Transforming Caste Domination and the Challenges of Structural Transformations and Transformation of Consciousness : Ambedkar, Shankara and Beyond
Giri, Ananta Kumar
Transforming Caste Domination and the Challenges of Structural Transformations and Transformation of Consciousness : Ambedkar, Shankara and Beyond - Calcutta : Sage, 2024 - p. 188-201 - Journal of Human Values .
Caste is a multidimensional reality in history and society, and it has manifested itself through varieties of structures of domination which are simultaneously cultural, economic, political and ideological as caste has also been related in complex ways with structures of class and gender domination. These structures of domination have led to the annihilation of self and society. This led Ambedkar to challenge us for annihilating caste. For Ambedkar, annihilation of caste calls for the realization of each person as an individual and not just a caste person. It also calls for the destruction of caste privileges, discrimination and their scriptural legitimation. However, this call for annihilation mainly has been a structural project without enough attention to the project of transformation of consciousness—self and social. There is a hint of this in Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste when he urges us to realize each one of us as unique individuals beyond the holes of caste which is further deepened in his Buddha and His Dhamma. Transformation of consciousness is also suggested in Adi Shankara’s treatise on self, Atmastakam. The essay engages itself with Ambedkar, Shankara, Gandhi and Sri Aurobindo, among others, as they help us in the transformation of caste domination and present a new hermeneutics of self-realization and social liberation. It deals with the simultaneous challenges of structural transformation of caste as well as consciousness of caste at the levels of both self and society which can draw on multiple sources of critique, creativity and transformations in India and the world.
Brahminism is the poison which has spoiled Hinduism. You will succeed in saving Hinduism if you will kill Brahminism. There should be no opposition to this reform from any quarter. It should be welcomed even by the Arya Samajists, because this is merely an application of their own doctrine of guna-karma.
Whether you do that or you do not, you must give a new doctrinal basis to your religion—a basis that will be in consonance with liberty, equality and fraternity; in short, with democracy. I am no authority on the subject. But I am told that for such religious principles as will be in consonance with liberty, equality and fraternity, it may not be necessary for you to borrow from foreign sources, and that you could draw for such principles in the Upanishads. Whether you could do so without a complete remoulding, a considerable scraping and chipping off from the ore they contain, is more than I can say. (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 303)
Introduction and Invitation
Caste is a multidimensional reality in history and society, and it has manifested itself through varieties of structures of domination which are simultaneously cultural, economic, political and ideological as caste has also been related in complex ways with structures of class and gender domination where structures refer to both modes of social and collective organization and modes of thinking, categorization and classification (Beteille, 1990; Dumont, 1980; Mohanty, 2004). The vertical aspect of caste domination, especially caste hierarchy, has nullified the significance of caste as a space of community and belonging. Caste as a structure of domination has caused death of soul, self, individual and society as it has blocked the realization of their full potential.1 Critics and transformers before and after Buddha, such as Kabir and Nanak, have striven to transform this system of domination.2 To this, in the last 200 years, many movements and socio-religious reformers have also contributed. This includes Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa, Dayananda Saraswati, Sri Narayana Guru, Bhima Bhoi, Jyotiba Phule, Pandita Ramabai, Swami Vivekananda3, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi and B. R. Ambedkar, among others. The Constitution of India has also made caste discrimination illegal and challenges us to build a casteless and classless society of gender equality and dignity. In our social imagination today, both this Constitutional injunction and aspiration and Ambedkar’s struggle for the annihilation of caste have a special place in helping us move beyond the prison and prism of caste domination. However, this struggle for transformation can be creatively and critically related to the vision of Adi Shankara and the streams of Vedanta which challenge us for manifold paths of non-dual realizations in self, culture, society and the world. While the historical Adi Shankara operated within a Brahminical framework, Shankara also strove for the radical dignity of soul, self and individuals irrespective of caste and gender. In Atmastakam, a pregnant formulation of Shankara, Shankara invites us to realize our souls as neither body nor caste but chidanandarupa, a manifestation of consciousness and bliss. Chidanandarupa is not chaturvanyarupa—form of chaturvanya—which ‘pigeon men into holes’ as Ambedkar writes in his Annihilation of Caste (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 279). Each one of us as chidanandarupa—manifestation of consciousness and bliss—is also accompanied by the realization of the unique worth of each individual which is again emphasized by Ambedkar. Nevertheless, the realization of the unique worth of each individual also calls for realizing each one of us as chidanandarupa and not just holes of chaturvanya. Ambedkar takes up this theme in his Riddles of Hinduism (Ambedkar, 2008) and tells us how Advaita Vedanta, which he terms as Brahmanism, has great potential for the generation of fraternity and social democracy which in turn helps in the annihilation of caste.
Vedanta, which found a creative manifestation in and draws inspiration from Shankara, has manifested itself socially through Brahminical structures as none of the Sankaracharyas so far have come from non-Brahmin castes.4 Despite this, reformers such as Mahatma Gandhi have drawn inspiration from Advaita Vedanta, among others, and have striven to transform the caste system. We can also here draw inspiration from Ramanuja who cultivated paths of Visistadvaita and who fought against Brahminical exclusion and domination and strove to make everybody part of a dignity of divine and social order though Ramanuja himself like Shankara supported the cruel and brutal injunctions of Manu to exclude the Shudras from reading the Vedas.5 It must be noted that there were attempts on Ramanuja’s life to undertake such transformational discourses and activities. Our task of caste liberation can draw upon these multiple sources of transformations. It is helpful now to bring Ambedkar in conversation with these visions and practices of caste liberation as Ambedkar himself has done in his openness to the Upanishadic sources of inspiration for his project of annihilation of caste as manifested in the epigraph from Ambedkar in the beginning of this essay. In this way, our vision and practice of annihilation and transformation of caste involves both structural changes as well as works of consciousness, conscience and what Ambedkar himself called ‘public conscience’ (see Khilnani, 2018; Teltumbde, 2018).
Annihilation of Caste: Ambedkar’s Challenge and the Calling of Transformations
Ambedkar called for the annihilation of caste. This calls for the destruction of caste privileges, hierarchy and their legitimation by the Sastras which can help individuals ‘to share and participate in a common activity so that the same emotions are aroused in him that animate the others’ (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 268). For Ambedkar, ‘The caste system prevents common activity and by preventing common activity it has prevented the Hindus from becoming a society with a unified life and consciousness of its own being’ (2002[1936], pp. 268). He critically engages himself with the ideology of Chaturvanya which puts human beings into four varnas—Brahmin, Khsatriya, Vaishya and Shudra. For him,
The system of Chaturvanya raises several difficulties … The principle underlying caste is fundamentally different from the principle underlying Varna. Not only are they fundamentally different but they are also fundamentally opposed. The former is based upon worth. How are you going to compel people who have acquired a higher status based on birth without reference to their worth to vacate that status? How are you going to compel people to recognize the status due to a man in accordance with his worth, who is occupying a lower status based on his birth? For this you must break up the caste system, in order to be able to establish the Varna system. (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 279)
In offering this critique and reconstruction, Ambedkar challenges us to understand the significance of worth—unique worth of individuals which chatuvarnya cannot really realize. Here he appreciates the work of Arya Samaj that wants to emphasize guna (quality and worth) and karma in Chaturvanya system but, at the same time, finds wanting its retention of Varna labels, and asks why ‘Arya Samajists insist upon labeling men as Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra’ (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 278). For him, Chaturvanya presupposes that ‘you can classify people into four different classes. Is this possible?’ He further suggest that the ideal of Chaturvanya has close ‘affinity to the Platonic ideal’ (2002[1936], p. 278). ‘To Plato, men fell by nature into three classes’—labouring and trading classes, defenders and guardians and the law-givers.
