Fighting Brahminical Privilege
The Question of Temple Entry
We understand that in pursuance of the resolutions passed by the Erode Devasthanam Committee (an official committee that presided over temple affairs – editors); some people of the depressed classes went to worship god in the Siva temple on Thursday the 4th instant. It seems the priest of the temple closed the doors and went away immediately. The worshippers then are said to have sat down throughout the night with the hope of worshipping god. The doors were not opened till morning. When the worshippers went out, the outer doors of the two temples were also shut. The worshipers are said to feel their disappointment very keenly and the citizens are up against the high-handed action of the temple priest. The Devasthanam Committee, we hope will be true to its resolutions and not allow their servant to rule over his master. On our part we will be only too glad if all the temples are closed for ever so that the energy of our people might be utilized for better purposes of serving humanity. But if at all the temples are to be opened for public worship, it should be opened for all including the depressed classes. We emphatically assert that these caste manufacturing machines should be immediately attended to by the reformers. Or else they would work unredeemable havoc to the country. We shall wait and see the decisions of the Devasthanam Committee.
Revolt, 10 April 1929
Sequel to Temple Entry : Arrest at Erode
As a result of the temple entry at Erode on the 4th instant, in pursuance of the Devasthanam Committe’s resolution, Mr. Easwaran and two others belonging to the depressed classes, Messrs. Pasupathi and Karuppan were arrested by the police on the 18th under under section 295, 297, and 169 IPC for alleged trespass, defilement and abetment. The case is being tried before the 2nd class Magistrate. Mr. K.C. Subramanian, Bar at Law, Nagapatam, has appeared for the accused.
Revolt, 24 April 1929
Erode Temple Entry Case: Judgement Delivered
In the famous Erode Temple-entry case which began about 9 months back, the judgment has been delivered on the 22nd by the 2nd Class Stationery Sub-magistrate, Erode, that Messrs. Eswaran, Pasupathi and Karuppan are punished under Sections 295 and 297 P.C., with a fine of Rs. 60 each or in default, to undergo a rigorous imprisonment of 2 months. The 2nd and 3rd accused has paid the said fine, whereas the first accused, Mr. Eswaran refused to pay and has cheerfully courted Imprisonment
Revolt, 19 January 1930
Temple Entry in the Tamil Country: (K.M. Balasubramaniam, B.A.)
The auspicious dawn of the Twentieth century rang the death knell of the “Stasis” India and India has fast become dynamic. The golden age of enlightened renaissance has been ushered in and old and worn-out ideas and habits have fast fallen into decay and have been replaced by fresher ideals and finer modes of life. All of us, the sons of Mother India wished, nay strongly willed to set our country moving and moving by leaps and bounds towards the cherished goal of Self-Government. And blindness itself dares not doubt the possibility of its realization in the near future. Pilot after pilot all of them stout-minded, immaculate and spotless patriots stood at the helm of the political India and many a mighty storm of merciless repression and persecution have been steered clear of most successfully.
A Pandit Motilal is now at the head and happy would be our lot to rally round his banner and rush to the field. His and our demand is Dominion Status for India. “Indeed” exclaims the Jingoist John “that’s too much for the money; Pray wait for a while.” But the Panditji and the patriotic Indians as well are mightily enraged at this insult and injustice. The Indians are taunted and trodden down. We must have our liberty our birthright; our inalienable right at any cost and nay at the cost of our lives.
Meanwhile the Hindus who of course constitute the majority of the Indians, are not oblivious to their social and socio-religious advancement. We must keep abreast of the political advancement, in the social field as well. But who is to wake up the intoxicated bigots of our ancient faith who have drunk deep into the poisonous fountain of orthodoxy? Who is to eradicate the inequalities and injustices that mark, nay mar our Faith, and improve our Status? Why, there is that unflinching advocate of the Hindus and Hinduism and the honoured High Priest of the Hindu Maha Sabha who is heart and soul engaged in the holy duty of reinfusing his co-religionists with new life and vigour? The depressed classes, the so called untouchables whose intolerable condition amidst constitute a blot on the fair page of our society. Pandit Malaviyaji is determined to raise and ameliorate. While Pandit Motilal is demanding “Dominion Status” for our country, an enviable status no doubt, our Pandit Malaviya is demanding a Human Status or a ‘Tolerable Status’ for the untouchables who form the backbone of the Hindus and who number sixty two millions. His sincerity is clearly above cavil and his efforts are indeed unceasing. But I wish the Panditji abrogated his ill chosen methods and adopted better ones in the place!
It is a thousand pities that even Pandit Malaviya has not succeeded in shedding his old and antiquated opinions and boldly face the present day realities. He is still ridiculously hugging his ‘Vedas’, and ‘Agamas’ to his shoulders and slavishly searching their moth-eaten leaves for a sanction to do this and that. His conference with the Pandits of the Parishad and his eruditious discussion and debates and what is worse and more ludicrous his obvious yielding to those obscurantists, provoke laughter and mirth. He has not yet quite realized that such academic discussions are of absolutely no avail. None but those grandiose Achariars ever give a thought to those Vedic sanctions and ‘Dayas and ‘Vishayams’. The Panditji carried the battle into the enemies’ camp and got severely defeated. The ‘devil cites scripture for its purpose’ is an adage our Panditji seems not to have benefited by.
The Tamil country should, however, beware of lending their ears to these puffings of these Parishad Pandits. We the Tamils are a glorious race of magnificent Temple builders and it does not lie in the mouth of a few obscurantist Pandits to quote scriptures from the Vedas and Agamas and refuse entry to the millions of our co-religionists. Let the Tamil world remember that our ancient society was essentially democratic in the real sense of the term. We had no such rigid and rigorous caste systems as in the North and the division of the Society into Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaisya and Sudra was wholly foreign to the Southern Dravidian. The Tholkapiam’s fourth class (the reference is to the four classes of humanity in this ancient Tamil grammar – editors) can never be indentified with the “Sudras” of the Vedic Division. Tholkapiam has not a word in reference to Manu’s compound castes. Hence untouchability is purely a foreign weed that was sedulously imported and sown amidst the healthy plants of such a society, as ours which had in the words of Mr. Manicka Naicker, “but a transmutable, plastic and barrier-less professional distinction”. This poisonous weed had become deep-rooted in our soil and has been for long, too long working havoc amidst us. It must at any cost now at least be blotted out root and branch, the vociferous roarings of the Varanashramites notwithstanding.
The whole of the Tamilland is studded with stupendous temples throughout its length and breadth which are marvels of architecture. All these were built by the Tamil monarchs. It was only after the advent of the Aryans that a class of untouchables were created and forbidden entry into these temples. Prior to that we learn from such works as Pattinappalai that a temple was known as ‘Ambalam’ which literally means a public place, Hence we have the appellation of ‘Ponnambalam’ by which the temple at Chidambaram has been known from time immemorial. Tradition itself asserts that the God therein used to be worshipped by every religionist.
Again as an argument for allowing the Adi-dravidas into temples, the classical instance of St. Nandanar is cited. Though per se it is a conclusive proof for it, yet the Parishad Pandits refuted it by saying that Nandanar had to be purified by fire before entering the Temple. Now granting this, what process of purification we ask, had that untouchable lutanist Thiruneelakanta Thirupanar, who accompanied the Brahman Saint Sambandhar even into the Sanctum Sanctorum of all the temples, had to undergo? What process again did the Thiruppan Alwar of Uraiyur (also a so-called untouchable saint – editors) undergo before he was ordered by Vishnu to be brought into His Holy shrine at Srirangam?
