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The history of caste politics in Bihar would perhaps require many books to do it full justice. For many laypersons, not from the state, this history begins and ends with the rise of Lalu Prasad Yadav. This is untrue, obviously. As the Bihar election results of 2020 are about to be announced, here is a paper that takes on the challenge of chronicling this vital history, beginning from the Janeyu Movement of the 1920s and the Triveni Sangh, through socialist leaders like Ram Manohar Lohia, Jayaprakash Narayan and Karpoori Thakur to the making of Lalu Prasad Yadav, and the subsequent rise of Nitish Kumar.

On the eve of the counting and declaration of votes for the Bihar state assembly elections of 2020 as well as on the day itself, one would anticipate that much of the conversation and analysis will revolve around caste politics in Bihar, particularly in light of the political alliance led by Tejashwi Yadav, Lalu Prasad Yadav’s son, being one of two contenders for the Chief Ministership. Whenever there is talk of the history of ‘backward’ and ‘lower’ caste movements in Bihar, particularly in the English media and social media discourse, then such conversations are wont to extend to the rise of Lalu Prasad Yadav in the nineties, with a cursory mention of Karpoori Thakur and the ‘JP Movement’, before sinking into a black hole that is glossed over. 

It is because of this that we have chosen to present today the paper Caste Politics in Bihar: In Historical Continuum by Rakesh Ankit, which traces the history of caste politics in the state back to the Janeyu Andolan of the 1920s “which saw the Yadavs and other lower castes sanskritising themselves by wearing the Brahmanical thread” and led to violent clashes between “the Yadav, Kurmi and Koeri castes and their upper-caste adversaries”. 

From here, Ankit catalogues, meticulously, how caste politics in Bihar has evolved, through state records, news editorials and English as well as Hindi scholarship. Ankit’s paper suggests, in its introduction, that while most English analysis of this subject is more focused, if not obsessed, with the recent decades and the political personalities of figures like Lalu Prasad Yadav and Nitish Kumar, the relevant Hindi literature may be credited for possessing greater depth as well as covering a more sweeping expanse of time. He cites Satta ke Sutradhar and Bihar: Rajniti ka Apraadhikaran by Vikas Kumar Jha, and Bihar mein Samajik Parivartan ke Kuch Aayaam, Swarg par Dhawa: Bihar mein Dalit Aandolan 1912-2000 and Bahi Dhaar Triveni Sangh Ki: Bihar mein Samajik Nyaya ka Pehla Sangharsh, by Prasanna Kumar Chaudhary and Shrikant, as examples. 

Alongside the 1920s Janeu movement – “the first modern milestone on the long road to mobility” – which paved the path for Yadavs (the most numerous in Bihar who – F. G. Bailey suggests – after the acquisition of wealth and land, saw sanskritization as a way to raise their position in the social order), Kurmis and Koeris, arose the Momin movement which “challenged the dominance of Syeds, Sheikhs and Pathans”. Ankit points to the domination of “caste orientation”, rather than “class orientation” during this period that even “fed a clash between the upper elite dominated national freedom movement and the social movement of agricultural communities and backward castes”. 

The latter movement found expression in bodies like the Kisan Sabha, the Yadav Mahasabha, the Momin Conference and the Triveni Sangh. Ankit calls Triveni Sangh, born in 1933, “the first step to consolidate and produce a comprehensive political ideology for the ‘backwards’ out of their various caste-based legends and myths” and “the first attempt to apply independent political pressure and form an autonomous political party in opposition to the indifference of Congress to upper-caste domination”.

Ankit points out how not a single person belonging to the ‘lower’ castes was a member of the Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee between 1934 and 1946. He also writes: “Brahmans, Rajputs, Bhumihars and Kayasthas commanded over 40% of Congress legislators from 1952 to 1962 and controlled ‘vote-banks’ of the Scheduled Castes and the Muslims.” While the Bihar Land Reforms Act of 1950 produced a “new class of people” from among “occupancy tenants” which affected the traditional social pyramid, this led mostly to patronage networks and caste alliances, with the reins still in the hands of the ‘upper’ castes. 

Ankit then describes how the Socialists, having broken away from the Congress in 1948, decided to target the “backward caste agricultural groups” to establish their political base. Ram Manohar Lohia, who led this charge, gave the slogan “pichhda pave sau mein saath [60% benefits to the backwards/downtrodden] / Socialists ne bandhi gaanth [Socialists have given their pledge]” which was popularised by Karpoori Thakur, “the emerging Socialist leader from the ‘lower’ Shudra nai or barber caste”. 

Ankit goes on to break up the happenings of the politically volatile sixties, seventies and eighties into key dates, events, numbers in the Lok Sabha and Bihar Vidhan Sabha, commentary from the papers and journals of the times as well as scholarly interpretation in hindsight— with a focus on caste politics in Bihar. Here is a staccato summary. 

1965. The Socialists led “the largest post-independence popular movement in Bihar” on the issues of “fee-increase in educational institutions, food crises, inflation and the corruption of the Congress government”. 1966. The devaluation of the Rupee. Unprecedented inflation. Famine and lawlessness in Bihar. A new, post-independence generation was coming of age and increasingly disillusioned with the Congress. 1967. The first non-Congress government in Bihar, drawn from different parties. In national elections the number of Congress Scheduled Caste MPs is reduced to more than half of the reserved seats (23/45) for the first time, with 13 of the remaining going to Socialists and Communists. 1968. The Samvid Sarkar (led by Mahamaya Prasad Sinha and Karpoori Thakur) in Bihar falls and is followed by ministries of B. P. Mandal (Samyukta Socialist Party) – “the first person from the Backward Classes to become Chief Minister” and B. P. Shastri (Congress) – “the first person from the Scheduled Castes to become Chief Minister”. 1969. Mid-term elections indicate Scheduled Castes are continuing to move away from the Congress. The number of Congress Scheduled Caste MPs is further reduced to 15. 

In the four years after 1967 “Bihar had five chief Ministers (CMs) from the Backward Castes, two Scheduled Caste CMs”. “However,” writes Ankit. “The accessions of these ‘backward caste/scheduled caste ministers’ had been the result of political compromise and did not alter the social vantage.” An exception was Karpoori Thakur’s decision, as Education Minister, to abolish English from school and college curriculum as well as its requirement in higher education institutes, which “led to a dramatic change in the social composition of institutes of higher education, with an influx of students from rural areas and Backward Castes, and a rise of the ‘forward among the backwards’ (Yadavs, Kurmis, Koeris)”. 

In the elections held in 1972, after the Bangladesh War, the Congress recovered in Bihar. Also in the early seventies, the Naxalite movement gathered support in Bihar, where it “continued till about 1976, even leading the Harijans of the Patna area”. This culminated in the early eighties in “a Naxalite Belt” in Bhojpur, Patna, Gaya and Aurangabad. 

But the watershed moment was to be the 1974 JP (Jayaprakash Narayan) movement, where “the seeds of the politics of the 1990s were sown” and which produced “almost all of the later political leaders of the 1990s”. “Bihar,” writes Ankit, “Had become the battlefield of the largest nation-wide student movement against Indira Gandhi’s rule, led by the Bihar Chhatra Sangharsh Samiti, fed by popular alienation among the urban middle classes against the Congress, and supported by the student fronts of Jan Sangh and Samyukta Socialist Party.” 

The movement addressed dissatisfaction on a gamut of micro and macro issues: galloping inflation, shortage of essentials, unemployment, economic stagnation, student union rights and representation, and outrage against political murders, prevalent in Bihar from the early 1970s. Writes Ankit: “Despite not being expressly centred on the social questions of caste, this movement provided a boost to the process of the shifting of power and proved to be a training ground for the new breed of leaders. Just as the older generation of leaders had the reference of the struggle for ‘first independence’; the new leaders now had the reference of the ‘second freedom’.” 

1977. In the assembly and national elections after the JP Movement and Indira Gandhi’s Emergency, Congress won no Lok Sabha seats from Bihar and only 57 out of 324 seats in the state assembly. However, out of these 57, “Yadavs for the first time headed the list with 10, edging out the Brahmans (9), followed by the Rajputs (7), Bhumihars (6) and Koeris (4) and Kurmis (2)”. In Bihar, Karpoori Thakur formed the Janata Ministry as Chief Minister. 

1978. Thakur implements 25% reservation for the Other Backward Classes in government services and decides to hold Panchayat elections which breaks the dominance of the upper-castes in local government. 1979. Thakur’s government is brought down and Ram Sunder Das replaces him with more than 50% ‘upper’ caste ministers in his cabinet. 1980. Indira Gandhi, back in power, dismisses Das’s government and Congress comes back to power in Bihar with 167 seats and 34.17% of the votes. 

Throughout the eighties the Congress continued to install ‘upper’ caste CMs: three Brahmins and two Thakurs. During this period, Ankit writes, “the squabbling and short-lived Janata government and the sympathy factor after Mrs. Gandhi’s assassination had overshadowed the question of empowerment of the backwards. Therefore, in this period in the legislative assembly, the representation of the backwards remained steady without being spectacular. But, by the 1990 election, backward empowerment had become the only question.” 

The 1980s witnessed a meteoric rise in political violence: “violent incidents increased from 260 in 1977 to 617 in 1984, nearly 100 people were killed in the 1985 election, compared with 34 in 1977, including 4 candidates”. Also, the period between 1972 and 1990 saw a rise of armed groups – led by rebels like Mohan Bind (Kaimur region) and Kailash Mandal (Diayara) – targeting the dominance of the upper castes. Between 1988 and 1989, Bihar saw the rise of caste armies like the Lorik Sena (Bhumihars), the Kunwar Sena (Rajputs), the Lal Sena (landless labourers) and the “Naxalite parallel government” in parts of the state.

Ankit quotes from Atul Kohli’s Democracy and Discontent: India’s growing crisis of governability: “The ‘turmoil in Bihar’ was seen as ‘a product of two related but independent struggles: a political struggle for control of the state pitting the forward castes against the backward castes, and a socio-economic struggle of the landless lower castes against the land owning forward and backward castes’.” 

It was in such circumstances, after Karpoori Thakur’s removal from the post of leader of opposition, that Lalu Prasad Yadav filled that position and then the position of Chief Minister of Bihar, which he was to hold for 15 years. Ankit also chronicles, with insightful observations and citations, the rise and fall of Lalu Prasad Yadav (and a juxtaposition of him with Nitish Kumar and what he is seen to stand for), a story of sweeping change as well as great disappointment, that is better known. But it is essential to understand the historical context in which he emerged— a context in which he continues to remain relevant. 

Introduction

Movements for social change in Bihar have endured for longer than popularly perceived and their ‘changing contours’ require a historical narrative as well as an ethnographic analysis. Personified by Lalu Prasad Yadav since 1990, their electoral emergence were earlier regarded as representing a ‘new phase’. Lately, it has been proffered as the product of a ‘state formation that produced structures of power and identity within which a caste-based politics democratically captured the state in order to systematically weaken it’. In India, where caste remains omnipresent and omnipotent, ‘interrogating’ it has dominantly been anthropological and sociological, the Republic of Bihar included. Old accounts of caste in Bihar politics were framed in binaries of social stagnation or economic growth, while newer works juxtapose the categories of democracy and development. In the writings of Harry Blair on Bihar, spanning from early-1970s to 1990s, one can see the entire gamut. Starting from talking about caste as a ‘differential mobiliser’ to tracking the consequent ‘social change’ and studying contemporary political behaviour of castes to establishing their electoral support, Blair produced a corpus on the intersection of caste and politics and called it Bihariana. In the last decade, land, religion, conflict management, government transfers and the Naxal struggle have provided various entry-points into Bihar’s present political pathologies. Simultaneously, Lalu Prasad Yadav and, his successor, Nitish Kumar have seen books written on them in attempts to understand the state’s unmaking and making through their making and remaking, respectively.

On the other hand, when one turns towards the existing relevant literature in Hindi, one finds works, singular in their scope, intense in their content and sweeping in their treatment of time. Vikas Kumar Jha wrote an exhaustive volume on the post Independence politics of Bihar titled Satta ke Sutradhar (‘The Narrators/Protagonists of Power’, Delhi: D. K. Publishers, 1996). His other book, Bihar: Rajniti ka Apraadhikaran (‘Criminalisation of Politics in Bihar’, Delhi: D. K. Publishers, 1991) was a smaller volume. Then, there are the three definitive works of Prasanna Kumar Chaudhary and Shrikant: Bihar mein Samajik Parivartan ke Kuch Aayaam (‘Some Aspects of Social Change in Bihar’, New Delhi: Vani Prakashan, 2001), Swarg par Dhawa: Bihar mein Dalit Aandolan 1912-2000 (‘The Dalit Revolution in Bihar 1912-2000’, New Delhi: Vani Prakashan, 2005) and Bahi Dhaar Triveni Sangh Ki: Bihar mein Samajik Nyaya ka Pehla Sangharsh (‘Triveni Sangh: The First Institutional Struggle for Social Justice in Bihar’, Patna: Loktantra Prakashan, 1998), respectively.

…Lalu Prasad Yadav and, his successor, Nitish Kumar have seen books written on them in attempts to understand the state’s unmaking and making through their making and remaking, respectively... On the other hand, when one turns towards the existing relevant literature in Hindi, one finds works, singular in their scope, intense in their content and sweeping in their treatment of time.

Following in their wake and drawing upon state archives and provincial newspapers, particularly The Indian Nation and The Searchlight, this article attempts to frame a rather known story in a longer context. At the heart of the caste ‘politics’ from 1990 lay the caste ‘structure’ of old – ‘local relations of dominance and subordination’ – that led to a ‘“territorial democracy” of caste empowerment’. Bihar politics has often been characterised by fragile institutions of liberal modernity, indeterminate political personalities, populist discourse, corruption and criminal activities. It arguably began with ‘the British never manage [ing] to establish more than a “Limited Raj”’. ‘Institutional decay’ in Bihar emerged with the two-decade rule of the Indian National Congress after the transfer of power (1947-67), was exacerbated by the crises, excesses and emergency of the following decade (1967-77) as well as the populist response to it led by Jayaprakash Narayan (in 1974-75), and arrived at a critical point with the subsequent widening of social and religious divides within the north Indian society (1986-89). At the turn of the 1990s, the question for Bihar was the age-old one: does it ‘need a society derived from political power or politics derived from social fabric’? As the Bihar District Gazetteer from 1970 offered:

“The Rajas, the big Zamindars, the Chairman of Local Bodies, Government Pleaders and Public Prosecutors mattered most. The businessman got scant notice and the common man was seldom thought of… The middle classes sponsored many social and educational institutions.The caste played a great role in society.”

At the turn of the 1990s, the question for Bihar was the age-old one: does it ‘need a society derived from political power or politics derived from social fabric’?

1920s and 1930s: the Janeyu Movement and the Triveni Sangh

In Francine Frankel’s vivid words, in Bihar, ‘Brahmins, Bhumihars and Rajputs held sway over society for at least one thousand years’ until challenged by the ‘Upper Shudras, the Yadavs, Kurmis and Koeris’. Among Muslims, the highest ranked were ‘Ashrafs, including Saiyads, Sheikhs and Pathans – landowning classes’ – followed by the Razil or ‘labouring people’. Together with each other and the Kayasths, these groups formed the ‘respectable’ people against the rest, ‘from the Ahirs, the [Momins]… to the Chamars, Julahas…’ Politically, Bihar Kayastha Provincial Sabha (1889), Bihar Landholders Association, Bihar Provincial Muslim League (1908) and Gopajatiya Sabha (1909), and later, Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee, All-India Yadav Mahasabha (1923) and Bihar Pradesh Kisan Sabha (1929), were vehicles of these forces.

The corresponding economic matrix was headed by the landlord and followed by his tenants, and therein emerged a four-fold churning of/by: (a) social categorisation, (b) agrarian distress, (c) socio-religious reform and (d) national freedom movement. An undertow of caste mobilisation and organisation, propped up each of these. Colonialism gave it a new character by consecrating the old and contributing to the new identities but this too was an intervention, and not an invention, by the Raj and thus has long outlasted it. Then, there was the national freedom movement, which launched, intensified and/or suppressed regional, social movements. While it cohered the elites, it did not determine, nor desire, a social reconstruction and entrenched a caste politics of ‘exclusion’.

While it {the national freedom movement}* cohered the elites, it did not determine, nor desire, a social reconstruction and entrenched a caste politics of ‘exclusion’.

Against this backdrop, the process of backward or lower-caste empowerment began with the Janeyu Andolan, which saw the Yadavs and other lower castes sanskritising themselves by wearing the Brahmanical thread, through the early years of the 1920s. This led to counter-measures by the Brahmans and there were violent as well non-violent encounters between peasants of the Yadav, Kurmi and Koeri castes and their upper-caste adversaries. The Janeyu Movement reached its apogee between 1921 and 1925. This was the first modern milestone on the long road to mobility. It provided the Yadavs with a social-cultural legitimacy, which paved a political path. Yadavs, also known as Goalas and Ahirs, were/are the most numerous caste in Bihar. They were ‘cultivators of all kinds’ and also ‘herdsmen and milkmen’. Kurmis and Koeris too were among the ‘great cultivating castes of Bihar’. Koeris were also known for being ‘skillful and industrious cultivators’, ‘the best tenants’ and ‘market-gardeners of Bihar’.

During the period of the aforementioned five years both north and south Bihar, excluding Chota Nagpur area, were affected. Confrontations took place in twenty villages of the districts of Patna and Munger of central-south Bihar and Darbhanga and Muzaffarpur in north Bihar. Simultaneously, a Momin movement ‘challenged the dominance of Syeds, Sheikhs and Pathans’. Like ‘other organisations of the oppressed social groups, such as the Kisan Sabha, Yadav Mahasabha, Triveni Sangh etc., the Momin Conference also emerged mainly from Bihar’. M. N. Srinivas, relying on the Census of the India Report for 1921, referred to the violent reaction of upper-caste men in north Bihar against the Yadavs’ attempts at sanskritisation. The Census Reports ascribe the attempt of lower castes at social uplift to the efforts of their respective caste sabhas. They emphasise the socio-economic oppression of the lower-caste peasants in general and the Yadavs in particular by the landlords of upper-castes as the root cause for violent upsurge. F. G. Bailey observed:

“The acquisition of substantial wealth by the two dominant castes led to investment in land, for land is still the best investment and without it a man has no prestige. They followed this by Sanskritizing their customs and rituals in order to raise their position in the caste system.”

…the process of backward or lower-caste empowerment began with the Janeyu Andolan, which saw the Yadavs and other lower castes sanskritising themselves by wearing the Brahmanical thread, through the early years of the 1920s. This led to counter-measures by the Brahmans and there were violent as well non-violent encounters between peasants of the Yadav, Kurmi and Koeri castes and their upper-caste adversaries.

Bihar in this period was economically barely developed barring the southern, industrial region of Jamshedpur, and agriculture remained primitive. Society was in the pre capitalist stage and class interests did not achieve full economic articulation. Economic elements were inextricably linked to socio-political and cultural-religious factors. Action against socio-economic oppression in Bihar was thus imbricated with the promotion of caste interests. Historian Ramakrishna Mukherjee, among others, has shown this contradiction between upper castes/class and lower caste/class. It was the ‘caste orientation and not class orientation that dominated at the manifest level’, and, fed a clash between the upper elite dominated national freedom movement and the social movement of agricultural communities and backward castes. In Bihar, like elsewhere but especially so, the defaulting, exclusive upper-middle classes/elites did not engage with the socio-political and cultural-economic aspirations of the lower castes and ex communicated their attempts to politicise these.

Against this backdrop of ‘planter-zamindar-government alliance’, confronted by Gandhi in Champaran in 1917, Swami Vidyanand in Darbhanga in 1919 and Sahajanand Saraswati in 1930s, it is instructive to remember the first consolidated political attempt at social equality made by the Yadavs, Kurmis and Koeris, the three landed castes among backward castes, seventy years ago. This was the Triveni Sangh, the organisational result of the Janeyu movement. Born on 30 May 1933 in Kargahar village of Shahabad district, Triveni Sangh was the first step to consolidate and produce a comprehensive political ideology for the backwards out of their various caste-based legends and myths. The Congress, which had been afflicted by caste factionalism and manoeuvring since the early 1920s, was proving inadequate in reflecting the growing ambitions of the backward castes and lower middle classes. Triveni Sangh was the first attempt to apply independent political pressure and form an autonomous political party in opposition to the indifference of Congress to upper-caste domination.

It should have provoked introspection in the Congress as to why those castes that formed the largest proportion of the state’s population and their representatives were absent from its leadership. But, as the tallest Congressman in Bihar, Rajendra Prasad, wrote, ‘orthodoxy reigned supreme among the Hindus’. Given the way the Kayasths politically dominated the Congress, the Bhumihars and the Brahmins dominated organisations like the Kisan Sabha, it was inevitable for an organisation to emerge, which would confront and cast a long shadow. After all, not one person of the lower castes was a member of the Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee between 1934 and 1946.

Triveni Sangh was the first attempt to apply independent political pressure and form an autonomous political party in opposition to the indifference of Congress to upper-caste domination.

K.B. Sahay

That though did not deter the launch of the ‘bakasht struggles’ of the Kisan Sabha, with its estimated 250,000 members, and spurred the formation of Bihar Provincial Khet Mazdoor Sabha by Jagjivan Ram in 1937. Thirty-five years later, analysing the poll prospects of different parties before the elections of 1972, an editorial in The Searchlight wrote: ‘Caste, like sex, is the Freudian instinct in Bihar where everything – particularly politics – veers around it’. Thus, much before Lalu Prasad Yadav, Congressmen like S. K. Singh (1887-1961), M. P. Sinha (1900-71), A. N. Sinha (1887-1957) and K. B. Sahay (1898-1974) had been great purveyors of caste identity politics. The decades from the 1930s to 1960s saw deep factionalism and fragmentation within Congress. Its ‘leadership’ was a ‘function of coalescence brought in a musical-chair game amongst the caste-based factions of the party’. Brahmans, Rajputs, Bhumihars and Kayasthas commanded over 40% of Congress legislators from 1952 to 1962 and controlled ‘vote- banks’ of the Scheduled Castes and the Muslims, ‘inclined to be docile [and] appendages’ (quotes from Francine Frankel’s Caste, Land and Dominance in Bihar: Breakdown of the Brahmanical Social Order). Bihar State Backward Classes Federation (1947), its Hindi weekly, Pichara-Varg, universal adult suffrage (1950, 1952), the Government of India’s Backward Classes Commission (1953), with its report (1955) were the key milestones of the politics of caste, at this time. The stymied Bihar Land Reforms Act (1950) did produce a ‘new class of people’ from among the occupancy tenants and would contribute in giving a ‘death blow to the traditional social pyramid’, albeit by developing a ‘patronage network’, linking a ‘caste alliance’.

Jayaprakash Narayan

Socialists, Naxalites/Maoists and the Politics of Caste

The emergence of Socialists as the major opposition power in Bihar occurred against this aforementioned ‘cultural crisis’, existing within and emanating from the Congress. There emerged an ideology, which significantly influenced the emerging middle-classes among the backward castes and their rise as a political power. Subsequently, almost all parties reflected a socialist and populist creed. However, to adapt George Bernard Shaw, this ‘social revolution’ in Bihar, ‘did not end tyranny; it merely shifted the burden to other shoulders’. After separating from the Congress in 1948, the Socialists had to face a two-fold struggle of establishing their separate political and ideological identity as well as consolidating their social base. This was met by the uncompromising Dr. Ram Manohar Lohia (1910-67) and the malleable Jayaprakash Narayan (1902-79), in their own ways, after the 1952 electoral debacle and the consequent difficult years. Within his ‘New Socialism’, Lohia retained Liberal Populism and Gandhism but replaced Marxism with his own understanding (since called ‘Lohia-ism’), which linked the continuing caste and social-assertion movements of the backwards with the socialists. In so doing he recognised a home-truth of Bihar Politics, as The Indian Nation re-affirmed fifty years ago: ‘The general impression is that almost everyone is casteist’.

A.N. Sinha

Within his ‘New Socialism’, Lohia retained Liberal Populism and Gandhism but replaced Marxism with his own understanding (since called ‘Lohia-ism’), which linked the continuing caste and social-assertion movements of the backwards with the socialists. In so doing he recognised a home-truth of Bihar Politics, as The Indian Nation re-affirmed fifty years ago: ‘The general impression is that almost everyone is casteist’.

To build a powerful opposition to Congress, Lohia decided to turn to the backward caste agricultural groups as his political base. The rising groups within the backward castes were also looking for a party that could represent their political ambitions. It was here that Lohia’s slogan, ‘pichhda pave sau mein saath’ [‘60% benefits to the backwards/downtrodden’], was popularised by Karpoori Thakur, the emerging Socialist leader from the lower Shudra nai or barber caste: ‘Socialists ne bandhi gaanth’ [Socialists have given their pledge]. Lohia also launched the comprehensive idea of ‘sapt-kranti’ (seven-fold revolution) bringing together the issues of social exploitation with racial, national, sexual questions and linking them with the imagery triad of ‘vote-spade-jail’ thereby attempting to consolidate the anti-Congress forces. Another initiative was the anti-English emphasis of the Socialist’s language policy, which emotionally resonated with the youth and the students of the north Indian backward-agricultural castes. In August 1965, the Socialists led the largest post-independence popular movement in Bihar on the issues of fee-increase in educational institutions, food crises, inflation and the corruption of the Congress government. 1966 followed with the devaluation of rupee leading to an unprecedented inflation. Bihar suffered famine and lawlessness. A new, post-independence generation was coming into its own and decidedly breaking away from the Congress, being thwarted by the vested status quo of the Grand Old Party.

Ram Manohar Lohia

The 1967 elections were held against this background ending Congress’ two-decade long electoral domination and a ‘non-Congress government was formed with tremendous goodwill… drawn from [different] political parties’. The number of Congress’ Scheduled Caste MPs, for the first time, was reduced to about half of the reserved seats for them (23/45). The rest went to different political parties including 13 to Socialists and Communists. After the fall of this Samvid Sarkar (SVD ministry) of Mahamaya Prasad Sinha and Karpoori Thakur, followed by the ministries of B. P. Mandal – ‘the first person from the Backward Classes to become Chief Minister’ and B. P. Shastri – the first person from the Scheduled Castes to become Chief Minister – mid-term elections were held in 1969 and the Scheduled Castes continued to move away from the Congress. The number of their MPs in Congress (15) was now equal to those in Samyukta Socialist Party (13) and Praja Socialist Party (2) combined. Later, the pro-Janata wave of 1977 saw the Congress being reduced to 2/45 in the reserved constituencies.

The 1967 elections were held… ending Congress’ two-decade long electoral domination and a ‘non-Congress government was formed with tremendous goodwill… drawn from [different] political parties’.

However, in the elections held after the Bangladesh war in 1972 and after the fall of the Janata experiment in 1980, the Congress recovered. Similarly, after the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in October 1984, the sympathy vote saw the figures regaining the heights of the 1950s in the 1985 elections. But, by/through the 1990s, Janata Dal/Rashtriya Janata Dal replaced the Congress in the vanguard of the political movement of the backward groups. Thus, the importance of that 1967 elections in Bihar’s socio-political history can be gauged from the fact that it was that particular election, which ‘brought in a coalition [politics] setting urban disillusionment/apathy and rural splinter-ism/assertion’. Albeit, in the short-term, as The Indian Nation opined in 1968: ‘There is one word to describe the present state of Bihar politics – ramshackle’. By now, the major demands of the Backward and Dalit movements, removal of untouchability and reservation in government jobs, had been given a constitutional framework by the 1950s-60s, though their execution had been far from satisfactory. Nevertheless, since independence, a middle class among intermediate castes had emerged. Writing prophetically, The Indian Nation warned the Congress in early 1972 that:

“Politically conscious backward castes, classes [and] tribals are struggling for recognition and representation and Congress’ drive for ‘social justice’ must embrace them. The coalition politics from ’67 to ’72 was an unstable disillusionary phase and Mrs. Indira Gandhi’s golden period of ’71- 72 has brought back stability in Bihar but complex social undercurrents should not be neglected.”

The 1974 JP movement was to be the watershed, which decisively turned this class away from the Congress. As well-known, almost all of the later political leaders of the 1990s were a product of this movement. The Naxalite Movement, on the other hand, emerged from the ideological struggle and splits within the Indian Communist Movement. By early 1970s, the Naxalite Movement was losing support in the rest of the country but in Bihar, it continued till about 1976, even leading ‘the Harijans of the Patna area’. By the early 1980s, a ‘Naxalite Belt’ would emerge in Bhojpur, Patna, Gaya and Aurangabad. Later, however, they would have to contend with Lalu Prasad Yadav, who would boast:

“I have proven that ballot boxes are more powerful than machine guns. Votes can decide whether a man will be in the dust or riding in an airplane. I am a true Naxalite [militant, communist revolutionary], from birth, a democratic Naxalite.”

His revolution would remain ‘incomplete’, by getting reframed as ‘Yadav Raj’. Even so, every failed revolution has its socio-political consequences, especially a democratisation of socio-political space that enhances subsequent mobilisation on the larger issues of public interest.

“I have proven that ballot boxes are more powerful than machine guns… I am a true Naxalite [militant, communist revolutionary], from birth, a democratic Naxalite.” —Lalu Prasad Yadav

1967 to 1989: The fall, rise and eclipse of Congress

The period from 1967 saw the social movement of the Backwards reaching the corridors of power for the first time. In the next four years, Bihar had five chief Ministers (CMs) from the Backward Castes, two Scheduled Caste CMs, as well as the only Backward Caste minister from Congress. Between 1967 and 1972, Bihar had nine governments, including ones that lasted as briefly as for three days and nine days. However, the accessions of these ‘backward caste/scheduled caste ministers’ had been the result of political compromise and did not alter the social vantage. The single most significant piece of social legislation for the Backward Castes, in this period, was the decision of Karpoori Thakur, as Education Minister in the Samvid Sarkar (1967-69), to abolish English education from school and college curriculum as well as to abolish its requirement in institutes of higher education. This led to a dramatic change in the social composition of institutes of higher education, with an influx of students from rural areas and Backward Castes, and a rise of the ‘forward among the backwards’ (Yadavas, Kurmis, Koeris). In contrast, Congress’ cohort of landed, educated and contracted elite headed by men like Harihar Singh, L. N. Mishra, Daroga Prasad Rai, Kedar Pandey and Abdul Ghafoor did not alter in that ‘the majority both before and after the 1969 split, remained with the Forwards and the Upper Backwards’.

The 1974 JP movement was to be the watershed, which decisively turned this class (“politically conscious backward castes, classes and tribals”) away from the Congress. As well-known, almost all of the later political leaders of the 1990s were a product of this movement.

A JP Movement procession

Twenty years before Lalu Prasad Yadav polarised Bihar’s electoral scene, Jayaprakash Narayan (JP) had already articulated the cardinal aphorism of Bihar politics. In 1974, he had said, ‘Caste is the biggest political party in Bihar’. By now, Bihar had become the battlefield of the largest nation-wide student movement against Indira Gandhi’s rule, led by the Bihar Chhatra Sangharsh Samiti, fed by popular alienation among the urban middle classes against the Congress, and supported by the student fronts of Jan Sangh and Samyukta Socialist Party. The Indian Nation had written in January 1974, of ‘back breaking prices, acute shortage of essential commodities, galloping inflation, mounting unemployment and virtual economic stagnation. However, the opposition could not make any substantial gains as they had neither the ability nor the leadership’. Now, helmed by JP, it became a nation-wide popular campaign. Initially, it had an eight-point agenda involving student union rights, provision of vocational education, bank loans for business, unemployment allowance, accommodation and scholarship, effective student representation, inflation, affordable food and study material. The traditional New Year piece of The Indian Nation in 1975 attempted to capture the ambiguity in this period:

“1974 was a year of processions and demonstrations, trials and tribulations, conflicts and confrontations for Bihar. It gave a shock treatment to the party in power, which had been fleecing the people. Significantly, the agitation took wings and spread over other parts of the country posing the first-ever serious threat to the party in power. Whether that would strengthen or weaken the country is a matter of opinion.”

Among other burning issues, the inflation rate reached 30% by August 1974 and there was outrage against the political murders which had become prevalent in Bihar from early 1970s, viz., those of freedom-fighter Suraj Narain Singh on 21 April 1973 and the then-Union Railway Minister Lalit Narayan Mishra on 2 February 1975. Between 1971 and 1981, Bihar saw ‘an average of 178 Ordinances compared to 15 Legislations’ and between 1966-7 and 1977-8, the state’s growth rate was 2.5%. After 34 years of planning, Bihar was ‘at the bottom’. Despite not being expressly centred on the social questions of caste, this movement provided a boost to the process of the shifting of power and proved to be a training ground for the new breed of leaders. Just as the older generation of leaders had the reference of the struggle for ‘first independence’; the new leaders now had the reference of the ‘second freedom’. However, ‘the tragedy of 1974’, was pronounced by contemporary commentary as {in The Indian Nation}*,

“…a double whammy: the government failed to protect the people; the opposition failed to give a right direction to the movement, which launched an orgy of violence shaking the conscience of people and nerves of the government. Ideally it should have happened the other way around.”

