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Sunday, February 24, 2013
Saturday, February 23, 2013
Training of 'safai kamdar' in karmakand
The provision of Rs. 22.50 lakh in
budget of Gujarat to train ‘safai kamdar’ in karmakand is neither ‘revolutionary’
nor ‘reformist’. It is simply an eye wash. Since five years Gujarat government
has already been wasting public money to train Guru Brahmin (a scheduled caste
performing religious rites among SCs) in karmakand. Today majority of Guru Brahmins
are leaving this profession, as it is not giving minimum amount to support family
in these days of hardship.
Modi government should fill reservation quota, if it
wants to give employment to Dalits. And if there is any idea of ‘samrasta’
behind this project, Modi should appoint dalits ‘pujaris’ in temples like
Ambaji, Dhwarka, etc. The karmakand scheme for Guru Brahmins has failed. Another
scheme for ‘safai kamdar’ will not serve the purpose.
If Modi wants to reform Hindu
religion, he can send government resolution to all Government offices including
Gujarat High Court, to perform so-called Bhumi Pujans in public places with the
help of ‘untouchable’ priests!
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Community, culture and literature in post-independence India
Raju Solanki
‘Navratri’ is a nine
day festival. A perforated earthen pot with an earthen lamp inside is kept on a
ground under open sky. Women dance with dandiya (a wooden stick) in a circle
surrounding the pot at night. They call it ‘garabo’, a word derived from
‘garbh’ i.e. embryo. Navratri is celebration of recreation and procreation,
production and reproduction. It celebrates life. Women worship mother goddess,
the nature, the almighty.
In any Indian village,
which is indisputably divided between Caste Hindus and Dalits, the festival of
Navratri is celebrated with same intensity and passion in every settlement
distinctly formed on the lines of traditional castes. Though divided they are
guided by same passion of procreation. And they believe they all are sons and
daughters of mother goddess, however illusionary it is in the reality.
‘Ek Laldarwaje
tambu tania re lol’, (the tents have been erected at Lal Darwaja) is one of
the most nicely and melodiously composed songs of Navratri. The song was
written against the back drop of medieval age, beautiful fort city of Ahmedabad
and its ruler AhmadShah Badshah who along with his commanders was quite
unexceptionally, rude and harsh to his subject, which was undoubtedly Hindus.
The women folk having acclimatized with their tormentors preserved the painful memory
of subjugation and submission in this song in their own unique way. The
mothers-in-law used to say, “He vahu tame na jaso jovane tya, Badso bado
mijaji” (O, daughter-in-law! don’t go there to see, the Sultan is very
arrogant!).
Amidst gaiety and
festivity of Navratri, when women sing this song, they simply fathom the
unconscious past and create an awesome world of energy and joy where the
‘arrogant’ badshah becomes a thing of oblivion. The bitter memories of past
have been diluted and what remains is a harmoniously blended melody of life
leading to catharsis of age old prejudices and taboos born from confrontations
and conflicts. Is this not what we call culture, the melting pot, the
unequivocal voice of humanity?
In India, ‘community’
is a word often misconceived and misinterpreted. In a village if you ask a man
from any caste, say Patel, "Who are the people living in this
village?" the prompt answer would be, "we Patel and ‘others’".
Every caste is a ‘community’ living on an island perfectly separated from each
other settled within geographical boundaries consecrated and sanctified by
Manusmriti – the ancient code of conduct. The castes are communities and
communities are castes, so overlapping with each other these words are that
they often used as synonyms. Indian caste system is so futile, treacherously
suicidal, that some times, not only ‘victims’, but even ‘oppressor’ feel
isolated.
The word
"community" is derived from the Old French communité which is
derived from the Latin communitas (cum, "with/together" + munus,
"gift"), a broad term for fellowship or organized society. One
explicit meaning of commune is “a small group
of persons living together, sharing possessions, work, income,
etc., and often pursuing unconventional lifestyles.”
This definition is sickeningly true for every caste in India.
