Short Essay on the Caste System of Hindu Society in South India

The word “casta” is of Portuguese origin, being a form of casta. Garcia de Orta wrote in 1563 that no Hindu changed from his father’s trade and that all those of the same casta of shoemakers were the same.

Caste is the basis of Hindu society, but it is interesting to note that in South India, more particularly in Kerala it has affected the Muslim and Christian social organizations also-converts to Islam and Christianity from outcastemen remained untouchables even within these respective religious folds…Syrian Christians even observed distance pollution in relation to lower caste Hindus until recently. But, by and large, caste remained a Hindu phenomenon.

Caste system in Kerala brought into being a peculiar social milieu wherein a Hindu’s approach near another Hindu was strictly conditioned by the superior-inferior relation of each in the caste hierarchy the punctilious observance of the institutional regulations as to untouchability and unapproachability, todil and tindal, from the very ancient times resulted in the stratification of the society into mutually excluding antagonistic groups. The belief was that not only the touch but the proximity of certain classes of people would cause pollution to the higher castes.

They were, therefore, treated as out-castes, or non-caste Hindus; their movement was restricted to certain areas which the superior ones would not frequent or when they were allowed to use public roads they had to be on their guard while moving about by making loud noise, lest unwittingly they should defile a Brahmin or a Nayar.

Thus James Forbes wrote, “The Pooleahs are not permitted to breathe the same air with the other castes nor to travel on the public road; if by accident they should be there and perceive a Brahmin or Nair at a distance, they must make a loud howling to warn him from approaching until they have retired or climbed up the nearest tree.”

Untouchability and inapproachability were ubiquitous in South Indian Society and they had left their mark on the entire life-pattern of the land, in economic, social, religious and political institutions. Socially they created a condition of extreme inequality, the lower orders having been prevented from the enjoyment of elementary facilities of social intercourse. Economically conditions were created for the rise of serfdom and grinding poverty.

The administrative structure was also feudalised resulting in rigid political domination of Brahmins. Distribution of justice was also made to conform to the caste rules. As a result of all these the vast majority of the population of each Hindu state became an unprivileged, slave community because lower castes were, for all purposes, treated as slave classes and were systematically exploited and reduced to straits. Apart from this, regular traffic in slaves was widely carried on everywhere.

As the Proclamation of 987 M.E. (1812 A.D.) of Rani Lakshmi Bai rightly pointed out “to buy at a cheap rate the boys and girls of the several low caste people of the country, sell them for a higher price, take them to distant places and pay tolls at sea ports and thus make a regular bargain of them had become a “disgraceful custom” in Travancore.

But unfortunately the state itself was the biggest slave-holder who even let them out for remunerative rental to individuals and institutions. The number of people held in bondage in the South Indian States was higher than the number of freemen. The extreme misery of these peasant and working classes was noted by all foreign observers and many local administrators too, in their reports, had adverted to the existence of hard conditions among them produced by caste restrictions and disabilities.

In most cases, these customary regulations and practices had no basis in the scriptures or sanctions of the Dharma Sastras: but the ethics of the Brahmins or Maryada gave a superior religious sanction for them, thus making them stronger than law. To give but one example, no sastraic injunction prevented a Sudra a lower caste woman from wearing upper garment. But in Travancore, a Royal Proclamation in 1829 gave that barbarous custom of prohibiting the lower caste women from wearing clothes above waist, the seal of legal authority.

As it is not reasonable on the part of Shanar women to wear cloths over their breasts, such custom being prohibited, they are required to abstain in future from covering the upper part of their body.” That the royal persons regarded these practices as ordained by religion and gave effect to them with unusual rigidity and harshness is evident from the case of the Rani of Attingal who, says Grose, “on a woman of her country coming to her presence, who having been some time in a European settlement, where she had conformed to the fashion there, had continued the concealment of her breasts, ordered them to be cut off, for daring to appear before her with such a mark of disrespect to the established manners of the country”.

The point is that the rulers were eager to maintain this custom, not because it was sanctioned by the Sastras, but because it was sanctified by the mode of life or achara of the Brahmins. Nuturally the law-courts also gave effect to the will of the determinate superior of the society, the Brahmin, as is evident from the reported case of two Shanar women in Travancore in 1859 who had been sentenced by the Zillah Court of Padmanabhapuram to four months’ imprisonment for no other alleged crime than wearing a cloth over the upper part of their bodies and had been sent to the Trivandrum jail in execution of their sentence.

