Vol. 3 · pages 316–320

303 THE TRIUMPH OF BRAHMANISM Manu however was not prepared to leave the outcast with this. He proceeds to enact penalty the severity of which cannot be doubted. The following are the penal sections of Manu Smriti against an outcast. III. 150…………Those Brahmins who are .....outcasts ………. Athesists are unworthy (to partake) of oblations to the gods and manes. IX. 201. .....Outcast receive(s) no share (in inheritance). XI. 185. But thenceforward (i.e. after the obsequies of the outcast have been performed) it shall be forbidden to converse with him, to sit with him, to give him a share of the inheritance, and to hold with him such intercourse as is usual among men; XI. 186. And (if the outcast be the eldest) his right of primogeniture shall be withheld and the additional share, due to the eldest son; and in his stead a younger brother, excelling in virtue (i.e. who observes the rule of caste) shall obtain the share of the eldest. Such is the law of Manu against an outcast. The severity of the penalties prescribed against him is quite obvious. Its effect is to exclude him from all social intercourse, to suspend him from every civil function, to disqualify him for all offices and to disable him from inheriting any property. Under these pains and penalties the outcaste might as well be dead which indeed Manu considers him to be, directing libations to be offered to the manes as though he was naturally so. This system of privations and mortifications was enforced by prescribing a similar fate to anyone who endeavoured to associate with an outcast. The penalty was not confined to the outcast. Nor was it restricted to males. Males and females were both subject to the law of the outcast. Even their progeny was subject to penalty. The law was extended to the son of the outcast. Born befo son was entitled to inherit immediately, as though his father was dead. Born after excommunication he lost his right to inherit, i.e. he became an outcast along with his father. The laws of Manu regarding the outcast are of course devoid of justice and humanity. Some might think that there is nothing very strange about them. That is because these laws are very similar to the laws against apostacy and heresy to be found in all religious codes. It is unfortunately a fact. All religions —Except Buddhism — have used or misued the laws of inheritance for enforcing adhesion and conformity to their codes. The conversion of a Christian to Judaism or paganism or any other religion was punished by the Emperors Constantines and Jul Emperors Theodosius and Valentiniaus added capital punishment, in

304 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES case the apostle endeavoured to pervert others to the same inequity. This was borrowed by all the European countries 1 who maintained a similar system of penalities to enforce the Christian faith. Such a view of the law of the outcast would be quite superficial. First of all the outcast is a creation of Brahmanism. It is a necessary coefficient of caste. Indeed once Brahmanism was determined to create the caste system the law against the outcast was absolutely essential. For only by punishing the outcast can the caste system be maintained. Secondly there is a difference between the Christian or Mahomedan Law of Apostacy and the Brahmanic law of caste. The disqualification under the Christian or Mahomedan law of apostacy was restricted to want of religious belief or the profession of wrong religious belief. Under the Brahmanic law the disqualification had no connection with belief or want of belief. It was connected with the sanctity of a certain form of social organization—namely Caste. It is the act of going out of one’s caste that was made punishable. This is a very important difference. The Brahmanic law of the outcast as compared with the law of apostacy in other religions shows that a belief in God is not essential to Brahmanism; that a belief in life after death is not essential to Brahmanism; that a belief in salvation either by good deeds or by a belief in a prophet is not essential to Brahmanism; that a belief in the sacredness of the Vedas is essential to Brahmanism. This is only one thing that is essential to Brahmanism. For it is only breach of caste which is penalized. All else is left to violation. Those who are not blind to these forces of integration will admit that this act of Brahmanism in prohibiting intermarriage and interdining is nothing short of a complete dismemberment of society. It is a deathknell to unity, an effective bar to united action. As will be shown hereafter Brahmanism was keen on preventing united action by Non-Brahmins to overthrow Brahmanism and that is why Brahmanism brought about this segmentation of Indian Society. But the fatal effects of a poison can never be confined to the limits of the original intention of the perpetrator. The same thing has happened in the case of Caste. Brahmanism intended to paralyse the Non-Brahmans for action against Brahmins, it did not design that they as a nation should be paralysed for action against a foreign nation. But the result of the poison of Caste has been they have become stricken for action against Brahmanism as well as against foreigners. In other words Brahmanism in instituting Caste system has put the greatest impediment against the growth of nationalism. 1. See Stephen’s Commentaries on the Laws of England (15th Ed.) Vo. IV. p. 179.

305 THE TRIUMPH OF BRAHMANISM In spite of what others say the Hindu will not admit that there is any thing evil in the Caste system, and from one point of view he is right. There is love, unity and mutual aid among members of a family. There is honour among thieves. A band of robbers have common interests as respects to its members. Gangs are marked by fraternal feelings and intense loyalty to their own ends however opposed they may be to the other gangs. Following this up one can say that a Caste has got all the praiseworthy characteristics which a society is supposed to have. It has got the virtues of a family inasmuch as there is love unity and mutual aid. It has got the honour known to prevail among thieves. It has got the loyalty and fraternal feeling we meet with in gangs and it also possesses that sense of common interests which is found among robbers. A Hindu may take satisfaction in these praiseworthy characteristics of the Caste and deny that there is anything evil in it. But he forgets that his thesis that Caste is an ideal form of social organization is supportable on the supposition that each caste is entitled to regard himself as an independent society, as an end in itself as nations do. But the theory breaks down when the consideration pertains to Hindu Society and to the Caste-System which goes with it. Even in such a consideration of the subject the Hindu will not admit that the Caste system is an evil. Charge Hinduism with the responsibility for the evils of the Caste-system and the Hindu will at once retort, “What about the Class System in Europe?” Upto a point the retort is good if it means that there exists nowhere that ideal society of the philosophers marked by organic unity, accompanied by praiseworthy community of purpose, mutuality of sympathy, loyalty to public ends and concern for general welfare. Nobody can have much quarrel if the Hindu by way of analogy were to say that in every Society there are families and classes marked by exclusiveness, suspicion, and jealousy as to those without; bands of robbers, gangs. narrow cliques, trade unions. Employees’ Associations, Kartels, Chambers of Commerce and political parties. Some of these are held together by the interest and plunder and others while aspiring to serve the public do not hesitate to prey upon it. It may be conceded that everywhere de facto society whether in the past or in the present is not a single whole but a collection of small groups devoted to diverse purposes as their immediate and particular objectives. But the Hindu cannot take shelter under this analogy between the Hindu caste system and the Non-Hindu Class system and rest there as though there is nothing more to be said about the subject. The fact is there is a far bigger question which the Hindu has still to

