Caste, King and Dharma: from Varendra to Bangladesh

by Sergio Targa

First published on the Parittran blog, January 31, 2011

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Historically caste as we know it today developed from the beginning of the Christian era. It received a major thrust from the Gupta period and got established by the 13th century. Far from being a religious sort of structure, caste was a political one: it was the way a kingdom was built and functioned. The caste system was basically the power structure of the early medieval Indian state. The following discussion will hopefully bear out this point.

Gopal paid his debt to his forefathers in heaven by begetting the illustrious Dharmapala, who, conversant with the precepts of the sastras, by restraining those who swerved from the right course, made the castes conform to their proper tenets.

These verses (slokas) are found in a Sanskrit copper plate (tamroshason) of Debpal, the third king of the famous Bengal Dynasty, reigning approximately between 810 and 849 AD. The name of the plate is The Mungir Copper Plate of Devapala. The verses are extremely important for our discourse. The kings of the Pal dynasty were fervent Buddhist; Debpal was certainly so. Thus how is it possible that a Buddhist king was praised for having enforced the discipline and the regulations of the caste system? If the caste system is a Hindu invention and institution how and why is it found as a major achievement among the deeds of a Buddhist king? My understanding is that caste was not a religious tenet but a political one. Debpal being a king used the caste system as a political device, no matter his personal religious affiliation. My idea is that the caste system was the framework and structure of the early medieval north eastern Indian state. That is, caste was the way the medieval state organised and structured itself.

How was it possible?

From the Monushonghita we come to know that:

“The king has been created (to be) the protector of the castes (varna) and orders, who, all according to their rank, discharge their several duties.”
(George Bühler, translator. (Sacred Books of the East, Volume 25), Chapter 7,35).

From this expression we understand that the main purpose of a king is that of enforcing the caste system. He has been created to that scope and purpose.

“Through fear of him all created beings, both the immovable and the movable, allow themselves to be enjoyed and swerve not from their duties.” (Chapter 7,15).

A king defends and enforces the caste system because of the exclusive use he has of military strength. It is because of danda (i.e. rod of punishment) that no one is allowed to swerve from his/her caste.

“If the king did not, without tiring, inflict punishment on those worthy to be punished, the stronger would roast the weaker, like fish on a spit; The crow would eat the sacrificial cake and the dog would lick the sacrificial viands, and ownership would not remain with any one, the lower ones would (usurp the place of) the higher ones.” (Chapter 7,20-21).

The previous idea finds his better explanation in these two verses: if the king doesn’t use force, then the stronger will get over the weaker. So far nothing remarkable, but the following verse shows what the previous one meant: stronger means lower caste and weaker means higher caste. Without force (i.e. danda) the system will collapse. Specifically, the collapse of the system is remarkable in that right, power and ownership become impossible. In other words, the state as such becomes impossible. This situation is called in Sanskrit either arajokota or matsianiaia. We’ll see these expressions later.

I would like now to draw the reader’s attention to one particular and all important point: ownership and right. Why is it that without castes or with the tumbling of castes ownership and right is not possible? The fact is that castes define and predetermine a very fixed hierarchical series of adhikaras. Let’s see them:

a) Sudra: the servants. According to dharmasastras, had the least entitlement as far as adhikaras were concerned. They had mastery over their body, in the best of cases. Service to the three higher castes was their true and only right. A sudra could not be the master or owner of anything: whatever he has belonged to the higher caste he served. He was completely excluded from the knowledge of the Vedas.
b) Vaisya: the commoners, the ordinary people. They had right over their own household and on movable wealth in general. Agriculture, animal husbandry and commerce were their rights. They had a certain access to the Vedas.
c) Ksatriya: the warriors and rulers. They were lords of the people and of the land. They were proficient in the use of weapons. Their mastery was exercised on land of which they could be real owners.
d) Brahmana: the religious specialists. Being the knower of the Vedas they were entitled to the whole cosmos. In particular they were the masters of sacrifices, the actions which indeed sustained the whole universe.