Nevertheless, the seeds of the politics of the 1990s were sown in this social movement of the 1970s. As the poet Nagarjuna wrote, ‘The decline of Bihar is not a story of yesterday. Actually, [since] history remains invisible to the common people therefore they start losing hope’. The elections of 1977 were a disaster for Congress with no Lok Sabha seats from Bihar and only 57 out of 324 seats in the state assembly. It had been clear for some time that ‘the flabby Congress, deeply involved in power politics, held only a tenuous touch with the masses as a result of its weakened base’. The party managed only a 23.5% share of the vote, an all-time low. But of greater significance is the caste composition of its 57 MLAs. Yadavs for the first time headed the list with 10, edging out the Brahmans (9), followed by the Rajputs (7), Bhumihars (6) and Koeris (4) and Kurmis (2). This was against the backdrop of the 1975-77 ministry of the maithil Brahman, Jagannath Mishra. But, the danger of empty and negative, anti-incumbency politics was not lost on all, amidst the widespread euphoria at the ouster of the Congress party from the corridors of power. The hollowness of the ‘Janata Wave’ was remarked upon thus {in The Indian Nation}*:

“The Janata wave was a natural outcome of the repression let loose in the country. Emergency had choked the people and, their mute struggle threw the political dictatorship, once they became fully awake and sat up, but beyond that, the JP Janata wave is no more on the move because it could not [be].”

…the seeds of the politics of the 1990s were sown in this social movement of the 1970s. As the poet Nagarjuna wrote, ‘The decline of Bihar is not a story of yesterday. Actually, [since] history remains invisible to the common people therefore they start losing hope’.

It was not long before disillusionment with the new non-Congress regime set in. Three months into the new government and a sense of helplessness can be detected as The Searchlight declared that ‘as long as narrowness prevails, governments may change, but things will not improve.’ By then, Karpoori Thakur had formed his Janata Ministry on 22 June 1977 and on 9 March 1978 decided to implement the 25% reservation for the Other Backward Classes in government services. The second major decision of the government was to hold Panchayat elections. Held amidst widespread election violence, these broke the traditional dominance of the upper-castes in local government forever. Unsurprisingly, Thakur’s government was brought down in April 1979 and Ram Sunder Das succeeded him and formed a cabinet, which had more than 50% of its ministers from upper castes. Das did not last long either. By January 1980, Indira Gandhi was back in power and she dismissed his ministry on 18 February 1980. The non-Congress forces were divided in the state and Congress came back to power in Bihar with 167 seats and 34.17% of the votes; figures that increased to 196 and 38.62% respectively in 1985. Even the number of Scheduled Caste MLAs rose to respectable figures (24/48 and 33/48), but these should not be construed as indicators of their return to the Congress’ fold. The decade of the 1980s in general and the two years of 1988-9, in particular, with four CMs, witnessed incredible episodes of anarchy and violence, unprecedented misrule and opportunist vote bank politics, led the way for a permanent eclipse of Congress rule in Bihar and made it easier for anti-Congress groups to succeed. Certainly as another editorial in The Indian Nation put it:

“…the schizophrenic Congress [had] made both democratic politics and democratic governance meaningless. But which brand of change? The Jan Sangh brand? The Socialist brand? The Congress (O) brand? A mixture? This question remains unanswered.”

The Congress in the 1980s was still installing upper-caste CMs; three were Brahmins and two Thakurs. The backward groups, meanwhile, continued towards their goal of political representation and power. At the outset of this period in the 1967 elections, there had been 82 Backward Caste MLAs compared to their 133 caste counterparts. By 1989, there were 90 Backward Caste MLAs and their caste adversaries had come down to 118.

“the schizophrenic Congress [had] made both democratic politics and democratic governance meaningless. But which brand of change? The Jan Sangh brand? The Socialist brand? The Congress (O) brand? A mixture?” —The Indian Nation

During this time, national issues like the Bangladesh war, the emergency and the following election, the squabbling and short-lived Janata government and the sympathy factor after Mrs. Gandhi’s assassination had overshadowed the question of empowerment of the backwards. Therefore, in this period in the legislative assembly, the representation of the backwards remained steady without being spectacular. But, by the 1990 election, backward empowerment had become the only question. This is best illustrated by the ‘political odyssey of Karpoori Thakur after the 1980 elections until his death in 1988’, which saw {Frankel’s Caste, Land and Dominance in Bihar: Breakdown of the Brahmanical Social Order}:

“…the emergence of two contradictory potentialities in the consolidation of larger political identities within the framework of the division between the Backward Classes and Forward Castes. Over all, the larger caste categories, i.e., forward and backward, were strengthened as the basic units of political identity. At the same time, within the Backward Classes, divisions emerged along class lines which simultaneously created an attrition in ‘Backward’ strength, and opened up the potentiality of a broader coalition of the poor.”

Moreover, between 1972 and 1990, there was a rise of armed rebel groups, which played a major part in breaking the dominance of the upper castes. Two prominent rebel leaders of this period were Mohan Bind in the Kaimur region and Kailash Mandal in Diayara area. The Hindustan Weekly noted in its 22 December 1991 issue that, ‘The criminalisation of politics and the politicisation of criminals have turned Bihar into the largest arena of political violence’. The Hindustan Times wrote on 10 January 1992 that, ‘Violence has become the way of life in Bihar. Bihar has become the test-tube of the ironies of India’. Between 1980 and 1986, ‘there had been more political murders in Bihar than in Punjab’, resulting in “warlordism”/“second serfdom”, while resulting from ‘decreasing effectiveness of government and the erosion of established patterns of domination in Bihar’s predominantly agrarian society’.

The ‘turmoil in Bihar’ was seen as ‘a product of two related but independent struggles: a political struggle for control of the state pitting the forward castes against the backward castes, and a socio-economic struggle of the landless lower castes against the land owning forward and backward castes’. The ‘always factionalised’ political elite of Bihar – whether Brahmans, Kayasths, Bhumihars, Rajputs or Yadavs, Koeris and Kurmis – always sought ‘a correlation among high status, landownership and political power’. This superbly summed ‘circulation of elites’ thrived on ‘co-option’, starting with the ‘middle peasantry’. By late-1980s, government ineffectiveness, party disarray and power conflict that had been increasing since 1967, was completed by a going together of ‘ballot and bullet’. This ‘democracy by gun’ saw the anti-Indira rebellion, the emergency, Jagannath Mishra’s ‘dark period’ – violent incidents increased from 260 in 1977 to 617 in 1984, nearly 100 people were killed in the 1985 election, compared with 34 in 1977, including 4 candidates – and Rajputs, Bhumihars and Kayasths move away from the Congress.

The ‘turmoil in Bihar’ was seen as ‘a product of two related but independent struggles: a political struggle for control of the state pitting the forward castes against the backward castes, and a socio-economic struggle of the landless lower castes against the land owning forward and backward castes’.

In the 1980s, ‘professionalism of the police [was] snuffed out by political interference [and] personalism’. And among personalities and private armies, ‘both politically and social, Karpoori Thakur symbolised a new phase in Bihar’s politics: the simultaneous consolidation of an alternative to Congress and the political rise of the backward castes’ – one of Harry Blair’s ‘rising kulaks’ {‘kulak’ is a term earlier used to describe peasants owning over 8 hectares of land during the last days of the Russian empire}. While often seen as personifying ‘the organisation of the poor in a double assault on the caste system and the class structure’, ‘it is important to note that Thakur did not win the 1977 poll solely or even mostly on the basis of his backward leadership; rather it was anti-Congress sentiment’. Karpoori Thakur himself acknowledged that ‘the main enemy was not the forward castes but the Congress party’. And yet, between 1988 and 1989, Bihar had four Brahman chief ministers, under whose ineffectual-ism rose caste armies like the Lorik Sena (Bhumihars), the Kunwar Sena (Rajputs), the Lal Sena (landless labourers) and the “Naxalite parallel government” in parts of the state. This culminated the long history of agrarian struggles in Bihar starting from tenant against landlords and ending with ‘caste-class conflict, police brutality, anarchic conflict, dacoity and criminal violence’. In June 1985, after the so-called Operation Black Panther, the state conceded that ‘Gaya, Aurangabad, Patna, Bhojpur, Rohtas, Munger, Bhagalpur, West and East Champaran were extremist-dominated areas’. No wonder, Jagannath Mishra prophesied in 1986 thus:

“The poor are being neglected by all parties. My own party is losing support among the SC and the ST. The old left has also lost the initiative. Politics, however, does not like a vacuum. Someone will move in.”

…between 1988 and 1989, Bihar had four Brahman chief ministers, under whose ineffectual-ism rose caste armies like the Lorik Sena (Bhumihars), the Kunwar Sena (Rajputs), the Lal Sena (landless labourers) and the “Naxalite parallel government” in parts of the state. This culminated the long history of agrarian struggles in Bihar starting from tenant against landlords and ending with ‘caste-class conflict, police brutality, anarchic conflict, dacoity and criminal violence’.

Lalu Prasad Yadav

The Advent of Lalu Prasad Yadav

Karpoori Thakur died an untimely death in 1988. By then, ambitious and younger Yadav legislators had already harassed and undermined him to the point of exhaustion, particularly the trinity of Anoop Lal, Srinarayan and Lalu Prasad Yadav. They collaborated with the Speaker of the State Assembly, Shiv Chandra Jha, and had Thakur removed from the post of leader of opposition in a dubious episode. The void left by Karpoori Thakur’s ousting and death was the one which Lalu Prasad Yadav filled with some luck and some help. He assumed the chair of Karpoori Thakur but neither by a unanimous decision nor a majority choice, rather as a compromise candidate. Devi Lal and Sharad Yadav ensured his succession over that of Anup Lal Yadav because, among other reasons, the latter had invited the Brahmin Hemvati Nandan Bahuguna for a meal.

Anup Lal Yadav

The ‘Subaltern Saheb’ began his political life as the Patna University Student Union’s President. He had been a member of the student organisation committee for the 1974 movement. He entered the Lok Sabha in 1977 and Vidhan Sabhas in 1980 and 1985, emerging as the leader of opposition in the latter, in 1988-89. In March 1990, he became the CM despite not contesting the 1990 state elections, having earlier won the Chhapra Lok Sabha seat in the 1989 general elections. The 1989 Lok Sabha and 1990 Vidhan Sabha contests had, as their major issues, the Bofors Scandal, the corruption of Rajiv Gandhi’s Central Government and the permutations forged by Vishwanath Pratap Singh, Devi Lal, Chandrasekhar, the BJP and the Left front. But the strongest undercurrent was that of backward empowerment, encapsulated in the word ‘Mandal’ apart from the ‘Mandir/Kamandal’ politics around Ayodhya Ram-temple. In the 1989 Lok Sabha elections, Janata Dal won 31 seats out of 54 in Bihar and for the first time the number of Backward Caste MPs (18) (Yadavs (11), Kurmis (3), Koeris (4)) was equal to that of upper caste MPs (18). This issue of backward empowerment became even more important in the 1990 Vidhan Sabha elections. Janata Dal emerged victorious with 121 seats leaving behind Congress (71), BJP (39), CPI (23), CPM (6), and JMM (19). Independents also emerged as a major force having won 30 seats.

The void left by Karpoori Thakur’s ousting and death was the one which Lalu Prasad Yadav filled with some luck and some help. He assumed the chair of Karpoori Thakur {leader of opposition in the Bihar Assembly}* but neither by a unanimous decision nor a majority choice, rather as a compromise candidate.

While in 1990 there were 117 Backward Caste MLAs as against 105 upper caste MLAs, by 1995 there were 161 Backward Caste MLAs as against 56 upper caste MLAs. The composition among the four ‘forward among backward’ castes in these two elections was as follows: 1990: Yadavs (63), Kurmis (18), Banias (16), and Koeris (12); 1995: Yadavs (86), Kurmis (27), Banias (18), and Koeris (13). In the 1991 Lok Sabha elections, there were 24 backward castes MPs in all – Yadavs (13), Kurmis (6), Banias (1) and Koeris (4). These three elections thus saw a conclusive displacement of the upper-castes from the corridors of political power at the hands of the ‘forward among backward’ castes. Analysing the reasons for the defeat of the Congress, The Indian Nation on 2 March and 6 March 1990, identified, ‘Lost goodwill, tarnished image, useless tactics, need for strategy and rebels’. In a hard-hitting editorial on 3 March 1990, The Hindustan Times gave its own verdict:

“The image of its leadership, indefinite postponement of organizational elections, and the arrogance of power on the part of leaders at different levels, factional squabbles and frequent change of CMs by the High Command had done incalculable harm to the party.”

The next seven days had elements of high drama as a row over the Bihar Janata Dal (JD) leadership came out in the open. A keen tussle developed between Ram Sunder Das, Lalu Prasad Yadav and Raghunath Jha. The Sunday edition of 4 March 1990 of The Hindustan Times almost anointed Ram Sunder Das as the next leader and provided the inevitable reason for it:

Ram Sunder Das

“Coalition government in Bihar [is] likely to be headed by Ram Sunder Das who is emerging as a consensus candidate – Mr. Laloo Yadav’s casteist image, his inexperience [and] his attempt to dominate the party with anti-social elements, plus the fact that [the] neighbouring Uttar Pradesh has a Yadav Chief Minister have militated against his serious candidature.”

Lalu Prasad Yadav’s candidature became public only on 5 March 1990 and a serious challenge was mounted over the next two days. He claimed the support of 79 MLAs, mostly those from the old guard of the Lok Dal and the Karpoori Thakur group. The situation was so chaotic that a fourth candidate, Anoop Lal Yadav, announced his bid the next day. Finally in the leadership contest held on 7 March 1990, Lalu Prasad Yadav (58 votes) defeated Ram Sunder Das (54) and Raghunath Jha (14). The victor was the candidate of Devi Lal, Sharad Yadav, Nitish Kumar and Jagdanand camp, while VP Singh and George Fernandes supported Ram Sunder Das and Chandrasekhar had put up Raghunath Jha. On 10 March 1990, the new CM took oath in public at the sprawling Gandhi Maidan. The early image of himself, which he sought to cultivate was that of a ‘leader of the people’ (from The Hindustan Times):

Raghunath Jha

“After a difficult election Laloo Yadav heads an unsteady coalition government, a difficult administration and the greenhorn CM – already being hailed as a “leader of the people” – would have to prove that he has the wherewithal to lead a government, if it has to last long…”

Proving everyone wrong, the incumbent went on to rule Bihar for fifteen years, first and foremost, as an aggressive representative of the drive for backward empowerment. This was his power, but this also provided an intrinsic limit to his power. His ability to ‘connect’ with his social and electoral base and his projection of his personality as his politics were a symbol of pride for them. Even before him, there had been lower or Scheduled Caste CMs, but they had not personified empowerment, barring Karpoori Thakur. Lalu Prasad Yadav, the grassroot Lohiaite, hardened by JP’s Total Revolution, became the prince of social justice and secularism in power. His (from Mohammad Sajjad’s Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours):

“ …arrest of the Hindu nationalist L.K. Advani and the stopping of his Rath Yatra, firm handling of communal riots, combined with his strong opposition to upper caste hegemony with his characteristic native wit and rustic wisdom, made him tremendously popular among the Muslims (and lower caste Hindus). His electoral equation, Muslim-Yadav, became the famous mantra for his subsequent electoral successes.”

His (Lalu Prasad Yadav’s) ability to ‘connect’ with his social and electoral base and his projection of his personality as his politics were a symbol of pride for them. Even before him, there had been lower or Scheduled Caste CMs, but they had not personified empowerment, barring Karpoori Thakur.

He gave his constituency; the Backwards and Muslims, a hitherto unprecedented sense of belonging and dignity by making them believe that he was their man, ruling on their behalf, for their benefit. He, then, brilliantly employed it by his knowledge of the nature of caste antipathies, social estrangements and constituency arithmetic. Once installed, he went about creating an iconoclastic image of the ‘common Chief Minister’. In the process, neither did he have to nor did he wish to govern Bihar in order to rule it; the twin themes of Mandal and Mandir, giving him an electoral ascendancy that the need for performance fell by the wayside. He emerged as a popular anti-establishment underdog and a rustic messiah. Among the heterogeneous caste/class groups within the Backwards, the economically rich and politically influential Yadavs (the so-called creamy layer) cornered most of the benefits of the ‘Lalu Raj’, while the larger mass of Backwards remained poor. But, they supported Lalu Prasad Yadav till 2005 because he provided them with a sense of pride and participation.

Politics is an act of self-location. Lalu Prasad Yadav loomed large because he emerged at a particular historical conjunction. With his advent, also emerged the ‘backwards among the backwards’. The one real change Lalu Yadav brought was a change of the caste character of the exploitative order. He gave the Backwards a sense of political participation and the Muslims a qualified sense of security in fractured times. He undid the hegemony of the upper castes and installed his own. He was a product of Caste and not its producer. Political violence and electoral malpractice in Bihar much predated him and his constituency had long been the victims. Be it corruption or political crime, caste war or anarchy, the Congress had set the precedents. Lalu Prasad Yadav was a response.

The one real change Lalu Yadav brought was a change of the caste character of the exploitative order. He gave the Backwards a sense of political participation and the Muslims a qualified sense of security in fractured times. He undid the hegemony of the upper castes and installed his own. He was a product of Caste and not its producer. Political violence and electoral malpractice in Bihar much predated him and his constituency had long been the victims. Be it corruption or political crime, caste war or anarchy, the Congress had set the precedents. Lalu Prasad Yadav was a response.

In the process, by mid-1990s, ‘the killing fields of Bihar… the site of persistent warfare against the poor, the weak, and the exploited of the rural countryside’ had descended in ‘the seven years of Lalu Prasad Yadav’s chief ministership as the populist champion of the poor, into “administrative atrophy” and “anarchy”’. Besieged by fodder scam charges, while Lalu Prasad Yadav was battling his (lack of) ‘right or suitability to continue’ as president of his party and chief minister of his state, the state seemed ‘on the verge of infrastructural collapse at the most fundamental levels of administering a civil society’. Lalu had an unvarnished and unrestrained ‘social justice theme’ in his first term, ‘of assuring izzat i.e., self-respect to the socially and economically deprived of the land’. Deep into his second term (completed by his wife Rabri), ‘the political calculus [showed] splits in the backward caste, untouchable-Dalit, and Muslim alliance which Lalu had crafted so brilliantly before and after the 1990 and 1991 elections’. As Mohammad Sajjad has shown, ‘Muslim society also underwent change in challenging upper caste hegemony [during] Lalu Yadav’s Chief Ministerial tenure. The Momins/Ansaris, the Rayeens, the Kulhaiyas, Pamarias and the Bhatiyaras mobilised their caste groups for access to social justice, not only reservations… but also a share in political power’. In his ally-turned-opponent, Syed Shahabuddin’s words:

“For Lalu Yadav, who swears by Mandal, social justice means the substitution of Bhumihar-Rajput Raj by Yadava Raj, that is, dominance and pre-eminence of the Yadavas in every walk of life.”

thus leading to a section of Muslims [The Pasmanda], in addition to the Koeris and the Kurmis, deserting Lalu.

…by mid-1990s, ‘the killing fields of Bihar… the site of persistent warfare against the poor, the weak, and the exploited of the rural countryside’ had descended in ‘the seven years of Lalu Prasad Yadav’s chief ministership as the populist champion of the poor, into “administrative atrophy” and “anarchy”’… Lalu had an unvarnished and unrestrained ‘social justice theme’ in his first term, ‘of assuring izzat i.e., self-respect to the socially and economically deprived of the land’. Deep into his second term (completed by his wife Rabri), ‘the political calculus [showed] splits in the backward caste, untouchable-Dalit, and Muslim alliance which Lalu had crafted so brilliantly before and after the 1990 and 1991 elections’.

By the turn of the century, for many, his ‘limiting “tunnel vision” reduced him to the status of yet another Yadav leader’. One of the visible factors for this was the brazen and cynical ‘Yadavisation’ of state administration, which fed ‘the formation of the Samata Party in 1994 by the engineer and Kurmi leader, Nitish Kumar’. In a subterranean sense, as shown by the historian Arvind Das, upwardly mobile middle castes and classes were ‘people not likely to be attracted by Lalu’s politics of poverty’, while being ‘concerned about a civil society of law and order of everyday life, no matter one’s social status or professional position’. A second ‘reality of post-Laloo dominance’ was ‘the softening of [his] scheduled caste-Dalit support base’. It is what has been crystallised as ‘specific secular and political interests, economic interests and personality interactions, which are decisive in determining how people vote… true for any social or religious segment of society; these are never unitary solidarities in any political sense’. As Walter Hauser proffered too:

“…issues of political freedom as well as economic and social freedom and the allied issues of social justice and self-respect have a long history in Bihar… Laloo Prasad Yadav brought the idea to a new level of awareness… But, the concept [went back to] Swami Sahajanand… and Jayaprakash Narayan, and Karpoori Thakur. And, movements like the Kisan Sabha, the Triveni Sangh, the Bihar Socialist Party, and the CPI, the CPI (ML).”

By the turn of the century, for many, his ‘limiting “tunnel vision” reduced him to the status of yet another Yadav leader’. One of the visible factors for this was the brazen and cynical ‘Yadavisation’ of state administration… A second ‘reality of post-Laloo dominance’ was ‘the softening of [his] scheduled caste-Dalit support base’.

Nitish Kumar

The story of Lalu Prasad Yadav then was also his transformation from being ‘the solution’ to becoming the problem, through the 15 years from 1990 to 2005. Since then, ‘just as Indira was not India, so Lalu is not Bihar’. Nitish Kumar’s government ‘expedited the enquiry process into the Bhagalpur riots (1989) and many aggressors [were] convicted. Most of these [were] Yadavs, which raised uncomfortable questions about Lalu’s famous mantra of the Muslim-Yadav electoral partnership’. Nitish Kumar’s governments have also shown ‘arguably better performance in matters of law and order, road construction, electric supply, reservation of seats for the EBCs and women, 15-point package for minorities… gestures which are looked at with some hope by the common Muslim communities, even though some suspicions and uncertainties do persist among the Muslims due to his alliance with the Hindu BJP’. The quest for social justice in Bihar then, among Backward and Scheduled Castes as well as Muslims since the 1990s has mystified much social commentary and ‘demystified’ many political vote-banks.

Lalu Prasad Yadav

Conclusion

Today, Bihar is a heartland of an estimated 100 million people, 40% of whom are below poverty line and 90% of whom continue to have a rural existence. They share a collective trajectory that can be traced to the colonial creation of rent-seeking landlords by the permanent settlement of 1793. That set Bihar on becoming a ‘classic enclave economy’ through the British Raj. Post-independence, the ‘freight equalization scheme’, an ‘explosive mix of caste and class struggles’, ‘transfer of caste power [and] material benefits to [hitherto] marginalized’, a ‘deinstitutionalized state apparatus and curtailed development’, and, large social groups, from the 14% twice-born castes, 39% OBCs (20% upper OBCs, 19% lower OBCs, 12% Yadavs, 3.5% Kurmis, 4.1% Koeris), 15% Dalits, 16% Muslims have operated within a paradigm of continuity of caste and class conflict. In these seven decades, from the Congress’ ‘social coalition of extremes’ dominated by the upper castes, followed by first the emergence and then the fragmentation of the OBCs, if Karpoori Thakur symbolised what was a precursor for the following Lalu Prasad Yadav, then the latter personified a ‘democratic upsurge’, a ‘plebeian politics [of] narrow-poor redistributive coalitions’. Since 2005, Nitish Kumar has represented a ‘wide-poor coalition [of] Dalits and upper castes’, with the 2015 Bihar assembly elections showing that ‘themes of identity remain central to mobilization efforts of political parties’. Indeed (from Sajjad’s Muslim Politics in Bihar: Changing Contours),

“ …it is said that the class and caste neutral economic policies of Nitish Kumar have broad sub-national support, and have triggered the formation of a ‘Bihari’ identity for the first time, especially after the implementation of positive discrimination for women, lower backwards, and the Dalits in the Panchayati Raj Institutions and [he] essentially represents the agglomeration of non-powerful social categories (Ati Picchra which also includes most of the Arzal and Ajlaf communities of Muslims, and Maha Dalits).”

On the other hand is the view that Nitish Kumar’s ‘governmental concern of welfare and development’ vis-a-vis Lalu Prasad’s ‘agenda of justice, dignity and distribution of governmental resources’ are complimentary to each other. One’s caste-based politics is matched by the other’s functional social engineering; ‘for an emancipative politics of the Dalits, this history holds a clue’. This article has tried to show that the electoral victories achieved from 1989 onwards and the emergence of the legend of Lalu Prasad Yadav represents continuity in this cycle of democratic empowerment and ‘breakdown of the Brahmanical social order’. It is another milestone on this road of identity assertion in Indian and Bihar politics. Bihar has always been severely limited by a deeply divided social structure. Since 1937, Congress adopted the strategy of dealing with these divisions by co-opting the elite into the power structure, providing affirmative actions for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, and increasingly the Other Backward Castes, and granting considerable, if conditional and contradictory, cultural autonomy to Muslims. This strategy left much of the ugly social reality untouched. Nevertheless, social mobility was always on the rise widening access to political, economic and social power. In democratic India, castes – as a social unit – have always been perceived as a strong vehicle of improving access to power and promotion of interests and it continues to matter. Increased political significance of castes has provided them a greater social hold. Democracy, industrialisation and an equitable economic redistribution have softened their edges but have not eroded their bases. In fact, they have provided an added economic dimension.

Conflicts have plagued Bihar not so much from economic deprivation, but a deep sense of exclusion and marginality along caste-lines, which must be moderated as much by means of a social transformation as by economic development. The question is whether social mobility in Bihar, having been expressed through the sphere and language of politics, will ultimately reflect a proper economic dimension – a new ‘social contract’ – what {Jeffrey} Witsoe alternatively calls ‘popular sovereignty’: ‘the experience of local power’ and ‘everyday interactions with state institutions’ that revolved around ‘dignity’; a democratic demand that ‘verily characterizes India’s postcolonial democracy’.

Conflicts have plagued Bihar not so much from economic deprivation, but a deep sense of exclusion and marginality along caste-lines, which must be moderated as much by means of a social transformation as by economic development. The question is whether social mobility in Bihar, having been expressed through the sphere and language of politics, will ultimately reflect a proper economic dimension – a new ‘social contract’ – what {Jeffrey} Witsoe alternatively calls ‘popular sovereignty’: ‘the experience of local power’ and ‘everyday interactions with state institutions’ that revolved around ‘dignity’; a democratic demand that ‘verily characterizes India’s postcolonial democracy’. It was a question that had first emerged during the Janeyu Movement during the 1920s and then evolved during the tetchy relationship between the Indian National Congress and the Triveni Sangh between the 1930s and 1950s. Having surveyed that, the article then showed the rise, fall and eclipse of the Socialists and the Congress on the caste question for two decades from the 1960s, especially 1967, and thereby set the historical scene for the advent of Lalu Prasad Yadav. Like many era-inaugurating events, hindsight has since distorted our understanding of this process, akin to Borges’ ‘forking paths’ or, closer home, ‘changing rivers’ in the heartland of Bihar, whose saga is one of resurrection.

Rakesh Ankit’s paper Caste Politics in Bihar: In Historical Continuum has been carried with the permission of its author. It has been presented without its abstract, citations and footnotes and bibliography for purposes of easier reading. You can read this paper in its entirety here.

* Braces – {} – have been used within quotes wherever an explanation has been added by us.

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[1]

Gandhi’s ideas on caste and untouchability have created much misunderstanding in scholarly circles. Gandhi has been attacked for ambiguity and inconsistency on this issue and accused of excessive deference to Hindu orthodoxy. Critics have focused on Gandhi’s alleged ‘specious’ distinction between varnashram dharma and the caste system. Others, sympathetic interpreters, see Gandhi undergoing a rational evolution, ranging from an all out orthodox stance in the early years to a liberal one by the 1930s. Such interpretations reflect an oversimplified understanding of a complex reality. This paper examines the different positions of attack or defense of Gandhi’s treatment of the question of caste and untouchability, an issue to which Gandhi devoted a large amount of time and energy.

 

 

Gandhi in South Africa

 

 

The removal of untouchability was one of Gandhi’s central concerns. In both words and actions, Gandhi attacked untouchability in ways that were radical for a ‘caste Hindu’. Despite being a ‘caste Hindu’ himself, Gandhi identified himself with the ‘Untouchables’. He said on 2nd February 1934, “as a savarna Hindu, when I see that there are some Hindus called avarnas, it offends my sense of justice and truth […]” and “if I discover that Hindu shastras really countenance untouchability as it is seen today, I will renounce and denounce Hinduism.” Writing in Young India in April 1921, Gandhi boldly described the practice of “untouchability” as “a blot on Hinduism” and characterised it as an excrescence. As early as 3rd May 1915, he had said, “if it were proved to me that this is an essential part of Hinduism, I for one would declare myself an open rebel against Hinduism itself.” According to him, “there was nothing so bad” as the practice of untouchability in Hinduism “in all the world.” “This religion,” he said in 1917, “if it can be called such, stinks in my nostrils. This certainly cannot be the Hindu religion.” These were strong words, but the passion behind them sprang from Gandhi’s soul’s agony. “And yet,” Gandhi wrote in 1933, “I cannot leave religion and therefore Hinduism. My life would be a burden to me, if Hinduism failed me. Take it away and nothing remains for me.” But Gandhi was “eager to live and commit untouchability to the flames.” To live with untouchability was “like a cup of poison” to him.

 

Eleanor Zelliot states that Gandhi “is said to have spoken and written more on untouchability than on any other subject.” In all historical fairness, according to D. R. Nagaraj, “it must be admitted that it was [Gandhi] who made untouchability one of the crucial questions of Indian politics.”

 

Gandhi’s beliefs were backed by the force of a lifetime of action. At age twelve, he had disregarded his mother’s warning not to touch Uka, an ‘Untouchable’, who came to clean latrines in his house. In South Africa (1893-1914), persons of all castes, communities, religions and races stayed in his house as members of his family. When Kasturba showed reluctance to clean the urine pot of one such member of his “family,” he had threatened to evict her from the house. In 1915, while in India, when he accepted the first ‘Untouchable’ family in the Kocharb Ashram and adopted Lakshmi, an ‘Untouchable’, as a daughter, the Vaishnavs of Ahmedabad stopped all monetary help to the ashram, following which he decided to move to the ‘Untouchables’’ quarters. Eleanor Zelliot states that Gandhi “is said to have spoken and written more on untouchability than on any other subject.” In all historical fairness, according to D. R. Nagaraj, “it must be admitted that it was [Gandhi] who made untouchability one of the crucial questions of Indian politics.” Gandhi publicly put the ‘abolition’ of untouchability as the essential prerequisite for India’s true independence.

 

According to him (Gandhi), “there was nothing so bad” as the practice of untouchability in Hinduism “in all the world.” “This religion,” he said in 1917, “if it can be called such, stinks in my nostrils. This certainly cannot be the Hindu religion.” These were strong words, but the passion behind them sprang from Gandhi’s soul’s agony. “And yet,” Gandhi wrote in 1933, “I cannot leave religion and therefore Hinduism. My life would be a burden to me, if Hinduism failed me. Take it away and nothing remains for me.” But Gandhi was “eager to live and commit untouchability to the flames.”

 

Yet, one of the charges levelled against Gandhi is that he acted as an apologist for the caste system. The origins of this critique can be located in B. R. Ambedkar’s 1945 publication, What Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables. It is a strong attack on Gandhi and the national movement led by him. This interpretation is not only a firm rejection of the Gandhian model of tackling the problem of the ‘Untouchables’, but has shaped the contours of themes and patterns of the critics of Gandhi, who make Gandhi’s conception of untouchability and his caste reform programmes appear threatening.

 

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Writings of Ambedkar create the impression that Gandhi was an out and out casteist, “opposed to all those, who [were] out to destroy the caste system.” “Mr. Gandhi’s views on the caste system,” asserts Ambedkar, “were fully elaborated by him in 1921-22 in a Gujarati journal called Navajivan.” Gandhi believed, states Ambedkar, “that if Hindu society has been able to stand it is because it is founded on the caste system. The seeds of swaraj are to be found in the caste system […]. A community, which can create the caste system, must be said to possess unique powers of organisation […]. It can work as an electorate for a representative body. Caste can perform judicial functions by electing persons to act as judges to decide disputes among members of the same caste […]. I believe that inter-dining or inter-marriage [is] not necessary for promoting national unity […]. To destroy caste system and adopt Western European social system means that Hindus must give up the principle of hereditary occupation, which is the soul of the caste system. Hereditary principle is an eternal principle. To change it is to create disorder.” Ambedkar termed Gandhi a casteist based on such published ideas. He preferred to disagree with Gandhi. Ambedkar said: “There cannot be a more degrading system of social organisation than the chaturvarnya. It is the system that deadens, paralyses and cripples the people from helpful activity.” Ambedkar envisioned nothing short of the destruction of the caste system or the chaturvarnya system.

