The Dalit Christians: A History 9788184653175

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THE DALIT CHRISTIANS: A HISTORY - Published by the Rev. Dr. Ashish Amos of the Indian Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge (ISPCK), Post Box 1585, 1654, Madarsa Road, Kashmere Gate, Delhi110006 under the Indian Contextual Theological Education Series (CTE-4). (Revised and Enlarged Edition) 1st edition, 1992, 2nd edition, 1994 3rd edition, 1996 4th edition, 2000 © John C.B. Webster, 2009 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the prior permission in writing from the publisher. The views expressed in the book are those of the author and the publisher takes no responsibility for any of the statements. ISBN: 978-81-8465-317-5

To

Penny

CONTENTS

Preface to the Third Edition Preface to the First Edition Preface to the Second Edition

1. THE DALIT BACKGROUND The Origins of Caste and Untouchability The Nineteenth Century The Chuhras of the Punjab The Chamars of North India The Mahars of Central and Western India The Paraiyar of South India Conclusions 2. THE MASS MOVEMENTS The Missionaries and the Dalits Dalit Mass Movements The Madiga Movement around Ongole The Chuhra Movement in the Punjab The Pattern of the Mass Movements The Impact of the Mass Movements The Churches The Dalit Converts The Dalit Movement Conclusions 3. THE POLITICS OF NUMBERS The Dalit Movement in the 1920s The Simon Commission and Round Table Conferences Gandhi’s Fast

Ambedkar’s Declaration The Provincial Governments Conclusions 4. COMPENSATORY DISCRIMINATION The Constitution and Compensatory Discrimination Compensatory Discrimination and its Dalit Beneficiaries Reservations Social Change Self-Assertion and Political Action Christian Dalits and Compensatory Discrimination Social Change Caste Within the Christian Community and Churches Self-Assertion and Political Action Conclusions 5. GOOD NEWS FOR DALITS The Mass Movements The Politics of Numbers Compensatory Discrimination Conclusions GLOSSARY OF INDIAN TERMS BIBLIOGRAPHY

Preface to the Third Edition I did not foresee the impact which writing this book would have upon my own life. Some Dalit Christian leaders urged me to become more directly involved than before with their current issues and struggles, so I resigned my position in the U.S.A. to do that. Involvement led to three group studies of Dalit Christians—The Pastor to Dalits (1995), From Role to Identity: Dalit Christian Women in Transition (co-author 1997), and Local Dalit Christian History (co-editor 2002)—as well as to a book on Religion and Dalit Liberation: An Examination of Perspectives (1999, 2002) and to editing the Dalit International Newsletter (1996-2006). Interspersed were numerous essays, lectures, seminars, workshops, consultations, clergy retreats, and sermons, all of which drew me deeper and deeper into Dalit and Dalit Christian intellectual, activist, and religious circles. My hope is that this history has now been enriched by that direct personal experience as well as by more reading on the subject. This new edition is probably long overdue. Much has happened and much has been written since the earlier editions were published. This one therefore attempts to bring the story up to date. The first and second editions used the August 1990 rally in New Delhi as their concluding event. This one has extended chapters four and five to cover the past eighteen years as well. I have also attempted to incorporate, as best I could, all the research which other scholars and I have published on this subject since 1992. As a result I have made not only additions and changes in every chapter of the book but also different assessments of how historically significant some specific events and developments actually were. Despite these differences from earlier editions, the overall framework, perspective, and general conclusions seem to have stood the test of time remarkably well. I would, however, like to lower my estimate of the proportion of Dalit Christians in the total Christian population of India, made in the preface of the first edition, from two-thirds to a majority. That earlier estimate was a projection from too Protestant a data base.

Most of the libraries I visited and friends who helped me with this edition were mentioned in the preface to the first edition. To that list I would like to add T. Franklin Caesar, who gave me copies of all the documents surrounding the current Supreme Court case mentioned in chapter four; Bishop V. Devasahayam as well as Dr. Monica Melanchthon, both of whom provided valuable assistance on recent developments in the field of Dalit theology; and Dr. P. Dayanandan, who has been a constant stimulus and resource in this work. My wife, Penny, went over the entire manuscript carefully, providing feedback once again as the intelligent non-specialist reader for whom this book has been written. For her comments and suggestions which brought added clarity to the text, for all the technical assistance she provided, and for so much more I am deeply grateful to her. – John C. B. Webster Waterford, Connecticut November, 2008

Preface to the First Edition On July 21, 1987 I was invited to share some of my research on Dalit Christians with a gathering of 30-40 people at the Community Service Center in Madras. I gave a brief presentation which was followed by intense discussion for close to an hour and a half. Just before we adjourned a highly educated Dalit Christian said, ‘You have made frequent reference to our heritage as Dalit Christians but what is our heritage as Dalit Christians?’ Then I knew I had to write this book. My interest in Dalit Christians began only in 1970-71 when I was writing my doctoral dissertation, which was later published under the title The Christian Community and Change in Nineteenth Century North India. This led me to examine the mass conversion of Dalits in the Punjab and U.P. primarily, but not exclusively, to Christianity. It also made me aware of the impact these conversion movements had not only upon the churches and missions but also upon North Indian society in general. As Director of the Christian Institute of Sikh Studies at Baring Union Christian College in Batala, Punjab, from 1971 to 1976, I became involved in further study of the Christian community in its Punjabi context with my colleagues, Clarence McMullen and Maqbul Caleb. There emerged from discussions of our research with Punjabi pastors and lay people, at least 90% of whom are Dalits, the beginnings of what later came to be called Dalit Theology. It is therefore no accident that the Punjab is frequently mentioned in this history. From 1977 to 1981, as a member of the History of Christianity Department at United Theological College in Bangalore, I taught a course entitled ‘Christianity and the Depressed Classes Movement’. This forced me to broaden my perspective from a regional to a national one. I brought to that course the conviction that the primary purpose of studying the history of one’s own people is to gain increased self-understanding. I discovered that Dalit Christians have come to believe things about their past which are not only either false or at best half-true, but are also very detrimental to their present well-being. Historical study under such circumstances becomes a form of group therapy, of casting out those demons created by past

controversy which still hold even educated Dalit Christians in their grip. However, if history is to be truly therapeutic, it must bring us as close to the truth of past reality as possible, because that kind of truth has far greater capacity to heal and to empower for present and future action than does the ideological use of the past. For me this has meant not only taking the discipline of historical inquiry very seriously but also raising what seem to me to be important issues of method along the way. I have found that the history of Dalit Christians, while often a painful story, is nonetheless one in which they can take legitimate pride. They can affirm their heritage and build upon it; they do not have to deny or renounce it in order to live fuller lives in the present. Actually, I would like to say ‘we can affirm our heritage’; I learned that a ‘Webster’ is a weaver and therefore I too am, in a sense, a Dalit Christian. This is the first full-length history of the Dalit Christians to be published. Writing it has been a challenging and difficult task, as the subject is both vast and complex. My hope is that it will prove to be a helpful starting point for future historical writing on this important subject! After all, Dalits probably comprise between two-thirds and three-quarters of the entire Christian population of India. This history, which relies heavily on case studies, will need filling out to include the stories of Dalit Christian groups not mentioned here in detail. For example, more Roman Catholic groups should be studied than are included here. Moreover, the perspective may have to change as well, as those additional stories and the rapid changes of the 1990s force us to look at the past differently. I hope that this history will stand the tests of time and further research, but I recognize that it can be only ‘a history’ instead of ‘the history’ of the Dalit Christians. It may be of help to the reader if I explain the rationale behind some of the decisions I made while writing it. The first concerns the term, Dalit. Historically, Dalits (literally ‘oppressed’ or ‘broken’ people) have been referred to as outcastes, exterior castes, depressed classes, untouchables, Harijans (children of God), and Scheduled Castes, to mention only the most common labels. I have chosen Dalit because of its currency and aptness. I have also tried to use it as consistently as possible in order to avoid confusion, and have avoided using it in its broader sense to refer to all oppressed Indians.

The second concerns the framework within which this history is written. I have chosen to set the history of the Dalit Christians in the context primarily of the history of the wider Dalit movement, of which it is an integral part, and only secondarily of the history of the Christian Church in India. Since the Dalit Christians were Dalits before they became Christians, I begin with a chapter on their Dalit background. The next three chapters are devoted to what I consider to have been the three important stages of the Dalit movement. The first stage, the stage generally ignored by other historians of the Dalit movement, was characterized by mass conversion, especially to Christianity. It is at this opening stage that Dalit Christians made their greatest contribution to the Dalit movement. Their conversion in the hundreds of thousands set the movement going, made the plight of the Dalits a public issue, and gave it an urgency which it had previously lacked. During the second stage, covering the 1920s and 1930s, politics replaced conversion as the movement’s dominant characteristic. Since the British set the rules for the political game, this was the politics of numbers between the different religious communities. During this stage, Dalit Christians were no longer the catalysts of change that they had been in the initial stage, but became instead responders to and even victims of changes initiated by others. It was also during this stage that the communal politics of numbers divided Christian Dalits from other Dalits in a manner and to a degree that conversion never had. The third and present stage, covering the postindependence period of Indian history, has witnessed the great experiment in ‘compensatory discrimination’ set forth in the constitution. The system of compensatory discrimination, which treats Christians and most other Dalits very differently and seeks to push them even farther apart, provides the context in which the common Dalit movement against oppression and for equality goes on. The final chapter provides a history of Christian theology for, about, and by Dalits. There is, in Christian circles, much interest these days in Dalit theology and therefore an examination of its antecedents may prove helpful. Beyond that I hope that this chapter will get at the heart and soul of Dalit Christian history in a way that the earlier chapters on their social and political history do not. Since the psychological and religious dimensions of the Dalit Christian past and present may well hold the most important key to the Dalit Christian future, this chapter will function as a conclusion.

Finally, a word needs to be said about the title of this book. Is this a history of Dalit Christians or of Christian Dalits? Which is the noun and which is the adjective modifying it? Both usages will appear in the text and there is a tension between the two. ‘Christian Dalit’ conveys a greater sense of solidarity with other Dalits than does ‘Dalit Christian’, and certainly the framework in which I have set this history is in keeping with that important emphasis. On the other hand, those Dalits who converted to Christianity did so in part because it provided a new identity which made an important difference to them. As Arvind Nirmal pointed out to me, the liberation they experienced in Christ embraced their Dalitness instead of rejecting it as something to be completely left behind. ‘Dalit Christians’ not only emphasizes this important aspect of their heritage but also indicates their current unwillingness to be pressured into that form of Christian tradition now dominant in India. ‘Dalit Christian’ thus seems to me to be the more accurate label, at least at this stage of their history. Research for this book was initially carried out in India primarily in the United Theological College library. The other major libraries I used there were the Nehru Memorial Library and the Vidyajyoti library in New Delhi. Here in the United States I have made extensive use of the libraries of Columbia University, the Presbyterian Historical Society, Union Theological Seminary in New York City, and the Yale Divinity School. I wish to record my thanks to the staff of those libraries for the help they gave me. I owe my education in Dalit Christian history to more people than I can name. M. Azariah, Saral Chatterjee, Fred Downs, Lindsey Harlan, Jose Kananaikil, Arvind Nirmal, Parveen Paul, M.E. Prabhakar, Nandu Ram, V. Rajshekar and Eleanor Zelliot made helpful suggestions which have found their way into the text of this book. Special thanks go to Geoff Oddie, George Oommen, Ravinder Kumar, Henry Thiagaraj, Hew McLeod, Donald Shriver, Thomas Thangaraj, and Boyd Wilson for reading through portions of this book at various stages of its development. Their comments have not only improved the quality of the book but also provided important reassurance. The book’s shortcomings, however, are mine.

I want to thank Dr. Ravinder Kumar, Director of the Nehru Memorial Library and Museum, for allowing me to borrow generously in chapter 3 from my article ‘Christians and the Depressed Classes in the 1930s’, which first appeared in its publication Economy, Society & Politics in Modern India edited by D.N. Panigrahi (1985). My publisher, the Rev. Dr. James Massey of the ISPCK, deserves my thanks not only for help in publishing this book but also for sending me the books and articles from India I needed to complete it. My wife, Penny, has been living with this book almost from the day we were married. She has taken my handwritten manuscripts and, with great patience and care, used her talent with a computer and access to a laser printer to transform them into photo-ready copy for the printer. Thus writing has been in reality a joint endeavor and I dedicate the book to her in gratitude for all we have shared in bringing it to publication. – John C. B. Webster Waterford, Connecticut February, 1992

Preface to the Second Edition Soon after the first edition was published, I had an opportunity to visit India. While I was there, the Department of Dalit Theology at the Gurukul Lutheran Theological College in Madras organized a two day consultation on this book. Then a staff institute for historians of Christianity organized by the South Asia Theological Research Institute in Bangalore discussed the book in considerable detail. I would like to thank my friends and colleagues for their comments and suggestions, some of which I have been able to incorporate into this revision. I also wish to thank Professor Arvind P. Nirmal and Dr. J.W. Gladstone for arranging, respectively, for the consultation and the institute. Most of the comments I received as well as most of my subsequent reading were concentrated upon the subject matter of chapter 4 and the corresponding section of chapter 5. That is where the reader will find the major additions and changes I have made in this new edition. I would like to thank my publisher, Dr. James Massey of ISPCK for bringing out this new edition and including it in ISPCK’s new Contextual Theological Education series. I also want to thank my wife, Penny, for her continued help and support in preparing this new edition for publication. – John C. B. Webster Waterford, Connecticut August, 1993

CHAPTER 1

The Dalit Background Early Dalit history is a contested history, and for good reason. The origins and roots of groups, as well as of indviduals, is closely intertwined with their self-image, public image, and identity. Personal or group origins are sources of selfconfidence, self-respect, and even pride or, alternatively, sources of insecurity, shame, and even guilt. In situations of social conflict, differing views of origins are often used ideologically to manipulate those emotions which either inspire or suppress political action. This has certainly been true of the differing views of the origins of caste and of untouchability. The questions, ‘Who were the ancestors of today’s Dalits?’ and ‘how and why did they become untouchables?’ are not purely academic. Their answers have granted or denied considerable psychological and hence potential political power to Dalits, as well as to other castes. Given these circumstances, how can a study of Dalit origins be anything but mere propaganda? What safeguards are there when the sources on which it must be based are occasionally very vague, sometimes rather unreliable, and frequently addressed to the ‘wrong’ questions? The approach taken here has been, firstly, to pay what may seem like excessive attention to matters of source criticism and to exercise great caution in not allowing conclusions to go beyond what the evidence warrants. Secondly, while not ignoring the question of origins, it uses the nineteenth century, for which source materials are far more abundant and detailed, rather than the ancient and medieval past, as its primary starting point from which to trace the history of both the modern Dalit movement and the Dalit Christians. THE ORIGINS OF CASTE AND UNTOUCHABILITY As it happens, the origins of caste and of untouchability lie deep in India’s ancient past and the evidence of those origins provided by the

archaeological and literary sources now available is largely circumstantial. Consequently, scholars have been forced to engage in considerable speculation in their efforts to reconstruct the past history of untouchability. What we now have are not hard and clear facts but a variety of competing theories, no one of which can be proven to the exclusion of all the others. Rather than list each of these theories in turn, along with the underlying assumptions and supporting evidence for each one, we will begin by providing a general historical framework, which is supported by available evidence and enjoys something of a scholarly consensus, and then point out where the contending theories tend to divide. Whereas J. H. Hutton concluded his major work, Caste in India, by locating the origins of caste in the taboos and divisions of labour in the pre-Aryan tribes of India as well as in their efforts at self-preservation in the face of invasion,1 the prevailing view traces the origins both of caste and of untouchability to the Aryans themselves and to their ways of relating to the peoples of India with whom they came into contact. The Aryans, a series of related and highly selfconscious tribes sharing a common language and religion, began their migrations into India from the northwest around 1500BC. For centuries they remained in seemingly constant conflict with the indigenous peoples, whom the Aryans looked down upon as culturally inferior and excluded as ritually unclean. Once conquered by superior military technology, some of these peoples withdrew into regions as yet unoccupied by the Aryans, while others were incorporated as separate and inferior clans within an Aryan-dominated society. In the post- Rig Vedic literature there are more frequent references to primitive forest-dwellers who were kept on the fringes of Aryan society in the conquered regions, among whom were the Candala. The jati seems to have evolved from the clan and tribe, whether Aryan or nonAryan, as settled communities and chiefships with their economic and political divisions of labour emerged. What resulted was a hierarchical society based on ethnicity and hereditary occupation. The creation story found in the later portions of the Rig Veda depicted the emerging social hierarchy as the divine order of things from the creation itself. In describing the cosmic sacrifice of the primeval man (Purusha) the hymn says, When they divided Purusha, in how many different portions did they arrange him? What became of his mouth,

what of his two arms? What were his two thighs and his two feet called? His mouth became the brahmin; his two arms were made into the rajanya [kshatriya]; his two thighs the vaishyas; from his two feet the shudra was born. (Rig Veda 10.90)

This orthodoxy, later strongly upheld in the Bhagavad Gita, was to be contested by heterodox sects, especially by Buddhism. The Buddha’s understanding of karma and his eightfold path towards nirvana were based on a social ethic which applied to everyone and were not made dependent upon performance of those duties necessary to maintain a castebased hierarchical social order. Both Vivekanand Jha and Prabhati Mukherjee have examined references to social stigma, to untouchability, and to the precursors of castes later considered untouchable in the early Sanskrit, Pali and Prakrit literature.2 In these texts, which represent the views (if not the actual behaviour) of the dominant Aryans who produced them, references to the Candala are of particular importance. Although the Candala were severely stigmatized in the later Vedic age, it was only in the period between 600BC and 200AD that untouchability appears as such. In the Dharmasutras and in Kautilya’s Arthasastra the Candala are treated as untouchable and the ‘mixed caste theory’ of the origins of untouchability is enunciated. However, it is in the Manusmriti that this theory, as well as the Varna theory and the classification of castes in a hierarchy based on occupation and degree of pollution, receives its classic statement. Manu restated that the four varnas were divinely ordained from the very beginning and added that other castes were the result of alliances between members of the four original varnas. The Candala, whom Manu considered the offspring of a Brahmin woman and a Sudra man, the worst possible combination, was to be ‘excluded from all considerations of dharma’.3 Four other groups were also relegated to the ranks of the untouchables. Buddhist literature from the same period also depicts the Candala as well as four other groups as both outside the four varnas and polluting. In the years following 200AD the practice of untouchability was intensified and applied to more groups, while the Candala became a label not simply for a tribe but for all whom the Aryans considered to be at the very bottom of society.

What has been described thus far relates to North India. The literature from South India is much later in date and even more sparse. Caste hierarchy and untouchability reached the South about one thousand years after coming to the North, largely through the southward spread of Aryan influences. N. Subrahmanian has argued that the Dalit peoples were among the original tribes of South India, who for reasons of geographic location and occupation became cut off from the advances of civilization and so were looked down upon by others.4 In the Sangam literature (300-600AD) there are references to broad divisions of society somewhat similar to the four varnas as well as to low and excluded groups such as goldsmiths, cobblers, and drummers. This description locates the origins of caste and untouchability but does not really explain them. They are Aryan creations going back to around 600BC, but why the Aryans developed this particular form of social organization and of segregation remains a matter of conjecture. The earliest theory used to explain them was the ‘mixed caste’ theory set forth in full by Manu. This theory posited the existence of the four varnas as divinely ordained and then explained the origins of those outside the varna system in terms of unlawful sexual alliances between women and men of differing varnas. While it is undoubtedly true that more such mixing of peoples occurred than the lawmakers wished, this theory does oversimplify what became over time a far more complex process. As Jha has pointed out, the number of untouchable castes always exceeded the number of mixed origin castes,5 so other considerations seem to have influenced the classification system. Moreover, this theory assumes the priority of varna to jati, the kinship and lineage group which existed within and beyond Aryan society before varna was used to classify them. Varna in fact may always have been more a theoretical model of society than an actual description of it,6 a model developed by the lawmakers to promote dharma and hence what they considered to be the well-being of society. More recent theories have sought to combine into coherent explanatory generalizations such components as: race and the concern for racial purity when races interact; the subjugation of diverse groups by the technologically superior Aryans; the division of labour as migrant Aryans settled down to agricultural and then urban ways of life; the incorporation

of new tribes, new guilds, and new religious sects into Aryan society; the concern of priestly lawmakers for ritual purity and for their own social preeminence; hierarchy as either an artificial, self-serving and oppressive form of social organization or as a ‘natural’ one. Each theory can find some support in the existing evidence; all must cover enormous gaps in the evidence with conjecture or broad generalization. Thus while the evidence may be sufficient to rule out some theories or give plausibility to others, it cannot establish one to the exclusion of all others. What this brief survey indicates is that the quest for the origins of caste, untouchability, and specific Dalit castes ends in speculation and uncertainty.7 It therefore provides little that is of decisive significance for settling the political and ideological battles of today. On the other hand, it also indicates not only that both caste hierarchy and untouchability have very long and continuing histories with roots in India’s ancient past but also that neither have gone uncontested. This can be seen in early Buddhism but more directly and emphatically in those medieval bhakti saints who denied that caste and inherited pollution mattered to God as much as did devotion of mind and heart. Some of those saints—Tiruppan Alvar, Nandanar, Chokamela, Ravidas— were Dalits, and it is in their poetry that the Dalit voice first becomes audible in Indian history, protesting against the social norms which defined them as low and impure.8

THE NINETEENTH CENTURY The modern Dalit movement traces its origins to the nineteenth century when Dalits began to make concerted efforts to change their lives and Dalit aspirations began to be taken seriously. Most of the source materials for the background and early history of this movement were written not by Dalits but by foreigners who became interested in them. The works of these foreign authors, for all their inadequacies, do provide valuable descriptive detail and even statistical compilations which offer a firmer basis for understanding Dalit history than do the sources the ancients left behind. However, these sources have come under close scholarly scrutiny in recent years9 and so need to be understood before their possibilities and limitations can be properly assessed. Two sets of foreigners have provided much of the source material for nineteenth century Dalit history. One consisted of missionaries who accepted the Orientalist view that India was ‘a society in which religious ideas and practices underlay all social structure’; upheld ‘the primacy of the Brahmin as the maintainer of the sacred tradition, through his control of knowledge of the sacred texts’; and accepted ‘the Brahmanical theory of the four varnas and saw the origin of castes in the intermixture through marriage of the members of the four varnas’.10 To this kind of textual study they added their own eyewitness accounts, impressions, and hearsay. The other consisted of administrators who produced not only the Census of India but also numerous volumes on ‘Castes and Tribes’ in all of which Dalits received considerable attention. By the time these appeared, however, the Brahmanical theory of caste origins was being replaced by more generalized speculative theories about racial conquest and mixture. Of special significance for Dalit history was the considerable descriptive detail these ethnologists gathered from ‘native informants’ and direct observation on beliefs, ceremonies, internal divisions and variations, status and occupation. In their work on individual castes and tribes the ethnologists, whether officials or missionaries or Indian scholars,11 shared two important assumptions which affected their treatment of Dalit as well as of other

castes. One was that each caste had a common name, a common line of descent (human or divine) and especially a common hereditary occupation.12 In fact, for them traditional occupation became the chief means by which castes were identified as well as the chief cause and indicator of their status. The other was that the basic details about caste occupations, beliefs, ceremonies, and patterns of interaction with other castes did not change much over time. Books written in the 1920s could quote the 1881 Census, taken over forty years earlier, for information still considered current. Obvious changes or deviations from the traditional norm were noted, but it was assumed that generally the same patterns continued on pretty much as before in the villages. Recently both Bayly and Dirks have challenged the notion that caste was ‘some unchanged survival of ancient India’.13 The caste ‘system’, they argue, was not as uniform, as pervasive, as rigid in its hierarchies, or as unchanging in its ‘traditions’ as the nineteenth century ethnologists portrayed it, nor was caste necessarily the primary social unit of Indian life it was to become in the ethnologists’ eyes. However, almost all the examples of fluidity, of caste mobility, or of multiple identities Bayly and Dirks cite concern castes above the ‘pollution line’, not the Dalits. Moreover, their critique does not reduce the value of the data presented in ethnographic or missionary sources for the reconstruction of late nineteenth century Dalit history. The remainder of this chapter attempts to establish a nineteenth century starting point from which the subsequent history of Dalit Christians can be traced. It returns to our original questions, ‘Who were the Dalits?’ and ‘Why were they Dalits?’, and adds a third: ‘Were any noticeable or significant changes taking place among Dalits during the nineteenth century?’. The answers to these questions must, of practical necessity, be shaped by a critical examination of the evidence which the ethnologists produced. The question of identity will be answered in terms of occupation, origins and religion. Answers concerning the nature and roots of their oppression will be sought in the patterns of social and economic interaction between Dalits and other jatis with whom they had dealings. Finally, those changes among the Dalits considered noteworthy will be those affecting their identity and patterns of interaction.

The 1891 Census was the first to adopt a standard classification of castes. It had sixty categories defined in terms of the occupations assigned by ‘tradition’. Dalits, or Panchamas (those belonging to the ‘fifth varna’) did not constitute a distinct category, but instead fell primarily into four of the Census categories: field labourers, leather workers, watchmen and village menials, and scavengers. Dalits were to be found all over India and together comprised at least eleven percent of the population.14 Since it is not possible to provide meaningful answers to the questions mentioned above with reference to all Dalits, four of the largest groups found in different parts of India have been selected as case studies.15 These will be compared in the concluding section of the chapter and their representativeness evaluated. The Chuhras of the Punjab In the 1881 Census Denzil Ibbetson placed the Chuhras among the ‘lower menial castes’ and specifically the first among the scavenger castes of the Punjab. However, he then went on to show that their actual occupations varied according to both region and religion. In the eastern Punjab the duties of the Chuhras included sweeping both in private homes and on village lanes, making dung cakes, grazing cattle, and serving as village messengers. In the central Punjab, where they were most numerous, Chuhras also did these things but were primarily agricultural labourers. Those Chuhras who had become Sikhs, however, generally refused to remove night soil and most of one group among them, the Rangreta, were doing leather work instead of sweeping. There were also Muslim Chuhras who had stopped removing night soil. Along the northwest frontier Muslim Chuhras included grave-digging among their other duties.16 Ibbetson recorded over a million Chuhras, making them one of the largest caste groups in the Punjab, with many clans or gotras, sixteen of which were enumerated. The origins and ancestry of the Chuhras remain a puzzle. Crooke suggested that they, along with the Bhangis of the United Provinces, with whom they have been invariably linked,17 may be descendants of the ancient Candala.18 Others have been less specific but no more certain. Ibbetson speculated that they, like the other ‘lower menials’, were once an aboriginal and vagrant people who settled down but kept many of their

earlier habits and sources of livelihood.19 Their darker skin colour as well as remnants of totems in their religion have been seen as evidence of preAryan, Dravidian origins.20 On the other hand, Risley’s anthropometric studies led him to conclude that they were Aryans.21 The Chuhras themselves used legend to describe their origins. W.P. Hares, writing in 1920, recounted two such legends. According to one, the Chuhras were originally Brahmins, who lost caste because their ancestor, the youngest of four Brahmin brothers, was tricked into getting rid of the carcass of a dead cow. His brothers promised not to outcaste him for this but did so anyway, assuring him of restoration first on the fourth day, then in the fourth week, the fourth month, the fourth year, and finally in the fourth yug or era. The other legend traces their origins to one Balmik—also referred to as Bala Shah or Lal Beg in various regions of the Punjab—a dacoit who changed his ways and became a saint.22 R.C. Temple, in recording some genealogies of Lal Beg in the eastern Punjab, identified Balmik, (who in that part of the Punjab was not the same person as Lal Beg), with Valmiki, ‘the low-caste author of the Sanskrit Ramayana’.23 Clearly there were many variations in these genealogies, depending upon local tradition, and the biographies of key people were also not the same. Herbert Strickler, obviously using different informants than Hares, described Lal Beg as a descendent of Jhaumpra, the outcasted youngest son of the god Brahma and Jastri, a Chuhra herdsman’s daughter. In this account Lal Beg also had a very different biography.24 All these legends suggest Aryan origins, but because those recorded by Temple and Youngson appear in the form of devotional songs which contain clear Muslim as well as Sikh references,25 the genealogies clearly seek to establish a religious rather than a strictly ancestral or ‘racial’ identity for the Chuhras. The nature of that religious identity was a matter to which early observers gave serious thought. Ibbetson had obvious misgivings when classifying the Chuhras as Hindus. He pointed out that the higher castes did not generally recognize the Chuhras as fellow Hindus and he also thought that the Chuhras’ caste religion resembled Christianity more closely than any other religion.26 Temple was of the view that they had a religion of their own which he characterized as ‘hagiolatry pure and simple’.

It consists merely of a confused veneration for anything and everything its followers, or rather their teachers, may have found to be considered sacred by their neighbours, whatever be its origin. Thus we find in the Panjab that in the religion of the scavenger castes the tenets of the Hindus, the Musalmans and the Sikhs are thrown together in the most hopeless confusion, and that the monotheism taught by the mediaeval reformers underlies all their superstitions.27

Strickler later argued more sympathetically that while it not only absorbed elements drawn from orthodox Hinduism, Islam, and Sikhism over the centuries, but also adapted itself to the religion of the dominant caste in the village or region, Chuhra religion was nonetheless ‘a real and distinct one’.28 Chuhra religion seems to have been too eclectic to be subsumed under a single defining label. Three features of it, however, do stand out with some clarity.29 The first was what a contemporary observer called their ‘religious flexibility.’30 Chuhras often adopted the religion of the dominant castes within their villages. In Muslim-dominated villages they became Musallis; in Sikh-dominated villages they became Mazhabis; and in Hindu-dominated villages they remained Chuhras with their own religious life. This form of religious accommodation did not necessarily lead to a rise in status. Musallis used Muslim rites but were not always accepted as equals by other Muslims.31 Mazhabi Sikhs used Sikh rites, wore long hair and did not smoke, but could not associate with other Sikhs even in religious ceremonies.32 However, regardless of their formal religious allegiances, Chuhras shared fully in the pervasive general religiosity of the rural Punjab. They believed in evil spirits and ghosts, in omens, the evil eye, charms, sorcery and magic, auspicious and inauspicious times. They not only joined in the worship of Muslim saints, of Mata Devi, and Gugga Pir, but also relied on faqirs, bhagats, and pirs in times of need. Like others, they too had their own totems and taboos which varied according to gotra. Their life-cycle customs and ceremonies, the most elaborate of which were those surrounding betrothal and marriage, also resembled those of other castes. However, Chuhras paid a bride price rather than a dowry and allowed divorce, but there were to be no ceremonies or exchange of gifts at subsequent marriages.33

The third and most interesting feature of Chuhra religion was their set of distinctive beliefs and practices centered around the worship of Bala Shah/Balmik/Lal Beg at imageless shrines called thans. In Chuhra legend Bala Shah was a devotee and priest of God whom God had exalted and in whom his followers could take refuge for protection and mercy, especially on the day of resurrection. O Bala Shah Nuri,

For the sake of thy son, Bal Bamrik,

Have mercy on the dark race.

Our cry is to thee,

Thy cry reaches the presence of God.34

What is especially significant about this feature of Chuhra religion is that, unlike the other two that are accommodative, this one contains elements of social protest. This can be seen in the myth of origins already referred to, in which the Chuhras’ low status is attributed to the treachery of others, as well as in their views of the day of judgement when they will be vindicated and those considered ‘higher’ punished The faith of Kalak Das, the Chuhra is a perfect faith.

If any Shahi reads Muhammad’s creed, an unbeliever he is branded. And if Baba Nanak’s, he shall be rejected.

All that do profess the creed of Bala straight to heaven shall go.35

The protest here, however, is passive rather than active; God offers neither guidance nor assurance of either support or victory in the Chuhras’ struggles in this life.36 The Chuhras were, at the end of the nineteenth century, at the bottom of the Punjab social hierarchy. ‘The Chuhra or scavenger caste are regarded by all religions as utterly polluted because they remove night-soil and eat carrion and vermin and the leavings of other people’.37 Sikhs as well as Hindus kept Chuhras at a distance, whereas Muslims generally accepted Chuhras of their own faith who had given up those polluting activities. Chuhras lived together, segregated from the other castes, at the edge or outside of the village. They were not permitted to draw water from the village well or

enter places of worship other than their own. When they died they were buried face downward. The other harsh fact of Chuhra life, in addition to social stigma, was poverty. In the towns and cities the Chuhras were scavengers and sweepers who were paid mostly in leftover food and rarely in cash. In the villages they were tenants at will.38 Strickler, in surveying nine villages of Lahore district, reported three different arrangements under which Chuhras laboured. The most favourable was that of a siri who received ‘one fifth of what one pair of oxen can tend’. Those who worked as a sepi had a one year agreement according to which they received one-eleventh of the grain harvested. However, by far the largest number of Chuhras had to work as mazdurs or daily wage labourers who might find work for as many as two hundred days per year.39 This arrangement meant extreme poverty and insecurity for the Chuhras, especially as their labour was generally abundant. Chuhras had little to wear, even in the cold Punjab winters, and little to eat. As a result they resorted to eating carrion, and even at times to cattle poisoning, just to stay alive. They were also in perpetual debt to landowners and local merchants, and thus under their control. In 1900 the Punjab Government’s Land Alienation Act did not classify the Chuhras as an ‘agricultural caste’, even though they supplied most of the agricultural labour, and so made it impossible for them to own land in the province.40 Chuhra organization was still very local in nature. Each village had its own caste panchayat made up of representatives selected by the Chuhra villagers themselves. Power was vested primarily in the head of the panchayat, the pir panch or sar panch. Its tasks included settling disputes between Chuhras, disciplining deviant behavior, looking after the poor among them, and representing the Chuhras in their dealings with the wider village community. Since the punishments the panchayat meted out included fines and, in extreme cases, excommunication, it exercised considerable control over the behaviour of individual Chuhras. Urbanization was not improving the Chuhras’ lot during the nineteenth century; contemporary observers indicated that those in the towns and cities were worse off than those in the villages.41 What did improve at least their social standing was conversion to Sikhism or Islam, especially when that

was accompanied by giving up those tasks and eating habits which were considered most polluting.42 The greatest Chuhra successes were those Mazhabi Sikhs who had been recruited into the armies of the Sikh kingdom as well as of the British and had won respect, as well as a good livelihood, for their martial qualities.43 They were, however, but a small proportion of the entire Chuhra population. By the end of the century recruitment of Mazhabis was way down and was revived only briefly as the need arose in World War I.44 The Chamars of North India In 1798 William Tennant, a chaplain of the British East India Company, wrote upon visiting a village in Banaras district, The lowest and most despised order of tradesmen in India, are the Chumars, or leather cutters. The Chumar receives in harvest three sheaves from each plough; but besides this annual fee he is paid for every set of ropes or harness he furnishes for a plough two seer and an half of grain. For each pair of shoes the customary price is ten seer of grain: tradesmen pay two anas, which is deemed in ordinary times a higher price; but they pay no part of his annual fee of three sheaves; when cattle die the hide goes to the Chumar.45

A century later leather-working was still considered to be the traditional occupation of the Chamars, but it was apparent that their actual work varied greatly according to region and subcaste, with agricultural labour being by far the most common. More than eleven million Chamars were recorded in the 1891 Census, about half of them in the United Provinces.46 Contemporary observers noted among them seven major subdivisions or subcastes, each with a geographical area of concentration and set of somewhat distinctive characteristics. For example, the Jaiswaras were concentrated in the eastern U.P., worked mostly as servants and day labourers, and carried burdens on their heads instead of their shoulders. The Jatiyas, concentrated around Delhi, Agra and Rohilkhand, were agricultural labourers, dealers in hides, and shoemakers. They not only claimed kinship with the Jats but also employed Gaur Brahmins as priests, and so were considered the highest of the Chamar subcastes. Other Chamar subcastes were weavers, grooms and musicians as well as agricultural and/or leather

workers, while Chamar women frequently were midwives. There were variations among and within subcastes regarding what kinds of skins they would deal with, what kind of leatherwork they actually did (tanning, harness & shoe-making, repairing shoes), whether or not they kept pigs and ate pork or carrion.47 The origins of the Chamars, like those of the Chuhras, are obscure. There are many references to tanning in the Vedas and Brahmanas.48 Manu stated that the Karavaras or leatherworkers were the offspring of a Nisada father (son of a Brahmin father and a Sudra mother) and a Vaidehi mother (daughter of a Vaishya father and Brahmin mother). Late nineteenth and early twentieth century ethnologists could not agree on whether they were Aryans or Dasas, while the Chamars themselves used several different legends about a brother removing a carcass to explain their origins. The Chamars’ physical features and legends suggested to the ethnologists that ‘the caste has received large recruitments from above’.49 The vast majority of Chamars were Hindus. Unlike the Chuhras, they did not have a distinctive ‘tribal religion’, but shared in the pervasive ‘village Hinduism’ of the region. There were, however, a number of Hindu sects which by the end of the century had attracted a large Chamar following, most notably the Rai Dasis, Siv Narayanas, and Satnamis. Those Chamars who converted to Sikhism were named Ramdasis after Guru Ramdas. They occupied a higher social position than did their Hindu counterparts, having given up leather-work (for weaving) and eating carrion, but were still not accepted as equals by their fellow Sikhs.50 The situation of those who had become Muslims was more complex. Most were known by the occupational name, Mochi, a skilled worker in leather that was already tanned, rather than by the caste name, Chamar. Observers disagreed over whether other Muslims treated them as equals.51 The Chamars, while above the Chuhras and Bhangis in social status, still bore the stigma of untouchability. Sherring attributed this stigma to their dealings in leather and to the popular view that they ‘do not belong to the Hindu race, except by very remote relationship’.52 In Crooke’s view it was due to their eating habits (which included beef, pork, fowl—‘all abomination to the orthodox Hindu’—and even carrion as well as the

leftover food of the higher castes), to their habit of keeping pigs, to the general filth of their section of the village, and to the fact that Chamar women served as midwives.53 As noted above, this stigma applied even to those Chamars who had converted to Islam or Sikhism. Chamars were bound to village landlords through the jajmani system. Chamar families received certain hereditary rights from their landlords (rights to dead cattle, to designated shares of the harvest, to fuel and grass from village lands, to gifts at festivals or special occasions) in exchange for carrying out specific responsibilities as leather workers, field labourers, midwives and general menials. In addition Chamars were required to do any number of odd jobs pretty much on demand and often without compensation. Briggs summed up their situation in 1920 quite accurately: For the most part [the Chamar] is still in an almost hopeless state of degradation and serfdom. In large areas he is at the beck and call of others, and dares not lift his voice in protest lest he be beaten or driven from his village.54

According to Crooke, cases involving jajmani rights were frequently brought before the Chamar panchayats.55 What is not clear, however, is whether these panchayats dealt with the disputes between Chamars and their jajmans or limited themselves to disagreements amongst Chamars about encroachments upon the perquisites each Chamar family was entitled to receive from their jajmans. Although the other general responsibilities of the Chamar panchayats resembled those of the Chuhra panchayats, the two were organized differently. For one thing Chamar panchayats were made up of the heads of all the Chamar families in the village, and not just their representatives. For another, they also had an ad hoc organization above the village level when the heads (pradhans or jamadars) of several neighbouring panchayats met together to decide matters too important to be dealt with at just the local level. A partial exception to this general pattern were the Satnamis of Chhattisgarh who by 1891 constituted a very large proportion of the area’s Chamar population. Chamars had played an active role in clearing land there and bringing it under cultivation during Maratha rule. As a result there were a good number of villages, the total population and all the landowners of which were Chamars. By the end of the nineteenth century an estimated

25 percent of the Chamars were tenants and the rest were either agricultural labourers or landowners. Yet despite this, they were all treated as untouchables because their caste was associated with leather work. Around 1820 Ghasidas, a Chamar landowner, formed the Satnampanth which worshipped the one formless, creator God and rejected both idolatry and the practice of untouchability/caste discrimination. It also prohibited the use of tobacco, liquor, and meat-eating, all of which lowered the members’ status in the eyes of others. Almost all the members of the Satnampanth were Chamars and those who did not join often preferred the religious label, Satnami, to the caste label, Chamar.56 There were signs of change among the Chamars at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century. Some were putting their traditional occupation as leather workers to good use in such new industrial centers as Kanpur and becoming wealthy.57 By 1920 Briggs noted that the migration of Chamars to the cities for work on the railways or in industry was causing a labour shortage and consequent wage increase for those who remained in the villages.58 Those Chamars who were escaping poverty or gaining wealth were giving up those customs and habits considered socially degrading and were seeking to imitate the life-style of the higher castes. There were few indications, however, that Chamars were using religious conversion as a means of upward social mobility. The Mahars of Central and Western India Unlike the Chuhra and the Chamar, the Mahar did not have a well-defined ‘traditional occupation’. In the 1881 Census they were described as village menials with a variety of tasks to perform, the most important of which were carried out for the village as a whole rather than, as in the case of Chuhra and Chamar, for individual families within the village. The Mahar was a village official, the fourth balutedar, whose responsibility was to assist the higher officials in a number of ways, but especially by knowing village boundaries well enough to settle land or tax disputes. In their unofficial capacities they were to carry off dead animals and open the pits in which grain was stored.59 However, in actuality they, like the Chuhras and Chamars, were predominantly agricultural labourers. A good number of Mahars, mainly in Central India, were also weavers.60

In his book, The Tribes and Castes of Bombay, Enthoven described the Mahars as a tribe or more properly speaking an assembly of tribal units...found throughout the Marathi speaking area of the Presidency, including the coast portion of the North Kanara district. The term includes over fifty tribal fragments that do not intermarry, and in reality connotes more a status than a tribe, being the broken residue of many former aboriginal tribes owning the country, of which they were dispossessed by successive waves of Aryan and post-Aryan invaders.61

He went on to list 53 endogamous Mahar groups but still treated the Mahars as a single entity with shared customs, traditions and sense of their own origins. So did Russell in his parallel description of the Mahars in the Central Provinces.62 Both writers cited the Mahars’ intimate hereditary knowledge of village boundaries as evidence that they were the original, non-Aryan settlers on the land. Certainly the argument that the original meaning of ‘Maharashtra’ as ‘the land of the Mahars’ rather than ‘the Great Country’ would also support that view. Yet Mahar traditions concerning their own origins pointed toward Aryan antecedents and there was even speculation among ethnologists that they might be fallen Rajputs!63 Not only did the Mahars share the beliefs and practices of ‘village Hinduism’ described earlier, but they also had several assigned roles in village religious life. For example, they were the guardians of Mariai, the village cholera goddess whose shrine was kept in the Mahar quarters. In times of epidemic the Mahars led the entire village in the appropriate rituals before Mariai.64 They also shared in Hindu pilgrimages, but were rarely allowed into Hindu temples or shrines. In the Central Provinces they also incorporated elements of popular Islam into their religious life.65 In addition, the Mahars had their own distinctive deities and, like the Chuhras and Chamars, their own priests drawn from their own caste. Of special importance to them was Chokhamela, the medieval bhakti poet-saint of Pandharpur who was himself a Mahar.66 That the Mahars were untouchables there was no doubt. Not only did they live outside the villages in their own quarters, but they also could not use the village well. Both their touch and even their shadow were considered defiling. There was a time when they had to wear earthen pots around their necks to catch their spittle and to drag thorns behind them to wipe out their footprints!67 Even at the end of the nineteenth century they were not

permitted to enter Hindu temples. The Mahars’ responsibility for getting rid of dead animals was considered largely responsible for this social stigma. It is more difficult to generalize about the poverty of the Mahars. As village officials they received a small plot of land and grain dues for such services to the village as sweeping roads, cutting firewood, and being the watchmen. They received the dead animals of the village, grain at the bottom of the storage pits, as well as gifts at weddings and funerals or for personal services. Gokhale has suggested that British land revenue assessments drove small landholders like the Mahars into debt. Many lost their land during the latter half of the nineteenth century, thus increasing their poverty and insecurity.68 Eleanor Zelliot, in her study of the Mahar movement, has shown that other changes in the economy of western India had important consequences for the Mahars. During the eighteenth century Mahars had served in the armies of both the Peshwas and the British. After 1802 the British began to recruit more from other castes, but Mahars continued on in the army until the end of the century.69 However, the Mahars found more opportunities for nontraditional employment opening up in railway and road gangs, mills and factories than in the army. As Zelliot pointed out, there were ‘no pollution bars which prevented them from doing dirty or heavy labor, and their lack of a single skill encouraged them to try various occupations’.70 With urbanization came opportunities for education in schools opened up by Christian missionaries, Hindu social reformers, then the government and near the end of the century, by Mahars themselves. With education came a profound dissatisfaction with their traditional social status. It was from the ranks of the educated that the first Mahar leaders began to emerge, to voice the grievances of their people, and to take steps to improve their lot. Gopal Baba Walgankar started the first untouchable newspaper, Vital Vidhuansak, in 1888 and in 1890 petitioned the British government against closing army recruitment to the Mahars and other untouchables. By 1910 there was even some incipient political organization among the Mahars!71 The Paraiyar of South India

In his famous Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies which appeared in 1816,72 the Abbe J.A. Dubois, a missionary of the Paris Missionary Society in what is today Karnataka and Tamilnadu from 1792 to 1823, devoted a lengthy chapter to ‘The Lower Classes of Sudras’. He noted among the Sudras a fundamental division, so that ‘certain classes [of Sudras]...owing to the depth of degradation into which they have fallen...are looked upon as almost another race of beings altogether outside the pale of society’.73 The largest of these castes were the Paraiyar. Although he showed more pity for than empathy with the Paraiyar, Dubois did provide a wellintegrated description of their situation at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Dubois stated that, according to the Puranas, the Paraiyar were most probably descendants of individuals who had been expelled from other higher castes and came to form ‘a class apart’ with its own life-style. That life-style was, Dubois maintained, primarily responsible for their low status and social distance from other castes. He was of the opinion that the line dividing them from other Sudras was less clear-cut in the northern than in the southern districts where they seemed to constitute a fifth varna, and more clear-cut in his own day than earlier. They were the lowest of the right-hand castes and were forever quarreling with the Pallan of Madurai and Cape Comerin, the lowest of the left-hand castes, who did not eat beef but otherwise shared the same life as the Paraiyar.74 The Paraiyar were agricultural labourers, most of them in servitude to landowners of other castes, although in some districts they did till their own land. Their wages were minimal and so they lived in abject poverty, eating only the coarsest of food, wearing minimal clothing, and unable to repay debts to their landlords who thus kept them in bondage. They were beaten at will by their masters and had no recourse but to accept their lot. They were indeed ‘the born slaves of India’.75 While elsewhere the Paraiyar were serfs, on the Malabar coast they were slaves who could be bought or sold. However, there they were well treated and were in good physical condition. In fact, Dubois considered the slaves to be better off than either the serfs or those who tilled their own land! A possible exception to this were the Totis, Paraiyar who were scavengers but who also irrigated their masters’ fields. Paraiyar also tended horses, cattle and elephants as well as served as

messengers, carriers, and manual labourers. A Paraiyar group known as Vallavas served as their priests and did not intermarry with other Paraiyar. The higher castes, especially the Brahmins, held the Paraiyar in great contempt. Their presence, even their footprints were considered defiling. So too was their touch. It was forbidden to eat with them, to eat food they had prepared, to drink water they had drawn, to use a pot they had held, to visit their homes or allow them to enter one’s own. Dubois attributed this social stigma primarily to the ‘low conduct and habits’ of the Paraiyar themselves who, because they have become ‘convinced that they have nothing to lose or gain in public estimation, abandon themselves without shame or restraint to vice of all kinds’.76 Among these vices Dubois mentioned were uncleanliness, both personal and domestic, intoxication, quarrels and domestic violence, and especially the eating of carrion. The Paraiyar also observed the same kind of caste distinctions towards ‘lower’ castes that the higher castes did towards each other and towards them. One can find signs of change among the Paraiyar in Dubois’ account despite his assertion that However, notwithstanding the miserable condition of these wretched Pariahs, they are never heard to murmur or to complain of their low estate. Still less do they ever dream of trying to improve their lot by combining together, and forcing the other classes to treat them with that common respect which one man owes to another. The idea that he was born to be in subjection to the other castes is so ingrained in his mind that it never occurs to the Pariah to think that his fate is anything but irrevocable.77

One sign of change was that they were enlisting in both European and Indian armies. Some had even risen to high ranks because of their courage and bravery, although Dubois considered them severely lacking in military discipline and honour. The other sign of change was that large numbers of them had become domestic servants to the Europeans. As Dubois pointed out, only the Paraiyar were willing to do the work Europeans wanted done — polishing shoes, cleaning chamber pots, cooking beef—or take the contempt and abuse, including kicking, which Europeans meted out. He also indicated that they were very poor servants: dishonest, disloyal, and untrustworthy.78

Writing close to a century later, the ethnologists do not change this picture so much as fill it out in greater detail. Some caused confusion by using the label Pariah—an Anglicized form of Paraiyan—as an umbrella term for all those jatis classified as ‘outcastes’ or ‘lower races’ below the four varnas79 rather than for a specific jati. Instead of looking to the Puranas for the origins of the Paraiyar they tried looking to history and cited inscriptions which indicated that the Valluvan Paraiyar were priests to the Pallava kings and that the Paraiyar in general were weavers or ploughmen under the Cholas.80 The ethnologists also considered such anomalies in current social custom as Paraiyar being assigned prominent roles in a number of important festivals or serving as hereditary, minor village officials and experts on local boundaries as evidence of a former importance which had since been lost.81 Thurston argued that the greatest of all Tamil poets, Tiruvalluvar, ‘ the holy Valluvan’ .... could not have attained the fame he did, or have received the honors that were bestowed upon him, had not the Valluvans, and therefore the Paraiyans, been in the circle of respectable society in his day” [ca. 10th century].82

The ethnologists also noted the many subdivisions among the Paraiyar; the 1891 Census recorded 348 endogamous groups,83 the larger ones with regional concentrations and even occupational specialties (e.g., cultivators, weavers, hunters, domestic servants, merchants, scavengers, etc.).84 They argued that while formally the Paraiyar were Saivites and some wore the sign of Vishnu on their foreheads, they were in fact neither Saivites nor Vaishnavites. They acknowledged one supreme God, Kadavul, and worshipped primarily three different kinds of devata or goddesses: the grama devata or goddess of the village who was its protector and benefactress, Gangammal (goddess of cholera), and Mariyattal (goddess of smallpox), as well as the demons and ghosts who needed to be propitiated. In their ‘village Hinduism’ the Paraiyar resembled the other Dalits described above.85 The social disabilities of the Paraiyar mentioned by Dubois continued on throughout the century. They lived outside the village, segregated in a separate quarter known as the cheri. The council of the cheri, made up of a small number of its more important men, had a very restricted autonomy, being subordinate to the village munsiff (headman) in police matters and, like other right hand castes, to the Desayi Chettis when moral offenses were

committed. The Paraiyar were excluded from temples and from the Brahmin section of the village. Their touch, and even their shadow, were considered polluting. What references do exist indicate that both in their own eyes and in the eyes of others they were a ‘fifth category’ of people outside the varna system.86 Thus the trend towards a sharper boundary between varna and non-varna which Dubois noted may well have intensified during the nineteenth century. However, what really struck later nineteenth century writers was less the social disabilities than the serfdom, even slavery, of the Paraiyar. This phenomenon has also attracted more recent scholarly attention.87 Both have described its dynamics in considerably greater detail than did Dubois, although it was prevalent in his time. When at the end of the eighteenth century the British took over what is today Tamilnadu, what they found was a communal form of landholding, known as the mirasi system. In this system no one owned land as private property but the village mirasdars enjoyed hereditary rights to the land, including the common waste land of the village. The Paraiyar and other Dalits, however, had no such rights to the land, but did the actual cultivation work for the mirasdars. For this they were given as their ‘share’ the barest subsistence living, just enough to keep them alive and working. Many were forced to sell themselves into slavery just to avoid starvation in bad times or acquire some ready cash for a marriage feast in good times.88 The deed of sale bound not only the individual making it, but his descendants as well. Slaves were treated as property that could be bought, sold and used in any way the owner wished. Slavery among the Paraiyar was common, but not all Paraiyar were slaves. During the course of the nineteenth century, three developments took place which affected the position of the Paraiyar in the village. The first was that the British introduced into the region a ryotwari revenue settlement which bestowed private property rights upon those, usually mirasdars, whom the British deemed to be the landholders. This generally eliminated whatever rights to house sites, use of common land, and the like which the Paraiyar had under the mirasi system. They became much more vulnerable and landless labour increased during the course of the century.89 When at the

end of the century the Paraiyar sought to take ownership of village waste land and cultivate it, they ran into almost insurmountable opposition from the village landowners who were not using it but did not want Paraiyar owning it.90 The second was the abolition of slavery. Initially Company officials adopted a policy of laissez-faire on the grounds that bonded labour was both different from western slavery and integral to Indian society. Following Parliament’s abolition of slavery in 1833, the Government of India passed the Slavery Abolition Act of 1843, according to which the legal state of slavery was ended and thus no legal claims upon a slave’s services would be upheld in the courts. Only in 1861 did the Indian Penal Code make slaveholding a punishable offense. However, this did not result in freedom because both indebtedness and advance payments for labour ensured that the Paraiyar remained tied to the land and to the landowners.91 Two arrangements between Paraiyar and landowners became prevalent. The padiyal was hereditarily attached to a landlord family for whom he worked exclusively. In exchange for his labour, he was assured support, even in times of famine. The kuliyal was freer but much more insecure. He was a day labourer who was employed (and paid) only when needed. He received more pay each working day than did the padiyal, but was on the whole much worse off because he worked only about 200 days a year. The third important development affecting the Paraiyar was the growing demand for agricultural labour and hence increased opportunities for emigration to Sri Lanka, Burma, South Africa, Fiji, Malaysia and elsewhere. Within India itself the new tea and coffee estates opened up possibilities of economic emancipation. It is not possible to know how many migrants and emigrants there were, but the proportion of Paraiyar and other Dalits among them seems to have been high.92 Paraiyar in South Africa participated in Gandhi’s satyagraha campaigns there.93 Money earned abroad or on tea estates could be sent home and used to repay debts, rebuild houses, educate relatives, and even purchase land. Yet at the end of the century, the vast majority of Paraiyar were still agricultural labourers. Such minor village positions as grave-digger, watchman, and scavenger were reserved for Paraiyar and those who held

them received small plots of land in exchange for their services. Some were moving out of the villages and, like the Mahars, into new forms of employment. Many of the domestic servants employed by Europeans were Paraiyar, some of whom were educating their children. In 1893 they began publishing their own Tamil monthly, Paraiyan, with an initial circulation of 500 copies and the following year started a political association.94 In 1898 Pandit Iyothee Thass, who had come to the conclusion that the Paraiyar were Buddhists in the time of Asoka, founded the Sakhya Buddhist Society as an emancipatory project. By 1914, when Iyothee Thass died, it had spread and gained influence among the Paraiyar in the northern part of the Madras Presidency.95

CONCLUSIONS The Chuhras, the Chamars, the Mahars, and the Paraiyar were among the largest Dalit jatis in nineteenth century India. However, the Chuhras were not the only scavenger jati; there were the Bhangis in U.P. and Mehtars in western India. Corresponding to the Chamars in the North were other large jatis engaged in leather work: the Mochis in the West, the Madigas in central India, and the Chakkiliyan in the South. Contemporary observers compared the Mahars to the Dheds in the North as well as to the Holayas in what is today Karnataka. The Malas in Andhra were said to be Paraiyar by a different name, while in present day Kerala the Cherumar and Pulaya were their local equivalents. Dalits were not a homogenous group in the nineteenth century. The case studies reveal considerable diversity among them, due either to differences in jati traditions and occupations or to variations in regional patterns of landholding and caste interaction. Moreover, interaction among Dalit jatis was affected by the same considerations of hierarchy which governed all Dalit relations with the higher castes. The Mangs and Mahars, Malas and Madigas both looked down on each other. Yet despite their lack of homogeneity or harmonious inter-relationships, Dalits of all jatis did have several things in common which not only led contemporary observers to place them in the same category but also could later give them a sense of shared history and destiny. The first of these was the harsh fact of social stigma. Dalits were considered polluting and were therefore kept at a distance. Their person, shadow, food, and vessels were to be avoided. They were made to live separately and often could not share such common village amenities as the well. The degree of pollution might vary from jati to jati or region to region, but the fact of a polluting presence did not. The stigma of ‘untouchability’, while attributed to the traditional occupation of the jati, was considered inherent and hereditary, thus affecting all members of the jati whether they were engaged in that occupation or not. Those jatis some of whose members cleaned up after other people, dealt with dead animals or ate their meat, were ritually unclean and beyond the pale of minimal respectability. This stigma was traced back centuries to Manu and was deeply ingrained.

The second shared characteristic of nineteenth century Dalits was their occupation. No matter what their ‘traditional’ jati occupation may have been, the fact remained that the vast majority of them were actually engaged in agricultural labour of one sort or another. For many their ‘traditional occupation’ was simply a supplementary task over and above their main job of agricultural labour. Ironically, agricultural labour was not in itself ritually polluting and carried no special social stigma; higher castes engaged in it without seriously jeopardizing their social status. Dalits, however, almost always worked for others under a variety of arrangements from slavery to sharecropping, rather than on their own land, and the stigma remained. Their third characteristic was poverty. Dalits were very poorly compensated for their labour and so were forced to live on the brink of starvation. A few came to own enough land to live comparatively well, while a somewhat greater number left agriculture for the army, the factories, the railways, road gangs, tea plantations, and even indentured labour overseas. However, the vast majority faced stark poverty. Their diet was poor; their clothes were few and rarely clean; their homes were small, fragile and unhealthy; and they were hopelessly in debt. Poverty and indebtedness meant bondage, living at the beck and call of the landlord, rather than as an independent, selfrespecting person. Fourthly, even though historically Dalits had not been part of the jati system, by the nineteenth century they were organized into jatis and were functioning like jatis. They not only lived and married within their own jatis, but they also had their own jati councils, at least within if not beyond the local village community. Moreover, considerations of status within the hierarchy of jatis shaped their relationships with members of other jatis, including other Dalit jatis. The fifth shared characteristic pertains to the complex matter of lifestyle. The ethnologists described Dalit customs and ceremonies surrounding birth, death, and marriage in great detail. In many respects these resembled those of the higher castes, and Dalit panchayats could be as severe as others in enforcing caste discipline. To this extent Dalits shared in a common Indian culture and life-style. However, two practices, both indicative of women’s

more equal status, did distinguish them from the higher castes: giving a bride price rather than a dowry and permitting widow remarriage. Abbe Dubois and others following him have also listed or referred to vices of whole Dalit jatis or even of Dalits in general, which in themselves are most revealing. Some of these, such as personal or domestic uncleanliness as well as the practice of eating carrion, were the direct consequence of severe poverty, and were to that extent imposed from without. Others— drunkenness, frequent quarrelling, domestic violence, not being trustworthy in serving others—are together indicative of a deep inner rage which could be expressed only in forms of self-hatred, contempt for one’s own people, and passive aggression vis-a-vis one’s ‘betters’. Since these were not so much individual vices as patterns of behaviour characteristic of large groups or categories of people, they were accepted, albeit unhealthy, mechanisms for coping with the cruel facts of enforced poverty and social degradation. Dalit religion was another way of facing and dealing with an essentially cruel and uncontrollable world. Those aspects of village Hinduism in which they seem to have had the greatest share involved the demons, ghosts, evil spirits, the evil eye, and malevolent deities. Dalits lived in fear of mostly evil and/or arbitrary forces which held them in their grip. Much of their ritual and other religious practices—exorcism, offerings, charms—were designed to cope with these. Their own ancestral deities offered them assurance and stability but were of limited power in the divine pantheon. Finally, Dalits had little hope of outside sympathy or support. Despite its claims to be the guardians of India’s silent masses, the British government took no interest in the Dalits during the nineteenth century. In keeping with its post-1857 desire to win or keep the support of the traditional leaders of Indian society, it adopted a laissez-faire attitude towards the caste system and did not interfere. Of course, the changes it introduced to tax and administer Indian villages as well as to develop the economy did affect Dalits, but these changes were not made with their welfare specifically in mind. Hindu social reformers were equally indifferent, concentrating their attention upon social evils affecting primarily the urban elites. The one exception, Jotirao Phule in Pune, opened two schools for Dalits and then in 1873 organized the Satyashodhak (Search for Truth) Samaj to save ‘the lower castes from the hypocritical Brahmins and their opportunistic scriptures’.96 Thus for the overwhelming majority of Dalits little help could

be expected from the reformers or the government before the end of the century. Who then were the Dalits? They were the ones who by virtue of their jati membership were placed socially, economically, culturally and politically at the very bottom of a hierarchical society. That was their permanent place; every effort was made to keep them there through enforced poverty and social degradation; and they knew it. Why were they Dalits? Not out of choice. They were Dalits because it suited the convenience of the ‘higher castes’ to keep them at the bottom, doing the ‘unclean’ work which would then allow the ‘higher’ castes to remain ‘clean’. Dalits lacked the power and Government lacked the will necessary to change that. The evidence available indicates that Dalits accepted the hierarchical ordering of society and those who did not accept their assigned place in the social hierarchy directed their efforts towards improving their place within it. Sanskritization, imitating the social practices of the higher castes, and economic advancement were the methods Dalits most frequently employed to do this. Religious conversion, at least to Buddhism, Islam or Christianity, represented a rejection of a hierarchy which kept Dalits down. During the final quarter of the nineteenth century increasing numbers of Dalits saw this as the way of liberation and chose to follow it.

CHAPTER 2

The Mass Movements

The modern Dalit movement began with what Christian missionaries called the mass movements. These were localized, grass roots, somewhat simultaneous, rural conversion movements, initiated and led by Dalits. While in some parts of India there were Dalits who chose to become Muslims, Sikhs, or Buddhists, the vast majority of Dalit converts throughout the country became Christians. By the outset of World War I approximately one million Dalits had converted to Christianity and many more were to follow in the 1920s and 1930s. So great was the impact of those mass movements that they changed the course of the history of Christianity in India and pushed the wider Dalit movement on to its next stage. Unfortunately, there is a lot of confusion and ignorance about these Dalit conversion movements. One reason for this, as will become apparent in the next chapter, is that they quickly became a matter of public controversy and those polemics helped to fix some unwarranted stereotypes in the public mind. Another reason is that scholars have, until recently, failed to do the kind of detailed historical research on those conversion movements necessary to get beyond those stereotypes. Virtually all histories of modern India, including those few which pay some attention to Dalit history, dismiss the mass movements in a few scattered sentences or a short paragraph. Historians of Christianity have paid more attention to them, but their work has been hampered by a narrow institutional perspective and inadequate social analysis. The term ‘mass movement’, a Christian label of long standing, is itself suggestive of the problem. First used to indicate both the quantity and interconnectedness of Dalit conversions, it was later redefined by Pickett, in a way that has been uncritically accepted, as being distinguished by ‘a group decision favorable to Christianity’ [italics mine].1

Beginning in the mid 1970s some fresh historical studies of specific mass movements have been undertaken which provide the basis for a reassessment of their nature and significance. This chapter begins with a discussion of the relationship of the foreign missionaries to the Dalits as the mass movements began. It is devoted primarily to the Protestants as they were the most involved with the Dalit mass movements during the nineteenth century.2 The main body of the chapter uses a survey, two case studies, and comparative analysis to arrive at some generalizations about the dynamics of the Dalit mass movements. In the third section the impact of these mass movements upon the churches, the converts, and the Dalit movement is assessed. Finally, some important conclusions are highlighted.

THE MISSIONARIES AND THE DALITS There is a strong tradition that the apostle Thomas was the first missionary to India, arriving in what is now Kerala in 52 AD. Little is known about how the early Christian communities developed and grew there, except that immigration and possibly inter-marriage with the Nayars were factors.3 When the Portuguese arrived in 1498, they found a Christian community of good size and standing in that region. While it had its own internal social divisions, it functioned more or less like a jati among other jatis, and did not seek to evangelize its neighbours, especially not the Dalits. The Portuguese, once they had established themselves in Goa and along the western coast, proved to be very aggressive in trying to convert both Hindus and Muslims to Christianity. To that end they underwrote the evangelistic work of several religious orders and even utilized the power of the state. They sought to win over local rulers and such influential jatis as the Nayars, but the usual pattern of conversion remained individual by individual and family by family. Three exceptions were some entire villages along the western coast near Goa, as well as mass movements among two fishing jatis who were seeking protection from local oppressors: the Paravas along the southeastern tip of India in 1535-1537 and the Mukkuvas on the southwestern tip in 1544. The Portuguese also evangelized Dalits and won converts from among them. Problems arose, however, in incorporating these converts into the fellowship of the Church. In Kerala they and other ‘new Christians’ followed the Latin rite used by the Portuguese and so were separated from the Syrian rite Christians. In the seventeenth century the Madurai Mission of Roberto de Nobili not only allowed distinctions between high and low castes to continue in the Church but even divided the Mission itself between Brahmin sanyassis who ministered to the high castes and pandaraswamis who ministered to the low. In general the Catholics chose to work within the caste system, following a policy of adaptation and viewing caste not as a religious but as a social institution like any other system of stratification. Protestant missionaries were comparatively late in coming to India. The Tranquebar Mission, started in 1706, was a modest endeavour, albeit with some remarkable individuals. The major influx of Protestant missionaries

began only in the early nineteenth century following William Carey’s arrival in Bengal in 1793. The vast majority of them were Evangelicals, of one denomination or another, from Great Britain and the United States. Like the Catholics, they came in order to evangelize the Indian people and they started baptizing converts from all jatis, high and low, individually or in families. Some experienced a mass movement among the Shanars or Nadars in southern India early in the century but that was, like the earlier mass movements, an exception.4 There is currently some misunderstanding about the evangelistic strategy of these early Protestant missionaries. The conventional wisdom on the subject is that they initially targeted the high castes for conversion on the assumption that Christianity would then filter down through them to the far more numerous lower castes. Invariably the ideas and practices of Alexander Duff, the famous Scottish missionary educator in Calcutta, are cited as evidence of this. Duff did establish high quality, English medium schools imparting a western education with the stated purpose of attracting, teaching, and winning over the Bengali elite who would then in turn influence the masses. For a time he did enjoy sufficient success in baptizing high caste students to make his an attractive model for other missionaries to follow. However, it must be borne in mind that Duff’s was a highly specialized work which most missionaries could not and did not emulate. A review of mission reports from the various societies will show that, whether they established English schools to reach local elites or not, Protestant missions were engaged in a broad range of evangelistic activities which were not at all caste-specific. In fact the opposite was the case; they ‘cast their bread upon the waters’ through bazar preaching, itinerating through villages, conducting open services in public places, attending religious festivals and melas, visiting homes, distributing scripture portions and tracts usually in Indian languages.5 They baptized and organized into congregations those who responded, no matter what their jati background. The early Protestant churches, comprised of individuals often from widely diverse social backgrounds, were reflections of this approach to evangelism.6 However, the conventional wisdom is correct on two other aspects of early Protestant missionary strategy relevant to this study. Protestant missionaries

did preach a gospel focused upon individual sin and salvation, the same gospel by and to which they themselves had been converted. They spent hours with individual inquirers both to instruct them and to make certain that each one had personally experienced the converting work of the Holy Spirit. Upon baptism the convert left the old jati community with its assigned place in the social hierarchy and entered a new ‘mixed’ community of unclear social status. Moreover, throughout almost the entire nineteenth century Protestant missionaries tended to juxtapose Christianity and either Hinduism or Islam as true and false religions. One of the signs both of the truth of Christianity and of the falsity of Hinduism in particular was equality in the former and caste in the latter. Protestant missionaries, unlike their Roman Catholic counterparts, tended to view caste as a religious institution sanctioned by and integral to Hinduism. They therefore chose not to work within the caste system but to condemn it and replace it with something better, probably a class system based on achieved rather than ascribed status. The Protestant condemnation of caste was, like their criticisms of the place of women in Hindu and Muslim society, an important part of their apologetic for the superiority and truth of Christianity! Both G.A. Oddie and Duncan Forrester have published important studies of the Protestant missionary attitude toward caste during the nineteenth century.7 These indicate that by the 1850s Protestant missionaries achieved a consensus not only in condemning caste but also in trying to eliminate caste within the churches. In this they achieved more success in the North than in the South, where Indian Christian opposition to this was strong and where missionaries therefore became divided over whether the best strategy for removing it was a hard-line prohibition or a more conciliatory approach.8 Oddie and Forrester have also shown that missionaries pioneered in mixing castes, including Dalits, within their schools despite opposition from higher caste parents.9 Finally, missionaries took an active role, generally on behalf of lower caste and Dalit converts, in trying to abolish some of the disabilities from which they suffered: prohibitions against the use of public roads and public wells and, in the extreme South, against women wearing a ‘breast cloth’ to cover the upper portion of their bodies.