To be kept in mind is that a higher caste included in its adhikaras (i.e. rights) the adhikaras of all the caste beneath his, so that a Vaisya had among its adhikaras the adhikaras of a Sudra as well; a Ksatriya had those of a Vaisya and a Sudra and so on. The caste system in practice preordained who could do what. And if we think about it, we’ll see that a state is exactly a system were a power order is enforced and respected. Particularly, a state is a power structure by means of which personal rights of property are enforced and protected.

But if we said that the king through the use of danda maintains the order of society, why is there the need of a caste system? We certainly remember that state power relies on two basic components: coercion and consensus. The stronger the consensus the lesser the use of coercion to maintain the status quo. Now, if we think that the Pal dynasty ruled in Bengal and Bihar for more than 400 years it is virtually impossible even to think that such a long rule was established on the continued use of force. The caste system which came to assume strong religious connotations worked exactly and was necessary exactly to create that consensus we were talking about above. People, generally speaking were they themselves convinced of caste belonging (through religious sanction) and thus less inclined to rebel. In case of rebellion the king could use violence to put things right. It must be borne in mind, however, that when in dharmasastras or other texts right and wrong are discussed about, they actually mean dharmic and odharmic, that is, according or disaccording to varnasramadharma (i.e. the law of caste and stages of life).

To further stress the point being made here, let us now see what arajakota and matsianiaia mean. In the Ramacarita of Sandiakaranandi (The Ramacarita was written during the reign of king Madanapala, 1144-1162. It deals with a rebellion at the time of king Mohipal II. Mohipal II ruled likely for a few years from 1068 AD. It was during his reign that the Kaivartas headed by Bhima rebelled and killing Mohipal II established their own kingdom in Varendra) it is said that:

“Varendri stood miserable because the visayas (i.e. districts) and villages fell in confusion regarding their ownership” (Ramacarita 1,48B).

This is what arajakata means: either a situation of kinglessness or a situation where an unlawful king reigns. In both situations there is confusion about the laws of property, because protection and enforcement of dharma (i.e. varnasramadharma) fails. In the same Ramacarita it is said that:

“Ramapala, never feeling too exultant and offering adequate protection, repelled the revolution against dharma, and holding up the rod of punishment he went round the earth and put the world on the path trodden by the righteous” (Ramacarita 1.24B).

The Kaivarta’s rebellion is here interpreted as a revolution against dharma. Why? Because the Kaivarta, a sudra caste, killed the lawful king Mohipal II. And this was certainly against dharma. When Rampal recovers Varendra this means that he recovers dharma. It is than with the rod of punishment (i.e. dondo) that he put things right (i.e. according to dharma).
In the Khalimpur Copperplate of Dharmapala (802 AD circa) it is said that

“The glorious Gopal was made to take the hands of Fortune by the people to put an end to the practice of fishes” (Indian Epigraphy IV, p. 251, verse 4).

We must remember that Sasanka died in circa 620 AD and Harsha Vardhana in circa 647 AD. After these two kings, particularly the latter, the situation in Bengal remained fluid without any king strong enough to unify and pacify it. This situation continued until circa 750 AD when Gopal the first king of the Pal dynasty was ‘elected’ king. Here it is interesting to notice that matsianiaia is a situation in which a big fish eats a small one. The event recorded in the copperplate far from revealing a sort of democratic practice, simply refers to Gopal as the king who enforced varnasramadharma. To prove this interpretation we could see Kamadakiya’s Nitisara, a manual of politics not early than the 8th century AD. In section II verse 40, it is said that matsianiaia is the breakdown of varnasramadharma.

To sum up our discussion we may quote another passage from puranic literature. The following is taken from the Brihaddharma Purana, a work from Bengal variously dated to the 10th century or later:

“In the absence of danda, men would turn haughty and kill animals, men and sacrificial preys; the crows would eat puradasa and the dogs the objects of sacrifice. No ownership of anything would be possible, nor would be there any gradation of high and low. The four varnas would totter before the oppression of the haughty. It is by danda, as such, that all are sustained and those who are pursuing dharma are protected. For fear of danda again, men become law-abiding and desist from evil deeds”.

