Can there be a Category called Dalit Muslims?
By Imtiaz Ahmad
On the face of it, the expression ‘Dalit Muslims’ would appear to be a contradiction in terms. It is commonly held that Islam is an egalitarian religion and there are no status differences among Muslims. As such, there is no question of the prevalence of untouchability among them and a category called ‘Dalit Muslims’ cannot be said to exist. This is the standard line that is handed down whenever any reference to ‘Dalit Muslims’ is made.
This would be a perfectly understandable position to take were it not for the fact that considerable evidence exists to suggest that a category called “Dalit Muslims’ does exist in India. Ghaus Ansari argued on the basis of evidence from the decennial censuses that Muslims in India were divided into three broad categories that he called the ashraf (noble born), ajlaf (mean and lowly) and arzal (excluded)[1]. Each of these categories was further divided into a number of groups which, following the practice of the decennial censuses, he chose to designate as castes. Since Ansari was relying on the evidence supplied by the decennial censuses, he could not examine the process of mutual interaction among these castes. He generally suggested that the three broad categories he had identified constituted a hierarchy in which the castes were ranked in an order of social precedence. How this hierarchy was constituted and what was the basis on which the rank order was settled were questions that Ansari could not discuss on account of the limitations of the data he used.
More focused research on social stratification among Muslims in the early seventies and subsequently relied upon empirical methods, painstakingly collecting information on actual, day-to-day interactions among the Muslim communities.[2] This research succeeded in providing a more grounded picture of the situation of the groups whom Ansari had called arzal. It demonstrated that in terms of day-to-day social interactions the arzal existed on the margins of society. Even so, the range of dimensions of interaction that this research explored was restricted to areas of commensality, endogamy and sociality.[3] It showed that the arzal engaged in the lowly occupation of scavenging, confined their marriages within the group and were excluded in the villages as well as the towns into separate residential quarters in which members of the other categories did not live. This research also noted the existence among the arzal communities of a system of internal government and social control with a hereditary official who regulated the life of group members and punished any transgressions of group norms besides settling domestic or intra-group disputes. Since much of this early research was focused on local communities, villages and towns, and covered groups falling into what Ansari had designated as arzal and ajlaf, the range of information on the arzal communities does not go beyond this limited range. For example, it is silent on the exclusion of the arzal communities in the ritual and religious spheres as well as on whether the religious specialists who cater to the ashraf and ajlaf communities also minister to them.[4]
One question raised by this research was how the presence of groups whom Ansari had called arzal be explained. Should they be seen in strictly occupational terms as practitioners of a distinct occupation that in their case happened to be lowly and demeaning without status connotations? Or, should it be seen as arising from more fundamental and intrinsic considerations requiring evaluation of groups into a ranked social order? Opinions on this significant point were substantially determined by how one viewed the position of Islam in relation to social stratification. Those who took the position that Islam was against any social stratification and posited the inherent equality of all human beings tended to represent the presence of arzal communities as merely an occupational division without any status implications. [5] From their point of view, the disabilities and exclusion characterizing the arzal communities applied to individuals and were relevant only in the occupational realm. Once their members move outside the occupational realm they are on par with everyone else. Others did not flatly take the position that Islam was against social stratification. They viewed the existence of arzal communities as reflecting a system in which groups were ranked as superior and inferior and individuals carried the burden of their group status through having to suffer disabilities and exclusion as members of groups.
Since the most elaborate expression of a system of social stratification wherein groups are ranked as superior or inferior and individuals are forced to carry the burden of their group status is found in the caste system, one way of characterizing the presence of arzal communities could be in terms of caste. However, since Islam in popular imagination is seen as the harbinger of social equality, such characterization is open to contestation on ideological grounds. This has precisely been happening in sociological research on the arzal communities. At the behavioural level, sociologists are willing to concede that there are elements of caste in Indo-Muslim society. However, as soon as the discussion shifts from behaviour to ideology they recoil form their position, seeking to add caveats or hedge around the issue by admitting unabashedly that when they apply the term in the context of a Muslim group they are using it in a loose sense. Two recent writings by Husnain[6] and Nazir[7] exemplify this tendency most eloquently.
Husnain locates his discussion in the context of the question whether the concept of caste can be applied to the system of social stratification of a community professing a faith other than Hinduism. His conclusion is bald and simple: ‘It is true that the egalitarian social order of Islam stands in sharp contrast with the ideology of caste yet the ‘Indian Islam’ and ‘Hindu Caste System’ have been able to achieve a substantial compatibility’[8]. He then goes on to offer a host of explanations for why this should be the case. He writes:
Hutton sounds convincing when he says that when Muslims and Christians came to India, the caste was in the air and the followers of even these egalitarian ideologies could not escape the infection of caste. Moreover, the overwhelming majority of Indian Muslim population comes form the lower Hindu castes who have been coming into the fold of Islam to escape from social persecution and the oppressive socio-economic disabilities. They were also attracted and lured by the social egalitarianism of Islam but the search for equality proved a mirage. In many cases there were improvements in their socio-economic condition yet the goal of social equality remained illusive. Moreover, in most of the cases the people embracing Islam gave up their religious faith but not the caste that was brought forward even to a new socio-religious milieu. Thus, it would be apt to say that while Islam may not be having castes or caste-like groupings, the Indian Muslims do have.[9]
No sooner that he has made this sociological formulation, Husnain becomes uncomfortable. As if fearing that he might have committed an almost sacrilegious act by declaring that there is caste among Indian Muslims, he wishes to recoil from it. Cryptically, he adds:
But in the present paper an attempt is being made to stay clear of the issue whether the model of social stratification among the Indian Muslims is the replica of the Hindu caste system or not. The author, in this paper, shall be using the term caste and caste system among the Indian Muslims in a conveniently loose manner. It is undisputed that there are groups of people among the Muslims who are organised more or less like the Hindu castes but this is also true that many of them are less rigid because Islam, theoretically at least, permits marriage between different classes of believers.[10]
Not only that. He looks for crutches that would enable him to perform this summersault. He finds one in the following statement of Nazir, which he quotes approvingly:
. . . . It is necessary to make a distinction between a caste system and caste labels: the former refers to a local system of hierarchically ordered corporate groupings involving division of labour, occupational specialisation, unequal dependence, and recruitment by birth only; the latter refers to a set of non-local, non-corporate named groups which provide a ranking hierarchy, and which do not involve occupational specialisation, unequal dependence, and recruitment by birth only.[11]
‘Perhaps,’ concludes Husnain, ‘the “caste system’ and “caste like groupings” among the Indian Muslims with all its fluidity may be better analysed and better understood through this observation’. [12]
This assumes that Hindus live under ‘the caste system’. Muslims only use castes labels. Several theoretical and empirical questions are raised by this assumption. First, how is this assumption made? Is it made on the basis of a piece of empirical research? Or, is it made on entirely a priori grounds. As far as I am aware, there has to date been no empirical research which can be said to have established beyond the shadow of a doubt that Muslims do not live under a caste system and only use caste labels. Indeed, if such empirical research existed, the dilemma these authors (and others) face over how to characterise Muslim social stratification in India would not exist. It exists because available empirical research has demonstrated that social stratification of Muslim communities in India and beyond is marked by features of the caste system. It is, therefore, clear that the assumption is made on a priori grounds. As believing Muslims committed to upholding the widely proclaimed Islamic egalitarianism as axiomatic, they cannot face up to the behavioural reality that Muslims live under a caste system. They not only assume the distinction between ‘the caste system’ and ‘caste labels’ but go on to suggest that it constitutes a viable framework for analysing and understanding Muslim social stratification in India. It is used as a smokescreen to avoid facing the harsh behavioural reality of caste among Muslims in India.
Second, is there an empirical basis to the assertion that Muslim social organisation in India is ‘a set of non-local, nor-corporate named groups which provide a ranking hierarchy, and which do not involve occupational specialisation, unequal dependence, and recruitment by birth only’? [13] Nazir does not make explicit the level at which he is talking. Is he talking about the categorisation of Muslims into the broad categories of ashraf, ajlaf and arzal. If that is his point of reference, then his characterisation of Muslim social organisation as a set of non-local, non-corporate groups can be said to have some validity. However, it would invalidate the distinction between ‘the caste system’ and ‘caste labels’ since similar broad division exists in the form of varna categories in ‘the caste system’. Ansari used the three broad categories of ashraf, ajlaf and arzal in the collective sense but clearly recognised that they were divided into smaller named groups that were distinguished from one another by occupation, endogamy and sociability. Thus, if Nazir’s reference is to the groups at this level, then his description of Muslim groups is wholly erroneous. Let us look closely at the empirical evidence in order to determine whether the distinction he posits between ‘the caste system’ and ‘caste labels’, and by implication between Hindu and Muslim modes of social organisation, is confirmed by available studies.
Sociological research on Muslims in India as opposed to lay and impressionistic writings continues to be thin. Evidence brought together by Ahmad (1973) and subsequent research demonstrates that Muslim groups which are the point of reference here, for which words biradari and zat are commonly used, are local and corporate entities. Even biradaris or zata such as Saiyyid, Sheikh and Ansaris, which are dispersed widely and found in different parts of a district, state or the county, are identified by their affiliation to a particular territory and restrict their marriages to members within that territory. Of course, how that territory is distinguished varies widely. For Sayyids, Shiekhs and Pathans, which resent being characterised as biradaris and prefer to be described as zats, the association to territory is expressed through appending the name of the territory to its name. Thus, one hears of Sayyids of Satrikh, Sheikhs of Allahabad, Kidwais of Baragaon or Kasauli and Pathans of Malihabad. In the case of biradaris that have an internal organisation of government and social control (called biradari or zat panchayat) this territorial association is defined by the jurisdiction of the biradari panchayat. The Ansaris in Rasulpur, where I carried out fieldwork, were divided into concentric circles of three and thirteen villages. They confined their marriages to thirteen villages though Ansaris existed in neighbouring areas as well.
This is not all. Considerable evidence exists to show that the biradaris or zats are associated with particular occupations, are inter-dependent (tied into patron-client relationships of the jajmani type), and are endogamous. This does not mean that all members of a biradari or zat necessarily practice the occupation with which their group is traditionally associated. There has been much variation throughout history among biradaris and zats, as indeed there has been within castes, in the extent to which their members remain tied to the practice of their traditional occupation. Biradaris and zats higher up in the social hierarchy did not usually have a traditional occupation and there was no close association between biradari or zat and traditional occupation. On the other hand, biradaris and zats further down the social ladder had traditional occupations and their association with occupation was strong. This was not significantly different from the picture of groups in what Nazir would characterise as ‘the caste system’. Risley’s following observation makes this explicit:
In theory each caste has a distinctive occupation, but it does not follow that this traditional occupation is practised by its members . . . . The traditional occupation of the Brahmans is the priesthood, but in practice they follow all manner of pursuits. Many are clerks or cooks, while some are soldiers, lawyers, shop-keeprs and even day-labourers, but they remain Brahmans all the same. The Chamars of Bihar are workers in skin, but in Orissa they are toddy-drawers. In Orissa and the south of Gaya the Dhobi is often a hewer of splitter of wood. In Bihar and Bengal the Dom is a scavenger or basket maker, but in the Orissa states he is a drummer or basket maker and has nothing to do with the removal of nightsoil: in Chittagong and Assam he is a fisherman, in Cashmere a cultivator and in Kumaon a stone mason.[14]
The argument that Muslim groups, biradaris and zats, are not based on recruitment by birth only is equally fallacious. Like the groups in what Nazir would call ‘the caste system’, Muslim biradaris and zats are based on recruitment by birth only. There is no process by which one can become a Saiyid, Shiekh or Julaha except that of birth. It is for this reason that when someone marries into another biradari or zat, he is not integrated into another biradari or zat but retains his or her original biradari or zat association. There exists a possibility in the case of biradaris and zats to attempt social mobility and end up becoming a Sayid, Shiekh or Pathan in course of time through inventing a rationale and a genealogy. Where such social mobility occurs, the basis of recruitment to the biradari or zat does not change. The biradari or zat just ends up becoming another biradari or zat, and comes to be known by another name, to which recruitment continues to be based on the principle of birth. This is again not significantly different from the situation in ‘the caste system’ where castes have the possibility of changing their antecedents and name through the process of social mobility. Thus, the point that both biradaris and zats are ‘less rigid, because Islam, theoretically at least, permits marriage between different classes of believers’ [15] is not empirically established. It is commonly asserted without a substantial basis in any empirical research.
This raises fundamental questions. Why Husnain and Nazir as well as a host of other researchers who have worked on the sensitive question of the existence of caste among Muslims are so strongly persuaded to posit that there are significant differences between ‘the caste system’ and the system of biradaris and zats? Is it that these differences actually exist but empirical research has so far failed to unearth them? Or, is it that they are persuaded into asserting these differences contrary to empirical evidence out of extraneous considerations? Is it that they are prone to emphasising these differences because as believing Muslims they are familiar with the Islamic discourse that asserts that Islam preaches social equality and are afraid to take a contrary position? Or, is it that asserting these differences is a defence mechanism whereby they can simultaneously adhere to their disciplinary obligation as social scientists as well as their religious obligation to uphold what is commonly considered the Islamic view on social stratification? My own view has been that the tendency to emphasise differences between ‘the caste system’ and the system of biradaris and zats arises from some such considerations, but I would refrain from making any such point here. I would like, instead to explore whether their starting point that Islam is an egalitarian religion and preaches social equality theologically and sociologically valid. This is central to understanding their standpoint.
There is need to ask three different questions of the Islamic text if we are to understand Islam’s position with respect to social stratification and social equality. First, whether Islam is opposed to social stratification as such or is merely opposed to social inequality. Second, what is truly the Islamic attitude towards social inequality that existed in the society in which Islam evolved and took root. Finally, whether the social equality that it proclaims, and to which reference is always made when it is suggested that Islam is an egalitarian religion, is a description of an existing state of affairs in society or is merely an ideal that is given to mankind as a direction in which it should strive. It is necessary to ask these questions in order to understand the nature of the emphasis on egalitarianism and social equality in Islam. Basic to these questions is the sociological dictum that no society beyond the most primitive in the sense of lacking any kind of economic surplus can be truly egalitarian. This was the point at the heart of Veblen’s Theory of the Leisured Class wherein he argued that as societies generated economic surplus there almost always developed some form of social stratification. Of course, Veblen’s concern was an analysis of the lifestyle and consumption pattern of the class that controlled the economic surplus and the symbolic and behavioural expressions of its privileged position. Even so, the substantive theoretical point of his analysis was that once a society starts generating economic surplus some form of social stratification is bound to emerge. Pitirim A. Sorokin articulated this point as a general statement:
Any organised social group is always a stratified social body. There has not been and does not exist any permanent social group which is “flat”, and in which all members are equal. Unstratified society, with a real equality of its members, is a myth which has never been realised in the history of mankind. This statement may sound paradoxical and yet it is accurate. The forms and proportions of stratification vary, but its essence is permanent, as far as any permanent and organised social group is concerned.[16]
On even the most casual reading of the Islamic scriptural text one is struck that quite irrespective of the emphasis it places on equality of human beings Islam’s orientation is remarkably hierarchical. Its hierarchical orientation comes in a wide variety of fields. First, the relationship of the believers with non-believers is conceived in strictly hierarchical terms with the believer, the dhimmi and the kafir constituting a clear hierarchy. Second, the relationship of Allah to the believer is conceived in hierarchical terms. It is a relationship of subordination and subservience so much so that the individual believer must prostrate before Allah in daily prayers and must at the same time see himself as utterly powerless in relation to Him. Any number of passages exist in the Islamic scriptural text that endorse the relatively lowly standing of the believers, whether as individuals or as a collective entity, in relation to Allah. Second, the relationship of the wife to her husband is clearly conceived in hierarchical terms even if the text does not distinguish between them in terms of the religious duties enjoined upon them. This is sometimes cited by Muslim feminists and Muslim modernists to argue that Islam guarantees equality of gender and does not place a Muslim woman in any inferior position to a man. However, in reality a woman is subordinate to a man and the relationship between them is seen as constituting a hierarchy wherein the woman stands in relation to a man in the same position as the individual stands in relation to the community and the community stands in relation to Allah. Fatima Mernissi[17] characterises this orientation of Islam in relation to women by the concept of nusuz, which implies an unequal relationship. Islam makes a distinction between the wives of the Prophet and other women and the responsibilities placed on them are also distinctly varied. Indeed, the Quranic verse that orthodoxy used at a later stage in the development of Islam to impose the custom of veiling for Muslim women originally related to the wives of the Prophet. Finally, the relationship between the master and slave is conceived in clearly hierarchical terms even if the master is called upon to deal with the slave with kindness and merit is assigned to those who would free their slaves. Thus, it is clear that the framework of Islamic thinking is deeply imbued with the notion of hierarchy and social stratification.