Thus when the mass movements began, Protestant missionaries had made contact with Dalits in many towns and villages, but there is no evidence that they were paying special attention to Dalits or making deliberate efforts to foster conversion movements among them. It was the Dalits, not the missionaries, who took the initiative in launching the mass movements and in doing so, challenged some of the assumptions upon which missionaries had been labouring for decades. Missionaries were thus forced to decide how best to respond to the Dalit initiative. When the Third Decennial Missionary Conference met in Bombay at the end of 1892, it devoted considerable attention to the questions which the Dalit mass movements were raising: e.g., are these movements the work of God? What opportunities and dangers are inherent in them? What forms should our responses to the Dalits take? Can and does Christianity in fact provide what Dalits are seeking? Should we try to ameliorate their social condition? If so, do we work on behalf of all Dalits or confine our efforts to those who have become Christians? How will work among Dalits affect the rest of the work we are doing?10 However, so many missionaries had already answered the first of these questions emphatically in the affirmative before the conference began that the history of Christianity in India became inexorably intertwined with the history of the Dalit movement.

DALIT MASS MOVEMENTS No historical study has yet been made of all the mass movements to Christianity which occurred during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In fact there is not even a list available which gives information about when such movements occurred, among which jatis, and into what churches.11 One reason for this was that some missionary observers saw only large numbers of Dalit converts coming in rather than a movement started, led and sustained through local Dalit initiatives.12 Another related reason was that these conversion movements varied greatly in size and duration; some affected only a few villages for a short period of time, while others spread over large areas and continued for decades. It is therefore difficult to draw the line between those which should be included in such a list and those which should not. A third reason is that, while some mass movements have received scholarly attention, others have not. This section therefore begins with a brief regional survey of Dalit mass movements. It will then provide two detailed case studies and conclude by comparing these with each other as well as with others whose histories have been written in order to arrive at some possible generalizations about the Dalit mass movements as a whole. It is important to note at the outset, however, that not all mass movements were Dalit movements and not all Dalits were involved in the mass movements. In the Punjab there was a very large mass movement among Chuhras which began in the 1870s, built up momentum in the 1880s, and continued on through the 1920s. All the major missions in the Punjab were affected by it and the Indian Christian population there grew from 3912 in 1881 to 395,629 in 1931 mostly as a result of Chuhra conversions.13 Equally important, approximately one quarter of all the Chuhras in the state had become Christians.14 The first mass movement in Uttar Pradesh began in 1859 when some Mazhabi Sikhs in the villages near Moradabad approached the Methodist missionaries there. Twenty years later virtually all of them had converted. Later, in the 1880s and 1890s there were much larger mass movements in the western part of the state among the Bhangis or Lal Begis, and to a lesser extent among the Chamars. These continued on sporadically into the 1920s when there were once again a lot of conversions among these

same two jatis. The Methodists were by far the most affected, but the Presbyterians and Anglicans also became involved. In 1931 there were still only 173,077 Indian Christians in the U.P., but the vast majority of these were Dalits.15 In Western India mass movements were so few and so relatively small as to make the term seem inappropriate. The Methodists in Gujarat witnessed the largest movement in the region; between 1889 and 1905 they baptized some 15,000 Dheds. In Maharashtra the Church of Scotland around Jalna, Congregationalists around Ahmednagar, Anglicans around Aurangabad, and Presbyterians in the Kolhapur area experienced only small, brief group movements, mostly among Mangs but also among Mahars. Similarly, there were small Dalit conversion movements in several parts of Karnataka in the early twentieth century. By way of contrast, Andhra Pradesh was probably the largest mass movement area in India and all the missions there became involved. For the London Missionary Society beginning in the 1840s, the Church Missionary Society beginning in the 1860s, and the Lutherans in the 1880s it was the Malas who converted in thousands and tens of thousands. For the Baptists the Madigas did the same in the 1870s and 1880s. The Methodists in the Medak area experienced mass movements first among the Malas in the 1880s and 1890s and then among the Madigas after 1906, while those in the Hyderabad-Vikarabad area experienced both between 1905 and 1913. In the 1920s and 1930s there were huge mass movements of Malas and Madigas in the Anglican diocese of Dornakal. In some parts of Andhra the Dalit mass movements led to mass movements among Sudras! In Tamilnadu the Paraiyar converted to Christianity in large numbers. There were mass movements involving the Church of Scotland and Methodists around Madras, the Reformed Church in the Vellore area, and the Roman Catholics especially in the Pondicherry Diocese. Later in the TrichinopolyTanjore area there was a large mass movement first of Paraiyar and then of Madharis (Chakkiliyan) between 1913 and 1947. In Kerala it was also the Paraiyar as well as the Pulayas who converted in mass movements during the final third of the nineteenth century and well into the 1930s. Again all the missions became involved, but especially the Anglicans, London Missionary Society and Salvation Army.

Several things should be made explicit in concluding this brief survey in order to place the case studies which follow in perspective. The first is that the mass movements were a rural rather than urban phenomenon. The missions affected had their headquarters in cities or large towns, but the mass movements themselves occurred in the villages. Another is that Dalit mass movements did not occur all over India. Bengal, Orissa, Bihar, and Madhya Pradesh witnessed large mass movements among tribals but except for small movements of Chamars in the latter two states, not among Dalits. Finally, not all Dalit jatis were involved and, in those that were, the proportions of those who converted varied greatly. For example, the proportion of Chamar or Mahar converts was very small indeed, whereas the proportion of Chuhra, Mala and Pulaya converts was high enough not only to attract public attention but also to generate even nation-wide concern and controversy. What follows is a more detailed examination of two of these movements for the insights they offer into the dynamics of the Dalit mass movements. One involved a sweeper caste, the other a leather working caste. One occurred in the North, the other in the South, but at about the same time. One focuses on interaction with one mission, the other with several. These case studies will then be compared to others in order to discover what general patterns, if any, were characteristic of the Dalit mass movements as a whole. The Madiga Movement around Ongole A very large Madiga movement can be traced back to the religious quest of Yerragunthla Periah from Tallakondapaud, a small village about forty miles southwest of Ongole in Andhra Pradesh. Like the other Madigas there, Periah was a leather worker and agricultural labourer. More importantly, however, he became involved in some of the religious reform movements prevalent in that area and was initiated by a caste Hindu guru into rajayoga, of which he himself subsequently became a teacher. When on a business trip purchasing hides, he heard the Christian message for the first time from a relative who had become a convert. He stopped in Ellore on his way home to learn more from an Anglican missionary who convinced him that the message was true. Periah now became very eager to find a missionary closer to his own village who would teach him and his people. To this end

he visited Ongole where the Baptists had purchased land to start a mission station. After he and his wife, Nagamma, were baptized in March 1866, he prevailed upon the Baptists to post a missionary in Ongole permanently. Periah then urged that missionary, the Rev. John E. Clough, to visit Tallakondapaud as soon as possible, because Periah had stirred up considerable interest there among his old following as a rajayoga guru. Clough sent some Telugu preachers on ahead and then came himself in January 1867. After five days of preaching and teaching outside that village, Clough baptized 28 Madigas. The mass movement had begun.16 This stage of the movement continued for ten years. Periah, the rajayoga guru, now became a Christian guru who wandered with his wife through villages as far as 80 miles from home, living off the gifts of his audiences. As groups of Madigas in a village were baptized, Clough asked them to send their best men to Ongole for periodic training as preachers and teachers. Clough’s own actions on behalf of the Madigas that went beyond baptizing those whom his evangelists considered ready, such as his failed attempt to get three Madiga Christians admitted to the government school at Ongole in 1867, came to identify him quite closely with the Madigas in the public mind. Clough, who was still interested in evangelizing all people of all castes, found that high caste inquirers stopped coming to him and that he was being forced to make a choice. A chance reading of ICorinthians 1: 2629,17 which was to become for many the great mass movement text, convinced Clough that he was right in choosing to respond to the Madigas. Beginning in 1869 the number of baptisms began to increase markedly. The movement spread through the work of Periah and the other early converts, supplemented by Clough’s preaching tours through the district. At the end of 1870 there were 1103 Christians in 160 villages around Ongole; by the end of 1876 there were some 3000 and the mission field had greatly expanded.18 Clough later described the pattern of conversion in the initial stage in these words. The movement, as it swept over the Madiga community, had picked up the best first—those who were ready to respond to the Christian appeal. The leaders had made the beginning. Then those followed who had been under their direct influence. Then came the wider circle of those with whom there were ties of family relationship. If it was within the memory of anyone that at some time a

marriage had been contracted between two families, it constituted a claim.... Those related families again had branches of their own. The appeal, carried along with the impetus of clannish, tribal life, moved like an avalanche, gathering up as it went along.19

In particular, the Madiga members of two Hindu reform groups in the area had been largely won over by the end of that first decade: the Ramanuja sect and the adherents of Yogi Nasriah.20 Clough’s comments on them show how they differed from other Madigas in their readiness for conversion and why he considered them ‘the best’. It was safe to say that all who had taken the first step out of the common village worship previous to our coming were with us by this time. They were attracted to the Christian religion and could not stay away. Many of those early members of our church had distinct religious experience back of them. They had taken one step after another, and knew why they had taken them…. This nucleus of three thousand Christians on the Ongole field was now hard at work among those who were still engaged in the worship of demons and serpents and female deities. They were bound to succeed, even though the response as yet was slight. There was less intelligence to work upon, less capacity for devotion, less religious impulse.21

Upon baptizing a number of Madigas from one or a cluster of neighbouring villages, Clough placed those converts who were already caste elders in charge of their local congregations, thus utilizing where possible local rather than western institutions for church governance. He also made three requirements of his converts which, as he pointed out, ‘went straight against the cooperative system of the Indian village’. These were: ‘Do not work on Sunday; do not eat carrion; do not worship idols’.22 The first two altered work relationships. Madigas, like Chamars, had been required to work on demand with no days off. They also received as part payment for their labour the carcasses of dead cattle. From these they made leather goods for those whom they served and then ate the meat. The prohibition against eating carrion meant a renegotiation of rates for the hides with landowners and with hide dealers, as the meat could no longer be part of the bargain. The prohibition against idol worship meant that Christian Madigas would no longer carry out such traditional functions at village religious festivals as beating the drums or dancing before idols in religious processions. These changes did not occur without conflict, retribution and persecution. Clough helped where he could by interceding, by offering legal advice, and, in a

few instances, by either trying to intimidate local officials or taking matters to court. The next stage of the Madiga mass movement around Ongole was set in motion by the great famine of 1876-78 which had a devastating impact upon the entire region, and especially upon the Madigas who lived close to the subsistence level in the best of circumstances. Clough’s response to the famine was significant. He began by distributing cholera pills and financial aid to those in need. Then when it became obvious that the famine was not going to be temporary, he took out a contract to dig a three and a half mile section of the Buckingham canal, a government relief project. From February through July 1877 he organized work on the canal, using his preachers as overseers and employing Christians as labourers. Large numbers of Madigas came to the camp for food and for work, knowing that they would be better treated there than at other relief projects where the overseers were caste Hindus instead of fellow Madigas. Those who had earned enough to tide them over went back home and sent family or friends to replace them. While working on the canal, they participated in Christian worship and heard the Christian message presented daily. What began as a relief project for Christians became a powerful evangelistic witness. When work on the canal was completed, Clough was put in charge of distributing grain and private relief funds by the local famine relief committee. This ceased in May 1878 when the famine had abated. Clough did not baptize during the famine despite repeated requests to do so. These requests became, if anything, even more persistent once the famine was on the wane, but Clough did not know what to do and kept sending people away. However, his indecision in the matter quickly vanished in June 1878 when two Catholic priests informed him that if he would not baptize those requesting it, then they would do so! In June 1168 were baptized, in July 7513 (2222 in one day!), 466 in August, 59 in November and 400 in December.23 Many more were turned away or told to wait until they were ready. Clough attributed this mass movement to the preparatory work done by the earlier converts, to the apparent powerlessness of the traditional deities in the face of famine, to the positive impression which Christian teaching and action had made during the famine, and to the people’s fear that they might yet die without having been baptized.24

In no subsequent year did the American Baptist Telugu Mission baptize as many converts as in 1878. There were about 3000 baptized in 1880. The years 1890 and 1891 witnessed another revival including the baptism of 1671 in one day.25 Writing in 1912, the Rev. W.L. Ferguson commented that ‘The impulse of these movements has never been lost. It is the normal thing for the Mission to have anywhere from 1500 to 3500 baptisms annually.’ By then the number of church members had reached 61,687.26 Virtually all of these were Madigas. The Chuhra Movement in the Punjab The beginnings of the Chuhra mass movements are generally attributed to a small, lame, illiterate 30-year old man named Ditt.27 Ditt lived in a village, Shahabdike, thirty miles from Sialkot, but made his living by buying up hides in his own and surrounding villages and then selling them to dealers. He first heard the Christian message from one Nattu, a Jat lambardar’s son from a neighbouring village who had fallen on hard times since his baptism in November 1872. Nevertheless, Ditt decided on the basis of Nattu’s testimony to become a Christian and so, in June 1873, Nattu took him to Sialkot, the headquarters of the United Presbyterian missionaries by whom Nattu himself had been baptized. There Ditt made two unusual requests of the Rev. Samuel Martin. The first was that he be baptized promptly. Martin therefore examined Ditt and, finding no scriptural reason for not baptizing him, did so. Ditt’s second request was that he be permitted to return to his family and village, even though there was neither a Christian community nor a missionary nearby to nurture him in his new faith. This request was also granted. When Ditt went back to his home, his people and his work, he told his family and friends that he had become a Christian and why. Three months later Ditt was back in Sialkot again bringing his wife, daughter and two neighbours to Martin for baptism. Six months after that he brought four more neighbours, one of whom, a relative of his named Kaka, joined Ditt in voluntary evangelistic work, which became more and more absorbing as time went on. The story of Ditt’s conversion and subsequent evangelistic work does not appear in the annual reports of the Sialkot Mission but only in Andrew Gordon’s history of the mission published in 1886. However, by 1875 the

missionaries were aware of a conversion movement among the Chuhras, even though it had not as yet become very large.28 Moreover, the movement came to have three distinct centers which, as far as the missionaries could determine, were completely independent of each other. The origins of one near Gujranwala, where Karm Bakhsh was the first Chuhra convert, have not been described.29 The other occurred in some villages near Gurdaspur, soon after a missionary was stationed there in 1876. In village Khaira nine adults and six children were baptized. Their main motive for conversion appeared to have been a desire to acquire land. When these and other demands were refused and those making them were left alone for a while, their attitude changed. By 1886 there were 40 Christians there. A more impressive movement occurred in the large village of Awankha led by Chaughatta, who had been on a religious quest for some time when he heard an Indian convert from Islam preaching in nearby Dinanagar. He in turn was instrumental in the conversion of a former faqir, Prem Masih. In the year 1881 first five men, then eighteen men and eleven children, and finally 21 more people, most of them wives and daughters of the initial converts, were baptized in Awankha.30 By 1884 Awankha had an organized congregation.31 Later a similar development was to occur in the nearby village of Tibur. In February 1886 eight people were baptized there; in July twelve more were baptized, and in 1904 ‘a large accession to membership’ took place.32 In the early years of this Chuhra movement the United Presbyterian missionaries devoted their energies to educating and training those who had decided to convert rather than to direct preaching among those who had not.33 Thus most of the actual evangelistic work was done by the Chuhra converts themselves. Moreover, at their January 1877 Mission meeting the United Presbyterians decided to devote special attention to the poor and especially to the Chuhras, in their evangelistic work, using I Corinthians 1:26-29 as their guide just as Clough had done.34 Soon they took the further step of shifting the emphasis in their work from the urban to the rural areas, and even posted missionaries there. A period of remarkable growth followed. Between 1881 and 1891 the number of baptized Christians affiliated with their mission increased from 660 to 10,165.35 In 1886 alone there were almost 2,000 baptisms, 1,041 in the Zafarwal area, where Ditt’s village was located and where they reported that year a total Christian

population of 2,558 as well as an average church attendance of 2,041!36 Another period of growth occurred between 1900 and 1914 when the communicant membership (always a lower figure than the number of baptized Christians) increased from 7,000 to 32,000.37 It is more difficult to discern from the available sources the process by which this movement spread. One missionary, writing in 1883, commented, It is now over ten years since the movement began; it is not therefore a mere temporary impulse. At the first, one man made a profession of faith in Christ, and it was principally through his efforts that the work spread through the neighboring villages, then through the friends and relatives of those who first believed.38

The following year another commented that it was spread as Chuhra converts met with their relatives at weddings and funerals; a woman missionary even preached at a funeral where hundreds of women were present.39 It also seemed to spread mostly from man to man and then from the men to the women in their families, as in the case of village Awankha cited above. Writing in 1896 Robert Stewart stated that ‘Perhaps twice as many men as women have been baptized’, a phenomenon he attributed in part to the men’s greater exposure to new ideas and to the women’s deeper attachment to familiar customs, religious beliefs and social ties.40 Direct evidence for group decisions to convert is, however, singularly lacking. In 1886 it was reported that nearly all the Chuhras in one village in the Sialkot area became Christians and in 1904 that the entire Chuhra community in another village requested repeatedly to be baptized, but had to be turned down for lack of a teacher.41 These group actions seem to have been the exception rather than the rule. In 1883 one missionary reported 82 Christians living in nine villages southeast of Zafarwal.42 That comes to about nine individuals or maybe three families per village. Two years later another reported that the Christian population of four villages in the Gurdaspur area was 45, 37, 16, and 12 respectively.43 In 1890 the Mission reported 10,171 Christians in 525 villages, not quite 20 per village.44 This suggests that while conversion did follow caste and family lines, Chuhras tended to convert in small clusters of individuals or families. These initial conversions might then be followed by those of other individuals or families in the same village at a later date, as in the case of village Tibur mentioned above.

There was a definite note of perplexity and uncertainty in the missionary response to this movement, especially in its early years. Three matters were the source of most of their misgivings. The first was whether the Chuhras would make good converts. The missionaries had to satisfy themselves not only that those seeking baptism were not simply seeking land, money, food or other such temporal benefits (‘loaves and fishes’) which might ease their poverty but also that they had some understanding of the Christian message and of the implications of Christian discipleship. Thus teaching converts and working changes in their lifestyle became as important as baptizing them.45 A second concern was whether the converts could withstand the persecution which almost inevitably followed baptism. Chuhras were at the mercy of their landlords who saw conversion as a sign of rebellion and brought pressure to bear upon them to return to the old religion. Finally, the missionaries were concerned that the baptism of Chuhras might do permanent harm to their evangelistic efforts among the higher castes. On that subject opinions differed until perhaps the mid-1880s, when the missionaries found that caste Hindu and Muslim converts continued to come in at about the same rate as before.46 The Chuhra movement did not remain confined to the ‘mission field’ of the United Presbyterians, but spread into areas defined by comity agreements as the ‘fields’ of other mission societies. This development occurred in 1884 and 1885. Charles Forman of the Punjab Mission of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. reported the beginnings of a Chuhra movement in two villages near Lahore in 1884.47 In time it spread within Lahore and Ferozepore districts and eastward. After that their numbers increased markedly so that by 1914 they had 3,457 communicant members but 22,339 baptized adherents.48 The Church of Scotland baptized their first five Chuhra villagers in November 1885. In 1886 440 more were baptized, in 1887 another 666, and in 1888 568 more. By 1912 there were 10,000 baptized Christians connected with the mission.49 In October 1885 an Anglican missionary of the Church Missionary Society baptized 14 Chuhras and the mass movements spread into the Amritsar and Gurdaspur districts where they were working.50 Later arrivals in the area—the Methodists, the Roman Catholics, and the Salvation Army— were to become involved as well. Like the United Presbyterians, the other missions went through considerable soul-searching, which included criticism of United

Presbyterian procedures, but in the end responded positively to a movement which they too considered to be the work of God.51 In order to avoid unnecessary competition with their neighbours, in 1889 the United Presbyterians worked out agreements which defined more precisely their mission field boundaries with the Church of Scotland and the Church Missionary Society. The agreement involved transferring 75 villages and 1,283 Christians to the latter and receiving 33 villages and 497 Christians from the former.52 No such agreements could be reached with the Roman Catholics whom they accused of engaging in trying to convert Protestants instead of Hindus or Muslims.53 Of the 163,994 Indian Christians reported in the 1911 Census, 92,739 were Presbyterians, 29,051 were Anglicans, 18,007 were in The Salvation Army, 11,723 were Methodists, and 8,497 were Roman Catholics.54 In each case the vast majority by that time would have been Chuhras. The Pattern of the Mass Movements The process of comparing and generalizing about Dalit mass movements began with contemporary missionary observers reflecting on their personal impressions. For them the question of motivation provided the key to understanding the movements. In 1900 the South Indian Missionary Conference listed five motivations that were ‘most immediate and manifestly operative’: the conviction that Christianity is the true religion; a desire for protection from oppressors and, if possible, material aid; the desire for education for their children; the knowledge that those who have become Christians had improved ‘both in character and condition’; and the influence of Christian relatives.55 One missionary remarked not many years later that It ought to be frankly recognized that it may be towards the Motherhood of the Church rather than towards the Fatherhood of the Savior from sin that the faces of the pariahs and aboriginal races of India are being slowly turned. They may be seeking baptism, for the most part not from a desire to have their lives and consciences cleansed from sin and to enter the eternal life of God, but because the Church presents itself to them as a refuge from oppression, and as a power that fosters hope and makes for betterment.56

The related question of why a mass movement should occur in one place or among one jati but not another baffled them. As one missionary in South India wrote, Famines are of constant occurance in the various mission districts of India, and

whenever they occur Christian missionaries take an active part in the relief of the people; but it is only here and there that they result in larger conversions to Christianity, and it is difficult to say why a famine should have led to the conversion of 40,000 converts in Tinnevelly, when the same cause leads to no such result elsewhere. There are pariahs and outcastes all over India, but it is only in certain districts that the pressure of caste tyranny drives them into the Christian Church. No doubt there are subtle causes which account for the fact that apparently similar conditions produce such different results in different parts of India, but it is not easy to detect them, and it is impossible to predict a priori the exact course which the progress of Christianity will follow in the future. ‘The Spirit bloweth where it listeth.’ We hear the sound and can see the results, but we cannot tell whence it is likely to come and whither it is likely to go.57

No one perspective or approach has dominated recent studies of individual Dalit mass movements and no historical study has yet been made of all of them. Specific movements have been examined for the insights they offer into the dynamics of the Christian mission,58 into the origins and development of certain Protestant churches,59 or into an important aspect of Indian social history.60 Even the two case studies presented above are not identical because of what the available sources include or leave out. Nonetheless, there is sufficient overlapping material in the detailed accounts at hand to make comparisons and develop some generalizations about the origins, stages, motivation and spread of the Dalit mass movements. Their impact will be considered in the concluding section of the chapter. Duncan Forrester has provided a very provocative analysis of the origins of the Dalit mass movements by raising three inter-related questions. Why was there such an upsurge of discontent among Dalits in the second half of the nineteenth century? Why did this restlessness so often assume a primarily religious form, and specifically that of conversion? Why did it flow towards Christianity and Protestant Christianity in particular? He traces the pervasive restlessness to ‘the cumulative effect of the western impact on India’, and specifically to those increasing dislocations of village life resulting from the new land revenue and legal systems. The point is simply this: as the traditional productive relationships and the system of reciprocal duties and services called jajmani were undercut, not only did the lowest sections of the village community lose such security as they had had and in most cases find themselves in a worse economic situation than before, but the general loosening of social links within the community set the depressed caste

groups free to fend for themselves, to look for new patrons, perhaps, or to change their lifestyle and religious commitments without the old pressure to conform to the norms of the village community being enforced by the higher castes. Periods of famine provide extreme instances of this process.61

This restlessness born of dislocation most frequently took a religious form not only because other avenues of upward mobility were effectively closed to Dalits but also because conversion offered them a new, better social and religious identity which was not dependent ‘on its acceptance and recognition by the higher castes’.62 The only clear answer Forrester provides as to why Christianity was adopted is that the Christians were the first to respond to Dalit restlessness.63 Forrester acknowledges that his hypothesis concerning the roots of nineteenth century Dalit restlessness is difficult to prove.64 While he does not offer any evidence in its favour beyond the example of famine, the evidence presented in the previous chapter undermines it at two key points. First, while western revenue and legal systems did change the situations of the landholding castes, there is no indication that it affected their relations with the village Dalits. The jajmani system, both in famine areas (e.g., Andhra) and in non-famine areas (e.g., Punjab) remained intact until well into the twentieth century.65 As the case studies of the Chuhras, Chamars, Mahars, and Paraiyar indicate, for Dalits there were no serious dislocations to produce restlessness. Second, what was new in the nineteenth century was not Dalit restlessness (why must one assume that Dalits were content with or even accepted their lot until the late nineteenth century?) but the increasing opportunities they found to move out of the old oppressive order. Mahars and Paraiyar were already seeking employment in the army and elsewhere as the century began; Chuhras were converting to Islam or Sikhism prior to British rule. Moreover, in addition to going against the evidence provided by the case studies cited in the previous chapter, Forrester’s hypothesis explains neither the pre-famine phase of the Madiga movement, nor the entire Chuhra movement, nor the fact that the overwhelming majority of Dalits never converted at all. An alternative explanation of the origins of the mass movements is therefore in order. For this it is necessary to begin an analysis of Dalit mass movements not with circumstances or social forces, but with people and specifically with

leaders. Periah, Ditt, Venkayya,66 and Alagan67 were leaders not just because they were the first to convert, but because they were also determined to lead the rest of their people to convert also. These were men who by virtue of their work, or family connections, or spiritual quests had been exposed to the wider world beyond their villages and were open to new orientations and new life-styles. Not only were they somewhat more economically independent than their local caste fellows, but they were also men of sufficient standing in their communities to be taken seriously and eventually followed. In this respect they were helped by the fact that Dalit jatis, unlike caste Hindu jatis, did not socially ostracize converts to other religions. Where such local leaders existed and accepted the Christian message, a conversion movement could follow; where they did not or where their concerns lay elsewhere, then it could not. This is what gave the Dalit mass movements that arbitrary character which missionary contemporaries found so baffling. It is important to distinguish this ‘leader stage’ of a mass movement from subsequent stages in order to understand better the motivations and dynamics of the movement as a whole. Some like Periah and Ditt came as individuals, while others like Venkayya and Alagan came as part of a small group of family or friends in one village. Their motivation was primarily religious in that accepting the truth of the Christian message was central to their decision. Occasional missionary references to their preaching indicate that God’s love ‘even for the outcaste’ was what made that message so appealing.68 As one Lal Begi leader put it, ‘Christ gave me a pagri (turban, symbol of respect) in place of dust’.69 This may have been part of that vision of a new social and religious identity, which contemporary observers, both Christian and Hindu, were to see as characteristic of these movements.70 The next stage of the movement, especially in the early movements, really belonged to these leaders. They shared their experience and their convictions with family members, with neighbours, and with relatives or business acquaintances of the same jati in nearby villages. If a mission sent an evangelist or teacher to their village at their request, it was the leaders who supplied the audience. Periah was very much the exception in making lengthy preaching tours. The motivation for conversion at this stage was

similar to that of the leaders with the added desire to be supportive of family members and friends who had already been baptized.71 The third stage came when the mission realized that a movement was afoot and decided to deploy its own resources both to spread and to shape it. At this stage the missionaries came to play a more dominant role. They sent out evangelists to augment the work of the leaders and their converts; they sent catechists to instruct inquirers and teachers to establish schools; then they themselves toured their ‘districts’, preaching, baptizing, and supervising the nurture of new Christians. They organized congregations with local leaders and sought to set standards of proper Christian behavior. (Clough’s threefold prohibition against idolatry, working on Sunday, and eating carrion was the most common.) Some also sought to intervene when Christians were being persecuted.72 Most important of all, they trained promising converts to become mission workers so as to give what the missionaries considered to be clear Christian substance and direction to the movement. It was at this stage that the ‘demonstration effect’ of Christianity became quite obvious. Dalits could now see in Christianity the possibility of human betterment, of education, of concern and help in the crisis of famine, of ‘friends in court’. They could also begin to see, as time went on, the differences becoming a Christian did, and did not, make in the lives of those who had converted. These perceptions in turn affected the motivation of subsequent inquirers and converts. This question of motivation, particularly at this more expansive stage of the mass movements, has been the subject of controversy since the movements began. There now appears to be a scholarly consensus that the underlying motivation was the search for improved social status, for a greater sense of personal dignity and self-respect, for freedom from bondage to oppressive land owners.73 Missionaries were reluctant to baptize in time of famine and, even in good times, lacked the kinds of resources necessary to alleviate the poverty of those Dalits who approached them. Moreover, the persecution which Dalits faced upon conversion involved not only physical violence but also economic deprivation.74 The epithet ‘Rice Christian’ thus flies in the face of the facts Dalit converts had to confront.

There is also no clear pattern of decision-making at this stage. Contemporary observers rarely noted whether or not conversion was the result of a group decision by a caste panchayat or by a caste faction. The best indicators available therefore are the baptismal statistics. Where the number of baptisms in one place at one time was very large, one may assume that a group decision was behind it, otherwise not. In many instances the process of winning over most or all the members of one’s jati in one’s village could take years. Thus Pickett’s definition of a mass movement as characterized by a group decision is not strictly correct. What is clear is that, whether caste panchayats or individual families made the decision, evangelism and conversion did follow along family and jati lines. Weddings, funerals, business deals all provided occasions to pass the word; at times conversion could even be a condition for a marriage between Christians and Hindus of the same jati.75 At some time each mass movement reached a saturation point. In the case of the Madiga movement around Ongole, it came when virtually all the followers of Yogi Nasriah had been baptized. Usually it came when the Missions found that they had more inquirers from more villages than they were able to respond to, given the number of mission workers at their disposal.76 A period of consolidation would then follow, when the emphasis shifted from evangelizing new villages to training those who had already been won in the Christian faith and life. Then, once again, fresh evangelistic initiatives would be taken. Some movements went on for decades with alternating periods of expansion and consolidation. This, then, was the general pattern of the mass movements with somewhat different motivations and dynamics operative at different stages. It cannot be asserted that all movements fit this pattern; further research may indicate major deviations from it. Yet all were basically people’s movements, as instances of mission rather than Dalit initiative were rare,77 and Dalit interest kept them going. THE IMPACT OF THE MASS MOVEMENTS Historians have tended to underestimate the enormous impact which the Dalit mass movements have had. Christian historians have treated them,

like medical or agricultural missions, as new and noteworthy aspects of mission work, while historians of modern India or of the Dalit movement have failed either to analyze them in any depth or to make causal connections between them and subsequent events in the Dalit struggle. Here, therefore, their impact upon the churches, upon the Dalit converts themselves, and upon the Dalit movement as a whole is assessed at some length before some general conclusions are drawn. The Churches The most obvious impact which the Dalit mass movements had upon the churches was demographic. They led to a dramatic increase in the membership of the churches, as is evident in the cases of the Baptists around Ongole and the United Presbyterians in the Punjab. These increases are reflected in the Indian Census figures in Table I which show that while the Indian population as a whole increased by about 71% in the sixty years between 1872 and 1931, the Indian Christian population nearly quadrupled in size. This difference was due primarily to conversion and especially to the Dalit mass movements.78 TABLE I

INCREASE IN THE INDIAN CHRISTIAN POPULATION

1872-1931

79

Source: Census of India

The other aspect of this demographic change was a transformation of the Christian community from a tiny, predominantly urban, educated community of mixed social origins to a predominantly poor, rural, illiterate Dalit community. According to the 1931 Census, about five of every six Indian Christians were rural.80 This transformation of the Christian community was accompanied by a redirection of missionary resources and effort not only to expand the mass movements but also to nurture all the new converts which the movements were bringing in. Thus in 1880 the Baptists in Ongole began facing up to the organizational problems which the post-famine conversions brought about by adding 24 ordained pastors to the seven they already had.81 The United Presbyterians established village schools in the Punjab primarily for the instruction of their Chuhra converts. In 1886 there were 695 students in their schools in the Zafarwal area; of these 470 were new Christians and another 92 were Chuhras.82 In fact, the whole purpose of this mission’s educational work began to shift from evangelizing Hindus and Muslims to training Christian leadership for the churches and mass movements.83 Some missions went farther than others in this respect. None totally gave up their more traditional forms of work, but all felt the strain on limited resources of money and personnel which the mass movements imposed.84 In addition, the mass movements brought Dalit concerns into the churches and so drew the missions into an enlarged perception of their work. Missionaries did stand up for the rights of persecuted Dalit converts, in court when necessary. In addition, the missions began to address themselves to the more enduring and difficult problem of Dalit landlessness. In the North missionary efforts were confined to acquiring land on which to establish self-supporting Christian villages. In the Punjab several missions were allocated land in the newly created and highly prosperous canal colonies for the resettlement of mostly Dalit converts.85 In the South, however, missionaries took a leading role in an important agitation for granting land to Dalits.

The roots of this agitation lay in the evangelistic work of the Rev. Adam Andrew of the Church of Scotland and the Rev. William Goudie, a Wesleyan Methodist, in Chingleput district near Madras. There had been an initial influx of Paraiyar into the two churches following the 1877 famine and then a mass movement began around 1890. It seems that only when the missionaries confronted powerful, sustained opposition to this movement from the mirasdars that they came to appreciate the severity of the oppression Paraiyar had to endure. The mirasdars feared losing total control over the Paraiyar and so used physical force, cut off all means of livelihood within the village, and even threatened eviction from their homes in the cheri in order to prevent or punish conversion. In 1890, when on leave in England, Andrew brought the plight of the Paraiyar to the attention of a member of Parliament and the Under Secretary of State for India. While questions were raised in Parliament in 1891, Goudie was working with the Collector of Chingleput district as famine conditions approached, and in April presented a paper to the Madras Missionary Conference on ‘The Disabilities of the Pariah’. This paper not only received considerable newspaper publicity but also led the Conference to petition the Government for an inquiry in 1891 and again in 1892. The basis of the appeal was not that Government should remove barriers to the spread of Christianity, but that it give justice to the Paraiyar who were still forced to live ‘in practical slavery’. The missionary demand for an inquiry was supported by two leading newspapers, the Madras Mail and The Hindu, as well as by Hindu reformers. While the Board of Revenue was unreceptive, the Madras Government took action. Firstly, it directed the lands escheated to Government for arrears of revenue might, after careful investigation, be allocated to members of the pariah community. Of this land there were 1500 acres available in the Chingleput district. Secondly, the Government, convinced that the mirasdars’ claim to the pariah’s home sites was an encroachment on established usage, promised to take steps to prevent their eviction and, thirdly, it declared it would do ‘whatever is reasonable and in its power’ to foster pariah education.86

This was a very modest victory in the face of strong mirasdar opposition. It did not give Dalits the right to own land and cultivate village wastelands as they and the missionaries had hoped. Also the educational assistance proved

to be very meager. Nevertheless, the churches had come out emphatically on the side of the oppressed Dalits on a matter of simple social justice. However, while this enlarged vision of its work was to have important short-run consequences, by far the most significant long term impact which the Dalit mass movements made upon the churches in India was to put a permanent Dalit stamp upon them. Visions and mission strategies would change as new challenges and new leadership arose, but the social roots of the Indian Christian community had become predominantly Dalit roots. While in many parts of India the Christian community has acquired a Dalit and mass movement image which remains to this day, the leadership of the churches, both foreign and Indian, has at times been either amazingly blind to or unwilling to accept this obvious social fact. Increasingly during the 1920s and 1930s as India moved towards independence, the development of the rural church (and that was almost always a Dalit church) as a selfsupporting, self-governing, self-propagating and hence enduring church became a major missionary concern. Immediately after Independence such other matters as the transfer of power within the churches from foreign missionary to Indian hands or relations with the majority community took priority, but the rural, predominantly Dalit church did not disappear. It remains the chief legacy of the mass movements to the Christian Church in India. The Dalit Converts The impact of the mass movements upon those Dalits who did convert to Christianity can best be appreciated by beginning with what did not change. While Ferguson indicated that upon conversion thousands of Madigas left their traditional occupation for agriculture,87 and while there were Dalits who benefitted from missionary efforts to acquire land for them or get them work on tea and coffee estates, the vast majority of converts remained in their villages, in their occupations, in their familiar social and economic relationships.88 The second half of Pickett’s definition of a mass movement is more accurate than the first half; the converts did preserve their social integration.89 Indeed the most immediate consequence of conversion was not liberation but increased oppression. Virtually every village where conversions took place had its persecution story to tell. Usually this

involved an economic boycott. To quote Clough,

The village washermen were told

not to work for [the Madiga converts]; the potter was told not to sell pots to them; their cattle were driven from the common grazing ground; the Sudras combined in a refusal to give them the usual work of sewing sandals and harness; at harvest time they were not allowed to help and lost their portion of grain.90

At times persecution went beyond these and other attempts at starving converts into submission to include physical abuse, burning chapels, and getting converts arrested on false charges.91 In time persecution invariably subsided as the landholders realized that conversion was not the first step towards the more fundamental agrarian revolt they feared.92 What then did change? Most obviously, those Dalits who accepted baptism became Christians and hence members of the Christian community. This ‘Body of Christ’, which included not only higher caste converts but also the ruling Europeans, was to be the Dalits’ new jati, whose identity they were entitled to share and whose injunctions they were expected to follow. While this new identity was conferred instantly at baptism, it was nurtured and reinforced through adherence to Christian teachings and regular participation in Christian worship. Socially, it was maintained through links with the Christian community beyond the village. Periodic visits by the missionary or district pastor, Christian festivals and melas, revival meetings and other occasions for community celebration helped develop this sense of Christian unity. However, the chief embodiment of the ties binding village Dalits to the wider church was the catechist-teacher posted in the village by the Mission. This man, himself usually a Dalit, was the one who, as Godfrey Phillips put it, alone from day to day bears the burden of the work through good report and ill. It is he who teaches the children all the week, and who preaches on Sunday. Whoever falls sick in the village, he will be looked to for advice, medicine, and prayers. When a refractory Christian lapses into some low heathen practice, it is the teacher who must convince him of the error of his ways. . . . In oppressions by the caste people, in domestic joys and sorrows, in disputes as to ownership of land or as to village right of way, this teacher-catechist is called to be the guide, philosopher and friend of the community, which naturally tends to lean hard on any outside help which may be offered.93

He was also to be, as this quotation indicates, the chief agent of Dalit transformation.

It was the inner transformation of Dalits following their conversion that struck contemporary missionary observers most forcefully. They found among the converts a new dignity, a new self-respect, which was previously lacking. The most common evidence cited for this change included such things as the converts’ impressive ability to withstand severe persecution, their almost universal refusal to eat carrion any more, and a new desire among many of them for selfimprovement, especially through education. To this evidence Clough added examples of better standards of hygiene and sanitation;94 Phillips mentioned examples of a better reputation among their caste Hindu neighbours;95 the United Presbyterians as well as the Baptists rejoiced in their willingness to support their own pastors;96 but H.B. Hyde provided the most striking evidence of all. Again, the existing Christian communities are seen to be prosperous beyond the average; they have larger surviving families and evince a fascinating democratic independence; they are known also to be remarkably immune from disease: if attacked by epidemics, large numbers of them recover. The ultimate cause of this latter remarkable fact is, of course, God’s grace; but the immediate cause is that men who have awakened to hope no longer submit to avoid calamity, they take the missionary’s medicine, and, better still, they make a fight for their lives.97

This transformation, however, should not be exaggerated. Missionaries frequently complained about Dalit converts clinging to old beliefs in demons, evil spirits and village deities. Kooiman noted that in times of famine Dalits not only entered the Christian fold but also left it to appease the demons considered responsible.98 Reports concerning the transforming impact of the other new element Christianity brought to the Dalits, namely education, are less uniform and clear than those concerning conversion. The Missions placed teachercatechists, when such men were available, in villages where there were a good number of converts. What the teacher-catechist offered in those villages was generally the government approved primary school curriculum supplemented by religious education. Its purpose was to impart Christian teaching, to provide basic literacy skills, and to afford an opportunity for further education in a mission boarding school or training center to those who did well. The teacher-catechist had to struggle against a tradition of Dalit illiteracy, against levels of Dalit poverty which forced even young

children to work in houses and fields, and against a curriculum so irrelevant to the realities of village life that even those who attended school lapsed back into illiteracy in a few years.99 Nevertheless, there were some impressive individual successes and it was generally agreed that the rate of literacy among Christian Dalits was far higher than among other Dalits.100 With education came the possibility of at least individual mobility and here too it was agreed that Christian Dalits were ahead of other Dalits.101 However, this was a slow process because it was generally not the converts themselves but their children who could avail themselves of the new job opportunities outside the village which some education and Mission connections opened up.102 Membership in the Christian community, despite the help offered and received, did pose a serious problem for the Dalits. Loyalty to their new community and its teachings jeopardized the converts’ relations with the unbaptized members of their jatis. For one thing, the missionaries were unanimous in insisting that the converts give up all ‘idolatrous practices’ from their past. This meant that Christian Dalits were not to participate in the weddings, funerals, or feasts for the dead of their non-Christian fellows because of the ‘idol worship’ inevitably involved. For another, even though inter-caste marriage among converts was rare, missionaries either discouraged or forbade inter-marriage with non-Christians, lest converts fall back into old ways.103 While Dalit jatis were not so quick to excommunicate converts to Christianity as were other jatis, they did expect participation in these and similar communal ceremonies. Thus converts were often forced to choose between their old and new communities.104 In 1924 W.S. Hunt, a C.M.S. missionary in Travancore, where the gulf between Syrian and Dalit Christians was extremely wide, lamented: In most areas village Christians feel their solidarity with the outcaste community of their own area, and especially that section of it to which they themselves originally belonged, rather than with the Christian community, in which indeed they exist as a kind of enclave. The outcastes, rather than the other Christians, are felt to be their brothers.105

This may be an overstatement for India as a whole. Missionary testimonials abound concerning the value Dalit converts placed upon both their new Christian identity and their relationships with the wider Christian community. Obviously the problem was less severe in those villages where

the entire membership of a Dalit jati converted and the caste panchayat could thus enforce Christian discipline, than in those villages where the jati was split after conversion. For this reason there were missions which, by the end of this period, would not baptize leaders until they brought the rest of their jati in the village to convert with them.106 The dilemma of divided loyalties was nonetheless a common one throughout India. Both Kooiman and Oddie found considerable movement back and forth between Hinduism and Christianity among Dalits in South Travancore as well as in the Tanjore and Trichinopoly districts of the Madras Presidency.107 Such movement was intensified where Dalits experienced caste discrimination within the churches. This was most severe in Kerala, where a Dalit Christian protest movement began in the 1890s, but was also found in varying degrees of severity wherever Dalit Christians sought to become part of town or city congregations dominated by converts from higher castes.108 What has been said here about the impact of conversion upon Dalits would seem to apply to the women as well as to the men. The contemporary literature, including even the women’s missionary magazines, were amazingly silent about Dalit women. A break with the past was extremely difficult for them because their lives, even more than the men’s, were totally absorbed by the constant pre-dawn to dark drudgery of survival.109 While appreciative of ‘the ministry of friendship’ offered by visiting missionaries and Bible women, Dalit women (unlike Dalit girls) had a difficult time learning the new teaching and adopting the new ways of Christianity.110 Perhaps the most difficult demand the missionaries made of women converts was that they stop using charms. As one missionary explained, ‘These things are all that the women know for the preservation of the life and health of their children’.111 Indeed this may well have been the Dalit woman’s central religious concern, both in turning to Christianity112 and in clinging to the old securities. Perhaps one great advantage Dalit women gained through conversion was that divorce, and hence abandonment, was more difficult for Christians than for others.113 For the Dalits, therefore, conversion to Christianity did not lead to a total break from the past. Not even large scale conversion could overturn either the caste system or the agrarian system, even if here and there it did provide added resources with which to withstand certain forms of oppression.

Moreover, it was only for a very small percentage of Dalits that conversion provided a means of outward and upward mobility by which to escape from the bondage those systems inflicted. For the vast majority of Dalit converts, however, the mass movements initiated a process of primarily cultural change which included alterations in perceptions of self and the world, in life-style, as well as the acquisition of enhanced resources for selfimprovement and self-empowerment. The Dalit Movement The nineteenth century witnessed the beginnings of change for the Dalits. New opportunities for education and occupational mobility were starting to open up to them. In the cultural sphere, Dalits were being drawn towards sectarian movements, towards sanskritization,114 and towards conversion as ways of reform and liberation from social and economic oppression. In the 1890s there were some urban Mahars and Paraiyar petitioning the government, forming associations, and even publishing some small newspapers. The Namasudras in Bengal were the earliest to become politicized as both proponents and opponents of the partition of Bengal (1905) sought their support.115 In Travancore Ayyan Kali began to mobilize the Pulayas with considerable Pulaya Christian collaboration and in 1911 was nominated to the Sri Mulam Popular Assembly as their spokesperson.116 However, with these possible exceptions, there were, prior to the eve of World War I, no organized movements among the Dalits other than the mass movements described in this chapter. These mass movements constituted the first stage of the modern Dalit movement, not simply because they greatly expanded opportunities for Dalit education in mission schools, but primarily because they succeeded in bringing the situation of all Dalits to public attention and making it a matter of public concern. Since this point has not been made with the sharpness and clarity it deserves, it must be emphasized here. The mass movements were Dalit movements, initiated and led by Dalits; missionaries did not lead Dalits, but responded to them. Moreover, it was only in responding that missionaries took to heart the severity of the oppression which was the Dalits’ daily lot and so became the Dalits’ friends, benefactors and advocates. In addition, the mass movements, by producing sharp increases

in the Christian population of India in the census reports, made the plight of the Dalits a matter of concern to Hindu social reformers and nationalists. This concern was greatly intensified by the Government of India Act of 1909 which established communal electorates and made communal representation in the legislatures proportional to a religious community’s percentage of the total population. By this decision the British government transformed the religious phenomenon of conversion into a highly charged political issue. Neither the government nor the Hindu reformers took much interest in the uplift of the Dalits until after the mass movements were in progress. In the Madras Presidency the government took minimal steps towards providing land or education for the Dalits, and then only under provocation,117 whereas in the Punjab it deliberately excluded Dalits from land ownership in the newly opened canal colonies and through the Punjab Land Alienation Act (1900). Throughout India it was invariably in mission schools rather than in government or other private schools that the first battles over the admission of Dalit students on a par with others were fought and won. Moreover, the work of the reformers for the Dalits both followed and was patterned upon that of the Christian missions. In western India Jotirao Phule had established some schools for Dalits as part of his anti-Brahmin, anticaste crusade,118 and in the 1870s the Prarthana Samaj organized some schools for low caste children in Bombay. However, only in 1906 with the creation of the Depressed Classes Mission, did the reformers’ work there begin in earnest. In the South the date was even later. Reformers had given some support to the missionary agitation in favour of granting unused waste land to the Dalits in 1890-1892; the Theosophical Society started a school for Dalits in 1894 and two more in 1899: there were some attempts by Srivaishnavas to open temples to Dalits;119 and the Depressed Classes Mission opened its first centers there in 1909. In that year it also began work in Bengal where in the 1890’s the first schools for Dalits had been organized. In the North, it was the Arya Samaj which was most aggressive in working among Dalits, mainly through offering them shuddhi or purification, but that got under way only in 1900.120 During this period the Indian National Congress deliberately avoided discussing ‘social questions’, while the National Social Conference passed resolutions on

raising the position of ‘Pariahs and other outcastes’ in 1896 and on relaxing caste restrictions in 1908.121 Not only were the reformers relatively late in responding to the Dalits, but it is also clear that they were provoked into doing so by the mass movements. In commenting upon the reformers in the South, Heimsath has stated, ‘The reformers generally acknowledged that the successes of Christian missionary conversions from among the outcaste groups was the initial incentive for Hindus to come to the rescue of their dishonored countrymen’.122 What was true in the South was true elsewhere in India as well, even though missionary ‘successes’ among the Dalits were not always as impressive as in the South. The Gaikwar of Baroda, a leader in Dalit uplift work under whose inspiration V.R. Shinde had started the Depressed Classes Mission,123 was quite explicit about this. We must purify our religious ideals. Religion must not be allowed to interfere with our progress individually and collectively. Millions have in the past been driven by this treatment to desert Hinduism for the Crescent and the Cross. Thousands are doing so every year. Can Hindus contemplate without alarm this annually increasing diminution in their number?124

In the North the Arya Samaj was pushed into work initially among Meghs but eventually among sweepers and Chamars in order to prevent their conversion to Christianity.125 As K. Natarajan was to remark later, ‘The fear of the Christian Missionary has been the beginning of much social wisdom among us.’126 The Government of India Act of 1909 turned a reformist and nationalist concern for the fate of the Dalits into an urgent matter of competitive politics. This constitution not only viewed India as a set of ‘interests’ which were to be represented in the legislatures but also, at the request of a Muslim deputation under the leadership of the Aga Khan, treated the Muslims as a separate interest entitled to elect their own representatives. The number of representatives they had would be based upon their census figures. Moreover, in its address to the Viceroy, the Aga Khan deputation had suggested that Dalits (‘those classes who are ordinarily classified as Hindus but properly speaking are not Hindus at all’) not be included in the Hindu totals, a measure which would enhance Muslim relative to Hindu

representation.127 While this request was not granted, it made Hindus apprehensive. Such misgivings were greatly heightened in November 1910 when E.A. Gait, the Census Commissioner, used the deputation’s phrase in a circular to the provincial superintendents of the forthcoming census to suggest that such people be listed in a separate table of ‘debatable Hindus’, but be retained as Hindus in the general census tables.128 The handwriting on the wall was clear for all to see: Dalit religious choices had serious political repercussions. What politically active Hindus feared was not so much the increase of the tiny and politically insignificant Christian community as the decreasing size and potential power of their own community. Between 1909 and 1912 a series of articles on the Depressed Classes appeared in the Indian Review, a recurring theme of which was the urgency of Dalit uplift efforts in order to stem the tide of conversion.129 Moreover, the opportunity which the 1909 communal award opened up for them was not lost upon educated Dalits, who began to organize and demand that their voice be recognized and heard.130 A new stage in the Dalit movement had begun. S.K. Gupta in his history has rightly attributed the political awakening of the Dalits and their introduction into the national political arena to ‘the process of their increasing importance for the various religious communities and groups that were vying with one another for increasing their own strength on the one hand, and tending to decrease that of the opponents on the other, in the game of “politics of numbers”’.131 The point to be made here is that it was the mass movements which gave the Dalits instant importance in the politics of numbers initiated by the 1909 Act. The mass movements had provided convincing evidence that caste Hindus could not take the Dalits for granted, that Dalits had already left the Hindu fold in large numbers and would continue to do so if not treated properly. It is an irony of history that a decade or two later Dalit political leaders would be critical of Dalit Christians who by conversion had diminished Dalit power in the politics of numbers. Yet, without those mass conversions, it would not have been possible for Dalits to take advantage of the politics of numbers in the first place!

CONCLUSIONS Thanks to the work of a number of recent historians, a fresh understanding of the mass movements is now possible. Some of the salient features of this are highlighted here by way of conclusion. First, the mass movements were Dalit movements initiated by Dalits and sustained by Dalit courage in the face of persecution. Second, they were not, as Pickett suggested, movements characterized by group decisions to convert. It would be more accurate to say that they included group as well as individual or family decisions to convert and they spread via caste linkages. Third, most of these movements seem to have progressed through a clearly defined series of stages. It was only at the third stage that the mission organization became involved. The contribution of the Christian missions was to give movements begun by Dalits what other religious movements often lacked, namely an organization which provided continuity and direction beyond the death of their original leaders.132 Fourth, it was primarily the foreign missionaries rather than the Indian Christians who responded most eagerly to the Dalit initiative; higher status Indian Christians were often quite unenthusiastic and even antagonistic towards the mass movements.133 Fifth, because they provoked Hindu nationalists and reformers to take steps toward redressing their grievances, especially when conversion became a heated issue in the politics of numbers, the mass movements constituted the first stage in the modern Dalit movement. What Christians could not achieve for the Dalits through their own agitations for social justice, as in Madras in 1890-1892, they were able to achieve by their evangelistic efforts, because of the competitive response those evoked from the far more resourceful Hindu community.

CHAPTER 3

The Politics of Numbers

The second stage of the Dalit movement, covering the period between the two World Wars, was quite different from the first. The transition had been set in motion by the Government of India Act of 1909 which had defined India not as a single nation but as a multitude of diverse ‘interests’ who had to be consulted for purposes of government. Because the British used numbers and ‘influence’ as criteria for recognition and representation as a separate ‘interest’, they gave Dalits and others an opportunity to enhance their relative power as distinct ‘interests’ by playing ‘the politics of numbers’. During the inter-war period when making two subsequent constitutions, the British maintained this working definition of India and granted representation to an increasing number of recognized ‘interests’, albeit with a very limited franchise, while the Indian National Congress tried to unite the nation as a single ‘interest’ and confront the British with a national demand for ever greater self-government. This struggle between the Congress and the British Raj dominated the period. At the same time there were struggles between various caste and religious communities within Indian society not only for power and place within the evolving political structures of colonial (and post-colonial) rule, but also, as G. Aloysius has pointed out, over what kind of society India was to become: one that continued to be based on a hierarchical ordering of ascribed (caste) status or a more egalitarian society based on citizenship rights.1 As both Dalits and Christians became involved in these struggles, they sought to secure for themselves a recognized ‘place’ in a future, democratically structured India. Thus politics, and specifically the politics of numbers, rather than religious change, became the distinguishing characteristic of this stage of the Dalit movement2 and religious conversion acquired a political significance it previously lacked.

In this stage of the Dalit movement, those Dalits who chose to become Christians were not the prime movers and actors that they had been during its initial stage. Instead, they quickly became marginalized in the struggle for place and power which characterized the 1920s and 1930s, a terrible turn of events for those who through conversion had brought the Dalit cause to public attention in the first place. In the politics of numbers the constitution-makers classified Dalit Christians as Christians rather than as Dalits and recognized the Indian Christian elite as the legitimate spokespersons for the Dalit Christians. The Dalit Christians had no outstanding leader of their own to challenge that. Not only did the Christian elite prove to be divided in its loyalties to the Dalits on the one hand and to the ‘mainstream’ nationalists in whose hands the nation’s destiny lay on the other, but it also, as leaders of a small and dispersed minority, lacked the political power to get what it wanted for the Dalit Christians anyway. The politics of numbers proved to be decisive in shaping not only the political identity and destiny of all Dalits but also the future relationship between the Dalit movement and the Christian Church in India. Thus the focus of this chapter, which is based primarily on newspaper sources,3 shifts from an analysis of grass roots developments to a narrative of political events culminating in and flowing from the Government of India Act of 1935. Unlike other studies of this stage of the Dalit movement which limit themselves to what the Government, Gandhi and the Congress, Dalit leaders and organizations were doing,4 this one also pays attention to the initiatives and responses of Christian leaders and Christian Dalits. The chapter begins with a survey of the 1920s and then provides a more detailed narrative of the 1930s. The events of that crucial decade are seen as falling into four distinct phases, defined according to who seized and held the initiative in dealing with the Dalits’ problems. Each phase began with an important event: the appointment of the Simon Commission in late 1927; Gandhi’s fast in 1932, Ambedkar’s declaration in 1935 that he would not die a Hindu, and the assumption of responsible provincial government in 1937. THE DALIT MOVEMENT IN THE 1920S

On 20 August, 1917 E.S. Montagu, the Secretary of State for India, issued a declaration which set the constitution-making process in motion. The policy of His Majesty’s government, with which the Government of India are in complete accord, is that of the increasing association of Indians in every branch of the administration, and the gradual development of selfgoverning institutions, with a view to the progressive realisation of responsible government in India as an integral part of the British Empire.

Prior to that declaration Dalits had no recognized spokesperson or All-India political organization of their own. Immediately after the declaration, Dalits who were politically active at the local level were courted not only by the Indian National Congress, which sought to present itself and its views on constitutional change as representative of all Indians, but also by the newly formed Justice Party, which claimed to speak for all non-Brahmins in the Madras Presidency. The latter made its appeal to the assembled Dalits at a public meeting in Madras on 2 October, 1917 but failed to win their support. The Congress fared somewhat better in Bombay where the Depressed Classes Mission Society organized a conference of some 2500 Dalits on 11 November, 1917. This endorsed the Congress proposals for constitutional change, but at the same time asked the Government to allow Dalits to elect their own representatives. The conference also called upon the Congress to pass a resolution at its forthcoming meeting ‘declaring to the people of India the necessity, justice, and righteousness of removing all the disabilities imposed by religion and custom upon the Depressed Classes’. This the Congress did, but their victory was somewhat blunted by the resolutions of another public meeting of some 2000 Dalits, also in Bombay, held under non-Brahmin sponsorship one week after the initial conference. This rejected the Congress proposals but reiterated the Dalit demand for their own representatives in the legislatures.5 Indeed, judging from the resolutions and petitions with which newly organized Dalit associations and public gatherings in different parts of the country responded to the Montagu declaration, Dalits at this juncture clearly had more faith in the British than in the caste Hindus (Congress or NonBrahmin) who would be the chief beneficiaries of any transfer of power.6 Moreover, it was equally clear that Dalits were more bent on establishing their own distinct political identity than in merging, and hence submerging,

it into a larger non-Brahmin or Indian identity. Those few Dalits and Dalit organizations which gained access to Montagu during his trip to India in the winter of 1917-1918 and to the Southborough Commission later in 1918, testified that Dalits wanted to have their own representatives, chosen by themselves rather than by others, in the new legislatures.7 What the Dalits actually received in the Government of India Act of 1919 were five Government nominees in the Madras Provincial legislature; two each in the Central Provinces as well as in Bihar and Orissa; one each in Bengal, Bombay, the United Provinces, and Assam; and none in the Punjab or Central legislatures. On the recommendation of the Muddiman Commission in 1924, these were doubled in Madras, the Central Provinces and Bombay, while the others remained the same and Assam lost its one nominee. Only in 1927 was a Dalit, M.C. Rajah of Madras, nominated to the Central Legislative Council.8 Once the constitution-making process was completed in 1919, Dalits and the major political parties had very little to do with each other. Dalits participated in neither the Rowlatt satyagraha in 1919 nor the NonCooperation Movement in 1920- 1922. In fact, they proved to be quite supportive of the British during the Congress boycott of the Prince of Wales’ visit to India.9 Soon after coming to power in Madras, the Justice Party severed its ties with the Dalits and became a caste Hindu party,10 as did the non-Brahmins in Bombay.11 During Non- Cooperation the Congress proved unable to get Dalit students admitted to the newly formed national schools and colleges. At Gandhi’s urging it did make the removal of untouchability part of its constructive program, but did little to implement this.12 Gandhi’s personal campaign for the removal of untouchability was blunted by his own opposition to the abolition of the caste system, a position for which he was severely criticized not only by Dalit leaders but also by such Hindu reformers as K. Natarajan, editor of the Indian Social Reformer.13 Hindu reform bodies, like the Depressed Classes Mission, which continued its grassroots efforts at Dalit uplift from the pre-war period and sponsored an annual Anti-Untouchability Conference, were joined by new ones in this endeavour.14 The provincial governments, now under dyarchy, also did little more than begin to deal with Dalit disabilities during the 1920s. In 1919 the Madras

government, which was considered the most progressive in this respect, appointed a Commissioner of Labour to look after Dalit interests, but his work, which got off to a good start,15 became increasingly hampered as the decade wore on. The Bombay government in 1923 first required schools receiving grants-in-aid not to discriminate against Dalit children, and then passed a resolution opening all public wells, watering places and dharmsalas to Dalits.16 In Mysore the Maharaja ordered government schools open to Dalits in 1919.17 Cochin opened its public roads and government schools in 1920, while Travancore even made some land assignments to Dalits and employed Dalits as government officials.18 However, if the provincial census commissioners of 1931 are to be believed, Dalit progress during the 1920s was not impressive. Despite general government efforts in the education of Dalits, literacy rates among them remained extremely low, albeit with interesting variations. In the Punjab a mere .8% of Chuhras and Chamars were literate, while in Bihar only .47% of Chamars and in U.P. just .33% of all Dalits were.19 In Madras Presidency the figures were 2.2% Paraiyar, .8% Malas, and .5% Madigas.20 In Cochin 5.3% of the Pulayas were literate.21 In Travancore the Census Commissioner made comparisons by religion. Among Pulayas 4.1% of the Hindus and 13.1% of the Christians were literate, while among Paraiyar the figures were 4.9% and 15.7% respectively.22 Census commissioners also noted a decline in the practice of untouchability in urban areas and towards those Dalits who had left their traditional occupations. Yet in the U.P. 85.6% of all Bhangis and 87.5% of all Chamars continued in their traditional occupations,23 and the figures elsewhere, where recorded, were generally high. Those who were perhaps the best off were the Mahars in the Bombay Presidency, only 17.9% of whom were reported to be continuing in their traditional occupation.24 Dalits enjoyed only limited access to wells and virtually no access at all to temples at the end of the decade. During the 1920s Dalits adopted a variety of strategies to deal with the conditions under which they were forced to live. Sanskritization was most marked in Bihar, as a rather detailed report of the activities of many castes in one district indicated.25 Another was changing caste names, from Chamar to Jatav or Jatav Rajput in U.P., from Paraiyar to Sambavar and

from Pulaya to Cherumar in Travancore. In this connection the most widespread change was in the adoption of an ‘Adi’ name (Adi- Dravida, Adi-Andhra, Adi-Karnataka, Adi-Hindu in the U.P., and Ad-Dharmi in the Punjab)26 which indicated that they were the original inhabitants of their respective regions who had been displaced by subsequent invaders. In January 1922 the Madras Legislative Council passed a resolution changing the generic labels, Pariah and Panchama, to Adi-Dravida and AdiAndhra.27 In 1925 M.C. Rajah wrote an important book, which gave expression to this ideology and set forth the Dalit programme in the Madras Presidency.28 However, the strategy of greatest consequence was definitely that of grass roots political organization and action. Dalit organizations multiplied during this period. Most were quite local and even caste-specific or ‘Adi’ in nature, but even the larger, more inclusive ones, such as B.R. Ambedkar’s Depressed Classes Institute, could not claim to be fully national or representative in scope. These organizations held public meetings and conferences, invited well-known Dalits to address their gatherings, and passed resolutions in order to provide political education and build up morale among their own people. Dalits also took direct action to claim their civic rights. There were local Dalit agitations in the Madras Presidency and United Provinces in the early 1920s29 but the two satyagrahas which attracted the most attention were at Vaikam in 1924- 1925 and at Mahad in 1927. The first was aimed at opening the roads around the Siva temple to all people. The leading spirit behind the 20 month long satyagraha, organized by the AntiUntouchability committee of the Kerala Provincial Congress, was the Izhava S.N.D.P. Yogam, but Pulayas were also involved. It included marches to use the road, hunger strikes, threats to convert, and Gandhi’s personal efforts at mediation. In November 1925 the Travancore government opened those three roads around the temple already used by Muslims and Christians to Hindus of all castes as well, but denied them access to the fourth road and to the temple itself. With that the Vaikam satyagraha ended.30 The Mahad satyagraha began in March 1927 when a Dalit conference under Ambedkar’s leadership processed to and drank water from the Chowdar Tank. A rumour that they were then going to enter

the Veerashwar Temple led to caste Hindu violence both during and after the conference. Caste Hindus ‘purified’ the tank, revoked the municipal ordinance which had opened it to Dalits in 1924, and brought a suit against Ambedkar and others for using the tank. A second Dalit conference there in December burned the Manusmriti in repudiation of its religious authorization of untouchability, but did not defy a court injunction by drinking again from the tank.31 This new preoccupation with political action did not preclude conversion, but it did place conversion in a different context. Dalits, especially in what are now Kerala, Tamilnadu, and Andhra Pradesh, continued to convert to Christianity in large numbers.32 For example, in Andhra the Dornakal Diocese of the Anglican Church alone grew from 56,681 members in 1912 to 225,080 in 1941, while in the Punjab from the 1920s onward conversions continued but the missions laid greater emphasis upon consolidating gains already won than upon winning new converts.33 In sections of U.P. and in Baroda as a whole, however, Arya Samaj efforts at reconversion were proving so successful that the Christian population actually declined in numbers.34 Indeed, Christian evangelistic work among Dalits faced increasingly intense criticism during the 1920’s not only from Hindu rivals who sought to keep Dalits within the Hindu fold by posing as their champions, but also from Dalits who feared that the loss of converts would decrease Dalit influence in the politics of numbers.35 Christians also had to consider the nationalist objection that conversion was contributing to the further communal fragmentation of the country when national solidarity was the crying need of the hour. Critics within the Church blamed evangelism among Dalits for bringing caste divisions into the Church, for lowering standards of baptism and churchmanship, for turning away potential converts from the higher castes, and for making the development of a truly Indian Church more difficult.36 In 1925 the National Christian Council sponsored a study by one of its secretaries, P.O. Philip, entitled The Depressed Classes and Christianity. Writing from a Christian nationalist perspective, Philip was very positive in his assessment of what Christians had done both in stimulating and responding to the Dalit awakening. While recognizing the objections mentioned above as matters the churches would have to take seriously, he did not feel that they warranted abandoning what had already been done.37

Indian Christians, like Dalits, had started to organize politically following the Government of India Act of 1909. Beginning first at the provincial level, they established the All-India Conference of Indian Christians (AICIC) in 1914. It was a small, elitist, predominantly Protestant38 association with some very distinguished members, modeled on the Indian National Congress of the pre-Gandhian era and quite close to the National Liberal Federation in political outlook. Its basic purpose was ‘to bring the various [regional Indian Christian] Associations into touch with one another, to discuss matters of common interest to the community and adopt measures to promote its welfare and to represent to the Government the needs and grievances of Indian Christians’.39 At the time of Montagu’s visit to India in 1917-18 it had petitioned him to allocate seats to representatives of the Indian Christian community in the central and provincial councils.40 Their representation to the Southborough Commission was more specific: six seats in the Madras Council, two in each of the other provincial councils and one in the central legislative council. In justifying this allocation they cited the following significant reasons, in addition to the rapidly increasing numbers and high literacy rate of the Indian Christian community. The members of this community, though they are drawn from all communities, classes and castes, varying in ideals, manners and customs, are unified and welded together into one homogenous body and form an Indian nation in miniature. Instead of ‘perpetuating class distinctions’ and ‘stereotyping existing relations,’ this community is helping obliterate class divisions and existing relations, and has more than any other community, contributed to a large extent towards the uplifting of the animistic races and the so-called untouchables and depressed classes, which form about one-third of the total population of India. However broad the Franchise may be made, the classes mentioned above cannot for a long time to come be expected to be represented on the Reformed Councils. The Indian Christian community may not unfittingly claim to understand them and represent their claims better than any other community in India.41

Like the Dalit leadership, the AICIC did not get what it wanted. In the Government of India Act of 1919 Indian Christians were granted separate electorates for five seats in the Madras Legislative Council, a decision which with experience the AICIC came to regret,42 and none elsewhere. Christians were occasionally Government nominees to other provincial and the central legislatures, and, in some instances, were nominated to legislative bodies as representatives of the Depressed Classes, a situation

which Dalits came to resent.43 However, the 1919 constitution, in expanding the number of distinct ‘interests’ to be represented in the legislatures, had placed Christians and Dalits in separate categories and thus turned them into potential competitors in the politics of numbers. The AICIC representation to the Southborough Commission quoted above indicates quite clearly that, as the decade began, the leadership of the Indian Christian community was not only out of touch with the realities of Dalit political life but also as patronizing in its attitude towards Dalits as were caste Hindus. Indeed, available AICIC reports from the 1920s reveal a highly ambivalent attitude towards the Church’s involvement with the Dalit movement. Dalits were primarily responsible for the rapid growth of the Christian community, but they were also responsible for a decline in its high literacy rate, of which elite Christians were so proud. The AICIC received reports and passed resolutions occasionally on the education of village (i.e., Dalit) Christians,44 and pointed with pride to examples of successful Dalit uplift within the Christian community,45 but it did not concern itself with the wider Dalit struggle. The criticisms of the mass movements cited by P.O. Philip in his study were those of the Christian elite and provide further evidence of their ambivalence.46 Meanwhile at the grassroots level, especially in the South where caste ties were stronger, Christian Pulayas and Paraiyar worked with their Hindu fellows in caste organizations devoted to communal uplift.47 Despite ambivalence among the Indian Christian elite, the churches and missions, which were still under missionary control, continued to work among Dalits much as in the past. The major innovations of the 1920s lay in the area of rural reconstruction. In 1920 a Commission on Village Education in India, made up of representatives of various mission societies, visited India and made their recommendations. However, the most creative work was begun in Moga, Punjab where the American Presbyterians introduced the project method to make learning more related to the realities of village life than the government curriculum was. This received recognition from the Punjab government and the National Christian Council helped introduce this elsewhere through conferences, teachers institutes and courses for village teachers and administrators.48 Efforts were also made to improve the economic condition of Dalit Christians through the

introduction of handicrafts and cooperatives of various kinds. Yet despite these efforts and despite the fact that Christian Dalits were generally better off than other Dalits, they continued to suffer from many of the same disabilities as did other Dalits.49 In the 1920s, for the first time, there were clear signs of Dalit rebellion against caste prejudice within the Church, especially in the South.50 In Kerala discontented Dalit Christians left older churches for newer ones or formed indigenous churches of their own.51 In 1924 there was a serious dispute between caste and Dalit Roman Catholics in Trichinopoly over the use of Holy Redeemer’s Church. This resulted in rioting, bloodshed, police intervention, and some reconversions to Hinduism when the hierarchy failed to protect caste privileges.52 In 1925 Dalit Christians took the significant step of getting an Anti-Untouchability Conference in Madras to condemn ‘the practice followed in certain Churches of totally refusing admission to converts or of segregating them to particular corners of churches and of making invidious distinctions in the matter of certain religious practices’.53 A Dalit agitation within the churches had begun that, like the broader Dalit movement of which it was a part, was now using political means to redress grievances. THE SIMON COMMISSION AND ROUND TABLE CONFERENCES In November 1927 the Conservative Government in Britain appointed an Indian Statutory Commission comprising seven members of Parliament. This commission, under the chairmanship of Sir John Simon, was to inquire into the working of the 1919 constitution and to make recommendations for a future constitution of India. Both the choice of an exclusively British commission for this task and its justification on the grounds that Indians were incapable of drawing up a constitution satisfactory to all sections of Indian society, set the stage for the political drama which was to follow. Two parallel bodies prepared reports on constitutional advance. One was the Simon Commission which proceeded to India in order to consult with the many ‘interests’ of which India was comprised. It ran into a boycott by not only the Congress but also the Muslim League, the Hindu Mahasabha, and the National Liberal Federation. The other was an All-Parties Conference convened in February 1928, in response to the British

challenge, for the purpose of preparing a constitution which would represent the national demand. Neither Dalits nor Christians were included in the All-Parties Conference but they did present their views to the Simon Commission. Their representations provide valuable insights into their political situations and agendas at that time. The appointment of the Simon Commission stimulated considerable political activity by Dalit organizations. S.K. Gupta has listed those which presented memoranda or appeared before the Simon Commission and has summarized their demands as follows: (i) the grant of effective and adequate representation to the untouchables in the provincial and central legislatures and in the various local self-governing bodies such as the panchayats, taluka boards, union boards, district boards, municipalities; (ii) the provision for their representation in the ministries and the Executive Councils of the Governors and the Viceroy; (iii) the extension of franchise; (iv) the necessity of political safeguards and statutory guarantees with regard to the proper and adequate arrangement of their education, their recruitment in civil and military services, and the unrestricted enjoyment of the civil rights.54

Behind this broad consensus were significant differences. Ambedkar and the Depressed Classes Institute in Bombay considered Dalits to be a distinct minority separate from the Hindu community. They also wanted to receive reserved seats in a general electorate provided an adult franchise were granted. If it were not, then separate electorates would be necessary.55 On the other hand, M.C. Rajah and the All-India Adi Dravida Maha Jana Sabha in Madras did not draw as sharp a line separating Dalits from caste Hindus, and downplayed caste divisions among Dalit jatis. They also advocated separate electorates as well as a combination of election and nomination in order to get ‘the best’ representatives for the Dalits and insisted that only Dalits, rather than interested or concerned members of other communities, be allowed to represent Dalits.56 Christians took somewhat similar stands. B.L. Rallia Ram, Secretary of the AICIC, defined its position in the following terms: “...in the first place we would advocate that communal elections be entirely abolished without any reservation of seats. Our second submission is that in case that is not done, and if seats are to be reserved, then we would want some indirect method of representation.57

This stance, however, was challenged in Madras where the Indian Christian Association of Madras changed its earlier position by coming out in favour of continuing the existing system of separate electorates, a position it now shared with the Catholic Indian Association of South India.58 They also wanted education to be considered along with property in determining who would get the franchise.59 However, a ‘Deputation from the Christian Depressed Classes’ in Madras led by S.M. Gnanaprakasam wanted the Christian electorate to be merged in the general electorate, so that they might receive the same privileges as Depressed Classes Hindus.60 It was during the Simon Commission’s inquiry that the identity of Dalit Christians was first raised as a political issue. In Delhi during the AICIC hearing both the AICIC deputation and M.C. Rajah took the view that Dalit Christians were Christians and should therefore be included in the Christian constituencies. While one member of the deputation stated that ‘There is no such thing, sir, as an Indian Christian Depressed class’, another pointed out that the Census Commissioner classes them all as Indian Christians, and we do not admit any caste distinction within our community. But the tendency is that other people still class them at any rate in the first generation as members of the depressed class, and sometimes enumerators too persist in putting them down as members of the depressed class other than Indian Christians.61

The All-India Adi Dravida Maha Jana Sabha and Madras Arundhati Maha Jana Sabha were in basic agreement. In their view, a Dalit upon conversion ceases to be untouchable and ‘becomes a touchable’ even in the eyes of caste Hindus. They also denied that the same differences between caste and noncaste Christians prevail as among caste and non-caste Hindus.62 On the other hand, the Dalit Christian deputation considered their Dalit identity primary, for Christian Dalits live side by side with Hindu Dalits and are treated as Dalits by caste Hindus and caste Christians alike. Both were Depressed Classes and religion was not a criterion.63 Behind these definitions lay some significant political choices. The AICIC and other Christian bodies in this discussion chose for their community both numerical size and the image of being a caste-free community, a more valid image in some parts of the country and within some churches than in others. M.C. Rajah and his Dalit associates opted to distance themselves from the Christian Dalits rather than to increase their constituency by several million.