Plato had no perception of the uniqueness of every individual, of his incommensurability with others, of each individual forming a class of his own. He had no recognition of the infinite diversity of active tendencies and combination of tendencies of which an individual is capable. To him, there were types of faculties or powers in the individual constitution. All this is demonstrably wrong. Modern science has shown that lumping together of individuals into a few sharply marked off classes is a superficial view of man not worthy of serious consideration. Consequently, the utilization of the qualities of individuals is incompatible with their stratification by classes, since the qualities of individuals are so variable. Chatruvanya must fail for the same reason that for which Plato’s Republic must fail, namely that it is not possible to pigeon men into holes, according as he belongs to one class or the other. That it is impossible to accurately classify people into four different classes is proved by that fact that the original four classes have now become four thousand castes. (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 279)
In the above paragraph, Ambedkar challenges us to realize the integral and inalienable unique and variable worth of individuals and to go beyond the ‘superficial view of man’. This calls for further deepening and widening of our conceptions and realizations of man, and here Shankaras’ view of chidanandarupa can deepen Ambedkar’s critique of chaturvanyarupa (form of chaturvanya) and it can also help us understand Ambedkar’s own transcendence of modernistic notion of individual through his openness to conceptions and realizations of individuals in the Upanishads, Vedanta, Buddhism and modern philosophies such as pragmatism.6
In his Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar offers many-sided critiques and reconstructions of caste and religions from which his distinction between religion of rules and religion of principles are particularly relevant here. For Ambedkar (2002[1936], p. 298), ‘Rules are practical; they are habitual ways of doing things according to prescription. But principles are intellectual; they are useful methods of judging things’.
Doing what is said to be good by virtue of a rule and doing good in the light of a principle are two different things. The principle may be wrong but the act is conscious and responsible. The rule may be right but the act is mechanical. A religious act may not be a correct act but at least be a responsible act. To permit of this religion must mainly be a matter of principles only. It cannot be a matter of rules. The moment it degenerates into rules it ceases to be Religious, as it kills responsibility which is essence of a truly religious act. (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 28)
However, such a formulation calls for further critical probing. If the enactment of rules become mechanical, is there not the same challenge of inherent mechanical rendering of principles as well? Moreover, how can something that is not correct can be a responsible act as suggested in Habermas’s critique of taken for granted moral principles of a society which in fact are ‘instances of problematic justice’ (Habermas, 1990; Mahadevan, 2018). According to Ambedkar, Hinduism is a religion of rules as contained in the ‘Vedas and Smritis’ which provide scriptural legitimation for the discrimination of the caste system. At the same time, he acknowledges that Hinduism is not just a religion of rules as in this mixed sentence of him:
What is called religion by the Hindus is nothing but a multitude of commands and prohibitions. Religion, in the sense of spiritual principles, truly universal, applicable to all races, to all countries, to all times, is not to be found in them, and it is, it does not form the governing part of a Hindu’s life. (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 298)
Hence, to overcome the limits of religion of rules in Hinduism, for that matter in any religion—Buddhism, Christianity and Islam—we need to realize universal principles with and beyond rules. But these principles themselves also become formulaic and rule-like. We need not only a critique of rules but also of principles, and principles themselves require transformation from their superficial constitution and dynamics into deeper formulation, realization and awakening. Religious principles need a spiritual deepening. For religion to be able to be responsible and be a critique of what seems to be conventionally correct, it needs to make a critique of religious principles as well as religion of principles.
In a foundational reading of Ambedkar, Ramashroy Roy (2006), a deep and border-crossing political theorist of our times, challenges us to realize this. For him, Ambedkar’s interpretation and practice of Buddhism seem to focus much more on the following of external rituals rather than their spiritual realization (cf. Ambedkar, 2011). For example, Roy suggests that ‘the idea of nibbana gets directed at the hands of Ambedkar from its transcendental meaning that is the source of spiritual life and experience’ (2006, p. 102). According to him, when Ambedkar talks of ‘prajna, he means only scientific rationality’ (2006, p. 110), but principles of scientific rationality can also be as limiting and mechanical as a religion of rules which call for creative visions, practices and movements of integration of science and spirituality. However, Roy acknowledges that this turn from the transcendental basis of Buddhism ‘becomes the basis, in modern times, for allowing liberty, equality and fraternity, the slogan of the French Revolution with meanings that are pregnant with revolutionary values to be used by the down-trodden everywhere, in general, and by the untouchables in India, in particular’ (2006, p. 103). The turn from the transcendental to goals of immanent emancipation in the case of Ambedkar still calls for a transcendental realization and continuous spiritual awakening, and here both Ambedkar’s own Buddhist spiritual practice as a Bhikhu and Shankara’s spiritual sadhana of realization of self as chidanandarupa can help us.