It is true that the Arab society in which Islam evolved did not possess great differences of wealth, but economic differentiation between ordinary Bedouins and the trading classes did exist. One can easily imagine that they would have differed with respect to their wealth, material possessions and lifestyles and Islam could not have brushed them under the carpet. It would have been required to deal with them, as they would have been reflected in their behaviour and mutual attitudes. As far as the Islamic scriptural text is concerned, it clearly recognises such distinctions in society and prescribes appropriate forms of behaviour for each. It asks those deprived in social and economic terms to be content and to live according to their means. It is repeatedly said in the text that Allah is All-seeing and would reward the poor for their poverty on the day of judgement. At the same time, the wealthy and rich, while they are allowed to live in their riches and to spend according to their economic standing, are warned not to be too proud of their material possessions. Moreover, they are asked to show kindness to those who are deprived and poor and to part with a portion of their wealth and income for the poor. Even the poor are conceived in hierarchical terms: first come the near ones followed by orphans and then the destitute and the deprived. If some kind of social stratification had not existed in society, Islamic scriptural text would neither have referred to those differences, nor indicated appropriate forms of behaviour for them. It would also not have sought to device an economic framework for the redistribution of wealth in a manner that the poor and able to meet both ends meet. It is, thus, clear that the emphasis that Islamic scriptural text places on social equality does not describe an existing state of affairs.
If the worldview of the Islamic scriptural text is hierarchical and it admits of social and economic differences in society, then how should we interpret its emphasis upon social equality? One way to interpret this can be to ignore that Islamic orientation is hierarchical and to argue that it stands for egalitarianism as an absolute value. I would argue that those who maintain that Islam contemplates no social stratification are interpreting Islam in precisely this way. Even when they encounter social differentiation and stratification, they glibly ignore it and flash the proclaimed egalitarianism of Islam as a social reality. The other way of interpretation can be to recognise a fundamental difference. This is the difference between the society as it exists and as it ought to exist and to maintain that the Islamic proclamation in favour of social equality is more in the nature of an ideal for the future than a description of an existing state of affairs. My own position is that drawing this distinction is important in any consideration of the question of the presence or absence of caste and caste-based social stratification in Indo-Muslim society. It enables us to see that a distinction has to be made between the society which exists, and where caste- or class-based distinctions may exist, and a future state of society where they are expected to disappear and give rise to an egalitarian society. This distinction applies to Islam as much as to any other ideological system that proclaims social equality as an ideal.
This distinction should not be entirely unfamiliar to us in India. As is well known, Indian society has been the most unequal society, the social inequality being institutionalised in the caste system. India’s constitution went on to declare India to be a casteless and classless society. In so doing, the constitution was not proclaiming that social inequalities of the past had entirely disappeared and the society was egalitarian from the time it was promulgated. The only sensible way would be to recognise that, while social inequalities persist, the ideal that the Constitution provides is that of egalitarianism. This is also true of Islam. It proclaims social equality to be an ideal, but recognises social inequalities existing in society. By this token, there is no contradiction between Islamic support for an egalitarian society as a future goal and presence of caste or class differences as a social reality.
Social realities have a way of prevailing over sociological and theological formulations. Contrary to the argument of some sociologists and most theologians that caste does not exist among Muslims and untouchability is disallowed in Islam, the expression ‘Dalit Muslims’ has been finding increasing mention in the discourse of traditionally backward Muslim communities in recent years. However, there does not yet exist any clear understanding of what this expression actually means or which castes or groups it is supposed to denote. On the one hand, it has been used to denote a whole range of Muslim castes which are currently included in the category of the Other Backward Classes. On the other hand, it has been used to denote those Muslim castes or groups which converted from the ‘untouchable’ Hindu castes or are so severely stigmatised and are subjected to such extreme forms of social exclusion that would render them comparable to the Scheduled Castes.
The Mandal Commission compounded and reinforced this confusion. As is already well-known, the Commission’s task was to identify Other Backward Castes and to determine whether they should be eligible for reservation along the lines of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. There was no difficulty in this with respect to Hindu castes because administrative policy clearly recognised a distinction between Scheduled Castes and Other Backward Castes. Because the presidential order of 1950 clearly and arbitrarily laid down that ‘No person wo professes a religion different from the Hindu religion shall be deemed to be a member of a Scheduled Caste’, the Mandal Commission lumped the severely stigmatised and extremely excluded among the Muslims with Muslim Other Backward Castes for purposes of affirmative action. Therefore, when the urge for equality and social justice seized the imagination of the lowest social groups in other religious traditions and the word Dalit came to be seen as a short-cut carrier of that aspiration, the expression ‘Dalit Muslims’ came to be used for a wide variety of groups other than those severely stigmatised and excluded and on that ground comparable to Hindu ‘ex-untouchable’ castes for whom the term ‘Scheduled Castes’ was reserved.
One can arrive at an assessment of the extent of confusion that prevails at present with respect to the expression ‘Dalit Muslims’ by reading between the lines in the statements of those claiming to speak on their behalf as well as by considering the castes that they have been tempted to include under that category. N. Jamal Ansari writes: ‘. . . it is an established fact that Indian Muslim community is divided into castes and has a large deprived section. . . . Before discussing constitutional provisions in respect of Dalits and exclusion of all ‘Dalit Muslims’ from those provisions, I think we must define “Dalit Muslims”. Dalit means downtrodden, oppressed, suppressed and backward. Also, Dalit stands for untouchable and depressed classes. The term “Dalit” applies to members of those menial castes that have been graded lowly which they have inherited by accident of birth’. Likewise, Ali Anwar [18] uses the words ‘pasmanda’ (meaning downtrodden and backward) and Dalit interchangeably and includes under ‘Dalit Muslims’ castes like Bhatiyara, Tikyafarosh, Itafarosh, Halalkhor, Khakrob, Mogalzada and Chirimar only some of which can be said to be severely stigmatized and excluded. In all such statements and lists, as their reading suggests, the expression ‘Dalit Muslims’ has been used as a generic term to denote all Muslim castes that are educationally and socially backward.
Clearly, there is need to define Dalit Muslims in more precise terms. Ansari suggested in his early work that the relationships between the ashraf and ajlaf on the one hand and the arzal on the other were shaped by considerations of social distance taking on the characteristics of untouchability. He mentioned that the members of the category called arzal were excluded both physically and socially. From a physical point of view, they tended to inhabit excluded localities and did not mix with the members of the other two categories. When it came to social intercourse, their relationship was characterized by strict maintenance of social distance and deference so that the members of the arzal communities had minimal and limited interaction with the members of the other communities. The expression should be restricted to refer to these castes alone. Since the expression ‘Dalit’ has come to acquire pejorative connotations, though it was originally used by the Dalit Panthers Movement as a short-hand way of referring to the extremely deprived and excluded castes, many Muslims may not like that expression to be used in the context of Muslim castes. Even so, there is need to recognise that the castes to whom we have here referred to as Dalit Muslims do form a class separate from the other categories of Muslim castes and need to be distinguished on account of the extreme degree of stigmatisation and exclusion suffered by them.
There is need for rich and focussed ethnographic research on such castes. This research should seek to understand the attitudes of the non-arzal castes and groups toward the members of the arzal category and to gauge the extent and intensity of discrimination suffered by them today. It is possible that with the introduction of sanitary toilets and other technological changes the arzal castes no longer engage in the demeaning and defiling occupation of scavenging but social distance from them continues to be maintained. It is also possible that the forms of discrimination and stigmatisation practised against the arzal castes have changed, but they may have taken other forms. Only focussed social research can indicate the contemporary situation of the arzal castes in contemporary Muslim society.
Refrences:
[1] Gaus Ansari, Muslim Castes in Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow, Ethnographic and Folk Culture Society, 1959.
[2] Imtiaz Ahmad, `Introduction’, in Imtiaz Ahmad (ed.), Caste and Social Stratificaion among Muslims, Delhi, Manohar Book Service, 1973.
[3] From my observations of growing up in a Muslim family I am able to recall a number of instances of both open and silent discrimination practiced against these castes. We had a Lalbegi woman come to clean the toilets in our house. She was on the best of terms with my mother and would sit for hours together gossiping with my mother. Whenever my mother would offer her pan, she would wrap her hand with her dupatta to receive it. My mother used to drop the pan in her hand, making sure that her hand did not touch the Lalbegi woman’s hand. On occasions of marriage the family would come and sit in a corner and wait until all guests had eaten and left. It would then be given food in vessels they brought with them. They did not eat the food there, but instead took it with them to be eaten at home. On sacrificial eid the family was not given any portion of the meat. It was given the intestines which were kept aside for them. It is possible that some of these forms of discrimination have changed, but there is no evidence to show that they have disappeared.
Some evidence exists to show that there is discrimination against these Muslim castes in the religious spheres. I found during fieldwork in eastern Uttar Pradesh that members of these castes did not go to the mosque for prayers and if they went they had to stand in the back rows. It has been mentioned by many observers that such groups often have their own mosques. N. Jamal Ansari notes that ‘in certain areas of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar there are separate mosques and burial grounds’ for these castes (Paper presented at the seminar on Dalit Muslims organized by Deshkal Society, New Delhi, 2004). Establishment of own mosque would call for a level of prosperity for the groups as a whole. Whether they have attained such levels of prosperity is something on which very little information exists.
[4] They were admitted to the house, but only for the performance of their services, in doing which they were required to ensure that they did not touch members of the household or other things that carried the risk of becoming polluted or rendered impure by their touch. They were asked to be present at social functions and festivals on social occasions such as marriages or life cycle rituals, but this was not by virtue of any social right. It was by way of recompense for the service they rendered throughout the year. On all such occasions they sat some distance away from the main entrance for the guests and waited until everyone had been entertained to be given food that they were not supposed to eat then and there but carry it in the containers they brought with them to be eaten at home.
[5] Charles Lindholm has argued that many of the features found in Muslim society are similar to those found among Muslims in other parts of South Asia and on that basis has argued that the Muslim social stratification found in India is an extension of the system found elsewhere (see Charles Lindholm, ‘Paradigms of Society: A Critique of Theories of Caste among Indian Muslims’, European Journal of Sociology, 1965, pp. 131-140). Many Muslims are themselves inclined to take a similar line of argument. This argument would have been tenable if Islamic scriptural sources had provided a blue-print of an Islamic social stratification system. This not being the case, the argument fails to sustain itself. It is plausible that Islam did modify certain social practices including that of caste. Whatever practices were not sanctified by Islam but existed in India were attenuated. Whatever practices existing in India were in conformity with the Islamic ethos became more rigid. Thus, purdah practices, which already existed even in India, were rendered more rigid and strict and caste principles were relaxed or made less restrictive.
[6] Nadeem Hasnian, in H. S. Verma (ed.), The OBCs and the Ruling Classes in India, Jaipur, Rawat Publications, 2005, pp 84-97.
[7] Nazir, 2898.
[8] Husnain, p. 2
[9] Husnainm pp. 207-08.
[10] Husnain, pp. 207-08.
[11] Nazir, 1993: 2898
[12] pp. 208.
[13] Nazir, pp. 2898.
[14] Census of India, 1902, pp. 350-51.
[15] Husnain, pp. 208.
[16] Pitirim A. Sorokin, Social and Cultural Mobility, The Free Press, New York, 1959, pp. 13-14.
[17Mernissi, Fatima (1986). Femininity as subversion: Reflection on the Muslim concept of nushuz. In Devaki Jain and Diana L. Eck(eds.), Speaking of faith: Crosscultural perspectives on women, religion, and social change. New Delhi: Kali for Women. 464-476.
[18]Anwar, Ali (2005). Masawat Ki Jung (in English), New Delhi, Indian Social Instittue.
URL:
http://www.dalitmuslims.com/2009/08/can-there-be-category-called-dalit.html
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Monday, 31 August 2009
Saturday, 15 August 2009
Indian Police: Broken System
S.R.Darapuri I.P.S.(Retd)
Email; srdarapuri@yahoo.co.in
“This week, I was told to do an encounter,” a police officer told Human Rights Watch (HRW). He was referring to the practice of taking into custody and extra judicially executing an individual, then claiming that the victim died after initiating a shoot- out with police. “I am looking for my target,” he said. “I will eliminate him. .. I fear being put in jail, but if I don't do it, I'll lose my position." This is the confession of an Officer from Uttar Pradesh but it is applicable to any officer in any state of India. This is how Human Rights Watch report titled “Broken System: Dysfunctional, Abuse and Impunity in the Indian Police” starts its narrative. This report was released by HRW in Lucknow (Uttar Pradesh) on 7th August, 2009. The Repot was earlier released at Banglore on 4th August, 2009. (Full report available at www. hrw.com)
This 118-page report documents a range of human rights violations committed by police, including arbitrary arrest and detention, torture and extrajudicial killings. The report is based on interviews with more than 80 police officers of varying ranks, 60 victims of police abuses, and numerous discussions with experts and civil society activists. It documents the failings of state police forces that operate outside the law, lack sufficient ethical and professional standards, are overstretched and outmatched by criminal elements, and unable to cope with increasing demands and public expectations. Field research was conducted in 19 police stations in Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Himachal Pradesh, and the capital, Delhi.
"India is modernizing rapidly, but the police continue to use their old methods: abuse and threats," said Naureen Shah of Asia Division of HRW. "It's time for the government to stop talking about reform and fix the system."
The repot describes the story of a fruit vendor in Varanasi who narrates how police tortured him to extract confessions to multiple, unrelated false charges:
"[M]y hands and legs were tied; a wooden stick was passed through my legs. They started beating me badly on the legs with lathis (batons) and kicking me. They were saying, ‘you must name all the members of the 13-person gang.' They beat me until I was crying and shouting for help. When I was almost fainting, they stopped the beating. A constable said, ‘With this kind of a beating, a ghost would run away. Why don't you tell me what I want to know?' Then they turned me upside down... They poured water from a plastic jug into my mouth and nose, and I fainted."
Almost every police officer interviewed by HRW was aware of the boundaries of the law, but many believed that unlawful methods, including illegal detention and torture, were necessary tactics of crime investigation and law enforcement.
Human Rights Watch also said that while not excusing abuses, abysmal conditions for police officers contribute to violations. Low-ranking officers often work in difficult conditions. They are required to be on-call 24 hours a day, every day. Instead of shifts, many work long hours, sometimes living in tents or filthy barracks at the police station. Many are separated from their families for long stretches of time. They often lack necessary equipment, including vehicles, mobile phones, investigative tools and even paper on which to record complaints and make notes.
Police officers told HRW that they used "short-cuts" to cope with overwhelming workloads and insufficient resources. For instance, they described how they or others cut caseloads by refusing to register crime complaints. Many officers described facing unrealistic pressure from their superiors to solve cases quickly. Receiving little or no encouragement to collect forensic evidence and witness statements, tactics considered time-consuming, they instead held suspects illegally and coerced them to confess, frequently using torture and ill-treatment.
"Conditions and incentives for police officers need to change,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, Senior Researcher,HRW. "Officers should not be put into a position where they think they have to turn to abuse to meet superiors' demands, or obey orders to abuse. Instead they should be given the resources, training, equipment, and encouragement to act professionally and ethically."
"Broken System" also documents the particular vulnerability to police abuse of traditionally marginalized groups in India. They include the poor, women, Dalits (so-called "untouchables"), and religious and sexual minorities. Police often fail to investigate crimes against them because of discrimination, the victims' inability to pay bribes, or their lack of social status or political connections. Members of these groups are also more vulnerable to arbitrary arrest and torture, especially meted out by police as punishment for alleged crimes.
Colonial-era police laws enable state and local politicians to interfere routinely in police operations, sometimes directing police officers to drop investigations against people with political connections, including known criminals, and to harass or file false charges against political opponents. These practices corrode public confidence.
In 2006, a landmark Supreme Court judgment mandated reform of police laws. But the central government and most state governments have either significantly or completely failed to implement the court's order, suggesting that officials have yet to accept the urgency of comprehensive police reform, including the need to hold police accountable for human rights violations.
"India's status as the world's largest democracy is undermined by a police force that thinks it is above the law," Naureen said. "It's a vicious cycle. Indians avoid contact with the police out of fear. So crimes go unreported and unpunished, and the police can't get the cooperation they need from the public to prevent and solve crimes."