Now, whether or not the scriptures enjoin us to admit the untouchables into the temples (and speaking for the Tamilians I do strongly hold that there is not a single word in the whole range of Tamil literature forbidding their entry) it is high time to cast them to the wind and set about seriously consolidating our society by granting the just wishes of our fellow religionists. In this connection, I must confess to a feeling of unmixed horror and indignation at the fact that it is the Non Brahmins that prove to be most inveterate and unbending opponents to this enlightened movement. They must be entirely ashamed of this sinful and suicidal deed. I can quite understand if a monopolist were to oppose it. But I am simply scandalized to see opposition emanate from a Non-brahmin. Verily the ‘slave mentality’ has become too much deep rooted in our breasts: and nothing can be a better tribute to the machination and ingenuity of the priestly class than that they are able to remain at the background and ignite the sparks of oppositions in the Non Brahmins themselves. It is to this incurable disease of self extinction that the efficacious panacea of Self respect ought to be administered. If really these people mean what they say when they heap up imprecations and abuses on the Self-respectors and their Atheistic propensities, if they indeed care anything for their cherished faith and celestial God in the name of that very Omnipresent, All Love, and All merciful Being for whose sake and at whose altar they are prepared to sacrifice their lives, I most humbly implore them to save that religion and serve that God by suffering sixty two millions of down trodden Hindus to partake of His worship along with themselves. Humanity dictates admission to them and religion itself proclaims equality amongst all. If not, Christianity is ready with its golden portals wide open and promising privilege on earth and bliss in heaven” and small wonder if your rank and file becomes lean and the former’s swelled. Then would the Hindus “Rot inwardly and foul contagion spread, Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw /Daily devours apace and nothing said.”
Revolt, 30 June 1929
Easy Solutions (By Ritus)
Much fuss is being made of temple entry. The so called high castes stand in the way of their brethren of the down-trodden classes entering Hindu temples while they boast of the Non-Brahmin majority, if we let alone minority section of Brahmins out of account (sic). Let the Non-brahmins who enter temples and those who are forbidden to get into their precincts make it a point to pay no fees or perquisites to the pujaris. The pujaris will resign their duties, seeing the lucrative profession or occupation gone and turn to do other paying jobs. The grand temples will be left to the worshippers, who can’t have direct worship without the intermediary or tarakan between them and God. Or let the downtrodden classes, the rank and file, enter the temples at once and capture the right of temple worship for themselves. When one man is killed, it is murder, but when thousands are slain, it is an honour to the general. The rulers will all go by the opinion of the majority and the claim put forward by the so-called high castes was at one time, enjoyed by the feet-born too, and became absolutely their own, when the latter lost their union and influence on account of the illiteracy brought about by the peculiar unfavourable political circumstances. Our benign government is now in a frame of mind to help to lift up the unfortunates known as the Adi-Dravidas in every possible way.
Interdining and intermarriage loom large in the public attention. Acquisition of wealth will accomplish more than any numbers of harangues on public platforms. The sub-sections are already vanishing before the blaze of wealth. At one time faith shattered the citadels of caste, and St. Jnana Sambhandar and St. Appar halted together and the former enjoyed the hospitality of Nila Kanda Yalpanar and the latter of the Brahmin of Brahmins, the great Apputhi Nayanar (a Saivite saint, one of the famed 63 devotees of Shiva – editors). Let our unfortunate brethren learn and make their fortunes and the castes will vanish into thin air. Education and wealth will make interdining and intermarriage easily feasible. The cosmopolitan dinners have become common and the cosmopolitan marriages have begun their rapid race. To have both fait accompli in no time, let the downtrodden make up their mind to abjure all service to those higher up in the scale unless they interdine and intermarry. The downtrodden are the hard labourers in the field, and can achieve their end easily as the men of the higher classes can turn no furrow or raise no food grains themselves.
The anniversary of the dead kindred celebrated or solemnized with a Brahmin Guru is being replaced by the celebration with a Gurukkal, who is but a replica of the Brahmin. The anniversary can be conducted by our fellowmen with prayers to the dead followed by a sumptuous repast, or dinner. The chief idea is the remembrance of the beloved dead. Much expense in the way of gifts can be cut down as supernumeraries.
The introduction of the communal headmen or elders for the solemnization of marriages is a step in the right direction, and the orthodox stick up to the Brahmin for the purpose, because long standing customs die hard with them. Many families are ruined by expensive marriages. Considerable reduction in expenses is a desideratum. It is a good sign of the times that most marriages are reduced to single days and it would be better that they terminate with a single feast.
Is Religion in danger? No. The hypocrisy of religion is in danger. The pillage in the name of God is in danger. The deception practiced in the name of Religion is in danger. The danger point will be reached only when the ignorant high castes come to know what religion is and how they have been duped for centuries, and also when the ignorant masses are taught what true religion is and realize the impositions of priests and Brahmin pujaris. Once again the remedy lies in the spread of education, primary and secondary, for which public money should be utilized more than for college education and university establishments.
The heads of mutts are the feeders of howlers of ‘religion in danger.’ They must be made to realize their ignorance and their misuse of their religious trusts. An easy way in which the heads of mutt can be brought to sense is to organize meetings of worshippers wherever the mutts own property and to persuade them to keep in abeyance the Kattukutthakais (tenancy rates to be paid on land owned by religious institutions – editors) left to mutts till the madathipathis discharge their functions legitimately. This may seem an impossible feat. But it is easily done provided a brand of zealous workers start on the crusade. Let suits be filed for the recovery of the rents due. Let the Brahmin vakils be their advocates and judges. Only fully let the defendants make the plea that they are worshippers and disciples of mutts and that, as such they have a right to see that the trust is not disgracefully abused for which they keep back the rents. The charity commissioners – what have they done till now with the mutts? Will they take the trouble of publishing and thereby making the people know all about the budgets of mutts hitherto submitted to them? Let them realize that in their honesty and diligence lies the reformation or the purgation of the Augean stables of mutts.
Revolt, 21 July 1929
The Right of Temple Entry (1) ( By P. Chidambaram Pillai, B.A., B.L.)
It is admitted, though, no doubt for a limited purpose, by no less a person than Mr. P. R. Ganapathy Aiyar of the Dharma Rakshana Sabha of Madras, that Hindu temples are “Cosmopolitan”. To use his own words, “Unlike Christian places of worship and English Churches, which are mostly parochial chapels in which parishioners alone can claim as of right to worship, while it appears also their duty to attend, temples of Hindus are like their religion more Cosmopolitan”. No doubt, the learned Brahmin Gentleman concluded a bit lamely, out of tune with the high-sounding word “Cosmopolitan” employed by him. “Primo facie” said the Cosmopolitan Brahmin lawyer, “all Hindus belonging to the four castes without exception are entitled as of right to worship in Hindu temples”. That is Cosmopolitanism with a vengeance. More about this, later.
Hindu temples are, according to Sir. T. Muthuswamy Aiyar, the first Indian Judge of the High Court of Madras, “religious institutions founded, endowed and maintained for the benefit of those sections of the Hindu Community who conform to certain recognized usages as those of the castes for whose benefit the temples are by immemorial usage dedicated as places of worship.” It looks a bit involved and it is apparently difficult to make out what the learned judge means by it. He is clearer when he says, in another place “Hindu temples were neither founded nor are kept up for the benefit of Mahomedans, outcastes and others who are outside the scope of it”.