Their only explicit reason for doing so was to discourage the British from nominating Christians to represent them.64 Perhaps also they, unlike Ambedkar’s followers, saw themselves as Hindus and they did not wish to share what benefits the government did offer Dalits with the better-off Christian Dalits who had ‘the missionaries to take up their cause’.65 On the other hand, the Dalit Christian deputation decided that Depressed Class benefits were more desirable than some extra seats in the legislature and seem to have assumed that representatives in general constituencies would be better able to secure those privileges for them than Christian representatives had been.66 In his testimony V.S. Azariah, Anglican bishop of Dornakal, a major mass movement area, indicated that while caste discrimination in the churches varied, the Dalit Christians’ real grievance was that the Education and Labour Departments of the Madras government had been denying them scholarship aid on the grounds that as Christians, they belonged to an educationally ‘forward’ community. ‘Of course these people [the Dalit Christian deputation] maintain, and I maintain, that religion should not become a disqualification. It is the social and economic condition that ought to determine it.’67 In July 1928 the All-Parties Conference drafting committee headed by Motilal Nehru recommended in its report that there be no separate electorates and that only Muslims be granted reserved seats. For the Dalits they offered no political safeguards, but an adult franchise, a declaration of rights, and special educational benefits instead. The Christian leadership, while concerned about safeguarding minority interests, was in general agreement with these recommendations, whereas the Dalit leadership definitely was not. The Simon Commission, which worked more slowly and issued its report only in May 1930, granted separate electorates to various minorities, including Christians. After noting that most of the Dalit deputations it met had favoured separate electorates, it nonetheless recommended that the Dalits have reserved seats in the general constituency in proportion to three-quarters of their population ratio and that in special cases Governors could nominate non-Dalits to represent them.68 However, by the time these recommendations were published, the political situation had changed considerably and so they carried little weight.

At its annual meeting in December 1928 the Indian National Congress had accepted the dominion status constitution recommended in the Nehru Report of the All Parties Conference only as a compromise. If the British did not concede dominion status within a year, the Congress would then demand complete independence. When the year was up, and the British were not forthcoming, the Congress abandoned the Nehru Report with an assurance to the minorities that it would not make a constitution without satisfying them and, on 26 January, 1930, took the independence pledge. In March Gandhi began his ‘march to the sea’ and on 6 April, 1930 inaugurated the Civil Disobedience Movement by making salt from sea water. Others followed. Dalits, however, did not participate in the movement and many Dalit organizations condemned it.69 For many educated Christians it marked an important turning point, as they now moved into the nationalist camp.70 The British met widespread civil disobedience with both the carrot and the stick. The stick they used was stern repression. The carrot they offered was the Round Table Conference recommended by the Simon Commission. This met in London from 11 November, 1930 to 19 January, 1931. The First Round Table Conference was an important milestone in the history of the Dalit movement, for it conferred upon Dalits the political recognition they had been seeking. They were represented by two of their own delegates, R. Srinivasan of Madras71 and B.R. Ambedkar of Bombay. Moreover, Ambedkar in particular was able to use the conference as a platform from which to make the Dalit cause a national issue of major importance. He did this first in his opening speech by aligning the Dalits with the national demand for responsible government, a reversal of their earlier position considered necessary because the British bureaucracy had failed to be of significant help to the Dalits. Then he presented to the Minorities Committee a memorandum in which he listed the political safeguards he considered necessary for the Dalits’ protection: equality of citizenship; free enjoyment of equal rights; social boycott to become a punishable offense; adequate representation in the legislatures, services and cabinet; provision for ‘redress against prejudicial action or neglect of interests’; and special departmental care.72 The Conference upon adjournment agreed that under the new constitution there would be a federation of British Indian and Princely States, an executive responsible to

the legislature, full responsible government at the provincial level, and at the center reserved powers for the Governor-General in defense, foreign affairs, law and order emergencies, and protection of minority rights. However, the Conference could not agree on the matter of minority representation. On this question Ambedkar and Srinivasan had been pushed from their opening position of an adult franchise and reserved seats within a joint electorate to separate electorates for Dalits.73 In other respects they got most of what they had wanted at the first session of the Round Table Conference.74 The second session of the Round Table Conference met in London from 7 September to 1 December, 1931. By that time Congress had suspended civil disobedience, agreed to participate in the Conference, and selected M.K. Gandhi as its sole representative. Prior to leaving for London Gandhi had indicated that he would recognize only the Muslims and Sikhs, but not the Christians or the Dalits as separate entities. Moreover, as Trilok Nath has pointed out, upon the suspension of civil disobedience Congress leaders issued statements and engaged in activities opposing untouchability in order to validate the Congress claim to represent the best interests of the Dalits.75 This, of course, posed a direct challenge to the Dalit political organizations which since 1917 had been trying to gain political recognition for Dalits as a separate and distinct group deserving of its own representatives. This conflict came out into the open at the Second Round Table Conference. Gandhi considered India to be one nation, of which the Congress was the legitimate spokesperson. He was willing to recognize the Muslims and Sikhs as separate entities and to grant them their own representatives not as a matter of principle but as ‘a necessary evil’. He gave two basic reasons for not doing the same for the Dalits. First, it would ‘create a division in Hinduism which I cannot possibly look forward to with any satisfaction whatsoever’.76 Second, it would perpetuate rather than remove untouchability. Separate electorates to the ‘Untouchables’ will ensure them bondage in perpetuity. The Musalmans will never cease to be Musalmans by having separate electorates. Do you want the ‘Untouchables’ to remain ‘Untouchables’ for ever? Well, the separate electorates would perpetuate the stigma. What is needed is destruction of untouchability, and when you have done it, the bar-sinister which has been

imposed by an insolent ‘superior’ class upon an ‘inferior’ class will be destroyed. When you have destroyed the bar-sinister to whom will you give the separate electorate?77

On the other hand, Ambedkar, who with Srinivasan continued to be a Dalit delegate, shared with the British and non- Brahmins the view that India was made up of diverse groups, each of which needed its own representatives. In one of his many exchanges with Gandhi, he remarked, ... we are not anxious for the transfer of power; but if the British Government is unable to resist the forces that have been set up in the country which do clamour for transference of political power—and we know the Depressed Classes in their present circumstances are not in a position to resist that—then our submission is that if you make that transfer, that transfer will be accompanied by such conditions and by such provisions that the power shall not fall into the hands of a clique, into the hands of an oligarchy, or into the hands of a group of people, whether Muhammadans or Hindus; but that the solution shall be such that the power shall be shared by all communities in their respective proportions.78

Moreover, it was quite clear from all of Ambedkar’s remarks and from the resolutions of Dalit organizations over the past decade that Dalits were not prepared to trust others to represent them, for others (Congress included) had done virtually nothing to warrant such confidence. Dalits were committed instead to self-help through their own chosen representatives. No attempt was made to work through these differences or to find a mutually acceptable solution. Gandhi offered the Dalits little except ‘trust me’ or ‘trust Congress’; he did not even endorse Ambedkar’s earlier position of reserved seats within joint electorates.79 Instead he sought to present himself and the Congress as the authentic representative of ‘the vast mass of the Untouchables’, first by claiming that he and Congress shared this with Ambedkar and Srinivasan; then by questioning in the Minorities Committee whether the other delegates, all nominated by the Government, in fact represented the views of their respective communities; and finally by asserting, after publication of the Minorities Pact which called for separate electorates, that ‘I would get ... if there was a referendum of the Untouchables, their vote, and that I would top the poll’.80 To all of this Ambedkar took exception. In the end the Conference adjourned and left the Prime Minister to make a decision on the communal question.

In this clash between reformist solicitude and Dalit selfassertion, Christians took independent positions. Both The Guardian and The Indian Witness opposed separate electorates for Dalits not only because they were opposed to communal electorates as a matter of principle but also because they, like the Hindu reformers and the Simon Commission, believed that such a separation within the Hindu fold would perpetuate untouchability as well as diminish Dalit political influence.81 K.T. Paul, the AICIC representative at the First Round Table Conference, opposed communal electorates and suggested administrative safeguards in the form of a ministerial portfolio or a statutory commission to deal with Dalits and religious minorities.82 S.K. Datta, his replacement at the Second Round Table Conference, also opposed communal electorates on principle and denounced the Minorities Pact. As alternatives he proposed a common electorate among all minorities, which would vary from province to province depending on who the majority in that province was, or according to shared economic interests within those minorities.83 On the other hand, Rai Bahadur Pannir Selvam, the Roman Catholic delegate at both conferences, favoured communal electorates and was one of the five drafters of the Minorities Pact.84 Bishop Azariah opposed communal electorates because, by stamping ‘the followers of Jesus Christ as a communal entity with distinct political interests of their own’, they not only were ‘a direct blow to the nature of the church of Christ’ but also served to place both caste and Dalit Christians, whose interests were very different, in what amounted to an inappropriate constituency.85 Dalit Christians had no say at the Round Table conferences and were not consulted by either Dalit or Christian delegates. GANDHI’S FAST The British Prime Minister’s announcement of the Communal Award on 17 August, 1932 set in motion a chain of events in and through which Gandhi was able to seize and maintain the initiative as champion of the Dalits for three years. The Prime Minister’s solution to the problem of minority representation left over from the Round Table Conference was, like its predecessors, based on the recognition of distinct interests which would be represented through separate electorates. With regard to the Dalits, however, it made a special arrangement whereby they would not be separated from the Hindu community, on the one hand, and yet have their

own elected representatives, on the other. Dalits eligible to vote would vote in the general constituency and then, in certain selected areas where they were most numerous, vote again in 71 separate constituencies of their own. This arrangement would continue for the next 20 years. Initial Dalit reaction to this decision was unfavourable, but their unhappiness was completely overshadowed by that of Gandhi who on the 18th August wrote a letter informing the Prime Minister that he would ‘fast unto death’ unless that provision of the award were revoked. Since the Prime Minister was agreeable to any adjustment accepted by the parties concerned, this left the matter to be negotiated by caste Hindu and Dalit leaders. The fast, begun on 20 September in Yervada Jail, Poona, was quite dramatic in its impact. Gandhi told the Hindu leaders before he began the fast that he wanted the end of untouchability and not simply a political agreement.86 Thus while the leaders negotiated, caste Hindus opened hundreds of temples, wells and other public places to Dalits and sponsored inter-caste meals with them. It seemed that untouchability had lost its moral acceptability, a death blow from which it could not recover. The Poona Pact, signed on 24 September with Gandhi’s consent and approved by the British on 26 September, provided Dalits with 148 reserved seats in the provincial legislatures and 18% of those in the Central legislature from the general constituency. Moreover, in order to ensure that those Dalits chosen through joint electorates were acceptable to the Dalits themselves, Dalits on the electoral rolls in each reserved constituency would first elect a panel of four Dalit candidates from which the joint electorate would then elect one. The pact thus gave Dalits access to political power, but not all the autonomy they sought.87 With this revision of the Communal Award in hand, Gandhi ended his fast and began his anti-untouchability campaign in earnest. At a public meeting in Bombay on 30 September, several of the signatories of the Poona Pact formed the Anti-Untouchability League (soon renamed the Servants of Untouchables Society and then the Harijan Sevak Sangh) with G.D. Birla as President and A.V. Thakkar as Secretary. Gandhi also received permission to carry on correspondence from jail in connection with the antiuntouchability campaign. From this correspondence and from his columns in Harijan, begun on 11 February, 1933 under the auspices of the Servants of Untouchables Society, one gets a good picture of the

ideology and programme which was to occupy people’s attention for the next three years. What Gandhi sought was the purification of Hinduism and Hindus by the removal of untouchability. Gandhi said many times that if Hinduism were to live, then untouchability must go. Since the roots of untouchability lay in the minds and hearts of caste Hindus, they would have to repent of this sin and atone for it through acts of love and service for the Harijans. Thus, as Gandhi pointed out on several occasions, Hindus were to remove untouchability not for the sake of the Dalits but for their own sake.88 This purely religious view of the issue had some important implications. One was that since repentance could only be a voluntary act, it must be brought on by persuasion and not by coercion. This meant that Gandhi placed greater emphasis upon changing public opinion than upon legislation. In particular, Gandhi felt he had to convince the orthodox (Sanatani) Hindus that untouchability, as currently being practiced, was not sanctioned by the Shastras and was therefore a corruption rather than an integral part of Hinduism. There were in the early issues of Harijan an unusually large number of commentaries by Gandhi and others on relevant portions of the Hindu scriptures written for this purpose.89 A second implication was that temple entry received top priority in the Gandhian programme. To Gandhi temple entry was symbolic of religious equality and solidarity from which all other forms of equality would flow.90 A third and very significant implication was that since this was an act of contrition, it could be performed only by Hindus towards Hindu Dalits. The Anti-Untouchability League which began with both a Hindu and Depressed Class membership, with Ambedkar, Srinivasan and M.C. Rajah on the Executive, had as its aim the complete removal of untouchability or any other bar in civic matters which operates to the detriment of the downtrodden people. The League will work to bring about such a radical change in the outlook and mentality of the Caste-Hindus that they will, as a matter of course, treat the Depressed Classes as their equals.91

Very soon, however, it became the Servants of Untouchables Society which Gandhi described as ‘a society of repentant Hindus’ and from which the three Dalit leaders resigned. In like manner, members of other communities

were discouraged from joining and service was to be confined to Hindu Dalits; this was in keeping with the overall aim in view and would also prevent communal misunderstandings. A final implication worth noting is that the Society stressed attitudinal rather than structural change. In Gandhi’s view untouchability was a sin whereas the caste system was a social institution. Thus he left the caste system alone and defended varnashrama dharma; what he attacked was the notion of hierarchy and its concomitant attitudes of ‘high-and-lowness’ and ‘touch-menot- ism’.92 Gandhi’s campaign had two major loci, the first of which involved temple entry legislation. While Gandhi was still in prison, a Brahmin named Kelappan began fasting outside the Guruvayar Temple in Malabar in order to get it opened to Dalits. Gandhi persuaded him to call off the fast on the understanding that he himself would join Kelappan if the temple was not opened within three months. The temple authorities stated that they were bound by law to adhere to traditional custom and so Dr. P. Subbaroyan introduced a Temple Entry Bill in the Madras Legislature which would have allowed the temple trustees to open temples provided that the majority of voters on the temple rolls approved. The question was referred to Delhi which ruled that this was an All-India matter. Thus in March 1933, S. Ranga Iyer introduced a similar bill into the Central Legislative Assembly, where it languished until 23 August, 1934 when it was finally withdrawn for lack of support.93 The government had canvassed for opinions and by July 1934 had received 863 opposed and only 40 in favour,94 while the opinions of the provincial governments were unanimously opposed, mainly because they anticipated serious law and order problems if it were passed.95 The main objection to the bill from Hindus like Pandit Malaviya, who otherwise supported temple entry, was that it constituted governmental interference in religion.96 This charge Gandhi tried to refute,97 but he also insisted that the bill should be passed only if favoured by a majority of the Hindu members, upon whom he refused to bring any pressure other than persuasion to bear.98 It was a significant defeat but at least it had the value of inspiring similar efforts elsewhere. The Travancore government appointed a commission to look into the matter, while the Cochin Assembly passed a motion favouring temple entry despite government opposition.99

The other major locus of Gandhi’s campaign was the Harijan Sevak Sangh of which he was the chief advisor and for which he was the chief propagandist. In its efforts to remove untouchability and its attendant evils, the Sangh tried not only to change caste Hindu attitudes but also to provide Dalits with such amenities as entry into temples, the use of wells, educational facilities and other forms of largely economic uplift. The early issues of Harijan gave a regular account of temples opened up to Dalits, wells either opened or constructed for them, schools either integrated or begun for them, and the like. The Sangh also provided opportunities for Hindus to serve the Dalit cause in a variety of ways in either an honorary capacity or at a very low salary, since Gandhi tried to keep the overheads down to ten per cent of receipts.100 Gandhi also indicated that gifts to the Sangh were being spent on Dalit welfare rather than on the temple entry agitation.101 These activities received a tremendous boost from Gandhi’s tour begun on the Sangh’s behalf at Wardha on 8 November, 1933 and ending, more than 20,000 km later, at Varanasi on 31 July, 1934. Gandhi placed major emphasis during this tour upon winning over caste Hindus, getting them to contribute to the work of the Sangh at least financially, and providing help as well as encouragement to those engaged in Dalit service. In addition, he sought to convince Dalits of his commitment to their well-being and to win their support for his reformist solution to their problems, in the face of the other options available to them.102 In Andhra the campaign did succeed in recruiting numbers of Dalits for the Congress, but not in either changing caste Hindu hearts or in overcoming the suspicions of Dalit activists.103 Gandhi’s own estimation of the tour was optimistic: in spite of efforts to prejudice people against his campaign, untouchability was now on its last legs, Rs. 8,000,000 had been collected for the Dalit cause, and the campaign had created increased awakening among Dalits themselves.104 This assessment of the situation, however, was much too optimistic. Opposition had been mounting ever since the Poona Pact. Caste Hindus, particularly in Bengal and the Punjab, were very angry at the increased representation given to Dalits at their expense.105 Moreover, as The Guardian noted at the time and more recent historians have confirmed,106 Gandhi’s campaign had also stimulated Sanatanis to organize considerable

opposition. It was they, and not the Gandhians, who won the battle over the Temple Entry Bill just a few weeks after Gandhi completed his tour. Among Dalits there was little enthusiasm over the Poona Pact.107 Many Dalits met Gandhi on his tour and tried to use his presence to good advantage. M.C. Rajah was supportive108 but Ambedkar and others remained critical: Gandhi’s priorities were wrong (education, economic uplift and civic rights were far more important than temple entry);109 his methods were paternalistic and patronizing (Dalits, not caste Hindus, should control the expenditure of funds);110 he was not getting at the heart of the problem which was the caste system itself.111 Christians were generally supportive of Gandhi’s efforts to change Hindu attitudes and to remove the disabilities from which Dalits suffered.112 However, they were also convinced that Gandhi’s solution did not go deep enough. On the one hand they believed, along with Ambedkar and The Indian Social Reformer, that only when the caste system went would untouchability disappear.113 Thus attitudinal change was not enough; structural change was also necessary. The second difference concerned the matter of religious faith. Gandhi believed that because all religions are equally true and equally false, one should therefore stay within the religion into which one is born. Christians, on the other hand, saw religions as distinctive and thus different. While some Christians were aggressive in asserting the superiority of Christianity over other religions, others were more modest, insisting only that it had something important to offer which should not be ruled out a priori. Moreover, there was the question as to whether Gandhi’s metaphor about religious faith being an indissoluble tie like the marriage relationship was applicable to Dalits who were neither steeped in the Hindu tradition nor capable of remedying its shortcomings.114 These differences concerning conversion were not purely academic. Not only were there signs of renewed interest in the conversion option among Dalits115 but there were many concerned Hindus who favoured reform so as to prevent conversion to Islam or Christianity.116 Moreover, in 1933 the publication of J.W. Pickett’s Christian Mass Movements in India, a survey sponsored by the National Christian Council, silenced most, but not all,117

of the Christian critics of evangelizing Dalits. After examining the Christian mass movements in five different parts of India, Pickett concluded that among those interviewed who were themselves converts (as opposed to second or third generation Christians) 53.3% converted for spiritual reasons, 34.3% had done so as an expression of solidarity with those in their jati who had taken the decision, whereas only 12.4% had done so for secular or worldly reasons. Moreover, Pickett and his associates found that a number of improvements had followed upon conversion, not in all cases but especially in those where there had been regular Christian worship and pastoral care: less drink, less fear of evil spirits, better health and housing, more interest in education and a better image among one’s neighbours. In fact, in Andhra these improvements among Mala and Madiga converts were responsible for Sudra mass movements, especially in the late 1920s and early 1930s.118 Thus measured in terms of life in both this world and the next, Christianity had something positive to offer which it should not deny Dalits. Therefore Christian work among them continued with renewed confidence and vigour.119 However, both Gandhi and A.V. Thakkar, who were strongly opposed to conversion, insisted that their aim was to purify Hinduism and not to maintain the numerical strength of Hinduism. Therefore they blamed conversion not so much on the Christian evangelists as on the caste Hindus who oppressed Dalits or treated Hindu Dalits with far less respect than they showed to Dalit converts.120 In fact during this period, The Indian Social Reformer sounded more combative on the conversion question than did either Gandhi or Thakkar.121 Gandhi’s campaign did far more than stimulate discussion in the churches; it also forced them to face the fact that their own Dalit converts faced disabilities similar to those of their Hindu counterparts. While still in jail Gandhi had received a letter from some ‘Christian Harijans’ in Malabar who sought his help in removing the disabilities from which they suffered. In reply Gandhi expressed his sympathy and assured them that his movement would help drive untouchability from the churches. He also took the occasion to point out that ‘Christian Harijans’ was a contradiction in terms.122 The same thing happened again when he was on tour in South India. The Guardian, stung by this indictment, urged its readers more than

once to combat caste in the churches.123 Other Dalit Christians, particularly the Roman Catholic Christians in the Tanjore and Trichinopoly districts of the Madras Presidency, held meetings to intensify their earlier demand for separate electorates within the Christian constituency, while Roman Catholic bishops and organizations, in response to this and to the inroads the Self-Respect movement was making among the faithful, issued statements pleading for the end of untouchability within the Church.124 Christian leaders also requested the government to make available to Dalit Christians the same benefits to which other Dalits were entitled. In this they achieved some success, especially in Madras and the United Provinces.125 Since the announcement of his fast Gandhi had held the initiative in seeking solutions to the Dalits’ problems. Others, Dalit leaders and Christian leaders included, tended to respond to his initiatives by opposing, questioning, or supporting him. Gandhi had broadened his protest against what he considered an unacceptable development in the politics of numbers into a crusade for the removal of untouchability. On 4 August, 1935 the Government of India Act of 1935, embodying the provisions of the Poona Pact, was passed into law and Dalits now had an assured share of political power. How well his crusade had succeeded was, however, by no means clear. His had been, at best, a movement for rather than of Dalits; among caste Hindus it had both changed hearts and provoked organized opposition. Several provincial governments had issued orders to their officers which prohibited sanctioning caste disabilities.126 In 1934 after the end of his tour and the withdrawal of the Temple Entry Bill, Gandhi’s attention began to move towards village uplift. One finds in Harijan less and less space being devoted to the removal of untouchability and in April 1935 The Indian Social Reformer reported that the Harijan Sevak Sangh’s antiuntouchability campaign was being merged with Gandhi’s rural uplift programmes.127 AMBEDKAR’S DECLARATION On 13 October, 1935, during the course of a lengthy speech before 10,000 people at the Bombay Presidency Depressed Classes Conference in Yeola, Dr. Ambedkar said, ‘I had the misfortune to be born with the stigma of “untouchable”. But it is not my fault, but I will not die a Hindu for this is within my power’. The conference subsequently passed a resolution stating

that they would leave the Hindu religion and join any other religion which promised them equal treatment with others.128 The announcement came as a surprise and it is not quite clear why Ambedkar made it. Obviously, as the rest of the speech indicates, Ambedkar felt that Gandhi and other caste Hindus had failed in removing untouchability. Zelliot has suggested that ‘the decision seems to have been made on intellectual and emotional grounds, a stab at the religion which denied him equality and selfrespect’.129 Another possible explanation suggested at the time130 and reinforced by Ambedkar’s subsequent writings131 was that it was an attempt to seize the initiative and to place the Dalits’ destiny in their own hands. Certainly the declaration had this effect. The declaration produced a strong reaction. Most Dalit leaders denounced it.132 R. Srinivasan said conversion would weaken the Depressed Classes; therefore they should stay where they were and fight.133 M.C. Rajah issued a lengthy statement listing ten other Dalit leaders besides Srinivasan and himself who were opposed. He went on first to question Ambedkar’s interest in religion as a means of social uplift and then to assert that Hinduism was the Dalit religion, as the current religious revival among them indicated. So instead of converting, Dalits should work for the passage of such legislation as his own Removal of Social Disabilities Bill.134 Initial Dalit support seemed limited to those at the Yeola conference, to the Izhavas of Travancore,135 to the United Provinces where it got the support of the Standing Committee of the Depressed Classes Conference of the United Provinces, and to Berar.136 The Indian Witness did report that Dalit leaders were complaining of a deliberate attempt by the Hindu press to eliminate all favourable comment on Ambedkar’s declaration while at the same time giving a lot of publicity to M.C. Rajah’s rejoinder,137 but the weight of Dalit opinion seemed opposed.138 Gandhi considered the declaration ‘unfortunate’ for three reasons: untouchability was on its last legs; one could not change one’s religion so easily; and it wouldn’t help the mass of Harijans whose lives were intertwined with those of the caste Hindus, whether they liked it or not.139 Gandhi, after elaborating the first point in an editorial entitled ‘On its Last Legs’ the following week, kept all reference to it out of his columns in the Harijan until the end of March 1936. The editor of The Indian Social Reformer stated that Ambedkar

wanted ‘the palm without the dust’ of hard reforming work140 and kept up the criticism fairly continuously thereafter, as did other Hindu leaders.141 The Shankaracharya of Karawir and Hindu Mahasabha leader, Dr. Kurtkoti, offered to establish the Dalits as a new Hindu sect equal in status to other Hindus in order to keep them within the Hindu fold.142 Ambedkar received prompt invitations to join from the Mahabodhi Society in Benaras, from Maulana Mohammad Irfar of the Caliphate Central Committee and Maul Ahmed Sa’id of the Indian Association of the Ulama,143 and according to Keer, from S. Dalip Singh Doabia, VicePresident of the Golden Temple Managing Committee.144 The Christians, on the other hand, were very cautious in their response and Zelliot indicates that ‘few Christian approaches directly to Ambedkar have come to light’.145 The Christian press understood the logic behind Ambedkar’s declaration and so did not consider it entirely wrong-headed. The Guardian defined the declaration as basically a protest and soon after saw it initiating a new stage of realism and vigour in the anti-untouchability campaign.146 The Indian Witness described it as ‘The Depressed Classes’ New Day’ but considered one massive movement out of Hinduism into some other religion as quite unrealistic because Dalits were too internally divided for that to happen.147 Dr. Eddy Asirvatham, after summing up his analysis of the changes already brought about with the remark that ‘if untouchability is on its last legs, those legs are extraordinarily powerful’, went on both to question whether Hinduism could ‘abolish caste and untouchability and yet remain Hinduism’, and to state his conviction that Christianity was the best alternative the Dalits had.148 Bishop Azariah of Dornakal said that while ‘the end of religion is not social uplift, but knowledge of God and union with God’, true religion would bring social uplift. He then pointed out what Christianity had done in that regard.149 The Roman Catholic Archbishop of Verapoly appealed for an end to caste in the Church to show that Christianity was a religion of equality.150 As the editor of The Guardian pointed out, in the prevailing atmosphere of communal rivalry Christians were in a difficult dilemma; they wanted to help the Dalits, but their efforts were treated with suspicion and they were often accused of interfering. He

concluded by citing Azariah’s earlier remark that just as long as Dalits were helped, then it did not matter to the Indian nationalist who helped them.151 The prospect of sixty million people changing their religion was stunning in its impact. Ambedkar and his followers realized this and were not slow to take advantage of it. Ambedkar held discussions with representatives of various faiths152 and went to Amritsar for a Sikh Mission Conference on 13-14 April, 1936, while his followers planned an allreligions conference in Lucknow. Soon afterwards Ambedkar published a full statement of his views on the Hindu reformist dilemma in The Annihilation of Caste, a presidential address which had led to the cancellation of the Jat Pat Todak Mandal conference in Lahore.153 Gandhi and the Harijan Sevak Sangh reported running into a lot of Dalit demands in the form of ‘either give us what we want or we will convert’.154 In June separate conferences of Mangs in Maharashtra and Thiyas in Cochin resolved to leave Hinduism.155 On the other hand, the Hindu Mahasabha passed more resolutions against untouchability; the Nawab of Dacca called for the Islamization of Dalits and deputations came from as far away as Cairo for this purpose;156 the Sikhs resolved to train up missionaries especially for work among Dalits and even started a college for them in Bombay.157 In May it was stated that orthodox Hindus wanted Dalits to become Sikhs so that they would not become Muslims.158 In this context three events were of special importance. The first was the All-Religions Conference of the All-India Depressed Classes Association held at Lucknow on 22-24 May, 1936. For this the Sikhs deputed cooks from the Punjab to prepare the meals; Muslims made up a good portion of the audience and entertained the delegates; Lucknow Christian College provided its hostel and hall. About one hundred Dalit delegates from seven provinces came but were outnumbered by the representatives of the various religions they had come to hear. On the first day they heard speeches by fourteen different spokespersons who indicated what their religions could do for the Dalits. One of the Christian speakers, Mrs. Mohini Das, was the only woman to speak; another the Rev. John Subhan, used Pickett’s survey to show how in Christianity individual transformation and social reconstruction went hand in hand. No Dalit Christian spoke. After conferring together and visiting local churches, mosques and gurdwaras, the

conference condemned Hinduism in no uncertain terms, decided to leave it, and appointed a committee to decide what religion would be best to convert to. Immediately after the conference three missionaries issued an appeal urging the churches to concentrate their efforts upon evangelizing Dalits, since this was a unique opportunity which should not be lost.159 A short time later the Bangalore Conference Continuation, a group of nationalist Christians, issued a statement on the ‘Christian Attitude to the Harijan Revolt’ addressed first to Dalits, then to Hindus and finally to the Christian Church. It urged Dalit leaders ‘not to regard a change of faith as a means to mere social advancement’; it urged Hindu leaders to bring about a radical change in the whole caste system for the sake of national solidarity; and it urged Christians not to exploit the situation, to remove all vestiges of caste in the Church, to work for reconciliation between Dalits and caste Hindus, and to witness to Christ when they saw signs of genuine religious longing.160 The second event was the ‘Ambedkar-Moonje Pact’ of August 1936. On 30 May, 1936, the Bombay Mahar Conference under Ambedkar’s leadership had resolved to change their religion and ‘as a preliminary step towards change of religion to give up henceforth the worship of Hindu deities, the observance of Hindu festivals, and visiting Hindu holy places’.161 In July Ambedkar was informed that the nomination papers of candidates attending that conference would be challenged on the grounds that conversion disqualified a Dalit from contesting an election in a reserved constituency.162 This led to correspondence between Dr. Ambedkar and Dr. Moonje, the President of the Hindu Mahasabha, aimed at an understanding according to which Dalits might convert to Sikhism and yet retain the political reservations and other safeguards granted to them under the 1935 constitution. In this correspondence Ambedkar made a financial, social and political assessment of Islam, Christianity and Sikhism and then went on to indicate why from the Hindu point of view Sikhism would be preferable to the other two. He concluded by indicating what Hindus would have to do to make Sikhism as attractive an alternative for Dalits as the other two.163 The whole discussion came in for almost universal condemnation as a mere communal transfer without an accompanying change of heart and as bartering religion and people for political purposes.164 It certainly did much to dampen enthusiasm for the religious conversion movement. Both Moonje

and Dr. Kurtkoti came under heavy criticism at the autumn meeting of the Hindu Mahasabha and the whole arrangement came to an end.165 It did reveal, however, that Hindu leaders would look more kindly upon Dalit conversions to Sikhism than to Islam or Christianity, an attitude which affected constitutional arrangements when India became independent.166 The third event was the Temple Entry Proclamation of the Maharaja of Travancore on 12 November, 1936 which was greeted with great enthusiasm in reformist circles, for here was the great victory which had eluded them earlier.167 However, there is much to suggest that the proclamation came as a response to the particular turn which the temple entry agitation had taken in recent months. As was mentioned earlier, the Izhavas responded positively to Ambedkar’s declaration. In May 1936 the annual meeting of the S.N.D.P. Yogam resolved unanimously to leave Hinduism. This led to an invasion of Travancore by missionaries of various religions; five Izhavas went to Amritsar and became Sikhs; and members of the S.N.D.P. Yogam were advising Izhavas to become Anglicans.168 Some did convert and it is significant to note that once the Temple Entry Proclamation was issued, the enthusiasm for conversion waned, although some Izhava families continued under Christian instruction and converted.169 It was at this time that the Christians came most into the limelight. As has already been noted, the Christians did not make direct approaches to Dr. Ambedkar or other Dalit leaders, even though as Harper has pointed out, Ambedkar’s declaration came not long after the National Christian Council had launched its ‘Forward Movement in Evangelism’ among Dalits.170 Nevertheless Christians did continue to present their message to the Dalit masses all over the country. In addition the Christians figured prominently in the national debate over conversion, not because they were the only ones involved or because they constituted a political threat in themselves, but because they illustrated two major issues of concern: (1) the rightness and/or wrongness of conversion as such and Dalit conversions in particular; (2) the actual consequences of conversion for the Dalits. During 1936 and 1937, following the Ambedkar declaration, Gandhi’s statements on conversion became more frequent and more sharp. The

declaration intensified religious rivalries and Gandhi questioned not only the principle of conversion but also the methods being used and the genuineness of the conversions which resulted, while The Indian Social Reformer raised very pointed questions about whether conversion in fact brought about the changes which Dalits were seeking. Both concentrated their attacks upon what Christians were saying or doing and rarely referred to the Muslims or Sikhs. Gandhi reported and commented upon cases of unfair means and exaggerated claims brought to his attention,171 and he also let it be known that he considered Dalits incapable of either understanding the Christian message or evaluating it in relation to alternative religious options. In an interview with Dr. John R. Mott, which caused him some embarrassment, he said, ‘Would you preach the Gospel to a cow? Well, some of the untouchables are worse than cows in understanding. I mean they can no more distinguish between the relative merits of Islam and Hinduism and Christianity than a cow.’172 He denied the Christian assertion that spiritual hunger led Dalits to become Christians. Presentation, with a view to conversion, of a faith other than one’s own, can only necessarily be through appeal to the intellect or the stomach or both. I do maintain in spite of the extract I have quoted that the vast mass of Harijans, and for that matter Indian humanity, cannot understand the presentation of Christianity, and that generally speaking their conversion wherever it had taken place has not been a spiritual act in any sense of the term. They are conversions of convenience. And I have had overwhelming corroboration of the truth during my frequent and extensive wanderings.173

In Gandhi’s view, the Dalits were becoming Christians because of material rewards offered or hoped for, although he did concede that blind rebellion against untouchability was also a factor.174 He also felt that to ‘dignify [the current competition for the Harijans’] religious allegiance with the name of spiritual hunger is a travesty of truth’.175 The Indian Social Reformer, while it did not share Gandhi’s view of the Dalits’ moral or intellectual capacity,176 did share his general views of the methods and motives for conversion. It also was not convinced that conversion really did any good anyway, and used the situation of Dalit converts to Christianity as an instructive case in point.177 During this period the Dalit Christians intensified their own efforts to gain equality with other Christians and to remove the disabilities from which they suffered.178

Instances of violent clashes between caste and Dalit Christians were also reported in the press.179 In Madras they organized the Depressed Classes Christians Association and waited upon the Governor to demand separate electorates within the Christian constituency.180 Moreover, the Christians— whether missionaries, Indian leaders, or Dalits— continued to demand for Dalit Christians the same kinds of concessions which other Depressed Class people were getting, on the grounds that they were suffering from the same kind of social and economic disabilities.181 The Government made this struggle even more desperate in 1936 when it published a schedule of castes eligible to benefit from the reserved seats and special help promised to Dalits by the Government of India Act of 1935. This schedule contained the significant provision that ‘No Indian Christian shall be deemed a member of a Scheduled Caste’.182 Clearly Christians were being placed in a very difficult position. Not only were Dalit converts being denied Scheduled Caste benefits by the Government, but the controversy between Christian leaders and the Hindu reformers had become so heated that in late 1936 and early 1937 the Indian Conciliation Group organized in London by the Society of Friends made an attempt to mediate, but without success.183 These continuing Dalit Christian problems may have led Dr. Ambedkar to rule out conversion to Christianity.184 He was certainly aware of them. In what was probably the most perceptive analysis of the Christian community from this period,185 Ambedkar noted that caste Hindus were the chief beneficiaries of Christian educational and medical work, that caste continued within the churches, and that Dalits suffered from the same disabilities after as before conversion to Christianity. More importantly, Christianity failed the political test. For one thing, while Christianity may have inspired Dalit converts to change their social attitudes, it had not inspired them to take practical steps to redress the wrongs from which they suffered. It is an extraordinary thing that the movement for the redress of wrongs is carried on by the untouchables who have not become converts to Christianity. I have never noticed the untouchable Christians meeting in Conferences for the redress of their social wrongs. That they have grievances is beyond question. That there are many who are educated enough to lead them in their struggle is also well known.186

For another, the Indian Christian community counted for little politically not only because of its small size but also because it lived ‘in the laps of the missionaries’. For their education, for their medical care, for religious ministration and for most of their petty needs they do not look to Government. They look to the Missions. If they were dependent upon Government they would be required to mobilize, to agitate, educate and organize their masses for effective political action. For without such organization no Government would care to attend to their needs and their requirements. They are not in the current and not being in the current they care not for public life, and therefore [have] no recognized place in the public.187

Finally, Christianity was not the distinct, cohesive and effective political entity Ambedkar was seeking.188 Indeed, its vision of its political role was quite different.189 By the end of 1936 the prospects of mass conversion stimulated by Ambedkar’s announcement one year earlier seemed pretty dim. Ambedkar’s own motives were rather discredited by his correspondence with Dr. Moonje and his own interests were turning towards his newly founded Independent Labour Party and the forthcoming elections under the new constitution. Mass enthusiasm for conversion among the Izhavas had also cooled off considerably after the Temple Entry Proclamation. The Indian Social Reformer concluded in January 1937 that the tide of conversions had turned.190 A follow-up to the Lucknow conference of May 1936 was held in Patna on 10-11 April, 1937 in spite of the opposition of the Bihar Provincial Depressed Classes League led by Jagjivan Ram, who opposed conversion as a solution to Dalits’ problems. It ended in chaos when the crowd rushed to the platform after several disparaging remarks were made about the futility of Gandhi’s efforts on the Dalits’ behalf.191 After that no more conferences of an all-India nature were held to pass resolutions on conversion. Ambedkar’s attempt to force the pace had run into difficulties. Neither the Dalit leadership nor the Dalit masses were sufficiently unified to take full advantage of the potential power he had placed in their hands.192 Moreover, his proposed course of action involved risking the reserved seats which were the Dalits’ assurance of a measure of political power. Christian work

among the Dalits does not seem to have been affected by this turn of events. In February 1937 a district missionary observed that Ambedkar’s following in the United Provinces was confined to the urban areas and that Ambedkar’s announcement had caused no group to approach him for baptism. Dalits interested in baptism, he said, came on the recommendation not of Dalit leaders and organizations but of their own relatives.193 The earlier pattern of the mass movements seems to have remained intact through the political turmoil of the 1930s, even if the numbers converting were not as great.

THE PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENTS At the beginning of 1937 elections were held for the Provincial legislatures under the 1935 constitution. Dalit candidates ran on Congress and other tickets for the reserved and, in some instances, general seats.194 The Congress won most of these elections and in June 1937 took office in six states. This gave them a chance to use the power of government for the benefit of Dalits.195 When examining what these governments did for the Dalits, it is important to note that Dalits benefitted from much of the legislation not just because they were Dalits but also because they were part of the general population or belonged to such economic categories as factory or agricultural labour. However, this discussion is limited to a few matters directly affecting the Dalits as such. The first piece of temple entry legislation was the rather cautious Bombay Temple Entry Act (1938) which removed the legal barriers hindering a trustee who wished to open a temple to Dalits, but gave neither Dalits nor anyone else any recourse if the trustee chose not to do so.196 While that was still under consideration the Maharaja of Indore issued a proclamation which opened not only public temples but also public wells, buildings, schools and government services to Dalits.197 However, the most controversial temple entry legislation was the Malabar Temple Entry Bill. This had been preceded by M.C. Rajah’s bill opening temples throughout the Madras Presidency, but the Madras Premier, C. Rajagopalachariar who in 1933 and 1934 had sought help on Gandhi’s behalf to get Ranga Iyer’s bill passed for all of India, wanted to proceed cautiously and begin with just one section of the state. This decision was attacked by Rajah and others, but the bill did provide for both trustee initiative and local referenda to force the trustee’s hands.198 In 1939 when the Sri Minakshi Temple in Madurai and Sri Brihadiswara Temple in Tanjore were opened, Madras pushed through the Temple Entry Indemnity and Authorization Bill which covered the whole state.199 Both Madras and Bombay also passed legislation to remove civil disabilities from which Dalits suffered and took steps to punish those who did not comply.200 In Madras M.C. Rajah’s Removal of Civil Disabilities Bill covered explicitly only those who were Hindus, thus

leaving open to the courts the problem of discrimination against Dalit Christians.201 The governments also made available funds for Dalit uplift which in Madras were administered through the Harijan Sevak Sangh.202 The Madras government also set up a Provincial Advisory Board and District Advisory Committees to advise the Commissioner of Labour and District Collectors respectively on Dalit uplift. Srinivasan was one of the five original nominees to the first provincial board, but three of the others were office-bearers in the Harijan Sevak Sangh.203 These Rajah attacked as means of bringing the administration under the control of various Harijan Sevak Sanghs in the Presidency consisting of Caste Hindus who are using the Depressed Classes for ‘their own purification’ and exaltation rather than for helping to raise the social and religious position of the Depressed Classes.

He therefore, recommended that members of other private agencies working with Dalits, such as Christian missionary workers, might be added both as useful guides and as a counterpoise.204 Subsequently a Depressed Classes Conference, over which Rajah presided, made a similar recommendation and also protested strongly against the label ‘Harijan’.205 Rajah’s complaint pointed to a more general problem which all the major Dalit leaders became concerned about, that of real political influence, especially on matters of direct concern to Dalits. The Congress had sponsored their own Dalit candidates for the reserved seats in the general constituencies. Those who won became subject to party discipline and hence were ineffective as champions of distinctively Dalit interests. This was one of Ambedkar’s major criticisms in his attacks upon the Congress.206 R. Srinivasan stated in April 1937 that ‘caste Hindus exploited 26 of the 30 seats’ in the recent Madras election and six months later he complained that except for M.C. Rajah and Swami Sahajananda all the Dalit M.L.C.s seemed to have their mouths sealed.207 M.C. Rajah, who earlier had placed great confidence in the Gandhians, had a running battle with the Congress on Dalit matters both as Minister for Development in the interim government and also after the Congress took over the ministry in July 1937.208 At an Adi- Dravida Conference in July 1937 he stated that ‘Independence and Cooperation is our motto ... we should first maintain

independence and then cooperate with the caste Hindus’.209 At about the same time the Dalit Congressman, Jagjivan Ram, told a Bihar Depressed Classes Conference that they must have their own organization separate from the Congress, which was a multi-class organization dominated by others, and adopt a policy of responsible cooperation.210 Clearly provincial autonomy and reserved seats had not brought with them the assurance that Dalits would have real political power. The most serious difference between the Christians and the provincial governments continued to be school fee concessions for Dalit Christians. On 26 July, 1938 the Governor of Madras issued G.O. No. 1766 according to which local bodies could grant full remission of fees to poor pupils belonging to the Scheduled Castes. In this order it was explicitly stated that ‘it is not intended that these concessions should be granted to converts from Scheduled Castes to Christianity or any other religion’.211 One result was that a good number of poor Christians lost their fee concessions and had to drop out of school; another was sufficient protest by Christians to warrant a clarification from C.J. Varkey, a Syrian Christian, who was Parliamentary Secretary to the Education Minister. Varkey pointed out that the rules had been misinterpreted. Poor Christians had been receiving halfconcessions and were to continue to get half concessions, while poor Hindu Scheduled Caste people could get full concessions.212 To Christians this was discrimination and a violation of religious neutrality.213 In a lengthy editorial The Guardian analyzed the possible educational reasons for this distinction and found them wanting. It then went on to what it considered to be the heart of the matter. But there remains the ominous possibility that the Government have a different motive altogether. Unfortunately it is not possible to dismiss the idea as a fancy. Taking the general atmosphere of the day and the suspicions that are harboured against Christian propaganda, it is not unlikely that the Government feel that Harijans should be discouraged from becoming Christians.214

As further evidence it cited the fact that the Labour Department in spending over Rs. 11 lakhs a year on Dalit welfare had excluded Christian Dalits from its care, ‘so if inducement there is, it is to make the Harijans remain Hindus and not to become Christians’.215 (Subsequently, in February 1939, the Premier, two other ministers, and the President of the Madras Harijan

Sevak Sangh sent warm messages of congratulations to 100 Adi-Dravida Christian families when they returned to Hinduism—an action which only increased such suspicions.)216 Moreover The Guardian editor went on to say: Without any justifiable reason, it tends to instil the idea that a certain community is not a part of Indian society, i.e., when a certain outcaste changes his religion he places himself outside the care of the State though in every [way] deserving of help otherwise. The repercussions of this idea are easily seen all over the Presidency and results in discrimination against Christians not alone in educational matters but in other affairs of life.217

Soon afterwards the order was modified to allow those Christians who were already enjoying a full fee concession to continue to do so,218 and in February 1939 further modifications were made, but without conceding the principle of equality, so that Bishop Azariah could still insist that economic criteria alone and not communal considerations should determine who is entitled to such help.219 In this struggle Dalit Christians seem to have received little or no support from other Dalits and in their petition to the Governor of Madras in January 1937 they complained of ‘the antagonistic attitude of the Hindu Depressed Class leaders towards them, against the will of the Hindu Depressed Class masses’.220 R. Srinivasan was sympathetic when they agitated against caste disabilities within the churches, but did not want them to receive Scheduled Caste benefits.221 M.C. Rajah’s attitudes are more difficult to discern. He was a loyal Hindu opposed to conversion who sought the end of caste disabilities for all Dalits of whatever religion; that much seems clear.222 In June 1937, he told an Adi-Dravida Catholics’ Conference in Tanjore that He had fought for the extension of the facilities given to the Hindu Adi-Dravidas to the Adi-Dravida Christians as well. If there were any further disabilities the latter were labouring under, he would be glad to do what he could to help them when and if the matter was brought to his notice. What applied to the Adi-Dravida Christians applied to the Hindu Adi Dravidas also.223

Yet his Removal of Civil Disabilities Bill which passed the Madras legislature in August 1938 applied only to Hindu Dalits.224 Madras was not an isolated case, but it is the best documented in the sources consulted.225 The Research Studies in the Economic and Social Environment of the Indian Church conducted by various Christian colleges

in conjunction with the meeting of the International Missionary Council at Tambaram in December 1938, while making few comparisons between Christians and other Dalits, gave a very sober picture indeed of the economic condition of rural Christians. The vast majority of these Dalit Christians continued in their traditional occupations, dependent upon and often in debt to village landowners, and ‘governed by the same customs and traditions in the matter of remuneration and reward’ as fellow Dalits from the same jatis.226 Despite many experiments and projects, Christian efforts at uplift appear from these studies to have succeeded more in providing means of upward mobility out of the villages for some individuals than in equipping ordinary Dalit Christians to raise their standards of living within their villages. In short, Christianity had not broken the grip of the village social and economic system upon its Dalit adherents, and Dalit Christians continued to complain of indifference and neglect.227 Two recent studies of the small urban minority among Dalit Christians show signs of some occupational mobility during this period. However, their mobility was far from dramatic and had nothing to do with their being Christians.228 Dalit Christians thus had a legitimate claim upon Scheduled Caste benefits. What the evidence so far examined seems to suggest is that at least in some provinces Gandhi’s ‘religious view’ of Dalit uplift and its implications got carried over into official circles. However, what were proper aims and procedures for a voluntary association could be seen as highly questionable if translated into government policy. As one Christian put the matter in 1939: Why Christian Indians, who have economic or civic or political disabilities, should not be given the same help by Government to which scheduled castes are entitled passes my understanding. Hindu depressed classes are not specially taken care of because they are Hindus but because they are depressed. There may be, and there are, such backward classes among Christians and Moslems. Conversion to Christianity or Islam has generally given to the depressed classes equality, brotherhood, and opportunity to rise within its own borders. But it cannot compel other communities to recognise them socially or religiously, to whom they remain as untouchable as ever. But as subjects and citizens of the State they are entitled to all civic and political amenities and rights equally with others.229

CONCLUSIONS With the outbreak of World War II in September 1939, the Congress ministries resigned and responsible provincial government, in effect, came to an end. So too did the politics of numbers, for when India won its independence after the war was over, it proceeded to write its own constitution on premises very different from those the British had used in 1919 and 1935. The political ground rules embodied in those constitutions had forced Indians to see themselves as belonging to distinct groups defined primarily by religion and then to compete with one another for recognition and ‘adequate representation’ for their respective groups. The ground rules in the 1950 constitution were to be quite different. Dalits had played the politics of numbers remarkably well and had benefitted from it. Since they wanted first and foremost to be recognized as a distinct political entity and to be represented by fellow Dalits of their own choosing rather than by others, they found the ground rules congenial. Moreover, they also had some outstanding leaders who possessed the skill to turn the circumstances of communal competition to good advantage. By the end of the 1930s they had gained for the Dalits a high degree of national visibility; a measure of political power in the form of reserved seats; changes in the laws which, when implemented, reduced some of the disabilities from which Dalits suffered; some expansion of educational and diversified employment opportunities; and some changes in attitudes, both in how others saw them and in how they saw themselves. Yet despite these gains, the Dalits’ political position was still a weak one. Not only did they lack economic resources but they also had yet to achieve unity of leadership, organization, ideology and strategy at the national level. Equally important was the fact that the Dalits had few real allies in their struggle. The British government, while posing as their champion, was prepared only to give them recognition as an ‘interest’ deserving of representation, but it was not ready to go beyond that lest it lose the support of conservative Hindus. Instead it left legislation on such ‘social matters’ as temple entry and the removal of disabilities to the dictates of ‘public opinion’. The reformers, whom the politics of numbers had committed to helping the Dalits, had to accommodate the more orthodox Hindus in order

to win elections and maintain national solidarity vis-a- vis the British. Once they came into power, the reformers did open some temples and take steps to punish those who inflicted caste disabilities upon Dalits. However they also subjected Dalit representatives to party discipline and, by providing strong disincentives to conversion, effectively blunted what was perhaps the most powerful political weapon Dalits possessed. Such class-based groups as labour unions and kisan sabhas were not much help to the Dalits either because, as Ambedkar indicated, they wished to preserve caste distinctions or because, as Jagjivan Ram insisted, they themselves were exploiters of Dalits.230 Christians, while sympathetic, lacked the political power Dalit leaders were seeking and produced no Dalit leader of their own with sufficient national stature to make a plausible case for an alliance between Christians and Dalits. This proved to be disastrous for Dalit Christians, for what the politics of numbers did was to separate them from other Dalits. Because the British rulers and other constitution-makers considered their religion rather than their socio-economic circumstances to be their defining characteristic, Dalit Christians were placed in the Christian rather than in the Dalit constituency.231 Moreover, both the British and then the provincial governments, when implementing the 1935 constitution, adopted what Galanter has described as a sacral rather than associational or organic view of caste, seeing each caste ‘as a component in an over-arching sacred order of Hindu society’,232 and hence an exclusively Hindu phenomenon affecting only Hindus. Thus those Dalits who chose to leave that Hindu sacred order through conversion to another religion were by law no longer Dalits and therefore not entitled to Scheduled Caste benefits.233 Being part of the Christian constituency under communal electorates proved to be of little political value to Dalit Christians. For one thing the State provided strong disincentives to convert and punished those who did by depriving them of the scheduled caste benefits to which they were otherwise entitled.234 For another, they became part of a constituency which had only token power at best and so could do little for them through the political process, even when it tried. Finally, Dalits were granted little power within the political and ecclesiastical structures of the Christian community. Instead, throughout this period they had to struggle for

recognition as equals and against caste disabilities imposed by fellow Christians as well as by the wider society. For the Dalit Christians, the chief victims of the politics of numbers, the decades of the 1920s and 1930s proved to be decisive. This was when their political identity was established or, more accurately, imposed upon them. Socially, they had been considered as neither fully Dalits, because in converting they had chosen to move outside the sacred order which had made them Dalits, nor fully Christians, because even in the churches they continued to suffer from caste discrimination. Indeed, their own loyalties continued to be divided between their old jatis on the one hand and their new religious community on the other, for they maintained strong ties to both. Unfortunately the rigid communal categories the British and other constitution-makers used during this period could not do justice to these complex realities of the Dalit Christians’ situation. Moreover, in this process through which their political identity was being defined and their political relationship to other Dalits determined, Dalit Christians were rarely consulted and their interests were virtually ignored. This happened despite clear evidence that the Dalit movement had ceased to be an exclusively Hindu movement, but now included Christians within the churches as well.

CHAPTER 4

Compensatory Discrimination

On 15 August, 1947 India became an independent nation and the Indian National Congress succeeded the British in forming the government of India. On 26 November, 1949 a new constitution was adopted which was put into effect on 26 January, 1950. This watershed in Indian history also marked the transition from the second to the third stage of the Dalit movement, from the politics of numbers to compensatory discrimination. Compensatory discrimination, sometimes called protective discrimination, was a government policy and programme of ‘preferential treatment of historically disadvantaged sections of the population’,1 built into the constitution. It was then implemented through subsequent legislation and judicial decisions. While its authors drew upon the historical precedents set by the Poona Pact and the 1935 Constitution, they, unlike their British predecessors, sought to place compensatory discrimination within the framework not of the politics of competing religious communities but of secular democracy and planned socio-economic change. Throughout the formative years of this stage of the Dalit movement the Indian National Congress remained the dominant political power in India. Although Ambedkar, as the chief drafter of the constitution,2 helped shape it, the system of compensatory discrimination was in effect the Congress’, and hence the reformers’, solution to the Dalits’ historic problems. Congress provided its official interpretation and implemented it in accordance with its own visions and plans. There were Dalits in the Congress and in other political parties, but not in positions of real power. In fact, Dalits were unable to overcome their earlier political weaknesses at that time. They had no political party of their own, although they were to develop one, and no central figure after Ambedkar’s death in 1956. The Dalit movement lost the central focal point it had during the 1920s and

1930s and became more fragmented, localized and diversified. What held it together was the shared Dalit struggle for justice, equality, and full human rights. Dalit Christians had even less voice in the development and implementation of compensatory discrimination than did other Dalits. With Independence separate electorates for Christians came to an end. However, being part of the general constituencies may have actually increased their political power, especially in those states where there were large Christian populations. As it happened, the well-being of the Dalit Christians was not a main item of the Christian elite’s early political agenda. Instead, as in the 1920s and 1930s, they took the path of accommodation with the Congress leadership by devoting themselves and the institutional legacy of the missionary past to broadly defined nation-building objectives.3 Indeed Church leaders were largely oblivious to the fact that the social base of the Christian Church in India was predominantly Dalit and therefore the Church’s destiny in India was bound up with that of the wider Dalit movement. This, however, began to change in the mid-1970s as more and more Dalits began to occupy important positions of leadership in the Christian community. Compensatory discrimination had a different impact upon Christian Dalits than upon most other Dalits. In fact that difference provides the single most important clue to understanding the post-Independence history of the Dalit Christians to date. This chapter therefore begins with a description of the system of compensatory discrimination as embodied in the constitution and its subsequent interpretation. Next it examines the situation of the Dalits eligible to benefit from this system, how they have been affected by it and responded to it. It then does the same for Dalit Christians before arriving at some conclusions. Because a good number of social scientists have conducted valuable field studies of Dalits in recent years, it is possible to make not only some assessments of the changes which have occurred as a result of compensatory discrimination but also some comparisons between Christian and other Dalits under this system.

THE CONSTITUTION AND COMPENSATORY DISCRIMINATION There was built into the 1950 constitution, unlike its British predecessors, an emphatic commitment to social and economic change. This was made explicit in the preamble which states that the purpose underlying the constitution: to secure to all its citizens

JUSTICE, social, economic and political;

LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship;

EQUALITY of status and opportunity; and to promote among them all

FRATERNITY assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity of the Nation,4

Compensatory discrimination was one of the means chosen to achieve those ends. So as to place this system within its constitutional context and see how it evolved, we shall set forth the relevant constitutional provisions in order of their appearance and then comment on each in turn in the light of subsequent amendments and interpretations. The opening articles of the constitution define the Union, its territory and citizenship. A lengthy section on fundamental rights follows. The first of these rights is equality. After affirming equality before the law and equal protection of the laws to all persons in Article 14, the constitution goes on to prohibit discrimination on the grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth in Article 15. This specifically covers ‘access to shops, public restaurants, hotels and places of public entertainments’ as well as ‘the use of wells, tanks, bathing ghats, roads and places of public resort’ generally denied Dalits. When in 1951 the Supreme Court ruled that communal quotas for educational institutions violated Article 29(2) of the constitution (which prohibits denying admission on grounds only of religion, race, caste, and language to educational institutions maintained or aided by the State), the constitution was amended to add to Article 15 a provision which linked the principle of compensatory discrimination to that of equality. (4) Nothing in this article or in clause (2) of Article 29 shall prevent the State from making any special provision for the advancement of any socially and educationally backward classes of citizens or for the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes.5

Article 16 protects equality of opportunity for all citizens in matters of public employment and then adds in section (4) a provision similar to that in the amendment to Article 15. Nothing in this article shall prevent the State from making any provision for the reservation of appointments or posts in favour of any backward class of citizens which, in the opinion of the State, is not adequately represented in the services under the State.

Article 17 states ‘”Untouchability” is abolished and its practice in any form is forbidden’. This was spelled out in the Untouchability (Offences) Act of 1955 which made not only the imposition of a large number of disabilities on the ground of untouchability but also indirect support of untouchability through social boycott punishable offenses. The 1955 Act was further tightened up in 1976 and renamed the Protection of Civil Rights Act. This was later supplemented by the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Prevention of Atrocities Act of 1989, the rules for the enforcement of which were published only in 1995. Article 23 prohibits begar or forced labour with the proviso that should the State impose ‘compulsory service for public purpose’ it would not discriminate on the basis of religion, race or caste. Thus, in upholding the right to equality the constitutionmakers were very explicit in seeking to redress many of those specific wrongs from which Dalits had traditionally suffered. Moreover, they also adopted two views of equality which have been in tension with one another. The first, which Galanter calls ‘the horizontal view’, consists of ‘identical opportunities to compete for existing values among those differently endowed’ and makes compensatory discrimination, as embodied in Articles 15(4) and 16(4) an exception to the rule. In the vertical or historical view, on the other hand, ‘the present is seen as a transition from a past of inequality to a desired future of substantive equality; the purpose of compensatory discrimination is to promote equalization by offsetting historically accumulated inequalities’.6 The other fundamental right set forth in the constitution which deserves special attention here is freedom of religion. This included the right of every religious denomination, subject to public order, morality and health, ‘to establish and maintain institutions for religious and charitable purposes’

as well as ‘to manage its own affairs in matters of religion’.7 However, the key provision was Article 25. (1) Subject to public order, morality and health and to the other provisions of this Part, all persons are equally entitled to freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practise and propagate religion.

Although this article was explicit in granting the right of temple entry to Dalit Hindus, the controversial portion had to do with the freedom to propagate religion. This was the provision which Christians under the leadership of Dr. H.C. Mukerji, Vice President of the Constituent Assembly, worked very hard to retain. In the early discussions of it a proposed amendment to prohibit the conversion of those less than 18 years old was rejected as objectionable; when the clause came up again for vote in 1949, the Congress leadership supported the Christians and it was retained without qualification and without negative vote.8 Subsequent attempts in 1955 and 1960 to limit the right to propagate religion by placing restrictions on conversion were defeated, thanks to the efforts of Jawaharlal Nehru.9 That, however, was not the end of the matter. In 1968 the State of Madhya Pradesh passed a ‘Freedom of Religion’ Act according to which No person shall convert or attempt to convert, either directly or otherwise, any person from one religious faith to another by the use of force or by allurement or by any fraudulent means nor shall any person abet such conversion.

The same year a similar act had been passed in Orissa with almost identical wording, except that the Madhya Pradesh Act called for notification of the magistrate when a conversion has taken place. Moreover, whereas the stated rationale of the Orissa Act was a concern for law and order, the Madhya Pradesh Act stated as its objects and reasons: It is observed that large scale conversions are taking place mostly among the adiwasis and persons belonging to other backward classes of the State. The illiteracy and poverty of the people is exploited and promises of monetary, medical and other aid given to allure them to renounce their religion and adopt another religion. The Bill seeks to prohibit such conversions by use of force or by allurement or by any fraudulent means.10

The constitutionality of both acts was upheld by the Supreme Court in 1977 on the grounds that the right to convert is not the same as the right to propagate, since the former impinges on the ‘freedom of conscience’ of the one whose conversion is being sought. ‘What is freedom for one, is freedom for the other, in equal measure, and there can therefore be no such thing as a fundamental right to convert any person to one’s own religion.’11 As one Christian barrister noted, this grants a person a right to express his views but not to convince others! It also, as the Orissa High Court saw, denies Christians the right to do something integral to their faith.12 Even more importantly, this legislation was based on the assumption that conversion is something one person does to another, instead of what people choose to do for themselves, thus placing limits on freedom of religious choice. Following the Supreme Court decision, the Arunachal Pradesh government passed similar legislation, but in October 2002, when J. Jayalalitha issued an anti-conversion ordinance in Tamilnadu, Dalits made a significant protest for the first time. The leaders of two Dalit political parties, leaders of Dalit non-governmental organizations, and Dalit panchayat presidents joined with leaders of religious minorities and opposition parties to protest the proposed legislation. Dalits argued that this was an attempt to curtail their religious freedom and to put obstacles in the way of their escape from ‘the horrors of Hinduism’. Despite these protests, the ordinance was passed into law and received the Governor’s approval. A similar bill passed the Gujarat legislature in March 2003 despite Dalit protests. Like the Tamilnadu Act, it increased penalties if the convert was a Dalit, a Tribal, or a woman. Unlike the Tamilnadu Act, it required the district magistrate’s permission prior to conversion. In 2004, after an election defeat, Jayalalitha withdrew the Tamilnadu law by ordinance but not by legislation. In 2006 both Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh passed similar anti-conversion laws.13 The section of the constitution following the Fundamental Rights is the Directive Principles of State Policy, covering Articles 36-51. Many of these set forth welfare objectives for the benefit of the entire population. Article 47 says that The State shall promote with special care the educational and economic interests of

the weaker sections of the people, and, in particular, of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes, and shall protect them from social injustice and all forms of exploitation.