"Broken System" sets out detailed recommendations for police reform drawn from studies by government commissions, former Indian police, and Indian groups. Among the major recommendations are:
• Require the police to read suspects their rights upon arrest or any detention, which will increase institutional acceptance of these safeguards;
• Exclude from court any evidence police obtain by using torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment in suspect interrogations;
• Bolster independent investigations into complaints of police abuse and misconduct through national and state human rights commissions and police complaints authorities; and
• Improve training and equipment, including strengthening the crime-investigation curriculum at police academies, training low-ranking officers to assist in crime investigations, and providing basic forensic equipment to every police office
The report also gives selected accounts of persons who wee tortured and kept in police custody. Some of the narratives are the following:
"She was kept in the police station all night. In the morning, when we went to meet her, they said she had killed herself. They showed us her body, where she was hanging from a tree inside the police station. The branch was so low, it is impossible that she hanged herself from it. Her feet were clean, although there was wet mud all around and she would have walked through it to reach the tree. It is obvious that the police killed her and then pretended she had committed suicide." –
- Brother-in-law of Gita Pasi, describing her death in police custody in Uttar Pradesh in August 2006.
The police officers have their own tale of woes as narrated below:
"We have no time to think, no time to sleep. I tell my men that a victim will only come to the police station because we can give him justice, so we should not beat him with a stick. But often the men are tired and irritable and mistakes take place."
- Gangaram Azad, a sub-inspector who heads a rural police station in Uttar Pradesh state
"They say, ‘investigate within 24 hours,' but they never care about how I will do [that]; what are the resources. ... There is use of force in sensational cases because we are not equipped with scientific methods. What remains with us? A sense of panic surrounds our mind that if we don't come to a conclusion we will be suspended or face punishment. We are bound to fulfill the case; we must cover the facts in any way."
- Sub inspector working near Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh
"Often, it is our superiors who ask us to do wrong things. It is hard for us to resist. I remember, one time, my officer had asked me to beat up someone. I said that the man would be refused bail and would rot in jail and that was enough punishment. But that made my officer angry."
- Constable in Uttar Pradesh
"With all the mental stress, the 24-hour law-and-order duty, the political pressure, a person may turn to violence. How much can a person take? ... We have to keep watch on an accused person, their human rights, but what about us? We live like this for 24 hours. We are not claiming that our power makes us born to work all the times. Sometimes we beat or detain illegally, because our working conditions, our facilities are bad. So we are contributing to creating criminals and militants."
- Inspector in charge of a police station in Kangra, Himachal Pradesh
On the above occasion giving the details of fake encounter cases, SR Darapuri, a retired IPS Officer and Vice President Of U.P. PUCL who contested the general election-2009 from Lucknow said, “Only countable genuine encounters like that of Ghanshyam Kewat which took place on June 17, 2009 made U.P. Police cops to taste a real encounter, rest 99 percent are fake.” Darapuri said, “I had been a police officer for 32 years and I know how encounters are planned.” “A common man does not feel safe in the state,” said Darapuri.
Lenin Raghuvanshi, Director People’s Vigilance Committee for Human Rights, while presenting the report said, “We studied 125 cases. In majority of cases justice was either delayed or denied to poor people for they had no approach to get the FIR lodged or to pursue the case fro proper investigation. There have been instances when cops violated even the basic policing norms. They a voided post mortem and even effused to hand over the body of victims of fake encounter to their families.”
It is the high time that the Indian government should take major steps to overhaul a policing system that facilitates and even encourages human rights violations, said the report. For decades, successive governments have failed to deliver on promises to hold the police accountable for abuses and to build professional, rights-respecting police forces. If the states refuse to undertake the police reforms, the civil society, human rights organizations and all right thinking persons should bring pressure on the states and political parties to force them to do it. We should not forget that democratic nations need democratic police.
S.R.Darapuri I.P.S.(Retd)
Email; srdarapuri@yahoo.co.in
“This week, I was told to do an encounter,” a police officer told Human Rights Watch (HRW). He was referring to the practice of taking into custody and extra judicially executing an individual, then claiming that the victim died after initiating a shoot- out with police. “I am looking for my target,” he said. “I will eliminate him. .. I fear being put in jail, but if I don't do it, I'll lose my position." This is the confession of an Officer from Uttar Pradesh but it is applicable to any officer in any state of India. This is how Human Rights Watch report titled “Broken System: Dysfunctional, Abuse and Impunity in the Indian Police” starts its narrative. This report was released by HRW in Lucknow (Uttar Pradesh) on 7th August, 2009. The Repot was earlier released at Banglore on 4th August, 2009. (Full report available at www. hrw.com)
This 118-page report documents a range of human rights violations committed by police, including arbitrary arrest and detention, torture and extrajudicial killings. The report is based on interviews with more than 80 police officers of varying ranks, 60 victims of police abuses, and numerous discussions with experts and civil society activists. It documents the failings of state police forces that operate outside the law, lack sufficient ethical and professional standards, are overstretched and outmatched by criminal elements, and unable to cope with increasing demands and public expectations. Field research was conducted in 19 police stations in Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Himachal Pradesh, and the capital, Delhi.
"India is modernizing rapidly, but the police continue to use their old methods: abuse and threats," said Naureen Shah of Asia Division of HRW. "It's time for the government to stop talking about reform and fix the system."
The repot describes the story of a fruit vendor in Varanasi who narrates how police tortured him to extract confessions to multiple, unrelated false charges:
"[M]y hands and legs were tied; a wooden stick was passed through my legs. They started beating me badly on the legs with lathis (batons) and kicking me. They were saying, ‘you must name all the members of the 13-person gang.' They beat me until I was crying and shouting for help. When I was almost fainting, they stopped the beating. A constable said, ‘With this kind of a beating, a ghost would run away. Why don't you tell me what I want to know?' Then they turned me upside down... They poured water from a plastic jug into my mouth and nose, and I fainted."
Almost every police officer interviewed by HRW was aware of the boundaries of the law, but many believed that unlawful methods, including illegal detention and torture, were necessary tactics of crime investigation and law enforcement.
Human Rights Watch also said that while not excusing abuses, abysmal conditions for police officers contribute to violations. Low-ranking officers often work in difficult conditions. They are required to be on-call 24 hours a day, every day. Instead of shifts, many work long hours, sometimes living in tents or filthy barracks at the police station. Many are separated from their families for long stretches of time. They often lack necessary equipment, including vehicles, mobile phones, investigative tools and even paper on which to record complaints and make notes.
Police officers told HRW that they used "short-cuts" to cope with overwhelming workloads and insufficient resources. For instance, they described how they or others cut caseloads by refusing to register crime complaints. Many officers described facing unrealistic pressure from their superiors to solve cases quickly. Receiving little or no encouragement to collect forensic evidence and witness statements, tactics considered time-consuming, they instead held suspects illegally and coerced them to confess, frequently using torture and ill-treatment.
"Conditions and incentives for police officers need to change,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, Senior Researcher,HRW. "Officers should not be put into a position where they think they have to turn to abuse to meet superiors' demands, or obey orders to abuse. Instead they should be given the resources, training, equipment, and encouragement to act professionally and ethically."
"Broken System" also documents the particular vulnerability to police abuse of traditionally marginalized groups in India. They include the poor, women, Dalits (so-called "untouchables"), and religious and sexual minorities. Police often fail to investigate crimes against them because of discrimination, the victims' inability to pay bribes, or their lack of social status or political connections. Members of these groups are also more vulnerable to arbitrary arrest and torture, especially meted out by police as punishment for alleged crimes.
Colonial-era police laws enable state and local politicians to interfere routinely in police operations, sometimes directing police officers to drop investigations against people with political connections, including known criminals, and to harass or file false charges against political opponents. These practices corrode public confidence.
In 2006, a landmark Supreme Court judgment mandated reform of police laws. But the central government and most state governments have either significantly or completely failed to implement the court's order, suggesting that officials have yet to accept the urgency of comprehensive police reform, including the need to hold police accountable for human rights violations.
"India's status as the world's largest democracy is undermined by a police force that thinks it is above the law," Naureen said. "It's a vicious cycle. Indians avoid contact with the police out of fear. So crimes go unreported and unpunished, and the police can't get the cooperation they need from the public to prevent and solve crimes."
"Broken System" sets out detailed recommendations for police reform drawn from studies by government commissions, former Indian police, and Indian groups. Among the major recommendations are:
• Require the police to read suspects their rights upon arrest or any detention, which will increase institutional acceptance of these safeguards;
• Exclude from court any evidence police obtain by using torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment in suspect interrogations;
• Bolster independent investigations into complaints of police abuse and misconduct through national and state human rights commissions and police complaints authorities; and
• Improve training and equipment, including strengthening the crime-investigation curriculum at police academies, training low-ranking officers to assist in crime investigations, and providing basic forensic equipment to every police office
The report also gives selected accounts of persons who wee tortured and kept in police custody. Some of the narratives are the following:
"She was kept in the police station all night. In the morning, when we went to meet her, they said she had killed herself. They showed us her body, where she was hanging from a tree inside the police station. The branch was so low, it is impossible that she hanged herself from it. Her feet were clean, although there was wet mud all around and she would have walked through it to reach the tree. It is obvious that the police killed her and then pretended she had committed suicide." –
- Brother-in-law of Gita Pasi, describing her death in police custody in Uttar Pradesh in August 2006.
The police officers have their own tale of woes as narrated below:
"We have no time to think, no time to sleep. I tell my men that a victim will only come to the police station because we can give him justice, so we should not beat him with a stick. But often the men are tired and irritable and mistakes take place."
- Gangaram Azad, a sub-inspector who heads a rural police station in Uttar Pradesh state
"They say, ‘investigate within 24 hours,' but they never care about how I will do [that]; what are the resources. ... There is use of force in sensational cases because we are not equipped with scientific methods. What remains with us? A sense of panic surrounds our mind that if we don't come to a conclusion we will be suspended or face punishment. We are bound to fulfill the case; we must cover the facts in any way."
- Sub inspector working near Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh
"Often, it is our superiors who ask us to do wrong things. It is hard for us to resist. I remember, one time, my officer had asked me to beat up someone. I said that the man would be refused bail and would rot in jail and that was enough punishment. But that made my officer angry."
- Constable in Uttar Pradesh
"With all the mental stress, the 24-hour law-and-order duty, the political pressure, a person may turn to violence. How much can a person take? ... We have to keep watch on an accused person, their human rights, but what about us? We live like this for 24 hours. We are not claiming that our power makes us born to work all the times. Sometimes we beat or detain illegally, because our working conditions, our facilities are bad. So we are contributing to creating criminals and militants."
- Inspector in charge of a police station in Kangra, Himachal Pradesh
On the above occasion giving the details of fake encounter cases, SR Darapuri, a retired IPS Officer and Vice President Of U.P. PUCL who contested the general election-2009 from Lucknow said, “Only countable genuine encounters like that of Ghanshyam Kewat which took place on June 17, 2009 made U.P. Police cops to taste a real encounter, rest 99 percent are fake.” Darapuri said, “I had been a police officer for 32 years and I know how encounters are planned.” “A common man does not feel safe in the state,” said Darapuri.
Lenin Raghuvanshi, Director People’s Vigilance Committee for Human Rights, while presenting the report said, “We studied 125 cases. In majority of cases justice was either delayed or denied to poor people for they had no approach to get the FIR lodged or to pursue the case fro proper investigation. There have been instances when cops violated even the basic policing norms. They a voided post mortem and even effused to hand over the body of victims of fake encounter to their families.”
It is the high time that the Indian government should take major steps to overhaul a policing system that facilitates and even encourages human rights violations, said the report. For decades, successive governments have failed to deliver on promises to hold the police accountable for abuses and to build professional, rights-respecting police forces. If the states refuse to undertake the police reforms, the civil society, human rights organizations and all right thinking persons should bring pressure on the states and political parties to force them to do it. We should not forget that democratic nations need democratic police.
Friday, 17 July 2009
Mayawati’s Idolization and the Question of Dalit Emancipation
S.R.Darapuri I.P.S.(Retd)
During the Assembly elections 2007, the people of Uttar Pardesh (U.P.) India and especially the Dalits voted Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) to absolute majority. They expected that this time with a stable government she will be able to take U.P. out of the quagmire of underdevelopment and backwardness. They also hoped that now she will work out a development agenda for the State as well as for the Dalits and implement it faithfully. During her previous three stints as Chief Minister she took the plea that due to her dependence on other parties for support she could not act independently. As such she needed a government with majority to give her a free hand in running her government. But even this time Mayawati did not come up to the people’s expectations. Neither she neither worked out development agenda nor stopped wasting public money on installing statues, creating memorials and making parks.
If judged from the point of view of development, at present U.P. is the one of the most backward states of India. As per 2001 Census Repot it has the largest population (16.16 crores) which stands as 16.16 % of total population of India. According to development parameters the total literacy rate of U.P. is 56.30 % (Male 68.8 and Female 42.2 %) whereas at the national level it is 68.84 % (Male 75.26 and 53.67 %). The sex ratio of U.P. stands at 898 whereas the national ratio is 933. According to available statistics the per capita income in U.P. during 2005-06 was Rs. 13,316 which is the lowest in the country excepting Bihar (Rs. 7875) whereas at the national level it is Rs. 25,716. During this period the per capita power production and consumption in U.P. was 113 and 167 K.W.Hour as compared with 563 and 372 K.W.Hour at the national level.
From the Public Health angle the birth rate, death rate and child mortality rate for U.P. were 30.4, 8.7 and 73 respectively whereas the national rates were 23.8, 7.6 and 58 respectively. As per the findings of NFHS-III, 2005-06 the infant mortality (number of infant deaths per thousand live births in the last five years) rate at national level is 57 whereas for U.P. it is 73. In India, 46 per scent children under three yeas of age are underweight whereas in U.P. it is 47 percent. Almost 38 % children (under three years age) are stunted (too short for their age). In U.P. their percentage is 46. Almost 79 % of children (6-35 months) and 56 % of women in India are anemic. In U.P. the figures are 85 and 51 percent respectively. From the employment angle during 2001 in U.P. only 23.78 % of total workers were Main Workers and 66 % were engaged as Agriculture Labourers. At present 32 % of U.P. population is living below poverty line against the national average of 27.5 percent.
From the above details it is clear that from the development point of view U.P. is one of the most backward sataes of India. In such a situation, not only Mayawati but every government is expected to utilize all the resources of the State for the development of the people. But it has not happened for last many years. Accordint to Sudha Pai “There is evidence that the conditions of the poorer sections in U.P. which include the major chunk of the Dalits have become worse during the 1990s. The National Human Development Report (NHDR) has pointed out the poor conditions of life in comparison with many other states. The State’s position in terms of Human Development Index was 29th in 1981 and has fallen to 31 out of 32 states (NHDR 2001:140-41). Similarly the Monthly Per Capita Consumption Expenditure registered a fall in the State between 1993-94 and 1999-2000; that this is due to a drastic reduction in the consumption expenditure on food between two periods clearly suggest deterioration in the standard of living. This down slide took place when the B.S.P. supported by B.J.P. was in power in U.P. for the most part (National Herald, Lucknow May 1, 2002). Despite the fact that the BSP. had formed a government twice during the 1990s and was again in power with the support of the Bhartiya Janta Party, the conditions of Dalits have not improved according to the draft proposals of the Tenth Five Year Plan (Jha, 28 December, The Times of India, New Delhi-2002). The BSP. did not put forward any policies for improving the socioeconomic conditions of the subaltern sections of the Dalits. The emphasis has been on political empowerment only.”
It is well known that Mayawati did not take up any development agenda during all her tenures of Chief Minister ship. During the elections BSP never came out with an election manifesto. This was done purposely. Because declaration of an agenda brings about the responsibility of implementing it and failure to do so invites public wrath. Mr. Kanshi Ram, the mentor of Mayawati, attracted Dalits by promising to fulfill the incomplete mission of Dr. Ambedkar but cleverly he never defined it in writing. “First capture political power and then any work” was the promise given by BSP. In the beginning, Dalits were instigated against higher castes by raising emotional and non-material issues but later on all sorts of unprincipled and opportunistic alliances were made to get political power. All the principles of Ambedkarism were thrown to winds and dalits were exploited emotionally in the name of caste. Personal ambitions were pursued in place of Dalit issues. This unprincipled, non developmental and corrupt politics has resulted in poverty, unemployment and backwardness of the people of U.P. and the Dalits at large.
Now it will be pertinent to see on what items the budget money was spent during this period. It has been found that major part of budget was spent on non-development projects. It is noticeable that 90 % of Cultural Department and about 40 % of Public Works Department budget was spent on parks, memorials and statues. What ever money was spent on welfare programmes, a major apart of it was eaten away by corruption. As such the poor were deprived of any benefit their of. The main cause of it has been the personal greed and corruption of Mayawati which may land her in jail in the near future. She has spent a major portion of state budget on installing statues, making parks and creating memorials. Along with the statues of Dr. Ambedkar and some other Dalit icons she has installed her own statues along with her mentor Kanshi Ram. She seems to have taken inspiration from North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Ill. She has made history by installing her own statues as a living person. According to available information she has spent more than 3,000 crores of Rupees on statutes and parks. These statues and memorials are so grand and costly which can put any king or queen to shame. According to one German scholar Maren Schempp, “Mayawati is building her own Rome.” Another scholar has labeled it as a criminal waste of public money.