Before we proceed to examine this observation, let us know something about him as a Judge.
“It used to be said” writes an admirer of his in a Law publication “that when Sir T. Muthuswamy Aiyer confirmed any death sentence, he would make Prayaschitam on going home. In a criminal case, he had to impose a fine of Rs. 200 on his spiritual Guru. The judge on going home wrote an apologetic letter to the Guru enclosing the Rs. 200. Such was his conception of his duty as a pious Hindu, a conscientious Judge and devoted disciple”.
In having to administer law, according to ‘Justice, equity and good conscience’, this eminent Brahmin Judge of the High Court of Madras, felt on those occasion when upon his decision the fate of a human being was settled, that he had transgressed his religious commandments, and freed himself from the sin of it according to his notions of the Hindu religion. It will now become apparent how he must have had peculiar notions about his judgeship and his religion. Lord Chancellor Bacon was a keen lawyer but a corrupt judge, so much so that, as later day critics remarked, it was difficult to differentiate his corrupt law from his immense learning in his Judgments.
Well, to come back to Justice Muthuswamy Aiyar’s dictum that Hindu temples were not founded for the benefit of the outcastes and others, I beg to demur. For one thing, there is no foundation for such a weighty dictum. I may willingly admit the proposition to be true in the case of a temple proved to have been founded by Smartha Brahmins – for I can very well understand the narrowness of vision, the insularity of that religious faith, the basic implication of the Aryan caste-system, the pretensions of the Dravida Brahmin, the deification of the Aryan Gods, the singing of the Vedic hymns and so on and so forth, which would have characterized such a foundation by such people. Vedic Patasalas and Brahmin Widow’s Homes maintained out of public funds are even today, shining examples of the generosity of the cosmopolitan Brahmin.
But such a proposition can never be true and can never be accepted in the case of public temples, which were founded and have been in existence, long, long before Smarthaism and even Brahminism, as such, appeared in South India : which were founded when Buddhist and Jain temples and monasteries crowded the length and breadth of the country; when each of these religions was emulating and must have been competing with one another in securing converts to its own faith; when the rulers who founded these temples were themselves changing their religion every other minute, from Saivism to Jainism; from to Buddhism and back again as it pleased them; when toleration and religious freedom were the order of the day; when caste was unknown in South India or being ushered in slowly and stealthily; when these temples were dedicated not to Aryan Gods but to ‘Rakshasa and Asura Dravidian’ Gods; when Vedic hymns ought not to be sung within the sanctum sanctorum; when to have even admitted the Brahmin within the holy of holies would have brought disaster to the King and Country; and what is much the most important thing of all, when the revenues from these public temples went to fill the King’s coffers and not the Brahmin’s bellies; to apply in the case of such public temples, this dictum of the learned Brahmin Judge would be – I respectfully submit in all Non-Brahmin humility – it would be monstrously unfair.
***
Temples were state institutions; “public” property in the best sense of the term. Now a days Brahmin lawyers use the word “public” with reference to temples with their tongues in their cheeks. “Prima facie all Hindus belonging to the four castes without exception are entitled as on right to workshop in Hindu temples” It must be remembered Brahmins had no hand is setting up idols and temples. Max Mueller says: “The religion of the Vedas knows of no idols. The worship of idols in India is a secondary formation, a later degradation of the more primitive worship of ideal Gods”.
Mr. J. C. Ghose in his Tagore Law Lecture says: “When the people engaged in the performance of Yajnas and Satras, the necessity for the setting up of temples and images was not felt… Brahmins alone could be Agnihotries. When the other castes became influential, they wanted gods for their worship. The wane of the influence of the Brahmins and the unpopularity of the worship of fire led to the worship of images which might have been borrowed from the aboriginal tribes and from the foreign invaders of India in ancient times. The setting up of images of Buddha and the Bodhisatwas and of Chaityas and stupas also probably made the setting up of images of Hindu gods and Hindu temples more general, in imitation of the Buddhists”.
Justice Sadasiva Aiyar in the Panakudy temple case said: “Though image worship was thus recommended and laid open to all castes (by the shastras) it was clearly recognised as not the highest form of worship. The appropriate mode of worship for the Brahmins was held to be through the media of the fire and the sun”.
In another case, the same learned Judge observed: “Idol worship itself was established in the beginning for communal purposes according to the shastras. Buddhistic influence had much to do with the development of idol worship in India. Buddhist temples arose in connection with Stupas over the relics of the Lord Buddha intended to publicly worshipped… That worship of idols is also intended for the masses is clear”.
“The Hindu temples,” Mr. Ghose continues, “succeeded the Buddhist temples and the Hindu monasteries and religious institution succeeded the Buddhist Viharas. Endowments in all cases were considered religious even when made for congregations of ascetics or for the relief of man or beast. These were all religious endowments and were all public. The king also made large endowments and maintained them. Generous merchants and noblemen also made such endowments, on the revival of Hinduism. Kings and wealthy men built great temples for the gods which were places of public worship. Side by side with these great temples, people began to have their special household gods and to dedicate property for the maintenance of their worship. These endowments were private”.
These altars, idols and temples came into existence at the behest of others than Brahmins; they were originally intended for the masses; including aborigines: there was no discrimination, no distance indented as between caste and outcaste , touchables and untouchables. That is what history tells us. And also, temple worship was encouraged by the old rulers, because it was a fruitful source or revenue for them. And temple worship was made attractive by the introduction of dancing and music.
“With the establishment of images and temples, dedications of land for their maintenance became necessary. Not only were lands dedicated but slave women were also attached to many ancient temples showing the spirit which led to images worship in India. Every temple even now is supposed have its dancing hall or Nata Mandir”. Thus writes the Bengali Lawyer.
Brahmins it seems, were even outcasted even if they went and worshipped, in temples. That is historically and Vedically true. “We should know”, says Mr. Ghose, “that dedication for the god meant dedication for the maintenance of the worshipping Brahmins who because they so worshipped were called Devalas and were all but outcastes among Brahmins, a fact showing the not very reputable origin and character of such worship and worshippers, the maintenance of servants, female slaves, “dancing girls and musicians and providing for the articles of worship”.
In those ancient days, as even today temples were places of variety entertainment and were so designed by the rulers. Therefore, there need be nothing historically shocking in the remarks of Mahatma Gandhi that temples today are “dens of prostitutes.” Historically, they were so intended by the founders.
At any rate in the days of Chanakya about 300 B.C., the King made very little distinction between “religious institutions, idols and altars” on the one hand and “State owned drinking saloons to supply liquor to man, women and children of all castes”. Both were State Departments working under separate officers of the King. The one was called the Superintendent of Religious institutions; the other was known as the Superintendent of Liquor. A comparative study of these two institutions ought to prove interesting and instructive.
Let us see what laws were laid down by Chanakya as regards the working of these “drinking saloons.” They are so interesting up-to-date and efficient and the success in the conduct of these “saloons” must have led to the re-organisation of temples also on those lines.
“By employing such men as are acquainted with the manufacture of liquor ferments, the superintendent of liquor shall carry in liquor traffic not only in forts and country parts but also in camps.
“In accordance with the requirements of demand and supply, he may either centralise or decentralise the sale of liquor.”
“Liquor shall not be taken out of villages nor shall liquor shops be close to each other”.
“A fine of 600 panas stall be imposed on all offenders”….
“Lest workmen spoil work in hands and Aryas violate their decency and virtuous character and lest firebrands commit indiscreet acts liquor shall be sold to persons of well known character in small quantities. Those who are well known and of pure character may take liquor out of the shop”.
