The Past of the Outcaste: Readings in Dalit History 9789386296658, 9386296659

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THE PAST OF THE O U TC ASTE Readings in D alit H istory

edited by S a b y a s a c h i B h a tta c h a r y a Y a g a ti C h in n a R ao

Orient BlackSwan

CONTENTS

Publishers Acknowledgements sabyasachi bhattacharya

vii Introduction

1

AND YAGATI CHINNA RAO

one

1 . G. K. GOKHALE 2. LALA LAJPAT RAI 3. G. A. NATESAN 4. R. G. BHANDARKAR 5. B. R. AMBEDKAR 6. M. K. GANDHI

7. BENOY K. SARKAR

B.T. RANADIVE

tw o

‘Turn the Search-light Inwards， ‘Humanity，Justice and Self-interest’ ‘Nation-building and Social Equality’ ‘Address to Depressed Classes’Conference’ ‘Right and Might’ Statement on Untouchability The Sociology of the Poor and the Pariah: The Pariahs Contributions to Brahmari Flesh and Blood Six Crore Untouchables: Their Place in Freedoms Battle

33 37 41 45 49 55 59

69

HISTORIOGRAPHY OF THE PRE-COLONIAL PERIOD

9. SUVIRA JAISWAL 10. VIVEKANAND JHA 11. K. R. HANUMANTHAN

three

APPROACHES TO THE ISSUE

Studies in Early Indian Social History: Trends and Possibilities Stages in the History of Untouchables Evolution of Untouchability in Tamil Nadu upto 1600 AD

83 104 123

CONTINUITY AND CHANGE IN COLONIAL SOCIETY

Labour Castes under the English Company in Madras in the 17th and 18th Centuries 13. PRIYADARSHINI VIJAISRI Outcaste Pasts: Rethinking the Boundaries 14. ELEANOR ZELUOT The History of Dalits in Pune 15. RAMNARAYAN S. RAWAT Making Claims for Power: A New Agenda in Dalit Politics of Uttar Pradesh, 1946-48 12. VI KRAM HARIJAN

149 172 226 252

vj

C ontents

four

DALIT CASTE MOVEMENTS

^6". Bharat patankar and Gail om vedt

17.

^ 18.

,'1ダ.

sekhar bandyopadhyay

yagati

CHINNA RAO

adapa satyanarayana

20. valerian rodrigues

five

The Dalit Liberation Movement in Colonial Period Protest and Accommodation: Two Caste Movements in Eastern and Northern Bengal, c .1872-1937 Rise and Growth of Dalit Consciousness in South India: A Case of Andhra and Hyderabad Dalit Identity and Consciousness in Colonial Andhra, 1917-47 Dalits and Cultural Identity: Ambedkar s Prevarications on the Question ot Culture

23. 24. .

Depressed し lasses’Uplift in the Gandhian Era: A Critique ofThree Approaches BHAGWAN DAS Untouchability, Scheduled Castes and Nation Building STEPHEN HENNINGHAM Autonomy and Organisation: Harijan and Adivasi Protest Movements Congress, Gandhi and the Politics of RAJ SEKHAR BASU Untouchability in Tamil Nadu in the 1930s GOPAL GURU Understanding Ambedkars Construction of the National Movement s ix

313

329 344

359 375 387 394 415

LOCATING DALITS IN POST-INDEPENDENCE INDIAN POLITY

26. K. A. MANiKUMAR — 27. Shura darapuri

,28.

297

DALITS AND THE NATIONAL MOVEMENT

ATUL CHANDRA PRADHAN

22.

275

mark juergensm eyer

JNotes on Contributors Index

Caste Violence in South Tamil Nadu: A Study of the 1995 Conflict Social Exclusion of Dalit Women What if the UntouchaDles Don5t Believe in Untouchability?

423 441 451

463 465

P U B L IS H E R 'S A C K N O W L E D G E M E N T S

For permission to reproduce copyright material in this volume, the publisher wishes to make the following acknowledgements. Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Source Material Publication Committee (DBASMPC) for extracts from B. R. Ambedkar, Annihilation of Caste? in Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches^ v o l.1 , compiled by Vasant Moon, 38-44 (Bombay: Government of Maharashtra, 1979). Indian Council for Historical Research (ICHR) for six essays published in the Indian Historical Review. SEKHAR BANDYOPADHYAY, 'Protest and Accommodation: Two Caste Movements in Eastern and Northern Bengal,c.1872-1937J, TheIndian Historical RevieWyVol.14, nos 1-2 (June 1987 - January 1988), [published in 1990]. RAJ SEKHAR BASU, Kongress, Gandhi and the Politics of Untouchability in Tamil Nadu in the 19305^ Indian Historical Review, vol.30 (January - July 2003), 84-110. K. R. HANUMANTHAN，‘Evolution of Untouchability in Tamil Nadu upto 1600 ad*, The Indian Historical Review^ vol.23, nos 1~2 (July 1996 ~ January 1997). SUVIRA JAISWAL, 'Studies in Early Indian Social History: Trends and Possibilities,, The Indian Historical Review^ vol.6, nos 1-2 (July 1979 - January 1980). VIVEKANAND JHA, 'Stages in the History of Untouchables,, The Indian Historical Review, voL 2, no.1 (July 1975), 14-31. ATUL CHANDRA PRADHAN， ‘Depressed Classes’Uplift in the Gandhian Era: A Critique of Three Approaches5, The Indian Historical Review^ vol.19, nos 1-2 (July 1992 - January 1993). Rajalakshmi Hanumanthan, legal heir of K. R. Hanumanthan, for one essay. K. R. HANUMANTHAN， ‘Evolution of Untouchability in Tamil Nadu upto 1600 ad 5, The Indian Historical Review, vol. XX3II, nos 1-2 (July 1996January 1997). Sitaram Yechury, General Secretary, Communist Party of India (Marxist) for permission to carry one essay. B.T. RANADIVE/Six Crore Untouchables: Their Place in Freedoms Battle*, Peoples War^ vol. 3, no. 23 (1944).

viii

Publisher's A c kn o w le d g e m e n ts

Annapurna Jha, legal heir of Vivekanand Jha, for one essay. VIVEKANAND JHA, 'Stages in the History of Untouchables', The Indian Historical Reviev),vo\. 2, no.1 (July 1975),14-31. Shura Darapuri, legal heir of Bhagwan Das, for one essay. BHAGWAN DAS, (Untouchability, Scheduled Castes and Nation Building^ SocialAction^ vol. 32, no. 3 (1982), 269—82. The Asiatic Society of Mumbai for one essay published in the Journal ofthe Asiatic Society ofMumbai, ELEANOR ZELLIOT, (The History of Dalits in Vunc f Journal of the Astatic Society of Mumbai^ n.s., vol.74 (1999), 211-39. Cambridge University Press for permission to carry one essay that appeared in Modern Asian Studies. RAMNARAYAN S. RAWAX ‘Making Claims for Power: A New Agenda in Dalit Politics of Uttar Pradesh, 1946-48^ Modern Asian Studies^ vol.37, no. 3 (2003)，585-612. Suresh Shelke of Vikas Adhyayan Kendra for permission to carry one essay that appeared in Vikalp, ADAPA SATYANARAYANA/Dalit Identity and Consciousness in Colonial Andhra, 1917-47, Vikalp, vol.6, no. 2 (1998), 41-57. Indian Social Institute for permission to carry two essays that appeared in SocialAction, BHAGWAN DAS/Untouchability, Scheduled Castes and Nation Building^ SocialAction^ vol.32, no. 3 (1982), 269—82. VALERIAN RODRIGUES, (Dalits and Cultural Identity: Ambedkar^ Prevarications on the Question of Culture5, SocialAction^ vol.50, no.1(2000), 1-15. Thomas P. Fenton, Editor, CriticalAsian Studies (www.criticalasianstudies.org) for permission to carry one essay that appeared in its predecessor journal, Bulletin of ConcernedAsian Scholars. MARK JUERGENSMEYER, (What if the Untouchables Dorft Believe in \]ntonch2biVityï Bulletin of ConcernedAsian Scholars, vol.12, no.1(1980).

IN T R O D U C T IO N Sabyasachi Bhattacharya andYagati Chinna Rao

To the Indian mind, when it is awake to reality, the discourse of iuntouchability, has always been like a conversation with personal and public conscience. That conversation may cease for a while at moments when we are unwilling or unable to look at things as they are. But that lapse into silence soon ends when stark reality intervenes. Therefore, most of the thought-leaders of what we call the modern period in India have addressed time and again the issue of untoucnability, the many dimensions of being outcaste, the urgent need to understand marginality. In that endeavour the academic historians have not been by any means in the forefront. Perhaps an ideological occlusion discouraged historical research on the marginalised communities. Only in very recent decades a substantial corpus of writings on that segment or history has developed. This book aims to look at those writings. The idea of a book of readings in the historical narratives or the outcastes5 developed in the context of the recent initiative in many universities to begin teaching and research in what the University Grants Commission has promoted as 'Studies in Exclusion. This is a positive development. On the other hand, the poverty of easily accessible teaching material and academic research in that history is self-evident. The aim of this book is to bring together in one volume the fruits of research scattered in different scholarly journals and books published long ago as well as unpublished doctoral theses produced in recent years. Before we go any further we need to say a few words on the terms ‘untouchable’， ‘outcaste， and ‘Dalit’一 terms which the authors in this collection have often used interchangeably. Some authorities look upon the retrospective use of the term ^ a lit5, in respect of social groups of the period prior to the emergence ofthat term in the 20th century Dalit movement, as anachronistic and unhistorical. The term £untouchable, has the merit of clearly counterposing the ‘touchables’as distinct from ‘untouchables’. Eleanor Zelliot, a pioneer in Dalit studies, refers to 1ex-untouchables, in her chapter in this volume—which was no doubt an effort on her part to be legally correct. The word outcaste, was commonly used from the era of early European contact. Some authors in this volume prefer it, possibly because it emphasises marginality and serves to remind us of the boundary between the privileged and the disprivileged and the boundary-maintenance mechanism which maintained that abominable system. The term outcaste, in fact emphasises precisely the phenomenon of exclusion, now in focus in the Exclusion studies'. While we have used the term outcaste, in the title of this volume, it seems to us that other terms like ^ntouchable7can be interchangeable

2

Sabyasachi Bhattacharya andYagati Chinna Rao

with it; variations of usage in the chapters which follow, due to the predilection of individual authors or the fashion of the period when he or she wrote, do not impede our comprehension. In arranging the readings we have selected for this collection, we had two options: to present them in chronological order or to arrange them in thematic groups. The first option enables the reader to get an idea of the development of historiography and the growth of new interpretations and narratives of the outcaste past. The second method will provide a reader-friendly guidance in respect of the specific subject matter of the selected readings. The editorial strategy has been to try to combine the merits of both these approaches. Although there is, inevitably, thematic overlap between different pieces of writing, we have aimed at a thematic arrangement and at the same time the sequence of readings included in each thematic group is in chronological order of publication. The first group includes some representative statements of positions, each of which might be considered as locus classical in its domain, e.g. statements by G. K. Gokhale, Lajpat Rai, G. A. Natesan, and, of course, Dr B. R. Ambedkar and Mahatma Gandhi. A rare piece of writing by the Communist leader B. T. Ranadive completes the first section. The second theme is the history of the outcastes in the pre-colonial period, in ancient and medieval north India and south India. We also have in this section an analysis of the new construction of history from the Dalit point of view. The third and fourth sections address the continuity of the pre-colonial past in the colonial period and the beginnings of Dalit consciousness and organised resistance to caste oppression. The next theme comprises a selection of essays on a theme that has attracted many research scholars recently, the relationship between the nationalist movement and the Dalits. Hie sixth and final group of readings tries to locate the Dalits in the post-Independence polity in India. Needless to say, the views of the authors are their own and the reproduction of these writings in the form of extracts in this collection does not involve endorsement of those views. In this Introduction an effort will be made briefly to review the selected writings in this volume in the light of trends in the historiography of the so-called outcastes. This will be followed by a more wide-ranging review of the entire discourse centred on the outcastes commencing from the late 19th century, and an attempt to situate the issues focused upon in this book in the conceptual framework of studies in Social exclusion. A bibliography has been provided at the end, not with the aim of exhaustive enumeration, but to guide readers to other readings and sources.

* * *

In the first section of this book the writings of some leading nationalist spokesmen indicate on the one hand a lofty sympathy for the depressed classes', and on the other certain limitations of the early nationalist approach to the outcastes or so-called untouchables5. In 1903, G. K. Gokhale1 shows his wonted liberal spirit in criticising the mild description of the outcaste situation in the very resolution which he defended at the Indian Social Conference; that conference was held conjointly with the Indian

Introduction

3

National Congress session each year and it was run by some reform-minded leaders of the Congress. The resolution, presumably reflecting the attitude of Congressmen, said: (the degraded condition of the low castes is, in itself and from the nationalist point of view, unsatisfactory/ Gokhale comments that this description fails to reflect the reality that their condition (is not only unsatisfactory as this resolution says, ~ it is so deplorable that it constitutes a grave blot on our social arrangements/ Even a moderate man like Gokhale was of the opinion that the resolution was not 'as strongly worded as it should have been/ Gokhale argued for more vigorous intervention in the caste question on two grounds. First, it was a question of sheer justice'. Second, the nationalist movement was unable to deploy 4the energy which these [depressed] classes might be expected to represent.' By the time Lala Lajpat Rai2 addresses the question, the battle lines were more clearly drawn between Sanatanist organisations on the one side and the reformists on the other. Lajpat Rai points out that in north India the Arya Samaj brought about 'religious equality5for all who join the Samaj including the so-called depressed classes. But this reformism stopped short of social equality5; attempts to draw water from the same well or inter-marriage were still resisted. In the south of India the caste prejudices were more blatant and visible according to some observers. In 1911,the prominent nationalist spokesman of Tamil Nadu, G. A. Natesan3 described the position of the depressed castes as Sickening,... pathetic and a state of things which no one can contemplate with equanimity/The moral fervour of opinion leaders like Gokhale or Lajpat Rai or Natesan was beyond question, and they recognised that as long as there was untouchability there could be no true unity and solidarity among the Indian people/ However, they also recognised a gap between those enlightened people at the top striving for amelioration of the depressed class and the objects of their attention. The latter were deprived of agency, the right to speak and act for themselves. As Lajpat Rai put it, what is most urgently needed for these classes is education which will produce leaders and reforms from amongst themselves/In 1913, R. G. Bhandarkar4 in a presidential address, originally in the Marathi language and reproduced here in translation, situates the problem of the so called depressed classes* in the perspective of ancient history. Recalling Buddha, Eknath Swami and others, he argues that (it cannot be maintained that no effort was made in our great land until the present day to elevate the depressed classes.5But, he conceded that the ideas of the great thinkers had no practical and permanent results in Indian society. Hie discourse of "depressed castes'enters a different level altogether in the debates between Dr B. R. Ambedkar and Mahatma Gandhi in 1936. Since many writings of both of them are easily available elsewhere, we have selected only two extracts and given more space to others. But, arguably, in these two writings some essential points made by both of them in many other writings are adequately presented. Dr Ambedkar5 points to the limitations of the approach of the mainstream nationalist leadership. He reminds us of the history of the division of the nationalist leaders, some espousing the cause of social reform* and others like W. C. Bonnerji who prioritised the cause of political reform above the social reform agenda. Dr Ambedkar reminds us of the historical background to that tussle—the inhuman treatment of untouchables

4

Sabyasachi Bhattacharya andYagati Chinna Rao

in Maratha country under the Peshwas, the social tyranny the untouchables were subjected to in Central India, the exclusion of untouchables in Gujarat from government schools, the atrocities in Jaipur State to keep the untouchables in their place. He points out that the cause of social reform met with defeat because it was a very limited agenda of action, it did not aim at 'the break up of the caste system5. And he denounces the political reforms party'which forgot that they could not ignore the problem arising out of the prevailing social order. He concluded the speech he wrote for the Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal with these stirring words: *the emancipation of the mind and the soul is a necessary preliminary for the political expansion of the people/ Mahatma Gandhi6 in ms intervention in the discussion set off by Dr Ambedkar wrote that although amelioration of the oppressed untouchable castes was first among his priorities, his attention turned to the political issues by a particular historical conjuncture. Referring to his fast in Yerveda jail in Pune, he wrote: when it was first undertaken, it was undoubtedly for removal of untouchability, root and branch. That it took the form it did was no choice of mine. The Cabinet decision [i.e. the decision of the British Government regarding reserved seats for the depressed castes] precipitated the crisis of my life .../ Hence, he focused attention on the constitutional issue. Further, he reminded his critics that in the course of his travels from one end of India to the other millions had come to know that Gandhi recognized no barriers between untouchables and touchables' and that he regarded untouchability as a curse and a blot upon Hinduism5, as a (crime against God and humanity*. Gandhi conceded that there were Sanatanist Hindus who condemned this attitude, but he claimed that he was also a Sanatanist but one of a different hue from the organised Sanatanist Hindu lobbies defending untouchability: Tor me the sanatan dharma is the vital faith handed down from generations belonging even to prehistoric period and based upon the Vedas’ and the Gita. This was a contrast to the stance taken by Ambedkar who adopted a secular attitude to the social problem delinking that from religious discourse. It is also notable that Mahatma Gandhi stated clearly that in his opinion ‘inter-dining should go on where the public itself is ready for it, it should not be part of the India-wide campaign/ And further: Correspondents have asked whether inter-dining and inter-marriage are part of the movement against untouchability. In my opinion they are not/These were reforms which he expected to come sooner than we expect^ but these he excluded from the campaign against untouchability. That must have been disappointing to some of his followers. We cannot, within the limits of this Introduction, elaborate further on the debate between Dr Ambedkar and Mahatma Gandhi, but we shall return to this theme in some other extracts or essays selected in this volume. Writing in 1940 sociologist Benoy Kumar Sarkar (1887-1949) brings to bear on the status of untouchables or pariahs, (a term of south Indian origin, extended in colonial usage to all outcaste groups) an anthropological approach.7 He points out that from the standpoint of the cephalic, nasal and other physiognomic indices no caste group, including brahmins, display homogeneity. The superior castes are not hermetically-sealed groups. In fact, mixture of ethnic groups has taken place for centuries. Therefore, there are physiognomic similarities between high and low

Introduction

5

castes: 'The Smritisastras, the Dharmasastras, Yajuavalka, and Raghunandana may rest content with establishing rigid discrimination between the Brahman and the pariah. ... But the horoscope of flesh and blood is too merciless, precise and severe/ Particularly, Professor Sarkar is keen to point out that the notion of ^ryan* origins was baseless, and that 'it is not possible to use the category Aryan in an ethnic or racial sense.’ The last of the public intellectuals we look at is B. T. Ranadive8, the Communist leader, who in 1944 asks what the place was of six crore untouchables^n the 'freedom battle1..On the one hand, he says, the Congress very creditably gave moral support to the lower castes1claim to social justice in Gandhi^ Non-Cooperation Movement and the Karachi Congress Resolution of 1931; on the other hand, Congress took no practical step* to help the untouchables cause, and even opposed separate electorates. Second, Randive lauds the Scheduled Caste Federation led by Dr Ambedkar for developing by 1942 a strong mass base and a programme of action to address the Scheduled Castes1problems; however, Ranadive thought that the scheduled Caste Federation unwisely isolated itself, (in its programme there is no place as yet for the complete independence of the country/ The end of colonial exploitation is a necessary condition of economic emancipation of the untouchables. Therefore, Ranadive ends with a call to *unite for freedom. ... Closest to the movement of the untouchables stand the class movements of the workers and the peasants. ... The vast mass of the untouchables belongs to these classes and it is their duty to join the trade unions and Kisan Sabhas/

H IS T O R IO G R A P H Y O F T H E P R E -C O L O N IA L P E R IO D

While this volume includes a few pioneering historical essays on untouchability in the pre-colonial period, there is no doubt that till the second half of the 20th century it was a neglected subject of research. ‘The history of “impure”castes or untouchables did not receive much attention, Suvira Jaiswal9 comments, 'in the nationalist phase of Indian historiography which was more interested in the glorification of Indias past and preferred to skip off its seamy side/This tendency to keep away from the seamy side, R. S. Sharma had surmised earlier, was due to the historians1yominantclass outlook*. Jaiswal provides a survey of the earlier historians1approaches to the explication of the origin of untouchability. She has considered N. K. Dutt^s theory that untouchability was not an 'Aryan social institution, but a consequence of their contact with Dravidians. She has also critically reviewed the anthropologist Hutton's observation that taboos concerning acceptance of food cooked by a person of another caste is the keystone in a system of prejudices that developed, Furer Haimendorf s hypothesis that untouchability was a consequence of urbanisation, George Harts view tracing the concept of pollution to ancient Tamil notions of the sacred and the polluted, and B. N. S. Yadavs approach to the problem in terms of the material interests operative in brahmanical society to place some aboriginal groups into a position that enabled their exploitation. Jaiswal also examines the historiography of

Sabyasachi Bhattacharya andYagati Chinna Rao

6

the transition from 'Vedic1egalitarianism to a patriarchal set up and the evolution of kinship and family structure in the works of G. S. Ghurye, A. S. Altekar, Iravati Karve, K. M. Kapadia and others, to impart emphasis to the basic point that modern sociological studies require historians to re-examine old stereotypes. It seems that the basic methodological point in this critical survey of the historiography of disprivileged social groups is to exhort historians to look at the evidence not only in terms of (the ritual language’which concerned Indologists for decades, but also in terms of‘secular and politico-economic factors5. That approach in term of politico-economic factors was reflected in the doctoral thesis of the late Vivekanand Jha in 1972. A synoptic view of his research findings is available in his chapter in this volume.10It is perhaps best to let the author summarise his findings: These are th e fo u r broad phases in th e early h is to ry o f un to u ch a b le s: The firs t phase up to circa 600

bc

p ro vid e s th e Vedic b ackground , w h e n th e ta b o o e d

sections o f society ap pear first. The second phase e xtends up to circa

ad

200,

w h e n u n to u c h a b ility begins and takes firm and d e fin ite shape w ith respect to a fe w groups. The th ird phase up to circa

ad

600 is m arked by an in te n s ific a tio n o f

th e practice and furnishes h in ts o f resistance on the p a rt o f u n to u ch a b le s, w hose n u m b e r records an increase. The ranks o f u n to u ch a b le s swell c o n sid e ra b ly by th e accession o f several new castes in th e fo u rth and fin a l phase w h ic h extends up to circa

ad

1200 and beyond and show s u n to u c h a b ility at its peak.

This chapter, enriched with about 300 citations of original texts, makes the important point that socioeconomic stagnation in the period from circa ad 600 to ad 1200 and beyond, the 'decline in commodity production, the localisation of the market for the craft guilds, the increasingly subservient position of backward artisan and service­ providing castes, and their resistance to the process of subordination—all that led to the growth of untouchability in its fullest form in early medieval India. We are happy that we are able to include in this volume this essay by Vivekanand Jha who passed away in 2013. The focus in the above-mentioned chapters is on north India. K. R. Hanumanthan11 turns our attention to the south of India in his chapter on (The Evolution of Untouchability in Tamil Nadu upto 1600 ad \ About the time when Vivekanand Jha wrote his doctoral thesis in Patna University, in 1974, Hanumanthan wrote his dissertation at Madras University to present the following argument: In the Sangam age, roughly covering the first three centuries of the Christian Era, none of the social groups is mentioned as untouchables, though some are identified as low-borrf but not untouchable. The chaturvarna system derived from the north Indian tradition is rarely noticed in the Sangam classics. Only in the late Sangam period and thereafter (the idea of the ceremonial purity of brahmanm and the practice of untouchability by them seem to have sprouted/ That idea seems to have taken deeper roots in Tamil society in the following period, that of the Pallavas, ad 575-900. While on the one hand the Bhakti movement—the Nayanmars and the Alvars—stridently

Introduction

7

spoke against caste rigidity and the spread of the notion of untouchability, in social and religious practices untouchability was an established institution. In the next phase, the Chola, Pandya and Vijayanagara period from 9th century ad to 1600 a d , 'untouchability took deeper roots in Tamil society'. The rulers are influenced by the ideology inherent in the chaturvarna system: £untouchabüity in Tamil Nadu seems to be the result of the unholy alliance between the indigenous social differentiation based on profession and the chaturvarna system of the north, a hierarchy based on birth and imaginary purity or impurity/ And yet, Hanumanthan points out that we have occasional evidence of untouchables being given ‘dignified positions in the Sangam society^ and even in the Chola and Vijayanagara periods they enjoyed some privileges. Thus there was a kind of ambivalpnc^ei12 On the whole, the chapters collected in this section make us aware of the variety of pasts constructed from different points of view. These chapters address the pre­ colonial period. Did the colonial period bring about a change in the status of the untouchables or was that period marked by continuity rather than change? In the third section we have a few attempts to answer that question.

C O N T IN U IT Y A N D C H A N G E IN C O L O N IA L S O C IE T Y

A notable difference between the historiography of the pre-colonial and colonial period is that the historians, access to contemporary records and archives is greater in the colonial period; moreover, in the colonial period there developed, as recounted in the bibliographic survey in the second part of this Introduction, a considerable ethnographic and historical literatxire created by British and other foreign observers. Vikram Harijan13 draws upon rich archival sources in his chapter on the labour castes5in colonial Madras in the 17th and early 18th centuries. The English East India Company^ business created new employment opportunity for some of these castes and hence a sort of social mobility, though the caste boundaries remained intact. This chapter covers various caste groups without focusing on the so-called untouchable castes from the rest. However, the information collected here on caste organisation, often functioning virtually as trade unions, and intercaste disputes including the well-known conflict between ^eft-hand1and 'Right-hand5castes, are of great interest. Priyadarshini Vijaisri's14 research straddles the colonial period and our own times. We have here 18th and 19th century historical sources as well as ethnographic accounts of the authors own fieldwork in a village near Tirupati in 2006-08. While the focus in terms of empirical data is on the traditional Kolupu festival in honour of the village goddess Mathangi who is the clan goddess of the Madigas, the inferences elicited from the historical and ethnographic data lead to wide-ranging theoretical formulations. While on the one hand these formulations address issues of identity and marginality of the outcastes which are touched upon by many other scholars in this volume, the author aads to that discourse a new dimension in examining the notion of Religious power' and by positing £dangerous marginality, as a key analytical

8

Sabyasachi Bhattacharya andYagati Chinna Rao

category. One of the significant results of this approach is that in place of the usual academic formulations regarding caste order which denied agency to the outcastes, it is possible to look at the outcastes as subjects—not only in terms of protest and conflict, but also in terms of rituals accepted as part of the sacral Hindu order and legitimised through the participation of the entire community of the village including of the highest castes. The ritual symbolism of the Kolupu festival in honour of the caste/clan goddess—kula devatalu—of the castes at the periphery is a process that (not only contests the absolute power of the caste-Hindu divinities but in the process liberates the outcastes by infusing them with religious power/That power is attributed to the outcaste Madiga’s contiguity to ‘the negative sacred’, such as dangerous spirits of a paranormal world. That is counterposed opposite brahmanic ritual purity. The touchable castes prostrate themselves in the kolupu festival at the feet of the outcaste ritual specialists, the entire village propitiates the Mathangi while the brahman recedes to the background, ridicule and abuses are showered on the touchable castes by the untouchables in leadership in the rituals on that occasion, mythic episodes evoke outcaste memories of a primordial social order prior to hegemonisation by the upper castes, the rituals contain the implicit postulation of a moral order in which there is a continuum between the touchable and untouchable castes each of which had specific obligations to other castes. All that points to the power of dangerous marginality, of outcastes, the enactment of a public demonstration of the communal interdependence between the touchable and untouchable communities, as well as a vision of an alternative moral order recognising reciprocity. Eleanor Zelliot,15 a pioneer in the field of Dalit studies, examines the stagnation as well as progress registered by the Dalit community in the colonial period in the next chapter. Her objective was the description of the status of the Dalits in Pune from about 1818 when British documentation is available. On the whole her account shows that while there was a continuity between the Peshwa regime and the colonial period in Pune, change was more in evidence. As we have seen earlier in Madras—in the chapter by K. R. Hanumanthan_ the structure of opportunities altered with the coming of the British administration. Untouchables had employment opportunities in the Poona Cantonment from 1818, in particular for Mahars in the British Indian army. Harold Manns survey of 1912 and D. R. Gadgils in 1945 are used by Zelliot to evaluate the change in the status and existential conditions of the untouchables in Pune. She has also looked at the ‘reformers’, notably Jotiba Phule，S. M. Mate and Shivram Kamble. She offers a balanced account of and thereafter. Although the study is limited to what is known commonly as a 'Brahman town, it is a significant study since Pune was a centre of Mahar socio-political activities and later an important site of the Dalit movement. In the last days of British rule, what was the impact of nationalist politics and the structure of electoral institutions since the Puna Pact (1932) and Government of India Act of 1935 on Dalit politics and consciousness? New light is thrown on that subject in Ramnarayan S. Rawat^ research on Uttar Pradesh (UP) in the 1940s.16 He argues that the trend in Dalit politics in the present times in UP can be traced back to the 1940s when a new agenda emerged. It seems that at the core of this process was

Introduction

9

the drive towards the elevation of the issue of untouchability from the level of a social agenda to a political agenda. Second, there was a redefinition of and greater salience accorded to achhut identity. Rawat argues that, contrary to the generalisations of most historians of that period, the issues regarding the lower castes were not marginalised in the decade leading to Independence, nor was there a tendency towards integration of those castes with the Congress in UR The evidence gathered from contemporary sources show these trends in Dalit politics: disenchantment with the Congress after the acceptance of the Cabinet Mission Award, increasing participation under leaders like Jaipal Singh in the protest movement against begari^ spread of branches of the Scheduled Caste Federation in various parts of UP, and a new mood and rhetoric emphasising achhut identity along with mobilisation through caste mahasabhas of Jatav, Chamar and Adi-Hindu Raidasis. The most visible outcome of these developments was the success of non-Congress Dalit candidates in the elections of 1945 in the Primaries where Dalits had a separate electorate; the electoral arrangement since 1932 was such that the General Election results concealed that success of Scheduled Caste Federation. Beyond electoral politics there was a less visible but equally important development: a sharpened awareness of the failure of the Congress and the non-Dalit leadership in general to address the issue of caste inequality— this strengthened the Dalit resolve to incorporate safeguards in the Constitution in which task Dr B. R. Ambedkar was destined to play a crucially important role in the Constituent Assembly. RawatJs socio-political study is a bridge-head into the next two themes of this volume—dalit caste movements and the location of Dalits in the national movement in the pre-Independence period.