Now Mayawati is ruling the State for the fourth time and she proclaims to be the savior of Dalits. In the face of this claim it will be proper to see what she has done to for the upliftment of Dalits of U.P. According to 2001 Census Report the population of Dalits in U.P. is 3.51 crores which is 21.2 % of State population and is the largest in whole of India. Ordinarily it is expected that in a state where a Dalit Chief Minister has occupied the chair for the fourth time, the Dalits of that state might have benefited much from her rule. But the ground reality is totally to the contrary. At present U.P. dalits are the most backward in whole of India leaving aside the Dalits of Orissa and Bihar. According to 2001 Census Report the Male- Female sex ratio of U.P. dalits is 900 whereas the national average of Dalits is 936. Similarly the literacy rate of U.P. Dalits is 46.3 % (Male 60.3 and Female 30.5 Percent) against the national average of 54.7 percent (Male 66.6 and Female 41.9 %). According to above Census report out of 1.33 crore children between the age of group 5-14 yeas only 58.3 lacs ( 56.4 % ) were going to school.
According to above census Report among total workers U.P. has got 42.5 % dalits working as Agriculture Labourers against the national average of 45.6 %. The percentage of U.P. dalits below poverty line is about 50 %. In U.P. Work Participation Rate of Dalits is 34.7 % which is lower than the national average. Being a dominantly agriculture based society land is an important source of production. In U.P. the number and size of land holdings with dalits is very small but land reforms have not been given proper priority in the State. What ever land was given to the landless, most of it is under illegal possession of higher castes and Mayawati cannot afford to annoy them as they form an important part of her Sarvjan (all included) followers.
On account of feudal social set up caste discrimination and practice of untouchabiity are the main factors behind atrocities against Dalits in U.P. Their number is highest in whole of India. A decrease in atrocities and prompt action against the offenders is the general expectation from Mayawati but the reality is totally otherwise. During 2001 Mayawati in order to keep her crime figures low issued a written order suspending the use of Scheduled Cases and Scheduled Tribes ( Prevention of Atrocities ) Act but was forced to withdraw the same in 2003. This had a very adverse effect on dalits. The atrocities continued to be perpetrated but their cases were not being registered by police. Besides this, the practice of untouchability is quite prevalent in midday meals in Primary Schools, Anganwari Centres and government hospitals but very little action is taken at government level. Thus Dalits continue to suffer under Mayawati’s rule. They have not experienced any empowerment material or otherwise.
“The statues serve as a source of inspiration for dalits” is the argument put forward by Mayawati for justifying her idolization. But this argument is quite contrary to the philosophy of Dalit icons. Let us see what Dr. Ambedkar said in a letter published in Bombay Chronicle in 1916. Following the death, in 1915, of Pherozeshah Merwnjee Mehta, one of the founders of Indian National Congress, and of Gopal Krishana Gokhle, another Congress leader and founder of Servants of India society, Ambedkar notes: “The memorial for Gokhle is to take the form of establishing branches of Servants of India Society at various places, while that of Sir P.M. Mehta is to stand in the form of a statue before the Bombay Municipal Office.” While appreciating the memorial for Gokhle, Ambedkar records his dismay over a statue for Mehta being “very trivial and unbecoming.” He is “at pains to understand why this memorial cannot be in a form that will be “of permanent use to posterity.”. He suggests that the memorial should be a public library named after Mehta. Drawing from his experience at “one of the biggest universities in the U.S., Ambedkar laments how we have not yet “realized the value of the library as an institution in the growth and advancement of society.”
Later, Dr. Ambedkar acted on these principles when he had the opportunity. He was driven by the belief that education was the greatest weapon for advancement. He founded “People’s Education Society” in 1944; three branches of Siddharth College beginning 1946; and Milind Mahavidhyalya in 1950. With a view to benefit the maximum number of students he established colleges in Bombay and Marathwar which is the most backward area in Maharashtra. The other Dalit icon Mahatma Joti Rao Phule did the pioneering work of starting girl education in India in Nineteenth century. Chhatarpati Shahu Ji Maharaj opened the doors of education for Dalits. But Mayawati has refused to learn any thing from these Dalit icons.
It is true that statues serve as source of inspiration but this role is very limited. The lasting inspiration comes by following their ideals and propagating their philosophy. But Mayawati has done hardly any thing in this direction. If the money spent on statues had been spent in establishing educational institutions in the name of dalit icons, it would have brought a qualitative change in the society.
From the brief above discussion it transpires that the emancipation of dalits can be achieved not by installation of statues but by working out a Dalit development agenda and implementing it honestly. In stead of spending crores on the statues, establishing educational institutions, hospital, libraries and useful institutions in the name of Dalit icons will be a true honour and memorial to them.
Writer’s email: srdarapuri@yahoo.co.in
S.R.Darapuri I.P.S.(Retd)
During the Assembly elections 2007, the people of Uttar Pardesh (U.P.) India and especially the Dalits voted Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) to absolute majority. They expected that this time with a stable government she will be able to take U.P. out of the quagmire of underdevelopment and backwardness. They also hoped that now she will work out a development agenda for the State as well as for the Dalits and implement it faithfully. During her previous three stints as Chief Minister she took the plea that due to her dependence on other parties for support she could not act independently. As such she needed a government with majority to give her a free hand in running her government. But even this time Mayawati did not come up to the people’s expectations. Neither she neither worked out development agenda nor stopped wasting public money on installing statues, creating memorials and making parks.
If judged from the point of view of development, at present U.P. is the one of the most backward states of India. As per 2001 Census Repot it has the largest population (16.16 crores) which stands as 16.16 % of total population of India. According to development parameters the total literacy rate of U.P. is 56.30 % (Male 68.8 and Female 42.2 %) whereas at the national level it is 68.84 % (Male 75.26 and 53.67 %). The sex ratio of U.P. stands at 898 whereas the national ratio is 933. According to available statistics the per capita income in U.P. during 2005-06 was Rs. 13,316 which is the lowest in the country excepting Bihar (Rs. 7875) whereas at the national level it is Rs. 25,716. During this period the per capita power production and consumption in U.P. was 113 and 167 K.W.Hour as compared with 563 and 372 K.W.Hour at the national level.
From the Public Health angle the birth rate, death rate and child mortality rate for U.P. were 30.4, 8.7 and 73 respectively whereas the national rates were 23.8, 7.6 and 58 respectively. As per the findings of NFHS-III, 2005-06 the infant mortality (number of infant deaths per thousand live births in the last five years) rate at national level is 57 whereas for U.P. it is 73. In India, 46 per scent children under three yeas of age are underweight whereas in U.P. it is 47 percent. Almost 38 % children (under three years age) are stunted (too short for their age). In U.P. their percentage is 46. Almost 79 % of children (6-35 months) and 56 % of women in India are anemic. In U.P. the figures are 85 and 51 percent respectively. From the employment angle during 2001 in U.P. only 23.78 % of total workers were Main Workers and 66 % were engaged as Agriculture Labourers. At present 32 % of U.P. population is living below poverty line against the national average of 27.5 percent.
From the above details it is clear that from the development point of view U.P. is one of the most backward sataes of India. In such a situation, not only Mayawati but every government is expected to utilize all the resources of the State for the development of the people. But it has not happened for last many years. Accordint to Sudha Pai “There is evidence that the conditions of the poorer sections in U.P. which include the major chunk of the Dalits have become worse during the 1990s. The National Human Development Report (NHDR) has pointed out the poor conditions of life in comparison with many other states. The State’s position in terms of Human Development Index was 29th in 1981 and has fallen to 31 out of 32 states (NHDR 2001:140-41). Similarly the Monthly Per Capita Consumption Expenditure registered a fall in the State between 1993-94 and 1999-2000; that this is due to a drastic reduction in the consumption expenditure on food between two periods clearly suggest deterioration in the standard of living. This down slide took place when the B.S.P. supported by B.J.P. was in power in U.P. for the most part (National Herald, Lucknow May 1, 2002). Despite the fact that the BSP. had formed a government twice during the 1990s and was again in power with the support of the Bhartiya Janta Party, the conditions of Dalits have not improved according to the draft proposals of the Tenth Five Year Plan (Jha, 28 December, The Times of India, New Delhi-2002). The BSP. did not put forward any policies for improving the socioeconomic conditions of the subaltern sections of the Dalits. The emphasis has been on political empowerment only.”
It is well known that Mayawati did not take up any development agenda during all her tenures of Chief Minister ship. During the elections BSP never came out with an election manifesto. This was done purposely. Because declaration of an agenda brings about the responsibility of implementing it and failure to do so invites public wrath. Mr. Kanshi Ram, the mentor of Mayawati, attracted Dalits by promising to fulfill the incomplete mission of Dr. Ambedkar but cleverly he never defined it in writing. “First capture political power and then any work” was the promise given by BSP. In the beginning, Dalits were instigated against higher castes by raising emotional and non-material issues but later on all sorts of unprincipled and opportunistic alliances were made to get political power. All the principles of Ambedkarism were thrown to winds and dalits were exploited emotionally in the name of caste. Personal ambitions were pursued in place of Dalit issues. This unprincipled, non developmental and corrupt politics has resulted in poverty, unemployment and backwardness of the people of U.P. and the Dalits at large.
Now it will be pertinent to see on what items the budget money was spent during this period. It has been found that major part of budget was spent on non-development projects. It is noticeable that 90 % of Cultural Department and about 40 % of Public Works Department budget was spent on parks, memorials and statues. What ever money was spent on welfare programmes, a major apart of it was eaten away by corruption. As such the poor were deprived of any benefit their of. The main cause of it has been the personal greed and corruption of Mayawati which may land her in jail in the near future. She has spent a major portion of state budget on installing statues, making parks and creating memorials. Along with the statues of Dr. Ambedkar and some other Dalit icons she has installed her own statues along with her mentor Kanshi Ram. She seems to have taken inspiration from North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Ill. She has made history by installing her own statues as a living person. According to available information she has spent more than 3,000 crores of Rupees on statutes and parks. These statues and memorials are so grand and costly which can put any king or queen to shame. According to one German scholar Maren Schempp, “Mayawati is building her own Rome.” Another scholar has labeled it as a criminal waste of public money.
Now Mayawati is ruling the State for the fourth time and she proclaims to be the savior of Dalits. In the face of this claim it will be proper to see what she has done to for the upliftment of Dalits of U.P. According to 2001 Census Report the population of Dalits in U.P. is 3.51 crores which is 21.2 % of State population and is the largest in whole of India. Ordinarily it is expected that in a state where a Dalit Chief Minister has occupied the chair for the fourth time, the Dalits of that state might have benefited much from her rule. But the ground reality is totally to the contrary. At present U.P. dalits are the most backward in whole of India leaving aside the Dalits of Orissa and Bihar. According to 2001 Census Report the Male- Female sex ratio of U.P. dalits is 900 whereas the national average of Dalits is 936. Similarly the literacy rate of U.P. Dalits is 46.3 % (Male 60.3 and Female 30.5 Percent) against the national average of 54.7 percent (Male 66.6 and Female 41.9 %). According to above Census report out of 1.33 crore children between the age of group 5-14 yeas only 58.3 lacs ( 56.4 % ) were going to school.
According to above census Report among total workers U.P. has got 42.5 % dalits working as Agriculture Labourers against the national average of 45.6 %. The percentage of U.P. dalits below poverty line is about 50 %. In U.P. Work Participation Rate of Dalits is 34.7 % which is lower than the national average. Being a dominantly agriculture based society land is an important source of production. In U.P. the number and size of land holdings with dalits is very small but land reforms have not been given proper priority in the State. What ever land was given to the landless, most of it is under illegal possession of higher castes and Mayawati cannot afford to annoy them as they form an important part of her Sarvjan (all included) followers.
On account of feudal social set up caste discrimination and practice of untouchabiity are the main factors behind atrocities against Dalits in U.P. Their number is highest in whole of India. A decrease in atrocities and prompt action against the offenders is the general expectation from Mayawati but the reality is totally otherwise. During 2001 Mayawati in order to keep her crime figures low issued a written order suspending the use of Scheduled Cases and Scheduled Tribes ( Prevention of Atrocities ) Act but was forced to withdraw the same in 2003. This had a very adverse effect on dalits. The atrocities continued to be perpetrated but their cases were not being registered by police. Besides this, the practice of untouchability is quite prevalent in midday meals in Primary Schools, Anganwari Centres and government hospitals but very little action is taken at government level. Thus Dalits continue to suffer under Mayawati’s rule. They have not experienced any empowerment material or otherwise.
“The statues serve as a source of inspiration for dalits” is the argument put forward by Mayawati for justifying her idolization. But this argument is quite contrary to the philosophy of Dalit icons. Let us see what Dr. Ambedkar said in a letter published in Bombay Chronicle in 1916. Following the death, in 1915, of Pherozeshah Merwnjee Mehta, one of the founders of Indian National Congress, and of Gopal Krishana Gokhle, another Congress leader and founder of Servants of India society, Ambedkar notes: “The memorial for Gokhle is to take the form of establishing branches of Servants of India Society at various places, while that of Sir P.M. Mehta is to stand in the form of a statue before the Bombay Municipal Office.” While appreciating the memorial for Gokhle, Ambedkar records his dismay over a statue for Mehta being “very trivial and unbecoming.” He is “at pains to understand why this memorial cannot be in a form that will be “of permanent use to posterity.”. He suggests that the memorial should be a public library named after Mehta. Drawing from his experience at “one of the biggest universities in the U.S., Ambedkar laments how we have not yet “realized the value of the library as an institution in the growth and advancement of society.”
Later, Dr. Ambedkar acted on these principles when he had the opportunity. He was driven by the belief that education was the greatest weapon for advancement. He founded “People’s Education Society” in 1944; three branches of Siddharth College beginning 1946; and Milind Mahavidhyalya in 1950. With a view to benefit the maximum number of students he established colleges in Bombay and Marathwar which is the most backward area in Maharashtra. The other Dalit icon Mahatma Joti Rao Phule did the pioneering work of starting girl education in India in Nineteenth century. Chhatarpati Shahu Ji Maharaj opened the doors of education for Dalits. But Mayawati has refused to learn any thing from these Dalit icons.
It is true that statues serve as source of inspiration but this role is very limited. The lasting inspiration comes by following their ideals and propagating their philosophy. But Mayawati has done hardly any thing in this direction. If the money spent on statues had been spent in establishing educational institutions in the name of dalit icons, it would have brought a qualitative change in the society.
From the brief above discussion it transpires that the emancipation of dalits can be achieved not by installation of statues but by working out a Dalit development agenda and implementing it honestly. In stead of spending crores on the statues, establishing educational institutions, hospital, libraries and useful institutions in the name of Dalit icons will be a true honour and memorial to them.
Writer’s email: srdarapuri@yahoo.co.in
Monday, 22 June 2009
The Ravi Dasis of Punjab: Global Contours Of Caste and Religious Strife
Surinder S Jodhka
The attack in May on two visiting religious leaders of Ravi
Dasis in Vienna, presumably by a group of local militant
Sikhs, sparked off widespread violence in Punjab.
Though most of the violence by Ravi Dasi dalits was
directed against public property and reflected their
general anger at the Vienna incident, the mainstream
media was quick to interpret it as yet another instance of
caste conflict within Sikhism, viz, between dalit Sikhs
and upper caste Sikhs. Such misrepresentations of caste
and religious realities of Punjab today could lead to a
communal divide between dalits and mainstream
Sikhism. Based on an empirical study of the Punjabi Ravi
Dasis, the paper tries to provide a historical perspective
on caste and religion in Punjab today.
The recent attack on two visiting religious leaders of Ravi
Dasis in Vienna presumably by a group of local militant
Sikhs sparked off widespread violence in towns of Punjab.
Though most of the violence by Ravi Dasi dalits was directed
against public property and reflected their general anger at the
Vienna incident, the popular media in India was quick to interpret
it as yet another instance of caste conflict within Sikhism, viz,
between dalit Sikhs and upper caste Sikhs. This was not only a
wrong interpretation of the unfortunate incidents of violence in
Vienna and Punjab, it also misrepresented the complex realities
of caste and religious identity in contemporary Punjab. Though
the Ravi Dasi dalits of Punjab treat the Sikh holy book Guru
Granth with reverence and their temples are also often called
Gurdwaras, a large majority of them do not identify with the Sikh
religion. Ravi Dasis have emerged as a strong and autonomous
caste-religious community, an outcome of vibrant dalit identity
movements in Punjab over the last (more than) eight decades.
Their reverence for the Guru Granth is primarily because it also
contains the writings of Guru Ravi Das. Over the years Ravi Dasis
have also evolved their own symbols and practices of worship,
which distinguish them from the Sikhs of Punjab. While caste is
certainly an important source of social dissension in Punjab and
a reason for the Ravi Dasis to evolve an autonomous religious
identity, they do not see their faith as being in an antagonistic
relationship with contemporary Sikhism.
