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CASTE, UNTOUCHABILITY AND SOCIAL JUSTICE :
EARLY NORTH INDIAN PERSPECTIVE
VIVEKANAND JHA
Social justice is a comparatively modern term and connotes just
and fair treatment to the people constituting a society. It presup-
poses a social order which is non-discriminatory and people-
oriented, one in which disparity, inequality and inequity do not
characterize social, economic and other aspects of life and
institutions. The term occurs with due emphasis in our Constitution
Its Preamble proclaims the solemn resolve of the Indian people to
secure to all its citizens “Justice, social, economic and political” and
Article 38 commits the State to take appropriate effective steps to
usher in “a social order in which Justice, social, economic and
political, shall inform all the institutions of the national life’. A few
other Articles, too, deal with the various facets of justice. All these
show an acute awareness of the fact that justice is by its nature an
integral whole, that elements of injustice are pervasive in Indian
society as a part of its colonial and precolonial heritage and that
serious efforts are required to remedy the situation and bring about
social transformation. Continuous changes in the course of our long
history notwithstanding, the fact of continuity from the past is
undeniable and certainly early India has contributed its share to the
present situation. Without going into other dimensions of the theme,
| shall try to show how the origin and development of caste and
untouchability in early north India has been instrumental in
perpetrating social injustice to a large segment of the Indian people:
Caste may be defined as a system of social stratification
characterized by hierarchy, heredity, pursuit of one or a few
particular occupations, inequality, endogamy, restrictions as to
taking food from outsiders, and the notion of purity and pollution =a
associated with hierarchy. Notwithstanding the existence
fledged class society in the pre-Aryan Mature phase of Harappa
culture, the available archaeological evidence unaided by written
records owing to the hitherto undeciphered script does not warrant
the hypothesis regarding the emergence of caste and untouchability
there.' The evolution of caste as a social phenomenon has, therefore
to be traced through the study of two seminal terms, varna and jati
varna being anterior to jati and receiving much greater attention in
the earlier texts than jati. From being used to distinguish Arya from
the ethnically and culturally separate Dasa and Dasyu in the Rigveda
(c. 1500 B.C. - c. 1000 B.C.), varna, literally meaning colour, came
to be applied to the four hierarchically ranked occupational catego-
ties of the brahmanas, kshatriyas, vaishyas and shudras during the
later Vedic period. Although the brahmana and the kshatriya are
mentioned in the Rigveda a few times in the sense of functional
groups which had emerged from the Aryan vish or jana, meaning
tribe, the brahmana as a priest composing and reciting hymns and
Officiating at the sacrifice of the kshatriya warrior chief (rajan), the
term varna is never applied to the brahmana or the kshatriya. We
occasionally come across a few generations of chiefs in the Rigveda,
but the examples of a poet describing his father as a physician and
his mother as a corn-grinder, of another poet enquiring from Indra
whether he would be made a sage, a protector of the people, a ruling
chief or an owner of enduring wealth, and of kshatriya princes Devapi
and Devashravas officiating as priests at the sacrifices of their ruling
younger brothers Shantanu and Devavata respectively, show that
professions had not become hereditary at this stage, that the
brahmana and kshatriya ranks were open and that these were a
matter of achievement rather than inheritance.? As a people often on
the move in the land of the seven rivers, the primarily pastoral
Rigvedic Aryans were neither practising endogamy nor observing any
restrictions regarding food from others.
Of a full.
1 For detgils, see my Presidential Address, Ancient India section, “Social Stratification in
Ancient india : Some Reflections", Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, 53rd session
(University of Calcutta, 1990), pp. 23-26.