In terms of limits of scriptural reasoning and its possible critique and transformation, Ambedkar discusses the in-built limits of the primacy of sadachar in Manu. Ambedkar suggests, ‘If any one were to suppose that Sadachar means right or good acts, i.e., acts of good and righteous men he would find himself greatly mistaken. Sadachar does not mean good acts or acts of good men. It means ancient custom good or bad’ (2002[1936], p. 297). But how do we critically engage with the annihilationist rendering of sadachar which denies the realization of worth of self and society? With Shankaracharya, it means not following the rules and rituals but their deep meditation which can help in critical discussion and reflections on these, as suggested by Ambedkar’s critique and Habermas’s discourse ethics where moral argumentation helps us realize instances of problematic justice in our customary conceptions of sadachar. Sankaras’ engagement with ritual is not one of customary reproduction but self-realizing meditation which can be brought together with modern critiques of such customs as well as Buddhist critiques and meditations.7
Annihilation of Caste: Upanishads, Atmastakam and Rohit Vemula
In his Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar (2002[1936]) refers to Upanishads as sources of thinking and action for realizing liberty, equality and fraternity which can contribute to the transformation of caste domination. But the dominant discourse of Annihilation of Caste as articulated by post-Ambedkar Dalit activists and thinkers including Gopal Guru who writes about the fluidity of caste and gender in Upanishadic times rarely engage with the Upanishads as a source of critical thinking and action for questioning and transforming caste domination. In the Upanishads, one does not find many references to caste structures, and it is a process of seeking of truth and realization of meaning and significance of life seeking, learning and sitting together. Upanishads have been one of the important sources of Vedanta which challenges us to realize the reality of self and the world beyond all illusive appearances, caste and gender. Probably, drawing inspiration from this source, Adi Shankara challenges us to realize that the self is neither body nor caste or gender. The self is chidanandarupa—manifestation of bliss and consciousness. The challenge for transformation of caste is to realize that each one of us—Brahmin or Dalit—is chidanandarupa and it is not just a product of caste system. The self is simultaneously socio-historical and chidanandarupa—transcendental. The socio-historical production of self as caste-marked self is also confronted with the realization of chidanandarupa—the transcendental self of beauty, bliss and consciousness—that lies with and across the caste self. We find such a challenge of realization in many scholars and activists including Rohit Vemula. In his letter before ending his life on 17 January 2016, Vemula challenges us to realize that each one of us is not just a caste or an identity, we are also a mind and we have a spark of star in us: ‘from shadow to stars’ (Vemula, 2016). We can read Shankara’s Atmastakam and Rohit Vemula’s letter together to realize that we are shadows, stars and chidanandarupa.
In his Atmastakam, Shankara says, ‘na me mrutusanka, na me jativeda’ [I do not have fear of death, I do not have discrimination of caste]. Shankara puts non-fear of death and lack of caste discrimination together which points to the reality of caste discrimination, fear of death and death going together. Vemula’s annihilation of his own life is a product of this conjunction, but Vemula’s letter is also a defiance of this and is a testimony of no fear of death. Another important aspect of Vemula’s life and letter here is the concluding line in his letter when he writes, ‘Do not trouble my friends and enemies on this after I am gone’. This is an aspect of love and radical love of care for all without any sense of vindictiveness and revenge especially when he has been subjected to such humiliation and torture as the university where he studied had withheld his due scholarship amount. Vemula’s last line is a testament of radical love embodying the undying reality of love as embodied in seekers and martyrs such as Jesus Christ and Gandhi. It is also an embodiment of what Yengde (2019) calls ‘Dalit love’ which embraces all and is not bounded by what Yendge calls ‘Brahminical exclusion’.
Annihilation of Caste: Limits of Annihilation, Sociopolitical Mobilization and the Challenges of Transformation of Consciousness
Ambedkar’s project of annihilation of caste has involved the mobilization of people and social energy for questioning the caste system. It has been accompanied by both legal and social mobilization. But Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste has mainly involved legal and social mobilization of transformation of structures of caste discrimination. In this, he has given primal significance to state and state apparatus and now we need to find an alternative realization of Ambedkar, as suggested by Kanchana Mahadevan (2018), which also realizes the limits of state and significance of civil society in this task. Social mobilization of annihilation of caste has mainly been anti-hierarchical and in many cases anti-Brahminical, but those calling for annihilation of caste do not question their own caste identity, their own pigeonholes as Ambedkar might say. Understandably because of the weight of centuries of oppression, the mobilization of annihilation of caste has been primarily structural and it has not involved the project of transformation of consciousness of those who are shouting slogans about annihilation of caste as well as fighting for it. To put it simply, which may sound blunt, those speaking for annihilation of caste do not themselves try to transform their own casteist consciousness which is similar to the problems of annihilation of class as those who are calling for class annihilation are themselves not often aware of and work towards the embodiment of overcoming class privilege in their own lives.8 Many low-caste people themselves practise caste discrimination, especially with regard to marriage with caste groups below their ranks, though Ambedkar himself has given primal significance to inter-caste marriage in his Annihilation of Caste. Even in landscapes of low-caste reality and struggles against caste, some groups such as Mahars in Maharashtra, Madigas in Andhra Pradesh and Chamars in Uttar Pradesh have fared much better, and there is not necessarily any heightened consciousness and urgent attention to plights of less privileged groups in the anti-caste struggles of India today or in the dominant politics of Dalits.9 Reference to acknowledgement and realization of such caste discrimination is not a justification for the existing caste hierarchy but the need for continued struggle for transformation of caste consciousness as well as organizational structures of existing caste discrimination and domination.
As we move ahead on this, a few lines of thought about consciousness are crucial here. For many thinkers and practitioners, consciousness is mainly determined by structures of societies and histories. This is an approach we find, for example, in Marx and many sociologists and historians. But there are some others who look at consciousness having an autonomy of its own though it is related to societies and histories in complex ways (Cohen, 1994; Ingold, 1986) while some others look at it as trans-social and trans-historical. We find the latter in many streams of spiritual visions, including thinkers and seekers such as Buddha and Sri Aurobindo. But I take an approach to consciousness which is simultaneously social and trans-social, historical and trans-historical, that is, while consciousness is shaped and produced to some extent by structures of societies and histories is nonetheless not solely confined and limited to socio-historical determination but has an autonomous realm for engagement, movement and manifestation (see Unger, 2001). Consciousness is a movement which is flowing across self, societies, cultures and histories and, while being affected by these, also have the capacity to interrogate, confront and transform these (see Cohen, 1994; Giri, 2013; Ingold, 1986). For transforming caste domination and creating conditions of non-domination (Forst, 2017), we also need these autonomous and inter-linked works of consciousness where all concerned work and meditate not to be the bearers of caste discrimination and domination and embody a different, non-caste and trans-caste modality of being, intersubjectivity, becoming and dynamics of new social co-realizations. These aspired for movements of social co-realizations, embody beauty, dignity and dialogues across rather than graveyards of ugliness, violence and nomological assertions and annihilation.
Adi Shankara in his Atmastakam invites us to realize that self is neither body nor jati; it is chidanandarupa. Realizing this is crucial for annihilation and transformation of caste. But Shankara had his own limitations in transcending caste domination. The story goes that when he was on his way to Benares, he saw a Chandala—a low-caste person—on his way. Coming from his Brahminical background, Shankara wanted to avoid him but suddenly the Chandala reappears as Siva in front of him thus helping him avoid the difficult situation of shaking his hands with a Chandala or even embracing him. But what if the Chandala does not want to reappear as Siva and appears as Ambedkar sticking to his own position and wants to embrace and be embraced by Shankara in a journey of mutual cognition, critique and recognition.10 This calls for the transformation of the still persisting caste prejudice of Shankara. Here, Ambedkar’s challenge is crucial which is also a frontal challenge to the patronizing attitude of many of the caste reformers. The Chandala does not want to turn into Siva now. The chandala is here to stay to question and confront for his and her rights, justice, dignity and responsibility, and also for an embrace of soul.