In addition of these arbitrary customary regulations the laws expounded and codified by Manu, Brihaspathi. Parasara, Narada and other ancient law givers also had been followed in South India, as in other parts of India. But they were differently interpreted for instance, by Malabar Brahmins and applied, modifying them to facilitate their convenience, in accordance with the practices followed by the various communities in this country. Thus, there is no agamic rule prohibiting lower castes from entering the precincts of the temple or approaching the outer prakara.

Manu said, “Chandalas and swapahas should live outside the village.” The argument advanced by the orthodox Brahmin in Kerala is that if the Chandalas are to be kept away from the Savarna habitation, “the event of Chandala entering a temple could not have been contemplated.” By no stretch of imagination can Manu’s rule be construed to support the orthodox view that the lower castes should not be allowed within the temple walls or premises because Manu enjoins only that they should live outside the Savarna village.

That pertains only to residence, not to temple worship. According to Sutasamhita to Skanda Purana the Hindu temples were meant for the benefit of every community, including the lowest in the social scale. Further to add weight to this view, Manu refers to the possibility of great men being born among chandalas also and approves the advisability of their being accepted as teachers of Brahmavidya. But nowhere in South India had these views of Manu and other law-givers any followers among Brahmins. Wherever convenient and suitable for their purpose Manu was quoted and followed literally.

It is interesting that the customary caste rules and practices were never interfered with by the British administrators for it was a fixed principle of that Government that it should not interfere with social laws and personal customs unless there was a general and unequivocal demand for reform on the part of the people themselves. Castes often appealed to the British Government to exercise the prerogative to the Hindu kings by prescribing social status of castes. But it declined to assume control over caste matters.

That, in a way, was tantamount to refusing to intervene on the side of the lower classes whose privileges had been destroyed, as custom or convention of caste demanded by the superior castes. Thus we find that the British authorities did not grant the right to way to the untouchables in certain roads because caste rules prevented them using those highways. Not only did they extend recognition to these unjust personal customs, but they also gave full effect to them through legislation and decisions of the courts.

A case which occurred in Malabar in 1816 may be cited as an instance in point. A Brahmin woman was taken into custody by the Darogha under the orders of the Magistrate and detained her for nearly eight months for illegal connection with some persons of inferior caste, pending the establishment of her guilt by an assembly of Brahmins after due enquiry which was known as Smartha Vicharam. In having recourse to this mode of proceeding the court was merely recognising the time- honoured jurisdiction of the Brahmin assemblies over women of their caste charged with moral lapses.

There were, moreover, recorded instances of British officers in South India having assumed ecclesiastical jurisdiction, setting aside, the authority of caste representatives in the early 19th century. Buchanan has referred to some such cases in his Journey from Madras through the countries of Mysore, Canara and Malabar In Coimbatore, Major Macleod superseded hereditary headmen and ordered that cases of caste offences should be heard by a Tahsilder assisted by an assembly of the most respectable men of the castes concerned.

The Tahsildar, after consulting the assembly as to the customs of the castes passed the sentence. Anyone who refused to submit to the decision of the Tahsildar and assembly was immediately banished from the district. Another officer in Coimbatore similarly ordered that all caste questions should be settled in the Court by a Tahsildar.

The caste rules were so strong, and the Brahmin influence so pervasive that even Europeans in South India had to recognise them as unimpeachable facts of social reality. Thus we find the English administrators extending judicial validity to Brahmin caste customs like Smartha Vicharam-a mode of trying Nambudiri women accused of moral lapses. That caste was taken into consideration even during the British period for awarding punishments, is clear from the Regulation XI of 1816.

On confinement in the stocks, the Regulation says that heads of villages have, in cases of a trivial nature such as abusive language and inconsiderable assaults or affrays, power to confine the offending parties in the village chaultry (lockup) for a time not exceeding twelve hours; or, if the offending parties are of the lower castes of the people on whom it may not be improper to inflict so degrading a punishment, to order them to be put in the stocks for a time not exceeding six hours.