2 Cf. Suvira Jaiswal, “Stratification in Ravedic Society: Evidence and Paradigms”, The Indian
Historical Review (hereafter IHR), Vol. XVI, Nos 1-2 (July 1989 and January 1990), pp. 18-19, 22
2 The first definite indication of the four-tier hierarchical inequality
developing among the Vedic Aryans, though without the use of the
term vama, is found in the famous purushasukta of the tenth
mandala of the Rigveda, which represents the brahmana as the
mouth, the rajanya as the arms, the vaishya as the thighs and the
shudra as emanating from the feet of the divine Purusha,? when he
was sacrificed by gods for the sake of creation of the universe. The
hymn is presumed to have accorded divine sanction to the emerging
social structure. It is significant that the tenth mandala belongs to
the latest stratum of the Rigveda, synchronizing with some of the
later Vedic texts, and that the rajanya, the vaishya and the shudra
appear in this hymn for the first and last time in the Rigveda.*
In the relatively stable substantially agrarian setting of the upper
Ganga basin in later Vedic times (c. 1000 B.C. - c. 600 B.C.) the
process of social differentiation went on steadily and the four vamas,
distinct and separate from each other, appear as a full-fledged social
reality, the brahmanas as a specialized class of priests monopolizing
the complex rituals and as scholars and teachers, the kshatriyas as
warriors and rulers controlling larger territorial units and material
resources as a result of participation and victories in ongoing battles,
the vaishyas as tribute-paying peasants, cattle-rearers, artisans and
traders, and the shudras as domestic servants, agricultural labourers
and slaves. The texts do not leave any room for doubt regarding
the dominant position of the brahmanas and the kshatriyas vis-a-
vis the vaishyas and the shudras in the increasingly inegalitarian
milieu of the times with more surplus available for unequal
distribution. Despite a protracted kshatriya challenge to the
Brahmanical claims to primacy, both combined well against the two
3. brahmano’sya mukhamasidbahu rajanyah kritah
uru tadasya yadvaishyah padbhyam shudro ajayata, 90.12.
4 Rajanya has the sense of a close kinsman of rajan; vaishya is derived from
vish; and shudra may originally have been a conquered tribe of that name
which occurs thrice in this sense in the earliest portion of the Atharvaveda
(IV.20.4; IV.20.8; V.11.3). |
lower vamas and the Aitareya Brahmana’ description of the Vaishya
as anyasya balikrita (a tributary to others), anyasyadya (one Who ig
lived on by others) and yathakamajyeya (one who can be Oppresseg
at will) and of the shudra as anyasya preshya (a servant or
messenger of others), kamotthapya (one who can be made to work
at any time of the day or night) and yathakamavadhya (one who can
be beaten at will), is indeed revealing
Towards the end of the later Vedic period the varnas tended to
become hereditary, endogamous and birth-based, leading to the
formation of jatis. The term jati is derived from the Sanskrit root jan,
meaning to be born, and is first applied by pre-Paninian Yaska in his
Nirukta to a woman of the black or shudra caste (krishnajatiya); it
is maintained that though sexually enjoyable, she should not be
approached after the fire altar has been laid as this is not conducive
to religious merit.’ Panini shows acquaintance with jati in the sense
of caste in his sutra, jatyantachcha bandhuni.® That birth was slowly
becoming an important factor of social tanking and the theory of
karma (deed) and punarjanma (rebirth), which proved such an
effective ideology in the internalization of the inequitous caste
system by the oppressed and the exploited and was ardently
5 VIL.29. The brahmana's material dependence on the king is indicated by
yathakamaprayapyah (one who can be removed at will) applied to him in this
text, XXXV.3.
6 Sayana's interpretation of vadhyah as kupitena svamina tadyo bhavati
icchamanatikramya, meaning ‘an angry master can beat the shudra if his
will has been transgressed’ seems appropriate here. The Nirukta, too, translates
vadha as ‘to kill’ as well as ‘to hurt.
7 agnim chitva na ramamupeyat; rama tu ramanayopeyate na dharmaya
krishnajatiya, X11.13. [Link] dates Yaska between 800 B.C. and 500 B.C.
(History of Dharmasastra, Vol. II, Pt I, 2nd edn, Bhandarkar Oriental Research
Institute, Poona, 1974, pxi). Yaska may have flourished in the seventh century B.C
8 Ashtadhyayi, V.4.9. The Kashika Vritti, commentary on Panini’s sutras by
Vamana and Jayaditya (early seventh century), cites as examples brahmanajatiyah,
kshatriyajatiyah and vaishyajatiyah. Unlike the brahmana, brahma does not
have the sense of caste, maintains Panini (brahmo'jatau, VI.4.171) VS.
Agrawala assigns Panini to the fifth century B.C., India as Known to Panini,
2nd revised edn (Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, 1963), pp.476-78.