“Or all may be compelled to drink liquor within the shops and not allowed to stir out at once.”
“No fresh liquor, other than bad liquor, shall be sold below its price. Bad liquor may be sold elsewhere or given to slaves or workmen in lieu of wages or it may form the drink of beasts for draught or the subsistence of hogs”
“Liquor shops shall contain many rooms provided with beds and seats kept apart. The drinking room shall contain scents, garlands of flowers, water and other comfortable things suitable to the varying seasons”
“Spies stationed in the shops shall ascertain whether the expenditure incurred by customers in the shop is ordinary or extraordinary and also whether there are any strangers. They shall also ascertain the value of the dress, ornaments and gold of the customers lying there under intoxication.”
“When customers under intoxication lose any of their things, the merchants of the shop shall not only make good the loss but also pay an equivalent fine.”
“Merchants seated in half closed rooms shall observe the appearance of false and foreign customers, who in real or false guise of Aryas, lie down in intoxication with their beautiful mistresses”
State drinking saloons must seem to the Varnasharmite, a much hoarier institution than idols and temples even, and if “ancient custom” or “immemorial usage” were the only surviving test for any one thing in India, today, then there is no greater danger to it, than the “total prohibition campaign” now in fashion. Such a propaganda in Chanakya’s days would have been very, very high treason, indeed. But we are not at that question, just now.
In good old Chanakya’s days men, women and children of all castes were supplied with fresh liquor (mark that) by the state as suited to their taste and capacity to stand it; the prices were reasonable; even the “virtuous Aryas” could have it without “much” trouble; separate drinking rooms and bed rooms could be had in those saloons; and what would have tempted even a Hogarth’s favourite or a washed-out Don Juan, there were “beautiful mistresses” to be had, arranged by the Superintendent of Liquor, along with “scents, garlands of flower, water and other comfortable things suitable to the varying seasons”; what more could the heart of any one, Arya or Non-Arya, desire?
It does not require much of historical imagination to infer from Kautilya, that some time or other, these State “drinking saloons” must have been amalgamated with State “religious institutions.” These “beautiful mistresses” of the saloons appeared in the “temples”; “scents, garlands of flowers, and water” could be had in both; “the sacred water” in the temple was made up of identical ingredients which went to the manufacture of Liquors also. Even the element of risk for the “virtuous Arya” in frequenting the public “saloons” must have been removed by this arrangement in the temples as “sacred water”. Religion was employed to save virtue as even today it is the case.
It was by such inducements that the Brahmins (Agnihotris) were taken to worship in these Hindu temples; if they did go and worship, they were treated as outcastes by the Brahmins themselves; perhaps, in order to give some sort of respectability to these temples Brahmins, at the risk of being outcasted, were induced by the masses and aborigines and by the attractions which were provided, to go and worship; and such outcaste, low and inferior Brahmins, because of their entry and worship in these temples had to be fed and maintained from these temples, along with dancing girls and musicians.
If there was such a huge lot of trouble for the Brahmin even for entering into and worshipping in a Hindu temple, it goes without saying that pujas inside the temple for the Non-Vedic ‘aboriginal’ gods would never have been performed by these Brahmins. Even today in South India the pujaris of all famous public temples are not Brahmins – who then these pujaris are is a different story altogether.
The Brahmins lost caste by going in for worship; and if they are or were fed, in such temples, it is because they had fallen low in Brahmin society and this eating, by itself was a hall mark of inferiority for the Brahmin.
Therefore in the old days, these Hindu ancient temples were founded by the rulers to please the masses and as a source or revenue to themselves – i.e., the rulers. These temples were later turned into paying places of entertainment by providing them with dancing girls and music; and these temples were made respectable socially, by maintaining some Brahmins as worshippers who had to be fed as their worshipping entailed them loss of caste.
It may not be irrelevant at this, juncture, to place before the reader the observations of Abbe Dubois:
“To have any connexion with a courtesan or with an unmarried person, is not considered a form of wickedness in the eyes of the Brahmins. These men, who look upon the violation of any trivial custom as a heinous sin, see no harm in the most outrageous and licentious excesses. It was principally for their use that the dancers and prostitutes are attached to the service of the temples were originally entertained and they may often be heard to intone the following scandalous line : Vesya darisanam punyam papa nasanam’ which means “looking upon a prostitute is a virtue which takes away sin”.
Again the Frenchman, a century ago wrote : “It appears that at first they (the courtesans and dancing girls, called devadasis) were reserved exclusively for the enjoyment of the Brahmins. And these lewd women, who make a public traffic of their charms are consecrated in a special manner to the worship of the divinities in India. Every temple of any importance has in its services a band of eight, twelve or more. Their official duties consist in dancing and singing within the temple twice a day, morning and evening, and also at all public ceremonies.”
It is something to have provided an historic basis for that wonderful affinity which subsists between the Brahmin and the Devadasi and which subsists even today. Without this basis, one will have missed the spiritual identity of the Brahmin championship of the Devadasi – lost the key to the mystery, as it were.
If what has been stated hitherto is historically true, then it stands to reason, that to every Hindu temple into which a single Brahmin can enter and worship and in which a single Brahmin is being fed, into each and every one of such temples every Hindu, caste or non-caste touchable or untouchable, can enter and worship. For it was for the latter’s worship that these temples were built of oldp; if the Brahmin is fed, it is because he lost caste, became a cosmopolitan as it were, by barely worshipping in such temples along with all the others – caste Hindus, untouchables and depressed classes.
In so far as the Brahmin worshipper is concerned, as he becomes an untouchable by his very worship, he himself will have to get out of every Hindu temple, in order to keep it pure ; he will have to desist from worshipping therein and it goes without saying that he cannot eat in any Hindu temples, if he still claims to be a Brahmin.
On the temple entry question, the Varnasharmite Brahmin’s mouth be he an official or non-official, lawyer or layman, retired or active, whatever it is, his mouth is historically sealed.
The Brahmin’s entry into a temple is the index; if he can enter into a Hindu temple, every other person under the sun can enter it. If a single Brahmin is fed in any Hindu temple then that temple, historically and legally, will have to be open for worship to the lowest Pariah or Chandala also for worship – because that Brahmin is eating, historically and religiously, the sin, if any, of that Chandala worshipper.
***
Every temple in India was founded by the old rulers with a view to get a handsome return in the shape of offering from the worshippers There was no spiritual attribute about such foundations; no salvation behind. It was simple financial statecraft; as simple as the policy of taxing the drunkard to carry on the administration of the country.
Let us go to our old Brahmin friend, Chanakya – otherwise known as Kautilya – who lived now more than two thousand years ago. “Kautilya is renowned not only as a king-maker, but also for being the greatest Indian exponent of the art of government, the duties of Kings , ministers and officials and the methods of diplomacy”. Kautilya’s Arthasastra was prior to the Smritis of Manu and Yagnyavalkya – the law which is now so considerably administered to all and sundry under the appellation of Mitakashara.
Whatever opinions might be had about the “methods of diplomacy” enunciated by Chanakya, there is no disputing the fact that the first great known historical Brahmin was terribly honest about it – as the following passages from his Arthasastra will show.
“The superintendent of religious institutions may collect in one place the various kinds of property of the gods of the fortified cities and country parts and carry away the property to the King’s treasury.”
“Or having on some night set up a god or an altar or having opened a sacred place of ascetics or having pointed out an evil omen, the King may collect subsistence under the pretence of holding processions and trees standing on the King’s garden.”
