If only legislation could have abolished caste pride and prejudice ...

                                           If only legislation could have abolished caste pride and prejudice ...

I read a 24 column-inch analysis article on abolishing caste pride and prejudice in Tamil Nadu in The Hindu of October 20, 2025. It called a spade a spade. Hence I am offering it to the visitors of this space. I would also admit that, at least once in a blue moon, this newspaper offers something that makes it worth reading.

I belong to the true top-tier caste (please read between the lines the severe shame I felt in admitting) Smartha Brahmin of Tamil Nadu, about which I could never have done anything. Yet, over the past nearly 43 years (ever since I was 28 years old), I have, out of necessity to scold myself, felt being whipped by myself. Lest I be misunderstood, I am seeking neither sympathy nor empathy. 

Within the Brahmin community, I keep studied silence. Among all others too, I keep a studied silence, because anything I might say is likely to be taken as an expression of condescension. That is why, basically, I am non-communicative.

It is this background that gave me so much pleasure in the above article. I felt I am darker than a spade. The article focuses on the intermediate communities, vis-a-vis the Scheduled Castes. It mentions that Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Mr. M. K. Stalin has argued that “a separate law was not necessary” to prosecute hate crimes. I agree with that take on the issue.

Untouchability is prohibited by the Indian Constitution. With your hand on your heart, can you say that the most severely demeaning practice is not a social reality, not merely in Tamil Nadu but across the nation? I have seen this happening anywhere I look. In a compartment in a train, yes. 

In temples in Tamil Nadu, the priests (Gurukkal) offer pilgrims ash, kumkum, thulasi (sacred basil plant), vilvam (Bael) and whatever else with disdain writ large on their faces. Is it my judgement without proof? 

No. They drop any of these at least a couple of inches from above the extended palm of the pilgrim. If that is not, a practice demanded by the scriptures the priestly class follows, untouchability, what is? Supposedly the holiest of holy places, Tirumala in Andhra Pradesh, and Tirupati Govindarajaswamy, Alamelu Mangapuram, Kalahasti, all in AP, and the other temples including those in Kancheepuram and Kumbakonam, Tamil Nadu, untouchability in temples is the norm. The Thiruvananthapuram Padmanbhaswamy temple and the famed Guruvayoor temple are equally unrepentant as regards their casteism. I dare anyone to deny. 

I have been in Delhi, Mumbai, Kanpur, visited Kolkata and other places including temples in Assam. I will not claim there is no untouchability in these places, but it appears that it is not the in-your-face kind in temples in these places.

The above three paragraphs (a total of 222 words) was not to fill space but to make sure I get my point across−the law against untouchability is more honoured in the breach. Who would say the same would not happen should there be a law against community-based hate crimes?

Hate crimes happen not because there is no law, but because it has the imprimatur of the society. A law against these specific crimes would share the fate of the Indian Constitution’s provision against untouchability. Did Periyar E. V. Ramasamy seek a law against untouchability? He did not have to as it was written in the Indian Constitution.  Yet, a counterfactual–would Periyar have gone running to the state or union government pleading for a law? I think not. He would rather have gone to the people and made his case to those who are ill-treated.

There is a group identified in the article that is given as, “various stakeholders”. Would this “various” include the intermediate communities who are bigly accused in hate crimes (per the article)? If they would be, would they allow any law that curtails their freedom to keep their caste pure? If they would not be, how can the commission be called representative? Representatives of only the oppressed and not of the oppressors. How would that be in the cause of what is called natural justice? If consensus is to be reached, make the sun go round the earth!

I am not against a law that protects “couples marrying outside their community”. Yet, it is a fool’s errand.

Periyar called for abolishing caste system. Nothing less can be effective in democratizing (in the sense of any law applicable at the same measure to anyone and to all) a society that is not devoid of caste.

Raghuram Ekambaram