D A L IT C A S T E M O V E M E N T S

Among the chapters in this section the first by Gail Omvedt and Bharat Patankar,17 and the last by Valerian Rodrigues offer an all-India perspective, while the other three are detailed regional case studies. Omvedt and Patankars survey of the history of Dalit struggle was written more than thirty years ago, and remains an important document of a period when Dalit studies were just beginning to draw academic attention. It is also an important document where the authors, pioneers in their generation, engaged in Dalit studies not only as a scholarly enterprise but also in search of a radical political agenda of action. The approach in this essay is of theoretical interest. The authors avoid the error of looking at untouchability purely in terms of ritual purity and the Hindu sacral system, as well as the error of looking at the issue exclusively in terms of agrestic servitude and appropriation of surplus, without considering the ideology of caste. Omvedt and Patankar have used the term £caste feudalism, for the system in operation. The way we understand their exposition, the system was as follows: (a) at the level of material production, there was (1)hierarchyin terms of agrarian relations between cultivators and landholders, as well as (2) hierarchy in terms of artisanal or service castes5obligations to provide services and superior castes5entitlement to receive services; {b) at the level of the superstructure

10

Sabyasachi Bhattacharya and Yagati Chinna Rao

of ideology and socio-cultural institutions,(1)an elaborate scale of degrees of purity and pollution, and (2) a notion of hereditary transmission of qualities appropriate to each station in life (and, one may add, the idea of transmittability of pollution attributed to untouchables), performed a vitally necessary legitimising function. While these were the central characteristics of caste feudalism5, the actual historical form in which these were evinced differed according to the context and region. Tihus, there were differences between ryotwari and zamindari villages, between different forms of unfree labour service, between field servant castes and artisan castes—but the content of relationship between untouchables giving labour and touchables taking services was similar, despite differences in form. Omvedt and Patankar also comment: 'While this traditional system of caste feudalism has left its stamp on the emerging rural class system of today, it is by no means equivalent to it/ Moreover, they reject a common stereotype of the British impact dissolving the traditional feudal order; on the contrary, colonialism maintained and reinforced the traditional hierarchised system. It is not possible to review in this Introduction the entire chapter by Omvedt and Patankar but it is useful to reflect on their perception in the concluding paragraph. The protest movements of the Dalits form a part of the great tradition of the struggle of the oppressed but each of them developed as an isolated revolt o f th e w eakest and m ost oppressed sections o f th e p o p u la tio n . The isolation ... m eant th a t, instead o f organising as th e m ost re v o lu tio n a ry section o f a u nified m ovem ent, Dalits d e veloped a separatism in w h ich th e y made dem ands o f nationalists as w e il as th e British.

A h o s tility

d e veloped to co m m u n ism and class

analysis (w hich was p u t fo rw a rd in such a w ay as to appear to Dalits to exclude considerations o f caste as such) w h ic h continues to have serious consequences today.

Sekhar Bandyopadhyay18 addresses precisely that issue, the isolation of the low caste movements and organisations. Why did they stay out of the mainstream? Bandyopadhyuy rejects the usual explanation in terms of subaltern passivity and failure of the major parties to mobilise them: 'None of these two interpretations ... seeks to explore the mentality of these marginal groups which preferred not to join any mainstream and evolved for themselves, at least for the time being, a separate socio-political entity. By means of case studies of two lower-caste movements in Bengal, that of Namasudras in the eastern parts and that of Rajbansis in the north of Bengal, Bandyopadhyay Instantiates what he perceives as the general trend in late 19th and early 20th century India. The general trend, he suggests, was as follows: {a) The historical vision dominant in these caste movements differed from the nationalist perspective, in that for many people among these castes British rule appeared to be an improvement over a darker past/ {b) These movements were not monolithic things, because within the caste there developed different levels of consciousness, and negotiations between different perspectives led to political actions in their movements, (c) These caste movements were in part expressions of the spirit of protest against disprivileged status, but in some levels within, there operated a spirit of accommodation and positional adjustment within the existing

Introduction

11

system of distribution of power and prestige/ (d) In consequence of the factors above, one perceives the development of a low caste consciousness which ran parallel to nationalist consciousness, and in the 1940s when the transfer of power became imminent 'the protesting spirit of the masses was channelised into the other more class-oriented movements [while] the accommodating elements were appropriated by the Congress/This clear delineation of the historical trends and the documentation through case studies, has the merit of pointing to complexities which are often ignored ia Dalit studies. The author concludes: The tw o social m o ve m e n ts o f th e N a m a s u d ra s a n d th e Rajbansis w h ic h in itia lly began in th e late 19th c e n tu ry as pro te sts a gainst social in ju stice a nd d is c rim in a tio n , were ... u ltim a te ly reduced to m ere p o litic s fo r re se rva tio n .T h e leadership o n ly used th e depressed status o f th e ir caste b re th re n to d e m a n d fro m th e c o lo n ia l g o v e rn m e n t som e in s titu tio n a l concessions th a t could h a rd ly b e n e fit th e peasant below .

Thus, the revolutionary potential, which Omvedt and Patankar also mention, was lost in the morass of politics for reservation or search for accommodation within the system. Rejection of the system as a whole was no longer on the agenda. While the majority of the authors in this volume focus only on north India, Bandyopadhyay looks at eastern India and the chapter by Yagati Chinna Rao and Adapa Satyanarayana look to the south. Chinna Rao19 offers a fairly detailed account of the growth of Dalit consciousness in Andhra, i.e. the Circar Districts on the coast) Haydseema and Tckingärm along wkh a similar study of Üydcrabüd. He traces the history from the foundation of Jaganmitra Mandal in 1906 by Bhagya Reddi Varma, followed by Manya Sangam in 1911 and Swasti Dal, i.e. Adi-Hindu volunteer corps, in 1912. Soon after Hyderabad witnessed these developments, the coastal districts of Andhra saw in 1917 the beginning of Adi-Ancjhra movement in the Provincial Panchama Conference under the leadership of a caste-Hindu, Guduru Ramachandra Rao. In Chinna Rao^ analysis, the Hyderabad wing of the movement of untouchables did not have much of a rural base, being limited to the urban educated class, while the coastal district's untouchable organisations succeeded in spreading into the countryside. However, there was cooperation between these two wings leading to the development of a non-brahmin identity consciousness and critique of brahminic hegemony and eventually educational endeavours and political mobilisation. Adapa Satyanarayanas20 study focuses not so much on the organisationsil story but on consciousness and ideology, on the articulation of the Self and the Other. In the poetry of Kusuma Dharmanna, Nakka Chinna Venkaiah, Jala Rangaswamy and writings and speeches of Bhagya Reddi Varma a beginning was made and there emerged Dalit consciousness of the need to fight for social justice and self-respect. Satyanarayana also analyses the impact of the Gandhian 'Harijan upliftment, movement since the founding of a branch of the All India Harijan Sevak Sangh in 1932. Raj Sekhar Basu has pointed out in another chapter in this volume, how the Dalit leaders in Tamil Nadu were critical of the Harijan upliftment programme. It was likewise in Andhra. A Dalit Telugu poet versified that critique:

12

Sabyasachi Bhattacharya andYagati Chinna Kao They say, No rig h ts to Malas [th e largest D alit caste] If w e are d e nied rig h ts H ow w ill you a tta in freedom ?

A new issue is posited by Valerian Rodrigues21 in his chapter on Dr B. R. Ambedkars role in the evolution of Dalit identity consciousness. He points out that Dalit identity is in 'deep contestation' while as far as 'their disabilities are concerned they can take recourse either to the public conscience or act as a pressure group or be a player, limited and localised, in the electoral arena. JThus, for many of the erstwhile untouchable castes' the primary identity remains on caste lines and their identity of being Dalits is thin in his judgement. Rodrigues goes on to argue that one factor in this situation is the role played by Dr Ambedkar in defining Dalit identity. While conceding his contribution, Rodrigues states that Ambedkar s Stance in this regard shifted appreciably from time to time. These shifts and prevarications are as integral a component of the contested Dalit identity today as are affiliations to caste and religious identities.5Prevarication is a strong word, but the chapter does demonstrate the changes and the evolution in Ambedkars approach to several possible Dalit identities culminating eventually in his construction of Dalits as a Buddhist community while leaving open other paths to identity formation—on linguistic or cultural or class lines. This chapter opens up some new questions about Dr Ambedkar^ intellectual life.

D A L IT S A N D T H E N A T IO N A L IS T M O V E M E N T

There are many studies of the nationalist movement which throw light on the outcaste socio-political movements. However, in this collection we have included authors who focus particularly on the latter issue. We have also tried to include writings in journals which are not easily accessible, rather than reproduce from recently published works of research, e.g. that of Nandini Gooptu, Saurabh Dube, et al.which are readily available. Atul Chandra Pradhan22 offers a synoptic account of the struggle by and on behalf of the ‘depressed classes’ in the 20th century. He differs from most authors in this collection in arguing that £the untouchability aspect of the Depressed Classes has been overemphasised over the past few decades/ In his judgement the status improvement of ‘Depressed Classes’ would depend not so much on specific action for their iupliftment, but on general economic and educational advancement of the country/ Bhagwan Das，23 chapter is not a research contribution but rather an informative document containing his personal experiences as a leader in various organisations of backward communities. Stephen Henningham24 on the other hand is a professional historian who, after having published a good deal of research on agrarian relations and peasant movement in Bihar, turns his attention to Harijan and Adivasi protest movements from the subalternist perspective. The point he makes is that agitations by Musahars and Santals in Bihar in the 1930s do not fit into the stereotype of a peasantry dependent on elite leadership. On the contrary, a great degree of autonomy is claimed and actually achieved by these Harijan and Adivasi

Introduction

13

movements. The Congress leaders, and even the Kisan Sabha which was blamed or credited for radical sympathies, kept their distance. Henningham perceives in the events he has studied an anticipation of the autonomy that peasant and subaltern protests acquired in the 1960s and 1970s. While the caste issue is not salient in that story, Raj Sekhar Basu25 addresses chiefly the politics of untouchability. The entry point in Bas^s story is a dramatic moment: in 1932 Gandhi wins a few points in the negotiations leading to the Poona Pact but he loses whatever non-brahmin support he had. And yet, within a few years Congress wins over a large number of non-brahmins, a section of Adi-Dravidas began to support the Congress, and eventually (the Congress [had] an electoral advantage over the Justice Party. The Congress slogan of Swarajya had indeed a greater appeal than E. V. Ramaswami Naicker’s slogan of Dravidanadu for the Tamil voters.’How Gandhi and the Congress managed to do that is Basu’s story. Gandhi’s temple entry movement， the Congress propaganda for Harijan upliftment and against the conservative Varnashrama Swarajya Sangha, Gandhi^ (Harijan tourJin 1933, the activities of the grassroots-level volunteers to reach out to non-brahmins, and C. Rajagopalacharis success in passing the temple entry bill—all these factors explain how Congress came out of the trough of 1932 to gain substantial non-brahmin support. Was the Harijan programme just a political ploy or was it the triumph of high moral values the Congress held up for all to see? Basu wisely leaves that question for the readers to answer. Although we did not by design offer here samples of different types of discourse— Nationalist, Social Reformist, Subaltern and cautiously academic—it so happens that in Pradhan， Bhagwan Das’ Herxningham and Basu we have approximation to such a design. Gopal Gurus26 scholarly engagement in a debate about Ambedkar gives us the flavour of the polemics he responds to and the pitch and temper of the contemporary debates in the Dalit discourse. Gopal Guru, in a brief piece of writing here, contests the view that the Right in Indian politics usually upholds that Ambedkar and his followers among the Dalits were not participants in the freedom movement, and thus their relationship with the British Raj was questionable. Gopal Guru rightly points to the historical inaccuracy of this approach and goes on to say that there were reasons why Ambedkar organised 'Dalits quite separately from the Indian national movement that was led by the Congress/In his view this was because Ambedkar was unwilling 'to be subordinated to the nationalist vision of the freedom struggle as floated by the Congress/ his desire to keep away from ^ in d u culture due to its anti-egalitarian tone5which was not accommodative enough to allow space for Dalits, and his belief that the dominant nationalist spokesmen refused to speak in the language of reciprocal recognition of an autonomous political identity of the Dalits/ Gopal Guru also surmises that before 1947 the Dalits were unable to make 'overnight, [an] historical advance, into political consciousness— —they were bound to Waken first to the socio-cultural consciousness which is the first glimpse of the political consciousness.'This is perhaps debatable because other authors in this volume have cited evidence of the political consciousness as well. Be that as it may, Gopal Guru is to be thanked for giving us a flavour of the debates currently taking place in the Dalit discourse.

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Sabyasachi Bhattacharya and Yagati Chinna Rao

L O C A T IN G D A L IT S IN T H E P O S T -IN D E P E N D E N C E P O L IT Y

In putting together selections for this last section we suffered from the embarrassment of riches. We regret that we could not include many worthwhile writings, but we made an attempt to include a few significant contributions. In the chorus of critical and denigratory voices castigating the Indian legal system for protective discrimination, we may note the legal historian Marc Gallanter s27 essay in 1965 (not included in the present collection) in defence of the system created by the Constituent Assembly led by the chairman of the Drafting Committee, Dr B. R. Ambedkar: India^ vast and unparalleled experiment with protective or compensatory discrimination in favour of “backward” sections of her population betokens a generosity and farsightedness that are rare among nations/ Gallanter s essay brings to us the pioneering research on the impact of the constitutional and legislative provisions in respect of Scheduled Castes and Tribes in the decades since 1950. On the other hand, in his chapter in this section, K. A. Manikumar28 examines instances of breakdown of law and order, the recurring pattern of {caste violence, in Tamil Nadu in the 1990s. Among other things, the author points to the quotidian acts of discrimination and the authorities, partisanship despite the legal provisions instituted. In recent times, gender studies have imparted to Dalit studies a new dimension and made us aware of genders as an axis of caste discrimination and oppression. In Shura Durapuri^29 narration of the various aspects of this issue in post-colonial India we have a comprehensive survey of that theme. At the end, we have an important theoretical intervention made by the sociologist Mark Juergensmeyer.30 In his doctoral dissertation on untouchables in Punjab, he touched on an interesting question: Do the untouchables believe in untouchability? No doubt in daily life they are compelled to conform to certain norms laid down for them by higher castes, but a distinction needs to be made between what J. E Staal called orthopraxy and orthodoxy, obedience of practice as distinct from faith. Almost half of the upper caste respondents in Juergensmeyer's survey professed faith in the doctrine of rebirth while less than one-third of the Scheduled Caste respondents believed that ones condition in this life resulted from actions in the previous birth. He cites the findings of Bernard Cohn, Gerald Berreman, Kathleen Gough, Pauline Kolenda and André Béteille that the lower castes had little faith in the concept of rebirth and karma in previous birth. That concept being the concept that legitimises caste, Juergensmeyer s conclusion is very important: 'the concept of karma does not play a significant role in the belief systems of the untouchables.1This difference of perceptioHj he says, cmade the untouchables uneasy participants in the cultural life of the dominant society, and ... impelled them to form their own independent religious and social organisations/ A corollary preposition is that in the perception of the untouchables their poverty has a salience that suggests that there is a class identity developing among them: (The Scheduled Caste seem to view themselves as a class, and the upper castes view them as castes/ Perhaps this generalisation boldly anticipates future developments, but it points to the potential of a radical transformative change in lower caste consciousness.

Introduction

15

On the whole, this collection, beginning with the pronouncements of some major public intellectuals from the early 20th century, includes some representative writings of the last four decades. A survey of the historiography of the pre-colonial period is followed by studies in the changes experienced by the outcastes in the colonial period. 111at leads to research focused on Dalit caste movements and the interface between them and the nationalist movement. Finally, we look at research in contemporary history, situating Dalits in post-1947 India. We are aware that many writings other than those included here merited inclusion. But we worked within the space limits of an agenda, to put together selected writings in a single volume. If this attempt to highlight historical research on the various interpretations and constructions of the past of the outcastes serves to generate interest and further research, the aim of this collection will have been met. We began this editorial 'Introduction with an attempt to situate the essays and documents we have gathered in in the evolving discourse of 147 In another poem, he argues in favour of intermarriage between various castes thus: (If a male buffalo cohabits with a cow, a hybrid which does not belong to either of the species is born. But when a brahmana has intercourse with a pulaiya lady, we get only a normal human offspring. When, such is the case why all these social distinctions occur/148 He further declares: 'It is true that the vëtiyars do not eat fish then and now. But do they not drink the water in which the fishes live and take bath in it. It is true you do not eat venison. But do you not use the skin of a deer for sitting during tapas (meditation)/149Turning to those who consider beef eating as a taboo, he asks, (You idiotic Saivites, you condemn beef as polluting stuff. But, have you forgotten that your body itself has grown out of cow’s milk taken during childhood.’150 To those who talk of impurity caused by saliva {ecchit) he asks the question, (Is it not a fact that the flowers with which you offer puja to God, and the honey you drink have been already polluted by the saliva of bees? Has not the milk you drink already been polluted by the saliva of the calf?'151 In spite of these formidable arguments against caste and untouchability, it continued to be practised in Tamil society. Kapilar, another Siddha of ttus period, condemns the rigid caste system in unequivocal terms and declares that the brähmanas were solely responsible for imposing the four-fold caste system on Tamil society.152 Inscriptions of this period, refer to paraiyas, pallas and cakkilians as belonging to low castes, but it cannot be definitely asserted that they were treated as untouchables. The paraiyas seem to have lived in separate cëris outside the villages. In an inscription of Räjaräja Cola I (ad 1014), separate cëris and burial grounds are mentioned for paraiyas, toddy-tappers, goldsmiths, etc.153 Paraicerk are mentioned even in the period of Mahavarman Sundara Pandya I154 (1216-123B). It is clearly stated in an inscription of Räjaräja I that tax exemption was granted to certain ceris known as tïntacëris meaning untouchable cëris.155 In another inscription also tintaceri is mentioned separately.156 Since paraiceri and tintaceri are mentioned separately in the same line of the inscription, we are led to suspect that the untouchables were different from the paraiyas. It is quite probable that only a few sections among paraiyas were considered as untouchables while the others were treated with dignity.

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While describing the different kinds of people who attended a village assembly, it is said in an inscription that from the topmost antana (brahmana) to the lowest arippan (one section of the paraiyans) all the castes were present. All these castes, thus assembled, took a vow that they should unite themselves against the enemy of their chieftain and if they allied with the enemy of their chief, they would incur the ignominy of giving their daughters in marriage to pulluparikkira paraiyans, that is, those paraiyas who gathered grass for the horses of vanniyars or that of becoming the husbands of their own mothers.157 But, in the same inscription, the names of panar, paraiyar and paraimutali (foremost among paraiyas) are found along with Sivabrahmanas, cakklis, etc. Therefore we are led to think that not all the paraiyas were considered as lowest untouchables and only certain sections of them such as arippan and grass-cutting paraiyas were treated as the lowest, while the others were regarded as somewhat higher in society. But they seem to be definitely lower in status to the vellälas and brahmanas who employed them as their field labourers. Paraiyar, panar, cakklis and irulas are spoken of as low castes in the same inscription. In another inscription, two persons promising loyalty to their master swear that if they run away from their master they would suffer the same ignominy as that of ojffering their wives to a cakkilian and watching them without taking any action.158 Thus cakkilians and some paraiyans seem to have been regarded as low and untouchable castes in the medieval Tamil society. Beef eating seems to be the cause of their untouchability. In an inscription of Rajaraja III, the imprecation for violating the injunction of the inscription was to acquire the sin of eating the flesh of a cow.159 In another inscription, it is declared that violation of its injunction would bring on the violator the sin of killing a tawny cow on the banks of the Ganges.160 Such being the veneration of the cow, it is but natural that those who consumed carrion or beef out of economic necessity or otherwise became untouchables to those who abstained from eating beef. Moreover, giving equality to the farm labourers would not be in the interests of vellala and brahmana landlords, who naturally kept the paraiyas, pallas and cakkilians as slaves in order to extract maximum work from them with minimum expenditure.They and their wives were sold as chattels along with lands. According to an inscription of the former Travancore State (ad 922-923), a pulaiyan was also sold along with the lands granted whenever such lands were transferred to a third person.161 Many sections of the paraiyas seem to have enjoyed certain privileges during the Cola and Vijayanagara periods. When the paddy was removed from, the straw, it was to be measured only by a paraiya162 to whom perquisites were to be paid. Those who worked in the fields were called ulaparaiyar who lived in separate ceris wmch were exempted from taxation. An inscription of Räjaräja I, dated ad 1014 speaks of the ceris of the ulaparaiyar situated on the eastern and western end of the main village being exempted from taxation.163 Some of the paräiyars served as talaiyaris or supervisors in the villages and earned some amount as wages. A tax known as talaiyärikkänam or vetti was imposed on them. In sqme cases, exemption was granted from this tax. An inscription of Sundara Cola and Räjaräja Cola (985-1014) speak of the exemption of such a tax from a gifted village.164 Certain ceris of paraiyar were rich enough to be taxed. Thus, we hear of a gift of the income from a paraiceri to a Siva temple during

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the period of Immadi Bukkaräya (ad 1394).165 Individual paraiyas seem to have been rich enough to endow the lighting of temples. We hear of such an endowment made by a paralyatiyan to the temple atTirakalukunram.166 During the period of Rajaraja I, a paraiya named Urparaiyän Martal Cömanatan made a similar endowment to a temple.167 Some of theparaiyas took to the profession of weaving and therefore were called necavu paraiyas {necavu means weaving) having separate looms cdlltdparaitari A tax cdlltdparait^ariyirai was levied on them. In sarvamänya villages (villages gifted outright) of the Colas, in the thirteenth century, the remission of a number of taxes including the taxes onparaitari and satiyatari (satiyans are another section of paraiyas included in the Scheduled Castes list). Many of them took up the profession of beating drums (parai) on festive occasions, marriages and funerals. Such persons were to pay a tax c a l l e d か which is mentioned in an inscription of Rajaraja IIL168 The paraiyas at times quarrelled with the other castes and refused to beat drums for them. We hear of one such quarrel between paraiyas and the residents of 24 villages during the reign of Vlrapäntiadeva (ad 1376) in which there was some bloodshed on both sides. Kankaarayan, an officer of the king, intervened and effected an amicable settlement between them, according to which the paraiyas should compulsorily beat the drums for the caste-Hindus on all occasions good and bad and receive in turn a fatakku (a measure) of paddy and a fowl as wages for their services. Sometimes rentfree land cAltAparaitutaimai were granted to such paraiyas.169 The paraiyas enjoyed some privileges from the king, which they zealously guarded. An inscription of the year ad 1665,170 refers to a quarrel between the paraiyas and kutumpans (pallas who are included in the Scheduled Castes list) over the enjoyment of privileges. The paraiyas of the village of Snvilluputtur claimed the same privileges as the kutumpans of the village, i.e. the right to use a white horse, a white parasol and keratti (the right to carry torches in daytime), to wear 2.pavatai (under garment), a pair of cilambu (anklet) and two kotukku (another ornament), to construct a sixteen pillared (a canopy resting on bamboos) on festive occasions, to use three ters (chariots) and eighteen kinds of musical instruments during funeral processions. This was disputed by the kutumpans whose leaders waited on the king and represented their case. It was then decided, on tne authority of certain copperplate grants which had been issued previously, that the paraiyas were to enjoy only a few privileges, such as erection of a three pillared pantal on festive occasions, wearing of one kotukku and one cilambu, use of the mäppu (white cloth under pantal) and ont paittam (torch), building a house without a second floor and payment of a fee for services during funerals. Some of the paraiyan did selfless service for the state and were duly honoured for such acts. It is stated that one Kalivlriya Muttarayan, a valluvan of Kakkalur in Eyil Nätu, died fighting against the thieves on behalf of perumakkal (dignified residents) of the village, who rewarded his son with a grant of land.171 We hear of one Poovan Paraiyan, who provided irrigation facilities to a wasteland by his hard work and made it into a cultivable land. For this service, he was awarded the title of araiyan anukkan.172 Only officers and soldiers of repute were usually given the title of (araiyan during the Cola period. An inscription of Räjaräja III, found at Kiranur at Kulattur

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taluk, Pudukkottai district says that two paraiyans called Armoonru Pamiyan and Kidarangonda Paraiyan possessed the titles oïpër araiyan and nätu araiyan. Some of them served as soldiers in the army. Räjaräja I had a special regiment called Valankai Velaikkära Cenai which perhaps consisted mostly of paraiya soldiers because the paraiyas are called valankai matrar (friends) in manuscripts.173 Those prominent among the paraiyar were also included in the village assembles and were denoted as paraimutaliP^ Mutali means the primary person or first among equals, who sat along with other castes and offered judgements. Some of the paraiyas were educated enough to sign their names in documents which were later engraved on stones as inscriptions. Among the signatories of some of the inscriptions found at Pudukottai are Ennankaiakki Paraiyan Uttamacola Paraiyan, Känättu Paraiyan and Axacar Mikamaparaiyan (.pilot in a ship).175 Thus, we find that the paraiyas of the Cola period engaged in multifarious useful tasks such as field labourers, drum-beaters, weavers, performers of funeral rites, watchers in villages, etc. They seem to have possessed property of their own and paia taxes. At least some of them were educated and participated in village assemblies. Some of them of course were segregated and settled in separate cëris called tïntacêris or untouchable slums. But only during the later Pandya and Vijayanagara periods their position in society seems to have deteriorated so much as to be dubbed as an untouchable caste as a whole. The pallas who form another major portion of the untouchables in Tamil Nadu at present, seem to have enjoyed a dignified status during the Cök period. They are referred to as kutumpan in inscriptions, which means head of the kutumpu or variant, the unit of the local administration in the villages. Members of the panchayat were elected by a system of lots {kutavolai system) in which the kutumpans played a significant role. They are referred to as those who did yeomen service to the village through kutumpu. Even at the present pallas possess the title kutumpan in the Pandyan and Kongu region. They practise the kutumpu system of elections for their pancayats even today. They trace their origin to Indra, god of the marutam region, and call themselves devëndrakula vèllalar. According to an inscription of Karivalamvanta Nällur, issued during the Nayaka rule, devëndra kulattar were allowed to possess royal insignia such as a white elephant, white umbrella, double cilambu, double kotukku, torch during daytime, two chariots, eighteen drums and pantal supported by sixteen wooden legs.176 When paraiyas also claimed the same privileges and picked up quarrels, devendra kulattar appealed to Tirumalai Nayaka, who after consulting old copperplates decreed that the paraiyas could enjoy only the privilege of wearing double cilambu and single kotukku, and possessing one torch, one pavatai and one house without a storey. We have seen how similar privileges were bestowed on them by the inscription found at Srivilliputhur.177 Even in modern times, temple priests used to go with an elephant, drums and garlands and invite the pallas to come and initiate the dragging of the temple car by touching the rope. This practice is adopted at Karivalamvanta Nallür, Perur near Coimbatore, Maturai, Colavantan, etc.178 During the period oi Uola and Vijayanagara rule, in Tamil Nadu, a peculiar system of classification arose, according to which there were ninety-eight valankai (right

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hand) and ninety-eight itankai (left hand) castes. According to Cölan Purvapattayam, a manuscript of Kulottunga Cola III, each of the four varnas, i.e. brähmana, ksatriya, vaisya and sudm，was divided into four castes and each of the four castes was fturther divided into six subcastes, thus bringing the total to 24 castes for each varna and altogether ninety-six castes, to which the low paraiya caste was added to valankai and matiga to the left hand castes, raising the number of castes to ninety-eight.179 In general, vellaläs (agriculturists) and their associates belonged to the valanKai, and kammälar (artisans) and their associates to the itankai classes. Frequently, they quarrelled among themselves over the sole enjoyment of certain petty privileges, such as wearing jasmine flowers in the hair, using drams or umbrellas during processions and so on. Such quarrels180 arose only between low-caste untouchables such as paraiyar and cakkilians181 (cobblers) or paraiyas and pallas.182The pallas as non-beef eaters considered themselves superior to the paraiyas who in turn considered the cakkilians as inferior to them as they came from the Andhra region and became rivals to them. The kammalars were relegated to the position of untouchables even to the paraiyas and cakkilians, since they called themselves the direct descendants of Brahma and claimed superiority to the brähmanas who are said to have sprung only from the face of Brahma. Whenever the kammalars claimed certain special privileges for themselves, it was the paraiyars who picked up quarrels with them.183 During the period of Vijayanagara rule (sixteenth and seventeenth centuries ad ) Viswanatha Nayaka, a viceroy of Vijayanagara in Tamil Nadu, introduced ^itpalayam system (a kind of feudal system) by which the whole of Tamil Nadu was divided into seventy-two pälayams. Telugu nobles who helped him in his expeditions were made zamindars of rich and fertile lands while drylands were allotted to the marava chieftains who helped them against the Pandyas. Ariyanatha Mudaliar, a vellala appointed as the chieftain of Tinnevelly region by Viswanatha Nayaka， brought a number of vellar from Tondaimandalam and settled them in the Pandya region. The lands which were owned by the allies of the Pandyas, i.e., the natars (canars), paraiyas and pallas were confiscated and given to the followers of the Nayakas. Landless canars, paraiyas and pallas naturally became agrestic serfs and untouchables in due course of time, to the vellala marava and Telugu landlords. In conclusion, it may be said that untouchability did not rear its ugly head in the early Tamil society at least till the end oi tne early Cankam age (up to the third century a d ). During the later Cankam age, due to the puristic and ahimsa doctrines of Buddhism and Jainism, the concept of pollution and untouchability is hinted at in works like Manimekalai ^nd Acarakovai. But, strong condemnation of superiority based on birth is made by most of the poets of this period and religious leaders such as Nayanmars and Alvars of the Pallava period, who of course accept the theory of untouchability of some castes such as puiaiyas, paraiyas and panas. During the Cola period, we find definite mention of untouchable villages called tintaceris in inscriptions, and literature like the Periapuranam. During the Vijayanagara rule, the list of untouchable castes seem to have increased further. The cakkilians, brought by them into Tamil Nadu, became untoucnables owing to their association with scavenging, leather work and beef eating. The paraiyas

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and pulaiyas were already untouchables owing to their beef eating and leatherwork. The vettians who handled dead bodies, the vannans who washed impure clothes, the navithan who shaved human hair became untouchables to the other castes. The non-beef eating pallas were relegated to the position of agricultural slaves after the disbandonment of the armies of the Pandyas and were treated as untouchables, perhaps due to their loyalty to the Pandyas and stiff opposition to the Vijayanagara Nayakas.The natars or canars also suffered the same fate due to their loyalty to the Pandyas and their opposition to the Nayakas of Madurai. But, many of them chose to eke out their livelihood by toddy-tapping and became untouchables to brahmanas and their allies. The kammalars who occupied a honourable position in the society during the Cola and earlier periods, came to be identified with rathakaras of anuloma caste and treated as untouchables, perhaps owing to their claim of superiority over brahmanas themselves. The idea of the caturvarna system seems to have touched only the fringe of Tamil society during the period under our survey. People came to be divided only horizontally according to their professions. Superiority based on birth was never accepted in Tamil Nadu. Though trading classes like komuttis and chettiars assumed the title of danavaisyas and martial classes like pallar, pallis, natars and maravars assumed the titles of vanniakulaksatriyas, pandyas and tevars, agricultural castes like the vellalars called themselves sat-sudrasy there were no varnas in reality in Tamil Nadu. Orthodox brahmanas never recognised them, and performed the upanayana ceremony for them or initiated them into Vedic studies after adorning them with sacred thread. But gradually, it created a sense of superiority and inferiority among the various castes which led to the relegation of some castes as untouchables. Thus, untouchability in Tamil Nadu seems to be the result of an unholy alliance between the indigenous social differentiation based on profession and the caturvarna system of the north, a hierarchy based on birth and imaginary purity or impurity.