We now come to more delightful methods for making money for “the King’s subsistence”.
A false panic must first of all be created in the city “an evil spirit has appeared on a tree!”! Within the tree the King has to arrange for hiding one of his men who must be making all sorts of devilish noises; of course the people must be made to see that the evil spirit must be pacified and allowed to depart in peace before dire calamity overtakes the city; there are the King’s men; spies disguised as ascetics who collect the money and do the trick. The “evil spirit” departs and the money goes to the King’s treasury. The king’s officers in those days must have had a hard time of it in collecting revenues for the king.
The case of the serpent trick is still more interesting and is known to exist even today in a modified form in one temple at least. One can now see the several uses to which the “sacred water” of a temple might have been put in Chanakya’s days; even though that sacred water has now drawn upon it the ignorant condemnation of Miss Mayo. That “sacred water” was only used when persons who “are not by nature credulous” appeared; it was then “doctored” but all these stratagems, it must be remembered were employed in a noble cause – the King’s cause. And not like today when the same or similar stratagems are constantly and variously employed to eke out a miserable existence for the employed.
“There is no trick” wrote the learned Abbe Dubois a century ago, “which the Brahmins will not employ in order to excise the fervour of the worshippers and thus to enrich themselves by their congregations to avert calamities.”
“Or else he shall proclaim the arrival of gods, by pointing out to the people any of the sacred trees in the King’s garden, which has produced untimely flowers and fruits.”
“Or by causing a false panic owing to the arrival of an evil spirit on a tree in the city, wherein a man is hidden making all sorts of devilish noises, the King’s spies under a guise of ascetics, may collect money with a view to propitiate the evil spirit and send it back”.
“Or spies may call upon spectators to see a serpent with numberless heads in a well, connected with a subterranean passage and collect fees from them for the sight. Or they may place in a bore-hole made in the body of an image of a serpent or in a hole in the corner of a temple or in the hollow of an anthill, a cobra, which is, by diet, rendered unconscious and call upon credulous spectators to see it on payment of a certain amount of fee. As to persons who are not by nature credulous, spies may sprinkle over or a drink of such sacred water as is mixed with anesthetic ingredients and attribute their insensibility to the curse of gods. Or by causing an outcaste person to be bitten by a cobra, spies may collect revenue under the pretext of undertaking remedial measures against ominous phenomena.”
“The offerings to the gods must reach the King’s treasury; gods and altars will have to be brought into existence in a single night and processions and festivals will have to be arranged purely for collecting money for the King – for his subsistence; for his bare living. Gods must be made to appear in the offerings. The most obvious means generally produce the best results. In the foremost rank we must place the oracles, a rich mine of wealth which pagan priests of other countries worked long ago with great success and which the lapse of ages has not yet exhausted for the heathen priests of India. Here it is the idol itself which addresses the dull of profoundly attentive crowd of worshippers, who unable to be inside or close by the god of stone, is speaking through the mouth of the idol”. More of such tricks, even now existent, have been graphically described by the Frenchman. That is the way.
To come to Chanakya. Now one can understand why if a single pie out of the temple revenue failed to reach the King’s treasury, the superintendent of religious institutions in Chanakya’s days would have been hanged high and dry.
And very properly too. “Idols and altars” in those days were a hard business proposition. Money, public money, King’s money, was spent upon manufacturing these idols and altars amd religious institutions, running them and ‘boosting’ them. These were looked upon as “productive works” by the old rulers just like the Mettur Project.
In those days, the old Indian Prince who founded these “religious institutions”, had to maintain huge armies; surrounded by enemies on all sides they had to carry on an incessant warfare. That meant resources and money, plenty of it. Those wards had to be paid for it. Feeding the Brahmins alone out of the temple revenues would have spelt the disappearance of King and temple together. They knew – the old kings who founded these temples and these altars and these idols – that it was a hard job to make both ends meet. Just as our Ministers today know that total “prohibition” would mean for instance total stoppage of secondary and higher education in the land, our old rulers knew and had to be alive every moment to the fact that upon a careful husbanding of these revenues, they safety of their kingdoms and their very lives depended. Those were strenuous days for the Maha Rajahas. Their thoughts centred upon the here and now and not upon the hereafter. It is only nowadays when most of our Rajhas are either absentee landlords or have not the worries of responsibility, that they think of satisfying the Brahmin and booking their passages to heaven and salvation or Paris and Monte Carlo.
What has been stated till now will be enough to show that the king just wanted money from the temples. Who gave the money to him, who worshipped in his temples or who drank his liquor, made no difference to him – it may be a Chandala, a Sudra, a Vyssia, a Kshatriya or a Brahmin. The more money the Chandala gave, the merrier the King was. The King would have even given “special benefit performances” with his idols and altars and serpents for the Chandala, if only money was forthcoming. If it reached his ears that a Brahmin it was, that was standing in the way of legitimate revenue reaching his coffers because a Brahmin was preventing a Chandala from entering a temple and worshipping the idol or cobra or tree, that man would have been strung up the nearest tree out of hand, Brahmin or no Brahmin.
That is to say, the ancient Hindu public temples were so much sources of public revenue to the King that if any one had even suggested that this, that or other an cannot, on any pretext whatever, enter a temple and worship an idol he would have been instantaneously pinned down for high treason.
The history of the origin of these temples very clearly shows that it was and must have been the avowed policy of the rulers to encourage everyone from Chandala to the Brahmin to go and worship and ‘contribute his mite’. There was no exception made even in the case of the Brahmin. That is to say, everyone would have been actually compelled to go and worship and pay for it to the King.
***
“As regards public temples and endowments” writes Mr. G.C. Ghose, the eminent lawyer, “ignorance of their history and original constitution has led to this confusion of the law.” This is a rather severe indictment to bring forward against our lawyers, especially Brahmins. It just means that our lawyers are enveloped in profound ignorance; and the law as known and practiced today with reference to public temples and their endowments is the result of chaotic confusion. In so far as the temple entry question is concerned, it is absolutely true.
It shall be our endeavour to show that in law there can be no justification on the part of the so-called “trustees” (it is a legal anachronism to call them trustees) or on the part of the Devasthanam Committees or on the part of the so-called caste Hindus, in preventing any Hindu of any class whatever, from entering any public Hindu temple and worshipping therein. Nor can there be any justification for this pernicious policy on religious, social or historical grounds. On the other hand, it may be pointed out, that any persistence in this policy just spells the greatest disaster that both Hindu religion and Hindu society have hitherto met with. It need not be emphasized that such a policy illegal, immoral, irreligious, insulting, selfish and unjustifiable can only proceed from quarters which have not the interests of Hindu religion and society at heart. In short, they are enemies and traitors to Hindu religion and society who, professing to be Hindus, still prevent brother-Hindus from entering these temples and worshipping therein, for any reason or upon any pretext whatever.
Let us proceed with the historical development of this branch of the law. We were at the position, deducible from Chanakya, that these Hindu temples were a source of profit and their revenues went to the King. And secondly, the position of the Brahmin in Hindu temples today is due to an accident. It was not intended for him or his worship; his temple worship was socially ruinous to him; his temple worship was dangerous to the King and Country. Spence Hardy says: “Image worship is alluded to by Manu but with intimation that the Brahmins who subsist by ministering in temples are an inferior class”. Brahmin feeding in a Hindu temple never took place, except when he was outcasted and became poor and consequently formed part of the institution along with dancing girls and musicians. There is no mention of any Brahmins being fed in any religious institution in Chanakya’s days. It would then, as now, have affected the revenues – earmarked for the King.