Drawing from my ongoing work on dalit religious movements,
this paper attempts to provide a brief historical introduction to the
Ravi Dasi community of Punjab and their evolving caste-religious
identity. Seen in this historical context, the street violence
in
Punjab following the Vienna attack on 24 May 2009 leading to
the death of a senior Ravi Dasi religious leader would appear
more
like a case of assertion of the Ravi Dasis’ political strength and a
statement of their united identity than a case of caste conflict, as it
has been popularly (mis)interpreted by the popular
media.
1 Caste Numbers in Colonial Punjab
The religious demography of Punjab has always been very different
from the country as a whole. A majority of its population
(nearly 60%) identifies with Sikhism, a religion that theologically
decries caste. Prior to the Partition of the subcontinent in 1947,
more than half of the Punjab identified with Islam, which similarly
decries caste. However, caste-based divisions and differences
have been quite prominent in the region. More than one-fourth of
its population has been treated as “outcaste” by the historically
dominant sections of the Punjabi society. Caste was not simply
an ideological reality. It also shaped land relations and conditioned
entitlements and rights of communities. Dalits wereinvariably among
the most deprived, materially, and excluded,
socially and culturally.
Interestingly, of all the states of the Indian union, Punjab has
the highest proportion of scheduled castes (SCs). Against the
national average of around 16%, Punjab, according to the 2001
Census, had nearly 29% of its population listed as SC. The SC
population in Punjab has also been growing at a rate much higher
than the rest of the population. In 1971 the proportion of the SC
population in the state was 24.7%. It went up to 26.9% in 1981
and further to 28.3% in 1991. However, in the following decade
it grew at slower rate, adding only around 0.6 percentage points
to the proportion of the SC population of the state. Another interesting
feature of the SC population of the state is that its concentration
is much higher in some pockets/districts of the state. In
the prosperous Doaba subregion, for example, their population is
over 35%, much larger than the state average. In the district of
Nawanshahr in Doaba region, the SC population during the 2001
Census was 40.46%.
Beginning with the early 20th century, the Punjab, particularly
the eastern, or the Indian Punjab, has also been a witness to active
dalit politics. The trajectory of dalit politics in Punjab can be
located in the changing socio-economic and political scenario of
the region after the establishment of colonial rule at the middle
of the 19th century. Though British colonial rule came to Punjab
late, its influence on the ground grew quite rapidly. The British
established canal colonies which helped in the growth of agriculture
in the region. Colonial rule also led to the development of
urban centres. Jalandhar was one such town which experienced
significant growth during the period after it was chosen for the
setting up of a military cantonment for recruiting soldiers from
the region. The colonial army provided new opportunities of
employmentto the children of Punjabi peasants and also opened
up avenues for social mobility for a section of local dalits, particularly
the Chamars who worked with leather.
The cantonment raised demand for leather goods, particularly
boots and shoes for the British army. As elsewhere in the subcontinent,
much of the leather trade in the region was controlled
by Muslim traders. However, at the local or village level, it was
the “untouchable” Chamars who supplied the raw animal skin.
Some enterprising members of the caste also tried to move to the
towns. Some of them were quick to exploit the new opportunities
being offered to them by the changing world. Not only did they
move out of the village but they also ventured out to other parts
of the subcontinent and abroad, to the United States, Canada and
the United Kingdom. The social and economic mobility that some
individual untouchables experienced during this period prepared
grounds for political mobilisations of dalits in the region.
The introduction of representational politics by the colonial
rulers also produced a new grammar of communities in India.
The colonial administrative structure deployed new categories of
social aggregation and classification. The British thought of their
populace in terms of religious communities and looked at them
accordingly in the process of governance. They “encouraged the
members of each community to present their case in communitarian
terms” (Grewal 1989). As is well known to students of Indian
history, the colonial census and classifications of population into
categories that made sense to the alien rulers played a critical
role in converting the fuzzy boundaries of difference into well defined
communities (Cohn 1996; Dirks 2001; Breckenridge and
van der Veer 1993). Though the British came to Punjab only around
the middle of 19th century, this process of new identity formations
and restructuring of communities became pronounced in
the region fairly early through social reform movements among
the Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims (Fox 1985; Oberoi 1994).
The anxiety about numbers among the neo-religious elite of
the Hindus and Sikhs also had important implications for the
Punjabi dalits. Through the newly launched social reform movements,
the Hindu and Sikh leaders began to work with dalits. The
Arya Samaj in Punjab started the shudhi movement wherein
they encouraged the “untouchables” to “purify” themselves and
become part of the mainstream Hinduism. It also encouraged
dalits to send their children to schools being run by the Samaj.
Similarly, the Sikh reformers began to decry caste publicly and it
was mainly through a claim to castelessness that they argued for
a distinctiveness of Sikhs from the Hindus (Jodhka 2000).
Ad Dharm Movement
It was in this context that the Ad Dharm movement emerged in
Punjab. Though the idea had already begun to take shape during
the early 1920s, it took off only with the arrival of Mangoo Ram
on the scene. Mangoo Ram was the son of an enterprising Chamar
of village Mangowal of the Hoshiarpur district of Doaba subregion
of Punjab. As was the case with dalits in rural Punjab during
the early 19th century, his family had to bear the stigma of
untouchability and social exclusion. However, his father was very
enterprising and had been able to make some money through
leather trade
.
Like some others of his caste community, Mangoo Ram acquired
secular education in a school run by the Arya Samaj.
Migrationto the west had already begun to be seen in the Doaba
sub-region of Punjab as a desirable source of social and cultural
mobility. His father mobilised some money and sent him to the US
for better paying work. While in California, Mangoo Ram was
influenced by left-wing ideas of his contemporaries from Punjab
and got involved with the Gadar movement. He came back to
Punjab in 1925, motivated to work with his people. On returning
home, he set up a school for lower caste children with the help of
the Arya Samaj, but very soon distanced himself from the Samaj
and joined hands with some other members of his community
who were trying to initiate an autonomous identity movement
among the local dalits (for details see Juergensmeyer 1988).
The Ad Dharm movement saw itself as a religious movement.
Its proponents advocated that the “untouchables” were a separate
qaum, a distinct religious community similar to the Muslims,
Hindus, and Sikhs, and should be treated as such by the rulers.
Invoking the then popular “racial-origin” theories of caste, they
argued that Ad Dharm has always been the religion of the
dalits and that the qaum had existed from time immemorial
(ibid: 45). Despite stiff opposition from the local Hindu
leadership,
the colonial Census of 1931 listed the Ad Dharmis as a
LP_SA_SSJodhka5June09_PC3.indd 80 06/11/2009 11:24:41 AM
separate religious community. In the very first conference of the
organisation, they declared:
We are not Hindus. We strongly request the government not to list us
as such in the census. Our faith is not Hindu but Ad Dharm. We are not
a part of Hinduism, and Hindus are not a part of us (cited in ibid: 74).
The emphasis on Ad Dharm being a separate religion, a qaum,
was to undermine the identity of caste. As a separate qaum, Ad
Dharmis were equal to other qaums recognised by the colonial
state, the Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs. Mangoo Ram also expected
to bring other untouchable communities into the fold of Ad
Dharm and emerge as a viable community at the regional level.
A total of 4,18,789 persons reported themselves as Ad Dharmis
in the 1931 Punjab Census, almost equal to the Christian populace
of the province. They accounted for about 1.5% of the total
population of Punjab and around a tenth of the total low-caste
population of the province. Nearly 80% of the low castes of
Jallandhar and Hoshiarpur districts reported themselves as
Ad Dharmis (ibid: 77).
The Ad Dharm movement succeeded in mobilising the Chamars
of the Doaba region and in instilling a new sense of confidence in
them. The Ad Dharmis are today among the most prosperous and
educated of the dalit communities of the country and far ahead of
other dalit communities of Punjab (see the Table).
However, despite its success, the movement could not maintain
its momentum for very long and began to dissipate soon after
its grand success in 1931. According to the popular understanding,
the causes of the decline of Ad Dharm movement lay in its success.
Its leaders joined mainstream politics. Mangoo Ram himself,
along with some of his close comrades, became members of the
Punjab Legislative Assembly. The caste issue was gradually taken
over by the emerging pan-Indian movement of the dalits and it
finally merged with it. The Ad Dharm Mandal began to see itself
as a social and religious organisation and in 1946 decided to
change its name to Ravi Das Mandal, “entrusting the political
work to All India Scheduled Castes Federation in conformity with
rest of India” (Juergensmeyer 1988:153)
.
2 From Ad Dharm to Ravi Dasi
A closer understanding of the Ad Dharm case would require a
critical look at the evolution of Indian state, and the manner in
which it dealt with caste and religion. The beginning of the
decline of the Ad Dharm movement can perhaps be located in
the famous Poona Pact of 1932 between Gandhi and Ambedkar
and the formation of Scheduled List in the Government of India
Act 1935. The clubbing of the SCs with the Hindus left no choice
for the Ad Dharm movement in Punjab but to accept the
nationalist and official mode of classification. They had to either
forgo the benefits of “reservations” or claim a separate religious
identity. Given the socio-economic status of the community at
that time they chose the former and reconciled to a softer
approach to the latter. As a senior dalit activist explained to us:
Ad Dharm lost its meaning after we got eight seats reserved for us
when the elections were first held in the province. Our candidates won
from seven of the eight seats. Mangoo Ram too was elected to the
Assembly during the next election in the year 1945-46
.1
Another activist put it more emphatically
In 1931 we were recognised as a separate religion by the colonial census
but by the Act of 1935 we became one of the scheduled castes, one
among others in the same category. Communal award had recognised
our autonomy, which had to be surrendered by B R Ambedkar under
the Poona Pact. Under the Poona Pact we were given reservations but
only if accepted to be part of the Hindu religion. ...However, even
though we legally became a part of Hinduism, it did not stop discrimination
against us. Even now it continues though it is less pronounced
and more subtle.2
Though most of our dalit respondents remembered the Ad
Dharm movement with a sense of pride and some of them also
regretted its decline, we did not observe any kind of strong feeling
for the movement or resentment among the Ad Dharmis at
being clubbed with the Hindu religion. Neither could we locate
any writings by its erstwhile leaders expressing distress/anger at
its decline or attributing it to conspiracies. The Ad Dharm movement
and its leaders were perhaps also swayed by the mainstream
or dominant politics of the time, i e, the freedom movement and
its hegemonic influence. As one of our respondents, who is currently
president of the Ravi Dasi Trust, said to us:
…at one time Ad Dharm movement was very popular in Punjab. However,
slowly, with growing influence of Congress politics, its leaders
started leaving. Master Gurbanta Sing was the first to leave Ad
Dharm Mandal. He joined the Congress Party. Similarly some other
leaders also left the movement to become part of the mainstream
national politics. Eventually even Mangoo Ram joined the Congress
Party. The movement was over.3
Those with more radical views on the dalit question were
swayed by B R Ambedkar and joined the Republican Party of
India (RPI) and the Scheduled Castes Federation, both set up by
B R Ambedkar. Some of them eventually turned to Buddhism for
spiritual autonomy and religious identity.
Equally important for its decline is perhaps the fact that though
Ad Dharm articulated itself as a religious identity and demanded
official recognition as a religious movement, it was essentially a
political movement. As a prominent member of the community
told us during an interview:
It had no holy book or scripture of its own, it had no rituals of its own,
it had no pilgrimage places, or sacred symbols…. How could it have
survived as a religion?4
While the identity of Ad Dharmi simply became a designation of a
Hindu caste group for official classification, the Chamars of Doaba
did not really go back to Hinduism. They began to develop their
autonomous religious resources under the identity of Ravi Dasis.
Ravi Dasi Identity
As mentioned earlier, it was, in fact, during the Ad Dharm movement
that the Ravi Dasi identity had begun to take shape. Leaders
of the movement also saw Ravi Dasi identity as their own
resource. Long after dissolving the Ad Dharm Mandal and being
in retirement for many years, Mangoo Ram summed up the
achievement of the Ad Dharm movement in an interview with
Mark Juergensmeyer in 1971 where his focus was more on having
given the local dalits a new community and religious identity
than their political empowerment:
We helped give them a better life and made them into a qaum.
We gave them gurus to believe in and something to hope for (as in
Juergensmeyer 1988: 155 emphasis added).
After having changed its name to Ravi Das Mandal in 1946, the
movement activists shifted their focus to social and religious
matters. They had realised long ago that in order to consolidate
themselves as a separate qaum, they needed a religious system of
their own, which was different from the Hindus and Sikhs. However,
in order to do that they chose a caste-based religious identity:
Chamar = Ad Dharmi = Ravi Dasi.
Even though during its early days the Ad Dharm movement
had aspired to bring all the “ex-untouchable” communities together
into the new faith, their appeal had remained confined
mostly to the Chamars of Doaba. After its listing as one of the SCs
in the Scheduled List, it became obvious and official that Ad
Dharmis were a section of the Chamars. Guru Ravi Das appeared
to be an obvious choice for the Ad Dharmis as a religious symbol
for the community. Though he was born in Uttar Pradesh, he belonged
to the Chamar caste. The fact that his writings were included
in the Sikh holy book, Adi Granth, which had been compiled
in Punjab and was written in the local language, made Ravi
Das even more effective and acceptable.5
Thus the Ad Dharm movement played a very important role in
developing an autonomous political identity and consciousness
among the Chamar dalits of Punjab and its renaming itself as a
religious body, Ravi Das Mandal in 1946, was an important turning
point in the history of dalit movements of Punjab. However,
it is important to mention here that the Ravi Dasi religious identity
had already begun to take shape, independently of the Ad
Dharm movement in the region. In fact, some of the Ravi Dasi
deras had, in fact, played an active role in the late 1920 when
Mangoo Ram was campaigning for separate religious status for
Ad Dharmis. Mangoo Ram often visited the Ravi Dasi deras
duringhis campaign.
Interestingly, even when the community reconciled itself to
the idea of being clubbed with Hindu SCs for census enumerations,
the identity of being Ad Dharmis continued to be important
for them. As many as 14.9% (5,32,129) of the 70,28,723 SCs of
Punjab were listed as Ad Dharmis in the 2001 Census, substantially
more than those who registered themselves as belonging to
the Ad Dharmi qaum in 1931. In religious terms, as many as 59.9%
of the Punjab SCs enumerated themselves as Sikhs and 39.6%
Hindus. Only 0.5% declared their religion as Buddhism.
However, notwithstanding this official classification of all SCs
into the mainstream religions of the region, everyday religious
life of the Punjab dalits is marked by enormous diversity and
plurality. Apart from the popular syncretic religious traditions
that have been in existence for a long time in the region, the
dalitsof Punjab, and elsewhere in India, have also developed an
urge for autonomous faith identities, particularly for getting out
of Hinduism. They view Hinduism as the source of their humiliating
social position in the caste system. This urge became much
stronger with the emergence of a nascent educated middle class
among them during the later phase of British colonial rule. The
Ad Dharm movement of 1920s (discussed above) was a clear
example of this
.
Historically, dalits have chosen two different paths to this
move away from Hindusim. The first of these was conversion to
other religions such as Christianity, Islam or Sikhism, which do
not theologically support caste-based inequalities and divisions.
The second path has been to look for indigenous egalitarian
faith traditions that emerged in opposition to the system of
caste hierarchy. The Ravi Dasi movement can be seen as an
exampleof this path.
Guru Ravi Das
Ravi Das was born sometime in 1450 AD in the north Indian town
of Banaras in an “untouchable” caste, the Chamars and died in
1520 (Omvedt 2008:7). Like many of his contemporaries, he
travelled extensively and had religious dialogues with saint
poets in different parts of the north India. Over time he acquired
the status of a saint. However, his claims to religious authority
were frequently challenged by the local brahmins who complained
against his “sacrilegious behaviour” to the local rulers.
His followers believe that every time the king summoned Ravi
Das, he managed to convince the political authorities about his
genuine “spiritual powers” through various miraculous acts. He
is believed to have also visited Punjab and met with Guru Nanak,
founder of the Sikh faith, at least thrice. He also gave most of his
writings to Guru Nanak, which eventually became part of the
Sikh holy book, Guru Granth.6
Though historians of Indian religions tend to club Ravi Das
with the Bhakti movement, a pan Indian devotional cult, his ideas
appear to be quite radical. He built his own utopia, a vision of an
alternative society, articulated in his hymn “Begumpura”, a city
without sorrows, “where there will be no distress, no tax, no restriction
from going and coming, no fear”. It is worth presenting
the English translation of the poem:
The regal realm with the sorrowless name:
they call it Begumpura, a place with no pain,
No taxes or cares, nor own property there,
no wrongdoing, worry, terror or torture.