N O T E S A N D R E FER EN C ES

1A. Aiyappan, Ira va s a n d C u ltu re Change (Madras: Government Museum,1945), 37. 2 Ibid” 38, 3 B. R. Ambedkar, The Untouchables^ second edition (Balrampur: Jetavan Mahavihar Shravasti,1969),1. 4 Ibid., 26. 5 Louis Dumont, H om o H ierarchicus: The Caste System and Its Im plications^ translated by Mark Sainsbury (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970), 134. 6 A. A. Führer, ed., Vasistha D harm a Sastra (Bombay: The Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute,1916), 21,fn. 7V. N. Mandlik, ed., M anu S m riti (Bombay: Ganpat Krishnaji s Press, 1886), IX, 235-38. 8 R V. Kane, H isto ry o f D harm asütras I (Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 1930-62), 168. 9 D. D. Kosambi, B hagaw an B uddha (Tamil), trans. Ka. Sri. Sri. (Madras: Palaniappa Brothers, 1957), 351-53.

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10 R. Moris and E. Hardy, A n g n tta ra N ika ya (London: Pali Text Society, 1885-1900), 107; 11,85. 11 For a detailed account of untouchability in Jain and Buddhist literature, see Vivekanand Jha, 'Candäla and the Origin of Untouchability', The Indian Historical Review 13.1-2 (New Delhi, July 1986 - January 1987), 24-32. 12 For a detailed discussion of taboos in Indian society, see K. R. Hanumanthan, U ntouchability: A H is to ric a l Study up to A .D . 1 5 0 0 w ith Special Reference to Tam ilnadu (Madurai: Koodaï Publishers,1979), 31-60. 13 Maturaikanchi, 238-326 in Pattuppattny edited by U. V. Swaminatha Iyer (Tirunelvely: South India Saiva Siddhanta Works [hereafter, SISSW] Publishing House, 1961). 14 Patirrupättu, 30:9-10, in Ettuttokai, edited by U. V. Swaminatha Iyer (Tirunelvely: SISSW Publishing House, 1961). 15Puranäniini, i i i : Ettutokai. 16Malaipatukatam^ 300-30, Pattuppattn. 17Puranänüniy 168-5-6,129: l^Ettuttokai. AinkunmiirUy 304: 1-2, Ettuttokai. 19Kuruntokai^ 210: 1-2, Ettattokai. 20Paranänüni^ 54:11-12, Ettutokai. 21 Palm -upättU y 13: 22~2A^ E ttu to k a i. 22Ainkurunüriiy 195: \ yEttutokai. 23Patirnippättu, 22: 20,28: 3—4. 24 Ibid., 43: 25. 25Puranänüru, 50:11,88: 3. 26Puranänüru, 170:13, Ettuttokai. {Puram abbreviation hereafter for Puranänuru) 27Patirruppattu,11:11;43: 22, Pattuppattu. {Patirru for Patirruppättu hereafter) 28AkananurUy 76: 5, Ettuttokai) Parananum, 368:15-16, Ettutokai. 29 Puram, 287:12;170: 2,5,6. 30Paranty 335: 7-8, Ettutokai. 31 Puram, 126:11;367:12,13, Ettutokai. 32Puram, 287:12;170: 2,5, 6, Ettutokai. 33Purarn^ 287:12, Ettutokai. 34Ibid., 170: 2, 5, 6, Ettutokai. 35Ibid., 360:15-20, 363:10-16, 82: 3-4, Ettutokai. 36Ibid., 387: 5, 6, Ettutokai. 37Pnramy378, Ettutokai. 38Maturaikänchiy 96-97. 39Akam, 226: 7-8, Ettutokai. 40Puram., 157: 1-8; 7, Ettutokai. 41 Puram, 143: 1-5; 127: 1-3; 129: 1-3, Ettutokai 42Purapporul Venpä Mülaï^ 2:14, Pattuppättu. 43 Puraniy 19, Ettutokai. 44Akamy 1:2, Ettutokai. 45Natrinai, 52, Ettutokai. 46Perumpanärruppataiy Pattuppattu. 47Puramy38.15, Ettutokai. 48M. Arunachalam, ed., Mukkütarpallu (Madras: Sadhu Achagam,1940),12. 的 Puram, 9 7 〜 Ettutokai. 50 Puram, 126: 1—4, Ettutokai.

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51 P eram pänärrupataiy 481-90, P a ttu p a ttii. 52 Ibid., 22,301-10. 53 Puraniy 34: 8—15,1-14; 325: \—\l> ^E ttutokai. 54 Ibid.,155,235. 55 M aturaikänchi^ P a ttuppättu. 56 Puram , 335: 7-8. 57 Perunkataiy 211: 30-40. 58 Maraimalaiatikal, C ä tive rru m aiyu m P öliccaivan im (Madras: T.M. Press, 1926), 68-69. 59 K uruntokai^ 40, E ttu to k a i. 60 M atnraikänchi^ 182-83, E ttu to k a i. 61 Puram , 367:12-13. 62 Ibid.，183. 63 P eru m pänärnipatai, 299, 301, P attu p ättu . (U. Ve. Swaminatha Iyer) 64 N. Subramanian, Satigam P o lity (Madras: Asia publishing House, 1966), 258. 65 P erunkatai, edited by U. V. Swaminatha Iyer, third;edition (Madras: T.M. Press, 1956), 35: 92-175. 66 Tolkäppiam , Torul^ \yA kam 5 (Tirunelvely: SISSW Publishing House, 1963). 67 Tolkäppiam ^ 615. 68 Ibid., 616. 69 Ibid., 622. 70 Ibid, 625. 71 M. S. Purnalingam Pillai, T a m il In d ia (Tirunelvely: SISSW Publishing House, 1963), 33-34. 72 Tolkäppiam , Toruf, 52, Tiruvalluvar, T iru k u ra l, edited by V. M. Gopalakrishnamachary (Tiruneively: SISSW Publishing House, 1938), 1033. 73 T irukkuraly 1034. 74 T iru k k u ra l,1032. 75 Tolkäppiam , ToruF, 52. 76 P. T Sreenivasa Iyengar, P re -A rya n T a m il C ulture (Madras: Asian Educational Services, 1980)，14. 77 T in tkku ra ly 409. 78 Ibid., 133. 79 Ibid., 134. 80N ä la tiyä r, 195, edited by Gopalakrishnamachari (Tirunelvely: SISSW Publishing House, 1964)， 81 N älatiyäVy 136. 82 Ibid, 374. ^ M anusm rtiy %S\Apastam ba D harm asutra^ 6,18-23-26. 84 M a n im e ka la ij 13: 91. 85 Ibid., 74: 80,13:43-44. 86 T iru ku raly 33: 9. 87 C ila p p a tik ä ra m ,16:107, edited by U. V. Swaminatha Iyer (Tirunelvely: SISSW Publishing House, 1964). 88 P uram , 353:1. 89 K. K. Pillai, A S ocial H isto ry o f the Tam ils (Madras: University of Madras, 1969), 282-83. 90 P em nkatai, 211: 30-40.. 91 K alittogaiy edited by E. V. Anantharamaier (Madras: Pari Nilayam,1965), 65:10, 85: 22, 95:10,69:19.

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92M. Raghava Iyengar, Some Aspects o fK erala and T a m il L itera tu re (Trivandrum: Department of Publications, University of Kerala,1959), 42. 93Perunkataiy p. 507,1:41,p. 234,1:163,164; C iiap p atikäram , 130; P uram , 61:1. 94K a litto g a i, 117: 7, 72:13-14. 95Ibid., 55:17. 96Ibid., 55:18; 158; 188-89. 97T. Celvakeswara Mudaliar, ed., Ä carä kö vai (Madras: SISSW Publishing House, 1942), 6，13. 98Ibid.，90. "Ibid” 92. 100Ibid.,10. 101 Ibid.，64. 102Ibid.，5. 103 South In d ia n In scrip tio n s (hereafter, 677), vol. I, 151; P a lla v a r Ceppëtukal M uppatu (Madras: Tamil Varalarrukkalakam, 1966), 55. 104 K. K. Pillai, Studies in In d ia n H isto ry w ith Special Reference to T a m il N adu (Madras: Published by the author, 1979), 320. 105 P a lla v a r C eppëtukal M uppatu^ The Tiruvalangadu Copper Plate. 106 M anu Sm rH j XI, 55, Y äjn avalkya S m rti, III, 227. 107 R V. Kane, H isto ry o f D harm asastras (Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 1930-62), vol.II, part II, 796. 108Appar, Täveram , edited by Swaminatha Pantitar (Jaffna, 1911),71,82. ^ A p astam b a,1,5,172, Satapatha B rähm ana, HI 1.2. 21-1.2 3.6. 110 Tavëram , 4267. 111 Cëkkilar, P eriapuränam , edited by Thiru. V. Kalyana Sundara Mudaliar, verse 24-31, p. 544.

112Periapuränaniy verse 6,p. 1098. 113Mänickaväsagar, Tiruvacakam (Madras: SISSW Publishing House,1971),37: 3,23: 3. 114Ibid., 32: 6. 115Ibid., K a n ta p a ttu , 5. 116P eriapuränam , K annappa N a yä n a r P uränam y 122-83. 117Ibid., T iru n ä la ip p o va r P u rä n am ,vtts& 16-37. 118Ibid., Cöm äci M a ra N a ya n a r P uranam } verse 1-6, p. 958. 119 Acärya Hirutayam, edited and translated by B. R. Purushotham Naidu (Madras: University of Madras, 1965), vol. I,sutra 73. 120Ibid. 121 N ä la yira T ivyaprapantam , edited by Madhavakasan (Madras: Catu accukutam, 1950), verse 938. 122Ibid., 2971. 123 Swami Ramakxishnananda, L ife o f R am anuja (Madras: Ramakrishna Math, 1959), 30. 124N ä la yira Tivyaprabandhaniy 8-10. ns A cärya H iru ta y a rrii vol.1,191. 126N ä la yira T ivyaprabandham , 26-28. 127K. A. Nilakanta Sastri, D evelopm ent o f R e lig io n in South In d ia (Madras: Orient Longman, 1963)，124. 128577，V〇l_IV，546. , 129A n n u a l R eport on E p igra p h y (hereafter, A R E ), vol.II (Archaeological Survey of India, 1955-56).

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130A R E 377 of 1935-36, also K. V. Raman, H isto ry o f Pändyas (Madras: Tamil Nadu Text Book Society, 1997), 210. 131 R. Sathianathaier, H isto ry o f the N äyaks o f M a d u ra i [microform] (Oxford UniversityPress: Madras, 1924), 261. 132Tiruttakkatevar, C ivakäcintäm aniy edited by U. V. Swaminatha Iyer (Madras, 1957), 935. 133Ibid., 2984, refer section dealing with Cankam Age, in this article; infra. 134 Ibid” 419,2150. 135 Ibid, 2752,2753,2868,3107. 136Ibid., 482. 137 Cëkkilar, P eriapuranam } 6: 29-207; 207: 5,22-4. 138 S II, IV, 546. 139 K. A. Nilakanta Sastri, The Colas (Madras: University of Madras, 1956), vol.II, part 1, 381-82. 140 Ramakrishnananda, L ife o f Ram anuja^ 129-220. 141 Gopinath Rao, H isto ry o f Vaishnavism (Madras: University of Madras Government Press, 1923), 43. 142 Ramakrishnananda, L ife o f Ram anuja^ 218-19. 143 S. R. Venkataraman, H a rija n s through the Ages (Madras: Bharati Devi Publications, 1946), 6-8. ]44Ä cärya H iru ta ya m } vol. 1,191. 145 Ibid” 196. 146 Ibid., 160. 147 Sivaväkkiar, P atinen, C itta r P ä ta lk a l (y izd m s : SISSW Publishing House), 31, 148 Ibid., 459. 149 Ibid” 155. 150 Ibid., 145. 151 Ibid., 478. 152 Kapilar, K a p ila r A h a v a l: C ä ti V araläru (Madras: publisher unknown), 60. 153 S II, vol.II, no. 5. 154 Ibid., vol.II, no. 63. 155 Ibid., vol.II, no. 4. 156 Ibid” vol.II ，no. 5_ 157 Ibid, nos 118,49. 158 Ibid, vol III, nos 8, 86. 159 Ibid., vol. VIIÏ, nos 79, 80. 160 Ibid., vol. I, no. 54. 161 Travancore A rchaeological Series (hereafter, 1j 4S), vol. Ill, no. 40. 162 In scrip tio n s ofP u d u koottai State (IP S ), no. 591. 163 S II, vol.II, no. 5, p. 56. 164 S lly vol. XIII, no. 240 and vol.II, no. 64. 165 M adras E p igra p h ica lR e p ort^ 9-12, Appendix B, no. 208. 166 OT，vol.VIII ，31，32, 33. 167 51/, vol VII, nos 794,168. ^ S J l v o l IV, no. 648. 169 Cëkkilar, P eriapuranam (T iru n a la ip o va rp u ra n a n i),13; A R E 69 of 1924. 170A R E 588 of 1926; Ibid., part II, para 19; A R E 69 of 1924. ^ A R E SA of 1947-48. 172A R E 480 of 1917; S II, vol. XIV, no. 4.

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173Ita n k a i V alankai C ä ti V aralaru, unpublished manuscript in the Manuscript Library of the University of Madras,1. S II,v o l VII, no. 118. U5 IP S , no. 534. ^ A R E A Z l of 1914. ^ AR ES% % of 1926 (See infra). 178 R. Deva Aseervatam, M oovendarY är? Rama Devan Publishers, 1977), 197-98. ]79 A R E 185 to 188,190,191 of 1910; C ölan Pürvapattayam ^ 43. iso p〇r a detailed account of such quarrels between itm ik a i and va la n k a i classes, see Hanumanthan, U n to ach ah ility: A H is to ric a l Study upto 1 5 0 0 A .D ., 194-99. 181 Abbe Dubois, H in d u M anners^ Custom s an d Cerem 〇 7iies (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1947), 25. 182 V alankai C a ritra m , 41-51, unpublished manuscript found in the Manuscript Library of the University of Madras. 183 V alankai C a ritra m , 41-51.

PART THREE

C O M T IN U IT Y A N D C H A N G E IN C O L O N IA L S O C IE T Y

T

XII L A B O U R C A S T E S U N D E R T H E E N G L IS H C O M P A N Y IN M A D R A S IN T H E 1 7 th A N D 1 8 th C E N T U R IE S ^ Vikram Harijan

The study of the labour caste groups and their activities in India in the early modern phase is an important theme* Generally, untouchables, artisans and different caste groups (left and right hand) who were engaged in different factories or in the agriculture fields as labourers, or as workers, slaves, servants, etc. on the basis of their hereditary or different occupations or as set by the society, may be called labour caste group'. This work intends to study the labour caste groups, their activities and functions, and their relationship with the English Company in Madras in the early modern period.

H IS T O R IO G R A P H Y

Very little research has been on the labour caste groups and theirs functions and position in the socio-economic and political-cultural system. Some good work has been done by S. Arasaratnam1 who has written many books on the merchant castes and some on occupational castes groups like the weavers. In his books Merchants^ Companies and Commerce in the Coromandal Coast 1650-1740 and Maritime India in the Seventeenth Century1 he deals primarily with merchant castes like Chetty and Comity. He also deals with their involvement with the English Company and their mutual dependence. He also describes in detail about the right and left hand castes and their role in the English Company. He has also written many articles such as *Dutch Indian Commercial policy in Ceylon and its Effects on the IndoCeylon Trade (1690-1750)’3, ‘Merchants and their Trading Methods， （circa 1700)’4, 'Coromandel Revisited: Problems and Issues in Indian Maritime History，5 and 'The Politics of Commerce in the Coastal Kingdoms of Tamil Nad,1650-1700’6. These articles also deal with the commercial aspects of a few merchants castes as well the English Company. However, he has not dealt with low-caste workers and their role in the English Company. Sanjay Subramanyam too has done some significant work related to the merchants and the English Company. His book, The Political Economy * Ï am indebted to my supervisor Professor Yogesh Sharma for his valuable insights, Professor Chinna Rao for his encouragement and my friends Prashant, Dhiraj, Sughathan and Pankaj. For further clarification, see Vikram Harijan, Occupational Caste Groups and the English East India Company in Madras, 1640-1720 a v \ unpublished MPhil dissertation submitted to the Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, 2005.

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of Commerce in Southern India: 1500-1650^ throws some light on the occupational castes groups. But, his work also ignores the specific study of the lower castes. Vijaya Ramaswamys Textiles and Weaver's in Medieval South Indict is a very important work and provides an overview of weaver castes and their role in south India, particularly in the textile industry. She has also contributed many articles in relation to the occupational castes of which 'Artisans in Vijayanagar Society, is very important.9 However, she too has not focused on the lower castes like the parai castes and grasscutters, umbrella-bearers, washermen, etc. Kanakalatha Mukund has also worked on the same topic, but her work is also related to the merchant castes.10 Recently, she has also dealt with the same issues, but interestingly enough she has given the following title to her book, The Viewfrom Below}1 She has however not dealt with the castes like halalkhore, grass-cutters, lamp-bearers, scavenger castes, etc. leading us to the question as to how her work can be a View from below. Brenda Beck, in her book Peasant Society in Konku,12states that there was a group of left and right in south India, but she has not mentioned the specific functions of the various castes that were veryimportant in the view of the English Company. She has nevertheless done very good work on the issue of the left and right hand castes. Arjun Appadurai deals with the left and right hand castes, their positions and their origins in south India and provides a lengthy description.13 However, he too ignores the emerging social awareness in the society that they had got from the English Company. Edgar Thurstons work, Castes and Tribes of Southern India}4 is a kind of encyclopaedia on the south Indian castes. He has also documented the various folklores which are good sources for the study of various castes. But his work studies a much later period. In Peasant, State and Society in Medieval South Indiayis Burton Stein wrote about left and right hand castes and the caste disputes, but he is not specific on the English East India Company and its role on caste. New occupations一 such as flag-bearers, lamp-bearers, etc.—in the English Company emerged as castes^ and this is a very significant development. Although these occupations did not begin as castes, but later became castes, historians have largely ignored them. K. N. Chaudhuri also documents about the various merchants castes including the weaver and dyer castes in Madras. His book, The Trading World of Asia and the East India Companyy 1000-1760}° is important to understand the trade and commerce politics of the English East India Company. K. N. Chaudhuri^ Trade and Civilization in the Indian Ocean: An Economic Historyfrom the Rise ofIslam to 1750^ is another important work which deals with the boatmen, seamen (and fishermen)—other very important labour caste groups. But Chaudhuri has not dealt in great length about their role in the English Comoany. H. D. Love^ Vestiges of Old Madras^ 1640-1800^ documents which were heavily dependent on the Records of Fort St. Geroge is very helpful to understand Madras under the English Company.

R O LE O F T H E E N G L IS H C O M P A N Y

Madras was a prolific commercial town under the English East India Company in the Coromandel Coast in the second half of the seventeenth century.19 It was the

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largest city in the Coromandel Coast,20 and its trade was considerable, especially in cotton.21 Eminent merchants were permitted to dwell and were admitted to free trade under the flag of the English,22 who were the lords and masters of Madras town.23 Indeed, the founding of Madras in 1640 was largely because of British commercial interests.24 East India Company created the *Black Town for the local inhabitants such as the Moors, Hindus, foreign traders, artisans, sailors and workmen.25 It was also primarily a commercial centre, and the majority of its inhabitants directly or indirectly depended on trade.26 The Black Town was the commercial centre of the city; it was more thickly populated part and many mercantile offices were situated here.27 Joseph J. Brennig analysed that European enclaves served as trading centres in seventeenth century and Madras was one of the major centres of trade in the Coromandel Coast.28 In other words, Madras was a major port and redistributive centre29 and a growing commercial centre in the Coromandel Coast.30 The English East India Company wanted to develop Madras into a commercial centre and this proved enormously successful.31 Generally, Madras became a strong commercial power centre in India during the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.32 The English Company gave this opportunity to the labouring castes due to its new economic policy. The Company employed Indians extensively, and various castes were adopting new professions such as shipping, carpentry, weaving and joining industries such as textiles. In this context, we see the occupational upward mobility of castes. This was, in fact, not practiced only by the sudras or untouchable groups; the upper castes too were adopting different professions. For Instance, one brahman, Rayasan Papaiya, was the chief dubash of the Company in Madras.33 Another example of upward occupational mobility was in the term of merchants. Generally, merchants organised their businesses independently or in private, with the Company or with other groups. But, in Madras, famous merchants were appointed as chief merchants of the Company. Becoming chief merchant of the Company meant that they had official status and power apart from their respective busineses. The Company provided them all facilities, including estate ownership, palanquin, and other honorary symbols which were not available for the ordinary merchants. It shows that they had extra honours as chief merchants of the Company. Therefore, it can be argued that occupational upward mobility was occurring in all castes from top to bottom. In the context of the numbers of occupational caste groups in Madras, it is again very problematic. The records of Fort St. George report that there were twenty-nine caste groups in Madras.34 The above facts show that the numbers of castes were always increasing throughout the centuries. The numbers rose in early medieval times, and by the seventeenth century it had become 29 caste groups, which became 300 in the nineteenth century, at least in Madras. Pertaining to caste positions and functions again, it is confusing. As by convention, the lower castes were always in a position of disadvantage while asking for better living and righting for their benefits. However, in seventeenth century Madras we have several instances of the untouchable groups fighting for their wages, and claiming a respectable position for their caste. They were also in a position to threaten

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the English Government in case their demands were not fulfilled. For instance, the washermen, who belong to untouchable groups, had told the English Government to increase the wages and provide all facilities to wash the calicoes and the Companys cloths. They also demanded that the Company provide security from dangers particularly from the seaside. The Company had agreed to provide the demands to prevent the washermen from leaving the town. There was also an instance of a strike which was called by the chief merchants of Madras in 1680-81 in which both the left and right hand castes and untouchables participated. We also see that in 1707-08 rignt hand caste groups, which includes the Pariah castes, protested against the English Government and migrated en masse to San Thorne. These untouchable groups were also in a position to take the support of the people of their respective caste divisions. For instance, the Pariah caste belonging to the right hand caste group had immense support of the entire group of right hand castes, including the Komatis and Chetti merchants. In 1716, a left hand caste boy insulted a Pariah caste woman, wmch resulted in riots between the left and right hand castes. Pertaining to labour castes, they were not tied to their traditional functions. They were adopting new jobs and through these opportunities, they gained a new form of identity and consciousness through their struggle, strikes and demanding wages. In fact, they were in a bargaining position and were changing traditional social relations. However, it is a fact that the untouchable groups were treated badly and were not even allowed to eat together. Despite that, in the urban centre, untouchability was receding slowly and gradually. They were also interacting with the English officers including the Governor.They also interacted with the chief dubashes and other European merchants. Thus, due to economic compulsion, all Company officers, Chettis, Komattis, weavers, artisans groups, bricklayers, palanquin bearers, washermen, painters, coolies, peons, Pariahs, horse-keepers, grass-cutters, barbers, hairdressers, water bearers and other occupational caste groups were becoming economically independent. In the contexts of social and physical space, merchant groups were at the top position while the untouchable groups were at the bottom. In the physical space, the whole of the labour castes groups were settled in the Black Town. However, the chief merchants were in a position to settle outside the Black Town. Black Town was divided into different streets which were named on the basis of occupational caste groups— —weaver^ street, washermen^ street, Chetti s street, and so on. This symbolises the social space of the occupational caste groups.

C H IE F M E R C H A N T S A N D C H IE F L A B O U R C A S TE S

Regarding the identities of individuals, I have tried to bring the personal nam esuch as, Narso Washerman—earlier not brought up by historians. I mean that the historians commonly address them as washerman or a palanquin bearer and not by taking their names; however, while addressing the merchants, they named them explicitly, as in Kasi Viran, Sunnaka Merchant, etc. Historians have focused a lot on the chief merchants and their day to day activities of their lives. That is, if Kasi Viran

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was going somewhere, they mentioned each and every gesture of the merchant. They have not done the same in the case of the chiefs of the labour castes. There were several chiefs of the labour castes, as mentioned in the records of Fort St George 1680-80—the chief of washermen, Chinna Purrupu Narso, who was not only the Chief Washerman but was also the person who led the strike in 1680. He forced the English Company to increase wages and the Company agree to the demand of the Narso. There were many Chief Washermen. Records of Fort St George in 1708 records that the Chief Carpenter was Nina Chine Lingapau Grua Murti. During the 1680 strike, under his leadership, the carpenters struck work and forced for raise in wages. There was the Chief Bricklayer cailed Nallan. Under his leadership, all bricklayers went for strike and left their jobs. The chief labour castes were very important for the English Company and both were dependent on each other. These facts have been ignored by historians.

IM P O R T A N T L A B O U R C A S T E S IN M A D R A S A r tis a n c a s te g r o u p s

Leading artisan caste groups were also prominent in Madras, particularly the Kammalan caste which consists a group of five. It is also called panchala because it is supposed to include only the five castes of Vorkers in gold, copper and brass, iron, wood and stone/35 i.e. goldsmiths, coppersmiths and brass smiths, blacksmiths, carpenters and masons.36 These castes dominated the metal business in Madras. According to the census report of 1871, they were in all 3588 in number. Their percentage to the whole population was 15.7 per cent. The blacksmiths were 1120 in number, brass workers 238 and coppersmiths 53.37 The social composition of blacksmiths constituted a mixture of several caste groups, besides the hereditary blacksmiths.The blacksmiths carried bellows and anvil, hammer and tongs.38 These people also supplied wares to the numerous shipyards in India in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, particularly in the port town of Narasapur.39 Thomas Bowrey had noticed blacksmiths in the region during his tour in the second half of the seventeenth century. He says: M any English m erchants and o th e rs have y e a rly ships and vessels b u ilt here, b e in g th e o n ly c o m m o d io u s p o rt o n th is o r th e n e x t a d jo in in g th e re to , v is it G ingalee ... th e best iron upo n th e coast is fo r th e m o st p a rt v e n d e d here and reasonable rates, w ith th e w o rkm a n s h ip also; any s o rt o f iro n w o rk is here in g e n u o u s ly p e rfo rm e d by th e Natives, as speeks [sic], b olts, anchors ... ve ry e x p e rt m aster builders, th e re are several here w h o have m o st o f th e ir dep e n d e n cie s u p o n th e English, and in d e e d le a rn t th e ir a rt and tra d e fro m som e o f th e m , by d ilig e n tly o b s e rv in g th e in g e n u itie s o f som e th a t b u ilt ships and sloops [s/c] here fo r th e English East India C om pany and th e ir Agents, so th a t th e y b u ild very w e ll... I m u st n o t fo rg e t th e ir false heartedness to o u r English builders.40

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Abbé Carré had informed us of the prevalence of a unified social system among the Kammalan artisans. He noted especially among the goldsmiths, blacksmiths and carpenters that 'if one of them is offended or wronged, all the others shut the shops and abandon all their works/41 Regarding their wages, we have no clear accounts from the available sources. However, we are told that in Tamil Nadu during the eighteenth century blacksmiths and carpenters received a special payment for the work they did when the house for the community peasants was built.42 The blacksmiths belonged to the left hand caste groups in Madras. Goldsmiths were also one of the prominent artisan castes in Madras. They made plates and jewels of silver or gold.43 Goldsmiths worked in the mint house where they made coins and other gold products. They also received Tasheif.44 Jewellers formed a special group of small community of producers during our period of study.45 However, among Kammalan groups, goldsmiths were economical and socially better than the others. Carpenters were also an important caste group in Madras. In carpentry, there were many castes. Tacchan, a carpenter caste, a sub-division of Kammalans, was very prominent in Madras. Irchakkollan caste also acted as carpenter.46 Though carpentry engaged many castes Tacchan was a traditional caste. Socially, carpenters belong to left hand caste groups. In 1708, the carpenter caste chiefs were Nina Chief Carpenter, Quallandeepau, Lingapau and Grua Moortee.47 The carpenter caste also acted as a well-wisher of the Company servants, particularly of W. Bridge, a person to whom they informed; they once informed Bridges that some seaman could attack at night and, therefore, he should not visit.48 The Company also depended upon the carpenters for timberwork and for repairing the buildings.49 Seeing their importance, the Company also tried to build a house for carpenters in the Fort.50 The Company also made a carpentry yard for the carpenters.51 The Company also paid them in advance.52 The Company also depended upon the carpenters for boat building. Therefore， they were employed by them. From these facts, it can be said that carpenters were in a good position, economically, socially and politically because they had a good cormection with the Company servants. Kal Tacchan was a sub-division of stone worker caste called the stone-masons. The Kammalan castes were economically prosperous, which enhanced their social mobility among the more prosperous artisan groups.53 The Kammalan caste was highly organised, and its organisation had very interesting features. Each of the five divisions had its headman and a chief executive officer. Arjun Appadorai and M. Arokiaswami point out that the Kammalans were a humble caste, but they were allowed to live only in certain parts of the village. They were not allowed to take residence in central parts of the village, because an artisans occupation was traditionally regarded as being lower than that of the farmer^.54 But this argument was not true in the case of Madras; artisans were considered important groups by the English East India Company as mentioned before. Burton Stein also mentions that the artisans are very important caste groups in Madras.55 However, the artisan castes had always maintained an animated fight for precedence in Hindu society. Further, the Kammalans called themselves achari and faththar^ and claimed

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knowledge of the Vedas. Their own priests officiated at weddings, funerals and other ceremonial occasions. Several folktales were ascribed to the Kammalans, some of which are given below: 1 . Hie goldsmith knows what ornaments are of fine gold, i.e. he knows who are the rich men of a place. 2. The goldsmith puts inferior gold into the refining pot. 3. The goldsmith will steal a quarter of the gold of even his own mother^. 4. When the blacksmith sees that the iron is soft, he will raise himself to the stroke. 5. A blacksmith^ shop and the place where donkeys are all by themselves are alike. 6. What has a dog to do in a blacksmith shop? Said a man who attempts to do work he is not fit for. 7. What if the carpenters wife has become a widow? (This would seem to refer to the former practice of widow remarriage). 8. The carpenters want (wood) too long, and the blacksmith wants (iron) too short (that is, a carpenter can easily shorten a piece of wood, and a blacksmith can easily hammer out a piece of iron).56 The above mentioned popular sayings show their strong economic, social and political status in local society. Accordingly, the goldsmiths5position was elevated while that of the carpenter s and the blacksmith s were weak.