Indian Law Reports, Madras series, 1883 reports a case in the High Court of Madras (now Chennai) in which a Muhammadan was convicted by a native petty magistrate in the Trichinopoly district of a petty theft and sentenced to be put in the stocks for three hours. The High Court on appeal, ruled that a Muhammadan cannot be said to belong to the lower castes of the people and that it is probable that the framers of the regulation had in view those castes which, prior to the introduction of British rule, were regarded as servile. In 1903, it was ruled by the High Court of Madras (now Chennai) that the Shanans belong to the lower classes, who may be punished by confinement in the stocks.

So also untouchability and inapproachability were accorded legal sanction by English law; offences pertaining to these were severely dealt with. Not only men, but inert objects belonging to the higher castes also were subject to ritual had distance pollution. Thus temples, houses, roads, tanks, wells, schools, markets, foodstuffs, courts, post offices and other public and private offices manned by caste Hindus, all came under the category of prohibited object for the approach or touch by outcastes in Travancore and Cochin.

Even in Malalabar and other places which were under direct rule of the British the practice was not different. Caste offences were punished by courts established by the British in these areas. Those who polluted by approach or touch temples, houses, tanks or roads belonging to the savarnas were awarded severe corporal punishments by the Brahmins and their agents. They were also compelled to pay compensation to meet the expenses of purificatory rites, refusal being met by civil action.

An interesting case occurred in Travancore in 1917. When a Kammala (carpenter) caused pollution to a savarna tank the owner performed purificatory rite and asked him to pay the expenses which the indigent carpenter was not in a position to do. Thereupon the savarna sued him in a civil court and the complainant’s claim was upheld. When appealed, the High Court of Travancore confirmed the award saying that “what is or is not, natural consequence of a tortuous act depends on the circumstance of each case.

In a country like Travancore, where social and religious usages, which may be deemed superstitious and even irrational, when judged by western stan­dards, prevail, the function of courts is confined to respecting and giving effect to them except when they are manifestly contrary to law or public policy or are subversive of morality”.

It is particularly interesting to see that even Christian missionaries, who endeavoured to alleviate the miseries of the low caste-men by converting them to Christianity and affording them protection, were not completely free from caste considerations. Charles Mead, an I.M.S. missionary was forced to leave the mission in 1853 on his marrying a Christian lady convert from Paraya caste.

The missionaries, it may be noted, maintained very vigorously the distinction between the European missionary and the local Christian and the marriage of a missionary with a low caste Christian lady was considered a great disgrace by them. Paraya and Pulaya converts had their own congregations, separate and distinct from others of the Nadar and Ezhava castes who were considered as more respectable converts.

In a different form we find this love of exalted castes even among the famous European missionaries. Robert de Nobili, the ‘Roman Brahmin’ of Madurai, was a self-proclaimed “twice-born” who wore a ‘sacred thread’, abstained from eating flesh, strictly kept ritual purity and put on the garb of a Sanyasi. For converting caste Hindus he, as Tatwa Bodhachari Swami, appealed to them within the context of their caste culture. The most renowned Catholic sage of all was Viramamuni or Dharrya Nathaswami (J.C. Boschi) who, as a Tamil scholar, had very few equals in his day.

In order to preach the Gospel with full effect, and to make convets to Christianity amongst the Hindus he made himself a master of Hindu sciences, opinions and prejudices, and conformed to their customs. His public appearance was in the style and manner of Sankaracharya of Kanchi. All these go to prove the hold of caste on the south Indian Society as a whole and the tragic plight of the outcaste communities in all parts of South India.

The wholesome influence of the British occupation of South India was altogether lost on caste and customs of the people; practically the British failed to prove the meaningless- ness of these institutions. Divinity inherent in Brahminhood was an accepted fact of social life in the whole of South India, especially in Kerala even during the British regime: everybody, including the lower caste men looked upon the Brahmin as a Bhoodeva and all, including the kings, dreaded a Brahmin’s curse which they believed, would bring ruin­ation to the victim.

There the laws applicable to the ordinary citizens were not applicable to Brahmins. A man of inferior caste suffered death for killing another of a superior or inferior caste, but a Brahmin was not to suffer capital punishment for whatever crime he committed. Death punishment for a Brahmin was equivalent to the king committing brahmahatya the vilest of all sins which would, in its wake, bring crack of doom to the country.