4 championed by Buddhism and Jainism as well, was taking shape
during this period is borne out by the Chhandogya Upanishad
assignment of pure birth (ramaniya yoni) to the brahmana, the
kshatriya and the vaishya and impure birth (kapuya yoni) to the
Chandala, the dog and the boar, and attribution of birth in the former
category to good deeds and in the latter category to evil deeds.®
The period saw the beginning of the process of assimilation,
acculturation and integration of the aboriginal tribes into the
expanding Aryan network at various levels. Thus the Aifareya
Brahmana describes the Andhras, Pundras, Shabaras, Pulindas and
Mutibas as antas (border people) and the progeny of the defiant
accursed sons of sage Vishvamitra," and refers to the forest tribes
and hunters as apachyas and nichyas with their own chiefs;" there
ara copious references to the proximity of and interaction with the
larger and better organized Nishadas;"2 the dedication of the
Paulkasa to bibhatsa (loathsomeness as a deity) in the symbolic
human sacrifice (purushamedha) in the Vajasaneyi Samhita? and
the Taittiriya Brahmana™ shows that the Paulkasas were an object
of spite and revulsion; and the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad statement
that all distinctions vanish in the spiritual realm where even the
Chandalas and the Paulkasas lose their separate identities*®
indicates that disparities were growing in the material world and
these two groups stood at the lowest level of the existing social
hierarchy. Caste was evidently in its formative stage during the later
9 V.10.7. The crude equation of the Chandala with animals is striking
10 VIL18. Vishvamitra is stated to have adopted Shunahshepa as his son and
given him the first rank among his hundred sons with the right of primogeniture;
the fifty older sons refused to accept this and incurred his wrath
11. Vill. 38.3; Suvira Jaiswal, “Vara Ideology and Social Change", Social Scientist,
214-15, Vol. 19, Nos 3-4 (March-April 1991), pp. 44,48
42 Vivekanand Jha, “From Tribe to Untouchable : The Case of Nisadas’ in
[Link] and Vivekanand Jha, ed, Indian Society: Historical Probings (In
Memory of [Link]) (People's Publishing House, New Delhi, 1974), pp.
67-71.
13 XXX.17.
14° [Link].
15 1V.3.22 bing many of the traits of yarn,
nd jati was imbit tl
5 laier Vedic period, however, interdining amon,
not prohibited, inter-varna marriages did take
10 untouchability.
8. Til)
9 the
Place,
Vedic period
the end of th
four varnas was
and there was Nn
The post-Vedic period (600 B.C. - 200 B.C.) is marked by the
extensive use of iron for production, enormous expansion of the
economy, substantial rise in the available surplus and accentuateg
" ull-fledged class society of the midgjg
conomic inequality in the fl ; c C
Ganga basin and further east. This provided an ideal locale for the
emergence of a more stratified society and consolidation of the
varna-jati structure. The Dharmasutras of Apastamba, Baudhayana,
Gautama and Vasishtha (600 B.C. - 300 B.C.) reflect this clearly in
the relatively more frequent use of jati in the sense of caste. The
* term occurs eight times in the Gautama Dharmasutra," six times in
the Baudhayana Dharmasutra,"” and four times each in the
Vasishtha Dharmasutra®® and the Apastamba Dharmasutra."° Varna,
however, continues to be the major term for designating caste and
occurs twenty-four times in the Baudhayana Dharmasutra, twenty-
three times in the Apastamba Dharmasutra, fourteen times in the
Gautama Dharmasutra and twelve times in the Vasishtha
Dharmasutra. The Dharmasutras place the hierarchical social
position and occupational roles of the four varnas in a legal setting
and detail the privileges of the first three twice-born (dvija) varnas,
demarcating them clearly from the shudras, who are saddled with
numerous and varied disabilities. These included obligatory service
to the twice-born and physical toil as landless agricultural labourers,
artisans, wage earners and slaves, denial of initiation with sacred
.thread (upanayana), exclusion from Vedic study and sacrifices or
sacraments with Vedic mantras, inequality before law in matters
relating to inheritance, rates of interest and criminal offences, lack
of access to judicial and high administrative positions, and
testrictions as to commensality, association and marriage with
16 VL20; X.1; X.50; X1.20; X1.29; XIL.1; XVIL1; XXL4
17 [Link]; [Link]; [Link]; [Link]; [Link]; [Link].
18 1.17; 1.2; ILS; XIX.7.
19 [Link]; [Link]; 1.5.11 10; [Link].
