ABSTRACT
The Indian national movement was not only a struggle for freedom from colonial rule. It was, as forcefully argued by Aloysius (1997: 93), essentially a struggle for power among diverse castes and communities. These diverse communities could broadly be categorised into two groups: Brahmin communities that include the first three castes/communities in the varna order and the subaltern or non-Brahmin communities, which include Dalits, Shudras, Adivasis and Muslims (ibid.). As these categories represent different layers in the hierarchical social order, the social discourse of each group was also largely shaped by their social standing. Not surprisingly, the same social discourse was reproduced in their political consciousness and agenda. By the early 20th century, the dichotomies between those two social forces – the Brahmin and non-Brahmin communities – were more obvious. Both were demanding the transfer of political power from the coloniser into the hands of the colonised. Yet, for each group, the intentions behind this demand were in direct contradiction to one another. While the Brahmin group was demanding transfer of power to retain its dominance in the social structure, as well as to gain a hold in the emerging power structure, the non-Brahmins, whose position within the sociopolitical structure until recently had appeared to be immutably fixed at the bottom rung through the formidable doctrines of karma and dharma, were aspiring for the homo genisation or equitable distribution of power within society.