 

Other critics follow suit. Kancha Illaiah writes Gandhi as wanting to “build a modern consent system for the continued maintenance of Brahminical hegemony […].” According to T. K. N. Unnithan, this was evident in “Gandhi’s defense of the caste system as an essential form of social organisation” giving “the impression that he was orthodox in this respect.” Caste to Gandhi, adds Unnithan, was “an extension of the principle of family, as both governed by blood and heredity.” Gandhi held, argues Dhananjay Keer, “that [caste] does attach to birth. A man cannot change his varna by choice. Not to abide by one’s varna is to disregard the laws of heredity.” Gandhi thus, emphasises Christophe Jaffrelot, highlighted “the necessity of maintaining one’s rank […] as an element of natural regulation.” Perry Anderson moreover adds that to Gandhi “there was no need to adjust the balance in this life.” Gandhi, says Jaffrelot, appreciated “the distribution of men in different castes as a factor of socio-economic complementarity and social harmony,” which “was essential for […] progress.” Unnithan further says that for Gandhi, “varnashram dharma [satisfied] the religious, social and economic needs of a community.” Gandhi, argues Arundhati Roy, said that “the villagers managed their internal affairs through the caste system and through it they dealt with any oppression from ruling power or powers.” G. Aloysius argues that Gandhi was “obsessed with the organic nature of Hindu society based on Rigvedic Varnashrama Dharma” and “appointed himself the guardian of its integrity.”

 

The various interpretations argued above are a product of seeing Gandhi as an unchanging person. “It is ironic,” writes Martin Deming Lewis, that “no aspect of Gandhi’s activities for social reform has been so widely acclaimed as his efforts on behalf of the Untouchables,” and yet “one of his most bitter critics should have been a man who was himself an Untouchable, B. R. Ambedkar.” But Ambedkar rooted his understanding of Gandhian ideas through Gandhi’s statements on the caste system, on inter-caste dining and marriages from Gandhi’s early writings. The later critics, however, concentrate on Ambedkar’s works and not on original works of Gandhi. For example, in 1927 Gandhi had said to the Sri Lankans that if India could take pride “in having sent you Mahinda and the message of the Buddha to this land, it has also to accept the humiliation of having sent you the ‘curse’ of caste distinctions.” By 1930s, Gandhi was declaring that caste was “a handicap on progress” and “a social evil.” By the 1940s, it had become “an anachronism,” which “must go.” The critics see Gandhi through Ambedkar’s eyes and generally overlook the context in which Gandhi was writing about caste. Ambedkar himself falls prey to this and thus creates a repertory of casteist images on Gandhi. For instance, Braj Ranjan Mani, writes, “[Gandhi] was a Bania more Brahmanised than Brahmans; his world-view and life philosophy were moulded and shaped by the age-old Brahmanic values and way of life. […] [He] never gave up his basic belief in the Brahmanic fundamentalism which is evident from his constant evocation of varnashrama, Ramrajya and trusteeship.”

 

One of the charges levelled against Gandhi is that he acted as an apologist for the caste system. The origins of this critique can be located in B. R. Ambedkar’s 1945 publication, What Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables… Other critics follow suit. Kancha Illaiah writes Gandhi as wanting to “build a modern consent system for the continued maintenance of Brahminical hegemony […].” …Gandhi thus, emphasises Christophe Jaffrelot, highlighted “the necessity of maintaining one’s rank […] as an element of natural regulation.” …Gandhi, argues Arundhati Roy, said that “the villagers managed their internal affairs through the caste system and through it they dealt with any oppression from ruling power or powers.” …The various interpretations argued above are a product of seeing Gandhi as an unchanging person… But Ambedkar rooted his understanding of Gandhian ideas through Gandhi’s statements on the caste system, on inter-caste dining and marriages from Gandhi’s early writings. The later critics, however, concentrate on Ambedkar’s works and not on original works of Gandhi.

 

Dennis Dalton has, however, argued that “Gandhi saw no harm in self-contradiction.” According to Gandhi, “life was a series of experiments, and any principle might change if Truth so dictated.” According to Bipan Chandra, “[Gandhi] constantly ‘experimented with truth’, and changed and developed his understanding of society, politics and social change.” On 29th April 1933, Gandhi said: “In my search after Truth, I have discarded many ideas and learnt many new things […] and, therefore, when anybody finds any inconsistency between any two writings of mine, if he has still faith in my sanity, he would do well to choose the later of the two on the same subject.” Gandhi also “did not see consistency as a virtue and [asserted that] all ideas were to be tested on the anvil of experience.” On the same lines Gandhi wrote on 27th August 1938: “During my student days […] I learnt a saying of Emerson’s which I never forgot. ‘Foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds’, said the sage. I cannot be a little mind, for foolish consistency has never been my hobgoblin, […] my recent writings must be held as cancelling my comparatively remote sayings and doings. Though my body is deteriorating through age, no such law of deterioration, I hope, operates against wisdom which I trust is not only not deteriorating but even growing.”

 

 

Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar

 

 

Rajmohan Gandhi argues that before 1935, Gandhi had at times claimed that “an ideal” form of caste could be justified, while nearly always adding that “the ideal” never existed in practice, and always insisting that any notion of superiority and inferiority was utterly wrong. “The varnas were set by birth though ‘changeable’ by a person choosing another profession.” Gandhi conceded that the hereditary principle in varnashram must be considerably relaxed. As early as December 1924, he urged the ‘caste Hindus’ to realise that just as other castes had given up their occupations, just as the Brahmins had forsaken teaching and taken up other jobs, just as the Kshatriyas had willingly accepted slavery, just as the Vaishyas had given up their trade and entered other fields, similarly the ‘Untouchables’, too, had a right to give up their old occupations. In fact, he helped many ‘Untouchables’ to quit their hereditary callings, to acquire an academic education and to qualify themselves as doctors, engineers and teachers. For example, it was the policy of the Harijan Sevak Sangh, founded by Gandhi in 1932, to encourage the ‘Harijan’ students by giving them scholarships, particularly for technical and professional courses. While notwithstanding the critics’ value judgement, we have to note that while Gandhi’s basic commitment to human values, truth and non-violence remained constant, his opinions on all these and other issues underwent changes – sometimes drastic – and, invariably, in more radical directions.

 

Gandhi’s noble consistency was that he broke every rule of the orthodox caste system. The ‘caste Hindus’ followed the caste system with the observance of heredity in occupations and in marriage and dining with only the members of sub-caste concerned when it pertained to untouchability. A. R. Wadia says that “Gandhi in the spirit of a true reformer broke every one of these prohibitions.” Though born a Vaishya, Gandhi played the role of a Brahmin becoming a teacher of mankind. He played the role of a Kshatriya or a warrior, though of a non-violent variety. He blessed the marriage of a Brahmin lady with a Vaishya, even though that Vaishya was his son. He had no objection to dine with a Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Parsi, or an ‘Untouchable’. Gandhi was not averse to even being a sweeper.

 

Bhikhu Parekh adds that Gandhi’s moral theory undercut the very basis of the varna system. According to Gandhi, writes Parekh, the true Brahmins were only those who engaged in “total dedication to the service of mankind as a way of attaining moksha.” There was thus no room for a distinct varna of Brahmins in his society who were engrossed in a “pedantic study of scriptures, religious ceremonies and karma-kānda.” The separate varna of Kshatriyas disappeared as Gandhi suggested that citizens trained in the art of non-violent satyagraha should replace the violence prone police and the army. The traditional occupation of the Kshatriyas thus became the general responsibility of all. Every man became a Vaisya, since he wanted “everyone to earn his living and no one to depend on dāna or charity,” and thus the Vaisyas as a separate varna disappeared. For Gandhi, manual labour, the work of the Shudras, “was the only true form of socially acceptable productive work.” Since all citizens performed the work of Shudras, they too ceased to exist as a separate varna. Therefore, Parekh emphasises that Gandhi’s well-rounded or “fully moral man” engaged in all four activities serving his fellowmen, fighting against untruth and injustices, earning his living and engaging in manual labour. He thus belonged to all four varnas and hence to none alone. According to Gandhi, the varna system therefore no longer made sense.

 

Bhikhu Parekh adds that Gandhi’s moral theory undercut the very basis of the varna system. According to Gandhi, writes Parekh, the true Brahmins were only those who engaged in “total dedication to the service of mankind as a way of attaining moksha.” There was thus no room for a distinct varna of Brahmins in his society who were engrossed in a “pedantic study of scriptures, religious ceremonies and karma-kānda.”

 

A corollary is Anthony J. Parel’s reading of Gandhi’s conception of dharma as “duty.” Members of society in the past carried out their ordained duties as enshrined in the scriptures, and on this depended the stability of the social order. According to Parel, Gandhi’s understanding of the scriptural teaching of the caste system was of “the four castes, as sanctioned in the Rig Veda and the Gita, embodied [in] an egalitarian principle, where all the four castes were equal in dignity.” Gandhi also believed that each human being was “born” with one of the three natural qualities or gunas – sattva or the quality of causing virtue, rajas or the quality of causing passion and tamas or the quality of causing dullness. These natural qualities determined his/her natural aptitude for work. Sattva was present in those inclined towards “truth, wisdom, beauty, and goodness;” those inclined towards “action, energetic behaviour, and violence” possessed rajas; and tamas was present in those inclined towards “stupidity, gloom, and melancholy.” “A combination of natural qualities and natural aptitudes,” to Gandhi, writes Parel, “determined one’s caste, not birth or heredity.” As Gandhi put it in January 1928: “There are only four varnas, so divided on the basis of their occupational aptitudes.” It was a matter of one’s “duty” to the welfare of the community, and all callings were to be considered of equal value, whether Brahmin or Bhangi.

 

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Gandhi’s continued belief in varna troubled Ambedkar, as he felt that the system was fundamentally opposed to democracy and could not be rationally defended. Ambedkar added that Gandhi was “preaching caste under the name of varna” in order to sustain the support of the orthodox and un-orthodox Hindus for the movement for swaraj. According to Ambedkar, Gandhi’s varna system was nothing dissimilar to the caste system of the orthodox Hindus, as Gandhi himself said, “it is based on birth.” Ambedkar states that whether “Mr. Gandhi changed over from caste system to the varna system,” it matters not, for “the idea of varna is the parent of the idea of caste,” and both “caste [and] varna […] are fundamentally opposed to democracy.” He therefore concludes that “the social ideal of Gandhism,” which is “either caste or varna, […] is not democracy.” Ambedkar further stated that under Hinduism there is a “fundamentally wrong relationship” between high-caste men and low-caste men. Without attempting to bring about any “structural” change of that wrong relationship, Gandhi, in Ambedkar’s words, was trying to present the Hindu society as a tolerable and a good religious community. The social system of the Hindus based on the caste/varna system, said Ambedkar, is what has to be changed. The Hindu society had to be transformed into a “casteless society.” To Ambedkar, “there will be outcastes as long as there are castes. Nothing can emancipate the outcaste except the destruction of the caste system.”

 

Other critics follow upon Ambedkar’s premise. In the contemporary period, says D. N., “it was disingenuous to suggest that it was varna that should be retained and not [caste], because what actually existed was [caste] with all its features of discrimination and untouchability.” To ask, as Gandhi did, that people should follow their traditional callings “was to condemn the Untouchables and other low castes to a life of servitude.” Gandhi, thus like an obedient “orthodox reformer,” writes Dhananjay Keer, “white-washed a dilapidated house!” Oliver Cromwell Cox concurs that Gandhi was unable to rise very far beyond the principles of impurity and its logical extreme, untouchability, and “would remove untouchability but otherwise maintain the caste system intact.” Gandhi’s suggestion that it “was necessary to improve the conditions of the Untouchables” is therefore “bogus,” says Keer, since “he believed in caste and at the same time wished to abolish untouchability!” Christophe Jaffrelot tries to explain this as a selective approach to untouchability, as Gandhi was fundamentally attached to a traditional Hindu social order. In H. N. Mukherjee’s words, Gandhi’s “fascination for varnashram concepts,” which he considered to be potentially harmonious, “weakened his championship of the Untouchables.” Judith Brown views this approach as a compromise “between the claims of orthodoxy and reform.” Arundhati Roy joins the scholars and says that “Gandhi never decisively and categorically renounced his belief in chaturvarna, the system of four varnas.” To A. R. Wadia also, the whole-hearted support that Gandhi gave to the caste system only meant that he was prepared to “give the Untouchables a place in the fourth caste of Shudras.” While Eleanor Zelliot argues that since “there [was] no fifth caste in the shastras, Untouchables [were to] be regarded as Shudras – a view acceptable to some orthodox Hindu leaders of the day.”

 

He (Ambedkar) therefore concludes that “the social ideal of Gandhism,” which is “either caste or varna, […] is not democracy.” Ambedkar further stated that under Hinduism there is a “fundamentally wrong relationship” between high-caste men and low-caste men. Without attempting to bring about any “structural” change of that wrong relationship, Gandhi, in Ambedkar’s words, was trying to present the Hindu society as a tolerable and a good religious community… Other critics follow upon Ambedkar’s premise.

 

Christophe Jaffrelot is more categorical in asserting that Gandhi wanted to “integrate” the ‘Untouchables’ in a hierarchical caste system as they “are so intimately mixed with those of the caste Hindus […] for whom they live.” G. Aloysius goes so far as to argue that Gandhi “sought to establish the [Indian] nation itself on the decadent Varna ideal,” “precisely to preserve the ascriptive division of labour in society.” Harold Coward argues that for these reasons Gandhi acted more as a fighter to preserve Hinduism and less as a reformer. Gandhi began to present himself as a committed sanatani Hindu. “Emphasising allegiance to his religion,” contends Coward, “Gandhi began to underplay his reformist goals, including the eradication of untouchability.” Even Bhikhu Parekh, who otherwise is less critical of Gandhi, states that Gandhi took a long time to acknowledge that the “roots of untouchability lay deep within the caste system;” that “he could only argue that the Untouchables should become touchables,” without ending “their lowest social and moral status.”

 

Critics, in general, lay emphasis on inconsistencies in Gandhi’s writings. It is, however, imperative to look at other side of Gandhi as well, so as to understand, as Anthony J. Parel asks, “why in his entire political career Gandhi did not attempt to restore the dharma of the discredited varnashram.” In fact, in July 1932, Gandhi is said to have asserted that restoring a pure varna system was like “an ant trying to lift a bag of sugar,” indicating that the varna system was impossible. Gandhi did not want to revive the institution of caste either, for in September 1934, he would argue that since everyone felt free to follow any calling “the law of varna [had] become a dead letter,” “it was [therefore] ‘an ideal dream’ and a ‘childish folly’ to attempt to revive the varna system.” Moreover, Gandhi, as early as 1934, had declared that the “caste ideal,” as envisaged in the scriptures, and as it was practiced today, was “a ‘hideous travesty’ of the original idea, [and] it existed only in distorted form.”

 

By 1935, when Ambedkar was criticising Gandhi’s views on caste and untouchability, Gandhi’s final position was that caste had to go. In fact, Gandhi had publicly given up defending caste even before the publication of Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste (1936). “Caste Has To Go” was his heading to a 16th November 1935 article in Harijan, in which Gandhi wrote, “the sooner public opinion abolishes [caste], the better.” Gandhi became more “sensitive” to the “structural roots” of caste discrimination when he was at the height of his prominence. In his 1936 debate with Ambedkar, Gandhi reiterated his rejection of caste, and said that it was “harmful both to spiritual and national growth,” and thereafter he publicly affirmed his acceptance of inter-dining and inter-marriage, which he had thus far hesitated to do, after learning of the discrimination faced personally by Ambedkar.

 

It is suggested by Raghavan N. Iyer that political thinkers are properly studied without reference to their personalities and practice. However, when one turns to Gandhi, one finds it particularly difficult to ignore his personality and his activities. Gandhi also very categorically said in 1932: “To understand what I say one needs to understand my conduct […].” From a very young age, Gandhi revolted against the practice of untouchability and in his whole life he did not practice untouchability in any form. Gandhi ate with people of different faiths as well as castes including the ‘Untouchables’. Not only did he allow his son Ramdas to marry someone who was from a different sub-caste but also allowed his other son Devadas to marry a girl who was from another varna altogether. He also married off his adopted daughter Lakshmi, who was an ‘Untouchable’, to a Brahmin boy in 1933.

 

It is suggested by Raghavan N. Iyer that political thinkers are properly studied without reference to their personalities and practice. However, when one turns to Gandhi, one finds it particularly difficult to ignore his personality and his activities. Gandhi also very categorically said in 1932: “To understand what I say one needs to understand my conduct […].” …It seems difficult to accept that a man, who violated caste restrictions throughout his life and who built ashrams where no caste restriction was observed, held the caste system or varnashram dharma as an ideal form to organise human society. Gandhi himself rejected such a possibility when he said on 24th November 1927: “I have gone no-where to defend varna dharma… ”

 

Gandhi writes in his autobiography that over the last three generations, starting with his grandfather, his family had not been pursuing their hereditary or traditional duty assigned to them according to the caste system. He himself never earned his bread and butter by following his ancestors’ calling. He let his children choose their own professions, and never pressed them to follow any pursuit prescribed for their caste. Moreover, he tried to master many activities prohibited for his caste, such as work of a scavenger, a barber, a washerman, a cobbler, a tiller and a tailor. It is to be noted that none of Gandhi’s ashrams were built on the basic principle of caste system or varnashram dharma: In the ashram, from the beginning, “it has been our rule not to observe the varna vyavastha […].” None of the caste restrictions were observed in his ashram. Gandhi did “unclean” work himself and forced it on his family, and he accepted ‘Untouchables’ in his social and domestic circles on equal terms. He made his family and associates break pollution taboos and engage in labour that was considered very profoundly ‘polluted’: Shoemaking, leatherwork, cleaning of toilets. In fact, cleaning toilets – work profoundly polluting to the ‘caste Hindus’ – persisted all his life.

 

It seems difficult to accept that a man, who violated caste restrictions throughout his life and who built ashrams where no caste restriction was observed, held the caste system or varnashram dharma as an ideal form to organise human society. Gandhi himself rejected such a possibility when he said on 24th November 1927: “I have gone no-where to defend varna dharma. I am the author of a Congress resolution for propagation of khadi, establishment of Hindu-Muslim unity, and the removal of ‘untouchability’, the three pillars of swaraj. But I have never placed establishment of varnashram dharma as the fourth pillar. You cannot, therefore, accuse me of placing a wrong emphasis on varnashram dharma.”

 

The critics, while focusing on Gandhi’s writings ignore his practice in actual life, thus, reaching a conclusion that Gandhi never decisively renounced his belief in chaturvarna. Even while focusing on his writings, critics tend to rest their understanding of Gandhi’s concern with caste in literal terms. They forget that Gandhi was a politician too. The critics miss to notice the possibility of a kind of strategy in Gandhi’s defense of some aspects of the caste system. What they miss can be understood in Rajmohan Gandhi’s metaphorical explanation. He writes, “I see the varnashrama remarks as sugar-coating for [Gandhi’s] pill for caste Hindus. He wants them to swallow his reforms.” The “caste system [Gandhi] was ‘defending’ was non-existent. Attacks on his ‘defense’ by his foes of the caste system only assured caste Hindus that Gandhi was not their enemy, which he was not.” It was Gandhi’s effort to carry everyone including those he was wanting to make changes in their lives.

 

Initially, in the 1920s, Gandhi made the argument that untouchability and its continued existence hindered national unity and harmed the cause of Indian independence. During the Non-Co-Operation Movement, Gandhi emphasised that “the Hindus must realise that, if they wish to offer successful non-cooperation against the Government they must make ‘common cause’ with the [‘Untouchables’], even as they have made common cause with the Musalmans.” Gandhi asserted that “non-cooperation against the Government means cooperation among the governed, and if Hindus do not remove the sin of untouchability there will be no swaraj whether in one year or in one hundred years […]. Swaraj is unattainable without the removal of the sin of untouchability as it is without Hindu-Muslim unity.” However, Bhikhu Parekh contends that “the political argument made only a limited impression on the orthodox Hindus, who neither believed that the struggle for independence required the abolition of untouchability nor cared for one bought at such a heavy price.” It made no impression on the illiterate masses either, “who were more concerned with religion than with independence and considered untouchability an integral part of it.” To eradicate untouchability Gandhi, therefore, began to rely on the idiom of religion and even fell back on the teachings of social reformers whose timely reforms, in his eyes, had saved the Hindu religion from extinction. Gandhi preferred to follow the footsteps of courageous reformers in order to redefine Hinduism of his time in a manner relevant to the new yuga. According to Parekh, Gandhi was a true sanatanist. To Gandhi, “a sanātanist is one who follows the sanātana dharma. According to the Mahābhārata, it means the observance of āhimsā, satya, non-stealing, cleanliness and self-restraint. As I have been endeavouring to follow these to the best of my ability, I have not hesitated to describe myself as a sanātanist.”

 

Even while focusing on his writings, critics tend to rest their understanding of Gandhi’s concern with caste in literal terms. They forget that Gandhi was a politician too. The critics miss to notice the possibility of a kind of strategy in Gandhi’s defense of some aspects of the caste system. What they miss can be understood in Rajmohan Gandhi’s metaphorical explanation. He writes, “I see the varnashrama remarks as sugar-coating for [Gandhi’s] pill for caste Hindus. He wants them to swallow his reforms.” The “caste system [Gandhi] was ‘defending’ was non-existent. Attacks on his ‘defense’ by his foes of the caste system only assured caste Hindus that Gandhi was not their enemy, which he was not.” It was Gandhi’s effort to carry everyone including those he was wanting to make changes in their lives.

 

A corollary is Thomas Pantham’s assertion that for Gandhi “the participation of the caste Hindus was necessary both for the effectiveness of the non-violent mass political movement for freedom from colonial rule and for the success of the movement against untouchability.” After the Vaikom Satyagraha (1924), Gandhi had been feeling that he, even while fighting against untouchability, had to be seen as a protector of the ‘caste Hindus’ as well. Until about 1935, Gandhi did not share Ambedkar’s sense of urgency to extend the anti-untouchability programme into a wider public political programme that would include campaigns against caste-based discriminations on inter-dining, inter-marriages, etc. As noted by Bhikhu Parekh, Gandhi was “involved in several battles, that against untouchability being only one of them, and political exigencies inevitably dictated their order of importance.” Rajmohan Gandhi writes: “[Gandhi] would unite pro-orthodox ranks, if he had started with an attack on caste, he chose to zero in on evil none could defend.” Light was thrown on Gandhi’s thinking on caste and untouchability by Jawaharlal Nehru: “I asked [Gandhi] repeatedly: Why don’t you hit out at the caste system directly? He said that he did not believe in the caste system except in some idealised form of occupations and all that; but that the present system was thoroughly bad and must go. I am undermining it completely, he said, by my tackling untouchability […]. If untouchability goes […] the caste system goes. So I am concentrating on that […]. So he made untouchability the one thing on which he concentrated, which ultimately affected the whole caste system.”

 

 

Jawaharlal Nehru

 

 

“I asked [Gandhi] repeatedly: Why don’t you hit out at the caste system directly? He said that he did not believe in the caste system except in some idealised form of occupations and all that; but that the present system was thoroughly bad and must go. I am undermining it completely, he said, by my tackling untouchability […]. If untouchability goes […] the caste system goes. So I am concentrating on that […]. So he made untouchability the one thing on which he concentrated, which ultimately affected the whole caste system.” —Jawaharlal Nehru

 

Gandhi’s concentration on “untouchability” made him favour abolition of caste-based discrimination more than the caste itself because for Gandhi “untouchability formed the core of the caste system.” Suhas Palshikar says that Gandhi was “right in identifying untouchability as the most abhorring expression of caste-based inequality and attendant inhumanity,” for it stood “for everything ugly in the caste system and therefore, it must go instantly.” In untouchability was rooted “caste-consciousness,” and hence its removal would “symbolically bury the caste system.” When seen in this light, argues Palshikar, how can “caste question become the core of Gandhi’s discourse [?]” There is no doubt about Gandhi’s ultimate preparedness to abolish caste,” but Gandhi would adopt a position to reform such Hindu practice from within rather than attack from outside.

 

(According to Suhas Palshikar) “There is no doubt about Gandhi’s ultimate preparedness to abolish caste,” but Gandhi would adopt a position to reform such Hindu practice from within rather than attack from outside.

 

[4]

Scholars have also added a different dimension to the analysis of Gandhi’s position on caste: The importance of its evolutionary nature. The writings of scholars on this issue range from Louis Fischer, B. R. Nanda and Thomas Pantham to Dennis Dalton. Their studies show Gandhi’s ideas on caste evolving from a simplistic understanding to a rational outlook, moving “gradually” from an orthodox stance to more liberal views, and culminating in a radical position, which can be termed as revolutionary. It is argued that initially Gandhi’s deference to Hindu orthodoxy was due to the weight of reality that compelled him to move cautiously while assessing the alignments in India. It was a tactical move.

 

Louis Fischer argues that for many years Gandhi “defended” caste restrictions. For example, Gandhi said in 1920, “I consider the four divisions to be fundamental, natural and essential.” He even wrote in Young India on 6th October 1921, that “Hinduism does most emphatically discourage inter-dining and inter-marriage between divisions […]. Prohibition against inter-marriage and inter-dining is ‘essential’ for the rapid evolution of the soul.” This was according to Fischer, the “orthodox” Gandhi. But by 1932, such “essentials” were “weakening Hindu society.” As Gandhi moved to a more liberal phase of his thought, asserts Fischer, he began to understand that inter-caste dining and marriages were not part of the Hindu religion from inception, and that these “crept into Hinduism when perhaps it was in its decline, and was then probably meant to be a ‘temporary’ protection against the disintegration of Hindu society. Today those two prohibitions are weakening the Hindu society.” According to Fischer, this was not Gandhi’s final position. He began to move further away from the orthodox tradition and by 1946 was declaring that “I therefore tell all boys and girls who want to marry that they cannot be married at Sevagram Ashram unless one of the parties is a ‘Harijan’.” This was Gandhi’s stance, contributing to the emergence of a “radical” Gandhi who would approve “only [inter]-caste marriages” by 1946.

 

Dennis Dalton’s interpretation differs somewhat in stating that the focus on evolutionary approach of Gandhi to caste projects too much orthodoxy into his earlier position, and purges his later ideas of all orthodoxy. Dalton posits that “the pace as well as the content of Gandhi’s views on caste must be seen in the context of his response to the Indian orthodoxy as well as to Western liberalism.” In 1909, in South Africa, Gandhi had publicly decried the caste system for its inequalities: “Its ‘hypocritical distinctions of high and low’ and ‘caste tyranny’, which made India turn back on truth and embrace falsehood.”

 

Scholars have also added a different dimension to the analysis of Gandhi’s position on caste: The importance of its evolutionary nature. The writings of scholars on this issue range from Louis Fischer, B. R. Nanda and Thomas Pantham to Dennis Dalton. Their studies show Gandhi’s ideas on caste evolving from a simplistic understanding to a rational outlook, moving “gradually” from an orthodox stance to more liberal views, and culminating in a radical position, which can be termed as revolutionary.

 

Shortly after he had returned to India in 1915, Gandhi was faced with the problem to counter the Western attack on caste, and also not to overawe the orthodoxy. This shaped his views on the problem in the 1920s. In the prevailing circumstances “Gandhi emphasised,” Dennis Dalton contends, “the generally beneficial aspects of caste,” and also defended it “for its wonderful powers of organisation,” while upholding “caste prohibitions on inter-dining and inter-marriage [as fostering] ‘self-control’; and [regarded] the system itself […] as a beneficial, natural institution.” A direct assault by Gandhi on caste, according to Dalton, would mean playing into the hands of Western Imperialism. The British Government criticised Gandhi for pursuing politics to serve narrow interests rather than take to social reform which would benefit millions. S. M. Michael, an English correspondent, wrote to Gandhi on 17th November 1920, stating that “even if you [Gandhi] succeed in establishing Indian independence tomorrow, it will be […] wrecked and broken to pieces on the rock of caste as it has been more than once in our long and chequered history.” “Should not […] the Hindus wash [their] blood-stained hands before [they] ask the English to wash theirs?” was the question seasonably put to Gandhi by the British Government. At the same time, Gandhi understood that the conservative, but, articulate and powerful section of Hindus, was not yet ready for radical reforms and he had also realised that he could not sustain his movement for political and social reforms without their help. For example, after he launched the Non-Cooperation Movement in 1920, orthodox Hindus had warned Gandhi that unless ‘Untouchables’ were excluded from the national schools, they would support the British Raj.

 

In 1909, in South Africa, Gandhi had publicly decried the caste system for its inequalities: “Its ‘hypocritical distinctions of high and low’ and ‘caste tyranny’, which made India turn back on truth and embrace falsehood.” … Shortly after he had returned to India in 1915, Gandhi was faced with the problem to counter the Western attack on caste, and also not to overawe the orthodoxy… A direct assault by Gandhi on caste, according to Dalton, would mean playing into the hands of Western Imperialism.

 

Dennis Dalton argues that at an early stage of the movement, Gandhi had synonymously used “caste and varnashram dharma, with no attempt to distinguish between them.” Not taking into account the sentiments of the majority of traditional Hindus would have been suicidal. Dalton furthermore states that it was the time when Gandhi was searching for an approach that would allow him to reform the caste system effectively from within, without alienating the orthodoxy. Gandhi thus suggested that a beginning should be made with inter-marriage not among different varnas but among members of different sub-castes. “This would satisfy,” Gandhi believed, “the most ardent reformers as a first step and enable men like Pandit [Madan Mohan] Malaviya, [an orthodox Hindu,] to support it.”

 

Gandhi did not deviate from the orthodox belief in the law of varna based on heredity. Moreover, with a view to the orthodoxy, he maintained his support of restrictions on inter-dining and inter-marriage; yet he asserted that closed-dining and closed-marriages were minor parts in varnashram. He declared that “a Brahman may remain a Brahman, though he may dine with a Shudra. The four divisions define a man’s calling, they do not restrict or regulate social intercourse.” By asserting that since a man’s varna was inherited, “inter-dining or even inter-marriage [did not] necessarily deprive a man of his status that birth has given him,” Gandhi separated inter-dining and inter-marriage from the concept of varna.

 

As early as 1927, Gandhi was able to argue that “varna has nothing to do with caste. Down with the monster of caste that masquerades in the guise of varna. It is this travesty of varna that has degraded Hinduism and India.” In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Gandhi was re-interpreting original sources to gather ammunition for an attack against the rigidity, exclusiveness, and prejudices of the caste system… As Gandhi rose to power within the Congress by 1920-21, he was in a position to wrest maximum advantage politically for his beliefs. What was his line of defense earlier now became his line of offence.

 

By the second-half of the 1920s, Gandhi clearly distinguished between varnashram dharma and caste. But now, Dennis Dalton contends, Gandhi reinforced his arguments with greater vigour in “favour” of varna dharma “to fill the vacuum replacing one traditional concept with another.” It was precisely on this basis that as early as 1927, Gandhi was able to argue that “varna has nothing to do with caste. Down with the monster of caste that masquerades in the guise of varna. It is this travesty of varna that has degraded Hinduism and India.” In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Gandhi was re-interpreting original sources to gather ammunition for an attack against the rigidity, exclusiveness, and prejudices of the caste system. A correct interpretation of the scriptures, Gandhi argued, would show that the caste system had only a historical, not permanent, validity. He said, “it is no good quoting from Manusmriti and other scriptures in defense of this orthodoxy. A number of verses in these scriptures are apocryphal, a number of them quite meaningless,” thereby asserting, writes Rajmohan Gandhi, “the duty to weigh ancient verses.” As Gandhi rose to power within the Congress by 1920-21, he was in a position to wrest maximum advantage politically for his beliefs. What was his line of defense earlier now became his line of offence. A typical example of his defiance of orthodoxy during this time is an extract from Gandhi’s journal, Young India of 22nd September 1927: “Fight by all means the monster that passes for varnashrama today, and you will find me working side by side with you. My varnashrama enables me to dine with anybody who will give me clean food, be he Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Parsi, whatever he is. My varnashrama accommodates a Pariah girl under my own roof, as my own daughter. My varnashrama accommodates many Panchama families, with whom I dine with the greatest pleasure, to dine with whom is a privilege.”