However, it is in Part XVI (Articles 330-342) of the constitution listing ‘Special Provisions Relating to Certain Classes’ that the system of compensatory discrimination is most clearly and fully set forth. Its first and probably most significant component, provided in Articles 330 and 332, is the reservation of seats, in proportion to their population, for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies. Originally reservations had been granted to Muslims, Sikhs and Christians as well, but on 11 May, 1949 the Advisory Committee of the Constituent Assembly decided to drop these. All the Christian members supported that decision. One of their reasons for doing so was to decrease opposition to conversion by bringing the politics of numbers to an end. As Fr. Jerome D’Souza, one of the Christian members of the Constituent Assembly, explained, Opposition to conversion and to the increasing of the strength of different communities was undoubtedly based upon the fact that such conversions had political effects. The keeping up of reservation on the basis of population would help to maintain such opposition to the expansion of our community. In a politically homogeneous country it matters little, as far as Government is concerned, to what religion a man belongs. Such political homogeneity is desirable in the interests of the Christians.14

Reservation did assure a bloc of Dalits in the legislatures, but could not guarantee that they would be staunch advocates of Dalit interests. Demographics were largely responsible for this. Even though the Delimitation Commission, when deciding which constituencies should be reserved for the Scheduled Castes, chose those with the highest concentration of Dalits, the Dalit proportion of those constituencies rarely exceeded thirty percent and the vast majority of Dalits lived outside the reserved constituencies.15 Moreover, Article 334 limited reserved seats to a ten year period. However, it has been renewed for another ten years each time the provision was due to expire. The second important element in the system of compensatory discrimination is found in Article 335 which states that The claims of the members of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes shall be taken into consideration consistently with

the maintenance of efficiency of administration, in the making of appointments to services and posts in connection with the affairs of the Union or of a State.

When taken with Article 16(4), this forms the basis for reserving jobs in government service for Dalits, Scheduled Tribes and ‘Other Backward Classes’. Quotas were set both at the Centre and in the States for each category, except that the ‘Other Backward Classes’ were never defined by the constitution but were defined by each state in accordance with local conditions and local pressures. The courts later decided that this reservation included not only recruitment to but also promotion within the public services.16 The other important element in the compensatory discrimination system was both the reservation of seats in educational institutions as well as the provision of financial assistance for Dalit, Scheduled Tribe, and other ‘Backward Classes’ students. This, however was not set forth in this section of the constitution but was covered under the Directive Principle of State Policy concerning State promotion of the educational and economic interests of the weaker sections of society (Article 47). The constitution also provided for a special officer for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Article 338) as well as for a Commission to investigate the conditions of the Backward Classes (Article 340). Both of these were appointed by and responsible to the President. It was article 341 which gave the President the important responsibility of specifying ‘the castes, races, or tribes or parts of or groups within castes, races or tribes which shall for the purposes of this Constitution be deemed to be Scheduled Castes’ and allowed Parliament to add to or delete from the President’s list. This wording is significant because it made membership in a specified social group, rather than an individual’s or family’s socioeconomic condition, the criterion of eligibility for the benefits of compensatory discrimination. An important assumption underlying this approach was that a close correlation exists between the social and ritual standing of one’s caste on the one hand and one’s actual socio-economic condition on the other.17 A second criterion was residence, for a caste could appear on the schedule of some states but not all. Thus a migrant from one state, or even from one part of a state, to another could lose eligibility for

benefits. The third criterion was religion which, as Galanter pointed out, was used not to select appropriate groups for inclusion, ‘but as a disqualification of individuals and groups who otherwise meet the criteria, thereby inevitably discouraging conversion’.18 This is not apparent in the constitution itself, but is most explicit in the President’s Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order No. 19 of 1950 issued on 10 August, 1950 which lists the castes designated Scheduled Castes according to the Constitution and then states 3. Notwithstanding anything contained in paragraph 2, no person who professes a religion different from the Hindu religion shall be deemed to be a member of a Scheduled Caste.

In 1956 this was amended to include the Sikh religion as well. There were criticisms in the Constituent Assembly itself that by making membership in a caste unit a criterion for eligibility, the constitution-makers were perpetuating rather than eliminating casteism and untouchability. Nevertheless, this has remained the determinative criterion for inclusion. The list of castes has been modified, but the criterion has remained unchanged. The residence requirement still stands but most intra-state restrictions have been abandoned.19 In 1990, at the time of Ambedkar’s birth centenary, the Buddhists were finally included. The religious criterion was, from the outset, a matter of concern to Christians. During the Constituent Assembly the Christian members had asked specifically for special assistance to Dalit Christians.20 When the constitution-makers decided to include only Hindu and some s Dalits in the initial list of Scheduled Castes,21 Dr. E.C. Bhatty, Secretary of the National Christian Council, protested. We do not grudge special help to the Scheduled Castes. In fact we welcome it for their uplift, and amelioration. But what we expect the Government of India, and the Provincial Governments to do is to provide the same economic and social concessions to all those who suffer from the same economic and social disabilities irrespective of their religion or party affiliations, otherwise, we are afraid, the present discrimination is likely to cause heartburning. We have made a good beginning in the consolidation of our nation, and nothing should be done that would cause suspicion and discontent. Equality of treatment accorded to all backward classes will be more worthy of a free secular and democratic Government.22

This protest was not without justification as the Assembly’s decision led several States to discontinue aid to Dalit Christians.23 When the Presidential Order defining the Scheduled Castes was issued in August 1950, the National Christian Council again protested asking the President to remove the obvious discrimination before implementing the Order.24 The President of the Catholic Regional Committee of Nagpur wrote to Prime Minister Nehru who, in his reply, stated that ‘all State aids and facilities’ are to be given not only to the Hindu Scheduled Castes, but also equally to all other educationally and socially backward classes, whether they profess Hinduism, Christianity or any other religion. Only in matters of reservation of seats no person who professes a religion other than Hinduism shall be deemed to be a member of Scheduled Castes, and accordingly no Indian Christian can be regarded as belonging to a Scheduled Caste for the purpose of the Constitution.25

In December 1950 Dr. H.C. Mukerji, Vice-President of the Constituent Assembly, and Fr. Jerome D’Souza, another Christian member, submitted to the President in person a memorandum from the Christian members of Parliament. They not only protested the definition of the Scheduled Castes in the Order but also pointed out that Prime Minister Nehru’s distinction between State aid and facilities on the one hand and reservation of seats on the other was not being observed in practice. The reply they received reaffirmed the distinction Nehru had made. I should, however, state at once that as far as educational and economic facilities to the Backward Classes are concerned it is not the intention of Government of India that there should be differentiation on grounds of religion or caste. The only differentiation between the Backward Classes and other backward groups, who are called Scheduled Castes can be in regard to certain political right such as separate representation.26

The distinction was, however, never made in practice despite these assurances. When Article 15 was amended in 1951 to add paragraph (4) allowing the government to make special provisions for any socially and educationally backward class, it opened the way for Dalit Christians to be classified as a Backward Class and so be eligible for those benefits. However, this meant that they had to apply to each State government for inclusion. Thus a major struggle lay ahead.

With regard to the courts, Galanter has pointed out that despite numerous cases concerning converts to Buddhism and Christianity, The courts have upheld the exclusion of non-Hindus without reaching the broader question of religious discrimination. Nor have the courts addressed the factual question of the effect of conversion in dissipating the conditions that lead groups to be listed as Scheduled Castes.27

Both of these are significant omissions, an avoidance of key issues raised during the debates of the 1920s and 1930s. Galanter offers no explanation for their failure to address the issue of religious discrimination. While an examination of the actual consequences of conversion offers a way out of this impasse, the courts have chosen instead to take normative views of Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity (i.e., caste is a Hindu phenomenon whereas Buddhism and Christianity prohibit caste), even though they have taken empirical realities into consideration in other kinds of cases.28 To deem conversion to non-Hindu communions an automatic disqualification for aid violates the constitutional command of equal treatment for different religions. It also restricts freedom of religion, which might be thought to require that government refrain from administering its welfare schemes so as to put a heavy price-tag on its exercise. And, apart from its dubious constitutionality, it is at variance with the stated welfare objectives of the policy of preferences for the disadvantaged.29

And so Galanter is forced to conclude that ‘The Hindu requirement seems to reflect a hostility toward conversions which is anachronistic’ since the politics of numbers is no longer in effect in independent India.30 That was written in 1984. On 30 September, 1985 the Supreme Court gave a judgment on two petitions challenging the constitutionality of paragraph (3) of the President’s Order of 1950. The first petition came from Soosai, a Christian Adi Dravida cobbler in Madras, who had been denied a free bunk given to other Adi Dravida cobblers by the Tamilnadu Khadi and Village Industries Board, on the grounds that the bunk was granted under a Scheduled Caste welfare scheme of the central government covered by the Presidential Order. The other petition protested a Tamilnadu government order stating that Dalit Christians who gain reserved seats in government service upon reversion to Hinduism would lose them upon changing their religion again. Both petitions charged religious discrimination in the Presidential Order and the second made the point that paragraph (3), as

indicated by the correspondence from Prime Minister Nehru and President Rajendra Prasad cited earlier, was intended to apply only to political reservations and not to job reservations, education and welfare schemes. In its judgment the Court affirmed not only that the Constitution enjoins upon the President to specify which castes or which parts of those castes are to be considered Scheduled Castes and only Parliament can change the President’s decision, but also that the caste system is a phenomenon peculiar to Hindu (not Indian!) society. Since the President knew that Hindu and Sikh Dalits suffered from serious disabilities and backwardness, he could limit constitutional protection to them. The Court concluded, To establish that paragraph 3 of the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order, 1950, discriminates against Christian members of the enumerated castes, it must be shown that they suffer from a comparable depth of social and economic disabilities and cultural and educational backwardness and similar levels of degradation within the Christian community necessitating intervention by the State under the provisions of the Constitution. It is not sufficient to show that the same caste continues after conversion. It is necessary to establish further that the disabilities and handicaps suffered from such caste membership in the social order of its origin—Hinduism— continue in their oppressive severity in the new environment of a different religions community.31

In dismissing the petition, the Court upheld the sacral view of caste and a compartmentalized view of Indian society, in which members of different religious communities live completely separate lives, unaffected by the value systems, prejudicial attitudes and behaviour of (especially dominant) members of other communities–a view with no empirical support whatsoever. In February 2004 a three judge bench of the Supreme Court ruled that Dalits do not necessarily lose their benefits, depending primarily upon whether or not they continue to be active members of their caste communities. Then in March 2004 the Centre for Public Interest Litigation and T. Franklin Caesar from Tamilnadu filed a public interest petition with the Supreme Court challenging the constitutionality of the third paragraph of the Presidential (Scheduled Castes) Order of 1950. They argued that, as amended, it is discriminatory and violative of articles 14 and 15 of the Constitution in as much as it discriminates against Scheduled Caste converts to religion and [sic] other than the Hindu, Sikh and Buddhist religions. It is submitted that the social and economic disabilities of Scheduled Caste converts to Christianity continue to persist in most cases even after their conversion. In this regard,

there cannot be any distinction between Scheduled Caste converts to Sikh and Buddhist religions and Scheduled Caste converts to the Christian religion. It is submitted that the theory that Christianity does not recognize castes cannot be a valid justification for excluding Christians from this, since in theory even Sikhism and Buddhism also do not recognize castes. The discrimination is also clear from the fact that Scheduled Tribe converts to Christianity continue to remain within the purview of the Scheduled Caste Order 1950, while Scheduled Caste converts to Christianity are denied this benefit.32

The petitioners also argued that since the social and economic disabilities suffered by Scheduled Castes persons in most cases do not cease even after their conversion to Christianity, such conversion cannot be a legal and constitutional basis for denying them the benefits available to other Scheduled Castes persons.33

The Court then asked the Attorney General for the government’s view on extending Scheduled Caste benefits to Christians. In response the government chose not to state its view or deal with the matter directly on the merits of all previous findings, but to present it to a recently constituted National Commission for Linguistic and Religious Minorities which held public hearings that became politicized. However, the Commission supported, with one dissenting vote, the removal of paragraph 3 from the 1950 Presidential Order so as to de-link Scheduled Caste status from religion and make it ‘religion-neutral’, just as Scheduled Tribe status is.34 When the matter was referred to the National Commission on Scheduled Castes, it also favoured opening Scheduled Caste status to Dalit Christians and Dalit Muslims, with the proviso that their inclusion should not encroach upon the 15% job quota reserved for those who already had Scheduled Caste status.35 The Supreme Court has yet to decide the case. Thus, while Independence and the 1950 constitution inaugurated a new era for India and a new stage of the Dalit movement, it is clear that competitive communal viewpoints, more appropriate to the politics of numbers than to a secular democracy, were not only carried over into the new era but also allowed to shape the constitution, its interpretation and implementation. This can be seen in the very different ways in which the Congress and the courts have treated Hindu and Christian Dalits so far.36 Whereas the former became automatic beneficiaries of compensatory discrimination, the latter were left to fight their way into the many State lists of beneficiaries as members either of a Scheduled Caste or of a Backward Class. Because Hindu and Christian Dalits have been treated differently under the system of compensatory discrimination, their histories in independent India will be examined separately and then compared.

COMPENSATORY BENEFICIARIES

DISCRIMINATION

AND

ITS

DALIT

The Government of independent India has used compensatory discrimination as a means of achieving greater equality by deliberately overcoming some of those ‘historically accumulated inequalities’ from which Dalits have long suffered. How has the government fared in helping the chief beneficiaries of this policy attain greater equality with other Indians? That question has interested many social scientists and their work is drawn upon here to answer it. Three areas will be explored before arriving at some conclusions: the system of reservations set forth in the constitution, social change among Dalits, Dalit self-assertion and political involvement. Reservations The provision in Articles 330 and 332 of the constitution for reserved seats in the Lok Sabha and State legislatures did not give Dalits the same independent voice that they had had when engaged in the politics of numbers, but it has assured that Dalit interests could not be totally ignored. Dalits have had fourteen to fifteen percent of the seats reserved for them both at the Centre and in the States. There have been Dalit candidates who have contested in general constituencies, but they have fared poorly in both Lok Sabha and State legislature elections.37 Thus, it seems safe to infer that without reservations few Dalits would have been elected.38 The vast majority of successful Dalits in reserved constituencies have been members of the ruling Congress Party or, more recently, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP); relatively few independents or members of Dalit-based parties have been elected. The dictates of party discipline, the dependence upon party support, and the fact that the majority of voters in reserved constituencies are not Dalits make it virtually impossible for Dalit legislators to be champions of exclusively Dalit interests. Research on how well the system of reserved seats has served the Dalit cause point to one general conclusion. Whereas there is disagreement over whether reservations widened the gap between the Dalit political elite and the Dalit masses,39 it is generally agreed that Dalit legislators have been much better

at watching over general Dalit interests then have other legislators. Thus Barbara Joshi’s observation is quite sound. The political representation policy proved particularly important in maintaining government support for Untouchable development programmes in the face of increasingly well-organized violent opposition to Untouchable mobility as well as competition for development resources from groups better equipped for electoral combat. The evidence strongly suggests that neither the basic provisions in the Indian Constitution for universal adult franchise and explicit prohibition of the practice of Untouchability, nor the influence of general socio-economic changes now in progress in India, could have maintained even the existing exasperatingly slow but perceptible rate of Scheduled Caste mobility and political mobilization without the additional influence of the political reservation policy.40

The reservation of jobs provided for in Article 16 of the constitution was applied initially only in recruiting for Central and State government service. In 1957 this was expanded to include promotion posts as well as initial employment, but in 1963 that was severely limited and then partially restored in 1968. Such concessions as a higher maximum qualifying age or lower qualifying marks on examinations have been granted to make it easier for Dalits to enter the higher ranks of government service. The use and implementation of reservations for employment by local government bodies has varied from state to state. With regard to employment in public sector undertakings, reservations were granted ‘in principle’ in 1954 but were officially introduced only 15 years later.41 From 1947 to 1970 one-eighth of all Central Government posts recruited by competitive examination on an All-India basis were reserved for Dalits; in 1970 this quota was raised to fifteen percent. Of the Central Government posts filled by other means but on an All-India basis one-sixth were reserved for Dalits, while those recruited locally were reserved according to the proportion of Dalits in the local population. State quotas have varied greatly for the same reason. Although progress has been made, the quotas for jobs above the menial and clerical levels in Central Government service and public sector undertakings, had not been filled by 1987. For high administrative positions the percentages were 8.23% and 4.86% respectively; for lower administrative positions 10.40% and 6.17%.42 The states have generally been behind the Center in filling their reserved

quotas.43 This shortfall scholars have attributed to persistent prejudice against Dalits as well as to resentment over the reservation system, especially as it affects promotions. Another stated cause has been a concern for maintaining the quality and efficiency of government services.44 Galanter addressed this issue in some detail and concluded that the decline in efficiency has been due primarily to the tremendous expansion of the services and resulting lowering of standards for all entrants.45 This situation did not improve markedly in the 1990s. The National Commission on Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes reported that in 1995 only 10.2% of the Class I, 12.67% of the Class II government officers, and 11.11% of the public sector bank officers were Dalits.46 Only 2.4% of the high court judges and additional judges were Dalits and in the universities Dalits had two percent of the jobs, even though 23% were reserved for them.47 Meanwhile, in 1990-91 the government adopted a new economic policy which resulted in the transfer of a large number of public sector enterprises, in which jobs were reserved for Dalits, to the private sector, where there were no reservations, thus reducing the number of job opportunities reserved for Dalits. This led before long to a growing Dalit demand for reservations in the private sector, which has faced a lot of resistance and has not been successful so far. Then in 1999 the Supreme Court took two decisions which have restricted Dalit access to reserved jobs. The first both reduced disparities in the minimum qualifying standards for reserved and unreserved categories and denied special provisions for candidates in the reserved category to qualify for the superspeciality courses which would enable them to enter highly specialized fields of government service. The second eliminated reservations for job promotions. This decision was overruled by an act of Parliament, but in 2006 the Court insisted that the state must prove both that Dalits were under-represented in, and that those up for promotion were qualified for, the jobs to which they were being promoted. At the same time the Court decided that members of the ‘creamy layer’ of Dalits were no longer eligible to compete for reserved jobs.48 In seeking to fulfill its obligations for Dalit education under the amended Article 15 as well as Articles 29 and 47 of the constitution, the Government provided both reserved seats in educational institutions and financial

assistance to Dalits. In practice reservations seemed to apply only where seats have been scarce—e.g., in graduate, post-graduate, technical, and professional education—and have not been uniformly applied. The states have been asked to reserve fifteen percent of their seats for Dalits and, in order to fill them, lower their standards of admission if necessary. Yet even when the states have complied, these reserved seats have not always been filled. Galanter cited two studies during the 1970s which put medical college admissions of Dalits at only 6.6% and 6.8%.49 Suma Chitnis, in a study of Dalits at one of the Indian Institutes of Technology, found, when comparing the backgrounds of the Dalit and non-Dalit students, that the former were drawn more from villages and small towns, while the latter were overwhelming urban. Moreover, their parents’ annual income and occupational levels were much lower than were those of the non-Dalit students.50 Dalit students thus had far more serious disadvantages to overcome than did other students. The government has also made education free for Dalits. Originally free education was provided only through the secondary level, but by 1955 it was extended beyond that to all levels. A means test was also applied to post-matriculation scholarships; only Dalits whose parents’ income was below a fixed amount could get scholarship aid.51 This has been the major source of financial assistance specifically for Dalits; between half and twothirds of all government ‘Harijan Welfare’ expenditures have been devoted to education. This has included not only free tuition but also assistance for hostel fees, books, and living expenses. The results of this government investment in Dalit education have been mixed. The literacy rate for Dalits has risen from two percent in 1931 to 21.38% in 1981, 37.41% in 1991, and 54.70% in 2001, but that lags far behind the 68.81% for the population as a whole.52 Literacy rates vary from state to state; Dalit rates are high where the general level is high, and low where the general level is low. What is true of literacy is also true of school enrollments. Dalit numbers have increased dramatically since Independence and yet remain lower than those of the population as a whole.53 The rate of attrition remains higher among Dalits than among other students. Whereas in 1981 the Dalit school dropout rate was 60.2% at the primary level, 76.8% at the middle school level, and 86.9% at the secondary level, it had dropped

by about fifteen percentage points at all three levels in 2001, but still remained six percentage points higher than the national average.54 As a result by 2001 only 3.4% of Dalit men and 1% of Dalit women had received a post-secondary education of any kind.55 Poverty, family background, neighbourhood environment, the social accessibility of schools, and the negligence or prejudice of teachers still act as constraints upon Dalit educational progress.56 Education accounted for from 55% to 70% of all government expenditure specifically targeted during the first five plan periods (1951-1979) for promoting ‘with special care the educational and economic interests’ of Dalits as mandated by Article 47 of the constitution. The remainder went to economic uplift, health, housing and other services for which the government spent annually from a mere 11 paise per Dalit during the first five year plan to Rs. 1.03 per Dalit during the fifth plan period.57 This was to be expenditure over and above the proportional benefits Dalits were expected to receive from general investment in economic development and welfare services. However, when the planners realized that ‘the weaker sections’ were stagnating amidst general development, they created a Special Component Plan to channel much more development money to Dalits in various sectors of the economy as well as an Integrated Rural Development Programme to raise rural Dalit families above the poverty line. These took effect at the beginning of the sixth plan in 1980.58 Near the end of that plan period V. Pushpa Kumari interviewed 150 rural Dalit families in Chittoor district of Andhra Pradesh to assess the impact of the new effort. Eleven percent of the beneficiaries in her sample had crossed the poverty line, which was in keeping with national and state averages.59 Moreover, these economic and social betterment measures accounted for far more of the all-around progress experienced by the beneficiaries than did any other government input, including education.60 More than a decade later, R. B. Singh interviewed all the beneficiaries in fourteen villages of Amritsar district in the Punjab. He found that most of the money allocated went to pay the salaries of the ‘welfare bureaucracy’ (most of whom were not Dalits) or was siphoned off by middlemen who persuaded poor, generally illiterate, Dalits to apply for loans. More than eighty percent of the recipients were unable to repay their loans and had fallen into a debt trap far worse than they had before.61 Social Watch—Tamilnadu found that

in 2003-04 much of the money allocated under the Special Component Plan was not being spent and that nine of the seventeen departments involved had done nothing.62 A similar trend has been noted with regard to land transfers to Dalits, a publicly proclaimed policy of virtually every government since the early years of Independence. ‘Land to the Dalits’, and especially to the tenants and agricultural labourers among them, has been a popular slogan, but state governments have appropriated relatively little land for transfer, and have not allocated all that they have appropriated. Opposition has been fierce, and in some places not only litigious but even violent. As a result, only a very small percentage of rural Dalits have received and hold on to the land given to them; for them it has made a positive difference.63 In January 2002 about 250 Dalit activists, intellectuals and academicians gathered in Bhopal at a conference under the auspices of the Madhya Pradesh government on ‘Charting a New Course for Dalits for the 21st Century’. Its Bhopal Declaration drew immediate national attention as one of its recommendations was referred to by President K. R. Narayanan in his Republic Day speech, namely that ‘Every government and private organization must implement Supplier Diversity from disadvantaged businesses and Dealership diversity in all goods and services’.64 The Chief Minister, Digvijay Singh, promised to implement the 21 recommendations in the Declaration and a year later issued a progress report. His government made an important new initiative by ordering that government purchases worth a billion rupees come from Dalit and Tribal suppliers and that 20% of all construction contracts of Rs. 200,000 or less be awarded to Dalit and Tribal contractors, so as to open up private sector employment to them.65 This brief survey of how the reservations provided in the constitution have worked in practice indicates that the Government of India has considered participation in the political process and social mobility to be the chief means by which Dalits might achieve greater equality in Indian society. With regard to the former, they have granted Dalits both the franchise and reserved seats, thus assuring them at least some influence upon the outcome of all elections and access to positions of political power. With regard to the latter, throughout most of this period they have treated education as the

most important prerequisite for mobility and opened up all kinds of education to Dalits. They have also assured Dalits of jobs in all grades and categories of government service, thus granting them access to positions of administrative as well as political power. The operative assumption behind reservations and other government initiatives designed to help Dalits seems to have been that occupational mobility would enable Dalits to lose the stigma of untouchability and so become well integrated into all levels of Indian society. The system of reservations and special allocation of development resources to Dalits have been imperfectly implemented at best and serious obstacles to Dalit power and mobility have been encountered in the process. What difference has it actually made? Has its operative assumption proven to be sound? What kinds of progress towards equality, if any, have Dalits made over the past century, and especially since the dawn of Independence? These questions now need to be addressed. Social Change The process of social change among Dalits had begun before Independence, but only a very small number of Dalits had been affected. Planned economic development and compensatory discrimination opened up opportunities for occupational and upward social mobility for many more. Studies of Dalits up through the 1980s used a variety of development indicators to measure Dalit progress within the prevailing social structure, the reasons for it, and the constraints or even resistance it confronted. From the 1990s onward, the focus shifted from the Dalits’ slow, incremental progress within a caste-based hierarchical social order to the increased caste conflict and atrocities against Dalits which has ensued. This suggests that by that time enough Dalits had made just enough progress within the prevailing hierarchical social order to challenge and even threaten it. This section attempts to describe that change. In 1982 Barbara Joshi provided a helpful assessment of progress made up to that point. She confirmed the findings concerning the results of reservations presented above. In addition she indicated that unemployment was higher among Dalits than among others at comparable educational levels, despite reservations. In 1971 twice as many Dalits (52%) were landless labourers as was true overall (26%); only 28% were individual cultivators of land they

owned or rented, whereas in the population as a whole the proportion was 43%. Dalits had also benefitted less from land reforms than had other groups. Urbanization and industrialization had not been of much benefit to Dalits as only 12% of them (compared to 20% of the overall population) lived in urban areas in 1961; by 1971 that population had increased 1% for Dalits and 2% overall. Dalits were concentrated at the lower levels of the industrial labour force and thus received comparatively lower wages than others. Politically, Dalits had been unable to mobilize quickly and effectively enough to compete successfully for the scarce development resources they needed to attain equality, while continuing caste prejudice had prevented political solidarity between the Dalit and non-Dalit poor. Yet the system of reservations had enabled them to maintain pressure upon the government for the socio-economic changes that serve Dalit interests and was therefore, in Joshi’s view, largely responsible for what progress Dalits had made.66 Joshi’s study reveals large gaps between the Dalit and non- Dalit populations at significant points. The 1981 Census showed that while the Dalit literacy rate was improving, it was doing so at a slower rate than that of the non-Dalit, non-Tribal population among both men and women.67 Urbanization among Dalits was increasing at about the same rate as the population as a whole.68 The proportion of male cultivators in the rural Dalit population increased slightly, while the proportion of agricultural labourers among them decreased by three percent.69 The gap between Dalits and non-Dalits widened with regard to workers in the nonagricultural sector (where Dalit occupational mobility was expected to occur), with an actual decline in the percentage of Dalit workers in that sector!70 In addition to gaps between Dalit and non-Dalit progress, there were also disparities among Dalits themselves. Chitnis noted that in each state most of the Dalit students in her school and college samples belonged to one or two jatis.71 Patwardhan in her study of Maharashtra cited figures showing that in 1963 Mahars received 85% of all post-matriculation scholarships awarded to Dalits, whereas Mangs, who are almost equal to the Mahars in population, received a mere two percent; five years later their percentages were 76% and 4% respectively.72

Another disparity was that created by class. Misra and Kaur, pooling the results of four examinations for the selection of officers in public undertakings, found a clear correlation between selection and family income. Of those Dalits in their lowest income category only 3.2% were selected; in their middle income category 10.2% were selected; and in their highest income category 18.7% were selected.73 While this data is somewhat suspect,74 it does confirm a common perception that reservations tend to benefit the Dalit elite far more than the Dalit poor,75 but these authors failed to point out that in these tests the Dalit poor did far better relative to the Dalit elite in the reserved quota (29.7% of the Dalits selected) than did the rest of the poor relative to the rest of the elite (11.7% of those selected) in the open competition,76 thus suggesting that the reserved quota is the more equalitarian!77 The other disparity was between Dalit men and Dalit women. Patwardhan cites the 1961 literacy rates among Mahars as 25.67% for men and 5.31% for women, while among the Mangs it was 17.04% and 2.54% for men and women respectively.78 The discrepancies at the level of higher education were even greater: about 9:1 among Mahars and 49:1 among Mangs.79 Chitnis in her national survey showed similar disparities, although they varied from state to state.80 In fact the disparity between Dalit men and Dalit women was greater than between Indian men and women generally.81 Malavika Karlekar in her study of Balmiki women in Delhi pointed out that Balmiki men had opportunities for job mobility that Balmiki women lacked. The women supported them in their efforts to take advantage of these opportunities by providing, through sweeping, the subsistence income necessary to keep the family going while the men qualified themselves for better jobs. Moreover this sexual stereotype—mobility was the man’s task and security the woman’s—shaped women’s views about educating their daughters.82 Much research concentrated upon those urban Dalits who have received an education and have left their traditional occupations. Since they are the chief beneficiaries of the policy of compensatory discrimination, their experience offers insight into whether that policy was leading to greater equality for Dalits or not. Since Nandu Ram’s data on Dalits in Kanpur,

gathered in the 1970s, was designed to address that issue, his findings are summarized here and then supplemented by those of other scholars where appropriate. Ninety-eight percent of Nandu Ram’s sample of 240 Dalits, who ranged in occupation from sweepers to Class I officers, had become in terms of education, occupation, income, consumption patterns and social power upwardly mobile when compared to their fathers. Whereas 78.3% were from low and 20% from middle socio-economic status backgrounds, he found only 9.6% to be of low and 82.9% of middle socio-economic status. In seeking to determine whether this rise in social class status translated into a rise in caste status as well (a key assumption behind the policy of compensatory discrimination), Nandu Ram used data on social interaction with non-Dalits ‘shaped by both modern and traditional attributes’ to determine caste status. Only one-eighth of his sample (including one-third of the Class I and II officers) saw no changes taking place, while the rest, including most of the sweepers, did. Thus there was some rise in caste status accompanying a rise in class status and few in the sample were experiencing ‘status anxiety’ due to serious discrepancies between their class and their caste status. Few identified themselves in terms of their caste, except when qualifying for Scheduled Caste benefits. Nandu Ram concluded that, as they could not accelerate interaction with either the higher castes or their own caste fellows, these Dalits constituted a somewhat separate and distinct ‘new middle class’.83 These findings were generally supported by other studies of upward mobile Dalits, most of which were undertaken in North India. That education and occupational mobility are prerequisites for enhanced class status seems clear enough, but not all upwardly mobile Dalits chose employment in reserved Government jobs. Chamars and related jatis in particular have turned their traditional occupational skills to good advantage in business.84 However, whether enhanced class status has led to different patterns of interaction and integration with caste Hindus is not clear. Malik used a number of indicators— friendships, attendance at high caste marriage functions, invitations to high caste people to one’s own social functions, participation as members and leaders in voluntary organizations—and concluded that Dalits were not being integrated with the higher castes.85

Dahiwale used similar indicators in concluding that Dalits in modern rather than traditional caste jobs do enjoy a rise in social status.86 Saberwal found less social distance observed in public than in domestic settings.87 Sachchidananda’s respondents reported greater discrimination when one’s caste background is known than when it is not,88 a view supported by Roy and Singh.89 This suggests that the correlation between a rise in class status and a rise in caste status is only partial and incomplete at best. Nandu Ram’s findings that upwardly mobile Dalits become cut off from their less fortunate caste fellows is also confirmed by other studies,90 and hence his definition of their situation as constituting a separate and distinct group stands. There was little evidence that those changes which are taking place in the cities are occurring in the villages as well. Studies conducted in both the North and the South indicated little significant occupational diversification among rural Dalits unless they found jobs in a nearby town or city; those who lived and worked in the villages continued to be economically dependent upon the dominant castes.91 Patterns of interaction between Dalits and higher castes remain pretty much unchanged. In a recent study of 565 villages in eleven states, it was found that in over 45% of the villages Dalits were denied entry into non-Dalit houses, places of worship, cremation and burial grounds, and access to water facilities; they continued to face prohibitions against food sharing, against using the services of barbers and washermen, against selling milk to cooperatives, and against marriage processions; and Dalit women continued to deal with ill treatment by non-Dalit women and men. Moreover, they faced an even longer list of discriminatory practices in smaller percentages of the villages.92 Slow incremental progress within a largely unchanged caste-based hierarchical social structure is one side of the story of social change among Dalits. The other side of the story is the resistance and even backlash which Dalits have had to face. Every village study consulted describes incidents of violent retaliation against Dalit attempts to claim their constitutional rights: walking on village roads, using the village well, organizing for higher wages, failures to show ‘proper respect’ to members of higher castes, deviations from time-honored but degrading social custom.93 Some recent studies indicate that Dalits still face local discrimination and humiliation in

such public welfare programmes as mid-day meals for school children, subsidized essential commodity shops, earthquake and tsunami relief, education, and reproductive health care, to name only a few.94 Manual scavenging has been prohibited by law but municipal governments continue to hire Dalits to do that work.95 In the Punjab, where Jodhka found untouchability on the wane, he also found Dalits facing discrimination in Hindu temples and in the langars of Sikh gurdwaras, at village festivals and cremation grounds, in panchayat buildings, at panchayat meetings where their views were not taken seriously, and even a Dalit sarpanch was not always given due respect.96 Moreover, as Dalits have progressed and asserted their rights, violence and atrocities have increased. Most atrocities—whether beatings, murder, rape or arson—go unreported or, if reported to the police, are not acted upon. Very few come to trial and even fewer are punished. Nonetheless the number of recorded atrocities against Dalits increased sharply each decade since Independence from about 4,000 annually during 1966-76, to 8,500 annually over the next five years, to 18,000 annually in 1981-86, to 35,262 in 1995 alone, to about 45,000 in 2004.97 Among the things Dalits did to provoke such attacks include contesting and winning elections or court cases, using government tube wells, taking bridal processions down the main street of a village, building houses on land the government had allocated to them, refusing to wash the feet of the upper castes, and denying dominant caste men the right to rape Dalit women.98 In these conflicts the police have either openly supported the dominant castes or tried to mediate, but rarely have they upheld Dalit rights. It seems safe to conclude that while Dalits made some progress under protective discrimination, their rate of progress has, in all probability, been slower than that of the rest of the population. As a result, while they may be better off now, they may not in fact be more equal to other Indians than they were in 1950. Thus far those Dalits who have enjoyed a rise in class or caste status live or at least work in urban areas; enhanced status relative to others has not really been possible for the great mass of Dalits who remain in the rural areas. There caste membership rather than individual achievement continues to determine the social status of Dalits and to limit their economic possibilities. Compensatory discrimination has produced a

visible Dalit middle class, but at least for Dalits, a class system has not yet replaced the sacral hierarchy of castes in India. That sacral hierarchy remains largely intact in rural India but is being complemented by a more secular, associational system of caste in urban India. In many small ways both urban and rural Dalits have been challenging the legitimacy of that hierarchy in the name of values enshrined in the constitution of India. Their efforts have led to increasing caste conflict and violence, which in this context may be considered to be indicators of social progress. Self-Assertion and Political Action Since Independence Dalits have considered politics to be the primary means by which they might attain equality of status with other Indians and remove the stigma of untouchability.99 However, throughout most of this period all of the political parties, including those of the Left, have been based upon coalitions of locally and regionally dominant castes. Patronclient relationships between these castes and the Dalits have been used to gain Dalit support. Even Dalit politicians in reserved constituencies have had to be clients of party leaders drawn from dominant castes in order to both get elected and then function as legislators. They have had the appearance but not the substance of political power, except when acting as a bloc on such issues as reservations. In like manner the dominant castes have monopolized access to the bureaucracy, to development resources, even to anti-poverty funds, and of course to the police. Dalits have thus had to survive on trickledown resources with little protection against their oppressors. Given this kind of political system, it is not surprising that the government’s record in social transformation and reduction of Dalit poverty has been a poor one.100 Moreover, the efforts of the Harijan Sevak Sangh and other reform bodies to bring about change virtually died with Gandhi.101 In short, the functioning of Indian politics, like that of Indian society generally, has remained hierarchical; the only leverage Dalits have had has been through the adult franchise and reservations. This general overview, based on analyses of politics at the state and national levels, is supported by field studies of Dalits and the political process at the local level. Since in ‘Modelpur’ Punjab, according to Saberwal, the mass of citizens considered the administration, police and courts unreliable as well

as beyond their reach, the weak took recourse ‘not in an abstract norm of justice but in seeking the protection of those who offer this protection: the politicians’. The politicians, in their turn, spent an inordinate amount of their time mediating between supplicants and administrators.102 The influence they could bring to bear on behalf of their clients depended upon the resources of power, wealth, connections (especially with state level politicians) and local support at their command. Since Dalit politicians had few of these resources, they had three basic options: (1) to enter into patron-client ties, usually with high-caste patrons, (2) to act in reference to the solidarity of one’s caste or of Harijans at large, or (3) to act in reference to the solidarity of one’s ‘class’—usually the ‘working class’— regardless of caste.103

The actual choices Dalit politicians make ‘seem to be linked with the arena(s) in which they operate’. At the local and municipal levels, a person from a predominantly Dalit ward could choose the second option; in running for the state legislature, where election depends less upon Dalit than upon upper caste support, the first option was a virtual necessity.104 Other studies, also from North India, support this analysis. In Agra and Aligarh, where Dalits had a sizeable population and lived in segregated wards, they have been able to exercise the second option with some success.105 In Kanpur, where the Dalit population is more fluid, and in Jodhpur, where the Bhangis form only 2.3% of the population, they have taken the first option.106 For rural Dalits the first option is really the only viable one.107 The kinds of concerns urban Dalit politicians have brought before local bodies, political parties, and administrators are many, varied, and generally very pragmatic. They have wanted basic public amenities (paved streets, electricity, street lights, water) made available in their neighbourhoods; development and welfare resources (new housing lots, government loans, health care, increased educational opportunities) given to their people; Dalits placed in decision-making bodies which allocate jobs, loans, and development funds; decent wages and working conditions for sweepers, whether working for the municipality or for private families; protection from harassment and atrocities. At a more symbolic level, they asked for statues of Ambedkar or streets, public buildings or institutions named after him so that they were included in the official civic culture.108 For rural

Dalits water, employment, wages, working conditions, loans, and education have been the key issues.109 Because both urban and rural Dalits have found their high caste patrons unwilling or unable to provide the consideration, fairness and equality they seek in this ‘politics of rights and resources’,110 many Dalit activists from Ambedkar onwards have believed that the only solution has been for Dalits to break loose from patron-client relationships and to acquire independent political power sufficient to ensure that their interests were respected. While Dalits of all shades of opinion have insisted upon continuing reservations as a matter of justice and survival in uneven competition with other groups, the post-Independence history of the Dalit movement centers more around self-assertion, protest and ongoing conflict with dominant caste Hindus than around either the perennial local issues mentioned above or reservations as such. In 1951, after failing to get the necessary support for the Hindu Code Bill he drafted, Ambedkar resigned as Law Minister and joined the opposition. He contested elections for reserved Lok Sabha seats in 1951 and 1954 as a candidate of the Scheduled Castes Federation, the successor in 1942 of his Independent Labour Party, but lost both to Congress candidates by narrow margins.111 He did, however, retain the Rajya Sabha seat, to which he was elected in 1952, until his death on 6 December, 1956. In those final five years he took two significant and complementary steps in leading Dalits towards greater cultural and political independence of the dominant caste Hindu elite. The first of these was his conversion to Buddhism on 14 October, 1956, the 2500th anniversary of the Buddha’s enlightenment. He chose Buddhism because he found it a moral religion, a rational religion, a religion of equality, a respected religion, and a religion of Indian origin.112 Ambedkar also initiated many of his followers that day (estimates vary from 50,000 to 500,000) using oaths which not only affirmed certain Buddhist teachings, but also explicitly rejected Hinduism, its deities and rites. One such oath states I embrace today the Bauddha Dhamma discarding the Hindu Religion which is detrimental to the emancipation of human beings and which believes in inequality and regards human beings other than Brahmins as low born.113

This oath sums up what subsequent field research has shown to be the main reasons for the mass conversions which followed Ambedkar’s: the rejection of the oppressive psychological conditioning of Hinduism and acceptance of an alternative which bestows dignity upon its adherents.114 By 1961 there were 3,200,333 Buddhists in India, a 2267% increase over 1951, but from 1961 until 1991, the first census after Buddhists became eligible for Scheduled Caste benefits, the growth rate of Buddhism has approximated that of the population as a whole.115 Between 1991 and 2001 its growth rate exceeded that of the general population by about two percent, the most dramatic increases being in Karnataka (438.7%) and to a lesser degree in Uttar Pradesh (44.8%).116 Ambedkar’s other step, also taken in October 1956, was to announce the foundation of the Republican Party as the successor to the Scheduled Castes Federation in order to broaden the party’s electoral base to include the Scheduled Tribes and Backward Classes. The party was actually organized only in October 1957 and enjoyed some success in the 1962 and 1967 elections, especially in general constituencies where they could make alliances with other minorities and when the other parties were deeply divided. However, the Republican Party was not a significant force in Indian politics. In 1970 it split and went into rapid decline.117 After that Dalits had to rely upon grassroots Dalit activists to apply constant pressure upon the Government in order to promote or protect Dalit interests. Dalit pressure and protest at that level took many different forms: demonstrations, mass rallies, strikes, boycotts, civil disobedience campaigns, violent retaliation for atrocities committed against Dalits. One movement which emerged during the 1970s, however, does deserve special mention. The Dalit Panther movement began in Bombay during the 1960s but was formally organized in 1972. Its 1973 manifesto attacked not only the Congress for continuing Hindu feudalism, but also both the Left for failing to combine the class struggle with the struggle against untouchability and the Republican Party for its impotence. ‘We do not want a little place in the Brahmin Alley. We want the rule of the whole land.’118 The Dalit Panthers came to prominence during the January 1974 byeelection in the central Bombay parliamentary constituency and in the Worli riots which followed in its wake. They also played an active role in the

1978 agitation to rename Marathwada University after Dr. Ambedkar. This agitation was successful, but the anti-Dalit backlash which followed it singled out Mahars—the most upward mobile and politically aggressive Dalits—as its chief victims, while leaving other Dalits largely alone.119 Soon afterwards the Dalit Panthers completely fragmented as a political movement.120 Another form of Dalit self-assertion, similar to Ambedkar’s, gained national attention in the early 1980s. In 1981 some Pallar Dalits in southern Tamilnadu converted to Islam. The largest number of converts, 180 families on 19 February and another 27 families on 23 May, came from the village of Meenakshipuram. Conversions also occurred in other villages in the region, some as a chain reaction to Meenakshipuram and others independently but at about the same time. In the end about 2000 Dalits converted and for some time there were rumors and threats of further conversions. The immediate cause appears to have been local initiative in response to persistent brutality by the dominant Thevars and the local police. A Muslim scholar has suggested that Islam was chosen not only because of its equalitarianism, solidarity, militant image and political power, but also because ‘Islam and Muslims have the highest, most challenging negative identity in India.’ Thus conversion to Islam would inflict more psychological pain on caste Hindus than any other religion Dalits could have chosen.121 The conversions certainly had that effect. Controversy raged. Over 50,000 people, including a Parliamentary Committee, visited Meenakshipuram. The Hindu Munnani, the Arya Samaj, and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad tried to reconvert the converts and prevent further conversions. The chief minister of Tamilnadu considered legislation prohibiting conversion, while the Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi, accepted the unproven hypothesis that ‘Gulf money’ was behind the conversions and sided with Hindu revivalists in opposing further efforts to convert.122 The other major Dalit conversion movement of this period was the Dalit Avatari (a reference to Jesus as the Dalit avatar of God) movement among the Bhangis in Uttar Pradesh. It began in 1984 when about 4000 rural Bhangi Christians met together and decided to revive the rural church, which had so suffered from pastoral neglect over the previous decades as to have virtually died. This movement grew at their initiative and went largely

unnoticed because it was rural, decentralized, avoided publicity, and worked not only independently of established churches but even in protest against them for their ‘urban captivity’. However, its Gramin Prachin Mandal (Rural Presbyterian Church) now counts over a million members and has a distinctive style of being Christian which draws heavily upon rural Bhangi culture and aspirations. It has urged fellow Bhangis to become Dalit Avataris, to educate their children, and to stop cleaning latrines. The movement has been fed not only by its message of individual and jati transformation, but also by Bhangi discontent with the status quo and disillusionment with the political parties’ failures to improve the lot of rural Dalits. Local Bhangi leaders have found the movement to have been far more promising in that respect than anything the various ruling parties have done. Moreover, the movement is something that the Bhangis have done for themselves, in which they take great pride, rather than something others have done for them.123 It was also in 1984 that Kanshi Ram, a Chamar from the Punjab, founded the Bahujan Samaj (Majority People’s) Party largely from Dalit beneficiaries of government job reservations whom he had previously organized. It entered the 1984 general election and won over a million votes but no seats, developing an especially strong power base among prosperous Jatavs in Uttar Pradesh, one of whom, Mayawati, became his second in command and eventual successor. Its central stated aim has been to capture and use political power for the benefit of the Bahujans and it has used a variety of strategies to achieve that end. At the outset it fought alone as a low caste, secular party, attacking the Manuwadi Congress and BJP. It then shifted to an alliance with the Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh to create an alternative Bahujan society. When this alliance broke down in 1995, the BSP shifted yet again to including Muslims and non-Dalits of various castes, including Brahmins, on its tickets. It came to power in Uttar Pradesh as part of an alliance with the BJP in 1995, in 1997, and again in 2002. In 2007 it won an absolute majority in the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly and is currently the sole ruling party there with Mayawati as Chief Minister.124 The Bahujan Samaj Party in Uttar Pradesh has been the major Dalit political success, although it certainly does have its Dalit critics. It has also

won seats in other northern state legislatures and in the Parliament. Other Dalit parties have not fared as well at the polls so far. Meanwhile Dalit human rights activists applied a different kind of political pressure at the national level to bring about change. On 10 December 1998, the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights submitted to the President of India a memorandum which insisted that ‘Dalit Rights are Human Rights’ and listed specific demands being made to the Government of India, to the international human rights community, and to the United Nations. One year later it presented this memorandum (now with 2.5 million signatures) and a Black Paper entitled ‘Broken Promises and Dalits Betrayed’ to the Prime Minister and Members of Parliament. In 2000 it conducted a National Public Hearing on Dalit Human Rights in Chennai and linked up with the newly formed International Dalit Solidarity Network. It then internationalized the struggle by trying to get caste discrimination outlawed by the World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance held in Durban, South Africa, from 31 August to 7 September 2001. While unable to achieve that because of strong opposition from the Government of India, it did draw national and international attention to the issue. In August 2004 the United Nations SubCommittee on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights declared discrimination based on occupation and descent a violation of international law and recommended that two Special Rapporteurs prepare a comprehensive study which would focus on principles and guidelines for eliminating such discrimination. The United Nations Human Rights Commission endorsed this in April 2005.125 It was when the Bharatiya Janata Party with its homogenizing Hindutva ideology had come to power and militant Hindu organizations had unleashed a veritable reign of terror against Christians, especially in Gujarat, allegedly to prevent conversions,126 that Dalit self-assertion took a defiant religious form once again. Following a six months campaign, on 4 November 2001 Ram Raj, Chairman of the All-India Confederation of Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe Organizations, converted to Buddhism and changed his name to Udit Raj at the Ambedkar Bhavan in New Delhi in front of some 50,000 Dalits, some of whom took diksha with him despite government opposition and police harassment. His explanations for this decision first emphasized Dalit liberation from a ‘subservient

mentality’, from mental slavery, and from a ‘tremendous faith in fate and destiny’ to ‘believing that one can change one’s destiny’.127 Later he emphasized protest against the indignities, humiliations, and atrocities to which Hindu society subjected Dalits.128 He continued his campaign for conversion and helped to sponsor conversion ceremonies in other parts of India. When in 2002 Jayalalitha pushed an anti-conversion bill through the Tamilnadu Legislative Assembly, Udit Raj and others organized conversion ceremonies in open defiance of the new law. At one some of the converts became Buddhists while others became Christians!129 Finally, mention should be made of Dalit literature as an important form of Dalit self-assertion in the cultural realm during this period. The Dalit Panthers used poetry, short stories, autobiography, and criticism to express their anger and resentment at past and present wrongs, to challenge the status quo and mobilize Dalit participation in the struggle for justice, and to give voice to Dalit views and visions. This literary movement spread to other parts of India and to other regional languages, combining with Dalit street theatre and dance, Dalit music and art, to inject a Dalit presence and challenge existing conventions in the nation’s culture. Equally important has been the voice of Dalit intellectuals and Dalit academics who, through their research and writings, have been engaged in ‘the politics of cultural contestation’.130 It has been argued that the 1996 Lok Sabha elections brought the era of one party dominance to an end and that Dalits, by withdrawing support from the Congress, rejected the ‘vertical integration’ process of patron-client political relationships in favour of creating their own ‘political niche’ as a distinct political entity.131 A complementary argument is that a ‘silent revolution’ has been going on in Indian politics, as dominant castes within the political parties have been forced to cede significant power to the Backward Classes and even to the Dalits in order to retain their loyalty.132 Taken together, these developments would seem to have given Dalits far more independent bargaining power on the national stage than they have ever had before and perhaps marked a new stage in the history of the modern Dalit movement. The evidence of Dalit self-assertion presented here would support that point of view. However, there is also ample evidence to support the opposite view that Dalits are still attracted to the

benefits of being clients not only within the Congress Party but even within the BJP, as became dramatically evident when Dalits became heavily involved in the 2002 anti-Muslim riots in Gujarat and responded favourably to an alliance with the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra.133 The reservation system, the main constitutional device for achieving a society based on liberty, equality, justice and fraternity as envisioned in the constitution, has given some Dalits a measure of social mobility and political power. In that sense there has been progress towards national goals. At the same time Dalit progress has also revealed how deep the caste divide is. It is arguably the basic contradiction in Indian society and every step Dalits take towards equality and justice is being met, not with the ‘change of heart’ Gandhi expected, but with resistance, co-option, divide and rule tactics, violence, or whatever it takes to keep at least this one feature of caste hierarchy in place. At this point Dalits are deeply divided among themselves not only by their own caste rivalries,134 but also by differences in both ideology and strategy. Should they work for the abolition of caste or for full human rights within a caste-based society? Who are their real friends, if any, and who are their main opponents in this struggle? And what strategy, or combination of strategies, holds the most promise of getting them to where they want to go: a political, an economic, a social, a religious or a cultural strategy? There is among them still no national leader or organization, and no consensus on these vital issues.

CHRISTIAN DALITS AND COMPENSATORY DISCRIMINATION The Presidential Order of 1950 explicitly denied Christian Dalits the benefits which compensatory discrimination made available to other Dalits. Some State governments did grant job, education and welfare benefits to Dalit Christians either as Dalits or as ‘Other Backward Classes’. Under these circumstances what progress towards equality have they made, largely without government assistance, over the past sixty years? How does this compare with the progress made by those Dalits who did not convert? Those questions can be answered only after an examination first of social change among Dalit Christians, then of the impact upon them of caste in the churches, and finally of Dalit Christian assertion and political action since Independence. Social Change Social change among Dalit Christians must be studied within the context of those changes affecting all Indians, and all Dalits in particular. There are two reasons for this. The first and most obvious one is that Christian Dalits are part of the same Indian social fabric, affected by the same social structures and forces of change as are other Indians and other Dalits; they are not isolated from these because of their religion. The second is that there is not the census data, or other comparable data, on Dalit Christian population size and distribution, literacy rates, education and occupation that is available on other Dalits. Greater reliance must therefore be placed on the data provided in micro studies of Dalit Christians undertaken to answer different questions than those posed here. These will be used to see whether, where and how the post-Independence history of Christian Dalits resembles or differs from that of other Dalits. The one thing Census data does point to is a dramatic drop in the growth rate of the Dalit Christian population since the introduction of compensatory discrimination. Whereas prior to 1951 the Christian population had grown at a rate between double and twenty times that of the population as a whole, Table II shows that after 1951 the Christian growth rate approximated the national rate much more closely, and even dropped below the national rate between 1971 and 1991.135

TABLE II

INCREASE IN THE INDIAN CHRISTIAN POPULATION

1931-2001

Source: Census of India While this change may be attributed to several factors, the implementation of compensatory discrimination is certainly one of them. This judgment is strongly reinforced by a comparison of the growth rates of the traditional Dalit mass movement areas on the one hand and the tribal mass movement areas on the other. This comparison is significant because tribal Christians are eligible for Scheduled Tribe benefits whereas Dalit Christians are not eligible for Scheduled Caste benefits. Table III shows that between 1961 and 2001 the percentage of Christians within the total population remained about the same in the three largest Dalit mass movement states of Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Tamilnadu, whereas it grew very markedly in the three largest tribal mass movement states of Manipur, Meghalaya, and Nagaland. This striking difference offers strong indirect evidence that compensatory discrimination has presented Dalits with disincentives to convert strong enough to reduce their conversions to a trickle.136 On the other hand, it is remarkable that the Dalit Christian population appears to have remained so stable despite the strong inducements to return to Hinduism the government offers Dalits through compensatory discrimination.137

TABLE III

CHRISTIAN PERCENTAGE OF THE POPULATION IN SIX SELECTED STATES

1961-1981

Source: Census of India The micro studies on which an estimate of Dalit Christian progress must depend, when taken together, suffer from some major limitations. For one thing, there are as yet no longitudinal studies of Dalit Christians in any part of India which trace their progress since Independence. It is therefore necessary to rely upon independent studies undertaken on different sample populations in different decades to get some sense of what the trends might be. Secondly, not all regions in which Dalit Christians are concentrated have received equal scholarly attention. Whereas there is useful data on the Punjab, Andhra Pradesh and Tamilnadu, there is little drawn from other parts of India. Thirdly, there is a strong rural bias to the studies conducted so far; urban Dalit Christians and the Dalit Christian elite have been almost totally ignored. This survey of the existing literature therefore concentrates on those states which have been studied most. That data will be supplemented by the few urban studies available. Since, given its predominantly mass movement origins, the Punjabi Christian community is an overwhelmingly Dalit community (probably at least 90% overall and even 99% of rural Christians), it provides the best

available starting point for a consideration of social change among Dalit Christians. The Punjabi Christians are a predominantly rural community, and since 1961 more rural than the Punjabi population as a whole. In 1971 the proportion of Christians who were rural was 83.4% in contrast to 76.3% for the general population; by 2001 that percentage had dropped to 72.1% while that of the general population was at 66.1%.138 Virtually all rural Christians have been landless agricultural labourers. At the time of partition many of them experienced a change from Muslim to Hindu or Sikh landowners. This change and the subsequent land reforms creating small, owner-cultivated land holdings hastened the breakdown of traditional jajmani relationships and hence increased the economic insecurity of the already poor Dalit Christians.139 In this they were no different from other rural Dalits. Campbell’s 1961 data on Christians in two villages in Jullundur district shows a significant contrast. In one the Christians were still mostly in traditional jajmani relationships, but with some signs of change: some educated Christians were employed outside the village and some others, not as well educated, unemployed within the village. In the other village, six miles from the city, occupations were greatly diversified, 38% of the Christians were literate, and most lived in brick houses, whereas most of the other Dalits, only 13% of whom were literate, lived in mud houses.140 A survey of Church of North India pastors in 1972 indicated that illiteracy was still a serious problem among their people; sixty percent reported that a majority of the school-aged children were not going to school. Unemployment and debt were also mentioned as serious problems.141 A study of Christian-Sikh relations in six diverse villages in Gurdaspur district revealed considerable differences in the economic status of the Christians living there. In five of these villages at least two-thirds of the men were seasonal labourers, dependent upon the landowners for their livelihood. In all of the villages Christians were seen as a socioeconomic group roughly equal in status to Mazhabi Sikhs who are also former Chuhras.142 Philip Dayal’s 1982 study of social integration in two villages and the city of Batala in Gurdaspur district found Christians in one village heavily concentrated in the lowest occupational prestige category, whereas in the other village near Batala, Christians were occupationally more diverse and much better off.143 The literacy rate among Christians in the former village

was 31.6% and in the latter 60%, both well above the general Dalit literacy rate of 21.38% in 1981.144 Social interaction between Christians on the one hand, and Hindus and Sikhs on the other, was quite minimal, although somewhat more frequent with Sikhs than with Hindus. Most respondents reported that their friends belonged to the same caste.145 Subsequent studies indicate that there has been far more continuity than change in the class or caste status of rural Punjabi Dalit Christians.146 The 2001 Census reported that the literacy rate among urban Christians (83.3%) is far higher than that of rural Christians (40.4%) there, but many urban Christians seem stuck in low paying private sector jobs.147 Whereas in the Punjab the Dalit Christians appear to be a distinct social entity, in the South their caste identities and ties with other caste fellows seem to be much stronger. This may be due to the tighter hold of the caste system in the South, but is more probably due to the fact that in each of the three large Dalit mass movement states in the South, two or more caste groups entered the Church in large numbers. Thus, for example, in Andhra Pradesh it is estimated that 75% of the Roman Catholics and 96% of all Protestants are either Malas or Madigas.148 Each of these two Dalit castes has retained within the Church its sense of caste identity, due in no small measure to its traditional rivalry with the other. Luke and Carman noted in their 1959 fieldwork in Medak district north of Hyderabad that intermarriage between Christians and others of the same caste was unusually high while inter-caste marriage among Christians was extremely rare; that Dalit Christians shared in the same rural moral culture (loka-niti) as their caste fellows: and that religious influences in both directions between Christians and Hindus of the same caste were quite marked.149 Moreover, the success of Christian evangelism among one caste served as a deterrent to the conversion of the other.150 The same phenomenon was noted by Paul Wiebe in his fieldwork among Dalit Christians in Mahbubnagar district south of Hyderabad twenty-five years later.151 These close caste ties explain not only the strong sense of injustice Christians have felt in being denied the Scheduled Caste benefits their caste fellows receive, but also their willingness to use Hindu names or even to revert to Hinduism in order to qualify for those benefits.152 It also explains why they have been fellow victims of anti-Dalit atrocities instead of being exempted as a distinct

group.153 In one of the most publicized atrocity cases in Andhra Pradesh, that in Karamchedu on 17 July, 1985, they were victims more because they were Dalits than because they were Christians.154 V.K. Rufus’ 1978 survey, cited by Wiebe, suggests that the outward circumstances of the lives of Christian Dalits in Mahbubnagar district probably differed little from those of other Dalits there. Agriculture and coolie work were their predominant occupations and the average monthly income for close to 90% of them was Rs. 100 or less. Literacy rates among Christians were also low, ranging from 7% to 67% in ten areas within the district, and with an average of 19%, lower than both the Dalit average for 1981 and the 22% noted in a 1970 survey of them.155 A more recent survey, conducted in Cuddapah district by Y. Antony Raj in 1989-90, found Christian Dalits to be better off in literacy, education, occupation, income, and in treatment by upper caste Hindus than were Hindu Dalits.156 On the other hand, at about the same time Godwin Shiri found in 24 villages in Kurnool district that only 38% of the Dalit Christian men and 17% of the Dalit Christian women were literate. Also 87% were engaged in agricultural work, thus suggesting little or no occupational mobility. Like other Dalits in their villages, almost all reported discrimination in tea and other village shops, in using the village barber’s and washerman’s services, in using the same drinking water and bathing facilities as others, and in access to nonDalit homes, localities, or even public places.157 Taken together these Andhra Pradesh studies also suggest more continuity than change among Dalit Christians there. The studies conducted among Tamilians have made explicit comparisons between Christian and other Dalits. The earliest, a study of Tamil-speaking Adi Dravidas in the Kolar Gold Fields just over the Tamilnadu border in Karnataka during the early 1970s, found the Christians ‘slightly better off in degree of schooling, level of occupation and level of income’.158 The second, a student project at United Theological College in Bangalore, was carried out in five Tamilnadu villages and one just over the border in Andhra Pradesh during the summer of 1980. The results indicated that although the Christians interviewed had experienced more occupational mobility than the other Dalits, especially over the last generation, they had not necessarily made more economic progress. Perceptions of change in

social status were about the same for both groups, as were the removal of disabilities from which they had suffered. The only difference between them was that Christians entered caste Hindu houses and inter-dined with them more than did other Dalits, due probably to the significantly higher level of education among Christian Dalits. Politically Christians had few opportunities to gain power because they were excluded from reserved seats in panchayats, but in fact both Christian and other Dalits have been equally passive and powerless.159 About a decade later, Jose Kananaikil surveyed 322 Dalit Catholics, 80% of whom were rural, spread throughout Tamilnadu, to determine their perceptions of their own situation relative to that of other Dalits in their area. In almost every instance, whether concerning such basic amenities as safe drinking water and types of houses, or occupational status, education, and the practice of untouchability, his respondents indicated that their situation was either the same as or slightly worse than that of other Dalits. The main reason given for this difference was their ineligibility for Scheduled Caste benefits. The one area where Christians considered themselves somewhat better off than other Dalits was in the treatment received from co-religionists.160 Most of these findings were confirmed in V. Joachim’s comparative study of Catholic and Hindu Dalits in four villages located in South Arcot district. He found no differences in the education of the respondents, but more Catholic children were getting more and better education than the Hindu Dalits’ children were. The Catholics’ housing was marginally better and they were somewhat less in debt, but there were no differences in occupation, in relations with higher caste Hindus and Christians, or in the level of discrimination they experienced.161 Even though this evidence is more fragmentary than desired, it is difficult to escape the conclusion that there is little if any difference between rural Dalit Christians and other rural Dalits. They live in the same kinds of villages, are dependent upon the same kinds of landowners, suffer the same kind of disabilities and atrocities, are subject to the same social and economic pressures, and face equally limited opportunities for occupational mobility as do other rural Dalits. The only noticeable difference between them is that the Christians have had an historical advantage in education and literacy, an advantage which the more recent studies indicate they may be losing162 and

which they have generally not been able to translate into occupational mobility or higher wages within the village economy. There are signs that without the advantages compensatory discrimination provides, Dalit Christians are finding it increasingly difficult to compete for scarce economic resources just to survive, let alone get ahead. As one church leader in Andhra Pradesh told Paul Wiebe back in 1980, ‘Five years ago no Christian would claim to be an SC. Now I face the question every day’.163 In both Andhra Pradesh and Tamilnadu, unlike in the Punjab, the Christian population is slightly more urbanized than is the population as a whole. Moreover, Dalit Christians are part of the national trend towards greater urbanization. Earlier studies of urban Christians do not separate out the Dalits for special attention. Alter and Jai Singh’s study of Christians in Delhi in 1959-60 as well as Caplan’s study of Christians in Madras in 197475 and 1981-82 indicate that there is a Dalit Christian middle class.164 This would be the Dalit Christian elite, comparable to Sachchidananda’s ‘Harijan Elite’ and Nandu Ram’s ‘New Middle Class’ except that they appear to be far more integrated into the Christian elite and middle class as a whole than Nandu Ram’s respondents. Two recent studies of urban Dalit congregations document the story of upward social mobility over several generations due primarily to education and to the increased diversity of job opportunities created by economic development. While members of the middle class in teaching and other professions are most conspicuous, the larger proportion of urban Dalit Christians are skilled workers or daily wage labourers.165 In short, urban Dalit Christians have experienced general upward mobility, but it has been incremental and slow rather than dramatic, and there is great concern over whether it can be sustained as the urban job market tightens and reservations are denied. Caste does not pose quite the same challenge to upward mobility for them as it does for their rural counterparts. Caste Within the Christian Community and Churches No aspect of Dalit Christian life has received more scholarly attention than has the role which caste plays within the Christian community and churches. Two features of this body of research are particularly noteworthy. First, it is confined almost exclusively to the South where several jatis of differing status converted to Christianity in large numbers.166 Thus in the

South there are villages where both the Dalits and the dominant castes are Christians, while in the cities caste can provide a basis for potential alliances in church politics. This is not true of the North where the local Christian population is overwhelmingly Dalit. Even in the cities there are rarely enough Christians from one dominant caste to make caste the basis for political alliances. Second, the researchers themselves have not made distinctions between a sacral as opposed to either an associational view of caste, or a view of caste which in effect equates it with social class. Consequently these distinctions must be inferred from often ambiguous data in order to determine whether caste is the same thing within the Christian community as in Indian society at large. There is, nonetheless, a scholarly consensus not only that jati membership is basic to every Dalit Christian’s identity, at least in rural areas, but also that inequalities based on jati membership continue to exist in virtually all aspects of Dalit Christian life. But has an associational replaced a sacral view of caste, or has class status come to replace caste status in the Christian community? Have the Christian community and churches also provided for their Dalit members avenues and resources for upward mobility, and hence for greater equality, or have these been monopolized by upper caste Christians? Answers to these questions will be sought in an examination of the role which caste has been playing in Christian worship, rites and festivals; in shaping social interaction within the Christian community; in determining the leadership and distribution of power in the community and churches; and in influencing the churches’ priorities in ministry and mission. With regard to Christian worship or Christian rites, the research conducted so far has concentrated upon how caste has affected the place Dalit and non-Dalit Christians occupy and the roles they play in regular Sunday worship and in special Christian rites. In Kerala Dalit Christians were given separate places of worship in the Roman Catholic, Mar Thoma and Church of South India dioceses, at least until the late 1960s.167 Elsewhere in the South caste has played a lesser role in Protestant than in Catholic churches, where separate seating for caste and Dalit Catholics still continues. There are also separate burial places in Catholic cemeteries as well. Dalits have been assigned inferior roles in the Catholic mass, in Catholic funerals, and

in the celebration of Christian festivals.168 These may be exceptions rather than the rule, but they do indicate that caste still functions in times and places Christians consider sacred. Two studies carried out in the 1990s beg the question of whether caste blindness or indifference rather than active caste prejudice continues to influence the accepted forms and substance of Christian worship. Many current Christian rites and ceremonies are too generic to meet Dalit needs; they are aimed more at ‘balance’ than at healing the wounds inflicted by a history of caste oppression, using the medium more of academic than of folk culture (and of Dalit culture in particular) to engage, involve, and transform Dalit lives in meaningful ways. In fact there are elements in traditional liturgies which are positively harmful to Dalit Christians. They reinforce negative stereotypes of impurity and unworthiness; they reduce the presence of Dalits in worship to the purely passive as hearers and receivers, ignoring all that they bring to worship; and they misrepresent the Dalits’ situation before God as autonomous and free individuals, ignoring the grip of institutionalized sin upon their lives. These studies argue against generic worship in favour of forms, styles and contents of worship which focus on both what Dalit Christians bring to worship and what God has to give specifically to them in and through their worship.169 The social interaction of Dalit Christians is shaped by jati membership as much in those villages where both Dalits and the dominant castes are Christians as in villages where the dominant castes are Hindus. In 1964 the answers given by both Syrian Christians and ‘Backward Class Christians’ in the Tiruvalla area of central Kerala to Ninan Koshy’s questions about frequency of interaction, forms of address used, the kinds of seats offered to visitors, interdining and intermarriage indicate that the Syrian Christians were at least patronizing if not arrogant in their treatment of Dalit Christians. However, the reasons they gave for this (‘They are not usually neat and decent;’ ‘They are not civilized enough to deserve [better] treatment’; ‘[Better] treatment will only create trouble’) can be interpreted as reflecting either a sacral or an associational view of caste, or even a class ideology.170 Alexander’s data suggests that even in rural Kerala at that time enhanced class status did translate into enhanced caste status, as middle class Dalit Christians did dine in Syrian Christian homes without having to

wash their own dishes.171 Mosse pointed out in his study of Catholic villages in the Ramnad district of Tamilnadu that for Christians as for Hindus ‘the cultural definition of pollution in inter-caste relations includes notions of service and subordination’172 which were so apparent in Koshy’s findings. Prabhakar’s descriptions of inter-caste conflict among Christians in Andhra Pradesh led him to conclude that these caste conflicts ‘were really class conflicts, between the haves and have-nots, the landed and the landless, the rich and the poor’.173 The clearest example of what looks like a sacral view of caste in a Christian village is Japhet’s 1986 study of a Roman Catholic village in the Bangalore district of Karnataka. He found social segregation between Dalit and other Catholics there to be extreme. This included use of the one well for drinking water (located on land owned by a Dalit Christian!), use of caste names when addressing Dalits, denial of the services of the village barber, as well as separate eating and drinking utensils in hotels and tea shops. In fact Dalit Christians reported receiving better treatment from caste Hindus in neighbouring villages than from caste Christians in their own village.174 Since four later studies in Andhra Pradesh and Tamilnadu indicate that such caste practices are not limited to just one village,175 it could well be that, at least among rural Catholics, caste hierarchy is sacred not because God built it into the cosmic order of creation, but because it is a deeply internalized tradition which the Church has not opposed strongly lest it offend caste Catholics.176 In the urban areas, it seems, social class or an associational view of caste predominates over a sacral view of caste in shaping interaction between caste and Dalit Christians. Alter and Jai Singh found that the major divisions among Delhi Christians were those of class, language, and degree of westernization. Although Dalits were most numerous in the lower class rather than the middle class or elite, caste distinctions between Dalits and non-Dalits played little or no role in the social and religious life of either the congregations or Christian neighbourhoods they studied.177 What they observed in Delhi in 1960 seems to have been true of North India in general by the mid 1980s.178 Lionel Caplan noted that among Protestants in Madras the categories used to identify people are not those of caste but of class: rich or big people, poor or small people, and ‘middle quality people’.179 Congregations are made up of people from different jatis, including Dalit

jatis, but similar classes. Caste Christians avoid marriage alliances with Christians known to be Dalits, but not necessarily with those of the same class who are ‘casteless’ or whose caste is unknown.180 Caplan found notions of purity and pollution attached to certain dietary, menstrual and burial customs, but not to restrictions on public interdining.181 A 1994 study found Dalit Protestants in Chennai testifying to the existence of caste prejudice in the churches and to being very ambivalent about revealing their own Dalit identities.182 In turning from social interaction to leadership and the distribution of power, it is important to recognize that the ecclesiastical, educational and medical institutions which foreign missions bequeathed to the Indian churches in the years immediately preceding and following Independence have been major employers of Dalit and non-Dalit Christians. Indeed, traditionally Dalit Christians have found in them a path of upward mobility not available to them in the wider society. Today there are many Dalit Christian school and college teachers, doctors, nurses, laboratory technicians, and clergy whose children have, in turn, moved into other middle class and professional occupations. Their numbers are impossible to estimate, for often their caste backgrounds are not known and, in the North, they have blended into the Christian middle class or, in a few cases, into the elite. One can see this process at work in Joseph Elder’s 1963 occupational statistics on Dalit Christians in Moradabad, U.P. Whereas 34.8% were unskilled and 27.8% were skilled workers, another 18.1% had become white collar workers, 15.2% were teachers, preachers and religious workers, while 2.9% were managers or executives.183 Thus, Dalit Christians have had a great stake in who controls the traditional structures and institutions of the churches, as well as the more recent church-related development projects. But so too have others, especially as competition for jobs, and particularly good jobs, has become more intense since the late 1970s and 1980s. There is more data available on the caste background of the clergy than of the lay leadership of the churches. Indeed, not surprisingly, Dalit inclusion in the Christian clergy follows the pattern of Dalit ‘place’ and role in Christian worship described above. In Kerala there were no Dalit priests in the Mar Thoma or Jacobite churches of Kerala by 1968, whereas there were