A small digression, please. Brahmins were out-casted, because they went in for temple-worship; and today, they are laying down the law as to which castes or sub-castes can have temple entry. The Brahmin goes with the Vellala, in this affair. It so happens that throughout South India, the right of these two communities to enter any Hindu temple seems to be taken for granted; and not merely that, they also seem to think that they have a right to say which other castes or sub-castes can have temple-entry and which not.
We have already indicated that, on historical grounds, if you find a single Brahmin entering a public temple, every other Hindu has also the right to enter. Similarly, if you find a Vellala or any other “good” sudra entering a temple, there can be no valid objection to any one, even a Non-Hindu, entering that temple for worship.
No one can now oppose, seemingly, the entry of a Brahmin into a Hindu public temple; nor of a Devadasi or a Dancing Girl; nor of the issue of such Devadasis. Such offspring of Devadasis were called in the old days Dasiputras; those Dasiputras are our modern-day Sudras. At any rate, Sudras, inclusive of Vellalas, have the undoubted right to enter any public temple.
Even if the etymological significance of Sudra being Dasiputra be disputed, let us know who the “offspring” of these Devadasis are and what becomes of them, in South Indian society today.
“Formerly” writes a distinguished historian, “the Dasis undoubtedly enjoyed considerable social position on account of their service in the temples, but now they have degenerated into prostitutes and as such have fallen low in social scale. It is not, however, every Dasi that is married to the deity but only a few are so dedicated, of the rest some voluntarily follow the profession of prostitution while a large number marry and settle down as family women. Of the males, some marry in the caste and live by playing on the flute and other musical instruments at the dance and by teaching them dancing and music, while others marry and drift out of caste, follow other occupations and try to get rid of the stigma attached to their birth, by merging into the general community of respectable Sudras”. This started in the days of Manimekalai.
There can be no reproach, neither historical nor racial, if the genealogy of the Vellala or Sudra is lost in the Devadasis as that of the Brahmin in his Rishis. In the matter of parentage, the Sudra is as “cosmopolitan” as the Brahmin. The offspring of Devadasis have become respectable Sudras today; some of them very respectable, indeed.
In the Panakudy Temple case, Justice T. Sadasiva Aiyar, had to observe, using judicial language: “Even among Sudras, those who consider themselves more respectable will try to avoid the touch of the less respectable classes though there is no ceremonial pollution caused by such touch. For instance DW1 says in the case, “I am a Sudra, caste Vellala. I do not touch the lower class of Vellalas”. This is not because their touch causes any religious pollution to the higher class but simply out of the exaggeration being due to ‘class’ sentiment having come in recent times to reinforce caste sentiment”.
It is very often a difficult question to determine the paternity of the children of Devadasis; nor are we interested in discussing it here, except to point out that it is very much of a “cosmopolitan” affair. It may be pointed out that in law, the offspring of a Devadasi takes the mother’s status and not the father’s, similar to that among Nairs on the West Coast, who are also reckoned Sudras.
Such being the case, there is considerable historical support for our view, that to whichever temple a Brahmin can enter, that a dancing-girl can enter, that a Dasiputra, including respectable Vellalas and Nairs, can enter, into that temple every Hindu ( let alone a Non-Hindu for the present), every Hindu, of whatever denomination or caste or sub-caste – untouchable or depressed or oppressed – every one whom we call a Hindu and whom the Govt. have recognized as a Hindu, every such Hindu has the right to enter that temple and worship therein.
***
Who has got the authority in law to prevent a Hindu from entering a public temple and worshiping therein? Has the ‘trustee’ of the Temple Committee, whose powers or the absence of it, seem to be similar, the right to do so? We shall deal with the rights of other sections of the Hindu Community itself later on.
Let us trace the history of these Committees of these Trustees. To use the compendious language of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council:
“In 1810 in the Bengal Presidency and in 1817 in the Madras Presidency, the British Government had assumed control of all the public endowments and benefactions, Hindu and Muhammadan, and placed them under the charge of the respective Boards of Revenue. In 1863, under certain influences to which it is unnecessary to refer, the Government considered it expedient to divest itself of the charge and control of these institutions and to place them under the management of their own respective creeds. With this object, Act XX of 1863 was enacted; a system of committees was devised to which were transferred the power vested to Government for the appointment of ‘managers, trustees and superintendents’; rules were enacted to ensure proper management and to empower the superior Courts in the district to take cognizance of allegations of misfeasance against the managing authority.” Their Lordships are not giving a Summary of the Act but indicating only its general features. The Act contains no definition of the word ‘trustee’; it uses indifferently and indiscriminately the terms “manager, trustee or superintendent”, clearly showing that the expressions were used to connote one and the same idea of management. After the enactment of 1863, the Committee to whom the endowments were transferred were vested, generally speaking, with the same powers as the Government had possessed before in respect of the appointment of “managers, trustees or superintendents”.
Two things must be noticed at this juncture; the first is, it was not explained as to what were the influences which brought about this change and secondly the transfer of powers by the British Government was to the respective creeds i.e., to the Hindus and Mahomedans respectively. That means, the transfer was not made nor intended to be made to any particular class or caste or section of community among the Hindus but to the whole body of all the Hindus. That is very important. In another case, the Privy Council was extremely careful to employ identical language: “The Government divested itself of the charge and placed them under the management of such respective creeds”.
In the Tirupati Scheme Suit, the Madras High Court (consisting of Subramania Aiyar and Davies J.J.) said “The temple of Sri Venkateswara in Siramalai or Tirupati in the North Arcot District is a very ancient Hindu temple to which worshippers resort from all parts of India and is in receipt of an annual income of Rs.2 to 3 lakhs. Prior to the establishment of British Government, the management of the institution was directly under the ruler of the country for the time being. After the advent of the British, the management passed into the hands of the East India Company and subsequent to the enactment of Regulation VII of 1817 of the Madras Code, it was carried on under the Control of the Board of Revenue through the Collector of the District. With reference to a dispatch of the year 1841 from the Court of Directors ordering the immediate withdrawal from all interference on the part of the officers of the Government with native temples and places of religious resort, the management of the temple was in 1843, made over to Seva Doss, the head of a Mutt called Hathiramji Mutt, situated in the town of Tirupathi at the foot of the hill on which the important shrine stands. In the ‘Sannad’ by which this transfer of management was effected, it was provided that Seva Doss’ successors in the Mutt should be his successors as Vicharanakarta or Manager of the Temple”. Here also, there is no indication as to who wanted this non-interference of the British Government with Hindu temples.
“The control of the management of these temples, which was vested in the Board of Revenue” says Mr. Ghose “was however found objectionable by many. The objection to the control of the Board of Revenue came not from Hindus but from Christian Missionaries who protested against a Christian Government exercising control over pagan temples. So loud was the outcry that the Government called for a report from the Collectors in 1841 with a view to transfer the management of religious endowments to qualified individuals. The Regulations about them were all repealed and by Act XX of 1863, the Board was relieved of the burden of looking after the temples and other endowments and provision was made for making over the properties to trustees or committees of management”.
If Mr. Ghose, the learned Tagore Law Lecturer, whose standing as an authority has been recognized by the Privy Council, if he is to be believed then it was neither the Smriti of the Brahmin nor the Agama of the Saivite nor any Varnashramite nor any Hindu even, that was responsible for the present day Devasthanam Committee and the Trustee – it was the Christian missionary that wanted his Christian Government to get rid of this control over ‘heathen’ religious institutions.