 

As Gandhi’s thought and ideas matured, he began to comprehend particular dimensions of the problem by moving towards a more radical approach. By then he frequently re-iterated that he would suffer no deviation from fundamental ethics, whatever might be its scriptural sanction. It was in 1932 that the vestiges of orthodoxy in Gandhi’s support of caste disappeared. Dennis Dalton states that the caste restrictions on inter-dining and inter-marriage were now criticised by Gandhi, “as being no part of Hindu religion, serving only to ‘stunt’ Hindu society.” Writing in 1935 on this issue under the title “Caste Must Go,” Gandhi insisted that “in varnashrama there was and should be no prohibition of inter-marriage and inter-dining.” It took almost a decade to make such an announcement by Gandhi because building a new consensus was a difficult undertaking. Gandhi’s frame of reference enabled him to develop a theory of varna, which sought to adjust the old fabric of socio-political organisation to the needs of the twentieth century India. His views on inter-marriage, once loosened, culminated in the announcement in 1946 that “I would persuade all caste Hindu girls coming under my influence to select ‘Harijan’ husbands.” To Dalton, this was Gandhi’s transformation. As has been noted by Valerian Rodrigues, Gandhi’s later-day insistence on inter-caste marriage may be seen as cutting at the root of the caste system. Ashis Nandy has argued that it was Gandhi’s insistence on inter-caste marriage that made him so dangerous to his adversaries in the Hindu Right. It is also to be noted that his assassin, Nathuram Godse, was an orthodox Brahmin from the purest of Brahmin categories.

 

Writing in 1935 on this issue under the title “Caste Must Go,” Gandhi insisted that “in varnashrama there was and should be no prohibition of inter-marriage and inter-dining.” It took almost a decade to make such an announcement by Gandhi because building a new consensus was a difficult undertaking… Ashis Nandy has argued that it was Gandhi’s insistence on inter-caste marriage that made him so dangerous to his adversaries in the Hindu Right.

 

[5]

Anil Nauriya has argued that Gandhi’s critique of the four-fold varna order has often been overlooked by scholars. However, it is to be noted that even in the early years, when he defended the four-fold varna order, Gandhi did not observe it in his own circle: “In the ashram, from the beginning, it has been our rule not to observe the varna vyavastha because the position of the ashram is different from that of the society outside.” As early as 1927, Gandhi had declared that “if varnashrama goes to the dogs in the removal of untouchability, I shall not shed a tear.” This position is different to the generally held view of Eleanor Zelliot, Tanika Sarkar and also Dennis Dalton that Gandhi never changed “his view of the hereditary nature of varna.” But Gandhi was writing in Young India and Harijan from 1927 to 1931 that after the removal of untouchability, “it is highly likely that at the end of it we shall all find that there is nothing to fight against in varnashrama. If, however, varnashrama even then looks an ugly thing, the whole of Hindu society will fight it.”

 

Anil Nauriya argues that Gandhi’s first salvo attack on the concept of varna came in 1933 and, though he did not repudiate birth as a criterion for varna, he nevertheless took away the conclusive element attached to birth. In 1933, he declared “on the basis of some authoritative texts that varna could not be perpetuated or determined merely by birth,” and urged that “these and numerous verses from the shastras unmistakably show that mere birth counts for nothing.” Nauriya rightly emphasises that “it is inaccurate and erroneous to say that Gandhi defended the four-fold varna order or varna vyavastha” after the 1930s. In 1934, Gandhi was saying that he could not accept that “there should be a single human being considered lower than myself,” and in 1935, he was describing “the restrictions on inter-marriage and inter-dining imposed in relation to the varna system as ‘cruel’.” “These are clearly not the words,” Nauriya states, “of one who is smug about the varna system.”

 

 

Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar

 

 

In 1945, in a new foreword to an old Gujarati language compilation of articles on the subject, Gandhi wrote: “There prevails only one varna today, that is, of Shudras, or you may call it, Ati-‘Shudras’, or ‘Harijans’ or ‘Untouchables’. I have no doubt about the truth of what I say. If I can bring around the Hindu society to my view, all our internal quarrels will come to an end.” Gandhi’s position against the four-fold varna order became more emphatic and close to Ambedkar’s, says Anil Nauriya, when in a reversal of his earlier understanding about untouchability, Gandhi claimed that “castes must go if we want to root out untouchability.” He added that it was better for the Untouchables to fight against the ‘caste Hindus’ than to live as “wretched slaves.” More significantly, Gandhi emphasised, “if this kind of untouchability were an integral part of sanatan dharma, that religion has no use for me.” Thus, he implicitly validated Ambedkar’s alternative. But Gandhi went a step further when he said in May 1946 that “I myself have become a ‘Harijan’ by choice” and also urged “the Hindus to become Ati-Shudras not merely in name but in thought, word and deed.” He also said, “if the caste Hindus would become Bhangis of their own free will, the distinction between ‘Harijans’ and caste Hindus would automatically disappear.” Then speaking in July 1946, he encouraged marriages between ‘Harijans’ and others. Nauriya thus states that by 1945-46, Gandhi had denuded the varna both of its sociological implication and of its original connotation of fixed classes of humanity determined by birth.

 

Gandhi’s position against the four-fold varna order became more emphatic and close to Ambedkar’s, says Anil Nauriya, when in a reversal of his earlier understanding about untouchability, Gandhi claimed that “castes must go if we want to root out untouchability.” He added that it was better for the Untouchables to fight against the ‘caste Hindus’ than to live as “wretched slaves.” More significantly, Gandhi emphasised, “if this kind of untouchability were an integral part of sanatan dharma, that religion has no use for me.” Thus, he implicitly validated Ambedkar’s alternative.

 

Gandhi’s approach and method were well understood by the famous Indian social reformer, G. Ramachandra Rao, ‘Gora’: “When [Gandhi] first undertook to remove untouchability, the problem of varna dharma was also there. It was easy to see intellectually, even then, that caste ought to go root and branch if untouchability was to be completely eradicated. But as a practical proposition, caste was not the immediate problem then. The problem was only the removal of untouchability. So he allowed caste to continue, though personally he observed no caste even then. Thus the work of the removal of untouchability progressed through the early stage, leaving the contradictions of the caste system untouched, and, therefore, without the complication of opposition from those who would resist the abolition of caste. When the stage had come where he found caste was a serious hindrance for further progress, [Gandhi] said that caste ought to go root and branch and proposed not only inter-dining but inter-marriages as the means. A mere intellectual might read inconsistency in [Gandhi’s] tolerance of caste earlier and his denunciation of it later. But to a practical man of non-violent creed these are stages of progress and not principles of contradiction.”

 

 

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

 

 

[6]

To Gandhi, untouchability was the worst practice known to mankind, the greatest blot on Hinduism and a cup of poison. He wanted to commit untouchability to flames. Gandhi had overcome caste prejudices at an early age when as a twelve-year-old he first challenged his mother that Hinduism did not sanction untouchability. At age eighteen, he defied caste to go abroad, thereafter faced the wrath of his brother who admonished him, subsequently took the risk of social boycott for accepting ‘Untouchables’ in his ashrams on equal terms, performed unclean tasks himself, and vowed and worked to eradicate untouchability. He averred to be an open rebel against Hinduism if untouchability was not abolished. Above all, he made removal of untouchability a central plank of Indian politics, necessary to achieve swaraj. Gandhi even critiqued the varna order, which unfurled over time, in a manner that was revolutionary for a ‘caste Hindu’. There was no element of compromise in Gandhi’s attitude towards untouchability, while his approach towards caste and varna evolved over time. Gandhi moved from a position of being a cautious reformer to a bolder position ending in a revolutionary position. Gandhi’s goal of equity remained the same throughout, though the manner in which it was sought to be executed naturally differed responding to the changing context over time and also of space as seen in the case of South Africa and India.

 

 

Sujay Biswas’ paper Gandhi’s Approach to Caste and Untouchability: A Reappraisal has been carried with the permission of its author. It has been presented without its abstract, citations and footnotes and bibliography for purposes of easier reading. You can read this paper in its entirety here.

 

ARCHIVE

The Making of an Indian MP

  

A tap at my study door. By its timidity I recognized the person who had made it. It was the “slavey” employed by the landlady from whom my wife and I rented the apartment in the heart of London and who cooked the victuals we bought and served them. The girl who was thus designated in democratic England even then – January 1910 – was perhaps fourteen or fifteen years of age. She had a thin, stunted figure, pale cheeks and eyes that often looked red, through weeping, we surmised.

“Come in,” I called out.

As she opened the door with a hesitant hand and came up to the chair where I was sitting near the fire blazing cheerily in the gate that she kept neatly black-leaded, I wondered at the cause of that disturbance. She had been in only a few moments before to draw the curtains, light the gas and put coal on the fire. A murky cloud had prematurely blotted out light and, a little late, it had begun to drizzle, making the evening damp and dismal.

“Two gentlemen to see you sir,” she said, in her whisper of a voice, from the other side of the small table upon which I was writing, fear, no doubt, gripping her heart that I would take it out of her for that interruption to my work.

No cards had been sent up – no names given. I, therefore, concluded that they must be Indians and asked the little maid to bring them up to our sitting room.

Only one of the callers – Mr. Bepin Chandra Pal – was known to me and I had met him but a few days before. He forthwith introduced his companion as Mr. Shapurji Saklatvala, who, I was told, had been eager to meet me.

I thanked the gentleman for his wish, helped him and Mr. Pal to divest themselves of their damp outer garments, drew easy chairs for them near the fire and put aside my writing, not without an inward sigh, for the work interested me and was of topical importance, so that I would have to resume it after they have left and would no doubt be kept up half the night in consequence.

Bipin Chandra Pal

Who could the stranger be? What did he do? Why did not Mr. Pal say anything about him that would give me a hint to his calling and his interests? Was there anything to say? Did silence mean that the Bengali leader had wished to have company on the way from his flat in Kensington, miles away from my apartment, and had brought one of his admirers along?

Who could the stranger be? What did he do? Why did not Mr. Pal say anything about him that would give me a hint to his calling and his interests? Was there anything to say? Did silence mean that the Bengali leader had wished to have company on the way from his flat in Kensington, miles away from my apartment, and had brought one of his admirers along?

Questions of that kind ran through my mind.

Not for long, however. Polite nothings did not interest Saklatvala. After a little more time he tired of playing second-fiddle to Mr. Pal, whose personality and eloquence he greatly admired, as he, at the very outset of the conversation, had taken care to inform me. Within a few minutes the conviction was forced upon my mind that he was an ambitious man, determined to make his mark in life.

He was, I judged, in the middle thirties. He had a trick of running his fingers through his black hair, rumpling it. The way it was brushed back gave him an immense forehead, which, in any case, would have been broad and high. Under the black, arched brows, his eyes were alive – afire – ever astir. The cheek bones stood out prominently. Between them was a long, firm nose. The way he screwed up his mouth reinforced the impression that his features in general conveyed of strength of character and fixity of intention.

In time I discovered that Saklatvala’s ambition and avocation were not as mine, luckily, were. He was in business and wished to be in Parliament.

An accident had placed him in the City – a term that Britons use to indicate the square mile or so of London where the Bank of England, the head offices of other banking institutions and insurance companies, the Stock Exchange and financial organs of various descriptions are huddled together. Consanguinity had caused that accident.

His father, who had built up an important business in Manchester, where Shapurji spent some of his early years, had a sister. This aunt was married to Jamshedji Nusserwanji Tata, who, by innate genius and personal exertion, had acquired considerable wealth and established mercantile houses in many places which he bequeathed to his sons Dorab and Ratan. Shapurji was sucked into this organization like a piece of paper in an eddy and might easily have been carried to the summit of financial success had his own weight (some persons would call it his perversity) not pulled him down.

Shapurji Saklatvala

As we talked I was impressed with my Parsi caller’s political ambition. His thoughts revolved round it. It was a wonder to me that it did not set his body on fire – consume it to ashes.

I welcomed his longing to get into Parliament. I felt that through carefully framed questions put to the Secretary of State for India and statements made in the course of Indian debates, an Indian in the Commons would be able to draw attention to matters connected with the administration. As matters were, it was necessary to seek the good offices of some sympathetic British M.P. whenever an Indian difficulty or grievance had to be aired in Parliament.

His father, who had built up an important business in Manchester, where Shapurji spent some of his early years, had a sister. This aunt was married to Jamshedji Nusserwanji Tata, who, by innate genius and personal exertion, had acquired considerable wealth and established mercantile houses in many places which he bequeathed to his sons Dorab and Ratan. Shapurji was sucked into this organization like a piece of paper in an eddy and might easily have been carried to the summit of financial success had his own weight (some persons would call it his perversity) not pulled him down.

II

How was Saklatvala to project himself into the House of Commons? Had he the means and the influence?

Mr. Dadabhai Naoroji, the first Indian to get into that chamber, had an easy mind in respect of finance. So, at least, I understood. During the many decades he was in England he had assiduously courted the Liberal Party; but the British constituency he sought to woo gave him the cold shoulder and he was never able to enter the Commons a second time.

Sir Mancherjee M. Bhownaggree, who, for several years, sat on the Conservative benches in that House, was, if anything, wealthier and certainly no less shrewd than Dadabhai Naoroji. He was believed to be in intimate touch with the men who dominated the Tory Party: but it was obvious that they had not exerted themselves, otherwise he, too, would not have been out of Parliament at that time.

I reminded Saklatvala that he himself had given me to understand that he was not cumbered with a superfluity of this world’s goods. I feared, in fact, from what he said, that his means were narrow and he had a growing family.

But the situation did not perplex him at all. He had discovered a ladder by which he could climb into Parliament. Keir Hardie and Ramsay MacDonald had gone up it into the Commons. Why not he?

I reminded Saklatvala that he himself had given me to understand that he was not cumbered with a superfluity of this world’s goods… But… He had discovered a ladder by which he could climb into Parliament. Keir Hardie and Ramsay MacDonald had gone up it into the Commons. Why not he?

III

I had my doubts about British Labour permitting an Indian to climb into Parliament over its shoulders. Not so very long before I had come up against the Trades Unions in Canada and found them far from friendly towards our people, whose interests I had been trying to protect.

The trouble our immigrants were having in the Dominion, as also south of the border in the United States of America, had, in fact, been engineered by organized labour in those countries. White workmen looked upon our fellows as intruders.

I had my doubts about British Labour permitting an Indian to climb into Parliament… The trouble our immigrants were having in the Dominion, as also south of the border in the United States of America, had, in fact, been engineered by organized labour in those countries. White workmen looked upon our fellows as intruders.

Our immigrants might have won their title to pin service-medals against their breasts by valour on the battlefields across the Frontier and even beyond the seas. But that title was not recognized when it came to settling in an integral part of the British Empire and obtaining work on the railways or in the timber-yards. It certainly could not secure them free homesteads in the manless wilderness that stretched from almost the margin of the Pacific Ocean to the Great Lakes. Working men of European descent regarded them with hostility and, being closely united, had been able to move the administration to exclude our people all but in name.

IV

Saklatvala was sorry to hear my plaint. He launched into a tirade against the capitalistic system. In the last analysis, he said, that system was responsible for setting one labourer against another. Workers were exploited everywhere – a little more in one country, a little less in another – but exploited everywhere – “even here in England.” Their interests were, therefore, the same everywhere. Their objective should be the same. But for the capitalistic machinations, the wage-earners would fraternize, despite differences of race, colour and creed.

These assertions were made with a vehemence that sprang from inner conviction. It displayed to me something of the quality that would endear him to Socialists.

I might, of course, have said that some day the workers in Canada may realize that Indian labourers were in the same boat as themselves and fraternize with them: but, unless I was mistaken, that day was distant. Such a remark would not, however, have carried us any farther. So I contented myself with asking him how matters stood in England, which I was then visiting for the first time.

His experience, he assured me, had been of the pleasantest. He had, for years, been a member of the Independent Labour Party and had come in intimate contact with the leaders of that movement, whom he had found most sympathetic and helpful. He had met the workers and Trades-Union officials in various parts of Britain. They did not know very much about the Indian situation: but he had no doubt that, in their hearts, they were with the common people in India and not with those who lorded over them. Of that he was certain. I could test the accuracy of his statement any day I liked.

He had, for years, been a member of the Independent Labour Party… He had met the workers and Trades-Union officials in various parts of Britain. They did not know very much about the Indian situation: but he had no doubt that, in their hearts, they were with the common people in India and not with those who lorded over them.

V

Before Saklatvala departed that evening, I gleaned from his talk that he had taken great pains to cultivate the British Labourites. He was, in fact, devoting practically all his leisure – most of the evenings and week-ends – to that purpose. He would travel great distances and, if I remember aright, pay his own expenses, to address Labour audiences.

It was evident from his manner of speech that these peregrinations had done him much good. They had given him confidence in himself and a remarkable ability to marshal facts in a way that, I judged, must have made an irresistible appeal to Britons of the working classes.

Even in my study, he showed an inclination to indulge in monologues. The words poured out of his mouth with the rapidity of shot from a quick-firing Maxim gun. They seemed, moreover, to be charged with fire. They must have scorched any one against whom they were directed.

Before Saklatvala departed that evening, I gleaned from his talk that he had taken great pains to cultivate the British Labourites. He was, in fact, devoting practically all his leisure – most of the evenings and week-ends – to that purpose. He would travel great distances and, if I remember aright, pay his own expenses, to address Labour audiences.

His propensity for prolixity and “tub-thumping” amused me. So did his inclination to repeat the Socialist catch phrases. I was, however, struck with his earnestness and fixity of purpose. He had an objective to strive for and plenty of grit and industry to enable him to reach it.

For all his international outlook, he was at heart an Indian patriot. That fact was plain to me long before Mr. Pal and he bade me goodbye and departed for their respective homes. I hoped that he would soon obtain his heart’s desire and, from his seat in the House of Commons, trounce wrong-doers in India and secure redress for their victims.

I hoped that he would soon obtain his heart’s desire and, from his seat in the House of Commons, trounce wrong-doers in India and secure redress for their victims.

VI

In later years, as I got to know Saklatvala better and came in contact with some of the members of his immediate circle, I realized that he was paying a heavy price for his ambition. By concentrating his thoughts upon politics and doing more or less mechanically the work that gave him his living, he was not only sacrificing his future in the City but also was getting into the bad books of his wealthy kinsmen in India and the men whom they had placed in positions of responsibility at Capel House, Old Broad Street – the London headquarters of Messrs. Tata, Limited.

A worldly-wise person would, on the contrary, have considered himself fortunate in having any kind of footing in a powerful commercial concern with connections spread over three continents. By putting his back as well as his brain into the work allotted to him and winning the approbation of the “higher-ups” he would have pushed his way towards – if not to – the top.

I have known persons with no acuter brain and no greater capacity for application than Shapurji Saklatvala possessed to make great commercial careers for themselves and to acquire considerable wealth and even titles of nobility. Few of them had, in fact, been born and brought up in an atmosphere charged with business as he was, or had quite so good a start as he did.

His inclination, however, lay, at least at that time, in a wholly different direction. So much so, indeed, that business actually bored him. But for undeniable necessity he would have gone away from the City and devoted all his time and talents to politics, which engrossed his mind.

 

A worldly-wise person would… have considered himself fortunate in having any kind of footing in a powerful commercial concern with connections spread over three continents… I have known persons with no acuter brain and no greater capacity for application than Shapurji Saklatvala possessed to make great commercial careers for themselves and to acquire considerable wealth… His inclination, however, lay… in a wholly different direction.

 

VII

I recall a conversation in this connection that we had when, yielding to pressure, I dropped in upon him in his office in Capel House soon after I settled down in London in the summer of 1911, after an eleven months’ tour of India. He looked the picture of misery as he sat at his desk in a small room that, if my memory has not played me false, he shared with Mr. Kaiko Mehta, Sir Pherozshah Mehta’s son; or possibly the latter may have just happened to be there at the time of my visit.

Sir Pherozeshah Mehta

I remember, in any case, making Mr. Mehta’s acquaintance. He seemed to be the antithesis of Saklatvala – quiet and unobtrusive – not interested in politics, for which his father possessed a genius that elevated him to a dizzy height. There nevertheless seemed to be a perfect understanding between Shapurji and Kaiko and no small degree of affection.

The more I discussed matters with Saklatvala in that office, the more I was convinced that his heart was not in his work there. Instead of dealing with dry-as-dust affairs in that bee-hive of commerce, he would have liked to be out in the open air, addressing workers whom he understood and who understood him.

It appeared to me that he was not doing justice either to the firm that held him in fee or to himself. He was not unlike a man who was hacking away with a sharp axe at the very limb upon which he was seated. The only difference was that Saklatvala, in his spare moments, was attacking the capitalistic system which gave him and his family bread and butter, and not any particular unit of that system, much less Messrs. Tata, Limited.

He took my chaffing – or was it chiding? – quite coolly. Nearly everyone in the Socialist movement, he declared, suffered from a similar disability. He had to live, like everyone else. So long as society rested upon a capitalistic basis, he must inevitably draw his – and his family’s – support from capitalism. There was no help for it. I liked Saklatvala’s candidness.

Nearly everyone in the Socialist movement, he declared, suffered from a similar disability. He had to live, like everyone else. So long as society rested upon a capitalistic basis, he must inevitably draw his – and his family’s – support from capitalism.

VIII

The hard-headed men who conducted, from Capel House, business operations upon a scale regarded as respectable even in the City of London, must have looked upon Saklatvala as queer. Except on some occasion when, owing to his thoughts being occupied with socialist propaganda instead of with his work, there was a lapse that got him into trouble, as I have reason to believe sometimes happened, they tolerated him, more for his family’s than for his own sake.

I must hasten to add that if, in the eyes of practical men of the world, Saklatvala, in those days, was a species of lunatic, he was, to say the least, a mild one. They thought that the maggot of socialism had burrowed into his head and honey-combed the grey matter in his brain so that it could not function normally.

But they knew that he harmed no one except himself and his dependents by making it impossible for him to get on in the only way that the work-a-day world appreciates.

 

IX

Even persons who were not in sympathy with Saklatvala found him likable. When his jaw was not set like a trap and he was not chewing red hot steel in smiles. Possessed of a keen sense of humour, his eyes would beam with delight whenever something tickled his fancy. He had a great capacity for laughter and his laughter set others to laughing.

He was fond of visiting his acquaintances and friends, sometimes to the point of making a nuisance of himself. He was generally “packing” one or another of his children along with him.

I recall my wife remonstrating with him on one occasion. The boy he had brought to our house late in the evening was quite small and fractious with sleepiness. She told Saklatvala that it was long past the hour when a child should be in bed. What sort of love was it, she asked, that made him lose sight of his son’s comfort and his future welfare?

“That is just it, Mrs. Singh,” was his ready reply, a smile playing upon his lips and his eyes gleaming with mischief. “You have hit the nail square on the head. I am thinking of the child’s future, otherwise I should not bring him to your house. Some words from your or your husband’s lips might fall upon his ears and prove the making of him. The making of him.”

That reply was as clever as it was sincere. It disarmed wrath. Mrs. Singh got out of her chair, carried the child in her arms to the sofa in the corner of the drawing room where we were sitting, and laid him there to sleep until his sire was ready to jump to catch a late (or was it the last?) train for the night that would carry him to his home in Twickenham, several miles distant from our house.

 

 

X

Of Saklatvala’s sociability I cannot speak too highly. He was particularly keen upon Indians away from the Motherland meeting other Indians likewise exiled. I have a re-collection (rather a dim one) that he had a hand in the establishment of the Indian Social Club, of which Sir Mancherjee M. Bhownaggree, who, in politics, was diametrically opposed to Saklatvala, was for years the President. He was, in any case, conspicuous at all the functions of that organization which I was invited to attend.

While he loved to talk in Gujarati whenever he got the opportunity, there was not a trace of sectionalism in him. A Parsi meant no more to him than an Indian who professed Hinduism, Sikhism, Islam or Christianity. He fraternized with all Indians, irrespective of their race, religion or rank.

The hospitable instinct used, in fact, to run away with him. Eating a meal by himself at a restaurant, even during the brief luncheon hour that businessmen in the City allow themselves, was a misery to him. He would invite friends and even chance acquaintances to meals in town. I doubt if there was ever a Sunday or a holiday when he was not attending or addressing a labour meeting, that he did not insist upon someone having luncheon or tea, usually both, at his home. In this way he frittered away a good deal of money that a less emotional person would have conserved.

He also caused no end of work for his wife – an English girl, nicely brought up, gentle-mannered and true as steel. They employed only a general servant – often not a very efficient one, I fear – and entertaining involved back-breaking work for Sehri Saklatvala.

The hospitable instinct used, in fact, to run away with him. Eating a meal by himself at a restaurant, even during the brief luncheon hour that businessmen in the City allow themselves, was a misery to him. He would invite friends and even chance acquaintances to meals in town. I doubt if there was ever a Sunday or a holiday when he was not attending or addressing a labour meeting, that he did not insist upon someone having luncheon or tea, usually both, at his home.

She, too, had very strongly developed social gifts. Whenever my wife or I tried to commiserate with her she made light of the trouble and spoke of the pleasure entertaining gave her. I must say that this was no mere make-believe upon her part.

XI

Nor did this social socialist lack in aesthetic instinct. That side of his nature was revealed to me on one occasion when he took me from his hometown in Twickenham, after a hearty luncheon at his home, to Richmond, where his millionaire cousin Sir Ratan Tata, to whom he was deeply attached, had, some years earlier, bought an estate and spent immense sums upon improving the grounds and enlarging, beautifying and furnishing the mansion. As he leisurely conducted me over the house, vacant at the time, his eye lingered over the silk curtains, tapestried chairs and sofas and soft pile carpets. The richness of the stuff and the exquisite blending of one tone with another delighted him. He spoke in warm terms of Lady Tata’s artistic taste, which had found unfettered expression there. He also told me of Sir Ratan’s interest in archaeology and of his quiet but discriminating charities.

Sir Ratan Tata

Under the hard crust of realism I discovered there was in Saklatvala love of the beautiful. Had he possessed ampler resources, I felt, he might have created a wholly different environment for himself and may even have not been such a “hot-gospeller” of socialism. Such was not meant to be the case, however, by the Fates that control the destinies of men.

 

Sir Ratan Tata was the last private owner of York House, in Richmond Road, Twickenham

 

XII

Shapurji must have been born with a combative faculty that, as he grew older, developed and, in time, dominated his whole nature. I recall his once confiding in me that while he was studying, I believe at St. Xavier’s College in Bombay, Mrs. Annie Besant visited that city and delivered an address. Something in her manner or message made him wroth. With the aid of some companions bent upon mischief, he tried to raise an uproar in the meeting.

Saklatvala never got over his dislike of Mrs. Besant. He found her socialism “as weak as water” – questioned the genuineness of her interest in Indian workers’ welfare – poked fun at her politics. His ideas had become so fixed in his mind that reasoning was of no avail.

Annie Besant

He found fault also with Mahatma Gandhi, chiefly because the Mahatma refused to quarrel with mill-owners while seeking to befriend the workers. Still greater hatred was reserved by him for the men who managed Congress affairs in London. He tried more than once to storm the citadel of the British Committee, but without success.

Saklatvala never got over his dislike of Mrs. Besant. He found her socialism “as weak as water” – questioned the genuineness of her interest in Indian workers’ welfare – poked fun at her politics… He found fault also with Mahatma Gandhi, chiefly because the Mahatma refused to quarrel with mill-owners while seeking to befriend the workers. Still greater hatred was reserved by him for the men who managed Congress affairs in London. He tried more than once to storm the citadel of the British Committee, but without success.

 

Mahatma Gandhi

XIII

Saklatvala had started an organization of his own. He called it the “Workers’ Welfare League of India.” It advocated the making of provision in India for the welfare of the working population “equivalent to if not identical with that granted to the working people of Great Britain”.

No one with a spark of humanity could help but admire the ideal. It was, however, beyond the realm of practicability. Conditions in India differed from those in Britain so widely that only a visionary could ask factory owners in Bombay, Ahmedabad and other Indian centres to approximate to British standards either in respect of hours or wages.

Our industrial workers came mostly from the countryside and did not stick to the mill or the factory throughout the year, let alone throughout their lives. They sprang from stock that, for generations, had been under-fed. What little physical strength they possessed when they entered the city was drained out of them by the work to which they were unused and by the insanitary conditions in which they were compelled to live and the temptations to which many of them succumbed. Their minds were steeped in ignorance and they lacked discipline of any description. How could anyone with any sense expect these men and women to produce as much yarn or fabric as a “hand” in Britain?

Saklatvala would not see this aspect of the case. Whenever it was brought to his notice, he would merely assert that even with the low per capita output, the mill-owners in India were battening on the toil of the wage-workers and that they could well afford to raise conditions to the British level.

Saklatvala had started an organization of his own. He called it the “Workers’ Welfare League of India.” It advocated the making of provision in India for the welfare of the working population “equivalent to if not identical with that granted to the working people of Great Britain”.

 

XIV

Again and again Saklatvala pressed me to join the League he had started. Each time I refused to have anything to do with it. He was impatient, sometimes to the point of rudeness, he did not part company with me, however.

He kept on coming to our house as before – oftener, if anything. At the back of his brain he had an idea that one day he would convert me to his doctrine and I would cease to regard the political as the dominating factor in India.

In the summer of 1919, I remember, he sent one of his British colleagues to reinforce him in the campaign to capture my support. One of his “very common man friends,” he called him in the letter that he sent to introduce him to me. Always in a hurry, he wished me to see his friend “now.”

“You,” he wrote in this letter, “might again charge me with attempting to force Economic Reform before Political Reforms. It is not you or I that decide it (that matter). The world has decided that the Political Reforms that are mere Class advances are of no value to human happiness.” On the contrary, he argued, “the world’s progress demands Mass Political Reforms, and these can only be achieved through and within Economic Reforms.”

  

XV

Saklatvala’s appeal to the “democratic circles of Great Britain” to see to it that the hours of work in India were scaled down while wages were raised, aroused interest in the minds of organized Labour in that Island. This was particularly the case in Lancashire and other counties that looked with a jealous eye upon the expansion of power industries in Bombay, Nagpur, Ahmedabad and other Indian centres. The higher the costs of production in these centres, they argued, the less the Indian competition to be feared.

The “general principle that Orientals have a claim to human rights similar to those of Occidentals” had, therefore, a dual fascination for the Britons with whom Saklatvala associated. It appealed to their humanitarian instincts and at the same time conserved their economic interests. It provided unction for the soul and cream for the body.

To suggest that this truth had never dawned upon Saklatvala would be to underrate his intelligence. Even persons who regarded him as wayward could not take him for a fool.

I will not say, or even imply, however, that he adopted that line of agitation merely because he knew it would make him solid with the British wage-workers who were becoming increasingly alarmed at India’s industrialization.

My contact with him was intimate enough to make me feel that, in this matter, as in others, he acted from inner conviction. No man – Indian or non-Indian – I have met had the welfare of Indian labourers – and of Indians in general – more at heart than he did.

The “general principle that Orientals have a claim to human rights similar to those of Occidentals” had, therefore, a dual fascination for the Britons with whom Saklatvala associated. It appealed to their humanitarian instincts and at the same time conserved their economic interests… I will not say, or even imply, however, that he adopted that line of agitation merely because he knew it would make him solid with the British wage-worker… No man – Indian or non-Indian – I have met had the welfare of Indian labourers – and of Indians in general – more at heart than he did.

 

XVI

Through the years of our lengthy acquaintance Saklatvala was becoming more and more vocal – more and more radical. This was particularly the case after the revolution in Russia. The break-down of the capitalistic system in that country he regarded as the beginning of the end of that system all over the world.

His drift towards Communism might have been tolerated by Messrs. Tata, had he not been so vocal. The men in command there did not like being associated in the public mind with such doctrines.

The day of parting came. It would have gone hard against Saklatvala and his family had provision for the future not been made. It enabled him to continue to live as he had been doing.

He had hoped that the Labour movement in the land where he had pitched his camp would go communist the way he did. He spoke to me, on more than one occasion, as if his wish were being realized.

He soon found out his mistake. Many of the Britons whom he had regarded as radical proved to be conservative, from his point of view, and refused to plunge into the uncharted ocean of Communism.

Even after his break with life-long associates in the Labour Party, Saklatvala did not lose out with the British workers. To thousands of them he remained the “Good Old Sak” that he was before the great upheaval. They continued to believe in his devotion to the cause of the submerged classes – in his genuine and undying hatred of all economic forms of exploitation.

The Labour element in North Battersea, across the Thames from Westminster, enabled Saklatvala to realize his life’s ambition in 1923 by sending him to the Commons. His faith in the British working-man was justified. Re-elected the following year, he remained in that House until the dissolution in 1929.

His drift towards Communism might have been tolerated by Messrs. Tata, had he not been so vocal… The day of parting came… The Labour element in North Battersea, across the Thames from Westminster, enabled Saklatvala to realize his life’s ambition in 1923 by sending him to the Commons. His faith in the British working-man was justified. Re-elected the following year, he remained in that House until the dissolution in 1929.

I cannot speak, from personal knowledge, of the work he did during those years, for they were spent by me away from Britain. I am sure, however, that he used every opportunity he could make to advance India’s cause, which, without question, was dear to his heart.

 

March 1936

ABOUT ‘THE MODERN REVIEW’:

 The Modern Review was founded in 1907 by Ramananda Chatterjee, who also founded and edited the Bengali magazine, Prabasi and the Hindi magazine, Vishal Bharat. All three periodicals can be best described as journals of opinion.