13 ‘Backward Class’ clergy in just the Madhya Kerala diocese of the Church of South India by that time.184 A study of the Roman Catholic clergy in Tamilnadu in the late 1980s showed that a mere 3.09% were Dalits; in 1990 the percentage in Pondicherry was 12.8%, and perhaps somewhat higher in Andhra Pradesh.185 By 2000 only five of the Roman Catholic bishops in India were Dalits.186 Dalits have made more progress in the Protestant churches. By now many of the bishops, and even some of the moderators, of both the Church of North India and Church of South India have been Dalits.187 While statistics on the Protestant clergy are not available, a survey of theological students and faculty in the mid-1980s indicated that just over half the students but only 13% of the faculty were Dalits.188 The urban elites and middle classes, both clergy and laity, have controlled the structures, institutions, and projects of the churches in both the North and the South. Caste has certainly played its role in their struggles for power within the churches, at least in the South. Where caste provides the basis for informal political alliances from the congregational level on up, the basic division has been between Dalits and non-Dalits, except among Andhra Pradesh Protestants, where the rivalry between Madigas and Malas has been even more serious. The politics of caste affects not only elections to positions of leadership and power, but also appointments and promotions in Christian institutions.189 Since it is the urban elites and middle classes, whether Dalit or non-Dalit, who dominate the decision-making bodies of the churches, their priorities in ministry and mission, rather than those of rural, uneducated or poor Christians, whether Dalit or non-Dalit, have been the churches’ priorities. Thus, while considerations of caste or caste hierarchy have not been directly involved in determining the churches’ priorities, those priorities which have been set have benefitted those categories of Christians in which Dalits are fewest at the expense of those in which Dalits form the vast majority. Moreover, as with the government so also in the churches, it has been less in establishing than in implementing policy and programmes that Dalit interests have suffered most. Only in the mid-1970s did the churches begin to take note of specifically Dalit grievances within the Christian community and begin to address them. However, even after that, in local

caste conflicts the church authorities stood behind the dominant caste Christians rather than the Dalit Christians.190 Dalit Christians have protested against this bias in the church in a variety of ways. In 1964 a group of ‘Backward Class Christians’ under the leadership of the Rev. V.J. Stephen left the Madhya Kerala Diocese of the Church of South India to form the Travancore Cochin Anglican (C.M.S.) Church. This was but one in a long series of revolts which had resulted in Dalit Christians leaving one church to either join or form another in protest against caste discrimination. A Church of South India commission investigating the grievances of Dalit Christians, whether they split off or remained with the Church of South India, wrote: First and foremost is the feeling that they are despised, not taken seriously, overlooked, humiliated or simply forgotten. They feel that again and again affairs in the diocese are arranged as if they did not exist. Caste appellations are still occasionally used in Church when they have been abandoned even by Hindus. Backward class desires and claims seem again and again to be put on the waiting list, while projects which they feel aim chiefly at the benefit of the Syrian community seem to get preferential consideration. In appointments, in distribution of charity, in pastoral care and in the attitude shown to them, in disputes with the authorities, the treatment they receive, when compared with that received by their Syrian brothers, suggests a lack of sympathy, courtesy and respect.191

The second and third reasons given were ‘a very serious failure in the pastoral care of these people’ and their obvious underrepresentation in the diocesan council and its boards.192 A Dalit was elected assistant bishop as the Commission had recommended and in 1974 became bishop of the diocese for six years. A Dalit was appointed diocesan development officer only in 1972. However, the procedures for Council elections, which heavily favored the Syrian minority over the Dalit majority, were not changed. Thus, when a Syrian became bishop in 1980, the situation reverted to what it had been in the 1960s except that the new bishop faced a highly politicized and well-organized Dalit Christian movement which had developed during his predecessor’s time. In 1982 they demanded not only changes in the election procedures but also, quite significantly, that half of ‘all Diocesan job opportunities and key positions like Diocesan Secretary, Treasurer and others [be reserved] for the Backward community’.193 These demands were backed up by large and persistent demonstrations, picketing and fasts through 1986.194

A more serious form of revolt has been conversion to other religions. Dalit Christians in villages near Meenakshipuram converted to Islam along with other Dalits in 1981. In investigating these conversions in two Protestant villages Andrew Wingate noted that in one Dalits suffered from almost total pastoral neglect, whereas in the other pastoral visits were regular but perfunctory. ‘They come, they preach, they eat in the teachers’ houses, and they go’ was how the people described them.195 During roughly the same period (July 1980 - February 1983) another study reported that 2564 Dalit Catholics in Tamilnadu reverted to Hinduism because of caste discrimination in the church,196 while large numbers in Andhra Pradesh were won back to Hinduism by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad.197 If the petitions of the large conference of Dalit Christians from Tamilnadu, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka held in Vellore on 14 January, 1982 is indicative of wider Dalit Christian sentiment, then the dominance of higher caste Christians in church bodies and their use of this power to give their own people access to educational opportunities and jobs at the expense of Dalit Christians is the form of caste discrimination most resented.198 With increasing Dalit assertion in the churches during the 1990s, Dalit Christian issues appeared on church agendas, challenging old priorities, with greater frequency. In response the churches passed many resolutions and initiated a good number of projects and programmes aimed at addressing Dalit demands for education and occupational mobility in particular. For example, some of the Catholic religious orders decided to reserve more seats for Dalit Christians in their elite educational institutions.199 In 1997 the Madras Diocese of the Church of South India founded CSI Ewart Women’s Christian College in the Christian rural settlement of Melrosepuram specifically for ‘the education of poor, oppressed and less privileged women, especially village women’. Currently about half of the 276 students are Christian or other Dalits and 91% of the hostel students are Dalit Christians, the vast majority of whom are rural women receiving substantial scholarship aid.200 This is especially significant since a small group of upper caste Christians had taken over control of the four Protestant colleges in Chennai from the diocese during the 1980s and maintained them as elite institutions in which Christian Dalits stood little chance of gaining admittance as either students or staff.201 However, most of the churches’ efforts specifically for Christian and other

Dalits have been carried out through special projects designed to provide non-formal, job-oriented or income-supplementing training. These have been supplemented by non-government organizations founded by Christians emphasizing both community organization and joboriented education for the benefit of all Dalits, regardless of religion.202 It is very difficult to generalize with a high degree of confidence from the data assembled here. It is, nevertheless, highly suggestive and does point in certain directions which should be noted by way of conclusion. First and most clearly, there is caste in the churches. However, it is not the same in all the churches. In the North caste has been largely replaced by class within the Christian community, but either an organic or a sacral view of caste continues to define Dalit Christian relations with dominant castes of other religions, especially in the villages. In the South the associational view of caste predominates within the Christian community, largely because of the existence of large bodies of Christians belonging to jatis of different status: e.g., Kammas and Reddys vs. Malas and Madigas in Andhra Pradesh; Vellalas and Nadars vs. Adi Dravidas in Tamilnadu; Syrians vs. Pulayas and Parayas in Kerala. However, an organic view of caste has not yet died out in the churches, especially in Kerala, and outside Kerala especially in villages and among Roman Catholics. Caste plays too strong a role in South Indian church politics to say that it has been replaced by class, even in the cities. Second, while the church in its role as educator and employer has played a significant role in the creation of a Dalit Christian middle class, it faces increasing difficulty in playing that role. Competition for education and for jobs has become so acute that the churches cannot satisfy all applicants. In this competition the elites, among whom Dalits are still few, have a great advantage because of their superior social networks and access to people with the power to decide. Thus the vast majority of Dalit Christians are in a double bind of increasing intensity: no room in Christian places of employment and no places outside because they are not included in Scheduled Caste quotas. For this reason economic issues have come to play a key role in Dalit Christian politics. Self-Assertion and Political Action

During the 1920s and 1930s Dalit Christians, especially in the South, organized to protest against caste discrimination within the churches and religious discrimination by the government in granting rights and benefits. In these protests Dalit Christians looked to the ecclesiastical and political leadership of the Christian community for help and found them more supportive in dealing with government officials than with fellow Christians. During the present stage of the Dalit movement, while Dalit Christians have continued various forms of protest against discrimination by Church and State, the focal point of their most sustained political struggle has been the Presidential Order of 1950 which denied them most of the benefits of compensatory discrimination. After the promulgation of the Presidential Order, the national leadership, especially of the Roman Catholic Church,203 and various regional Christian bodies took action to get Dalit Christians the same kinds of benefits, at least from the State governments, that other Dalits were receiving. Upon recommendation of the 1955 Backward Classes Commission the government of Travancore-Cochin (later Kerala) included Dalit Christians in the list of Other Backward Classes. It was only in 1971, after many petitions, and two satyagrahas in 1969 and 1970, that Dalit Christians there became eligible for all the educational concessions the State offered. Then in 1977 the Kerala State Development Corporation granted them the same loan facilities other Dalits were given. Progress in Tamilnadu was only slightly quicker. Christian Dalits received the same educational concessions as other Dalits as early as 1957 but had to wait until 1975 for the other concessions the State government could grant. However, they still were not given reserved seats in legislative bodies, educational institutions, or government service. The government of Andhra Pradesh took the same action in 1977. Dalit Christians have also been included in the Other Backward Classes by the governments of Punjab (1972), Karnataka (1976), and Gujarat (1978). Thus, in those states where their population is the largest, Dalit Christians have gained eligibility for some of the benefits those governments bestow on other Dalits. Elsewhere, where the Dalit Christian population is smaller, they have been granted Backward Class status or received nothing at all.204

Progress at the Centre was even less impressive. From time to time prominent church leaders, Christian organizations and even Christian members of Parliament sent petitions or went in deputations to see the President and Prime Minister, but all to no avail.205 Representations were also made to the Backward Classes Commission in 1955. The Commission recommended that Dalit Christians be included among the Other Backward Classes in the South and where appropriate.206 Then in June 1975 the National Christian Council of India convened a conference in Madras to address the problem of Dalit Christians. This conference was noteworthy primarily because it included representatives of both the Catholic Union of India and the Ad Hoc Committee on Harijan Welfare of the Catholic Bishops Conference of India along with Protestant leaders. It recognized that earlier efforts to deal with discrimination had been fragmentary and piecemeal; now the Christian community had to speak with one voice and demand justice for Dalit Christians. To this end the conference appointed an Ad Hoc Action Committee with equal representation of Catholics and Protestants.207 A follow-up conference was held in Secunderabad the following January to focus attention upon the situation in Andhra Pradesh. This met with some success.208 However an important high point was reached when the National Christian Council of India, the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India, and the Catholic Union of India jointly sponsored a National Convention on the Plight of Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin at Bangalore in June 1978, because this did so much to publicize the problem at least within the Christian churches. The convention was a gathering of over 200 people which included some of the top leadership of the churches. Dalit Christians were present, read papers, and shared in the leadership of the conference. The emphasis of the programme was on sharing information and organizing for appropriate action. There was a background paper summarizing the churches’ efforts since Independence ‘in the cause of Christians of Scheduled Caste origin’.209 Presentations were made on the legal aspects of the problem, on the harsh realities Dalit Christians faced, and on casteism in the churches. The Convention both made social justice its priority concern and focused attention primarily upon the Christian community. In its recommendations and closing message, it stated that the churches had to clean house by ending discrimination and injustice within; they had to be educated about

the plight of Dalit Christians and to align themselves with the poor and oppressed; they had to take steps to end discrimination against Dalit Christians by the government and society at large.210 In their follow-up memorandum to the President of India, spokespersons for the sponsoring bodies as well as of the Federation of the Associations of Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin asked that the Presidential Order of 1950 be further amended to include Dalit Christians in the list of Scheduled Castes and that the protection of the Civil Rights Act of 1955 be extended to Dalit Christians. The rationale for these requests was that the exclusion of Dalit Christians in paragraph 3 of the Presidential Order was blatant discrimination on the basis of religion. Except in the matter of religious belief there is absolutely no differentiation between the converts and their Hindu brethren. In a Caste-ridden society as we have in India, Caste practices and prejudices die hard. Hence Christians of Scheduled Caste origin suffer from disabilities of the practice of untouchability.211

Two years later in a similar memorandum to the Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi, they took a somewhat broader view by asking that paragraph (3) of the Presidential Order simply be deleted.212 In her reply Mrs. Gandhi, ‘while expressing sympathy for the cause, told the delegation that she would place the issue before her Party which alone could take a final decision after taking into consideration the financial and constitutional implications’.213 As usual, no changes were made. In 1980 the Backward Classes Commission chaired by B.P. Mandal recommended that Dalit Christians be included among the Backward Classes and that 27% of all Central Government jobs be reserved for the Backward Classes,214 but the Government did not implement this. In the same year P.J. Kurien, a Member of Parliament from Kerala, introduced a bill to delete paragraph 3 of the Presidential Order.215 It was debated on 22 December, 1983 and on 24 February, 1984, but failed for lack of support from any party. The Christian Dalit Liberation Movement (CDLM), organized in December 1984, embodied a different approach to political action than did the National Convention. Whereas the Christian leadership who convened the former envisioned the Church acting with and on behalf of its Dalit members, the Dalit Christian elite organized the latter as a network of

Christian Dalit associations working for economic and social justice as well as against casteism in society and in the churches.216 While it did present the now customary petition to the Prime Minister in 1985 asking that paragraph 3 of the Presidential Order be removed, and received the customary response,217 the CDLM devoted most of its attention to redefining Dalit Christian identity and developing an appropriate ideology for the upcoming struggle. To this end it held three large conferences between March 1985 and December 1986. The papers presented at those conferences provide insight into the shift in self-understanding taking place among educated Dalit Christians. Probably the most significant of these shifts is seen in the name of the movement itself, which highlights the Dalit identity shared with other Dalits instead of submerging it into a common Christian identity shared with Christians from higher caste backgrounds. Both Sundaraj Manickam, an historian at Madurai Kamaraj University, and M. Azariah, then General Secretary of the Church of South India, stressed the separate and distinct identity of Dalits as the original inhabitants and masters of the land, who never became part of either the Hindu religion or the caste system; they were made a part of both only by legislative action in the 1935 Constitution.218 The second conference reinforced this emphasis upon a common ethnic identity shared by all Dalits despite current differences in religion by resolving ‘To arrange Dialogue with other Dalit organizations such as Ambedkarites, NeoBuddhists, Satnamis, Raidas[is], Mazhabi Sikhs, and also other Christians committed to the Dalit cause’.219 K. Wilson, a philosopher at Osmania University, referred in his paper to Dalit Christians as ‘twice alienated’. On the one hand, they, like all Dalits, are socially segregated by Hindu society; on the other, they have been culturally alienated by Christian missions who made them passive and dependent, waiting both for the salvation Christ gives and for help from a paternalistic Church, instead of active in shaping their own future.220 A paper on perspective at the second conference stated, ‘The struggle for dalit liberation needs a new spirituality for combat. A new theology of the people, an Indian Christian Theology, has to emerge from their sufferings and hopes, amidst the concrete social, economic, political and cultural struggles for total liberation.’221 This the third conference, on Dalit

theology, sought to provide. It included, as the previous conferences had not, considerable input from women about Dalit women222 as well as a paper embodying a dialogue between Christian theology and Dalit literature.223 Dalit Christian political action against religious discrimination was not confined to holding conferences and developing ideology. In November 1978, following the National Conference in Bangalore, a procession was taken out in Madras to publicize the plight of Dalit Christians and to demand the end of religious discrimination.224 On 12 September, 1988 a much larger rally described as ‘massive’ by the Indian Express,225 was held in Madras. Two hundred Christian schools, colleges, and other institutions were closed and over a thousand Christians undertook a day long hunger strike in support of the rally. However, the largest rally to date was that held in New Delhi on 17 August, 1990 at which Dalit Christians from all over India were present. The decision to hold this All-India Convention for the Rights of Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin was taken on 12 July by a group of influential Protestants and Roman Catholics residing in and near New Delhi. The time seemed right to them. During the 8 May debate in Parliament on the amendment to the Presidential Order to include the Buddhists, the Minister of Labour and Welfare, Ram Vilas Paswan, had assured the Parliament that he would soon be proposing similar legislation to include Christian and Muslim Dalits; on that assurance both the Congress-I and National Conference withdrew their amendments for inclusion.226 Moreover, subsequent Christian delegations had been urged by the political leadership to demonstrate that the demand for inclusion was that of the Dalit Christian masses and not just that of the church leaders.227 The organizers sent out a circular to ‘All Heads of Churches/Christian Organisations’ and made arrangements to host large numbers of participants from all parts of the country.228 Participation in the rally, at least in North India, was fed by anger at Government inaction over the rape of two nuns in Gajraula, U.P. that same day (a rally of some 10,000 Christians was held in New Delhi and Christian schools all over the country closed on 1 August)229 as well as by the

ensuing taunt by Deputy Prime Minister Devi Lal that ‘the Christians should go back to Europe and America where they came from’.230 The actual numbers present for the 17 August rally far exceeded the expectations of the organizers. Around 30 busloads of Christians came from Haryana and an estimated 300-400 truckloads came from Punjab where the ecclesiastical and local Dalit Christian leaders had conducted a highly successful campaign for support and participation. A special train brought 2000 Dalit Christians led by Bishop M. Azariah from Madras to Delhi. The many banners at the rally were evidence of the spreading grass roots political organization throughout the country. It was estimated that as many as 100,000 Dalit Christians were present and once again Christian educational and other institutions all over the country were closed in support of the rally. The rally was the most impressive demonstration of Christian unity in the history of India. It also received more grass-roots financial support than any previous Christian endeavor in India. The rally received public support from the Communist Party of India as well as from the Dalit Voice, an influential bi-weekly based in Bangalore.231 The Prime Minister, Mr. V.P. Singh, assured the deputation sent to meet him that he saw the justice of their petition and the widespread support among Christians it enjoyed.232 However, he was soon overwhelmed by agitation over implementing the Mandal Commission’s recommendations concerning job reservations for the Other Backward Classes as well as the Hindu-Muslim clash over the mosque in Ayodhya, U.P. The Government fell in November without acting on the Dalit Christian demand. In March 1994 some 50,000 Christians gathered once again in New Delhi for another rally to press their case.233 In May 1995 over 150 members of Parliament submitted a memorandum to the Prime Minister, P. V. Narasimha Rao, asking that Dalit Christians be included among the Scheduled Castes.234 The following November a number of Christian leaders, including Mother Theresa, undertook a two day fast to press the government to act. The fast was accompanied by rallies, public meetings, the closure of Christian institutions, as well as visits to members of Parliament and party leaders to gain their support.235 In March 1996 the Ministry of Welfare submitted an extensive note to the Cabinet

recommending that the Presidential Order of 1950 be amended to include Dalit Christians among the Scheduled Castes. The Cabinet approved a bill, which could not be introduced prior to the adjournment of Parliament, and then issued an ordinance that could not be promulgated because a new government was about to take over from Narasimha Rao.236 This was as close as Dalit Christians came to getting what they wanted through the political process. When the Bharatiya Janata Party, which strongly opposed including Dalit Christians in the Scheduled Castes, came to power in 1997, that door of opportunity was slammed shut. Since then Dalit Christian hopes have rested upon the Supreme Court in the case brought by the Centre for Public Interest Litigation and T. Franklin Caesar in 2004.237 Political activity has concentrated upon winning support from party leaders and members of Parliament for appropriate legislation which the government can present to the Court to satisfy the petitioners.238 Dalit Christian political action since 1947 has not been confined solely to eliminating the religious discrimination built into the Presidential Order of 1950. That has been the distinctively Dalit Christian issue and so it has been given prominence here. However, Christian Dalits have joined with other Dalits in the local politics of public amenities, allocation of resources, wages, working conditions, protection from harassment and atrocities, although without the leverage of reserved seats in elected and appointed bodies. Christian organizations and more broadly based organizations with significant Christian leadership have also assisted Dalits in these local struggles.239 Moreover, there has been running through Dalit Christian political action, whether directed at the Church or at the state, the same kinds of frustration with the constituted political process dominated by others, and hence the same protest, conflict and self-redefinition which has characterized the post-Independence Dalit movement as a whole. Christian and other Dalits have taken steps toward drawing closer together politically, not simply in response to ideological changes among the leadership, but also because the situation they face and the courses of action open to them have become virtually identical.

CONCLUSIONS Compensatory discrimination was adopted as a means towards becoming a more equalitarian society. Ambedkar and others took what had been modest, piecemeal measures created by the politics of numbers during the colonial period and turned them into integral parts of a secular democracy’s constitutional commitment to equality. However, those charged with the responsibility of implementing this constitutional mandate brought to that task an outlook more appropriate to the earlier colonial politics of numbers than to the constitutional mandate itself. First they made assured opportunities for occupational mobility, rather than a major reallocation of land or development resources,240 virtually the only way for Dalits to attain equality. Then they made ‘merit’ the reason for opening those opportunities up only very slowly to otherwise qualified Dalits. This course of action reflects a paternalism and incrementalism supportive less of equality than of continued domination by the old caste elites. In like manner, paragraph (3) of the Presidential Order of 1950, which denied those assured opportunities to non-Hindu Dalits, was more a carryover from the politics of numbers in a system of communal electorates than a fresh, equalitarian start by a secular democracy constitutionally opposed to discrimination on the basis of religion. The Presidential Order also kept Dalits divided politically on the basis of religion just as the British had earlier divided and ruled India as a whole. The evidence gathered here, mostly from the research of Indian social scientists, indicates that the policy of compensatory discrimination as implemented thus far has changed neither the position of Dalits within Indian society nor the Indian social structure and its underlying value system so as to grant Dalits greater equality with other Indians. Shifts have occurred and increased reported atrocities against Dalits could be taken as a sign of progress. However, from the perspective of ordinary Dalits the reality of continuity with the past is far more obvious than is significant change. The most important consequence of compensatory discrimination has been the emergence of a Dalit elite or new middle class. As symbols and beneficiaries of reservations, they have been the targets of caste Hindu resentment and violence, especially as educated unemployment increases.

They have also been the focal point of much controversy within Dalit circles. They have been accused of having been co-opted by the oppressors of the Dalit masses, of cutting themselves off from their own people, and of monopolizing all the reservations so that the Dalit masses continue to be left out. On the other hand, it is from this group that the intellectual and political leadership in the continuing Dalit struggle for equality has come. Research on Christian Dalits has been neither as comprehensive nor as refined as the research on other Dalits. The studies analyzed here indicate that the life of the Dalit Christian masses is similar to that of the Dalit masses in general and their progress towards equality with other Indians has been equally slow, even if it has followed a somewhat different pattern. Dalit Christians did gain something of an early head start over other Dalits in the area of education. By now that head start has been nullified by exclusion from the reserved seats for which other Dalits have been eligible. In the highly competitive struggle for upward mobility they face prejudice both as Dalits and Christians. Thus, the most significant development during this period of Dalit Christian history has not been the emergence of a new Dalit Christian elite or middle class; that process began earlier, has been more gradual and less conspicuous than for other Dalits. Instead this period has witnessed the emergence of Dalit Christians from the obscurity in both Church and society into which they entered following the mass movements. Official religious discrimination has made them aware of themselves as a distinct social entity and led them to take collective action to redress their grievances. Even without political reservations, Dalit Christians have become increasingly active both in the wider Dalit movement and in their own particular movement for equal justice. In this process some of the barriers dividing Christians from other Dalits have been removed and there are signs of the two coming closer together in a shared struggle for equality.

CHAPTER 5

Good News for Dalits

The history of Dalit Christians described in the preceding pages has been intimately connected with the history of the modern Dalit movement. While the two histories cannot be separated from each other without doing violence to both, there is a problem involved in bringing them together. British and Indian politicians have been placing Christian Dalits and other Dalits in separate compartments for such a long time that people have become conditioned to seeing them as separate, but there is more to it than that. Christians have believed that the love of God embodied in Jesus Christ offers Dalits something unique and foundational which neither governments, nor socioeconomic change, nor ideology, nor an alternate religious faith can provide. This history has shown how this conviction has both drawn Christians towards Dalits and yet at the same time has separated them from Dalits. It has also generated considerable controversy, and even conflict, between Christians and Hindus in particular over the past one hundred years. Yet that conviction gets at the very heart of Dalit Christian history. This concluding chapter examines how that distinctively Christian conviction has been expressed during each of the three periods of Dalit and Dalit Christian history already described. During the mass movements Christian theological reflection with reference to Dalits was of three kinds: (1) theology about Dalits, or theological reflection among Christians concerning their responsibility to Dalits; (2) theology for Dalits, or the theology of the Christian gospel (i.e., ‘good news’) they addressed to Dalits, and to which Dalits responded; and (3) theology by Dalits, or the Christian theology which Dalits have developed themselves or which has been implicit in their expressions of Christian faith. This distinction provides a helpful way of organizing theological statements of various kinds from that period. It is retained but becomes less significant during the periods of the

politics of numbers and of compensatory discrimination. In order to understand the inner connection between Christian theology and Dalit life in each of these three periods, those views of the Dalit situation, of its spiritual consequences, and therefore of the good news for Dalits in the Christian message which were built into each theology are examined. Analysis is, of necessity, limited to only a small number of theological materials selected on the basis of their uniqueness, their representative character, or their historical significance. Some are quoted at length so that they might ‘speak for themselves’.

THE MASS MOVEMENTS As noted earlier,1 most of the missionaries involved in the mass movements were Evangelicals from Great Britain and the U.S.A. The kind of theology they brought to India and were preaching prior to the mass movements is well illustrated in an address on ‘Preaching to the Heathen’ which the Rev. John Newton gave to the Punjab Missionary Conference, a conference of Evangelicals, on 26 December, 1862. In urging the participants to ‘preach the Word’, Newton went on to explain what he meant. It is not the wisdom of the world, but ‘the wisdom of God in a mystery’, even the Cross of Christ, and those truths which cluster around the Cross, that God is pleased to make use of, as the means of saving sinners. These truths, however, divide themselves into different classes; and each class is made up of many particulars. The first has reference to God’s own character, and his natural relations to mankind. These must lie at the foundation of all true religion. Who is the God in whom we live and move and have our being? Why has he made us? And what are the laws by which he wishes us to be governed? These questions can be truly answered only from the Bible…. The first work of the Spirit is to convince men of their sinfulness, their helplessness, and their danger: and towards this end should much of every missionary’s labor be directed. But still, this must only be preparatory to the exhibition of another class of truths,—those which are summed up in the word Gospel, in its proper sense of good news. When men have a sense of sin, and feel their spiritual poverty, then indeed is the good news of a gratuitous pardon and a full salvation, through the abounding mercy of God, received with a hearty welcome. The missionary is not, however, to withhold the story of the Cross, and the doctrines of redemption connected with that story, till his hearers, under a conviction of sin, are eager to know what they must do to be saved; for an exhibition of Christ crucified often proves to be the best means of awakening men to a sense of their need of salvation…. Jesus, as the incarnate Son of God, endowed with all the attributes of a mighty Saviour, cannot be held up too much to the view of the heathen. … Let every preacher to the heathen, then, rehearse the life of Christ, often, with minute detail; so as to exhibit, in the liveliest colors, the supreme excellence of his character, and the nature of his mediatorial work. Let it be seen that he was indeed spotless, and benevolent, and self-denying, as well as mighty, beyond comparison. Let his voluntary, painful, and vicarious death be set forth in illustration of the intensity of his love and mercy towards a sinful world; and in proof, at the same time, of the infinite riches of the Father’s grace. The resurrection, too, of Jesus should occupy a prominent place, as the crowning miracle of his incarnate state, as the great attesting seal of all his claims, and as affording a sure presage of the resurrection to immortality of all his people…. Not less should the preacher expatiate on the present exaltation of Jesus, and the fullness of his power to save:

and it is well sometimes … to announce to the heathen ... that by this same Jesus they are themselves to be judged, and have their destiny fixed for all eternity. The doctrine of eternal rewards is among the means used by the Spirit of God, for awakening sinners, and leading them to Christ. In order, therefore, to excite both fear and hope, let judgment and mercy, hell and heaven, be appealed to, in turn.2

Underlying the theological themes which Newton chose to highlight were some important assumptions about the Indian people. One was that this message would indeed be news to them because not only were they totally ignorant of the God to whom the Bible bears witness but they could also easily confuse that God with one of their own. Another was that what the Indian people, like all people, needed salvation from was eternal damnation. Thirdly, since only through Jesus Christ was the necessary divine pardon mediated to humankind, this ‘true religion’ centered on Jesus Christ had to replace the ‘false religions’ of the Indian people. In fact, the most important thing about the Indian people, as about any people, was their religion, for all else of importance really depended on that. Finally, the message of divine pardon through Jesus Christ was to be directed primarily through the individual’s intellect and reason so as to get at, most probably, his or her sense of guilt and fear of probable damnation. The Dalit mass movements challenged some of these assumptions and brought about a shift in Evangelical theological perspective. At the Third Decennial Missionary Conference held in Bombay over the new year of 1892-93, two sessions were devoted to the mass movements: ‘Work among the Depressed Classes and the Masses’ and ‘The Social Condition of the Lower Classes’. The papers, speeches and discussions at these sessions were definitely practical rather than theological in nature. The conference directed its attention more to the Dalits’ socio-economic plight than to their religious situation, and more to the Dalits’ hopes for deliverance (the obvious driving force behind the mass movements) than to their sense of guilt or fear of probable damnation. (Missionaries reported that Dalits, unlike the higher castes, were quite convinced they were already damned!) Theology was introduced into the discussions primarily to provide a rationale for the work being done among Dalits. It was thus theology about Dalits.

The opening paper at the first session by J.F. Burditt, a Baptist colleague of Clough near Ongole, presented the theological rationale which was accepted, often repeated and never contradicted by the conference members. From the outset the Gospel appears to find its prime objective point, its magnetic pole, among the poor, the lowly, the oppressed, and the outcaste. And if again this earth were trod by the blessed feet of the Son of God, can we doubt that far beyond the confines of the rich, respectable, self-satisfied upper classes, He would press with yearning compassion, and His voice of infinite tenderness would be heard again crying to the most sinful, and wretched and lost, ‘Come unto Me all ye that labour and are heavy-laden and I will give you rest.’3

Burditt went on to argue that work among Dalits was justified not only because it was in keeping with Jesus’ own, and hence God’s, priorities, but also because of the Dalits’ exceptional need as well as their openness to the Christian message.4 To these poor neglected ones the Gospel message comes as the first ray of hope they have ever known. They listen eagerly and multitudes accept and obey the Gospel. To be instrumental not only in inspiring these down trodden ones with new hopes and new purposes for the life that now is, but in leading them by hundreds to the feet of Jesus to lay hold of life eternal is a privilege beside which the ambitions of earth pale into insignificance.5

Burditt’s statement poses what was a crucial but unaddressed theological issue in the conference’s discussions of the Dalits: was the ‘uplift’, the liberation not only from bondage to serfdom and even slavery but also from social stigma and almost total degradation, which the Dalits sought integral to salvation through Jesus Christ? The conference members were clearly convinced that the kind of salvation Dalits sought was not only a desirable ethical good which Christians should help them attain but was also attainable only through Jesus Christ and participation in the life of His church.6 Moreover, they saw transformation of Dalit lives as commending the Christian gospel to other Indians and the emancipation of the Dalits as undermining the entire unjust caste system by pulling the bottom out from under it.7 Yet, like Burditt, they viewed these as leading towards, or as a byproduct of, the salvation of Dalits, but not as dimensions of that salvation.

There was, however, one clear exception. An extraordinary statement of W.H. Campbell, a member of the London Missionary Society posted at Cuddapah in the Madras Presidency, is worth quoting in full. How far are missionaries called upon to ameliorate the condition of these people? They are for the most part miserably poor; they are unable to acquire land or to practice any handicraft which would enable them to rise into a position of independence; they are, as you have been told, in many cases, debarred from entering the courts of justice or walking along the public streets, and they are treated by their social superiors with a contempt and scorn which cannot fail to degrade and depress. The great and significant fact for us is that a new life has entered into this people. They are no longer content to remain ignorant and degraded; they believe that the time has come to improve their condition and assert their rights; they appeal to us in Christ’s name for sympathy and help. Some brethren look on this movement with something akin to fear and suspicion, and dread any action which would tend to make the people discontented with their lot. I have no sympathy with such timid doubters. Our Lord Jesus Christ took up no such position. Where there is injustice and oppression His message is not a message of peace but of war; He came ‘not to send peace but a sword’. As Christian men and women, above all, as Christian missionaries, we are bound to do all that lies in our power to help these people to throw off their bondage. The people will not rest content in their present state; of that you may be assured. In one part of the country at least they are discontented with their lot and resolved to better it. I do not believe that Government interference, or even missionary assistance, can solve this problem. ‘Who would be free themselves must strike the blow’. The great work for us is to prepare the people for the struggle which must inevitably arise, so that they may enter upon it with no low evil motives, but as Christian men whose only desire is to obtain what is just and right. We can do much to prepare them, and to help them to assert their rights. We can do this in many ways,—by helping them to take up Government waste land, by teaching them useful arts and industries which will make them, to a great extent, independent of their richer neighbours, by giving them a good elementary education, which is one of the best means of preparing them to occupy a higher and more honourable position in the land. But all these are only subsidiary. The one and only power that can really elevate these poor ignorant people is the Gospel of Christ. If we lead them to the Saviour. He will make them free.8

Campbell, however, was not the only exception at that time. In an article on ‘Social Work Among the Pariahs’ published in The Indian Evangelical Review a few months after the Bombay Conference, William Goudie (a leader of the missionary agitation in Madras seeking land for Dalits described earlier),9 wrote in language suggestive of the social gospel which was to influence later missionary thinking. Goudie offered three reasons

‘for us to embark on works of social relief and emancipation among the Pariahs’.10 The first was simple compassion and the third was ‘that a philanthropic work among the poor may be made a gospel of the Grace of God, an embodiment and exposition of the Love that is in Christ’, for, he asked, ‘how is it possible to expound to [Dalits] the goodness and Love of God save in the object lessons of good deeds— sermons and expositions of the Divine pity in the universal tongue of kind and helpful acts’?11 It was Goudie’s second reason which put this into clearer theological perspective. In the second place the relief of such suffering as I have described among the Pariahs and the removal of those cruel evils by which they are plagued are a part of the divine purpose for men, one of the promises of the Kingdom of Christ; and must therefore be accepted as a part of the Christian Church’s programme. His must be a very narrow mind, who can see nothing good, nothing Divine, anywhere save in that outward profession of Christianity which we have learned to associate with conversion. To the liberal minded, every improvement in the conditions and conduct of human life, or in the relationships of men to each other mark the coming of the Kingdom of the Son of Man. And every helpful act in the humblest spheres of life is a good deed and worth doing for its own sake.12

Goudie set as his aim ‘to restore to the character and the state of manhood those who are fallen from both’. Significantly, his first concern was ‘to test the ultimate utility of every charitable act by the question whether its results are likely to be permanent or will the virtue depend on the eternal repetition of the charity’. Our work is not to buy up all the slaves of the country, and to go on redeeming them as oft as they may fall into the snare that is set for them; we are to make such new men of them that it will be impossible for them to be held in bondage or to be treated by any man as other than our equal. We must therefore regard as helpful to our purpose every act that helps to remove unlawful restraint, that encourages hope and self-reliance in the heart of the despairing, or that stimulates on the part of the individual or the community intelligent and persevering effort to help themselves.13

Goudie therefore concluded that one could not separate social from religious work among Dalits. That the Pariahs may be free men, they must be new men, and all our work among them must be salted by the renewing Grace of God. . . . Legislation may protect a man’s rights and give him new

facilities for self-help, but of itself it never makes character, and what the Pariah needs most is ... not a new environment, but new moral fibre.14

Thus the theological starting point for the nineteenth century missionaries was their own Anglo-American Evangelicalism with its other-worldly view of salvation, its individualism and its moralism. This seemed to remain pretty well intact when doing theology about Dalits, although, as Campbell and Goudie indicate, there were cracks in the Evangelical consensus. In seeking to make connections between Evangelical theology and the realities of Dalit life in preaching a theology for Dalits, these missionaries relied heavily upon their combined personal impressions developed through considerable direct contact with Dalits. Despite the thousands of evangelistic sermons preached to Dalits during the mass movements, no written record of them has yet been found. Clough wrote simply, ‘I must have preached hundreds of sermons an hour in length on the text “Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” It was always new.’15 His other favorite texts were ‘In my Father’s house are many mansions’ and ‘Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you for my name’s sake’.16 Thus, for lack of direct evidence, the theology for Dalits during the mass movements must be inferred from statements such as the following: For to those oppressed ones, loathed and abhorred even as plague-stricken, forbidden even to worship the gods, deprived of any hope for ever, Christ’s gospel appeals with a wonderful power. It stirs their wonder and gratitude to learn that God cares for them, that Christ died for their sakes to save them from the guilt and punishment of sin, that He calls the most wretched and sinful and despised, and freely gives to all who believe and obey eternal life, making them sons of God and heirs of heaven.17

A similar statement by another missionary suggests a different theological emphasis. … they have learned that the powers of this world are under the control of a loving God of infinite wisdom Who is their heavenly Father, and not subject to the caprice of evil spirits which have to be continually propitiated. A wholesome self-respect takes the place of cringing fear and terrorised subservience. The story of the Incarnation and the Atonement comes home with power to hearts already prepared to receive it, and the earthly sufferings of the Son of Man make an appeal to them in their afflictions as profound as it is sympathetic. To them more than to most people in the world it

comes as a revelation that they too can, by the grace of God, become members of Christ, children of God, and inheritors of the Kingdom of Heaven.18

These statements suggest that Evangelicals offered Dalits two things which were closely inter-related. One was a new selfimage as a person whom God in fact loves and has already forgiven. The other was hope, primarily for life eternal, but also for a life free from ‘cringing fear and terrorised subservience’ here and now. Since both of these were denied Dalits by all parties in their existing circumstances, the Evangelical message came as good news and many Dalits responded accordingly. However, when they came to provide Christian instruction for Dalits just prior to or following baptism, the missionaries seemed to lapse back into more traditional Evangelicalism. The only adaptation to the life situation of the Dalits in this catechism of Zaruri Talim (Essential Teaching), especially prepared for them by a team of mass movement workers in U.P., is its brevity and simplicity of form, not its theological content. 1. Q. Who are you? A. I am a Christian. 2. Q. What is a Christian? A. One who obeys Jesus Christ. 3. Q. Who is Jesus Christ? A. Jesus Christ is the Son of God and our Saviour. 4. Q. What did Jesus Christ do to save us? A. He gave His life for us. 5. Q. What is salvation? A. Salvation is deliverance from sin and its punishment and becoming a child of God. 6. Q. What are the results of salvation?

A. Union and communion with God in this life and afterward heaven. 7. Q. What is sin? A. Sin is the breaking of God’s commandments. .... 10. Q. How is salvation obtained? A. Salvation is obtained by repentance for sin and faith in Jesus Christ. 11. Q. What is true repentance? A. True repentance is confession and forsaking of all sin. 12. Q. What are the results of true repentance? A. The results of true repentance are pardon of all sin and a new life in Jesus Christ. 13. Q. How can the power of this new life be obtained? A. It is obtained by prayer in the name of Jesus Christ and the indwelling of God’s Holy Spirit.19 The same is even true of the prayer recommended, in addition to the Lord’s Prayer, for them to use as a model. O God, forgive my sins; abide with me all day and save me from sin; bless my family; bless my village to-day and the whole Christian community also. For all thy blessings, I thank thee, O Lord, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.20

Perhaps this catechism makes obedience to Christ the defining characteristic of the Christian and defines sin as breaking God’s commandments in order to emphasize the necessity of making a total break with the past and adopting a life-style appropriate to the Dalit converts’ new faith in Christ. Evangelicals were clearly of the view that only by taking such a radical step and undergoing the discipline of a new life would Dalits

acquire ‘a new moral fibre’, regain ‘their fallen manhood’, ‘throw off their bondage’, ‘become new men, treated as equals’, as well as ‘enter into eternal life’. Conversion was to be, quite deliberately, culturally alienating; only with a radically different ‘rule of life’ could there be hope for Dalits. Two problems arise when turning from missionary theology about or for Dalits to Christian theology by Dalit converts themselves. The first is that there are so few examples to choose from. The second is that those which have been found were selected by missionaries. They may thus be examples of ‘approved theology’ rather than ‘representative theology’ by Dalits. They are, nonetheless, the best evidence available of the Christian theology being internalized by Dalits during this period. The following hymn by a Chuhra convert in the Punjab is very much in the tradition not only of bhakti (devotion) which had appealed to Dalits since medieval times, but also of Chuhra hymns to Bala Shah. Bring my Jesus to me, O my God!

To Thy door have I come, O my Creator!

The winner of my heart, Christ the Beloved!

My Creator, my beloved Lord!

Let me never forget Thee, my Lord, O Christ!

’Twas for me He came into the world;

My Beloved lost His life for my soul,

And saved my soul from sin.

I wandered about astray and lost,

But I heard His voice calling me;

Having pity on me, a sinner.

He bore the burden of my sorrows;

He injured none,

Yet the cruel ones crucified Him.

O cruel ones! why did you commit this dreadful deed?

Did not the fear of God restrain you?

We are all beggars at Thy door,

Thou hast fed us all.

In Thy hand is my life,

The shadow of Thy mercy is over me.

O Beloved, show kindness to me,

Who am oppressed by many sorrows.21

The theological emphasis upon divine compassion and deliverance throughout this hymn, and especially in the closing petition, is much closer to the theology of the missionaries’ evangelistic preaching than to their subsequent ‘line upon line’ teaching. The same is true of another Chuhra hymn which narrates the story of Jesus’ raising Lazarus from the dead and concludes with this testimony to Jesus’ power. Now hear all of you this word of counsel;

If any desire to go to Heaven, let him believe in this Jesus,

God gave him [Jesus] all power in heaven and earth.

O Talib (seeker), my Saviour, Jesus, is Lord of all.22

Another example of theology by Dalits during the mass movements is a Pulaya lyric ‘which they delight to sing at their work’. This lyric celebrates a specific event: their deliverance from the bondage of slavery, which they attribute to the missionaries whom Christ had sent to them. The chorus which begins the lyric and is repeated after each verse is Our slave work is done, our slave bonds are gone, For this we shall never henceforth forsake Thee, O Jesus!

The verses are as follows: 1. To purchase cattle, fields, houses and many luxuries (we were sold); (Now) Messiah himself has settled in the land a people who once fled in terror. 2. The father was sold to one place, the mother to another; the children also separated. But now 3. The owners who enslaved us often caused us much suffering: But will it comfort us to relate all the oppressions in full? 4. After exhaustion with labour in burning heat, in rain and cold and dew, They beat us cruelly with thousands of strokes. 5. Dogs might enter streets, markets, courts, and lands; (but) if we went near they beat and chased us to a distance.

6. As unclean lepers must run and hide in the jungles, so we outcastes must leave the road after warning those who approach. But now 7. As the Lord freed from slavery the much suffering Israelites in Egypt, So He has freed us from our distresses. 8. The Scripture teachers came, sent by the Triune God: Through this, slavery was ended and liberty was gained. 9. They diligently taught letters, arithmetic and hymns; made us clearly see the path to heaven, and set us therein. 10. Come in crowds, brethren, let none hang back, Heartily to trust and worship Jesus, the great and wise God. 11. Come, ye elders! gather the people unitedly into the church: Today and evermore remember the love of Jesus and the Judgment Cry. 12. Observe Baptism and Communion. Advance. And walk wisely in the path of a renewed nature.23 A comparison between the Chuhra hymn and the Pulaya lyric makes generalizations about Dalit Christian theology during this period almost impossible. The focus of the Pulaya lyric is very this-worldly; it celebrates deliverance from the externally imposed bondage of slavery, something the Chuhras never experienced. This was accomplished by Christ through the missionaries He sent. Moreover, it also includes the discipline of the Christian life as part of the good news to be celebrated. On the other hand, the focus of the Chuhra hymn is upon the inner transformation of the believer which was accomplished directly by Christ himself through His death upon the cross rather than through an intermediary such as a missionary. It ends not with total deliverance but with a plea for continued help in an ongoing struggle with many afflictions. No better evidence exists to help us understand what the transition to the new psycho-social world of Christianity meant to Dalit converts. The theology which expressed the Christian gospel’s distinctive and significant relevance to Dalits in this period might be called the theology of God’s friendship. The God to whom the Bible bears witness is the friend

especially of Dalits. In this God’s world Dalits are full human beings created in God’s image and for friendship with God. Because their present religion/culture does not recognize them as such, God calls Dalits to make a break with the past and begin a new life as those who know God has befriended them. This gospel for and about Dalits grew out of not only the evangelistic mission of the Church to the Dalits in rural India but also the Dalits’ response to that mission, while this gospel by the Dalits was an expression of their devotional life. It gave Dalits a sense of themselves and of their future very different from that which had been part of their social conditioning. This gospel’s impact upon those Dalits who accepted it and became Christians was powerful enough to carry them through persecution. Its lasting significance upon succeeding generations of Dalit Christians is difficult to estimate, but it may well account for their remarkable unwillingness to give up their Christian identity despite discrimination, frustration, and disappointment.

THE POLITICS OF NUMBERS The context of Christian theological reflection in this stage of the Dalit movement was no longer the same as during the mass movement stage. The constitutions of 1909, 1919 and 1935, by creating separate electorates for the various religious communities, had politicized conversion. Christian mass movement evangelism, which in effect changed the communal balance of power by transferring large numbers of Dalits from one political constituency to another, was now a matter of heated public controversy. Moreover, Dalit political leaders from Ambedkar on down were now using conversion, or the threat of conversion, as a weapon in their struggle for an equal and respected place in the new emerging order. Thus Christians were confronted with potential conversion movements of enormous size which were not the same as the earlier mass movements. One missionary, in contrasting what he called the new Harijan Movement to the mass movements, noted two significant differences between them. The Harijan Movement has sprung from the leaders, whereas mass movements start from one or two unknown men in a place who surrenders to Christ. In a Mass Movement there is no uncertainty as to where they are going, whereas in the Harijan movement there is uncertainty as to how and where to proceed. Rivalry among other religions in appealing to the Harijans confuses the latter. Harijan leaders have adopted the policy of wait and see.24

In this context Christian theology about Dalits was no longer simply a friendly conversation among missionaries about how to respond to Dalit expectations; it had become part of highly politicized, inter-faith debate about conversion itself. In like manner, Christian theology for Dalits was not limited to evangelistic sermons and catechisms for training new converts; it also included public presentations giving Dalit leaders the case for Christianity as a religious option which they should consider seriously. The Church in India had also changed since the 1890s. Among Protestants the National Christian Council, made up of representatives from both churches and missions, had replaced the decennial missionary conference as the forum for collective reflection and cooperative action on common problems. Leadership in the Council, in its member churches, and in the Christian community at large was being transferred from foreign missionary

to Indian hands. Thus most of the important theological reflection about and for Dalits in the crucial controversies following Ambedkar’s declaration in October 1935 was done by Indians. What they said was influenced not only by their assessments of the political situation but also by J.W. Pickett’s important Christian Mass Movements in India, published in 1933. This was not a theological work but an empirical study primarily of the motivations for and consequences of conversion to Christianity. Although its sample included Nadars and Tribals along with Dalits, its very positive and encouraging findings25 became part of the Christian apologetic about and for Dalits. Because it was based on survey research in five mass movement areas instead of on the collected personal impressions of interested missionaries, it gave Christian apologists added confidence in the empirical grounding of their apologetic. The opponents of Christian evangelism among Dalits criticized it for being an unspiritual, highly opportunistic, and very divisive attempt to exploit Dalit discontent for the sake of increased numerical growth.26 During 1936 and 1937, when controversy was at its height, Protestants prepared three, fairly brief, collective statements which provided strategic ethical guidelines rather than theological perspectives for Christian action while Dalits were deciding which religion to adopt. Yet each statement contains significant elements of a theology of evangelism. The first of them, entitled ‘Christian Attitude to Harijan Revolt’, the Bangalore Conference Continuation addressed to Harijans, Hindus and the Christian Church in June 1936. The second, at the very end of 1936, was a National Christian Council statement, ‘Christian Evangelism in India’, intended primarily for Christians. Then fourteen educated South Indian Christians published ‘Our Duty to the Depressed and Backward Classes: An Indian Christian Statement’ in March 1937 primarily for the wider Indian public. Taken together these statements reveal not only a significant shift from the theology of the Evangelicals described in the previous section, but also in varying degrees, the impact of nationalism—with both its emphasis upon national regeneration, national unity, national well-being and its basically optimistic outlook on the future—upon the theology of evangelism. The most striking difference between these statements and the speeches at the Bombay missionary conference is in the understanding of salvation

through Christ they present. Significantly, there is no mention at all of the life after death; the benefits of salvation are described purely in terms of changes in this life: ‘spiritual communion with God’, the liberation of the spirit and the new hope and purpose in life which He gives us’.27 ‘The Gospel of Christ has been from the beginning addressed to the whole man and is the means not only to spiritual health but to all good’.28 In addition, salvation was not depicted in purely individualistic terms; the transformation of society was also part of God’s saving work in Christ. The Bangalore Conference Continuation spoke of ‘the regeneration of the world . . . by the power of the love of God’ as well as of ‘the Gospel failing in its purpose and appeal if its implications were not worked out in the economic and social order no less than in the spheres of personal salvation’. One of those implications was ‘reconciliation between caste Hindus and Harijans’.29 The fourteen authors of the ‘Our Duty’ statement put it this way. We are convinced that the Gospel of Jesus is a Gospel not only to the poor and down-trodden masses in India but to all sections of the country’s population, and that the task before the Indian Church is to permeate the ideology and outlook of the land with a genuine respect for the teachings of Jesus and a willingness to accept His leadership in all that concerns personal happiness and national well-being. The service it can render to the Depressed and Backward classes and its own development in membership as well as in spirituality should form part of this larger programme.30

All three documents, in contrast to Gandhi and other opponents of the conversion movement Ambedkar was leading,31 affirmed the genuineness of the spiritual hunger behind the conversion movement or ‘Harijan Revolt’, although none of them was very precise in describing the nature of that hunger. This was perhaps best expressed by J.W. Pickett in his Christ’s Way to India’s Heart published in 1938 when public controversy was beginning to subside. His continued study of mass movement work had convinced him that ministry to Dalits’ social and economic needs without presenting ‘the Gospel of the love of God making full provision for the need of the soul’, evoked little positive response from Dalits. His conclusion was The Depressed Classes of India are desperately poor. But their chief economic need is not financial; it is an antidote to the poisonous ideas that have made them incapable of struggling successfully with their environment. As severe as is the physical oppression to which they are continuously subjected, the Depressed Classes could not have been reduced by its operation alone

to the low state in which they have lived for centuries. Much more devastating than physical oppression has been the psychological oppression inflicted by the Hindu doctrines of karma and rebirth, which have tought [sic] them that they are a degraded, worthless people suffering just retribution for sins committed in earlier lives. It is, then, a true instinct that makes the Depressed Classes respond more eagerly to the preaching of the Christian Gospel than to any direct ministry to their social and economic ills. The concepts which the Christian Gospel gives them of themselves and of God in relation to their sufferings and sins are worth incomparably more to them than any direct social or economic service the Church could render.32

The other obvious contrast to the theology of the nineteenth century Evangelicals is the central place these statements assigned to the Church as an Indian community of believers. Evangelism in this theological perspective is the work of the Church as a body, not that of individual specialists or specialized Christian groups. The National Christian Council statement is most explicit about this; it wanted all evangelistic work to ‘centre in the Church’ and have the leadership of that work ‘be increasingly Indian’. Put the other way around, ‘evangelism is the Church’s primary duty and the natural expression of its life’.33 The Bangalore Conference Continuation spoke of the Church as the witness for Christ in India, while the fourteen ‘Our Duty’ authors expected the Church to welcome all ‘seekers after the truth as it is in Jesus Christ’ and commend the Gospel ‘to the whole of India’.34 Neither statement gave this task to any other Christian body. Indeed, the National Christian Council took this view of the Church as the evangelizing community to its logical conclusion by urging greater unity and cooperation among all branches of the Church in meeting the present evangelistic challenge because ‘No part of the Church is alone sufficient for the task, nor are all the parts separately’.35 However, the primary prerequisite for the Church to fulfill its evangelistic responsibilities was not unity as much as selfpurification. The National Christian Council statement said, The Council are convinced that the present situation constitutes a call to the Church in India to re-dedicate itself to the service of the Master. This rededication will demand in the first place a careful self-examination on the part of the members of the Christian community, individually and corporately. They must free themselves from all that is unworthy of the followers of Christ—for instance, all imperfections in Christian home-life, all remnants of caste, all faction and division within the Church, all indifference to calls for the service

of the country—in short, from all that hinders the Christian community from reflecting the image of Christ.36

In like manner the Bangalore Conference Continuation had called the Church to ‘serious repentance, humble confession and prompt action for the removal of the vestiges of caste in the community which have long burdened the full realisation of the oneness of all in Christ’.37 Not only was self-purification, especially in the area of caste, an appropriate response both to Dalits and to critics, but it also embodied a more genuinely Indian approach to evangelism. Whereas missionaries, coming from more individualistic societies of the West, tended to emphasize the message of salvation, Indian Christians, coming from a more community based society, tended to emphasize the quality of community life as the chief attraction in Christianity.38 Indeed, Ambedkar was at this stage evaluating communities more than doctrines in deciding where to lead his followers. Nationalist Christians during this period, in these collective statements and in individual articles,39 held up before their own community and Indian society at large the ideal of the Church as a community in which there was no caste, expressing in its own life the oneness of all humanity India was seeking for itself. At the time this clearly meant that Christians, where they had not already done so, were to remove all signs of untouchability and caste hierarchy within the churches both as a matter of Christian principle and as a way of making the Christian message more credible as good news to Dalits. However, the ideal came to take on other meanings as well. One was that Christians were to shed their jati identities and merge into one shared Christian identity, a message which appealed especially to upward mobile, urban Dalit Christians who wanted to hide their social origins. The other was that the award of Scheduled Caste benefits to Dalit Christians would only ‘reintroduce the infection of caste’ into the churches, an argument much used by later caste Hindu politicians. Where the three documents disagree is in the degree of aggressiveness with which they believed the Church should carry out its evangelistic mission to Dalits. The National Christian Council statement saw recent events giving ‘added significance’ to its 1934 ‘Call to a Forward Movement in Evangelism’ and urged that those plans be implemented ‘with renewed

devotion and expectation’.40 The Bangalore Conference Continuation spoke more of responding to spiritually awakened Dalits than of creating spiritual hunger among them. Where the Harijans showed the genuine religious longing we as Christians have a duty to tell them of what Christ has done for us and of the liberation of the spirit and the new hope and purpose in life which He gives us. Moreover, the Conference desires to point out that we have in this situation apart from any hope of conversions from this group, a great opportunity to identify ourselves, in the spirit of the Lord, with the Harijans in their distress and suffering.41

The ‘Our Duty’ statement is less concerned with evangelism as such than with preserving the right of Christians, set forth in the Karachi Congress resolution, not only to profess and practice but also to propagate their religion. They take the awakening and spiritual quest of the Dalits as a given and then insist on the right and duty to receive those seeking the fellowship of the Church, but also to ‘go about in these days of irreligion and materialism to awaken spiritual hunger in all’. However, they also took the position that it would be ‘very unwise at this juncture to alienate the sympathy and spoil the open-mindedness of the Hindu to the Gospel by any illconsidered attempts at external results of a questionable value’.42 The New Leader, a Roman Catholic weekly published in Madras, took strong exception to this statement for its ‘secular views’ of the Christian mission, ‘influenced by considerations of “national solidarity” and expediency’. They seem to ignore the elementary truth that Christianity is a missionary religion and that one of its essential objects is to preach the saving truths taught by Christ and to place the tidings of salvation within the reach of all. Its appeal is mainly religious, for Christianity is a rule of faith and a rule of conduct—there are certain truths to be believed and certain precepts to be observed. Social welfare and material prosperity are not the primary concern of Christianity as the worthy gentlemen who appended their signature to this strange document ought to know. Obviously they do not believe that Christianity is the only true Religion and that those to whom its truths are adequately presented are bound to accept it under the penalty of eternal damnation.43

As this Roman Catholic critique indicates, both the fourteen Indian Christians and even the Bangalore Conference Continuation were concerned primarily with the political dilemma of the Indian Christian community caught between the rising aspirations of Dalits and the

criticisms of the caste Hindu heirs-apparent of the British Raj. Their theology, along with their political analysis, reflects this concern for the image of the Christian community as well as the politics of caution to which the Christian leadership was committed. During this period there were also several Indian Christian presentations of the gospel message to Dalits. The first, lengthiest, and most thoroughly theological of these was the address the Rev. John Subhan, a convert from Islam, gave to the Dalit leaders gathered for the All-Religions Conference at Lucknow in May 1936. ‘The Good News of Christ for the Depressed Classes’, the major Christian address at the conference, was strongly influenced by the theology of the social gospel.44 Subhan set out to tell the Dalit leaders ‘what Christ and His Kingdom of God vision and programme can do for you’.45 Right at the beginning he emphasized the fact that what he was offering them was based not merely on promises but on what has already been done for many years for Dalit men and women who had accepted Christianity. What Dalits needed, he said, was both individual transformation and ‘the reconstruction of society in general, and of the Depressed Classes in particular’. These two, individual and social regeneration, were in fact ‘two aspects of the one and the same thing—the Kingdom of God upon earth’.46 This he defined as the new order characterized by love, sharing, good will, cooperation and brotherhood breaking into the old order, ‘cleansing, purifying, changing, and regenerating it’.47 Subhan said that Christ began with the individual rather than with society as a whole. Both in his teachings and in his relationships with people Christ laid great emphasis upon human equality, viewing all distinctions not as inherent but as socially imposed. Equally important was Christ’s regard for the infinite worth of individuals. He saw ‘the image of God stamped on every individual’, even the socially and morally humiliated. ‘Christ came to seek and to save every such individual’.48 He even made some his specially chosen followers. ‘It is through Christ that individuals, no matter how degraded they be, begin to respect their own personalities, or in other words, acquire a new sense of self-respect.’49

Subhan went to great lengths to show that Christ throughout his life, identified with the poor and oppressed. The living Christ, in giving infinite worth to human personality, especially sympathised, and still sympathises with those who laboured and were burdened. He always took the side of the poor and oppressed…. He did not serve humanity from a distance, but He made Himself one with the poor and the outcastes of His time. He lived with them, He ate with them, so much that proud religionists of His age began to jeer at Him and say, ‘Behold a friend of sinners and publicans!’50

This identification with the poor and oppressed went to its farthest extent in Christ’s death upon the cross. For this is what the death of Jesus on the Cross reveals: it reveals the Love of God who suffers because of the suffering of humanity. It reveals God identifying Himself with men and women who are suffering under the tyranny and oppression of the so-called upper classes in society. So Christ dying on the Cross is the means, the only means, whereby we can truly understand how the miseries and evils of societies or individuals affect God. Christ dying on the Cross is the manifestation in time of what God is through all ages. He reveals the very heart of God bleeding for suffering men and women. Christ on the Cross is God speaking in the language which every one can understand, even the language of suffering love. He from the Cross is proclaiming that He is on the side of those who are oppressed, the victims of the tyrannies of an unjust social system. Christ on the Cross is God’s answer to the question, ‘Does God care for the out castes, the people of the Depressed Classes Community, and for all those who are under the cruel and humiliating domination of the so-called high class people?’51

Through Christ’s life, death and resurrection God ‘introduced a new redemptive and dynamic Life into the world…. With this life He offers to us a new beginning—a New Birth. We could not choose our physical birth but we can choose our spiritual birth, the New Birth in Christ! The new beginning is also the starting point for a new social order’.52 Subhan spoke briefly about how that ‘redemptive and dynamic Life’ evolved in the early Church but concentrated upon its work among Dalits during and since the mass movements, drawing upon Pickett’s work and anecdotal evidence. He categorized these as improvements in physical health, mental transformation, and spiritual transformation. This last-mentioned process requires people to ‘expose themselves to Christ, surrender to His will and obey Him. The tyranny of the lower lusts and affections is broken down,

and a real freedom reigns within the spirit.’53 Subhan used Jesus’ announcement at Nazareth recorded in Luke 4:18-19 to describe the Christian programme of social reconstitution for the economically, the socially and politically, the physically, as well as the morally and spiritually disinherited. This programme included cooperatives, development projects, and aids to upward mobility based upon Christian experience in local Dalit communities. There was little on politics other than a willingness to share with Dalits ‘every right and advantage which may come to the Indian Christian Community’ and a commitment to ‘strive to embody in the political order the basic principles of the Kingdom of God on earth’ through the democratic process.54 In a much briefer speech, ‘What Womanhood Owes to Christ’, Mrs. Mohini Das took what Subhan had said and applied it to women, referring not only to Indian women but also to Dalit women who had become Christians. Jesus, by his life and teachings, ‘opened a new door of opportunity’ for women, who constituted a Depressed Class, Wherever His teachings took root the condition of women began to alter. She became not just a glorified courtesan and housekeeper, but a home-maker, a companion to her husband and a fit mother for bringing up his children.55

She described Jesus and his teaching as a Force ‘released nearly 2000 years ago and still energizing in the living present’ which has ‘worked as leaven and revolutionized the position of women, as that of all suppressed peoples’.56 The other important source of Christian theology for Dalits coming in response to Ambedkar’s declaration was ‘An Open Letter to our Countrymen who are classified as Belonging to the Depressed Classes’ signed by Bishop V.S. Azariah and some fifty Christians from Andhra Desa several months after the Lucknow conference. Azariah, a Nadar and not a Dalit, was the chief signatory and may well have been its chief, if not sole, author. However, because it refers to the signatories as fellow members of the Depressed classes and brethren, it comes closer to giving a Dalit perspective than do any of the documents from this period analyzed thus far. The central question it poses and seeks to answer is ‘What has Christianity done for us who are converts and your brethren?’

Three answers were provided: ‘It has lifted us socially;’ ‘it has raised our womanhood’ (largely through education); ‘it has removed the customs and habits that have been the causes of our past degradation.’ Among these they list marriage customs, the curse of drink, poor sanitation, illiteracy and lack of education. The last two of these and their description of the process by which these have occurred are worth quoting in full because of their theological significance. (e) Christianity has brought us fellowship and brotherhood. It has treated us with respect, and it has given us self-respect. It has never despised us because of our lowly origin, but on the contrary has held us as individuals who are as valuable before God and man as any man of any origin. We believe it has been the working out of the will of God, that probably more than seventy-five per cent of all the great efforts Christian missions have made in the past two centuries, has been for us, the Depressed Classes, for whom previously no one had shown any interest or care. All this has been in accord with the life and character of the Lord Jesus, who said, ‘I am come to seek and save that which is lost.’ We, your blood and brethren, can witness to you what a blessing it has been to be ‘found’ of Him.

(f) Best of all, Christianity has given us happiness and joy that can only come by the knowledge that God has forgiven our sins and has made us His children in Christ. We consider this as the foundation cause of all that we have received through this religion. The fact that Jesus Christ died for us makes us hate sin, and live new lives. He lives now and enables us to give up our old bad habits and grow in newness of life. ‘If any man is in Christ there is a new creation’, say our Scriptures.

All this has not been accomplished through any magic, or done in a day. It has been the result of years of service, patiently and with love poured out for us by thousands of consecrated men and women, both Indian and foreign who have laboured to improve our lot. It has been the result of constant teaching, care, and instruction. It has been accomplished moreover, because we ourselves, freed by Christ from chains of ignorance and fear, have found within ourselves new courage, new hope, new strength to struggle upward. It is still a process going on; we are not a finished product (you may no doubt find many faults within us) but no man can deny that we are growing, moving toward the goal. If you, like us, should choose Christ in your momentous choice, you will find in Him, not empty words, but an opportunity for an abundant life. ‘I am come that ye might have life, and that more abundantly.’57

Taken together, these theological statements from the 1930s reveal three points of important theological difference between ‘the evangelists’ and ‘the nationalists’. First, evangelists like Pickett and Azariah shared with Ambedkar the view that conflict was the inevitable price of Dalit progress; they therefore felt quite justified in evangelizing Dalits because they were convinced that the Christian gospel provided the only real solution to the Dalits’ problems. Nationalists, like the Bangalore Conference Continuation and particularly the authors of the ‘Our Duty’ statement, on the other hand, were more sensitive to the political context and were concerned about Christian evangelism intensifying communal conflict. Hence they sought not only reconciliation between Dalits and caste Hindus but also selfrestraint by Christian evangelists. This fundamental difference may account for the other two. The nationalists separated the religious from the social, economic and political aspects of the Dalit movement; the evangelists saw the moral and spiritual as inseparable from the other aspects. Moreover, the nationalists tended to see religion as an individual matter with social implications, whereas the evangelists saw it (at least among Dalits) as inherently social in nature. While the nationalists sought to distinguish the spiritually hungry from the socially angry and receive only the former, the evangelists saw group conversion as a good thing, in fact ‘Christ’s Way to India’s Heart’, because it not only provided an antidote to the converts’ social dislocation and westernization but also helped Christianity to spread.58 While the context, the language, and the emphases of Christian theology about, for and by Dalits had changed since the 1890s, there is a remarkable continuity in the inner connections made between Christian theology and Dalit life. Even though theology now focused more exclusively upon salvation within this life, the good news for Dalits was still presented in terms of a new self-image; a new community granting Dalits greater equality, respect, and caring; and a new hope defined primarily in terms of enhanced opportunities for individual and family mobility. Social transformation was confined to social reform and community development at the grass-roots level. Even though the Dalit movement had become very political at this stage, there was no Christian theological commitment to political change at either the national or the local level. The Christian vision was limited to working within existing political structures for progressive

measures and to sharing with Dalits what little political power the Christian constituency had. It is at this point that Christian theology most obviously failed to come to terms with Dalit aspirations in the 1930s. Whereas Ambedkar wanted the Church to be a cohesive and effective political entity that would count for something in the politics of numbers, at least Protestant Christians understood the nature and purpose of the Church quite differently. This can be inferred from Bishop V.S. Azariah’s comments on political events from 1932 to 1937 in his diocesan magazine. Unlike Ambedkar, Azariah opposed the communal award and communal electorates because they were ‘a direct blow to the nature of the Church of Christ’.59 He seems to have had three reasons for taking this view. The first was that communal electorates separated Christians from other Indians on the assumption that they constituted a separate and distinct political interest, when in fact they did not. Christians, like other Indians, were divided on class lines (farmers, capitalists, labour) and so had differing political interests; it would therefore be more appropriate that they align themselves with other Indians whose interests they shared than with each other. Second, communal electorates forced the Christian Church to function like ‘a religious sect, a community which seeks selfprotection for the sake of its own “loaves and fishes”’.60 This is a violation of the true nature of the Church; it is to be instead the body through which ‘the dynamic in the religion of Jesus’ is to permeate the entire society, across boundaries of caste, class, language and race. This it would do through the members of the Church who live along side other Indians sharing in their struggles and in their politics but who also seek to apply Christian principles to public life. For that reason he urged Christians to vote in the general rather than in the Christian constituency.61 Thirdly, communal electorates put Christian evangelism, the Church’s primary task, in a bad light, as ‘a direct move to transfer so many thousands of voters from the Hindu group to the Indian Christian group’.62 His conclusion was that ‘from every point of view the communal electorate system for Christians is a curse’.63 The Church could not and should not function as a separate political bloc; instead it was to function independently, through its diverse members as light and leaven in all political matters in the manner Subhan had indicated.64

The failure of Christian theology in the 1930s, however, went deeper than its failure to address Dalit political aspirations, as some important studies of Christian communities near the end of the decade were to show. One was the set of socio-economic surveys of the rural Christian community prepared for the 1938 meeting of the International Missionary Council in Tambaram.65 Whereas Pickett’s work had highlighted the beneficial consequences of conversion to Christianity, these studies documented the seriousness of continuing poverty among rural (i.e., overwhelmingly Dalit) Christians. By drawing attention to the enormity of the problems as yet unsolved, these studies highlighted that tragic dimension of Dalit and Dalit Christian life which had been virtually ignored in the enthusiastic theology of this period. The other important study was J.C. Heinrich’s, The Psychology of a Suppressed People published early in 1937. Heinrich, a United Presbyterian missionary working among Chuhra converts in the Punjab, drew upon not only the insights of Alfred Adler, Pierre Janet, and G.V. Hamilton but also the literature on African Americans and his own observations of Dalit Christians to describe the psychopathology of oppression and its impact upon those who, like Dalit converts to Christianity, were recently emerging from oppression. His central thesis was that the craving for self-expression and superiority is such a basic biological urge, a major craving, as necessary in the struggle for existence as is the sex urge and the urge for self-preservation. When blocked its natural result is a manifestation of the emotion of rage and anger. Open expression of these emotional reactions are usually inexpedient and bring results inimical to personal welfare.66

Among the results Heinrich mentioned were lying, concealment, intense selfishness, ‘establishing a pseudosuperiority by lowering and disparaging rivals or apparent superiors’, all of which can produce exhaustive nervousness in the suppressed people,67 dissention among them when unity is needed for their struggle, and all kinds of difficulties for those who work with them. This book was highly controversial when it appeared, but it was the first major Christian attempt to deal with Dalit anger, especially among those who now felt freer to express it.68 Heinrich’s own suggestions for the church, however, were pastoral and ecclesiological rather than theological in nature.

