Backwardpeople

The Independent Dalit Movement and the Challenge ofSavarna Cooptation

Yoginder Sikand

One of the greatest challenges before the contemporaryDalit movement is the threat of cooptation by SavarnaHindu forces. Historically, conquest and physicalsubjugation of Dalit and Adivasi communities by Savarna Hindus has gone along with a gradual processof absorption of these communities into the castesystem, with these communities being relegated to thebottom of the caste hierarchy as slaves or worse.

This historical process entailed a re-writing of thehistory and myths of these communities in such a wayas to promote Savarna hegemony and Dalit and Adivasienslavement.
This process of refashioning of myths and histories ofthese communities is underway today as well. Hindutvaas well as Gandhian organizations, often with statebacking, have been hard at work to Hinduise these communities, which, in other words, means to furtherentrench their marginalisation and the hegemony of theSavarnas.

At the same time, every effort is beingmade to prevent the Dalits from mobilizingautonomously for their rights independent of Savarna tutelage and control. Independent Dalit activism isseen as threatening Savarna privileges and hence as amenacing threat, denounced routinely as 'divisive','casteist' and 'anti-national'.

A recently published booklet recently brought out bythe Gandhian Institute of Studies, Varanasi, clearlyindicates that on the question of the independentDalit struggle seemingly do-gooder Gandhians as well Hindutva chauvinists think alike.

Titled'Manufacturing History Through Falsehood: Revisitingthe Dalit Movement in India', it quotes both Gandhi aswell as Hindutva ideologues to launch a bitterdiatribe against Dalit leaders and ideologues who insist on the separate, independent mobilization ofDalits against Savarna Hindu oppression.

The booklet's major purpose is to absolve the Savarnasof their role in the oppression of the Dalits andhence to steer the Dalits away from challengingSavarna hegemony. It is not the Savarnas, the bookletseems to suggest, that the Dalits should be mobilizingagainst.
Hence, it seeks to provide a defence of thecaste system, extolling its supposed virtues anddenouncing any critique of it. Not willing torecognize the fundamental inequality and oppression on which the caste or varna system is based, it insists,'The details of the Varna system were always innovatedand up-to-dated (sic.) as per the need to (sic.) thesociety, but Varna Vyavastha and Varna dharma has (sic.)
remained an integral part of Hindu dharma fromthe earliest period till the present times'.
It arguesthat varna is based on qualities of a person and aperson can therefore shift from one varna to another, completely ignoring the fact that this was probablynever true in the past and is most certainly not thecase today. Seeking to provide a pseudo-scientificdefence of the Varna system, it argues that theBrahmins are 'undoubtedly most revered and privileged' because they supposedly possess various noble virtues.
It quotes numerous Hindu religious texts to argue thispoint. Significantly, there is not even a hint ofcritique of Brahminical texts, from the Vedas down to the Ramayana and after, for the harsh strictures theycontain against the Shudras and the Dalits.
The booklet recognizes the practice of untouchability,but every effort is made to minimize its magnitude andinhumanity.
Thus, it claims that the proportion ofpeople actually treated as untouchables is miniscule, arguing, without citing any proof, that in the earlytwentieth century British administrators estimatedthem to be a mere 3.5% of the total population ofIndia. Blaming the British for allegedly creating acategory of untouchables, it claims that by 'cleverlyordain[ing] some special facilities for them', theymanaged to get several more castes to definethemselves as untouchables, thus inflating theirnumbers.

Likewise, the Adivasis were allegedly instigated by the British to declare themselves asseparate from the Hindus, and in this they wereallegedly enticed by offers of special facilities. Itis as if the British magically conjured up the Dalitsand Adivasis from nowhere, and that prior to thisthere was absolutely no consciousness on the part ofthese oppressed communities of the inhuman conditionsunder which they had to live as a result of Savarnadomination.
There is also in this argument a clearattack on reservations and other forms of affirmativeaction for Dalits and Adivasis, which are seen asencroaching on the privileges of the Savarnas. Turningto the present day, the booklet opposes the notion ofa separate Other Backward Classes category andpolicies of affirmative action for these groups onsimilar specious grounds. The inane argument it givesin its defence is that 'It is impossible to divide the highly spiritually-advanced, complex Bharatiya societyinto such primitive groups and understand itscharacteristics with such an immature approach'.

The booklet reluctantly recognizes the practice ofuntouchability, but Savarna Hindus are sought to bespared all responsibility for it. Instead, Muslims areblamed for the practice, although, of course, this goes quite against all historical evidence.
Thus, thebooklet argues, 'Untouchability and excommunicationgrew when Hindu society was facing very difficulttimes', an indirect reference to the period ofTurkish, Afghan and Mughal rule. At the same time, it is at pains to defend untouchability onpseudo-scientific grounds. Thus, it argues,"[U]ntouchability out of consideration for purity andcleanliness had nothing to do with any kind ofhardness of heart but is the result of the requirements of hygiene and cleanliness and also dueto psychological or religious views.

The nearest anddearest women relatives, such as one's own mother ordaughter or wife were to be 'untouchable' during their monthly periods. The most affectionate friends wereuntouchable during the mourning period". In this way,the seriousness of the permanent untouchability of theDalits is sought to be dismissed, being equated with the temporary ritual untouchabilty that some Savarnaswere subjected to by their fellow Savarnas on certainoccasions.

The booklet claims that 'The Smritis do not say thatthe untouchables or antyajas cannot worship the Hindudeities', but conveniently ignores the horrendousstrictures against the Dalits and Shudras contained in the Smritis and other Hindu scriptures. It seeks toargue that the Dalits have never been subjected tooppression by the Savarnas, neither in the past nor inthe present. After whitewashing the history of crimes committed by Savarnas against Dalits that aresanctioned by the Brahminical religious tradition, thebooklet then shifts to the present-day, making thesame sort of specious claims.

Thus, for instance, itargues that 'When the Constitution of IndependentIndia was prepared, untouchability was declared acrime and no Hindu opposed it'. The continued practiceof untouchabiluty all over India is ample testimony tothe ridiculousness of this claim. The booklet offersthe example of some Dalit leaders holding importantpolitical posts and insists that this shows that'mainstream Hindus, believing in the caste system,have elected and honoured so-called untouchable leaders in recent times'. There is no reference, ofcourse, to the fact that several of these leaderscontinued to be derided even after the assumedimportant positions of power, and that the ordinarySavarna continue to deeply resent what is seen to be their wrongful usurpation of positions that theyconsider as meant for Savarnas alone.

Clearly, as the booklet suggests, as far as the issueof independent mobilization of Dalits, Adivasis andother similarly placed marginalized communitiesagainst Savarna hegemony is concerned, there is little to distinguish Gandhians from rabid Hindutvawadis.Whatever their other differences, they are bothequally opposed to these oppressed communities seekingto struggle for their rights on the basis of their own identities, instead of subsuming them under aSavarna-led Hindu umbrella.