The Modern Review published essays by practically every well-known leader of the Indian nationalist movement, along with the views of foreign sympathisers. It also carried rousing editorials from Ramananda Babu himself. After his demise in 1943, his son Kedarnath carried on the good work until he passed away in 1965. The magazine also published fiction, book and art reviews, travelogues, etc., including essays by pioneers like the anthropologist Verrier Elwin and historian, Jadunath Sarkar.

Ramananda Babu allowed his contributors to present every shade of opinion and argue their cases, while ensuring the magazine itself maintained an impartial editorial stance. He was happy to publish long multi-issue arguments between luminaries like Tagore-Gandhi and Subhas Bose-Sardar Patel about the shape and direction of the nationalist movement. Contemporary opinions about topics such as education, women’s rights, the relations between religions and castes, electoral politics, India’s place in the world, and international relations can be accessed and contextualised by leafing through the archives of this journal of record.  

—Devangshu Datta

To read a select anthology of articles, interviews, poetry and fiction published from 1907-1947 in the Modern Review, you can buy‘Patriots, Poets and Prisoners’ here.

ARCHIVE

AYODHYA: 1800–1857 

 

A glimpse of life during this period in Ayodhya is hard to come by, but rare interstices in the form of British gazettes give us fleeting insights. Published in 1828, Walter Hamilton’s gazette is devoid of any specific details. But it does capture the general attributes of Awadh—the province and Ayodhya. Written twenty-six years before the great rebellion of 1857 and almost an equal number after the Treaty of 1801, it describes the Hindus of the province as:

 

‘ …a very superior race, both in their bodily strength and mental faculties, to those of Bengal and the districts south of Calcutta… Rajpoots or military class here generally exceed Europeans in stature, have robust frames, and are possessed of many valuable qualities in a military point of view. From the long predominance of the Mahomedans a considerable proportion of the inhabitants profess that religion, and from both persuasions a great number of the Company’s best sepoys are procured.’

 

This is also perhaps how the moniker of Awadh being ‘a nursery of sepoys’ came into being. About Ayodhya, the town of Ram, Hamilton writes:

 

‘This town is esteemed as one of the most sacred places of antiquity.

 

‘Pilgrims resort to this vicinity, where the remains of the ancient city of Oude, the capital of the great Rama, are still to be seen; but whatever may have been its former magnificence it now exhibits nothing but a shapeless mass of ruins. The modern town extends a considerable way along the banks of the Goggra, adjoining Fyzabad, and is tolerably well peopled; but inland it is a mass of rubbish and jungle, among which are the reputed sites of temples dedicated to Rama, Seeta, his wife, Lakshman, his general, and Hunimaun (a large monkey), his prime minister. The religious mendicants who perform the pilgrimage to Oude are chiefly of the Ramata [Ramawat] sect, who walk round the temples and idols, bathe in the holy pools, and perform the customary ceremonies.’

 

 

The Hamilton Gazette

 

 

It is noteworthy that Hamilton finds not one temple worthy enough to be described in detail. He merely sums up the religious affiliation—belonging to the Ramanandi Ramawat sect—of the monks, and his account also makes no mention of Ram’s birthplace temple or the Hanumangarhi or even the ancient Nageshwarnath temple. Hamilton recorded what he saw, and perhaps this was all there was to be found: a town in the wilderness, within which lay ruins that had come to be woven with cobwebs and legends of Ram. The majority of Ayodhya’s population stayed close to the river, and some isolated temples had come up across the inland keorah (a tree used for perfumes and spices) forests. In short, it was (unlike it is now) a place shorn of the humdrum of a big pilgrim centre or the buzz of the religious bazaar of other Hindu centres like Haridwar and Banaras.

 

 

It is noteworthy that Hamilton finds not one temple worthy enough to be described in detail… Hamilton recorded what he saw, and perhaps this was all there was to be found: a town in the wilderness, within which lay ruins that had come to be woven with cobwebs and legends of Ram… In short, it was (unlike it is now) a place shorn of the humdrum of a big pilgrim centre or the buzz of the religious bazaar of other Hindu centres like Haridwar and Banaras.

 

FIRST BATTLE OVER A PLACE OF WORSHIP IN AYODHYA

 

The year 1855 was momentous in the history of Ayodhya. It is often cited as the year in which the recorded history of the Ram Janmabhoomi– Babri Masjid dispute commences. It should also be seen as a marker of the half-truths that have come to systematically shroud the vexed issue. This is because in 1855, the bloody conflict that took place was not over the supposed birthplace of Ram. It was over the Hanumangarhi temple and the claims by certain Sunnis that the Bairagis of Hanumangarhi had destroyed a mosque that existed atop it. The Muslims charged on the Hanumangarhi but were repelled and routed. They hid inside the mosque of Babur that lay at a distance of less than a kilometre from Hanumangarhi. In this way, the site of the Babri Masjid became embroiled in the dispute over Hanumangarhi. At the time of the 1855 riot, the Bairagis had not claimed the Babri mosque as the birthplace of Ram. It was only much later that the conflict of 1855 came to be associated primarily with the Babri Masjid instead of the Hanumangarhi temple. Today, it is widely believed that the first recorded Hindu struggle for Ram’s birthplace dates back to the events of 1855.

 

 

…in 1855, the bloody conflict that took place was not over the supposed birthplace of Ram. It was over the Hanumangarhi temple and the claims by certain Sunnis that the Bairagis of Hanumangarhi had destroyed a mosque that existed atop it.

 

 

It is ironic that despite voluminous British and other contemporary records of the incident, it is this falsified version that is accepted as the ‘truth’. There are however, some incontrovertible facts about it:

 

Firstly, that the Muslims claimed that there was a mosque on Hanumangarhi and that it was destroyed by the Bairagis.

 

Secondly, that there took place a bloody battle in which Muslims were routed and that they took shelter in the Babri mosque.

 

And finally, at least till the 1855 dispute, the Babri Masjid had not been claimed as Ram’s birthplace.

 

 

HANUMANGARHI: AYODHYA’S PRE-EMINENT TEMPLE

 

Hanumangarhi, a temple of Hanuman, Ram’s most devout devotee, is built atop a small hillock that also happens to be the highest point in Ayodhya. Today, it is a well-fortified temple, with fourteen cannons adorning its ramparts. At its foot live hundreds of Bairagis, the more important ones live in modern buildings equipped with all conveniences. It is the most favoured temple for the lakhs of devotees who visit Ayodhya every year. For them a trip to Ayodhya has always meant a dip in the Sarayu, followed by a visit to Nageshwarnath and Hanumangarhi. Hanuman is special even to Ram; therefore it is no surprise that for Hindu pilgrims too, he is sometimes revered more than Ram himself.

 

Even though Hanuman is identified with Ram by most lay devotees, he is claimed by both Vaishnavas and Shaivas (in fact to lay devotees, Ram, Shankar, Vishnu, Hanuman and Ganesh are all forms of the same god).

 

Devdutt Pattanaik, in some ways a modern version of Valmiki himself, explains Hanuman’s all-round appeal thus:

 

‘According to Shaivites, Shiva himself descended as Hanuman to destroy Ravana, an errant Shiva-bhakta. They said that Ravana had offered his ten heads to Shiva and obtained boons that made him very powerful. But as Rudra, Shiva has eleven forms. Ravana’s offering of ten heads satisfied ten forms of Rudra. The eleventh unhappy Rudra took birth as Hanuman to kill Ravana. Hence Hanuman is also Raudreya.

 

‘To establish their superiority, Vishnu-worshippers argued that Hanuman, hence Shiva, obeyed instructions given by Vishnu. To counter this, Shiva-worshippers said that without Hanuman’s help, Ram would never have found Sita. In many stories, it is Hanuman who enables the killing of Ravana. For example, in one Telugu retelling, despite knowing that Ravana’s life resided in his navel, Ram shot only at the head of Ravana as he was too proud a warrior to shoot below the neck. So Hanuman sucked in air into his lungs and caused the wind to shift direction causing Ram’s arrow to turn and strike Ravana’s navel. Association with Shiva, and with celibacy, was reinforced by Hanuman’s association with the various ascetic schools of Hinduism, from the Nath-jogis who followed the path of Matsyendranath from around 1,000 years ago, to the Vedantic mathas who followed Madhva-acharya from around 700 years ago, to Sant Ramdas who inspired many Maratha warriors 400 years ago. The latter sages, especially during the bhakti period, introduced the idea of connecting celibacy with service; you give up your worldly pleasures and work for the worldly aspirations of society. Just as the hermit Shiva becomes the householder Shankara for the benefit of Humanity, they spoke of how the ascetic Hanuman became Ram’s servant for the benefit of society.’

 

So, irrespective of whether it was the Bairagis or the Shaiva Sanyasis or Nath-Yogis who were the original founders of Hanumangarhi, at the time of the 1855 conflict, Ayodhya and Hanumangarhi both had become centres of the Ramanandis.

 

Land was first allotted to one Abhayaram Das of Hanumangarhi in the time of Saadat Khan, who, as we have seen earlier, was the first governor of Awadh, between 1722–1739 CE. Subsequently, his successors, Safdarjung as well as Shuja-ud-daulah, supported the temple’s construction with more revenue land grants. Finally, in the time of Asaf-ud-daulah, the Hanumangarhi temple was completed. It is important to note here that according to tradition, the first land grant made to Hanumangarhi was after the Galta conference of 1718 CE, and the completion of Hanumangarhi happened only in 1799 CE under Diwan Tikait Rai during Asaf-ud-daulah’s governorship of Awadh. Asaf-ud-daulah, as we have seen, moved the capital even further away from Ayodhya—from Faizabad to Lucknow. Earlier, Safdarjung had moved the capital from Ayodhya to Faizabad. Some writers find the shifting of the capital as evidence of the Muslim nawabs recognizing the Hindu pre-eminence of Ayodhya. There is no evidence to suggest that this was the reason, but from a strategic point of view, Faizabad would have made more sense as it was more suited for the founding of a capital with its vast plains and the river Sarayu’s wide channel protecting it in the west.

 

 

Ayodhya as seen from the river Ghaghara, Uttar Pradesh. Coloured etching by William Hodges.

 

 

Land was first allotted to one Abhayaram Das of Hanumangarhi in the time of Saadat Khan, who, as we have seen earlier, was the first governor of Awadh, between 1722–1739 CE. Subsequently, his successors, Safdarjung as well as Shuja-ud-daulah, supported the temple’s construction with more revenue land grants. Finally, in the time of Asaf-ud-daulah, the Hanumangarhi temple was completed… Asaf-ud-daulah, as we have seen, moved the capital even further away from Ayodhya—from Faizabad to Lucknow… Some writers find the shifting of the capital as evidence of the Muslim nawabs recognizing the Hindu pre-eminence of Ayodhya. There is no evidence to suggest that this was the reason, but from a strategic point of view, Faizabad would have made more sense… 

 

 

1855 CONFLICT: THE WEAKENING POWER OF LUCKNOW AND INCREASING BRITISH INTERFERENCE

 

By 1855, the British had become the de facto rulers of Awadh. British troops were present in places like Faizabad, Lucknow and Gorakhpur to ensure the stability of areas under their direct control. With the help of a large spy network, the British officers ensured that they were in step with the developments in the province. In February 1855, the Resident of Lucknow, Major General G. B. Outram of the Awadh Frontier Police, had written to Wajid Ali Shah, warning him of a ‘dreadful breach of peace’ by Muslims led by one Shah Ghulam Hussein. Muslim fundamentalists in north India had gained much currency owing to the weakening of the absolute supremacy of rulers. In Awadh, the situation was a little more suitable for people like Hussein, given that the rulers of the province were Shia and a large number of the Muslim population were Sunni. In addition to this, there existed a historical rivalry between the mostly Sunni Afghan-origin Pathans and the more recent arrivals, non-Afghani Shias. But more than anything it was the defiance of rulers by religious leaders that incited the conflict. Muslim religious preachers had started to blame the godlessness of the rulers for the enslavement by the British, and openly preached jihad.

 

 

In Awadh, the situation was a little more suitable for people like Hussein, given that the rulers of the province were Shia and a large number of the Muslim population were Sunni. In addition to this, there existed a historical rivalry between the mostly Sunni Afghan-origin Pathans and the more recent arrivals, non-Afghani Shias. But more than anything it was the defiance of rulers by religious leaders that incited the conflict. Muslim religious preachers had started to blame the godlessness of the rulers for the enslavement by the British, and openly preached jihad.

 

 

The letter Major General Outram to the King of Awadh, Wajid Ali Shah, dated 8 February 1855, stated with the certitude of foreknowledge and forewarning:

 

‘ …it appears that Shah Ghulam Hussein has assembled a large force of Musulmans at Kotuaha in the neighbourhood of Fyzabad and is intent upon committing some dreadful breach of the peace and is determined to destroy and ruin the Hunnooman Ghurrie which is inhabited by Hindoos… His Lieutt. [astt.] called the Maulvee Sahib (Three maulvis or Muslim priests feature in reference to Faizabad and the 1857 mutiny. Ghulam Hussein; Ameer Ali of Amethi who was killed by the Awadh forces while on a march to attack Hanumangarhi; Maulvi Ahmadulah Shah who appeared in Faizabad in 1856 and was imprisoned by the British for his anti-British speeches.) is even more diabolically inclined and ready for strife—hence the mendicants and devotees, who are there at Hunnooman Ghuree in defence of their lives have been obliged to arm themselves… therefore the Resident feeling exceedingly anxious on this subject entreats His Majesty to despatch a very swift camel messenger with all possible speed, to convey to the King’s servants, most peremptory orders to cause the immediate apprehension of Ghulam Hussein and his coadjutors.’

 

Maulvi Ghulam Hussein claimed to his followers that the Bairagis of Hanumangarhi had destroyed a mosque atop that hillock which needed to be redressed by rebuilding it. A large number of Muslims gathered on his side in support of this cause, and having the confidence of belonging to the religion of the ruler, charged at the 70-feet-high Hanumangarhi on 28 July 1855. With help from Hindus from surrounding areas, the Bairagis and the more militant Naga sadhus (Vaishnavas), repulsed this attack and routed the maulvi and his followers. The Muslims retreated to the Babri Masjid, which was then attacked by the Bairagis. More than sixty-five Muslims were killed and the Bairagis allegedly held possession of the mosque for three days. The bodies of Ghulam Hussein’s men (he managed to escape) were buried around the mosque and the area later came to be known as Ganj Shaheeda, or Martyr’s Place or Quarters.

 

Captain A. P. Orr, as the British officer in charge of the troops stationed in Faizabad, acting on intelligence about the impending attack, had secured a temporary peace between the Bairagis and Shah’s followers a day earlier. The peace he had secured was by dint of placing his troops between the Hanumangarhi and the Babri Masjid. Orr expected reinforcements the following day; however, as he realized later, the few buildings that existed then were all filled with the supporters of the Bairagis. Having prevented violence for a day by invoking the power of the king and the British Resident, Orr returned to his house at night.

 

 

Maulvi Ghulam Hussein claimed to his followers that the Bairagis of Hanumangarhi had destroyed a mosque atop that hillock which needed to be redressed by rebuilding it. A large number of Muslims gathered on his side in support of this cause, and having the confidence of belonging to the religion of the ruler, charged at the 70-feet-high Hanumangarhi on 28 July 1855. 

 

 

Ghulam Hussein and his band of ‘fanatic’ followers used the Babri Masjid as the launching place for the attack that finally took place on 28 July 1855 at around 1 p.m. A. P. Orr’s first-person account gives us an insight into how the British viewed the entire episode. After the battle, Orr in a letter to his superior, G. K. Weston, superintendent of the Awadh Frontier Police, wrote:

 

‘ …with regard to Shah’s people all our remonstrances were of no avail; persuasion, entreaty, threats, all were lost on these fanatics. On the other hand the Byragees were perfectly willing to listen to us and to obey the government orders… the answer that we last obtained from the Shah’s people was that at the time of Johur Nemaz [Muslim prayer after mid-day] they would attack the Byragees and not listen to further proposals as they could no longer restrain the Ghazees [volunteers ready to die in a religious cause].’

 

By the morning of 28 July 1855, Orr’s small force had been augmented by more troops led by Captain Hearsey, another officer, and in all they had 150 men and a few guns. Deciding not to intervene, they moved to a better vantage point from where the imminent battle between the two parties could be observed. Orr continues:

 

‘ …the Mahomedans may at the outset have numbered 4 or 500 men, the Byragees with their allies more than 8000. The leaders of the Shah’s party were soon laid prostrate while endeavouring to cheer on their men towards the Hunooman Gurrie, the greater portion of the Shah’s allies i.e Mahomedan inhabitants of Oude and of Fyzabad fled on every side and his own immediate followers together with few friends who still remained staunch to him, retreated.’

 

The maulvi and his Ghazees were badly routed and they ran back to the masjid ‘pursued by the Hindoos’.

 

In the letter, Orr records for the first time the use of the Babri Masjid as a hiding place by the retreating followers of Ghulam Hussein.

 

That day a general massacre of those hiding in the masjid took place. Orr described it as a ‘deadly contest’, in which ‘the Byragees yelling and furious though obstinately resisted closing on the Musjid hemmed it in on every side and after a few desperate efforts stormed it and gave no quarter’. Orr records that seventy of the Shah’s people were killed, ‘and as many perhaps or more of the Byragees and their allies’.

 

 

In the letter, Orr records for the first time the use of the Babri Masjid as a hiding place by the retreating followers of Ghulam Hussein.

 

That day a general massacre of those hiding in the masjid took place. Orr described it as a ‘deadly contest’, in which ‘the Byragees yelling and furious though obstinately resisted closing on the Musjid hemmed it in on every side and after a few desperate efforts stormed it and gave no quarter’. 

 

 

Watching the massacre from a distance as a passive observer needed to be explained to his superiors, and Orr did so by suggesting that their numbers were too few and thus if they had intervened, and failed, a general insurrection would have been likely. ‘Thus we remained passive though during the whole of this fray we endeavoured by every means in our power to restore peace,’ Orr wrote. Hostilities were briefly interrupted because of a monsoon storm and during this short break, Orr tried to get the Muslims in the masjid to take shelter in his position which was defended by small cannons and guns, but they refused to do so. Soon enough the rain stopped and fighting resumed, which ended only when all the Muslims were either dead or had escaped.

 

The concluding part of Orr’s letter—in which he demarcates the different equations at play in this affair—is more important. He writes that the nawab’s local nazim or agent of the district, Aghai Ally Khan, was a Shia and Ghulam Hussein and his followers Sunni; therefore a compromise would not have been reached. About the Hindu leadership, Orr wrote, ‘as to Raja Maun Singh, his followers openly espoused the cause of the Byragees, his claims to impartiality must therefore be much questioned’. Raja Man Singh was in charge of Sultanpore under which Oude (or Ayodhya) also fell.

 

 

He (Orr) writes that the nawab’s local nazim or agent of the district, Aghai Ally Khan, was a Shia and Ghulam Hussein and his followers Sunni; therefore a compromise would not have been reached. About the Hindu leadership, Orr wrote, ‘as to Raja Maun Singh, his followers openly espoused the cause of the Byragees, his claims to impartiality must therefore be much questioned’. Raja Man Singh was in charge of Sultanpore under which Oude (or Ayodhya) also fell.

 

 

Another reason for Orr to not intervene in the battle was that he doubted the loyalties of his Hindu and Muslim soldiers if he ordered them into a three-way fight. Thus, the first bloody battle in Ayodhya came to an end, with a cynical British force overseeing it from a vantage point. And once all seventy odd Muslims and many more Hindus were killed, Orr seemed to justify his inaction; in characteristically colonial style, he blamed the Hindus and Muslims for their own deaths. Orr reasoned, ‘in conclusion though none can more than ourselves regret that so many blind misguided creatures have been so summarily disposed of, yet, it may truly be said that their blood is on their own head’. This—as British history in India vindicates—was a pattern: the British were somehow always ‘too few in number’ to prevent a massacre of Indians by Indians.

 

 

Outram, Resident at Lucknow.

 

 

 

TRIPARTITE COMMISSION OF ENQUIRY

 

A series of letters, secret communiqués and meetings followed the massacre at Faizabad. In August 1855, the British and the nawab were so completely occupied with this matter that not a day passed without the Resident, G. B. Outram, weighing in on this issue, either in letters to Governor General Lord Dalhousie in Calcutta, or in meetings with Wajid Ali Shah, even as he continued to exchange reports and instructions with his subordinates like Orr.

 

It seems the nawab had been warned about the possibility of such violence before it occurred and it was brought up by Resident Outram when he met Wajid Ali Shah on 1 August 1855 at a conference held at a palace called Zard Kothi. The nawab was surprised to learn this and denied any prior knowledge at which point Outram produced a copy of an earlier letter of warning.

 

The nawab, cautious not to appear to be siding with the Hindus, did not, at first, agree with the Resident’s suggestion of setting up a tripartite commission of enquiry made up of ‘Hindus, Muslims and a Christian judge’. The nawab’s own view was to first allow for a cooling of tempers on both sides before such a step was taken. Given the rising anger in his Muslim subjects against the massacre of Muslims in Ayodhya, the nawab was worried about a backlash.

 

Outram, taking up the cudgels on behalf of Hindus, reminded the nawab that over two-thirds of Awadh’s population was Hindu and that it wouldn’t be wise to give them any cause for enmity. The Hindu chiefs were powerful and would not remain quiet and unmoved if ‘the contest were renewed and any further outrages were committed on shrines which from time immemorial had been held by them as peculiarly sacred’.

 

The nawab having been persuaded by Outram, issued instructions for the constitution of a commission comprising Captain Alexander Orr (who had watched the bloody battle), Raja Man Singh and Chukledar Aghai Ally Khan to ‘commence an immediate investigation into all the particulars connected with the melancholy loss of life—assuring all parties that they should have a patient hearing and most complete redress’. This tripartite commission of enquiry became the first such body to be appointed in the case of Ayodhya.

 

Almost 150 years later, another commission of enquiry would be set up by the Government of India, under its archaeology wing, but as we shall see, it would have nothing to do with Hanumangarhi or the alleged destruction of a mosque on it. In a remarkable diversion from the original, primeval source of dispute the masjid from which Captain Orr said the Muslims launched their attack on Hanumangarhi would become the site of the same claims and counterclaims. After the 1857 rebellion and the victory of the British to 1980s–1990s India, Hindus would go on to expand their claims to argue that the mosque referred to by Orr was built exactly atop Ram’s birthplace, while Muslims would deny this by saying it was a concocted story.

 

 

The nawab having been persuaded by Outram, issued instructions for the constitution of a commission comprising Captain Alexander Orr (who had watched the bloody battle), Raja Man Singh and Chukledar Aghai Ally Khan to ‘commence an immediate investigation… ’… Almost 150 years later, another commission of enquiry would be set up by the Government of India, under its archaeology wing, but as we shall see, it would have nothing to do with Hanumangarhi or the alleged destruction of a mosque on it. In a remarkable diversion from the original, primeval source of dispute the masjid from which Captain Orr said the Muslims launched their attack on Hanumangarhi would become the site of the same claims and counterclaims. 

 

 

Back in 1855, Outram, the cautious Resident, after getting the commission of enquiry constituted, set about ensuring that the military presence of the British remained strong in Lucknow. He also detailed the entire sequence of events in a letter to Governor General Dalhousie and brought him abreast of the happenings. On 4 August, three days after his meeting with Wajid Ali Shah, Outram stated that the removal of any troops from Lucknow would be hazardous to peace and stability given the high state of vengeful excitement that he claimed the Muslims were in. He also seems to have acted against the advice of his officer, Captain A. P. Orr, by getting the king to set up the commission under Man Singh and Aghai Ally Khan. Orr believed that the two neither got along nor could they be trusted to act above their religious affiliations. Patting both himself and the Hindus on the back, Outram omitted this fact from his letter to Dalhousie. He wrote:

 

‘I hope the mixed commission consisting of Captain Orr, Aghai Ally Khan and Rajah Maun Singh possessing as it does an equal Mahomeddan and Hindoo element with a Christian Umpire may inspire confidence so as to induce the belligerents to submit to their mediation; for the victorious Hindoos have heretofore displayed the most praiseworthy forbearance and the humbled Mahomedan factions are more likely now to listen to reason.’

 

Reverting to his fears about the possible fallout of the withdrawal of troops, he concluded his letter by saying:

 

‘ …but certainly any weakening of the British troops at Lucknow at this juncture when such exaggerated reports of the success of the Sunthal rebels prevail and the already reduced strength of the Cawnporre Brigade is known would be highly dangerous as calculated to encourage the excited Hindoos who form 4/5th of the Oude population to aim at higher objects.’

 

It appears that Outram knew quite well that he was playing with fire. While he was endeavouring to implement a British plan to annex Awadh, he wanted to be careful not to allow the situation to go out of control. The violence over Hanumangarhi had given the British another pretext to decry the Awadh king, but if not handled with care, Hindu fury and Muslim anger could turn into a general insurrection against the British as well.

 

 

It appears that Outram knew quite well that he was playing with fire. While he was endeavouring to implement a British plan to annex Awadh, he wanted to be careful not to allow the situation to go out of control. 

 

 

 

Wajid Ali Shah

 

 

In Ayodhya, things were moving at a fast pace in the usually quiet temple town. Since the massacre by the Bairagis and their supporters—mostly men from neighbouring villages, the Muslims of Ayodhya had moved out to other safer places. At the same time, the news of this defeat was bringing in Muslims from neighbouring districts to Faizabad every day. The usually more hardline Pathans among them had united under the banner of two maulvis, Ameer Ali and Ramzan Ali of Amethi, who were now said to be marching towards Ayodhya. Through hurriedly written letters, Outram and Wajid Ali Shah had informed each other of the developments at almost the same time. Outram pleaded with the king to direct his servants to ensure that the events of July were not repeated, he implored the king to order the stopping of ‘Pathans and others who are bent in proceeding to Fyzabad and especially to cause the arrest of the two Maulavees’. Wajid Ali Shah, the nawab-king of Awadh, equally concerned by the threat of more violence along religious lines, wrote to Resident Outram:

 

‘ …it appears from newswriters’ reports that numerous Hindoos and Musulmans are flocking into that place from all sides and that many more are determined to join them. The King is most anxious to put an end to this rupture and therefore entreats the Resident to be good enough to address the various Magistrates of adjacent districts to prevent bodies of armed devotees whether Hindoo or Mahomedan from entering Oude and to take steps to forbid their coming.’

 

Wajid Ali Shah’s tone makes it clear who the real ruler of Awadh was. The districts from which the mobs were flocking were all in the traditional zone of Ayodhya’s religious influence. There were also Muslim strongholds in the list sent by Wajid Ali Shah. Gorakhpur, Jaunpur, Allahabad, Fatehpur, Kanpur, Farrukhabad, Shahjahanpur and Azamgarh were the chief regions of Sunni populations and these were governed by British magistrates; thus the nawab hoped that his request to Outram, if fulfilled, would deprive the maulvis of Amethi from gaining more followers.

 

 

‘The King is most anxious to put an end to this rupture and therefore entreats the Resident to be good enough to address the various Magistrates of adjacent districts to prevent bodies of armed devotees whether Hindoo or Mahomedan from entering Oude and to take steps to forbid their coming.’ … Wajid Ali Shah’s tone makes it clear who the real ruler of Awadh was.

 

 

Meanwhile, the Bairagis of Hanumangarhi had signed a bond alluding to their complete willingness to abide by the findings of the tripartite commission of enquiry, whatever they may be. Under Mahant Bilramdass, three other priests put their signature to this bond in which they also spoke of past friendships and a willingness to compromise. Interestingly, the Hanumangarhi priests who were Ramanandis belonging to the Nirvani Akhada did not object to the presence of Aghai Ally Khan. They perhaps knew that as a Shia Muslim, he was not going to be overtly excited by the prospect of Sunni claims. Hindus favoured a Shia over a Sunni member in the enquiry commission and, as Captain Orr had believed, Muslims themselves being largely Sunni, did not trust Aghai Ally Khan because of his Shia persuasion.

 

Irrespective of all this, the bond signed by Hanumangarhi priests on 10 August 1855 must have brought peace to the mind of the avowedly irreligious and secular Wajid Ali Shah.

 

The bond promised that:

 

‘ …having in view our former friendship and acquaintance we declare we have no enmity towards them [Gholam Hussein and others], and agreeing to Aghai Alee Khan, Rajah Maun Singh, Captain Orr as our arbitrators we solemnly swear by Mahabir [another name for Hanuman] and hereby write that we will not on any account create any disturbance or tumult on condition that no one molests us or abuses us. All the Byragees who are of our tribe will not do anything contrary to what we have written… if we act contrary to what we have written we confess that we are deserving of whatever punishment may decree.’

 

 

…the bond signed by Hanumangarhi priests on 10 August 1855 must have brought peace to the mind of the avowedly irreligious and secular Wajid Ali Shah. ‘ …having in view our former friendship and acquaintance we declare we have no enmity towards them [Gholam Hussein and others], and agreeing to Aghai Alee Khan, Rajah Maun Singh, Captain Orr as our arbitrators we solemnly swear by Mahabir [another name for Hanuman] and hereby write that we will not on any account create any disturbance or tumult on condition that no one molests us or abuses us.’

 

 

In Lucknow, the nawab, anxious to avoid a confrontation with the maulvis, sought the help of the influential chiefs of neighbouring Hadergarh and Gosainganj. The nawab wanted them to persuade the Muslims at Amethi to desist from marching to Ayodhya. In his communiqué to Outram on 11 August 1855, Wajid Ali Shah also apprised him of his plan of seeking religious opinion on how to tackle the belligerent maulvis. On the whole, the nawab appeared to be confident that his plan of peaceful resolution would work, obviating the need for arrests and violence. The king’s seeking of religious sanction was made necessary because of the nature of the maulvis’ campaign. In order to enlist more followers they had declared a planned revenge-attack on Hanumangarhi, a jihad, or religious crusade, against infidels. The king was aware that a jihad could be declared only by the king in a Muslim-ruled country; his plan was to counter the maulvis theologically and take the wind out of their proposed jihad. Ever careful, Wajid Ali Shah concluded his note to Outram with the words ‘but the future is in the disposal of God’.

 

This, however, was not enough for Outram to repose faith in Wajid Ali Shah’s abilities. Outram was also acting on his own secret intelligence which said that the nawab was only buying time and that once the Sawan mela (the sawan mela is one of the three melas held in Ayodhya every year, it is held in the month of July and marks the start of the rains) in Ayodhya was over, he had promised the maulvis that the mosque would be rebuilt in Hanumangarhi.

 

 

In Lucknow, the nawab, anxious to avoid a confrontation with the maulvis, sought the help of the influential chiefs of neighbouring Hadergarh and Gosainganj. The nawab wanted them to persuade the Muslims at Amethi to desist from marching to Ayodhya.

 

 

In Faizabad, Captain Orr had his ear to the ground. Consistent with the first report he sent to his superior police officer, G. K. Weston, the superintendent of the Awadh Frontier Force, Orr again advised against any immediate enquiries by the tripartite commission. In this he was echoing Nawab Wajid Ali Shah’s own instinct. However, Orr also warned about the effect of the presence of certain Muslims in Faizabad.

 

On 11 August 1855, the same day that the king informed the Resident of his aversion to arresting the maulvis, Orr wrote to G. K. Weston again regarding certain decisions taken by the committee comprising Aghai Ally Khan, Raja Maun Singh, Captain A. P. Orr and Captain J. Hearsey. He opened his letter by stating forthrightly that ‘it would not be safe in the present state of affairs to institute enquiries regarding the existence in the midst of Hanooman Gurrie of a Musjid’.

 

Ameer Ali, the radical preacher who had vowed to avenge the deaths of Muslims in Ayodhya, was gathering numbers for his jihad near Amethi. Meanwhile, certain Muslim notables said to be deputed by the court in Lucknow, were in Faizabad and Ayodhya. They were conducting their own enquiry and were collecting signatures and testimonies vouching for the existence of the mosque in Hanumangarhi. As we will see later in the book, such campaigns continue to take place in contemporary Ayodhya.

 

Captain Orr also worried about the adverse effect these persons were having in an already tense atmosphere. In the same letter Orr categorically mentions the danger posed by the presence of these ‘notables’ and requests his superior to ensure that they are removed from there.

 

‘INDEPENDENT’ ENQUIRY FINDS MOSQUE AT HANUMANGARHI

 

Captain Orr’s fears about the independent enquiries by the notables from the Lucknow court proved to be justified as the next day, on 12 August 1855, Outram, the Resident, received another communiqué from the king of Oude. Along with the dispatch, the king had also sent for his perusal the documents collected through the above-mentioned notables’ efforts.

 

The king’s letter summed up the findings thus:

 

‘The purports of these papers is that A MOSQUE WAS BUILT BY ONE OF THE FORMER SOVEREIGNS OF DELHIE, that this fact is notorious, that in the days of Borhanool Muk [Saadat Ali Khan I] Sobahdar of Oude, there was a quarrel of the same kind but the Hindoos subsequently declared that they had no intention of meddling with the mosque. One witness who declares he is 104 years old asserts that he has repeatedly seen the mosque. One Chuprasee Dhunnee Singh, a Hindoo, declares that he saw the mosque in the time of Hakeem Mehudee who was a minister in the days of Nusseeruddeen Hyder (1827–1837), one Chedee, a Hindoo, declares he has often seen the Musjid. The tenor of all these papers casts all the blame on the Hindoos and details their atrocities—two leaves of the Koran which were found on one of the slain is sent for His Majesty’s inspection; they have been trampled upon, burnt and torn.’

 

The note then proceeds to record the various crimes committed by Hindus, including destroying the tomb of Khwaja Huttee Shah and slaying a pig in the mosque while it was in their possession. It ends by describing the genesis of the Hindus’ aggression and says that, ‘the Hindoos first began to interfere and became powerful when the district of Sultanpore fell into the hands of Durshan Singh Chukledar and their encroachments commenced and have progressed’.

 

The next day, Resident Outram responded with disdain to these documents and summarily declared them to be ‘untrue’ in a letter to the king. While doing so he employed the age-old argument of ‘obtained under duress and coercion’ that is used against suspicious affidavits and testimonies.

 

The Resident wrote, ‘His Majesty must be well aware that it is very easy for interested parties to obtain seals and signatures to any representations they may choose to make in the heat of religious excitement and doubtless the opposite party would easily obtain similar testimony in support of their assertions.’ The Resident then declared the documents and the claims made by the nawab-king to be baseless. He also goes on to dismiss the claims about the slaying of a pig, desecration of the Quran, and destruction of Khwaja Huttee’s tomb in Hanumangarhi. He explained his dismissal saying:

 

‘The enclosed representations are obviously untrue in one particular in as much as they attribute the whole of the blame to Hindoos, whereas it is notorious and moreover officially reported by Capt Orr that they were ready to submit their grievances to the King’s decision, even when victorious they abstained from all violence and from the commission of any excesses and enormities. His Majesty can not fail to be convinced of the truth of this when His Majesty peruses the bond signed by the leaders of the Byragees in which they profess their readiness to submit to terms and which reached the King yesterday. It is well known that the Mahomedans would not listen to reason and that they began the conflict.’

 

The Resident then concludes that ‘the alleged atrocities of the Byragees such as trampling on the Kuran and the sacrifice of swine (in the musjid) may prove equally unfounded and baseless’.

 

 

The Hanumangarhi temple

 

 

Though Outram doesn’t specify the mosque he is referring to, it could only either be the one atop Hanumangarhi, which was destroyed by the Bairagis, or the Babri Masjid from where the Muslims had launched the attack. In 1855, curiously enough, no extant British record of the Hanumangarhi conflict identifies the said mosque as Ram Janmabhoomi. The next day, on 15 August 1855, Captain Orr reported to Superintendent Weston a series of steps he had taken for the officially appointed tripartite commission to carry on its work. Owing to the sawan mela a large number of Hindus had gathered in Ayodhya. As the presence of thousands of Hindus had increased the risk of violence erupting again, the commission had been unable to make probes regarding the existence of a masjid on Hanumangarhi. Therefore, Orr finally decided that Raja Man Singh should conduct ‘private and strict enquiries as to the existence of the supposed Musjid and to report the result of his personal researches, which would eventually be verified’ by other members of the committee. The reason Orr gave for reposing such faith in Man Singh was curious and contradictory to his own earlier view regarding Man Singh’s impartiality. Orr said, ‘the Rajah being of the Hindoo persuasion could more easily effect the object the Committee had in view than any other of its members’. In July, Orr had cited the same ‘Hindu persuasion’ to report to Weston the untrustworthiness of Man Singh. But now, Man Singh had become fit to be trusted again and he lived up to the expectations of the British by quickly completing his ‘private and strict’ probe. As Orr put it in his letter:

 

‘Raja Maun Singh had succeeded, not only in obtaining the desired information stating that to the best of his belief no Musjid existed in the Gurrie, but also obtained from the Mahunt Byragees of Hannooman Gurrie two papers signed and sealed by them, by which they bind themselves to allow the Committee to make any investigations necessary to satisfy the demands of the government.’

 

 

Though Outram doesn’t specify the mosque he is referring to, it could only either be the one atop Hanumangarhi, which was destroyed by the Bairagis, or the Babri Masjid from where the Muslims had launched the attack. In 1855, curiously enough, no extant British record of the Hanumangarhi conflict identifies the said mosque as Ram Janmabhoomi. 

 

 

Having obtained this bond, and armed with Man Singh’s findings, the committee called a public meeting of prominent Muslims of Faizabad–Ayodhya and surrounding areas in Gulab Bari, the magnificently built tomb of Shuja-ud-daulah. The purpose of this meeting was to give Muslims an opportunity to put forward their claims, grievances and evidence regarding the mosque in contention. A large number of Muslims had fled Ayodhya after the massacre in July, and now a number of them spoke up to say that even if such a masjid existed, it was in the domain of the king of Oude to recover it. All that these Muslims ‘now wished was to obtain some security of life and property in order to return to their homes at Awudh, which they have abandoned since the late disturbance’, wrote Orr.

 

Interestingly, it was also decided that the individuals who had claimed to have seen the masjid, including the Hindus Chedee Singh and Dhunee Singh, should be taken to Hanumangarhi, asked to show the spot where the masjid stood, and prove the veracity of their assertions. Orr reported to his superior Weston that this was now possible as the Hanumangarhi priests had agreed to ‘allow us to dig open any one spot pointed out by the Mahomedans as containing their Musjid’. If there was a quid pro quo deal affected by Raja Man Singh with the priests, Orr’s letter doesn’t reveal it. Seemingly satisfied with the committee’s work so far, Orr concluded that ‘surely such an investigation will satisfy the most bigoted’.

 

 

Outram was pleased to hear that Orr had been successful in defusing the situation with the help of Man Singh and Aghai Ally Khan. Outram transmitted the contents of Orr’s letter to Governor General Dalhousie in Calcutta. As Lucknow was under his direct supervision, he also added the latest update on the situation there:
‘In this city especially the excitement was very great. War with the Hindoos was openly preached in the mosques in spite of the exertions of the authority to prevent it and fanatic moolahs erected the standard of Islam at Qurcita 7 miles distant where all true Moslams were urged to assemble. Some hundreds did so and thousands in this city who were prepared to join, were with difficulty deterred by the most stringent measures of the Government.’

 

 

Outram’s self-serving portrayal of the situation at Lucknow and Ayodhya was only partially true. Indeed, the Muslim clergy, including some Shia priests, were by now roused by the British-backed handling of the Hanumangarhi situation. Just a week after Outram had shared his satisfaction at the abatement of the conflict, a mujtahid, a high priest or Shia imam, raised the hackles of the British once again.

 

Spies brought news that after the Eid celebrations at Asaf-ud-daulah’s Imambara, the high priest had openly showered curses on Aghai Ally Khan, a member of the Hanumangarhi committee, and alleged that he, a Shia, had accepted bribes to favour the Hindus. Many notables from Wajid Ali Shah’s court were present on this occasion but remained silent.

 

Four days later, on 28 August, the Hanooman Ghuree Commission’s petition was received by Wajid Ali Shah. The commission had concluded its work and was ready to present itself and the various witnesses and deponents it had examined to the king in Lucknow. Orr, the unofficial head of the commission, also wrote to Weston, forwarding with the letter the various depositions collected by the king’s committee under Maulvi Hafizullah, the eleven depositions given to the tripartite committee (including Orr, Man Singh and others), the statement of a Muslim bricklayer, Joomun Khan, bonds furnished by the priests of Hanumangarhi, sunuds (royal grants) furnished by the priests of Hanumangarhi, and the committee’s urz-dasht (written petition).

 

 

Spies brought news that after the Eid celebrations at Asaf-ud-daulah’s Imambara, the high priest had openly showered curses on Aghai Ally Khan, a member of the Hanumangarhi committee, and alleged that he, a Shia, had accepted bribes to favour the Hindus.

 

 

The findings of the other so-called independent committee led by maulvis Hafizullah and Nihaluddeen were rejected as false and fake by Orr. He considered them as having been ‘preconsented’ and full of discrepancies.The sunuds shown by the Hanumangarhi priests on the other hand were taken to be legitimate and because ‘no reference whatsoever is made to the existence of a Musjid, neither within nor near the precincts of the Gurhee’. Orr thought it was proof that no masjid could have existed there. Orr further stated that the deposition of Joomun Khan corroborated his conclusions. Moreover, according to Orr, more proof lay in the

 

‘ …depositions furnished by two of the Mahunts of the Guree, they contain total denial of the Musjid having ever existed, with a shrewd and in my opinion just remark, that had a Musjid stood in their Gurree at all events within the last 25 or 30 years would it not have been remarked by the Kotwal of the City Mirza Mooneem Beg, whom they cite, as having on more than one occasion visited their building.’

 

Finally, Orr clinches the anti-mosque argument by stating that even those Muslims who had claimed to have seen and even prayed in the mosque at Hanumangarhi were unable to point to the spot where it could have existed. Some even blundered by pointing out a directionally implausible spot as Muslims offer prayer while facing the west. Thus Orr concluded with certitude:

 

‘no traces however slight of such a building now exist… In fact it seems of itself improbable that two buildings consecrated to such opposite creeds, could ever have stood in so close proximity—and is it not moreover extraordinary that during so many years, that is at the very lowest calculation from the time of Munsoor Ali Khan Soobadar of Oudh, to the present period, no one, either ruler or subject should with the exception of Shah Ghulam Hussein and his followers, have taken cognizance of such matter had they been worthy of consideration.’

 

Thus, the claims of Muslims being deemed bogus, fake and time-barred, were rejected and the commission sought to close the matter.

 

Upon learning the outcome of the commission’s enquiry, Maulvi Ameer Ali, who had reached Lucknow and was under house arrest, set out on his jihad once again. With more than 200 devoted followers the maulvi seemed to have been discreetly supported by the Shia clergy in addition to the Sunni clergy. In order to halt his march, Wajid Ali Shah dispatched some envoys who were able to convince the maulvi to postpone it for the time being and allow the peaceful resolution of the dispute. Ameer Ali was also warned that if he disobeyed the nawab’s order, he would be forcibly restrained. What Wajid Ali Shah had in mind was a plan that would ‘satisfy all parties’. The proposal was radical; it suggested ‘that the King should build a mosque resting on one wall, but outside of the ghuree… and the dividing wall be so raised as to prevent either Moslem or Hindoos interfering with each other, or either party even seeing into the others’ place of worship’. Wajid Ali Shah also stated that Hanumangarhi priests would be suitably awarded any reasonable demands of land if they agreed to this proposal. Resident Outram reported these details to Dalhousie with scepticism about the success of the proposal.

 

 

What Wajid Ali Shah had in mind was a plan that would ‘satisfy all parties’. The proposal was radical; it suggested ‘that the King should build a mosque resting on one wall, but outside of the ghuree… and the dividing wall be so raised as to prevent either Moslem or Hindoos interfering with each other, or either party even seeing into the others’ place of worship’.

 

 

In Calcutta, upon learning of the developments in Awadh, Governor General Dalhousie stressed that this was ‘further proof, if further proof were necessary, of the unfitness of the King of Oude and of his Durbar to hold the powers of Government in that country and fortify the opinion which I lately submitted to the Hon’ble Court that the administration should be entirely taken out of their hands’. The British were preparing the ground to annex Awadh and the Hanumangarhi incident was being woven into that plan.

 

Back in Ayodhya, Orr, who was tasked with getting the Hanumangarhi priests to agree to the king’s compromise formula, failed to convince them. Orr conveyed his failure to Outram, who transmitted it to Dalhousie on 16 September. The Bairagis, reported Outram, declared ‘that if it is attempted to build a Mosque adjoining the Hunooman Ghuree, they will vacate the place and at the same time desert every one of the temples of Awudh, which in other words really means that they are prepared to resist any such attempt to the death, for never in life would they abandon these holy shrines’. Rhetoric was building up again on both sides—on three sides if one includes the British, who were desperately hoping to convert this conflict into a dramatic cause so that they could annex Awadh.

 

When Outram met with Wajid Ali Shah a few days later on 29 September, he tried his utmost to impress upon him the need to take immediate action to restrain Maulvi Ameer Ali. No doubt this would have made Wajid Ali Shah extremely unpopular among his co-religionists in the court and outside. He was aware that any action by him that was perceived to be anti-Islam would make his position even more untenable. Unsympathetic to Wajid Ali Shah’s predicament, Outram also alleged that the nawab-king had made a secret pledge to Ameer Ali about the construction of the mosque at an appropriate time even though Wajid Ali Shah had dismissed such allegations as ‘preposterous’. The nawab-king was convinced that the matter could be resolved to the satisfaction of all. In order to buy more time, he now proposed the formation of a second commission comprising an equal number of Hindus and Muslims. It seems from Outram’s account that Wajid Ali Shah was not convinced of the Bairagis’ version of the dispute. According to the minutes of a meeting between Outram and him, the king believed, ‘much misconception prevailed… as to the sanctity of the ground generally known as Hanooman Guree—in fact—but a very small portion of it was sacred, the rest having been quietly added by the Hindoos to the ground granted by His Majesty’s ancestors more than a century ago’.

 

And therefore, Wajid Ali Shah expected the Hindus to agree to the proposal of sharing the space atop Hanumangarhi with a mosque. Outram agreed but added a caveat. The minutes of that meeting record him issuing a warning to the king of Oude.

 

‘The Resident declared that he would be delighted to learn that the Hindoos could be persuaded to yield compliance but he did not hesitate to warn His Majesty against any such attempt to take even one yard of ground without the fullest and most unqualified consent of the Hindoos—on no other ground could His Majesty attempt to build the Musjid without lighting up the flames of civil discord in his territories.’

 

What Wajid Ali Shah really thought of the British Resident’s very sensible but obvious word of caution is not known but he assured him that nothing would be done by force.

 

Meanwhile, Ameer Ali who was still camped on the road to Ayodhya, thought of keeping his ghazis (crusaders) motivated by letting them loose on Hindus and Shias. While stationed near Saheliya, a village that now falls in Barabanki district, his followers, ‘annoyed at the blowing of Sunks [conch shells] in the temples belonging to Roopnarain and Salikram Brahmins of Saheli’, attacked the place and destroyed all the idols and threw them into the adjacent pond. The Brahmins, together with their families, fled to Calcutta, according to a dispatch dated 4 October from the Resident’s office. Besides mentioning the attack on Hindus the same set of dispatches also informed the Governor General in Calcutta that ‘the report is confirmed that a fight had taken place between the Syeeds of Zaidpore (20 kilometres from Saheli) and Ameer Ali’s followers, in consequence of the Maulavi having endeavoured to prevent the Syeeds carrying their Tazeahs in procession until the Musjid should be built in the Hanooman Ghuree, 8 men were killed and 6 wounded on both sides’.

 

The dispatch by Outram on 4 October was significant as it not only reported the maulvi’s communal excesses but also because it reported that Wajid Ali Shah, responding to the spate of conflicts involving the maulvi’s militia and Hindus—and in one case Shias—had deputed mainly Hindu troops to march to Hanumangarhi and protect it. It also conveyed a rising degree of alarm among the general population which was evidenced by the fact that the richer families of Faizabad and Ayodhya were relocating their women and children in anticipation of violence.

 

 

MAULVI AMEER ALI’S END DRAWS NEAR

 

Between 5 October and 8 November a number of events took place that brought an end to Maulvi Ameer Ali’s campaign. His patience exhausted, Ameer Ali gave up on Wajid Ali Shah keeping his reported promise to build the mosque atop Hanumangarhi. The king too had all but abandoned hopes of a peaceful resolution, and now he gave clear orders to intercept the maulvi en route to Ayodhya. On 5 October, Outram reported to Lucknow that it was generally believed ‘that the assault on the Hanooman Ghuree will take place on the 40th day of Mohurram (23 October)’.

 

In Hanumangarhi, the Bairagis were fortifying their defences and making small holes in the walls of the temple-fortress through which arms could be fired. The word on the street in Ayodhya, Faizabad and Lucknow was that Hanumagarhi was also receiving aid from the kingdoms of Gwalior, Jodhpur and the local talukdars or chiefs of Awadh. Amidst this buildup, Raja Man Singh brought a delegation of Hanumangarhi priests to Lucknow.

 

The maulvi, still camped on the road to Ayodhya, was also being joined by hordes of Muslim men. In a last-ditch effort to strike a compromise, the king’s deputies met him and once again beseeched him to defer his march. Writing disapprovingly about it, Outram informed Calcutta on 7 October that after much persuasion and ‘begging’, Ameer Ali was ‘induced to grant a further respite of 5 days—if, however, on the Friday next, some steps shall not have been taken by the Durbar, he intends then to proceed to Bansa… eastward of Saheli, and there raise the standard of Islam’.

 

The maulvi had relented, but only a little. Unbeknownst to him at the time, his predicament was to worsen soon. Outram was totally against the constitution of another commission of enquiry and had rejected the nawab’s request to join such a commission if it were formed. His reason being: ‘he [Wajid Ali Shah] supposed the British Government would be bound to support the subsequent measures of the Durbar for enforcing the decree of the Committee whatever that might be. As I had reason [not specified] to believe that bribery would be employed to induce the Hindoo members to betray their trust, it behoved me I conceived for that reason particularly but also under any circumstances, to reject the overture in explicit terms.’

 

The British had practically come to rule Awadh in the eighty years since the Battle of Buxar in 1775. Gradually, they had also come to acquire a network of spies that was spread deep and wide across the province as well as in other parts of India. A letter dated 15 October reflects the astuteness with which the East India Company ran its intelligence network. On the basis of information provided by a clerk in a government office in Faizabad, Outram listed the number of local Hindu chiefs who were ready to support the Bairagis of Hanumangarhi; some of them had also offered money. Outram wrote, ‘among others from whom letters and pecuniary contributions have been received, he [the clerk-spy] enumerates the Rajahs of Bansee, Pyrespore, Ramnuggur, Dumeree, Souhan—Ranee of Dairwa— and Maharajahs of Gwalior and Joudhpore’.

 

 

Governor General Lord Dalhousie

 

 

On the same day, Governor General Dalhousie in Fort William, Calcutta, drew up a note that both summarized the developments in Awadh and laid down British policy for future events. He authorized Outram to use ‘decided language’ to convey the displeasure of the British government should Wajid Ali Shah ‘either direct or not prevent an attack on the Hindoos’. He declared that such a neglect of duty would make the king regret his inaction. Dalhousie approved the actions of the Resident at Lucknow along with his own and patted himself on the back for his commitment to always acting in the interests of the British government. Wajid Ali Shah’s decision to dispatch Hindu troops for the protection of Hanumangarhi was lauded by Dalhousie. That rare praise was overshadowed by his severe criticism of the ‘feebleness and falseness’ of the king of Oude.

 

And with the characteristic duplicity that defined the era of the British East India Company, Dalhousie noted, ‘the King of Oude having permitted the rise of the present disorders at Awudh near to Fyzabad and having permitted flagrant wrong to be done to the Hindoos, not only contrary to the advice of the resident, but in defiance of his warnings and his resistance, the British troops ought upon no account to be moved to the assistance of the royal troops if hostilities should again break out at Awudh’. If Orr and Hearsey had refrained from interfering in the July clash because of being ‘few in number’, now they were explicitly ordered to stay out of it. Dalhousie seemed to have been hoping that Awadh would soon be engulfed in communal bloodshed, and to make sure it was not impeded by the interference of British troops, he directed his officers to stand by, just as they had done in July when Shah Ghulam Hussein had attacked Hanumangarhi. At that time, it was Muslims who had been massacred. But for Dalhousie, it was not Hindu versus Muslim or right versus wrong. The sole concern was how to justify the annexation of Awadh by the British government.

 

 

Wajid Ali Shah’s decision to dispatch Hindu troops for the protection of Hanumangarhi was lauded by Dalhousie. That rare praise was overshadowed by his severe criticism of the ‘feebleness and falseness’ of the king of Oude. And with the characteristic duplicity that defined the era of the British East India Company, Dalhousie noted, ‘ …the British troops ought upon no account to be moved to the assistance of the royal troops if hostilities should again break out at Awudh.’

 

 

Therefore, the main purport of his note was the Treaty of 1801, which gave control of more than half of Awadh’s richest cultivable lands in return for an annual stipend to the nawab of Awadh. It also bound the British to defend Awadh against external and internal aggressions. This, technically, stood in the way of the annexation of Awadh, even though many British acts of omission and commission had left the treaty all but abrogated. Now, in the event of the explosion of further violence between Hindus and Muslims, the British would have found a dramatic justification to annex the province. Towards that end, it was also imperative that communal anarchy defeat the writ of the king of Awadh as well as its largely harmonious social culture.

 

 

In the event of the explosion of further violence between Hindus and Muslims, the British would have found a dramatic justification to annex the province. Towards that end, it was also imperative that communal anarchy defeat the writ of the king of Awadh as well as its largely harmonious social culture.

 

 

AMEER ALI SUFFERS A SETBACK

 

Therefore, upon receiving Outram’s letter dated 17 October, Dalhousie must have felt a tinge of disappointment. Outram, who was cast in the same colonial die as his Governor General, reported two instances of Muslim landords refusing to join the maulvi’s crusade. One of them, Shujat Ali of Masauli in Barabanki district, was said to have declared to the maulvi that ‘he said his prayers five times a day, and kept all fasts like a true Moslem, but as to disobeying the order of the King who is a true believer like himself, or going to certain death at Ajoodhea, he chose to decline’. Razabaksh, another Muslim landholder in Barabanki, rejected the maulvi’s inducements on similar grounds. It was not just a sense of communal harmony that drove the general public and landlords to snub Ameer Ali. The king of Oude had issued a proclamation warning all who supported the fanatic crusade of dire consequences. The proclamation and its translation were made available to Outram who forwarded it to Calcutta on 18 October. The proclamation stated:

 

‘ …that whoever may have ventured to quit his Amaldaree, Talookdaree, or Zamindarees to join the rebels shall have his houses and property seized by our soldiers, and whoever may be on the point of going to the rebels is to be restrained, and wherever either of the above-mentioned parties presumes to refuse obedience to our orders or to abandon his vile intentions, shall be punished by the imprisonment of his family and relatives who are to be forwarded to the capital, and by the demolition of their houses and property; whoever chooses to return home in peace shall not be molested in any way… ’

 

 

The king of Oude had issued a proclamation warning all who supported the fanatic crusade of dire consequences. 

 

 

On 19 October, Outram had reported to Calcutta that the maulvi had decided to proceed with his march towards Ayodhya and was ready to battle the king’s troops if they tried to stop him. Unaware of either the proclamation or the maulvi’s march, the secretary to the Government of India at Fort William in Calcutta had dispatched a set of instructions to Outram in Lucknow on 20 October. They wanted him to clearly state to the nawab of Awadh that the government would never agree to a second commission, and even if formed, ‘the Government will never approve of a mosque being built in the Hanooman Ghuree or near to it’.

 

The king’s proclamation was successful in restraining Muslims from joining Ameer Ali’s jihad. A letter from Outram, dated 6 November, notes ‘that the effect of the proclamation has been most satisfactory, scarcely an individual from the British districts [land ceded under the Treaty of 1801] having joined the large assemblages of Mahomedans or Hindoos which have been threatening the peace of Oude for some time past’. Outram was now ‘hopeful’ of a speedy and peaceful resolution of the dispute, and he was ‘happy’ to report it (like now, it wasn’t uncommon then for official communication to be ‘tracked’ or even leaked by couriers for a good reward. Therefore, non-secret official letters seldom contained anything that might indict the government in any way). But it would have been a cause of some alarm for the Governor General who was banking on an imminent breakdown of peace and order.

 

 

THE BATTLE OF DHAURAHRA

 

The next day (7 November) began unexpectedly for the British troops and officers who were tasked with monitoring Maulvi Ameer Ali and his zealous followers. For the maulvi it was the day of reckoning which began in a planned way. At Dariabad, he gave the slip to the British troops led by Colonel Barlow and got a lead of an hour before his absence was discovered. The maulvi’s plan seems to have been to attack Hanumangarhi on Diwali, which was going to fall on 9 November. The maulvi’s selection of the day could have not been loaded with more symbolism. Diwali marks the day Ram, the exiled prince of Ayodhya, returned home after defeating Ravan at the culmination of fourteen years of banishment, along with his wife Sita and brother Lakshman. In Ayodhya, the day before Diwali is celebrated as Hanuman Jayanti, or the birthday of Hanuman. Unlike in the rest of the country where Hanuman Jayanti falls in the summer, in Ayodhya it is pegged to Diwali which falls in the winter.

 

According to an account written by a junior officer named Lieutenant Catania, British troops caught up with the maulvi’s militia at Dhaurahra, a small village situated near Rudauli. Ameer Ali’s force of ghazis was resting under the shade of some trees when Colonel Barlow sent some Indian troopers to tell him to return to Dariabad, and ‘that if he persisted to advance’, they would fire on him. The maulvi defied the warning and resumed the march after midday prayers. Catania writes:

 

‘ …the 2-9 Pounders attached to our Corps were  the  only  guns that had come up, the rest with the Najeebs and other Telangah Regiments not having arrived. They were immediately placed into position, and laid by Col. Barlow, the Infantry supporting them, the order to fire was given as soon as the enemy was within range, they as instantaneously returned the compliment, and thus the action became general.’

 

Maulvi Ameer Ali got his head cut off by an Indian sepoy, all other recruits of his cause fought to the death, asking for no quarter nor giving one. In this way Barlow, Catania and their force of 300 soldiers, Indian and British, had successfully eliminated the threat of the maulvi’s band of ‘fanatics’ in a bloody battle near Rudauli which lies nearly 40 kilometres from Faizabad. Lasting for two hours, it ended with the death of Ameer Ali and more than 400 of his followers. About eighty men belonging to the other side were also killed. Ameer Ali’s dead were buried in four large pits in nearby Rudauli. The British-led troops, too, were exhausted by the long and bloody day. Most had had nothing to eat. After the battle they marched on to camp at Mahmudpur where they took care of their dead and wounded. It is here that Catania recorded the details of the battle and its aftermath on 8 November, the eve of Diwali. In the letter detailing this narrow and lucky victory, he indicted the nawab’s troops for not showing up. This battle would be an enduring end of the conflict over Hanumangarhi but that night, on the eve of Diwali, Catania feared a reprisal and an unprecedented outbreak of communal violence. He wrote, ‘it is rumoured that affairs are not yet settled and the Mahomedans are again assembling, if this prove correct, I fancy we have yet a great deal to do’. Soon after receiving Catania’s letter, Lucknow Resident Outram travelled to the British headquarters at Fort William in Calcutta.

 

 

Barlow, Catania and their force of 300 soldiers, Indian and British, had successfully eliminated the threat of the maulvi’s band of ‘fanatics’ in a bloody battle near Rudauli which lies nearly 40 kilometres from Faizabad. Lasting for two hours, it ended with the death of Ameer Ali and more than 400 of his followers. About eighty men belonging to the other side were also killed.

 

 

Some citations have been removed from this excerpt to make for smoother reading. You will find all of them in the book. 

 

This excerpt has been carried courtesy the permission of Valay Singh. You can buy Ayodhya: City of Faith, City of Discord here.

 

ARCHIVE

In the 1936 Allahabad Municipal Elections, the Congress had “dared to nominate” a Dalit candidate. Ranjit Sitaram Pandit wrote a succinct and scathing piece that exposed how the scourge of caste – a scourge that we’re still very much dealing with – was entrenched in our attitudes and therefore in our local governments. The article, though brief, is masterfully written and says more than many longer academic papers can hope to, on the subject.

 

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Some of the circumstances will seem strange to a 21^st century reader. Some will not. 

 

A lower-caste candidate – a “chamar” (leather-worker) referred to only as “Hari” (short for “Harijan”) – is inducted as a candidate in an Allahabad municipal election in 1936. Although he is an educated and capable man, he loses. Indeed, he stands little chance. A coalition of the bigoted – comprising upper caste Hindus, those offended by this audacious individual from a ‘low’ caste background, those whose economic interests may be affected, etc. – aligns against him. 

 

That scenario would be easily understood by a 21^st century social scientist. A similar dynamic to the one that operated in Civil Lines, Allahabad in the United Provinces in 1936, continues to operate today in Civil Lines, Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh. Anybody acquainted with UP politics in 2020 will intuit the prejudices a Dalit candidate would have to confront if he stood for elections in Civil Lines. 

 

What will be unfamiliar is the nuts and bolts of the electoral system during the latter days of the British Raj. Elections began in the 1920s with municipal bodies. The Government of India Act (1935) copy-pasted the British bicameral structure with an Upper Chamber that contained the nominated, and an elected Lower Chamber. Provincial elections occurred in 1936-37 in six provinces. 

 

But the structural elements, such as the demarcation of constituencies and seats, and the lists of eligible voters, were very different in 1936. There were reserved constituencies, for Muslims, Christians, “Europeans”, Sikhs and Scheduled Castes. In these, candidates and voters had to belong to the concerned community. This was supposed to ensure that the interests of various communities were represented. There was a very public argument between Gandhi and Ambedkar on the subject of caste-based reservations for the ‘low’ caste. Ambedkar won. 

 

There were also general seats where anybody could stand, and seek the vote of the eligible voter. But this wasn’t a universal franchise by any means. The right to vote depended on qualifications like ownership of property, payment of income tax, payment of municipal tax, the holding of land, etc. In practice only the creamy layer – perhaps 5 percent of Indians, or even less, had the vote. 

 

It was considered a daring experiment when the new Indian republic decided on universal franchise – giving the vote to every citizen. The General Elections of 1951-52 saw over 170 million voters (India had a population of about 360 million according to the 1951 Census) exercise their right in what was by far, the largest democratic exercise ever undertaken. The voting lasted for almost six months. 

 

The new republic also eliminated the concept of the reserved constituency though it introduced the concept of the reserved seat where only an SC/ST candidate could stand although everybody could vote. Much later, the concept of gender reservation has been introduced at the Panchayat level, where up to one-third of seats are reserved for women candidates. 

 

Does this work better than the old system with reserved seats for specific communities? Perhaps. But it certainly hasn’t led to an elimination of caste bigotry. Indeed, that appears to have been successfully exported, going by the ongoing legal battle between Cisco and the State of California.

 

—Devangshu Datta 

 

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How a “Harijan” Candidate was Defeated

 

December 3rd – polling day – was approaching and Prayag Dutt, the canvasser, tried to speed up the delivery of the candidate’s cards. “Who is this Hari,” enquired the Brahman elector, an Advocate of the High Court, “and what is his caste?” Prayag Dutt canvassing on behalf of the Harijan candidate replied that the candidate was a Chamar by caste.

 

Thereupon the Advocate spoke in his persuasive manner: “Why don’t you Chamars stick to the ancestral work of shoe-making? It should pay well. Why do you want to stand for the Municipal Election- what can a Chamar do in the Municipal Corporation?”

 

Prayag Dutt agreed that shoe-making would be profitable work. But he said: “We pure Chamars would never have given up the shoe trade but for the fact that in this city there are now a number of mongrel Chamars.”

 

“Who are these mongrel Chamars?” asked the Advocate, and Prayag Dutt replied: “A number of Brahmans, Khatris, and Baniyas have set up shops of imported boots and shoes and are making profits by underselling the hard-working Chamar in the shoe business.”

 

 

“Why don’t you Chamars stick to the ancestral work of shoe-making? It should pay well. Why do you want to stand for the Municipal Election- what can a Chamar do in the Municipal Corporation?” 

 

 

The Allahabad Municipal Corporation building

 

 

The elector felt disconcerted and perhaps in order to get rid of the canvasser expressed his willingness to vote for the Harijan candidate.

 

The local Congress Committee had decided to help the poor to win a seat during the recent Municipal Election at Allahabad from the Civil Lines, which includes a number of Bastis with hundreds of voters who are for the most part poor manual workers. With its modern roads, which serve the houses of the high and mighty, surrounded by gardens and lit with electricity, the Civil Lines area is a contrast to the Bastis of the poor whose hubs are taxed by the Municipality, which has, however, never shown any anxiety to make a road or provide the poor with water or even oil lamps. During the rains water collects in pits in the dust tracks and little children die by drowning in the very midst of the Bastis.

 

The nomination of a Harijan candidate from the Civil Lines caused a flutter in the dove-cotes of orthodoxy. While some of the educated and respected middle-class voters took this as a personal affront to their intellectual attainments, others regarded it as a challenge to caste superiority and the sacred principle of private property. The Advocates’ Association sensed the coming danger instinctively and some of the learned fraternity asked the writer to explain why the Congress had dared to nominate a Chamar for a seat from the Civil Lines. A Kashmiri Pandit asserted with vehemence that he would never tolerate a Harijan candidate. His attention was drawn to the fact that caste was immaterial; the candidate was a Kashtkar (farmer), literate and a nationalist and was chosen by the local Congress committee as a straightforward and incorruptible man. Indeed, he was personally known to many as a faithful servant of the late Pandit Motilal Nehru. But the learned Counsel was adamant. He said he would be prepared to vote for a Chamar or even a Mehtar if the latter were “reformed” by Islam or Christianity!

