05-23-2006, 03:56 AM
Are Brahmins still our shatrus?
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There are two portraits in front of you. One is of a Brahmin and the other, of a Shudra, (Vokkaliga to be precise). You have the option of blackening the face of only one of them, whom would you prefer?" was my straightforward question to a very enlightened and committed Kannad Dalit intellectual friend during a recent visit to Bangalore. His reply was instantaneous. "Brahmin," he quipped. I was not surprised. If one were to conduct a survey, to begin with, of Dalit NRIs, and pose the same question, the answer may be the same. Back home, enlightened Dalits, writers, university and school teachers, babus, civil servants and even clerks will be unanimous in their choice of blackening the Brahmin's face out.
And why not? Brahmins created hierarchical social order, scripted viperous notions of "purity" and "pollution", and accorded a divine sanction to their criminal ideological pursuit. Not the Theory of Relativity or Quantum Mechanics, but the mephitic notion of Untouchability and Tribals' seclusion sprung from their antennae, artlessly stalled on that grey heap, at best a reservoir of low quality compost. The Brahmins instead of repenting their unlit antecedents, often take pride in it. Thus, there is no reason why a Dalit should have any compassion for Brahmins. Brahmins, in Dalits' ideological kingdom, will always remain prime target.
But my discourse with the Kannad Dalit was rather prolonged. "Suppose a Vokkaliga smashes a Dalit, or molests his wife, who should the Dalit (victim) fight against?" was my next question. "Obviously against that Vokkaliga," he replied. "Who are the biggest tormentors of Dalits in the Kannad countryside: Brahmins or Vokkaliga-like Shudras?" I carried on. My Kannad friend pondered a bit and replied, "Mostly Shudras or what we call Backward Classes." Quoting census figures I reminded him that nearly 80 per cent Kannad Dalits live in the countryside, and a majority of them are landless agricultural labourers. "Tell me Sir," I asked a very blunt question, "Whom should the Kannad Dalit movement target first - Brahmins or Shudras?" By now, my Dalit friend had turned more thoughtful, and probably understood what I meant to convey.
During my second and final break from JNU in 1991, when I launched Dalit Shiksha Andolan in UP, I had the opportunity to travel to all parts of the state. As far back as 1993 itself, I had sincerely begun believing that the community's intellectual articulations are more derived from the past than today's "lived" experiences. Back in JNU, this time as an unauthorised guest, I began thinking afresh, also taking into account my experiences as an "ML" full-timer in my first break from JNU (1993-1987). I very deeply felt that the thinking Dalit, including myself, has somehow become a prisoner of the past, and for any successful battle of emancipation, the emancipators themselves must emancipate first. Wailing for freedom, I fought within myself, and won over myself. I presented my paper titled, "Social Changes in India since Independence: a Dalit Perspective", in Teen Murti in 1996. I argued that in India's social ordering, there is a dramatic intra-structural re-ordering, wherein Shudras have replaced Dwijas as the dominant ruling coalition in the countryside.
While Dwijas are faced with the freighting prospect of becoming politically irrelevant, Dalits are confronted with Shudras as their immediate tormentors, and hence, for their own reasons, Dalits and Dwijas are destined to form a common political coalition against marauding Shudras. The BSP theorists, initially hostile to my theorisation, have come to ultimately settle at what I argued eight years back.
What we understand by "Dalit vision" or "Dalit Perspective", is articulated not by ordinary Dalit masses, or grassroot activists. That doesn't happen anywhere in the world. Theorisation of social dynamics is undertaken by the elite, or middle classes. In case of Dalit intellectuals, most of them are first or second-generation educated, born, brought up, and schooled in rural societies where they have seen the Brahmin mind at work. A mind that is conspiratorial, instigating Kammas or Yadavs to hit at Dalits. Such Dalits are now settled in urban centres and face these Brahmins everywhere. Whether it is an officer transferring you to some godforsaken place, a Brahman editor refusing to democratise the edit page, or a Brahman VC refusing to appoint Dalits as teachers.
The "imprisoned" Dalit mind is not voluntary, but circumstantial. Because the articulate Dalit mind has not been able to revisit the countryside with a social inquest, and with a resolve to theorise intra-structural re-ordering of Indian society during past five decades. Thus, if Jat-Sikhs traumatise Dalits of Telhan, Dalit writers like us sitting in Delhi may be found cursing Brahmins. This is a great social drama refusing to unfold any further. All this while, Shudra is sitting pretty and smiling.