Absence of danda either means the absence of a king or the presence of an unworthy one. Then it is stated that without a king not only there is a sort of collapse in the law and order situation, but a collapse in the cosmos as well. To be noticed is that the impossibility of ownership is mentioned right besides the confusion between high and low and the tottering of the four varnas. In fact the destruction of the laws of property is the destruction of the four varnas. This is again orajokotha and matsianiaia.

To conclude: in early medieval north eastern India, the caste system articulated the then state, in as much as it articulated the laws of property. The king was absolutely necessary for the system to work, being himself entitled to use dondo and thus enforce caste configuration. Without king there could not possibly be castes. In other words we may say that caste was born to be functional to the distribution and exercise of power.

Now we have no longer a king but we do have power. Is it possible to think that even today caste and what has remained of it remains functional to the distribution and exercise of power? I personally believe that even in modern Bangladesh caste and casteism are the foundation of the distribution and exercise of power both at the micro and macro levels. Today we may give caste the name of patronage: another name for the feudal structure the caste system was born to sustain and foster. Even in today’s Bangladesh’s society hierarchy and patronage are the real axis of the power structure. Privileges are apportioned according to social status creating linkages of personal loyalties between individuals and communities alike. The resilience of the system has created that strange and hybrid political configuration, which is in-between the modern nation state which Bangladesh wishes to be and the feudal social system casteism continually recreates. In the end, Bangladesh might once again be defined as a congery of warring principalities where this time the rulers are not the kings or ksatriyas of old but the new captains of the people this time blessed by formal electoral processes. We might not be longer able to identify in today’s society the four castes of dharmasastric memory, but I wonder whether in Indian history we have ever been able to do so.

But caste has now a stronger cultural connotation as well. Caste and the hierarchical principle it embodies are part and parcel of Bangladeshi culture and custom. The social discrimination we see at work between poor and rich, women and men, low ranking people and high ranking ones is the same we see at work in the private and familial spheres of life. Bangladeshi culture is imbued with hierarchy no matter how highly we speak of democracy and equality. The latter values are pretty much foreigner to this land and antithetic to hierarchy, the super value of the Indian sub-continent’s cultural milieu. What to do then? Things being so, a political transformation is, though desirable, not enough to ensure a definite departure of caste and casteism. What is really necessary is a cultural revolution. In as long as the hegemonic culture is one of patronage and hierarchy, there is no real possibility of change. In this context, whatever political revolution or transformation would merely reproduce the ancient regime. It is only when a new culture will gain a space in Bangladeshi society that a political transformation for the good will come about. Cultural transformations require long spans of time but can be planned and implemented. A counter culture, the like of which Gramsci speaks about in his Prison’s Notebooks, must start at grass roots level through programmes of formal and informal education. People must be made aware of their own dignity and power. They must be alerted to the fact that their consent is important and should not be given to anybody without thinking and understanding. People should be taught that socio-economic and political structures are man made and as such can be changed etc. But what is more people should learn to resist the arrogance of local influential men, the ksatriyas of today, who for personal interest and social prestige do not hesitate to maintain the poor poor, the weak weak, the oppressed oppressed, the untouchables utouchables.

Read the full article here. The author is a Xaverian missionary. Parittran, the organisation on whose website this article was published, was created among the Dalits of Bangladesh with support from these missionaries. The Xaverians are recognized for taking up the cause of the Rishi, a Dalit caste. Read another of Sergio Targa’s articles on the changes among the Rishi here.

Caste in academia and activism: In conversation with P.D. Sathyapal

P.D. Satyapal is an anthropologist, professor and BAMCEF speaker. In conversation, he has shared his experience of caste and gender and his experiences of caste inside educational institutions. In this concluding excerpt from the conversation, he shares his experiences as an anthropologist and of his work at the interface between activism and academia.