T h e B o a tm e n

The role of boatmen was also very important. Especially the Catamarans boatmen were naturally very significant. Catamarans or mussoalars were very big boats, used by the Machus. They were widely employed in transporting passengers and bulky goods.57 Elijah Hoole, an 18th century missionary in the region reports that the Musoala boats and Catamarans exclusively carried on the communication between the shipping and the shore. He says: th e boats w h ich w ere fro m tw e n ty to th ir ty fe e t in le n g th , six fe e t d e p th b re a d th w ere co n stru cte d o f s tro n g planks, b e n t by means o f fire; s titc h e d to g e th e r th ro u g h holes d rille d all ro u n d th e edges w ith threads o r chord o f coir, th e o u te r fib ro u s covering o f th e co co n u t; inside th e bo a t, th e s titch e d enclose a so rt o f ca lkin g or w a d d in g o f straw, re n d e rin g th e seams w a te r t i g h t ... Mussoala b o a t was g e n e ra lly m anned by ten hands; e ig h t m en at th e oars, o ne at th e h e lm and o ne b o y to th e w a te r• … D uring strike th e b o a t th e y sing a song to g e th e r.58

K. N. Chaudhari has also pointed out that the fishermenj coral-divers, boat-builders, rope-makers, and net-menders always settled near the sea. Their childhood starts with the connection or the sea and it continued through the hard toils of an entire lifetime. Such people were found everywhere and at every port. They were the

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original boatmen who found their daily sustenance in the sea. In the social hierarchy, the position or the fishermen was very low. Thomas Bowrey noticed that the caste of fishermen in the Coromandel Coast—called the Machuas—was regarded as the lowest among the Hindu untouchables and they lived separately from other people.59

B ric k la y e r s

Bricklayers were also a part of Kammalans but their role in Madras was very important. In Madras, aggamoodee or agamudian members were the bricklayers.60 Hie badaga caste also acted as bricklayers. Bricklayers, function was to construct buildings, repair walls of bricks, plaster,61 buttresses and pillars,62 and measuring the land to build the building or wall.63 The brick-maker^ wages varied. Sometimes, bricklayers were paid 500 pagodas64 and at other times 300 pagodas.65 It is said that wages depended on the number of bricks laid and the volume of the whole work. Nallana was a chiet bricklayer in Madras.66 Bricklayers also contributed 400 pagodas towards the construction of the walls of the Black Town. This contribution was quite significant, compared to their status in the society when many other castes were seen to be higher than them.67 Seeing their position and contribution, it can be said that, though they belonged to the lower strata, they had made considerable economic progress.

P a la n q u in b e a re rs

Palanquin bearers were another major occupational caste group in Madras. The palanquin refers to a box-litter for travelling, with a pole projecting before and behind which was borne on the shoulders of four and six men.68 Thevenot describes that it was a kind of coach with four feet, on each side of the ballista, four or five inches high. A backstage was like a child cradle. That machine hang by long poles of bamboo made into two frames nailed to the feet of the coach. Suppose a warm, woman (i.e. a rich woman) was travelling in that palanquin, it was covered with velvet. If there would be a possibility of rain that day, the whole palanquin was covered with waxed cloth. In the bottom of the palanquin, there was a seating mat which moved easily by means of some straps of silk that were fastened inside the bamboo. Everyone decorated their palanquin according to their wealth. Some covered theirs with plates of silver and some had theirs only painted with flowers.69 Peter Mundy points out that a palanquin was a sitting box, which was carried on mens shoulders. Six or eight men were required at one time. It was used by wealthy men and women. Palanquin was very comfortable to lie.70 Mundy says that the palanquin was carried by members of a low caste called kahar.71 They travelled 25 or 30 miles a day bearing a weight oiVi quintal on their shoulder.72 Tlievenot also noted that four men were required to carry a palanquin because each of the ends of the bamboo rested upon the shoulder of two men and when the journey was long, someone else would take their turn.73

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Elijah Hoole, a missionary, who landed in India in the beginning of the 18th century, extensively describes the palanquin bearers. He points out that four men were required to carry the palanquin. The four men were relieved about every ten minutes by four others. Those who were not actually carrying were running before or behind. The whole party talked, laughed and sang songs while carrying the palanquin. They usually covered about five miles an hour. The Europeans often dislike this method of travelling, but it was often indispensable as India was extensive and the good roads were not good for other modes of transport. There were vast jungles and very few bridges. For the local people such occupation was regarded as another avenue for employment. The palanquin bearers were, in fact, very cheerful in the performance during the journey, Hoole observed. He also says that though they run tired and thirsty through the forty miles stretch during the night they were fully prepared to proceed their journey on the succeeding evening. Six men took his palanquin at the mission door in Madras, with the intention of making a journey of six hundred miles. Hoole mentions that they were even ready to travel with him to Kasi or Benaras.74 About their nature and social status, Hoole notes that the palanquin bearer quarrelled rarely with the people of the villages through which they passed. Unfortunately, in the end of a stage, they often disputed violently among themselves about various trifles and when they were excited, their language and gestures were most ill. For instance, he narrates the story of a Danish missionary who was travelling in a palanquin. At the end, the bearers quarrelled violently. The Danish missionarythought that they were fighting over money and had decided to kill him. Thinking so, he offered money and his gold watch so that they would spare his life and conduct him safely on his journey. At this gesture the bearers greet him with astonishment and lead him safely to his destination.75 Elijah Hoole also notes the caste divisions within the bearers. He reports that their caste did not allow them to eat with each other. During their journeys, one person was entrusted with carrying their pots for preparing their meals, which consisted chiefly of rice.76The palanquin bearers were classified into three categories— gentoos5, Calabars'and pariars,.77The gentoo boys were employed in most of the families. They did all sorts of jobs. The gentoo palanquin boys were mostly employed in the northern settlements. The same work was done by the malabars and pariars in Madras.78 Concerning their wages, the Company paid five pagodas a month.79The master of the palanquin bearers was paid one fanam monthly.80 Love says that gentoos worked in sets of eight, malabars in sets of seven and pariars in sets of six. Their wages ranged from 134 to P4 pagodas per month for each man.81The Company provided houses to their inhabitants, including the palanquin boys, during times of difficulty.82 Here is a converation between a master (the then Governor of Madras) and with his tupas (the dubash) about procuring palanquin boys: M aste r: H ow m any p a la n q u in boys m u st I keep? Tupas: Sir, you m u st keep six p a la n q u in boys. M a ste r: W hat is th e ir w ages a m onth? Tupas: Sir, acco rd in g to th e C om pany's order, you m ust pay five pagodas.

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On the whole, the condition— —social, economie and political— —of the palanquin bearers was not very good.

W a tc h m e n

Watchmen were also an occupational caste group, whose role was very important in Madras. Traditionally, people of the taliar caste worked as watchmen in the region. The word ‘taliar’is derived from ‘talai’， which means ‘head’， a chief watchmen.8311ie TTalaiari or chief watchman was a kind of policeman who was generally known as the (talari\ Watchmen had other duties also, that is, to follow on the track of stolen cattle, to act as a guard over persons, and to serve process and detrain goods. H. D. Love also points out that trTailia/means watchmen and that they acted as watch and guard,84 Watchmen were appointed in the city of Madras for preventing robberies and other disorders in the city,85 from the time of the first settlement.86Abbé Carré notes thatTalliars are a caste of bandits who lurked in the mountains and woods during the day and ravaged the countryside at night.87The Talliars lived like savages, cut off from all connection with the towns.88 Not only in Madras, but also all over India, these watchmen were generally not respected and they did not have a good reputation.89 The Company employed them and gave them importance, but politically, socially and economically they were weak.

W a s h e rm e n

Washermen were also another leading occupational caste group in Madras. They were known as 'dhobi^ a term derived from 'dhoba, which in Sanskrit, fdhav5, means to wash. They followed no other profession but washing.90 Washermen were called as sembadivan and also Vunnan. Buchanan says that agasa were washermen,91while Fort St George records referred to them as saccala warr,.92 However, the washerman was extremely important for the Company. Between gentoo town or the Black Town and the potters town, there was a river which, the Company decided, could be extremely useful for the washermen who would wash and dry the Companys calicos everyday. The Company therefore ordered that Justice of the Choultry should clear as much as possible of the ground or sand on the North side of river on either side of Mr. Edward Henry s house and garden, from the houses and gardens that might be useful for the washers/93 In a sort of protest, the washermen opposed the contract with the East India Company and forced the latter to provide a proper space for washing. The washermen were also given money in advance for curing the Companys cloth.94 But the washermen complained of being paid low prices while they washed loads of cloths. They also complained to the Company to increase the number of washermen as they were not able to wash them all. The Company brought washermen from other parts of the country. In 1700, the Company settled the prices of curing the cloths cfor their encouragement,.95

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The above facts show that washermen were in a position to bargain with the Company. Despite this good relationship, the washermen made serious complaints against their chief washerman Narso. They alleged that he was a cheat who did not give their wages and that he abused them. Therefore, the Company ordered that Roggiah, Saugie and Coopah would be three chief washermen and that the head in the General Book be changed from Narso to Roggiah, Saugie and Coopah as chief washermen.96 The following folktales can be attributed to the washermen in South India:97 1 . Get a new washerman, and an old barber. 2. The washerman knows the defects of the village. That is, he learns a good deal about the private affairs of the various families when receiving and delivering the clothes. 3. When a washerman gets sick, his sickness must leave him at the stone. That is, however sick a washerman may be, his work must be done—the stone referred to here is a large stone on wmch the washerman washes the clothes. With the above facts, it could be said that they were in a bargaining position at least with the English East India Company. Their social position was not good. As Buchanan says, they were not allowed to sit and eat with the other persons from the higher castes. They were highly divided within and not permitted to intermarry. The washermen were not respected and belonged to the most ignorant caste.98Thus, they were a socially-ignored caste. Economically, they were not so dominant, but during the East India Company s time, they improved their status.

P a in te rs

Another important labour caste group was that of the painter, who drew patterns and painted them on calicoes. In the English factory cloths were mostly dyed blue, with over 300 jars set in the ground for that work. Also, the painters made many of their best painting here in the 17th century. The Portuguese applied the pintado to any cloth with a spotted design or any other designs." Chintz were material on which the coloured design was imprinted by wood blocks or traced by hand, and painters who worked on this material were known as chintz designers and stampers.100 The caste composition of the painters are disputed. Aobe Carré refers to them as the palli caste.101The English Factory records speak of a dispute between the painters and pallis.102 The Records of Fort St George also indicated that £painter castes5and palli caste^ were different, because they had different signs and symbols.103 For Thurston, pallis were mainly agriculturist castes,104 but they were not confined to this occupation. They were merchants, cultivators, painters (printers), lascars, sweetmeat vendors, flower vendors, fitters, sawyers, oil-pressers, gardeners, polishers, bricklayers and masons.105 Hence, A 〇De Carré did not understand them wrongly; pallis were also involved in painting. However, the painters also painted ships and clay goods,106 and their wages depended on the nature of work done by them—fine or rough.107 The painter castes played a significant role in developing Madras as they tried to collect capital for Fort St George.108 Socially, the painter caste (pallis) belonged

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to the left hand section.109 Among the pallis, there was also one section who were the beggars, called nokkan.110 Thus, pallis (painters) were economically, socially and politically one of the most servile groups in Madras.

C o o lie s a n d P e o n s

The caste of Coolies was also an occupational caste group in Madras. Coolie means hired labourer or burden carrier. In north India, the term has been frequently used for the lower class of labourers who carried earth brick as distinguished from the digger. The word appeared to have been the same as gentleMlve name kuli of a race or castes in western India meant savagery. The application of the word would mean a slave who was captured and made a bonded servant in South India. 'Kuli* was a word in Tamil and Canara commonly used to signify‘hire’or wages.111The term‘Cooly’also denoted the kahar who were palanquin bearers in North India. They travelled 25 or 30 miles a day. When they carried the palanquin, they ran.112 Coolies were the most subjected caste group in India. They were servile labourers who earned a living by a meagre wages. They may be called Hindu because they were of the ancient inhabitants of the country and had a reverence for the cow. They did not make distinction of meats and drinks. They did not eat meat at all.113 Coolies were also hired by other countries.114 The Company also fixed their wages to hire labourers and the chief coolie.115 The chief coolies were Pundula Grua and Woundda Nasso and their wages were 20 pagodas a month.116 Emaun Coolly was also a chief coolie. He maintained good relations with Nawab Zulfikar.m Emaun Coolly is also said to have had good relations with the chief dubashes of Madras.118 He had certain privileges in Madras.119 Despite his relation with the nawab and the dubash, there were several complaints against him— that he used several people unkindly. He could not proceed his business according to peons.120However, Emaun Coolly was granted freedom from rent in Madras. This grant was given by the Prince.121 There were also important coolies such as Issa Coolly122 and Rasasa Coolly.123 The chkf coolies were trying to develop the Madras city, when Fort St George was in a developing stage.124 Exceptig some coolies, like Emaun Coolly, the conditions of coolies were deplorable politically, socially and economically. The role of the peon as an occupational caste group was also certainly important in Madras, at least for the English East India Company. Peon means a footman, an armed messenger and orderly,125 a foot soldier,126 a labourer127 and could act as a watchman.128 The Company appointed talliars and peons to watch persons, arrest them if found guilty and carry them to the next guard. The officer of the guard shall examine the arrested person and, if he did not provide satisfactory answers, he would be finally carried to the justice-delivering authority. If any person shall oppose abuse or fight even at night, he shall be arrested and should undergo the same process.129 Hie appointment of peons as watchmen to the city was important as there were many reports of robberies and burglaries both within the walls and in the Black Town, and of other social disorders.130 The peons employment was based on the city’s extension and security. Formerly， peons were only 20 in number, but later on

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they were increased to 50.131 However, for the delivering of paddy or rice, peons were employed in large numbers, sometimes even up to 120 or 150.132 Peons also received prizes as a soldier and guard.133 They were categorised as servants on the basis of occupation for which they were employed. Streynsham Master employed 12 peons as servants.134 Peons were also employed as pattamar% (foot messengers). Despite their hard work, a peons wages were only 1 pagoda per day.135 In conclusion, we can surmise that they were not a socially, politically and economically powerful caste.

P a ria h c a s te

Another important occupational caste group in Madras was the Pariah caste. They played a very significant role. Pariah refers to a hereditary drum beater. It is derived from parai which means *drum,. The term pariah5had been extended to include all the lowest caste members who, in the city of Madras, were about one-fifth of the population.136 A Pariah was a servant whose office was hereditary, i.e. they inherlted their profession from father to son. Contemporary writings are full of derogatory and contemptuous language against the Pariahs. For instance, Bowrey says: 'The Pariahs are the vilest caste of all.. . . Buy me ... [a] slave boy ... let him not be of Parryar, but a good caste/137 H. Kotani, a formidable scholar of inscription in south India, points out that above paraiyas are, in ascending order, watchmen, washermen, barbers, potters, goldsmiths, carpenters, blacksmiths, oil merchants, weavers, merchants and others. While below Pariahs, in descending order, are soldiers {sarvakkarar) and toddy tappers {ilampunjai) only.138 Apart from these, Pariahs were not admitted in the temple.139 They were not even allowed to draw water from public wells.140 This confirms what Yule says: 'low caste Hindoos [are] in their own land, to all ordinary apprehension, slovenly, dirty, ungraceful, generally unacceptable in person and surrounding. Yet offensive as is the low caste Indians, were I estate-owner or colonial governor, I had rather see the lowest Pariah of the low， then a single trim，smooth-faced, smooth-wayed，clever. High caste Hindoo on my land or in my colony/141 Generally, Pariahs were the lowest category in society. Despite that, Pariahs were part of the right hand categories.142Generally, according to social norm, right hand castes had more privileges than left hand castes. However, the Pariahs were much below even to left hand castes, as Kotani points out.143 How did the Pariahs secure a place among the right hand castes? All the primary sources support that Pariahs were a right hand caste. Though Pariahs were traditionally drum beaters, they were servants, grave diggers, watchmen, scavengers and palanquin bearers,144 who were largely employed by the Europeans. The wages of palanquin Pariahs ranged from 134 to 1% pagodas.145 Economically, Pariahs were not in a good position. Some folktales pertaining to the Pariahs are given below:146 1 . T h o u g h 70 years o f age, a Pariah w ill o n ly d o w h a t he is co m p e lle d . 2.

Pariah talks in half-ta lk. This is a reference to th e pariah vu lg a rism o f speech.

162 3.

Vikram Harijan If a Pariah boils rice, w ill it n o t reach th e gods? T hat is, th e gods w ill n o tice all pity, even th a t o f th e Pariah.

4.

The d ru m is beaten at a w e d d in g , and also at a fu n e ra l. Refers to, a ccording to th e Reverend H. Jensen, o f a d o u b le -d e a lin g , u n re lia b le person w h o is a ready fo r g o o d as w e ll as evil.

5.

You m ay believe a Pariah, even in te n ways; you c a n n o t believe a b ra h m a n .T h is is th e o n ly saying in fa v o u r o f th e Pariah.

These sayings also reaffirm the social, political, economical and cultural position of the Pariahs, which played a big role in the construction of Pariah consciousness.

O t h e r la b o u r c a s te s

Several other castes who played also an important role in Madras are cooks; purchasers, servants who went to the market and kept accounts; horse-keeper boys;147 grass cutters; shaving barbers; hair dressers; water women and totties (sweepers).148 Oil-makers who used two oxen in their mills for producing oils;149 boatmen or caUmararnnen， who usually appear in the coastal areas for fishing or employed by Europeans for businesses;150 fishermen; scavengers; potters; flagmen (bearers of the European flag); kite sellers; chupdars (bearer of silver staff); rundelleers (umbrella bearers); dutymen (lamp-cleaners); arramen (pike men); sukymen (water-carriers); gardeners; and other occupational castes.

R O LE O F T H E L A B O U R C A S T E S IN C A S T E D IS P U T E S A N D R IO T S IN M A D R A S

Various English records have incorporated evidences of caste conflicts and riots of the two vertically differentiated groups'~right and left hand castes, i.e. the valangai and idangai castes—during the 17th~18th century period. Most records agree that in the mentioned period, caste conflicts between the two sides were continuous causing great problems to Madras people, in general, and to the English authority, in particular, especially when it erupted into major riots. Honorary distinction, pride, exclusive privileges and religious superiority were the main factors behind all these disputes.151 In other words, social status, physical space of human settlements, and various symbolic locations and areas were the main causes of the riots.152 It is also very significant that merchants were the leaders of both divisions. Balijas and Komatis were leaders of the right hand castes and beri Chettis were leaders of the left hand castes. In the ensuing riots, the Company had an important role to play as the ruler of the port town. The English authority regarded such disputes as 'factious madness，153 which needed to be taken seriously, as they destabilised the smooth functioning of trade and commerce. During our period of study, there were four major riots—in

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1652-5 3 ,1707-0 8 ,1716-17 and 1720—apart from many skirmishes between the two major caste groups. During the riots of 1652-53, we find that the leaders were the balija Chettis (for the right hand caste) and the Beri Chettis (for the left hand caste). Seshadri nayak and koneri Chettis (right hand caste merchants) held prominent positions in Madras. Hie immediate cause of the riots was the use of the routes for wedding and funeral processions. President Baker of Madras had allotted some portion of the town to each caste for their exclusive residence and rules were laid down as to the streets through which marriage and funeral processions may pass.154 In a series of disputes, the right hand caste merchants told the left hand caste merchants, that they were not worth cash'. In response, the berewar (a left hand caste) replied that the right hand castes were not worth ctwo cash^. Upon this, the right hand caste attacked the left hand caste, and the entire right hand caste group ran with swords and clubs in the direction of the left hand caste streets, plundered their houses and murdered two left hand caste men. Hearing of this, all the left hand caste groups organised themselves to avenge the wrongs done to them by the right hand caste group.155 Interestingly enough, during the ensuing riots, two brahmin brothers who held very influential positions (they were dubashes to the Agent and the Choultry judge), siaea with the beri Chettis and the left hand faction.156 In the context of the caste riots, President Baker saia: £We know not what spirit ot factious madness hath of late possessed our townes people in general, but the like, we assure you, in all iives, we never knew/157 Hie second major caste riots began in the year 1707 and went on till 1708. During these disputes, Ihomas Pitt was the Governor of Madras. The leaders of the conflicts were, on one side, merchants from the right hand caste group—Sunku Muthu Rama, a rising merchant of Madras; and the kelavi chetti and venkata chetti on the left hand caste group side.TKe reasons for the riots were again demarcation of streets, wedding processions and some commercial interests. There was continuous dispute between the right hand and the left hand castes for passing through some streets on their wedding processions. The Company tried very actively to prevent future disputes.158 The heads of the castes of both sides surveyed the two areas of the town and decided that those who were living in houses on streets belonging to the other side had to sell them and move to their own area. The area was demarcated by four stones (pillars) at the cost of the left hand castes. The Company ordered that both castes should not cross their limits and not ignore tne rule.159 However, the right hand castes were not satisfied with the decisions and, consequently, they pasted a notice on the pillars on the streets and gave the notice to the left hand castes. The notice urged the left hand castes to break the pillars as it was built by the English authority at their own expense.160 The government also noted that a paraiyar (a right hand caste) wedding procession went through the left hand caste streets, which was against the rule.161 This breaking of the rule resulted in the right hand castes leaving Madras in large numbers for San Thome and neighbouring villages. These belonged to the boatmen, washermen, fishermen and barber castes.10^ The right hand castes tried to taKe support from the neighbouring places.loJ, The left hand caste leaders, merchants kelavi chetti and venkata chetti, felt that the

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disputes occurred because of commercial reasons. This related to the investment in the Company and right hand castes merchants were not interested in it, and they made very little progress.164 Thomas Pitt summoned the right hand castes but they refused to come.165 Finally, an arbitrary division of streets solved the matter and it was done through the Governor of San Thome. Lastly, both heads of the caste groups signed the agreement.166 Another riot broke out in Madras in 1716 and lasted till 1717. Edward Harrison was the Governor of Madras at that time. Again, the contending leaders were merchants of both sides. The kalavi chetti and kalatti were from the left hand side and komati and chetti castes were in the forefront on the right hand side. It all began when a young boy of the left hand caste hurt a paraiyar woman of the right hand caste. After hearing the news, all the right hand castes grouped together and came violently down the streets, demanding justice from the Government. Although the right hand caste group dispersed during the day, they gathered together at night. Since this was a grave situation, the head asked the left hand castes such as cooks, water bearers, coolies, palanquin bearers, flagmen and umbrella bearers to desert the place. The Company ordered the head of the right hand castes to ensure that they returned to the services and threatened severe consequences if they did not.167 Another dispute arose between the right hand komati caste and the left hand chetti caste due to a dispute regarding some ceremonies.168Another dispute broke out between both the castes over an issue in the Nagaram temple, because the Komatis sang there.169 However, a solution was reached by an act of pardon of Chetti by the Company which ordered that both divisions should not disturb public ceremonies.170 Again, a minor dispute between both the castes broke out in the year 1720. This was regarding taking to streets for processions and other ceremonies. The Madras Governor, Hastings was informed by the right hand castes that the left hand castes had carried an image in a procession through their streets. The Governor talked to 16 left hand caste merchants for the proposed inquiry, but they refused to provide any information regarding the procession. However, the Company decided to hold an inquiry.171

C a u s e s f o r t h e R io ts

Various records and writings on the subject agree that pride, honour, symbols, and physical and social space, were the most important causes for conflicts and disputes in Madras. However, we also find that new urban economies—which provided new avenues for occupational172 upward social mobility to merchants—were one of the main causes for various disputes including the riots.173 Numerically, the right hand caste merchants were more dominant than the left hand caste groups. However, because of their influential position and economic status the left hand caste groups started to claim an equitable status on par with the right hand caste.This had brought about constant conflicts between the two groups, which sometimes broke out into open riots. Apparently, the left and right hands castes were fighting for physical and

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social space. However, if one goes deeper, booming economic conditions provided the base for the conflicts between the two. The fact that Madras witnessed those caste riots more frequently in comparison to the hinterlands and other port towns, suggests that flourishing trades and the booming economy of Madras were the main cause of the conflicts. Another chief cause was urbanisation. Since the Cola period, urbanisation started to gain importance as the state undertook both domestic and foreign trade. It contributed to the weakening of the state and brought about dramatic social change. This became prominent especially during the Vijayanagar period and later during the British period.174 Most scholars who have worked on caste riots such as Stein, Appadurai, Arasaratnam, etc. agree that urbanisation was the chief factor for the break of riots. Arasaratnam says that urbanisation factors brought many differences into caste, production and performance of many caste-related ceremonies, weddings and funerals.

C O N C L U S IO N

As we have seen, Madras was a great commercial social city under the English East India Company. The Company heavily employed occupational caste groups such as skilled and unskilled labourers who were not merchants but cogs in the wheels of the trade of the Company. The Company was unable to carry on its work without their support. These occupational castes were in a position to bargain on the issue of wages and duties. They also went on strikes regarding the wages and migrated to the San Thome. The English trade paralysed without their participation in work. Due to this reason, there was great occupational mobility in the profession of the various castes. The two groups, the left hand and the right hand groups, fought bitterly for the sake of their pride and for various symbols which the Company called 'madness'. The labouring caste challenged the caste-hegemony of the brahmanical order. They defied the existing caste-based knowledge and caste-based structure. For instance, wherever caste riots challenged the brahmanical order they also challenged the English Company because it was the brahmanical traditions that prevented the lower castes or so-called labouring castes from rioting, or getting any kind of education. The Manusmriti and other brahmanical sources provided rules and conventions that each and every caste had to uphold and follow. The labouring castes could be seen as having tried to internalise the values of this brahmanical order. For centuries, they were just following these rules which were inherently unjust and wrong. It was only with the advent of the English Company, that the lower castes, labouring castes, could take up some kind of economic power. This also gave them dignity and empowerment. These were the reasons behind this occurrence: 1 . The labouring caste became part of the English Company where everyone irrespective of caste were employed.This interaction with the British generated a great deal of new knowledge about: everything and equality among all the people.

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Vikram Harijan

2. The English Company employed and designated among its employees fa chief caste* for the labouring caste which again an exclusiveness for the so-called lower caste. In the absence of any such political structures in medieval times— where a labouring caste is regarded as a chief caste—it contributed to a new identity, new ideas and new thinking among the lower castes. 3. The reconstruction of a new history of the labouring caste was an important event of the colonisation experience. The Company started listing the inamaual names of all the labouring castes, which had vanished from medieval history. This is significant because generally in history writing the name of the labouring caste were left out. Only the name of the big magnate —nobility or king—was listed by historians or history-writer. 4. The English Company employed the labouring caste on the basis of merit and provided wages. Earlier these labouring were working as (begar, without a monetary payment. Under the colonial government, they were working or became salaried employees' which was an important factor in the labouring caste. To me it was a great empowerment. 5. The English Company scattered information pertaining to caste. 6. The left and right hand castes were exclusive caste groups which vanished in the 18th century. However, as long as they existed, we gather that caste-based discrimination was being practised within the group and between other groups. Sayings are the reflection of a society. Sayings, which were sometimes veryderogatory, have produced a negative knowledge about particular castes. Thurston has used these sayings without much thought, and this appears brahmanical in nature.

N O T E S A N D R EFERENCES

1 S. Arasaratnam, Merchants^ Companies and Commerce in the Coromandel Coast 1650-1740 (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1986). 2S. Arasaratnam, Maritime India in the Seventeenth Century^ reprint (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2005). 3 S. Arasaratnam, 'Dutch Commercial Policy in Ceylon and its Effects on the Indo~Ceylon Trade (1690-1750),JIndian Economic & Social History Review 4 (1967), 109—30. 4 S. Arasaratnam, Indian Merchants and their Trading Methods (circa 1700)', Indian Economic & Social History Review 3 (1966), 85~95. 5S. Arasaratnam, 'Coromandel Revisited: Problems and Issues in Indian Maritime History5, Indian Economic & Social History Review 26 (1989), 101-10. 6 S. Arasaratnam, JThe Politics of Commerce in the Coastal Kingdoms of Tamil Nadu, ^SO-iyOO1, South Asia 1.1(1971), 1-19. 7 Sanjay Subrahmanyam, The Political Emiomy of Com?nerce in Southern India, 1500-1650 (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990). 8 Vijaya Ramaswamy, Textiles and Weavers in Medieval South India (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1985). 9 Vijaya Ramaswamy, Artisans in Vijayanagar Society1, Indian Economic & Soda/ History Review 22.4 (1985), 417-44.