Oh my brother, I have come to take it as my own,
my distant home, where everything is right.
That imperial kingdom is rich and secure,
where none are third or second – all are one;
Its food and drink are famous, and those who live there
dwell in satisfaction and in wealth.
They do this or that, they walk where they wish,
they stroll through fabled places unchallenged.
Oh, says Ravidas, a tanner now set free,
those who walk beside me are my friends.
– (Hawley and Juergensmeyer 1988: 32)
–
As is evident from the poem he is not simply talking about his
love for god and his limitless devotion. His utopia is quite “this
worldly”, aspiring for a life without pain and not emphasising on
“other worldly” peace or moksha. Equally important is the fact
that his message is constructed by his contemporary followers in
quite a modernist language where question of caste oppression
and his fight against the prevailing structures of authority and
brahmanical modal order is foregrounded. Writing on the social
milieu in which he was born, his biographer Sat Pal Jassi writes:
Since the advent of Vedic Age, caste system and untouchability have
been prevalent in India. In passage of time, the socio-religious inhibitions
became more strict and cruel. The untouchables were given an
ignoble place. They were debarred from acquiring knowledge, own
property and worship of God…. These conditions prevailed in India
for more than 3,000 years (Jassi 2001:24).
It was in this “degenerated environment” that Ravi Das was
born. What did he preach and propagate? Jassi continues:
He was a protagonist of equality, oneness of God, human rights and
universal brotherhood….He was a suave socio-religious reformer, a
thinker, a theosophist, a humanist, a poet, a traveller, a pacifist and
above all a towering spiritual figure… He was a pioneer of socialistic
thought and strengthened noble values (ibid: 25).
Ravi Das’ utopia was also significantly different from some of
the later writings on “a desirable India” produced by people like
Gandhi. As Gail Omvedt rightly comments, Ravi Das
…was the first to formulate an Indian version of utopia in his song
“Begumpura”. Begumpura, the ‘city without sorrow’, is a casteless,
classless society; a modern society, one without a mention of temples;
an urban society as contrasted with Gandhi’s village utopia of Ram
Rjaya…. (Omvedt 2008:7).
Though born in a dalit family, Ravi Das indeed became a part
of the larger movement of protest against the brahmanical control
over the social and religious life of the people and was
acceptedas a leader across the entire region. His identification
with Guru Nanak, who was from an upper caste, clearly proves
this point. As mentioned above, Guru Nanak added 40 of his
hymns and one couplet into his collection of important writings
of the times, which were eventually compiled into the Adi Granth
by the fifth Sikh Guru.
It is perhaps this connection with Guru Nanak and Sikhism
that explains the emergence of major centres of Ravi Das in Punjab,
and not in Uttar Pradesh, where he was born.
3 R avi Dasis Today
Though the message of Ravi Das had been integrated into the
Sikh holy book and was routinely read and sung at the Sikh
Gurdwaras as part of the gurbani (religious singing), it was only
in the early years of the 20th century that separate Ravi Dasi deras
began to emerge in Punjab. The reason for this sudden mushrooming
of Ravi Dasi deras can perhaps be found in the growing
prosperity of Chamars in the region after the British set up a
cantonment in Jalandhar. Reform movements among the major
religious communities of the Muslims, Hindus and the Sikhs
would have also played a role in opening-up of opportunities for
secular education among them.
Perhaps the most important of the Guru Ravi Das deras in
Punjab today is the dera located in village Ballan, around 10 km
from the town of Jalandhar. It is locally known as Dera Sachkhand
Ballan. Though the Dera was set up by Sant Pipal Dass sometime
during the early 20th century,7 it is identified more with his son,
Sant Sarwan Dass. In fact, among its followers, it is also known as
Dera Sant Sarwan Dass. As per the popular myth narrated to us
by various respondents during the field work, which we also
found in published leaflets, the history of the dera goes like this:
Sant Sarwan Dass was born in a village called Gill Patti in Bhatinda
district of Punjab. He lost his mother when he was five years old. To
help his son overcome the loss, his father, Pipal Dass, decided to travel
with him. After visiting a few places, they came to village Ballan. The
elder brother of Sarwan Dass had earlier lived in the same village. On
the outskirts of the village Ballan, they found a Pipal tree that was
completely dry and dead. However, when Pipal Dass watered the tree,
life returned to it and its leaves turned green. This, for him, was an
indication of the place being spiritually blessed. The tree also made
the child Sarwan Dass happy. The father and son decided to build a
hut close to the tree and began to live there.
After the death of his father in 1928, Sant Sarwan Dass expanded his
activities. He opened a school and started teaching Gurumukhi and
the message of Guru Granth to young children. He also persuaded
his followers to send their children to the school. “Parents who
did not educate their children were their enemies”, he used to tell to
his followers.
Impressed with the work that Sant Sarwan Dass was doing in
the village, a local landlord gifted him one kanal (about one-fifth
of an acre) of land close to the hut, where the dera building was
eventually constructed. Sarwan Dass remained head of the dera
from 11 October 1928 until he died in June 1972. He was succeded
by Sant Hari Dass and Sant Garib Dass. The dera is currently
headed by Sant Niranjan Dass.
Though Dera Ballan is a religious centre with a focus on
preaching universalistic values and spirituality, it actively identifies
itself with local dalit issues and dalit politics. Not only do they
foreground Ravi Das’ message of building a casteless society,
they have also been actively identified with dalit activism.
Sant Sarwan Dass kept in active touch with Mangoo Ram
during the Ad Dharm movement and Mangoo Ram too visited
the dera to communicate his message to dalit masses of the region.
During one of his visit to Delhi, he also met B R Ambedkar, who
“showed great respect to Sant Sarwan Dass Ji”. In one of his
letters to Ambedkar, Sant Sarwan Dass described him as “a great
son of the community”.8
In the emerging national context, the dalit political leadership
had begun to connect itself across regions. This ambition was not
confined to dalit political activists but could be also seen in the
efforts of religious gurus like Sant Sarwan Dass.
The message of Ravi Das had thus far reached the Punjabi dalits
primarily through the Sikh Holy Scripture, the Guru Granth.
However, the religious institutions of Sikhism were mostly controlled
by “upper castes” among them.9 The continued presence
of caste differences and hierarchy in the region made Sant Sarwan
Dass look for internal resources, within the caste community,
for further expansion of the dera activities. Ravi Das was the
obvious symbol for the Chamar dalits for building a community
of believers.
Having established a separate religious centre in Punjab Sant
Sarwan Dass decided to travel to Banaras in 1950, hoping to visit
the shrine at the birth place of his Guru, Guru Ravi Das. However,
to his surprise and disappointment, he could not find any shrine
or place in his name. Nothing existed in the name Guru Ravi Das
in the holy city of Banaras. He took it upon himself the task of
building a temple in the name of Ravi Das in the city. With the
help of his followers at the Dera Ballan, he purchased a piece of
land on the outskirts of Banaras where on 16 June 1965 he laid
the foundation stone of the Ravi Das temple. The first phase of
construction of this temple was completed in the year 1972.
Though the leaders were excited about building the Ravi Das
temple in Banaras, the disciples, who are mostly from Punjab,
were apprehensive. How were they going to visit Banaras?
“When the subject came up for discussion with the Sant Sarwan
Das Ji, he said we will hire a special train which will go all the
way from Jalandhar to Banaras once every year, at the time of
the birth anniversary of Ravi Das. This train will be called
Begampura Express.” 10
Dera Ballan has continued to be an important centre of dalit
political activity in Punjab. Leaders, writers and intellectuals of
the community often meet at the dera and discuss emerging
political and cultural challenges before the community of Ravi
Dasis. Kanshi Ram, another leader of dalits of north India, who
belonged to Punjab and was born in a Ravi Dasi family was a
frequent visitor to the dera. He did so not only to pay his respect
to the dera chief but also to discuss strategies with other leaders
of the community for making dalit politics more effective.
4 The Diaspora Effect
The second, and perhaps more important and interesting, phase
in the history of Ravi Das movement in Punjab begins during the
1990s, with the phase of globalisation. Along with other Punjabis,
a large number of Chamars of the Doaba region had migrated to
countries of the western hemisphere during the 1950s and 1960s.
Though there are no exact figures available, but quoting the
Indian consular office, Juergenmeyer claims that in the United
Kingdom “the percentage of scheduled castes within the total
Punjabi community was as high as 10%. The rest were largely Jat
Sikhs” (Juergenmeyer 1988: 246).11
In the alien context, with no systemic justification for caste
ideology, the Punjabi dalits did not expect to be reminded of
their “low” status in the caste hierarchy. While they did not
have any such problem at the workplace and in the urban public
sphere in UK, they often experienced caste prejudice when they
tried to be part of the local Punjabi community in the diaspora.
Juergensmeyer sums this up quite well in the following words:
The Chamars, who came to Britain expecting to find life different,
take offence at the upper caste Sikhs’ attitude towards them. They
earn as much as the Jat Sikhs, sometimes more, and occasionally find
themselves placed by the British in command over them – a Chamar
foreman superintending a Jat Sikh work crew – much to the displeasure
of the latter…The scheduled castes can afford to act more bravely
in Britain since they have now entered a new context for competing
with the Jat Sikhs. In the Punjab the cards were stacked against them,
but in Britain they have a fresh start, and the ideology of Ad Dharm has
prepared them to take advantage of it (Juergensmeyer 1988: 247-48).
The migrant dalits felt this bias in the gurdwaras which were
mostly controlled by the Jats and other upper caste Sikhs. Given
their numbers and position in the local economy dalits did not
find it difficult to assert for equal status and dignity. They began
to set up their own autonomous associations in the name of Guru
Ravi Das. The first two came up in the UK, in Birmingham and
Wolverhampton, in 1956 (ibid: 248). While initially, over the first
20-25 years of their migration, they simply built their own community
organisations and separate gurdwaras wherever they
could, over the years they also began to influence the “homeland”.
The growing availability of new communication channels
such as internet and satellite television during the early/mid-1990s
made it easier for them to renew an active relationship with
Punjab and the Ravi Dasi community at home.
By the early 1990s, diaspora dalits had also experienced considerable
economic mobility, which made it easier for them to
travel back home and they began to do so more frequently. When
they came, they also brought with them money for the religious
deras and this new money and diasporic energy played a very
important role in the further growth of the movement. This was
summed up well by a dalit businessman who has been involved in
mobilising the Ravi Dasi sants into a pan-Indian association:
It is the brethren from the west who first understood the value of our
deras and the need to strengthen them. They gave huge donations
when they came to pay a visit. The number of visitors from abroad and
frequency of their visits also increased during the 1990s. They invited
the local Sants to their countries. All this gave a boost to the Ravi
Dasi movement.12
Over the last 15 years or so, the dera at Ballan has expanded
significantly. A new building was inaugurated in 2007 where
nearly 20,000 people could be accommodated to listen to the
teachings of Guru Ravi Das. It has a langar hall where 2,000
people can eat together. Among other things, this hall has
the technology for live telecast and recording of VCDs. In
collaboration with the Jalandhar channel of Doordarshan it
telecasts a programme called Amrit Bani every Friday and
Saturday morning.
Not only has Dera Ballan expanded over the years, deras,
gurdwaras and temples in the name of Guru Ravi Das have flourished
in Punjab, particularly in the Doaba region where Ad
Dharmis and Chamars have been numerically predominant
among the dalits. We were told that there are some six or seven
major sants who can be considered as leaders of the community
and more than 250 deras/gurdwaras in the name of Guru Ravi
Das in the state of Punjab. Some of these deras have become quite
affluent and influential. However, they are all patronised exclusively
by the local Chamars and Ad Dharmis.
5 Conclusions
As I have argued elsewhere (Jodhka 2002, 2004), despite the
cultural influence of Islam and Sikhism, caste has survived in
Punjab and has worked as a disabling institution for those located
at the margins of Punjabi society, the dalits. However, over the
years caste relations have undergone some major changes. Not
only has the ideological hold of caste nearly disappeared, structurally
also dalits have moved away from tradition-based caste
occupations, and in some regions, even from the local agrarian
economy. Their growing economic autonomy also finds its expression
in their urge for cultural and religious autonomy.
Though as a religious system Sikhism is opposed to caste-based
divisions and denials, its social and religious institutions have
come to be dominated by the traditionally and economically
dominant caste groups. It is in opposition to this dominance that
Ravi Dasis have tried to carve out an autonomous identity for
themselves. Though nearly half of all the dalits of Punjab enumerate
themselves as Sikhs and some of them have risen to positions
of power within the religious establishment, the Ravi Dasis
prefer to be outside. However, Ravi Dasi gurus maintain cordial
relations with the Sikh religious leadership and some would even
claim to be Sahajdari Sikhs.13 A large majority of the Ravi Dasis of
Doaba region identify with Dera Sachkhand Ballan. To them the
Guru Granth is sacred but they equally respect their living guru.
Their places of worship look like the Sikh gurdwaras and are
sometimes also called as such but there are subtle differences.14
Their prayers, rituals and slogans too sound quite similar to those
of the Sikhs but with subtle changes to distinguish themselves from
mainstream Sikhism, which is by now a well-codified religious
system in itself. A large majority of Ravi Dasis in Punjab also list
themselves as Ad Dharmis, technically Hindu SCs who always
wanted to organise themselves as a separate religious community.
The contemporary realities of caste and religion also raise
some other, perhaps more fundamental, questions about the
way we have understood and conceptualised the processes of
social change in modern times. Historians have been emphasising
that the fuzzy boundaries that existed across communities in
south Asia were made more concrete during the later years of
colonial rule (Oberoi 1994). However, on the ground, at the popular
level, religious practice continues to be characterised by
syncretic fuzziness and diversity. It is perhaps the failure to comprehend
and accept this fluidity and diversity that on the one
hand leads to violent conflicts as it happened in Vienna, and on
the other hand to misleading interpretations of public action, as
the popular media did after the violence in Punjab during the
second half of May 2009.
Notes
1 Personal interview in December 2008 with a leading
dalit activist in Jalandhar in Punjab.
2 Personal interview, March 2009.
3 Personal interview in Ballan, Jalandhar in
December 2008.
4 Personal interview in Ballan, Jalandhar in
December 2008.
5 Some of the local dalit leaders also believe that it
was the Hindu nationalists who suggested Ravi
Das as a possible religious symbol to the Chamars.
“In order to make sure that untouchables did not
convert to Sikhism, Islam or Christianity, the
Arya Samajis propagated the symbol of Ravi Das
among Chamars, Valmiki among the Chuhras and
Kabir among the Meghs. That’s how they made
sure that dalit stayed within the Hindu fold”.
While this may be true, the image of Ravi Das as a
Chamar had already been made available to the
people of Punjab by the Sikh Gurus.
6 This discussion is based on Sat Pal Jassi’s book
(2001).
7 Mark Juergensmeyer in his pioneering work on
the Ad Dharm movement mentions that “When he
(Sant Hiran Das) established his Ravi Das Sabha,
in 1907, in village Hakim… several other deras
including that of Sant Pipal Das, were founded
soon afterward…(Juergensmeyer 1988:87)”.
8 As in a leaflet “Sant Sarwan Dass Ji: A Great Visionary
Sant”, published by Sant Surinder Dass Bawa (nd).
9 Even though Sikhism decries caste, caste-based
divisions and hierarchies have continued to survive
among the Sikhs in Punjab (Jodhka 2002, 2004;
Puri 2004; Judge and Bal 2008).
10 Personal interview at Dera Ballan, December 2008.
11 The total number of Punjabis in United Kingdom
is roughly half a million, (http://indiandiaspora.
nic.in/diaspora pdf/chapter10.pdf, 10 April 2009).
12 Personal interview in Jalandhar in October 2008.
13 See Charlene 2008.
14 See Ram 2008.
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Courtesy: Economic & Political Weekly EPW june 13, 2009 vol xliv no 24 79
Surinder S Jodhka
The attack in May on two visiting religious leaders of Ravi
Dasis in Vienna, presumably by a group of local militant
Sikhs, sparked off widespread violence in Punjab.
Though most of the violence by Ravi Dasi dalits was
directed against public property and reflected their
general anger at the Vienna incident, the mainstream
media was quick to interpret it as yet another instance of
caste conflict within Sikhism, viz, between dalit Sikhs
and upper caste Sikhs. Such misrepresentations of caste
and religious realities of Punjab today could lead to a
communal divide between dalits and mainstream
Sikhism. Based on an empirical study of the Punjabi Ravi
Dasis, the paper tries to provide a historical perspective
on caste and religion in Punjab today.
The recent attack on two visiting religious leaders of Ravi
Dasis in Vienna presumably by a group of local militant
Sikhs sparked off widespread violence in towns of Punjab.