In this period the theology of God’s friendship continued as the theology Christians considered to be of greatest relevance to Dalits. However, in the face of a more multi-faceted Dalit awakening and the existence of alternative visions actively competing for Dalit loyalty, this theology was developed in two directions. On the one hand, it depicted God as being more closely identified with Dalit poverty, degradation and suffering than did the earlier theology. On the other, it elaborated more upon the social dimensions of God’s friendship with Dalits, especially in emphasizing God’s will and work for human equality. Along with these developments in the theology of friendship came a new emphasis upon ecclesiology. The Church as a community was to be both the embodiment and the instrument of God’s purpose of dignity, equality and oneness for all humanity. Christians not only celebrated the Church’s achievements in this respect but also called for repentance and improvement in the face of obvious shortcomings. This theological view of the Church, along with their more fully developed theology of God’s friendship for Dalits, gave Dalit Christians a sense of being in the vanguard of the Dalit movement, of now enjoying to a great degree what other Dalits were still agitating for. Like its predecessors, this theology was also a product of the Church’s evangelistic mission to the Dalits. However, its primary spokespersons were now the Indian Christian elite who were addressing not only the Dalits but also those Indian elites who saw the political consequences of conversion and were critical of it. The task of these spokespersons was thus not just to evangelize Dalits but, equally importantly, also to sway aroused public opinion so as to maintain both the religious freedom and the good reputation of the Christian community, amidst the clashing of various nationalist as well as communal ideologies and interests. Dalit Christians faced the same twofold challenge in presenting their case.

COMPENSATORY DISCRIMINATION Indian independence from Great Britain in 1947 and the Presidential Order of 1950 concerning the implementation of the new constitution’s provisions for compensatory discrimination created a new context for Christian theological reflection in relation to Dalits. On the one hand, the great evangelistic opportunities of the 1920s and 1930s had disappeared. Compensatory discrimination, with its powerful disincentives to convert, effectively brought the Dalit mass movements to an end and Ambedkar led his followers into Buddhism. On the other hand, the implementation of compensatory discrimination had given Christians in general and Dalit Christians in particular a special sense of grievance. An avowedly secular government had used religious difference to reduce Dalit Christians to second class citizenship by denying them the same consideration granted Dalit relatives and neighbours who belonged to the same jatis, lived in the same villages, and did the same work. They were told, ‘There is no caste in Christianity’, and in the condescending words of the Backward Classes Commission Report in 1955 ‘it would be doing a disservice both to Islam and Christianity if we encourage backward individuals following these two faiths to exaggerate their social hardships and claim that they form a distinct social community’.69 Dalit Christians had been defined in abstract theological/sociological terms, drawn not from the new constitution but from the old politics of numbers, with no sensitivity to all the harsh empirical realities which were their daily lot. The Indian Church itself had also undergone significant change. The number of foreign missionaries gradually dwindled to insignificance and ecclesiastical power was transferred to Indian Christian hands. Dalits as such were not among the early mission and ministry priorities of the Indian Church leadership, while the theologians virtually ignored the Dalit social base of the churches in developing Indian Christian theologies.70 Dalit Christians themselves would now have to create appropriate theologies for their own people. The earliest statements of Dalit Christian theology in this period came not from the theologians but from field studies of what Dalit Christians actually

believed. Alter and Jai Singh’s study of the predominantly Chamar Church in Delhi in the late 1950s noted that it ‘is strongly conservative, particularly in the areas of creed and cultus’,71 a conclusion Caplan also drew from his study of lower class Christians in Madras some twenty years later.72 Delhi Christians saw Jesus as the crucified saviour, bestower of health and strength, and protector of those who appeal to him. There are indications that traditional Indian beliefs and attitudes influence the Church’s understanding of Jesus Christ. The name of Jesus is popularly believed to have a mysterious power and some Christians use the words Khudawand Yisu (Lord Jesus) as a mantra (magical formula) to ward off disease or evil spirits. For many Christians Jesus is the object of bhakti (religious devotion). A pastor commented that ‘Jesus worship’ is common among members of his parish and that prayers are often addressed to Jesus rather than to God the Father. Finally, there is a marked strain of docetism in the thinking of many Delhi Christians. The humanity of Jesus is seldom stressed; he is regarded, rather, as a divine being who appeared in the form of a man. In common usage, the word ‘Jesus’ is always preceded by ‘Lord’ and the emphasis is on his superhuman character and power. Jesus Christ is thus regarded as having some of the characteristics of a Hindu avatar (incarnation) though Christians always hasten to say that he is far superior to any Hindu deity.73

Luke and Carman’s study of rural Dalit Christians in Andhra Pradesh, also conducted in the late 1950s, came to similar conclusions, except that Jesus was the major but not the only deity whom Christians worshipped. Village Christians believe that if their ‘Lord’ Jesus is worshipped, He will heal the sick, bless their family and keep it from all troubles and misfortunes, bless their crops and livestock abundantly, and give success in all their undertakings. But if they fail to see such barkat (material blessing) in those families which are faithful to Christ, they sometimes begin to doubt the power and effectiveness of Christianity and ridicule other Christians who remain faithful in the face of misfortune.74

Caplan found fundamentalism appealing to Dalit Christians in Madras because it accepted popular views of the sources of affliction (evil spirits, etc.) and asserted that they were overcome by the power of the Holy Spirit.75 An intentionally Dalit Christian theology, developed by Dalit Christian theologians for and about Dalits, emerged only in the mid-1980s. However, before then there were several attempts to deal theologically with the Dalit

Christian situation. A pioneer in this regard was the Telugu poet, Gurram Joshua (1895-1971), who drew upon his own personal experience both as a Dalit and as a Christian when describing and protesting against Dalit suffering and humiliation. In his poetry he presented Jesus Christ as the Son of God and embodiment of divine grace, divine friendship for the lowly, and divine selfsacrifice for reconciliation and equality within the world, which he contrasted to the human hypocrisy, caste divisions, and conflicts which he witnessed both outside and inside the Christian Church.76 A joint statement on “The Gospel for the Punjab” from a consultation held at the Christian Institute of Sikh Studies in March 1975 took seriously the fact that the Punjabi Christian community is a community of Dalits. In the Punjabi situation the Gospel is the message of the Cross. In the social sense, acceptance of the Gospel in the present Punjabi situation implies joining an underprivileged and deprived community. It means suffering, humiliation, and loss of status in the eyes of other communities. Yet the message of the Cross is the power of God to transform man and the world. It enables the individual to endure suffering and loss of status but at the same time inspires and enables him to change his lot and the lot of his neighbours. We bear the Cross and discover it is the power of God.77

In this view, the major problem of the Punjabi Christian has been a debilitating self-image. The message of the gospel is the power of God because it changes one’s self-image. As Clarence McMullen pointed out in a larger, follow-up consultation in October 1976. Exposure to the Gospel should change a person and give him a new understanding of self, others and society. A person thus transformed does not look at himself from the eyes of other people and form an opinion of himself through this. Instead he sees himself through the eyes of Christ. Before this transformation he has been judging himself through the standards of the world in terms of his social and economic standing. Now he judges himself through the standards of Christ and through his grace which is given to every person irrespective of his social status. Other people still remain significant and become even more so—not as judges but as neighbours.78

At the time of the 1978 National Convention in Bangalore,79 the Rev. M. Azariah used Biblical precedent, especially in the life of Jesus and the early Church, to enlist the Church in the Dalit struggle for justice. ‘The central concern of the God of the Bible’, he argued, ‘is for justice and

righteousness to prevail among men and women’.80 God is closest to the poor and powerless; God sides with the weak and oppressed; Jesus’ ministry was ‘essentially for the victims of injustice and oppression’.81 Since in India Dalit Christians suffer discrimination both from the government and within the Church, they clearly are subjects of God’s special concern; they are, moreover, fellow Christians in need for whom the Church thus has a special obligation. Azariah showed how ending discrimination among believers was a major issue both in the ministry of Jesus and in the New Testament Church.82 He made this and the training of Dalit Christians for leadership so that as a group they could ‘rise up and walk’ two Biblicallymandated priorities for the Church in India. The Christian Institute for the Study of Religion and Society held a consultation on ‘Theology of the People’ in December 1979. This consultation gathered activists to reflect theologically from and for the situation of oppressed people. Dalits were included among the oppressed along with tribals, women and the poor. In reflecting upon the consultation, CISRS director Saral Chatterji wrote that the ‘irreducible elements’ of ‘the reality of Jesus as the historic redeemer of the people’ were: Jesus among the people who were poor, captive, without hope, outcaste and oppressed; he had compassion for them which refers to the fact that his ministry was one of deep fellowship with the people in their suffering; and his action was one of solidarity with the people shown on the cross, as well as one of redemption and liberation of the totality of the people through his resurrection.83

While not derived exclusively or even primarily from Dalit Christian experience, this became the theological outlook of the CISRS’ new casteclass programme which helped stimulate the later development of Dalit Christian theology. In March 1981 the present author read a paper to the Faculty Research Seminar at the United Theological College in Bangalore entitled ‘From Indian Church to Indian Christian Theology: An Attempt at Theological Construction’. This paper argued that since the social base of the Indian Church was overwhelmingly Dalit, it was necessary to develop theologies which contained good news for Dalits. While the paper’s social and psychological analyses were to influence future developments in Dalit theology, its theological proposals, based on election and covenant, were

largely ignored.84 However, the paper did provoke a colleague at United Theological College, Arvind P. Nirmal, to deliver a few weeks later an address entitled ‘Towards a Sudra Theology’ which Sathianathan Clarke later described as a watershed event, in that it called upon Dalits to shun theological passivity and sociological camouflage in order to embrace the more demanding task of reclaiming the liberative ends of theology. The tacit inclination towards theological sanskritization was confronted and a new way that put the motif of liberation at the centre was opened.85

However, it was several years before Nirmal himself was able to develop further this new model for doing theology. Each of these statements was addressed to the Christian community at large and not just to its Dalit members. Each in its own way gave expression to the conviction that the Church would be renewed if it took both its own gospel and the circumstances of either its predominantly Dalit membership or of Dalits in general more seriously. Where they differed was in emphasis. Azariah’s emphasis was upon justice for Dalits within church, state and society; the CISRS emphasized liberation of the oppressed, and the other two sought to proclaim a gospel which was such good news to Dalit Christians that it would bring about an inner transformation among them. K. Wilson’s The Twice-Alienated marks the transition into the theology of the mid-1980s. This book was a Dalit critique of traditional Christian theology in India which cleared much of the ground and helped give new direction for future theological work. Wilson was particularly perceptive in describing the psychological impact which traditional Christian beliefs have had upon Dalit Christians. ‘The one most powerful instrument that has blinded and immobilized [Dalit Christians] is the salvation theology taught by the acculturated Christian missions.’86 Wilson argued that this theology promotes psychological dependence, political passivity, and communal exclusiveness among Dalit Christians. Its views of sin and salvation show that ‘salvation theology’ is not only ‘built upon the edifice of human weakness’ but also nurtures a low selfimage and a sense of helplessness. Like the ‘traditional Hindu social dharma’, it locates the roots of the Dalit predicament within the Dalits themselves and not in the oppressive institutions of society. Instead of encouraging Dalits to take action for their own emancipation in the present, it makes their salvation completely

dependent upon future divine intervention. ‘The net outcome of the acceptance of religious Christianity in the Dalit Christian epoch, is the emergence of a life style which anticipates things to happen without individual effort.’87 This leaves Dalit Christians feeling ‘spiritually saved’ when they are ‘in reality existentially enslaved’.88 By giving them a false sense of superiority over other Dalits, this faith cuts Dalit Christians off from the common caste struggle of all Dalits.89 Wilson therefore urged his fellow Dalit Christians to reinterpret their scriptures and reformulate their ‘theological doctrines in the context of their existential problems’.90 Wilson’s book marks an important shift of theological attention away from the Indian Church as a whole and towards its Dalit members in solidarity with other Dalits. They themselves, and not the Church, were the source of their own emancipation. These views found political expression in the Christian Dalit Liberation Movement (CDLM), founded in December 1984.91 In November 1987 Gurukul Lutheran Theological College in Madras established a Department of Dalit Theology and appointed the Rev. Arvind P. Nirmal its head. Both organizations encouraged serious theological work by Dalit Christians for Dalit Christians in the context not only of their own particular struggle against discrimination but also of the broader Dalit struggle for equality. Three initial collections of essays in Dalit Christian theology drew considerable attention to Dalit theology and provided direction to its further development: Towards a Dalit Theology (1988), Emerging Dalit Theology (1990), and A Reader in Dalit Theology (1991). Most of these essays were devoted to showing why there was a need for Dalit Christian theology, what sources it should draw upon, and what criteria it must meet. Much of this work was very tentative and experimental; all of it shows the influence of liberation theology. However, the essays of three theologians mark important beginnings in constructing a new Dalit theology. M.E. Prabhakar was Associate Director of the Christian Institute for the Study of Religion and Society in charge of a major caste-class study programme in Andhra Pradesh. He saw theology providing Christian Dalits with ‘the motivating force to liberate themselves, in solidarity with all other dalits, across their religious and sub-caste loyalties’.92 Because of their sociopolitical, socio-cultural, and socio-spiritual alienation, Christian Dalits

were ‘economically weak, politically powerless, socially divided and spiritually ambiguous’.93 What they and other Dalits needed in their struggle for liberation was a new sense of self, in which the old ‘inferiority complex’ and ‘slave mentality’ would be replaced by an awareness that ‘dalit is dignified’,94 and ‘a new spirituality for combat’.95 This he saw the Dalit Theology Project of the CDLM providing. Prabhakar’s own emphasis in this common effort was upon the Church, in continuity with ancient Israel, as a ‘shalom community’ brought into being by God through Jesus Christ.96 The Church is primarily a group of people, committed to fulfilling Christ’s mission of justice and liberation for suffering humanity. This involves being both a Church of the Poor and a Servant Church.97 In this Church there is to be no caste oppression and theological authority is to come from the bottom up rather than from the top down.98 The early work of M. Azariah, who subsequently became General Secretary of the Synod and in 1990 Bishop of the Madras Diocese of the Church of South India, has already been referred to.99 His major emphasis since then was upon analysis of the Dalit and Dalit Christian situation, both historical and contemporary,100 which had important theological consequences. Christ the Liberator has declared, ‘You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free (John 8:31).’ Indeed here is the basic principle for Dalit Liberation in as much as the victimization, oppression and slavery of the Dalit populations in this country basically took place precisely in the realm of truth and beliefs, about life, about God, about the past and about the future…. The seat or the location of the beliefs and truths by which human beings live by (sic) has been accepted to be in their soul or psyche rather than in the mind or even the conscience. It is with such an understanding and analysis that I have ventured to define the basic problem of the Dalits as being ‘wound in their soul’ or ‘wounded psyche’. Dalit Liberation therefore must take the form of healing the ‘wounded psyche’ as the basic and elementary step in the long process of a struggle.101

The consequences of this conviction for theology he indicated in an essay on ‘The Church’s Healing Ministry to Dalits.’ The condition of the wounded psyche of our brothers and sisters of outcaste groups would call for nothing less than a programme for healing or ‘catharsis’ of the inner being of each of these our

brothers and sisters as also their community consciousness. Only the deep can call unto the deep. And I believe only a deep understanding of the Christian faith can lead the Church to bringing an in depth level healing and salvation to the deeply wounded brothers and sisters who are viewed and treated as ‘outcastes’ and as ‘untouchables’ even within the fold of the Church.102

Azariah did not give a detailed presentation of what this ‘deep understanding of Christian faith’ is. His starting point was Christological. Jesus of Nazareth, who ‘rose from the dead to be the living Christ’ and ‘living Lord of all who believed in Him’, identified fully in his day ‘with the despised, the discriminated and the oppressed both in life and in death’.103 ‘The Dalit Christ Who is the Resurrected Lord must be encountered in the Dalit experience in our day.’104 His liberating work among Dalits in the present consists, first of all, of revealing Truth in the light of which Dalits, long wounded by both the denial of their God-given human dignity and by the ‘demonic doctrine of Karma’ in Hinduism, can see themselves as they really are.105 This appears to be part of Christ’s total healing work which also includes being in present solidarity with Dalits at the deeper levels of their inner being where faith, sin and forgiveness operate’.106 However, it was the Dalit theology of Arvind P. Nirmal which proved to be the most influential. His was a confessional theology which sought to interpret the history and identity of the Dalit people theologically. He saw Dalit pathos as the epistemological starting point and an important criterion for theological truth for Christian Dalit theology. ‘It is in and through this pain-pathos that the sufferer knows God. This is because the sufferer in and through his/her pain-pathos knows that God participates in human pain.’107 As evidence of this he drew upon Dalit literature as well as upon his own experience.108 Nirmal used the creed in Deuteronomy 26:5-12 as a paradigm for his own theology not only because of the liberation motif running through it but also because it lays bare the roots, identity and pathos of the Dalit people. Central to this theologically interpreted Dalit history has been their Godgiven change of status from ‘no people’ to ‘God’s people’. However, its goal is not ‘a land flowing with milk and honey’ but ‘the realization of our full humanness or conversely, our full divinity, the ideal of the Imago Dei, the image of God in us. To use another Biblical metaphor, our goal is “the glorious liberty of the children of God”’.109

Christian Dalits in India have had their own exodus experience from Hinduism to Jesus Christ. ‘Our exodus to him has enabled us to recognize our God.’110 This God is a Dalit God, a servant God, who ‘does not create others to do servile work but does servile work himself. Servitude is innate in the God of dalits. Servitude is the sva-dharma of our God; and since we the Indian dalits are this God’s People, service has been our lot and our privilege.’111 Similarly, dalitness or servanthood is the key to understanding both the humanity and divinity of Jesus Christ. This can be seen in Jesus’ genealogy, in his using the title ‘son of man’ to refer to himself, in his identification with the Dalits of his day, and most fully in his brokenness and Godforsakenness on the cross. Similarly, ‘the Holy Spirit is the Spirit on the side of the Dalits’.112 Nirmal concluded, It is through us that God will manifest and display his salvation. It is precisely in and through the weaker, the down-trodden, the crushed, the oppressed and the marginalized that God’s saving glory is manifested and displayed. This is because brokenness belongs to the very being of God. God’s divinity and his humanity are both characterized by his dalitness. He is one with the broken. He suffers when his people suffer. He weeps when his people weep. He laughs when his people laugh. He dies in his people’s death, and he rises again in his people’s resurrection.113

Nirmal saw Dalit theology, like all peoples’ theologies, as a theology of identity,114 seeking to establish theologically a distinctive identity for Dalits in general and for Dalit Christians in particular. Like the theologies of the 1930s, this Dalit theology laid almost exclusive emphasis upon salvation within this life as both individual and social transformation. However, unlike the earlier theologies, it assumed a conflict rather than an organic model of society, with caste as the basic source of conflict. As a result, these transformations were redefined with greater psychological depth and greater attention to the political. The ends now in view were a full humanity, liberation and justice, both of which required structural change and not just individual or family mobility. These three pioneering Dalit Christian theologians were too aware of the Church’s obvious failures and weaknesses to continue holding it up to other Dalits as the vanguard of a new humanity. Instead, they developed distinctively Christian visions to inspire, guide and support Dalit Christians in the common Dalit struggle for liberation, justice and dignity. They took Dalit religious pluralism for

granted and sought solidarity with, not the conversion of, other Dalits. Shared ideology, compatible but not identical with their distinctively Christian visions, now provided the basis for this solidarity and unified action of Christian and other Dalits.115 V. Devasahayam, Nirmal’s colleague and then successor as Head of the Department of Dalit Theology at Gurukul from 1994 to 1999 when he became Bishop of the Madras Diocese of the Church of South India, pulled the various threads in these early Dalit liberation theologies together, identified the underlying methodological issues, and made them more pastorally accessible. In a series of Bible studies published in 1992 he juxtaposed the caste system, its religious/ideological and economic foundations, its major features and dynamics, its impact upon all Dalits, as well as its influence within the churches, with the sharply contrasting messages of dignity, equality, justice, community and liberation in the Old and New Testament passages he selected.116 In a subsequent collection of essays on Dalit theology published in 1997 he contributed eight more Bible studies and an essay on basic assumptions, all of which examined some of the methodological issues in Dalit theology itself. For Devasahayam Dalit pathos, brought on primarily by caste oppression, and the Dalit experience of transformative divine grace in the context of that oppression provide the starting point for Dalit theology.117 He depicted Jesus as the representative of the ‘oppressed collective’118 whose ‘dwelling among us and participation in life is characterized by protest and struggle against the forces of oppression, sin and death’.119 Devasahayam also called for a critical encounter between the Gospel and Dalit culture. Dalit theology...needs to be rooted in Dalit cultural traditions adopting a stance of critical appropriation of the positive aspects of Dalit religion and culture. The resultant articulation has a greater chance of acceptance in the church and would contribute effectively to the liberation of oppressed people.120

This critical encounter has since been carried out in a variety of ways, as is illustrated in the field research-based theological reflection of Sathianathan Clarke and M. Deenabandhu, in the Biblical scholarship of A. Maria Arul

Raja S.J., in the development of Dalit women’s theology, as well as in the songs of James Theophilus Appavoo. Clarke did anthropological field work on the Paraiyar in a Tamilnadu village in order to understand their ‘already internalized religious worldpicture’, on the twin assumptions that it is in their religious world-picture that their experience of pain-pathos is best symbolized and that ‘human beings need to ground their aspirations of freedom, liberation and humanization upon their existing overall conception of living under the Divine’.121 He singled out the symbol of the drum as ‘the heart-beat of the religious life of the Paraiyar community’.122 ‘The capacity of the drum to galvanize resistive and emancipatory forces in order to retain the particularity of their collective identity is the hallmark of the religious creativity of the Paraiyar.’123 Seen from a Christian point of view, the symbol of the drum ‘represents the particular content of God’s relational and mediating activity among God’s people’;124 ‘The way of the suffering and the path of Christ are intimately bound up in the drum.’125 Because the drum both functions as a hitherto unrecognized Christ symbol within the Paraiyar religious world and serves as a medium that penetrates realms of that world which the written or even spoken word cannot, it is a valuable symbol for Dalit Christian theological discourse.126 As a participant observer in two Andhra Pradesh villages, M. Deenabandhu conducted personal interviews and group discussions among Dalit Christians to gather experiential data for an Indian ecclesiology. He found that their experience challenged Indian ecclesiological thinking at four key points: on ‘the place of social identities in ecclesiological reflections’; on ‘the narrow conceptions of community’, and hence of the Church as community, in the Indian experience; on the ‘Dalit life of struggle and resistance as a way of participation in the mission of God’; and on the historical nature of Dalit faith as a corrective to the restricted ambit of faith of many a Christian in India.127 In the face of these challenges ‘from below’, he proposed that the Church opt for a Dalit identity as a liberating identity instead of hanging on to its strong institutional public identity; that instead of remaining an exclusive community, it become a movement that not only ‘gives a sense of warmth in interpersonal relations and a sense of belonging’ [which it already does] but also ‘motivates constructive action,

keeps public conscience and presents itself as an alternative community’;128 that it bear witness to the coming reign of God by joining with and providing pastoral community leadership for all Dalits in their struggles against injustice and oppression; and that it find in the faith experience of its Dalit members its own ‘change-oriented faith tradition’ concerning a God who intervenes in history, ‘liberating, restoring, and transforming situations and people’.129 Fr. Arul Raja’s own theological dialogue with Dalit culture has focused upon Dalit pre-understandings and subjectivity, shaped by a variety of written and other ‘texts’ that are part of the Dalit heritage, because these affect the way Dalits read the Bible and grasp the Biblical message. The Bible holds no privileged or authoritative position in Dalit lives. Indeed some Biblical themes and texts resonate well with Dalit preunderstandings and dispositions (e.g., divine immanence and liberative action, parables and apocalyptic) whereas others do not (e.g., divine transcendence, priestly concern with purity and pollution, long lists of rules and regulations). Those interested in facilitating an engagement between the Dalit subjective world and the Biblical subjective world in ‘mutual osmosis’ must therefore not only select those Biblical themes and texts which resonate best with Dalit pre-understandings and aspirations, but also be prepared to have the Bible read from the vantage point of those who are discriminated against. ‘The overriding criterion for the genuine Dalit hermeneutics is the ethical necessity of annihilation of discriminating hierarchy’.130 Arul Raja has not only drawn up parallel lists of Dalit and Biblical locations, interior movements, and primordial events to show where Dalit and Biblical subjectivity might most beneficially engage one another, but also illustrated this engagement with Bible studies on such themes that resonate well with Dalits as exorcism and apocalyptic.131 Dalit women’s theology has engaged Dalit culture at two key points: it not only challenged the patriarchy prevalent in it but also affirmed the inherent strength and resilience of Dalit women born of their ongoing struggle to survive with dignity. It began by establishing the fact that the Dalit woman’s situation was worse than that of Dalit men; they were ‘the Dalits of the Dalits’, subject to forms of oppression that Dalit men did not experience. This Ruth Manorama did at the 1986 conference on Dalit

theology. ‘In my understanding, any theology denying women’s questions/concerns in the ingredients of making theology is unwholesome and unholy’.132 In the one paper on Dalit women’s theology at the 1996 summer institute Faustina commented on some stories of Dalit Catholic women. ‘In the name of God, Jesus, Holy Mass, Holy Eucharist, faith and spirituality Dalit women are exploited in such a subtle way, that they don’t even realise that they are exploited and fooled.’ 133 Instead, she wanted Dalit women to discover Jesus the liberator. There are instances in the Gospels through which we come to know the other side of Jesus who is angry, violent, and who rebelled against the inhuman and hypocritical attitudes of people in authority. While doing Dalit theology it is necessary to kindle the fire of righteous anger within the Dalit women by familiarising them with this person of Jesus who had come to set fire on earth. This will enable them to destroy the existing exploitative system and create a new earth and a new heaven.134

A year later a study of the self-image and identity of Dalit Christian women used empirical research to provide theological guidance both for the women themselves and for the churches’ ministries to them. The study began by locating Dalit Christian women at the intersection of the dominant, the Dalit, and the Indian Christian traditions concerning women. Field research comparing them to other Dalit women indicated that the central struggle of their lives, both within and beyond the family, was in making the transition from being considered only as roles within the patriarchal order (e.g., daughter, wife, mother) to acquiring identities as persons in their own right. It drew upon the data provided in the study, including the theological preferences of the Christian women interviewed, as well as the Bible to prepare a theological statement addressed to three questions concerning the meaning of Jesus Christ in the Dalit Christian woman’s transition from role to identity. What theological categories, themes or stories best express her situation before God and what God’s grace might therefore mean to her in the midst of this transition? What is God inviting her to become in relation to role expectations and potential identity? What then is her special calling within the wider purposes of God?135

God’s grace to her is described in terms of a favoured status, far better than that offered by society, which gives her dignity (that is clearly distinguished

from respectability—a crucial distinction),136 hope, and value. At present God’s intention for her transition from role to identity is that she continue attaining and defining her identity both as a person in her own right and as a personin- community. In that process each woman will be given fresh understandings of what her own role or roles ought to become.137

Since then Dalit Christian women theologians and writers have concentrated upon calling Dalit theologians’ attention to the Dalit woman’s situation,138 upon Biblical hermeneutics,139 and upon women’s issues which are not confined to Dalit women.140 The fullest compendium of Dalit women’s theological concerns and interpretations is the September 2007 issue of In God’s Image, the journal of the Asian Women’s Resource Centre for Culture and Theology. The fifteen essays under the theme, ‘The Haunts of Pain: Theologizing Dalits’, display the same diversity of approach, style and subject matter as in the earlier essays. The editor explained, As victims of triple injustices and dual patriarchies, Dalit women are today crusading against the invasion of their inner spaces, against the imposition of unwelcome identities, and against subordination. It is this inspiring movement of Dalit feminism and theology that we seek to analyze and represent in this issue of IGI.141

The other significant encounter between Christian theology and Dalit culture is seen in the songs and liturgies of James Theophilus Appavoo (Parattai), Professor and Director of the Department of Communications at Tamilnadu Theological Seminary. At one level he focused the attention of Dalit theologians upon rural (Tamil) Dalit religiosity and culture. For Parattai and for rural Dalits, theology is not just words, concepts and perspectives; it is an embodied way of life which finds its most important expression in worship. Parattai wanted to use Dalit culture as the main medium for Christian worship and other forms of theological expression. Dalit culture, he argued, has closer Biblical parallels and is more liberating than is the elite culture which has dominated Christian worship and theology.142 At a more practical level, he deliberately chose the medium of folk music, with folk instruments like the drum, for his songs and liturgies. His themes are liberative (God as bigendered parent of the universal family, the eucharist as shared communal food, God as farmer), but so is his music in its rhythms, melodic devices, communal and participatory singing roles, all of which facilitate the internalization of his liberative themes.143

Since the creation of the Department of Dalit Theology and the appointment of Arvind Nirmal as its Head, Gurukul Lutheran Theological College in Chennai had provided an institutional base and academic support system for the development of Dalit theology. However, with the departure of V. Devasahayam and M. Deenabandhu for responsibilities elsewhere in 1999, it could no longer play that role. In September 2001 the Centre for Dalit/Subaltern Studies (Theology) in New Delhi took up that role.144 Its founder director was James Massey who had participated in all the early discussions of Dalit theology; had started the inter-religious Dalit Solidarity Programme (later Dalit Solidarity Peoples); had published extensively on Dalit issues, especially those of concern to Dalit Christians;145 and from 1996 to 2001 had served as the Christian member of the National Commission on Minorities. The Centre was set up as a research institute, as an educational and training resource, and as an agency of transformation of the churches and wider society. It established academic ties with the Catholic University in Nijmegan and Free University in Amsterdam, both in the Netherlands, for doctoral research.146 Since then it has sponsored and published the proceedings of annual national seminars on Dalit theology at which scholars could present the fruits of their research and reflection. However, its most ambitious project to date has been to provide a multivolume Dalit Bible Commentary, the aim of which is to ‘enable Dalit sensibility to enter into dialogue with the word/text, making the Scripture more meaningful to their lives’.147 To date six New Testament volumes have been published, almost all by Massey himself and Monodeep Daniel. Each has an opening essay on historical context and special relevance to Dalits. A distinctive feature of this commentary, apart from highlighting things in the text of special concern to Dalits, is that it is written not just for Christians, but for other Dalits as well, as it presupposes little prior knowledge of the Bible. While liberation theology has provided the dominant paradigm for doing Dalit theology during this period, other often older forms of Dalit theology continue to exist alongside it. The Gramin Prachin Mandal148 is one church that has deliberately incorporated a distinctively Dalit theology into its articles of faith which, while quite traditional theologically, do have special significance for Dalit Christians. For example, Article 1: There is only one God who is the heavenly father of all humankind. He created each and every man and woman equal to one

another and in His own image.

Article 4: God the Father chose the believers from before the creation of the world so that they would walk before Him as holy and sinless people.

Article 5: We believe that God did not give this vision to the proud and knowledgeable of the world, or to those who consider themselves great, but the Heavenly Father’s heart was full of love for the broken and shows forth the greatness of his Dalit Avatar through us.

Article 6: There is a second spiritual birth, which is a secret gift of life-power, that has been revealed for the Dalits through the only Dalit Avatar, Jesus Christ. On this basis Jesus Christ’s compassion woke up the sleeping spirits of the Dalit Avataris and they have been born again in a second spiritual birth. Those men and women who have been born of the Spirit receive peace, prosperity and eternal life.

All twenty articles, and expositions of each one, are published in a book which is used to train local leaders who in turn train local parishioners in their new faith and way of life.149 The Pentecostal churches, to which large numbers of Dalits have been attracted, also lay emphasis upon spiritual rebirth and a new way of life. Moreover, for them, as V. V. Thomas has pointed out, the Pentecostal experience of speaking in tongues and giving testimony to healings (including from evil spirits) or other blessings received are not only a deliverance from silent passivity, but also load-shedding or burden-lifting (and in that sense liberating) experiences.150 Over the past twenty years Dalit theologians have caused Dalit theology to flourish. It has challenged the dominance of other forms of Indian Christian theology and placed them on the defensive. It has developed a variety of methodologies and dealt with a wide range of concerns. It has not only addressed the problems of Dalit psychology and Dalit politics far more directly, but also reached out more readily across the barriers which have divided Christian Dalits from other Dalits than did its predecessors. It has been and is being taught in theological seminaries where clergy are being trained; it can be found in the statements of church bodies and church officialdom; it has often provided an important rationale for Christian organizations and programmes serving Dalits in various ways; it has gained recognition both in India and abroad as an important, if not the most significant, Indian Christian theology to emerge so far. What is much less

clear is the degree to which it has influenced either the practice of pastoral ministry to Dalits or the consciousness and behaviour of Dalit churchgoers.151 During this period Dalit theology has been, for the most part, a liberation theology. Dalit liberation theology has been the product, not so much of the Church’s evangelistic mission as of Dalit Christian academics and intellectuals, with some help from sympathetic non-Dalits. It is a theology by Dalits, about Dalits, and for those Dalits who are already Christians. Its primary aim has been to ‘conscientize’ them in a struggle not only against continued discrimination by both Church and State, but also for the attainment of their full human rights and ‘the glorious liberty of the children of God’. In addition, it has also sought to assert a distinctively Dalit presence and identity within the wider Indian and international Christian community. Dalit women theologians have worked within a liberationist framework to focus attention upon the struggles and concerns of Dalit and Dalit Christian women. Thanks to the existence of specialized women’s programmes and ministries in the churches, as well as to the growing number of women clergy, their theological work may well have had a greater impact upon those for whom it was intended than that of their male counterparts. The challenge of healing and empowering Dalit Christian lives at the grassroots level, in all likelihood, remains the greatest challenge Dalit theology faces.

CONCLUSIONS This chapter has focused largely upon what might be called the ‘great theological tradition’ of Christianity in India with regard to the Dalits. It is the tradition of the well-educated leadership, most of whom have had considerable formal theological training, and it is written in English. There is much less here on the theologies either of the less well educated village pastors and catechists or of the semi-literate and illiterate majority on the Dalit Christian population. Those theologies, expressed in regional languages and embodied most obviously in the sermons, music, prayers, styles and customs of worship, make up the many ‘little theological traditions’ of Dalit Christians.152 There is, however, enough material representative of some of the little theological traditions here to indicate that they are not just simplified versions of the great tradition and that shifts in the great tradition do not necessarily bring about corresponding shifts in little traditions. It is unclear from this survey how operative the great theological tradition has been at the local level and therefore what kinds of impacts it has had upon the little theological traditions or individual Dalit lives. Nevertheless, the survey does show that the great theological tradition has been responsive to at least some aspects of the life situations of Dalits generally and of Dalit Christians in particular at each stage of their history. The great theological tradition of Christianity in India depicted Dalit life as lived in relationship to the Biblical God, the source and ground of their being. Life lived in relationship to this God has value, purpose and meaning —things previously lacking in Dalit life. What that specific meaning was and how it was articulated changed as the Dalit movement and Dalit Christian history moved from stage to stage. So too did the corresponding understandings of the nature and mission of the Christian Church in India which this great theological tradition provided. In the era of the mass movements the great theological tradition gave to Dalits a radically new understanding of themselves as beloved of God and precious in God’s sight. Because God loved them and valued them for God’s own purposes, they were people who had reason to hope for a better quality of life here and now as well as for eternal fellowship with God in the life to come. This good news provided a clear and sharp alternative to

the Hindu world-view and value system which denied Dalits both dignity and hope. Acceptance of this good news meant a break with the past and a new way of life affecting beliefs as well as life-style. The great theological tradition saw the Church not as the literate, urban, educated elite community it had been, but as a community of and for ‘the poor, the lowly, the oppressed and the outcaste’. In the period of the politics of numbers, the great theological tradition became more optimistic about Dalits and God became more immanent. The tradition also separated Christian Dalits from other Dalits. Christians were blessed by ‘the spiritual dynamic’ Jesus has given, whereas other Dalits, while still loved by God but choosing to remain under the law of karma, were spiritually hungry but not yet satisfied. Moreover, the Christians were the ‘first fruits’ of God’s work of individual transformation and social reconstruction among all Dalits. For that reason and because they belonged to a new community in which there was no jati, Dalit Christians were, theologically speaking, no longer Dalits. Instead they were part of the servant people of God, a community with resources to help, committed to function as God’s leaven in Indian society as a whole. The Christian community would play this role not by functioning as a self-serving political bloc in the competition with other blocs for ‘loaves and fishes’, but by bringing the teachings and dynamic of Jesus to bear through its members upon all aspects of Indian life. The great theological tradition during the nearly sixty years of compensatory discrimination begins not with good news but with a call to Dalit Christians to face the truth about themselves. The first and most basic truth is that, despite conversion to Christianity, they remain Dalits. As Dalits not only do they face the same kinds of degradation and injustice as do other Dalits, but they also share the same pathos. Yet they live within the context of the liberating activity of God. God works in and through the common Dalit struggle against the forces of oppression for the justice and full humanity God wills for all Dalits, both women and men. This Dalit God also shares the pathos of the Dalit people and provides the healing of ‘wounded psyches’ they need to carry on their struggle as well as to realize their full humanity. God calls Christian Dalits to participate actively and even lead in the grassroots political struggle of all Dalits for the liberation

God intends. In that struggle the Church has proven to be weak, ineffective, and often an instrument of caste oppression, even though it is predominantly Dalit in composition. The Church must repent and become the shalom community God created it to be, living and acting in solidarity with all Dalits. In each of these periods the great theological tradition has highlighted and expressed something very close to the heart of Dalit Christian experience of divine grace. It has also been out of touch with or ignored other things which also lie close to the heart of the Dalit Christian experience. Each generation has left its own unfinished business and unaddressed issues for the next to deal with. Those who are shaping the great theological tradition vis-a-vis Dalits in India today are no exception. Their agenda already includes interacting theologically with the little theological traditions of Dalit Christians, with other theological traditions within the Indian Church, with Dalit culture, and with Dalits who do not share their Christian convictions. Yet theirs will not be the final nor even necessarily the definitive word.

A Glossary of Indian Terms



Adi: Avatar: Bahujan: Balutedar: Barkat: Begar: Bhakti: Cheri: Dacoit: Dasas:

first, original incarnation the people who constitute the majority of the population a village public servant material blessing forced labor devotion to a personal God separate hamlet inhabited by Dalits on the edge of the village robber, bandit literally ‘slaves’; Aryan word for the inhabitants of India they conquered Devata: goddess Dharma: sacred moral and religious duties prescribed for each caste Dharmsala: places of worship; also places where pilgrims can spend the night Diksha: initiation Faqir: Muslim ascetic Ghat: place for bathing Ghi: clarified butter Gotra: a clan or lineage group within a jati Gur: molasses Guru: spiritual preceptor Harijan: ‘child of God’: Gandhi’s term for Dalits Harijan Society of Those Serving Dalits Sevak

Sangh: Jajmani: hereditary patron-servant relationship of a dominant caste

family with a lower caste family Jati: an endogamous caste unit Karma: a person’s fate or destiny as determined by his/her actions in a previous life Khudawand Lord Jesus Yisu: Kisan peasant organization Sabha: Lakh: 100,000 Lambardar: village headman Lok Sabha: Lower House of the Indian Parliament similar to the British House of Commons Mantra: religious incantation Manuwadi: a term used by Dalits for those upholding the Laws of Manu concerning caste, caste hierarchy, and caste relationships. Mazhabi those Chuhras who are Sikh by religion Sikhs: Mela: fair Panchama: those belonging to the ‘fifth’ varna; a term for Dalits Panchayat: a council of five members Puja: worship, often with offerings to the deity Rajayoga: practitioner of yoga according to Pitanjali’s Yoga Shastra Rajya Upper House of the Indian Parliament Sabha: Ryotwari: land revenue settlement between the state and the peasant cultivator Sabha: assembly or society Sahitya: literature Samaj: society Sanatani: upholders of the eternal moral and religious duties Sangam: literary academy of ancient South India Satyagraha: ‘truth force’; Gandhi’s method of non-violent protest Seer: two pounds

Shuddhi: purification; a rite used by the Arya Samaj Sva-dharma: dharma appropriate to one’s own station Taluka: an administrative unit larger than a town or village but smaller than a district Varna: ‘color’; the broad categories into which jatis were classified Varnashrama The social order based on people carrying out the respective Dharma: dharma of their varnas and stage in life

End Notes

Chapter 1 1J.H. Hutton, Caste in India: Its Nature, Function and Origins (4th edition; London, 1963)

2Vivekanand Jha, ‘Stages in History of Untouchables’, The Indian Historical Review II (July 1975),

14-31; Prabhati Mukherjee, Beyond the Four Varnas: The Untouchables in India (Shimla, 1988).

3Excerpts in W. Theodore de Bary, ed., Sources of Indian Tradition (Delhi, 1963), 225-228.

4N. Subrahmanian, Sangam Polity (Bombay, 1966), 247-261.

5Vivekanand Jha, op cit., 16-17.

6Romila Thapar, Ancient Indian Social History (New Delhi, 1978), 125. Mukherjee argues that

varna was prior and, as society became more complex, subdivided into jatis. Op. cit., 96. A more recent discussion of the issue may be found in Romila Thapar, The Penguin History of Early India From the Origins to AD 1300 (New Delhi, 2003), 122-125.

7It also sometimes ends in myth and legend. Two helpful analyses of Dalit ‘myths of origin’ are Lynn Vincentnathan, ‘Untouchable Concepts of Person and Society,’ Contributions to Indian Sociology (n.s.) 27:1 (January 1993), 62-71 and Robert Deliege, The Untouchables of India, trans. by Nora Scott (Oxford, 1999), 71-88.

8See Eleanor Zelliot and Rohini Mokashi-Punekar, eds., Untouchable Saints: An Indian Phenomenon (New Delhi, 2005).

9Two major works are Susan Bayly, The New Cambridge History of India IV.3 : Caste, Society and Politics in India from the Eighteenth Century to the Modern Age (Cambridge, 1999), 97-143 and Nicholas B. Dirks, Castes of Mind: Colonialism and the Making of Modern India (Princeton, 2001), 3-227.

10Bernard S. Cohn, ‘Notes on the History of the Study of Indian Society and Culture’ in Milton Singer and Bernard S. Cohn, eds., Structure and Change in Indian Society, (Chicago, 1968), 10.

11E.g., Jogandra Nath Bhattacharya whose Hindu Castes and Sects was originally published in 1896.

12Along with the work of Bernard Cohn cited above, I have found K.L. Sharma’s ‘New Introduction’ to J. Murdock, Review of Caste in India (Jaipur, 1977), i-xxix helpful in analyzing 19th century sources.

13Nicholas B. Dirks, op. cit., 5.

14J.A. Baines, Census of India, 1891. General Report (London, 1893), 188, 190, 192-193, 199-200.

15In 1891 there were 1,243,370 Chuhras, 11,258,105 Chamars, 2,960,568 Mahars, and 2,210,988

Paraiyar. If the Paraiyar had been listed as field labourers in the General Report as they were in the Madras Report, then all four occupational categories would be represented in the case studies. Ibid.,

199; A.A. Stuart, Census of India, 1891. Volume XIII, Madras (Madras, 1893), 244.

16Denzil Charles Jelf Ibbetson, Report on the Census of the Panjab Taken on the 17th of February 1881. Part I: Text (Calcutta, 1883), 318-319.

17Ibid; M.A. Sherring, Hindu Tribes and Castes as Represented in Benares (Calcutta, 1872), 396397; and others following them. Ibbetson noted that Chuhras are offended if called Bhangis. Griswold, while linking the two in occupation, religion, and social status, indicated that the Chuhra was taller, stronger, and, unlike the Bhangi, did not raise pigs. Hervey DeWitt Griswold, Insights into Modern Hinduism (New York, 1934), 229-232.

18W. Crooke, The Tribes and Castes of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh (Calcutta, 1896), I: 260-262.

19Denzil Ibbetson, op. cit., I: 305.

20H.J. Strickler, The Religion and Customs of the Chuhra in the Punjab Province, India

(Unpublished MS., 1926), 1-2.

21Referred to in ibid., 2.

22W.P. Hares, ‘The Chuhras of the Punjab’, The Church Missionary Review (June 1920), 115-117.

23R.C. Temple, The Legends of the Panjab (Patiala, 1962). I: 529. This was originally published by

the Oxford University Press in 1890. A recent, careful study of the texts referring to Valmiki, as well as to the legend that he was a dacoit, is Julia Leslie, Authority and Meaning in Indian Religions: Hinduism and the Case of Valmiki (Burlington, 2003).

24H.J. Strickler, op. cit., 26-31. See also John W. Youngson, ‘Chuhras’, in James Hastings, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics (New York, 1913), III: 616-617. In an earlier, more extended study Youngson provided two different genealogies drawn from informants in Sialkot district. J. Youngson, ‘The Chuhras’, The Indian Antiquary (March 1906), 83-85.

25R.C. Temple, op. cit., 1: 530-546; J. Youngson, ‘The Chuhras’, The Indian Antiquary (December 1906), 340-353.

26Denzil Ibbetson, op. cit., I: 153-154, 318.

27R.C. Temple, op. cit., I: 529.

28H.J. Strickler, op. cit., i-ii.

29My categories closely parallel those of Griswold who discerned three layers of religious belief

and practice among the Chuhras: ‘(1) the rites of a gotra, or clan, including its special tabu and special ancestral worship; (2) the special tribal religion with its worship of Bala Shah; and (3) a thin veneer of belief or practice due to association as workmen with Hindus, Moslems, Sikhs, or Christians.’ Op. cit., 232.

30Punjab Census Report, 1921, 178.

31Denzil Ibbetson, op. cit., I: 154, 319.

32Ibid; W.P. Hares, op. cit., 118.

33J. Youngson, ‘The Chuhras’, Indian Antiquary (January 1907), 19-21; H. A. Rose, A Glossary of

the Tribes and Castes of the Punjab and North-West Frontier Province (Patiala, 1970), 2:207-209; H. J. Strickler, op. cit., 50-61.

34John W. Youngson, ‘Chuhras’, 617.

35The Indian Antiquary (January 1907), 29.

36For a fuller description of Chuhra religion, see John C. B. Webster, Religion and Dalit

Liberation: An Examination of Perspectives (second edition; New Delhi, 2002), 15-23.

37Denzil Ibbetson, op.cit., 154.

38M.A. Sherring, loc. cit.

39H.J. Strickler, op. cit., 4-8. See also Neeladri Bhattacharya, ‘Agricultural Labour and Production:

Central and South-East Punjab, 1870-1940’, in Gyan Prakash, ed., The World of the Rural Labourer in Colonial India (Delhi, 1992), 153-178; Vijay Prasad, Untouchable Freedom: A Social History of a Dalit Community (New Delhi, 2000), 25-28.

40The intention of the Act was to exclude urban money-lenders from land ownership, but its effect was to exclude the Chuhras as well.

41H.D. Griswold, ‘A Chuhra Jag’, 81; H.J. Strickler, op.cit., 5. See also Vijay Prasad, op. cit., 4245.

42M.A. Sherring, op. cit., II: 75-76; Denzil Ibbetson, op. cit., I: 319.

43Ibid. See also Stephen P. Cohen, ‘The Untouchable Soldier: Caste, Politics, and the Indian Army’,

The Journal of Asian Studies, XXVIII (May 1969), 455-456.

44Cohen, op. cit., 456-458.

45William Tennant, Indian Recreations; Consisting Chiefly of Strictures on the Domestic and Rural

Economy of the Mahomedans & Hindoos (second ed.; London, 1804), II: 195.

46J.A. Baines, Census of India, 1891. General Report (London, 1893), 199; D.C. Baillie, Census of India, 1891. Vol. XVI The North-Western Provinces and Oudh (Allahabad, 1894), I: 312.

47This information, like the rest in this section, is based on four very helpful studies of the Chamars: M.A. Sherring, Hindu Tribes and Castes as Represented in Benaras, 391-395; W. Crooke, The Tribes and Castes of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, II: 169-191; Frank Lillingston, ‘Chamars’ in James Hastings, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics (New York, 1913), III: 351355; and George W. Briggs, The Chamars (Calcutta, 1920).

48G. W. Briggs, op. cit., 11-13.

49Ibid., 17.

50Denzil Ibbetson, op. cit., I: 322.

51With reference to the Punjab, Ibbetson said on the one hand, that ‘I believe that the Mahomedans

admit Musalman Chamars, or, as they are more often called, Mochis, to a participation in their rites’ (ibid, I: 153) and on the other that they were not ‘admitted to religious or social communion by

other Musalmans’ (ibid). Lillingston some thirty years later stated that ‘When once a Chamar has been admitted as a Muhammadan, he becomes, in regard to all religious privileges, the equal of Muslims of the highest social position’ (op. cit., 355). This suggests that equality was confined to participation in Muslim rites and did not include social interaction as well.

52M.A. Sherring, op. cit. 391-392.

53W. Crooke, op. cit., 189-190.

54G.W. Briggs, The Chamars, 58.

55W. Crooke, op. cit., 175.

56This paragraph is based upon Saurabh Dube, Untouchable Pasts: Religion, Identity and Power

among a Central Indian Community, 1780-1950 (Albany, 1998), 25-113 and Gnana Prakasam, Social Separatism: Scheduled Castes and the Caste System (Jaipur, 1998), 50-95.

57W. Crooke, op. cit., 191. Owen Lynch indicated that this was how the Jatavs of Agra became wealthy, although he does not date their progress prior to Independence. Owen W. Lynch, The Politics of Untouchability (Delhi, 1974), chapter III.

58G. W. Briggs, op. cit., 58-59.

59Eustace J. Kitts, Report of the Census of Berar 1881 (Bombay, 1882), 144-145.

60Ibid., 145. R.V. Russell states in his The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India that

their principal occupation was weaving. (London, 1916) IV: 144.

61R.E. Enthoven, The Tribes and Castes of Bombay (Bombay, 1922), II: 401.

62R.V. Russell, op. cit., IV: 129-146.

63Ibid., IV: 130.

64R.E. Enthoven, op. cit., II: 413-414.

65R.V. Russell, op. cit., IV: 137-139.

66R.E. Enthoven, op. cit., II: 413. For more on Chokhamela and the Mahars see Eleanor Zelliot and

Rohini Mokashi-Punekar, eds., Untouchable Saints. 123-194.

67R.E. Enthoven, op. cit., II: 402; R.V. Russell, op. cit., IV: 143.

68Jayashree Gokhale, From Concessions to Confrontation: The Politics of an Indian Untouchable

Community (Bombay, 1993), 47.

69Eleanor Mae Zelliot, ‘Dr. Ambedkar and the Mahar Movement’ (Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1969), 53-56. Cohen estimated that ‘the Mahars numbered between a quarter or a fifth of those units in which they were recruited and perhaps a sixth of the entire Bombay Army’. Op. cit., 455.

70Eleanor Mae Zelliot, op. cit., 38.

71Ibid., 57 & 70.

72Apparently an original edition, completed in 1806, was published in 1816, the year in which

Dubois completely rewrote and improved it. This revised edition, which is being used here, was not

published until the end of the century. Abbe J. A. Dubois, Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Translated from the Author’s Later French MS. and Edited with Notes, Corrections, and Biography by Henry K. Beauchamp (third edition; Oxford, 1906), viii - xxviii.

73Ibid., 48-49.

74On right- and left-hand castes, see Brenda E.F. Beck, ‘The Right-Left Division of South Indian

Society’, The Journal of Asian Studies, XXIX (August 1970), 779-798.

75J. A. Dubois, op. cit., 49.

76Ibid., 54-55.

77Ibid., 50.

78Dubois’ description of the Paraiyar is in ibid., 49-62.

79This mistake was made by W.R. Cornish who was then cited by others. W.R. Cornish, Report on

the Census of the Madras Presidency, 1871 (Madras, 1874), I: 117, 130, 168-171. Dubois himself was not that indiscriminate, but he did use the term to cover the more closely related Cherumars of Malabar (pp. 56-58) and Holayas of Mysore (p. 51). Usually the context makes clear whom he was describing.

80Edgar Thurston, Castes and Tribes of Southern India (Madras, 1909), VI: 82-83.

81Ibid., VI: 83-89; H.A. Stuart, op. cit., 244-245.

82Edgar Thurston, op. cit., VI: 82. More recently Hart has argued that much of the early Tamil

literature was written on the model of the oral poetry of wandering Paraiyar and other Dalit bards. George L. Hart III, ‘Ancient Tamil Literature: Its Scholarly Past and Future’, in Burton Stein, ed., Essays on South India (Honolulu, 1975), 42, 46.

83H.A. Stuart, op. cit., 245.

84These are given in M.A. Sherring, Hindu Tribes and Castes (Calcutta, 1881), III: 132-135.

Sherring, who lived in North India, based this primarily on the 1871 Madras Census, Caldwell’s Grammar of the Dravidian Languages and J.H. Nelson’s, The Madura Country.

85This description of Paraiyar religion is based on Edgar Thurston, op. cit., VI: 103-108.

86W.R. Cornish, op. cit., I: 116-117; M.A. Sherring, Hindu Tribes and Castes, III: 130.

87Benedicte Hjejle, ‘Slavery and Agricultural Bondage in South India in the Nineteenth Century’,

The Scandinavian Economic History Review, XV(1967), 75-86; Dharma Kumar, Land and Caste in South India (Cambridge, 1965); S. Manickam, Slavery in Tamil Country: A Historical Overview (Madras, 1982); Haruka Yanagisawa, A Century of Change: Caste and Irrigated Lands in Tamilnadu 1860s-1970s (New Delhi, 1996); Gunnel Cederlof, Bonds Lost: Subordination, Conflict and Mobilisation in Rural South India c. 1900-1970 (New Delhi, 1997).

88Cornish listed 15 recognized ‘species of slaves’; of these at least five are covered by this statement, (op. cit., 169) and it is the cause most commonly referred to.

89Dharma Kumar notes the increase but attributes it also to increasing land being brought under

cultivation.

90S. Manickam, op. cit., 71-79; G.A. Oddie, Social Protest in India (New Delhi, 1979), 128-146. Yanagisawa makes the point that the dominant castes took special care that the Paraiyar and other Dalits did not become landowners, so as not to lose a cheap and dependent labour force. Haruka Yanagisawa, op. cit., 31-32, 35-43.

91A helpful discussion of ‘the contested term “slavery”’ is found in Gunnel Cederlof, Bonds Lost, 34-42.

92S. Manickam, op. cit., 65; Benedicte Hjejle, op. cit., 105-109.

93This is an inference from Gandhi’s statements about the origins of the indentured laborers and

their participation in his campaigns. M. K. Gandhi, An Autobiography (second edition; Ahmedabad, 1959), 77, 102-104; Satyagraha in South Africa (American edition; Stanford, 1954), 39.

94G. A. Oddie, op. cit., 144.

95G. Aloysius, Religion as Emancipatory Identity: A Buddhist Movement among the Tamils under

Colonialism (New Delhi, 1998), 50-79.

96Quoted in Charles H. Heimsath, Indian Nationalism and Hindu Social Reform (Princeton, 1964), 103, who later pointed out that Phule’s movement had little impact upon Dalits (p. 249). This judgment finds support in Rosalind O’Hanlon’s monograph which shows that the major focus of Phule and the Satyashodhak Samaj was on the Malis and ‘the Maratha-Kunbi caste complex’. Caste, Conflict and Ideology (Cambridge, 1985). Eleanor Zelliot treats the Mahar and Non-Brahman movements in Maharashtra as parallel movements, but does mention a few instances when the former received help from the latter. ‘The Nineteenth Century Background of the Mahar and NonBrahman Movements in Maharashtra’, The Indian Economic and Social History Review, VII (September 1970), 397-415.

Chapter 2 1‘The distinguishing features of Christian mass movements are a group decision favorable to

Christianity and the consequent preservation of the converts’ social integration. Whenever a group, larger than the family, accustomed to exercise a measure of control over the social and religious life of the individuals that compose it, accepts the Christian religion (or a large proportion accept it with the encouragement of the group), the essential principle of the mass movements is manifest.’ J. Waskom Pickett, Christian Mass Movements in India (New York, 1933), 22.

2There is almost no scholarly literature on the Roman Catholics and the Dalits during this period. Two exceptions are Henriette Bugge’s study of Paris Missionary Society in Tamilnadu, Mission and Tamil Society: Social and Religious Change in South India 1840-1900 (Richmond 1994), 167-178 and Christopher Harding’s comparative study of the Belgian Capuchins and Church Missionary Society in the Punjab, Religious Transformation in South Asia: The Meanings of Conversion in Colonial Punjab (Oxford 2008).

3A. Mathias Mundadan, History of Christianity in India. Volume I: From the Beginning up to the Middle of the Sixteenth Century (Bangalore, 1984), 191-192.

4A good study of this is Robert L. Hardgrave Jr., The Nadars of Tamilnad (Bombay, 1969), 43-70.

5Frederick and Margaret Stock have argued that this choice of evangelistic methods reveals an

unconscious elitist strategy. People Movements in the Punjab with special reference to the United Presbyterian Church (South Pasadena, 1975), 18-20. This is a good point but should not obscure the fact that missionaries became conscious of their ‘unconscious strategy’ only after the Dalit mass movements began. It was ‘wisdom after the fact’.

6For example in 1824 the Serampore Christian community included 20 Brahmins, 8 Kshatriyas, 28 Vaisyas, 64 Sudras, 25 Muslims, 7 Anglo- Indians and 5 Cochin Jews. E. Daniel Potts, British Baptist Missionaries in India 1793-1837 (Cambridge, 1967), 45. I have estimated that between 1834 and 1886 the converts of the Punjab and North India Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. were by background 33% Muslim, 19% Brahmins, 6% high caste Hindu, 24% Hindu (unspecified), 11% low caste Hindu, and 7% Sikh. John C.B. Webster, The Christian Community and Change in Nineteenth Century North India (Delhi, 1976), 49. Similar diversity is apparent in the 1871 Madras Census data provided by G.A. Oddie, ‘Christian Conversion among non-Brahmins in Andhra Pradesh, with Special Reference to Anglican Missions and the Dornakal Diocese, c. 1900 - 1936’, in G.A. Oddie, Religion in South Asia (New Delhi, 1977), 68.

7G.A. Oddie, ‘Protestant Missions, Caste and Social Change In India, 1850-1914’, Indian Economic and Social History Review, VI (September 1969), 259-291; Duncan B. Forrester, Caste and Christianity (London, 1979). Similar accounts dealing exclusively with Tamilnadu are found in S.

Manickam, Studies in Missionary History: Reflections on a Culture-Contact (Madras, 1988), 32-61 and Hugald Grafe, History of Christianity in India. Volume IV, Part 2: Tamilnadu in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (Bangalore, 1990), 97-113.

8The general reason given for this is that caste feeling was stronger in the South than in the North. My own view is that it was only in the South that several jatis of varying status joined the church in sufficiently large numbers to enforce old distinctions upon the others. In Tamilnadu these were the Vellalas, the Nadars and the Paraiyar. In Kerala they were the Syrian Christians, the Izhavas, and the Pulayas. In Andhra Pradesh they were the Kammas and Reddys, the Madigas and Malas.

9See also John C. B. Webster, op.cit., 175.

10Report of the Third Decennial Missionary Conference Held at Bombay, 1892-93 (Bombay, 1893),

I: 5-55; II 541-589.

11Even Pickett in his important study, Christian Mass Movements in India, was far from detailed or comprehensive in this respect.

12For a discussion of the appropriateness of the label, ‘movement’, see John C. B. Webster, ‘LargeScale Conversion to Christianity in Late Nineteenth Century Punjab as an Early Dalit Movement’, in Chetan Singh, ed., Social Transformation in India: The Punjab Region in the Twentieth Century (forthcoming).

13The Census figures for 1881-1931 are assembled in my ‘Christians and Sikhs in the Punjab: the Village Encounter’, Bulletin of the Christian Institute of Sikh Studies, VI (December 1977), 5 and ‘Punjabi Christians’, Journal of Punjab Studies (forthcoming).

14In the 1931 Census there were 1,058,663 Chuhras who were Hindu, Sikh, Muslim or Ad Dharm. It is safe to assume that at least 300,000 Christians were Chuhras, but there are no caste data on Christians. Khan Ahmad Hasan Khan, Census of India, 1931. Punjab Part I - Report, 322, 334.

15A.C. Turner, Census of India 1931, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. Part I: Report, 500.

16John E. Clough, Social Christianity in the Orient (New York, 1914), 92- 107; David Downie, The

Lone Star: The History of the Telugu Mission of the American Baptist Missionary Union (Philadelphia, 1893), 78-81; George H. Brock, “Yerragunthla Pariah,” The Baptist Missionary Review, XI (August 1905), 291-298.

17‘For consider your call, brethren: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth; but God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise, God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong, God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.’ (Revised Standard Version).

18American Baptist Missionary Union. Fifty-Seventh Annual Report: with the Proceedings of the Annual Meeting held in Chicago, Ill. May 23,1871, 61; Alvin Texas Fishman, For This Purpose (Madras, 1958), 8.

19John E. Clough, op. cit., 224.

20Yogi Nasriah, who died in 1825, was originally a Muslim but then started a Hindu reform

movement which resembled Christianity in its teaching that God is one and is spirit, as well as in its repudiation both of idolatry and of caste exclusiveness. By the 1860s this movement had lost its original power, so Nasriah’s followers were ready for the new teaching Christianity had to offer. Ibid., 140-141.

21Ibid., 224-225.

22Ibid., 159.

23‘American Baptist Missionary Union. Sixty-Fifth Annual Report’, The Baptist Missionary

Magazine LIX (July 1879). 240.

24Clough gave the substance of the petitions requesting baptism as ‘Preacher ____ has preached in our village more or less for several years; but we did not believe what he said. The famine came, and many or several from our village worked on the canal. By this aid, and the loving words of the missionary, urging us to work, and not be discouraged, or not to give up, we are now alive. We have learned about Jesus Christ: we now believe in him as the only God and Saviour. We are very poor: our huts are fallen down, and we have not much to eat but leaves; but we do not ask you for money. We will not ask you for a pie, even though we starve to death; but we believe in Jesus, and, as he commanded us, we want to be baptized. We can die, if it be God’s will; but we want to be baptized first. Be pleased to grant our request, and do not put us off any longer. May the Lord help us all!’ Ibid., 238.

25John E. Clough, op. cit., 363.

26W.L. Ferguson, ‘The Growth of the Church in the Mission Field: IV. The Telugu Mission of the

American Baptist Foreign Mission Society’, The International Review of Missions, I (1912), 691.

27Andrew Gordon, Our India Mission (Philadelphia, 1886), 421-432; Frederick and Margaret Stock, op. cit., 64-67. See also my ‘A Quest for the Historical Ditt’, Indian Church History Review, XXXVII (June 2003), 53-68.

28The Seventeenth Annual Report of the Board of Foreign Missions of the United Presbyterian Church of North America Presented to the General Assembly in May 1876 (hereafter referred to as UPCNA Annual Report), 19. That year there had been 46 baptisms in the Zafarwal area, where Ditt came from, and 25 the previous year; all apparently were Chuhras. Ibid. and UPCNA Annual Report: May 1875, 21. (The discrepancy between the dates given in the text and in the references is due to the fact that reports for the year were written at the end of the year and submitted to the General Assembly the following May.)

29Robert Stewart, Life and Work in India (Philadelphia, 1896), 242.

30Andrew Gordon, op. cit., 437-445.

31UPCNA Annual Report: May 1885, 38.

32UPCNA Annual Report: May 26th 1887, 29; UPCNA Annual Report: 1905, 165.

33UPCNA Annual Report: May 1876, 19; UPCNA Annual Report: May, 1877, 15.

34Andrew Gordon, op. cit., 428-429.

35Frederick and Margaret Stock, op. cit., 68.

36Ibid., 69 and UPCNA Annual Report: May 26th, 1887, 37.

37Frederick and Margaret Stock, op. cit., 109-111.

38UPCNA Annual Report: May, 1884, 85.

39UPCNA Annual Report: May, 1885, 19.

40Robert Stewart, op. cit., 243.

41UPCNA Annual Report: May 24th, 1888, 46; UPCNA Annual Report: 1905, 164.

42UPCNA Annual Report: May, 1884, 83.

43UPCNA Annual Report: May 27th, 1886, 70-71. 44UPCNA Annual Report: May 28th, 1891, 29.

45Gordon, writing in 1886, put the conditions of admission to baptism in these terms. ‘The

attainments of these people before baptism are necessarily very limited. To set up a high standard, and require them to reach it before admission, would, we think, be entirely without Scripture example. They must know Jesus Christ the Son of God, the sinless One, and the only Saviour of sinners; they must know that he came from God, became man, laid down his life for sinners, and now welcomes all, even the poorest and vilest, to come to him; they must turn their backs upon idols, and every religion but that of Jesus, heartily receiving and resting upon him alone, and promising obedience to him. If we are satisfied with them on such simple points as these, we think it our duty to receive them.’ Op. cit., 462.

46Some of these misgivings came up or were discussed in the following Annual Reports: 1876, 19; 1877, 15; 1884, 85-86; 1885, 25-27.

47C.W. Forman, ‘The Chuhras’, The Presbyterian Monthly Record, 36 (July 1885), 263.

48John C.B. Webster, The Christian Community and Change, 47.

49John F.W. Youngson, Forty Years of the Panjab Mission of the Church of Scotland, 1855-1895

(Edinburgh, 1896), 258-261; H.F. Lechmere Taylor, In the Land of the Five Rivers (Edinburgh, 1906), 85-87; Elizabeth G.K. Hewat, Vision and Achievement 1796-1956 (London, 1960), 119.

50Robert Clark, The Missions of the Church Missionary Society and the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society in the Punjab and Sindh edited & revised by Robert Maconachie (London, 1904), 122; R. Maconachie, Rowland Bateman: Nineteenth Century Apostle (London, 1917), 101.

51See H.C. Velte, ‘Mission Work among the Low Caste Tribes of the Punjab’, The Indian Evangelical Review, LXIX (July 1891), 1-12.

52UPCNA Annual Report: May 28th, 1890, 54.