6 superior varnas. These texts also draw a line between the first two
varnas and the vaishyas and though even the latter are permitted
to take up arms to prevent the mixture of varnas,” primarily entrust
the former with the responsibility to maintain the varna order which
is regarded as sacrosanct.
The Dharmasutras are unanimous in prescribing sixfold duties
of study, sacrificing, giving gifts, teaching, sacrificing for others and
receiving gifts for the brahmanas and participating in battles,
protecting people and wielding political, administrative and judicial
authority for the kshatriyas. Gautama, however, permits a brahmana
to take up agriculture and trade provided he does not directly
engage in it (asvayamkrite);?* Vasishtha allows the brahmanas
unable to maintain themselves through their lawful occupations
(ajivantah) to adopt the kshatriya profession of arms and, failing in
that, the vaishya occupations of agriculture and trade with restric-
tions on selling certain commodities, and even directly tilling land
to produce sesamum (svayam krishyotpadya tilan) provided due
care is taken of the oxen;?? and Baudhayana not only echoes
Vasishtha to the extent of according to such a brahmana even
permission to plough the field (karshi syat) while treating the oxen
mildly,2? but maintaining that the study of the Veda and practising
agriculture impede each other (vedah_ krishivinashaya
krishirvedavinashini), ordains that he who is able to attend to both
should do so and he who is unable to do it should give up agriculture
(shaktimanubhayam kuryadashaktastu krishim tyajet).* Despite the
flexibility shown by the lawgivers owing to considerations of practical
consiraints, there is no doubt that sizeable sections of brahmanas
and kshatriyas who could afford it tended to withdraw themselves
from primary productive activities and came to broadly represent
‘status’ and ‘power’ respectively; the shudras substantially provided
20 varnasamvarge, Vasishtha Dharmasutra, 111.24; varnanam samkare,
Baudhayana Dharmasutra, [Link]
21 Xs
22 1122, 24-36.
23 [Link], 18-21
24 15.10.10. i : between the elite and th
tive manual labour; and the gap .
ee eeNidanetl intensifying the notion of the high and the low,
ial fabric at this time was, however, in a tremendous flux
eee eareeione| crafts and tribes were crystallizing as
distinct entities. Neither their existence could be ignored, nor could
they be identified with the four existing varnas. This gave rise to the
theory of varnasamkara or mixed castes, which ascribed their origin
to interbreeding among the members of the four varnas and also
antong their progeny from anuloma (in natural order or with a woman
of lower varna) and pratiloma (in inverted order or with a woman of
higher varna) unions.* The relatively superior rating of anuloma to
pratiloma was due to the patriarchal nature of society. The
Dharmasutras mention a total of twenty-four such mixed castes
resulting from miscegenation at the specified varna levels. Serious
disagreement among the authors about the number, names,
classification and details of derivation of these mixed castes,
however, expose glaring contradictions in this speculative theoretical
exercise.”° That the mixed castes constitute a residual category
apart from the four varnas is borne out by Baudhayana’s treatment
of the inhabitants of Avanti, Magadha, Surashtra, Dakshinapatha,
Upavrit, Sindh and the Sauviras as sankirnayonayah.?’ The notion
of vratya, subsuming the Aryan origin of a group and its subsequent
loss of status due to the non-observance of varna norms such as
upanayana, is another concept which was used independently” and
—
25 The status of woman is not equal to that of man in an anuloma marriage,
as is presumed in The Encyclopaedia Britannica, Vol. V (1973 reprint), p. 25.
nor does anuloma mean a woman's sexual alliance with a lower ranking
partner, as is maintained by The New Encyclopaedia Britannica, Vol. 11, 15th
edn (1985), p.930
26 For details, see my Article *Varnasamkara in the Dharmasutras: Theory and
Practice’, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, Vol XIll,
Pt III (Leiden, 1970), pp.277-80.
27 [Link]
28 While Baudhayana uses vratya in the sense of a faithful observer of the
Prescribed Dharmashastra norms (III.3.7.13-15), Baudhayana applies the
term to the sons of an uninitiated (avrata) twice-born who are excluded
from savitri(savitribhrashtan) ([Link])
8 as part of the varnasamkara theory” to accommodate the exterior
groups into the mainstream.