I came back to Andhra University for my Ph.D. and took the topic, ‘inequality among the tribes’. So far, sociologists and anthropologists have been saying that there are two different groups of society – caste society, inequal, hierarchical and so on, and societies of tribes, where there is no hierarchy and they are relatively homogenous. I had seen multi-tribal villages, like multi-caste villages, where we find very clearly the system of caste, or discrimination on the lines of caste. So, I studied that. For my M.Phil., I had worked in the Andaman and Nicobar islands. I was there for five and a half months, studying tribes in isolation. I had been to more than 12 islands. That was a very good experience for me. We always dream of anthropologists as adventurers, so that satiated some of my fantasies of working alone with groups on tiny islands. Then I came to the Andhra-Orissa border and stayed for nine months in a village. That is a usual routine for anthropologists – we do our fieldwork by a methodology called participant observation, so the stipulation is that we must stay with the community we are studying for nearly a calendar year. That does not always happen, but I managed to stay for nine months in a small village. I had to walk for 17 kilometres from the nearest bus stop to reach that place, established rapport with the villagers, stayed in a hut that was abandoned, and studied inequality there.

Later on, I joined the Department of Anthropology in Andhra University. In between, I became president of research scholars, we used to have some 920 research scholars. As research scholars, we had some agitations about how appointments were being made, along with the Teachers’ Association. We had a Scholars and Teachers Action Committee, had bitter fights with the Vice Chancellor. There were several questions hurled in either direction, the government came down and make a commission with the Chief Secretary and Vice Chancellor, those sort of things went on. There, too, I was looking at rosters, seeing how they manipulate with the rosters.

I joined the same university as a teacher. Since my area of interest is inequality and my passion is for Ambedkarite thought, I picked up those papers that deal with Indian society, culture, stratification, democracy, human rights, things of that sort. Till that time, I had never worked specifically in any Ambedkarite organisation. I used to go to Ambedkar Bhavan, participate in some protests sporadically, talk at events, that’s all.

As a teacher, I tried to reflect upon the syllabus and pedagogical things. Nowhere do we find that the real problems of society are being dealt with. Even at the post-graduate level, where we are talking about things like society, where we read about caste – even there, with regard to theories and origins of caste, and how mechanisms of caste work, caste in relation to economy, politics, religion – we do not see our viewpoints there. Of what Ambedkar I have read, these people – they don’t matter at all – people like M.N. Srinivas, Dubey, they are all talking about their own small concepts. In India, so far, nobody has given a theory in anthropology, there is no grand theory of anthropology as the Indian contribution, from any of the Indian anthropologists. Concepts like Sanskritisation, they are only small concepts, they were fashioned after anthropologists like Robert Redfield and others. So Srinivas and Dubey and people like them are treated as authorities on caste and are believed to have done many things on caste. I am not convinced. Dr. Ambedkar’s work and contribution is much more, his ideas are more rigourous. The looking at concepts analytically – I don’t find those qualities here with Indian anthropologists. The observations that we were made to teach, I had a feeling that these were all peripheral.

I was a young teacher, I had been expressing some of these opinions but it was to no avail. Noone was taking me very seriously at that time. That was when I thought I should get abreast of this subject first. I started teaching and started changing my papers almost every year, six, seven years, it went on like that. I was reading Ambedkar, I was participating in events. Till 1997, 1998, I only had these stray attachments, very very thin attachments to the Ambedkarite movements.

This took a turn, because I came in touch with an organisation called BAMCEF, the All India Backward And Minority Communities Employees Federation, with which I work even now. Here I find a different kind of argument, a rigour, ideologial clarity. Here, there is very fine analysis, it gives scope for the right kind of perspective, so that we can understand a society quite well. So with the influence of BAMCEF and my reading in Ambedkar and other people, I thought this is the time I should intervene into my study area. I started taking on these guys, I’ve become much more vocal. In 5-6 years I had understood that professor is the top position you can get academically. All other posts like warden, dean, VC are all honorary position. In anthropological association, there are honorary positions and much of these people are handpicked. So with the influence of BAMCEF on my personality, I decided not to go after these posts and take up activism as my passion. Then I grew bolder, I started arguing with senior teachers. I started facing difficult times, if I talked about one thing, they used to change the topic to something else. In university seminars, you know what happens, if you are pointing out one thing, they will try to shift to another. They tried, in fact, to baffle me, intimidate me with their presence as senior teachers an all. I’ve seen all that and it took me one year to retaliate. I make very calculated and sharp criticism. That is how I started taking on these so-called Indian anthropologist who are not well-versed with the subject of caste.