But the project of transformation that is there in Shankara’s Atmastakam has been annihilated in the historical practices emanating from Shankara. He was engaged in a fight with the Buddhists and following Shankara’s victory, many of the Buddhists were annihilated in India. The digvijaya or victory of Shankara has been accompanied by ascendency of casteist Brahminical domination in societies and histories. Caste and gender domination and annihilation of the others such as Buddhists have been part of this structure of annihilation. Right from Adi Shankara, none of the Shankaracharyas in the four mutths [monasteries] established by him come from non-Brahmin castes as well neither of them are women. So gender and caste exclusion is part of the historical manifestation of the Shankarite system. Realization of each one of us as chidanandarupa calls for the transformation of such a system of exclusion and here Ambedkar’s project of annihilation of caste is important. Ambedkar’s challenge can transform the patriarchal and Brahminical system of Shankaracharyas and make it open for all. Women and Dalits should also be Shankaracharyas which is crucial for transforming Hinduism as well and its association with caste hierarchy and exclusion (Nadkarni, 2006). It must be noted here that women becoming priests is a crucial challenge of realization of dignity in such hierarchical spaces such as Roman Catholicism (Vattimo, 2002). In his Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar (2002[1936]) argues at great length for the need to destroy the hereditary priestly caste and make it open to all.
Buddhism, Vedanta and Tantra
Historically and philosophically Shankara was in dialogue with Buddhism and some of the Buddhist challenges deeply influenced him. Ambedkar also embraced Buddhism, thus Buddhism becoming a thread of conversations between Shankara and Ambedkar. The Buddhist vision and practice of anatta [no self] is a significant challenge to essentialist caste self and casteist identity. Anatta is also part of the inter-linked vision and practice of paticcasamuppada [co-dependent] origination which contributes to realizing self and society as part of commons (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 268). This vision of paticcasamuppada has a practical and mystical dimension and challenges all concerned to realize that we are part of webs of interdependence (Bhikhu, 2011). In India, the interdependence among castes has been historically manifested in a hierarchical and dominating jajmani system. But now the challenge is to transform the caste-based system of inter-dependence to a dignified web of co-dependent origination, mutual flourishing and non-domination. Ambedkar emphasizes upon the need to create spaces of living and thinking in commons which caste system has not enabled in India.
But Buddhism itself also drew from the spiritual sources of the Upanishads and Vedanta as Buddha also drew from the spiritual wisdom of the indigenous and tribal people of India. Thus, Buddhism and Vedanta have mutually challenged and nourished each other. But the dominant manifestation of Buddhism and Vedanta in Indic tradition has been patriarchal. Moreover, Tantra as a multi-dimensional journey and movement with the feminine in self, culture, nature, divine and the world has also influenced in varieties of ways Vedanta and Buddhism, many a time revitalizing both these traditions. Shankaracharya himself wrote a deeply evocative prayer to the Divine Mother called Soundaryalahari. Many of the existing communities in India, including Dalit communities, are patriarchal, and Dalit thinkers such as Kancha Ilaiah do not necessarily acknowledge the frontal significance of gender liberation for the annihilation of caste. Anti-caste movements as part of struggle for both cast and gender liberation can sing with Shankaracharya’s Soundaryalahari and realize beauty, dignity and radiant fire of Divine Mother in each of our soul as well as in self, culture and society (see Clooney, 2015). They can also sing and cook together which is a challenge for the male reformers of caste including Buddha and Ambedkar.
Tantra has questioned practices of caste and gender hierarchy. Ram Manohar Roy drew inspiration from Mahanirvana Tantra, not only from Western ideals of liberty and equality (see Watanabe, 2000). For the transformation of caste and gender domination, we can now also draw upon Tantra (see Saxena, 2021). In fact, Tantra has energized both Buddhism and Vedanta. The quest for gender equality in Ambedkar’s project of annihilation of caste has a Tantric dimension in reality and potential that many of the masculine Dalit activists need to realize (see Rege, 2013). But unfortunately, it is not realized by even women Dalit activists and feminist scholars working for Dalit emancipation and caste liberation. Ambedkar’s (2008) own essay on Tantra in his Riddles of Hinduism points to this, but this needs further critical elaboration and realization.
With such a multi-dimensional realization of dimensions and challenges of transformation, we can now revisit the Gandhi Ambedkar dialogue for the transformation of caste. Gandhi learnt throughout his life and tried to realize the pain and sufferings of brothers and sisters belonging to the low caste. He initially began with an approach of Varnashramadharma as a way of division of labour without hierarchy and prejudice, but, towards the end of his life, he abandoned this approach and advocated inter-caste marriage, like Ambedkar, as a way of transforming caste system. Gandhi also advocated for the abolition of dowry, which he thought is linked to caste-based marriage. This advocacy has a Tantric dimension as with the sharing of bodies and intimacy through marriage we can realize the beauty and warmth of human intimacy. After passing away of his first dear wife Ramabai, Ambedkar himself Sabita from Brahmin caste,11 as Gandhi himself solemnized many inter-caste marriages in Sevagram inspired by the life, dedication and commitment of his fellow co-traveller and fighter Gora from Andhra Pradesh who married a person from the low-caste.
In his approach, Gandhi was influenced, among others, by the Vedantic ideal of non-duality. His work for abolition of untouchability and later for transformation of caste was animated by the realization of non-duality and unity between the self and other. Gandhi here was influenced not only by Vaishnava tradition but also by the path of Pranami religious and spiritual movement which included books and inspiration from many religious traditions. He was also influenced by Narayana Guru who also drew on Vedantic visions of non-duality as well as Buddha’s critique of caste and put in the service of eradication of caste discrimination and transformation of caste (Krishan, 2018). Although born into a low caste Irava, Narayan Guru wrote in Sanskrit and engaged himself with the Vedantic tradition. He established an Advaita Ashram in Kalady, the birth place of Shankara which had no idol and performed no puja. In 1921, Narayan Guru said, ‘Whatever may be the difference in man’s creed, dress, and language etc. because they belong to the same kind of creation, there is no harm at all in dining together or having marital relations with one another’. It was in the background of Vaikkom Satyagraha that Gandhi visited Guru in 1925 in which E. V. Ramaswami Naicker-Periyar, the leader of the Vaikom Satyagraha from Tamil Nadu, was also present. This meeting had considerable impact on Gandhi which led him to include the abolition of untouchability in the action programmes of Indian National Congress although Periyar considered this inadequate and later on became a staunch critique of Gandhi and his approach to the caste question and started the self-respect movement in Tamil Nadu.
