ABSTRACT
At the time of writing-for this case is quite recent-the caste people of the village in question are still biding their time. But meanwhile a new thing is being talked of with amazement in the villages of those parts: a Pariah has rights!Not always have unjustly-treated Pariahs been successful in their appeal to law. In the army no distinction is allowed. A number of Pariahs have become sepoys. A Christian sepoy of Pariah origin went on leave to his village during an outbreak of plague. Before travelling back he had to get his plague passport signed by the village headman. He went on this errand dressed in full uniform, with boots, putties, coat, and turban. The headman, seeing the Pariah thus arrayed, was enraged and went to beat him. The sepoy fled to his house and locked himself in. The headman’s party came down and tried to force their way into the house. The sepoy’s wife went out to them and pleaded for her husband. They seized her and flogged her, cutting her breasts open with the cane they used. The missionary who told me these facts saw the woman and her wounds himself. The husband was also seized and beaten-for the offence of appearing before caste people in a coat. The case was taken to court. It was postponed more than a dozen times, causing the plaintiff and witnesses enormous inconvenience. In the end the case was practically dismissed.A Christian Pariah boy, brought up and educated in a missionary boarding-home, was home for his holidays. He, too, had to get his plague passport signed by the headman. Taught self-respect in the Mission and the way to appear before elders and superiors, he went to the headman nicely dressed and wearing a coat. This headman also was furious at the sight, had him seized and cruelly flogged; his coat was torn off and ripped to pieces.That boy got back his own in a different way. When his education was finished he emigrated to the Straits Settle-
ments, where he ultimately obtained a very good position and was generally esteemed. When he last visited India and went to his own village even the headman treated him with respect. In the Pariah quarters of that village the Mission has now a very good school to which caste boys also come, amongst them a son of that headman himself!In another village where the Pariahs came under the influence of Christianity and where many of them became baptized the headman and others persecuted them in every possible way. Their livelihood, i.e. field labour for the caste people, was taken away; they were not even allowed firewood. When this did not avail to make them revert to Hinduism the headman had their houses set on fire and burnt. This, however, was proved against him and he went to prison for six months. When he came out he pursued his old tactics, caused the Pariahs to be robbed of their goats and injured in all possible ways, but managed to avoid legal detection. Some of the Pariahs, almost starving, recanted. Finally, however, they all returned to Christianity; their teacher worked on faithfully and courageously, and to-day the Pariah school is largely attended by caste boys. The Pariahs, as Christians, have continued to gain general respect.It is difficult within a limited compass to give a true picture. The instances quoted, though they could be multiplied, must not lead anyone to think the problem is solved. Even Gandhi, admitting them to his own Ashram in these days, has not solved it.There are over sixty millions of outcastes in India. Christian Missions have barely touched the fringe of them. Reformers are agitating; Government is investigating and willing to help by grants of land, etc., yet for the bulk of the outcaste population the old conditions of oppression and injustice remain.Wanted: neighbours.Here and there they may be found. Lachmi Nursappa,
the Brahmin priest of Patacheruvu, who championed the cause of the outcastes in his town, has been mentioned elsewhere.1 He has passed to his reward, but another heroic figure in this district is still with us, Bhumanand Reddi of Vajrapad. He came under the influence of a Lingait priest who was baptized as a Christian. Nanjandappa, 2 a lover of his kind and of all who are oppressed, infected his friend with his own enthusiasm; Bhumanand Reddi became an out and out social reformer. A great outcry was made, also attempts to ruin him in various ways, but Bhumanand is wealthy and can afford to disregard opposition and contempt. Outcastes are received at the house of this dignified old man, of fine and wise countenance; if marriages can be arranged for young widows on Brahmo Samaj lines he lends his house for the ceremony and pays expenses; he helps to educate backward and low-caste boys. His own daughter, a child widow, he encouraged to re-marry, but she preferred to remain with her father and help in his work. Much loneliness must of necessity be the portion of the inmates of such a home, still within the pale of Hinduism, yet surely treading in the footsteps of the greatest Lover of men ever known in human history.But though there are these amazing and honoured exceptions, in the main it still remains true to say that among the general population lack of neighbourliness for the out-caste troubles no one. They may be denied justice, deprived of land and of water, of the right to dress as others dress, of the use of roads-who cares ? They are outside the pale of respectable society.And if recently Hinduism has woken up to the fact that this lowest stratum of Indian society shows signs of insubordination, of going over to other religions where they shall count as brothers and human beings, and has now decreed that outcastes are part of the Hindu community, 1 An Uphill Road in India. 2 See Chap. xvii. A Solitary.