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10 Kanakalatha Mukund, Trading World of the Tamil Merchant: Evaluation of Merchant Capitalism in the Coromandel (Hyderabad: Orient Longman, 1999). 11 Kanakalatha Mukund, The View from Below. Indigenous Society, Temples and the Early Colonial State in Tamilnadu,1700-1835 (Hyderabad: Orient Longman, 2005). 12 Brenda E. F. Beck, Peasant Society in Konku: A Study of Right and Left Subcastes in South India (Vancouver: University of British Colombia Press, 1972). 13Arjun Appadurai, 'Right and Left Hand Castes in South India^, Indian Economic & Social History Review 14.1(1974), 217-59. 14 Edgar Thurston, Castes and Tribes of Southern India^ 1 vols (Madras: Government Press, 1909). 15Burton Stein, Peasant, State and Society in Medieval ^outh India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1980). 16 K. N. Chaudhuri, The Trading World of Asia and the English East India Company, 16601760 (New Delhi and Cambridge: S. Chand &c Co. and Cambridge University Press, 1978). 17 K. N. Chaudhuri, Trade and Civilization in the Indian Ocean: An Economic History from the Rise of Islam to 17^0 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985). 18 H. D. Love, Vestiges of Old Madras 1640-1800^ 3 vols, reprint (Delhi: Asian Educational Service, 1996). 19 Yogesh Pharma, lA Life of Many Parts: Kasi Viranna, A Seventeenth Century South India Merchant Magnate1, The Medieval History Journal 1.2 (1998), 261-90. 20 Niccolao Manucci, Storia Do Mogor (1653-1708) III, edited by William Irvin (New Delhi: Oriental Books Reprint Corporation,1981),92. 21 V. Ball, ed., Travels in India by Jean Baptiste Tavernier (New Delhi: Oriental Books Reprint Corporation,1977), 381. 22Tliomas Bowrey,^ GeographicalAccount of Countries Round the Bay of Bengal 1669-1679-, edited by C. R.Temple (New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, 1997[1905]), 5. 23 The Travels of the Abbé Carre in India and the near East, 1672-1674 II (New Delhi and Madras: Asian Educational Service,1990), 554. 24 Patrick A. Roche, (Caste and the British Merchant Government in Madras, 1639-1749T, Indian Economic & Social History Review^ vol.12, no. 4 (1975), 381-407. 25 Travels of the Abbé Carré II, 549. 2ö busan M. Neild, Colonial Urbanism the Development of Madras v^ity in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Modern Asian Studies, vo\,13, no. 2 (1979), 217-46, 239. 27 Gazetteer of South India I, edited by S. W. Francis and others (Delhi: Mittal Publications, 1988X498. 28Joseph J. Brennig, {Chief Merchant and the European Enclaves of Seventeenth Century Covom^ndtY yModern Asian StudieSy'voh ll,n o .3 (1977), 52. 29 Subrahmanyam, Political Economy of Commerce in Southern Indiay52. 30 Ibid., 62. 31 hx2.sd,X2Xr\.2im, MerchantSy Companies and Commerce, 21. 32 H. A. Newell, Madras, The Birth Place of British India (Madras: Madras Times Printing, 1919)，5. 33 Rayasan Papaiya held the position of chief dubash and translator to successive governors of Fort St George from 1697 to 1727. After ms death, his successor was ms brother. Following this, his son, Vyasam Venkatachalam held the position up to 1746. Then, Vellalar Manali Muthukrishnan Mudaliar became the Chief Dubash of Madras. Susan Neild-Basu, iHhe Dubashes of Madras*, Modern Asian Studies^ vol.18, no.1(1984): 9-11.

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34 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras: Fort St George, 1706), 55. 35 Census Report of 1871^ 80. 36 Vijaya Ramaswamy, Weaver Folk Traditions as a Source of Histoiyf, Indian Economic & Social History Review^ vol.19, no.1(1982), 47-62. 37 Census Report of 1871^ 93. 38Alexander I.Tchitcherov,/«^: Changing Economic Structure in the Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries; Outline History of Crafts and Trade (New Delhi: Manohar, 1998), 71. 39 Ibid., 76-77. 40 Bowrey,^ Geographical Account^ 102. 41 Travels of the Abbé Carré II, 96. 42Tchitcherov, India^ 45. 43 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1700), 89. 44 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1692), 44. 45Tchitcherov, Indiay80. 46 Ibid., vol 2,372. 47 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1708), 5. 48 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George,1700), 5. 49 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1672-78), 124. 50 Ibid., 3. 51 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1705),110. 52 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1702), 93. 53 Vijaya Ramaswamy, Artisans in Vijayanagar Society5, Indian Economic & Social History ル 22.4 (1985〉，417-44,435_ 54 Cited in Tchitcherov, India, 36. 55 Stein, Peasant, Sate and Society^ 248. 56Thurston, Castes and Tribes 1,1*22-25. 57 Ibid” 122. 58 Elijah Hoole, MadrasyMysore, and the South of India, second edition (London: Longman, Brown and Green, and Longmans, 1844), 28. 59 Chaudhuri, Trade and Civilization^ 121. 60 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1706), 55. 61 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1672-78), 124. 62 Ibid,, 3. 63 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1705),110. 64 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1683), 32. 65 Ibid., 119. 66 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1672-78), 124. 67 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1706), 55. 68 Sir Henry Yule, Hobson-Jobson^ edited by William Crooke (London: J. Murray, 1903), 659. 69 Indian Travels ofThevenot and Careri, edited by Surendarnath Sen (New Delhi: National Archives of India, 1949), 76. 70 The Travels of Peter Mundy, in Europe and Asiat 1608-1667, Volume II, Travels in Asia, 1628-1634^ second series, no. 35, edited by R. C. Temple (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,1914),189. 71 Ibid” 114-15. 72Void. ^xxx. Indian Travels of 7hevenot and Careri，1ら,

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74Hoole, Madras, Mysore^ 46-47. 75Ibid., 47. 76Ibid” 48. 77Love, Vestiges of Old Madras III, 328. 78Ibid. 79Love, Vestiges of Old Madras II, 330. 80Love, Vestiges of Old Madras III,15. 81Ibid., 328. 82Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1696), 144. 83Yule, Hobson-Jobson^ 718-19. 84 Love, Vestiges of Old Madras 1,126; see also Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St George, 1672-78),14. 85 Love, Vestiges of Old Madras III, 465. 86 Travels of the Abbé Carré II, 583. 88Ibid, 589. 89Ibid., 583. 90 Francis Buchanan, A Journey from Madras through the Countries of Mysore, Canara and Malabar^ 3 vols (London: T. Cadell and W. Davies, 1807), 1,337-38. 91Buchanan,^Journeyfrom Madras 1,337-38. 92Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1706), 55. 93Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1672-78), 76. 94Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1706), 3. 95(lhe prices of the cloths are Long cloth (Pags:l Fan corge.), Long cloth Midling (Pags: 1:4 Fan corge.), Long cloth Fine (Pags 1:10 Fan corge.), Salampares fine (Pags: 21 Fan corge〇, Salampares Midling (Pags:16 Fan corge.), Moorees fine (Pags:12 Fan corge.), Moorees Ordinary (Pags:10 Fan corge,), succatnums (Pags: 23 Fan corge.), Betteelas Original (Pags: 25 Fan corge.), Betteelas d 40 coveds (Pags: 21 fan corge.), Betteelas d 50 (Pags: 25 fan corge.)/ Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1700), 85-86. 96Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1693),15. 97Thurston, Castes and Tribes II,169. 98 A Journeyfrom Madras I, 337-38. 99Yule, Hobson-Jobsoriy 139. 100Love, Vestiges of Old Madras 1,129n. 101 Travels of the Abbé Carré II, 595. 102Love, Vestiges of Old Madras 1,140. 103Records mentioned several castes including pallis and painter castes: 1 ) Churliar Cast. 2) Painter Cast. 3)Taylor Cast. 4) Husband man Cast. 5) Cooley Cast. 6) Washers Cast, 7) Barber Cast. 8) Parrian Cast. 9) Comity C ast.10) Olyimake Cast.11) Furniture C ast,12) Pot maker C ast.13) Moocha c a s t.14} Shepherds C ast.15) Patanara Cast 16) Tigga Cast.17) Cavaree Cast.18) Hugabamds Cast.19) Pa"y Cast. 20) Goldsmiths Cast. 2 1 )Chitty Cast. 22) Weaver caste. {Diary and Consultation Book [Madras, Fort St. George, 1686], 5)

104Thurston, Castes and Tribes VI, 6. 105Ibid.,17. 106Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1703),14. 107Ibid” 22.

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108 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1686), 5. 109 Ibid.,16. Ibid.,17. 111 Y v le } H obson-Johorij 250. 112 Travels of Peter Mundy^ 114-15. 113 Colonel Henry Yule, The Diary of William Hedges esq., 1681-1687 III (London: Printed for the Hakluyt Society, 1889), cccxiu, ccxiv} cccxv. 114 Sir William Foster, The English Factories in India: 1665-1667 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1925), 91. 115 'To Metchele Patan each coolly 1 :Pags: Dustoory 2: Fans, to Golcondah each colly 1 V Pags : Dustoory 3; Fans., To Soundy each colly 34 Pags; Dustoory 1 V Fans., To Neloor each colly; 14:Fans : Dustoory 3/4 Fans., To Carrenda each colly 19: Fans Dustoory 1 Fans., To Ramapatam each colly 18: Fans: Dustooryl: Fans.,To Oudcore each coolly 13: Fans: Dustoory M; Fans., To Armagon each c o o ly 8:Fans: Dustoory3/8;Fans., To Policat each coolly 3; Fans ; Dustoorry XA ;Fans.,ToTrevilore Battee and 3: Fans; Dustoorry XA : Fans.,To Congee Voraum each colly 5:Fans: Dustoory 3/8 fans, To Veloor each coolly 18: Fans: Dustoory 1 ;Fans, To Chengy each coolly 16: Fans: Dustoory lFans, To Inpitee each coolly 18: Fans: Dustoory 1 ;Fans, To Tnncumber each coolly 18: Fans: Dustooryl; Fans., To Porto Novo each coolly 12: Fans: Dustoory 2/3 Fans., To puddicherree each coolly 12: Fans: Dustoory 2/3 Fans., To Sadrasspatam each coolly 4 Fans: Dustoory Va Fans/ Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1680), 42 116 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1680), 42. 117Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1696), 28. 118Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1694),11. 119 Ibid.,15. 120 Ibid.,117. 121Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1692), 5, 122Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1694),18. 123 Ibid.，29. 124Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1686), 5, 125Yule, Hobson-Jobsotij 528. 126 Love, Vestiges of Old Madras I, 74. 127 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1683), 74. 128 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1701), 109. 129 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1693), 147. 130 Ibid” 146. 131 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1686), 97. 132 Ibid., 98. 133 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George,1692), 8. 134 Love, Vestiges of Old Madras 1,448. 135 Love, Vestiges of Old Madras I I I ,15. 136Yule, H obson-Jobsotiy 680. 137 Bowrey,yf GeographicalAccount, 41. 138 H. Kotani, ed., Caste System, Untouchability and the Depressed (New Delhi: Manohar, 1999), 23-24. 139Yule, Hobson-Jobson^ 680. 140Thurston, C似如 ' 仰ノ ZWfc VI，78. 141 Ynlcy Hobson-Jobsorij 171. 2

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142 Appadurai， ‘Right and Left Hand Castes， ，217. 143 Kotani, Caste System, 23-24. 144 Love, Vestiges of Old Madras III, 115. 145 Love, Vestiges of Old Madras III, 328. 146Thurston, Castes and Tribes V I,117-18. 1474Boys, means slaves; a servant, as Henry Yule understands them. See Yule, Hobson-Jobson. 148 H. D. Love understands. See Love, Vestiges of Old Madras I I I ,15. 149 Buchanan,^? Journeyfrom Madras I, 80. 150 Hoole, Madras, Mysore and the South India, 30. 151 Yule, Diary of William Hedges III, ^n. 152 Mukund, Trading World of the Tamil Merchant^ 145. 153 Foster, English Factories in India^ 155. 154 Ibid., 135-36. 155 Ibid., 155-56. 156 Ibid., 236-41. 157 Ibid., 155. 158 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1707), 36. 159 Ibid., 40. 160 Ibid., 51. 161 Ibid., 52 162 Ibid., 54. 163 Ibid., 61. 164 Ibid., 54. 165 Ibid., 62. 166 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1708), 5-7. 167 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1716), 155. 168 Ibid.,149. 169 Ibid., 198-200. 170 Ibid., 30. 171 Diary and Consultation Book (Madras, Fort St. George, 1720), 190-91. 172 ‘Occupation is my term. I use the phrase ‘upward occupational mobility， instead ‘caste mobility, because mobility in caste was not possible. Mobility takes place only in occupation. 173 Mukund, Trading World of the Tamil Merchants^ 148. 174 Stein, Peasant^ State and Society, 204.

XIII O U T C A S T E PASTS R e t h in k in g t h e B o u n d a r ie s

Priyadarshini Vijaisri

Writing outcaste histories is a difficult enterprise.1 One of the most widely acknowledged reasons being paucity of historical sources. Yet another significant cause has been the manner in which narratives of outcastes have been framed and theorised, over the years, resulting in a genre of outcastes7histories一 that of a history of pathos. The diverse trends within this emerging genre of writing have been shaped by traditional social sciences, which in turn have culminated in the creation of a specialised field of studies under the broad rubric of exclusion and marginalisation.2 Simultaneously, the political radicalism of the outcastes has fosterea vibrant a literary movement broadly termed as Dalit literature—celebrated as protest literature in the form of pamphlets, fictional writings, memoirs—that has brought to the fore works produced by outcaste leaders from the late 19th century onwards. This surgence, which has produced an intellectual basis for Dalit discourses and politics, has a paradoxical quality; accentuation of a kind of monoistic view of outcaste condition and being in caste society and thereby absolute denunciation of caste system simultaneous with (since the 1980's, particularly) emphasis on distinctiveness from caste culture set in a trend of glorification of selective aspects of outcaste culture. Despite the crucial significance of existing writings on outcastes, the narratives are beset with ambiguities and do not often reconcile to the memories and cultural dilemmas of communities. Eventually, these gaps and silences invisibilse larger structural dimensions, more so the issue of power in pre-colonial societies resulting in quasi mythos that essentially mystmes outcaste existence. In tms chapter, focusing on the institution of priesthood amongst the Madiga, an attempt is made to re-examine issues of caste structure and outcaste identity focusing on outcaste priesthood and the implications of such formalised religious power in rethinking caste/histories.3Through an analysis of the ritual tradition associated with outcaste priests, the chapter seéks to discern its locus within Indie tradition and suggests of a shared past given the overarching structural unity of sacrificial ritual across religious traditions, and, to deduce ideas emanating from this sacred space to retrace the different ways of ordering the profane world. In departing from conventional historicism towards alternative ways of writing histories, the notions of religious power and dangerous marginality, it is proposed, offers a conceptual grid to explore the spaces and processes that have been devalued in both outcaste discourses and conventional Historiography. This exploration moves by broad

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conjectures and while such indulgence may lack the credibility of conventional ways of reconstructing the past, this might yet be worthwhile even if it arrives at proposing challenging questions for future investigation. This study eclectically borrows from diverse sources like colonial accounts, clan legends of the outcastes and the touchables {kulapurana^)ysacred lore and ethnographic data to weave an idea about the broader process of transfiguration from proto-caste to outcaste identity and inversely retrace the past through the archaic in contemporary times. As a conceptual category, the term outcaste marks a threshold of immense possibilities in excavating the cultural past, exuding a sort of wholesomeness, from its almost bare essence to a transcendent category, is unburdened by essentialised epistemic and academic attributions. The term is not posited as a self-defining category, considering the limitations, yet in a certain sense the manner in which it is used in this chapter is to cast it as a critical discursive category. It does not essentially suggest the notion of the outcastes as being external to the caste structures that occurs in the brahamanical ideology, and prominently emphasised in colonial ethnography, but that it is a category that is counter positioned to the dominant mode of being, i.e. that of the touchable. It also imputes an epistemic privilege to those at the boundaries of competing local structures and recognises their tenuous position. Thus, the term outcaste is postulated as a mutating category contrary to the dominant conception, and is crucial so far as there is scope for recognising the tension within that discursive category and can be validated, especially given its idiomatic usages, within the emic discursive practices. T H R E S H O L D O F T H E PAST: C O N T R A R Y SITES

Charting this cultural terrain would require keeping at abeyance a premise that has assumed mythic proportions: the mvth of the outcaste as external to caste structure, even if that is the desired ideal of brahmanical order and was actualised in specific cultural zones. The claims to legitimacy of brahmanical texts in interpretation of caste has led to the representation of outcastes as an embodiment of the oppressed condition, voiceless and passive beings cast out of the social space, reproducing his own inferiority* or extreme fatalism. This entrenched conception of the outcaste—as one cast out of the pure order, whose links to it are circumscribed by stigmatised duties and subjected to a state of unequivocal suppression—is an undercurrent in most sociological studies shaped by reformist movements during the colonial period. As an entry point to chart this overlaid space it would be useful 组 p'QgêJha conflicting images of outcastes across time with the dominant discourse and academic formulations to ascertain the facticity of ^ransgressive' elements. This will enable traversing the complex conflicting spaces and to disentangle the overarching ideals from the synchronic manifestations that bear the imprint of play of different factors. Moreover, contemporaenity of such ritual traditions, rather than obscuring the past, indicate the survival of hidden elements of the archaic and thus impart a different quality to religious traditions. Also this is suggestive of a certain degree of autonomy

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of the ritual domain, thus conserving the artefacts in rituals from the oeuvre of nonreligious forces or even larger historical processes. For while at one plane outcastes appear as powerful beings as priest/priestess reinstating a certain moral social order, at another plane they figure as a mass oJFpowerless victims mirroring the horrors of extreme violations as normative in caste society. Thus, weaning the senses towards the archaic within the contemporary would require identifying broader elements with a prescient quality to serve as markers towards an overshadowed yet persistent pattern within Indie tradition. Following are entries in colonial accounts and contemporary period that defy the stereotypical image of the outcastes: 1 . Abbe J. A. Dubois makes the following entry on the Pariahs and Chuklers within the Left-hand and Right-hand factions:4 M ost castes b e lo n g to e ith e r th e L e ft-hand or th e R ig h t-h a n d factions. The fo rm e r com prises th e Vaishyas or tra d in g classes, th e Panchalas or artisan classes and som e o f th e lo w Shudra castes. It also co n ta in s th e Chuklers or leather w orkers, w h o are lo o ke d u p o n as its c h ie f s u p p o r t.... To th e R ight-hand fa c tio n b e lo n g m ost o f th e h ig h e r castes o f Shudras. The Pariahs are its c h ie f supporters, as a p ro o f o f w h ic h th e y g lo ry in th e title o f V alangai-M angattar, o r friends o f th e R ig h t-h a n d . In th e d isputes and c o n flic ts w h ic h so o fte n take place betw een th e tw o fa c tio n s it is always th e Pariahs w h o make th e m ost disturbances and d o th e m o st dam age.

To illustrate the spirit that animates the Hindus' due to such Tatal distinctions5, Dubois recalls a dispute he had witnessed between the Pariahs and the Chuklers: There seemed reason to fears such disastrous consequences th ro u g h o u t th e w h o le d is tric t in q u estion, th a t m any o f th e peaceful in h a b ita n ts began to desert th e ir villages and to carry aw ay th e ir g oods and chattels to a place o f safety ju s t as is done w h e n th e c o u n try is th re a te n e d by th e near approach o f a M aratha army. H ow ever m atters d id n o t reach th e ir e xtre m ity.T h e p rin cip a l in h a b ita n ts o f th e d is tric t offered to a rb itra te in th e m atter, and th e y succeeded by d ip lo m a cy and co n cilia tio n in s m o o th in g away th e d ifficu ltie s and in appeasing the tw o factions, w h o w ere o n ly w a itin g fo r signal to a tta ck each other.

2. Here^ an entry from a work of colonial ethnography:5 W hen M ahalaxm i, o r Poleram m a o r A nkam m a o r any o th e r o f th e villa g e deities is to have her festival, th e nearest M atangi is a p p lie d to. Her necklace o f co w ry {Cyprea m o n e ta ) shells is d e p o s ite d in a w e ll fo r th re e days, before she is a llow ed to p u t it on fo r th e cerem ony. She d ons th e necklace, and marches b e h in d th e m aster o f th e cerem onies, w h o carries a knife, w o o d e n shoes and trid e n t, w h ic h have been s im ila rly placed fo r a tim e at th e b o tto m o f a w ell. The m aster o f th e cerem onies, his m ale and fem ale re la tio n s th e n stand in a

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line, and M a ta n g i runs ro u n d and ro u n d th e m u tte rin g w h a t appears to be a m eaningless e xcla m a tio n , s p ittin g u p o n all o f th e m and to u c h in g th e m w ith her stick. Her to u c h and saliva are believed to p u rg e all uncleanliness o f b o d y and soul and are in v ite d by m en w h o w o u ld o rd in a rily scorn to approach her, and it passes one's co m p re h e n sio n h o w she should be h o n o u re d w ith th e task o f p u rify in g th e soul and b o d y o f h ig h class Reddis and p u rs e -p ro u d Komatis. It m ust be said th a t o n ly very fe w B rahm in fa m ilie s keep up th is m ysterious cerem ony o f h o m a g e to th e M atangi. She is a llo w e d to com e in to th e house, th a t is, to pass th e o u te r gate. There she besm ears a c e rta in sp o t th e co w d ung, and places u p o n it a basket. It is a t once fille d w ith co o ke d fo o d . A layer o f rice p o w d e r covers th e surface o f th e fo o d , and o n it is p laced a sm all lam p, w h ic h is lig h te d . She th e n holds o u t a little e a rth e n w a re p o t, a nd asks fo r to d d y to fill it w ith . B ut th e B rahm in says th a t she m ust be c o n te n t w ith water. W ith a p o t on her head, a nd w ild e x u lta n t songs in her m o u th , re c o u n tin g her h u m ilia tio n o f Brahm in and Kshatriya, o f saint and sovereign, she m oves q u ic k ly ro u n d th e assem bled m en and w o m e n , sca tte rin g w ith th e free h and u p o n th e m th e w a te r fro m th e p o t. The w o m e n d o ff th e ir p e tty coats and m ake p resent o f th e m to th e M atangi, and a m istress o f th e house gives her th e c lo th she is w earing. The m en how ever, w ith strange inconsistency, d o ff th e ir sacred threads, and replace th e m by n e w ones a fte r a bath.

3. To arrive at archaic contemporaenity: The Mathangi, an outcaste Madiga priestess, addressing a gathering of village community during a Kolupu articulates a familiar conception of relationship between priesthood and kingship and an exposition of their exceptional state of being as outcaste.6 In one event the Mathangi says, (Even a king has to fall at our feet if they dont we make them fall/And, in another ritual performance: 'You all possess touchability and untouchability. We are truly here. If the lotus leaf is touchable so are we/ On the last day of Kolupu, in the ritual of thanksgiving to the deity, the Madiga priests, known as bainollu^ induce important members of touchables and outcastes who are ritual participants, into a ritual play. The bainollu are in command, one standing in the centre and another outside the circle formed by the ritual participants. The one standing within the circle addresses the priest outside it and says: brother, this week we have done our duty, humbly submitted ourselves to the command of the villagers, we have brought them joy by appeasing the goddess, and instead what did we get? We have been subject to their whims. Now see we will show them om powerywhat we can do.,? Overtly restating their power^ they command the participants to sit and then stand, run in a circle, animated by robust spirit of mockery and fun. The pedda Golla (the sacrifier who represents the village in rituals),8 considerably embarrassed by this overt display of control and to save himself from further embarrassment, asks the men to quickly complete the ritual formalities.9This bleak assertion of authority is met with a vituperative reprimand from the bainollu who mockingly respond to the

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Pedda Golla saying; (Why, Mandadi? Why are you in such a hurry? Is the heat of the sun too unbearable for you? Are you so weak? Why, Mandadi, all these days having drunk the urine of the Mathamma [the goddess Mathangi] hasrft invigorated you enough?*10Hie pedda Golla simply blushes at this derision as the participants and others witnessing the play laugh aloudJeering or effective utilisation of vitriolic speech is not uncommon and is nurtured zealously by ritual specialists. Similarly, caste identities are typified and subject to revelry despite being highly provocative. As the katha (the performative rendering of mythical narratives, which are rites in themselves) progresses, ritual specialists indulge in mocking and mimicking certain caste stereotypes. However, the manner in which the brahmin stereotype is subjected to exceptional diagnosis and caricatured remains unparalleled.11 In histories of caste or outcastes these images mentioned above lapse as insignificant episodes unfathomable within the available frameworks on caste system Or religious traditions. During the early 20th century, colonial and missionary accounts were marred by confusion and misconceptions with the conflation of the mythic and the ritualistic elements in traditions wherein outcastes appear with a distinctive status. The sheer horror of bloody sacrificial rituals and the presumption of a lack of profound metaphysical ideas on the part of the writers then logically culminated in the notion of the outcaste as symbolising intense debasement of primitive communities, and occlusion from the minimal civilising influence of the caste order. Consequently, such perceptions lent to idealisation and validation of brahmanical-values, and the epitomisation of outcaste culture and being as a ‘lapse into barbarism’. A summation of such popular representations and disdain is typified in Abbe DuboisJimportant work that was to serve as a manual for the colonial bureaucracy in administering the colony. By conjuring the image of the (Nation of Pariahs\ the abbot—who praised the colonial state for its worthy presence一 attributes great positive value to the caste system, as the most apt (devise for maintaining a state of civilization amongst the Hindus whose cultural proclivities were determined by characteristic Deculiar to the torrid zone.5The brahmanical class thus was a civilising force that had prevented absolute degeneration of the 'general social classes^ wn〇 left to themselves would speedily become worse than the hordes of cannibals who wander in the vast waste of Africa, and would soon take to devouring each other/12 Thus the term outcaste acquired generic connotation as tasteless' people, whose 'natural predilections and sentiments5was repulsive and abnormal, and illustrated the disastrous consequences of non-conformity to caste norms and etiquette. In a similar vein, bishop Henry Whitehead, whose work on the village gods of south India was an important source for ethnographic accounts of the colonial state,13 categorically disapproved religious practices associated with the outcaste priests as unfolding Midsummer madness,. Despite the bishop's diatribe his work remains crucial for recording the prevalence of a model of priesthood contrary to the brahmanical ideal of priesthood. The classification of such customs under primitive traditions, lacking any shastric sanction or as signitying the degeneration caused by caste and superstitious beliefs,

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received legitimacy from across caste-Hindu and outcaste reform movements and decisively shaped the discourse on caste and outcastes.14 In academic formulations, Dumont's pervasive influence in writings on outcaste religion is evident in the manner issues relating to outcaste identity are framed.15 Dumont arrives at the pure order by delineating the structural principles， while not adequately dealing with the nature of religious power. His postulation of the encompassing principle—of religious authority—is constrained by non-recognition of its porosity and dispersal across communties/the caste orders, and lends to ahistorical renderings of the past. In such formulations the untouchable appears as the very antithesis of the pure order, as structural analysis is premised on brahmanical conceptions that pertain to specific historical phase and textual tradition. This relegates to the margins not only the complex layers within the brahamanical tradition itself but also a range of traditions and cultural spaces that did not conform to the superimposed brahmanical structure, with little significance for overall orientation of the Indie. Another underlying idea in Dumont^ postulations lies in the erroneous formulations on impurity and sacred which primarily informs the problematic proposition of'the encompassing and the encompassed, as the basic feature of caste society. While impurity or pollution itself is preempted of its complex religious and cultural significations， the idealisation of one specific model of hierarchy masks the questions of power, and the elements of dissent within tradition itself. Two broad trends can be discerned in existing studies on outcaste religious traditions: (a) the structural functional analyses that focuses on the relationship between the structure and religious practices, and their functional significance in resolving anxieties and powerlessness. However, such perspectives， which evoke ideas of ‘protestant sectarianism’ or transformation of personality and its capacity to bring about luminal states, leave Unexplained dimensions of overall structure/16 (b) deviating from this frame is the theoretical proposition of Michael Moffat and C.J. Fuller—who were influenced by Dumont—that untouchable religious traditions suggest a continuum with the dominant Sanskrit tradition and thus the outcaste reproduces his own inferiority.17Robert Deliège critically points to the implications of such generalisations that obfuscate complex cultural process and terms Moffats' view as one-sided, and that, apart from the inadequacies of the categories of replication and consensus, there is no necessary link between the two and thus introduces a substantial difference in the notion of ambiguity and the fringes.’18 During the post-colonial period, except some rare attempts,19studies on outcastes and religions were largely based on the Dumontian structuralist framework or the hegemonic varna system with necessary modifications to suit regional variations. The fetish for the varna order as an overarching order and thus the unceasing urge to trace the point of origin of the untouchable/untouchabilty within the varna scheme has resulted in ingenious modern origin myths, scripted in the West. For instance, against the authoritative stance of commentators of dharmashastric texts, following upon Manusmirtis injunction that 'There is no fifth caste/20 Alan Dundes offers a novel reinterpretation of the very creation myth and claims to have discovered the original

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point of origin of the untouchable within the creation myth. The untouchable is posited to have originated from the anus of Prajapati, thus assigning a place in the creation myth in consonance with the impure occupation of scavenging attributed to untouchables.21 Such interpretation signifies the very apotheosis of the Dumontian framework and the limitations of brahmanical textual sources that represent but one dominant way of ordering the world/cosmos. While Dumont brings to fore the distinctive universalism of the East, contra West or by counterfeit (construct of Homo equalis^ in opposition to Homo hierarchichusyas the essence of the Western/ European world does not take into account the entrenched cultural notions of racial purity and impurity and institutionalised practices of racism), the problem with his postulations lies in imputing absolute value to brahmanical ideology as the source of such universalism. Over the years, two broad contrary discourses have emerged—one that continues to seek validation for everything within the brahmanical tradition as the authentic source of Indie civilisation, and the other trend—opposite yet complementing partially the former~a tautological criticism, that the outcaste is the eternal victim, a consequence of the flawed understanding of the past as also the manner in which modernist discourses have consolidated over the years.22 Thus, while the burgeoning studies have had to struggle with constraining ideas—where the outcaste figures as an abomination of the pure order—there has also been a parallel trend that has culminated in inverse exclusivist formulations that accentuated the absolute externality of the outcaste to caste society and the increasing emphasis on selective aspects of outcaste culture as emanating from imposed isolation and powerlessness. It will be useful to lay forth the broad spectrum of notions that the construct outcaste embodies. The term outcaste is central to the metaphysical universe of caste, ascribed both primal mystical notions and structural significations. Outcastes occur as part of different clusters signifying different meanings by virtue of Deionging to such broad identificatory groups. For example, while outcastes and women are coordinates symbo丄ismg a state of being in different degrees (temporary and permanent untouchability) outcastes are also identified with and share such identificatory terms with the heretics or those who were opposed to the brahmanical order. Extricated from such specific meanings it was constricted to signify an ascribed status within the structure.23 What then were the causes for the continuance of tne institution of outcaste priesthood? Such historical possibility suggests that outcastes were as much entrenched m the universe of caste and, it will be seen^ not only embroiled in its tumultuous history but—being its proponents—have shaped caste society in parts of southern India like other religious communities. Such history is deeply intertwined with the fall of the outcastes.