Ambedkar was influenced by Buddhism and was open to Upanishadic, Buddhist and Tantric ideas and ideals. We find similar cross-currents of influence and confluence in Gandhi as well.12 For the realization of non-duality and unity, we need to cultivate simultaneously Buddhist, Vedantic and Tantric dimensions which in case of Gandhi has also involved border crossing dialogues with Jainism, Christianity and Islam. Vedanta in Gandhi has been multi-dimensional, simultaneously focusing on self and social transformation as, in Ambedkar, Buddhism has also simultaneously focused on self and social transformation. The neo-Vedanta of Gandhi and neo-Buddhism of Ambedkar are multi-dimensional, and we now need to cultivate this multi-dimensionality further. Neo-Vedanta of Gandhi emerged out of his acceptance of challenges of equality both from Indian traditions as well Christianity and Islam as Gandhi walked and meditated deeply with Tolstoy as well as Islamic ideals of equality and dignity. Both Christianity and Islam had also influenced Ramakrishna Paramahansa and Swami Vivekananda who also challenged caste domination. The implication for Ambedkarite movement against caste domination is also to engage with a broader hermeneutics and social struggle of transformation engaging itself with Buddhism, Vedanta, Tantra, Christianity, Islam, indigenous and other contemporary visions and practices of liberation.
Transpositional Movements
This calls for transpositional movements and practices, moving from our own inherited and ideologically accepted positions and move across positions with critique, creativity and transformations. Those of us who are born in Dalit life-worlds need to move transpositionally to Brahmin life-worlds and many other contemporary life-worlds as well. This can draw inspiration from Gandhi’s transpositional wish that he wanted to be born as a Bhangi in his next life. In his own life, Gandhi also worked as a Bhangi, performing the manual labour of a cleaner. He also combined intellectual, manual and spiritual labour. With difficult struggles of education and social mobility, Ambedkar had mainly focused on intellectual labour in his life and work which was not necessarily linked to manual labour. At the same time, Ambedkar led the Labor Party of India in 1936 which did electorally well in the provincial elections of Bombay Presidency. Ambedkar had fought for the rights and dignity of labouring classes in the Roundtable Conference, and, as Labor Minister in Viceroy’s War Cabinet, he has enacted many pro-labour legislation. Building on both Gandhi and Ambedkar, the challenge for us is to create movements of integration of manual, intellectual and spiritual labour which can help us in the transformation of caste domination (cf. Sohn-Rethel, 1978). A transpositional movement across Dalit and Brahmin life-worlds can help us realize the plurality in these life-worlds, for example, some Brahmins as seekers of knowledge and not just mechanical reproducers of caste hierarchy and domination. Ambedkar’s emphasis on education for both the transformation of caste and the realization of individual worth and social democracy can learn from the habitus of learning in some Brahmin life-worlds without reproducing the weight of caste hierarchy. Without essentializing Brahmins and Dalits and even without uttering these names and creating new names as Ambedkar challenges us (2002[1936], p. 278), we can learn intellectual, spiritual and manual labour from each other. This calls for going beyond the dualism of Sanskritization and Dalitization (cf. Ilaiah, 1996), and realizing the significance of dialectic of self-realization and co-realization (Giri, 2002).
For the transformation of caste domination, there is a need for simultaneous engagement with all the sources of self and social liberation as mentioned above and not only be confined to the historical legacy and thoughts of Ambedkar. The challenge of transformation is also not met by locking ourselves or enacting in a vicarious way the fight between Gandhi and Ambedkar. Gandhi and Ambedkar had their fights and also debates, but what do we gain by reproducing these ad infinitum now? For all of us engaged in the struggle for transformation of caste, we have a necessity and responsibility to simultaneously engage ourselves with both Gandhi and Ambedkar and not construct and condemn one from an apriori identification with the one against the other.13 An either or politics or hermeneutics is not adequate. We need a politics and hermeneutics of simultaneous engagement, simultaneously engaging ourselves with the vision and struggles of both Gandhi and Ambedkar and in the process transcending their limitations and making them part of contemporary multi-dimensional struggles for liberation. One of the limitations of both Gandhi and Ambedkar is that both of them had an insufficient identification with the problems of the tribals of India. Ambedkar himself had a problematic construction of tribals in his Annihilation of Caste.14 In our life-worlds, many a time tribals are exploited by the Dalits, and contemporary Dalit politics is not sufficiently sensitive to the complicity with which Dalit groups are entangled in these webs of exploitation. It must be noted that some Gandhian movements and leaders such as Ekta Parishad and P. V. Rajagopal are simultaneously working on caste and tribal questions by bringing them together for fighting against land alienation for realizing some minimum amount of land for all (see Reubke, 2020). However, none of the notable Dalit leaders and intellectuals seems to establish moral, political, intellectual and spiritual solidarity with the tribals and also work against the exploitation of tribals.
Self and Other and Creation of Non-Domineering and Evolutionary Solidarity
In transforming structures of caste domination and consciousness, going beyond the dualism of the self and other, is a continued challenge before us. This is a calling of permanent Satyagraha, which is a deeper challenge than the logic of permanent revolution. Both Gandhi and Ambedkar offered themselves to the call of Satyagraha in life and politics for transforming existing systems of domination. But now this Satyagraha calls for continued sadhana and struggles to overcome the dualism between the self and the other. The project of the annihilation of caste is still understandably imprisoned in a logic of dualism between Brahmin and Dalits and the challenge for all of us concerned is to struggle to transform caste domination without being totally imprisoned in a dualism of Brahmins and Dalits; however, for contextual reasons, we may have to live and struggle with the limits of the dual. Non-dual realization is a continued journey and here it is also linked with a permanent task of establishing maîtree or friendship across boundaries of entrenched dualism. Ambedkar’s constitutional and spiritual project in both his working with Indian constitution and his work as a Bhikhu is to help us create friendship in a world of enmity and hatred. Establishing friendship challenges us to go beyond a model of permanent enmity offered in both dominant movements of politics and theology and political theologies of modernity. For the transformation of caste domination, Gandhi, Ambedkar and Sri Aurobindo in their own ways challenge us to realize the limits of political theology of enmity and violence and embody friendship, fraternity and ahimsa in our own lives, consciousness and social relationship (Connolly, 1991; Dallmayr, 2007; Gandhi, 1947; Guru & Sarukkai, 2019; Lindlely, 2002; Neelakandan, 2016; Painadath, 2007; Sen, 2009; Sri Aurobindo, 2001; Srinivas, 2003). This is a journey of practical spirituality (Giri, 2018; Mahadevan, 2021).