“When a State was pledged to maintain a particular form of religion, religious institutions of a different religion or sect, or educational or charitable institutions intended to advance such religion or sect, could not be recognized or protected by it. It was for this reason that in Catholic countries, Protestant institutions were not protected by the State and in Protestant countries; Catholic institutions were not recognized by the State. It was for the same reason that the British Government as a Christian Government in 1863, withdrew from the direct supervision of Hindu and Mahomedan temples and endowments which it had assumed under the Regulations of 1810”.
In their anxiety to be rid of a bother, the British Government did not indicate by the Act of 1863, to which caste or class or community among Hindus, these ‘trustees’ or members of the Temple Committee should belong. They possibly could not have indicated it, in restoring these temples in 1863, as equally they were not sure from whom or from which community or caste, if any, these religious institutions were originally taken by them and later on placed under the control of the respective Revenue Boards in Bengal in the year 1810 and in Madras in the year 1817.
To put it shortly, Hindus as Hindus without any distinction of caste or colour got back their temples and endowments, in 1863, with identical powers of management of these temples and endowments and no more. There is not a whisper in that Act of 1863 or anywhere else, of authority being conferred by the Government upon these ‘trustees’ or temple committees to prevent any Hindu, as such from entering a public temple under their control and worshipping therein.
Have these ‘trustees’ and Temple Committees, inherent power, apart from any statutory authority which does not seemingly exist to prevent the entry of a Hindu to a temple for worship?
They may have undoubtedly the right to regulate the conduct of the public within the temples but not the right to prohibit any class or section of the Hindu public from entering for worship. Decent conduct is no doubt, an obligatory condition for entering a public temple as any other public place. “Rules by trustees for good order and decency and prevention of overcrowding are binding on all. They can “turn out creators of disturbance within the temples preventing the proper performance of worship”. That is all. These are just the disciplinary powers which a trustee or a Temple Committee has got. Such powers are manifestly analogous to those possessed by a judge over his Court House.
“There cannot be the slightest doubt” said their Lordships of the Calcutta High Court in a well-known case, “that a judge has a general power over his own Court in the sense that he has a right to see that order is maintained, that the Court room is not encumbered by persons loitering about there to the detriment of the business of the Court and that the public are not allowed to enter those portions of the Court house which are not intended for their use. But as a matter of fact the Court House is a public place and is a place to which the public has a right to resort so long as they behave properly and do not make a disturbance and do not crowd the Court in such a way as to interfere with the disposal of business; and as long as persons behave themselves properly in a Court House there is no authority vested in any one to turn it into a private place; and though undoubtedly this learned Judge has a perfect right to control the way in which the Court room is to be used by particular persons – that is to say, to arrange the seats in such a way as he finds most convenient; allotting to the pleaders one place, to the parties another, and to the public a third – I do not think he is right or that he is justified in making any general order by which he excludes any portion of the community, as a general body, from his Court and though I expressly wish to be understood as not interfering in any way with the right of the Judge to control his Court promises in such a way as is most convenient to the public and to persons working there, still I think this very general order is objectionable because it is directed against a particular class of persons.”
These observations of the learned Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court sum up to a nicety the analogous powers of a trustee or Temple Committee. Any act by which any portion or class of the Hindu public is excluded by these trustees and Temple Committees from entering a public temple for worship will be completely beyond their powers and manifestly illegal if, at any rate, a temple of Justice stands, as it ought to on a par with a temple of God.
***
What was the state of that Hindu Society between 1842 and 1863 when this transfer of Hindu temples and endowments to the ‘creed’ of Hinduism took place?
In that society, the Brahmins were then and long earlier, the most educated and the most politically minded class among the Hindus. And they were practically the official class also – which is everything in Indian society.
Why now a century ago, the Abbe Dubois wrote in 1816: “The Brahmins have also been clever enough to work their way into favour with the great European power that now governs India. They occupy the highest and most lucrative posts in the different administrative boards and Government offices, as well as in the Judicial Courts of the various districts. In fact there is no branch of public administration in which they have not made themselves indispensable. Thus it is nearly always Brahmins who held the posts of sub-collectors of revenue, writers, copyists, translators, treasurers, book keepers etc. It is especially difficult to do without their assistance in all matters connected with accounts as they have a remarkable talent for arithmetic”.
“Furthermore, their perfect knowledge of native opinion and of the ways in which it may be guided, to say nothing of the influence which they exercise by the prerogative of birth, are quite sufficient reasons to account for the readiness with which their services are accepted. In fact, the veneration and respect with which their fellow countrymen regard them, shed in the opinion of the vulgar, a kind of reflected glory and dignity on the different Government offices in which they occupy subordinate positions. But woe to the European head of the office who does not keep the strictest watch over the conduct of these said subordinates or places implicit confidence in them! He will soon find himself the victim of his own negligence, with his position seriously compromised”.
The remarks of the translator Sir H.K. Beauchamp (former editor of the ‘Madras Mail’) run thus: “The proportion of Brahmins in Government employ is still large; for it is the Brahmins who, more than any others, have availed themselves of the benefits of English education”.
Whatever be the reasons which made the Brahmin predominant in South Indian society at this period, it cannot be disputed that it is a fact that when the Government of India transferred these Hindu temples and endowments, these naturally and inevitably, passed into the control of the Brahmins and such of the Non-brahmin Caste Hindus who were Brahminical and even their number was a small one – uneducated, terribly superstitious and led by the nose by the Brahmin Purohit.
When the Act XX of 1863 “enabled the Government to divest itself of the management of religious endowments”, it so happened, the Hindu society, then as now, was so constituted, that it enabled the Brahmin, directly or indirectly, to take upon himself the management of these Hindu religious endowments. And what happened when the British Government washed its hands off these things and when the Brahmin and the Brahminical Non-brahmin took up the management of these institutions, will be considered now.
The Government when it transferred these religious institutions to the ‘creed’ of Hinduism, omitted to define who a ‘Hindu’ was. This failure to define a Hindu led to the consolidation of Brahminical power and prestige and to the exclusion of the major portion of the Hindu population from their privileges of a Hindu citizenship, viz, the so called depressed classes, the untouchables and ever so many other Sub-castes and communities.
In so far as the Brahmin was concerned, with the assistance of Brahmin lawyers, Brahmin Judges and Brahmin text writers and other Non-Brahmins Brahminically inclined, he bettered and secured his position in a way which he could not have dreamt of, even in the fabulous days of Rama Rajyam.
Temple worship was to the regulated according to his Smritis and not Agamas even; any and every Dharmam, known or unknown was made synonymous with Brahmin feeding, Brahmin comforts and Brahmin advancement; attempts were made, in law, first to indicate that temples were founded for their benefit, spiritual and material, latterly to assume that the Brahmin in was himself the deity; the Brahmin in South India got a move up socially and religiously; he could go into the holy of holies; his Guru can even perform puja inside a public temple; his Vedas became important; his Smritis assumed an importance in South India, which was made to compare favourably with that described by Ragozin in his ‘Vedic India’ – “a narrowly orthodox Brahminical School with its petty punctiliousness in the matter of forms, rites and observances, its intolerance everything un-Aryan, its rigid separatism”.
