local waves of conquest, 123 due to illicit relations of low castes, 122 due to political system of pre-British India, 121 of high castes in ancient and medieval India, 119 Mahar caste, conversion to, 118

motivating factors in, 118–128 occupational demand and economic dimension, 122 outcasting and, 119–120 of Rajputs, 123–124 social degradation of Inda Rajputs, 120 trends, 131 atrocities bottom-up perspective, 37–38 committed on the Jatavs, 39 committed on the Scheduled Castes, 36 in conflicts between scheduled and non-scheduled castes, 35–36 explanations of, 36 incidents of, 35–36 trauma of, 42–46 as violence, 36 At the Bottom of Indian Society: The Harijans and Other Low Castes, 120 Ayyankali, 231

Bahujan Samaj Party, xxiii, xxxii Bayley, Susan, xx bhadralok community, xx Bhakti cults, 121, 403 Bhangiization, 125–128 in government jobs, 128–131 motivating factors in, 129–131 in nagarpalikas in Jodhpur, 128 in Northern Railway Workshop, Jodhpur, 129 Bhatias/Banias, 137 Bhumihars, xxxi, 316 body language, cultural prescription of, xxiii Bordieu, Pierre, xxii Bose, S.C., 122 Brahmin–Parayar social standoff, 211

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Briggs, G.W., 122–123 British India, untouchability in, 72–73 Buddhism, xxix, xxvii, 38, 208–209 Tamil, 209–212 Buddhist socioreligious system, 40 Caironi, Fr, 306 California Parents for the Equalization of Educational Materials (CAPEEM), 422 caste based oppression, 287, 292–293, 318, 336, 402 defined, 421, 423–424 discrimination, xvi, 42, 75, 139, 215–217, 311, 314, 379–380, 384 discriminations, xvi, xxii distinctions in central Kerala, 101 evolution into class, 396–397 “us” and “them”, 421 violence, xxii–xxiv. See also atrocities; upper-caste violence Chakkilis, 54 Chakraborty, Ramakant, xx Chamars, 122–124, 341 cheris, 55 Chettiars, 137 Chirakkal Mission, 306 Chuharmal, story of, 316–317 narrative context and contesting claims, 320–327 Chuharmal song, 320 civil society, xxxvi class, exclusion of, 25 class consciousness, 26, 110 Commissioner for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, 36 Common Minimum Programme (CMP) of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), 389 Communist ideology, 102 Communist Party of India, 23 Constitutional safeguards, xxiv conversions. See Asprashyeekaran (downward mobility), process of; Yohannan, Poyikayil

cultural arbitrariness, xxii Culture of silence, 259 Current Anthropology, xix Dalit identities, 391–394, xxxii feminism, xxxiii–xxxiv between “Harijan” and Dalit, xxxii political, 403–406, xxxii Dalit movement, 72 Mahar movement, Nagpur, 297–305 Dalit Panthers, 38 Dalits approaches to economic development and empowerment, 139–144 change in upper castes’ attitude towards, 148–150 Christianity and, 228–231 defined, 256 employment in the British establishments, 136 experience of oppression, 37–38 exploitation of, 138 globalization and, 410–417 in India today, 201 in Old Testament, 202–207 participation in the decision-making process, 149 plight of, 257 possibilities of optimally using globalization, 150–151 public hearing on atrocities on, 257–258 resistance, 391–394 settled abroad, 422–423 situation in rural and urban areas, 26–27 state’s employment opportunities, 145–146 as teachers in Social Science and Science faculty in universities, 146 victims of globalization or state’s development initiatives, 146–148 voice against, 257 worldview and values, 182–183 Dalit Sangharsh Samiti (DSS), 383 Dalit scholarship, xviii–xix Dalit-subalterns, 208–209

Index

Buddhist identity as emancipation, 209–213 communities, 209 as “depressed classes”, 215–216 identity in modernity, 218 subjectivity and agency, 217–218 Dalit women, 417–422 discrimination against, xxxiii, 258, 261– 263, 265 excerpts from Sangati by Bama, 267–282 initiative towards emancipation of, 259–260 in liberation, demands of, 260–261 status of, 76–77, 258–259 Dalit writers, xxvii Dalit youth, 286, xxxv, xxxvi Deliege, Robert, 360–363, 365–367, xviii de-Sanskritization. See Asprashyeekaran (downward mobility), process of dharma, xvii, 20, 25, 91 dhobi katras (Lutyen’s Delhi), fieldwork at, 172 being poor and marginalized, complaints on, 176–177 concept of honor or izzat, 173 Dalit movement and, 182–183 Hindu values, 180–182 kinship relation, 177 older and younger generations, changes within, 177–178 people perception about upper-caste, 173–174 reality of continued discrimination, 184–185 resentment and contempt for the “spoiled rich”, 173 security, 183–184 superiority, perception about, 175–176 worldview and values, 178–180 Dirks, Nicholas, xxi discrimination, 338, 347 caste, xvi, xxix, 42, 75, 139, 215–217, 311, 314, 379–380, 384 against Dalit women, xxxiii, 258, 261– 263, 265