The sadhana and struggle of transformation of caste domination here is linked to the creation of non-domineering solidarity. This solidarity is not static but evolutionary, preparing us for our inter-linked evolutionary consciousness which helps us transcend the limitations of both tradition and modernity. Presenting Ambedkar’s ideal, Gopal Guru (2017, p. 746) writes: ‘The ultimate value is maître or friendship. In order to transform the existing condition one requires the political solidarity of those who have stake in creating a new social order’. The stakes here involve all concerned, going beyond the dualism of the high and the low, Brahmins and the Dalits although far more Dalits have far more life stakes involved in transforming caste domination. However, solidarity here also calls for what Gianni Vattimo (2011) calls charity which is not paternalistic sympathy but acts and meditation of compassio-nate identification. Compassion here is also not devoid of the ever-present processes of confrontation which are helpful if they are non-violent, but, in socio-historical processes, violence does take place in transforming systems and consciousness which then is a challenge for continued movement of transformation from violence to non-violence. For the transformation of caste domination and creating conditions and movements of non-domination, we need to work on both structural transformation and transformation of consciousness. However, here are challenges as well as possibilities of learning, and courageous movements are manifold. We can never forget the challenges that Isabel Wilkerson, a recent critic of caste, presents us in her book:
We are not personally responsible for what people who look like us did centuries ago. But we are responsible for what good or ill we do to people alive with us today. We are, each of us, responsible for every decision we make that hurts or harms another human being. (2020, pp. 387–388)
Acknowledgments
I am grateful to Dr Parthasarathi Mondal of TISS for his kind invitation to the TISS conference, to Professor Aakash Singh Rathore for his kind invitation to the Bangalore conference on Ambedkar in 2017 and to participants in all these for their comments and reflections, especially to Professor John Clammer of Jindal Global University. I am grateful to Vishnu Varatharajan now at the Graduate Institute, Geneva, for his help with editing and references for this text.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.
Footnotes
1. Here I draw inspiration from the classic work of Orlando Patterson (1982), Slavery and Social Death: A Comparative Study.
2. In his Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar writes:
There have been many who have worked in the cause of the abolition of caste and untouchability. Of those, who can be mentioned, Ramanuja, Kabir and others stand out prominently. Can you appeal to the acts of these reformers and exhort Hindus to follow them. (2002[1936], p. 296)
3. Regarding Swami Vivekananda and caste and its link with the current Dalit mobilization, Michael de Saint-Cheron’s words deserve our careful consideration:
However, the tidal wave that drove him made Vivekananda understand that the caste system, and the concept of the mleccha (the non-Hindu, or outsider) needed to be reformed into a Sanatana Dharma, a Universal order of Vedanta which believes that the Brahmin or Kshatriya, the caste of aristocrats to which he belonged himself are not superior to the genuine aristocracy that can only be acquired by an active resistance to evil, or by the intrinsic value of the soul. One can but conclude that the Swami’s optimistic vision failed. But the present day uprising of intellectual Dalits (untouchables), the poorest of whom remain outcast in India and the rest of the world, against oppression under the Brahmins [the author here refers to Kancha Ilaiah’s Why I am not a Hindu] is a continuation of battles he initiated, is it not? (De Saint-Cheron, 2016, pp. 31–32)
4. For understanding Shankara and Advaita Vedanta, works of T. P. Mahadevan (1968), Govind Chandra Pande (1994) and Hirst (2005) are helpful. I do not engage with the details of their works in this essay.
5. I am grateful to my dear and respected friend Professor Francis X. Clooney of Harvard University for sharing with me these contrary aspects of Ramanuja which we need to work and mediate with in transformative ways. Regarding the exclusion of Shudras from reading the Vedas, it is important to remember what Ambedkar (2002[1936]) writes about it:
Some people seem to blame Rama because he wantonly and without reason killed Shambuka. But to blame Rama for killing Shambuka is to misunderstand the whole situation. Ram Raj was a raj based on chaturvarnya. As a king, Rama was bound to maintain chaturvarnya. It was his duty therefore to kill Shambuka, the Shudra who had transgressed his class and wanted to be a Brahmin. This is the reason why Rama killed Shambuka. But this also shows that penal sanction is necessary for the maintenance of chaturvarnya. Not only penal sanction is necessary, but the penalty of death is necessary. That is why Rama did not inflict on Shambuka a lesser punishment.
6. As Kanchana Mahadevan argues,
Besides the modern concept of justice, Ambedkar’s critique of Hinduism also appeals to the Buddhist critique of caste and its virtues of compassion and fellowship. This is buttressed by the Buddha’s non-essentialist approach to the self, as well as his stress on non-dogmatism, nonabsolutism and non-authoritarianism, as preconditions for religious conviction. (2018, p. 115)
7. For example, Shankara tells us while interpreting Vedic rituals that what is important is not the formal repetition of rituals but self-realization and sadhana. Swami Vivekananda writes about this:
If you will kindly look into the introduction to the Shariraka-Bhasya of Shri Shankaracharya, you will find there the Nirapekhata (transcendence) of Jnana is thoroughly discussed, and the conclusion is that realization of Brahman or the attainment of Moksha do not depend upon ceremonial, creed, caste, color, or doctrine. It will come to any being who has the four sadhanas, which are the most perfect moral culture. (2009, p. 341)
The meditative approach to rituals in Vedanta finds some correspondence in meta-knowing in Confucianism which is usually look at as consisting of ritual actions. According to Youngmin Kim (2018), the subject in Confucius is an agent of meta-knowing and is not a mere reproduction of existing modes of knowing and conventions.
8. In a seminar on caste in 2011 in Chennai, Anand Teltumbde, a noted and devoted scholar and activist, pointed to the contradiction in the project of annihilation of caste without a foundational critique of caste and casteist consciousness (see Teltumbde & Yengde, 2018). In the field of class solidarity and realizing the ideals of egalitarianism, G. A. Cohen (2000) raises the same challenge of disjunction between theory and practice in his paper ‘If You’re an Egalitarian, How Come You’re So Rich?’
9. In his study of Dalit Bahujan politics and policies in Uttar Pradesh, Bardri Narayan (2016, p. 19) points to this unfortunate and tragic reality: ‘The marginalized communities that have gained power do not want to share it with less fortunate brothers, thus creating a dominant community’.
10. On the need to link cognition and recognition together, please see Strydom’s (2012) formulation of this in his discussion of the work of Axel Honneth.
11. Sabita came from a Brahmin family which followed Kabirpanthis as Ambedkar himself. One of the readers of this essay has suggested that Ambedkar did not marry inter-caste for the sake of abolition of caste. It may be, but the fact remains that Ambedkar married inter-caste which is significant itself.
12. In their dialogue, Daisaku Ikeda and Lokesh Chandra (2009) explore Buddhist influence on Gandhi.
13. In his latest book on Gandhi, Ramachandra Guha (2018) challenges us to understand the limitations of Arun Shourie’s critique of Ambedkar and Arundhati Roy’s critique of Gandhi.
14. In his Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar (2002[1936], p. 270) uses the word savage to characterize the tribals as he writes, ‘Caste is, therefore, the real explanation as to why the Hindu has let the savage remain a savage in the midst of his civilization without blushing or without feeling…’.
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Transforming Caste Domination and the Challenges of Structural Transformations and Transformation of Consciousness : Ambedkar, Shankara and Beyond - Calcutta : Sage, 2024 - p. 188-201 - Journal of Human Values .