T H E O R IG IN S O F T H E S T R U C T U R A L O P P O S IT IO N A N D T H E D U A L IS T IC M O D E L

To critically re-examine the structural opposition between the brahmin and the outcaste it would be useful to chart the transfiguration of the category outcast

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itself from its earlier generic significations to gradual constriction as an attribute of specific communities. It might be useful to recall Hocart s important proposition that caste is reckon that historically there was no singular imagination of ordering the world, at least in the southern region.24 It is in this context that an attempt is made in this section to revisit, through ritual exegesis, a pivotal theme—-the loci of outcaste in juxtaposition to the brahmin over the longue durée. Recent historical criticism, by cautioning against the idealisation of varna, has noted the significance of taking account of parallel processes in shaping caste order and relations during the medieval and colonial period in Andhra, thereby unsettling narratives undergrid by neat binaries and predictable frameworks.25 Also, the recognition of contrary religious cultural principles in reconfiguring local caste networks26 suggests that locales or sites of power were rarely fixed and categories of status were often dynamically reconstituted and accompanied by idioms and practices of contestations against any single overarching normative system.27 And, thereby, sets forth the ground to move beyond the four-fold caste system as an absolute structure or caste as an exclusive category-determining status. There is an increasing recognition of other historical factors in the way caste was reconfigured by multiple processes and was constantly reproduced, enabling the reproduction and persistence of clusters of castes as parallel regional schemes of social organisation. T. N. Madan observes that, given the historical fallacy of notions of caste structure as an absolute, unchanging, homogeneous structure, it is necessary to locate not only occasional reversals, but also, more importantly, to stress the continuity of those reversals and further explore the persistent, constant existence of alternative structures.28 From such conceptual vantage it becomes possible to reinstate the seemingly chaotic elements in contemporary relics of the archaic—the rites mentioned above-—within the encompassing quality of the transcendent, where contestation and claims to religious and worldly power find articulation. And, the chaotic and disorderly violent outbreaks that intrigued the colonial authorities point to a very different configuration of communities and distinctiveness of the outcastes, in terms of the notoriety attributed to them—both as rioters and as priests officiating horrifying bloody rites. Thus, rethinking the locus of power in caste societies has far more significant implications than simply recovering the outcaste from the abyss of history. The above mentioned deviant* customs and tdisorderly, instances (in colonial records and encoded in kula puranas) become available to the historian, as valuable continuous connecting links to conjure broader shifts in the historical processes, despite the scattered nature of their occurrence. To understand the process of the transmutation of proto-castes to outcastes it would be useful to conjure the historical past within the context of the southern region. The tenuous conflict between those at the apical position and those excluded outside the structure could, to an extent, be unravelled by broad transitions pointing to the more fundamental tension in caste society. This exploration is. based on a premise offered by the archaic in contemporary— the outcastes have conserved an ancient feature of priesthood in Indie tradition, in the institution of the priestess and possess religious authority, albeit very distinctive

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from the brahmin. Far from being inferior specialists in impurity, whose role in ritual activity is marginal to the actual ritual domain, outcastes across the southern region have been central to the shakta tradition and continue to be priests and priestesses.29 Their religious persona and entrenched authority has been of such measure that they are believed to possess ‘god-like quality’.30 This is in accordance with the nature of Indie religiosity which is impelled by a force to actualise it in ritual enactments, and resonates with another form of priesthood—the brahmins as (gods on earth,. Hence, the almost undeniable pivotal principle of the caste system that, (in Hindu society, the brahmin stands supreme'31 was not impervious to contestation, especially in a unique case of paradoxical reversal, by the outcaste priesthood. Crucially, the three aperture sites mentioned to serve as entry points, indicating outcastes potent entrenchment within caste order and outcaste priesthood, can be traced from the early historical developments in the southern region. The earliest evidence of such ritual persona, fused with the role of the bard and priest, is indicated amongst several prominent clans in Sangam literature—the Panar, Paraiyar, Valluvar and Tutiyar who towards the end of the later Sangam period (3rd century ad to 6th century a d ) began to be classified as untouchables.32 Their links with specialised groups organised into egalitarian eco zones in Tamilakam (the land between the hills of Venkatam and the tip of Kanyakumari) hints at perhaps what can be construed as indicating the transition of proto-caste to outcaste identities.33 The prominent role of these clans, entrusted with making royal announcements and declarations of war,34 is interwoven with heroic tradition emerging amongst the dominant clans. The function of the domestic segments of the Panar, Tutiyar and Paraiyar were integral to the heroic culture underpinned by a dominant feature of society, of plundering raids as (a principle mode of resource mobilisation.35 Their duties were crucial to the expeditions, beginning with the commencement of the event to overcoming perils, the challenges involved in such raids and eventual celebration of the clans'prowess. With their musical services the Paraiyars and Tutiyars as heralders invoked the powers of the sacred as also the clans for raid, predatory marches to achieve their goals and re™ distributive feasts and rituals. For instance, the Panars elicit such roles as bards who joined the raids to be inspired by the fighting skills on the battlefield so as to enable them to compose eulogies of the warrior clans heroic acts. On return to the urythe settlement, the courageous acts of the heroes were conserved in clan lores, and would be invoked later to stir up pride in the hero by recalling the glorious past of their heroic ancestors. This heroic ethos was largely shaped by the close interdependence between the dominant clans and bardic and priestly clans. Mention is made of such wandering bards visiting courts and composing eulogies of the kings greatness, and that outcastes were 4great clans* who occupied positions of bardic authority as genealogists with ritual functions.36 A significant clue hinting at the transfiguration of the status of the Valluvar occurs in a historical account, a section of Paraiyars, regarded as untouchable during later period, were the royal heralders and court poets during the Sangam period.，37 However, despite the extreme contempt for untouchables with the increasing presence of brahmins in southern India, it is only in the later Sangam period that

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the notion of infinite or permanent impurity gains credence. A possible crucial shift during this phase, suggested in historical accounts, is the decreasing provenance of the proto-outcaste clans with the arrival of brahmins by virtue of a coup dttat and appropriation of these roles. Eventually, the new category of brahmin bards came to be closely associated with dominant chiefs, (with enormously high resource potential, range of domination, extensive and re-distributive complex and elaborate social relations.5At the centres of political power, analogous to the Panar bard, the 'brahmin bards eulogised Velar (Cholas, Pandyas and Cheras) chiefs and the majority of brahmins took to singing exploits of the Muventar/38 There seems to have been an interregnum period between the usurpation of religious authority by the brahmins and the consolidation of an order that set in motion a process that provided coherence to the structural opposition between rivalrous bardic clans. That this religious conflict was to severely constrict the protooutcaste clans can be deduced by developments in the newer order. The displaced clans were despised as contemptible and impure in the new order, and several restrictions and mechanisms of exclusion formalised during this period. Some of the features that are indicative of this change can be discerned: aversion to beef-eating percolated into Tamil society during the Pallava period; and, by the 7th century a d , untouchables were excluded from entering temples in areas of brahmanical influence.39 However, it is in later puranic literature that the outcastes are depicted as infinitely polluted—symbolised by the Pulaya who revelled in skinning the cow and consuming beef7whose presence was undesirable in the pure space in caste society. Around the 10th century, the notion of ritual impurity was institutionalised and untouchabilty as cultural norm seems to have been firmly established in the south, with empires patronising the new brahmanical order. Thus, the apical position enjoined by the brahmin is simultaneous and in contradistinction to the exclusion of outcastes to habitation outside the habitation of touchable communties.40There are no historical accounts of a sacred cartography of settlement patterns of castes during this period, however, clues to this are available at least as the desired ideal in brahmanical texts where it is decreed that the outcastes reside beyond the boundaries of cremation grounds. Yet, this is but a part of the decree, for in the same breath it needs to be underscored that it is also the space assigned to heretics.41 Thus, during the early stage, outcaste as a term constituted a fundamental category, attributed a negative metaphysical value within the conceptual universe of caste, subsuming diverse meanings and categories of outcasteness. Accounts of differentiation within outcaste communities thus cannot be reducible to any one specific linear history given the complexity of historical processes. From their status of aggrestic serfs, leather working, weaving, as village watchmen, executioners who aided the state (by absorbing the sin of killing’，42 to some groups who were‘rich enough to be taxed’ and rich enough to make endowments like the lighting of lamps in the temple.43 Yet, extant sources indicate that despite the extraordinary vitriolic onslaught ensued by brahmanical authority, and perhaps other religious orders too, from within the proto-outcaste tradition, the most powerful archaic model of priestess survived and figures in records of the medieval and colonial period.44 Such striking continuity

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of outcaste priesthood can be explained by the unique socio-cultural formations in the region. Scholarly works on the social formations of the medieval period have noted that the social dynamics of the region precluded the possibility of the varna from emerging as a singular model of social scheme. Cynthia Talbot s study on Andhra in the early medieval period elucidates the spirit of the period as generally oriented by the relative insignificance of varna for non-Brahmins in the 13th century/while the brahmins accorded it great importance.45 Instead, clan and lineage identities, i.e. kula, gotra and vamsham, were categories by which people identified themselves and were largely a consequence of the instability of the period.46 This witnessed physical moments when large tracts of land were being brought under the plough and mercantile activities received an impetus. Social dynamism is thus attributed to the intensity of agrarian expansion, which not only resulted in influx of communities into the hinterlands but also the integration of artisans and pastoral communities that 'fostered flexibility in social relations and mutability in definitions of community/47 Given the f l ui di t y, ( or subcaste) as a clearly-defined cultural unit had not emerged. The prevalent social groups were less characteristic of an immutable kinship group, than as an occupational or professional group. Similarly, local administrative mechanisms like the ayagar system were important localised units of services between communities and administration in the village. In the ayagar system the outcastes figure with indispensable roles offering obligatoryservices.48 As one of the twelve ayagars, the Madigas were obliged to supply leather products that were extremely crucial for the agrarian economy. In return the Madigas received wages，rights t:o land and customary payments. Äs a community of craftsmen they were integrated into the local economic network at par with other crafts or artisanal groups. Certain categories of outcastes flourished as craftsmen Vich enough to be taxed5and make endowments like lighting of lamps in the temple.49 Thus, while their status suffered beyond recovery with the hegemony of caste ideology, local networks of castes were based on a very distinctive principle of mutuality and reciprocity and the location of the outcastes in these orders was unlike the debasing status ascribed in varna order. Yet， there is ambiguity over the actual organisation of castes in the region given the diversity of accounts and conflicting trends. And, despite the prevalence of other categories of affiliation, the incursions of varna ideology in Andhra society is evidenced by a set of imprecatory passages during the 17th and 18th century. The occurrence of the outcastes in inscriptional sources with a brahmanical orientation, indicate very crucial points: the conception of the outcaste as mirroring the real danger of loss of purity of caste, and the fall from their recognised status in the overall general scheme. The purity of customs, allegiance to a dominant order, was becoming more significant as deviation or violation implied dreadful degradation accompanied by humiliating debasement. In a recent study of inscriptional sources in Andhra Pradesh during 17th to 18th centuries, Ramachandra Reddy discerns a verystriking pattern of reference to outcastes with reference to village administration.50 In seeking to explore the contextual references to outcastes in inscriptional sources

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of medieval period, he identifies a corpus of inscriptions that reveal the conflicting images of the outcastes in the region. These recur in the context of issuing of regulations, and foreseeing violation of several communal obligations. Interestingly, they concern the peasants and the village officials and in very specific context to everybody residing in the village. These occur in the context of maintenance of tanks, collections of customary fees and special exemptions.51 Indeed what makes these unique is .the symbolism surrounding the persona of the outcaste vis-a-vis the touchable; for instance, the dispersed symbolism and core meaning is woven around this basic pattern, a variety of acts that breach conformity to the regulations, misappropriation of fee {merd) received for maintenance of tanks or destruction or defacement of inscription—•i.e. concealing the regulation would be tantamount to have given his wife to be fucked by an outcaste labourer {vetti)yor to have given/lost his wifes honour to an outcaste (Madiga or Mala). Or it would symbolically amount to indicating that the defaulter was born to the outcaste. There are also instances where the person who engages in fraudulent acts is degraded to the level of having licked the vagina of an outcaste woman (Mala).52 However, one cannot fail to notice in these occurrences a dimension—in sexualised metaphors the virtual threat of fall, susceptibility of loss, the danger of degradation of the violator. Here within the brahminical normative order the outcaste has a unique structural value of outcasting the violator, of penetrating the pure intimate space of the community, as the lurking threat of dishonour or absolute loss or purity or honour. The imminent dangers on violations of administrative regulations are crucial to underscore the devaluation of the outcastes in political and social contexts where brahminical norms gained ascendancy due to royal patronage.53 Thus, the period between the widening provenance of varna ideology during the 17-18th centuries and the dissolution of the dualistic order in the middle of 19th century may have been a period of competing structures and intensifying deterioration of the status of the outcastes. It is puzzling that, despite the abomination that the outcaste came to symbolise in this period, the outcastes continued to be referred as ‘friends’ of specific blocks in the dualistic order and recognition as priests accorded. However, the prevalence of such parallel models of organising castes was to have a decisive impact in resuscitating south Indian outcastes from regression. Available accounts on the dualistic order evidences its effective sway over parts of the southern region until the second half of the 19th century. However, the colonial government was distraught with the dualistic order for being so elusive, that any initiative at regulation was to imperil the Company government itself. In the neighbouring territory of Pondicherry the conflicts between theses castes were of such magnitude that the French government was involved in a war of petitions and civil disturbances. The French itself were at certain stages embroiled in these disputes that its authority was challenged as castes refused to confirm to the several regulations introduced to resolve these disputes.54 Early British colonial accounts betray bewilderment at the frenzy of caste riots that afflicted the newly-established port towns. The colonial port town of Madras witnessed a series of riots in which outcastes were actively involved in alliance with

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the touchable dominant castes. Incidents of violence between the touchable castes and outcastes seemed to be erupting over 'frivolous* matters like the right to marriage processions and display of symbols of honour are reported.55 Far more problematic for the colonial government, apart from the peculiar nature of violent outbreaks, was in terms of arbitrating and regulating an incomprehensible configuration of alliances between different communities and the resulting paralysis of colonial bureaucracy. For there was no ‘reliable’ traditional authority to ascertain the logic and traditional authority of what was construed as a native nuisance that hindered the exercise of eiFective control. Consequently, it caused the colonial state immense embarrassment and frustration, given the scale at which these riots broke and the magnitude of crisis. The missionaries who were closely associated with outcaste communities during this period regarded these riotous eruptions as not only extremely provocative and non-conducive to peaceful coexistence but also obscene, especially due to the overt display of brute physical force by the despised castes.56The records of Fort St George provides a more complex picture of the magnitude of the conflict between the right hand castes and left hand castes, noting also the alliances formed across the touchable communities and outcastes.57 The structural basis and difference of the dualistic order from the brahmanical varna scheme has been perceived as a mode of social phenomenon with inbuilt and complex opposition and conflict. During the 19th century, F. W. Ellis, one of the earliest orientalist scholars and who was later part of a committee to arbitrate over the traditional privileges of the members of the two blocks, postulated the basic distinction between the two antagonistic blocks. According to him, the origin of this dualistic model emerged as a consequence of the ‘rise of trading and manufacturing groups in a society dominated by agriculturalists/58 Another posited principle underlying this structural opposition was the opposition between brahman dominance and the Buddhists who were, in a sense, non-conformists,59 Scholars who sought to provide a detailed analysis of the model in southern India further elaborated this opposition. Elaborating on this basic proposition, Brenda Beck defines this dual classification, right and left dualistic organisation as an overarching scheme of two ritually-opposed social categories that served to classify the localised and occupational specific kin groups. This dichotomous structure was characterised by two loci of power; castes dependent on land formed an alliance known as the right-hand block and were dominated by rural landlords, and castes with no links to land and basically comprising artisan castes and hereditary specialised occupational castes constituted the left-hana block.60 The former division was oriented by hierarchical, integrated model of jati stratification, i.e. the jajmani system; the latter generally comprised urban-based, itinerant groups and lived mainly by marketing their skills and who were paid by the individual job/61 Heesterman posits it as the structural reflection of two sources of power; castes of right-hand section was characterised by the kingly model with land based power and interdependence, while the left-hand section that of priestly model with emphasis on purity.62 Similarly, emphasising the structural logic of such dualistic cultural order, Appadurai posits this model as a ‘root paradigm’ offering a ‘basic form capable of conferring cultural meanings to a variety of antagonism in South Indian Society/63

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The position of the brahmin within this order has been one of ambiguity. Beck argues, 'the Brahmin (and the Namboodiri Pillai sub-caste of scribes) are neutral or may viewed as forming the head for the social order/Gananath Obeyesekere criticises the image of a ‘body social’一 with a head brahmin and the two sides, right and left—by Becks own superimposition of the brahmin at the top of the structure.64 He notes that the underlying idea of body politic is embedded in the varna scheme, while rightleft distinction is not associated with the body politic idea at all.65 This corresponds to Neils Brimnes observations in documenting the conflict between the two blocks in the early colonial period. A very significant insight emerging from this analysis is the structural location of the brahmin. Verily the brahmins—being structurally outside the dual system—had little power to intervene in matters concerning ritual, caste rules, regulations or obligations. Thus, 'Brahmin pundits were not particularly helpful in settling disputes between the two divisions among the aIower>,castes/ and unsuitable for consultation on matters of dispute between the two divisions.66 The French government was petitioned by the disputing parties and drawn into arbitration of such disputes. In the absence of any authoritative source of information on the origins and principles of the dualistic order, Jacques Weber mentions, the French consulted the brahmins of Chidambaram. On the failure of the southern brahmins to provide any useful advice on this matter further, counsel was sought from the brahmins of Tanjore, Jaganatha and Benares. Eventually, when all efforts proved to be futile, the government, convinced that the brahmins had no authority on these matters, arbitrated according to local usages and precedents.67 The dualistic order prevailed almost until the middle of 19th century in British territories and, further, in the French colony of Pondicherry as a parallel or the basic social scheme. It continued to induce impassioned emotions, provoked by issues of honour and custom causing virtual chaos and instability of order, from increasing disturbances, damage with its indiscernible tactics of desertions. Given the fact that such honours were highly contested and could not be permanently resolved, the conflicts caused a great hindrance to effective maintenance of order. They proved to be, as Dubois notes 'most direful disturber of the public peace'and even military force insufficient to quell the fury/ for the members involved were so ruthlessly passionate about their privileges that they demonstrated no fear of sacrificing their lives for safeguarding honour.68What is significant in this context is the initiation of a process by the colonial power, in its efforts to consolidate their authority, of imparting greater legitimacy to the brahmanical hierarchical order and reinforced the superiority of the brahmins as the authentic legislators of custom and tradition. While missionary accounts represented the disturbances and alliances within the structure as lacking any authoritative basis, it was Dubois5authoritative stance that remarkably germinated an idea that gained legitimacy during the later period. Being extremely dismissive of the YactionaF riots, he construes the right and left order as a 'modern invention in Indian society lacldng reference in ancient texts.69 Major changes ensued in the 19th century, with the gradual consolidation of colonial rule resulting in newer economic and political practices. Analysing the causes for the gradual corrosion of the dualistic structure, Beck identifies two major factors that initiated a gradual

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transformation of the social order during this period; the presence of the British and the introduction of changes in the economy. Beck points to the larger field of power, wherein the disintegration of the two exclusive locales of power witnessed the shift, where power was diversified and nucleated around the colonial state. The possibility of acquiring a respectful social position was dependent on access to newer avenues of power and prestige. Major change was introduced by the ryotwari system which gradually transformed economic and community relations, and eventually the ‘social superstructure’ itself.70 Beck’s reading of the Vociferous’ claims or passionate involvement of the outcastes in disputes within this structure is problematic when applied in different regional contexts. According to her, this is a structural trait of the lower groupings, who—akin to the untouchables—do not have a fixed patterned identity status within the block due to their ambivalence and fluid position, and is a phenomenon that reflects the anxiety of those at the bottom, (those who rank low in the social hierarchy are very often very concerned to show that there exist some other groups who rank still lower.' However, more intriguing is the assumption that such ambivalence in fact compels them into an extreme outward show of commitment/71 In this mode of argumentation the position of the outcastes and their structural ties are merely incidental and epiphenomenal, lacking any structural validity and in fact ascribes a negative trait to a prominent feature of social phenomenon. Such interpretations entrap the outcaste to a superfluous state of psychosis, without any identifiable positive trait of creative potential or will. Yet, it needs to be noted that this location transmuted the structural status of the outcastes who were complexlyinterwoven within contending blocks. These become definitive with the increasing competition and consolidation of identities. Brimnes observations in this regard are valuable, for they suggest the ways in which the transition of the south Indian society from a fluid, dynamic and competing structure to a more ‘static，traditionalised，order gained preeminence, conducive as it was for regulating and controlling the colonised people. Yet, this was a process in which both the colonial powers and the elite, and influential groups within Indian society collaborated in inventing a fixed, overarching structure that claimed its legitimacy by its conformity to a singular dominant source of ancient rights and immemorial custom.72 Thus the compilations of colonial ethnographers, in a way, reduces the incidents to mere intra-outcaste conflicts as simply an assortment of myth, hearsay and thereby dismisses the right and left hand divisions as a mere superjfluous trait of the overarching four-fold caste order within which the census, official and other ethnographic data was oddly fitted to reinforce outcastes5lowly social status.73 Though the colonial bureaucracy tried to arbitrate differences, in a way it also reinforced moral authority of the brahmin as arbitrators of tradition—a practice that was to have decisive consequences in the manner in which the social structure was reformulated in the region from thence. This period in colonial history, retrospectively,had a definitive impact in transforming the nature of caste, given the unprecedented loss of legitimacy and value suffered by the dualistic model. Such measure of oblivion was achieved with the consolidation of colonial authority and the progressive devaluation of diverse precolonial locales of authority and collectivities, the colonial enterprise of codification of tradition and the

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overpowering presence of non-traditional conception of sovereignty that subsumed divergent loci of power. Perhaps it may then be possible to deduce that the traditional space for forging bonds across castes and intimacies dissipated due to the expunction of the locus of precolonial forms of authority and widened the separation between outcastes and touchables by introducing an element of autonomy into demarcated domains, by disjointing the erstwhile interwoven domains of the political and the cultural/religious. While these elements of affinity, and of a shared past, tended to be redundant with the accentuation of the outcaste as a separate component of caste society, it was within the transcendental space (that periodically enlivened those memories) that artefacts of precolonial bonds survived. The effect of such a process during this period is reflected in the colonial governments attitudes towards specific customs associated with the shakta tradition. Nicholas Dirks* work is useful to understand this dimension within the larger concern of the British to control and govern the colony in accordance with the demands of imperial rule. Notions of custom were transmuted by missionary epistemology and colonised elites, especially the brahmins. A different normative order was being reproduced wherein customs like hook-swinging were diagnosed as symptomatic of barbaric torturous tradition causing harm to the individual and social body. Such representations failed to take into account how customs interconnected with pre-colonial traditional prerogatives associated with privileges, honour and status of specific communties.74 Several points of intervention by colonial authorities in arbitrating traditions continued to be rallying points for liberal modernist discourses in post-colonial India.75 These principles, largely evolved to legalise traditions, were intimately linked to the 'irritation such practices caused not only to the Christian missionaries, as argued by Dirks, but also to the brahmins who were, in a sense, outside that domain that relayed a kind of rituality that caused them great discomfort. Colonial domination and authority opened up newer possibilities of contesting the validity of such practices which were outside their province of religious control, and, ironically received support from missionary circles.The anthropological knowledge that provided a reliable basis on information to understand and regulate custom were mostly overriding presumptions of the colonised elites and the missionary/administrative accounts; and it often suppressed other opinions of the practitioners, mostly clower castes^ or precisely the religious authorities of the 1popular, traditions. This privileging of the brahmin religious authority set in motion a gradual process of corrosion of the legitimacy of the ritual domain of the non-brahmin priestly class, especially outcaste priesthood. The policing and eventual lllegalisation of hook-swinging, the banning of nude worship, the criminalisation of the practice of dedicating girls to the gods/ goddess, all crucially transformed the ritual domain of the non-brahmin religious traditions and their moral legitimacy.76The colonial legal mechanism, formulated for intervention, directly affected the essence of the sakta tradition. Drawing a clear line between purely religious motives and those elements believed to be causing disturbance or effecting sensibilities of other communities and invoking the need for righteous restraint a basis was laid for the gradual future criminalisation or invalidation of contesting traditions. What is however hinted

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in the explication of regulation of custom is, it might be argued, a sort of inverse Sanskritization—in appropriation of tradition by the brahmins who sought to trace the genealogy of the ^riginaFrite within a dominant philosophical tradition.77These representations invalidated the authenticity of not only the religious authority of the non-brahmanical priestly class but also the very authenticity of the ritual domain, its practitioners. In fact, the official recognition of the brahmin priestly class as the sole authority in religious matters recasts the brahmanical worldview as the litmus test for adjudicating all other traditions which, in the pre-colonial period, had certain autonomy in defining the domains by rejecting brahmanical authority and worldview. At work here was a sort of a technique of passive coercion wherein the brahmins created a conglomeration of cultural principle for the colonial state to govern the colonised for those belonging to the ^ower castes' were not the ideal subjects to be consulted for opinion, who were much in awe of the power of the state to oppose its power.78 However, though Dirks points to the dynamics of this process and the brahmin position in the colonial bureaucracy as a corollary to the emergence of a colonial public space that witnessed the reinvention of tradition, to contingent factors like ‘anglidsation’ or even the ‘alienation’ of brahmins from the rural, he in fact reinforces—howsoever indirectly—the notion of the brahmanical caste as a traditional sacerdotal caste with absolute claims to religious authority. It needs to be noted that there was no overarching provenance of brahmanical authority or even an uncontested supreme brahmin priestly authority. The religious domain was indeed marked by local social schemes and If the brahmins enjoyed absolute religious authority in a particular religious hierarchy, other parallel structures in fact exteriorised the brahmins from its scheme to a large extent and had inverted the principles of power, espousing for a more continuous hierarchy and a moral economy. The eventual colonial codification of the religious/social body legally redefined the pre-colonial domains and introduced a hierarchy of traditions; lowly popular traditions and upper-caste brahmanic traditions. Despite the prevalence of syncretic elements or an interface of the brahmanical and the non-brahmanical practices, the domains clearly nucleated around distinct locales of power. And it is in this context that the conflict for religious authority becomes more evident in both the representation and reinvention of tradition. Thus, by privileging a particular tradition that was contested through the centuries, the colonial state accomplished a task that brahmanical ideology and order had failed to accomplish. The ultimate exteriorisation of the outcastes, with the esteem bestowed on brahmanical texts by the colonial government and scholarship, lead to grave misconceptions on Indie history and traditions. There is very little systematic, critical and in-depth work on the dualistic structure capturing its complexity. While there is clarity about its structural opposition to the varna order, founded on the idea of a social body organised into two opposed blocks, and while clusters of communities were thus bonded by their affiliation to the right hand and the left hand castes, there is very little reflexivity on the status or location of the outcastes. However, it is explicit that this parallel structure resulted in radical realignment of caste groups, inclusive of the outcastes who were structurally exteriorised in the four-fold varna caste structure. What is crucial in this context is

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that the structural affiliation of the outcastes to the contesting blocks, vested them with power both inside and outside the domain of the sacred. It is from within this space that the contest for and reclamation of religious power from another iocus becomes inescapable. This social configuration suggests that, until about the fundamental shift occurring during the colonial period, there was no great obsession for affiliation to the varna order. Which then implies that brahmanical preeminence, except in urban centres, must have, had to contend with various communities who were religious specialists, bards, sectarian priests and priestesses, whose traditions were beyond the sphere of brahmanical sacerdotal influence and shaped the cultural ethos of the dynamic space and reverberated the aspirations of the emerging and competing communities. That brahmins as religious specialists had to compete for resources with other groups—whom they held with contempt—which were diversified, is evident in the commentaries of the 18th century.79 Instantiating this is， Kuchimanchi Timmanakavi’s ridicule of the prominence shown to non-brahmin specialists in his work Kukkutesvara Satakam expressing concern regarding the impropriety of the manner in which brahmins or temple money was diverted to lowly categories like prostitutes, semi-nomadic groups, deceitful persons, healers, outcaste priests, minstrels and bards and penalties for violations, spurious drinks like toddy the black drug (ganjayi), cock fights and opium {nallamandu) rather than showering gifts on poets.80 The crisis in brahmanical tradition is explained as symptomatic of Kaliyuga, suggesting the setback to brahmanical faith with non-brahmanical sects and specialists gaining a dominant hold on the masses.81

F R O M T H E A R C H IV E T O T H E F IE L D : T H E W O R L D O F M Y T H A N D R IT U A L

A shift from the archive to the field offers possibilities for charting the trajectory of the dualistic order during the pre-colonial period and the cultural basis for manifestations of unique bonds evoked in myth and ritual between outcastes and touchables, the sacred and mortals. Such histories, by virtue of having overcome the constraints of erroneous conceptions, unfold the broader principles and distinctive spirit that shaped specific cultural zones during the pre-colonial period. Conventional historical methods have foreclosed the possibility of critically drawing from the kula puranas, sacred lore and specific forms of religious traditions, as historical narratives are constrained by a linear, temporal time and privileging of texts and bounded constructs at the expense of a totality. Thus mobilising archival sources and orality offers a possibility of grappling with the challenges emerging from understanding a multivalent notion of time, space and being, in reference to the contingent, the form and ways in which they mark their presence in temporality. Unlike orality, whose locus is the body and memory in self validation traces its origin to the primordial and whose utility is in its constant enactment; texts are impelled by structural autonomy in the way idea is envisaged. The text and orality, informed by memory in varying measures, tend to work towards a desired ideal, its perfection is realised in the former

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as it recedes from the facticity of existence in all its complexitysome areas being almost inscrutable and irresolvable. Both may be precursors to the desired future. Thus, both the epistemic artefact/text, and its referent the actualisation in myth/ ritual, need to be taken into account in any critical rendering of rituality. For it is this dyadic relationship that: shapes civilisational trajectories and marks stages of creative tensions between over-arching principles that underlie the radical transvaluation of such principles, inaugurating movements of creative possibilities for ordering the whole: to enable a credible engagement with these sites, to move back and forth the archives and the field; to excavate mythical accounts that underlie the ritual—the embodiment of encoded bonds in mythic time—and to discern the mode by which the whole is positioned within shakta cosmology. In this context it will be pertinent to recount a few excerpts from the mythical narratives and ritual domain within the backdrop of the archive. This idiosyncratic foray will facilitate keeping pace with the temporal and the mythic as also to detect the contingent within a historical framework. The colonial ethnographic accounts are extremely critical despite the almost fragmented superficial entries^ for they evidence a continuity. Excerpts from mythical narratives/rituals and clues in archives point to a past that debunks conventional histories. Here we arrive at the chief conundrum around the persona of the priestess that hints at a remarkable feature of Indie tradition. Whenceforth becomes available a contrary narrative of past—the complementary pair occupying a decisive place in all sacrificial orders, its distinctiveness in the dualistic space within the religious cosmology of shakta tradition, crucial for setting the cultural basis of such institution. It needs to be noted that myths have a critical value in caste society for they lay forth a prototypical model for organising the profane and it is by approximation of that model that ones membership in the whole finds legitimation. Thus, while bonds between communities find articulation around such continuous enactments of ones distinctive being, it is in ritual that such enactments are heightened and ones part in the whole is inscribed. Thereby, given that each member of caste society enacts his preordained duty, myths are like communal decrees that orient the ethos of caste society differently from the Dharmashastras which denote a very different principle of legitimation.82

S H A R E D PASTS: O U T C A S T E S A N D T O U C H A B L E S

Before delving into the past, clearing the conceptual ground will help both ridding off some general misconceptions and also the limitations of the kind of investigation undertaken here. A fundamental feature of the dualistic order is the alignment or alliances between the discrete caste communities in the region. While it is being increasingly recognised that outcastes do not constitute a cultural monolithic community, due to the emerging dissenting political movements, it needs to be noted that the conception of a unified Dalit community is a modern construct that emerged during the late colonial period. Thus, there persists an uneasy tension between the traditional identities that continue to shape intercaste relations and those

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forged during the late colonial period that witnessed the emergence of a singular identificatory category for a broad cluster of outcaste communities with a definitive modern/politico-legal status. Paradoxically, the modern categorisation corresponds to the enunciation of status of castes within the order. However the dualistic order belies such fallacious conception and opens up another site for re-examining the relationship between outcastes and touchables—that they do not constitute a single monolithic category, and are split into two oppositional blocks. The fact that such a divide within the outcastes was deeply rooted is evident by discrete entities that form a cluster of segments with a broader caste group based on the principle of difference and separation that is a shared feature of both the structures. Intracaste divisions were also oriented by this primary basis of division. Thus, while groups of outcastes were divided into left and right hand orders, subcastes within each division of the outcastes were similarly hierarchised and structured as belonging to right and left hand groupings. The ritual identity of the outcastes was pronounced and a primary connecting link with various touchable castes within the dualistic structure, in accordance to their affiliation to the blocks. Several cultural practices reflect these inter-block values and are marked in their ritual relations. Thus, the two dominant outcaste communities in Andhra—Malas and Madigas—indicate the extent to which such block solidarities lead to irreconcilable differences and hardened hostilities amongst the outcastes as reflected in aversion and strife leading to disturbance. It needs to be noted that the rivalry between the Madigas and Malas is graphically evoked in one of the verses uttered in front of the goddesses during weddings by the Madigas: £I shall cut with my saw the Malas of the four houses of Nandyal, and having caused them to be cut up shall remove their skin and fix them to the drums/83 That such occasions were highly provocative is evidenced by a petition submitted by a missionary to the collector of Kurnool in 1887 referring to its obscene nature1and for being the cause of frequent quarrels between the Malas and Madigas. Similarly, their position within these blocks legitimated outcaste communities to challenge the privileges or rights of the touchable members of the opposing block. Such conflicts mostly centred round issues of honour and ritual privilege like 'one divisions right to wear a red ribbon, to take the procession through the streets or to display certain banner and temple flags at festivals/84 and the use of palanquin during marriages/ processions on horseback on certain streets.85 Simultaneously, it enabled the fostering of close cultural bonds across touchable and untouchable communities; for instance, the Madigas share a special relation with the block castes like Gollas and Komatis, unlike the Malas who have parallel relations of privilege with the Kammalan or Balija and extended to a set of rules concerning commensality, prestations and obligations. It is here that the practice of revering Active bonds amongst the touchable and untouchable members of the dualistic order becomes intelligible, and such intimacies between outcastes and touchables are encoded in myths. Interestingly, the Komatis, according to mythical tradition, are believed to be descendents of a brahmin man and a Madiga woman. In this context, the Madiga-Golla affinity instantiates the persistence of an archaic bond that has survived the onslaught by vuma order. This relationship between the Shepherd King—Golla raju or the chief of the dominant Gollas caste—and

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the Madiga ritual specialists begins to get intricate with the pattern of interaction formulated on the religious notions of mystical kingship and dangerous specialists, and not simply in terms of prestations, mutual identificatory idioms or coterminous ritual obligations, but also in their relationship to the village as a ritual unit that is complete in itself. The Madigas* unique relationship with the Gollas is predicated on their affiliation to the left block. Their role as spiritual guides of the Gollas has vested the Madigas with the title of kommuvandluyevocative of their bond sealed in sacred time. TDhieythus alternate between this exclusive role and their generic priestly identity as bainoilu. Kommuvandlu (horn blowers; horn being the traditional honorific symbol of the Gollas) are traditionally regarded as both a bard and priest by the Gollas and as having, to a great extent, contributed to the composition and transmission of kula purana. The religious traditions of the Gollas become intelligible when one reckons the centrality of religio-cultural ideals of heroism which are interwoven with religious and cultural aspirations that find expression in rituals. The Madigas as a clan are indispensible for accomplishment of their clan-specific rites essential for the survival of the pastoral clans of the Gollas.86 They figure prominently as bards and priests on all or u-ollas'domestic and public ceremonies, as their most intimate allies in times of crisis and for their martial identity. Such is their intimate relationship with the Gollas that in an ineluctable verse of the Katama Raju Katha\ ^ridevi, the Golia mother, nurtured Madiga baby by feeding him from her right breast, while her own son suckled from the left'—this conscious suclding of the Madiga baby in an honourable manner sealed their bonds for eternity.87The mythological narratives illustrate the conflict between right and left hand castes, especially in the Yadava Purana or Katama Raju Kathaytheir kula purana. The rivalry between the Siddi kings, belonging to the right hand caste, and GollasJ indicated in conflicts over counter claims to traditional rights over pastoral and agrarian resources. Within this backdrop the relationship between the Gollas and the Madigas, is lent to exquisite enactments during celebrations, and occurs as follows: W hen B atineni entered th e b a ttle fie ld in Yerra Gadda Padu th e re lie scattered bodies o f his b ro th e rs-in -la w and a n u m b e r o f Yadava w arriors. To ensure th a t th e y d o n o t becom e fiends or ghosts (pisach i) he has to make a p p ro p ria te o b la tio n s to ensure th e y achieve salvation (m o ksh a m ) and reach heaven (ka ila sa m ). On reaching th e b a ttle fie ld he sees mass d e s tru c tio n w ith corpses lyin g u n a tte n d e d and w o u n d e d soldiers crying in pain. He firs t sprinkles w a te r and sacred ash a nd revives M adiga Vira N aidu (also m e n tio n e d as Kaspa Naidu) th e firs t person to lay his life on th e b a ttle fie ld as he m arched ahead o f th e Golla arm y. He gives Vira N aidu his conch and asks him to b lo w it as he p e rfo rm s obsequies to th e dead kin. The dead relatives th u s receive funeral rites and achieve salvation. Then he sprinkles sacred ashes on w o u n d e d soldiers. The w o u n d s are healed and on recovery th e y ask fo r fo o d since th e y have been starvin g on th e b a ttle fie ld . He gives th e m th e fo o d g o t fro m his m other. A fte r th is th e re m a in in g Yadava w arriors, Vira N aidu and B atineni return to th e ir native to w n .

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At the battlefield Batineni, the Yadava ancestor, declares the Gollas,special bond with the Madigas: As lo n g as th e sun and m o o n exists and th e Yadava lineage survives, w h a te ve r cerem onies are organised by th e Yadavas— be it m arriage, G angam m a festivals, sacrificial rites (g o vu th e va lu ), fu n e ra l rites— — you w ill be th e re . D u rin g fu n e ra l rites w h e n you take th e h o rn and e n te r in to th e lake and take a d ip it w ill sym bolise th e h o ly d ip o f th e Yadavas. The firs t c lo th w ill be o ffe re d to you. O nly th e re a fte r w ill o u r paternal and m aternal kin receive such honours.

This alludes to the remarkable bond between the heroic clan and the Madigas who have a distinctive persona of a and at that time visits to some of the quarters inhabited by Mahars and Mangs show a state of things which has to be seen to be believed/37 Even the watandar Mahars lived in less than satisfactory conditions. The pucca houses of the Mangalwar Peth area were more closed in than were huts, and the space around them extremely limited (a condition that still exists).

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For non-watandars, renting open space and building a hut was the chief option. Gadi Tai and Bhokarwadi were typical of these areas, states Mann (and it was Bhokarwadi in which Shinde was to establish his chief Depressed Class Mission Centre a little later than when Mann made his observations). Here, the land belonged to the Municipality and there were fairly adequate latrines and a good tap water supply, although the drains remained kachcha. Living quarters for the Bhangis were far better, with 84 of the 89 families interviewed living in a pucca house. The overall picture, however, ^akes one ashamed,. Mann decries the wisdom of those who want to simply close off the worst areas and drive the people away and notes that he has proposed a model colony, a proposal sanctioned but not funded.38 His 1912 words are often echoed today.

G A D G IL 'S P R E -W O R L D W A R II S T U D Y

Although D. R. Gadgil s invaluable study of Pune was published in two volumes in 1945 and 1952 much of the data is from late 1930's surveys. And, although Gadgil was enormously interested in the Depressed Classes, his statistics are for a fairly small sample; he could include only the city and the suburbs, not the Camp; and he does not deal with such fascinating questions as the relative place of watandar and nonwatandar Mahars, The aggregate picture of Depressed Glass life is not as complete as Mann's, but the statistics are our only clue to change, and the incidental information is very telling. The tabulation of the occupation of 382 Depressed Class heads of families (out of a total survey of 4529) is worth reproducing in full, since it shows the very beginnings of occupational advancement:39 Occupational Grade Unskilled manual work Skilled manual work Lowest professions and administrative posts Small business Highly-skilled and supervisory manual work Clerks and shop assistants Intermediate professions Medium business Highest professions and salaried posts Owner of factories, etc. Pensioners Beggars and prostitutes No earner Total

Mahar Chambhar AUDC 94 7 185 41 39 101 19 1 29 9 3 23 10 1 15 2 1 4 1

8 1 184

1 —

54

1

1 15 17 382

Comparing these as best one can to Manns statistics for 842 Mahar workers, and assuming Manns categories of sweepers and coolies would count as unskilled labour,

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one finds more than half the Mahars worked in unskilled manual labour in 1912, only slightly more than in 1937! However, some advance has been made, it seems, in ‘lowest professions’， clerkships and supervisory manual labour. Overall, Gadgils school statistics show a great change. The category titled backward Classes'includes Depressed Classes and the low castes immediately above them, but as Gadgil uses it seems to include only Untouchables. Hie enrolment figures were gathered in 1937-38:40 Category of Institution

Arts Colleges Fergusson SP Wadia Professional Colleges Engineering Agricultural Law BJ Medical School High Schools for Girls Middle School High Schools for Girls Training College for Men Training College for Women Seva Sadan Training College VJ Municipal Tech. Tailoring College

Backward Class Boys Girls

Total Student Enrolment

14 9 6

—

1370 881 412

3 1 14 — — 54 41 5 6

-

210 174 363 303 2395 383 2395 278 98 68 61 79

—

—

14 4 14 6 2 , —

Schools and institutions with no Backward Class enrollees have been omitted from this list. Some interesting facts emerge from such raw statistics: look at the disproportionate number enrolled in Law öcnool! Note the pre-eminence of Fergusson in educating Dalit men at this time (I have been told by a Buddhist woman that she did attend Fergusson in this period, but not under the caste name of Mahar.) In another table, Gadgil tells us that the Poona Seva Sadan Hostel for Depressed Class Women housed 4 women attending college, which must include half the 8 women in the Training Colleges noted above.41The High Schools most important in the education of Dalits were Nutan MV and Camp Education Society, with over 40 students each. The New English School, surprisingly enough, had 26 Backward Class students. The number of boys in teaching training confirms an observation I have made in interviewing activists in the Ambedkar movement: much early leadership came from Mahar school teachers. Compulsory education was instituted throughout the city in 1943, and Patel claims that the greatest emphasis was given on iBackward, areas. However, the most crowded school in the city was No. 29 in Bhangi Galli in Bhawani Peth， where two masters taught 133 boys.42

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Incidental information in Gadgils volumes adds to the total picture: out of 220 sellers at the Juna Bazaar on Sunday, 9 May 1937,46 of the men and 8 of the women were Mahars, the largest single caste involved, and 26 of the women sellers were Chambhars.43 One has an image of the most enterprising of the Dalits recycling old material this way, and of Dalit women engaging in public commerce in a way that few other Marathi-speaking women at the time did. A 1938 survey showed that the great preponderance of casual labour was Maratha, and Gaagil found that the organised group at the Budhwar stand did not allow Depressed Classes to seek employment there.44 Gadgil noted 81 shoe-making and repair concerns in 12 Peths, most of them owned by Chambhars.45 Later in the volume, he notes 64 leather and footwear shops in Poona; his sample investigations indicated that all were owned by Chambhars or

X

^ —

Q

—

ベ ぐ •一 • ’

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Bharat Patankar and Gail Omvedt

leader to state forcefully the need for Indeoendence as the minimal basis for solving DaHt problems, and he stated publicly that he would be satisfied with reserved seats as long as there was adult suffrage. Then7at London, he completely reversed his position and asked for separate electorates (at this conference too, it should be added, with tEe Congress absent 11e was the most forceful spokesman for Indian Independence). By the time of the second Round Table Conference this attitude had hardened to produce the major confrontation with Gandhi, \Vhy? Two reasons that have been suggested are that the unanimous Dalit opinion, aside from Ämfcieäkär, was in favour of separate electorates, and that Ambedkar felt bound to represent this; and Ambedkar^ personal experience ot Lrandhi s hardline and even arrogant attitude13 which rejected not only separate electorates but even reserved seats. To this it may be jdded 1930^31r th the Maharashtrian nonbrahmins were moving in.to C^ that meant an essential aoandonment oi: their own independently-based social radicalism 9^4怎 (碑印P〇rary) acceptance of upper-class, upper-caste Congress leadership. WKat then of Gandhi^ Here it is worth noting that, when Ambedkar and Gandhi met for the first time in 1930, Ambedkar not only felt he had been treated rudely, but Gandhi himself admitted that he had not known that Ambedkar himself was a Dalit but thought rather that he was a brahmin social reformer aiding the untouchables! In other words, v^andhi had not only done substantially nothing himself on the issue of untouchabiliiy up to this time, but he betrayea a crucial ignorance oi the movement which had been going on for over a decade and of its leadership. Indeed he unwittingly betrayed his assumption that Dalits themselves were incapable of doin^ much on their own or of producing their own leadership. Ambedkar, therefore, insisted on separate electorates. Gandm insisted equally adamantly that Dalits were Hindus and must be represented by Hindus as a whole (and was met on his return from London by a black-flag demonstration of 8,000 Bombay Dalits).14 The British Communal Award gave Ambedkar his separate electorates; and Gandhi undertook his fast~to-death in protest. Here again it has to be stressed that, this first fast over the.(issue, of untouchability was not a fast against the British for nationalist causes or against the oppressive caste system, but was a fast against Dalits themselves to^force tte give up .their demands. Ambedkar conceded—knowing that if Gandhi died there would be massive reprisals on his people throughout India—and the result was the Poona Pact of 25 September 1932, which as a compromise gave Dalits the reserved seats that Ambedkar had demanded in the first place. For Dalit? jrxd for Ambedkar, the lesson was. clean.jQl a laith in the ability of satyagraha to Change the hearts, of caste-Hindus, rather that only by fighting for their rights would Dalits win anything at all. After 1932, Gandhi made 'untouchability woric a major programme of the v.on^ress and for many a crucial moral part of the Indian national movement. And yet essential paternalism,^ Dalits were Hindus remained in the choice of the tern 'Hanjan1, in the insistence that caste-Hindus aïid わöt Dalits shöül'd cö位 ïöl the Harijan Sevak §angh. However ‘radical’Gandhi’s own views on caste became (in approving or mter-dining and inter-marriage, for

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example), he never dropped the belief in chaturvarnya or the idea that children should follow their fathers}professions, themes that stood in direct contradiction to the anti-feudal principles of the Dalit movement. Even worse, anti-untouchability became identified with the Gandhian, i.e. the conservative, wing of the Congress and~remained a distraction and diversion to the radicals within Congress (and for that matter the Communist Left) who never developed a programme of their own on the issue or caste. It seems rair to say that, essenriailv, the British Raj did nothing to transform caste feudalism or to alleviate the worst aspects ot untoucnability. Whatever steps were taken came m the transition period between the wars when concessions were being given to Indian nationalists. And whatever steps the Indian nationalist leadership took came as a response to Dalit struggles. In,-1917—after the first 'depressed classes5conferences were organised in Bombay and Dalits as well as norirlOThïïtiïis 'made proposals for separate electorates—the Congress reversed its policy of excluding ‘social reform’ and passed a resolution urging upon 'the people of 丄 naia tße necessity，justice and righteousn— ess custom upon the Depressed.Classes^In the 1920s, the governments of Madras and BomEay (controlled or influenced by non-brahmin organisations) passed resolutions confirming the rights of Dalits to equal use of government facilities, schools and wells; so did several progressive princely states. These did little, however, to provide reinforcement and remained almost totally ineffective. In 1931, the Karachi Congress session propounded a programme of fundamental rights which called for equal access for all to public employment etc. regardless of caste and equal right to use of public roads, wells, schools and other facilities. Temple entry bills were introduced between 1932 and 193b in the Central Assembly, Madras and Bombay legislatures and generally met with opposition from both the government and conservatives in Congress. Baroda and Travancore states proclaimed temple entry in 1933 and 193b. In 1938, after Congress legislatures were elected, temple entry bills were passed in Madras and Bomoay.15 But the full and formal Abolition of untouchability^ad to wait until Independence. In 1946, the Scheduled Caste Federation fought for the reserved seats but lost heavily to (Congress HarijansJ in strongly nationalist and caste-Hindu dominated constituencies. As a result, the movement suffered a blow and Dalit demands were ignored in the final settlements and in the traumas of the Hindu-Muslim holocaust. The Scheduled Caste Federation then launched satyagrahas in Bombay, Pune, Lucknow, Kanpur and Wardha, demanding that the Congress make known their proposals for giving rights to Dalits; the satyagraha forced the abrogation of the Pune session of the Bombay Legislative Assembly and a compromise meeting with Ambedkar in July. Against this background, the Constituent Assembly met. Its resolution that ^ntouchability in any form is abolished and the imposition of any disability on that account shall be an ofFenceJwas in line with the development of the Congress movement in the last 25 years.16 But the system of protective discrimination —i.e. reserved positions for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in government service

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and educational institutions—was not at all in line with Congress (or Gandhian) thinking and so was even more clearly then the nationalist response to Dalit struggles, a result of the Dalit movement itself.

D A L IT S A N D T H E LEFT: T H E IS S U E O F L A N D

The relation between the Dalit movement and the emerging Communist and Left movement was, unfortunately, little better than that with the national movement. The Left evolved no programme of its own regarding the abolition of caste. And, m regard to working class orgamsmg， a history of antagonism was built u p . 丄he major exception was in fightine- feudalism m agrarian relations where the All Inaia Kisan öabha (AIKS) orogramme dia make an important contribution. Hus, however, remained partial and isolatea from the organised Dalit movement. In terms of the working class, the position or i^alits as unskilled workers in tne most dangerous and difficult-to-organise jobs put them in the position of potential antagonism to other working-class-organising in the sense that they were often ready to act as strike-breakers in the hope of getting higher-level jobs (the same phenomenon could be seen elsewhere where groups were excluded and so given no opportunity to develop working class solidarity, e.g. among US blacks prior to World War I), ana in the sense that they were inclined to form separate unions. Thus, Dalit willingness to return to work first in a Dalit-caste Hindu 1921 mill strike in Madras provoked violence and a conflict with the Justice Party. Dalits were part of the major 1928 Bombay textile strike which brought Communists to the leadership of the working class movement. But, when a second strike was called in 1929, Ambedkar not only opposed it but attempted to actively organise Dalit strike­ breakers. His reasons were the special hardships imposed on the economically-weaker Dalits by the earlier strike and the fact that the womng class leaders had taken no stand regarding the barring of Dalits from the better-paid weaving department.17 On the other side of what proved to be an enduring hostility between Amoedkar and the Communists, it has to be emphasised that the Communists concentrated their attempts on militant economic gains, on organising the working class in its fight for survival, rather than attempting to put it in the leadership of the anti-imperialist and anti-feudal struggles. The latter, as we have emphasised, meant not simply that workers should give leadership to a peasant movement but that the working class itself should fight to break down the feudal within it that held Dalits down. Yet nothing was done by AITUC on the caste issue and in the Bombay textile industry, where ‘the red flag was planted in the Indian working class’ 50 years ago, Dalits remain barred up to the present from (non-automated) weaving departments. The most central aspect of the anti-feudal struggle for Dalits and for other toiling peasants was, however, the land issue and village economic relations. Here, the work of the Kisan Sabha becomes crucial. By the late 1930s and 1940s, the AIKS had become a force in several areas—most especially Bihar, Andhra, Kerala, UP (in a sense, for, Kisan Sabhas here remained outside the AIKS for a long time)—and made

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a conscious and revolutionary effort to evolve an all-round anti-feudal programme that would be in the interests of poor as well as middle and rich peasants. But the gaps were crucial. The top AIKS leadership was almost entirely of non-peasant origin; even though peasants came to be crucial as cadres, these were overwhelmingly drawn from caste-Hindu middle-rich peasants even at a time when the AIKS was attracting more and more poor and low-caste peasants; partly perhaps because of this and partly because of the strenuous pace of organising there was little formulation of the Indian problem in Indian terms and abstract class categories were simply borrowed, usually from European thinking. The AIKS did not pass a resolution on untouchability until 194518 and never really considered cultural-level struggles of importance (this applied also to the role of women). Opposing feudal Torced labour1was a major element of Kisan Sabha programmes but this was never analysed in its specific expression through caste bondage. This, in itself, may not have been of overwhelming significance. After all, the fact that forced labour was actively opposed was of crucial significance to the Dalit toilers who took part and were apparently a major part of the Telangana rebellion. This may be one of the reasons for the enthusiastic mobilisation of Dalits, who reportedlyprovided the major element of the armed squads.19The most important failure of the AIKS was at a different level. It lay in the way it formulated the land question itself. For the AIKS, land to the tiller' was the central anti-feudal demand, and it was expressed mainly in terms of abolition of landlordship (zaminäari, taluqdari, klioti, jenmi, malguzari, etc.). Along with this, ryotwari peasants were to be freed from indebtedness to moneylenders and from government over-assessments. Lower-level feudal relations within the village seemed to be invisible to the AIKS. A category of ^agricultural labourers, was identified and this presumably included almost all Dalit toilers, but they were seen in European terms as peasants dispossessed of the land. The Kisan Sabha leadership was amoigupus about tneir inclusion, but where they argued for unity of interest between 'kisans* ana agricultural labourers' it was in terms of the fact that middle-D〇or peasants were rapidly becoming impoverished, losing lands, and becoming landless labourers..The special, traditional position of Dalit field servants with their hereditary connection to the land was simply not taken note of. A 1947 AIKS resolution on the abolition or landlordism stated: 'All agricultural labourers must have a minimum wage. All other tillers of the soil must get proprietaryrights in it under their direct cultivation, and cultivable waste land must be distributed among poor peasants and agricultural labourers/20 Thus, while Dalits here were somewhat ambiguously seen as 'tillers' they were not considered to have any rights in the land at all; only their wage interests were to be protected and their land hunger satisfied by leftover— —i.e. waste5land. Thus, in spite of the participation of poor peasants and landless toilers in kisan Sabha agitation, it is not surprising—because only middle-caste cultivating peasants were seen as having rights in the land—that the end result was land reforms which even in their most radical version (e.g. Kerala) have benefited rich peasants. (Land to the tiller^, then, systematically excluded Dalits. On the other side, the Dalit movement itself also took up the issue of land, but in an equally partial way. Campaigns against veth-begar and specific menial and

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degrading caste duties (carrying away dead cattle, serving officials) were, as noted above, an important part of the movement and were, of course, equivalent to the AIKS opposition to 'feudal forced labour\ But, generally, these were undertaken by the Dalit movement in such a way that the alternative was seen, not as revolutionary land reform in the villages or transformation of the villages, but rather as moving from the villages altogether to new jobs in industry and service. The inability to see any real opportunity for advance within the village was, of course, realistic in the absence of a revolutionary movement. No direct struggles for land for Dalits were apparently taken up before Independence, but as far as Ambedkar at least was concerned it seems the issue of land was always present. Again, though it was a question of looking beyond the village, in one of his earlier meetings he argued that Dalits should look for land for colonisation. In later meetings, he considered the possibility of settlements in Sind.21The climax of this, however, came in 1942, at the conference which founded the Scheduled Caste Federation, when a resolution was passed on separate village settlements. This was a demand that Dalits from all the villages in one area (later sometimes specified as I a taluka) should be given land—to be provided both from unoccupied government [ land and from land bought up by the government for the purpose—so that they j could form independent settlements of their own.22 This has come to be known as ? the (Dalitstan demand. But the term is something of a misnomer for it is not really a \ demand for a Dalit homeland but rather a way of posing the land question for Dalits, j In contrast to the Kisan Sabha, here it is implicit that Dalits do have rights to land, j and not only to waste\ But the emphasis is still on moving away from the villages; / and, because this land demand was not linked to a proposal for agrarian revolution, it served instead to pose the interests of Dalits against those of all caste-Hindus and appeared as a totally utopian proposal around which it was impossible to organise struggles. Yet, the continual survival of the idea undoubtedly lies both in the land hunger of Dalits and their continued feeling of insecurity as a village minority. Ambedkar^ final thoughts on the land question, however, were on very different lines. Urging State Socialism, he argued: N either co n so lid a tio n [o f land h o ld in g s ] n o r te n a n c y le g is la tio n can be o f any help to th e 60 m illio n s o f un to u ch a b le s w h o are ju s t landless labourers. O nly c o lle ctive farm s can h e lp them . ... A g ric u ltu re shall be a state in d u stry. Land w ill b e lo n g to th e State and shall be le t o u t to villagers w ith o u t d is tin c tio n o f caste or creed and in such a m anner th a tth e re w ill be no la n d lo rd , no te n a n t, a nd no land-less labourer.23

For an avowed anti-Communist and a stem critic of Indian ‘socialism’ it was an impressive programme. What was lacking, of course, was an idea of how it might be achieved. In the end it seems that, however anti-Communist or anti-nationalist Dalit leadership might be, the Dalit movement remained consistently radical on the land question. It was Ambedkar who proposed a bill and led a march in 1986 for the abolition of the khoti system in the Konkan, and attempted to arouse Mahars in

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opposition. In Bengal, the Namashudras allied with Muslims against the Hindu bhadmlok nationalists—not simply on opportunist grounds but on a programme of which the central feature was abolition of zamindari, and the Scheduled Castes withdrew their support when this programme was reneged upon.24 The organised Dalit movement was inevitably a radical force for agrarian revolution and not just for the5abolition of'cultural5aspects of caste bondage. But, in the absence of integration into an all-round peasant movement, this force could have little impact in the rural areas before Independence.