dhobi katras (Lutyen’s Delhi), 184–185 gender, 417–421. See also Dalit women positive, xxiv, xxviii, 244, 389–390, 406–410 racial, 255–256 reservations and, 406–410 DMK Party, 18 dress code, cultural prescription of, xxiii Dubois, Abbe J.A., 119 Dumont, Louis, xix, xvii Dutch East India Company, 135 educated Harijan, 103–109 educational system, xvi–xvii caste discriminations, xvi colonization, influence of, xvi marginalization of non-brahmanical perspectives, xvi–xvii Ekauni Kand, 317–319 Ekauni village, 337–339 elite Hinduism, xxi English East India Company, 135 ex-criminal tribes, xxi family ties, xxvi feminism, Dalit, xxxiii–xxxiv fieldwork in Kerala, 158 fieldwork in Tamil Nadu, 158–170 tribulations, 164–166 folklore Chuharmal, story of, 316–317 and myth-making process of subaltern communities, 334–337 narrative context and contesting claims, 320–327 versions and multiple narratives, 327–333 Foreign Exchange and Regulation Act (FERA), 141 Foucault, Michel, xviii–xix, 402 free and fair competition, xxxv French East India Company, 135 Gandhi, Indira, 141 Gandhi, Mahatma, 136, 140

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Gandhi, Rajiv, 142 Gavai, G.A., 353 Ghauri Pathans, 123 globalization in India Dalits and, 410–417 pre-Independence period, 135–136 God, controversy of term, 214 green revolution, scope of, 141 group solidarity, 17 Guha, Ranajit, xix Gunarthi, Ramesh Chandra, 121, 124 Guru, Sree Narayana, 102

Harijan vs Brahmans point of view, Manjapalayam, 159–163 hierarchy from the bottom up, 163–164 traditional view, 157 Indian society, 4–10 Ambedkar’s views, 37–38 organized class-based groups, 26 untouchables in ancient and medieval India, status of, 10–14 individualism of upper castes, xxxii intellectual analysis, caste based, xix Iyer, Sir C.P. Ramaswamy, 244

Harijans, 54 attendance and academic achievements of, 88–90 barriers to science eduation, 106–107 behaviour at the bus stop, 91 dependence on agriculture, 57 entry into local temples, 90–91 examples of status change, 97–100 identity, 90–95, xxxii landless laborers, 83–87 landowners vs, 23 land tenure given to, 87–88 views of, 20 Hazari’s life experiences, 74–80 with Anglo-Indians, 75 British rule for the change in attitude towards, 74–75 conversion to Muslim, 79 death of his brother, 79 employment with Bengali woman, 78 life of grinding poverty, 75–76 position of women, 76–77 Hindu caste society, reforms of, xxix Hinduism, xx–xxii, xxix Hindu–Mahar riots, 297–305 Holeyas, 370–372, 375–384

jajmani relationships, xix Janamma, 238 Jana Sangharsh Morcha, 147 Jatavs of Agra city atrocities committed on, 39 economic prosperity of, 49 as a force, 46–47 occupational mobility and political participation, 41–42 relations with Ambedkar’s ideology and Buddhism, 47–48 Shobha Yatra, 1948, incidents followed at, 43–45 social and economic transformation of, 41–42 social position of, 39–42 as a vital force in the social and political structures, 49–50 Jessica Lal murder case, xxii Joseph, Iyyali, 238 Joseph, Kanichukualm, 238

Indian diaspora, 421–423 Indian economy, post-Independence, 139–153 Indian nation, social reality of, xiv–xvi Indian social structure

Kalyans, 120 kanam, 242 karma, 20, 91, xvii Karnataka, untouchable communities of concept of hegemony, 368 cultural consensus, 361–367 notion of “inclusion” and “exclusion”, 363–364 in Rajapura, 367–373 replication, 361–367

Index

strategies of replications and dissenting, 373–385 structural analysis, 361–362 Karwals, 120 Kayasthas, xvi Kayasth-Mochis, 120 Kerala caste distinctions in central Kerala, 101 caste social order among Christians, 228–229 Christianity and Dalits in, 228–231 freedom struggle and communism, 102 globalization impact, 226–227 landlord–tenant relationships, 101 Pandarappattom proclamation of 1865, 226 political manipulation of stigmatized identity, 100 pre-colonial understanding of slavery, 229 Travancore’s modernization, 226 Kerala Dalits, xxxiv Ketkar, S.V., 119–120 kinship, xxvi knowledge, xviii Koramas, 370–372 Kori-Chamars, 120 labor-union membership in Kerala, 24 Lambanis, 370–372 land allotment, reforms in, 96–97 land reforms, 143 liberalization policies, xxxv Lingayats, 362, 370