Caste is a multidimensional reality in history and society, and it has manifested itself through varieties of structures of domination which are simultaneously cultural, economic, political and ideological as caste has also been related in complex ways with structures of class and gender domination. These structures of domination have led to the annihilation of self and society. This led Ambedkar to challenge us for annihilating caste. For Ambedkar, annihilation of caste calls for the realization of each person as an individual and not just a caste person. It also calls for the destruction of caste privileges, discrimination and their scriptural legitimation. However, this call for annihilation mainly has been a structural project without enough attention to the project of transformation of consciousness—self and social. There is a hint of this in Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste when he urges us to realize each one of us as unique individuals beyond the holes of caste which is further deepened in his Buddha and His Dhamma. Transformation of consciousness is also suggested in Adi Shankara’s treatise on self, Atmastakam. The essay engages itself with Ambedkar, Shankara, Gandhi and Sri Aurobindo, among others, as they help us in the transformation of caste domination and present a new hermeneutics of self-realization and social liberation. It deals with the simultaneous challenges of structural transformation of caste as well as consciousness of caste at the levels of both self and society which can draw on multiple sources of critique, creativity and transformations in India and the world.
Brahminism is the poison which has spoiled Hinduism. You will succeed in saving Hinduism if you will kill Brahminism. There should be no opposition to this reform from any quarter. It should be welcomed even by the Arya Samajists, because this is merely an application of their own doctrine of guna-karma.
Whether you do that or you do not, you must give a new doctrinal basis to your religion—a basis that will be in consonance with liberty, equality and fraternity; in short, with democracy. I am no authority on the subject. But I am told that for such religious principles as will be in consonance with liberty, equality and fraternity, it may not be necessary for you to borrow from foreign sources, and that you could draw for such principles in the Upanishads. Whether you could do so without a complete remoulding, a considerable scraping and chipping off from the ore they contain, is more than I can say. (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 303)
Introduction and Invitation
Caste is a multidimensional reality in history and society, and it has manifested itself through varieties of structures of domination which are simultaneously cultural, economic, political and ideological as caste has also been related in complex ways with structures of class and gender domination where structures refer to both modes of social and collective organization and modes of thinking, categorization and classification (Beteille, 1990; Dumont, 1980; Mohanty, 2004). The vertical aspect of caste domination, especially caste hierarchy, has nullified the significance of caste as a space of community and belonging. Caste as a structure of domination has caused death of soul, self, individual and society as it has blocked the realization of their full potential.1 Critics and transformers before and after Buddha, such as Kabir and Nanak, have striven to transform this system of domination.2 To this, in the last 200 years, many movements and socio-religious reformers have also contributed. This includes Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa, Dayananda Saraswati, Sri Narayana Guru, Bhima Bhoi, Jyotiba Phule, Pandita Ramabai, Swami Vivekananda3, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi and B. R. Ambedkar, among others. The Constitution of India has also made caste discrimination illegal and challenges us to build a casteless and classless society of gender equality and dignity. In our social imagination today, both this Constitutional injunction and aspiration and Ambedkar’s struggle for the annihilation of caste have a special place in helping us move beyond the prison and prism of caste domination. However, this struggle for transformation can be creatively and critically related to the vision of Adi Shankara and the streams of Vedanta which challenge us for manifold paths of non-dual realizations in self, culture, society and the world. While the historical Adi Shankara operated within a Brahminical framework, Shankara also strove for the radical dignity of soul, self and individuals irrespective of caste and gender. In Atmastakam, a pregnant formulation of Shankara, Shankara invites us to realize our souls as neither body nor caste but chidanandarupa, a manifestation of consciousness and bliss. Chidanandarupa is not chaturvanyarupa—form of chaturvanya—which ‘pigeon men into holes’ as Ambedkar writes in his Annihilation of Caste (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 279). Each one of us as chidanandarupa—manifestation of consciousness and bliss—is also accompanied by the realization of the unique worth of each individual which is again emphasized by Ambedkar. Nevertheless, the realization of the unique worth of each individual also calls for realizing each one of us as chidanandarupa and not just holes of chaturvanya. Ambedkar takes up this theme in his Riddles of Hinduism (Ambedkar, 2008) and tells us how Advaita Vedanta, which he terms as Brahmanism, has great potential for the generation of fraternity and social democracy which in turn helps in the annihilation of caste.
Vedanta, which found a creative manifestation in and draws inspiration from Shankara, has manifested itself socially through Brahminical structures as none of the Sankaracharyas so far have come from non-Brahmin castes.4 Despite this, reformers such as Mahatma Gandhi have drawn inspiration from Advaita Vedanta, among others, and have striven to transform the caste system. We can also here draw inspiration from Ramanuja who cultivated paths of Visistadvaita and who fought against Brahminical exclusion and domination and strove to make everybody part of a dignity of divine and social order though Ramanuja himself like Shankara supported the cruel and brutal injunctions of Manu to exclude the Shudras from reading the Vedas.5 It must be noted that there were attempts on Ramanuja’s life to undertake such transformational discourses and activities. Our task of caste liberation can draw upon these multiple sources of transformations. It is helpful now to bring Ambedkar in conversation with these visions and practices of caste liberation as Ambedkar himself has done in his openness to the Upanishadic sources of inspiration for his project of annihilation of caste as manifested in the epigraph from Ambedkar in the beginning of this essay. In this way, our vision and practice of annihilation and transformation of caste involves both structural changes as well as works of consciousness, conscience and what Ambedkar himself called ‘public conscience’ (see Khilnani, 2018; Teltumbde, 2018).
Annihilation of Caste: Ambedkar’s Challenge and the Calling of Transformations
Ambedkar called for the annihilation of caste. This calls for the destruction of caste privileges, hierarchy and their legitimation by the Sastras which can help individuals ‘to share and participate in a common activity so that the same emotions are aroused in him that animate the others’ (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 268). For Ambedkar, ‘The caste system prevents common activity and by preventing common activity it has prevented the Hindus from becoming a society with a unified life and consciousness of its own being’ (2002[1936], pp. 268). He critically engages himself with the ideology of Chaturvanya which puts human beings into four varnas—Brahmin, Khsatriya, Vaishya and Shudra. For him,
The system of Chaturvanya raises several difficulties … The principle underlying caste is fundamentally different from the principle underlying Varna. Not only are they fundamentally different but they are also fundamentally opposed. The former is based upon worth. How are you going to compel people who have acquired a higher status based on birth without reference to their worth to vacate that status? How are you going to compel people to recognize the status due to a man in accordance with his worth, who is occupying a lower status based on his birth? For this you must break up the caste system, in order to be able to establish the Varna system. (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 279)
In offering this critique and reconstruction, Ambedkar challenges us to understand the significance of worth—unique worth of individuals which chatuvarnya cannot really realize. Here he appreciates the work of Arya Samaj that wants to emphasize guna (quality and worth) and karma in Chaturvanya system but, at the same time, finds wanting its retention of Varna labels, and asks why ‘Arya Samajists insist upon labeling men as Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra’ (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 278). For him, Chaturvanya presupposes that ‘you can classify people into four different classes. Is this possible?’ He further suggest that the ideal of Chaturvanya has close ‘affinity to the Platonic ideal’ (2002[1936], p. 278). ‘To Plato, men fell by nature into three classes’—labouring and trading classes, defenders and guardians and the law-givers.