I am not paid for my work in BAMCEF. I have to travel and speak to groups. I am travelling on many weekends. I am lucky in that my wife shares my passion for this struggle against caste and does not have a problem with my work. Some of my colleagues complain that it is difficult to take their family’s complaints about their work. I luckily don’t have any problems there.

Caste in the educational institution: In conversation with P.D. Sathyapal

P.D. Satyapal is an anthropologist, professor and BAMCEF speaker. In conversation, he has shared his experience of caste and gender. Here he shares his experiences of caste inside educational institutions and his first encounters with Ambedkarite thought…

Both my parents were teachers in high school. It was a church school. I didn’t have negative experiences in school, except for a few occasions when the Brahmin teachers would talk about reservation. We were not enjoying reservation at the time, except, as Christians, we have 1 per cent reservation in Andhra Pradesh. When discussing personalities, they would say, ‘You should have a lot of regard for Gandhi, because if he was not there, you will not have ended up in schools.’ I never really understood at the time. Later, I came to understand that they were sarcastic comments.

I went to Loyola College – that’s in Vijayawada. I did my intermediate and degree there. I am from a Protestant background and there for the first time, I saw the difference between the Protestants and Catholics. I was there for a full five years. I used to be block leader for a hostel. The warden used to give me a list of students. He asked me to check if they regularly attend mass or not. I thought he was giving me a list of Christians. I told him, ‘Father, there are so many other Christian boys. Should I give their names?’ He said, ‘No, no, I know who all are there. But I am particular about these guys.’ It was only in the final year that I understood that they were all the so-called upper caste Christian boys. In the final year of my BSc, we could understand how the management was moving. My rector was a Brahmin convert. My principal was a Kamma convert and my warden was Reddy. They say that they are a Christian institution but they don’t go with the compassion and concern that they always boast of. In my final year, we had a problem with our warden, 71 of our students made some kind of an agitation for the first time in the history of that college. All our TCs were posted home…I stayed outside taking a private room. Since then, I can see how they could be antagonistic to students who were rebels,  at the same time, the inequal treatment that is meted out due to caste.

After graduation, I moved to TISS. My father had made a commitment that they would send me to the church as a missionary. Even after Plus Two, I was slowly coming out of the fold. My father was worried. ‘If not as a missionary, I will send you as a social worker,’ he said. So, though I’ve done graduation in sciences, he sent me to do a Masters in Social Work (MSW) at TISS. We belong to a church called the Salvation Army which has social work as a part of the missionary work they do. There in Mumbai, I came in touch with Ambedkarite organisations. I got friends who were well-versed in Ambedkarite ideology.  I attended their meetings on things like ‘what is caste,’ ‘what is its dynamics.’ That was my first brush with Ambedkarite surroundings.

After I graduated from TISS, my father wanted to send me to the church by force. There were heated discussions. My father was a disciplinarian, he used to beat me around. So, when I decided and told him I was not going to the church, he was angry with me, and threw out my suitcase. I came out of the house. One of my relatives was studying in Andhra University. He asked me to join a course. This anthropology struck me. I was just going through the syllabus and it was quite exotic for me. That’s how I strayed into anthropology and stayed there. Throughout my stint at Andhra University, in Vizag, there used to be caste associations, and different castes used to have them. Andhra University is an area where things are open, social identities are open, and people used to agitate. So then I took part, I started reading Ambedkar.