Madigas, 370–372, 374–384 Madi Kavu, 307 Mahar movement, Nagpur, 297–305 Mandal era, xxii manhood of castes, 288 Manjapalayam, social structure in Harijan vs Brahmans point of view, 159–163 hierarchy from the bottom up, 163–164 tribulations of fieldwork, 164–166

Manorama, Ruth, 261–267 marginalization Dalit experience, xxxiv–xxxvi Kerala, xxxiv of non-brahmanical perspectives, xvi–xvii margins, concept of, xxviii Marwaris, 137 Marwar Report, 123 Massey, xxvii materialistic view of untouchables, 20 materialist view of caste, xxv Mayawati, xxiii Moffatt, Michael, xix, 360–361 Mohan, Sanal, xxix–xxx. See also Yohannan, Poyikayil Mudaliars, 19, 94, 96 multinational companies (MNCs), 135 Muthurajahs, 189 mythic imagination of untouchables, xxviii–xxix myth-making process of subaltern communities, 334–337 conditions of deification, 336 ritual of defiance, 336 Nagesar dance troupe, 319 Narayan, Badri, xxx Narayanan, K.R., 151 National Commission for the Castes and Schedule, 36 National Federation of Dalit women, 260 National Sample Survey Organisation, The, xxiv National Science Foundation (NSF) project, 15–16 Nehru, Jawaharlal, 137, 139–140 neo-colonization, 135 Odda castes, 370 Okkaligas, 368–373, 376–377, 384 Old Testament dal in, 202–204 direct relationship between God and the Dalits, 203 existence of “Dalits”, 202–204

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messianic message of hope for Dalits, 206–207 ongoing oppression against “Dalits”, 204–205 state of “dalitness”, 204–205 oppression, 140, 204–205, 419, 426, xix caste-based, 287, 291–293, 318, 336, 402 Dalit experience, xxxiii, 37–38, 46, 80, 112, 204–205, 256–259, 264–265 economic, 21 Hindu, in Kerala, 228 shared, 175, 183, 418 social, 306, 356 symbolic protest against, 308–314 oppressive outsiders, 138 oppressive social order, 227, 356 organized class-based groups, 26 Other Backward Castes (OBCs), 136 outcasting, 119–120 Paccaiyur Mudaliars, 19 Padiyar Rajputs, 120 Pallans, 54, 56 Pallars, 189 Pandarappattom proclamation of 1865, 226 Paraiyans, 15–19, 21, 53–57 after independence, 57–59 agrestic servitude of, 55 assistance at non-Brahman funerals, 56 caste-based restrictions on, 68–69 caste-linked occupations and, 54 1961 distribution, 57–58 educational level of, 67 jobs of, 56–57 numbers compared with upper castes, 58 population in 1961, 53–54 status in rural areas, 59–70 traditional role as “village policemen”, 56 Parayars, 210–211, 226, 228 Passeron, Jean-Claude, xxii Periyar, xvi Philippose, Karimbanakkuzhi, 238 Phule, Jyotiba, xvi, xxix

Phule, Mahatma Jyoti Rao, 138 Poona Pact, xxiv possession, phenomenon of, 189 alaku procession, 194–195 beliefs, 198–199 and Brahman-style ritual purity, 190 divine grace and wealth, 192 and gender, 199–200 institutionalized, 192 in Pallar street, case example, 193–194 political implications, 194–195 types of, 190–191 upper-caste view, 195–198 women and temporary, 191 power, xviii Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha (PRDS), 225 Christian affiliation, 243 identity and boundary, 242–245 myths and histories of appropriation, 235–239 organizational structure of, 244 Yohannan, Poyikayil, 231–235 public space, appropriation of, 290 Pulayan or Cheruman caste, 11–13, 226, 228 Chemmanakali myth, 312–313 Maruthiyodan Gurukal myth, 313–314 myths, 308–314 Potten Theyyam myth, 309–310 Pulimarinjna Thondachan myth, 310–312 status of, 306–308 “race science” hypothesis, xxvi racial discrimination, 255–256 Rajput Mali caste, 123–124 Ram, Nandu, xxii Ramakrishna mission, xxi–xxii Ramchandra, Baba, 353 Reddiars, 19–20, 95–96 replication, 361–367 reservations, 389–391 alternatives to, 397–399 dominant caste resistance against, 394–396 positive discrimination and, 406–410