The notion of ritual pollution in relation to the shudra had made
a fleeting appearance towards the end of the later Vedic period when
the use of milk milked by the shudra was forbidden at the daily
agnihotra (oblation to fire)* and a person consecrated for a sacrifice
(dikshita) was enjoined not to speak to the shudra.?'' The shudra
had even been designated ayajniya, that is, unfit to perform a
sacrifice.* Physical contact with or touch of the shudra was,
however, not regarded as polluting. Though the Dharmasutras
continued to adhere to this position, the notion of pollution as an
enduring feature of social life — an important characteristic of caste
— was institutionalized as untouchability in these lawbooks.
Untouchability meant permanent and hereditary pollution owing to
physical contact with a section of the Indian people and the group
first identified for the purpose was the Chandala. The Dharmasutras
are unanimous in holding the touch of the Chandalas as polluting
and prescribe bath with clothes on as a means of expiation. The
Chandalas also cause pollution through proximity, sight, hearing and
speech, entailing corresponding expiations. Physical association
and commensal and connubial ties with the Chandalas are
completely prohibited and their segregation is legalized. The
Shvapakas and the Antyavasayins may be identified as two other
untouchable castes at the Chandala level. Terms such as anta,
antya, antyayoni, bahya, apapatra, etc., signify this new social
phenomenon and distinguish the untouchables from the shudras
Evidently closer integration of the Chandalas in society involved
further depression in the status of this later Vedic tribe.? The
theoretical origin of the Chandalas from the most hated pratiloma
29. varnasamkaradutpannanvratyanahurmanishinah, [Link].
30 Baudhayana Shrautasutra, XXIV.31; Shankhayana Shrautasutra, 11.8.3;
Apastamba Shrautasutra, VI.3.12
31 Shatapatha Brahmana, IIl.1.1.10; Apastamba Shrautasutra, XV.20.16.
32. Panchavimsha Brahmana, VI.1.11; Kumkum Roy, The Emergence of Monarchy
in North India: Eighth-Fourth Centuries B.C. (OUP, Delhi, 1994),p.232
33. Vivekanand Jha, “Candalas and the Origin of Untouchability’, /HR, Vol. XIII,
Nos 1-2 (July 1986 and January 1987), p. 34.
9 “Ss
union of shudra men with brahmana women reflected this disdain,
though such union on any considerable scale was unthinkable within
the varna-jati structure and was never a tangible social reality,
The trend set by the Dharmasutras on the issue of sociay
stratification is substantially endorsed, elucidated and elaborateq by
the Grihyasutras, the Ashtadhyayi of Panini, the Arthashastra of
Kautilya, the Manusmriti, the Mahabhashya of Patanjali, the
Ramayana and the Mahabharata. Although the details vary, we have
information about many new groups being absorbed within the
varna-jati framework, their changing position in social hierarchy ang
Perceptions about it, their prescribed and actual functions, and their
fission and fusion. Varna and jati are used commonly in the texts
in the sense of caste and though the jatis being more numerous than
the varnas are often distinguished in early Indian literature, the two
terms are also used interchangeably. To take just one example,
Manu's view that hina hinanprasuyante varnan panchadashaiva tu
does not mean that the low [varnas] produce fifteen low [varnas],
but that the low [six pratiloma jatis in an ascending order, the
Chandala, Kshattri, Ayogava, Vaidehaka, Magadha and Suta]
produce [on pratiloma wives or through pratiloma connections]
fifteen low jatis.°° What is significant is that untouchability developed
in stages and the number of really untouchable castes at the bottom
of society grew rather slowly. The cumulative evidence of the
Brahmanical texts up to A.D. 200 does not add more than three or
four such castes to the Dharmasutra list of three. Of these the
Pulkasas and the Medas had, like the Chandalas, an indigenous
tribal background and were essentially hunters by profession. The
steady advance of ihe organized society and its encroachment into
forest areas depleted their source of subsistence and obliged them
to join the dominant productive system for the sake of minimum
34 X.31. The Anushasana Parva of the Mahabharata, Critical Edn, 48.18, has
the expression hina hinatprasuyante varnah panchadashaiva tu (these low
varnas produce on the low fifteen jatis).
35 [Link], “From Varna to Caste through Mixed Unions" in Jack Goody, ed
Character of Kinship (Cambridge,1973), pp.204-5
10