Though most of the violence by Ravi Dasi dalits was directed
against public property and reflected their general anger at the
Vienna incident, the popular media in India was quick to interpret
it as yet another instance of caste conflict within Sikhism, viz,
between dalit Sikhs and upper caste Sikhs. This was not only a
wrong interpretation of the unfortunate incidents of violence in
Vienna and Punjab, it also misrepresented the complex realities
of caste and religious identity in contemporary Punjab. Though
the Ravi Dasi dalits of Punjab treat the Sikh holy book Guru
Granth with reverence and their temples are also often called
Gurdwaras, a large majority of them do not identify with the Sikh
religion. Ravi Dasis have emerged as a strong and autonomous
caste-religious community, an outcome of vibrant dalit identity
movements in Punjab over the last (more than) eight decades.
Their reverence for the Guru Granth is primarily because it also
contains the writings of Guru Ravi Das. Over the years Ravi Dasis
have also evolved their own symbols and practices of worship,
which distinguish them from the Sikhs of Punjab. While caste is
certainly an important source of social dissension in Punjab and
a reason for the Ravi Dasis to evolve an autonomous religious
identity, they do not see their faith as being in an antagonistic
relationship with contemporary Sikhism.
Drawing from my ongoing work on dalit religious movements,
this paper attempts to provide a brief historical introduction to the
Ravi Dasi community of Punjab and their evolving caste-religious
identity. Seen in this historical context, the street violence
in
Punjab following the Vienna attack on 24 May 2009 leading to
the death of a senior Ravi Dasi religious leader would appear
more
like a case of assertion of the Ravi Dasis’ political strength and a
statement of their united identity than a case of caste conflict, as it
has been popularly (mis)interpreted by the popular
media.
1 Caste Numbers in Colonial Punjab
The religious demography of Punjab has always been very different
from the country as a whole. A majority of its population
(nearly 60%) identifies with Sikhism, a religion that theologically
decries caste. Prior to the Partition of the subcontinent in 1947,
more than half of the Punjab identified with Islam, which similarly
decries caste. However, caste-based divisions and differences
have been quite prominent in the region. More than one-fourth of
its population has been treated as “outcaste” by the historically
dominant sections of the Punjabi society. Caste was not simply
an ideological reality. It also shaped land relations and conditioned
entitlements and rights of communities. Dalits wereinvariably among
the most deprived, materially, and excluded,
socially and culturally.
Interestingly, of all the states of the Indian union, Punjab has
the highest proportion of scheduled castes (SCs). Against the
national average of around 16%, Punjab, according to the 2001
Census, had nearly 29% of its population listed as SC. The SC
population in Punjab has also been growing at a rate much higher
than the rest of the population. In 1971 the proportion of the SC
population in the state was 24.7%. It went up to 26.9% in 1981
and further to 28.3% in 1991. However, in the following decade
it grew at slower rate, adding only around 0.6 percentage points
to the proportion of the SC population of the state. Another interesting
feature of the SC population of the state is that its concentration
is much higher in some pockets/districts of the state. In
the prosperous Doaba subregion, for example, their population is
over 35%, much larger than the state average. In the district of
Nawanshahr in Doaba region, the SC population during the 2001
Census was 40.46%.
Beginning with the early 20th century, the Punjab, particularly
the eastern, or the Indian Punjab, has also been a witness to active
dalit politics. The trajectory of dalit politics in Punjab can be
located in the changing socio-economic and political scenario of
the region after the establishment of colonial rule at the middle
of the 19th century. Though British colonial rule came to Punjab
late, its influence on the ground grew quite rapidly. The British
established canal colonies which helped in the growth of agriculture
in the region. Colonial rule also led to the development of
urban centres. Jalandhar was one such town which experienced
significant growth during the period after it was chosen for the
setting up of a military cantonment for recruiting soldiers from
the region. The colonial army provided new opportunities of
employmentto the children of Punjabi peasants and also opened
up avenues for social mobility for a section of local dalits, particularly
the Chamars who worked with leather.
The cantonment raised demand for leather goods, particularly
boots and shoes for the British army. As elsewhere in the subcontinent,
much of the leather trade in the region was controlled
by Muslim traders. However, at the local or village level, it was
the “untouchable” Chamars who supplied the raw animal skin.
Some enterprising members of the caste also tried to move to the
towns. Some of them were quick to exploit the new opportunities
being offered to them by the changing world. Not only did they
move out of the village but they also ventured out to other parts
of the subcontinent and abroad, to the United States, Canada and
the United Kingdom. The social and economic mobility that some
individual untouchables experienced during this period prepared
grounds for political mobilisations of dalits in the region.
The introduction of representational politics by the colonial
rulers also produced a new grammar of communities in India.
The colonial administrative structure deployed new categories of
social aggregation and classification. The British thought of their
populace in terms of religious communities and looked at them
accordingly in the process of governance. They “encouraged the
members of each community to present their case in communitarian
terms” (Grewal 1989). As is well known to students of Indian
history, the colonial census and classifications of population into
categories that made sense to the alien rulers played a critical
role in converting the fuzzy boundaries of difference into well defined
communities (Cohn 1996; Dirks 2001; Breckenridge and
van der Veer 1993). Though the British came to Punjab only around
the middle of 19th century, this process of new identity formations
and restructuring of communities became pronounced in
the region fairly early through social reform movements among
the Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims (Fox 1985; Oberoi 1994).
The anxiety about numbers among the neo-religious elite of
the Hindus and Sikhs also had important implications for the
Punjabi dalits. Through the newly launched social reform movements,
the Hindu and Sikh leaders began to work with dalits. The
Arya Samaj in Punjab started the shudhi movement wherein
they encouraged the “untouchables” to “purify” themselves and
become part of the mainstream Hinduism. It also encouraged
dalits to send their children to schools being run by the Samaj.
Similarly, the Sikh reformers began to decry caste publicly and it
was mainly through a claim to castelessness that they argued for
a distinctiveness of Sikhs from the Hindus (Jodhka 2000).
Ad Dharm Movement
It was in this context that the Ad Dharm movement emerged in
Punjab. Though the idea had already begun to take shape during
the early 1920s, it took off only with the arrival of Mangoo Ram
on the scene. Mangoo Ram was the son of an enterprising Chamar
of village Mangowal of the Hoshiarpur district of Doaba subregion
of Punjab. As was the case with dalits in rural Punjab during
the early 19th century, his family had to bear the stigma of
untouchability and social exclusion. However, his father was very
enterprising and had been able to make some money through
leather trade
.
Like some others of his caste community, Mangoo Ram acquired
secular education in a school run by the Arya Samaj.
Migrationto the west had already begun to be seen in the Doaba
sub-region of Punjab as a desirable source of social and cultural
mobility. His father mobilised some money and sent him to the US
for better paying work. While in California, Mangoo Ram was
influenced by left-wing ideas of his contemporaries from Punjab
and got involved with the Gadar movement. He came back to
Punjab in 1925, motivated to work with his people. On returning
home, he set up a school for lower caste children with the help of
the Arya Samaj, but very soon distanced himself from the Samaj
and joined hands with some other members of his community
who were trying to initiate an autonomous identity movement
among the local dalits (for details see Juergensmeyer 1988).
The Ad Dharm movement saw itself as a religious movement.
Its proponents advocated that the “untouchables” were a separate
qaum, a distinct religious community similar to the Muslims,
Hindus, and Sikhs, and should be treated as such by the rulers.
Invoking the then popular “racial-origin” theories of caste, they
argued that Ad Dharm has always been the religion of the
dalits and that the qaum had existed from time immemorial
(ibid: 45). Despite stiff opposition from the local Hindu
leadership,
the colonial Census of 1931 listed the Ad Dharmis as a
LP_SA_SSJodhka5June09_PC3.indd 80 06/11/2009 11:24:41 AM
separate religious community. In the very first conference of the
organisation, they declared:
We are not Hindus. We strongly request the government not to list us
as such in the census. Our faith is not Hindu but Ad Dharm. We are not
a part of Hinduism, and Hindus are not a part of us (cited in ibid: 74).
The emphasis on Ad Dharm being a separate religion, a qaum,
was to undermine the identity of caste. As a separate qaum, Ad
Dharmis were equal to other qaums recognised by the colonial
state, the Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs. Mangoo Ram also expected
to bring other untouchable communities into the fold of Ad
Dharm and emerge as a viable community at the regional level.
A total of 4,18,789 persons reported themselves as Ad Dharmis
in the 1931 Punjab Census, almost equal to the Christian populace
of the province. They accounted for about 1.5% of the total
population of Punjab and around a tenth of the total low-caste
population of the province. Nearly 80% of the low castes of
Jallandhar and Hoshiarpur districts reported themselves as
Ad Dharmis (ibid: 77).
The Ad Dharm movement succeeded in mobilising the Chamars
of the Doaba region and in instilling a new sense of confidence in
them. The Ad Dharmis are today among the most prosperous and
educated of the dalit communities of the country and far ahead of
other dalit communities of Punjab (see the Table).
However, despite its success, the movement could not maintain
its momentum for very long and began to dissipate soon after
its grand success in 1931. According to the popular understanding,
the causes of the decline of Ad Dharm movement lay in its success.
Its leaders joined mainstream politics. Mangoo Ram himself,
along with some of his close comrades, became members of the
Punjab Legislative Assembly. The caste issue was gradually taken
over by the emerging pan-Indian movement of the dalits and it
finally merged with it. The Ad Dharm Mandal began to see itself
as a social and religious organisation and in 1946 decided to
change its name to Ravi Das Mandal, “entrusting the political
work to All India Scheduled Castes Federation in conformity with
rest of India” (Juergensmeyer 1988:153)
.
2 From Ad Dharm to Ravi Dasi
A closer understanding of the Ad Dharm case would require a
critical look at the evolution of Indian state, and the manner in
which it dealt with caste and religion. The beginning of the
decline of the Ad Dharm movement can perhaps be located in
the famous Poona Pact of 1932 between Gandhi and Ambedkar
and the formation of Scheduled List in the Government of India
Act 1935. The clubbing of the SCs with the Hindus left no choice
for the Ad Dharm movement in Punjab but to accept the
nationalist and official mode of classification. They had to either
forgo the benefits of “reservations” or claim a separate religious
identity. Given the socio-economic status of the community at
that time they chose the former and reconciled to a softer
approach to the latter. As a senior dalit activist explained to us:
Ad Dharm lost its meaning after we got eight seats reserved for us
when the elections were first held in the province. Our candidates won
from seven of the eight seats. Mangoo Ram too was elected to the
Assembly during the next election in the year 1945-46
.1
Another activist put it more emphatically
In 1931 we were recognised as a separate religion by the colonial census
but by the Act of 1935 we became one of the scheduled castes, one
among others in the same category. Communal award had recognised
our autonomy, which had to be surrendered by B R Ambedkar under
the Poona Pact. Under the Poona Pact we were given reservations but
only if accepted to be part of the Hindu religion. ...However, even
though we legally became a part of Hinduism, it did not stop discrimination
against us. Even now it continues though it is less pronounced
and more subtle.2
Though most of our dalit respondents remembered the Ad
Dharm movement with a sense of pride and some of them also
regretted its decline, we did not observe any kind of strong feeling
for the movement or resentment among the Ad Dharmis at
being clubbed with the Hindu religion. Neither could we locate
any writings by its erstwhile leaders expressing distress/anger at
its decline or attributing it to conspiracies. The Ad Dharm movement
and its leaders were perhaps also swayed by the mainstream
or dominant politics of the time, i e, the freedom movement and
its hegemonic influence. As one of our respondents, who is currently
president of the Ravi Dasi Trust, said to us:
…at one time Ad Dharm movement was very popular in Punjab. However,
slowly, with growing influence of Congress politics, its leaders
started leaving. Master Gurbanta Sing was the first to leave Ad
Dharm Mandal. He joined the Congress Party. Similarly some other
leaders also left the movement to become part of the mainstream
national politics. Eventually even Mangoo Ram joined the Congress
Party. The movement was over.3
Those with more radical views on the dalit question were
swayed by B R Ambedkar and joined the Republican Party of
India (RPI) and the Scheduled Castes Federation, both set up by
B R Ambedkar. Some of them eventually turned to Buddhism for
spiritual autonomy and religious identity.
Equally important for its decline is perhaps the fact that though
Ad Dharm articulated itself as a religious identity and demanded
official recognition as a religious movement, it was essentially a
political movement. As a prominent member of the community
told us during an interview:
It had no holy book or scripture of its own, it had no rituals of its own,
it had no pilgrimage places, or sacred symbols…. How could it have
survived as a religion?4
While the identity of Ad Dharmi simply became a designation of a
Hindu caste group for official classification, the Chamars of Doaba
did not really go back to Hinduism. They began to develop their
autonomous religious resources under the identity of Ravi Dasis.
Ravi Dasi Identity
As mentioned earlier, it was, in fact, during the Ad Dharm movement
that the Ravi Dasi identity had begun to take shape. Leaders
of the movement also saw Ravi Dasi identity as their own
resource. Long after dissolving the Ad Dharm Mandal and being
in retirement for many years, Mangoo Ram summed up the
achievement of the Ad Dharm movement in an interview with
Mark Juergensmeyer in 1971 where his focus was more on having
given the local dalits a new community and religious identity
than their political empowerment:
We helped give them a better life and made them into a qaum.
We gave them gurus to believe in and something to hope for (as in
Juergensmeyer 1988: 155 emphasis added).
After having changed its name to Ravi Das Mandal in 1946, the
movement activists shifted their focus to social and religious
matters. They had realised long ago that in order to consolidate
themselves as a separate qaum, they needed a religious system of
their own, which was different from the Hindus and Sikhs. However,
in order to do that they chose a caste-based religious identity:
Chamar = Ad Dharmi = Ravi Dasi.
Even though during its early days the Ad Dharm movement
had aspired to bring all the “ex-untouchable” communities together
into the new faith, their appeal had remained confined
mostly to the Chamars of Doaba. After its listing as one of the SCs
in the Scheduled List, it became obvious and official that Ad
Dharmis were a section of the Chamars. Guru Ravi Das appeared
to be an obvious choice for the Ad Dharmis as a religious symbol
for the community. Though he was born in Uttar Pradesh, he belonged
to the Chamar caste. The fact that his writings were included
in the Sikh holy book, Adi Granth, which had been compiled
in Punjab and was written in the local language, made Ravi
Das even more effective and acceptable.5
Thus the Ad Dharm movement played a very important role in
developing an autonomous political identity and consciousness
among the Chamar dalits of Punjab and its renaming itself as a
religious body, Ravi Das Mandal in 1946, was an important turning
point in the history of dalit movements of Punjab. However,
it is important to mention here that the Ravi Dasi religious identity
had already begun to take shape, independently of the Ad
Dharm movement in the region. In fact, some of the Ravi Dasi
deras had, in fact, played an active role in the late 1920 when
Mangoo Ram was campaigning for separate religious status for
Ad Dharmis. Mangoo Ram often visited the Ravi Dasi deras
duringhis campaign.
Interestingly, even when the community reconciled itself to
the idea of being clubbed with Hindu SCs for census enumerations,
the identity of being Ad Dharmis continued to be important
for them. As many as 14.9% (5,32,129) of the 70,28,723 SCs of
Punjab were listed as Ad Dharmis in the 2001 Census, substantially
more than those who registered themselves as belonging to
the Ad Dharmi qaum in 1931. In religious terms, as many as 59.9%
of the Punjab SCs enumerated themselves as Sikhs and 39.6%
Hindus. Only 0.5% declared their religion as Buddhism.
However, notwithstanding this official classification of all SCs
into the mainstream religions of the region, everyday religious
life of the Punjab dalits is marked by enormous diversity and
plurality. Apart from the popular syncretic religious traditions
that have been in existence for a long time in the region, the
dalitsof Punjab, and elsewhere in India, have also developed an
urge for autonomous faith identities, particularly for getting out
of Hinduism. They view Hinduism as the source of their humiliating
social position in the caste system. This urge became much
stronger with the emergence of a nascent educated middle class
among them during the later phase of British colonial rule. The
Ad Dharm movement of 1920s (discussed above) was a clear
example of this
.
Historically, dalits have chosen two different paths to this
move away from Hindusim. The first of these was conversion to
other religions such as Christianity, Islam or Sikhism, which do
not theologically support caste-based inequalities and divisions.
The second path has been to look for indigenous egalitarian
faith traditions that emerged in opposition to the system of
caste hierarchy. The Ravi Dasi movement can be seen as an
exampleof this path.
Guru Ravi Das
Ravi Das was born sometime in 1450 AD in the north Indian town
of Banaras in an “untouchable” caste, the Chamars and died in
1520 (Omvedt 2008:7). Like many of his contemporaries, he
travelled extensively and had religious dialogues with saint
poets in different parts of the north India. Over time he acquired
the status of a saint. However, his claims to religious authority
were frequently challenged by the local brahmins who complained
against his “sacrilegious behaviour” to the local rulers.