I met a professor called Pawan Murthy – he was a professor of political science. He was a good Ambedkarite. He had worked with Dr. Ambedkar. He knew him right from 1944, when he came to Andhra. Both things are there for him – he is in teaching as well as activism. When I was in hostel, he used to be our chief warden. Whoever approaches him, he would always conduct a small interview, he used to ask, who is Dr. Ambedkar, what is his birthday, have you read any of his work. When the answer is no, he would immediately come down on you. [laughs] He forced me to read many books and he used to be very strict.

Later on, he became my father-in-law. I married his daughter.

After my post-graduation here, we were in several agitations. I was involved in the agitations against the Karamchedu* incident. I participated in caste associations. I started identifying myself as an Ambedkarite. In 1986, I joined the Hyderabad Central University(HCU) for my MPhil. In 1985, they started the first UGC NET. I was the second batch. If I had not got that fellowship, I might not have got into research, I moved to HCU, there I found that it is an agraharam. There I’ve seen that, of course, they take students from SC/ST backgrounds. But they’ll see to it, that within the first semester itself, more than 60 to 70 people will discontinue. What happens is, you know, there is an SC guy or some person maybe from a Telugu medium background because Central Universities should take students from rural backgrounds. In the very first or second week, they’ll ask them to prepare for a talk on a certain topic and the whole department will be there, including the teachers. The teachers bombard the students with questions. First thing is, they could not converse very freely in English. Second, this kind of a thing is new for them. They get discouraged and they leave.

We had a HoD, she was a Bengali Brahmin, married to a Telugu guy. She has done good work on ethnicity, she had got a PhD from Philadelphia, she used to smoke a pipe, she used to be very, very vocal, and I was under her guidance. She had two – six research scholars were there – she had two pet research scholars who were girls, who also started smoking. I went to see her and I was told that she was busy. Then I went to the canteen. How they try to discourage you, you know -  she came to the canteen, she found me, and said ‘Hey you, you’re the one who came from Andhra University?’ and I said, ‘Yes, ma’am’, and she said, ‘Don’t you know that you should come and see the HoD. What kind of people are you? You don’t know …’  She was just shouting like that. Anyone would have been really shaken by this, I was just.. I told her, ‘Ma’am, I came to your room but I was told that you are busy, so I thought I would meet you later on. Anyway, nice meeting you.’ I just gave it back like that.

Then she thought, ‘Ok, this guy is giving back,’ and after three months, she changes me to another teacher who is from BC background. He is also from Andhra University, then he moved to Shillong, his name is professor Kothanda Rao. He is one who really taught me how to face these guys in educational institutions. He’s from the fishermen community. His own experience is quite exemplary – he came from a very poor background, he’s a self-made man, he’s got a lot of influence, he used to write to people like Fredrik Barth in 1963 when he was doing his M.A. (Barth was interested in ethnic communities. Barth took him to the Hague, Netherlands.) Later on, professor Kothanda Rao became an authority on kinship, specially in south India – he worked on the elder sister’s daughter alliance ties. People like Louis Dumont used to write to him. He is a fearless critic. He was in very bad health, when he was in bed also, he reviewed a book on Paramalai Kallar, written by Louis Dumont. He asked me to take notes – Louis Dumont missed the elder-sister’s daughter alliance in the kinship ties – so this fellow started of with ‘I cannot forgive you for your methodological sin’ and, like that, so many harsh words he used. Later on, after two years, after Kothanda Rao passed, Louis Dumont wrote an article, mentioning him. He said ‘What do a few harsh words matter, when people like Rao are extending my work and correcting its inadequacies.’ It was my good fortune that I was under this man. Here was the man who told me, ‘If  you are good at your subject and if you can shoot with your tongue, you can get away with these institutions, otherwise they will really crush you.’

…

*The names of the Dalits murdered in Karamchedu have been recorded here. Scroll down this page to find excerpts from the article by D. Narasimha Reddy 1985. ‘Karamchedu: A dialectic without development’, Economic and Political Weekly 20 (37): 1546–49.

In the concluding set of excerpts from a conversation with P.D. Sathyapal, he will share his experiences as an anthropologist and of his work at the interface between activism and academia.