Index

Roy, Arundhati, 147 rural self-employment programs, 144 Sadhu Jana Paripalana Sangham, 231 Sahles song, 320 Sanskritization, xxvii, 41, 46, 227, 368 dominant castes in multi-caste villages, 368 Sara, 237 Satnami Mahasabha, 353–355 Satnamis, 341–342 creation of Satnampanth, 346–347 guru, significance of, 348–351 transformative processes, 352–355 untouchable pasts of, 342–348 Satnampanth under Balakdas, 348–351 creation of, 346–347 organizational hierarchy of, 346–347 Scheduled Castes (SCs), 35, 37–38 financial outlays for empowerment of, 144 post independence, 57 programs for improving the economic status of, 96–97, 139–144 state’s employment opportunities, 145–146 Scott, James C., 229 self respect marriages, xxxii Sen, Ballal, 121 shared oppression, 175, 183, 418 Shastri, H.P., 124 shoe industry, Agra, 41 sin, Christian concept of, 230 Singh, Arjun, 354 Singh, Munshi Hardayal, 120 Smith, Lt. Col. J. Manners, 122 social acceptance, xxvi social classes, formation of, 26 social inequality, 40 social segregation, 41–42 Special Component Plan (SCP), 144 Sree Narayana Dharma Paripalana Yogam (SNDP) movement, 227 Srinivas, M.N., xix, xvii “losing caste,” process of, xxvii

theory of Sanskritization, xxvii state, hiatus between Dalits and, xxiv–xxv status change examples, 97–100 formation of agricultural labor unions, 109 in Kerala, 100–102 Tamilnadu, 102–103 stigmatized identity, 83 examples of status change, 97–100 stigmatized identity of Harijans, 90–91 Naicker caste, 95–97 role in inhibiting class consciousness, 94–95 Structural Adjustment Policies (SAP), 142 subaltern consciousness, xxvi, 227 and myth-making process, 334–337 subaltern soteriology, 336–337 subjugation of tribe, 122 Swedish East India Company, 135 symbolic violence, xxii Syrian Christians of Kerala, xxiii taliarys, 12–13 Tamil Buddhism, 209–212 Tamil Nadu. See also Manjapalayam, social structure in Bodi riots in, 288 fieldwork in, 158–170 untouchable communities of, 365 Thassar, Iyothee, 209–218 Thassar, Iythee, xxix Theyyam rituals, xxix thoti, 374–375 Tirgars, 120 transcendent objectivity, xxv “twice-born” category, xxvii United East India Company of the Netherlands, 135 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 255 University Grants Commission (UGC), xvii untouchables in ancient and medieval India, 10–14

437

438

Life as a Dalit

attendance and academic achievements of, 88–90 attitude toward beef eating, 92 British India, 72–73 educated, 103–109 food habits, 21–22 Hazari’s life, case of, 74–80 landless laborers, 83–87 land tenure given to, 87–88 materialistic view of, 20 middle-class, 108–109 in modern India, xxiv overt and covert values of, 21 political manipulations, 22–23 as “polluting”, 91–93 in present-day Tamil Nadu, 14–20 revolts against caste in precolonial times, 14 South India vs North India, 74 as would-be entrepreneurs, 108 upper-caste leadership Ambedkar’s view on industrialization, 140 in Indian freedom struggle, 137–139 and mechanization of agriculture and allied sectors, 140–141 Nehru’s view on industrialization and nationalization of industries, 140 promises and performances after independence, 139–153 upper-castes change in attitude towards Dalits, 148–150 and elitist intellectualism, xvi–xvii nationalism, 137–138

view of Dalit, xviii upper-caste violence, 425. See also atrocities Bodi riots in Tamil Nadu, 288 caste-based oppression, 291–292 causes for the eruption of conflict, 286–287 in Chilakurti, 285–286 encounter between a woman and a man of different castes, 288 in Krishna district, 286 Muthamma’s case, 288, 290, 292 sexual harassments, 288–290 in Tsundur, 284–285 use of violence on children, 291 Vanniyars, 93 varna hierarchy, xvi, 40, 256 vasundharam kutumbakam, concept of, 136 Venkatachalam, Jyoti, 108 vettiyans, 12–13, 56 Vivekananda, Swami, xvi, xxii World Conference against Racism, 261–267 World Conference against Racism (WCAR), xxiv, xxxiv World Trade Organization (WTO), 142 Yohannan, Poyikayil, xxvi, xxx, 231–235 cleanliness of the body, 242 myths and histories of appropriation, 235–239 problem of Dalit slavery, 241 reconstitution of history, 240–241 reform/reformulation of the body and the self, 241–242