Post-independence Indian literature attempts to combine
two processes, two narratives, one is emphasising on consistent struggle to
unshackle the age-old clutches of caste system and another voices recurrent
frustrating failure of socio-economic change. ‘Juthan’, a story of a Chuhra boy
is a conspicuous example of both narratives. The Chuhras, a sweeper caste,
converted to Shikhism, following a dramatic and historic event in Shikh
history. Stephen Cohen has given very illuminating insights into the lives of
Chuhras in his book, ‘the untouchable soldier’. We cannot understand, and
evaluate ‘Juthan’ without the historical perspective of the great Chuhras.
As you all know, the ninth Guru, Tegh Bahadur, was
killled by Aurangzeb in 1675. In a daringly expedition, his mutilated body was
snatched from mogul army in Delhi’s Chandi Chawk by three Chuhras and carried
back to Teg Bahadur’s son, the great Guru Govind Singh. As a reward for their
effort the sweepers were admitted to the Khalsa and bestowed with the title,
‘Mazhabi’, the faithful. They thus became the special sub-caste of outcastes in
the Sikh community, and in fact distinguish themselves between recent and
historic converts to the faith. After Guru Govind Singh, the Mazhabis were
patronised by Ranjit Singh and they were formed into separate companies, one
attached to each high caste battalion. The ultimate and supreme sacrifice of
Chuhras could not transform the caste-ridden Hindu-Sikh mentality.
After the defeat of the Khalsa, the Mazhabis saw no
military service for several years. They were classed as criminal caste by the
British. Eventually the Dogra Maharaj of Kashmir, Gulab Singh recruited them as
pioneer troops for his own army. Pioneers were infantry trained for road, canal
and construction tasks; when attacked they could defend themselves, unlike
ordinary labourers. In addition, these tough untouchable Shikhs were useful to
the Maharaja for overseeing his Mohamadan subjects.
When the mutiny broke out the Mazhabis were drawn into
the British Indian Army and formed the first Pioneer Sikh Regiment. They were
soon put to good use; marched to Delhi; they were instrumental in breaking the
resistance of the mutineers. A second regiment was raised in 1858 by John
Lowrence, and a third followed shortly. The three Pioneer units saw extremely
varied service, at one time or another they were employed in china, Africa,
Europe and the Middle East. After mutiny, the Chuhras became unwilling victims
of the theory of the ‘Martial Races’. The meek was disarmed and sent to
sweeping, his hereditary profession. The meek could not inherit the earth.
‘Joothan’ narrates the painful
saga of an untouchable boy in the most tantalizing manner: “The third
day I went to the class and sat down quietly. After a few minutes the
headmaster’s loud thundering was heard: ‘Abey Chuhre ke, motherfucker, where
are you hiding … your mother …’ I had begun to shake uncontrollably. A Tyagi
boy shouted, ‘Master Saheb, there he is, sitting in the corner.’”
“The headmaster had pounced on my neck. The
pressure of his fingers was increasing. As a wolf grabs a lamb by the neck, he
dragged me out of the class and threw me on the ground. He screamed: ‘Go sweep
the whole playground … Otherwise I will shove chillies up your arse and throw
you out of school.’”
“Frightened, I picked up the three-day-old
broom [now only a cluster of] thin sticks. Tears were falling from my eyes. I
started to sweep the compound while my tears fell. From the doors and windows of
the schoolrooms, the eyes of the teachers and the boys saw this spectacle. Each
pore of my body was submerged in an abyss of anguish.”
This is a story of a boy, whose forefathers
were assigned the most derogatory tasks like sweeping the roads, cleaning the
cattle barns, getting shit off the floor, disposing of dead animals, working
the fields during harvests and for them conversion and military prowess the
social amelioration has remained a mirage. In this era of Jingoism where every
Tom, Dick and Harry sings ballads of patriotism and middle-class intelligentsia
thrives on media-sponsored war-hysteria, the story of ‘Juthan’ points to
infallible and water tight divisions of Indian society; gives perceptive images
of shocking realities and compels us to change our world view and perceptions.