53See Frederick and Margaret Stock, op. cit., 102. The charge was not entirely groundless. See Fr.

Leo, The Capuchin Mission in the Punjab (Mangalore, 1910), 129.

54Harikishan Kaul, Census of India, 1911. Vol. XIV, Punjab. Part II: Tables, 444-451.

55Report of the South Indian Missionary Conference held at Madras, January 2-5,1900 (Madras,

1900), 44-45.

56H.B. Hyde, ‘South Indian Missions—The Present Opportunity’, The East and the West, VI (January 1908), 78.

57Henry Whitehead, ‘The Progress of Christianity in India and Mission Strategy’, The East and the West. V (January 1907), 23.

58Frederick and Margaret Stock, op. cit.; Samuel Jayakumar, Dalit Consciousness and Christian Conversion: Historical Resources for a Contemporary Debate (Delhi, 1999). The essays on Dalit movements in F. Hrangkhuma, ed., Christianity in India: Search for Liberation and Identity (Delhi, 1998) would fall into this category.

59Sundararaj Manickam, The Social Setting of Christian Conversion in South India (Wiesbaden, 1977); James P. Alter, In the Doab and Rohilkhand: North Indian Christianity 1815-1915, revised and completed by John Alter (Delhi, 1986).

60G.A. Oddie, ‘Christian Conversions in the Telugu Country 1860- 1900: A Case Study of One Protestant Indian Movement in the Godavery- Krishna Delta’, Indian Economic and Social History Review, XII (January- March 1975), 61-80; J.W. Gladstone, Protestant Christianity and People’s Movements in Kerala (Trivandrum, 1984); Franklyn J. Balasundaram, Dalits and Christian Mission in the Tamil Country (Bangalore, 1997); George Oommen and John C. B. Webster, eds., Local Dalit Christian History (Delhi, 2002). My own work, The Christian Community and Change in Nineteenth Century North India, combines the second and third approach in an analytical rather than narrative fashion.

61Duncan B. Forrester, Caste and Christianity, 74.

62Ibid., 77.

63Ibid., 81.

64Ibid., 75.

65All the ethnographic data in the previous chapter supports this conclusion. It is significant that

William Wiser, a missionary, wrote the pioneer work on The Hindu Jajmani System in the 1930s in the U.P., a mass movement area.

66A Mala from village Raghapuram in Andhra. G.A. Oddie, ‘Christian Conversion in the Telugu Country’, 67.

67A Paraiyan from village Perunkarunaipalayam in Tamilnadu. Sundararaj Manickam, The Social Setting of Christian Conversion in South India, 80-82.

68Ibid., 82-83.

69Quoted in James P. Alter, op. cit., 140.

70See John C.B. Webster, The Christian Community and Change, 61-62.

71Oddie also refers to the role of family and economic networks in the conversion of Paraiyar in the

Tanjore and Trichinopoly districts. G. A. Oddie, Hindu and Christian in South-East India (London, 1991), 156.

72The United Presbyterians in the Punjab made a general policy of not interfering lest it encourage dependency among their converts, the very thing the missionaries wanted to avoid. Andrew Gordon, Our India Mission, 438, 445.

73Ibid., 61-62; G.A. Oddie, ‘Christian Conversion in the Telugu Country’, 76-77; Sundararaj Manickam, The Social Setting of Christian Conversion in South India, 106; Dick Kooiman, Conversion and Social Equality in India (Columbia, n.d.), 82-83. Oddie’s description of the Paraiyar in Tanjore and Trichinopoly districts is more ambivalent on this point. Compare pp. 157158 with p. 159 of G.A. Oddie, Hindu and Christian in South East India.

74G.A. Oddie, ‘Christian Conversion in the Telugu Country’, 75; Sundararaj Manickam, The Social Setting of Christian Conversion in South India, 89.

75G.A. Oddie, ‘Christian Conversion in the Telugu Country’, 71.

76Ibid., 68-69; James P. Alter, op. cit., 200.

77The Church Missionary Society seems to have approached the Pulayas in Travancore before the

Pulayas approached them, but the Pulaya conversion movement relied heavily upon Pulaya initiative. J.W. Gladstone, op. cit., 110-117; George Oommen, ‘The Struggle of Anglican Pulaya Christians for Social Improvement in Travancore, 1854-1966’ (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Sydney, 1993), 16-92. The Methodists around Moradabad tried and succeeded to get a mass movement going among the Lal Begis, but they already had Lal Begi converts helping them in that campaign. James P. Alter, op. cit., 197-201.

78There were also mass movements among tribals in the Central Provinces and Bengal Presidency during this period, but the Dalit mass movements were larger.

79The Census of 1881 and of 1931 did not provide separate figures for Indian Christians as did the others. The 1881 figure was arrived at by using the percentage growth figures cited in the 1901 Census (1872-1881 = 22.0%; 1881-1891 = 33%). General Report of the Census of India, 1901, 388). The 1931 figure was arrived at by subtracting 90% of the foreign and Anglo-Indian population from the total Christian population of 6,296,763.

80J.H. Hutton, Census of India, 1931. Vol. I - India. Part I - Report, 423.

81W.L. Ferguson, op. cit., 692.

82UPCNA Annual Report: May 26th, 1887, 38.

83See Frederick and Margaret Stock, op. cit., 90-91 for the statistics and Robert Stewart, op. cit.,

267-276 for the details.

84In the Punjab the United Presbyterians certainly went much farther in becoming a rural and mass movement mission than did the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. or the Church Missionary

Society. John C.B. Webster, ‘Mission Sources of Nineteenth Century Punjab History’, in W. Eric Gustafson and Kenneth W. Jones, eds., Sources of Punjab History (Delhi, 1975), 179-181.

85J.A.L. Montgomery, ‘Christian Village Settlements in the Punjab’, The East and the West, III (January 1905), 30-35.

86G.A. Oddie, Social Protest in India, 142-143. This account of the agitation follows Oddie’s on pp. 128-146. See also Hugald Grafe, op. cit., 215-216.

87W.L. Ferguson, ‘The Bearing of the Influx of Panchamas into the Church on the Evangelization of India’, The Baptist Missionary Review, XI (May 1905), 170.

88For example in 1899 Stewart described the occupations of the United Presbyterian converts in the Punjab, almost all of whom were Chuhras, in these terms. ‘The great body of our Christians are common coolies or sweepers, and earn a precarious livelihood as hired laborers. Many of them are agriculturalists, but work for Hindu or Moslem farmers in a kind of serfdom. Nor is that serfdom of that fixed variety which guarantees permanent home and perpetual employment. They are liable to be dismissed from time to time at the will of their masters. A few of our people rent and farm land for themselves, while a rare individual here and there, owns property as other zamindars do. A number of Christians speculate in skins and other articles of merchandise; some weave for a living; some are house servants; some are teachers, scriveners, policemen, or employees in the civil service; while about 200 are working for the Mission.’ Robert Stewart, op. cit., 243-244. The 1911 and 1921 Census in both the Punjab and the United Provinces indicated that the occupations of the vast majority of Christians were ordinary cultivators, farm servants and field labourers, ‘industries concerned with refuse matter’, and labourers (unspecified). Census of India, 1911. Punjab. Part II: Imperial Tables, 388-393; Census of India, 1921. Volume XV Punjab. Part II: Imperial Tables, 366377; Census of India, 1911. United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. Part II: Imperial Tables, 548-561; Census of India, 1921. Volume XVI United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. Part II: Imperial Tables, 395-407.

89See footnote 1.

90John E. Clough, op. cit., 171-172.

91Robert Stewart, op. cit., 232-236; J.W. Gladstone, op. cit., 112-113, 121- 122; Sundararaj

Manickam, The Social Setting of Christian Conversion, 89- 90; G.A. Oddie, Social Protest in India, 132-135; John C.B. Webster, The Christian Community and Change, 147-148; Godfrey E. Phillips, The Outcastes’ Hope or Work Among the Depressed Classes in India (London, 1915), 40-44.

92John C.B. Webster, The Christian Community and Change, 148.

93Godfrey E. Phillips, op. cit., 68.

94John E. Clough, op. cit., 166.

95Godfrey E. Phillips, op. cit., 82-83.

96W.L. Ferguson, ‘The Growth of the Church in the Mission Field’, 701-702; S. Martin, ‘Work

Among the Chuhras’, UPCNA Annual Report, 1906, 65; W.T. Anderson ‘Progress in the Village

Christian Communities’, UPCNA Annual Report, 1909, 170-173.

97H. B. Hyde, op. cit., 78.

98Dick Kooiman, op.cit., 188-189.

99This problem was to be rectified in the 1920s. At Moga Presbyterian missionaries developed new

patterns of education more suited to the village situation. These won acceptance in both Christian and Government circles. See W.S. Hunt, India’s Outcastes: A New Era (London, 1924), 71-83, 8891.

100Godfrey E. Phillips, op. cit., 84-85; A.B. Mynors, ‘Mass Movements in India: The Church’s Opportunity and Responsibility’, The East and the West, XVIII (January 1920), 42-43.

101J.F. Burditt, ‘Work Among the Depressed Classes and the Masses: Paper I’, Report of the Third Decennial Missionary Conference Held at Bombay, 1892-93 (Bombay, 1893), I: 16-17. C.H. Monahan, ‘The Uplifting of the Pariah’, The Harvest Field (November 1910), 429. Sydney Cave, ‘A Typical Mass Movement Church—1806 to 1918’, The International Review of Missions, VII (1918), 478-479.

102G.A. Oddie, ‘Christian Conversion in the Telugu Country’, 76; Sundararaj Manickam, The Social Setting of Christian Conversion, 110. In this connection it is perhaps significant that in 1914 J.A. McConnelee could report that a majority of the students in the United Presbyterian boarding schools in Sialkot were Dalits. ‘The Chuhras—Their History and Their Future’, The Women’s Missionary Magazine (November 1914), 210. 103R. Maconachie, Rowland Bateman: Nineteenth Century Apostle, 101-102; Dick Kooiman, op. cit., 179 - 180. The problems posed by intermarriage are illustrated in W.S. Hunt, op. cit., 69.

104Perhaps the best publicized case of this kind took place among the Chamars in Delhi during 1884. James P. Alter and Herbert Jai Singh, The Church in Delhi (Lucknow, 1961), 29-36.

105W.S. Hunt, op. cit., 101.

106The Methodists were one. Frank W. Warne, ‘Indian Women in the Mass Movement’, Woman’s

Missionary Friend (January 1914), 6.

107Dick Kooiman, op.cit., 188-189, G.A. Oddie, Hindu and Christian in South-East India, 162165.

108On Kerala, see J.W. Gladstone, op. cit., 123-138; Dick Kooiman, op.cit., 177-178. On North India see John C.B. Webster, The Christian Community and Change, 254-255.

109See the description in Kate M. Corbett, ‘Evangelistic Work: Sketch of Work Among Women in India’, The Women’s Missionary Magazine (March 1910), 263-265.

110See, e.g., Rosa T. Wilson, ‘City and District Work in India’, ibid. (November 1904), 108; ‘Report of the Foreign Secretary’, ibid. (June 1909), 410 - 411.

111Frank W. Warne, op.cit., 7.

112Other evidence that this may have been so is provided by Melva A. Livermore, ‘A Gospel Tour

Through Meerut District’, Women’s Missionary Friend (September 1914), 311 and Jessie I. Peters, ‘From Village to Village’, ibid., 349.

113Josephine L. White, ‘Letter from India’, The Women’s Missionary Magazine (July 1895), 326327.

114‘The process by which a “low” Hindu caste, or tribal or other group, changes its customs, ritual, ideology, and way of life in the direction of a high, frequently “twice-born” caste.’ M.N. Srinivas, Social Change in Modern India (Bombay, n.d.), 6.

115Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India: The Namasudras of Bengal 1872-1947 (Richmond, 1997), 64-98.

116George Oommen, The Struggle of Anglican Pulaya Christians, 295-315.

117Supra. 75-76.

118Although Phule was educated in a Christian school and was accused of being a Christian, his

work may be the one exception. J.R. Shinde, Dynamics of Cultural Revolution: 19th Century Maharashtra (Delhi, 1985), 51-119.

119‘Editorial Notes’, The Harvest Field (March 1898), 119.

120This regional survey is based on Charles H. Heimsath, op. cit., 230- 308; S.K. Gupta, The

Scheduled Castes in Modern Indian Politics: Their Emergence as a Political Power (New Delhi, 1985), 71-181; Trilok Nath, Politics of the Depressed Classes (Delhi, 1987), 18-35.

121Charles H. Heimsath, op. cit., 246. 122Ibid., 261. See also J.W. Gladstone, op. cit., 208 and his description of the work of Ayyan Kali

among the Pulayas. It and that of the Travancore government were strongly motivated by a desire to prevent their conversion to Christianity, Ibid., 265-289, 293-302.

123S. Natarajan, A Century of Social Reform in India (Bombay, 1959), 171.

124Gaikwar of Baroda, ‘The Depressed Classes of India’, in The Depressed Classes of India: An

Enquiry into their Conditions and Suggestions for their Uplift with an Introduction by Rajinder Singh Vatsa (New Delhi, 1977), 12. This is a reprint of a volume of collected speeches and essays originally published in 1912.

125Kenneth W. Jones, Arya Dharm: Hindu Consciousness in 19th-Century Punjab (Berkeley, 1976), 202,203; John C.B. Webster, The Christian Community and Change, 145-150.

126Indian Social Reformer, vol. 36, p. 592. Quoted by Martin Luther Dolbeer, ‘The Movement for the Emancipation of the Untouchable Classes in South India’ (Unpublished M.A. Thesis, University of Chicago, 1929), 127. Kooiman attributes it to N.G. Chandavarkar, Op. cit., 88.

127Trilok Nath, op. cit., 43-44.

128Kenneth W. Jones, op.cit., 305-306; Kenneth W. Jones, ‘Religious Identity and the Indian

Census’, in N. Gerald Barrier, ed., The Census in British India, 91-92.

129These are collected in The Depressed Classes of India. See the essays by Ambika Charan

Muzumdar, p. 20; B. De, p. 24; Annie Besant, p. 32; T.V. Seshagiri Aiyar, pp. 54-55, 57; Sant Nehal Singh, p. 59; Babu Govind Das, pp. 169-170; G.A. Natesan, p. 182. See also J.L. Chatterjee, ‘Our Depressed Classes’, The Hindustan Review, XXV (February 1912), 153, and Ganga Ram and Charan Das, The Uplift Movement at Sialkot Punjab: A Brief Report of the Working of the Arya Megh Uddhar Sabha (1914), 1-2. Quotations from leading Hindus are also found in A.F. Painter, ‘The “Untouchables” of India and Christ’, The East and the West, X (April 1912), 201-203.

130J.N. Farquhar, Modern Religious Movements in India (Indian ed.; Delhi, 1967), 368-369; Trilok Nath, op. cit., 44.

131S.K. Gupta, op. cit., 168.

132Examples of Christ-centered sect groups of this kind are found in John C.B. Webster, The

Christian Community and Change, 122-123. I owe this insight to Penny Webster.

133An Indian Christian testimony to this is found in S.K. Datta, ‘The Spirit and Conditions of Independence’, in ‘The Up-Building and Expansion of the Indian Church’ Being a Collection of Addresses Delivered at the North Indian Conference of Christian Workers (Mussoorie, 1910), 18. In Kerala Syrian Christians did not oppose conversion so much as the subsequent integration of Pulaya Christians into their congregations. George Oommen, op. cit., 186-224.

Chapter 3 1G. Aloysius, Nationalism Without A Nation in India (Delhi, 1997), 80. On the nonBrahmin and

Self-Respect movements in the Madras Presidency, for whom proportional [caste] representation and self-respect were major issues, see V. Geetha and S. V. Rajadurai, Towards a Non- Brahmin Millennium: From Iyothee Thass to Periyar (Calcutta, 1999).

2Aloysius has also pointed out that ‘It is significant, that the earliest struggles of the oppressed in the modern era, attack the religio-ritual and cultural sphere of the old order, indicating the most damaging aspects of the system.’ Nationalism without a Nation in India., 56. This happened not only through conversion but through the creation of new religious sects and movements. It is at this second stage that the struggle takes a more overtly political form but, as continuing conversion movements as well as the Self-Respect movement demonstrate, the attack on the religio-ritual and cultural did not cease.

3The most important of these are The Indian Witness, (IW), a Methodist weekly published in Lucknow expressing predominantly missionary opinion; the National Christian Council Review, (NCCR), a Protestant monthly expressing both Indian and missionary opinion; The Guardian, (G), an Indian Protestant weekly published in Calcutta until 1932 and thereafter in Madras; The Indian Social Reformer, (ISR), published in Bombay by the well known Hindu social reformer, K. Natarajan; the Gandhian weekly, Harijan, (H), which began publication in 1933; and The Depressed Classes: A Chronological Documentation, (DC), which is a compilation by some Jesuits in Kurseong of newspaper reports dealing with the Depressed Classes from August 1932 to March 1938. These newspapers not only carried on considerable dialogue with each other but also printed selections from other newspapers as well. They therefore provide quite broad and intensive coverage of this stage of the Dalit movement.

4S.K. Gupta, The Scheduled Castes in Modern Indian Politics: Their Emergence as a Political Power (New Delhi, 1985) and Trilok Nath, Politics of the Depressed Classes (Delhi, 1987).

5These resolutions are given in B.R. Ambedkar, What Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables (second edition; Bombay, 1946), 14- 18.

6See S.K. Gupta, The Scheduled Castes in Modern Indian Politics, 187- 192, and Trilok Nath, Politics of the Depressed Classes, 53.

7S.K. Gupta, op. cit., 189-196; Trilok Nath, op. cit., 57-58.

8S.K. Gupta, op. cit., 203-204.

9Ibid., 206. In February 1922 a Chamar Conference, meeting in Delhi, took time out to greet the

prince and present a petition to him. A. Crosthwaite, ‘A Conference of the Depressed Classes in India’, The East and the West (July 1922), 204-210.

10This is described in Eugene F. Irschick, Politics and Social Conflict in South India (Berkeley,

1969), 188-192.

11Trilok Nath, op.cit., 62.

12Of the Rs. 200,000 it set aside from the Tilak Memorial Fund for this purpose, it actually

allocated only Rs. 43,381 during 1921-1923, and then decided to transfer the responsibility for removing untouchability to the Hindu Mahasabha! B.R. Ambedkar, op. cit., 22-36.

13‘Mr. Gandhi on Caste’, ISR (19 December, 1920), 269-271; ‘Caste and Untouchability’, ISR (9 October, 1921), 87-88; ‘Removal of Untouchability’, ISR (10 May, 1924), 579-80.

14One of these was the Jat Pak Todak Mandal. ‘League to Abolish Caste System’, ISR (13 January, 1923), 320.

15See ‘The Untouchables in the Madras Presidency’, The Harvest Field (April 1920), 143-147.

16‘Notes’, ISR (3 March, 1923), 425-426; ‘The Untouchable Classes’, ISR (6 October, 1923), 92.

17‘Panchama Conference at Melkote’, ISR (13 April, 1919), 429. 18‘Notes’, ISR (29 February, 1920), 410; ‘Depressed Classes in Travancore’, ISR (13 October,

1923), 103-104.

19Census of India, 1931. Vol. XVII, Punjab Part I: Report, 266; Vol. VII, Bihar and Orissa Part I: Report, 228; Vol. XVIII, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh Part I: Report, 461.

20Census of India, 1931. Vol. XIV, Madras Part I: Report, 281.

21Census of India, 1931. Vol. XXI, Cochin Part I: Report, 195.

22Census of India, 1931. Vol. XXVIII, Travancore Part I: Report, 310.

23Census of India, 1931. Vol. XVIII, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh Part I: Report, 438.

24Census of India, 1931. Vol. VIII, Bombay Presidency Part I: General Report, 251.

25Census of India, 1931. Vol. VIII, Bihar and Orissa Part I: Report, 268-269.

26The Ad-Dharmis, unlike the others, used an original religion as the basis of their unity. See Mark

Juergensmeyer, Religion and Social Vision: The Movement Against Untouchability in Twentieth Century Punjab (Berkeley, 1982), 22-63.

27S.K. Gupta, The Scheduled Castes in Modern Indian Politics, 230.

28M.C. Rajah, The Oppressed Hindus (Madras, 1925).

29S.K. Gupta, op. cit., 226.

30This is based primarily upon M.S.A. Rao, Social Movements and Social Transformation (Delhi,

1979), 61-67.

31This account is based on Eleanor Mae Zelliot, Dr. Ambedkar and the Mahar Movement, 100-105.

32Census of India, 1931. Vol. XIV, Madras Part I: Report, 323; Vol. XXI, Cochin Part I: Report,

237; Vol. XXIII, H.E.H. the Nizam’s Dominions Part I: Report, 241; Vol. XXVIII, Travancore Part I: Report, 337.

33Susan Billington Harper, In the Shadow of the Mahatma: Bishop V.S. Azariah and the Travails of

Christianity in British India (Grand Rapids and London, 2000), 184; John C. B. Webster, ‘Dalits and Christianity in Colonial Punjab: Cultural Interactions’, in Judith M. Brown and Robert Eric Frykenberg, eds., Christians, Cultural Interaction, and India’s Religious Traditions (Grand Rapids and London, 2002), 107-112.

34Census of India, 1931. Vol. XVIII, United Provinces of Agra and Oudh Part I: Report, 501-502; Vol. XIX Baroda Part I: Report, 378-380.

35S.K. Gupta, op. cit., 55-56.

36P.O. Philip, The Depressed Classes and Christianity, (Madras, 1925), 40.

37Ibid.

38While the AICIC was open to Roman Catholics and tried very hard to get them to join, they were

successful in this only periodically. See The Report of the Third All India Conference of Indian Christians Held in Madras 1916, 30 (Hereafter referred to as AICIC Report by year). AICIC Report, 1917, 47; AICIC Report, 1920, 6-26; AICIC Report, 1926, 17-18.

39AICIC Report, 1914, 1.

40AICIC Report, 1917, 59-64.

41AICIC Report, 1919, xvi.

42AICIC Report, 1923, 53.

43S.K. Gupta, op.cit., 231.

44AICIC Report, 1914, 23, xi-xvi; AICIC Report, 1919, 22-23, viii-xiv; AICIC Report, 1929, 27.

45AICIC Report, 1926, 25-26.

46See Supra, 103.

47J.W. Gladstone, Protestant Christianity and People’s Movements in Kerala 1850-1936, 343;

George Oommen, The Struggle of Anglican Pulaya Christians, 278-352; Census of India 1931. Vol. XXVIII, Travancore Part I: Report, 439.

48One of these is described in ‘Rural Education in India’, NCCR (May 1924), 175-184.

49Two very thoughtful articles on this subject coming from the Punjab are: R.B. Nesbitt,

‘Disabilities of Village Christians’, NCCR (June 1926), 325-331 and Barkat Ullah, ‘An Aspect of the Mass Movement Problem in the Punjab’, NCCR (May 1927), 291- 300.

50‘Caste and Christianity’, ISR (26 January,1924), 347; ‘News of the Week’, ISR (24 May, 1924), 618.

51J.W. Gladstone, op. cit., 339-342; George Oommen, op. cit., 225-277.

52‘News of the Week’, ISR (24 May, 1924), 618; ‘News of the Week’, ISR (7 June, 1924), 650;

‘Caste in the Indian Church’, ISR (14 June, 1924), 663-664.

53‘Anti-Untouchability Conference in Madras’, ISR (7 November, 1925), 152.

54S.K. Gupta, op.cit., 244.

55Indian Statutory Commission Oral Evidence - Bombay Volume II: Eleventh Meeting held at

Poona. October 23rd. 1928 at 11:00 a.m., 12-13. (Hereafter referred to as Oral Evidence with meeting place and date).

56Oral Evidence, Tenth Meeting, Madras, February 26, 1929, 2-31.

57Oral Evidence, Sixth Meeting, Delhi, November 26, 1928, 8.

58Oral Evidence, Thirteenth Meeting, Madras, March 1, 1929, A17- A29; Oral Evidence,

Fourteenth Meeting, Madras, March 1, 1929, 2-13. An excellent study of the contrasting Protestant and Catholic approaches to these issues in South India can be found in Chandra Mallampalli, Christians and Public Life in Colonial South India, 1863-1937: Contending with Marginality (London and New York, 2004), 87-156.

59Oral Evidence, Thirteenth Meeting, Madras, March 1, 1929, A21- A26.

60Oral Evidence, Fourteenth Meeting, Madras, March 1, 1929, 13-26, A1-A2.

61Oral Evidence, Sixth Meeting, Delhi, November 26, 1928, 11.

62Oral Evidence, Tenth Meeting, Madras, February 26, 1929, 19.

63Oral Evidence, Fourteenth Meeting, Madras, March 1, 1929, 14-20.

64Oral Evidence, Tenth Meeting, Madras, February 26, 1929, 19.

65Ibid., A-7.

66Oral Evidence, Fourteenth Meeting, Madras, March 1, 1929, 18, 20- 21.

67Ibid., A-7.

68Report of the Indian Statutory Commission, Volume 2 - Recommendations, (Calcutta, 1930), 65-

67.

69S.K. Gupta, op. cit. , 264.

70Compare ‘Notes’, G (29 May, 1930), 254 with ‘Notes’, G (17 July, 1930), 338.

71Trilok Nath has argued that the Government chose Srinivasan over the more prominent M.C.

Rajah because the latter’s persistent denunciation of the civil disobedience movement had made him very unpopular in India. Op. cit. , 120.

72B.R. Ambedkar, op. cit. , 42-52.

73Eleanor Mae Zelliot, op. cit., 175-177.

74S.K. Gupta, op. cit. , 270-273.

75Trilok Nath, op. cit., 127-131.

76Quoted in B.R. Ambedkar, op. cit., 69.

77Ibid., 71. 78Ibid., 66.

79Trilok Nath, op. cit. , 68.

80B.R. Ambedkar, op. cit., 68. Gandhi’s posturing on this point was particularly infuriating to

politically active Dalits. See V. Geetha and S.V. Rajadurai, Towards a Non-Brahmin Millennium, 361-362.

81‘Notes’, G (26 November, 1931), 541; ‘Minority Representation’, IW (19 November, 1931), 737-

738.

82K.T. Paul, ‘The Problems Before the All Parties Committee at Delhi’, G (20 March, 1930), 138; ‘Indian Christian Demands at the Round Table Conference’, G (11 June, 1931), 268-269.

83Indian Round Table Conference (Second Session), Proceedings of the Federal Structure Committee and Minorities Committee, III: 1370-1372, 1438- 1440.

84Ibid., 1394-1399; ‘Indian Christian Demands at the Round Table Conference’, G (11 June, 1931), 268-269.

85‘The Communal Award’, Dornakal Diocesan Magazine (October 1932), 10-13.

86Pyarelal, The Epic Fast (Ahmedabad, 1932), 30.

87Barbara R. Joshi, ‘Introduction’, in Barbara R. Joshi, ed., Untouchable! Voices of the Dalit

Liberation Movement (London, 1986), 12. Ambedkar’s acceptance of the pact seems to have been motivated by fear of massive violent retribution upon Dalits for Gandhi’s death in the fast. See Ravinder Kumar, Gandhi, Ambedkar and the Poona Pact (New Delhi, 1985), 21.

88This is based on many of Gandhi’s statements during this period. I have found three in Harijan unusually succinct: ‘Its Implications’, 11 February, 1933, 2; ‘Untouchability’, ibid, 4; ‘True Inwardness’, 12 August, 1933, 4. In describing Gandhi’s fast, Judith M. Brown indicates that he saw the removal of untouchability as but one dimension of his work for swaraj which, as she argues throughout her biography, consisted of far more in his view than being free of British rule. Gandhi: Prisoner of Hope (New Haven, 1989), 268.

89E.g., ‘Pundits’ Opinions on Untouchability’, H (11 February, 1933), 6.

90‘The Temple Entry Bill’, H (2 September, 1933), 4; ‘Temple Entry vs. Economic Uplift’, H (16

March, 1934), 36.

91Quoted in ‘Notes’, G (20 October, 1932), 437.

92‘True Inwardness’, H (12 August, 1933), 4.

93A good review of the events leading up to the Temple Entry Bill is found in ‘The Temple Entry

Bill’, ISR (1 September, 1934), 835; the closing debate is in ibid , 842-844.

94‘Temple Entry Bill’, G (26 July, 1934), 478.

95‘Provincial Governments on the Temple Entry Bill’, ISR (8 September, 1934), 24-25.

96‘Malaviya-Gandhiji Correspondence’, H (18 February, 1933), 4-7. See also the views of Raja

Bahadur G. Krishnamachariar, M.L.A. in ‘The Assembly and the Temple Entry Bill’, ISR (4 August, 1934), 778-779.

97‘The Inwardness of the Movement’, H (17 November, 1933), 5. See also K.M. Munshi, ‘The Hindu Temple Entry and Untouchability Abolition Bills’, H (29 June, 1934), 164-166.

98‘The Assembly and the Temple Entry Bill’, ISR (4 August, 1934), 778-779; ‘That Ill-Fated Measure’, H (31 August, 1934), 228.

99‘Travancore Letter’, G (24 November, 1932), 505; ‘Notes’, G (8 December, 1932), 522.

100Mukut Behari Verma, History of the Harijan Sevak Sangh 1932- 1968 (Delhi, 1971), 130.

101‘Temple Entry vs. Economic Uplift’, H (16 March, 1934), 36.

102‘Notes’, G (8 February, 1934), 81.

103Chinna Rao Yagati, Dalits’ Struggle for Identity: Andhra and Hyderabad 1900-1950 (New

Delhi, 2003), 118-119, 162-164.

104‘Gandhiji on the Harijan Tour’, H (10 August, 1934), 205.

105S.K. Gupta, op. cit., 299-302.

106‘Harijan Campaign’, G (21 June, 1934), 387; S.K. Gupta, op.cit. , 326- 327.; Trilok Nath, op.cit.

, 180-183.

107S.K. Gupta, op.cit., 302-308.

108Rajah also saw the issues in religious terms and gave priority to temple entry. ‘The Anti-

Untouchability Movement - I’, G (17 November, 1932), 487.

109‘Temple Entry vs. Economic Uplift’, H (16 March, 1934), 36.

110‘Weekly Letter - No.6’, H (22 December, 1933), 2.

111‘Dr. Ambedkar and Caste’, H (11 February, 1933), 3.

112‘The Fast and After’, G (29 September, 1932), 403; ‘Editorial Notes: The Greatest Reform of

Our Times’, NCCR (August 1933), 395-397; ‘Untouchability Repudiated’, IW (29 September, 1932), 610.

113‘Notes’, G (9 February, 1933), 62; ‘Editorial Notes: The Greatest Reform of Our Times’, NCCR (August 1933), 395-397; ‘Where Untouchability Reigns’, IW (10 August, 1933), 505.

114This metaphor is found in ‘True Inwardness’, H (2 August, 1933), 4. A Christian critique is found in ‘Notes’, G (17 August, 1933), 386. See also ‘Untouchables - Like Hindus’, IW (22 September, 1932), 594.

115‘Travancore Notes’, G (7 December, 1933), 584.

116K.V. Sesha Aiyangar, ‘Conversion from Hinduism’, G (5 September, 1935), 565.

117‘Christian Mass Movements in India’, G (15 March, 1934), 162-163; also the reprint of Bishop

Fisher’s review in The Christian Century in G (5 April, 1934), 217.

118J.W. Pickett, op. cit. passim. For a recent study of the Sudra movements, see G.A. Oddie, ‘Christian Conversion Among non- Brahmins in Andhra Pradesh’.

119It was during this period that the National Christian Council sponsored the Forward Movement in Evangelism. K. Baago, A History of the National Christian Council of India 1914-1964 (Nagpur, 1965), 54-59.

120‘What it means to be a Harijan’, H (22 April, 1933), 3; ‘Notes’, H (22 March, 1935), 42.

121E.g., ‘Notes’, ISR (24 August, 1935), 817-818.

122‘Notes’, G (23 March, 1933), 133-134.

123‘Untouchability in Christianity’, G (15 February, 1934), 108; ‘Notes’, G (1 March, 1934), 130.

124‘Notes’, G (27 April, 1933), 194; ‘Notes’, G (30 July, 1933), 338; ‘All India Catholic Congress’,

G (4 January, 1934), 14. While Periyar’s and the Self-Respecters’ attacks upon religion targeted mainly the Brahmins, they did not spare the Roman Catholic hierarchy and priesthood. V. Geetha and S.V. Rajadurai, op. cit., 307, 427-429.

125‘Notes’, G (20 October, 1932), 437-438; ‘Scholarships for Depressed Classes Christians’, G (11 October, 1934), 687; ‘The Educational Needs of Village Christians’, NCCR (November 1934), 612615.

126‘U.P. Government and Depressed Classes’, G (4 January, 1934), 10; ‘Bombay Government and Depressed Classes’, ISR (18 May, 1935), 604- 605; ‘A Good Resolution’, H (6 July, 1935), 161.

127‘Harijan Sevak Sangh’, ISR (6 April, 1935), 501.

128‘Bombay Harijans’ Resolution’, G (17 October, 1935), 670.

129Eleanor Mae Zelliot, op.cit., 201-202.

130‘Uplifting the Depressed Classes’, IW (28 November, 1935), 1; ‘Notes’, G (29 October, 1936),

689.

131B.R. Ambedkar, op.cit., chapter 8.

132There is a sampling of opinion in ‘Views on Dr. Ambedkar’s Declaration’, G (24 October,

1935), 685.

133‘Madras Leader’s Advice’, G (17 October, 1935), 670.

134‘The Depressed Classes and Hinduism’, ISR (16 November, 1935), 168-169.

135Eleanor Mae Zelliot, op.cit., 209. Her source is The Examiner.

136‘The Depressed Classes’ New Day’, IW (31 October, 1935), 690; ‘Views on Untouchability’, G

(16 January, 1936), 41.

137‘The Depressed Classes and the Press’, IW (21 November, 1935), 100.

138For statements of Dalit opinion see also Trilok Nath, op.cit. , 192- 195.

139‘Unfortunate’, H (19 October, 1935), 288.

140‘Hinduism and the Depressed Classes’, ISR (19 October, 1935), 100.

141Trilok Nath has also gathered caste Hindu opinion in op. cit. , 196.

142‘Views on Dr. Ambedkar’s Declaration’, G (31 October, 1935), 701.

143Eleanor Mae Zelliot, op.cit. , 211-222.

144Dhananjay Keer, Dr. Ambedkar—Life and Mission (3rd ed.; Bombay, 1971), 255.

145Eleanor Mae Zelliot, op.cit., 217. See also K.V. Sesha Aiyangar, ‘Should the Depressed Classes

Secede from Hinduism?’ G (12 December, 1935), 789-790. Trilok Nath states that ‘Ambedkar’s conversion efforts aroused missionary zeal in proselytising religions. A stream of letters and telegrams poured into his residence in which Muslim, Christian, Sikh and Buddhist correspondents urged him to adopt their respective religions’. He then goes on to provide ample evidence of Muslim, Sikh and Buddhist efforts, but not one single piece of evidence of Christians doing so. Op.

cit., 200-202.

146‘Notes’, G (24 October, 1935), 673-674 and (14 November, 1935), 721.

147‘The Depressed Classes’ New Day’, IW (31 October, 1935), 690; ‘Caste and Untouchability’,

IW (14 November, 1935), 1.

148E. Asirvatham, ‘The Depressed Classes and Christianity’, NCCR (December 1935), 616.

149‘The Bishop of Dornakal on Dr. Ambedkar’s Declaration’, G (12 December, 1935), 791 & 793.

150‘Notes’, G (7 November, 1935), 705.

151‘Concerning Untouchables’, G (9 January, 1936), 19.

152Eleanor Mae Zelliot, op.cit. , 218-222.

153The organizers, after inviting Ambedkar to preside, cancelled the conference on the grounds that

they found his address objectionable. In publishing the correspondence in his preface, Ambedkar stated that in his view what they really objected to was his attendance at the Sikh Mission Conference. B.R. Ambedkar, Annihilation of Caste with a Reply to Mahatma Gandhi and Caste in India - Their Mechanism, Genesis and Development, (Jullundur, 1968), 14.

154‘Limitation of Reformers’, H (21 March, 1936), 44.

155‘Mangs to Leave Hinduism’, G (18 June, 1936), 396; ‘Cochin Thiyas’ Decision’, ISR (6 June,

1936), 632-633.

156Eleanor Mae Zelliot, op.cit., 221.

157Ibid., 224; ‘Sikh Missionary Conference’, IW (30 April, 1936), 281.

158‘Orthodox Hindus and Sikhs’, IW (7 May, 1936), 290. See also Trilok Nath, op.cit. , 203-204.

For further information on especially Muslim and Sikh efforts to win over Dr. Ambedkar, see Bhagwan Das, ‘Ambedkar’s Journey to Mass Conversion’, in Devendra Swarup, ed., Politics of Conversion (Delhi, 1986), 316-319.

159‘Dr. Ambedkar’s Conference’, IW (21 May, 1936), 332; See also the entire 28 May, 1936 as well as the 4 June, 1936 issues of IW.

160G (11 June, 1936), 372.

161DC, 107.

162DC, 138-140.

163‘Ambedkar-Moonje Scheme’, G (13 August, 1936), 522-523, 527.

164‘Notes’, ibid., 513; ‘A Deal in Souls’, ISR (15 August, 1936), 788; ‘A Dangerous Proposal’, H

(22 August, 1936), 220.

165‘Notes’, ISR (31 October, 1936), 30; ‘The Mahasabha at Lahore’, ibid., 132-133; ‘Dr. Kurtkoti on Lahore Mahasabha’, ISR (5 December, 1936), 668-669.

166Recently Harish K. Puri has addressed the question of why Ambedkar and his followers decided not to convert to Sikhism. Two sources he cited indicate that Ambedkar was warned against it by Punjabi Dalits who told him of the atrocities they suffered at the hands of Jat Sikhs. Another,

perhaps less reliable, source stated that the Akali leadership was opposed to their conversion because the addition of millions of Dalit converts would threaten their Jat-based leadership in the Sikh community. Harish K. Puri, ‘The Scheduled Castes in the Sikh Community: A Historical Perspective’ in Harish K. Puri, ed., Dalits in Regional Context (Jaipur, 2004), 209-212.

167‘Temple-Entry in Travancore’, ISR (21 November, 1936), 180; ‘An Example for Hindu Princes and their Advisors’, H (21 November, 1936), 324. M.C. Rajah also expressed his happiness with the proclamation. DC, 256.

168P.O. Philip, ‘Unrest among the Izhavas of Travancore’, NCCR (June 1936), 302-305; A.S.A. Rao, op.cit. ,75-76.

169‘Forward Movement in Evangelism’, NCCR (December 1936), 668- 669.

170Susan Billington Harper, ‘The Politics of Conversion: The Azariah- Gandhi Controversy over

Christian Mission to the Depressed Classes in the 1930s’, Indo-British Review, XV:1, 150.

171M.K. Gandhi, Christian Missions: Their Place in India (Ahmedabad, 1941) has numerous examples of this taken from this period, 92-97 and 106-112. The same was true of the ISR , e.g., ‘Notes’, (2 May, 1936), 547.

172M.K. Gandhi, Christian Missions, 98. Earlier he said to Basil Mathews, ‘But to approach the Pulayas and Pariahs with their palsied hands and paralysed intelligence is no Christianity’. ‘Weekly Letter’, H (5 December, 1936), 339.

173M.K. Gandhi, Christian Missions , 105.

174Ibid., 104-105.

175‘Weekly Letter’, H (5 December, 1936), 339.

176‘Gandhi’s Slip’, ISR (3 April, 1937), 487.

177‘Notes’, ISR (27 June, 1936), 674.

178The most celebrated case, reported fully in The Hindu and ignored by The New Leader (The

Roman Catholic weekly published in Madras), concerned St. Mary’s Cathedral in Kumbakonam where caste distinctions were observed in seating and the bishop, while expressing sympathy for the Dalit Catholics, adopted the policy of ‘hastening slowly’ and condemned the agitators for being Self-Respecters stirring up trouble for ulterior reasons. The Adi-Dravida Catholic Conference in continuing their agitation sought and received support from Adi-Dravida Hindus including R. Srinivasan and M.C. Rajah. DC, 275-280, 283-286, 290-291, 304-305, 353, 418-419, 474-480, 483.

179‘Caste in the Indian Church’, G (12 March, 1936), 162-163.

180‘The Depressed Indian Christians Association’, G (6 August, 1936), 507; ‘Petition to Governor

by Depressed Class Christians’, G (28 January, 1937), 62.

181Ibid. and ‘Bombay Representative Christian Council Resolutions’, G (17 September, 1936), 603.

182Government of India (Scheduled Caste) Order, 1936 para 3, quoted in Marc Galanter, ‘The

Problem of Group Membership: Some Reflections on the Judicial View of Indian Society’, Journal

of the Indian Law Institute, IV (1962), 347. It has been argued that this ruling was intended to apply only to reserved seats in elected bodies and not to job reservations, scholarship aid, or other such reserved benefits because there were already laws on the books which included Dalit Christians among those eligible for the latter kinds of benefits. Edward Mathias, ‘Dalit Christians and Reservation Policy’, Social Action, 48 (April-June 1998), 162-163.

183Susan Billington Harper, ‘The Politics of Conversion’, 153-160. Indeed part of the controversy not referred to by Harper was on the issue of Scheduled Caste benefits for Dalit converts. See, e.g., ‘Notes’, ISR (25 January, 1936), 323.

184He later expressed his own appreciation of Jesus’ message to a group of missionaries in western India. ‘What is non-violence? It means that everything is sacred and all life must be treated with reverence. Let no man deal roughly with even the weakest and meekest of living creatures. Jesus taught non-violence. To me that is the unique thing in his message. I look at Jesus not from the standpoint of theology but of society. If taken seriously, Jesus’ unique message could not only save my people but it could build the Kingdom of God on earth.’ Jeanne H. Carruthers, ‘Dr. Ambedkar Speaks to Missionaries’, IW (2 February, 1939), 72.

185‘The Condition of the Convert’, in Vasant Moon, compiler, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar, Writings and Speeches (Bombay, 1989), V: 445-476. This essay is not dated but internal evidence indicates that it was written no earlier than 1938; there is also no reference to either World War II or the 1941 Census returns in it.

186Ibid., 472. While these comments do apply to the Bombay Presidency where Ambedkar lived, they were not true for India as a whole. The best documented exception to Ambedkar’s generalization was Travancore where Pulaya Christians took leading roles in the Pulaya movement. George Oommen, op. cit., 278-352.

187B.R. Ambedkar, ‘The Condition of the Convert’, 475. Chandra Mallampalli has suggested that whereas Roman Catholic Dalits in the Madras Presidency tended to seek greater integration within their Church, Protestant Dalits there tended to seek common cause with other Dalits to address shared Dalit grievances. Chandra Mallampalli, op. cit., 159-194.

188B.R. Ambedkar, ‘The Condition of the Convert’, 476.

189Chandra Mallampalli has argued that in the Madras Presidency Roman Catholics did seek to

organize themselves as a community to play a role in the communal politics of the Presidency, whereas the Protestants chose not to but sought instead to be advocates of a noncommunal nationalism at the All-India level. Mallampalli found the former strategy to have been more effective that the latter. Op. cit., 87- 156.

190‘Notes’, ISR (9 January, 1937), 289.

191DC , 362-364, 367-376. At the Champaran District Depressed Classes Conference two weeks

later Jagjivan Ram gave two reasons for opposing conversion. ‘We have to check it because on the one hand, it will cause a decrease in our number and thereby weaken us and on the other hand, our

difference with the caste Hindus is only social and economic and not cultural.’ DC, 405.

192Zelliot says organization was not Ambedkar’s forte. Op. cit., 229.

193John E. Wallace, ‘Motives and the Depressed Classes’, IW (25 February, 1937), 117-118.

194An analysis of the election returns from the point of view of their effect upon the Depressed

Classes is found in B.R. Ambedkar, What Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables, chapter 6.

195A common complaint made earlier was that the government was deliberately blocking social progress. ‘The Story of the Assembly’, by C. Rajagopalachariar in H (4 March, 1933), 2-3.

196‘The Bombay Temple Entry Act’, G (8 September,1938), 566.

197‘Depressed Classes in Indore State’, G (24 March, 1938), 187.

198‘Notes’, G (1 September, 1938), 545-546; ‘Gandhi-Rajah Correspondence’, G (3 November,

1938), 690-691; ‘Notes’, G (15 December, 1938), 785. The text of the bill is given in ‘Malabar Temple Entry Bill’, G (1 September, 1938), 553.

199The following articles in The Guardian are useful sources: ‘Harijan Temple Entry in Madura’ (13 July, 1939), 430; ‘The Harijan Temple Entry Movement’ (20 July, 1939), 435; ‘Temple Entry in Tanjore’, ibid., 443; ‘Madras Premier Justifies Ordinance’ (27 July, 1939), 461; ‘The Temple Entry Authorization Bill’ (10 August, 1939), 482-483; and ‘Madras Premier’s Justification for Temple Entry Ordinance’, ibid., 486.

200A number of hotels and restaurants in Bombay were reported to have lost their licenses. ‘Harijans and Hotels’, ISR (4 February, 1939), 364. In Madras funds were withheld from schools which did not admit Dalit students. ‘Harijan Pupils in Madras Schools’, G (25 May, 1939), 317.

201‘Notes’, G (18 August, 1938), 514.

202Mukut Behari Verma, op. cit., 146.

203‘Harijan Uplift Advisory Boards’, G (8 September, 1938), 574.

204‘Harijan Advisory Boards’, G (15 September,1938), 590. The editor of The Guardian had made

a similar suggestion earlier but for different reasons. ‘Notes’, (8 September, 1938), 562.

205‘Depressed Classes Conference’, G (29 December, 1938), 830.

206B.R. Ambedkar, What Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables, 102.

207DC, 422 & 552.

208DC, 432, 447, 476, 505-511 as well as the issues of temple entry and administration of Harijan

welfare funds already referred to.

209DC, 509-510.

210DC, 518-519.

211‘Fee Concessions to Converts in Madras’, G (1 September, 1938), 556.

212Ibid.

213‘Salem District Christian Conference’, G (29 September, 1938), 618- 619.

214‘The Madras Government and Indian Christians’, G (13 October, 1938), 643.

215Ibid.

216‘Christian Families Reconverted to Hindus’, G (16 February, 1939), 91-92. The clarification by

C. Rajagopalachariar is given in ‘Madras Premier and Conversions’, G (6 April, 1939), 208.

217‘The Madras Government and Indian Christians’, G (13 October, 1938), 642.

218‘Notes’, G (3 November, 1938), 690.

219‘Fee Concessions for Harijans’, G (14 & 21 September, 1939), 567. The modification is given in

‘Fee Concessions to Converts’, G (30 March, 1939), 190.

220‘Petition to Governor by Depressed Class Christians’, G (28 January, 1937), 62.

221Contrast DC, 304-305 with ‘Do Governments Help Conversion?’ H (10 October, 1936), 280.

222DC, 19.

223DC, 475-478.

224‘Notes’, G (18 August, 1938), 514.

225Christians in Travancore went through a similar experience ‘Fee Concessions for Depressed

Class Christian Converts’, G (11 November, 1937), 713 and ‘Fee Concessions in Travancore’, G (30 March,1939), 190.

226A number of studies were done in different parts of India at that time. These were quite uneven in quality, but the best economic data was given in E.D. Lucas and F. Thakur Das, The Rural Church in the Punjab (Lahore, 1938). D. Tickell, ‘Poverty Among Village Christians,’ NCCR (December 1935), 621-627. The quotation is from E.C. Bhatty, ‘The Economic Background of the Christian Community in the United Provinces,’ NCCR (October 1938), 553-554.

227A very strong petition was sent to the International Missionary Conference when it met at Tambaram on behalf of numerous Travancore Christians by one S.H. Tilak and was reprinted in ISR under the heading ‘Christian Missions and Harijan Converts’ (24 December, 1938), 267. A recent study by P. Dayanandan indicates that significant occupational mobility among rural Dalits in Chengalpattu district was effectively blocked by elitist missionaries centered at Madras Christian College. ‘Dalit Christians of Chengalpattu Area and the Church of Scotland’ in George Oommen and John C. B. Webster, eds., Local Dalit Christian History (Delhi, 2002), 46-56.

228Godwin Shiri, ‘A Dalit Parish to be Remembered: Sawday Memorial CSI Church in Mandya, Karnataka’ in George Oommen and John C. B. Webster, eds., Local Dalit Christian History, 74-75; Monodeep Daniel, ‘The People Who Believe that God is Faithful: The Story of the People of the Turkman Gate Darwazah (Holy Trinity Church, Delhi)’ in ibid., 127-129.

229R.C. Das, ‘”Christian” Untouchables’, ISR (4 February, 1939), 362.

230Indian Statutory Commission, Oral Evidence - Bombay Volume II: Eleventh Meeting held at

Poona, October 23rd, 1928 at 11:00 a.m., 30; DC, 514-515.

231Even in Travancore, where they were granted a distinct identity with regard to public service

appointments, they had to contend with the dominance of Syrian Christians in the Christian category. Dick Kooiman, ‘Political Rivalry among Religious Communities: A Case-Study of Communal Reservations in India’, Economic and Political Weekly (13 February 1993), 287-94.

232Both the associational and organic views of caste are secular, the former defining it in terms of its internal bonds, the latter as part of a larger social rather than sacred order. Marc Galanter, ‘Changing Legal Conceptions of Caste’, in M. Singer and B.S. Cohn, eds., Structure and Change in Indian Society (Chicago, 1968), 300-301.

233Christians were not the only ones thus forced to choose between Scheduled Caste benefits and their chosen religious visions. The cohesion and momentum of the Buddhists, Satnamis and Ad Dharmis were compromised by this government decision because they did not consider themselves Hindus. G. Aloysius, Religion as Emancipatory Identity, 99- 100; Saurabh Dube, Untouchable Pasts, 178-179; Mark Juergensmeyer, Religion as Social Vision, 143.

234‘Punishment’ is not too strong a term to use here, especially when applied to those who became Christian. As Harper has also pointed out, Hindu criticism of conversion, which they deeply resented, was confined to Christians even though Muslims and Sikhs were also seeking converts during this period. Susan Billington Harper, ‘The Politics of Conversion’, 153. Ambedkar had made a similar point much earlier. See ‘The Condition of the Convert’, 446-450.

Chapter 4 1Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities: Law and the Backward Classes in India (Berkeley, 1984), 1.

2He not only chaired the Drafting Committee but is also credited with doing almost all the drafting

himself.

3The most impressive statement of a consensus Christian agenda for the Church in independent India is P.D. Devanandan and M.M. Thomas, eds., Christian Participation in Nation-Building (Bangalore, 1960). This makes no mention of the Dalit Christians at all.

4The Constitution of India with Short Notes (Lucknow, 1966), 1. All future quotations from the constitution are taken from this edition.

5For a discussion of this see Donald Eugene Smith, India as a Secular State (Princeton, 1963), 314315 and K.S. Padhy and Jayashree Mahapatra, Reservation Policy in India (New Delhi, 1988), 2831.

6Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 379-380.

7Article 26(a) and (b).

8On this and related matters the All India Council of Indian Christians and the Catholic Union of

India worked closely together, forming a joint committee for the purpose. ‘The News from Many Quarters’, NCCR (January 1948), 45-47. See also Jerome D’Souza ‘Constituent Assembly Discussions on Fundamental Rights’, G (2 June, 1949), 342; Donald Eugene Smith, op. cit., 181184. Much of the debate is given verbatim in Sita Ram Goel, History of Hindu-Christian Encounters (New Delhi, 1989), 238-292.

9Donald Eugene Smith, op. cit., 184-186.

10Both acts are found in Mathai Zachariah, Freedom of Religion in India (Nagpur, 1979), 32-34,

55-57.

11Ibid., 80.

12E.D. Devadason, ‘The Supreme Court Judgement on the Orissa Freedom of Religion Act, 1967’,

NCCR (September 1977), 433-437.

13John C. B. Webster, ‘Dalits and Anti-Conversion Legislation in Tamil Nadu’, Dalit International Newsletter (February 2003), 1, 10-12; ‘News Clippings’, ibid. (June 2003), 3; ‘News Clippings’, ibid. (June 2006), 3.

14Jerome D’Souza, op. cit., 343.

15Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 47-48.

16Ibid., 370-371.

17Donald Eugene Smith, op. cit., 314; Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 135.

18Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 144.

19Ibid., 143.

20Jerome D’Souza, op. cit., 5.

21Initially only four Dalit Sikh jatis were included in the list; in 1956 all Dalit Sikhs became

eligible. Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 132.

22‘Correspondence’, G (30 June, 1949), 7.

23‘Editorials’, NCCR (September 1951), 361. The states were Orissa, Bihar and Madras. Madras

even issued a Government order assuring Christian Dalits aid if they reconverted to Hinduism. R. Chinnathambi, ‘The Minister and the Minorities’, G (27 October, 1949), 14-15.

24‘Editorials’, NCCR (September, 1951), 362.

25The Story of 20 Years Struggle for Justice. (Bangalore, 1978), 4-5; ‘Editorial Notes’, NCCR

(March 1951), 104-105.

26‘Editorial Notes’, NCCR (March 1951), 104-105.

27Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 144.

28Padhy and Mahapatra cite a case in which the Bombay High Court did use empirical criteria in

arguing that conversion changed nothing, but this applied only to Maharashtra. Op. cit., 43-44.

29Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 325. This concludes a lengthy argument beginning on page 313.

30Ibid. Smith attributes the policy to religious discrimination, to Hindu society’s desire to reward those Dalits who did not convert, and to the decision to base state aid on caste membership. Op. cit., 325-326.

31Jose Kananaikil, ed., Scheduled Castes in Search of Justice. Part II: The Verdict of the Supreme Court (New Delhi, 1986), 49. This book contains both petitions and the judgment of the Court.

32In the Supreme Court of India Writ Petition (Civil) No. 180 of 2004 in the Matter of Centre for Public Interest Litigation and T. Franklin Caesar, Petitioners, Versus Union of India, Respondents, 18-19. (This is also quoted in ‘Dalit Christian Petition Before the Supreme Court’, Dalit International Newsletter (October 2006), 4.

33Ibid.

34Report of the National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities, paras 16.3.4 and

16.3.5 and Dissenting Note by Mrs. Asha Das.

35‘Panel favours quotas for Dalit converts’, Sunday Times (14 October 2007), 1.

36‘Hindu’ is actually used as a residual category in the Presidential Order; the assumption is that all

Dalits are Hindus unless they have actually converted to another religion, be that Buddhism, Christianity or Islam.

37A table of the elections between 1952 and 1977 is provided in Ghanshyam Shah, ‘Protective Discrimination, Equality and Political Will’, in Vimal P. Shah and Binod C. Agrawal, eds., Reservation: Policy, Programmes and Issues (Jaipur, 1986), 4. See also Report of the Commissioner

for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes: Twentyeighth Report 1986-87, 534.

38This judgment has been affirmed by Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 50, and Barbara Joshi, Democracy in Search of Equality: Untouchable Politics and Indian Social Change (Delhi, 1982), 62-64.

39Lelah Dushkin, ‘Scheduled Caste Politics’, in J. Michael Mahar, ed., The Untouchables in Contemporary India (Tucson, 1972), 211-213; Padmini R. Narayanan, ‘Reservation in Politics and the Scheduled Caste Elite’, in Vimal P. Shah and Binod C. Agrawal, eds., op. cit. , 84-85. The opposing view is taken by Oliver Mendelsohn and Marika Vicziany, The Untouchables: Subordination, Poverty and the State in Modern India (Cambridge, 1998), 238-257.

40Barbara Joshi, op. cit., 2. See also Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 52-54. This is in keeping with a more recent general assessment of the effectiveness of Dalit legislators. While acknowledging that ‘their role in the decision-making process remains marginal’, Behar sees them becoming more astute in using factional politics to the advantage of their Dalit constituents. S. C. Behar, ‘Reservation: An Insufficient Condition for Social Transformation’, The Administrator, XLII (January-March 1997), 89-90, 92.

41Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 100-103.

42Report of the Commissioner for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes: Twentyeighth Report

1986-87, 482 & 491. All I.A.S. posts reserved for Dalits were filled during 1980-86. Ibid., 484.

43Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 90-92.

44Ibid, 98-99; Barbara Joshi, op. cit., 16-17; Ghanshyam Shah, op. cit., 7-8.

45Ibid., 111.

46Cited in P. G. Jogdand, ‘Job Reservations: The Issues and the Facts’, Dalit International

Newsletter (June 2000), 10.

47Ibid., 4, 10.

48‘Supreme Court Decision on Reservations’, Dalit International Newsletter (October 2006), 12.

49Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 63-64.

50Suma Chitnis, ‘Measuring up to Reserved Admissions’, in Vimal P. Shah and Binod C. Agrawal,

eds., op. cit., 32-46.

51Suma Chitnis, A Long Way to Go (New Delhi, 1981), 52, 162. She does not state when this was first applied.

52Barbara Joshi, op. cit., 12 and Report of the Commissioner for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes: Twentyeighth Report 1986-87, 290.

53Marc Galanter, Competing Equalities, 58-60. Galanter estimated that by 1961 only one percent of all college graduates were Dalits. Ibid, 61. Umakant, ‘Dalits and Education’, Dalit International Newsletter (June 2006), 10.

54Selected Educational Statistics, 2001-2002, cited in Umakant, ‘Dalits and Education’, 11.

55Census of India, 2001, cited in ibid.

56Shah’s 1983 survey of rural Gujarat comparing high and low caste people at similar economic

levels showed that the former’s chances of getting a college education were far greater than the latter’s. This he attributed chiefly to neighbourhood environment. Ghanshayam Shah, ‘Caste, Class and Reservation’, in Haroobhai Mehta and Hasmukh Patel, eds., Dynamics of Reservation Policy (New Delhi, 1985), 120-122. Chitnis in her national survey of Dalit secondary school and college students reported that despite all the financial aid government provides Dalit students, the cost of their education to their families is still higher than their families can rightly afford. Suma Chitnis, A Long Way to Go, 162. Umakant, op. cit., 1, 10-12.

57The figures have been gathered by Galanter. Competing Equalities, 57.

58Imtiaz Ahmed, ‘Five Year Plans and the Development of the Weaker Sections: An Overview’ and

P.S. Krishnan, ‘Development of the Scheduled Castes’, in Jose Kananaikil, ed., Seventh Plan and Development of Weaker Sections (New Delhi, 1985), 9-19, 41-60.

59V. Pushpa Kumari, op. cit., 150.

60Ibid., 214.

61R. B. Singh, ‘Dalit Welfare: Myth or Reality?’ Dalit International Newsletter (October 2004), 7-

10. This is based on his larger study, Scheduled Caste Welfare: Myth or Reality (New Delhi, 2003).

62Social Watch - Tamilnadu, Special Component Plan: Dalit Hopes Betrayed (revised edition; Chennai, 2004).

63For some case studies, see Sanjeeb K. Behera, ed., Dalits and Land Reforms in India (New Delhi, 1999).

64Government of Madhya Pradesh, The Task Force Report on Bhopal Declaration: Charting a New Course for Dalits for the 21st Century (Bhopal, 2003), 8.

65Government of Madhya Pradesh, Historical Initiative for all round Development of Scheduled Castes-Scheduled Tribes in Madhya Pradesh: Implementation of Bhopal Declaration (Bhopal, 2003), 11.

66Barbara Joshi, op. cit.,11-20, 86-96, 177-179.

67Report of the Commissioner for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes: Twentyeighth Report

1986-87, 290-294.

68Ibid., 319.

69Ibid., 320.

70These census figures are presented and analyzed in Sukhdeo Thorat, ‘Dalit Reality: From an

Economic Perspective’, in V. Devasahayam, ed., Dalits and Women: Quest for Humanity (Madras, 1992), 37-39, 44.

71Suma Chitnis, A Long Way to Go, 16-20. Similar findings have occurred in micro-studies of Dalits in specific cities or states. Nandu Ram cites several in The Mobile Scheduled Castes: Rise of

a New Middle Class (Delhi, 1988), 114.

72Sunanda Patwardhan, Change Among India’s Harijans: Maharashtra - A Case Study (New Delhi, 1973), 88-90.

73R.G. Misra and Gurvinder Kaur, Reservation Policy and Personnel Selection (New Delhi, 1990), 112-114.

74The authors give no indication of which examinations these were, when or where they were held, or why they should be considered representative of all such examinations.

75K. Saradamoni divided her sample of Dalit and non-Dalit villagers in Kerala into three occupational categories: agricultural labour, other wage labour, and other occupations. Those in the third category were far more successful in getting an education and government employment than were those in the first two categories. K. Saradamoni, Divided Poor: Study of a Kerala Village (Delhi, 1981), 43-44. For perceptions see Ramashray Roy, ‘The Political Dilemma of the Scheduled Castes’, in Ramashray Roy and Richard Sisson, eds., Diversity and Dominance in Indian Politics. Vol. 2: Division, Deprivation and the Congress (New Delhi, 1990), 47.

76R.G. Misra and Gurvinder Kaur, op. cit., 112-114.

77There is also evidence that urban Dalits have benefitted more from Scheduled Caste welfare and

development schemes than have rural Dalits. H.C. Upadhyay, Reservations for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (New Delhi, 1991), 372, 376.

78Ibid., 83.

79Ibid., 92.

80Suma Chitnis, A Long Way to Go, 15-16. See also M. Showeb, Education and Mobility Among

Harijans (Allahabad, 1986), 33-42 and V. Pushpa Kumari, op. cit., 89-91.

81Status of Women in India: A Synopsis of the Report of the National Committee on the Status of Women (Bombay, 1975), 96-97.

82Malavika Karlekar, Poverty and Women’s Work: A Study of Sweeper Women in Delhi (Delhi, 1982), 98-101; 119-122. See also K. Saradamoni, op. cit., 60, 81-83.

83Nandu Ram, op. cit., passim.

84Owen M. Lynch, The Politics of Untouchability (Delhi, 1974); Sunanda Patwardhan, op. cit., 72-

74; Satish Saberwal, Mobile Men (New Delhi, 1976), 73-74, 78.

85Suneila Malik, Social Integration of Scheduled Castes (New Delhi, 1979), 61-90. P. Nirmala Bhai’s survey of Dalit women in Kerala would support this conclusion. Harijan Women in Independent India (New Delhi, 1986), 87-88.

86It would seem that they are thus well integrated with the higher castes, but this is not made explicit in either the data or the analysis. S.M. Dahiwale, Emerging Entrepreneurship Among Scheduled Castes of Contemporary India: A Study of Kolhapur City (New Delhi, 1989), 92-99.

87Satish Saberwal, op. cit., 212.

88Sachchidananda, The Harijan Elite (Faridabad, 1976), 43.

89Ramashray Roy and V.B. Singh, Between Two Worlds: A Study of Harijan Elites (Delhi, 1987),

68.

90Roy and Singh point out that mobility brings a life that is psychologically and intellectually as well as materially different from that of one’s caste fellows. It also puts one in a position where one is expected but unable to provide significant help to caste fellows, a cause of disappointment and distancing. Ramashray Roy and V.B. Singh, op. cit., 122-124. See also R.S. Khare, The Untouchable as Himself: Ideology, Identity and Pragmatism among the Lucknow Chamars (Cambridge, 1984), 131-132.

91T.S. Wilkinson, ‘Buddhism and Social Change among Mahars’, in T.S. Wilkinson and M.M. Thomas, eds., Ambedkar and the Neo-Buddhist Movement, (Madras, 1972), 71-100. T. Scarlett Epstein, Economic Development and Social Change in South India (Bombay, 1979), 180-189, 307310; Mumtaz Ali Khan, Seven Years of Change: A Study of Some Scheduled Castes in Bangalore District (Madras, 1979), 58; Miriam Sharma, The Politics of Inequality: Competition and Control in an Indian Village (Hawaii, 1978), 45, 67; Dinesh Khosla, Myth and Reality of the Protection of Civil Rights Law: A Case Study of Untouchability in Rural India (Delhi, 1987), 28; Soran Singh, Scheduled Castes of India: Dimensions of Social Change (Delhi, 1987), 67-82. V. Pushpa Kumari, op. cit., 97-98.

92Ghanshyam Shah et al., Untouchability in Rural India (New Delhi, 2006), 65, 103-4. A somewhat more optimistic survey of 51 villages is Surinder S. Jodhka, ‘Caste and Untouchability in Rural Punjab’, Economic and Political Weekly (11 May, 2002), 1813-1823.

93For an analysis of this problem see Nandu Ram, “Law and Atrocities on the Weaker Sections in India,” in R.G. Singh, ed., The Depressed Classes of India (New Delhi, 1986), 91-113. The data collected by D. Venkateswarlu in rural Andhra Pradesh suggests that violence against Dalits is endemic in villages. Harijan-Upper Caste Conflict (New Delhi, 1990), 108-110.

94Prashant Negi, ‘Caste Discrimination and Food Security Programs’, Dalit International Newsletter (June 2006), 7-9; Umakant, ‘Dalits and Education’, ibid., 10; ‘Caste Discrimination in Tsunami Relief’, ibid. (February 2005), 4-5; Sarah Pinto, ‘Dalit Women and the Predicaments of Reproductive Health Care’, ibid. (October 2003), 1, 9-12; R. Eugene Culas, ‘Earthquake Relief and Discrimination against Dalits’, ibid. (June 2001), 1, 4, 8, 11.

95Y. Moses, ‘A Movement to Eradicate Manual Scavenging in India’, ibid. (October 2005), 1, 7-10.

96Surinder S. Jodkha, op. cit

97S. K. Thorat, ‘Dalits and the New Economic Policy’, Dalit International Newsletter (June 1996),

4: H. Hanumanthappa, ‘Dalits in India: A Status Report’, ibid. (June 1997), 9; ‘News Clippings’, ibid. (October 2005), 3.

98These examples are taken from the ‘News Clippings’ section of issues of the Dalit International Newsletter between 1996 and 2006..

99Barbara R. Joshi, Democracy in Search of Equality, 128, 137.

100This paragraph has been influenced by Atul Kohli, The State and Poverty in India (Cambridge,

1987); Rajni Kothari, ‘Integration and Exclusion in Indian Politics’, Economic and Political Weekly (22 October, 1988), 2223-2227; Paul R. Brass, The Politics of India Since Independence (Cambridge, 1990).

101Jagjivan Ram, Caste Challenge in India (New Delhi, 1980), 50. It is worth noting that many of these organizations received Government grants-in-aid for this work and thus may have received very little from private sources. Report of the Commissioner for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes: Twentyeighth Report 1986-87, 544. See also Mukut Behari Verma, History of the Harijan Sevak Sangh 1932-1968, 176. Swami Anand Thirth provides a good example of the lack of support given to a sincere Harijan Sevak Sangh worker. A.M. Abraham Ayrookuzhiel, Swami Anand Thirth. Untouchability: Gandhian Solution on Trial (Delhi, 1987), 52-59.

102Satish Saberwal, Mobile Men, 169-170. This political culture is not confined to ‘Modelpur’ but is widespread. See, e.g., Dr. Shyamlal, Caste and Political Mobilization: The Bhangis (Jaipur, 1981), 81; R.S. Khare, op. cit., 131; D.R. Singh, Rural Leadership Among Scheduled Castes (Allahabad, 1985), 153-155, 161-165.

103Satish Saberwal, op. cit., 190.

104Ibid.

105Owen W. Lynch, op.cit., 89-128; Barbara R. Joshi, Democracy in Search of Equality, 100-107.

106Barbara R. Joshi, Democracy in Search of Equality, 107-112; Dr. Shyamlal, op. cit., 79-122.

107Miriam Sharma, op. cit., 67, 180. D.R. Singh found Dalit panchayat members consulted by other

panchayat members only on matters pertaining to sanitation! Everything else was kept in the hands of the higher caste members. Op. cit., 126-129.

108Owen W. Lynch, op. cit., 110, 118; Dr. Shyamlal, op. cit., 81, 83, 98; Janet A. Contursi, ‘Political Theology: Text and Practice in a Dalit Panther Community’, Journal of Asian Studies, LII (May 1993), 329-330.

109Miriam Sharma, op. cit., 8, 182; D.R. Singh, op. cit., 161-165.

110R.S. Khare, op. cit., 151. Miriam Sharma found development funds ‘eaten up’ before they

reached the Dalits and no interest among village leaders in implementing decisions relating to the village Chamars. Op. cit., 170, 193.

111He lost the 1951 election in North Bombay 137,950 to 123,576 and the 1954 by-election in Bhandara 140,864 to 132,483. Dhanjay Keer, Dr. Ambedkar: Life and Mission (3rd ed.; Bombay, 1971), 440, 454.

112Ibid., 498 and Eleanor Mae Zelliot, Dr. Ambedkar and the Mahar Movement, 238.

