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HomeLog InSign Up Changes in Mahatma Gandhi’s views on caste and intermarriagemore by Mark Lindley 15,163 Download (.pdf) Changes_in_Mahatma_Gandhis_Views_on_Caste_and_Intermarriage.pdf 175 KB C HANGES IN M AHATMA G ANDHI ’ S V IEWS ON C ASTE AND I NTERMARRIAGE Mark Lindley ABSTRACT
 * Gandhi’s views in regard to basic aspects of the caste system changed in the last years of his life. In the 1920she had held that every Hindu “must follow the hereditary profession” and that “prohibition of intermarriage” between people of different varnas was “necessary for a rapid evolution of the soul.” But later he gradually became “a social revolu-tionist,” advocating intermarriage between Brahmins and Untouchables in order to dismantle the caste system “root and branch,” and acknowledging that “When all become casteless, monopoly of occupations would go.” The changes were duein part to the influence of two opponents of the caste system whose integrity he held in high regard: Ambedkar and Gora.His view of marriage between people of different religious affiliations underwent a similar change.

Key words
 * Mahatma Gandhi, caste, varna, Untouchability, intermarriage, Ambedkar, Gora, Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal.

OBJECTIVES AND METHODS
 * Toward the end of his life (1869-1948) Gandhi said that he had, many times, found him-self in the wrong and therefore changed his mind,

1 and that his writings should be destroyed along with his body when itwas cremated, because there was a risk that people would conform mistakenly to something he had written. 2 The main purpose of this article is to trace in detail the remarkable changes between ca. 1920 and 1946 in his views about the castesystem and about intermarriage between people of different castes. (This will entail giving some account of two men,Ambedkar and Gora, who influenced him in this regard.) An ancillary purpose is to show that his views about intermarriage between people of different religious affiliations underwent a somewhat similar change.The methods mainly used in preparing this article have been (1) to gather and analyze more than sixty relevant citationsfrom the writings and recorded speeches of Gandhi, Ambedkar and Gora, and (2) to gather fresh evidence from people whoknew him personally. (This latter evidence is mainly about specific matches in regard to which Gandhi expressed privatelyan opinion.) The use of a fairly large number of citations from Gandhi has been deemed worthwhile because his attitudeevolved in a complex way that could easily be misconstrued by examining only a few of them.The following material is divided into sections as follows:1a.Gandhi’s views in the 1920s in regard to caste1b.Developments in this regard in the 1930s1c.Further changes in this regard in the 1940s2a.His views in the early-to-mid-1920s in regard to intercaste marriages2b.Developments in this regard between the mid-1920s and 19402c.Further changes in this regard in the 1940s3.His views in regard to inter-religious marriages4.Concluding remarks.1a. Gandhi’s views in the 1920s in regard to caste In the early 1920s Gandhi held that the hundreds of castes should be reduced in number, but that “inherited vocation” andthe four basic “varnas” (this is the relevant Sanskrit term) into which the castes were classified should be maintained: [Citation 1] 1920: I believe that caste has saved Hinduism from disintegration. But like every other institution it has sufferedfrom excrescences. I consider the four divisions alone to be fundamental, natural and essential. The innumerable subcastesare sometimes a convenience, often a hindrance. The sooner there is fusion, the better....One of my correspondents suggests that we should abolish the caste [system] but adopt the class system of Europe – meaning thereby, I suppose, that the idea of heredity in caste should be rejected. I am inclined to think that the law of heredityis an eternal law and any attempt to alter that law must lead us, as it has before led [others], to utter confusion.... If Hindus believe, as they must believe, in reincarnation [and] transmigration, they must know that Nature will, without any possibilityof mistake, adjust the balance by degrading a Brahmin, if he misbehaves himself, by reincarnating him in a lower division,and translating one who lives the life of a Brahmin in his present incarnation to Brahminhood in his next. 3 Here the phrase “lives the life of a Brahmin” means: “behaves with a degree of moral purity worthy of a good Brahmin.”A Brahmin is a member of a caste in the highest, originally priestly varna. The other three varnas – Kshatriya, Vaishya andShudra – are analogous mutatis mutandis to the Western concepts of aristocracy, bourgeoisie and workers. Ordinances of Manu (O, 318), “If any man low in birth should, through greed, live by the occu- pations of the exalted, the king should banish him at once, after depriving him of his property” – and as for high-caste