 

The issue was thus side-tracked. It was not one of religion or of caste. It was purely secular. The poor knew where the shoe pinched and it was their right, if they so chose, to elect as a representative from among themselves one who would bring the grievances of the poor and needy before the Municipal Commutes and get them redressed as far as possible. The reactions of the so-called high castes and the intellectuals revealed that they were either unconscious of the sufferings of large numbers of the so-called depressed classes or that they refused to act justly towards masses of the poor born within the fold of Hinduism who were perpetually on the anvil under the blows of a hundred hammers.

 

 

A Kashmiri Pandit asserted with vehemence that he would never tolerate a Harijan candidate. His attention was drawn to the fact that caste was immaterial; the candidate was a Kashtkar (farmer), literate and a nationalist and was chosen by the local Congress committee as a straightforward and incorruptible man. Indeed, he was personally known to many as a faithful servant of the late Pandit Motilal Nehru. But the learned Counsel was adamant. He said he would be prepared to vote for a Chamar or even a Mehtar if the latter were “reformed” by Islam or Christianity!

 

 

The issue involved in Hari’s candidature was thus misinterpreted. Hari’s canvassers included enthusiastic students and some Advocates who had volunteered their services. When they presented his card and appealed to the high-caste voters they found many of them forgot, in their anger, that the candidate was set up by the Congress. One of the Brahman Advocates was amazed that he should have been asked to vote for a Chamar. He tore up the card and threw it in the face of the Advocate canvasser.

 

At first in the Indian Clubs it was considered a joke, but when the canvassing in favour of Hari, the representative of the working class, became increasingly successful the menace was considered too grave for the high castes to ignore it. The tension ended in a storm of opposition in the Civil Lines against the very idea of the candidature of a Chamar.

 

 

Ranjit Sitaram Pandit

 

 

In the Civil Lines there are two seats for the Non-Muslim constituency, which is a joint constituency for Europeans and Indians, Hindus, Christians, Parsees and others. With one solitary exception, about nineteen years ago when a Hindu was returned, the Civil Lines area has been represented heretofore only by Europeans, Anglo-Indians or Christians. The Congress Committee had set up a candidate to contest one out of the two seats with the bonafide desire to train the voters among the poor and manual workers to exercise their rights. Two Hindu candidates were in the field this year, besides three Christians, for the two seats. Municipal elections had heretofore evoked no enthusiasm in the Civil Lines, but this was a dangerous departure.

 

At first in the Indian Clubs it was considered a joke, but when the canvassing in favour of Hari, the representative of the working class, became increasingly successful the menace was considered too grave for the high castes to ignore it.

 

Every house now discussed the pros and cons of this problem and opinion was sharply divided until the orthodox of all kinds combined and determined to reduce the support Hari had already gained by a vigorous campaign of counter canvassing. Single voting for the high-caste candidates was resorted to to secure the defeat of Hari. The substantial support already secured among all classes of voters, including Europeans, Parsees, Professors, Doctors, Advocates, Theosophists, Christians and others was thus  neutralised.

 

The working classes, such as the Kashtkar, the carpenter, the mason, the dhobi, the petty shop-keepers at street corners were easily divided by the agents of the high-castes. The poor lacked organization and their support was undermined, without much difficulty, by methods commonly employed in elections. The orthodox and respectable of all sections had combined to save religion and respectability from the menace of the Harijan. And they won.

 

ABOUT ‘THE MODERN REVIEW’:

 

The Modern Review was founded in 1907 by Ramananda Chatterjee, who also founded and edited the Bengali magazine, Prabasi and the Hindi magazine, Vishal Bharat. All three periodicals can be best described as journals of opinion.

 

The Modern Review published essays by practically every well-known leader of the Indian nationalist movement, along with the views of foreign sympathisers. It also carried rousing editorials from Ramananda Babu himself. After his demise in 1943, his son Kedarnath carried on the good work until he passed away in 1965. The magazine also published fiction, book and art reviews, travelogues, etc., including essays by pioneers like the anthropologist Verrier Elwin and historian, Jadunath Sarkar

 

Ramananda Babu allowed his contributors to present every shade of opinion and argue their cases, while ensuring the magazine itself maintained an impartial editorial stance. He was happy to publish long multi-issue arguments between luminaries like Tagore-Gandhi and Subhas Bose-Sardar Patel about the shape and direction of the nationalist movement. Contemporary opinions about topics such as education, women’s rights, the relations between religions and castes, electoral politics, India’s place in the world, and international relations can be accessed and contextualised by leafing through the archives of this journal of record. 

 

 

—Devangshu Datta

 

To read a select anthology of articles, interviews, poetry and fiction published from 1907-1947 in the Modern Review, you can buy‘Patriots, Poets and Prisoners’ here.

 

 

 

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Tilak and Agarkar were close associates in their younger days. Born into the brahmanical class, they both studied together in Pune. In those days, Western education was a means to acquire a job in the British colonial bureaucracy, albeit at a lower level. But Tilak and Agarkar vowed not to work for the British government in India in any capacity. Instead, they decided to dedicate their lives to nation building. One way to do this was through education and raising public awareness through the press. Hence, along with another elite Brahman, Vishnushastri Chiplunkar, they started a ‘New English High School’ and two newspapers Kesari in Marathi and Maratha in English in 1881. Agarkar became the editor of Kesari and Tilak that of Maratha. Though working together, they were each of a different bent of mind from the other. Tilak’s father was a teacher of Sanskrit, and he himself had considerable mastery over it. Along with formidable Sanskrit, he acquired considerable mastery over the Hindu scriptures. This inculcated in him, some degree of pride in the Hindu Brahmanical tradition. He felt strongly about the political domination of India by an alien power and was among the pioneers to publicly express strong views against it. He objected to any British interference in reforming Hindu society. He took a position that Indian society should be reformed by Indians themselves, and not by an alien power. He maintained that, though politically defeated, the Hindus have superior traditions, and this gave them an independent identity under British imperial domination. Tilak personified this identity and associated it with the bigger concept of Swarajya. His painstaking efforts in organizing people through popular Ganesh Puja and Shivaji Jayanti are well known. This is an example of what Partha Chatterjee has called the ‘inner domain of sovereignty’, whereby anti-colonial nationalism creates an independent space within the colonial society to organize and launch its struggle against imperial domination.

 

 

The Maratha, edited by Tilak

 

 

Agarkar on the other hand, was influenced by Western intellectual tradition. His sarcastic criticism of Hinduism reflects Gibbon’s comments on Christianity in his The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire; Agarkar was also impressed by the democratic tradition of the west and had no hesitation in taking help from the British administration in introducing reforms in India. Fired by patriotism, they both managed to work together in spite of the attitudinal differences and also faced imprisonment together in British jails.

 

 

He (Tilak) objected to any British interference in reforming Hindu society. He took a position that Indian society should be reformed by Indians themselves, and not by an alien power… Agarkar on the other hand, was influenced by Western intellectual tradition. His sarcastic criticism of Hinduism reflects Gibbon’s comments on Christianity in his The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire… Fired by patriotism, they both managed to work together in spite of the attitudinal differences and also faced imprisonment together in British jails.

 

 

 

The Appearance of a Crack

 

The differences between them started surfacing at the functioning of the New English High School, which they were running with great enthusiasm. Agarkar requested a salary raise in a meeting, but Tilak opposed it. Tilak was relatively affluent, and Agarkar was mostly dependent on his salary. Tilak accused Agarkar of deviating from the noble mission. Agarkar reacted by calling Tilak ‘obstinate’ in claiming a moral high ground. Tilak did not like Agarkar’s sarcasm about Hinduism in Kesari. Agarkar on the other hand was uneasy with Tilak’s aggressive criticism of the British government and some prominent people like Ranade. These differences finally led to Agarkar resigning from the Kesari and starting his newspaper Sudharak in 1887. Now it was an open war of words between the two, with Sudharak on the one hand and Kesari and Maratha on the other.

 

 

Kesari, which Agarkar edited, then resigned from

 

 

Tradition Vs Modernity

 

Tilak believed that the masses in India hav lost their self-confidence under the oppressive British colonial rule. The need of the hour therefore is to unite and work towards taking political power from the alien hands. At a time when the anti-colonial political mobilization is underway, social reforms will shift the focus from the main goal of national liberation. Accordingly, divided opinions about social reforms would only suit British machination to further divide the Hindu society. Tilak argued further, that the Indian masses are attached to their age-old traditions. Its violent criticism will lead to Tejobhanga, i.e. loss of spirit.

 

Sudharak of Agarkar became the mouthpiece of those who were in favor of prioritizing social reforms. They took a general stand that before asking for a democratic form of government in the public sphere, there should be democracy within the house. If we treat our women as slaves and have an oppressive caste hierarchy, we have no right to ask for equality. This aspect was exposed in great detail by Tarabai Sindhe in her trenchant critique of Hindu patriarchy. Tilak on the other hand, rejected the assumption of Indian women being treated as slaves. As stated earlier, he accepted the need for social reforms, but maintained that it should come from within and not be superimposed by the alien government. Tilak also claimed that the British are deliberately pointing out the shortcomings of Hindu society to justify their imperial domination. He accused the Sudharak, stating that, by aggressively criticizing Hindu tradition, they were playing into the hands of the British. Some of the supporters of Sudharak like Ranade, were in fact in the British service. Pointing this out, Tilak claimed that such people will not state anything that will antagonize their colonial masters. He was of the opinion that, if the British are allowed to interfere in social matters, very soon they will also start interfering in other things, such as ritual observances and practices. Hence, this encouragement of social reformers by the British is a deliberate plan to divert the attention of Indian people from core political issues raised by the national movement. Sudharak’s unwillingness to understand this, caused Tilak a great deal of anguish.

 

Tilak and Agarkar both focused primarily on urban society. A vast majority of the non-Hindu and rural women remained outside the purview of the Tilak-Agarkar debate. This also applies to their views on social reforms in general. Hence, their approach remained restricted and marginal, and could not really go deeper into the Indian social system.

 

 

Tilak and Agarkar both focused primarily on urban society. A vast majority of the non-Hindu and rural women remained outside the purview of the Tilak-Agarkar debate.

 

 

Tilak repeatedly stated that he is not against social reforms per se. But it should not be a top priority of the Indian struggle. When Sudharak took up a stand against the tonsuring of Brahmin widows, Tilak reacted by stating that stopping the practice is not going to have any substantial effect on Indian society. Agarkar on the other hand was deeply concerned about women’s issues. As a child, he had seen the suffering of his two widowed aunts. Apart from that, his thoughts were also influenced by J.S. Mill’s Subjection of Women, which states that the standard of a given society is indicated by the position of women.

 

Tilak was more focused on the use of political power to undertake social reforms. He maintained that, so long as political power was in the hands of alien rulers, no serious reforms can be undertaken. Therefore, priority should be given to acquiring political power, and social reforms would come gradually. He gave an example of Parshuram Bhau Patwardhan, the Brahmin ruler of small principalities, who tried to arrange the marriage of his widowed daughter and sought scriptural support for it. However, he was dissuaded by the orthodox Brahmins. And Parshuram Bhau was unable to get his widowed daughter married. Here, the weakness of Tilak’s approach was exposed.

 

Agarkar on the other had tried to rationalize that social reforms can be best achieved under British rule, as the white colonial masters were immune from public opinion. If the rulers are indigenous, they will only initiate those reforms which will support their power structure.

 

 

Agarkar… tried to rationalize that social reforms can be best achieved under British rule, as the white colonial masters were immune from public opinion. If the rulers are indigenous, they will only initiate those reforms which will support their power structure.

 

 

Mahadev Govind Ranade

 

 

A case of Rukhmabai in 1886 proved the difference of opinion between them. Rukhmabai was married at a very young age. But after attaining maturity, she refused to accept the marriage as it was done without her consent. The case went to court. Tilak supported the right of the husband over her, and Agarkar and Ranade stood beside Rukhmabai. The high court finally ruled in favor of the husband.

 

In order to prove their point, sometimes both the parties lost decorum. Pointing out the weakness of twenty-five crore Indians, who are ruled by one lac Europeans, Agarkar called the natives ‘Shudra Jantu,’ i.e. insignificant insects. No wonder Tilak, being proud of the Indian heritage, reacted sharply.

 

 

Age of Consent Bill, 1891

 

Marriages of young girls were common practice in those days. The young girls were very often at high risk of early pregnancy and sometimes even death. There was a demand from certain sections of progressive Indians to enact a law to prevent this. In 1889 a ten-year-old girl named Phulmoni Dasi died due to a brutal rape by her thirty-five-year-old husband Hari Mohan Maitee in Bengal Province. As he was married to her, rape charges could not be proved. But he was found guilty of causing death due to negligence. This episode was a catalyst that led to the enactment of the law called ‘Age of Consent Act, 1891’ by the Governor-General and his council. It made sexual intercourse with a girl less than twelve years of age a criminal offence.

 

Sudharak welcomed this initiative. But Tilak, characteristic of his dislike for British intervention in socio-religious matters, opposed the legislation. It is surprising that he was not moved by the death of an eleven-year old girl. Was he insensitive towards the unspeakable sufferings of the young girls who were married to grown up men? Did he personify the orthodox Brahmanical patriarchal attitude of treating women as less than human beings? Are women expected to suffer and, if necessary, die without a whimper to uphold the tradition that is determined by patriarchy? Tilak was present in the Calcutta session of the Indian National Congress in 1890. Had he not heard about the Phulmoni’s case which happened just a year back in Bengal? Was the matter discussed among the Congress delegates? Was the Congress leadership so insensitive to the women’s plight? All these questions remained unanswered.

 

 

In 1889 a ten-year-old girl named Phulmoni Dasi died due to a brutal rape by her thirty-five-year-old husband Hari Mohan Maitee in Bengal Province. As he was married to her, rape charges could not be proved. But he was found guilty of causing death due to negligence. This episode was a catalyst that led to the enactment of the law called ‘Age of Consent Act, 1891’ by the Governor-General and his council.

 

 

Marriage for a Hindu, is considered a sacred act. Hence, it was easier for Tilak to mobilize public support against the legislation. It is stated that many women were also opposed to the ‘Age of Consent Act’. Gayatri Spivak in her essay, Can the Subaltern Speak? narrates that the women became so psychologically imprisoned by the patriarchal narrative/indoctrination that they also adopt the language that suits patriarchy. The hegemony makes women the victim of ‘Stockholm Syndrome’, where the prisoners of the system start loving their own tormentors as they see no escape from the shackle. This can also be described as a situation of ‘hegemony with consent,’ from Gramsci’s perspective.

 

Though Tilak opposed the legislation, he educated his daughter and arranged her marriage at the age of fifteen. Thus by action, he showed that he is not opposed to social reforms as such. He only emphasized that it has to come gradually and, also, from within the society.

 

 

Who was the People’s Leader?

 

If we look at the relative support that these two different groups received, we have evidence to suggest that Tilak understood the pulse of the masses better than ‘Sudharaks’ (reformers). His support base suggests that the people in general were more receptive to prioritizing national liberation/Swaraj over social reforms. His strong criticism of Sudharaks made them so unpopular in Pune that people took out a funeral procession of the effigy of Sudharak, from in front of Agarkar’s residence, and burnt it.

 

Tilak deliberately stated what appealed to the people. He confessed to his daughter that he approved of the reforms the Sudharaks wanted to initiate, but couldn’t say it in public, for the fear of losing popular support. Was he a clever politician? Should a true leader not state what he sincerely believes to be good for the society, even if it means an erosion of popularity? Or should he understand the pulse of the masses and state only those things that appeal to people? Or try to maintain a balance between two extremities? Tilak believed that if he plunged into reforming the society, he would not be able to arouse the masses against colonial domination, which was his main mission. As he boldly stated, “Swarajya is my birthright and I shall have it.”

 

 

Pandita Ramabai

 

 

Turning things around, Agarkar accused Tilak of an addiction to popularity even though agreeing with social reforms in his private thoughts. The Agarkar-Tilak debate sometimes degenerated into personal attacks. For example, when Tilak had tea and biscuits in a Christian mission, it was highlighted by Agarkar in his newspaper with the intention of projecting Tilak as a hypocrite who claims to be a leader of the traditional Hindus and, yet, has no hesitation in accepting food from the missionaries. Later he also alleged that Tilak was eating rice from the hands of a Muslim. Enraged, Tilak was preparing to file a case against this ‘defamation’ but, with the intervention of Ranade, the matter was settled. Nevertheless, when Pandita Ramabai launched a lifelong struggle against Hindu caste system and brahmanical patriarchy and eventually converted to Christianity to emancipate herself, every one of the nationalist and social reformers turned against her. She was completely marginalized and even erased from the collective consciousness.

 

 

When Tilak had tea and biscuits in a Christian mission, it was highlighted by Agarkar in his newspaper with the intention of projecting Tilak as a hypocrite who claims to be a leader of the traditional Hindus and, yet, has no hesitation in accepting food from the missionaries.

 

 

The obstinacy of Tilak is well known. Once he decided on a position, he did not budge from it. He displayed a remarkable capacity for work. Nevertheless, he lacked the modesty to consider anyone else his equal. Oftentimes, his stubbornness proved to be resolute. On the issue of having tea and biscuits with the missionaries, he faced social ostracism bravely and refused to submit to extreme orthodoxy. Ranade, a well-known Sudharak, also had tea in the Christian mission, but submitted to the dictates of religious orthodoxy by undertaking Prayascitta (penance) ordered by Shankaracharya.

 

So, the difference in social attitude and political outlook was stark. A popular Marathi proverb, “moden pan vaknar nahi” (I will break but will not bend), probably suits Tilak because, in his zeal for ‘Swaraj’, he could not overcome the prejudices and practices of the caste system.

 

However, it seems that these obstinate, uncompromising traces of his personality added some ‘masculine’, rustic charm and appealed to people who were looking for a ‘strong’ leader who had the courage to stand against the might of the British empire.

 

While criticizing Tilak, the Sudharaks also did not follow in their personal life what they preached in public. Ranade’s submission to Shankaracharya is already mentioned above. He was one of the leading luminaries of the movement for widow’s remarriage. But on the death of his first wife, he married a child bride instead of a widow. Telang, though he opposed child marriage, got his own daughter married at the age of eight. Agarkar did not object to these discrepancies in thought and practice. Tilak did not miss any opportunity to point out this double standard of Sudharaks and called them ‘sign boards’, who show the way to others, but do not themselves traverse it. Ideological differences blended with ego and turned the situation between these two stalwarts into long drawn conflicts.

 

Visible contradictions in the practice and preaching of both Tilak and Agarkar made them both relevant and irrelevant during their times and beyond.

 

 

The Sudharaks also did not follow in their personal life what they preached in public. Ranade’s submission to Shankaracharya is already mentioned above. He was one of the leading luminaries of the movement for widow’s remarriage. But on the death of his first wife, he married a child bride instead of a widow. Telang, though he opposed child marriage, got his own daughter married at the age of eight.

 

 

It seems that Agarkar came around to the opinion of Tilak in the later stages of his life. In an article written three years before his death, Agarkar also accepted that political reforms should be given priority over social ones. But his dislike for Tilak did not subside. In his last days, Agarkar was bed ridden. Tilak visited him. According to C.G. Devdhar, a close associate of Agarkar, the latter was not very comfortable with Tilak’s visit and wished him to go away. But according to a version provided by Agarkar’s wife, Yashodabai, Agarkar was relieved that the bitterness between him and Tilak was resolved before he finally shut his eyes.

 

Agarkar appears to be a rather lonely figure, who lived a life of poverty. As he departed from Tilak, the latter’s popularity graph soared. Ranade became a judge and went to Bombay. Gokhale also became well known. It was only Agarkar, who appears to be lonely and led a life of deprivation. It is said that after his death, a small amount of money was found in his home tied in a paper, on which it was mentioned that this money was kept for his funeral. Agarkar’s life appears to be like a lonely mountain, that had burnt its own trees and deprived itself of shade. Agarkar’s wife says that her husband had never thought about himself, but about others. But sadly, his work was not valued in his lifetime.

 

Vishram Bedekar’s drama ‘Tilak ani Agarkar’ is a very well researched piece of creative writing. The concluding scene of this drama portrays Agarkar’s death, where Tilak is present. We hear a cry of a newly born girl in the background and Tilak says, “The girls born in Maharashtra do not have to cry so much now, because Agarkar was born here.”

 

 

The concluding scene of this drama portrays Agarkar’s death, where Tilak is present. We hear a cry of a newly born girl in the background and Tilak says, “The girls born in Maharashtra do not have to cry so much now, because Agarkar was born here.”

 

 

Conclusion

 

Looked at from one angle, the Tilak-Agarkar debate depicts the coming of age of Indian nationalism and also the confidence to tackle social issues independently, and mobilize the masses against British colonial rule. But from a critical angle, this debate was not really relevant for the vast majority of rural and working women of the Hindu community. It also did not do anything for the tribals. It completely ignored and alienated non-Hindus, i.e., Muslims, Christians, tribal communities and others. They formed a substantial proportion of the population in the country.

 

 

From a critical angle, this debate was not really relevant for the vast majority of rural and working women of the Hindu community. It also did not do anything for the tribals. It completely ignored and alienated non-Hindus, i.e., Muslims, Christians, tribal communities and others.

 

 

So, the debate scratched only the very thin surface of Indian society and did not go deep enough to usher in any radical change or social reform. Most importantly, the issue of violence against women was not even addressed. The debate took place within the elite upper caste Hindu social framework. It never challenged the oppressive social system that was presided over by an equally oppressive British colonial rule. The British colonialists, nationalists, and social reformers would try to address women’s issues without actually involving the women themselves in their own emancipation. While Tilak and Agarkar debated endlessly on what should come first, national liberation or social reform, Gandhi tried to show later that both can be undertaken simultaneously.

 

 

The British colonialists, nationalists, and social reformers would try to address women’s issues without actually involving the women themselves in their own emancipation.

 

 

Ravi Khangai and Laxman D. Satya’s paper Tilak-Agarkar Debate: Ideologies of Social Reforms in 19th Century Maharashtra – Its Relevance and Irrelevance has been carried with the permission of its authors. It has been presented without its abstract, citations or references for purposes of easier reading. You can read this paper in its entirety here.

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On 14 July, 1930, Rabindranath Tagore visited Albert Einstein’s house in Caputh, near Berlin. The conversation between them – on how to understand truth and reality – was recorded and subsequently published in the January 1931 issue of Modern Review.

 

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Almost exactly 90 years ago, Albert Einstein and Rabindranath Tagore had a long conversation faithfully recorded in The Modern Review. An unbiased observer reading that, without context, might assume that the two intellectual giants were essentially talking past each other, as they discussed truth, beauty and the divine.

 

They may well have had some communication issues since neither spoke English as a first language. But this actually serves as a wonderful illustration of two different ways of looking at the universe. And, no, it wasn’t a dialogue that can simply be glibly characterised as East meets West.

 

A quick look at their backgrounds may be helpful. Einstein was a secular Jew. He never took religion very seriously. If he believed in God at all, it was not in the patriarchal Yahweh of the Torah, who laid down the law to Moses and appeared in a burning bush.

 

That’s very clear from other statements Einstein made, starting with the off-the-cuff, “Does the Old Man play dice with the Universe?” That was when he was discussing quantum action, with Nils Bohr who responded with the classic: “Don’t tell Him what to do!”

 

Einstein also said, “I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this, but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it.”

 

Tagore on the other hand, was brought up in the Brahmo tradition by a great preacher, his father, Maharishi Debendranath. Brahmoism can be described as a Unitarian religion. It acknowledges one Advaita Param Brahma, a formless, eternal creator. The religion is focused on the Vedas, while rejecting caste, food fads, other later Sanatan Hindu writing and customs.

 

Tagore however broke out of the rather puritanical perspective imposed by his father. He embraced a broader mysticism, some of which he tries to articulate in this conversation. In his play Achalayatan, Tagore created a character, Dadathakur, who may have encapsulated his attitude to religion. Dadathakur is a free spirit who has a joyous, untrammelled direct relationship with the divine, rejecting a narrow rule-and-ritual-bound existence.   

 

The poet set up Santiniketan in Birbhum District, which has a strong baul tradition reaching back to the Bhakti cult with its philosophy of building personal connections to the divine. Birbhum District also has its fair share of tribals who are animists, not mainstream Hindus. Some of that – Bhakti certainly, quite possibly the animistic worship of the divine in the natural – exerted influence on the poet.

 

But insofar as one can analyse a free-flowing conversation of this nature, the best framework is perhaps provided by a look at the anthropic principle (AP).  Although the AP was only defined and articulated from the 1960s onwards, long after the demise of these two, it provides a context that actually allows us to make sense of the conversation.

 

Tagore was a believer in the Strong Anthropic Principle: The Universe was created the way it was, with natural laws that led to the emergence of sapient life because it could only be observed and appreciated if there was life. According to this philosophical stance, truth and beauty cannot exist in the absence of sentient observers.

 

There is also a Weak Anthropic Principle which can be defined as a belief that life can only appreciate the wonders of a universe which happens, by some statistical chance, to have natural laws that support life.

 

Going by this conversation Einstein was not a believer in the Anthropic Principle at all: His position is that the laws of nature are the laws of nature. They exist and they create their own beauty and harmony, regardless of observers.

 

I hope this helps provide some context for the conversation. Now take a deep breath and dive in!

 

 

—Devangshu Datta

 

 

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TAGORE: You have been busy, hunting down with mathematics, the two ancient entities, time and space, while I have been lecturing in this country on the eternal world of man, the universe of reality.

 

EINSTEIN: Do you believe in the divine isolated from the world?

 

TAGORE: Not isolated. The infinite personality of man comprehends the universe. There cannot be anything that cannot be subsumed by the human personality, and this proves that the truth of the universe is human truth.

 

EINSTEIN: There are two different conceptions about the nature of the universe — the world as a unity dependent on humanity, and the world as reality independent of the human factor.

 

TAGORE: When our universe is in harmony with man, the eternal, we know it as truth, we feel it as beauty.

 

EINSTEIN: This is a purely human conception of the universe.

 

TAGORE: The world is a human world — the scientific view of it is also that of the scientific man. Therefore, the world apart from us does not exist; it is a relative world, depending for its reality upon our consciousness. There is some standard of reason and enjoyment which gives it truth, the standard of the eternal man whose experiences are made possible through our experiences.

 

EINSTEIN: This is a realization of the human entity.

 

TAGORE: Yes, one eternal entity. We have to realize it through our emotions and activities. We realize the supreme man, who has no individual limitations, through our limitations. Science is concerned with that which is not confined to individuals; it is the impersonal human world of truths. Religion realizes these truths and links them up with our deeper needs. Our individual consciousness of truth gains universal significance. Religion applies values to truth, and we know truth as good through our own harmony with it.

 

EINSTEIN: Truth, then, or beauty, is not independent of man?

 

TAGORE: No, I do not say so.

 

EINSTEIN: If there were no human beings any more, the Apollo Belvedere no longer would be beautiful?

 

TAGORE: No!

 

 

A self-portrait by Rabindranath Tagore.

EINSTEIN: I agree with this conception of beauty, but not with regard to truth.

 

TAGORE: Why not? Truth is realized through men.

 

EINSTEIN: I cannot prove my conception is right, but that is my religion.

 

TAGORE: Beauty is in the ideal of perfect harmony, which is in the universal being; truth is the perfect comprehension of the universal mind. We individuals approach it through our own mistakes and blunders, through our accumulated experience, through our illumined consciousness. How otherwise can we know truth?

 

EINSTEIN: I cannot prove, but I believe in the Pythagorean argument, that the truth is independent of human beings. It is the problem of the logic of continuity.

 

TAGORE: Truth, which is one with the universal being, must be essentially human; otherwise, whatever we individuals realize as true, never can be called truth. At least, the truth which is described as scientific and which only can be reached through the process of logic—in other words, by an organ of thought which is human. According to the Indian philosophy there is Brahman, the absolute truth, which cannot be conceived by the isolation of the individual mind or described by words, but can be realized only by merging the individual in its infinity. But such a truth cannot belong to science. The nature of truth which we are discussing is an appearance; that is to say, what appears to be true to the human mind, and therefore is human, and may be called maya, or illusion.

 

EINSTEIN: It is no illusion of the individual, but of the species.

 

TAGORE: The species also belongs to a unity, to humanity. Therefore the entire human mind realizes truth; the Indian and the European mind meet in a common realization.

 

A portrait of Albert Einstein by post-impressionist painter Leonid Pasternak. 1924.

 

EINSTEIN: The word species is used in German for all human beings; as a matter of fact, even the apes and the frogs would belong to it. The problem is whether truth is independent of our consciousness.

 

TAGORE: What we call truth lies in the rational harmony between the subjective and objective aspects of reality, both of which belong to the superpersonal man.

 

EINSTEIN: We do things with our mind, even in our everyday life, for which we are not responsible. The mind acknowledges realities outside of it, independent of it. For instance, nobody may be in this house, yet that table remains where it is.

 

TAGORE: Yes, it remains outside the individual mind, but not the universal mind. The table is that which is perceptible by some kind of consciousness we possess.

 

EINSTEIN: If nobody were in the house the table would exist all the same, but this is already illegitimate from your point of view, because we cannot explain what it means, that the table is there, independently of us. Our natural point of view in regard to the existence of truth apart from humanity cannot be explained or proved, but it is a belief which nobody can lack—not even primitive beings. We attribute to truth a superhuman objectivity. It is indispensable for us—this reality which is independent of our existence and our experience and our mind—though we cannot say what it means.

 

TAGORE: In any case, if there be any truth absolutely unrelated to humanity, then for us it is absolutely non-existing.

 

EINSTEIN: Then I am more religious than you are!

 

TAGORE: My religion is in the reconciliation of the superpersonal man, the universal spirit, in my own individual being.

 

ABOUT ‘THE MODERN REVIEW’:

 

The Modern Review was founded in 1907 by Ramananda Chatterjee, who also founded and edited the Bengali magazine, Prabasi and the Hindi magazine, Vishal Bharat. All three periodicals can be best described as journals of opinion.

The Modern Review published essays by practically every well-known leader of the Indian nationalist movement, along with the views of foreign sympathisers. It also carried rousing editorials from Ramananda Babu himself. After his demise in 1943, his son Kedarnath carried on the good work until he passed away in 1965. The magazine also published fiction, book and art reviews, travelogues, etc., including essays by pioneers like the anthropologist Verrier Elwin and historian, Jadunath Sarkar.

Ramananda Babu allowed his contributors to present every shade of opinion and argue their cases, while ensuring the magazine itself maintained an impartial editorial stance. He was happy to publish long multi-issue arguments between luminaries like Tagore-Gandhi and Subhas Bose-Sardar Patel about the shape and direction of the nationalist movement. Contemporary opinions about topics such as education, women’s rights, the relations between religions and castes, electoral politics, India’s place in the world, and international relations can be accessed and contextualised by leafing through the archives of this journal of record. 

 

—Devangshu Datta

 

 

To read a select anthology of articles, interviews, poetry and fiction published from 1907-1947 in the Modern Review, you can buy‘Patriots, Poets and Prisoners’ here.

 

COLLECTIONAll ArticlesModern Review YEARAll Years2500 B.C.2200 B.C.400 B.C.600CE-1200CE 700 - 1400800 CE1100–1199 CE11921200 - 185015001530-18581575157916001600 CE-1900 CE16011630172418181828-184318311855185618571858 - 1976188318871893, 1935, 194618971910-19501913 - 19161916191719181920 - 194719211921 - 2018192419251925, 19261928193019321933193519361937193819421943-19451944194619471947-1951194819491950195119671970197319751977198420042008200920202021 AUTHORAll AuthorsAakash Singh RathoreAditya Mukherjee, Mridula Mukherjee, Sucheta MahajanAfsar MohammadAlbert Einstein, Rabindranath Tagore, Devangshu DattaAmjad Ali KhanAnandibai Joshi, Bankim Chandra ChatterjeeAnirudh Kanisetti Appu Esthose Suresh and Priyanka KotamrajuB.D. Ganapathy

1950-1951

Panikkar’s 1950 Ordeal: China’s Moves, Family Crisis, and Diplomatic Distrust

In this excerpt by Narayani Basu, explore K. M. Panikkar’s 1950–51 ordeal as India’s ambassador to China, marked by personal turmoil, diplomatic isolation, and ignored warnings amid rising Cold War tensions.

Narayani Basu

__

1828-1843

Scandal of Manners: ‘Urinating Standing Up’

Families despaired, newspapers railed, and society ridiculed a generation of young men who refused to accept inherited custom and ritual in 1830s Calcutta. What was at stake in these scandals of manners? Read Rosinka Chaudhuri’s excerpt to find out.

Rosinka Chaudhuri

__

1100–1199 CE

Topography as History: Reading Kashmir through Rajatarangini

Read this excerpt from Kalhana’s Rajatarangini, where history unfolds through a precise mapping of medieval Kashmir’s towns, rivers, and sacred sites.

