Mulk Raj Anand's short-lived connection with DV
V.T. Rajshekar

Dr. Mulk Raj Anand (99), India's topmost English litterateur who died at Pune on Sept.28, 2004, was the inspiration behind the launch of the 25-year-old Dalit Voice which has emerged as the country's most powerful "Voice of the Persecuted Nationalities Denied Human Rights". His name used to appear as Adviser just below the DV masthead.

As soon as he heard of our dismissal from the Indian Express, Bangalore, he called us from Bombay, and said there was nothing to worry and would come to meet us. A telephone from such a famous personality whom we had never met was a pleasant surprise.

As you have already established yourself as a revolutionary writer and started a Dalit journal, I will go round the country and popularise it", he said.

Low caste birth: Though it was started on June1, 1981 for "private circulation only" with the famous Editorial, "Dream come true". DV as a regd. paper started only from Dec.15, 1981. Dr. Mulk Raj Anand's name as Adviser started appear from the issue dated Dec.1, 1981 (Vol. No.4).

He made several visits to Bangalore and sometimes visited our DV office also in Palace Lower Orchards. He was so fond of us. We also visited his Bombay home several times and travelled with him twice to Delhi.

His love for Dalits was partly because of his "low caste" birth as the son of a Punjabi coppersmith who served in the British army as a lowly jawan. That is how he authored the famous book, Untouchable (1935) and Coolie (1936).

Marxist & gandhian: Though he was India's topmost English writer, the vaidik circles never recognised this fact. To them R.K. Narayan, an Iyengar from Karnataka who hardly wrote on human beings, was the darling. Several times we brought this to his notice. But Dr. Anand simply laughed away. He knew that to ome up as writer in this Brahmin-dominated literary field one has to compromise.

That is how he became a devotee of M.K. Gandhi, the enemy No.1 of Untouchables. Otherwise it was impossible for a person calling himself a Marxist to be also a gandhian. How can any genius flourish in this vast intellectual desert that is India with multitudes of contradictions?

Killing of Sikhs: These contradictions in him exploded and the clash came in 1984 when Indira Gandhi rushed the Army into the Amritsar Golden Temple and killed thousands of innocent Sikhs who were fighting for self-determination — a principle which DV always supported.

Indira Gandhi, who was responsible for the biggest-ever modern-day slaughter of Sikhs, was assassinated by a Dalit Sikh in Delhi on Oct.31, 1984 and this led to another bout of anti-Sikh riots in Delhi in which over 3,000 Sikhs were massacred by the Hindus. The Hindu police was ordered to be silent as the Hindus of India rejoiced over the Sikh slaughter. But DV strongly condemned this barbarity.
But Dr. Anand proved to be a Hindu and hence an admirer of Gandhi. But Gandhi also was praised by Hindus for his "fight" for self-determination in India, But Dr. Anand was critical of our stand and asked us to delete his name as Adviser. He came to Bangalore to express his "disappointment" with DV. He praised Indira Gandhi who was responsible for the death of thousands of innocents. His name was removed from Dalit Voice from the issue of Jan.16, 1985 as desired.

Gandhian sympathy: Never during our four-year close association he had talked of the grave issues confronting the persecuted nationalities. However, it was Dr. Anand who asked us to discard our previous dress of pant and shirt but take to kurta-pajama — the dress of the masses of Indians.

Mere gandhian sympathy for Dalits is no use. What is needed as a writer is a surgical operation of the caste-afflicted society, and then identifying and naming the enemy, which is causing this caste cancer, and then the elimination of the cancer cells.

Dr. Ambedkar did it but Dr. Anand didn't. That is how he parted from DV.
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DEBATE ON SHIVA DHARMA
Marathakaran of non-Brahmin movement helped vaidiks

Prof. Shrawan T. Deore, Mangesh Apt.,Datta Colony, Vidyanagari, Deopur, Dhule - 424 005
I am a social worker with the Phule-Ambedkarite movement since 25 years. I had written books on Mandal Commission, OBC movement and SC/STs. I am a founder of Satyashodhak Chhatrapati Dnyanpeeth conducting state-level examinations on the thoughts of Phule, Dr. Ambedkar, Shahu, Shivaji etc. This project (since last 12 years) getting tremendous response from all sections of the society.

The Satyashodhak (non-Brahmin) movement was dominated by the OBCs. They were wrongly advised that once they acquire political power, social problems would get solved automatically. But this did not happen. The Kalelkar report which was in the interest of OBCs was shelved after we won the political power. Then came the Mandal Commission. The supporters of political power first distorted the Mandal report with the concept of "creamy layer".

Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar prepared the Hindu Code Bill to liberate the Hindu women of India. But it was cruelly rejected in the Lok Sabha by the Hindus only. In the "freedom struggle" the labour class also participated but they gained nothing in "free India". They lost even their fundamental right to strike. The section which suffered most was of the farmers. Thousands of farmers were literally butchered in Telengana.