I started with an example of a song sung
during Navratri. I said that this song is an example of cultural assimilation
and catharsis. Any insignificant Dalit basti with its modest resources celebrates
the festival of mother goddess. However, the question is why the social
disabilities and cruelties inflicted on Dalits since the ages have never become
theme of Navratri songs? Because, has the religion diluted the oppressive
nature of social realities? Because, has the cultural assimilation not been
complete? Or because, the ‘dalit’ narrative has been distorted by inter-faith
perceptions and Dalits simply imitate cultural tattoos engraved by upper caste
masters?
Inter-community relations, biases,
preconceived notions, stereotypes perceived as ‘culture’ often form the basis
of literature and post-independence Indian literature may not be an exception. The
first vocabulary of Gujarati language compiled by Magan Desai, the man who
later came to be known as pioneer of Magan-Madhyam and published by Gujarat
Vidhyapith had given the meanings of various caste/communities, like Vaghari as
‘dirty, unclean, rustic, mean’ (मेलो, गंदो, असभ्य के नीच
माणस), Baraiya as
‘thief’ (चोरी के लूंटफाट करनार), Hajam (barber) as ‘idle’ (नवरो माणस),
Kumbhar (potter) as ‘unskilled’ (अणघड), dhedvado as ‘dirty and unclean place’ (गंदी अने अस्वच्छ जग्या). Quite unimaginable
and disgusting stuff from the stable of tolerance and penance!
In the end, I
would like to categorize post-independence Indian literature in two broad
categories. One is simply narrative, descriptive, narrates society as it is
with all its follies and futilities. Another is futuristic, revolutionary,
optimistic, portrays struggles of suppressed humanity with all its strengths
and stupidities. The revolutionary songs of Andhra poet Gaddar represents the
India - suppressed and subjugated, dishonored and disgraced. It fills our hearts with optimism, shatter
our submissiveness and assert that new order is possible, new world is
possible.
“Ye gaon hamara, ye gali
hamari. ye basti hamse hai. Har chiz hamse hai. mitti ke liye hum hai, mahelon
ke liye hum hai. gulam ke liye hum hai, salam ke liye hum hai. bone ke liye hum
hai, Katne ke liye hum hai. hal apana, hashiya apana, hathoda apana, kulhadi
apni to, ye jalim kaun hai, uska julam kya hai.” (ये गांव हमारा, ये गली हमारी. ये बस्ती हमसे है, हर चीज़ हमसे है. मीट्टी के
लिये हम है, महलों के लिये हम है. गुलाम के लिये हम है, सलाम के लिये हम है. बोने
के लिये हम है, काटने के लिये हम है. हल अपना, हसीया अपना, हथोडा अपना, कल्हाडी
अपनी तो ये जालिम कौन है, उसका जुलम क्या है?) Gaddar’s
songs bring forth the unheard, subaltern, the voice of meek, which is certainly
not week. It transfuses new hope in our Stale, fragile hearts and transgresses
deep into our self nurtured, self addressed, hypocritically ‘secure’ comfort
zone.
Here in my language, I may
have found similar powerful voices in Sahil Parmar : “Azadi avi to ene rangi
kala kuchade, (आज़ादी आवी तो एने
रंगी काळा कुचडे - when independence came, it
was humiliated) kagal me bandhine Alyu gadhadane na punchhale (कागळमां बांधीने आल्यु गधाडाना पूंछडे - wrapped
in a paper, it was tied with tail of a donkey) or in Shankar Painter (Tu gamade
mara avaje re ho vira mare kalammvala (तु गामडे मारा आवजे रे हो वीरा मारा कलमवाळा - O
writer, my brother, come to my village). Dukhiyano bheru thaje re
ho vira mara white collarwala, (दुखियानो भेरु थाजे रे
हो वीरा मारा व्हाइटकोलरवाळा - O white-collar, my
brother, help the vulnerable!)
Let us hope, the literature of Dalits, Tribals, subaltern
will bring profound optimism and vigour in Indian literature and enrich our
lives and broaden our vision.
(paper presented in national seminar organized by Shree P N Pandya Arts, M P Pandya Science and Smt D P Pandya Commerce college, Lunavada on 31 January, 2013.)
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