306 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES face. He must take note of the fact that although every society consists of groups there are societies in which the groups are only non-social while there are societies in which the groups are anti-social. The difference between a society with the class system and a society with the caste system lies just in this namely the class system is merely non-social but the caste system is positively anti-soicial. It may be important to realize why in some societies the group system produces only non-social feeling and in some societies the group system produces anti-social feeling. No better explanation of this difference can be given than the one given by professor John Dewey. According to him every thing depends upon whether the groups are isolated or associated, whether there is reciprocity of interest between them or whether there is lack of reciprocity of interest. If the groups are associated, if there is a reciprocity of interest between them the feeling between them will be only non-social. If the groups are isolated, if there is no reciprocity between them the feeling between them will be anti-social. To quote Professor Dewey1: “The isolation and exclusiveness of a gang or clique brings its anti-social spirit into relief. But this same 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 the protection of what it has got, instead of reorganization and progress through wider relationships. It marks nations in their isolation from one another; families which seclude their domestic concerns as if they had no connection with a larger life; schools when separated from the interest of home and community; the divisions of rich and poor; learned and unlearned. The essential point is that isolation makes for rigidity and formal institutionalizing of life, for static and selfish ideals within the group.” The question to be asked is not whether there are groups in a Society or whether the Society is one single whole. The question to be asked is what degree of association, cooperative intercourse and interaction exists among the different groups; how numerous and varied are the interests which are consciously shared by them: how full and free is the interplay with other forms of Association? A society is not to be condemned as body because there are groups in it. It is to be condemned if the groups are isolated, each leading an exclusive life of its own. Because it is this isolation which produces the anti-social spirit which makes co-operative effort so impossible of achievement. This isolation among the classes is the work of Brahmanism. The principal steps taken by it was to abrogate the system of intermarriage 1Democracy and Education p. 99

307 THE TRIUMPH OF BRAHMANISM and interdining that was prevalent among the four Varnas in olden times. This has already been discussed in an earlier section of this chapter. There is however one part of the story that remains to be told. I have said the Varna system had nothing to do with marriage. That males and females belonging to the different Varnas could marry and did marry. Law did not come in the way of inter-varna marriage. Social morality was not opposed to such marriages. Savarna marriage was neither required by law nor demanded by Society. All marriages between different Varnas—irrespective of the question whether the bride was of a higher Varna than the bride-groom or whether the bridegroom was of the higher Varna and the bride of the lower Varna—were valid. Indeed as Prof. Kane says the distinction between Anuloma and Pratiloma marriage was quite unknown and even the terms Anuloma and Pratiloma were not in existence. They are the creation of Brahmanism. Brahmanism put a stop to Pratiloma marriages i.e. marriages between women of a higher Varna and men of lower Varna. That was a step in the direction of closing the connection between the Varnas and creating in them an exclusive and anti-social spirit regarding one another. But while the inter-connecting gate of the Pratiloma marriage was closed the inter-connecting gate of Anuloma marriage had remained open. That was not closed. As pointed out in the section on graded inequality Anuloma marriage i.e. marriage between a male of the higher Varna and the female of the lower Varna was allowed by Brahmanism to continue. The gate of Anuloma marriage was not very respectable and was a one way gate only, still it was an interconnecting gate by which it was possible to prevent a complete isolation of the Varnas. But even here Brahmanism played what cannot but be called a dirty trick. To show how dirty the trick was it is necessary first to state the rules which prevailed for determining the status of the child. Under the rule existing from very ancient times the status of the child was determined by the Varna of the lather. The Varna of the mother was quite unimportant. The following illustrations will place the point beyond doubt: Father’s name Varna of father Mother’s Name Varna of mother Child’s name Varna of child 1. Shantanu Kshatriya Ganga Shudra (Anamik) Bhishma Kshatriya 2. Shantanu Kshatriya Matsyagandha Shudra (Fisher) Viehitra Virya Kshatriya 3. Parashar Brahmin Matsyagandha Shudra (Fisher) KrishnaDwaipayana Brahmin 4. Vishwamitra Kshatriya Menaka (Apsara) Shakuntala Kshatriya 5. Yayati Kshatriya Devayani Brahmin Yadu Kshatriya 6. Yayati Kshatriya Sharmishta Asuri (Nonaryan) Druhya Kshatriya 7. Jaratkaru Brahmin Jaratkari Nag. (Nonaryan) Asita Brahmin