Non-Brahmins suffer: After the "independence", the position of all the non-Brahmins has deteriorated, excluding that of Brahmins.

All the credit for the Indian "freedom struggle" is given to Gandhi and his Congress. This is a Brahminical manipulation. When the Congress was born as Rashtriya Sabha, Mahatma Phule called it "Brahman Sabha". The Rashtriya Sabha was used by the Brahmins to establish their hegemony.

When Phule criticized Ganpati of the Peshwas, Tilak decided to impose this Ganpati on the heirs of Hanumans (the non-Brahmins). That is how Tilak started the Ganeshotsav festival as a political activity.
Tilak feared that if the BCs and the Kshatriyas united they would be a threat to Brahmins. That is why how the Brahmins hijacked Shivaji and used him for anti-Muslim riots.

If the followers of Phule had been brave all the BCs and OBCs could have remained united and the non-Brahmin party would have been strong. The political freedom movement could have come under the non-Brahmin party instead of the Brahmin Congress Party.

Marathas join Brahmins: To frustrate Phule, the Brahmin camp and the Maratha camp had their own selfish interests. The Maratha camp side-tracked Shahu Maharaj who could have proved a thorn in their way. By accepting the Tilak-sponsored Shivaji, efforts were made to disrupt the Phule-sponsored BC-OBC unity. Gangarambhau Mhaske, a Maratha, was a leader of the Satyashodhak Samaj. Influenced by the Brahmin camp, he started a new caste organisation for the Marathas. The Phule-sponsored BC-OBC unity thus became a branch of the Brahmin camp and destroyed the Satyashodhak non-Brahmin movement and also the Dr. Ambedkar movement.

The rise of Gandhi and his gandhism took place when the Tilak-sponsored Brahmin camp was in full control of the Congress.

Why RSS was started: Initially Tilak had bitterly opposed Gandhi. Later, he realised that Gandhi would be a good stooge of the Brahmin camp in the Congress. The Brahmin camp became happy that Gandhi was implementing their agenda. The rise of Dr. Ambedkar scared the Brahmins.

They launched the RSS to see that Gandhi did not stray from the Brahmin philosophy and to isolate Dr. Ambedkar.

Gandhi finally took over the Brahmin political programme as well as their philosophy while taking over the Congress from Tilak. This "philosophy" is today called gandhism.

The Maratha lobby no doubt opposed the Brahmin-dominated Congress. With the new label of gandhism on it, their entry into Congress became easier. Thus, the pre-independence OBC movement became a victim of Marathakaran first and later of to Brahminism by entering the Congress.

Lately, a Maratha-Brahmin coalition idea is being heard. The conversion of the Satyashodhak movement into a non-Brahmin movement, that is Marathakaran, through the Congress and further its alignment with the Brahmin camp caused the downfall of all non-Brahmins.

Before the rise of Gandhi, the Brahmin camp controlled the Congress. But to please the Brahmins, Gandhi called for political freedom first instead of fighting to eradicate the class-caste system.
The Brahmin camp was using the Congress to crush the Phule-sponsored caste eradication movement. Gandhi differed from this. Gandhi belonged to the Vaishya caste which controlled the market.

That is how Banias aligned with the Brahmin camp. As the stalwarts of caste eradication system, the Satyashodhak non-Brahmins joined the Congress, Brahmins got full strength. Satyashodhaks like Guruvarya Keshavrao Vichare alone fought the battle.

The murder of Gandhi was also for the same reason. It is said that his murder was for his support to Pakistan. But he was murdered six months after the creation of Pakistan. At that time the Constitution committee headed by Dr. Ambedkar was about to conclude its work.

While handing over the Congress to Gandhi, the Brahmin camp had taken every care that it would remain under them. When they found that Gandhi was trying to avoid this pressure, they murdered him.
When Gandhi was murdered by a Sangh Swayamsevak, the OBCs attacked many Brahmins.

The Brahmins through their educational textbooks are slow-poisoning the future generation. We have to prepare our own textbooks which will destroy the caste system. The beginning of a grand renaissance was started by us through the Satyashodhak Dnyanpeeth. Please to help fulfil the dreams of Mahatma Phule.
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DOCUMENT: Vaidik as a parasite: Why he is never loved in history ?
Prof. N. subrahmanian, Prof, of History (retd), N.E.H.U., Shillong & M.K. University, Madurai

In the foregoing pages I have tried to trace the history of the advent of the Brahmin in Tamil country, his fortunes and travails here and his present position. He represents perhaps the one community which has had the longest continuous history and which has the most notable rise and fall.

Within the period of documented history, he was always at a distance from the rest of that society, i.e. both when respected and when despised.

He was admired, imitated, denounced, used, served, but it is doubtful if he was ever loved.

