The word ‘Dalit’ comes from the root ‘dal’ and means ‘broken, ground-down, downtrodden, or oppressed’ and ‘Dalit’ is a designation for a group of people traditionally regarded as ‘untouchable’. According to Victor Premasagar, the term ‘Dalit’ shows these people’s “weakness, poverty and humiliation at the hands of the upper castes in the Indian society” (108). The Dalits, called by different names like Dasyu, Dasa, Atisudra, Panchama, Tirukulattar, Adi Karnataka, Adi Dravida, and Poundra, are actually the Depressed classes of Indian society, and according to the Indian Constitution, the Dalits are the people coming under the category ‘Scheduled Castes’. The transformation of the stigmatised identity of these erstwhile untouchables to a self-chosen identity as Dalit is a story of a collective struggle waged over the centuries against the Indian caste system that originated in functional groupings called Varnas, which had their beginnings in the Aryan society of ancient northern India. Varna literally means colour, and chaturvarna signifies four gradations, comprising Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, and Shudras, arranged in a hierarchical order. According to the Rig Veda,1 the Brahmins were born from the mouth of Brahma, the Kshatriyas came from the shoulders of Brahma, the Vaishyas from the thighs of Brahma, and the Shudras from the feet of Brahma. As Buhler observes, according to Manu, “the name of a Brahmana should have a word for auspicious, of a Kshatriya for strength, the name of a Vaishya for wealth, and the name of a Shudra should breed disgust” (31). So, at the top of this hierarchical order were the Brahmins, who performed rituals and kept sacred texts, the Vedas, the Smritis, and the Puranas. The Kshatriyas were the rulers and warriors who patronised the Brahmins and commissioned the rituals, including the Yagna ritual of animal sacrifices and gifts to the Brahmins. The Vaishyas were cultivators and traders. But the lowest, the Shudras, were the servitors and performers of all menial tasks. This led Ambedkar to consider the caste system as a scheme of “graded inequality in which castes are arranged according to an ascending scale of reverence and a descending scale of contempt”.2 Shudras were considered clearly inferior to the other three Varnas and were constrained to perform only menial jobs. Those doing menial jobs obviously had a low status, and since the Shudras were assigned the responsibilities of serving the other three Varnas, they were deprived of education and of a higher training of the mind and were denied social status. They were barred from the right to education and knowledge, and in schools, Dalit children were often forced to sit separately from the rest of the students and were the only ones asked to clean the latrines. This claim has historical shreds of evidence if we look at the plight of Shambuka, Ekalavya, and Gargi. They were simply compelled to refrain from gaining knowledge, despite their excellence and exemplary skills, only because of their caste identity. They had to bear severe reprimand unjustly at the hands of the upper-caste representatives. Shambuka, who belonged to the Shudra community, started austerities in order to gain divinity. This action was considered highly sinful by the upper-caste men and a harbinger of all the glitches in society. As a result, he was killed by Rama. In another incident, Ekalavya, who belonged to a forest tribe, tried to learn archery from Dronacharya, who was the teacher of the royal sons. Dronacharya was impressed by his humility and was willing to accept him as his disciple, but after learning his caste identity, he refused to teach him the skills of warfare. However, Ekalavya tried to learn those skills by himself, creating a clay statue of Dronacharya and keeping that in front of him. Finally, when he appeared as a better-skilled archer than even Arjuna, Dronacharya compelled him to cut off his thumb to destroy his career as well as the rival of Arjuna by some tricks. These two incidents display that the upper castes, by all their cunningness, used to prevent the lower castes from gaining any kind of knowledge. It seems that since it is believed the Brahmins came out of the mouth of Brahma, they are first born, the purest, and the best, so they have all the rights over the Veda, which is considered the source of all knowledge. If anybody like Shambuka or Ekalavya violates these norms, they are bound to face severe chastisement, as Uma Chakravarti, in her book Gendering Caste: Through a Feminist Lens (2013), writes:The Brahmins had the monopoly on intellectual knowledge, and all the informal knowledge related to the so-called inferior professions like agriculture, carpentry, fishing, hunting, and black or gold smithy was allotted to the lower castes. The legacy is continued even in the twentieth century, which is evident in Omprakash Valmiki’s autobiography Joothan (1997), where he narrates the struggle and hardships he had to endure to gain a formal education. The following episode from his book validates the Brahmanical hegemony in the field of intellectual knowledge and formal education and how the Dalits are looked down upon on the subject of receiving ‘book knowledge’. He writes:

Indian Caste System and the Origin and Plight of the Dalits

章节
发表日期：

2025年

查看全文

Shubhendu Shekhar Naskar

摘要

The word ‘Dalit’ comes from the root ‘dal’ and means ‘broken, ground-down, downtrodden, or oppressed’ and ‘Dalit’ is a designation for a group of people traditionally regarded as ‘untouchable’. According to Victor Premasagar, the term ‘Dalit’ shows these people’s “weakness, poverty and humiliation at the hands of the upper castes in the Indian society” (108). The Dalits, called by different names like Dasyu, Dasa, Atisudra, Panchama, Tirukulattar, Adi Karnataka, Adi Dravida, and Poundra, are actually the Depressed classes of Indian society, and according to the Indian Constitution, the Dalits are the people coming under the category ‘Scheduled Castes’. The transformation of the stigmatised identity of these erstwhile untouchables to a self-chosen identity as Dalit is a story of a collective struggle waged over the centuries against the Indian caste system that originated in functional groupings called Varnas, which had their beginnings in the Aryan society of ancient northern India. Varna literally means colour, and chaturvarna signifies four gradations, comprising Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, and Shudras, arranged in a hierarchical order. According to the Rig Veda,1 the Brahmins were born from the mouth of Brahma, the Kshatriyas came from the shoulders of Brahma, the Vaishyas from the thighs of Brahma, and the Shudras from the feet of Brahma. As Buhler observes, according to Manu, “the name of a Brahmana should have a word for auspicious, of a Kshatriya for strength, the name of a Vaishya for wealth, and the name of a Shudra should breed disgust” (31). So, at the top of this hierarchical order were the Brahmins, who performed rituals and kept sacred texts, the Vedas, the Smritis, and the Puranas. The Kshatriyas were the rulers and warriors who patronised the Brahmins and commissioned the rituals, including the Yagna ritual of animal sacrifices and gifts to the Brahmins. The Vaishyas were cultivators and traders. But the lowest, the Shudras, were the servitors and performers of all menial tasks. This led Ambedkar to consider the caste system as a scheme of “graded inequality in which castes are arranged according to an ascending scale of reverence and a descending scale of contempt”.2 Shudras were considered clearly inferior to the other three Varnas and were constrained to perform only menial jobs. Those doing menial jobs obviously had a low status, and since the Shudras were assigned the responsibilities of serving the other three Varnas, they were deprived of education and of a higher training of the mind and were denied social status. They were barred from the right to education and knowledge, and in schools, Dalit children were often forced to sit separately from the rest of the students and were the only ones asked to clean the latrines. This claim has historical shreds of evidence if we look at the plight of Shambuka, Ekalavya, and Gargi. They were simply compelled to refrain from gaining knowledge, despite their excellence and exemplary skills, only because of their caste identity. They had to bear severe reprimand unjustly at the hands of the upper-caste representatives. Shambuka, who belonged to the Shudra community, started austerities in order to gain divinity. This action was considered highly sinful by the upper-caste men and a harbinger of all the glitches in society. As a result, he was killed by Rama. In another incident, Ekalavya, who belonged to a forest tribe, tried to learn archery from Dronacharya, who was the teacher of the royal sons. Dronacharya was impressed by his humility and was willing to accept him as his disciple, but after learning his caste identity, he refused to teach him the skills of warfare. However, Ekalavya tried to learn those skills by himself, creating a clay statue of Dronacharya and keeping that in front of him. Finally, when he appeared as a better-skilled archer than even Arjuna, Dronacharya compelled him to cut off his thumb to destroy his career as well as the rival of Arjuna by some tricks. These two incidents display that the upper castes, by all their cunningness, used to prevent the lower castes from gaining any kind of knowledge. It seems that since it is believed the Brahmins came out of the mouth of Brahma, they are first born, the purest, and the best, so they have all the rights over the Veda, which is considered the source of all knowledge. If anybody like Shambuka or Ekalavya violates these norms, they are bound to face severe chastisement, as Uma Chakravarti, in her book Gendering Caste: Through a Feminist Lens (2013), writes:The Brahmins had the monopoly on intellectual knowledge, and all the informal knowledge related to the so-called inferior professions like agriculture, carpentry, fishing, hunting, and black or gold smithy was allotted to the lower castes. The legacy is continued even in the twentieth century, which is evident in Omprakash Valmiki’s autobiography Joothan (1997), where he narrates the struggle and hardships he had to endure to gain a formal education. The following episode from his book validates the Brahmanical hegemony in the field of intellectual knowledge and formal education and how the Dalits are looked down upon on the subject of receiving ‘book knowledge’. He writes: