WITH
"He that WILL NOT reason is a bigot He that CANNOT reason is a fool He
that DARE NOT reason is a slave " H. drummond
Printed from the third edition
of 1944
_____________________________________________________________________
Contents
3. 3.
Prologue
ANNIHILATION OF CASTE
The speech prepared by me for the Jat-Pat-Todak
Mandal of Lahore has had an astonishingly warm
reception from the Hindu public for whom it was primarily intended. The English
edition of one thousand five hundred was exhausted
within two months of its publication. It is translated into Gujarati and Tamil. It is being translated in Marathi, Hindi, Punjabi
and Malayalam. The demand for the English text
still continues unabated. To satisfy this demand it has become necessary to
issue a Second Edition. Considerations of history and effectiveness of appeal
have led me to retain the original form of the essay—namely the speech
form—-although I was asked to recast it in the form of a direct narrative. To
this edition I have added two appendices. I have collected in Appendix I the
two articles written by Mr. Gandhi by way of review
of my speech in the Harijan,
and his letter to Mr. Sant Ram, a member of the
Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal. In Appendix II, I have printed my views in reply to the
articles of Mr. Gandhi collected in Appendix 1. Besides Mr. Gandhi many others
have adversely criticised my views as expressed in my speech. But I have felt
that in taking notice of such adverse comments I
should limit myself to Mr. Gandhi. This I have done not because what he has
said is so weighty as to deserve a reply but because to many a Hindu he is an
oracle, so great that when he opens his lips it is expected that the argument
must close and no dog must bark. But the world owes much to rebels who would
dare to argue in the face of the pontiff and insist that he is not infallible.
I do not care for the credit which every progressive society must give to its
rebels. I shall be satisfied if I make the Hindus realize that they are the
sick men of India and that their sickness is causing danger to the health and
happiness of other Indians.
The Second edition of this Essay appeared in
1937, and was exhausted within a very short period. A new edition has been in demand for a long time. It was my intention to
recast the essay so as to incorporate into it another essay of mine called " Castes in
India, their Origin and their Mechanism ",
which appeared in the issue of the Indian Antiquary Journal for May 1917. But
as I could not find time, and as there is very little prospect of my being able
to do so and as the demand for it from the public is very insistent, I am
content to let this be a mere reprint of the Second edition.
I am glad to find that this
essay has become so popular, and I hope that it will serve the purpose for
which it was intended.
22, Prithwiraj Road
22, Prithwiraj Road
New Delhi 1st December 1944 B. R. AMBEDKAR
PROLOGUE
PROLOGUE
On December 12, 1935, I received the following letter from Mr. Sant Ram, the Secretary of the Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal :
My dear Doctor Saheb,
Many thanks for your kind letter of the 5th December. I have released it
for press without your permission for which I beg
your pardon, as I saw no harm in giving it
publicity. You are a great thinker, and it is my well-considered opinion that
none else has studied the problem of Caste so deeply as you have. I have always
benefited myself and our Mandal from your ideas. I have explained and preached
it in the Kranti
many times and I have even lectured on it in many Conferences. I am now very
anxious to read the exposition of your new formula—"
It is not possible to break Caste without annihilating the religious notions on
which it, the Caste system, is founded." Please do explain it at length at your earliest convenience, so
that we may take up the idea and emphasise it from press and platform. At
present, it is not fully clear to me.
*
* * * *
Our Executive Committee persists in having you as our President for our
Annual Conference. We
can change our dates to accommodate your
convenience. Independent Harijans of Punjab are
very much desirous to meet you and discuss with you their plans. So if you
kindly accept our request and come to Lahore to preside over the Conference it will serve double purpose. We will invite
Harijan leaders of all shades of opinion and you
will get an opportunity of giving your ideas to them.
The Mandal has deputed our Assistant Secretary, Mr. Indra Singh, to meet you
at Bombay in Xmas and discuss with you the whole
situation with a view to persuade you to please accept our request.
*
* * * *
The Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal, I was given to
understand, to be an organization of Caste Hindu
Social Reformers, with the one and only aim, namely to eradicate the Caste
System from amongst the Hindus. As a rule, I do not like to take any part in a
movement which is carried on by the Caste Hindus. Their attitude towards social
reform is so different from mine that I have found it difficult to pull on with
them. Indeed, I find their company quite uncongenial to me on account of our
differences of opinion. Therefore when the Mandal
first approached me I declined their invitation to preside. The Mandal,
however, would not take a refusal from me and sent down one of its members to
Bombay to press me to accept the invitation. In the end I agreed to preside.
The Annual Conference was to be held at Lahore, the headquarters of the Mandal.
The Conference was to meet in Easter but was subsequently postponed to the
middle of May 1936. The Reception Committee of the Mandal has now cancelled the
Conference. The notice of cancellation came long after my Presidential address
had been printed. The copies of this address are now lying with me. As I did
not get an opportunity to deliver the address from the presidential chair the
public has not had an opportunity to know my views on the problems created by
the Caste System. To let the public know them and also to dispose of the
printed copies which are lying on my hand, I have decided to put the printed
copies of the address in the market. The accompanying pages contain the text of that address.
The public will be curious to know what led to the cancellation of my
appointment as the President of the Conference. At the start, a dispute arose
over the printing of the address. I desired that the address should be printed
in Bombay. The Mandal wished that it should be printed in Lahore on the ground
of economy. I did not agree and insisted upon having it printed in Bombay.
Instead of agreeing to my proposition I received a letter signed by several
members of the Mandal from which I give the following extract :
27-3-36
Revered Dr. Ji,
Your letter of the 24th instant addressee to
Sjt. Sant Ram has been
shown to us. We were a little disappointed to read it. Perhaps you are not
fully aware of the situation that has arisen here. Almost all the Hindus in the
Punjab are against your being invited to this province. The Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal has been subjected to the
bitterest criticism and has received censorious rebuke from all quarters. All
the Hindu leaders among whom being Bhai Parmanand, M-L.A. (Ex-President, Hindu Maha Sabha), Mahatma Hans Raj, Dr. Gokal Chand Narang, Minister
for Local Self-Government, Raja Narendra Nath, M.L.C. etc., have dissociated themselves from this step of the Mandal.
Despite all this the runners of the Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal (the leading figure
being Sjt. Sant Ram) are determined to wade through thick and thin but would
not give up the idea of your presidentship. The Mandal
has earned a bad name.
* *
* * *
Under the circumstances it becomes your duty to co-operate with the
Mandal. On the one hand, they are being put to so much trouble and hardship by
the Hindus and if on the other hand you too augment their difficulties it will
be a most sad coincidence of bad luck for them.
We hope you will think over the
matter and do what is good for us all.
* * * *
*
This letter puzzled me greatly. I could not understand why the Mandal
should displease me for the sake of a few rupees in the matter of printing the
address. Secondly, I could not believe that men
like Sir Gokal Chand Narang had really resigned as a protest
against my selection as
President because I had received the following letter from Sir Gokal Chand
himself :
5 Montgomery Road
Lahore,
7-2-36
Dear Doctor Ambedkar,
I am glad to learn from the workers of the Jat-Pat-Todak
Mandal that you have agreed to preside at their next anniversary to be held at
Lahore during the Easter holidays, it will give me
much pleasure if you stay with me while you are at Lahore. More when we meet.
G. C. narang
Whatever be the truth I did not yield to this pressure. But even when the
Mandal found that I was insisting upon having my address printed in Bombay
instead of agreeing to my proposal the Mandal sent me a wire that they were
sending Mr. Har Bhagwan
to Bombay to " talk over matters personally " Mr. Har Bhagwan came to Bombay on the 9th of
April. When I met Mr. Har Bhagwan I found that he had nothing to say regarding
the issue. Indeed he was so unconcerned regarding the printing of the address,
whether it should be printed in Bombay or in Lahore, that he did not even
mention it in the course of our conversation. All that he was anxious for was
to know the contents of the address. I was then convinced that in getting the
address printed in Lahore the main object of the Mandal was not to save money
but to get at the contents of the address. I gave him a copy. He did not feel
very happy with some parts of it. He returned to Lahore. From Lahore, he wrote
to me
the following letter :
Lahore,
dated April 14, 1936
My dear Doctor Sahib,
Since my arrival from Bombay, on the 12th, I have been indisposed owing to my having not slept continuously
for 5 or 6 nights, which were spent in the train.
Reaching here I came to know that you had come to Amritsar. I would have seen you there if I were well enough to
go about. I have made over your address to Mr. Sant
Ram for translation and he has liked it very much, but he is not sure whether
it could be translated by him for printing before the 25th. In any case, it woud have a wide publicity and we are sure it would
wake the Hindus up from their slumber.
The passage I pointed out to you at Bombay has been read by some of our
friends with a little misgiving, and those of us who would like to see the
Conference terminate without any untoward incident would prefer that at least
the word " Veda "
be left out for the time being. I leave this to your good sense. I hope,
however, in your concluding paragraphs you will make it clear that the views
expressed in the address are your own and that the responsibility does not lie
on the Mandal. I hope, you will not mind this
statement of mine and would let us have 1,000 copies of the address, for which
we shall, of course, pay. To this effect I have sent you a telegram today. A
cheque of Rs. 100 is enclosed herewith which kindly
acknowledge, and send us your bills in due time.
I have called a meeting of the Reception Committee and shall communicate
their decision to you immediately. In the meantime kindly accept my heartfelt
thanks for the kindness shown to me and the great pains taken by you in the
preparation of your address. You have really put us under a heavy debt of
gratitude.
har bhagwan
P.S.—Kindly send the copies of the
address by passenger train as soon as it is printed, so that copies may be sent
to the Press for publication.
Accordingly I handed over my manuscript to the printer with an order to
print 1,000 copies. Eight days later, I received another letter from Mr. Har Bhagwan which I
reproduce below :
Lahore,
22-4-36
Dear Dr. Ambedkar,
We are in receipt of your telegram and letter, for which kindly accept our thanks. In accordance with your desire, we have
again postponed our Conference, but feel that it would have been much better to
have it on the 25th and 26th, as the weather is growing warmer and warmer every
day in the Punjab. In the middle of May it would be fairly hot, and the
sittings in the day time would not be very pleasant and comfortable. However,
we shall try our best to do all we can to make
things as comfortable as possible, if it is held in the middle of May.
There is, however, one thing that we have been compelled to bring to your
kind attention. You will remember that when I
pointed out to you the misgivings entertained by
some of our people regarding your declaration on the subject of change of
religion, you told me that it was undoubtedly outside the scope of the Mandal and that you had no intention to say anything
from our platform in that connection. At the same time when the manuscript of
your address was handed to me you assured me that that was the main portion of
your address and that there were only two or three concluding paragraphs that
you wanted to add. On receipt of the second instalment
of your address we have been taken by surprise, as that would make it so
lengthy, that we are afraid, very few people would read the whole of it.
Besides that you have more than once stated in your address that you had
decided to walk out of the fold of the Hindus and
that that was your last address as a Hindu. You have also unnecessarily
attacked the morality and reasonableness of the Vedas and other religious books of
the Hindus, and have at length dwelt upon the technical side of Hindu religion,
which has absolutely no connection with the problem at issue, so much so that
some of the passages have become irrelevant and off the
point. We would have been very pleased if you had confined your address to that
portion given to me, or if an addition was necessary, it would have been
limited to what you had written on Brahminism etc.
The last portion which deals with the complete annihilation of Hindu religion
and doubts the morality of the sacred books of the Hindus as well as a hint
about your intention to leave the Hindu fold does
not seem to me to be relevant.
I would therefore most humbly request you on
behalf of the people responsible for the Conference to leave out the passages referred to above,
and close the address with what was given to me or add a few paragraphs on
Brahminism. We doubt the wisdom of making the address unnecessarily provocative
and pinching. There are several of us who subscribe to your feelings and would
very much want to be under your banner for remodelling of the Hindu religion.
If you had decided to get together persons of your cult I can assure you a
large number would have joined your army of reformers from the Punjab.
In fact, we thought you would give us a lead in the destruction of the
evil of caste system, especially when you have studied the subject so
thoroughly, and strengthen our hands by bringing about a revolution and making
yourself as a nucleus in the gigantic effort, but
declaration of the nature made by you when repeated loses
its power, and becomes a hackneyed term. Under the circumstances, I would
request you to consider the whole matter and make your address more effective
by saying that you would be glad to take a leading part in the destruction of
the caste system if the Hindus are willing to work in right earnest toward that
end, even if they had to forsake their kith and kin
and the religious notions. In case you do so, I am sanguine that you would find a ready response from the Punjab in such an
endeavour.
I shall be grateful if you will
help us at this juncture as we have already undergone much expenditure and have
been put to suspense, and let us know by the return of post that you have condescended to limit your
address as above. In case, you still insist upon the printing of the address in toto, we very much regret it would not
be possible—rather advisable for us to hold the Conference,
and would prefer to postpone it sine die,
although by doing so we shall be losing the goodwill of the people because of
the repeated postponements. We should, however, like to point out that you have
carved a niche in our hearts by writing such a wonderful treatise on the caste
system, which excels all other treatises so far written and will prove to be a
valuable heritage, so to say. We shall be ever indebted to you for the pains
taken by you in its preparation.
Thanking you very much for your
kindness and with best wishes.
I am,
har bhagwan
To this letter I sent the following reply :
27th April 1936
I am in receipt of your letter of the 22nd
April. I note with regret that the Reception Commitiee
of the Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal
" would prefer to postpone the Conference sine die " if I insisted upon
printing the address in toto. In
reply I have to inform you that I also would prefer to have the Conference
cancelled—1 do not like to use vague terms—if the Mandal insisted upon having
my address pruned to suit its circumstances. You may not like my decision. But
I cannot give up, for the sake of the honour of
presiding over the Conference, the liberty which every President must have in
the preparation of the address. I cannot give up
for the sake of pleasing the Mandal the duty which every President owes to the Conference over which he presides to give it a lead
which he thinks right and proper. The issue is one of principle and I feel I
must do nothing to compromise it in any way.
I would not have entered into
any controversy as regards the propriety of the decision taken by the Reception
Committee. But as you have given certain reasons which appear to throw the
blame on me. I am bound to answer them. In the
first place, I must dispel the notion that the views contained in that part of
the address to which objection has been taken by the Committee have come to the
Mandal as a surprise. Mr. Sant Ram, I am sure, will
bear me out when I say that in reply to one of his letters I had said that the
real method of breaking up the Caste System was not to bring about inter-caste dinners and inter-caste
marriages but to destroy the religious notions on which Caste was founded and
that Mr. Sant Ram in return asked me to explain what he said was a novel point of view. It was in response to
this invitation from Mr. Sant Ram that I thought I
ought to elaborate in my address what I had stated in a sentence in my letter
to him. You cannot, therefore, say that the views expressed are new. At any
rate, they are not new to Mr. Sant Ram who is the moving spirit and the leading light of your Mandal.
But I go further and say that I wrote this part of my address not merely because I felt
it desirable to do so. I wrote it because I thought that it was absolutely
necessary to complete the argument. I am amazed to read that you
characterize the portion of the speech to which
your Committee objects as " irrelevant and off the point ". You
will allow me to say that I am a lawyer and I know the rules of relevancy as
well as any member of your Committee. I most
emphatically maintain that the portion objected to is not only most relevant but is also important. It is in that part of
the address that I have discussed the ways and means of breaking up the Caste
System. It may be that the conclusion I have arrived at as to the best method
of destroying Caste is startling and painful. You are entitled to say that my
analysis is wrong. But you cannot say that in an address which deals with the problem of Caste it is not open to me to discuss
how Caste can be destroyed.
Your other complaint relates to the length of the address. I have pleaded
guilty to the charge in the address itself. But, who is really responsible for
this ? I fear you have come rather late on the
scene. Otherwise you would have known that originally I had planned to write a
short address for my own convenience as I had neither the time nor the energy
to engage myself in the preparation of an elaborate thesis. It was the Mandal
who asked me to deal with the subject exhaustively and it was the Mandal which
sent down to me a list of questions relating to the Caste System and asked me to answer them in the body of my
address as they were questions which were often
raised in the controversy between the Mandal and its opponents and which the
Mandal found difficult to answer satisfactorily. It was in trying to meet the
wishes of the Mandal in this respect that the address has grown to the length
to which it has. In view of what I have said I am sure you will agree that the
fault respecting length of the address is not mine.
I did not expect that your Mandal would be so upset because I have spoken
of the destruction of Hindu Religion. I thought it was only fools who were
afraid of words. But lest there should be any misapprehension in the minds of
the people I have taken great pains to explain what I mean by religion and
destruction of religion. I am sure that nobody on reading my address could
possibly misunderstand me. That your Mandal should have taken a fright at mere
words as "destruction of religion etc." notwithstanding the
explanation that accompanies .them does not raise
the Mandal in my estimation. One cannot have any respect or regard for men
who take the position of the Reformer and then refuse even to see the logical
consequences of that position, let alone following them out in action.
You will agree that I have never
accepted to be limited in any way in the
preparation of my address and the question as to what the address should or
should not contain was never even discussed between myself and the Mandal. I had always taken for granted that I was free
to express in the address such views as I held on
the subject Indeed until, you came to Bombay on the 9th April the Mandal did
not know what sort of an address I was preparing. It was when you came to
Bombay that I voluntarily told you that I had no desire to use your platform
from which to advocate my views regarding change of religion by the Depressed
Classes. I think I have scrupulously kept that promise in the preparation of
the address. Beyond a passing reference of an indirect character where I say that " I am sorry I will not be here. . . etc." I have said nothing about the subject in
my address. When I see you object even to such a passing and so indirect a
reference, I feel bound to ask ; did you think that
in agreeing to preside over your Conference I would be agreeing to suspend or
to give up my views regarding change of faith by the Depressed Classes ? If you did think so I must tell you that I am in no
way responsible for such a mistake on your part. If any of you had even hinted
to me that in exchange for the honour you were doing me by electing as
President, I was to abjure my faith in my programme
of conversion, I would have told you in quite plain terms that I cared more for
my faith than for any honour from you.
After your letter of the 14th, this letter of yours comes as a surprize to me. I am sure that any one who reads them
will feel the same. I cannot account for this sudden volte face on the part of the Reception Committee. There is no
difference in substance between the rough draft which was before the Committee
when you wrote your letter of the 14th and the
final draft on which the decision of the Committee communicated to me in your
letter under reply was taken. You cannot point out a single new idea in the
final draft which is not contained in the earlier draft. The ideas are the
same. The only difference is that they have been worked out in greater detail
in the final draft. If there was anything to object to in the address you could
have said so on the 14th. But you did not. On the contrary you asked me to
print off 1,000 copies leaving me the liberty to
accept or not the verbal changes which you suggested. Accordingly I got 1,000
copies printed which are now lying with me. Eight days later you write to say
that you object to the address and that if it is not amended the Conference
will be cancelled. You ought to have known that there was no hope of any
alteration being made in the address. I told you when you were in Bombay that I
would not alter a comma, that I would not allow any censorship over my address
and that you would have to accept the address as it came from me. I also told
you that the responsibility. for the views expressed in the address was
entirely mine and if they were not liked by the Conference I would not mind at
all if the Conference passed a resolution condemning them. So anxious was I to
relieve your Mandal from having to assume responsibility
for my views and also with the object of not
getting myself entangled by too intimate an association with your Conference, I
suggested to you that I desired to have my address
treated as a sort of an inaugural address and not as a Presidential address and
that the Mandal should find some one else to
preside over the Conference, and deal with the resolutions. Nobody could have
been better placed to take a decision on the 14th than your Committee. The
Committee failed to do that and in the meantime cost of printing has been
incurred which, I am sure, with a little more firmness on the part of your
Committee could have been saved.
I feel sure that the views expressed in my address have little to do with
the decision of your Committee. I have reasons to believe that my presence at
the Sikh Prachar Conference held at Amritsar has had a good deal to do with the decision
of the Committee. Nothing else can satisfactorily explain the sudden volte face shown by the Committee
between the 14th and the 22nd April. I must not however prolong this
controversy and must request you to announce immediately that the Session of
the Conference which was to meet under my Presidentship is cancelled. All the
grace has by now run out and I shall not consent to preside even if your
Committee agreed to accept my address as it is- in toto.
I thank you for your appreciation of the pains I have
taken in the
preparation of the address. I certainly have profited by the labour if no one
else docs. My only regret is that I was put to such hard labour at a time when my health was not equal to the strain it has
caused.
Yours sincerely,
This correspondence will disclose the reasons which have led to the
cancellation by the Mandal of my appointment as President and the reader will
be in a position to lay the blame where it ought properly to belong. This is I
believe the first time when the appointment of a President is cancelled by the
Reception Committee because it does not approve of the views of the President.
But whether that is so or not, this is certainly the first time in my life to
have been invited to preside over a Conference of Caste Hindus. I am sorry that
it has ended in a tragedy. But what can any one expect from a relationship so
tragic as the relationship between the reforming sect of Caste Hindus and the
self-respecting sect of Untouchables where the former have no desire to
alienate their orthodox fellows and the latter have
no alternative but to insist upon reform being carried
out ?
Dadar, Bombay 14 15th May 1936 B. R.
AMBEDKAR
Dr.
B. R. Ambedkar
FOR
The 1936 Annual Conference of
the Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal of Lahore
BUT NOT DELIVERED
Owing to the cancellation of the Conference by the
Reception Committee on the ground that the views expressed in the Speech would
be unbearable to the Conference
Friends,
I am really sorry for the members of the Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal who have so
very kindly invited me to preside over this Conference. I am sure they will be
asked many questions for having selected me as the President. The Mandal will
be asked to explain as to why it has imported a man from Bombay to preside over
a function which is held in Lahore. I believe the Mandal could easily have
found some one better qualified than myself to preside on the occasion. I have
criticised the Hindus. I have questioned the authority of the Mahatma whom they
revere. They hate me. To them I am a snake in their garden. The Mandal will no
doubt be asked by the politically-minded Hindus to explain why it has called me
to fill this place of honour. It is an act of great daring. I shall not be
surprised if some political Hindus regard it as an insult. This selection of
mine cannot certainly please the ordinary religiously-minded Hindus. The Mandal
may be asked to explain why it has disobeyed the Shastric injunction in selecting the President. Accoding to the Shastras the Brahmin is appointed to be
the Guru for the three Varnas, varnanam
bramhano garu, is a direction of the Shastras.
The Mandal therefore knows from whom a Hindu should take his lessons and from
whom he should not. The Shastras do
not permit a Hindu to accept any one as his Guru merely because he is well
versed. This is made very clear by Ramdas, a Brahmin saint from Maharashtra,
who is alleged to have inspired Shivaji to establish a Hindu Raj. In his Dasbodh, a socio-politico-religious
treatise in Marathi verse Ramdas
asks, addressing the Hindus, can we accept an Antyaja to be our Guru because he
is a Pandit (i.e. learned) and gives
an answer in the negative. What replies to give to these questions is a matter
which I must leave to the Mandal. The Mandal knows best the reasons which led
it to travel to Bombay to select a president, to fix upon a man so repugnant to
the Hindus and to descend so low in the scale as to select an Antyaja— an
untouchable—to address an audience of the Savarnas.
As for myself you will allow me to say that I have accepted the invitation much
against my will and also against the will of many of my fellow untouchables. I
know that the Hindus are sick of me. I know that I am not a persona grata with them. Knowing all
this I have deliberately kept myself away from them. I have no desire to
inflict myself upon them. I have been giving expression to my views from my own
platform. This has already caused a great deal of heartburning and irritation.
I have no desire to ascend the platform of the Hindus to do within their sight
what I have been doing within their hearing. If I am here it is because of your
choice and not because of my wish. Yours is a cause of social reform. That
cause has always made an appeal to me and it is because of this that I felt I
ought not to refuse an opportunity of helping the cause especially when you
think that I can help it. Whether what I am going to say today will help you in
any way to solve the problem you are grappling with is for you to judge. All I
hope to do is to place before you my views on the problem.
II
The path of social reform like the path to heaven at any rate in India,
is strewn with many difficulties. Social reform in India has few friends and
many critics. The critics fall into two distinct classes. One class consists of
political reformers and the other of the socialists.
It was at one time recognized that without social efficiency no permanent
progress in the other fields of activity was possible, that owing to mischief
wrought by the evil customs, Hindu Society was not in a state of efficiency and
that ceaseless efforts must be made to eradicate these evils. It was due to the
recognition of this fact that the birth of the National Congress was
accompanied by the foundation of the Social Conference. While the Congress was
concerned with defining the weak points in the political organisation of the
country, the Social Conference was engaged in removing the weak points in the
social organisation of the Hindu Society. For some time the Congress and the
Conference worked as two wings of one common activity and they held their
annual sessions in the same pandal. But soon the two wings developed into two
parties, a Political Reform Party and a Social Reform Party, between whom there
raged a fierce controversy. The Political Reform Party supported the National
Congress and Social Reform Party supported the Social Conference. The two
bodies thus became two hostile camps. The point at issue was whether social
reform should precede political reform. For a decade the forces were evenly
balanced and the battle was fought without victory to either side. It was
however evident that the fortunes of the; Social Conference were ebbing fast.
The gentlemen who presided over the sessions of the Social Conference lamented
that the majority of the educated Hindus were for political advancement and
indifferent to social reform and that while the number of those who attended
the Congress was very large and the number who did not attend but who
sympathized with it even larger, the number of those who attended the Social
Conference was very much smaller. This indifference, this thinning of its ranks
was soon followed by active hostility from the politicians. Under the
leadership of the late Mr. Tilak, the courtesy with which the Congress allowed
the Social Conference the use of its pandal was withdrawn and the spirit of
enmity went to such a pitch that when the Social Conference desired to erect
its own pandal a threat to burn the pandal was held out by its opponents. Thus
in course of time the party in favour of political reform won and the Social
Conference vanished and was forgotten. The speech, delivered by Mr. W. C.
Bonnerji in 1892 at Allahabad as President of the eighth session of the
Congress, sounds like a funeral oration at the death of the Social Conference
and is so typical of the Congress attitude that I venture to quote from it the
following extract. Mr. Bonnerji said :
" I for one have no
patience with those who saw we shall not be fit for political reform until we
reform our social system. I fail to see any connection between the two. . .Are
we not fit (for political reform) because our widows remain unmarried and our
girls are given in marriage earlier than in other countries ? because our wives
and daughters do not drive about with us visiting our friends? because we do
not send our daughters to Oxford and Cambridge ? " (Cheers)'
I have stated the case for political reform as put by Mr. Bonnerji. There
were many who are happy that the victory went to the Congress. But those who
believe in the importance of social reform may ask, is the argument such as
that of Mr. Bonnerji final ? Does it prove that the victory went to those who
were in the right ? Does it prove conclusively that social reform has no
bearing on political reform ? It will help us to understand the matter if I
state the other side of the case. I will draw upon the treatment of the
untouchables for my facts.
Under the rule of the Peshwas in the Maratha country the untouchable was
not allowed to use the public streets if a Hindu was coming along lest he
should pollute the Hindu by his shadow. The untouchable was required to have a
black thread either on his wrist or in his neck as a sign or a mark to prevent
the Hindus from getting themselves polluted by his touch through mistake. In
Poona, the capital of the Peshwa, the untouchable was required to carry, strung
from his waist, a broom to sweep away from behind the dust he treaded on lest a
Hindu walking on the same should be polluted. In Poona, the untouchable was
required to carry an earthen pot, hung in his neck wherever he went, for
holding his spit lest his spit falling on earth should pollute a Hindu who
might unknowingly happen to tread on it. Let me take more recent facts. The
tyranny practised by the Hindus upon the Balais, an untouchable community in
Central India, will serve my purpose. You will find a report of this in the Times of India of 4th January 1928.
"The correspondent of the Times of
India reported that high caste Hindus, viz. Kalotas, Rajputs and Brahmins
including the Patels and Patwaris of villages of Kanaria, Bicholi-Hafsi,
Bicholi-Mardana and of about 15 other villages in the Indore djistrict (of the
Indore State) informed the Balais of their respective villages that if they
wished to live among them they must conform to the following rules :
(1) Balais must not wear
gold-lace-bordered pugrees.
(2) They must not wear dhotis
with coloured or fancy borders.
(3) They must convey intimation
of the death of any Hindu to relatives of the deceased—no matter how far away
these relatives may be living.
(4) In all Hindu marriages,
Balais must play music before the processions and during the marriage.
(5) Balai women must not wear
gold or silver ornaments; they must not wear fancy gowns or jackets.
(6) Balai women must attend all
cases of confinement of Hindu women.
(7) Balais must render services
without demanding remuneration and must accept whatever a Hindu is pleased to
give.
(8) If the Balais do not agree
to abide by these terms they must clear out of the villages. The Balais refused
to comply; and the Hindu element proceeded against them. Balais were not
allowed to get water from the village wells; they were not allowed to let go
their cattle to graze. Balais were prohibited from passing through land owned
by a Hindu, so that if the field of a Balai was surrounded by fields owned by
Hindus, the Balai could have no access to his own field. The Hindus also let
their cattle graze down the fields of Balais. The Balais submitted petitions to
the Darbar against these persecutions ; but as they could get no timely relief,
and the oppression continued, hundreds of Balais with their wives and children
were obliged to abandon their homes in which their ancestors lived for
generations and to migrate to adjoining States, viz. to villages in Dhar,
Dewas, Bagli, Bhopal, Gwalior and other States. What happened to them in their
new homes may for the present be left out of our consideration. The incident at
Kavitha in Gujarat happened only last year. The Hindus of Kavitha ordered the
untouchables not to insist upon sending their children to the common village
school maintained by Government. What sufferings the untouchables of Kavitha
had to undergo for daring to exercise a civic right against the wishes of the
Hindus is too well known to need detailed description. Another instance
occurred in the village of Zanu in the Ahmedabad district of Gujarat. In
November 1935 some untouchable women of well-to-do families started fetching
water in metal pots. The Hindus looked upon the use of metal pots by
untouchables as an affront to their dignity and assaulted the untouchable women
for their impudence. A most recent event is reported from the village Chakwara
in Jaipur State. It seems from the reports that have appeared in the newspapers
that an untouchable of Chakwara who had returned from a pilgrimage had arranged
to give a dinner to his fellow untouchables of the village as an act of
religious piety. The host desired to treat the guests to a sumptuous meal and
the items served included ghee
(butter) also. But while the assembly of untouchables was engaged in partaking
of the food, the Hindus in their hundred, armed with lathis, rushed to the
scene, despoiled the food and belaboured the untouchables who left the food
they were served with and ran away for their lives. And why was this murderous
assault committed on defenceless untouchables ? The reason given is that the
untouchable host was impudent enough to serve ghee and his untouchable guests
were foolish enough to taste it. Ghee is undoubtedly a luxury for the rich. But
no one would think that consumption of ghee was a mark of high social status.
The Hindus of Chakwara thought otherwise and in righteous indignation avenged
themselves for the wrong done to them by the untouchables, who insulted them by
treating ghee as an item of their food which they ought to have known could not
be theirs, consistently with the dignity of the Hindus. This means that an
untouchable must not use ghee even if he can afford to buy it, since it is an
act of arrogance towards the Hindus. This happened on or about the 1st of April
1936 !
Having stated the facts, let me now state the case for social reform. In
doing this, I will follow Mr. Bonnerji, as nearly as I can and ask the
political-minded Hindus " Are you fit for political power even though you
do not allow a large class of your own countrymen like the untouchables to use
public school ? Are you fit for political power even though you do not allow
them the use of public wells ? Are you fit for political power even though you
do not allow them the use of public streets ? Are you fit for political power
even though you do not allow them to wear what apparel or ornaments they like ?
Are you fit for political power even though you do not allow them to eat any
food they like ? " I can ask a string of such questions. But these will
suffice, I wonder what would have been the reply of Mr. Bonnerji. I am sure no
sensible man will have the courage to give an affirmative answer. Every
Congressman who repeats the dogma of Mill that one country is not fit to rule
another country must admit that one class is not fit to rule another class.
How is it then that the Social Reform Party last the battle ? To
understand this correctly it is necessary, to take note of the kind of social
reform which the reformers were agitating for. In this connection it is
necessary to make a distinction between social reform in the sense of the
reform of the Hindu Family and social reform in the sense of the reorganization
and reconstruction of the Hindu Society. The former has relation to widow
remarriage, child marriage etc., while the latter relates to the abolition of
the Caste System. The Social Conference was a body which mainly concerned
itself with the reform of the high caste Hindu Family. It consisted mostly of
enlightened high caste Hindus who did
not feel the necessity for agitating for the abolition of caste or had not the
courage to agitate for it. They felt quite naturally a greater urge to remove
such evils as enforced widowhood, child marriages etc., evils which prevailed
among them and which were personally felt by them. They did not stand up for
the reform of the Hindu society. The battle that was fought centered round the
question of the reform of the family. It did not relate to the social reform in
the sense of the break-up of the caste system. It was never put in issue by the
reformers. That is the reason why the Social Reform Party lost.
I am aware that this argument cannot alter the fact that political
reform did in fact gain precedence over social reform. But the argument has
this much value if not more. It explains why social reformers lost the battle.
It also helps us to understand how limited was the victory which the Political
Reform Party obtained over the Social Reform Party and that the view that
social reform need not precede political reform is a view which may stand only
when by social reform is meant the reform of the family. That political reform
cannot with impunity take precedence over social reform in the sense of
reconstruction of society is a thesis which, I am sure, cannot be controverted.
That the makers of political constitutions must take account of social forces
is a fact which is recognized by no less a person than Ferdinand Lassalle, the
friend and co-worker of Karl Marx. In addressing a Prussian audience in 1862
Lassalle said :
" The constitutional questions are in the first instance not questions of
right but questions of might. The actual constitution of a country has its
existence only in the actual condition of force which exists in the country :
hence political constitutions have value and permanence only when they
accurately express those conditions of forces which exist in practice within a
society"
But it is not necessary to go to Prussia. There is evidence at home. What
is the significance of the Communal Award with its allocation of political
power in defined proportions to diverse classes and communities ? In my view,
its significance lies in this that political constitution must take note of
social organisation. It shows that the politicians who denied that the social
problem in India had any bearing on the political problem were forced to reckon
with the social problem in devising the constitution. The Communal Award is so
to say the nemesis following upon the indifference and neglect of social
reform. It is a victory for the Social Reform Party which shows that though
defeated they were in the right in insisting upon the importance of social
reform. Many, I know, will not accept this finding. The view is current, and it
is pleasant to believe in it, that the Communal Award is unnatural and that it
is the result of an unholy alliance between the minorities and the bureaucracy.
I do not wish to rely on the Communal Award as a piece of evidence to support
my contention if it is said that it is not good evidence. Let us turn to
Ireland. What does the history of Irish Home Rule show ? It is well-known that
in the course of the negotiations between the representatives of Ulster and
Southern Ireland, Mr. Redmond, the representative of Southern Ireland, in order
to bring Ulster in a Home Rule Constitution common to the whole of Ireland said
to the representatives of Ulster : " Ask any political safeguards you like
and you shall have them." What was the reply that Ulstermen gave ? Their
reply was " Damn your safeguards, we don't want to be ruled by you on any
terms." People who blame the minorities in India ought to consider what
would have happened to the political aspirations of the majority if the
minorities had taken the attitude which Ulster took. Judged by the attitude of
Ulster to Irish Home Rule, is it noting that the minorities agreed to be ruled
by the majority which has not shown much sense of statesmanship, provided some
safeguards were devised for them ? But this is only incidental. The main
question is why did Ulster take this attitude ? The only answer I can give is
that there was a social problem between Ulster and Southern Ireland the problem
between Catholics and Protestants, essentially a problem of Caste. That Home
Rule in Ireland would be Rome Rule was the way in which the Ulstermen had
framed their answer. But that is only another way of stating that it was the
social problem of Caste between the Catholics and Protestants, which prevented
the solution of the political problem. This evidence again is sure to be
challenged. It will be urged that here too the hand of the Imperialist was at
work. But my resources are not exhausted. I will give evidence from the History
of Rome. Here no one can say that any evil genius was at work. Any one who has
studied the History of Rome will know that the Republican Constitution of Rome
bore marks having strong resemblance to the Communal Award. When the kingship
in Rome was abolished, the Kingly power or the Imperium was divided between the Consuls and the Pontifex Maximus.
In the Consuls was vested the secular authority of the King, while the latter
took over the religious authority of King. This Republican Constitution had
provided that, of the two Consuls one was to be Patrician and the other
Plebian. The same constitution had also provided that, of the Priests under the
Pontifex Maximus, half were to be Plebians and the other half Patricians. Why
is it that the Republican Constitution of Rome had these provisions which, as I
said, resemble so strongly the provisions of the Communal Award ? The only
answer one can get is that the Constitution of Republican Rome had to take
account of the social division between the Patricians and the Plebians, who
formed two distinct castes. To sum up, let political reformers turn to any
direction they like, they will find that in the making of a constitution, they
cannot ignore the problem arising out of the prevailing social order.
The illustrations which I have taken in support of the proposition that
social and religious problems have a bearing on political constitutions seem to
be too particular. Perhaps they are. But it should not be supposed that the
bearing of the one on the other is limited. On the other hand one can say that
generally speaking History bears out the proposition that political revolutions
have always been preceded by social and religious revolutions.
The religious Reformation started by Luther was the precursor of the
political emancipation of the European people. In England Puritanism led to the
establishment of political liberty. Puritanism founded the new world. It was
Puritanism which won the war of American Independence and Puritanism was a
religious movement. The same is true of the Muslim Empire. Before the Arabs
became a political power they had undergone a thorough religious revolution
started by the Prophet Mohammad. Even Indian History supports the same
conclusion. The political revolution led by Chandragupta was preceded by the
religious and social revolution of Buddha. The political revolution led by
Shivaji was preceded by the religious and social reform brought about by the
saints of Maharashtra. The political revolution of the Sikhs was preceded by
the religious and social revolution led by Guru Nanak. It is unnecessary to add
more illustrations. These will suffice to show that the emancipation of the
mind and the soul is a necessary preliminary for the political expansion of the
people.
Ill
Let me now turn to the Socialists. Can the Socialists ignore the problem
arising out of the social order ? The Socialists of India following their
fellows in Europe are seeking to apply the economic interpretation of history
to the facts of India. They propound that man is an economic creature, that his
activities and aspirations are bound by economic facts, that property is the
only source of power. They, therefore, preach that political and social reforms
are but gigantic illusions and that economic reform by equalization of property
must have precedence over every other kind of reform. One may join issue on
every one of these premises on which rests the Socialists' case for economic
reform having priority over every other kind of reform. One may contend that
economic motive is not the only motive by which man is actuated. That economic
power is the only kind of power no student of human society can accept. That
the social status of an individual by itself often becomes a source of power
and authority is made clear by the sway which the Mahatmos have held over the
common man. Why do millionaires in India obey penniless Sadhus and Fakirs ? Why
do millions of paupers in India sell their trifling trinkets which constitute
their only wealth and go to Benares and Mecca ? That, religion is the source of
power is illustrated by the history of India where the priest holds a sway over
the common man often greater than the magistrate and where everything, even
such things as strikes and elections, so easily take a religious turn and can
so easily be given a religious twist. Take the case of the Plebians of Rome as
a further illustration of the power of religion over man. It throws great light
on this point. The Plebs had fought for a share in the supreme executive under
the Roman Republic and had secured the appointment of a Plebian Consul elected
by a separate electorate constituted by the Commitia
Centuriata, which was an assembly of Piebians. They wanted a Consul of
their own because they felt that the Patrician Consuls used to discriminate
against the Plebians in carrying on the administration. They had apparently
obtained a great gain because under the Republican Constitution of Rome one
Consul had the power of vetoing an act of the other Consul. But did they in
fact gain anything ? The answer to this question must be in the negative. The
Plebians never could get a Plebian Consul who could be said to be a strong man
and who could act independently of the Patrician Consul. In the ordinary course
of things the Plebians should have got a strong Plebian Consul in view of the
fact that his election was to be by a separate electorate of Plebians. The
question is why did they fail in getting a strong Plebian to officiate as their
Consul? The answer to this question reveals the dominion which religion
exercises over the minds of men. It was an accepted creed of the whole Roman populus that no official could enter
upon the duties of his office unless the Oracle of Delphi declared that he was
acceptable to the Goddess. The priests who were in charge of the temple of the
Goddess of Delphi were all Patricians. Whenever therefore the Plebians elected
a Consul who was known to be a strong party man opposed to the Patricians or
" communal " to use the term that is current in India, the Oracle
invariably declared that he was not acceptable to the Goddess. This is how the
Plebians were cheated out of their rights. But what is worthy of note is that
the Plebians permitted themselves to be thus cheated because they too like the
Patricians, held firmly the belief that the approval of the Goddess was a
condition precedent to the taking charge by an official of his duties and that
election by the people was not enough. If the Plebians had contended that
election was enough and that the approval by the Goddess was not necessary they
would have derived the fullest benefit from the political right which they had
obtained. But they did not. They agreed to elect another, less suitable to
themselves but more suitable to the Goddess which in fact meant more amenable
to the Patricians. Rather than give up religion, the Plebians give up material
gain for which they had fought so hard. Does this not show that religion can be
a source of power as great as money if not greater ? The fallacy of the
Socialists lies in supposing that because in the present stage of European
Society property as a source of power is predominant, that the same is true of
India or that the same was true of Europe in the past. Religion, social status
and property are all sources of power and authority, which one man has, to
control the liberty of another. One is predominant at one stage; the other is
predominant at another stage. That is the only difference. If liberty is the
ideal, if liberty means the destruction of the dominion which one man holds
over another then obviously it cannot be insisted upon that economic reform
must be the one kind of reform worthy of pursuit. If the source of power and
dominion is at any given time or in any given society social and religious then
social reform and religious reform must be accepted as the necessary sort of
reform.
One can thus attack the doctrine of Economic Interpretation of History
adopted by the Socialists of India. But I recognize that economic
interpretation of history is not necessary for the validity of the Socialist
contention that equalization of property is the only real reform and that it
must precede everything else. However, what I like to ask the Socialists is
this : Can you have economic reform without first bringing about a reform of
the social order ? The Socialists of India do not seem to have considered this
question. I do not wish to do them an injustice. I give below a quotation from
a letter which a prominent Socialist wrote a few days ago to a friend of mine
in which he said, " I do not believe that we can build up a free society
in India so long as there is a trace of this ill-treatment and suppression of
one class by another. Believing as I do in a socialist ideal, inevitably I
believe in perfect equality in the treatment of various classes and groups. I
think that Socialism offers the only true remedy for this as well as other
problems." Now the question that I like to ask is : Is it enough for a
Socialist to say, " I believe in perfect equality in the treatment of the
various classes ? " To say that such a belief is enough is to disclose a
complete lack of understanding of what is involved in Socialism. If Socialism
is a practical programme and is not merely an ideal, distant and far off, the
question for a Socialist is not whether he believes in equality. The question
for him is whether he minds one class
ill-treating and suppressing another class as a matter of system, as a matter
of principle and thus allow tyranny and oppression to continue to divide one
class from another. Let me analyse the factors that are involved in the
realization of Socialism in order to explain fully my point. Now it is obvious
that the economic reform contemplated by the Socialists cannot come about
unless there is a revolution resulting in the seizure of power. That seizure of
power must be by a proletariat. The first question I ask is : Will the
proletariat of India combine to bring about this revolution ? What will move
men to such an action ? It seems to me that other things being equal the only
thing that will move one man to take such an action is the feeling that other
man with whom he is acting are actuated by feeling of equality and fraternity
and above all of justice. Men will not join in a revolution for the
equalization of property unless they know that after the revolution is achieved
they will be treated equally and that there will be no discrimination of caste
and creed. The assurance of a socialist leading the revolution that he does not
believe in caste, I am sure, will not suffice. The assurance must be the
assurance proceeding from much deeper foundation, namely, the mental attitude
of the compatriots towards one another in their spirit of personal equality and
fraternity. Can it be said that the proletariat of India, poor as it is,
recognise no distinctions except that of the rich and the poor ? Can it be said
that the poor in India recognize no such distinctions of caste or creed, high
or low ? If the fact is that they do, what unity of front can be expected from
such a proletariat in its action against the rich ? How can there be a
revolution if the proletariat cannot present a united front? Suppose for the sake
of argument that by some freak of fortune a revolution does take place and the
Socialists come in power, will they not have to deal with the problems created
by the particular social order prevalent in India ? I can't see how a Socialist
State in India can function for a second without having to grapple with the
problems created by the prejudices which make Indian people observe the
distinctions of high and low, clean and unclean. If Socialists are not to be
content with the mouthing of fine phrases, if the Socialists wish to make
Socialism a definite reality then they must recognize that the problem of
social reform is fundamental and that for them there is no escape from it.
That, the social order prevalent in India is a matter which a Socialist must deal
with, that unless he does so he cannot achieve his revolution and that if he
does achieve it as a result of good fortune he will have to grapple with it if
he wishes to realize his ideal, is a proposition which in my opinion is
incontrovertible. He will be compelled to take account of caste after
revolution if he does not take account of it before revolution. This is only
another way of saying that, turn in any direction you like, caste is the
monster that crosses your path. You cannot have political reform, you cannot
have economic reform, unless you kill this monster.
IV
It is a pity that Caste even today has its defenders. The defences are
many. It is defended on the ground that the Caste System is but another name
for division of labour and if division of labour is a necessary feature of
every civilized society then it is argued that there is nothing wrong in the
Caste System. Now the first thing is to be urged against this view is that
Caste System is not merely division of labour. It is also a division of labourers. Civilized society undoubtedly
needs division of labour. But in no civilized society is division of labour
accompanied by this unnatural division of labourers into watertight
compartments. Caste System is not merely a division of labourers which is quite
different from division of labour—it is an hierarchy in which the divisions of
labourers are graded one above the other. In no other country is the division
of labour accompanied by this gradation of labourers. There is also a third
point of criticism against this view of the Caste System. This division of
labour is not spontaneous; it is not based on natural aptitudes. Social and
individual efficiency requires us to develop the capacity of an individual to
the point of competency to choose and to make his own career. This principle is
violated in the Caste System in so far as it involves an attempt to appoint
tasks to individuals in advance, selected not on the basis of trained original
capacities, but on that of the social status of the parents. Looked at from
another point of view this stratification of occupations which is the result of
the Caste System is positively pernicious. Industry is never static. It
undergoes rapid and abrupt changes. With such changes an individual must be
free to change his occupation. Without such freedom to adjust himself to
changing circumstances it would be impossible for him to gain his livelihood.
Now the Caste System will not allow Hindus to take to occupations where they
are wanted if they do not belong to them by heredity. If a Hindu is seen to
starve rather than take to new occupations not assigned to his Caste, the
reason is to be found in the Caste System. By not permitting readjustment of
occupations, caste becomes a direct cause of much of the unemployment we see in
the country. As a form of division of labour the Caste system suffers from
another serious defect. The division of labour brought about by the Caste
System is not a division based on choice. Individual sentiment, individual
preference has no place in it. It is based on the dogma of predestination.
Considerations of social efficiency would compel us to recognize that the
greatest evil in the industrial system is not: so much poverty and the
suffering that it involves as the fact that so many persons have callings which
make no appeal to those who are engaged in them. Such callings constantly
provoke one to aversion, ill will and the desire to evade. There are many
occupations in India which on account of the fact that they are regarded as degraded
by the Hindus provoke those who are engaged in them to aversion. There is a
constant desire to evade and escape from such occupations which arises solely
because of the blighting effect which they produce upon those who follow them
owing to the slight and stigma cast upon them by the Hindu religion. What
efficiency can there be in a system under which neither men's hearts nor their
minds are in their work? As an economic organization Caste is therefore a
harmful institution, inasmuch as, it involves the subordination of man's
natural powers and inclinations to the exigencies of social rules
V
Some have dug a biological trench in defence of the Caste System. It is
said that the object of Caste was to preserve purity of race and purity of
blood. Now ethnologists are of opinion that men of pure race exist nowhere and
that there has been a mixture of all races in all parts of the world.
Especially is this the case with the people of India. Mr. D. R. Bhandarkar in
his paper on Foreign Elements in the
Hindu Population has stated that " There is hardly a class, or Caste
in India which has not a foreign strain in it. There is an admixture of alien
blood not only among the warrior classes—the Rajputs and the Marathas—but also
among the Brahmins who are under the happy delusion that they are free from all
foreign elements." The Caste system cannot be said to have grown as a
means of preventing the admixture of races or as a means of maintaining purity
of blood. As a matter of fact Caste system came into being long after the
different races of India had commingled in blood and culture. To hold that
distinctions of Castes or really distinctions of race and to treat different
Castes as though they were so many different races is a gross perversion of
facts. What racial affinity is there between the Brahmin of the Punjab and the
Brahmin of Madras ? What racial affinity is there between the untouchable of
Bengal and the untouchable of Madras ? What racial difference is there between
the Brahmin of the Punjab and the Chamar of the Punjab ? What racial difference
is there between the Brahmin of Madras and the Pariah of Madras ? The Brahmin
of the Punjab is racially of the same stock as the Chamar of the Punjab and the
Brahmin of Madras is of the same race as the Pariah of Madras. Caste system
does not demarcate racial division. Caste system is a social division of people
of the same race. Assuming it, however, to be a case of racial divisions one
may ask : What harm could there be if a mixture of races and of blood was permitted
to take place in India by intermarriages between different Castes ? Men are no
doubt divided from animals by so deep a distinction that science recognizes men
and animals as two distinct species. But even scientists who believe in purity
of races do not assert that the different races constitute different species of
men. They are only varieties of one and the same species. As such they can
interbreed and produce an offspring which is capable of breeding and which is
not sterile. An immense lot of nonsense is talked about heredity and eugenics
in defence of the Caste System. Few would object to the Caste System if it was
in accord with the basic principle of eugenics because few can object to the
improvement of the race by judicious noting. But one fails to understand how
the Caste System secures judicious mating. Caste System is a negative thing. It
merely prohibits persons belonging to different Castes from intermarrying. It
is not a positive method of selecting which two among a given Caste should marry.
If Caste is eugenic in origin then the origin of sub-Castes must also be
eugenic. But can any one seriously maintain that the origin of sub-Castes is
eugenic ? I think it would be absurd to contend for such a proposition and for
a very obvious reason. If Caste means race then differences of sub-Castes
cannot mean differences of race because sub-Castes become ex hypothesia sub-divisions of one and the same race. Consequently
the bar against intermarrying and interdining between sub-Castes cannot be for
the purpose of maintaining purity of race or of blood. If sub-Castes cannot be
eugenic in origin there cannot be any substance in the contention that Caste is
eugenic in origin. Again if Caste is eugenic in origin one can understand the
bar against intermarriage. But what is the purpose of the interdict placed on
interdining between Castes and sub-Castes alike ? Interdining cannot infect
blood and therefore cannot be the cause either of the improvement or of
deterioration of the race. This shows that Caste has no scientific origin and
that those who are attempting to give it an eugenic basis are trying to support
by science what is grossly unscientific. Even today eugenics cannot become a
practical possibility unless we have definite knowledge regarding the laws of
heredity. Prof. Bateson in his Mendel's
Principles of Heredity says, " There is nothing in the descent of the
higher mental qualities to suggest that they follow any single system of
transmission. It is likely that both they and the more marked developments of
physical powers result rather from the coincidence of numerous factors than
from the possession of any one genetic element." To argue that the Caste
System was eugenic in its conception is to attribute to the forefathers of
present-day Hindus a knowledge of heredity which even the modern scientists do
not possess. A tree should be judged by the fruits it yields. If caste is
eugenic what sort of a race of men it should have produced ? Physically
speaking the Hindus are a C3 people. They are a race of Pygmies and dwarfs
stunted in stature and wanting in stamina. It is a nation 9/1Oths of which is
declared to be unfit for military service. This shows that the Caste System
does not embody the eugenics of modem scientists. It is a social system which embodies
the arrogance and selfishness of a perverse section of the Hindus who were
superior enough in social status to set it in fashion and who had authority to
force it on their inferiors.
VI
Caste does not result in economic efficiency. Caste cannot and has not
improved the race. Caste has however done one thing. It has completely
disorganized and demoralized the Hindus.
The first and foremost thing that must be recognized is that Hindu
Society is a myth. The name Hindu is itself a foreign name. It was given by the
Mohammedans to the natives for the purpose of distinguishing themselves. It
does not occur in any Sanskrit work prior to the Mohammedan invasion. They did
not feel the necessity of a common name because they had no conception of their
having constituted a community. Hindu society as such does not exist. It is
only a collection of castes. Each caste is conscious of its existence. Its
survival is the be all and end all of its existence. Castes do not even form a
federation. A caste has no feeling that it is affiliated to other castes except
when there is a Hindu-Muslim riot. On all other occasions each caste endeavours
to segregate itself and to distinguish itself from other castes. Each caste not
only dines among itself and marries among itself but each caste prescribes its
own distinctive dress. What other explanation can there be of the innumerable
styles of dress worn by the men and women of India which so amuse the tourists
? Indeed the ideal Hindu must be like a rat living in his own hole refusing to
have any contact with others. There is an utter lack among the Hindus of what
the sociologists call " consciousness of kind ". There is no Hindu
consciousness of kind. In every Hindu the consciousness that exists is the
consciousness of his caste. That is the reason why the Hindus cannot be said to
form a society or a nation. There are however many Indians whose patriotism
does not permit them to admit that Indians are not a nation, that they are only
an amorphous mass of people. They have insisted that underlying the apparent
diversity there is a fundamental unity which marks the life of the Hindus in as
much as there is a similarity of habits and customs, beliefs and thoughts which
obtain all over the continent of India. Similarity in habits and customs,
beliefs and thoughts there is. But one cannot accept the conclusion that
therefore, the Hindus constitute a society. To do so is to misunderstand the
essentials which go to make up a society. Men do not become a society by living
in physical proximity any more than a man ceases to be a member of his society
by living so many miles away from other men. Secondly similarity in habits and
customs, beliefs and thoughts is not enough to constitute men into society.
Things may be passed physically from one to another like bricks. In the same
way habits and customs, beliefs and thoughts of one group may be taken over by
another group and there may thus appear a similarity between the two. Culture
spreads by diffusion and that is why one finds similarity between various
primitive tribes in the matter of their habits and customs, beliefs and
thoughts, although they do not live in proximity. But no one could say that
because there was this similarity the primitive tribes constituted one society.
This is because similarly in certain things is not enough to constitute a
society. Men constitute a society
because they have things which they possess in common. To have similar thing is
totally different from possessing things in common. And the only way by which
men can come to possess things in common with one another is by being in
communication with one another. This is merely another way of saying that
Society continues to exist by communication indeed in communication. To make it
concrete, it is not enough if men act in a way which agrees with the acts of
others. Parallel activity, even if similar, is not sufficient to bind men into
a society. This is proved by the fact that the festivals observed by the
different Castes amongst the Hindus are the same. Yet these parallel
performances of similar festivals by the different castes have not bound them
into one integral whole. For that purpose what is necessary is for a man to
share and participate in a common activity so that the same emotions are
aroused in him that animate the others. Making the individual a sharer or
partner in the associated activity so that he feels its success as his success,
its failure as his failure is the real thing that binds men and makes a society
of them. The Caste System prevents common activity and by preventing common
activity it has prevented the Hindus from becoming a society with a unified
life and a consciousness of its own being.
VII
The Hindus often complain of the isolation and exclusiveness of a gang or
a clique and blame them for anti-social spirit. But they conveniently forget
that this anti-social spirit is the worst feature of their own Caste System.
One caste enjoys singing a hymn of hate against another caste as much as the
Germans did in singing their hymn of hate against the English during the last
war. The literature of the Hindus is full of caste genealogies in which an
attempt is made to give a noble origin to one caste and an ignoble origin to
other castes. The Sahyadrikhand is a
notorious instance of this class of literature. This anti-social spirit is not
confined to caste alone. It has gone deeper and has poisoned the mutual
relations of the sub-castes as well. In my province the Golak Brahmins,
Deorukha Brahmins, Karada Brahmins, Palshe Brahmins and Chitpavan Brahmins, all
claim to be sub-divisions of the Brahmin Caste. But the anti-social spirit that
prevails between them is quite as marked and quite as virulent as the
anti-social spirit that prevails between them and other non-Brahmin castes.
There is nothing strange in this. An anti-social spirit is found wherever one
group has " interests of its own " which shut it out from full
interaction with other groups, so that its prevailing purpose is protection of
what it has got. This anti-social spirit, this spirit of protecting its own
interests is as much a marked feature of the different castes in their
isolation from one another as it is of nations in their isolation. The
Brahmin's primary concern is to protect " his interest " against
those of the non-Brahmins and the non-Brahmin's primary concern is to protect
their interests against those of the Brahmins. The Hindus, therefore, are not
merely an assortment of castes but they are so many warring groups each living
for itself and for its selfish ideal. There is another feature of caste which
is deplorable. The ancestors of the present-day English fought on one side or
the other in the wars of the Roses and the Cromwellian War. But the decendents
of those who fought on the one side do not bear any animosity— any grudge against
the descendents of those who fought on the other side. The feud is forgotten.
But the present-day non-Brahmins cannot forgive the present-day Brahmins for
the insult their ancestors gave to Shivaji. The present-day Kayasthas will not
forgive the present-day Brahmins for the infamy cast upon their forefathers by
the forefathers of the latter. To what is this difference due ? Obviously to
the Caste System. The existence of Caste and Caste Consciousness has served to
keep the memory of past feuds between castes green and has prevented
solidarity.
VIII
The recent discussion about the excluded and partially included areas has
served to draw attention to the position of what are called the aboriginal
tribes in India. They number about 13 millions if not more. Apart from the
questions whether their exclusion from the new Constitution is proper or
improper, the fact still remains that these aborigines have remained in their
primitive uncivilized State in a land which boasts of a civilization thousands
of years old. Not only are they not civilized but some of them follow pursuits
which have led to their being classified as criminals. Thirteen millions of
people living in the midst of civilization are still in a savage state and are
leading the life of hereditary criminals! ! But the Hindus have never felt
ashamed of it. This is a phenomenon which in my view is quite unparalleled.
What is the cause of this shameful state of affairs ? Why has no attempt been
made to civilize these aborigines and to lead them to take to a more honourable
way of making a living ? The Hindus will probably seek to account for this
savage state of the aborigines by attributing to them congenital stupidity.
They will probably not admit that the aborigines have remained savages because
they had made no effort to civilize them, to give them medical aid, to reform
them, to make them good citizens. But supposing a Hindu wished to do what the
Christian missionary is doing for these aborigines, could he have done it ? I
submit not. Civilizing the aborigines means adopting them as your own, living
in their midst, and cultivating fellow-feeling, in short loving them. How is it
possible for a Hindu to do this ? His whole life is one anxious effort to
preserve his caste. Caste is his precious possession which he must save at any
cost. He cannot consent to lose it by establishing contact with the aborigines
the remnants of the hateful Anary as of the Vedic
days. Not that a Hindu could not be
taught the sense of duty to fallen humanity, but the trouble is that no amount
of sense of duty can enable him to overcome his duty to preserve his caste.
Caste is, therefore, the real explanation as to why the Hindu has let the
savage remain a savage in the midst of his civilization without blushing or
without feeling any sense of remorse or repentance. The Hindu has not realized
that these aborigines are a source of potential danger. If these savages remain
savages they may not do any harm to the Hindus. But if they are reclaimed by
non-Hindus and converted to their faiths they will swell the ranks of the
enemies of the Hindus. If this happens the Hindu will have to thank himself and
his Caste System.
IX
Not only has the Hindu made no effort for the humanitarian cause of
civilizing the savages but the higher-caste Hindus have deliberately prevented
the lower castes who are within the pale of Hinduism from rising to the
cultural level of the higher castes. 1. will give two instances, one of the
Sonars and the other of the Pathare Prabhus. Both are communities quite well-known
in Maharashtra. Like the rest of the communities desiring to raise their status
these two communities were at one time endeavouring to adopt some of the ways
and habits of the Brahmins. The Sonars were styling themselves Daivadnya
Brahmins and were wearing their " dhotis " with folds on and using
the word namaskar for salutation.
Both, the folded way of wearing the " dhoti " and the namaskar were special to the Brahmins.
The Brahmins did not like this imitation and this attempt by Sonars to pass off
as Brahmins. Under the authority of the Peshwas the Brahmins successfully put
down this attempt on the part. of the Sonars to adopt the ways of the Brahmins.
They even got the President of the Councils of the East India Company's
settlement in Bombay to issue a. prohibitory order against the Sonars residing
in Bombay. At one time the Pathare Prabhus had widow-remarriage as a custom of
their caste. This custom of widow-remarriage was later on looked upon as amark
of social inferiority by some members of the caste especially because it was
contrary to the custom prevalent among the Brahmins. With the object of raising
the status of their community some Pathare Prabhus sought to stop this practice
of widow-remarriage that was prevalent in their caste. The community was
divided into two camps, one for and the other against the innovation. The
Peshwas took the side of those in favour of widow-remarriage and thus virtually
prohibited the Pathare Prabhus from following the ways of the Brahmins. The
Hindus criticise the Mohammedans for having spread their religion by the use of
the sword. They also ridicule Christianity on the score of the inquisition. But
really speaking who is better and more worthy of our respect—the Mohammedans
and Christians who attempted to thrust down the throats of unwilling persons
what they regarded as necessary for their salvation or the Hindu who would not
spread the light, who would endeavour to keep others in darkness, who would not
consent to share his intellectual and social inheritance with those who are
ready and willing to make it a part of their own make-up ? I have no hesitation
in saying that if the Mohammedan has been cruel the Hindu has been mean and
meanness is worse than cruelty.
X
Whether the Hindu religion was or was not a missionary religion has been
a controversial issue. Some hold the view that it was never a missionary
religion. Others hold that it was. That the Hindu religion was once a
missionary religion must be admitted. It could not have spread over the face of
India, if it was not a missionary religion. That today it is not a missionary
religion is also a fact which must be accepted. The question therefore is not
whether or not the Hindu religion was a missionary religion. The real question
is why did the Hindu religion cease to be a missionary religion ? My answer is
this. Hindu religion ceased to be a missionary religion when the Caste System
grew up among the Hindus. Caste is inconsistent with conversion. Inculcation of
beliefs and dogmas is not the only problem that is involved in conversion. To
find a place for the convert in the social life of the community is another and
a much more important problem that arises in connection with conversion. That
problem is where to place the convert, in what caste ? It is a problem which
must baffle every Hindu wishing to make aliens converts to his religion. Unlike
the club the membership of a caste is not open to all and sundry. The law of
caste confines its membership to person born in the caste. Castes are
autonomous and there is no authority anywhere to compel a caste to admit a
new-comer to its social life. Hindu Society being a collection of castes and
each caste being a close corporation there is no place for a convert. Thus it
is the caste which has prevented the Hindus from expanding and from absorbing
other religious communities. So long as caste remain, Hindu religion cannot be
made a missionary religion and Shudhi
will be both a folly and a futility.
XI
The reasons which have made Shudhi
impossible for Hindus are also responsible for making Sanghatan impossible. The idea underlying Sanghalan is to remove from the mind of the Hindu that timidity and
cowardice which so painfully make him off from the Mohammedan and the Sikh and
which have led him to adopt the low ways of treachery and cunning for
protecting himself. The question naturally arises : From where does the Sikh or
the Mohammedan derive his strength which makes him brave and fearless ? I am
sure it is not due to relative superiority of physical strength, diet or drill.
It is due to the strength arising out of the feeling that all Sikhs will come
to the rescue of a Sikh when he is in danger and that all Mohammedans will rush
to save a Muslim if he is attacked. The Hindu can derive no such strength. He
cannot feel assured that his fellows will come to his help. Being one and fated
to be alone he remains powerless, develops timidity and cowardice and in a
fight surrenders or runs away. The Sikh as well as the Muslim stands fearless
and gives battle because he knows that though one he will not be alone. The
presence of this belief in the one helps him to hold out and the absence of it
in the other makes him to give way. If you pursue this matter further and ask
what is it that enables the Sikh and the Mohammedan to feel so assured and why
is the Hindu filled with such despair in the matter of help and assistance you
will find that the reasons for this difference lie in the difference in their
associated mode of living. The associated mode of life practised by the Sikhs
and the Mohammedans produces fellow-feeling. The associated mode of life of the
Hindus does not. Among Sikhs and Muslims there is a social cement which makes
them Bhais. Among Hindus there is no
such cement and one Hindu does not regard another Hindu as his Bhai. This explains why a Sikh says and
feels that one Sikh, or one Khalsa is equal to Sava Lakh men. This explains why one Mohammedan is equal to a crowd
of Hindus. This difference is undoubtedly a difference due to caste. So long as
caste remains, there will be no Sanghalan
and so long as there is no Sanghatan
the Hindu will remain weak and meek. The Hindus claim to be a very tolerant
people. In my opinion this is a mistake. On many occasions they can be
intolerant and if on some occasions they are tolerant that is because they are
too weak to oppose or too indifferent to oppose. This indifference of the
Hindus has become so much a part of their nature that a Hindu will quite meekly
tolerate an insult as well as a wrong. You see amongst them, to use the words
of Morris, " The great reading down
the little, the strong beating down the weak, cruel men fearing not, kind men
daring not and wise men caring not." With the Hindu Gods all
forbearing, it is not difficult to imagine the pitiable condition of the wronged
and the oppressed among the Hindus. Indifferentism is the worst kind of disease
that can infect a people. Why is the Hindu so indifferent? In my opinion this
indifferentism is the result of Caste System which has made Sanghatan and co-operation even for a
good cause impossible.
XII
The assertion by the individual of his own opinions and beliefs, his own
independence and interest as over against group standards, group authority and
group interests is the beginning of all reform. But whether the reform will
continue depends upon what scope the group affords for such individual
assertion. If the group is tolerant and fair-minded in dealing with such
individuals they will continue to assert and in the end succeed in converting
their fellows. On the other hand if the group is intolerant and does not bother
about the means it adopts to stifle such individuals they will perish and the
reform will die out. Now a caste has an unquestioned right to excommunicate any
man who is guilty of breaking the rules of the caste and when it is realized
that excommunication involves a complete cesser of social intercourse it will
be agreed that as a form of punishment there is really little to choose between
excommunication and death. No wonder individual Hindus have not had the courage
to assert their independence by breaking the barriers of caste. It is true that
man cannot get on with his fellows. But it is also true that he cannot do
without them. He would like to have the society of his fellows on his terms. If
be cannot get it on his terms then he will be ready to have it on any terms
even amounting to complete surrender. This is because he cannot do without
society. A caste is ever ready to take advantage of the helplessness of a man
and insist upon complete conformity to its code in letter and in spirit. A
caste can easily organize itself into a conspiracy to make the life of a
reformer a hell and if a conspiracy is a crime I do not understand why such a
nefarious act as an attempt to excommunicate a person for daring to act
contrary to the rules of caste should not be made an offence punishable in law.
But as it is, even law gives each caste an autonomy to regulate its membership
and punish dissenters with excommunication. Caste in the hands of the orthodox
has been a powerful weapon for persecuting the reforms and for killing all
reform.
XIII
The effect of caste on the ethics of the Hindus is simply deplorable.
Caste has killed public spirit. Caste has destroyed the sense of public
charity. Caste has made public opinion impossible. A Hindu's public is his
caste. His responsibility is only to his caste. His loyalty is restricted only
to his caste. Virtue has become caste-ridden and morality has become,
caste-bound. There is no sympathy to the deserving. There is no appreciation of
the meritorious. There is no charity to the needy. Suffering as such calls for
no response. There is charity but it begins with the caste and ends with the
caste. There is sympathy but not for
men of other caste. Would a Hindu acknowledge and follow the leadership of a
great and good man? The case of a Mahatma apart, the answer must be that he
will follow a leader if he is a man of his caste. A Brahmin will follow a
leader only if he is a Brahmin, a Kayastha if he is a Kayastha and so on. The capacity
to appreciate merits in a man apart from his caste does not exist in a Hindu.
There is appreciation of virtue but only when the man is a fellow caste-man.
The whole morality is as bad as tribal morality. My caste-man, right or wrong;
my caste-man, good or bad. It is not a case of standing by virtue and not
standing by vice. It is a case of standing or not standing by the caste. Have
not Hindus committed treason against their country in the interests of their
caste?
XIV
I would not be surprised if some of you have grown weary listening to
this tiresome tale of the sad effects which caste has produced. There is
nothing new in it. I will therefore turn to the constructive side of the
problem. What is your ideal society if you do not want caste is a question that
is bound to be asked of you. If you ask me, my ideal would be a society based
on Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. And why not ? What objection
can there be to Fraternity ? I cannot imagine any. An ideal society should be
mobile, should be full of channels for conveying a change taking place in one
part to other parts. In an ideal society there should be many interests
consciously communicated and shared. There should be varied and free points of
contact with other modes of association. In other words there must be social
endosmosis. This is fraternity, which is only another name for democracy.
Democracy is not merely a form of Government. It is primarily a mode of
associated living, of conjoint communicated experience. It is essentially an
attitude of respect and reverence towards fellowmen. Any objection to Liberty ?
Few object to liberty in the sense of a right to free movement, in the sense of
a right to life and limb. There is no objection to liberty in the sense of a
right to property, tools and materials as being necessary for earning a living
to keep the body in due state of health. Why not allow liberty to benefit by an
effective and competent use of a person's powers ? The supporters of caste who
would allow liberty in the sense of a right to life, limb and property, would
not readily consent to liberty in this sense, inasmuch as it involves liberty
to choose one's profession. But to object to this kind of liberty is to
perpetuate slavery. For slavery does not merely mean a legalized form of subjection.
It means a state of society in which some men are forced to accept from other
the purposes which control their conduct. This condition obtains even where
there is no slavery in the legal sense. It is found where, as in the Caste
System, some persons are compelled to carry on certain prescribed callings
which are not of their choice. Any objection to equality ? This has obviously
been the most contentious part of the slogan of the French Revolution. The
objections to equality may be sound and one may have to admit that all men are
not equal. But what of that ? Equality may be a fiction but nonetheless one
must accept it as the governing principle. A. man's power is dependent upon (1)
physical heredity, (2) social inheritance or endowment in the form of parental
care, education, accumulation of scientific knowledge, everything which enables
him to be more efficient than the savage, and finally, (3) on his own efforts.
In all these three respects men are undoubtedly unequal. But the question is,
shall we treat them as unequal because they are unequal ? This is a question
which the opponents of equality must answer. From the standpoint of the
individualist it may be just to treat men unequally so far as their efforts are
unequal. It may be desirable to give as much incentive as possible to the full
development of every one's powers. But what would happen if men were treated
unequally as they are, in the first two respects ? It is obvious that those
individuals also in whose favour there is birth, education, family name,
business connections and inherited wealth would be selected in the race. But
selection under such circumstances would not be a selection of the able. It
would be the selection of the privileged. The reason therefore, which forces
that in the third respect we should treat men unequally demands that in the
first two respects we should treat men as equally as possible. On the other
hand it can be urged that if it is good for the social body to get the most out
of its members, it can get most out of them only by making them equal as far as
possible at the very start of the race. That is one reason why we cannot escape
equality. But there is another reason why we must accept equality. A Statesman
is concerned with vast numbers of people. He has neither the time nor the
knowledge to draw fine distinctions and to treat each equitably i.e. according to need or according to
capacity. However desirable or reasonable an equitable treatment of men may be,
humanity is not capable of assortment and classification. The statesman,
therefore, must follow some rough and ready rule and that rough and ready rule
is to treat all men alike not because they are alike but because classification
and assortment is impossible. The doctrine of equality is glaringly fallacious
but taking all in all it is the only way a statesman can proceed in politics
which is a severely practical affair and which demands a severely practical
test.
XV
But there is a set of reformers
who hold out a different ideal. They go by the name of the Arya Samajists and
their ideal of social organization is what is called Chaturvarnya or the
division of society into four classes instead of the four thousand castes that
we have in India. To make it more attractive and to disarm opposition the
protagonists of Chaturvarnya take great care to point out that their
Chaturvarnya is based not on birth but on guna
(worth). At the outset, I must confess that notwithstanding the worth-basis of
this Chaturvarnya, it is an ideal to which I cannot reconcile myself. In the
first place, if under the Chaturvarnya of the Arya Samajists an individual is
to take his place in the Hindu Society according to his worth. I do not
understand why the Arya Samajists insist upon labelling men as Brahmin,
Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra. A learned man would be honoured without his
being labelled a Brahmin. A soldier would be respected without his being
designated a Kshatriya. If European society honours its soldiers and its
servants without giving them permanent labels, why should Hindu Society find it
difficult to do so is a question, which Arya Samajists have not cared to
consider. There is another objection to the continuance of these labels. All
reform consists in a change in the notions, sentiment and mental attitudes of
the people towards men and things. It is common experience that certain names
become associated with certain notions and sentiments, which determine a
person's attitude towards men and things. The names, Brahmin, Kshatriya,
Vaishya and Shudra, are names which are associated with a definite and fixed
notion in the mind of every Hindu. That notion is that of a hierarchy based on
birth. So long as these names continue, Hindus will continue to think of the
Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra as hierarchical divisions of high and
low, based on birth, and act accordingly. The Hindu must be made to unlearn all
this. But how can this happen if the old labels remain and continue to recall
to his mind old notions. If new notions are to be inculcated in the minds of
people it is necessary to give them new names. To continue the old name is to
make the reform futile. To allow this Chaturvarnya, based on worth to be
designated by such stinking labels of Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya, Shudra,
indicative of social divisions based on birth, is a snare.
XVI
To me this Chaturvarnya with its old labels is utterly repellent and my
whole being rebels against it. But I do not wish to rest my objection to
Chaturvarnya on mere grounds of sentiments. There are more solid grounds on
which I rely for my opposition to it. A close examination of this ideal has
convinced me that as a system of social organization, Chaturvarnya is
impracticable, harmful and has turned out to be a miserable failure. From a
practical point of view, the system of Chaturvarnya raises several difficulties
which its protagonists do not seem to have taken into account. The principle
underlying caste is fundamentally different from the principle underlying Varna. Not only are they fundamentally
different but they are also fundamentally opposed. The former is based on worth
. How are you going to compel people who have acquired a higher status based on
birth without reference to their worth to vacate that status ? How are you
going to compel people to recognize the status due to a man in accordance with
his worth, who is occupying a lower status based on his birth ? For this you
must first break up the caste System, in order to be able to establish the Varna system. How are you going to
reduce the four thousand castes, based oil birth, to the four Varnas, based on worth ? This is the
first difficulty which the protagonists of the Chaturvarnya must grapple with.
There is a second difficulty which the protagonists of Chaturvarnya must
grapple with, if they wish to make the establishment of Chaturvarnya a success.
Chaturvarnya pre-supposes that you can classify people into four definite
classes. Is this possible ? In this respect, the ideal of Chaturvarnya has, as
you will see, a close affinity to the Platonic ideal. To Plato, men fell by
nature into three classes. In some individuals, he believed mere appetites
dominated. He assigned them to the labouring and trading classes. Others
revealed to him that over and above appetites, they have a courageous
disposition. He classed them as defenders in war and guardians of internal
peace. Others showed a capacity to grasp the universal reason underlying
things. He made them the law-givers of the people. The criticism to which
Plato's Republic is subject, is also the criticism which must apply to the
system of Chaturvarnya, in so far as it proceeds upon the possibility of an
accurate classification of men into four distinct classes. The chief criticism
against Plato is that his idea of lumping of individuals into a few sharply
marked-off classes is a very superficial view of man and his powers. Plato had
no perception of the uniqueness of every individual, of his incommensurability
with others, of each individual forming a class of his own. He had no
recognition of the infinite diversity of active tendencies and combination of
tendencies of which an individual is capable. To him, there were types of
faculties or powers in the individual constitution. All this is demonstrably
wrong. Modem science has shown that lumping together of individuals into a few
sharply marked-off classes is a superficial view of man not worthy of serious
consideration. Consequently, the utilization of the qualities of individuals is
incompatible with their stratification by classes, since the qualities of
individuals are so variable. Chaturvarnya must fail for the very reason for
which Plato's Republic must fail, namely that it is not possible to pigeon men
into holes, according as he belongs to one class or the other. That it is
impossible to accurately classify people into four definite classes is proved
by the fact that the original four classes have now become four thousand
castes.
There is a third difficulty in the way of the establishment of the system
of Chaturvarnya. How are you going to maintain the system of Chaturvarnya,
supposing it was established ? One important requirement for the successful
working of Chaturvarnya is the maintenance of the penal system which could
maintain it by its sanction. The system of Chaturvarnya must perpetually face
the problem of the transgressor. Unless there is a penalty attached to the act
of transgression, men will not keep to their respective classes. The whole
system will break down, being contrary to human nature. Chaturvarnya cannot
subsist by its own inherent goodness. It must be enforced by law.
That, without penal sanction the ideal of Chaturvarnya cannot be
realized, is proved by the story in the Ramayana of Rama killing Shambuka. Some
people seem to blame Rama because he wantonly and without reason killed
Shambuka. But to blame Rama for killing Shambuka is to misunderstand the whole
situation. Ram Raj was a Raj based on Chaturvarnya. As a king, Rama was bound
to maintain Chaturvarnya. It was his duty therefore to kill Shambuka, the
Shudra, who had transgressed his class and wanted to be a Brahmin. This is the
reason why Rama killed Shambuka. But this also shows that penal sanction is
necessary for the maintenance of Chaturvarnya. Not only penal sanction is
necessary, but penalty of death is necessary. That is why Rama did not inflict
on Shambuka a lesser punishment. That is why Manu-Smriti prescribes such heavy
sentences as cutting off the tongue or pouring of molten lead in the ears of
the Shudra, who recites or hears the Veda.
The supporters of Chaturvarnya must give an assurance that they could
successfully classify men and they could induce modern society in the twentieth
century to reforge the penal sanctions of Manu-Smriti.
The protagonists of Chaturvarnya do not seem to have considered what is
to happen to women in their system. Are they also to be divided into four
classes, Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra? Or are they to be allowed to
take the status of their husbands. If the status of the woman is to be the
consequence of marriage what becomes of the underlying principle of
Chaturvarnya, namely, that the status of a person should be based upon the
worth of that person ? If they are to be classified according to their worth is
their classification to be nominal or real ? If it is to be nominal then it is
useless and then the protagonists of Chaturvarnya must admit that their system
does not apply to women. If it is real, are the protagonists of Chaturvarnya
prepared to follow the logical consequences of applying it to women ? They must
be prepared to have women priests and women soldiers. Hindu society has grown
accustomed to women teachers and women barristers. It may grow accustomed to
women brewers and women butchers. But he would be a bold person, who would say
that it will allow women priests and women soldiers. But that will be the
logical outcome of applying Chaturvarnya to women. Given these difficulties, I
think no one except a congenital idiot could hope and believe in a successful
regeneration of the Chaturvarnya.
XVII
Assuming that Chaturvarnya is practicable, I contend that it is the most
vicious system. That the Brahmins should cultivate knowledge, that the
Kshatriya should bear arms, that the Vaishya. should trade and that the Shudra
should serve sounds as though it was a system of division of labour. Whether
the theory was intended to state that the Shudra need not or that whether it was intended to lay down that he must not, is an interesting question.
The defenders of Chaturvarnya give it the first meaning. They say, why should
the Shudra need trouble to acquire wealth, when the three Vamas are there to support him ? Why need the Shudra bother to take
to education, when there is the Brahmin to whom he can go when the occasion for
reading or writing arises ? Why need the Shudra worry to arm himself because
there is the Kshatriya to protect him ? The theory of Chaturvarnya, understood
in this sense, may be said to look upon the Shudra as the ward and the three Vamas as his guardians. Thus
interpreted, it is a simple, elevating and alluring theory. Assuming this to be
the correct view of the underlying conception of Chaturvarnya, it seems to me
that the system is neither fool-proof nor knave-proof. What is to happen, if
the Brahmins, Vaishyas and Kshatriyas fail to pursue knowledge, to engage in
economic enterprise and to be efficient soldiers which are their respective
functions ? Contrary-wise, suppose that they discharge their functions but
flout their duty to the Shudra or to one another, what is to happen to the
Shudra if the three classes refuse to support him on fair terms or combine to
keep him down ? Who is to safeguard the interests of the Shudra or for the
matter of that of the Vaishya and Kshatriya when the person, who is trying to
take advantage of his ignorance is the Brahmin? Who is to defend the liberty of
the Shudra and for the matter of that, of the Brahmin and the Vaishya when the
person who is robbing him of it is the Kshatriya ? Inter-dependence of one
class on another class is inevitable. Even dependence of one class upon another
may sometimes become allowable. But why make one person depend upon another in
the matter of his vital needs ? Education everyone must have. Means of defence
everyone must have. These are the paramount requirements of every man for his
self-preservation. How can the fact that his neighbour is educated and armed
help a man who is uneducated and disarmed. The whole theory is absurd. These
are the questions, which the defenders of Chaturvarnya do not seem to be
troubled about. But they are very pertinent questions. Assuming their
conception of Chaturvarnya that the relationship between the different classes
is that of ward and guardian is the real conception underlying Chaturvarnya, it
must be admitted that it makes no provision to safeguard the interests of the
ward from the misdeeds of the guardian. Whether the relationship of guardian
and ward was the real underlying conception, on which Chaturvarnya was based,
there is no doubt that in practice the relation was that of master and
servants. The three classes, Brahmins, Kshatriyas and Vaishyas although not
very happy in their mutual relationship managed to work by compromise. The
Brahmin flattered the Kshatriya and both let the Vaishya live in order to be
able to live upon him. But the three agreed to beat down the Shudra. He was not
allowed to acquire wealth lest he should be independent of the three Varncus. He was prohibited from
acquiring knowledge lest he should keep a steady vigil regarding his interests.
He was prohibited from bearing arms lest he should have the means to rebel
against their authority. That this is how
the Shudras were treated by the Tryavarnikas is evidenced by the Laws of Manu.
There is no code of laws more infamous regarding social rights than the Laws of
Manu. Any instance from anywhere of social injustice must pale before it. Why
have the mass of people tolerated the social evils to which they have been
subjected? There have been social revolutions in other countries of the world.
Why have there not been social revolutions in India is a question which has
incessantly troubled me. There is only one answer, which I can give and it is
that the lower classes of Hindus have been completely disabled for direct
action on account of this wretched system of Chaturvarnya. They could not bear
arms and without arms they could not rebel. They were all ploughmen or rather
condemned to be ploughmen and they never were allowed to convert their
ploughshare into swords. They had no bayonets and therefore everyone who chose
could and did sit upon them. On account of the Chaturvarnya, they could receive
no education. They could not think out or know the way to their salvation. They
were condemned to be lowly and not knowing the way of escape and not having the
means of escape, they became reconciled to eternal servitude, which they
accepted as their inescapable fate. It is true that even in Europe the strong
has not shrunk from the exploitation, nay the spoliation of the weak. But in
Europe, the strong have never contrived to make the weak helpless against
exploitation so shamelessly as was the case in India among the Hindus. Social
war has been raging between the strong and the weak far more violently in
Europe than it has ever been in India. Yet, the weak in Europe has had in his
freedom of military service his physical
weapon, in suffering his political
weapon and in education his moral
weapon. These three weapons for emancipation were never withheld by the
strong from the weak in Europe. All these weapons were, however, denied to the
masses in India by Chaturvarnya. There cannot be a more degrading system of
social organization than the Chaturvarnya. It is the system which deadens,
paralyses and cripples the people from helpful activity. This is no
exaggeration. History bears ample evidence. There is only one period in Indian
history which is a period of freedom, greatness and glory. That is the period
of the Mourya Empire. At all other times the country suffered from defeat and
darkness. But the Mourya period was a period when Chaturvarnya was completely
annihilated, when the Shudras, who constituted the mass of the people, came
into their own and became the rulers of the country. The period of defeat and
darkness is the period when Chaturvarnya flourished to the damnation of the
greater part of the people of the country.
XVIII
Chaturvarnya is not new. It is
as old as the Vedas. That is one of
the reasons why we are asked by the Arya Samajists to consider its claims.
Judging from the past as a system of social organization, it has been tried and
it has failed. How many times have the Brahmins annihilated the seed of the
Kshatriyas! How many times have the Kshatriyas annihilated the Brahmins! The
Mahabharata and the Puranas are full of incidents of the strife between the
Brahmins and the Kshatriyas. They even quarreled over such petty questions as
to who should salute first, as to who should give way first, the Brahmins or
the Kshatriyas, when the two met in the street. Not only was the Brahmin an
eyesore to die Kshatriya and the Kshatriya an eyesore to the Brahmin, it seems
that the Kshatriyas had become tyrannical and the masses, disarmed as they were
under the system of Chaturvarnya, were praying Almighty God for relief from
their tyranny. The Bhagwat tells us very definitely that Krishna had taken
Avtar for one sacred purpose and that was to annihilate the Kshatriyas. With
these instances of rivalry and enmity between the different Vurnas before us, I do not understand
how any one can hold out Chaturvarnya as an ideal to be aimed at or as a
pattern, on which the Hindu Society should be remodelled.
XIX
I have dealt with those, who are without you and whose hostility to your
ideal is quite open. There appear to be others, who are neither without you nor
with you. I was hesitating whether I should deal with their point of view. But
on further consideration I have come to the conclusion that I must and that for
two reasons. Firstly, their attitude to the problem of caste is not merely an
attitude of neutrality, but is an attitude of aimed neutrality. Secondly, they
probably represent a considerable body of people. Of these, there is one set
which finds nothing peculiar nor odious in the Caste System of the Hindus. Such
Hindus cite the case of Muslims, Sikhs and Christians and find comfort in the
fact that they too have castes amongst them. In considering this question you
must a.t the outset bear in mind that nowhere is human society one single whole. It is always plural.
In the world of action, the individual is one limit and society the other.
Between them lie all sorts of associative arrangements of lesser and larger
scope, families, friendship, co-operative associations, business combines,
political parties, bands of thieves and robbers. These small groups are usually
firmly welded together and are often as exclusive as castes. They have a narrow
and intensive code, which is often anti-social. This is true of every society,
in Europe as well as in Asia, The question to be asked in determining whether a
given society is an ideal society ; is not whether there are groups in it,
because groups exist in all societies. The. questions to be asked in
determining what is an ideal society are : How numerous and varied are the
interests which are consciously shared by the groups ? How full and free is the
interplay with other forms of associations ? Are the forces that separate
groups and classes more numerous than the forces that unite ? What social
significance is attached to this group life ? Is its exclusiveness a matter of
custom and convenience or is it a matter of religion ? It is in the light of
these questions that one must decide whether caste among Non-Hindus is the same
as caste among Hindus. If we apply these considerations to castes among
Mohammedans, Sikhs and Christians on the one hand and to castes among Hindus on
the other, you will find that caste among Non-Hindus is fundamentally different
from caste among Hindus. First, the ties, which consciously make the Hindus
hold together, are non-existent, while among Non-Hindus there are many that
hold them together. The strength of a society depends upon the presence of
points of contact, possibilities of interaction between different groups which
exist in it. These are what Carlyle calls " organic filaments " i.e. the elastic threads which help to
bring the disintegrating elements together and to reunite them. There is no
integrating farce among the Hindus to counteract the disintegration caused by
caste. While among the Non-Hindus there are plenty of these organic filaments
which bind them together. Again it must be borne in mind that although there
are castes among Non-Hindus, as there are among Hindus, caste has not the same
social significance for Non-Hindus as it has for Hindus. Ask Mohammedan or a
Sikh, who he is? He tells you that he is a Mohammedan or a Sikh as the case may
be. He does not tell you his caste although he has one and you are satisfied
with his answer. When he tells you that he is a Muslim, you do not proceed to
ask him whether he is a Shiya or a Suni; Sheikh or Saiyad ; Khatik or Pinjari.
When he tells you he is a Sikh, you do not ask him whether he is Jat or Roda ;
Mazbi or Ramdasi. But you are not satisfied, if a person tells you that he is a
Hindu. You feel bound to inquire into his caste. Why ? Because so essential is
caste in the case of a Hindu that without knowing it you do not feel sure what
sort of a being he is. That caste has not the same social significance among
Non-Hindus as it has among Hindus is clear if you take into consideration the
consequences which follow breach of caste. There may be castes among Sikhs and
Mohammedans but the Sikhs and the Mohammedans will not outcast a Sikh or a
Mohammedan if he broke his caste. Indeed, the very idea of excommunication is
foreign to the Sikhs and the Mohammedans. But with the Hindus the case is entirely
different. He is sure to be outcasted if he broke caste. This shows the
difference in the social significance of caste to Hindus and Non-Hindus. This
is the second point of difference. But there is also a third and a more
important one. Caste among the non-Hindus has no religious consecration; but
among the Hindus most decidedly it has. Among the Non-Hindus, caste is only a
practice, not a sacred institution. They did not originate it. With them it is
only a survival. They do not regard caste as a religious dogma. Religion
compels the Hindus to treat isolation and segregation of castes as a virtue.
Religion does not compel the Non-Hindus to take the same attitude towards
caste. If Hindus wish to break caste, their religion will come in their way.
But it will not be so in the case of Non-Hindus. It is, therefore, a dangerous
delusion to take comfort in the mere existence of caste among Non-Hindus,
without caring to know what place caste occupies in their life and whether
there are other " organic filaments ", which subordinate the feeling
of caste to the feeling of community. The sooner the Hindus are cured of this
delusion the butter.
The other set denies that caste
presents any problem at all for the .Hindus
to consider. Such Hindus seek
comfort in the view that the Hindus have survived and take this as a proof of
their fitness to survive. This point of view is well expressed by Prof. S.
Radhakrishnan in his Hindu view of life. Referring
to Hinduism he says, " The civilization itself has not, been a short-lived
one. its historic records date back for over four thousand years and even then
it had reached a stage of civilization which has continued its unbroken, though
at times slow and static, course until the present day. It has stood the stress
and strain of more than four or five millenniums of spiritual thought and
experience. Though peoples of different races and cultures have been pouring into India from the dawn of
History, Hinduism has been able to maintain its supremacy and even the
proselytising creeds backed by political power have not been able to coerce the
large majority of Hindus to their views. The Hindu culture possesses some
vitality which seems to be denied to some other more forceful current . It is
no more necessary to dissect Hinduism than to open a tree to see whether the
sap still runs." The name of Prof. Radhakrishnan is big enough to invest
with profundity whatever he says and impress the minds of his readers. But I
must not hesitate to speak out my mind. For, I fear that his statement may
become the basis of a vicious argument that the fact of survival is proof of
fitness to survive. It seems to me that the question is. not whether a
community lives or dies ; the question is on what plane does it live. There are
different modes of survival. But all
are not equally honourable. For an individual as well as for a society, there
is a gulf between merely living and living worthily. To fight in a battle and
to live in glory is one mode. To beat a retreat, to surrender and to live the
life of a captive is. also a mode of survival. It is useless for a Hindu to
take comfort in the fact that he and his people have survived. What he must
consider is what is the quality of their survival. If he does that, I am sure
he will cease to take pride in the mere fact of survival. A Hindu's life has
been a life of continuous defeat and what appears to him to be life everlasting
is not living everlastingly but is really a life which is perishing
everlastingly. It is a mode of survival of which every right-minded Hindu, who
is not afraid to own up the truth, will feel ashamed.
XX
There is no doubt; in my
opinion, that unless you change your social order you can achieve little by way
of progress. You cannot mobilize the community either for defence or for offence.
You cannot build anything on the foundations of caste. You cannot build up a
nation, you cannot build up a morality. Anything that you will build on the
foundations of caste will crack and will never be a whole.
The only question that remains to be considered is—How to bring about the reform of the Hindu social order ? How to
abolish caste ? This is a question of supreme importance. There is a view
that in the refarm of caste, the first step to take, is to abolish sub-castes.
This view is based upon the supposition that there is a greater similarity in
manners and status between sub-caste than there is between castes. I think,
this is an erroneous supposition. The Brahmins of Northem and Central India are
socially of lower grade, as compared with the Brahmins of the Deccan and
Southern India. The former are only cooks and water-carriers while the latter
occupy a high social position. On the other hand, in Northern India, the
Vaishyas and Kayasthas are intellectually and socially on a par with the Brahmins
of the Deccan and Southern India. Again, in the matter of food there is no
similarity between the Brahmins of the Deccan and Southern India, who are
vegetarians and the Brahmins of Kashmir and Bengal who are non-vegetarians. On
the other hand, the Brahmins of the- Deccan and Southern India have more in
common so far as food is concerned with such non-Brahmins as the Gujaratis,
Marwaris, Banias and Jains. There is no doubt that from the standpoint of
making the transit from one caste to another easy, the fusion of the Kayasthas
of Northern India and the other Non-Brahmins of Southern India with the
Non-Brahmins of the Deccan and the Dravid country is more practicable than the
fusion of the Brahmins of the South with the Brahmins of the North. But assuming
that the fusion of sub-Castes is possible, what guarantee is there that the
abolition of sub-Castes will necessarily lead to the abolition of Castes ? On
the contrary, it may happen that the process may stop with the abolition of
sub-Castes. In that case, the abolition of sub-Castes will only help to
strengthen the Castes and make them more powerful and therefore more
mischievous. This remedy is therefore neither practicable nor effective and may
easily prove to be a wrong remedy. Another plan of action for the abolition of
Caste is to begin with inter-caste dinners. This also, in my opinion, is an
inadequate remedy. There are many Castes which allow inter-dining. But it is a
common experience that inter-dining has not succeeded in killing the spirit of
Caste and the consciousness of Caste. I am convinced that the real remedy is
inter-marriage. Fusion of blood can alone create the feeling of being kith and
kin and unless this feeling of kinship, of being kindred, becomes paramount the
separatist feeling—the feeling of being aliens—created by Caste will not
vanish. Among the Hindus inter-marriage must necessarily be a factor of greater
force in social life than it need be in the life of the non-Hindus. Where
society is already well-knit by other ties, marriage is an ordinary incident of
life. But where society cut asunder, marriage as a binding force becomes a
matter of urgent necessity. The real
remedy for breaking Caste is inter-marriage. Nothing else will serve as the
solvent of Caste. Your Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal has adopted this line of
attack.
It is a direct and frontal attack, and I congratulate you upon a collect
diagnosis and more upon your having shown the courage to tell the Hindus what
is really wrong with them. Political tyranny is nothing compared to social
tyranny and a reformer, who defies society, is a much more courageous man than
a politician, who defies Government. You are right in holding that Caste will
cease to be an operative farce only when inter-dining and inter-marriage have
become matters of common course. You have located the source of the disease.
But is your prescription the right prescription for the disease ? Ask
yourselves this question ; Why is it that a large majority of Hindus do not
inter-dine and do not inter-marry ? Why is it that your cause is not popular ?
There can be only one answer to this question and it is that inter-dining and
inter-marriage are repugnant to the beliefs and dogmas which the Hindus regard
as sacred. Caste is not a physical object like a wall of bricks or a line of
barbed wire which prevents the Hindus from co-mingling and which has,
therefore, to be pulled down. Caste is a notion, it is a state of the mind. The
destruction of Caste does not therefore mean the destruction of a physical
barrier. It means a notional change.
Caste may be bad. Caste may lead to conduct so gross as to be called man's
inhumanity to man. All the same, it must be recognized that the Hindus observe
Caste not because they are inhuman or wrong headed. They observe Caste because
they are deeply religious. People are not wrong in observing Caste. In my view,
what is wrong is their religion, which has inculcated this notion of Caste. If
this is correct, then obviously the enemy, you must grapple with, is not the
people who observe Caste, but the Shastras
which teach them this religion of Caste. Criticising and ridiculing people for
not inter-dining or inter-marrying or occasionally holding inter-caste dinners
and celebrating inter-caste marriages, is a futile method of achieving the desired
end. The real remedy is to destroy the belief in the sanctity of the Shastras. How do you expect to succeed,
if you allow the Shastras to continue
to mould the beliefs and opinions of the people ? Not to question the authority
of the Shastras , to permit the
people to believe in their sanctity and their sanctions and to blame them and
to criticise them for their acts as being irrational and inhuman is a
incongruous way of carrying on social reform. Reformers working for the removal
of untouchability including Mahatma Gandhi, do not seem to realize that the
acts of the people are merely the results of their beliefs inculcated upon
their minds by the Shastras and that
people will not change their conduct until they cease to believe in the
sanctity of the Shastras on which
their conduct is founded. No wonder that such efforts have not produced any
results. You also seem to be erring in the same way as the reformers working in
the cause of removing untouchability. To agitate for and to organise
inter-caste dinners and inter-caste marriages is like forced feeding brought
about by artificial means. Make every man and woman free from the thraldom of
the Shastras , cleanse their minds of
the pernicious notions founded on the Shastras,
and he or she will inter-dine and inter-marry, without your telling him or her
to do so.
It is no use seeking refuge in quibbles. It is no use telling people that
the Shastras do not say what they are
believed to say, grammatically read or logically interpreted. What matters is
how the Shastras have been understood
by the people. You must take the stand that Buddha took. You must take the
stand which Guru Nanak took. You must not only discard the Shastras, you must deny their authority, as did Buddha and Nanak.
You must have courage to tell the Hindus, that what is wrong with them is their
religion— the religion which has produced in them this notion of the sacredness
of Caste. Will you show that courage ?
XXI
What are your chances of success ? Social reforms fall into different
species. There is a species of reform, which does not relate to the religious
notion of people but is purely secular in character. There is also a species of
reform, which relates to the religious notions of people. Of such a species of
reform, there are two varieties. In one, the reform accords with the principles
of the religion and merely invites people, who have departed from it, to revert
to them and to follow them. The second is a reform which not only touches the
religious principles but is diametrically opposed to those principles and
invites people to depart from and to discard their authority and to act
contrary to those principles. Caste is the natural outcome of certain religious
beliefs which have the sanction of the Shastras,
which are believed to contain the command of divinely inspired sages who were
endowed with a supernatural wisdom and whose commands, therefore, cannot be
disobeyed without committing sin. The destruction of Caste is a reform which
falls under the third category. To ask people to give up Caste is to ask them
to go contrary to their fundamental religious notions. It is obvious that the
first and second species of reform are easy. But the third is a stupendous
task, well nigh impossible. The Hindus hold to the sacredness of the social
order. Caste has a divine basis. You must therefore destroy the sacredness and
divinity with which Caste has become invested. In the last analysis, this means
you must destroy the authority of the Shastras
and the Vedas.
I have emphasized this question of the ways and means of destroying
Caste, because I think that knowing the proper ways and means is more important
than knowing the ideal. If you do not know the real ways and means, all your
shots are sure to be misfires. If my analysis is correct then your task is
herculean. You alone can say whether you are capable of achieving it.
Speaking for myself, I see the task to be well nigh impossible. Perhaps
you would like to know why I think so. Out of the many reasons, which have led
me to take this view, I will mention some, which I regard much important. One
of these reasons is the attitude of hostility, which the Brahmins have shown
towards this question. The Brahmins form the vanguard of the movement for
political reform and in some cases also of economic reform. But they are not to
be found even as camp followers in the army raised to break down the barricades
of Caste. Is there any hope of the Brahmins ever taking up a lead in the future
in this matter? I say no. You may ask why ? You may argue that there is no
reason why Brahmins should continue to shun social reform. You may argue that
the Brahmins know that the bane of Hindu Society is Caste and as an enlightened
class could not be expected to be indifferent to its consequences. You may
argue that there are secular Brahmins and priestly Brahmins and if the latter
do not take up the cudgels on behalf of those who want to break Caste, the
former will. All this of course sounds very plausible. But in all this it is
forgotten that the break up of the Caste system is bound to affect adversely
the Brahmin Caste. Having regard to this, is it reasonable to expect that the
Brahmins will ever consent to lead a movement the ultimate result of which is
to destroy the power and prestige of the Brahmin Caste ? Is it reasonable to
expect the secular Brahmins to take part in a movement directed against the
priestly Brahmins ? In my judgment, it is useless to make a distinction between
the secular Brahmins and priestly Brahmins. Both are kith and kin. They are two
arms of the same body and one bound to fight for the existence of the other. In
this connection, I am reminded of some very pregnant remarks made by Prof.
Dicey in his English Constitution.
Speaking of the actual limitation on the legislative supremacy of Parliament,
Dicey says : " The actual exercise of authority by any sovereign whatever,
and notably by Parliament, is bounded or controlled by two limitations. Of
these the one is an external, and the other is an internal limitation. The
external limit to the real power of a sovereign consists in the possibility or
certainty that his subjects or a large number of them will disobey or resist
his laws. . . The internal limit to the exercise of sovereignty arises from the
nature of the sovereign power itself. Even a despot exercises his powers in
accordance with his character, which is itself moulded by the circumstance
under which he lives, including under that head the moral feelings of the time
and the society to which he belongs. The Sultan could not, if he would, change
the religion of the Mohammedan world, but even if he could do so, it is in the
very highest degree improbable that the head of Mohammedanism should wish to
overthrow the religion of Mohammed ; the internal check on the exercise of the
Sultan's power is at least as strong as the external limitation. People
sometimes ask the idle question, why the Pope does not introduce this or that
reform? The true answer is that a revolutionist is not the kind of man who
becomes a Pope and that a man who becomes a Pope has no wish to be a
revolutionist." I think, these remarks apply equally to the Brahmins of
India and one can say with equal truth that if a man who becomes a Pope has no
wish to become a revolutionary, a man who is born a Brahmin has much less
desire to become a revolutionary. Indeed, to expect a Brahmin to be a
revolutionary in matters of social reform is as idle as to expect the British
Parliament, as was said by Leslie Stephen, to pass an Act requiring all
blue-eyed babies to be murdered.
Some of you will say that it is a matter of small concern whether the
Brahmins come forward to lead the movement against Caste or whether they do
not. To take this view is in my judgment to ignore the part played by the
intellectual class in the community. Whether you accept the theory of the great
man as the maker of history or whether you do not, this much you will have to
concede that in every country the intellectual class is the most influential
class, if not the governing class. The intellectual class is the class which
can foresee, it is the class which can advise and give lead. In no country does
the mass of the people live the life of intelligent thought and action. It is
largely imitative and follows the intellectual class. There is no exaggeration
in saying that the entire destiny of a country depends upon its intellectual
class. If the intellectual class is honest, independent and disinterested it
can be trusted to take the initiative and give a proper lead when a crisis
arises. It is true that intellect by itself is no virtue. It is only a means
and the use of means depends upon the ends which an intellectual person
pursues. An intellectual man can be a good man but he can easily be a rogue.
Similarly an intellectual class may be a band of high-souled persons, ready to
help, ready to emancipate erring humanity or it may easily be a gang of crooks
or a body of advocates of a narrow clique from which it draws its support. You
may think it a pity that the intellectual class in India is simply another name
for the Brahmin caste. You may regret that the two are one.; that the existence
of the intellectual class should be bound with one single caste, that this
intellectual class should share the interest and the aspirations of that
Brahmin caste, which has regarded itself the custodian of the interest of that
caste, rather than of the interests of the country. All this may be very
regrettable. But the fact remains, that the Brahmins form the intellectual
class of the Hindus. It is not only an intellectual class but it is a class
which is held in great reverence by the rest of the Hindus. The Hindus are
taught that the Brahmins are Bhudevas
(Gods on earth) vernanam
brahmnam guruh ! : The Hindus
are taught that Brahmins alone can be their teachers. Manu says, "If it be
asked how it should be with respect to points of the Dharma which have not been
specially mentioned, the answer is that which Brahmins who are Shishthas
propound shall doubtless have legal force." :
anamnateshu dharmehu katham
syaditi chedbhveta !
yam shishta brahnam bruyuh sa dharmah syadashnkitah !!
When such an intellectual class, which holds the rest of the community in
its grip, is opposed to the reform of Caste, the chances of success in a
movement for the break-up of the Caste system appear to me very, very remote.
The second reason, why I say the task is impossible, will be clear if you
will bear in mind that the Caste system has two aspects. In one of its aspects,
it divides men into separate communities. In its second aspect, it places these
communities in a graded order one above the other in social status. Each caste
takes its pride and its consolation in the fact that in the scale of castes it
is above some other caste. As an outward mark of this gradation, there is also
a gradation of social and religious rights technically spoken of an Ashta-dhikaras
and Sanskaras.
The higher the grade of a caste, the greater the number of these rights and the
lower the grade, the lesser their number. Now this gradation, this scaling of
castes, makes it impossible to organise a common front against the Caste
System. If a caste claims the right to inter-dine
and inter-marry with another caste placed above
it, it is frozen, instantly it is told by mischief-mongers, and there are many
Brahmins amongst such mischief-mongers, that it will have to concede inter-dining and inter-marriage
with castes below it ! All are slaves of the Caste
System. But all the slaves are not equal in status. To excite the proletariat
to bring about an economic revolution, Karl Marx told them : " You have nothing to lose except your chains."
But the artful way in which the social and religious rights are distributed
among the different castes whereby some have more
and some have less, makes the slogan of Karl Marx quite useless to excite the
Hindus against the Caste System. Castes form a graded system of sovereignties,
high and low, which are jealous of their status and which know that if a
general dissolution came, some of them stand to lose
more of their prestige and power than others do. You cannot, therefore, have a
general mobilization of the Hindus, to use a military expression, for an attack
on the Caste System.
XXII
Can you appeal to reason and ask the Hindus to discard Caste as being
contrary to reason ? That raises the question : Is a Hindu free to follow his reason? Manu has laid down three sanctions to which every
Hindu must conform in the matter of his behaviour vedah smritih sadacharah uvasy cha
priyamatmanah Here there is no place for reason to play
its part. A Hindu must follow either Veda,
Smriti
or Sadachar.
He cannot follow anything else. In the first place how are the texts of the Vedas and Smritis to
be interpreted whenever any doubt arises regarding their meaning ? On this important question the view of Manu is quite
definite. He says :
yovamanyet te moole
hetushrashraya dwizah
sa sadhubhirbahishkaryo nashtiko
vedandikah
According to this rule, rationalism as a canon of interpreting the Vedas and Smritis, is absolutely condemned. It is regarded to be as wicked as atheism and the punishment
provided for it is ex-communication. Thus, where a matter is covered by the Veda or the Smriti, a Hindu cannot resort to rational thinking. Even when there
is a conflict between Vedas and Smritis on matters on which they have given a positive injunction, the solution is not left to
reason. When there is a conflict between two Shrutis, both are to be regarded as
of equal authority. Either of them may be followed. No attempt is to be made to
find out which of the two accords with reason.
This is made clear by Manu:
shrutidwadham tu yatra syaptatra dharvarvudhau smritau
"When there is a conflict between Shruti and Sinriti ,
the Shruti
must prevail." But here too, no attempt must be made to find out which of
the two accords with reason. This is laid down by Manu in the following Shloka :
ya vedabahyah snrityo yashch kashch kridrishtah i
sarvasta nishphalah prety tamonishtha hi tah smritah ii
Again, when there is a conflict between two Smritis, the Manu-Smriti must prevail, but no attempt is to be
made to find out which of the two accords with reason. This is the ruling given
by Brihaspati:
vedayatvopanibandhritavat pramanyam hi manoah
smritah
manvrthaviparita tu ya smritih sa na shashyate
It is, therefore, clear that in any matter on which the Shrutis and Smritis have given a positive direction, a Hindu is not free to use
his reasoning faculty. The same rule is laid down in the Mahabharat :
puranam manvo dharmah sango vedashchikitsitam
agasidhani chatvari na hantavyani hetubhih
He must abide by their directions. The Caste and Varna are matters, which are dealt with by the Vedas and
the Smritis and consequently, appeal
to reason can have no effect on a Hindu. So far as Caste and Varna are concerned, not only the Shastras do
not permit the Hindu to use his reason in the decision of the question, but
they have taken care to see that no occasion is left to examine in a rational
way the foundations of his belief in Caste and Varna. It must be a source of silent amusement to many a Non-Hindu
to find hundreds and thousands of Hindus breaking Caste on certain occasions,
such as railway journey and foreign travel and yet endeavouring to maintain
Caste for the rest of their lives ! The
explanation of this phenomenon discloses another fetter on the reasoning
faculties of the Hindus. Man's life is generally habitual and unreflective.
Reflective thought, in the sense of active, persistent and careful
consideration of any belief or supposed form or knowledge in the light of the
grounds that support it and further conclusions to which it tends, is quite
rare and arises only in a situation which presents a dilemma—a Crisis-Railway journeys and foreign travels are really
occasions of crisis in the life of a Hindu and it is natural to expect a Hindu to
ask himself why he should maintain Caste at all, if he cannot maintain it at
all times. But he does not. He breaks Caste at one step
and proceeds to observe it at the next without raising any question. The reason for this astonishing conduct is to be found in the rule of the Shastras, which directs him to
maintain Caste as far as possible and to undergo praynschitia when he cannot. By this
theory of prayaschitta
,
the Shastras by following a spirit of
compromise have given caste a perpetual lease of
life and have smothered reflective thought which would have otherwise led to the destruction of the notion of
Caste.
There have been many who have worked in the cause of the abolition of
Caste and Untouchability. Of those, who can be mentioned, Ramanuja,
Kabir and others stand out prominently. Can you
appeal to the acts of these reformers and exhort the Hindus to follow them ? It is true that Manu
has included Sadachar
(sadachar) as one of the sanctions along with Shruti and Smriti. Indeed, Sadachar has been given a higher place than Shastras :
yaddwacharyate yen dharmya vadharmamev va
deshasyacharanam nityam charitram tadwikirtatam
according to this, sadachar,
whether, it is dharmya or adharmya in accordance with Shastras or
contrary to Shastras,
must be followed. But what is the meaning of Sadachar ?
If any one were to suppose that Sadachar
means right or good acts i.e. acts of
good and righteous men he would find himself greatly mistaken. Sadachar does not means good acts or
acts of good men. It means ancient custom good
or bad. The following verse makes
this clear :
yasmin deshe ya acharah
parmpayakramagatah
varnani kil sarvesham sa
sadachar uchyate
As though to warn people against the view that Sadachar means good acts
or acts of good men and fearing that people might understand it that way and follow the
acts of good men, the Smrities have
commanded the Hindus in unmistakable terms not to follow even Gods in their
good deeds, if they are contrary to Shruti, Smrili and Sadachar. This may sound to be most
extraordinary, most perverse, but the. fact remains that na devacharitam charet is an injunction, issued to the Hindus by their
Shastras. Reason and morality are the two
most powerful weapons in the armoury of a Reformer.
To deprive him of the
use of these weapons is to disable him for action .How are you going to
break up Caste, if people are not free to consider whether it accords
with reason ? How are you going to break up Caste if people are not free to consider whether it
accords with morality ? The wall built around Caste is impregnable and the material, of
which it is built, contains none of the combustible stuff of reason and morality.
Add to this the fact that inside this wall stands
the army of Brahmins, who form the intellectual class, Brahmins who are the natural leaders of the Hindus, Brahmins who are there not as mere mercenary
soldiers but as an army fighting
for its homeland and you will get an idea why I think that breaking-up
of Caste amongst the Hindus is well-nigh impossible.
At any rate, it would take
ages before a breach is made. But whether the doing of the deed
takes time or whether it can be done quickly, you must not forget that if you wish to bring about &
breach in the system then you have got to apply
the dynamite to the Vedas and the Shastras, which deny any part to reason, to Vedas and Shastras, which deny any part to
morality. You must destroy the Religion of the Shrutis and the Smritis.
Nothing else will avail. This is my considered view of the matter.
XXIII
Some may not understand what I mean by destruction
of Religion; some may find the idea revolting to
them and some may find it revolutionary. Let me
therefore explain my position. I do not know whether you draw a distinction
between principles and rules. But I
do. Not only I make a distinction but I say that
this distinction is real and important. Rules are practical ; they are habitual ways of doing things according to prescription. But principles
are intellectual; they are useful methods of
judging things. Rules seek to tell an agent just what course of action to pursue. Principles do not prescribe a
specific course of action. Rules, like cooking recipes, do tell just what to do
and how to do it. A prinsiple, such as that of
justice, supplies a main head by reference to which he is to consider the bearings of his desires and purposes, it guides him
in his thinking by suggesting to him the important consideration which he should bear in mind. This difference between rules and principles makes the acts
done in pursuit of them different in quality and in content. Doing what is said
to be,
good by virtue of a rule and doing good in the light of a principle are two
different things. The principle may be wrong but the act is conscious and responsible. The rule may be right but the act is
mechanical. A religious act may not be a correct act but must at least be a
responsible act. To permit of this responsibility, Religion must mainly be a matter
of principles only. It cannot be a matter of rules. The moment it degenerates
into rules it ceases to be Religion, as it kills responsibility which is the
essence of a truly religious act. What is this
Hindu Religion ? Is it a set of principles or is it a code of rules ? Now the Hindu Religion, as contained in the Vedas and the Smritis, is nothing but a mass of sacrificial, social, political
and sanitary rules and regulations, all mixed up. What is called Religion by the Hindus is nothing but a multitude of commands and prohibitions.
Religion, in the sense of spiritual principles, truly universal, applicable to
all races, to all countries, to all times, is not to be found in them, and if
it is, it does not form the governing part of a Hindu's life. That for a Hindu,
Dharma means commands
and prohibitions is clear from the way the word Dharma
is used in Vedas and the Sinritis and understood by the
commentators. The word Dharma as used in the Vedas in most cases means religious
ordinances or rites. Even Jaimini in his Purva-Mimansa defines Dharma as "a desirable goal or result that is indicated by injunctive (Vedic) passages ". To put it in plain language, what the Hindus
call Religion is really Law or at best legalized class-ethics. Frankly, I
refuse to cull this code of ordinances, as Religion. The first evil of such a
code of ordinances, misrepresented to the people as Religion, is that it tends
to deprive moral life of freedom and spontaneity
and to reduce it (for the conscientious at any rate) to a more or less anxious and servile
conformity to externally imposed rules. Under it,
there is no loyalty to ideals, there is only conformity
to commands. But the worst evil of this code of ordinances
is that the laws it contains must be the same yesterday, today and forever.
They are iniquitous in that they are not the same
for one class as for another. But this iniquity is made perpetual in that they
are prescribed to be the same for all generations.
The objectionable part of such a scheme is not that they are made by certain persons called Prophets or Law-givers. The
objectionable part is that this code has been invested with the character of
finality and fixity. Happiness notoriously varies with the conditions and
circumstances of a person, as well as with the
conditions of different people and epochs. That being the case, how can
humanity endure this code of eternal laws, without being cramped and without
being crippled ? I have, therefore, no hesitation
in saying that such a religion must be destroyed and I say, there is nothing
irreligious in working for the destruction of such
a religion. Indeed I hold that it is your bounden duty to tear the mask, to remove the
misrepresentation that as caused by misnaming this Law as Religion. This is an
essential step for you. Once you clear the minds of the people of this
misconception and enable them to realize that what they are told as Religion is
not Religion but that it is really Law, you will be in a position to urge for
its amendment or abolition. So long as people look upon it as Religion they
will not be ready for a change, because the idea of Religion is generally
speaking not associated with the idea of change. But the idea of law is
associated with the idea of change and when people
come to know that what is called Religion is
really Law, old and archaic, they will be ready for a change, for people know
and accept that law can be changed.
XXIV
While I condemn a Religion of Rules, I must
not be understood to hold the opinion that there is no necessity for a
religion. On the contrary, I agree with Burke when he says that, "
True religion is the foundation of society, the basis on which all true Civil
Government rests, and both their sanction." Consequently, when I urge that
these ancient rules of life be annulled, I am anxious that its place shall be
taken by a Religion of Principles, which alone can lay claim to being a true
Religion. Indeed, I am so convinced of the necessity of Religion that I feel I
ought to tell you in outline what I regard as necessary items in this religious
reform. The following in my opinion should be the cardinal items in this reform
: ( 1 ) There should be one
and only one standard book of Hindu Religion, acceptable to all Hindus and
recognized by all Hindus. This of course means that all other books of Hindu religion
such as Vedas, Shastras and Puranas, which are treated as sacred
and authoritative, must by law cease to be so and the preaching of any
doctrine, religious or social contained in these books should be penalized. (2)
It should be better if priesthood among Hindus was abolished. But as this seems
to be impossible, the priesthood must at least cease to be hereditary. Every
person who professes to be a Hindu must be eligible for being a priest. It
should be provided by law that no Hindu shall be entitled to be a priest unless
he has passed an examination prescribed by the State and holds a sanad from
the State permitting him to practise. (3) No ceremony performed by a priest who does not hold a sanad shall be deemed to be valid in law and it should be made penal for a person who has no sanad to officiate as a priest. (4) A priest should be the servant
of the State and should be subject to the disciplinary
action by the State in the matter of his morals, beliefs and worship, in
addition to his being subject along with other citizens to the ordinary law of
the land. (5) The number of priests should be limited by law according to the
requirements of the State as is done in the case of the I.C.S. To some, this may sound radical. But to my
mind there is nothing revolutionary in this. Every profession in India is
regulated. Engineers must show proficiency, Doctor must show proficiency,
Lawyers must show proficiency, before they are allowed to practise their
professions. During the whole of their career, they must not only obey the law
of the land, civil as well as
criminal, but they must also obey the special code of morals prescribed by
their respective professions. The priest's is the only profession where
proficiency is not required. The profession of a Hindu priest is the only
profession which is not subject to any code. Mentally a priest may be an idiot,
physically a priest may be suffering from a foul disease, such as syphilis or gonorrheae, morally he may be a wreck. But he is fit
to officiate at solemn ceremonies, to enter the sanctum sanctorum of a Hindu temple
and worship the Hindu God. All this becomes
possible among the Hindus because for a priest it is enough to be born in a priestly caste. The whole thing is abominable
and is due to the fact that the priestly class
among Hindus is subject neither to law nor to morality. It recognizes no
duties. It knows only of rights and privileges. It is a pest which divinity
seems to have let loose on the masses for their
mental and moral degradation. The priestly class must be brought under control
by some such legislation as I have outlined above. It will prevent it from
doing mischief and from misguiding people. It will democratise it by throwing
it open to every one. It will certainly help to kill the Brahminism and will
also help to kill Caste, which is nothing but Brahminism incarnate. Brahminism
is the poison which has spoiled Hinduism. You will succeed in saving Hinduism
if you will kill Brahminism. There should be no opposition to this reform from
any quarter. It should be welcomed even by the Arya
Samajists, because this is merely an application
of their own doctrine of guna-karma.
Whether you do that or you do not, you must
give a new doctrinal basis to your Religion—a
basis that will be in consonance with Liberty,
Equality and Fraternity, in short, with Democracy. I am no authority on the subject. But I am told that for such religious
principles as will be in consonance with Liberty, Equality and Fraternity it may not be necessary
for you to borrow from foreign sources and that you could draw for such
principles on the Upanishads. Whether you could do so without
a complete remoulding,
a considerable scraping and chipping off the ore they contain ,
is more than I can say. This means a complete
change in the fundamental notions of life-it means a complete
change in the values
of life. It means a
complete change in outlook and in attitude towards men and things. It means conversion but if you do not. like the word, I will say, it means new
life. But a new life cannot enter a body that is dead. New life can center only in a new
body. The old body must die before a new body can come into existence
and a new life can enter
into it. To put it simply:
the old must cease to be operative
before the new can
begin to enliven and to pulsate. This is what I meant when I said you must discard the authority
of the Shastras and destroy the religion of the Shastras.
XXV
I have kept you too long. It is time I brought this
address to a close. This would have been a convenient point for me to have stopped. But this would probably be my
last address to a Hindu audience on a subject
vitally concerning
the Hindus. I would
therefore like,
before I close, to place
before the Hindus, if they will allow me, some questions which I regard as
vital and invite them seriously to consider the same.
In the first place, the Hindus must consider whether it is sufficient to take the placid view of the anthropologist that there is nothing to be said about the beliefs, habits, morals and outlooks on life, which obtain among the different peoples of the world except that they often differ ;
or whether it is not necessary to make an attempt
to find out what kind of morality, beliefs, habits
and outlook have worked best and have enabled
those who possessed
them to flourish, to go strong, to people the earth and to have dominion over it. As is observed
by Prof. Carver, "
Morality and religion, as the organised expression of moral
approval and disapproval, must be regarded as
factors in the struggle for existence as truly as
are weapons for offence and defence, teeth and
claws, horns and hoofs, furs and feathers. The social group, community, tribe or nation, which
develops an unworkable scheme of morality or
within which those social acts which weaken it and unfit it for survival, habitually create the sentiment of approval, while those which would
strengthen and enable it to be expanded habitually
create the sentiment of disapproval, will eventually be eliminated. It is its habits of approval or disapproval
(these are the results of religion and morality)
that handicap it, as really as the possession of
two wings on one side with none on. the other will handicap the colony of flies. It would be as futile in the one
case as in the other to argue, that one system is just
as good as another." Morality and religion, therefore, are not mere
matters of likes and dislikes.
You may dislike exceedingly a scheme of morality, which, if universally practised within a nation, would
make that nation the strongest nation on the face of the earth. Yet in spite of
your dislike such a nation will become strong. You
may like exceedingly a scheme of morality and an
ideal of justice, which if universally practised within a nation, would make it enable to hold
its own in the struggle with other nations. Yet in spite of your admiration
this nation will eventually
disappear. The Hindus must, therefore, examine their religion
and then morality in terms
of their survival value.
Secondly, the
Hindus must consider whether they should conserve the whole of their social heritage or
select what is helpful and transmit to future generations
only that much and no more. Prof, John Dewey., who was my teacher and to whom I owe so much, has said : " Every society
gets encumbered with what is trivial, with dead
wood from the past, and with what is positively perverse... As a society becomes more enlightened, it realizes that it is responsible not to conserve and transmit, the whole of its
existing achievements, but only such as make for a better future society." Even Burke in
spite of the vehemence with which he
opposed the principle of change embodied in the
French Revolution, was compelled to admit that "
a State without the means of some change is without
the means of its conservation. Without such means it might even
risk the loss of that
part of the constitution which it wished the most religiously to preserve, '' What Burke said of a State applies equally to a society.
Thirdly, the Hindus must consider whether they must
not cease to worship the past as supplying its ideals.
The beautiful effect
of this worship of the
past are best summed up by Prof. Dewey when he says : " An individual can live only in the present. The present is not just something which comes after the past ; much less something produced by it. It is what life is in leaving
the past behind it. The study
of past products will
not help us to understand the present. A knowledge of the past and its heritage is of great significance when it enters into the present, but not otherwise. And the mistake of making
the-records and remains of the past the main material of education is that it tends to make the past a rival of the present and the present a more or less futile imitation of the past." The principle, which makes little of the present act of living and growing, naturally looks upon the
present as empty and upon
the future as remote. Such a principle is inimical
to progress and is an hindrance to a strong and a steady current of life.
Fourthly, the Hindus must consider
whether the time has not come for them to recognize that there is nothing fixed, nothing eternal, nothing sanatan; that everything is changing, that
change is the law of life for individuals as well
as for society. In a changing society, there must be a constant
revolution of old values and the Hindus must realize
that if there must be standards
to measure the acts of men there must also be a readiness to revise those standards.
XXVI
I have to confess that this address has become too lengthy. Whether this
fault is compensated to any extent by breadth or
depth is a matter for you to judge. All I claim is
to have told you candidly my views. I have little to recommend them but some
study and a deep concern in your destiny. If you
will allow me to say, these views are the views of a man, who has been no
tool of power, no flatterer of greatness. They
come from one, almost the whole of whose public exertion has been one
continuous struggle for liberty for the poor and for the oppressed and whose
only reward has been a continuous shower of
calumny and abuse from national journals and national leaders, for no other
reason except that I refuse to join with them in performing the miracle—I will not say trick—of liberating the oppressed
with the gold of the tyrant and raising the poor with the cash of the rich. All
this may not be enough to commend my views. I think they are not likely to
alter yours. But whether they do or do not, the responsibility is entirely
yours. You must make your efforts to uproot Caste,
if not in my way, then in your way. I am sorry, I will not be with you. I have
decided to change. This is not the place for giving reasons. But even when I am gone out of your fold, I will watch your movement with active sympathy and you
will have my assistance for what it may be worth.
Yours is a national cause. Caste is no doubt primarily the breath of the Hindus.
But the Hindus have fouled the air all over and everybody is infected, Sikh,
Muslim and Christian. You, therefore, deserve the support of all those who are
suffering from this infection, Sikh, Muslim and Christian. Yours is more
difficult than the other national cause, namely Swaraj. In the fight for Swaraj
you fight with the whole nation on your side. In this, you have to fight against the whole nation and that too, your own. But it is
more important than Swaraj. There is no use having Swaraj, if you cannot defend
it. More important than the question of defending Swaraj is the question of defending the Hindus under
the Swaraj. In my opinion only when the Hindu Society becomes a casteless
society that it can hope to have strength enough to defend itself. Without such internal strength, Swaraj for Hindus
may turn out to be only a step towards slavery. Good-bye and good wishes for
your success.
Dr. Ambedkar's
Indictment I
The readers
will recall the fact that Dr. Ambedkar was to have
presided last May at the annual conference of the Jat-Pat-Todak
Mandal of Lahore. But the conference itself was
cancelled because Dr. Ambedkar's address was found
by the Reception Committee to be unacceptable. How far a Reception Committee is
justified in rejecting a President of its choice
because of his address that may be objectionable to it is open to question. The
Committee knew Dr. Ambedkar's views on caste and
the Hindu scriptures. They knew also that he had in unequivocal terms decided
to give up Hinduism. Nothing less than the address
that Dr. Ambedkar had prepared was to be expected
from him. The committee appears to have deprived the public of an opportunity of listening to the original views of a man, who
has carved out for himself a unique position in society. Whatever label he
wears in future, Dr. Ambedkar is not the man to allow himself to be forgotten.
Dr. Ambedkar was not going to be beaten by the Reception Committee. He
has answered their rejection of him by publishing the address at his own
expense. He has priced it at 8 annas, I would suggest a reduction to 2 annas or
at least 4 annas.
No reformer can ignore the address. The orthodox will gain by reading it.
This is not to say that the address is not open to
objection. It has to be read only because it is open to serious objection. Dr.
Ambedkar is a challenge to Hinduism. Brought up as a Hindu, educated by a Hindu
potentate, he has become so disgusted with the so-called Savarna Hindus for the treatment that he and his
people have received at their hands that he proposes to leave not only them but
the very religion that is his and their common heritage. He has transferred to
that religion, his disgust against a part of its professors.
But this is not to be wondered at. After all, one can only judge a
system or an institution by the conduct of its representatives.
What is more. Dr. Ambedkar found that the vast majority of Savarna Hindus had
not only conducted themselves inhumanly against those of their fellow religionists, whom they classed as untouchables, but
they had based their conduct on the authority of their scriptures, and when he
began to search them he had found ample warrant for their beliefs in untouchability and all its implications. The author
of the address has quoted chapter and verse in proof of his three-fold indictment—inhuman conduct itself, the unabashed
justification for it on the part of the
perpetrators, and the subsequent discovery that the justification was warranted
by their scriptures.
No Hindu who prizes his faith above life itself
can afford to underrate the importance of this
indictment. Dr Ambedkar
is not alone in his disgust He is its most uncompromising exponent and one of the ablest among them. He is certainly the most irreconcilable among
them. Thank God, in the front rank of the leaders, he is singularly alone and as
yet but a representative of a very small minority.
But what he says is voiced with more or less vehemence by many leaders belonging to the depressed
classes. Only the latter,
for instance Rao Bahadur
M. C. Rajah and Dewan
Bahadur Srinivasan, not only do not threaten to give up Hinduism
but find enough warmth in it to compensate for the
shameful persecution to which the vast mass of Harijans
are exposed.
But the fact of many leaders remaining in the Hindu
fold is no warrant for disregarding what Dr. Ambedkar
has to say. The Savaraas
have to correct their belief and their conduct. Above all
those who are by their learning and influence
among the Savarnas have to give an authoritative interpretation of
the scriptures. The questions that Dr. Ambedkar's indictment
suggest are :
(2) Are all the printed texts to
be regarded as an integral
part of them or is any part of them to be rejected as unauthorised
interpolation ?
(3) What is the answer of such accepted and expurgated scriptures on the question of untouchability,
caste, equality of status, inter-dining and
intermarriages ? (These have been all examined by Dr. Ambedkar in his address.)
I must reserve for the next issue my own
answer to these questions and a statement of the
(at least some) manifest flaws in Dr. Ambedkar's
thesis
II
The Vedas, Upanishads, Smritis and Puranas including Ramayana and Mahabharata are the Hindu Scriptures. Nor is this a
finite list. Every
age or even. generation has added to the list. It follows,
therefore, that everything printed or even found handwritten is not scripture. The Smrities for instance-contain much that can never be accepted as the
word of God. Thus. many of the texts that Dr. Ambedkar quotes from the Smritis
cannot be accepted as authentic. The scriptures,
properly so-called, can only be concerned with
eternal varieties and must appeal to any conscience i.e. any heart whose eyes of understanding are opened. Nothing can be accepted as the
word of God which cannot be tested by reason or be
capable of being spiritually experienced. And even when you have an expurgated
edition of the scriptures, you will need their interpretation. Who is the best
interpreter? Not learned men surely. Learning
there must be. But religion does not live it. It lives in the experiences of
its saints and seers, in their lives and sayings.
When all the most learned commentators of the scriptures are utterly forgotten,
the accumulated experience of the sages and saints
will abide and be an inspiration for ages to come.
Caste has nothing to do with religion. It is
a custom whose origin I do not know and do not
need to know for the satisfaction of my spiritual hunger. But I do know that it
is harmful both to spiritual and national growth. Varna and
Ashrama are institutions which have
nothing to do with castes
.The law of Varna
teaches us that we have each one of us to earn our bread by following the
ancestral calling. it defines
not our rights but our duties. It necessarily has reference to callings that are conducive to the welfare of
humanity and to no other. It also follows that
there is no calling too low and none too high. Ail
are good, lawful and absolutely equal in status. The callings of a Brahmin—
spiritual teacher—-and a scavenger are equal, and
their due performance carries equal merit before God and at one time seems to have carried identical reward before man. Both were entitled to their livelihood
and no more. Indeed one traces
even now in the villages the faint lines of this healthy operation of the law.
Living in Segaon with its population of 600, I do
not find a great disparity between the earnings of different tradesmen including
Brahmins. I find too that real Brahmins are to be found even in these
degenerate days who are living on alms freely given to them and are giving freely of what they
have of spiritual treasures. It would be wrong and improper to judge the law of Varna by its caricature in the lives of men who profess to belong to a Varna, whilst they openly commit a breach
of its only operative rule. Arrogation of a superior status by and of the Varna over
another is a denial of the law. And there is nothing in the law of Varna to warrant a belief in untouchability.
(The essence of Hinduism is contained in its enunciation of one and only God as Truth and its bold acceptance of Ahimsa
as the law of the human family.)
I am aware that my interpretation of Hinduism will be disputed by many besides Dr. Ambedkar.
That does not affect my position. It is an
interpretation by which I have lived for nearly half a century and
according to which I have endeavoured to the best
of my ability to regulate my life.
In my opinion the profound mistake that Dr. Ambedkar
has made in his address is to pick out the texts
of doubtful authenticity and value and the state
of degraded Hindus who are no fit specimens of the faith they so
woefully misrepresent. Judged by the standard applied by Dr. Ambedkar, every known living faith will probably fail.
In his able address, the learned Doctor has over proved his case. Can a
religion that was professed by Chaitanya, Jnyandeo, Tukaram, Tiruvailuvar, Rarnkrishna Paramahansa,
Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Maharshi
Devendranath Tagore, Vivekanand
and host of others who might be easily mentioned, so utterly devoid of merit as
is made out in Dr. Ambedkar's address ? A religion has to be judged not by it's worst specimens but by the best it might have
produced. For that and that alone can be used as
the standard to aspire to, if not to improve upon.
(Harijan,
July 18, 1936)
III
VARNA
VERSUS CASTE
Shri Sant
Ramji of the Jat-Pat-Todak
Mandal of Lahore wants me to publish the following: " I have read your remarks about Dr. Ambedkar and the Jat-Pat-Todak
Mandal, Lahore. In that connection I beg to submit
as follows :
" We did not invite Dr. Ambedkar to preside over our conference because he
belonged to the Depressed Classes, for we do not distinguish between a touchable and an untouchable Hindu. On the contrary
our choice fell on him simply because his diagnosis of the fatal disease of the
Hindu community was the same as ours, i.e.
he too was of the opinion that caste system was the root cause of the
disruption and downfall of the Hindus. The subject of the Doctor's thesis for
Doctorate being caste system, he has studied the subject thoroughly. Now the
object of our conference was to persuade the Hindus to annihilate castes but
the advice of a non-Hindu in social and religious matters can have no effect on
them. The Doctor in the supplementary portion of his address insisted on saying
that that was his last speech as a Hindu, which was irrelevant as well as
pernicious to the interests of the conference. So we requested him to expunge
that sentence for he could easily say the same thing on any other occasion. But
he refused and we saw no utility in making merely a show of our function. In
spite of all this, I cannot help praising his address which is, as far as I
know, the most learned thesis on the subject and worth translating into every
vernacular of India.
Moreover, I want to bring to
your notice that your philosophical difference
between Caste and Varna is too subtle to be grasped by
people in general, because for all practical
purposes in the Hindu society Caste and Varna
are one and the same thing, for the function of both of them is one and the
same i.e. to restrict inter-caste marriages and inter-dining.
Your theory of Varnavyavastha
is impracticable in this age and there is no hope of its revival in the near
future. But Hindus are slaves of caste and do not want to destroy it. So when
you advocate your ideal of imaginary Varnavyavastha
they find justification for clinging to caste. Thus you are doing a great
disservice to social reform by advocating your imaginary utility of division of
Varnas,
for it creates hindrance in our way. To try to remove untouchability
without striking at the root of Varnavyavastha
is simply to treat the outward symptoms of a disease or
to draw a line on the surface of water. As in the heart of their hearts dvijas do
not want to give social equality to the so-called touchable
and untouchable Shudras, so they refuse to break
caste, and give liberal donations for the removal of untouchability,
simply to evade the issue. To seek the help of the Shastras for the removal of
untouchability and caste is simply to wash mud with mud."
The last paragraph of the letter surely cancels the first. If the Mandal rejects the help of the Shastras, they do exactly what Dr. Ambedkar
does, i.e. cease to be Hindus. How
then can they object to Dr. Ambedkar's address
merely because he said that that was his last
speech as a Hindu ? The position appears to be
wholly untenable especially when the Mandal, for which Shri Sant Ram claims to
speak, applauds the whole argument of Dr. Ambedkar's address.
But it is pertinent to ask what the Mandal believes if it rejects the Shastras. How can a Muslim remain one if
he rejects the Quran ,or
a Christian remain Christian if he rejects the Bible ?
If Caste and Varna are convertible
terms and if Varna
is an integral part of the Shastras
which define Hinduism, I do not know how a person who rejects Caste i.e. Varna can call himself a Hindu.
Shri Sant Ram likens the Shastras
to mud. Dr. Ambedkar has not, so far as I remember, given any such picturesque name to the Shastras. I have certainly meant when I
have said that if Shastras support
the existing untouchability I should cease to call myself a Hindu. Similarly,
if the Shastras support caste as we
know it today in all its hideousness, I may not call myself or remain a Hindu
since I have no scruples about interdining or intermarriage. I need not repeat
my position regarding Shastras and their interpretation. I
venture to suggest to Shri Sant Ram that it is the only rational and correct
and morally defensible position and it has ample warrant in Hindu tradition.
(Harijan, August 15,1936)
I appreciate greatly
the honour done me by the Mahatma in taking notice
in his Harijan of the speech on Caste which I had prepared for the Jat Pat Todak Mandal. From a perusal
of his review of my speech it is clear that the Mahatma completely dissents from the views I have
expressed on the subject of Caste. I am not in the
habit of entering into controversy with my
opponents unless there are special reasons which
compel me to act otherwise. Had my opponent been some mean and obscure person I
would not have pursued him. But my opponent being the Mahatma
himself I feel I must attempt to meet the case to the contrary which he has sought to put forth. While I appreciate the honour he
has done me, I must confess
to a sense of surprize on
finding that of all the persons the Mahatma should
accuse me of a desire to seek publicity as he
seems to do when he suggests that in publishing
the undelivered speech my object was to see that I was not " forgotten ".
Whatever the Mahatma may choose to say my object
in publishing the speech was to provoke the Hindus to think and take stock of their position. I have
never hankered for publicity
and if I may say so, I have more of it than I wish or need. But supposing it
was out of the motive of gaining publicity that I printed the speech who could
cast a stone at me ? Surely not those, who like
the Mahatma live in glass houses.
II
Motive apart, what has the Mahatma to say on
the question raised by me in the speech ? First of
all any one who reads my speech will realize that the Mahatma
has entirely missed
the issues raised by me and that the issues he has raised are not the issues
that arise out of what he is pleased to call my indictment of the Hindus. The principal points which I have
tried to make out in my speech may be catalogued as follows
: (1) That caste has ruined
the Hindus ; (2) That the reorganization of the
Hindu society on the basis of Chaturvarnya is
impossible because the Varnavym'astha is like a leaky pot or like a man running at the
nose. It is incapable of sustaining itself by its own virtue and has an
inherent tendency to degenerate into a caste system unless there is a legal
sanction behind it which can be enforced against every
one transgressing his Varna ; (3) That the reorganization of the Hindu
Society on the basis of Chaturvarnya is harmful, because the effect of the Varnavyavastha is to degrade the masses by denying
them opportunity to acquire knowledge and to emasculate them by denying them
the right to be armed ; (4) That the Hindu society
must be reorganized on a religious basis which
would recognise the principles of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity ; (5) That in order to achieve this object the sense
of religious sanctity behind Caste and Varna
must be destroyed ;
(6) That the sanctity of Caste and Varna can be destroyed only by
discarding the divine authority of the Shastras. It will be noticed that
the questions raised by the Mahatma are absolutely beside the point and show that the main
argument of the speech was lost upon him.
Ill
Let me examine the substance of the points made by the Mahatma. The first
point made by the Mahatma is that the texts cited by me are not authentic. I
confess I am no authority on this matter. But I should like to state that the
texts cited by me are all taken from the writings
of the late Mr. Tilak who was a recognised
authority on the Sanskrit language and on the Hindu Shastras. His second point is that
these Shastras should be interpreted
not by the learned but the saints and that, as the saints have understood them,
the Shastras do not support Caste and
Untouchabilty. As
regards the first point what I like to ask the Mahatma
is what does it avail to any one if the texts are
interpolations and if they have been differently
interpreted by the saints ? The masses do not make
any distinction between texts which are genuine and texts which are
interpolations. The masses do not know what the texts are. They are too illiterate to know the contents of the Shastras. They have believed what they have been
told and what they have been told is that the Shastras do enjoin as a religious duty the observance of Caste and Untouchability.
With regard to the saints, one must admit
that howsoever different and elevating their teachings may have been as
compared to those of the merely learned they have been lamentably ineffective. They have been ineffective for two reasons.
Firstly, none of the saints ever attacked the
Caste System. On the contrary, they were staunch
believers in the System of
Castes. Most of them lived and died. as members of the castes which they respectively belonged. So passionately attached was Jnyandeo to his status as a Brahmin that when the Brahmins of Paithan would not admit
him to their fold he moved heaven and earth to get his status as a Brahmin
recognized by the Brahmin fraternity. And even the saint Eknath
who now figures in the film " Dharmatma " as a
hero for having shown courage to touch the untouchables and dine with them, did
so not because he was opposed to Caste and Untouchability
but because he felt that the pollution caused thereby could be washed away by a
bath in the sacred waters of the river Ganges. The saints have never according to my
study carried on a campaign against. Caste and Untouchability. They were not concerned with the struggle between men. They were concerned with the relation between man and God. They did not preach
that all men were equal. They preached that all men were equal, in the eyes of
God a very different and a very innocuous proposition which nobody can find difficult to
preach or dangerous to believe in. The second reason why the teachings of the
saints proved ineffective was because the masses have been taught that a saint
might break Caste but the common man must not. A saint therefore never became an example to follow. He always remained
a pious man to be honoured. That the masses have remained staunch believers in
Caste and Untouchability shows that the pious lives and noble sermons of the saints have
had no effect on their life and conduct as against the teachings of the Shastras.
Thus it can be a matter of no consolation that there were saints or that there
is a Mahatma who understands the Shastras
differently from the learned few or ignorant many. That the masses hold
different view of the Shastras is
fact which should and must be reckoned with. How is that to be dealt with
except by denouncing the authority of the Shastras,
which continue to govern their conduct, is a question which the Mahatma has not
considered. But whatever the plan the Mahatma puts forth as an effective means
to free the masses from the teachings of the Shastras, he must accept that the pious life led by one good Samaritan may be very elevating to himself but in
India, with the attitude the common man has to saints
and to Mahatmas—to honour but not to follow—one
cannot make much out of it.
IV
The third point made by the Mahatma is that a religion professed by Chaitanya, Jnyandeo, Tukaram, Tiruvalluvar, Rarnkrishna Paramahansa
etc. cannot be devoid of merit as is made out by me and that a religion has to
be judged not by its worst specimens but by the best
it might have produced. I agree with every word of this statement. But I do not
quite understand what the Mahatma wishes to prove thereby. That religion should
be judged not by its worst specimens but by its best is true enough but does it
dispose of the matter ? I say it does not. The
question still remains—why the worst number so
many and the best so few ? To my mind there are
two conceivable answers to this question : ( 1 ) That the worst by reason of some original perversity of theirs
are morally uneducable and are therefore incapable
of making the remotest approach to the religious
ideal. Or (2) That the religious ideal is a wholly wrong ideal which has given
a wrong moral twist to the lives of the many and that the best have become best
in spite of the wrong ideal—in fact by giving to the wrong twist a turn in the
right direction. Of these two explanations I am not prepared to accept the
first and I am sure that even the Mahatma will not insist upon the contrary. To
my mind the second is the only logical and reasonable explanation unless the
Mahatma has a third alternative to explain why the
worst are so many and the best so few. If the second
is the only explanation then obviously the argument of the Mahatma that a
religion should be judged by its best followers carries us nowhere except to
pity the lot of the many who have gone wrong because they have been made to
worship wrong ideals.
V
The argument of the Mahatma that Hinduism
would be tolerable if only many were to follow the example of the saints is fallacious for another reason. By
citing the names of such illustrious persons as Chaitanya
etc. what the Mahatma seems to me to suggest in
its broadest and simplest form is that Hindu society can be made tolerable and
even happy without any fundamental change in its structure
if all the high caste Hindus can be persuaded to follow a high standard of
morality in their dealings with the low caste Hindus. I am totally opposed to
this kind of ideology. I can respect those of the
caste Hindus who try to realize a high social ideal in their life. Without such
men India would be an uglier and a less happy place to live in than it is. But
nonetheless anyone who relies on an attempt to turn the members of the
caste Hindus into better men by improving their personal character is in my
judgment wasting his energy and bugging an
illusion. Can personal character make the maker of armaments a good man, i.e. a man
who will sell shells that will not burst and gas that will not poison ? If it cannot, how can you accept personal character
to make a man loaded with the consciousness of Caste, a good man, i.e. a man who would treat his fellows
as his friends and equals ? To be true to himself
he must deal with his fellows either as a superior
or inferior according as the case may be; at any
rate, differently from his own caste fellows. He
can never be expected to deal with his fellows as his kinsmen and equals. As a
matter of fact, a Hindu does treat all those who
are not of his Caste as though they were aliens, who could be discriminated
against with impunity and against whom any fraud or trick may be practised
without shame. This is to say that there
can be a better or a worse Hindu. But a good Hindu there cannot be. This is so not because there is anything wrong with his
personal character. In fact what is wrong is the entire basis of his
relationship to his fellows. The best of men cannot be moral if the basis of
relationship between them and their fellows is fundamentally a wrong
relationship. To a slave his master may be better
or worse. But there cannot be a good master. A good man cannot be a master and
a master cannot be a good man. The same applies to the relationship between
high caste and low caste. To a low caste man a high caste man can be better or worse as compared to other high caste men.
A high caste man cannot be a good man in so far as he must have a low caste man
to distinguish him as high caste man. It cannot be good to a low caste man to
be conscious that there is a high caste man above him. I have argued in my
speech that a society based on Varna
or Caste is a society which is based on a wrong relationship. I had hoped that
the Mahatma would attempt to demolish my argument. But instead of doing that he
has merely reiterated his belief in Chaturvarnya without
disclosing the ground on which it is based.
VI
Does the Mahatma practise what he preaches ? One does not like to make personal reference in an
argument which is general in its application. But
when one preaches a decline
and holds it as a dogma there is a curiosity to know how far he practises what
he preaches. It may be that his failure to practise is due to the ideal
being too high. to be attainable; it may be that
his failure to practise is due to the innate hypocrisy of the man. In any case
he exposes his conduct to examination and I must not
be blamed if I asked how far has the Mahatma
attempted to realize his ideal in his own case.
The Mahatma is a Bania by birth. His ancestors had
abandoned trading in favour of ministership which is a calling of the Brahmins.
In his own life, before he became a Mahatma, when
occasion came for him to choose his career he
preferred law to scales. On abandoning law he became half saint and half
politician. He has never touched trading which is his ancestral calling. His youngest son—I take one
who is a faithful
follower of his father—born a Vaishya has married
a Brahmin's daughter and has chosen to serve a newspaper magnate. The Mahatma
is not known to have condemned him for not following his ancestral calling. It may be
wrong and uncharitable to
judge an ideal by its worst specimens. But
surely the Mahatma as
a specimen has no better and if he even fails to realize
the ideal then the ideal must be an impossible ideal quite opposed to the practical instincts of
man. Students of Carlyle know that he often spoke
on a subject before he thought about it. I wonder whether such has not been the
case with the Mahatma in regard to the subject
matter of Caste. Otherwise
certain questions which occur to me would not have
escaped him. When can a calling be deemed to have become
an ancestral calling so as to make it binding on a man ? Must man follow his ancestral
calling even if it does not suit his capacities,
even when it has ceased to be profitable ? Must a
man live by his ancestral calling even if he finds
it to be immoral ? If every one must pursue his
ancestral calling then it must follow that a man must. continue to be a pimp
because his grandfather was a pimp and a woman must continue to be a prostitute
because her grandmother was a prostitute. Is the
Mahatma prepared to accept the logical conclusion of his doctrine ? To me bis ideal of following
one's ancestral calling is not only an impossible
and impractical ideal, but it is also morally an indefensible ideal. VII
The Mahatma sees great virtue in
a Brahmin remaining a Brahmin all his life. Leaving aside the fact there are
many Brahmins who do not like to remain Brahmins
ail their lives. What can we say about those Brahmins who have clung to their ancestral
calling of priesthood ? Do they do so from any
faith in the virtue of the principle of ancestral calling or do they do so from
motives of filthy lucre
? The Mahatma does not seem to concern himself with such queries. He is
satisfied that these are " real Brahmins who are living on alms freely given to them and giving freely
what they have of spiritual treasures ". This is how a hereditary
Brahmin priest appears to the Mahatma—a carrier of spiritual treasurers. But another portrait
of the hereditary Brahmin can also be drawn. A Brahmin can be a priest to
Vishnu—the God of Love. He can be a priest to Shankar—the
God. of Destruction. He
can be a priest at Buddha Gaya worshipping
Buddha—the greatest teacher of mankind who taught
the noblest doctrine of Love. He also can be a
priest to Kali, the Goddess, who must have a daily sacrifice of an animal to satisfy her thirst for blood ; He
will be a priest of the
temple of Rama—the Kshatriya
God! He will also be a priest of the Temple of Parshuram, the God who took Avatar to destroy the Kshatriyas ! He can be a priest to Bramha, the Creator of the world. He can be a priest
to a Pir whose God Allah will not brook the claim
of Bramha to share his spiritual dominion over the
world ! No one can
say that this is a picture which is not true to life. If this is a true picture
one does not know what to say of this capacity to bear loyalties to Gods and Goddesses whose attributes are so
antagonistic that no honest man can be a devotee to all of them. The Hindus
rely upon this extraordinary phenomenon as evidence of the greatest virtue of their religion—namely
its catholicity, its spirit of toleration. As
against this facile view, it can be urged that
what is toleration and catholicity may be really
nothing more creditable than indifference or flaccid latitudinarianism.
These two attitudes are hard to distinguish in
their outer seeming. But they are so vitally unlike in their real quality that
no one who examines them closely can mistake one for the other. That a man is
ready to render homage to many Gods and Goddesses may be. cited as evidence of
his tolerant spirit.. But can it not also be
evidence of insincerity born of a desire to serve the times ? I am sure that this toleration is merely
insincerity. If this view is well founded, one may ask what spiritual treasure
can there be with a person who is ready to be a priest and a devotee to any
deity which it serves his purpose to worship and to adore ? Not only must such a person be deemed to be
bankrupt of all spiritual treasures but for him to practice so elevating a
profession as that of a priest simply because it
is ancestral, without faith, without belief,
merely as a mechanical process handed down from. father to son, is not a
conservation of virtue; it
is really the prostitution of a noble profession which is no other than the
service of religion.
VIII
Why does the Mahatma cling to the theory of
every one following his or her ancestral calling ? He gives his
reasons nowhere But there must be some reason although he does not cars to avow
it. Years ago writing on "
Caste versus
Class " in his Young India he argued that Caste System was better than Class System on the ground
that caste was the best possible adjustment of social stability. If that be the
reason why the Mahatma clings to the theory of every one following his or her
ancestral calling, then he is clinging to a false view of social life.
Everybody wants social stability and some adjustment must be made in the
relationship between individuals and classes in order that stability may be
had. But two things, I am sure nobody wants. One
thing nobody wants is static relationship, something that is unalterable,
something that is fixed for all times. Stability
is wanted but not at the cost of change when change is imperative. Second thing
nobody wants is mere adjustment. Adjustment is wanted but not at the sacrifice of
social justice. Can it be said that the adjustment
of social relationship on the basis of caste i.e. on the basis of each to his
hereditary calling avoids these two evils ? I am
convinced that it does not. Far from being the best possible adjustment I have
no doubt that it is of the worst possible kind
inasmuch as it offends against both the canons of social adjustment—namely
fluidity and equity.
IX
Some might think that the Mahatma has made
much progress inasmuch as he now only believes in Varna and docs not believe in Caste. It is true that there was a
time when the Mahatma was a full-blooded and a blue-blooded Sanatani Hindu. He
believed in the Vedas,
the Upanishads,
the Puranas
and all that goes by the name of Hindu scriptures and therefore in avatars and rebirth. He believed in
Caste and defended it with the vigour of the orthodox. He condemned the cry for
inter-dining, inter-drinking
and inter-marrying and argued that restraints
about inter-dining to a great extent " helped the cultivation of will-power and the
conservation of certain social virtue ". It
is good that he has repudiated this sanctimonious nonsense and admitted that
caste " is harmful both to spiritual and
national growth," and may be, his son's marriage outside his caste has had
something to do with this change of view. But has
the Mahatma really progressed ? What is the nature
of the Varna for which the Mahatma
stands ? Is it the Vedic conception as commonly
understood and preached by Swami Dayanaad Saraswati and
his followers, the Arya Samajists
? The essence of the Vedic conception of Varna is the pursuit of a calling which is appropriate to one's
natural aptitude. The essence of the Mahatma's
conception of Varna is the pursuit of
ancestral calling irrespective of natural aptitude. What is the difference
between Caste and Varna as understood
by the Mahatma? I find none. As defined by the Mahatma, Varna becomes merely a different name for Caste for the simple reason that it is the same in essence—namely pursuit of ancestral calling. Far from
making progress the Mahatma has suffered retrogression. By putting this
interpretation upon the Vedic
conception of Varna he has really
made ridiculous what was sublime. While I reject the Vedic Varnavyavastha for reasons given in the speech I
must admit that the Vedic theory of Varna as interpreted by Swami Dayanand and some others is a sensible and an
inoffensive thing. It did not admit birth as a determining factor in fixing the
place of an individual in society. It only
recognized worth. The Mahatma's view of Varna not only makes nonsense of the Vedic Varna but it makes it an abominable thing. Varna and Caste are two very different concepts. Varna is based on the principle of each
according to his worth-while Caste is based on the principle of each according
to his birth. The two are as distinct as chalk is
from cheese. In fact there is an antithesis between the two. If the Mahatma believes as he does in every one following his or her ancestral calling,
then most certainly he is advocating the Caste System and that in calling it
the Varna System he is not only
guilty of terminologicale inexactitude, but he is causing confusion worse confounded. I am sure that all his confusion is
due to the fact that the Mahatma has no definite
and clear conception as to what is Varna
and what is Caste and as to the necessity of either for the conservation of
Hinduism. He has said and one hopes that he will not find some mystic reason to change his view
that caste is not the essence of Hinduism. Does he regard Varna as the essence of Hinduism ? One
cannot as yet give any categorical answer. Readers of his article on " Dr. Ambedkar's
Indictment " will answer " No ". In
that article he does not say that the dogma of Varna is an essential part of the
creed of Hinduism. Far from making Varna
the essence of Hinduism he says " the essence
of Hinduism is contained in its enunciation of one and only God as Truth and
its bold acceptance of Ahimsa as the law of the
human family " But the readers of his article
in reply to Mr. Sant Ram will say " Yes ". In
that article he says " How can a Muslim
remain one if he rejects the Qurtan, or a Christian
remain as Christian if he rejects the Bible ? If
Caste and Varna are convertible terms
and if Varna is an integral part of
the Shastras
which define Hinduism I do not know how a person who rejects Caste, i.e. Varna can call himself a Hindu ? " Why this
prevarication ? Why does the Mahatma hedge ? Whom does he want to please ? Has the saint failed to sense the truth ? Or does the politician stand in the way of the
Saint ? The real reason why the Mahatma is
suffering from this confusion is probably to be traced to two sources. The
first is the temperament of the Mahatma. He has almost in everything the
simplicity of the child with the child's capacity
for self-deception. Like a child he can believe in anything
he wants to believe. We must therefore wait till
such time as it pleases the Mahatma to abandon his
faith in Varna as it has pleased him
to abandon his faith in Caste. The second source of confusion is the double
role which the Mahatma wants to play—of a Mahatma and a Politician. As a
Mahatma he may be trying to spiritualize Politics. Whether he has succeeded in
it or not Politics have certainly commercialized him. A politician must know
that Society cannot bear the whole truth and that he must not speak the whole
truth; if he is speaking the whole truth it is bad
for his politics. The reason why the Mahatma is always supporting Caste and Varna is because he is afraid that if he
opposed them he will lose his place in politics. Whatever may be the source of
this confusion the Mahatma must be told that he is
deceiving himself and also deceiving the people by preaching Caste under the name of Varna.
X
The Mahatma says that the standards I have applied to test Hindus and Hinduism are too severe
and that judged by those standards every known living
faith will probably fail.
The complaint that my standards are high may be true. But the question is not whether
they are high or whether they are low. The question is whether they are the
right standards to apply. A People and their Religion must be judged by social standards based on
social ethics. No other standard would have any meaning if religion is held to be a necessary good for the
well-being of the people. Now I maintain that the standards I have applied to
test Hindus and Hinduism are the most appropriate standards and that I know of
none that are better. The conclusion that every known religion would fail if tested by my standards may be
true. But this fact should not give the Mahatma as the champion of Hindus and
Hinduism a ground for comfort any more than the existence
of one madman should give comfort to another
madman or the existence of one criminal should give comfort to another
criminal. I like to assure
the Mahatma that it is not the mere failure of the
Hindus and Hinduism which has produced in me the feelings of disgust and
contempt with which. I am charged. I realize that
the world is a very imperfect world and any one who wants
to live in it must bear with its imperfections.
But while I am. prepared to bear with the imperfections and shortcomings of the society in which I may be destined to labour, I feel I should not
consent to live in a society which cherishes wrong ideals or a society which
having right ideals will
not consent to bring its social life in conformity with those ideals. If I am
disgusted with Hindus and Hinduism it is because I
am convinced that they cherish wrong ideals and live a wrong social life. My quarrel with Hindus and
Hinduism is not over the imperfections of their
social conduct. It is much more fundamental. It is over their ideals.
XI
Hindu society seems to me to stand
in need of a moral regeneration which it is
dangerous to postpone. And the question is who can determine and control this moral
regeneration ? Obviously only those who have
undergone an intellectual regeneration and those
who are honest enough to have the courage of their
convictions born of intellectual emancipation. Judged by this standard the
Hindu leaders who count are in my opinion quite unfit
for the task. It is impossible to say that they
have undergone the preliminary intellectual regeneration. If they had undergone an intellectual regeneration they would neither delude themselves in the simple way
of the untaught multitude nor would they take advantage of the
primitive ignorance of others as one sees them doing. Notwithstanding the crumbling state of Hindu society these leaders
will nevertheless unblushingly
appeal to ideals of the past which have in every way ceased to have any connection with the present ;
which however suitable they might have been in the days of their origin have
now become a warning rather
than a guide. They still have a mystic respect for the earlier
forms which make them disinclined—nay opposed to any examination of the foundations of
their Society. The Hindu masses are cf course incredibly
heedless in the formation of their beliefs. But so are the Hindu leaders. And what is worse
is that. These Hindu leaders become filled with an
illicit passion for their beliefs when any one
proposes to rob them of their companionship. The Mahatma.
is no exception. The Mahatma appears not to
believe in thinking He prefers to follow the saints. Like a conservative with his reverence for consecrated notions
he is afraid that if he once starts thinking, many
ideals and institutions to which lie clings will be doomed. One must sympathize with him.
For every act of independent thinking puts some portion of apparently stable world in
peril. But it is equally
true that dependence on saints cannot lead us to
know the truth. The
saints are after all only human beings and as Lord Balfour
said , " the human mind is no more a
truth finding apparatus than the snout of a pig ".
In so far as he does think, to me he really appears to be prostituting his
intelligence to find reasons for supporting this
archaic social structure of the Hindus. He is the
most influential
apologist of it and therefore the worst enemy of
the Hindus.
Unlike the Mahatma there are Hindu leaders who are not content merely to
believe and follow. They dare to think, and act in, accordance with the result of their
thinking. But unfortunately they are either a
dishonest lot or an indifferent lot when it comes
to the question of giving right guidance to the mass of the people. Almost every Brahmin has transgressed the rule of Caste. The number of
Brahmins who sell shoes is far greater than those
who practise priesthood. Not only have the Brahmins given
up their ancestral calling of priesthood for trading but they have entered trades which, are prohibited to them by the Shaslras. Yet how many Brahmins who
break Caste every day will preach against Caste and against the Shastras ? For one honest Brahmin preaching against Caste and Shastras
because his practical instinct and moral conscience cannot support a conviction
in them, there are hundreds who break Caste and trample upon the Shastras every day but who are the most
fanatic upholders of the theory of Caste and the sanctity of the Shastras. Why this duplicity ? Because they feel that if the masses are
emancipated from the yoke of Caste they would be a menace to the power and prestige
of the Brahmins as a class. The dishonesty of this intellectual class who would
deny the masses the fruits of their thinking is a
most disgraceful phenomenon.
The Hindus in the words of Mathew Arnold are "
wandering between two worlds, one dead, the other powerless to be born ".
What are they to do ? The Mahatma to 'whom they appeal for guidance
does not believe in thinking and can therefore
give no guidance which can be said to stand the test of experience. The intellectual classes to whom the masses look for guidance
are either too dishonest or too indifferent to
educate them in the right direction. We are indeed witnesses to a great
tragedy. In the face of this tragedy all one can do is to lament and say—such
be thy Leaders, O! Hindus.