Today in the light of historical research and criticism, that wonderful fabric of Smritis, that house of cards built so laboriously by the South Indian Brahmin Varnashramite, is falling about his ears. Now, it will be plain, why an ardent Travancore Brahmin, a veritable pillar of Varnashrama Dharma appeared before the Simon Commission and pleaded that no Indians at all should be made High Court Judges. No doubt, it was laughed out; but there is more in that Brahmin’s suggestion than meets the eye. It was evidently not meant to exclude Brahmin Judges like Sir. T. Muthuswamy Aiyar who did Prayaschittam whenever he had to confirm a capital sentence, it was aimed at Brahmin judges of the type of the late Sir. T. Sadasiva Aiyar. Of course Non-brahmin Indian Judges ought not to be there at all.
It is just because all the pretences of the Brahmin, the official, the lawyer and the Judge, are being found out and exposed that this Travancore variety of the Varnashramite comes out with the native suggestion that no Indian Judges shall find a place in the highest tribunal in the land. Oh! Ye shades of Chanakya!
***
Hindu temples were always cosmopolitan and were intended by the founders to be cosmopolitan. It was only yesterday that the whole trouble arose.
We concluded the last article, by asking the question as to why it was that the Brahmin was fighting shy, of the Agamas, it would turn out that as a Brahmin he has no right to enter a temple for worship; that he will have to lose all his privileges gained recently after the advent of the English, by twisting and torturing the law on the subject, and by playing upon the ignorance of the credulous and simple-minded masses.
The first thing to be done is to notice the difference between Agamas and Smritis. This portion of the subject will be treated as light’ as possible. The writer relies upon the profound scholarship of Mr. K. Subramonia Pillai M.A., M.L., for Agamic information, even though Mr. P. T. Srinivasa Aiyangar also has dealt with the subject as lucidly in his recent book “History of the Tamils.” The quotations are taken from Mr.Pillai; the comments and inference are my own.
“The Source of Smiritis is Vedic; while that of the other is Agamic Tantric which may be used as a synonym for Tamilian”. This distinction is important this way: …..”the study of the Vedas is restricted to the twice-born; while that of the Agamas is open to all Castes and Communities.” That is to say, even a Pariah or Chakklia or a Chandala can master the Agama; there is no restriction as in the case of Vedas and Smritis. Consquently the Vedists “will look upon such of the Brahmins as seek initiation into the Agamic religion as the dregs of Brahmin society,” And further they view “that Agamas are intended for those who are by birth unfit to read the Smritis and Puranas.” Sir John Woodroffe seems to have expressed his wonder “at the contract between the cosmopolitan character of the Tantras and the parochial restrictions of the Vedas.”
From the observations and from further things to be noticed, it will be evident that wherever Agamic form of worship is adopted – and that is the case throughout South India, as also the north – that temple is cosmopolitan and is intended for all castes and communities among Hindus and not merely to the twice-born. I shall make it clearer.
Please notice two things laid down by Justice Sadasiva Aiyar in the Panakudy Temple Case:-
(a) “So far as the Garbagraham is concerned, it is only the Brahmins who belong to the temple-priest sect that could stand inside it for the purpose of worship. Ordinary Brahmins, Pillais and Mudaliars are entitled to worship from the outer Mantapam.”
(b) “Ordinary Brahmins were not allowed to go into the Garbagraham, as the touch of the uninitiated, (i.e., those who had not Deeksha) though they be Brahmins was supposed to pollute the images”
According to the Agamas then as accepted by Justice Sadasiva Aiyar (and he seems to have known something about it, whereas as pointed out already Justice Muthuswami Aiyar displayed profound ignorance about it) an ordinary Brahmin cannot enter the “holy of holies” and his entrance therein will cause “pollution.” The only Brahmin who can enter it, is, what he euphemistically calls, “the temple-priest sect Brahmin.”
And who are the temple-priest sect Brahmins?
“Temple priests are regarded as a low class of Brahmins. This feeling seems to have been in existence from the days of Manu”, says Mr. P. R. Ganapathy Aiyar, the learned Madras Brahmin commentator. Well and good.
Justice Seshagiri Iyer says (in a well-known reported case which went up to the Privy Council) “The next circumstance relied on is that the family of the defendants (Gounders or Vellalas or Sudras) are the archakas. It is true they do not belong to a class from which the Poojaries of a temple are drafted. But there is no rule that unless a person belongs to a particular class, he should not perform worship in a temple.”
“In the well-known temple at Chidambaram there are a large number of archakas who claim to have come down to earth along with the Deity for which they are performing Pooja. They do not belong to the caste from which ordinarily temple archakas are drawn.”
To put it shortly, the Dikshitars of Chidambaram are not Brahmins and there is no rule at all that a temple priest should be a Brahmin or that he should belong to any particular class or caste.
This view of Mr. Justice Seshagiri Aiyar was accepted by the Privy Council, when the case went up on appeal. Said their Lordships of the Privy Council: “It may perhaps appear to be strange that the Pujari of a public Hindu Temple should be of a caste other than that of a Brahmin; but apparently in the Presidency of Madras, there are some Hindu public temples, the Pujaris of which are Sudras. Mr. Seshagiri Aiyar in his judgement in this case stated that ‘there is no rule that unless a person belongs to a particular class (caste) he should not perform worship in a temple and he referred as an example to the well-known public temple at Chidambaram in which he said, the priests (Pujaries) are not Brahmins’. The accuracy of that statement has not been questioned in this appeal”.
Reading between the lines, it is easy to see that “the temple-priest sect Brahmin” of one Brahmin Judge, is a “low class Brahmin” according to the Brahmin commentator, and is no Brahmin at all, according to another Brahmin Judge and the Privy Council but is a plain Sudra in those public temples where Agamas govern the situation.
It is again this ‘Sudra” who can enter the Garbagraha or holy of the holies, which an ordinary Brahmin can not enter, not even His Holiness Sankaracharya, because he also is an uninitiated Brahmin according the Agamas. While this ‘Sudra’s puja pleases the deity, even the approach of the ordinary Brahmin within the holy of the holies, brings about pollution to the image. A Brahmin to pollute? What do the Agamas mean? It does not stop here if we go by the Agamas.
(1) “Even an initiated Brahmin should not touch any of the idols in the Saivite temple but can only serve as cook or (can be ) any other menial servant “
(2) “An initiated Saivite of whatever community (even a Pariah can get initiated) should not receive food or drink at the hands of an uninitiated Brahmin”.
From these and more yet to come, it will be found that even according to Agamas which are said to govern these institutions, all the temples were open to all Hindus alike touchable and untouchable. As a matter of fact, a correct reading of these Agamas would go to show that nobody in those days could ever have dreamt of excluding anybody of any religion, let alone an untouchable Hindu, from entering a Hindu temple for worshipping. Today’s exclusion is un-Agamic and more political than religious.
As a great Agamic scholar observes: “Saivism and Vaishnavism keep some kind of initiation open to all classes including the Pariahs. Even a Pariah may be admitted into the temple provided he is a member of the religion, observing clean habits of life. It is Varnashrama Dharma that has resulted in the keeping of the Panchamas from entrance into the temple.”
Revolt, 28 July; 4, 11 and 25 August; 20, 27 October, 1929; 19 January 1930
Notes
This essay comprises a series of articles serialized in Revolt under the title “The Right of Temple Entry”. Subsequently, and with more chapters added, these were consolidated into a book and published in 1933 with a preface by Periyar E.V.Ramasami. P.Chidambaram Pillai , as is evident from his writings, was a leading Self-respector of the time was also a legislator in the erstwhile princely state of Travancore.