He lived in India without belonging to it: His loftiness simply could not permit that sentiment. He was self-sacrificing, and content with invisible power and a patently second place in the polity, but very much like any one else in so far as his daily life went. He was in the king's court and ran royal errands, serving often as envoy; he was in the court of justice; he was in the royal and literary assembly halls; he was in the village council. He was not averse even to military service. He had no objection to wealth and approved of secular pleasures of all kinds. He claimed and enjoyed a monopoly of Sanskrit sacred knowledge, but was just one among many in the mastery of local lore. Somehow he resided in that society without very much belonging to it; to use a hackneyed expression, one might say, he was in it but not of it. He was like the woman who while living with her husband and in the company of her in-laws, all the time contemplated the glories of her maternal home, and so indirectly irritated the in-law establishment.

Jews of India: It is tempting to compare the fate of the Brahmin with that of the international Jewry. In spite of denigration and low ring of status and denial of opportunities, it cannot be said that the Brahmin was ever seriously persecuted. The sufferings of the Brahmin bear no comparison to the mass physical sufferings of the Jews in Germany, Russia etc. But the has not prospered either to the extent the Jew has prospered in commercial societies, like the USA for instance. The Jew has suffered and prospered more than the Brahmin. He has suffered because of Christian religious prejudices and political ideological animus, as in the case of Nazi Germany, and his minority status had been exploited to his disadvantage. The Jew's financial utility had assured him a tolerated and even coveted place in any society. Even as Antonio wanted a Shylock, though the latter was mocked at.

The Brahmin's utility, on the other hand depended on the society's acceptance of the values he stood for and propagated. Those values have been uprooted by modernism and a scientific outlook on life.

Sacrificing principle of survival: That the Brahmin could both be orthodox and modern by turns or even simultaneously shows his limitless capacity for sacrifice of principle for sake of survival; this does not mean that others continued to respect his orthodoxy; they merely tolerated him for his scholarship and clerical skills. But once his values were rejected by the rest of society he lost his identity as the most respected segment of society.

The Brahmins were no idlers; they believed in work (though not manual work) and in earning their bread. To say that when they were engaged in their priestly activities they were idling or wasting time or being merely parasites on a working society is to impute modern prejudices to an ancient setup. They and those who believed in this system would not think so and that is what is relevant in sympathetically appreciating this situation. When we used words like "business class", "economic work", "idling", non-productive" etc. we are operating at a modern utilitarian socio-economic plane. We do not describe the ancient and medieval Tamil Brahmin from this angle; though we are entitled to judge his impact on the society from the modern point of view.

Special qualities: The Brahmins have all the talent needed to make them modern, united, prosperous and happy. But they carry the dead weight of the past centuries on their backs and this holds them back. They move forward no doubt but with strong chains attached to their feet, chains which pull them back to a remote ancient point. Among the links of the chain are:
1. Superstitions which they call religion.
2. Indifference which they call tolerance.
3. Blind addiction to the past which they call respect for heritage
4. Irrational belief which they call faith.
5. Lack of unity which they think is the freedom of the individual.
6. Pride which they think is self-confidence.
7. Jealousy which they confuse with healthy competitiveness.
8. Rationalisation of the indefensible which they consider clear proof.
9. Cleverness which they think is wisdom.
10. Accumulation of facts which they mistake for knowledge.
11. Bravado which they attribute to courage.
12. A craze for the status quo which they call conservation of culture.
13. Pretention which they call diplomacy — and so on endlessly.

These are not special to them, but they belong more or less to all the Hindus; but in their case since they are a hunted down minority who are left out in the cold by the very nature of the polity, it comes with a deadening rebound and shows them up for what they are.

But to conclude:
The Brahmin stood for classicism. He delighted in creating, sustaining, promoting classical arts — music, literature etc. The denigration of the Brahmin meant denigration of the classical and the promotion and the encouragement of a no-grammatical indisciplined cultural ethos. Later in the name of the romantic, the classical was denigrated and this change was equated with some development erroneously called "progress". This "progress" has jumped into a cultural abyss sans grammar, order and responsibility of any kind. The change became and constituted a complete triumph of tribalism over brahminical classicism; the most disorganised type of chaos conceivable and this is witnessed by the new poetry, films which contemporary Tamil culture produces, the new music which blares in transport buses and so on.

The picture so injures the delicate mind of the cultured men that one is obliged to say, with Charles Lamb, that the "presents endear the absents". Whatever the faults of the Brahmins, the successor culture makes one seriously regret the denial of opportunity for self expression to a great and gifted community.
(Conclusion, pp.137-139)

THE BRAHMIN IN THE TAMIL COUNTRY
N. Subrahmanian
1989 pp.210
Enness Publications, Madurai - 625 019
Only a photocopy of the book (pages 210), available
with DV office. Please send Rs. 100.