It is interesting to see that this exemption of Brahmins from capital punsihment was scrupulously effected in the judicial processes of Cochin and Travancore even in 1871 as is evident from the correspondence between the Dewan of Cochin and the British Resident. On the Resident expressing his disapproval of a sentence passed by the Appeal Court, by which the first accused, a Brahmin and his accomplices were exempted from capital punishment, the Cochin Raja reacted sharply.

The Dewan wrote, “I am directed by his Highness the Raja to inform you in reply that, according to the Hindu Shastras the taking away of the life of a Brahmin is an unparalleled sin, and hence whatever may be the crime committed by a Brahmin, he has never hitherto been subjects to capital punishment.

“Neither is it in this country alone that such a law prevails. The law is in force in Travancore and if His Highness is not mistaken, also in the other Hindu States.

“His Highness is aware that Europeans do not, in such cases, take into account the caste or sex of the persons committing the offences-but His Highness cannot, without! Doing great violence to his own feeling and to those to the majority of his subjects, sanction the execution of a sentence of death on a Brahmin or on a female.”

The Resident pursued the matter further, but the king was adamant and the Dewan again wrote to him saying that “according to the Shastras, the commission of murder or I any other heinous crime does not render a Brahmin liable for capital punishment although it may render him unfit to associate with persons of his own caste.” He quoted the passages from the Statute of Manu bearing on the subject, which is as follows:

“380. Never shall the king slay Brahmin, though convicted of all possible crimes, let him banish the offender from his realm but with all his property secured and his body unhurt.

“381. No greater crime is known on earth then slaying a Brahmin, and the king, therefore, must not even form in his mind an idea a killing of priests.”

How observance of caste rules and usages, especially distance, pollution, and insis­tence on the performance of feudal obligations had affected the life of ordinary masses and how they had vitiated the whole administrative machinery of the native states are very ably brought out in a letter written in April 1870 by Ballard, the Resident of Tranvancore of the Government of Madras (now Chennai). The nature of suffering endured by the lower castes of Travancore was more or less the same in other parts of South India including Madras Presidency. The evils Ballard had mentioned were in one form or other present in backward areas of Tamil country and Canara.

The British Government had granted the untouchable’s equal right to enter public service, attend public educational institutions, walk along highways, make use of public offices like courts and post offices etc. Equality in regard to the enjoyment of these rights was, however, left aside by these weaker sections as it was difficult for them to avail of it.

On account of their extreme poverty and lack of education, the boon of public service entry they were forced to forfeit. In the case of other rights they were debarred from the enjoyment of them by the opposition and sometimes the actual persecution of their co-religionists: the customs of a people cannot be quickly changed by official mandates. O’Malley remarks, in this connection: Hindu judges in outlying places have been known to be influenced by prejudice.”

According to evidence given in Madras (now Chennai) before the Lee Commission in 1924, ‘”Untouchables in such places and before such judges were not permitted to enter the courts, even though they were parties to a case as witnesses, but had to stand afar off, and examination was conducted by a go- between who would go out, question them and take back their answers to the judge.”

Similarly Madras (Chennai) Government’s efforts to provide facilities for education to the untouchables were often stultified by the opposition of the higher castes. If they took advantage of these facilities, says O’Malley, “one of three things is apt to happen. Their children may be allowed to attend school on sufferance, provided they sit apart from other children; or their life, or that of their parents, may be made miserable till they are withdrawn; or the school may be boycotted altogether.” He cites an extraordinary case that occurred in Saidapet, a suburb of Madras city, in 1931.

A Committee which was appointed to consider the question of extending education found that high caste Hindus “used every refinement of social and economic boycott to compel untouchables to withdraw their children from the public schools, even to the extent of combining to deny their families employment, food and shelter.” Under this circumstance, untouchables themselves pre­ferred separate schools and the committee was “forced to the conclusion that the best thing was not to struggle against caste prejudice” and recommended separate schools to be opened for them “so as to save them from persecution and prevent communal friction.”

In this background the disabilities, of the lower castes of Travancore will certainly appear as truly representative of South India as a whole. The letter of Ballard the British Resident, delineates four types of substantial disabilities and oppressions to which outcaste men in Travancore were subjected, viz., (1) they were not permitted to use roads open to the public of higher castes; (2) they were not permitted to enter or approach within a certain distance of many courts and public offices; (3) they were excluded from the government schools; and (4) they were excluded from public service.