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<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Are Brahmins still our shatrus?
There are two portraits in front of you. One is of a Brahmin and the other, of a Shudra, (Vokkaliga to be precise). You have the option of blackening the face of only one of them, whom would you prefer?" was my straightforward question to a very enlightened and committed Kannad Dalit intellectual friend during a recent visit to Bangalore. His reply was instantaneous. "Brahmin," he quipped. I was not surprised. If one were to conduct a survey, to begin with, of Dalit NRIs, and pose the same question, the answer may be the same. Back home, enlightened Dalits, writers, university and school teachers, babus, civil servants and even clerks will be unanimous in their choice of blackening the Brahmin's face out.
And why not? Brahmins created hierarchical social order, scripted viperous notions of "purity" and "pollution", and accorded a divine sanction to their criminal ideological pursuit. Not the Theory of Relativity or Quantum Mechanics, but the mephitic notion of Untouchability and Tribals' seclusion sprung from their antennae, artlessly stalled on that grey heap, at best a reservoir of low quality compost. The Brahmins instead of repenting their unlit antecedents, often take pride in it. Thus, there is no reason why a Dalit should have any compassion for Brahmins. Brahmins, in Dalits' ideological kingdom, will always remain prime target.
But my discourse with the Kannad Dalit was rather prolonged. "Suppose a Vokkaliga smashes a Dalit, or molests his wife, who should the Dalit (victim) fight against?" was my next question. "Obviously against that Vokkaliga," he replied. "Who are the biggest tormentors of Dalits in the Kannad countryside: Brahmins or Vokkaliga-like Shudras?" I carried on. My Kannad friend pondered a bit and replied, "Mostly Shudras or what we call Backward Classes." Quoting census figures I reminded him that nearly 80 per cent Kannad Dalits live in the countryside, and a majority of them are landless agricultural labourers. "Tell me Sir," I asked a very blunt question, "Whom should the Kannad Dalit movement target first - Brahmins or Shudras?" By now, my Dalit friend had turned more thoughtful, and probably understood what I meant to convey.
During my second and final break from JNU in 1991, when I launched Dalit Shiksha Andolan in UP, I had the opportunity to travel to all parts of the state. As far back as 1993 itself, I had sincerely begun believing that the community's intellectual articulations are more derived from the past than today's "lived" experiences. Back in JNU, this time as an unauthorised guest, I began thinking afresh, also taking into account my experiences as an "ML" full-timer in my first break from JNU (1993-1987). I very deeply felt that the thinking Dalit, including myself, has somehow become a prisoner of the past, and for any successful battle of emancipation, the emancipators themselves must emancipate first. Wailing for freedom, I fought within myself, and won over myself. I presented my paper titled, "Social Changes in India since Independence: a Dalit Perspective", in Teen Murti in 1996. I argued that in India's social ordering, there is a dramatic intra-structural re-ordering, wherein Shudras have replaced Dwijas as the dominant ruling coalition in the countryside.
While Dwijas are faced with the freighting prospect of becoming politically irrelevant, Dalits are confronted with Shudras as their immediate tormentors, and hence, for their own reasons, Dalits and Dwijas are destined to form a common political coalition against marauding Shudras. The BSP theorists, initially hostile to my theorisation, have come to ultimately settle at what I argued eight years back.
What we understand by "Dalit vision" or "Dalit Perspective", is articulated not by ordinary Dalit masses, or grassroot activists. That doesn't happen anywhere in the world. Theorisation of social dynamics is undertaken by the elite, or middle classes. In case of Dalit intellectuals, most of them are first or second-generation educated, born, brought up, and schooled in rural societies where they have seen the Brahmin mind at work. A mind that is conspiratorial, instigating Kammas or Yadavs to hit at Dalits. Such Dalits are now settled in urban centres and face these Brahmins everywhere. Whether it is an officer transferring you to some godforsaken place, a Brahman editor refusing to democratise the edit page, or a Brahman VC refusing to appoint Dalits as teachers.
The "imprisoned" Dalit mind is not voluntary, but circumstantial. Because the articulate Dalit mind has not been able to revisit the countryside with a social inquest, and with a resolve to theorise intra-structural re-ordering of Indian society during past five decades. Thus, if Jat-Sikhs traumatise Dalits of Telhan, Dalit writers like us sitting in Delhi may be found cursing Brahmins. This is a great social drama refusing to unfold any further. All this while, Shudra is sitting pretty and smiling.
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->