C O N C L U S IO N

One of the most striking features of the anti-feudal movement in colonial India was its fragmentation—a fragmentation which reflected the divisions among the exploited sections that were so characteristic of Indian caste feudalism. While social reform and anti-caste movements arose throughout India, and all provided some kind of ground for Dalits to begin to move ahead, the non-brahmin movements of south and west India posed a genuine possibility of a radical movement against caste traditions that could unify both caste-Hindu toilers and Dalits. Their ideology itself and the principles of their most radical organisations—the Satyashodhak Samaj and the Self-Respect movement—posed a thorough challenge to caste hierarchy and, in fact, provided the central ideological themes for the Dalit movements. But such unity did not materialise as the more conservative wing of these movements gained strength among caste-Hindu peasants and educated sections. It might have been expected that a national movement, dominated by bourgeois and upper-caste forces would prove resistant to Dalit demands and respond only in a nominal and co-opting way. More serious really was the failure of the Left to provide a radical and unifying anti-feudal alternative. The Communists organised the working class in its struggle for survival and at points this organisation aided the lowest sections of that class, but they failed really to put the working class politically in the leadership of the anti-feudal movement and as a result the class remains divided and the organisation benefited mainly its skilled and more upper-caste sections. Kisan Sabha organising, in its areas of strength, benefited Dalits more directly. The fight against feudal force-labour struck at bondage within the village; the organisation of agricultural labourers, which had its beginnings in the 1940s, also involved a challenge to feudal servitude: as a Kerala landlord put it, (His body and his father s body are my property and he dares to ask for wages. Is it rights?'25The demand for giving cultivable waste land to agricultural labourers and poor peasants, though a partial one, proved to be the main form around which Dalit struggles for land took place, particularly after Independence. And yet this was insufficient. In failing to pose the land issue in a July revolutionary and thoroughgoing way, the Kisan Sabba gave no defence against the real alternative programme to what became an essentially bourgeois land reform and offered no way to prevent its most militant agricultural labourer unions from being caught in the trap of economism in the post-

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Independence period. The connection between agrarian revolution and the wagebased organising o f labourers remains problematical.

Indian Communists thus failed to formulate a programme for a revolutionary antifeudal movement which could unify the exploited, which could take up cultural and political as well as economic issues, and which could pose a real alternative to bourgeois land reform (abolition of zamindari)， bourgeois notions of‘uplift’of depressed groups， bourgeois separation of ‘cultural’ and ‘economic’ factors, and bourgeois strategies of creating and absorbing an educated elite among the down-trodden sections. This was not simply a case of being relatively weak, or of being unable to take leadership of the national movement away from bourgeois upper-caste nationalists. It may well have been impossible to organise a struggle for a full-scale agrarian revolution or do more than fight on partial demands linked to it. The problem was that the agrarian revolution was never really posed. The Left was unable to appear before the people as anything more than devoted organisers of the working class on economic demands and (with the exception of 1942) more militant anti-imperialists. It was in this context that the Dalit movement developed before Independence as an isolated .revolt'o£ th©-weakest and most oppressed sections of the population. The isolation had serious consequences; for it meant that, instead of organising as the most revolutionary section of a unified movement, Dalits developed a separatism in which they made demands of'nationalists as well as the British. A hostility developed to communism and class analysis (which was put forward in such a way as to appear to Dalits to exclude considerations ofcaste^ as such), which continues to have serious consequences today. Still the achievements of the Dalit movement are impressive, and are too often overlooked. They have given birth to a tradition of struggle in many areas, not only on cultural and ritual issues but on breaking feudal bonds. They have mounted powerful pressure on the national movement resulting in constitutional provisions for reservations and laws making imtouchability an offence; unsatisfactory as these have been, they have still provided weapons in the hands of low-caste organisers. They have created a deep-seated conviction of equality and self-confidence which is inevitably making itself heard. If this has not yet achieved a revolutionary transformation in the life of the most exploited sections of society, it is because of the incompleteness of the revolutionary and democratic movement itself. If tms is to go forward, the Dalit movement will inevitably be a part of it.

N O T E S A N D R E FER EN C ES

1

TKere are still limited studies of the existing Dalit movements and some existing works have been unavailable to us. But among important sources are the ‘tribes and caste’ studies of the British period (Thurston, Blunt, Enthoven, etc.) which give some ethnographic data on the various castes. Contemporary village studies which give detailed data about social relations in the villages studied are also very useful. Whatever may be the theoretical bias of the authors, the most useful collection on Dalits, though somewhat dated, is J. Michael Mahar, ed,, The U ntouchable

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in Contemporary India (Tucson: The University of Arizona Press, 1972). Among these, in terms of the Dalit castes studied, can be included: On the Chamars—J. Michael Mahar, Agents of Dharma in a North Indian Village, in Untouchables in Contemporary IndiayMahar, 17-36; Oscar Lewis, Village Life in Northern India (New York: Vintage Books, 1975); M. C. Pradhan, The Political System of the Jats o f Northern India (Bombay: Oxford University Press,1966); On the Pallas in Tamil Nadu—André Béteille, Caste, Class and Power (Bombay: Oxford University Press, 1969); Kathleen Gough, ^arijans in Thanjavnr7in Imperialism and Revolution in South Asia^ edited by Kathleen Gough and Hari P. Sharma (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1973); Kathleen Gough, cColonial Economics in Southeast India^ Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 12, n o .13 (26 March 1977), 541-54; On the Paraiyans in Chingleput district,Tamil Nadu— Joan Mencher, Continuity and Change in an ex-Untouchable Community of South India in Untouchables in Contemporary India, Mahar, 37-56; Joan Mencher, 'Hie Caste System Upside Down, or Hie Not So-Mysterious East*, Current Anthropology^ vol.15, no. 4 (December 1974), 469-93; Marguerite Ross Barnett and Steve Barnett,'Contemporary Peasant and Post-Peasant of New York Academy Alternative in South India:IKe Ideas of a Militant Untouchable1, of Sciences^ vol.220 (1973), 385-410; On the Holeyas or Adi~Karnatakas—T. Scarlett Epstein, Economic Development and Social Change in South India (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1962); On the Pans of the Kondmal Hills, Orissa— R G. Bailey, Caste and the Economic Fr ⑽ 汾 r (Manchester: Manchester University Press，1957); and, on the Dublas or Halpatis of Gujarat~~Jan Breman, Patronage and Exploitation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974); Jan Breman， ‘Mobilisation of Landless Labourers: Halpatis of South Gujarat’， ⑽ 麵 /c 必 .似 / 浓 ペ ケ ，vol.9, n o .12 (1974)，489- 96. Studies of specific Dalit movements are still rare, but include Eleanor Zelliott^ many works on the Mahars: a forthcoming book by Mark Juergensmeyer on the Ad~Dharm movement in the Punjab and Owen Lynch, The Politics of Untouchability (New York: Vintage Books, 1966), on the Chamars/Jatavs in Agra. 2 See Louis Dumont, Homo Hierarchicus (Chicago and London: Lmversity of Chicago Press, 1970); McKim Marriott and Ronald Inden,'Caste Encyclopedia Britannica^vol. 3 (Chicago: Bentons, 1974), 982-91. 3For a useful discussion, see Eric Stokes, The Peasant and the Raj (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978)，‘Introduction，，1一18 and Chapter 2 ,‘Privileged Land Tenure in Village India in the Early Nineteenth しentury’，46_62. 4These types were often modified. However, for instance, as Frank Perlin shows for 17th century Maharasntra, feudal states were often organised by D ig families buying up various types of watan and inam rights; it is thus crucial to look beyond the purely formal definition of rights for any complete analysis. 5 For an excellent description of such a system see Gough， ‘Colonial Economics in Southeast India’. 6See, for example, Swasti Mitter, who records over 100 villages where two-thirds of the population were Rajbanshi and Pods who were not only share-croppers but also joteda-n) this, of course, is not a tDalit, type of situation; lSonarpur: A Peasant s View of the Class W ar, South Asian Review^ vol.8, no. 4 (197^ J. Tlie situation in Bengal in many ways seems anomalous and needs closer study. 7Marc Galanter,111ie Abolition of Disabilities: Untouchability and the Law^in Untouchables in Contemporary IndiayMahar, 227-314. 8Quoted in Dhananjay Keer, Dr Ambedkar: Life and Mission (Bombay: Popular Prakashan, 1954)，150.

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10 See Mark Juergensmeyer， ‘A d-Dharm: Origins of a Revolutionary Religion and 'Myth and Mobilisation: The Religious Symbols of Untouchables5, forthcoming book from University of California Press; Eleanor Zelliot, le a rn in g the Use of Political Means: The Mahars of MaharashtraJin Caste in Indian Politics^ edited by Rajni Kothari, 27-65 (New Delhi: Orient Longman, 1970); Eleanor Zelliot, 'Gandhi and Ambedkar: A Study in Leadership* in Untouchables in Contemporary India, Mahar, 69-95; C. B. Khairmode, Dr Bhimrao Ramji (Marathi) 5 vols (Bombay: Baudhian Panchayat Samid, 1952-68); L H. Broomfield, Elite Conflict in a Plural Society: Twentieth Century Bengal (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968) (contains limited information of the Namashudras); V. R. Shinde, Turva Bangalyantil As-prushya Vargachya Uce Shikshanaci Pragiti, in Shinde Lekhangraha (Marathi) (Pune: publisher unknown, 1963): Marguerite Barnett and Steve Barnett, 'Contemporary Peasant and Post-Peasant Alternative,; Uma Ramaswamv/Scheduled Castes in Andhra: Some Aspects of Social Change^, Economic and Political Weekly^ v ol.9, no. 29,(1974), 1153-58; and Uma Ramaswamv, 'Self-Identity among Scheduled Castes: A Study of Andhra Pradesh1, Economic and Political Weekly^ vol.9, no. 47,(1974), 1959-64; Y. B. Abbasayalu, Scheduled Caste Elite: A Study of Scheduled. Caste Elite in Andhra Pradesh (Hyderabad: Department of Sociology, Osmania University, 1978); Fran 〇is Houtart and Genevieve Lemercinier, {Socio-religious Movements in Kerala: A Reaction to the Capitalist Mode of Production, Social Scientistyvol. 6, no. 7 (1978), 3-34. 11 Mark Juergensmeyer, A d Dharm: Religion of the Untouchables,, Times of India, 12 October 1975. 12Abbasayalu, ‘Scheduled Caste Elite’，35-37. 9

13 See Zelliot， ‘Learning the Use of Political Means，. On the evolution ot Gandhi’s, views of caste, see Dennis Dalton, 'The Gandhian View of Caste, and Caste after Gandhi! in India and Ceylon: Unity and Diversity^ edited by Philip Mason, 159-81 (London: Oxford University Press, 1967). 14Keer, Dr Ambedkary191-92. 15Galanter, £The Abolition of Disabilities: Untouchability and the Law1. 16Keer, DrAmbedkar, 375-91; Leela Dushkin, ^Scheduled Caste Politics, in Untouchables in Contemporary India, Mahar. 17Khairmode, Dr Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, vol. 3; Keer, DrAmbedkar, 128-29. 18M. A. Rasul,A History of the All India Kisan Sabha (Calcutta: National Book Agency, 1974) , 123. Also, on the Kisan Sabha see Maiteya Ghatak, cThe Agricultural Labourer: A Case Study from Bengaf, National Labour Institute Bulletin (May 1977); D. N. Dhanagare, *1116 Politics of Survival: Peasant Organisations and the Left W ing in India^, Sociological Bulletin (March 1975); D. N. Dhanagare, Teasant Protest and Politics: The Tebhaga Movement in Bengoï, Journal of Peasant Studies^ vol. 2, no. 3 (April 1976); D. N. Dhanagare, 'Social Origins of the Peasant Insurrection in Teiengana, Contributions to Indian Sociology^ vol.8, n o.1(1974), 109-34. 19Dhanagare, Social Origins of the Peasant Insurrection in Teiengana, 108,112. 20Rasul, History of the All India Kisan Sabha, 147.

21 Keer, Dr Ambedkar, 63,127.

22 For the full resolution, see Vasant Deshpande, Towards Social Integration (Pune: Sliubbada-Saraswat, 1978), 167-69. 23 Keer, D r Ambedkar, 389.

24Broomfield, Elite Conflict in a Plural Society, 295-310. 25 Quoted in K. C. George. Im m ortal Punnapra-Vayalar5 (New Delhi; New Age Press, 1975) , 17-18.

XVII P R O T E S T A N D A C C O M M O D A T IO N ^ T w o C a s te M o v e m e n t s in E a s te rn a n d N o r t h e r n B e n g a l, c 1 8 7 2 -1 9 3 7

Sekhar Bandyopadhyay

1 Almost all the historians of nationalist movement in Bengal have agreed that sorpe castes heré remained outside the political mainstream. The phenomenon is either explained as a failure of mobilisation1 or presented as a manifestation of subaltern.： pa^sTOt^3 None of these two interpretations, however, seeks to explore the mentality of these marginal groups which preferred not to join any mainstream and evolved for themselves, at least for the time being, a separate sociopolitical identity that took shape through movements of a different kind. Such lower caste agitations occurring in other parts of colonial India in the late 19th ana the early 20th centuries have been looked at primarily in two different ways. These are considered as manifestations of protest against a dominant system of social organisation that imposed disabilities and inflicted deprivation on certain subordinate groups.3 Alternatively, such movements are interpreted as expressions of ambitions and. aspirations that sought accommodation and positional readjustments within the existing system of distribution of power and prestige.4 Both these interpretations, however, overlook the important fact of differentiation within each of these communities. This chapter would show that within such social groups, different levels of social consciousness and different forms of political action emerged—all incorporated within a single movement. At one level, due to their socioeconomic backwardness, some of these lower castes of Bengal had developed world-views which were in many respects fundamentally different from that of the nationalists; this resulted in their alienation from the mainstream. However, at another level, within the same social movement of such ritually low castes, there could be a convergence of different tendencies, some protestant and some accommodating. Indeed, it was such convergence that actually led to* * I am indebted to Professor Barun De for his valuable comments on an earlier draft of this chapter. This chapter was originally published as Trotest and Accommodation: Two Caste Movements in Eastern and Northern Bengal,c.1872-1937,, The In d ia n H isto rica l R eview , v o l.14, nos 1-2 (June 1987 - January 1988), [published in 1990].

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the strengthening or 'rise* of such movements at different historical junctures. But, this did not preclude the possibility of divergence at a subsequent stage, resulting in the weakening or TalF of the movements. Their social protest, as a result, in spite of the immense possibilities of initiating some fundamental change in the structure of society or polity, ultimately dissipated without any major or tangible positive consequence. The way these caste movements had developed till the middle of the 1930s also shows that these were based on a different ideological construct on the nature of colonial rule and on a different perspective on what should properly w o r d I i x their Yiew of history^ British rule appeared to be an improv^nent over a darker past, and in their frame of reference caste5preceded the larger natiorf. In this sense, tfiese movements represented some parallel streams of consciousness, and were not certainly the distributaries of any major stream of nationalist politics in the country. But subsequently, the dominant streams sought to capture them, and this Viver capture'process picked up momentum in the 1940s?when the transfer of power became an imminent possibility. At this stage, while the protesting spirit of the masses was channelised into the other more class-oriented movements, the accommodating elements were appropriated by the Congress. This shifting of the flow into the major streams gradually reduced the lesser parallel streams into 'beheaded rivers1, some of them, however, still maintaining their inconsequential existence, much as oxbow bends do in an active delta. All these trends have been illustrated here through a comparative study of two major caste movements in Bengal during the late 19th and the early 20th centuries: that of the Namasudras in eastern Bengal and of the Rajbansis in the north. These were perhaps the two most powerful movements among the Scheduled Castes of Bengal and, when separate Scheduled Caste politics emerged in this province in the 1930s, it was these two communities which provided it with both leadership and a popular support base. And so far as the nationalist movement was concerned, the non-participation of these two large communities constituted a major constraint that circumscribed its success. The Namasudras being tne largest agrarian caste in eastern Bengal, their separatism—as mstorians of all shades would agree—weakened the nationalist movement almost in the same way as the Muslim breakaway politics in the early 20th century.J The Rajbansis were also a dominant peasant caste in northern Bengal, where tneir lack of enthusiasm was perhaps the major reason behind the inertia that was palpable in this region as far as the nationalist movement was concerned.6The social movements of the two communities, although begun initially as powerful protests against caste disabilities and social discrimination, ultimately failed to leave any permanent imprint on either the social structure in the province or on the cultural ethos of its people. Hus failure, in the final analysis, was due to the limitations of an accommodating leadership, which in the end looked only for certain institutional concessions to ensure their own positional improvements, while the dissent of the masses, in the absence of proper mediation, also failed to effect any permanent systemic change in Bengali society.

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2

The Namasudras, who were earlier known as the Chandals of Bengal, lived mainly in its eastern districts. According to the Census of 1901, more than 75 per cent of the Namasudra population lived in the districts of Bakarganj, Faridpur, Dacca, Mymehsingh, Jessore and Khulna. Within this area again, a contiguous region comprising north-eastern Bakarganj, southern Faridpur and the adjoining Narail and Magura subdivisions of Jessore and the Sardar and Bagerhat subdivisions of Khulna contained more than half of this caste population.7 A section of the Kochs of north Bengal who began to call themselves Rajbansis from the early 19th century8 also lived in a contiguously definable region; in 1921 more than 88 per cent of their population lived in the districts of Rangpur, Dinajpur, Jalpaiguri and the state of Cooch Behar.9 This geographical anchorage, which may be explained in terms of the tribal origin of both the communities,10 was certainly one of the sources of their strength and the loss of such territorial anchorage in 1947 contributed to the decline of their movements. The Namasudras enjoyed a very low social status among the Hindus and were considered as untouchables. Though untouchability se was never a problem in colonial Bengal,11 they suffered from various social disabilities which created a considerable social distance between them and the traditional higher castes of Bengal, that is, the brahmans, Kayasthas and Baidyas.12 And this was further accentuated by the specific class situation in the region. In 1911, about 78 per cent of the actual earners among the Namasudras lived on agriculture. Among this agricultural population, on 1.15 per cent were rent-receivers, while 95.71 per cent were cultivatorsMhe majority of cultivators were tenant-farmers with or without occupancy right, while a few were sharecroppers or bargadars, whose numbers increased towards the end of the 1920s. Landholding in this region was on the other hand monopolised by the three Hindu higher castes and the Sayed Muslims. In the three eastern Bengal divisions of Dacca, Rajshahi and Chittagong, where almost the entire Namasudra population lived, 80.82 per cent of the rent-receivers belonged to these social groups, while only 3.78 per cent were Namasudras. Thus the fundamental dichotomy in Bengal agrarian relations between the rent-receivers and the rent-payers had coincided in the case of the Namasudras with the caste hierarchy. And this contradiction sharpened all the more because of the various forms of zamindari oppression, such as subinfeudation, exaction of illegal cesses, non-fixity of rent and the introduction of heavy produce rent in lieu of easy cash rents. However, the situation also suggests that a small group among the Namasudras had moved up the economic ladder by taking advantage of the process of reclamation that had started in the area in the mid-19th century. As a result, a big Namasudra peasant or a Namasudra tenure holder was not rare in the late 19th or the early 20th century. Many of them took to money-lending and trade, and later to education and various professions. But a very rough calculation would suggest that such upwardly mobile people constituted even less than 2 per cent of the caste population.13

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The Rajbansis in the north were also situated in almost the same socioeconomic conditions. So far as the social relations were concerned, they fared no better, as the stigma of untouchability often put even some of the well-placed educated members of the community in uncomfortable situations.14 But economically, in comparison with the Namasudras they were in a better and perhaps more dominant position in the agrarian^, structure of the region. In 1911,89 per cent of the Rajbansis who had any occupation were ‘cultivators’, while only 1.2 per cent had income from rent. But， in the Rajshahi division as a whole—which in fact contained the major concentration of this caste population—the Rajbansis constituted about 10.68 per cent of the rent-receivers, preceded only by the Muslims (46.74 per cent) and the brahmans (25.26 per cent). Among the cultivators*, although many were sharecroppers or adhiarsy a substantial section had become rich peasants, enjoying various grades of tenurial rights asjotedars and chukanidars. Like their Namasudra counterparts, the process of reclamation of the jungle areas in northern Bengal had been the major source of their economic mobility, which resulted even in the establishment of some big zamindari houses by the Rajbansis. Later on some of them also took to trade, education and various professions.15 In comparison with the Namasudras， this upwardly mobile section among the Rajbansis was of relatively larger size， and consequently this community was much less homogeneous. But these inner contradictions did not come to the fore till about the end of the 1930s, as the elites—like their Namasudra counterparts_ had not been able to evolve a separate identity of their own and consequently remained attached to the peasant community. The latter also considered these men to be its integral parts， as opposed to the high caste Hindu gentry， representing dearly outside economic and social control. This symbiotic relationship, however, could be stretched only up to a certain point, after which it was likely to break down, as it did in the 1940s. Under the influence of certain liberal religious sects, a sense of self-respect had been developing among the Namasudras in the early 19th century.16Their movement actually began in 1872-73 in the Faridpur-Bakarganj region and it took the form of a social and economic boycott of the higher castes who denied them social rights.17 The failure of this initial move led to the development among them of an organised religious sect, known as Matua. Its guru, Sri Guruchand Thakur, coming from a rich peasant background, preached the elimination of caste, equality of men and women and above all a work ethic attuned to the social needs of an upwardly mobile community.18 Apart from this sect, which acted as a powerful instrument of social mobilisation, a samiti was started in 1902 and regular uplift meetings1were organised to disseminate the message of the caste movement. Other mediums, such as performance ofjatra (folk theatre) and collection of mushti (handful of rice) were also frequently used for the purpose of mobilisation. From 1912, the Bengal Namasudra Association provided the movement with a formal organisational network.19 However, as the movement progressed, two levels of consciousness and two forms of action gradually became clearly discernible, one represented by the elite leaders and the other by their peasant followers. An almost similar situation could also be found among the Rajbansis although their movement was slightly more organised from the very early stage. In the 19th century,

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Buchanan Hamilton had noticed the beginning of a social movement among them, under the leadership of certain important zamindars like Mahiram Chaudhuri.20 To organise this movement further, in 1891 the Rangpur Bratya Kshatriya Jatir Unnati Bidhayani Sabha was established, with another influential zamindar, Haramohan Khajanchi, as its president. And then in 1910, Rai Sahib Panchanan Barma founded the Kshatriya Samiti which, in order to reach out to the masses, decided in its fourth annual conference in 1913 to set up mandali samitis in every village. From 1916 onwards, under the initiative of its volunteers, such samitis began to come up slowly. By 1918, the scheme was further elaborated into a full-fledged network of village organisation, spreading its tentacles from district to subdivisional, village and neighbourhood levels. By 1926, about three hundred such mandli samitis had come into existence21 and they were trying to bridge the gulf between the cultivating Rajbansi masses and their rich peasant-landholding leadership.

3

The first and foremost demand of the Namasudra leaders was for the public recognition of their new name instead of the old despised appellation £ChandaF. As a result of the growing strength of their movement, ultimately in 1911 the census authorities accepted their new caste name and entered them as Namasudras. Along with this, the elites within the community also went in for other forms of Sanskritization and sought to appropriate symbols that would give them a ritually higher status. For example, they began to refer to their brahman origin, forbade their women from visiting market places, acquired sacred thread and performed eleven days mourning like the higher castes.22 At a secular level, they realised that education and employment were the new sources of higher social status. Uneven competition with privileged higher castes as well as various forms of overt or concealed discrimination were, according to them, reasons of their lack of access to educational institutions or exclusion from public employment. Hence, the colonial policy of protective discrimination initiated since 1906 in favour of the Muslims also inspired the Namasudras to ask for the same privileges.23 Some concessions in matters of education and employment were also granted to them in the 1920s and the early 1930s. But in spite of that their position did not improve noticeably, mainly due to the local officials, noncompliance with such orders.24 From 1891,the Rajbansi leaders were also trying to dissociate themselves from the Kochs and demanding official recognition of their new caste name, which was finally granted at the time of the Census of 1911. As a further step towards Sanskritization, in 1891 tftey described themselves as bratya (fallen) kshatriyas, while from 1911 they began to boast of a pure kshatriya origin and secured vyavasthas from Nabadwip pundits to validate that claim. The sacred thread for them became a symbol of social mobilisation, as since 1912 a number of mass thread-wearing ceremonies (milan kshetrd) were organised in different districts, where laidis of Rajbansis went through the ceremony of ritual reDirth and began to don the sacred thread as a mark of their

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kshatriya status. Along with this, they began to adopt kshatriya surnames; some of them arranged early marriages for their daughters and some began to confine their women behind the purdah. And then, in order to forge a greater pan-Indian horizontal unity, their leaders in 1920 established links with the Bharatiya Kshatriya Mahasabha.25 Yet at another level? they were also speaking about the necessity of education and raised money to maintain student hostels and offer scholarships to poor students of their community. Their kshatriya samiti, in its annual conferences, almost invariably appealed to the government to recruit them in larger numbers in the army and to start a Kshatriya Regiment for them (this demand may be identified as a manifestation of both the tendencies of Sanskritization and secularisation), to nominate them to local bodies and to extend preferential treatment to them in matters of education and employment.26They had reservations about being classified as a 'depressed class, because of the stigma attached to that category. They were prepared, however, to accept—or for that matter also pray for—special favour from the government offered in view of their depressed socioeconomic conditions.27 These lower caste elites, both Namasudra and Rajbansi, also remained deprived of political power. Although their position in the local bodies had gradually improved,28 their representation in the provincial legislature was still minimum. This fact of under-representation, in the context of the possibilities of greater devolution of power, led to the development of separatist tendencies among the Namasudra elites. When the Montagu-Chelmsford Reform proposals were announced, they resolved at a conference in Calcutta in 1917 that if any additional power was Vested in the hands of few leaders without giving any share of power to us it will make the future progress of the backward classes impossible,.29 A similar conference next year unequivocally demanded 'communal representation to prevent 'the oligarchy of a handful limited castes’. The resolution was also endorsed by the Rajbansis.30 As a result of these demands, the Reform Act of 1919 provided for the nomination of one representative of the depressed classes to the Bengal legislature. But apart from this member, such classes remained almost totally unrepresented and all the constituencies inhabited by them returned only caste-Hindu candidates.31 Hie attitudes of these lower caste elites to nationalism, vis-a-vis the Raj, were based on their own ideological construct about the nature of colonial rule. As the nationalists portrayed the establishment of this alien rule as a break with a glorious past, in the lower caste perception of history, the new regime appeared to be an improyement over that past. The new era seemed to promise the permanent elimination of the ageold disparities, discriminations and disabilities. 'There is no more the casteism and communalism of the middle ages*, wrote Kshatriya in 1920, *God has dispensed evenhanded justice by placing the Indians for their proper education in the hands of a noble nation from far off Britain'.32 Since the Pandavas, wrote a Namasudra publicist in 1919, no Hindu or Muslim king had taken so much care to dispense impartial justice and look after the welfare of the subjects as the present Emperor of India.33 In this egalitarian rule, even the Sudras can now read the Vedas,.34 For everybody, brahman and sudra, there was now the same court, the same law and the same prison. The codes of Manu had thus been thrown off by the British and so any political

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movement to overthrow them appeared to be steps in historical retrogression, as attempts to put the clock back and thus to re-establish the oppressive social control of the higher castes.35 The continuing frustration of their political ambitions had, in this way, led to the development among the Namasudra and Rajbansi elites of a certain sense of loyality to the colonial government and a suspicion about nationalist politics which came to be identified as a high caste affair. Nationalism for these marginal elites had in fact assumed a different connotation. The Bengali wordjaH for these people, had come to mean not nation, but only caste, and its upliftment became their sole concern.36The same language was thus communicating different messages to different people with different levels of political consciousness. The differences, therefore, seem to have been much wider than were imagined by some of nationalist leaders of that time, as also by some of their recent historians. As a consequence, the Namasudras opposed the Swadeshi movement along with the Muslims, condemned the Home Rule agitation and even in the age oi Lrandhian mass politics stayed away from the Non-Cooperation and the Civil Disobedience movements.37 Of course, not all the educated Namasudras followed the same path. Important personalities like Keshab Chandra Das, Bhyagai Haider or Mohini Mohan Das tried to maintain the link between this community and the nationalist mainstream. But, as some of the contemporary accounts suggest, they were, still ploughing lonely furrow.38 Such ambivalence was much more evident among the Rajbansi leaders. They were occasionally involved in nationalist mass protests, such as the Non-Cooperation movement, and later developed connections with the Hindu Mahasabha from its inception in Bengal in 1924. Some of the important personalities among them, like Upendranath Barman or Jagadindradev Raikat, were also deeply influenced by the nationalist fervour at different junctures. But in spite of all these, their kshatriya movement on the whole remained loyal to the British and in its 13th annual conference in 1926, their samiti adopted a formal resolution expressing its ‘loyalty and obedience’to the Raj.39 This rejection óf the nationalist politics was not just an elite affair. Certainly in the case of the Namasudras it was common at the lower level too, as their leaders could successfully convince the peasantry that nationalism was simply a high caste gentryaffair. Such an identification of the Swadeshi movement was quite obvious, as most of the leaders and volunteers in eastern Bengal came from these social groups and were frequently using their coercive power to compel the peasants to participate in their movement.40 The latter detested it and the antipathy that was generated persisted through the days of the Non-Cooperation and Civil Disobedience movements.41 But this non-participation and sometimes active opposition to the nationalist politics was ふ >'riiaiiifestatioi.Q£Jc)yalty to the Raj. On the contrary， it was an expression of protest against social and economic injustices perpetrated on them by tKe^high caste landlords who were now in the leadership of the movement against the Raj. Indeed, the attitude of the Namasudra peasantry towards the government was rather ambivalent, Usua%, .|hey preferxed the.. 4^ nearby and frequently resorted to bazaar-looting ancL house-breaking ta harass thek obtrusive landlords. But whenever a u t h o r i t i e s . 及身取を.〇.f 犯 gntaining

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law and order, sided with the landed classes, as they did in Faridpur in 1909, the Namasudra peasants did not hesitate to take up arms against the state machinery.42 What was really consistent in their oehaviour was a yearning for social honour and an urge to escape economic exploitation. For these purposes, they sometimes sided with the government against the nationalists. Sometimes, they combined with the Muslims against tHe ïiigh caste Hindus as in parts of Jessore, Khulna, Faridpur and Mymen Singh in 1908-09.43 But sometimes they also fought pitched battles with the Muslims, as in various pockets of Jessore, Khulna, Faridpur and Bakarganj in 1911,1923-25 and 1938, to uphold primarily their community honour.44 This strife with the Muslims was also a part of social existence of the Rajbansi peasants. At one time, in fact, 'Dangdhari maoJ, the club-wielding mother, had become their rallying cry for communal mobilisation against the Muslims, ostensibly to protect the honour of their women.45 But so far as nationalism was concerned, passivity in their case was the more dominant trend46 than active opposition as among tïïeTïamasudras. But here too they were guided by their own judgement and looted shops? as in the Swadesm period, when they found prices to .be too high ,;and;v;^^ an