Kalhana

__

1910-1950

Forging Unity: Vallabhbhai Patel and the Politics of Nationalism

An analysis of the romanticised narrative of Indian nationalism by examining Vallabhbhai Patel's political journey as a case study.

Rani Dhavan Shankardass

__

1943-1945

Origin Of The Azad Hind Fauj

An excerpt from the book My Memories of I.N.A. and Its Netaji by Major General Shahnawaz Khan, where he documents how Bose formed the INA, inspired disillusioned Indian soldiers to revolt, and challenged British rule with Axis support.

Major General Shahnawaz Khan

__

1900-1950

Gazing at the Woman’s Body: Historicising Patriarchal Lechery

In the colonial period, the fear of the male gaze was used by the new patriarchy to restrict women’s access to work and public space, reinforcing a patriarchal division of labour. Read more in our latest excerpt.

Saurav Kumar Rai

__

1865-1928

Understanding Lajpat Rai’s Hindu Politics and Secularism

Was Lala Lajpat Rai's Hindu nationalism congruent with the principles of secularism? Explore our latest excerpt from Vanya Vaidehi Bhargav's fresh off-the-press book - Being Hindu, Being Indian: Lala Lajpat Rai's Ideas of Nation for more.

Vanya Vaidehi Bhargav

__

1947-1951

Ambedkar Cartoons: The Joke’s On Us

Popularly, we think that political cartoons question the powerful but what if this was not the case? What if political cartoons, replicated structures of the socially dominant? Read how in our new excerpt on political cartoons featuring Dr. Ambedkar.

Unnamati Syama Sundar

__

1948

“My Father, Do Not Rest”

On Martyrs' day 2024, read the poet Sarojini Naidu's tribute to Gandhi given over All India Radio two days after his assassination.

Sarojini Naidu

__

1950

Illustrations from the constitution

On Republic Day, the Indian History Collective presents you, twenty-two illustrations from the first illustrated manuscript (1954) of our Constitution.

Indian History Collective

__

1200 - 1850

Temples, deities, and the law.

One of the key petitioners in the Ayodhya title dispute was Bhagwan Sri Ram Virajman. This petitioner was no mortal, but God Ram himself. How did Ram find his way from heaven to the Supreme Court of India to plead his case? Read further to find out.

Richard H Davis

__

1940-1960

Integration Myth: A Silenced History of Hyderabad

Labelled "one of the shortest, happiest wars ever seen", the integration of the princely state of Hyderabad in 1948 was anything but that. Read about the truth behind the creation of an Indian Union, the fault lines left behind, and what they signify

Afsar Mohammad

__

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COLLECTIONAll ArticlesModern Review YEARAll Years2500 B.C.2200 B.C.400 B.C.600CE-1200CE 700 - 1400800 CE1100–1199 CE11921200 - 185015001530-18581575157916001600 CE-1900 CE16011630172418181828-184318311855185618571858 - 1976188318871893, 1935, 194618971910-19501913 - 19161916191719181920 - 194719211921 - 2018192419251925, 19261928193019321933193519361937193819421943-19451944194619471947-1951194819491950195119671970197319751977198420042008200920202021 AUTHORAll AuthorsAakash Singh RathoreAditya Mukherjee, Mridula Mukherjee, Sucheta MahajanAfsar MohammadAlbert Einstein, Rabindranath Tagore, Devangshu DattaAmjad Ali KhanAnandibai Joshi, Bankim Chandra ChatterjeeAnirudh Kanisetti Appu Esthose Suresh and Priyanka KotamrajuB.D. GanapathyBhagat SinghBrajadulal ChattopadhyayaChanakya, Devangshu DattaCharu GuptaDr. Bhimrao Ramji AmbedkarGovind PansareGyan PrakashHenry Louis Vivian DerozioIndian History CollectiveIndian History Collective Ira MukhotyIrfan HabibJadunath SarkarJaipal Singh MundaJawaharlal Nehru and Muhammad Ali JinnahJawaharlal Nehru, Devangshu DattaKalhanaKidambi Srinivasa SanthaMahadev DesaiMajor General Shahnawaz KhanManan Ahmed AsifMani Rao, Priya Sarukkai Chabria & Ravi ShankarMark Tully, Satish JacobMohandas Karamchand GandhiMonobina GuptaMulk Raj AnandMunshi PremchandNarayani BasuNariman KarkariaParvati SharmaPralay KanungoPramod Kapoor Rabindranath TagoreRabindranath Tagore, Mohandas Karamchand GandhiRabindranath Tagore; Mohandas Karamchand GandhiRakesh AnkitRamesh Chandra MajumdarRana SafviRani Dhavan ShankardassRanjit Sitaram Pandit, Devangshu DattaRavi Khangai, Laxman D. SatyaRichard Eaton Richard H DavisRobert ElgoodRomila ThaparRosinka Chaudhuri Sant Nihal Singh, Devangshu DattaSarojini NaiduSatyendra Chandra Mitra, Devangshu DattaSaurav Kumar RaiShafaat Ahmad KhanShahid AminShailaja PaikShraddha KumbhojkarSiddharth Chandra and Eva Kassens-NoorSomnath HoreSujay BiswasSumanta BanerjeeTCA RaghavanTripurdaman SinghUnnamati Syama SundarUpinder SinghValay SinghVanya Vaidehi BhargavVeena Talwar OldenburgYogesh Maitreya

• 2500 BC - Present
  	2500 BC - Present
  Tribal History: Looking for the Origins of the Kodavas 2500 BC - Present Tribal History: Looking for the Origins of the Kodavas As part of our series on ‘Tribal history’, we bring to you the origin of the Kodavas from the region of Kodagu in Karnataka, as studied by BD Ganapathy Read More..

• 2200 BC to 600 AD
  	2200 BC to 600 AD
  War, Political Violence and Rebellion in Ancient India 2200 BC to 600 AD War, Political Violence and Rebellion in Ancient India An excerpt from Upinder Singh's recent ‘Ancient India: Culture of Contradictions’ where she deals with political violence and non-violence in ancient India Read More..

• 400 BC to 1001 AD
  	400 BC to 1001 AD
  The Dissent of the ‘Nastika’ in Early India 400 BC to 1001 AD The Dissent of the ‘Nastika’ in Early India An excerpt from Romila Thapar’s ‘Voices of Dissent: An Essay’ that examines what impact the 'Nastika' - the name Brahmanical texts tended to give to a range of non-Brahmanical belief systems - had both outside of and within the Brahmanical religion Read More..

• 600CE-1200CE
  	600CE-1200CE
  The Other Side of the Vindhyas: An Alternative History of Power 600CE-1200CE The Other Side of the Vindhyas: An Alternative History of Power An excerpt from Anirudh Kanisetti’s ‘Lords of the Deccan’ that explores how modern day Hinduism originated not merely out of devotion but also out of the political necessity of providing a firm footing to rulers with imperial ambitions Read More..

• c. 700 - 1400 AD
  	c. 700 - 1400 AD
  A Historian Recommends: Representing the ‘Other’ in Indian History c. 700 - 1400 AD A Historian Recommends: Representing the ‘Other’ in Indian History Suchandra Ghosh recommends a chapter from Brajadulal Chattopadhyaya’s book which is an inquiry into how the ‘other’ has been perceived by historians and how sources have been read, particularly with regard to Islam and Sanskrit sources Read More..

• c. 800 - 900 CE
  	c. 800 - 900 CE
  ‘Drape me in his scent’: Female Sexuality and Devotion in Andal, the Goddess c. 800 - 900 CE ‘Drape me in his scent’: Female Sexuality and Devotion in Andal, the Goddess Excerpts from ‘Andal: Autobiography of a Goddess,’ providing a historical and literary background to the celebrated Bhakti Poet-Saint Read More..

• 1100–1199 CE
  	1100–1199 CE
  Topography as History: Reading Kashmir through Rajatarangini 1100–1199 CE Topography as History: Reading Kashmir through Rajatarangini Read this excerpt from Kalhana’s Rajatarangini, where history unfolds through a precise mapping of medieval Kashmir’s towns, rivers, and sacred sites. Read More..

• 1192
  	1192
  Sufi Silsilahs: The Mystic Orders in India 1192 Sufi Silsilahs: The Mystic Orders in India What is Sufism? Read this chapter by Rana Safvi to understand the role of Sufi Mystic Orders to help spread Sufism in India Read More..

• 1200 - 1850
  	1200 - 1850
  Temples, deities, and the law. 1200 - 1850 Temples, deities, and the law. One of the key petitioners in the Ayodhya title dispute was Bhagwan Sri Ram Virajman. This petitioner was no mortal, but God Ram himself. How did Ram find his way from heaven to the Supreme Court of India to plead his case? Read further to find out. Read More..

• c. 1500 - 1600 AD
  	c. 1500 - 1600 AD
  A Historian Recommends: Religion in Mughal India c. 1500 - 1600 AD A Historian Recommends: Religion in Mughal India Shireen Moosvi recommends a chapter on religion, from Irfan Habib's book which examines the evolution of different religions, considering it to be, in her words, “topical for the present” Read More..

• 1200-2020
  	1200-2020
  Policing Untouchables and Producing Tamasha in Maharashtra 1200-2020 Policing Untouchables and Producing Tamasha in Maharashtra An excerpt from Shailaija Paik's new book 'Vulgarity of Caste' that documents the pivotal role Tamasha (the popular art form) has played in reinforcing and producing caste dynamics in Marathi society. Read More..

• 1530-1858
  	1530-1858
  Rajputs, Mughals and the Handguns of Hindustan 1530-1858 Rajputs, Mughals and the Handguns of Hindustan A chapter from Robert Elgood’s 'The Maharaja of Jodhpur’s Guns' - "the first book to be written specifically on historic Indian firearms" - compares Rajput and Mughal attitudes to firearms, particularly the matchlock handguns Read More..

• 1575
  	1575
  Abdul Qadir Badauni & Abul Fazl: Two Mughal Intellectuals in King Akbar‘s Court 1575 Abdul Qadir Badauni & Abul Fazl: Two Mughal Intellectuals in King Akbar‘s Court An excerpt from Parvati Sharma’s ‘Akbar of Hindustan’, which revisits the lives and times of two remarkable Mughal scholars: Abul Fazl and Abdul Qadir Badauni Read More..

• 1579
  	1579
  Padshah-i Islam 1579 Padshah-i Islam A chapter from Mughal Emperor Akbar’s biography by Ira Mukhoty that delves into his approach towards religion Read More..

• 1550-1800
  	1550-1800
  Who are the Bengal Muslims? : Conversion and Islamisation in Bengal 1550-1800 Who are the Bengal Muslims? : Conversion and Islamisation in Bengal How did Bengal get a large Muslim population? Was it conversion by ruling elites was there something deeper at play? Read Dr. Eaton's classic essay to find out. Read More..

• c. 1600 CE-1900 CE
  	c. 1600 CE-1900 CE
  The Birth of a Community: UP’s Ghazi Miyan and Narratives of ‘Conquest’ c. 1600 CE-1900 CE The Birth of a Community: UP’s Ghazi Miyan and Narratives of ‘Conquest’ An excerpt from Shahid Amin’s book ‘Conquest and Community: The afterlife of Saint Ghazi Miyan’ that unpacks the historical and contemporary remembrance of a conquering ‘warrior saint’ by a heterogeneous community Read More..

• 1553 - 1900
  	1553 - 1900
  What Happened to ‘Hindustan’? 1553 - 1900 What Happened to ‘Hindustan’? How ‘Hindustan’ became ‘India’. How the European (particularly British) geography of the subcontinent was divisive, faulty and an instrument of colonisation. And how it plagues us to this day Read More..

• 1630-1680
  	1630-1680
  Shivaji: Hindutva Icon or Secular Nationalist? 1630-1680 Shivaji: Hindutva Icon or Secular Nationalist? A chapter from Govind Pansare’s provocative and insightful book Who Was Shivaji? which examines his attitude towards the Hindu and Muslim religions Read More..

• 1630 -1680
  	1630 -1680
  Shivaji: His Legacy & His Times 1630 -1680 Shivaji: His Legacy & His Times Jadunath Sarkar analyses Shivaji’s personality and legacy in the context of Maratha society, institutions and foreign policy in the seventeenth century Read More..

• c. 1724 – 1857 A.D.
  	c. 1724 – 1857 A.D.
  Bahu Begum and the Gendered Struggle for Power c. 1724 – 1857 A.D. Bahu Begum and the Gendered Struggle for Power This extract from The Begums of Awadh by KS Santha reconstructs the life history of Bahu Begum, the third Begum of Awadh, and provides an illuminating example of the political role that the Begums of Awadh occupied in the 18th and 19th centuries Read More..

• 1818 - Present
  	1818 - Present
  The Contesting Memories of Bhima-Koregaon 1818 - Present The Contesting Memories of Bhima-Koregaon Examining continuity and change in the commemorative history of the Bhima-Koregaon memorial, this paper shows that the contestations for hegemony in the present often take the form of contestations about memories. Read More..

• 1828-1843
  	1828-1843
  Scandal of Manners: ‘Urinating Standing Up’ 1828-1843 Scandal of Manners: ‘Urinating Standing Up’ Families despaired, newspapers railed, and society ridiculed a generation of young men who refused to accept inherited custom and ritual in 1830s Calcutta. What was at stake in these scandals of manners? Read Rosinka Chaudhuri’s excerpt to find out. Read More..

• 1831
  	1831
  The Derozians’ India 1831 The Derozians’ India On Henry Louis Vivian Derozio, his work and values, and his freethinking students who would become 'Young Bengal' Read More..

• 1855
  	1855
  Ayodhya 1855 1855 Ayodhya 1855 Similar violence. Similar conflict. But it was not about a temple in a mosque. It was about a mosque in a temple. And the games people played Read More..

• 1856
  	1856
  “Worshipping the dead is not an auspicious thing” — Ghalib 1856 “Worshipping the dead is not an auspicious thing” — Ghalib Mirza Ghalib’s chastisement of Syed Ahmad Khan for writing a new edition of Ai’n-e Akbari, via a poem Read More..

• 1857
  	1857
  A Subaltern speaks: Dalit women’s counter-history of 1857 1857 A Subaltern speaks: Dalit women’s counter-history of 1857 In this essay, Charu Gupta examines the ways in which Dalit literature has dealt with the role of Dalit women in the revolt of 1857 Read More..

• 1858 - 1976
  	1858 - 1976
  Lifestyle as Resistance: The Curious Case of the Courtesans of Lucknow 1858 - 1976 Lifestyle as Resistance: The Curious Case of the Courtesans of Lucknow A fascinating essay that explores the ‘resistance’ of the courtesans of Lucknow, towards the changing patterns of the society after the arrival of the British Read More..

• 1883 - 1894
  	1883 - 1894
  The Sea Voyage Question: A Nineteenth century Debate 1883 - 1894 The Sea Voyage Question: A Nineteenth century Debate 19th-century upper-caste Hindus (Anandibai Joshi, Bankim Chattopadhyay) debate against the idea of being outcasted after crossing the sea Read More..

• 1887
  	1887
  The Great Debaters: Tilak Vs. Agarkar 1887 The Great Debaters: Tilak Vs. Agarkar A debate between tradition and reform in 19th Century Maharashtra that retains its relevance today Read More..

• 1893-1946
  	1893-1946
  A Historian Recommends: Gandhi Vs. Caste 1893-1946 A Historian Recommends: Gandhi Vs. Caste Aditya Mukherjee recommends Sujay Biswas’s paper that traces and evaluates Gandhi’s differing positions on caste at different points of time Read More..

• 1897
  	1897
  Queen Empress vs. Bal Gangadhar Tilak: An Autopsy 1897 Queen Empress vs. Bal Gangadhar Tilak: An Autopsy A post-mortem of India's first sedition conviction. Read More..

• 1910-1950
  	1910-1950
  Forging Unity: Vallabhbhai Patel and the Politics of Nationalism 1910-1950 Forging Unity: Vallabhbhai Patel and the Politics of Nationalism An analysis of the romanticised narrative of Indian nationalism by examining Vallabhbhai Patel's political journey as a case study. Read More..

• 1913 - 1916 Modern Review
  	1913 - 1916
  A Young Ambedkar in New York 1913 - 1916 A Young Ambedkar in New York How did Ambedkar's formative years in New York and Columbia University shape his later life and legacy? Read More..

• 1916
  	1916
  A Rare Account of World War I by an Indian Soldier 1916 A Rare Account of World War I by an Indian Soldier A rare first-hand account of the iconic Battle of Somme, one of the most important battles of the First World War, through the eyes of an Indian-Parsi soldier who fought in it. Read More..

• 1917
  	1917
  On Nationalism, by Tagore 1917 On Nationalism, by Tagore An essay and a poem by Rabindranath Tagore tells us all we need to know about nationalism, and more Read More..

• 1918 - 1919
  	1918 - 1919
  What Happened to the Virus That Caused the World’s Deadliest Pandemic? 1918 - 1919 What Happened to the Virus That Caused the World’s Deadliest Pandemic? Economist Siddharth Chandra's pioneering work traces the spread of the Spanish Flu in India, in 1918 Read More..

• 1920 - 1947
  	1920 - 1947
  How One Should Celebrate Diwali, According to Gandhi 1920 - 1947 How One Should Celebrate Diwali, According to Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi's statements on Diwali, Rama, Ravana and Ramarajya, from three different years Read More..

• 1921
  	1921
  Great Debates: Tagore Vs. Gandhi (1921) 1921 Great Debates: Tagore Vs. Gandhi (1921) An exchange of open letters between Rabindranath Tagore and Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, in which they argue for 'Cooperation' and 'Non-Cooperation', respectively, with a focus on the idea of ‘Soul-force’ (as opposed to ‘Brute-force’) Read More..

• 1921 - 2015
  	1921 - 2015
  A History of Caste Politics and Elections in Bihar 1921 - 2015 A History of Caste Politics and Elections in Bihar A chronicling of the history of caste politics in Bihar, from the Janeyu Movement of the 1920s and the Triveni Sangh, through Ram Manohar Lohia, the JP Movement and Karpoori Thakur to the making of Lalu Prasad Yadav Read More..

• 1915-1921
  	1915-1921
  The Satirical Genius of Gaganendranath Tagore 1915-1921 The Satirical Genius of Gaganendranath Tagore The audaciously brilliant caricatures, art and life of Gaganendranath Tagore, as explored by writer Mulk Raj Anand Read More..

• 1924-1937
  	1924-1937
  What were Gandhi’s Views on Religious Conversion? 1924-1937 What were Gandhi’s Views on Religious Conversion? In his own words, read Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi's views on the proselytising efforts taken on by the organisations such as Arya Samaj, Tabhligi Jamaat, and the Church Missionary Society of England. Read More..

• 1900-1950
  	1900-1950
  Gazing at the Woman’s Body: Historicising Patriarchal Lechery 1900-1950 Gazing at the Woman’s Body: Historicising Patriarchal Lechery In the colonial period, the fear of the male gaze was used by the new patriarchy to restrict women’s access to work and public space, reinforcing a patriarchal division of labour. Read more in our latest excerpt. Read More..

• 1925, 1926
  	1925, 1926
  Great Debates: Tagore vs Gandhi (1925-1926) 1925, 1926 Great Debates: Tagore vs Gandhi (1925-1926) Tagore raises questions about Gandhi’s ‘Cult of the Charkha’ in an essay, following it up with another essay that further stirs things up. Gandhi responds in an essay published in ‘Young India’ and then a postscript, of sorts, to the entire controversy Read More..

• 1928
  	1928
  Bhagat Singh’s dilemma: Nehru or Bose? 1928 Bhagat Singh’s dilemma: Nehru or Bose? Read this article from 1928, where Bhagat Singh underlines the reasons why he envisions Nehru's idea of India more than Netaji Bose's Read More..

• 1930 Modern Review
  	1930
  The Modern Review Special: On the Nature of Reality 1930 The Modern Review Special: On the Nature of Reality Albert Einstein in Conversation with Rabindranath Tagore Read More..

• 1932
  	1932
  Caste, Gandhi and the Man Beside Gandhi 1932 Caste, Gandhi and the Man Beside Gandhi Why did Gandhi go on a fast unto death to protest separate electorates for Dalits? An intimate glimpse into the days leading up to this decision from the diary of his personal secretary Mahadev Desai Read More..

• 1933 - 1991
  	1933 - 1991
  Raghubir Sinh: The Prince Who Would Be Historian 1933 - 1991 Raghubir Sinh: The Prince Who Would Be Historian An intellectual portrait of Raghubir Sinh — known to most as a prince and a politician rather than a scholar — told mostly through the lens of his relationships with his mentors, pioneering historians Jadunath Sarkar and GS Sardesai Read More..

• 1935
  	1935
  A Historian Recommends: SA Khan’s Timeless Presidential Address 1935 A Historian Recommends: SA Khan’s Timeless Presidential Address Manan Ahmed Asif recommends Shafaat Ahmad Khan’s presidential address at the birth of the Indian History Congress in 1935, which elaborated on the Indian historiographical landscape, challenges ahead and possible solutions Read More..

• 1865-1928
  	1865-1928
  Understanding Lajpat Rai’s Hindu Politics and Secularism 1865-1928 Understanding Lajpat Rai’s Hindu Politics and Secularism Was Lala Lajpat Rai's Hindu nationalism congruent with the principles of secularism? Explore our latest excerpt from Vanya Vaidehi Bhargav's fresh off-the-press book - Being Hindu, Being Indian: Lala Lajpat Rai's Ideas of Nation for more. Read More..

• 1935 Modern Review
  	1935
  The Modern Review Special: The Mind of a Judge 1935 The Modern Review Special: The Mind of a Judge A window to a time we can learn from, this essay raises questions of state force & violence that remain relevant today Read More..

• 1936 Modern Review
  	1936
  The Modern Review Special: When Netaji Subhas Bose Was Wrongfully Detained for ‘Terrorism’ 1936 The Modern Review Special: When Netaji Subhas Bose Was Wrongfully Detained for ‘Terrorism’ The story of the draconian law that was used to detain Subhas Chandra Bose and other freedom fighters like him without trial Read More..

• 1936
  	1936
  Annihilation of Caste: Part 1 1936 Annihilation of Caste: Part 1 ‘Annihilation of Caste’ by BR Ambedkar needs to be read and reread Read More..

• 1936 Modern Review
  	1936
  The Modern Review Special: An Indian MP in the British Parliament 1936 The Modern Review Special: An Indian MP in the British Parliament A profile of Shapurji Saklatvala, a man of paradoxes from India and Britain Read More..

• 1936
  	1936
  Annihilation of Caste: Part 2 1936 Annihilation of Caste: Part 2 The second and most crucial part of ‘Annihilation of Caste’ followed by a Gandhi-Ambedkar debate Read More..

• 1936
  	1936
  A Reflection of His Age: Munshi Premchand on the True Purpose of Literature 1936 A Reflection of His Age: Munshi Premchand on the True Purpose of Literature Munshi Premchand, one of modern India's most influential writers, addresses the first conference of the Progressive Writers’ Association in 1936, on the nature and purpose of literature Read More..

• 1936 Modern Review
  	1936
  The Modern Review Special: The Defeat of a Dalit Candidate in a 1936 Municipal Election 1936 The Modern Review Special: The Defeat of a Dalit Candidate in a 1936 Municipal Election A piece that illustrates the workings of caste on ground and in politics that, tragically, is still relevant today Read More..

• 1937 Modern Review
  	1937
  The Modern Review Special: Rashtrapati 1937 The Modern Review Special: Rashtrapati That critique of Nehru which said: “We want no Caesars”, from The Modern Review Read More..

• 1938
  	1938
  Great Debates: Nehru Vs. Jinnah (1938) 1938 Great Debates: Nehru Vs. Jinnah (1938) Nehru and Jinnah may have been spokespersons for different political bodies, but their often heated interactions were marked by consistent civility. Read this exchange discussing the question of Muslim representation and the communal question Read More..

• 1942 Modern Review
  	1942
  IHC Uncovers: A Parallel Government In British India (Part 1) 1942 IHC Uncovers: A Parallel Government In British India (Part 1) In 1942, five years before India was independent, two sub-divisions in Bengal not only declared their independence— they also instituted a parallel government. The first in a new series. Read More..

• 1943-1945
  	1943-1945
  Origin Of The Azad Hind Fauj 1943-1945 Origin Of The Azad Hind Fauj An excerpt from the book My Memories of I.N.A. and Its Netaji by Major General Shahnawaz Khan, where he documents how Bose formed the INA, inspired disillusioned Indian soldiers to revolt, and challenged British rule with Axis support. Read More..

• 1942-1945
  	1942-1945
  IHC Uncovers: A Parallel Government in British India (Part 2) 1942-1945 IHC Uncovers: A Parallel Government in British India (Part 2) In 1942, two sub-districts in Bengal declared independence and set up a parallel government. The second part of our story brings you archival papers in the form of letters, newspaper reports, and judicial records documenting this remarkable movement. Read More..

• 1946
  	1946
  Our Last War of Independence: The Royal Indian Navy Mutiny of 1946 1946 Our Last War of Independence: The Royal Indian Navy Mutiny of 1946 An excerpt from Pramod Kapoor’s book ‘1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence’ examines the different reasons for the RIN Mutiny as put forward by the British and Indian witnesses in the Commission of Enquiry proceedings Read More..

• 1946
  	1946
  An Artist’s Account of the Tebhaga Movement in Pictures And Prose 1946 An Artist’s Account of the Tebhaga Movement in Pictures And Prose In December, 1946, one of India’s major artists travelled to North Bengal to document India’s “first consciously attempted revolt by a politicized peasantry”. Here are his sketches, art and diary entries on the Tebhaga Movement Read More..

• 1946 – 1947
  	1946 – 1947
  “The Most Democratic People on Earth” : An Adivasi Voice in the Constituent Assembly 1946 – 1947 “The Most Democratic People on Earth” : An Adivasi Voice in the Constituent Assembly Three powerful speeches from one of the few Adivasi representatives in the Constituent Assembly – Jaipal Singh Munda, vocalising the community’s long history of exploitation and their expectations from India an independent nation Read More..

• 1946-1947
  	1946-1947
  VP Menon and the Birth of Independent India 1946-1947 VP Menon and the Birth of Independent India A bold behind-the-scenes account of how V. P. Menon worked to effect the princely states' accession to the Indian Union Read More..

• 1916 - 1947
  	1916 - 1947
  8 @ 75: 8 Speeches Independent Indians Must Read 1916 - 1947 8 @ 75: 8 Speeches Independent Indians Must Read On the 75th anniversary of Indian independence, here are eight speeches from the Indian freedom struggle, and around Indian independence, from leaders and thinkers who still have lots to say Read More..

• 1947-1951
  	1947-1951
  Ambedkar Cartoons: The Joke’s On Us 1947-1951 Ambedkar Cartoons: The Joke’s On Us Popularly, we think that political cartoons question the powerful but what if this was not the case? What if political cartoons, replicated structures of the socially dominant? Read how in our new excerpt on political cartoons featuring Dr. Ambedkar. Read More..

• 1948
  	1948
  “My Father, Do Not Rest” 1948 “My Father, Do Not Rest” On Martyrs' day 2024, read the poet Sarojini Naidu's tribute to Gandhi given over All India Radio two days after his assassination. Read More..

• 1940-1960
  	1940-1960
  Integration Myth: A Silenced History of Hyderabad 1940-1960 Integration Myth: A Silenced History of Hyderabad Labelled "one of the shortest, happiest wars ever seen", the integration of the princely state of Hyderabad in 1948 was anything but that. Read about the truth behind the creation of an Indian Union, the fault lines left behind, and what they signify Read More..

• 1948
  	1948
  The Assassination of a Mahatma, the Princely States and the ‘Hindu’ Nation 1948 The Assassination of a Mahatma, the Princely States and the ‘Hindu’ Nation Was anti-Gandhi rhetoric echoing only within the Hindu Mahasabha, or were princely states involved too? Read a telling excerpt from A E Suresh and P Kotamraju's book, presenting fresh research on Gandhi's assassination Read More..

• 1949
  	1949
  Ambedkar warns against India becoming a ‘Democracy in Form, Dictatorship in Fact’ 1949 Ambedkar warns against India becoming a ‘Democracy in Form, Dictatorship in Fact’ Before enacting the Constitution into law, Babasaheb told us how to guard against dangers to the same Read More..

• 1950
  	1950
  Illustrations from the constitution 1950 Illustrations from the constitution On Republic Day, the Indian History Collective presents you, twenty-two illustrations from the first illustrated manuscript (1954) of our Constitution. Read More..

• 1951
  	1951
  How the First Amendment to the Indian Constitution Circumscribed Our Freedoms & How it was Passed 1951 How the First Amendment to the Indian Constitution Circumscribed Our Freedoms & How it was Passed The story of how a provisional parliament elected on a limited franchise passed the first amendment to our Constitution that continues to restrict key Indian liberties Read More..

• 1950-1951
  	1950-1951
  Panikkar’s 1950 Ordeal: China’s Moves, Family Crisis, and Diplomatic Distrust 1950-1951 Panikkar’s 1950 Ordeal: China’s Moves, Family Crisis, and Diplomatic Distrust In this excerpt by Narayani Basu, explore K. M. Panikkar’s 1950–51 ordeal as India’s ambassador to China, marked by personal turmoil, diplomatic isolation, and ignored warnings amid rising Cold War tensions. Read More..

• 1967
  	1967
  Once Upon A Time In Naxalbari 1967 Once Upon A Time In Naxalbari Indian History Collective’s first in a series on the Naxalbari movement Read More..

• 1970
  	1970
  R.C. Majumdar on Shortcomings in Indian Historiography 1970 R.C. Majumdar on Shortcomings in Indian Historiography An excerpt from R.C. Majumdar’s book, originally published in 1970, outlining flaws he saw in the historiography of the historians of his time, and their root causes Read More..

• 1973 - 1993
  	1973 - 1993
  Balasaheb Deoras: Kingmaker of the Sangh 1973 - 1993 Balasaheb Deoras: Kingmaker of the Sangh An in-depth look at Balasaheb Deoras’ two-decades long tenure as RSS sarsanghchalak, analysing his role in transforming the organisation from a fringe party to the national alternative to the Congress Read More..

• 1975
  	1975
  The Emergency Package: Shadow Power 1975 The Emergency Package: Shadow Power An excerpt from Gyan Prakash’s ‘Emergency Chronicles’ that will inform and remind you. Because you must remember Read More..

• 1975
  	1975
  The Emergency Package: The Prehistory of Turkman Gate – Population Control 1975 The Emergency Package: The Prehistory of Turkman Gate – Population Control A second excerpt from Gyan Prakash’s ‘Emergency Chronicles’ traces the lineage of one of the Emergency’s worst excesses Read More..

• 1977 – 2011
  	1977 – 2011
  Power is an Unforgiving Mistress: Lessons from the Decline of the Left in Bengal 1977 – 2011 Power is an Unforgiving Mistress: Lessons from the Decline of the Left in Bengal This chapter from Monobina Gupta’s book traces the rule of the Left Front government in West Bengal, illustrating how its desire to hold on to power overpowered its promises to the public, paving the way for the end of its 34 year-long rule Read More..

• 1984
  	1984
  Mrs Gandhi’s Final Folly: Operation Blue Star 1984 Mrs Gandhi’s Final Folly: Operation Blue Star This gripping and incisive chapter from veteran journalists Mark Tully and Satish Jacob's book goes over the key events of Operation Blue Star in detail. In particular, the night of 5th June when the bulk of the combat took place Read More..

• 1916-2004
  	1916-2004
  Amjad Ali Khan on M.S. Subbulakshmi: “A Glorious Chapter for Indian Classical Music” 1916-2004 Amjad Ali Khan on M.S. Subbulakshmi: “A Glorious Chapter for Indian Classical Music” A short but telling personal account of the life, music and times of M.S. Subbulakshmi by Amjad Ali Khan Read More..

• 2008
  	2008
  Whose History Textbook Is It Anyway? 2008 Whose History Textbook Is It Anyway? On NCERT, the Sangh and history school textbooks Read More..

• 2006 - 2009
  	2006 - 2009
  Singur-Nandigram-Lalgarh: Movements that Remade Mamata Banerjee 2006 - 2009 Singur-Nandigram-Lalgarh: Movements that Remade Mamata Banerjee This chapter from Monobina Gupta’s Didi: A Political Biography looks at the Singur-Nandigram-Lalgarh agitations and how they laid the ground for Mamata Banerjee to emerge as an alternative to the CPI-M in West Bengal Read More..

• 2020
  	2020
  The Indo-China Conflict: 10 Books We Need To Read 2020 The Indo-China Conflict: 10 Books We Need To Read 10 recommendations from experts for what to read to better comprehend the Indo-China flareup in Ladakh Read More..

• 2021
  	2021
  Singing/Writing Liberation: Dalit Women’s Narratives 2021 Singing/Writing Liberation: Dalit Women’s Narratives An examination of literature and songs produced by Dalit women, providing a glimpse into their role in building an anti-caste consciousness and the role of Dr. BR Ambedkar as a feminist icon Read More..

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