His followers believe that every time the king summoned Ravi
Das, he managed to convince the political authorities about his
genuine “spiritual powers” through various miraculous acts. He
is believed to have also visited Punjab and met with Guru Nanak,
founder of the Sikh faith, at least thrice. He also gave most of his
writings to Guru Nanak, which eventually became part of the
Sikh holy book, Guru Granth.6
Though historians of Indian religions tend to club Ravi Das
with the Bhakti movement, a pan Indian devotional cult, his ideas
appear to be quite radical. He built his own utopia, a vision of an
alternative society, articulated in his hymn “Begumpura”, a city
without sorrows, “where there will be no distress, no tax, no restriction
from going and coming, no fear”. It is worth presenting
the English translation of the poem:
The regal realm with the sorrowless name:
they call it Begumpura, a place with no pain,
No taxes or cares, nor own property there,
no wrongdoing, worry, terror or torture.
Oh my brother, I have come to take it as my own,
my distant home, where everything is right.
That imperial kingdom is rich and secure,
where none are third or second – all are one;
Its food and drink are famous, and those who live there
dwell in satisfaction and in wealth.
They do this or that, they walk where they wish,
they stroll through fabled places unchallenged.
Oh, says Ravidas, a tanner now set free,
those who walk beside me are my friends.
– (Hawley and Juergensmeyer 1988: 32)
–
As is evident from the poem he is not simply talking about his
love for god and his limitless devotion. His utopia is quite “this
worldly”, aspiring for a life without pain and not emphasising on
“other worldly” peace or moksha. Equally important is the fact
that his message is constructed by his contemporary followers in
quite a modernist language where question of caste oppression
and his fight against the prevailing structures of authority and
brahmanical modal order is foregrounded. Writing on the social
milieu in which he was born, his biographer Sat Pal Jassi writes:
Since the advent of Vedic Age, caste system and untouchability have
been prevalent in India. In passage of time, the socio-religious inhibitions
became more strict and cruel. The untouchables were given an
ignoble place. They were debarred from acquiring knowledge, own
property and worship of God…. These conditions prevailed in India
for more than 3,000 years (Jassi 2001:24).
It was in this “degenerated environment” that Ravi Das was
born. What did he preach and propagate? Jassi continues:
He was a protagonist of equality, oneness of God, human rights and
universal brotherhood….He was a suave socio-religious reformer, a
thinker, a theosophist, a humanist, a poet, a traveller, a pacifist and
above all a towering spiritual figure… He was a pioneer of socialistic
thought and strengthened noble values (ibid: 25).
Ravi Das’ utopia was also significantly different from some of
the later writings on “a desirable India” produced by people like
Gandhi. As Gail Omvedt rightly comments, Ravi Das
…was the first to formulate an Indian version of utopia in his song
“Begumpura”. Begumpura, the ‘city without sorrow’, is a casteless,
classless society; a modern society, one without a mention of temples;
an urban society as contrasted with Gandhi’s village utopia of Ram
Rjaya…. (Omvedt 2008:7).
Though born in a dalit family, Ravi Das indeed became a part
of the larger movement of protest against the brahmanical control
over the social and religious life of the people and was
acceptedas a leader across the entire region. His identification
with Guru Nanak, who was from an upper caste, clearly proves
this point. As mentioned above, Guru Nanak added 40 of his
hymns and one couplet into his collection of important writings
of the times, which were eventually compiled into the Adi Granth
by the fifth Sikh Guru.
It is perhaps this connection with Guru Nanak and Sikhism
that explains the emergence of major centres of Ravi Das in Punjab,
and not in Uttar Pradesh, where he was born.
3 R avi Dasis Today
Though the message of Ravi Das had been integrated into the
Sikh holy book and was routinely read and sung at the Sikh
Gurdwaras as part of the gurbani (religious singing), it was only
in the early years of the 20th century that separate Ravi Dasi deras
began to emerge in Punjab. The reason for this sudden mushrooming
of Ravi Dasi deras can perhaps be found in the growing
prosperity of Chamars in the region after the British set up a
cantonment in Jalandhar. Reform movements among the major
religious communities of the Muslims, Hindus and the Sikhs
would have also played a role in opening-up of opportunities for
secular education among them.
Perhaps the most important of the Guru Ravi Das deras in
Punjab today is the dera located in village Ballan, around 10 km
from the town of Jalandhar. It is locally known as Dera Sachkhand
Ballan. Though the Dera was set up by Sant Pipal Dass sometime
during the early 20th century,7 it is identified more with his son,
Sant Sarwan Dass. In fact, among its followers, it is also known as
Dera Sant Sarwan Dass. As per the popular myth narrated to us
by various respondents during the field work, which we also
found in published leaflets, the history of the dera goes like this:
Sant Sarwan Dass was born in a village called Gill Patti in Bhatinda
district of Punjab. He lost his mother when he was five years old. To
help his son overcome the loss, his father, Pipal Dass, decided to travel
with him. After visiting a few places, they came to village Ballan. The
elder brother of Sarwan Dass had earlier lived in the same village. On
the outskirts of the village Ballan, they found a Pipal tree that was
completely dry and dead. However, when Pipal Dass watered the tree,
life returned to it and its leaves turned green. This, for him, was an
indication of the place being spiritually blessed. The tree also made
the child Sarwan Dass happy. The father and son decided to build a
hut close to the tree and began to live there.
After the death of his father in 1928, Sant Sarwan Dass expanded his
activities. He opened a school and started teaching Gurumukhi and
the message of Guru Granth to young children. He also persuaded
his followers to send their children to the school. “Parents who
did not educate their children were their enemies”, he used to tell to
his followers.
Impressed with the work that Sant Sarwan Dass was doing in
the village, a local landlord gifted him one kanal (about one-fifth
of an acre) of land close to the hut, where the dera building was
eventually constructed. Sarwan Dass remained head of the dera
from 11 October 1928 until he died in June 1972. He was succeded
by Sant Hari Dass and Sant Garib Dass. The dera is currently
headed by Sant Niranjan Dass.
Though Dera Ballan is a religious centre with a focus on
preaching universalistic values and spirituality, it actively identifies
itself with local dalit issues and dalit politics. Not only do they
foreground Ravi Das’ message of building a casteless society,
they have also been actively identified with dalit activism.
Sant Sarwan Dass kept in active touch with Mangoo Ram
during the Ad Dharm movement and Mangoo Ram too visited
the dera to communicate his message to dalit masses of the region.
During one of his visit to Delhi, he also met B R Ambedkar, who
“showed great respect to Sant Sarwan Dass Ji”. In one of his
letters to Ambedkar, Sant Sarwan Dass described him as “a great
son of the community”.8
In the emerging national context, the dalit political leadership
had begun to connect itself across regions. This ambition was not
confined to dalit political activists but could be also seen in the
efforts of religious gurus like Sant Sarwan Dass.
The message of Ravi Das had thus far reached the Punjabi dalits
primarily through the Sikh Holy Scripture, the Guru Granth.
However, the religious institutions of Sikhism were mostly controlled
by “upper castes” among them.9 The continued presence
of caste differences and hierarchy in the region made Sant Sarwan
Dass look for internal resources, within the caste community,
for further expansion of the dera activities. Ravi Das was the
obvious symbol for the Chamar dalits for building a community
of believers.
Having established a separate religious centre in Punjab Sant
Sarwan Dass decided to travel to Banaras in 1950, hoping to visit
the shrine at the birth place of his Guru, Guru Ravi Das. However,
to his surprise and disappointment, he could not find any shrine
or place in his name. Nothing existed in the name Guru Ravi Das
in the holy city of Banaras. He took it upon himself the task of
building a temple in the name of Ravi Das in the city. With the
help of his followers at the Dera Ballan, he purchased a piece of
land on the outskirts of Banaras where on 16 June 1965 he laid
the foundation stone of the Ravi Das temple. The first phase of
construction of this temple was completed in the year 1972.
Though the leaders were excited about building the Ravi Das
temple in Banaras, the disciples, who are mostly from Punjab,
were apprehensive. How were they going to visit Banaras?
“When the subject came up for discussion with the Sant Sarwan
Das Ji, he said we will hire a special train which will go all the
way from Jalandhar to Banaras once every year, at the time of
the birth anniversary of Ravi Das. This train will be called
Begampura Express.” 10
Dera Ballan has continued to be an important centre of dalit
political activity in Punjab. Leaders, writers and intellectuals of
the community often meet at the dera and discuss emerging
political and cultural challenges before the community of Ravi
Dasis. Kanshi Ram, another leader of dalits of north India, who
belonged to Punjab and was born in a Ravi Dasi family was a
frequent visitor to the dera. He did so not only to pay his respect
to the dera chief but also to discuss strategies with other leaders
of the community for making dalit politics more effective.
4 The Diaspora Effect
The second, and perhaps more important and interesting, phase
in the history of Ravi Das movement in Punjab begins during the
1990s, with the phase of globalisation. Along with other Punjabis,
a large number of Chamars of the Doaba region had migrated to
countries of the western hemisphere during the 1950s and 1960s.
Though there are no exact figures available, but quoting the
Indian consular office, Juergenmeyer claims that in the United
Kingdom “the percentage of scheduled castes within the total
Punjabi community was as high as 10%. The rest were largely Jat
Sikhs” (Juergenmeyer 1988: 246).11
In the alien context, with no systemic justification for caste
ideology, the Punjabi dalits did not expect to be reminded of
their “low” status in the caste hierarchy. While they did not
have any such problem at the workplace and in the urban public
sphere in UK, they often experienced caste prejudice when they
tried to be part of the local Punjabi community in the diaspora.
Juergensmeyer sums this up quite well in the following words:
The Chamars, who came to Britain expecting to find life different,
take offence at the upper caste Sikhs’ attitude towards them. They
earn as much as the Jat Sikhs, sometimes more, and occasionally find
themselves placed by the British in command over them – a Chamar
foreman superintending a Jat Sikh work crew – much to the displeasure
of the latter…The scheduled castes can afford to act more bravely
in Britain since they have now entered a new context for competing
with the Jat Sikhs. In the Punjab the cards were stacked against them,
but in Britain they have a fresh start, and the ideology of Ad Dharm has
prepared them to take advantage of it (Juergensmeyer 1988: 247-48).
The migrant dalits felt this bias in the gurdwaras which were
mostly controlled by the Jats and other upper caste Sikhs. Given
their numbers and position in the local economy dalits did not
find it difficult to assert for equal status and dignity. They began
to set up their own autonomous associations in the name of Guru
Ravi Das. The first two came up in the UK, in Birmingham and
Wolverhampton, in 1956 (ibid: 248). While initially, over the first
20-25 years of their migration, they simply built their own community
organisations and separate gurdwaras wherever they
could, over the years they also began to influence the “homeland”.
The growing availability of new communication channels
such as internet and satellite television during the early/mid-1990s
made it easier for them to renew an active relationship with
Punjab and the Ravi Dasi community at home.
By the early 1990s, diaspora dalits had also experienced considerable
economic mobility, which made it easier for them to
travel back home and they began to do so more frequently. When
they came, they also brought with them money for the religious
deras and this new money and diasporic energy played a very
important role in the further growth of the movement. This was
summed up well by a dalit businessman who has been involved in
mobilising the Ravi Dasi sants into a pan-Indian association:
It is the brethren from the west who first understood the value of our
deras and the need to strengthen them. They gave huge donations
when they came to pay a visit. The number of visitors from abroad and
frequency of their visits also increased during the 1990s. They invited
the local Sants to their countries. All this gave a boost to the Ravi
Dasi movement.12
Over the last 15 years or so, the dera at Ballan has expanded
significantly. A new building was inaugurated in 2007 where
nearly 20,000 people could be accommodated to listen to the
teachings of Guru Ravi Das. It has a langar hall where 2,000
people can eat together. Among other things, this hall has
the technology for live telecast and recording of VCDs. In
collaboration with the Jalandhar channel of Doordarshan it
telecasts a programme called Amrit Bani every Friday and
Saturday morning.
Not only has Dera Ballan expanded over the years, deras,
gurdwaras and temples in the name of Guru Ravi Das have flourished
in Punjab, particularly in the Doaba region where Ad
Dharmis and Chamars have been numerically predominant
among the dalits. We were told that there are some six or seven
major sants who can be considered as leaders of the community
and more than 250 deras/gurdwaras in the name of Guru Ravi
Das in the state of Punjab. Some of these deras have become quite
affluent and influential. However, they are all patronised exclusively
by the local Chamars and Ad Dharmis.
5 Conclusions
As I have argued elsewhere (Jodhka 2002, 2004), despite the
cultural influence of Islam and Sikhism, caste has survived in
Punjab and has worked as a disabling institution for those located
at the margins of Punjabi society, the dalits. However, over the
years caste relations have undergone some major changes. Not
only has the ideological hold of caste nearly disappeared, structurally
also dalits have moved away from tradition-based caste
occupations, and in some regions, even from the local agrarian
economy. Their growing economic autonomy also finds its expression
in their urge for cultural and religious autonomy.
Though as a religious system Sikhism is opposed to caste-based
divisions and denials, its social and religious institutions have
come to be dominated by the traditionally and economically
dominant caste groups. It is in opposition to this dominance that
Ravi Dasis have tried to carve out an autonomous identity for
themselves. Though nearly half of all the dalits of Punjab enumerate
themselves as Sikhs and some of them have risen to positions
of power within the religious establishment, the Ravi Dasis
prefer to be outside. However, Ravi Dasi gurus maintain cordial
relations with the Sikh religious leadership and some would even
claim to be Sahajdari Sikhs.13 A large majority of the Ravi Dasis of
Doaba region identify with Dera Sachkhand Ballan. To them the
Guru Granth is sacred but they equally respect their living guru.
Their places of worship look like the Sikh gurdwaras and are
sometimes also called as such but there are subtle differences.14
Their prayers, rituals and slogans too sound quite similar to those
of the Sikhs but with subtle changes to distinguish themselves from
mainstream Sikhism, which is by now a well-codified religious
system in itself. A large majority of Ravi Dasis in Punjab also list
themselves as Ad Dharmis, technically Hindu SCs who always
wanted to organise themselves as a separate religious community.
The contemporary realities of caste and religion also raise
some other, perhaps more fundamental, questions about the
way we have understood and conceptualised the processes of
social change in modern times. Historians have been emphasising
that the fuzzy boundaries that existed across communities in
south Asia were made more concrete during the later years of
colonial rule (Oberoi 1994). However, on the ground, at the popular
level, religious practice continues to be characterised by
syncretic fuzziness and diversity. It is perhaps the failure to comprehend
and accept this fluidity and diversity that on the one
hand leads to violent conflicts as it happened in Vienna, and on
the other hand to misleading interpretations of public action, as
the popular media did after the violence in Punjab during the
second half of May 2009.
Notes
1 Personal interview in December 2008 with a leading
dalit activist in Jalandhar in Punjab.
2 Personal interview, March 2009.
3 Personal interview in Ballan, Jalandhar in
December 2008.
4 Personal interview in Ballan, Jalandhar in
December 2008.
5 Some of the local dalit leaders also believe that it
was the Hindu nationalists who suggested Ravi
Das as a possible religious symbol to the Chamars.
“In order to make sure that untouchables did not
convert to Sikhism, Islam or Christianity, the
Arya Samajis propagated the symbol of Ravi Das
among Chamars, Valmiki among the Chuhras and
Kabir among the Meghs. That’s how they made
sure that dalit stayed within the Hindu fold”.
While this may be true, the image of Ravi Das as a
Chamar had already been made available to the
people of Punjab by the Sikh Gurus.
6 This discussion is based on Sat Pal Jassi’s book
(2001).
7 Mark Juergensmeyer in his pioneering work on
the Ad Dharm movement mentions that “When he
(Sant Hiran Das) established his Ravi Das Sabha,
in 1907, in village Hakim… several other deras
including that of Sant Pipal Das, were founded
soon afterward…(Juergensmeyer 1988:87)”.
8 As in a leaflet “Sant Sarwan Dass Ji: A Great Visionary
Sant”, published by Sant Surinder Dass Bawa (nd).
9 Even though Sikhism decries caste, caste-based
divisions and hierarchies have continued to survive
among the Sikhs in Punjab (Jodhka 2002, 2004;
Puri 2004; Judge and Bal 2008).
10 Personal interview at Dera Ballan, December 2008.
11 The total number of Punjabis in United Kingdom
is roughly half a million, (http://indiandiaspora.
nic.in/diaspora pdf/chapter10.pdf, 10 April 2009).
12 Personal interview in Jalandhar in October 2008.
13 See Charlene 2008.
14 See Ram 2008.
References
Breckenridge, C A and Peter van der Veer, ed. (1993):
Orientalism and the Postcolonial Predicament: Perspectives
on South Asia (Philadelphia: University
of Pennsylvania Press).
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