113Dharma Deeksha (New Delhi, n.d.) cited by Eleanor Zelliot in ibid., 237 and ‘Religion and

Legitimation in the Mahar Movement’, in Bardwell Smith, ed., Religion and the Legitimation of

Power in South Asia (Leiden, 1978), 104.

114Adele M. Fiske, op. cit., 107-108; Sunanda Patwardhan, op. cit., 128; Eleanor Zelliot, ‘The Psychological Dimension of the Buddhist Movement in India’, in G.A. Oddie, ed., Religion in South Asia, 119-144; Prahlad Gangaram Jogdand, Dalit Movement in Maharashtra (New Delhi, 1991), 155; Jayashree B. Gokhale, ‘The Sociopolitical Effects of Ideological Change: The Buddhist Conversion of Maharashtrian Untouchables’, Journal of Asian Studies, XLV (February 1986), 273, 276-277.

115Census of India 1971 Series I: India. Paper 2 of 1972: Religion, 3 & 22; Census of India 1981. Paper 4 of 1984: Household Population by Religion of Head of Household, 3.

116Census of India 2001. India: The First Report on Religion Data, xxvii, xxxv.

117Prahad Gangaram Jogdand, op. cit., 69-70.

118The manifesto is given in English translation in Barbara R. Joshi, Untouchable!, 141-147.

‘Land’ rather than ‘lane’ appears to be correct.

119Amrita Abraham, ‘A Report from Marathwada’, Economic and Political Weekly (September 9, 1978), 1539.

120The best study of the Dalit Panthers to date is Lata Murugkar, Dalit Panther Movement in Maharashtra: A Sociological Appraisal (Bombay, 1991).

121Abdul Malik Mujahid, Conversion to Islam: Untouchables’ Strategy for Protest in India (Chambersburg, 1989), 85 & 105-106.

122In addition to ibid, other works consulted were Mumtaz Ali Khan, Mass Conversion of Meenakshipuram: A Sociological Enquiry (Madras, 1983); Devendra Swarup, ed., Politics of Conversion, 9-46; S. Albones Raj, ‘Mass Religious Conversion as Protest Movement: A Framework’, Religion and Society, XXVIII (December 1981), 58-66.

123For a fuller description of the Dalit Avataris, see John C.B. Webster, Religion and Dalit Liberation, 96-98, 144.

124This paragraph is based primarily on Sudha Pai, Dalit Assertion and the Unfinished Democratic Revolution: The Bahujan Samaj Party in Uttar Pradesh (New Delhi, 2002). See also Christophe Jaffrelot, India’s Silent Revolution: The Rise of the Low Castes in North Indian Politics (Delhi, 2003), 387-425.

125This paragraph is based on the following articles in the Dalit International Newsletter: ‘National Campaign for Dalit Human Rights’ (February 1999), 1, 4; ‘Memorandum: National Campaign for Dalit Human Rights’ (ibid.), 9-10; N. Paul Divakar, ‘National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights’ (February 2000), 4, 5. 8; ‘Broken Promises & Dalits Betrayed’ (ibid.), 9-10; ‘National Public Hearing on Dalit Human Rights’ (June 2000), 5-6; A.X.J. Bosco, ‘Dalits at Durban’ (October 2001), 6-9; N. Paul Divakar, Peter N. Prove, James Massey, ‘Post-Durban Reflections’ (February 2002), 510; ‘U.N. Sub-Commission Recommends Appointing Special Rapporteurs’ (October 2004), 12; ‘U.N. Human Rights Victory’ (June 2005), 3.

126This is well documented in a report by Human Rights Watch. Smita Narula, Politics by Other

Means: Attacks Against Christians in India (Washington 1999).

127Poornima Joshi, ‘Jailbreak: Escaping Hinduism’, Hindustan Times (11 November 2001), 13; Amit Sengupta, ‘I am no more an achoot or a shudra’, ibid.

128‘Converts’ Conscience’, Times of India (29 October 2002), 12; ‘Friday’s Interview: Udit Raj’ in either the Indian Express or Hindustan Times (1 November 2002).

129This paragraph is based on research done for writing ‘Dalits and Conversion’ in Helen Asquine Fazio et al, eds., Home and the World: South Asia in Transition (Newcastle, 2006), 303-321.

130Kate Nash, Contemporary Political Sociology: Globalization, Politics and Power (Oxford, 2000), 151.

131Pushpendra, ‘Dalit Assertion through Electoral Politics’, in Ghanshayam Shah, ed., Dalit Identity and Politics: Cultural Subordination and the Dalit Challenge Volume 2 (New Delhi 2001), 311-339.

132This is the argument of Christophe Jaffrelot, India’s Silent Revolution.

133See the essays in Anand Teltumbde, ed., Hindutva and Dalits: Perspectives for Understanding

Communal Praxis (Kolkata, 2005).

134The most obvious example of this is the Madiga agitation for quotas within the Scheduled Caste job quotas in Andhra Pradesh. See Sambaiah Gundumeda, ‘Emergence of Caste Consciousness among the Madigas of Andhra Pradesh’, Dalit International Newsletter (February 2001), 5, 9-12.

135Supra, 73. Between 1971 and 1981 the basis of tabulation changed from individual religion to religion of head of household.

136A notable exception has been the Dalit Avatari movement and enormous growth in the Gramin Prachin Mandal (Rural Presbyterian Church) among the Bhangis in Uttar Pradesh who have converted in large numbers since 1984. For details, see supra 203-204 and John C. B. Webster, Religion and Dalit Liberation, 96-98, 144.

137These inducements may provide a partial explanation of the dramatic drop in the Christian population of Andhra Pradesh between 1971 and 2001. See Paul D. Wiebe, Christians in Andhra Pradesh (Madras, 1988), 202-203; M.E. Prabhakar, ‘Caste in Andhra Churches: A Case Study of Guntur District’, Religion and Society, XXXIV (September 1987), 50; M.E. Prabhakar, ‘Andhra Christians—Some Demographic and Ecclesial Issues’, Religion and Society XXXVII (March 1990), 16-17.

138Census of India 1971 Series 1: India. Paper 2 of 1972 Religion, 30-31; Census of India 2001. India: The First Report on Religion Data, 2.

139John C.B. Webster, ‘Christians and Sikhs in the Punjab’, 11-13; E.Y. Campbell, The Church in the Punjab: Some Aspects of Its Life and Growth (Nagpur, 1961), 27.

140E.Y. Campbell, op. cit., 19-21, 25-27, 37-38.

141Clarence O. McMullen, John C.B. Webster, Maqbul Caleb, The Amritsar Diocese: A Preliminary Survey (Batala, 1973), 40, 41-2. 142John C.B. Webster, ‘Christians and Sikhs in the

Punjab’, 18-25.

143Philip Dayal, ‘Level of Social Integration of Ethnic Minorities: A Case Study of the Christians of Gurdaspur District in the Punjab’ (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, Panjab University, 1982), 91.

144Ibid., 97.

145Ibid., 250-263, 277.

146This impression is confirmed by the initial findings of a more recent survey. Clarence O.

McMullen, ‘A Survey of the Christian Community in North West India: A Preliminary Report’, Bulletin of the Christian Institute of Religious Studies, 22 (January 1993), 20-28; Vidya Sagar J. Dogar, Rural Christian Community in Northwest India (Delhi, 2001). 147Census of India 2001. India: The First Report on Religion Data, 26; John C. B. Webster, ‘Varieties of Dalit Christianity in North India’ (forthcoming).

148M.E. Prabhakar, ‘Caste-Class and Status in Andhra Churches and Implications for Mission Today: Some Reflections’, Religion and Society, XXVIII (September 1981), 17.

149P.Y. Luke and John B. Carman, Village Christians and Hindu Culture (1968), 31, 165-189, 192199.

150Ibid., 64-65.

151Paul D. Wiebe, op. cit., 106.

152Ibid., 202-203.

153M.E. Prabhakar, ‘Caste-Class and Status in Andhra Churches’, 10-16.

154For a good collection of descriptive and analytical articles on Karamchedu see ‘Focus on

Karamchedu’, Samata (January 1986).

155Paul D. Wiebe, op.cit., 119-123. The 1970 survey was conducted by P.M. Hamm.

156Y. Antony Raj, Social Impact of Conversion: A Comparative Sociological Study on The

Christians of Scheduled Caste Origins and Scheduled Caste Hindus (Delhi, 2001), 47-91.

157Godwin Shiri, The Plight of Christian Dalits: A South Indian Case Study (Bangalore 1997), 33, 34, 63, 74. Also included in this survey were 20 villages in the Bellary district of Karnataka, where conditions were generally worse for Dalit Christians than those reported above.

158Paul D. Wiebe and G. N. Ramu, ‘Christian and Hindu Harijans: Study of the Effects of Christian Programs in India’, The Eastern Anthropologist, 28 (July-September 1975), 223.

159John C.B. Webster, ‘Does Being a Christian Make a Difference?’ Bangalore Theological Forum, XII (July - December 1980), 86-106.

160Jose Kananaikil, Scheduled Caste Converts and Social Disabilities: A Survey of Tamil Nadu (New Delhi, 1990).

161V. Joachim, ‘Status of Scheduled Castes in Two Religious Communities—Hindus vs. Christians’

(Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, Mahatma Gandhi Kashi Vidyapith, Varanasi, 1996), 138-250. These findings are supported by the data assembled in L. Stanislaus, The Liberative Mission of the Church Among Dalit Christians (Delhi, 1999), 61-104.

162The three studies of Tamilians cited above and Ambrose Pinto, Dalit Christians: A SocioEconomic Survey, Archdiocese of Bangalore (Bangalore, 1992), 12-14, 18-19. As early as 1978 Satish Saberwal indicated that there was ‘a decline in the mobility rate of education’. Quoted by Lionel Caplan, Class and Culture in Urban India (Oxford, 1987), 93.

163Paul D. Wiebe, op. cit., 202.

164James P. Alter and Herbert Jai Singh, The Church in Delhi (Nagpur, 1961) and Lionel Caplan,

op.cit. On the other hand, Lobo found little social mobility among Dalit Catholic migrants from Gujarat in Bombay. Lancy Lobo, ‘Conversion, Emigration and Social Mobility of an Ex- Scheduled Caste from Central Gujarat’, Social Action, 36 (October- December 1989), 431, 436.

165Godwin Shiri, ‘A Dalit Parish to be Remembered’, 78-9; Monodeep Daniel, ‘The People Who Believe that God is Faithful’, 124.

166In the Kerala and Tamil Nadu volumes of the Anthropological Survey of India’s People of India series, Brahmin Christians, Izhava Christians, Nadar Christians and Chakkiliyan Christians are described as separate and distinct ‘communities’. K. S. Singh, ed., People of India. Volume XXVII: Kerala, edited by T. Madhava Menon, Deepak Tyagi and B. Francis Kulirani (New Delhi 2002) and Volume XL: Tamil Nadu, edited by R. Tirumalai and S. Manoharan (Madras 1997).

167Ninan Koshy, Caste in the Kerala Churches (Bangalore, 1968), 48-49; K.C. Alexander, ‘The Neo-Christians of Kerala’, in J. Michael Mahar, ed., op. cit., 155; George Koilparampil, Caste in the Catholic Community in Kerala (Cochin, 1982), 250.

168Paul D. Wiebe and S. John-Peter, ‘The Catholic Church and Caste in Rural Tamil Nadu’, in Harjinder Singh, ed., Caste Among Non-Hindus in India (New Delhi, 1977), 45; Mark Stephen et al., The Plight of Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin (C.S.C.O.) of Roman Catholic Church in Tamilnadu (Madras, n.d.), 1-2; C.D.F. Mosse, ‘Caste, Christianity and Hinduism: A Study of Social Organization and Religion in Rural Ramnad’ (Unpublished D. Phil. Thesis, University of Oxford, 1986), 266-269, 280, 343-348; S. Japhet, ‘Christian Dalits: A Sociological Study on the Problem of Gaining a New Identity’, Religion and Society, XXXIV (September 1987), 73-76; Antony Raj, Children of a Lesser God: Dalit Christians (Madurai, 1992), 10-12.

169John C. B. Webster, The Pastor to Dalits (Delhi 1995), 104-106; John C. B. Webster et al., From Role to Identity: Dalit Christian Women in Transition (Delhi 1997), 112-113, 127-132.

170Ninan Koshy, op. cit., 28-43, 62-65. Fuller has argued that ‘Christians and Hindus share a common orthopraxy—i.e. behave in accordance with the same set of rules concerning caste and pollution—in respect of relations between castes, although the Christians also had a role as pollution neutralizers in certain contexts’. However, he uses historical rather than current data to back this up. C.J. Fuller, ‘Kerala Christians and the Caste System’, Man 11(1976), 68.

171K.C. Alexander, op. cit., 161.

172C.D.F. Mosse, op. cit., 268.

173M.E. Prabhakar, ‘Caste-Class and Status in Andhra Churches’, 24; see also M.E. Prabhakar,

‘Caste in Andhra Churches’, 31-51 and R. Vidyasagar and Narendra Subramanian, ‘A Report of a ‘Caste Clash’’, Religion and Society (June 1988), 29-34.

174S. Japhet, op. cit., 59-66.

175J. Antony Raj, op. cit., 120, 128; V. Joachim, op. cit., 246-249; Sunil George Kurian, ‘The

Christian Dalits’ Experience–A Case Study of the Palai Diocese’, Religion and Society, 45 (December 1998), 69-88; L. Stanislaus, The Liberative Mission of the Church Among Dalit Christians, 64-80.

176This is the rationale Vanniar Catholics gave for the violence they perpetrated upon Dalit Catholics in Eraiyur (Tamil Nadu) during Holy Week of 2008. S. Viswanathan, ‘A House Divided’, Frontline (12-25 April, 2008).

177James P. Alter and Herbert Jai Singh, op. cit., 81-115.

178A commission studying the Church of North India concluded that a rigid class structure had

replaced the caste system among Christians, although in mass movement areas caste still affects matrimonial alliances. Profile of a Christian Church (Madras, 1990), 66-67.

179Lionel Caplan, Class and Culture in Urban India, 11.

180Ibid., 125-126.

181Ibid., 150-152.

182John C. B. Webster, The Pastor to Dalits, 79-89.

183This data was used by Robert Lawrence Knapp, ‘Caste Within the Christian Churches of

Moradabad City’ (Unpublished M.A. Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1966), 33. Wiebe and Ramu’s sample of 71 Dalit Christians in the Kolar Gold Fields included 28 manual labourers, 9 skilled workers, 11 clerk-typists, 3 teachers, 11 supervisors, 2 engineers and a doctor. Op. cit., 227.

184Ninan Koshy, op. cit., 45.

185Mark Stephen et al., op. cit., 3; Ecumenical Fellowship for Human Rights, Report of the Fact

Finding Team about the Happenings in the Catholic Archdiocese of Pondicherry during May-June 1990 (Madurai, 1990), 7. Prabhakar noted in one Roman Catholic parish in Andhra Pradesh he studied that only 6% of the priests were Dalits and 60% of the seminarians belonged to the higher castes. M.E. Prabhakar, ‘Caste in Andhra Churches’, 44-45. More recent figures on five Roman Catholic dioceses in Tamilnadu are provided by Fr. Antony Raj, op. cit., 19-20.

186Nandi Joseph, ‘Dalit Reality of the Indian Catholic Church’, Dalit International Newsletter (October 2000), 8.

187D. Jacob Devadasan has examined the caste backgrounds of all the Church of South India bishops in all of the Tamilnadu dioceses in ‘The Emergence of Dalit Leadership in the Church of

South India since 1947 with Special Reference to Tamilnadu’ (Unpublished M. Th. Thesis, Senate of Serampore College, 1999).

188Hunter B. Mabry, T.K. Oommen and Richard W. Taylor, ‘External Theological Students in India’, Religion and Society, XXXV (September 1988), 4; Hunter B. Mabry et. al., ‘Study of Theological Teachers in India’, Religion and Society, XXXIV (June 1987), 9.

189Ninan Koshy, op. cit., 46; Lionel Caplan, op. cit., 157-163; Ecumenical Fellowship for Human Rights, op. cit.

190M.E. Prabhakar, ‘Caste in Andhra Churches’, 38; S. Japhet, op. cit., 64, 79-87; Mark Stephen et al., op. cit., 3-4; Ambrose Pinto, op. cit., 28; Nandi Joseph, op. cit., 6-9.

191Quoted in Ninan Koshy, op. cit., 79-80.

192Ibid., 80.

193‘The Movement of Christian Dalit People in the CSI Madhya Kerala Diocese’, Samata (2/1986),

15.

194Ibid., 12-16; K.J. John, ‘Theological Aspects of the Struggle in the Madhya Kerala Diocese’, in M.E. Prabhakar, ed., Towards a Dalit Theology (Delhi, 1988), 131-139. For information on a similar movement within the Roman Catholic Church in Tamilnadu, see Antony Raj, op. cit., 25- 39.

195Andrew Wingate, ‘A Study of Conversion from Christianity to Islam in Two Tamil Villages’, Religion and Society XXVIII (December 1981), 8 & 20. In a later, more comprehensive study of Tamil churches, Wingate wrote that, ‘failure of ministry, pastoral care and support is the largest single cause of reversion to Hinduism. It is also a factor behind active conversion to Islam. Caste and social issues may appear to come first. But they are often also related to ministry and a failure of the church to be the liberating church they expected. The ministry is the key symbol of what this does or does not mean.’ Andrew Wingate, The Church and Conversion: A Study of Recent Conversions to and from Christianity in the Tamil Area of South India (Delhi 1997), 229.

196Mark Stephen et al., op. cit., 3-4.

197M.E. Prabhakar, ‘Caste in Andhra Churches’, 48.

198‘The Christian Converts of Scheduled Caste Origin’, Samata (1982/ 1), 26-29.

199Nandi Joseph, op. cit., 7.

200P. Dayanandan, email to the author, 26 May, 2008. Review of the Christian Education

Scholarships Programme, CSI Ewart Women’s Christian College, July 2007.

201Statement of the Christian College Retrieval Committee, Diocese of Madras, Church of South India, Released on 11th October 2005 at a Public Meeting in Chennai.

202These seemed to proliferate during the 1990s. A pioneer and model for others was the Dalit Liberation Education Trust begun in Chennai in April 1985. It began with job training, moved into community organization, and then into human rights education through workshops, consultations and publications. Their origins are described in Dalit Liberation Education Trust (Regd.), Report–

1985-88.

203This is apparent from the summary given in The Story of 30 Years Struggle for Justice and from the general silence on the subject in the National Christian Council during those years.

204The Story of 30 Years Struggle for Justice and Clarence O. McMullen et.al., The Amritsar Diocese, 33.

205The Story of 30 Years Struggle for Justice, passim.

206Government of India, Report of the Backward Classes Commission, I:160.

207S. Poonraj, ‘Discrimination Against Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin’, NCCR (September,

1975), 444-446.

208S. Poonraj, ‘National Christian Council’s Conference on Discrimination against Christians of Scheduled Caste origin in Andhra Pradesh’, South India Churchman (March 1976), 8-9.

209This is The Story of 30 Years Struggle for Justice.

210Reports and papers from this convocation are found in the NCCR (August 1978), 356-358, 367-

393 and ‘The Church Fights for the Oppressed’, Madras Diocesan News & Notes (Special edition; August 1978).

211‘Memorandum Respectfully Submitted: To His Excellency Sri N. Sanjiva Reddy, President of India’, South India Churchman (January 1979), 3-4.

212‘Memorandum Submitted to the Prime Minister of India Regarding Removal of Disabilities of Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin’, South India Churchman (March 1981), 7.

213I.E. Wilson Isaac, ‘Injustice to Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin’, South India Churchman (April 1981), 11.

214Government of India, Report of the Backward Classes Commission: First Part (Volumes I - III) 1980, I: 55,56, & 58.

215P.J. Kurien, M.P., ‘Discrimination Based on Religion Offends Fundamental Rights’, NCCR (April 1984), 190-197. The text of the debate is given in Jose Kananaikil, Scheduled Castes in Search of Justice. Part I: Knocking at the Door of the Lok Sabha (New Delhi, 1986), 6-59.

216Christian Dalit Liberation Movement, In the Struggle of the Least of My Brothers and Sisters: Proceedings of the First National Conference New Delhi March 25-27, 1985, 58.

217The text is given in ibid., 52-55. The following year the CDLM President commented, ‘Our own memorandum submitted to our Prime Minister, Shri Rajiv Gandhi, was received by him sympathetically with the promise of due attention at a later date. However, soon after we returned home, the Home Ministry sent us a letter saying there were no immediate plans for a review of the matter.”’ Christian Dalit Liberation Movement, Struggles and Hopes of Christian Dalits in India: Perspectives for Ideology and Vision (Vellore, 1986), 64.

218M. Azariah, ‘Indian and Dalit Realities’, in ibid., 2.

219Ibid, 44.

220K. Wilson, ‘The Twice-Alienated Predicament of the Dalit Christians’, In the Struggle of the

Least of My Brothers and Sisters, 44-51.

221‘Perspectives for a Vision and an Ideology for Christian Dalits’, Struggles and Hopes of Christian Dalits in India, 46.

222See the six papers in M.E. Prabhakar, ed., Towards a Dalit Theology, 146-154, 164-170.

223Arvind P. Nirmal, ‘A Dialogue with Dalit Literature’, in ibid., 64-82.

224M. Abel, ‘To Set at Liberty the Oppressed’, South India Churchman, (December 1978), 1.

225‘Dalit Christians Demand Inclusion in SC List’, Indian Express, 13 September, 1988. Other

estimates ranged from 40,000 upward.

226All-India Convention for the Rights of Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin, Backgrounder, 23.

227All-India Convention for the Rights of Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin, Preparatory Meeting: - CBCI Center New Delhi on 12/7/1990.

228All-India Convention for the Rights of Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin, ‘To All Heads of Churches/Christian Organisations.’

229‘Rape Ruckus’, India Today (31 August, 1990), 59.

230Interview with the Rt. Rev. Pritam B. Santram, 19 August, 1990.

231‘Dalit Christians want SC Status, Privileges’, The Hindu (New Delhi), 18 August, 1990, 3; V. T.

Rajshekar, ‘Dalit Christians Must Start Agitations for Reservations’, Dalit Voice 16-31 March, 1990), 10-11; ‘Big Dalit Christian Rally’, ibid. (1-15 September, 1990), 12; Interview with the author, 2 September 1990.

232Interview with M.E. Prabhakar, a member of the deputation, 31 August, 1990. For a fuller account of the rally see John C.B. Webster, ‘A Historic Rally for Dalit Christians’, The Christian Century (27 February, 1991), 236-239 and ‘Focus on All-India Christian Dalit Convention and Rally’, Samata (January 1990).

233M. E. Prabhakar, ‘National Christian Convention and Mass Rally to Demand Equal Rights for Dalit Christians’, North India Churchman (April 1994), 9-11.

234‘Memorandum Submitted to the Hon’ble Prime Minister by the Members of Parliament for the Immediate Extension of Statutory Benefits to the Scheduled Castes following Christianity’ in The Supreme Court of India, Writ Petition (Civil) No. 180 of 2004 in the Matter of: Centre for Public Interest Litigation & Ors. Versus Union of India, Paper-Book, 69-89.

235‘Delhi Declaration on SC Christians’, North India Church Review (January 1996), 5; ‘The Church stands with the Dalits’, ibid., 8; ‘Editor’s Update’, ibid.

236The Supreme Court of India, Writ Petition (Civil) No. 180 of 2004 in the Matter of : Centre for Public Interest Litigation & Ors versus Union of India, Paper-Book, 12-13, 90-108.

237See supra, 174-176.

238Among the letters of support, copies of which are in the files of T. Franklin Caesar, are those

from former Prime Minister V. P. Singh; Ram Vilas Paswan; Lalu Prasad; the Communist Party of India; the Communist Party of India (Marxist); Mayawati, the leader of the Bahujan Samaj Party; and two Chief Ministers of Tamil Nadu, J. Jayalalitha and M. Karunanidhi.

239The Christian Institute for the Study of Religion and Society and the Indian Social Institute are examples of the first type of organization; the Dalit Liberation Education Trust and National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights are examples of the second type.

240On land redistribution in Kerala see P. Sivanandan, ‘Economic Emancipation through Institutional Reform and Development Programmes: Experience of the Dalit Community in Kerala’, in A.M. Abraham Ayrookuzhiel, op. cit., 12-29.

Chapter 5 1Supra, 43.

2Report of the Punjab Missionary Conference held at Lahore in December and January, 1862-63

(Lodiana, 1863), 5-7.

3Report of the Third Decennial Missionary Conference, I:6.

4Burditt appealed to ‘the great principle set forth in Acts 13:46, 18:6’, that of ‘conserving our

powers for the greatest, most persistent effort where the Holy Spirit indicates a soil prepared of God’ as the warrant for this third reason. Ibid., I:7.

5Ibid.

6See the statements of Phillips , L.L. Uhl and J. Heinrichs in ibid., I:52; II: 554 & 565. The latter

spelled this out in the following terms, ‘Only he whom the Son of God makes free is free indeed. After Christ has entered the heart of these people and they are made obedient to the Spirit, they will also have faith in the missionary’s message and the superiority of his social, moral and religious ideas. They will, on accepting Christ as their Saviour from the sins and evils of this world as well as the everlasting misery of the next, not only learn the Ten Commandments by heart, but try to practise them in their daily lives. They will try to keep the Sabbath holy, endeavour to speak the truth, look upon adultery and bigamy as crimes, will cover their bodies, comb their hair, keep their houses clean and white washed, abstain from eating carrion, and do a great many other things which they formerly did not do; and that not always from personal and religious conviction, but simply because the missionary’s religion inculcates these principles and they have faith in him.’

7See the statements of Burditt, Martin, and Phillips, and Parker in ibid., I:16-17, 19, 52, 55.

8Ibid., II: 575-576.

9Supra, 75-76.

10W. Goudie, ‘Social Work Among the Pariahs’, The Indian Evangelical Review (April 1893), 311.

11Ibid., 312.

12Ibid.

13Ibid., 313. Several members of the Decennial Conference in Bombay also spoke on the

importance of helping Dalits to help themselves. Op. cit., II: 549, 566.

14W. Goudie, ‘Social Work Among the Pariahs’, 314.

15John E. Clough, Social Christianity in the Orient, 206.

16Ibid., 184.

17A.F. Painter, ‘The “Untouchables” of India and Christ’, The East and the West, X (April 1912),

198.

18Chas. Hope Gill, ‘The Strategic Value of the Mass Movements in India’, The East and the West,

XIII (January 1915) 42-43.

19‘Current Mission News’, The Harvest Field, XXXIV (September 1914), 356-357. Gordon’s description of the instruction given in the Punjab is not much different. See supra, 61 footnote 45.

20‘Current Mission News’, 357.

21J.F.W. Youngson, Forty Years of the Panjab Mission of the Church of Scotland, 269-270.

22Ibid., 271.

23Quoted in Samuel Mateer, Native Life in Travancore (London, 1883), 317-318. In India

Awakening (New York, 1911), Sherwood Eddy referred to this as an old slave song heard in the Pulaya congregation in Nagercoil. He quotes only verses 2,4,5,6 and 10 (pp. 89-90). In a recent study of Poyikayil Yohannan and the Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha, a Dalit social and religious movement in Kerala Yohannan led which at this stage functioned within a basically Christian theological frame of reference, Sanal Mohan finds that slavery provided the ‘foundationalist category’ in their discourses, as in this hymn. His analysis of their theology indicates that their view of salvation not only was more otherworldly and eschatological than that reflected in this hymn but also involved both Christ’s sharing the slaves’ suffering and becoming clean as an aspect of salvation, which this hymn does not. Sanal Mohan, ‘Narrativizing Oppression and Suffering: Theorizing Slavery’, South Asia Research, 26:1 (2006), 5-40. See also P. Sanal Mohan, ‘Religion, Social Space and Identity: The Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha and the Making of Cultural Boundaries in Twentieth Century Kerala’, South Asia, XVIII (April 2005), 35-63.

24From the summary of Dr. E. Forrester Paton’s address to the Bangalore Conference Continuation on 1 June, 1936. ‘Bangalore Conference Continuation’, G (18 June, 1936), 389.

25See supra, 126-127.

26This not only may be inferred from Christian replies to critics but may also be seen in such

articles as M.D., ‘Dr. Mott’s Visit’, H (19 December, 1936), 359-362.

27‘Christian Attitude to Harijan Revolt’, G (11 June, 1936), 372.

28‘Christian Evangelism in India’, G (28 January, 1937), 60.

29See footnote 27.

30This statement is printed in full in M.K. Gandhi, Christian Missions: Their Place in India, 131-

137. The quotation is on page 136.

31See, e.g., M.K. Gandhi, Christian Missions: Their Place in India, 130; M.D., ‘Weekly Letter’, H (5 December, 1936), 339.

32J. Waskom Pickett, Christ’s Way to India’s Heart (Lucknow, 1938), 36, 38. In another work published in 1938 Pickett quoted a conversation with a sweeper which illustrates the kind of grip the doctrines of karma and rebirth had on Dalit minds.

Q. Who are you?

A. I’m a sweeper.

Q. Are you a Christian?

A. No, I was born a sweeper. I must die a sweeper.

Q. But why not be a Christian?

A. For my sins I was made a Sweeper. I must not object. Can I change my karma and be born a Christian?

Q. Why not ask God to forgive your sins? He will do so and you can be born again in this life.

A. No. There is no forgiveness. I was very wicked in a previous life or I would not have been born a Sweeper.

Q. Won’t you send your children to the mission school? They can live better lives if they learn.

A. No! They, too, must suffer for their sins. They were born Sweepers. If they try to be gentlemen it will only add to their sins.

J. Waskom Pickett, ‘Untouchables’, in Gertrude C. Warner et. al., Moving Millions (Boston, 1938), 55.

33See footnote 28.

34See footnote 27.

35See footnote 28.

36Ibid.

37See footnote 27.

38This was not new. For a discussion of this in the nineteenth century, see John C.B. Webster The

Christian Community and Change in Nineteenth Century North India. 90-92.

39E.g., V.S. Azariah, ‘The Bishop’s New Year Letter’, Dornakal Diocesan Magazine (January 1936), 10-11; B.L. Rallia Ram, ‘The Caste System and its Influence upon the Christian Church in North India’, NCCR (November 1938), 613-614.

40See footnote 28.

41See footnote 27.

42See footnote 30, p. 136.

43‘Catholic Comments on the Joint Indian Christian Statement’, DC, 383, 384.

44This is quite apparent from the theological sources Subhan refers to: Shailer Mathews, The Social

Gospel and J.H. Montgomery, The Social Message of Jesus.

45This speech was serialized in The Indian Witness of 28 May, 4 June, and 11 June, 1936. Since the pagination begins with the first of the year, only the page number will be given in this and subsequent footnotes. This reference is to p. 339.

46Ibid.

47Ibid., Here he quotes from the pamphlet, The Christian Programme for Reconstruction.

48P. 340.

49Ibid.

50P. 346.

51P. 347.

52Ibid.

53P. 375.

54Pp. 374, 375.

55Mrs. Mohini Das, ‘What Womanhood Owes to Christ’, IW (11 June, 1936), 373.

56Ibid., 374.

57‘An Open Letter’, IW (17 September, 1936), 598.

58J.W. Pickett, Christian Mass Movements in India, 330-332.

59‘The Communal Award’, Dornakal Diocesan Magazine (October 1932), 11.

60Ibid., 12.

61‘The Bishop’s New Year Letter’, ibid. (January 1936), 8-10.

62‘The Bishop’s Letter’, ibid. (May 1937), 4.

63Ibid.

64In addition to the articles already cited, this paragraph has been influenced by ‘Our Duty as

Citizens’, ibid. (February 1938), 5-10.

65Supra, 151-152.

66J.C. Heinrich, The Psychology of a Suppressed People (London, 1937), 52.

67Ibid., 59-60.

68James C. Scott described some of the same reactions to oppression in his more recent and highly

influential study of the political economy of rural Malaysia, Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance (New Haven 1985). For a somewhat fuller analysis of Heinrich’s views, see John C. B. Webster, Religion and Dalit Liberation, 131-132.

69Report of the Backward Classes Commission (1955), I: 28.

70This is apparent in such surveys as Robin Boyd, An Introduction to Indian Christian Theology

(Madras, 1969); Marcus Braybrooke, The Undiscovered Christ (Madras, 1973); Godwin Shiri, Christian Social Thought in India 1962-1977 (Madras, 1982).

71James P. Alter and Herbert Jai Singh, The Church in Delhi, 151.

72Lionel Caplan, Class and Culture in Urban India, 185, 195.

73James P. Alter and Herbert Jai Singh, op. cit., 136.

74P.Y. Luke and John B. Carman, Village Christians and Hindu Culture, 172.

75Lionel Caplan, op. cit., 224-227. 76This paragraph is based upon Swarnalata Devi, ‘Kavi Jashuva’s Reflections on Andhra Christian

Dalits’, Religion and Society, XXXVII (March 1990), 35-42; M. E. Prabhakar, ‘In Search of Roots– Dalit Aspirations and the Christian Dalit Question: Perceptions of the Telugu Poet Laureate, Joshua’, ibid. XLI (March 1994), 2-20; M. E. Prabhakar, ‘The Dalit Poetry of Poet Laureate,

Joshua’, in Joseph Patmury, ed., Doing Theology with the Poetic Traditions of India: Focus on Dalit and Tribal Poems (Bangalore, 1996), 3-20.

77‘The Gospel for the Punjab’, Bulletin of the Christian Institute of Sikh Studies (July 1975), 14.

78Clarence O. McMullen, ‘The Self-Image of the Christians in the Punjab’, Bulletin of the Christian

Institute of Sikh Studies (January 1977), 21.

79Supra, 236-237.

80M. Azariah, ‘Injustice and Discrimination Against Christians of Scheduled Castes Origin

(CSCO): A Theological Interpretation’, Madras Diocesan News and Notes (August 1978), 32.

81Ibid., 31.

82This is mentioned in ibid., 36-37, but is more fully stated in M. Azariah, ‘Biblical Basis for

Church’s Concern for the Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin’, South India Churchman (February 1979), 4-5.

83Saral K. Chatterji, ‘Some Ingredients of a Theology of the People’, Religion and Society XXVII (December 1980), 9. Most of that issue of Religion and Society is devoted to the consultation.

84The 1981 revision of the paper was published by the Dalit Liberation Education Trust in Madras as a booklet in 1992. The original may be found in Arvind P. Nirmal, ed., A Reader in Dalit Theology (Madras, 1991), 93-127.

85Sathianathan Clarke, Dalits and Christianity: Subaltern Religion and Liberation Theology in India (New Delhi, 1998), 45.

86K. Wilson, The Twice Alienated: Culture of Dalit Christians (Hyderabad, 1982), 26.

87Ibid., 74.

88Ibid., 49.

89Ibid., 87.

90Ibid., 72.

91Supra, 238-239.

92M.E. Prabhakar, ‘The Search for a Dalit Theology’, in M.E. Prabhakar, ed., Towards a Dalit

Theology, 35.

93M.E. Prabhakar, ‘A Working Paper on the Indian Christian Dalits’, Struggles and Hopes of the Christian Dalits in India, 53.

94M.E. Prabhakar, ‘The Search for a Dalit Theology’, 45.

95M.E. Prabhakar, ‘A Working Paper on the Indian Christian Dalits’, 54.

96M.E. Prabhakar, Liberty to the Captives (Deenapur, 1987), 35-36.

97M.E. Prabhakar, ‘The Search for a Dalit Theology’, 45-46; ‘Caste in Andhra Churches’, 49-50.

98M.E. Prabhakar, ‘Bible Study: James 2: 1-9’, In the Struggle of the Least of My Brothers and

Sisters, 64; ‘The Search for a Dalit Theology’, 44-46.

99Supra, 290-291.

100In addition to his addresses in CDLM proceedings, see M. Azariah, The Un-Christian Side of

the Indian Church: The Plight of the Untouchable Converts (Bangalore, 1985). 101M. Azariah, Christ and Dalit Liberation (Madras, n.d.), 30.

102M. Azariah, ‘The Church’s Healing Ministry to Dalits’, in M.E. Prabhakar, ed., Towards a Dalit

Theology, 119.

103M. Azariah, Christ and Dalit Liberation, 20.

104M. Azariah, Mission in Christ’s Way in India Today (Madras, 1989), 94-95.

105M. Azariah, ‘Inaugural Address’, In the Struggle of the Least of My Brothers and Sisters, 42-43.

106M. Azariah, ‘The Church’s Healing Ministry to Dalits’, 121. Azariah’s theology had a strong

influence on the work of the Dalit Liberation Education Trust in Madras. Dalit Liberation Education Trust (Regd.) Report — 1985-88, 2-3. The Trust in turn published some of his work.

107A.P. Nirmal, ‘Doing Theology from a Dalit Perspective’, in Arvind P. Nirmal, ed., A Reader in Dalit Theology, 141.

108See especially Arvind P. Nirmal, ‘A Dialogue with Dalit Literature’, in M.E. Prabhakar, ed., Towards a Dalit Theology , 64-82.

109Arvind P. Nirmal, ‘Towards a Christian Dalit Theology’, in Arvind P. Nirmal, ed., A Reader in Dalit Theology, 62.

110Ibid., 63.

111Ibid., 64.

112Ibid., 70.

113Ibid.

114Arvind P. Nirmal, ‘Doing Theology from a Dalit Perspective’, 143.

115‘”Perspectives for a Vision and an Ideology” for Christian Dalits’, Struggles and Hopes of

Christian Dalits in India, 46-49. Some explorations in the area of shared ideology may be found in Arvind P. Nirmal, ed., Towards a Common Dalit Ideology (Madras, 1991). 116V. Devasahayam, ‘Bible Studies’, in V. Devasahayam, ed., Dalits & Women, 209-263.

117Devasahayam saw caste oppression and patriarchy as closely intertwined and mutually

reinforcing, but gave primacy to caste oppression as the root of Dalit pathos. V. Devasahayam, ‘Bible Studies’, in V. Devasahayam, ed., Frontiers of Dalit Theology (Delhi 1997), 8, 30; V. Devasahayam, ‘Doing Dalit Theology: Basic Assumptions’, in ibid., 274; V. Devasahayam, ‘Dimensions of Dalit Dilemma’, in Andreas Nehring, ed., Prejudice: Issues in Third World Theologies (Madras 1996), 273-301.

118In one essay he referred to the ‘oppressed collective’ as a ‘messianic community’. Vedamayaam Devasahayam, ‘Die Botschaft der Bibel’, in Deutscher Evangelisher Kirkentag, Leipzig, 1997, 189.

119V. Devasahayam , ‘Bible Studies’ in Frontiers of Dalit Theology, 5.

120Ibid., 37. Devasahayam’s choice of the Bible study was a deliberate attempt to use a cultural

medium in keeping with both the Indian tradition of commentary and the Indian Christian love of the Bible.

121Sathianathan Clarke, Dalits and Christianity, 34.

122Ibid., 47, 122.

123Ibid., 122.

124Ibid., 184.

125Ibid., 194.

126Ibid., 160, 188.

127M. Deenabandhu, ‘Re-Visioning Ecclesia in the Light of Dalit Experience: An Attempt Towards

an Indian Ecclesiology with the Experience of the Malas and Madigas in Dommeru and Jonnada in Andhra Pradesh, as a Point of Engagement’ (Unpublished Doctor of Theology Dissertation, Senate of Serampore College, 2001), 215.

128Ibid., 218.

129Ibid., 222.

130A. Maria Arul Raja, ‘Dalit Layers of Consciousness in Dialogue with Biblical World’ in James

Massey and Shimreingam Shimray, eds., Dalit-Tribal Theological Interface: Current Trends in Subaltern Theologies (New Delhi 2007), 202.

131The fullest and most lucid treatment of Arul Raja’s programme is ibid., 195-217. Earlier works include ‘Some Reflections on a Dalit Reading of the Bible’ and ‘New Exorcism and Dalit Assertion’ in V. Devasahayam, ed., Frontiers of Dalit Theology, 336-345, 346-356; ‘Hermeneutical Empowerment of Dalits in Dialogue with Biblical World’, Word and Worship, 39 (July-October 2006), 228-240; ‘A Casteless World is Possible: Building Dalit Horizons from Apocalyptic Ethos’ in Leonard Fernando S.J. and James Massey, eds., Dalit World-Biblical World: An Encounter (Delhi 2007), 171-185.

132Ruth Manorama, ‘Dalit Women: The Thrice Alienated’, in M. E. Prabhakar, ed., Towards a Dalit Theology, 149.

133Faustina, ‘From Exile to Exodus: Christian Dalit Women and the Role of Religion’, in V. Devasahayam, ed., Frontiers of Dalit Theology, 95. One of V. Devasahayam’s Bible studies in this volume was on ‘Doing Women’s Theology’ based on Mark 5:24-34. Ibid., 28-35.

134Ibid., 96-97.

135John C. B. Webster, Deborah Premraj, Ida Swamidoss, Rashilda Udayakumar, and Chandra

Yesuratnam, From Role to Identity: Dalit Christian Women in Transition (Delhi: 1997), 119.

136Ibid., 92 & 122.

137Ibid., 125.

138E.g., Shalini Mulackal pbvm, ‘Hunger for Food and Thirst for Dignity: Well-Being as

Hermeneutical Key to a Feminist Soteriology’ in James Massey and S. Lourdeswamy, eds., Dalit

Issue in Today’s Theological Debate (New Delhi 2003), 83-103.

139E.g., Surekha Nelavala, ‘Smart Syrophonecian Woman: A Dalit Feminist Reading of Mark 7:2431’, Expository Times 118:2 (2006), 64-69; Monica Jyotsna Melanchthon, ‘Dalit Readers of the Word: The Quest for Hermeneutics and Method’, in James Massey and Samson Prabhakar, eds., Frontiers in Dalit Hermeneutics (Bangalore & Delhi 2005), 45-64.

140E.g., Evangeline Anderson-Rajkumar, ‘Skin, Body and Blood: Explorations for Dalit Hermeneutics,” Religion and Society, 49:2&3 (June & September 2004), 106-120.

141Monica Jyotsna Melanchthon, ‘The Haunts of Pain: Theologizing Dalits’, In God’s Image 26:3 (September 2007), 8.

142J. Theophilus Appavoo (Parattai), ‘Dalit Religion and Culture’, in Andreas Nehring, ed., Prejudice, 302-318; Parattai (J. Theophilus Appavoo), ‘Dalit Way of Theological Expression’, in V. Devasahayam, ed., Frontiers of Dalit Theology, 383-389.

143See Zoe C. Sherinian, ‘Dalit Theology in Tamil Christian Folk Music: A Transformative Liturgy by James Theophilus Appavoo’, in Selva J. Raj and Corinne C. Dempsey, eds., Popular Christianity in India: Riting Between the Lines (Albany 2002), 233-253.

144Another important institutional base has been the Dalit Resource Centre created in 1989 at Tamilnadu Theological Seminary, the primary medium at which is Tamil. In addition to collecting materials on Dalits and the Dalit movement, it has sponsored consultations, training workshops, and, since 1996, an annual Dalit Cultural Festival. (This information was obtained from the seminary website, tts.org.in, on 20 September 2008.) A list of books on Dalit theology in Malayalam can be found in Y. T. Vinaya Raj, Re-imagining Dalit Theology: Post Modern Readings (Tiruvalla, 2008), 50-51.

145Among his major works are Roots of Dalit History, Christianity, Theology and Spirituality (Delhi, 1991); Towards Dalit Hermeneutics: Rereading the Text, the History and the Literature (Delhi 1994); Dalits in India: Religion as a Source of Bondage or Liberation with Special Reference to Christians (Delhi 1995); and Dalits: Issues and Concerns (Delhi 1998). Earlier in his career he had translated the entire Bible from the original Greek and Hebrew into Punjabi.

146See James Massey and S. Lourduswamy, eds., A Theology from Dalit Perspective (New Delhi 2001), passim.

147James Massey, The Gospel According to Luke. Dalit Bible Commentary: New Testament Volume 3 (New Delhi 2007), 6.

148Supra, 203-204.

149Dalit Avatariyan ki Aradhana ewn Dharampranali (Pavitrasthan 1998), 78-92. The twenty

articles themselves have been translated into English and are found in John C. B. Webster, ‘Whither Dalit Theology: A Historian’s Assessment’ in James Massey and S. Lourduswamy, eds., Dalit Issue in Today’s Theological Debate (New Delhi 2003), 36-38.

150V. V. Thomas, Dalit Pentecostalism: Spirituality of the Empowered Poor (Bangalore 2008), 349-

53, 375. See also P. J. Titus, ‘Pentecostal Indigenous Movements in Andhra’, in Roger E. Hedlund, ed., Christianity is Indian: The Emergence of an Indigenous Community (Delhi 2004), 368-70; Siga Arles, ‘Indigenous Church Growth at Kolar’, in ibid., 392.

151A group study involving 19 pastors to Dalits which addressed this is John C. B. Webster, The Pastor to Dalits.

152This distinction between ‘great’ and ‘little’ traditions has been common among anthropologists. M.E. Prabhakar suggested that I refer to them as the intellectual and popular traditions instead, in order to remove any implied judgments on the relative superiority and inferiority of those traditions. This is a good point. However, his terms highlight one aspect of the distinction being made, but ignore the fact that the former tradition covers a wider geographic area than does any one of the latter.

Bibliography

I. NOTE ON PRIMARY SOURCES A major primary source used throughout this work is the decennial Census of India 1881-2001, which contains not only statistics but also, in the volumes through 1931, important descriptive materials on the various jatis. Individual volumes are cited in the footnotes. For the case studies in chapter two the Annual Reports of the American Baptist Missionary Union as well as of the Board of Foreign Missions of the United Presbyterian Church of North America were consulted along with the issues of The Baptist Missionary Magazine and The Baptist Missionary Review. Other major periodical sources for the chapter were: The Church Missionary Review, The East and the West, The Harvest Field, The Hindustan Review, The Indian Evangelical Review, The Indian Standard, The Woman’s Missionary Friend, and The Women’s Missionary Magazine. Important Government sources for chapter three were The Indian Statutory Commission Oral Evidence and The Report of the Indian Statutory Commission as well as Indian Round Table Conference (Second Session) 7th September, 1931 — 1st December, 1931. Proceedings of Federal Structure Committee and Minorities Committee (Volume III). The Reports of the All-India Conference of Indian Christians from 1914 to 1931 were also consulted. Important newspaper and periodical sources were: Dornakal Diocesan Magazine, Harijan, Indian Social Reformer, National Christian Council Review, The Guardian, The Harvest Field, The Indian Standard, The Indian Witness, The New Leader, The United Church Review, as well as the compilation of newspaper reports from August 1932 to March 1938 by some Jesuits in Kurseong entitled The Depressed Classes: A Chronological Documentation.

The newspapers and periodicals used for chapter four were: Bulletin of the Christian Institute of Sikh Studies, Dalit International Newsletter, Dalit Voice, Indian Express, National Christian Council Review, North India Churchman, North Indian Church Review, Samata, South India Churchman, The Guardian, The Hindu, The Indian Witness and The Times of India. Both Seminar and Economic and Political Weekly were consulted; major articles cited from those are listed separately. In addition, the papers for the Supreme Court of India Writ Petition (Civil) No. 180 of 2004 in the Matter of Centre for Public Interest Litigation and T. Franklin Caesar, Petitioners, Versus Union of India, Respondents, which include the petition, the PaperBook, the Report of the National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities, and the letters of support received by T. Franklin Caesar have all been consulted. Books, major articles, and other materials were used both as primary and as secondary sources. II. BOOKS Alter, James P. In the Doab and Rohilkhand: North Indian Christianity 1815-1915, revised and completed by John Alter (Delhi, 1986). Alter, James P. and Jai Singh, Herbert. The Church in Delhi (Lucknow, 1961). Aloysius, G. Nationalism Without A Nation in India (Delhi, 1997). Aloysius, G. Religion as Emancipatory Identity: A Buddhist Movement among the Tamils under Colonialism (New Delhi, 1998). Ambedkar, B.R. Annihilation of Caste with a Reply to Mahatma Gandhi and Caste in India - Their Mechanism, Genesis and Development (Jullundur, 1968). Ambedkar, B.R. What Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables (second edition; Bombay, 1946).

Ayrookuzhiel, A.M. Abraham. Swami Anand Thirth. Untouchability: Gandhian Solution on Trial (Delhi, 1987). Ayrookuzhiel, A.M. Abraham, ed. The Dalit Desiyata: The Kerala Experience in Development and Class Struggle (Delhi, 1990). Azariah, M. Christ and Dalit Liberation (Madras, n.d.). Azariah, M. Mission in Christ’s Way in India Today (Madras, 1989). Azariah, M. The Un-Christian Side of the Indian Church: The Plight of the Untouchable Converts (Bangalore, 1985). Baago, K. A History of the National Christian Council of India 1914-1964 (Nagpur, 1965). Bandyopadhyay, Sekhar. Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India: The Namasudras of Bengal 1872-1947 (Richmond, 1997). Barrier, N. Gerald, ed. The Census in British India: New Perspectives (New Delhi, 1981). Bauman, Chad M. Christian Identity and Dalit Religion in Hindu India, 1868-1947 (Grand Rapids, 2008). Bayly, Susan. The New Cambridge History of India IV.3 : Caste, Society and Politics in India from the Eighteenth Century to the Modern Age (Cambridge, 1999). Bhai, P. Nirmala. Harijan Women in Independent India (New Delhi, 1986). Bhattacharya, Jogendra Nath. Hindu Castes and Sects. Forward by Nirmal Kumar Bose (Calcutta, 1968). Boyd, Robin. An Introduction to Indian Christian Theology (Madras, 1969). Boyd, Robin. Church History of Gujarat (Madras, 1981). Brass, Paul R. The Politics of India Since Independence (Cambridge, 1990).

Braybrooke, Marcus. The Undiscovered Christ (Madras, 1973). Briggs, George W. The Chamars (Calcutta, 1920). Brown, Judith M. Gandhi: Prisoner of Hope (New Haven, 1989). Bugge, Henriette. Mission and Tamil Society: Social and Religious Change in South India 1840-1900 (Richmond, 1994). Campbell, E.Y. The Church in the Punjab: Some Aspects of Its Life and Growth (Nagpur, 1961). Caplan, Lionel. Class and Culture in Urban India: Fundamentalism in a Christian Community (Oxford, 1987). Cederlof, Gunnel. Bonds Lost: Subordination, Conflict and Mobilisation in Rural South India c. 1900-1970 (New Delhi, 1997). Chitnis, Suma. A Long Way to Go: Report On a Survey of Scheduled Caste High School and College Students in Fifteen States of India (New Delhi, 1981). Clark, Robert. The Missions of the Church Missionary Society and the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society in the Punjab and Sindh, edited & revised by Robert Maconachie (London, 1904). Clarke, Sathianathan. Dalits and Christianity: Subaltern Religion and Liberation Theology in India (New Delhi, 1998). Clough, John E. Social Christianity in the Orient: The Story of a Man, A Mission and a Movement (New York, 1914). Crooke, W. The Tribes and Castes of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh (Calcutta, 1896). Dahiwale, S.M. Emerging Entrepreneurship Among Scheduled Castes of Contemporary India: A Study of Kolhapur City (New Delhi, 1989). Dalit Avatariyan ki Aradhana ewn Dharampranali (Pavitrasthan 1998).

Dalit Bible Commentary: New Testament Volumes 1, 3, 5, 6, 7, 9 (New Delhi, 2007, 2008). Dangle, Arjun. Poisoned Bread: Translations from Modern Marathi Dalit Literature (Bombay, 1992). David, Immanuel. Reformed Church in America Missionaries in South India, 1839-1938: An Analytical Study (Bangalore, 1986). Deliege, Robert. The Untouchables of India, trans. By Nora Scott (Oxford, 1999). Devanandan, P.D. and Thomas, M.M., eds. Christian Participation in Nation-Building (Bangalore, 1960). Devasahayam, V., ed., Dalits and Women: Quest for Humanity (Madras, 1992). Devasahayam, V., ed., Frontiers of Dalit Theology (Delhi 1997). Dirks, Nicholas B. Castes of Mind: Colonialism and the Making of Modern India (Princeton, 2001). Dogar, Vidya Sagar J. Rural Christian Community in Northwest India (Delhi, 2001). Downie, David. The Lone Star: The History of the Telugu Mission of the American Baptist Missionary Union (Philadelphia, 1893). D’Souza, Victor S. Inequality and its Perpetuation: A Theory of Social Stratification (New Delhi, 1981). Dube, Saurabh. Untouchable Pasts: Religion, Identity and Power among a Central Indian Community, 1780-1950 (Albany, 1998). Eddy, Sherwood. India Awakening (New York, 1911). Enthoven, R.E. The Tribes and Castes of Bombay (Bombay, 1922).

Epstein, T. Scarlett. Economic Development and Social Change in South India (Bombay, 1979). Farquhar, J.N. Modern Religious Movements in India (Indian edition; Delhi, 1967). Fernandes, Walter. Caste and Conversion Movements in India: Religion and Human Rights (New Delhi, 1981). Fishman, Alvin Texas. For This Purpose: A Case Study of the Telugu Baptist Church in its Relation with the South India Misssion of the American Baptist Foreign Mission Societies in India (Madras, 1958). Forrester, Duncan B. Caste and Christianity (London, 1979). Freeman, James. M. Untouchable: An Indian Life History (Stanford, 1979). Galanter, Marc. Competing Equalities: Law and the Backward Classes in India (Berkeley, 1984). Gandhi, M.K. An Autobiography (second edition; Ahmedabad, 1959). Gandhi, M.K. Christian Missions: Their Place in India (Ahmedabad, 1941). Gandhi, M.K. Satyagraha in South Africa (American edition; Stanford, 1954). Geetha, V. and Rajadurai, S.V. Towards a Non-Brahmin Millennium: From Iyothee Thass to Periyar (Calcutta, 1999). Gladstone, J.W. Protestant Christianity and People’s Movements in Kerala (Trivandrum, 1984). Goel, Sita Ram. History of Hindu-Christian Encounters (New Delhi, 1989). Gokhale, Jayashree. From Concessions to Confrontation: The Politics of an Indian Untouchable Community (Bombay, 1993).

Gordon, Andrew. Our India Mission (Philadelphia, 1886). Grafe, Hugald. History of Christianity in India. Volume IV, Part 2: Tamilnadu in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (Bangalore, 1990). Graham, Carol. Azariah of Dornakal (revised edition; Delhi, 1972). Griswold, Hervey DeWitt. Insights into Modern Hinduism (New York, 1934). Gupta, S.K. The Scheduled Castes in Modern Indian Politics: Their Emergence as a Political Power (New Delhi, 1985). Hanumanthan, K.R. Untouchability: A Historical Study Up to 1500AD with Special Reference to Tamil Nadu (Madurai, 1979). Hardgrave Jr., Robert L. The Nadars of Tamilnad (Bombay, 1969). Harding, Christopher, Religious Transformation is South Asia:The Meanings of Conversion in Colonial Punjab (Oxford, 2008). Harper, Susan Billington. In the Shadow of the Mahatma: Bishop V.S. Azariah and the Travails of Christianity in British India (Grand Rapids and London, 2000). Hedlund, Roger E., ed. Christianity is Indian: The Emergence of an Indigenous Community (Delhi 2004). Heimsath, Charles H. Indian Nationalism and Hindu Social Reform (Princeton, 1964). Heinrich, J.C. The Psychology of a Suppressed People (London, 1937). Hewat, Elizabeth G.K. Vision and Achievement 1796-1956: A History of the Foreign Missions of the Churches United in the Church of Scotland (London, 1960). Hines, Herbert Waldo. Clough, Kingdom-Builder in South India (Philadelphia, 1929).

Hrangkhuma, F., ed. Christianity in India: Search for Liberation and Identity (Delhi, 1998). Hunt, W.S. India’s Outcastes: A New Era (London, 1924). Hutton, J.H. Caste in India: Its Nature, Function and Origins (4th edition; London, 1963). Irschick, Eugene F. Politics and Social Conflict in South India: The NonBrahmin Movement and Tamil Separatism, 1916-1929 (Berkeley, 1969). Irudayaraj, Xavier, ed. Emerging Dalit Theology (Madras, 1990). Isaacs, Harold R. India’s Ex-Untouchables (Bombay, 1964). Jaffrelot, Christophe. India’s Silent Revolution: The Rise of the Low Castes in North Indian Politics (Delhi, 2003). Jayakumar, Samuel. Dalit Consciousness and Christian Conversion: Historical Resources for a Contemporary Debate (Delhi, 1999). Jogdand, Prahlad Gangaram. Dalit Movement in Maharashtra (New Delhi, 1991). Jones, Kenneth W. Arya Dharm: Hindu Consciousness in 19th- Century Punjab (Berkeley, 1976). Joseph, P.C. The Economic and Social Environment of the Church in North Travancore and Cochin (1938). Joshi, Barbara R. Democracy in Search of Equality: Untouchable Politics and Indian Social Change (Delhi, 1982). Joshi, Barbara R., ed. Untouchable! Voices of the Dalit Liberation Movement (London, 1986). Juergensmeyer, Mark. Religion and Social Vision: The Movement Against Untouchability in Twentieth Century Punjab (Berkeley, 1982).

Kananaikil, Jose. Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin (New Delhi, 1983). Kananaikil, Jose. Constitutional Provisions for the Scheduled Castes (New Delhi, 1984). Kananaikil, Jose. Scheduled Caste Converts and Social Disabilities: A Survey of Tamil Nadu (New Delhi, 1990). Kananaikil, Jose, ed. Scheduled Castes and the Struggle Against Inequality: Strategies to Empower the Marginalized (New Delhi, 1983). Kananaikil, Jose. Scheduled Castes in Search of Justice. Part I: Knocking at the Door of the Lok Sabha (New Delhi, 1986). Kananaikil, Jose, ed. Scheduled Castes in Search of Justice. Part II: The Verdict of the Supreme Court (New Delhi, 1986). Kananaikil, Jose. The Scheduled Castes in the Constituent Assembly: Rebirth in a New Nation (New Delhi, 1982). Karlekar, Malavika. Poverty and Women’s Work: A Study of Sweeper Women in Delhi (Delhi, 1982). Keer, Dhananjay. Dr. Ambedkar: Life and Mission (third edition; Bombay, 1971). Khan, Mumtaz Ali. Mass Conversion of Meenakshipuram: A Sociological Enquiry (Madras, 1983). Khan, Mumtaz Ali. Seven Years of Change: A Study of Some Scheduled Castes in Bangalore District (Madras, 1979). Khare, R.S. The Untouchable as Himself: Ideology, Identity and Pragmatism among the Lucknow Chamars (Cambridge, 1984). Khosla, Dinesh. Myth and Reality of the Protection of Civil Rights Law: A Case Study of Untouchability in Rural India (Delhi, 1987). Kohli, Atul. The State and Poverty in India (Cambridge, 1987).

Koilparampil, George. Caste in the Catholic Community in Kerala (Cochin, 1982). Kooiman, Dick. Conversion and Social Equality in India (Columbia, n.d.). Koshy, Ninan. Caste in the Kerala Churches (Bangalore, 1968). Kumar, Dharma. Land and Caste in South India: Agricultural Labour in the Madras Presidency during the Nineteenth Century (Cambridge, 1965). Kumar, Ravinder. Gandhi, Ambedkar and the Poona Pact (New Delhi, 1985). Kumari, V. Pushpa. Poverty Alleviation and Rural Harijans (New Delhi, 1991). Latourette, Kenneth Scott. A History of the Expansion of Christianity. Volume 6: The Great Century in Northern Africa and Asia 1800A.D. to 1914A.D. (New York, 1944). Leo, Fr. The Capuchin Mission in the Punjab (Mangalore, 1910). Leslie, Julia. Authority and Meaning in Indian Religions: Hinduism and the Case of Valmiki (Burlington, 2003). Lucas, E.D. and Thakur Das, F. The Rural Church in the Punjab (Lahore, 1938). Luke, P.Y. and Carman, John B. Village Christians and Hindu Culture (1968). Lynch, Owen W. The Politics of Untouchability: Social Mobility and Social Change in a City in India (Delhi, 1974). Maconachie, R. Rowland Bateman: Nineteenth Century Apostle (London, 1917). Mahar, J. Michael, ed. The Untouchables in Comtemporary India (Tuscon, 1972).

Malik, Suneila. Social Integration of Scheduled Castes (New Delhi, 1979). Mallampalli, Chandra. Christians and Public Life in Colonial South India, 1863-1937: Contending with Marginality (London and New York, 2004) Manickam, S. Slavery in Tamil Country: A Historical Overview (Madras, 1982). Manickam, S. Studies in Missionary History: Reflections on a CultureContact (Madras, 1988). Manickam, Sundararaj. The Social Setting of Christian Conversion in South India: The Impact of the Wesleyan Methodist Missionaries on the TrichyTanjore Diocese with special reference to the Harijan Communities of the Mass Movement Area 1920-1947 (Wiesbaden, 1977). Massey, James. Dalits in India: Religion as a Source of Bondage or Liberation with Special Reference to Christians (Delhi 1995). Massey, James. Dalits: Issues and Concerns (Delhi 1998). Massey, James. Roots of Dalit History, Christianity, Theology and Spirituality (Delhi, 1991). Massey, James. Towards Dalit Hermeneutics: Rereading the Text, the History and the Literature (Delhi 1994). Massey, James and Lourdeswamy, S. eds. Dalit Issue in Today’s Theological Debate (New Delhi 2003). Mateer, Samuel. Native Life in Travancore (London, 1883). Mathew, Joseph. Ideology, Protest and Social Mobility: Case Study of Mahars & Pulayas (New Delhi, 1986). McMullen, Clarence O., Webster, John C.B., Caleb, Maqbul. The Amritsar Diocese: A Preliminary Survey (Batala, 1973). Mendelsohn, Oliver and Vicziany, Marika The Untouchables: Subordination, Poverty and the State in Modern India (Cambridge, 1998).

Misra, R.G. and Kaur, Gurvinder. Reservation Policy and Personnel Selection (New Delhi, 1990). Moffatt, Michael. An Untouchable Community in South India: Structure and Consensus (Princeton, 1979). Moon, Vasant, compiler. Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar, Writings and Speeches: Volume 5 (Bombay, 1989). Mujahid, Abdul Malik. Conversion to Islam: Untouchables’ Strategy for Protest in India (Chambersburg, 1989). Mukherjee, Prabhati. Beyond the Four Varnas: The Untouchables in India (Shimla, 1988). Mundadan, A. Mathias. History of Christianity in India. Volume I: From the Beginning up to the Middle of the Sixteenth Century (Bangalore, 1984). Murugkar, Lata. Dalit Panther Movement in Maharashtra: A Sociological Appraisal (Bombay, 1991). Narula, Smita. Politics by Other Means: Attacks Against Christians in India (Washington 1999). Nash, Kate. Contemporary Political Sociology: Globalization, Politics and Power (Oxford, 2000). Natarajan, S. A Century of Social Reform in India (Bombay, 1959). Nath, Trilok. Politics of the Depressed Classes (Delhi, 1987). Nehring, Andreas, ed. Prejudice: Issues in Third World Theologies (Madras 1996). Nirmal, Arvind P., ed. A Reader in Dalit Theology (Madras, 1991). Nirmal, Arvind P., ed. Towards a Common Dalit Ideology (Madras, 1991). Oddie, G.A. Hindu and Christian in South East India (London, 1991). Oddie, G.A. Social Protest in India: British Protestant Missionaries and Social Reforms 1850-1900 (New Delhi, 1979). O’Hanlon, Rosalind. Caste, Conflict and Ideology: Mahatma Jotirao Phule and Low Caste Protest in Ninteenth-Century Western India (Cambridge, 1985). Oommen, George and Webster, John C. B., eds. Local Dalit Christian History (Delhi, 2002). Oommen, T.K. Protest and Change: Studies in Social Movements (New Delhi, 1990). Padhy, K.S. and Mahapatra, Jayashree. Reservation Policy in India (New Delhi, 1988). Pai, Sudha. Dalit Assertion and the Unfinished Democratic Revolution: The Bahujan Samaj Party in Uttar Pradesh (New Delhi, 2002).

Patwardhan, Sunanda. Change Among India’s Harijans: Maharashtra - A Case Study (New Delhi, 1973). Philip, P.O. The Depressed Classes and Christianity, (Madras, 1925). Phillips, Godfrey E. The Outcastes’ Hope or Work Among the Depressed Classes in India (London, 1915). Pickett, J. Waskom. Christian Mass Movements in India (New York, 1933). Pickett, J. Waskom. Christ’s Way to India’s Heart (Lucknow, 1938). Pinto, Ambrose. Dalit Christians: A Socio-Economic Survey, Archdiocese of Bangalore (Bangalore, 1992). Ponniah, J.S. An Enquiry into the Economic and Social Problems of the Christian Community of Madura, Ramnad, and Tinnevelly Districts (1938). Potts, E. Daniel. British Baptist Missionaries in India 1793-1837 (Cambridge, 1967). Prabhakar, M.E. Liberty to the Captives (Deenapur, 1987). Prabhakar, M.E., ed. Towards a Dalit Theology (Delhi, 1988). Prakasam, Gnana. Social Separatism: Scheduled Castes and the Caste System (Jaipur, 1998). Prasad, Vijay. Untouchable Freedom: A Social History of a Dalit Community (New Delhi, 2000). Pyarelal. The Epic Fast (Ahmedabad, 1932). Raj, Antony. Children of a Lesser God: Dalit Christians (Madurai, 1992). Raj, Y. Antony. Social Impact of Conversion: A Comparative Sociological Study on The Christians of Scheduled Caste Origins and Scheduled Caste Hindus (Delhi, 2001).

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Sachchidananda, The Harijan Elite (Faridabad, 1976). Saradamoni, K. Divided Poor: Study of a Kerala Village (Delhi, 1981). Shah, Ghanshyam, Harish Mander, Sukhadeo Thorat, Satish Deshpande, Amita Baviskar. Untouchability in Rural India (New Delhi, 2006). Shah, Vimal P. and Agrawal, Binod C., eds. Reservation: Policy, Programmes and Issues (Jaipur, 1986). Sharma, G.S. Legislation and Cases on Untouchability and Scheduled Castes in India (Bombay, 1975). Sharma, Miriam. The Politics of Inequality: Competition and Control in an Indian Village (Hawaii, 1978). Sharma, Ram Sharan. Sudras in Ancient India: A Social History of the Lower Order down to Circa A.D. 600 (second edition; Delhi, 1980). Sherring, M.A. Hindu Tribes and Castes (Calcutta, 1881). Sherring, M.A. Hindu Tribes and Castes as Represented in Benares (Calcutta, 1872). Shetty, V.T. Rajshekar. Dalit Movement in Karnataka (Madras, 1978). Shinde, J.R. Dynamics of Cultural Revolution: 19th Century Maharashtra (Delhi, 1985). Shiri, Godwin. Christian Social Thought in India 1962-1977 (Madras, 1982). Shiri, Godwin. The Plight of Christian Dalits: A South Indian Case Study (Bangalore 1997). Showeb, M. Education and Mobility Among Harijans (Allahabad, 1986). Shyamlal, Dr. Caste and Political Mobilization: The Bhangis (Jaipur, 1981).

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Tennant, William. Indian Recreations; Consisting Chiefly of Strictures on the Domestic and Rural Economy of the Mahomedans & Hindoos (second edition; London, 1804). Thapar, Romila. Ancient Indian Social History (New Delhi, 1978). Thapar, Romila. The Penguin History of Early India From the Origins to AD 1300 (New Delhi, 2003). The Depressed Classes of India: An Enquiry into their Conditions and Suggestions for their Uplift with an Introduction by Rajinder Singh Vatsa (New Delhi, 1977). Thomas, V.V. Dalit Pentecostalism: Spirituality of the Empowered Poor (Bangalore 2008). Upadhyay, H.C. Reservations for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (New Delhi, 1991). Venkateswarlu, D. Harijan-Upper Caste Conflict (New Delhi, 1990). Verma, Mukut Behari. History of the Harijan Sevak Sangh 1932-1968 (Delhi, 1971). Vinaya Raj, V. T. Re-imagining Dalit Theology: Post Modern Readings (Tiruvalla, 2008). Webster, John C.B. From Indian Church to Indian Christian Theology: An Attempt at Theological Construction (Madras, 1992). Webster, John C.B., Deborah Premraj, Ida Swamidoss, Rashilda Udayakumar, and Chandra Yesuratnam, From Role to Identity: Dalit Christian Women in Transition (Delhi 1997). Webster, John C.B. Religion and Dalit Liberation: An Examination of Perspectives (second edition; New Delhi, 2002). Webster, John C.B. The Christian Community and Change in Nineteenth Century North India (Delhi, 1976).

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