people: “Better one’s own duties incomplete than those of another well performed, for he who lives by the duties of another falls from caste at once.”Medieval societies in some other parts of the world had traditional occupations and social regulations without limiting categoric-ally a youngster’s vocational choice. In neo-Confucian China he would enter government service by doing well in written examina-tions in which the candidates’ identities were concealed from the evaluators. In Medieval and Renaissance Europe he could be appren-ticed to someone in a different occupation from that of his father. The first paragraph of the next citation shows that Gandhi took just as dim a view of social inequality due to unequal dis-tribution of money (even though his own varna was Vaishya) as he did of violent revolution. [Citation 2] 1920: The beauty of the caste system is that it does not base itself upon distinctions of wealth-possessions. Money, as history has proved, is the greatest disruptive force in the world.... Caste is but an extension of the principle of thefamily. Both are governed by blood and heredity. Western scientists are busy trying to prove that heredity is an illusion andthat milieu is everything. The... experience of many lands goes against the conclusions of these scientists; but even acceptingtheir doctrine of milieu, it is easy to prove that milieu can be conserved and developed more through caste than throughclass.... As we all know, change comes very slowly in social life, and thus, as a matter of fact, caste has allowed new group-ings to suit the changes in lives. But these changes are [as] quiet and easy as a change in the shape of the clouds. It is difficultto imagine a better harmonious human adjustment.Caste does not connote superiority or inferiority. It simply recognizes different outlooks and corresponding modes of life.But it is no use denying the fact that a sort of hierarchy has been evolved in the caste system, but it cannot be called the cre-ation of the Brahmins. When all castes accept a common [religiously determined] goal of life, a hierarchy is inevitable, be-cause all castes cannot realize the ideal in equal degree. 4 [Citation 3] 1921: “I believe that if Hindu society has been able to stand, it is because it is founded on the caste system.... Acommunity which can create the caste system must be said to possess unique power of organization....“To destroy the caste system and adopt the Western European social system means that Hindus must give up the principleof hereditary occupation which is the soul of the caste system.... [The] hereditary principle is an eternal principle. To changeit is to create disorder.... It will be a chaos if every day a Brahmin is to be changed into a Shudra [a member of a caste in thelowest varna] and a Shudra is to be changed into a Brahmin. The caste system is a natural order of society.... I am opposedto all those who are out to destroy the caste system.” 5 [Citation 4] 1926: In accepting the fourfold division I am simply accepting the laws of Nature, taking for granted what is in-herent in human nature and the law of heredity.... It is not possible in one birth entirely to undo the results of our past doings. 6 In the mid-1920s he began to downplay the idea (set out at the end of Citation 2) that “a hierarchy is inevitable.” He wouldnow say that no one should have a superior status merely by virtue of the caste he was born into: [Citation 5] 1925: For me there is no question of superiority or inferiority. A Brahmin who regards himself as a superior being born to look down upon the other castes is not a Brahmin. If he is first [in status] he is so by right of [spiritual] service. 7 —and that performers of any and all good services all deserved the same status: [Citation 6] 1927: In [my] conception of the law of varna, no one is superior to any other.... A scavenger [e.g. a rubbish-collector or a latrine- or street-sweeper] has the same status as a Brahmin. 8 According to traditional Hindu doctrine, however, the “scavenger” castes are, along with those of tanners, weavers, etc.,even lower than the Shudra varna. Their political spokesmen might sometimes call themselves “ Panchama ,” i.e. membersof an alleged “fifth varna,” but an equivalent term for them among high-caste people was “ Ati-Shudra ” (meaning “beyondthe boundaries of the Shudras”). Traditional Hindu doctrine is unequivocal that no member of any of the four varnas shouldever touch such people (they amount to about 20% of the Hindus). The normal English-language term for them was “Un-touchable” (which I capitalize in deference to the fact that the term entailed sacred obligations).Gandhi’s consistent opposition to the doctrine and practice of Untouchability is so well known 9 that I needn’t give a seriesof citations to prove it. The following will suffice: Dr. Ambedkar. Life and Mission (Popular Prakashan; 4rd ed., 2009).† No transcript was made. However, Gandhi later explained ruefully to his secretary (see The Diary of Mahadev Desai, Ahmedabad1953, i, 52): “I did not know he was a Harijan. I thought he was some Brahmin who took deep interest in Harijans and thereforetalked intemperately.” (“Harijan” was Gandhi’s term for Untouchable. Etymologically it means “child ofGod” – the word for “God”in this instance being “Hari” as in “Hari Krishna.”)‡ It is said to have been at Gandhi’s suggestion (see for instance Anil Nauriya, “Criticising Gandhi,” in the Indian journal, Mainstream ,xxxiv/8 (27/i/1996), 45) that Ambedkar was appointed in 1946 chairman of the drafting committee for the Constitution of the Repub-lic of India. (Article 17 says: “ ‘Untouchability’ is abolished and its practice in any form is forbidden. The enforcement of any dis-ability arising out of ‘Untouchability’ shall be an offence punishable in accordance with law.”)[Citation 7] 1924: Supposing swaraj [self-rule] was a gift descending from Downing Street to India, that gift would be a curseupon the land, if we do not get rid of this curse of Untouchability. 10 He wanted the Untouchables to be regarded as Shudras: [Citation 8] 1925: I have indeed said that varna is based on birth.... He who performs the duty of [for instance] a Brahminwill easily become one in the next incarnation. But a translation from one varna to another in the present incarnation mustresult in a great deal of fraud. The natural consequence must be the obliteration of varna. I have seen no reason to justify itsdestruction.... [However] I have asked that a Panchama should be regarded as a Shudra because I hold that there is no warrantfor a belief in a fifth caste [i.e. a fifth varna]. A Panchama does the work of a Shudra and he is therefore naturally classifiedas such when he ceases to be regarded as a Panchama. 11 But he nevertheless found Western-style competition and class conflict so terrible that he would prohibit any Hindu whomanaged to acquire a skill other than the “hereditary” one from earning a living by the new one: [Citation 9] 1925: There is no harm if a person belonging to one varna acquires the knowledge or science and art specializedin by persons belonging to other varnas. But as far as the way of earning his living is concerned, he must follow the occupationof the varna to which he belongs, which means he must follow the hereditary profession of his forefathers.The object of the varna system is to prevent competition and class struggle and class war. I believe in the varna system because it fixes the duties and occupations of persons.... Varna means the determination of a man’s occupation before he is born.... In the varna system no man has any liberty to choose his occupation. 12 1b. Developments in the 1930s in his views in regard to caste In 1931 Gandhi met a highly educated man, Ambedkar (1892-1956), who had been born into a caste of street-sweepers but was unwilling to sweep the streets. Ambedkar’s caste had been employed at British military bases, and some of its mem- bers, including his father, had thus become rather better off than other Untouchables. Ambedkar attended school and, not-withstanding the humiliations there due to his Untouchable status, showed such academic promise that an enlightened ma-haraja undertook to subsidize his higher education. In due time he earned an M.A. degree at Columbia University in NewYork, and a Ph.D. at the University of London, and studied Sanskrit at the University of Berlin. He was unique. That first meeting with Ambedkar, in Bombay in 1931, did not end cordially, † but Gandhi came to appreciate Ambedkar’s brilliance, honesty and adherence to non-violence notwithstanding a lot of clearly expressed anger, ‡ and indeed was im-mediately influenced to some extent by his criticisms. Hence the novel (for Gandhi) nuances in the following statements: [Citation 10] 1931: I do not believe in caste in the modern sense. It is an excrescence and a handicap on progress. Nor do I believe in inequalities between human beings. We are all absolutely equal. But equality is of souls and not bodies.... We haveto realize equality in the midst of this apparent inequality. Assumption of superiority by any person over any other is a sinagainst God and man. Thus caste, in so far as it connotes distinctions in status, is an evil.I do however believe in varna which is based on hereditary occupations. Varnas are four to mark four universal occupa-tions – imparting knowledge, defending the defenceless, carrying on agriculture and commerce, and performing servicethrough physical labor. These occupations are common to all mankind, but Hinduism, having recognized them as the law of our being, has made use of it in regulating social relations and conduct. Gravitation affects us all whether one knows its exist- Job Board About Press Blog Stories We're hiring engineers! FAQ Journals Terms Privacy Copyright Send us Feedback Academia © 2013 '''--Biswasmit Lenka (talk) 02:11, 25 September 2013 (UTC)
 * According to the classical Hindu
 * The best-informed biography is Dhananjay Keer’s