Plato had no perception of the uniqueness of every individual, of his incommensurability with others, of each individual forming a class of his own. He had no recognition of the infinite diversity of active tendencies and combination of tendencies of which an individual is capable. To him, there were types of faculties or powers in the individual constitution. All this is demonstrably wrong. Modern science has shown that lumping together of individuals into a few sharply marked off classes is a superficial view of man not worthy of serious consideration. Consequently, the utilization of the qualities of individuals is incompatible with their stratification by classes, since the qualities of individuals are so variable. Chatruvanya must fail for the same reason that for which Plato’s Republic must fail, namely that it is not possible to pigeon men into holes, according as he belongs to one class or the other. That it is impossible to accurately classify people into four different classes is proved by that fact that the original four classes have now become four thousand castes. (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 279)
In the above paragraph, Ambedkar challenges us to realize the integral and inalienable unique and variable worth of individuals and to go beyond the ‘superficial view of man’. This calls for further deepening and widening of our conceptions and realizations of man, and here Shankaras’ view of chidanandarupa can deepen Ambedkar’s critique of chaturvanyarupa (form of chaturvanya) and it can also help us understand Ambedkar’s own transcendence of modernistic notion of individual through his openness to conceptions and realizations of individuals in the Upanishads, Vedanta, Buddhism and modern philosophies such as pragmatism.6
In his Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar offers many-sided critiques and reconstructions of caste and religions from which his distinction between religion of rules and religion of principles are particularly relevant here. For Ambedkar (2002[1936], p. 298), ‘Rules are practical; they are habitual ways of doing things according to prescription. But principles are intellectual; they are useful methods of judging things’.
Doing what is said to be good by virtue of a rule and doing good in the light of a principle are two different things. The principle may be wrong but the act is conscious and responsible. The rule may be right but the act is mechanical. A religious act may not be a correct act but at least be a responsible act. To permit of this religion must mainly be a matter of principles only. It cannot be a matter of rules. The moment it degenerates into rules it ceases to be Religious, as it kills responsibility which is essence of a truly religious act. (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 28)
However, such a formulation calls for further critical probing. If the enactment of rules become mechanical, is there not the same challenge of inherent mechanical rendering of principles as well? Moreover, how can something that is not correct can be a responsible act as suggested in Habermas’s critique of taken for granted moral principles of a society which in fact are ‘instances of problematic justice’ (Habermas, 1990; Mahadevan, 2018). According to Ambedkar, Hinduism is a religion of rules as contained in the ‘Vedas and Smritis’ which provide scriptural legitimation for the discrimination of the caste system. At the same time, he acknowledges that Hinduism is not just a religion of rules as in this mixed sentence of him:
What is called religion by the Hindus is nothing but a multitude of commands and prohibitions. Religion, in the sense of spiritual principles, truly universal, applicable to all races, to all countries, to all times, is not to be found in them, and it is, it does not form the governing part of a Hindu’s life. (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 298)
Hence, to overcome the limits of religion of rules in Hinduism, for that matter in any religion—Buddhism, Christianity and Islam—we need to realize universal principles with and beyond rules. But these principles themselves also become formulaic and rule-like. We need not only a critique of rules but also of principles, and principles themselves require transformation from their superficial constitution and dynamics into deeper formulation, realization and awakening. Religious principles need a spiritual deepening. For religion to be able to be responsible and be a critique of what seems to be conventionally correct, it needs to make a critique of religious principles as well as religion of principles.
In a foundational reading of Ambedkar, Ramashroy Roy (2006), a deep and border-crossing political theorist of our times, challenges us to realize this. For him, Ambedkar’s interpretation and practice of Buddhism seem to focus much more on the following of external rituals rather than their spiritual realization (cf. Ambedkar, 2011). For example, Roy suggests that ‘the idea of nibbana gets directed at the hands of Ambedkar from its transcendental meaning that is the source of spiritual life and experience’ (2006, p. 102). According to him, when Ambedkar talks of ‘prajna, he means only scientific rationality’ (2006, p. 110), but principles of scientific rationality can also be as limiting and mechanical as a religion of rules which call for creative visions, practices and movements of integration of science and spirituality. However, Roy acknowledges that this turn from the transcendental basis of Buddhism ‘becomes the basis, in modern times, for allowing liberty, equality and fraternity, the slogan of the French Revolution with meanings that are pregnant with revolutionary values to be used by the down-trodden everywhere, in general, and by the untouchables in India, in particular’ (2006, p. 103). The turn from the transcendental to goals of immanent emancipation in the case of Ambedkar still calls for a transcendental realization and continuous spiritual awakening, and here both Ambedkar’s own Buddhist spiritual practice as a Bhikhu and Shankara’s spiritual sadhana of realization of self as chidanandarupa can help us.
In terms of limits of scriptural reasoning and its possible critique and transformation, Ambedkar discusses the in-built limits of the primacy of sadachar in Manu. Ambedkar suggests, ‘If any one were to suppose that Sadachar means right or good acts, i.e., acts of good and righteous men he would find himself greatly mistaken. Sadachar does not mean good acts or acts of good men. It means ancient custom good or bad’ (2002[1936], p. 297). But how do we critically engage with the annihilationist rendering of sadachar which denies the realization of worth of self and society? With Shankaracharya, it means not following the rules and rituals but their deep meditation which can help in critical discussion and reflections on these, as suggested by Ambedkar’s critique and Habermas’s discourse ethics where moral argumentation helps us realize instances of problematic justice in our customary conceptions of sadachar. Sankaras’ engagement with ritual is not one of customary reproduction but self-realizing meditation which can be brought together with modern critiques of such customs as well as Buddhist critiques and meditations.7
Annihilation of Caste: Upanishads, Atmastakam and Rohit Vemula
In his Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar (2002[1936]) refers to Upanishads as sources of thinking and action for realizing liberty, equality and fraternity which can contribute to the transformation of caste domination. But the dominant discourse of Annihilation of Caste as articulated by post-Ambedkar Dalit activists and thinkers including Gopal Guru who writes about the fluidity of caste and gender in Upanishadic times rarely engage with the Upanishads as a source of critical thinking and action for questioning and transforming caste domination. In the Upanishads, one does not find many references to caste structures, and it is a process of seeking of truth and realization of meaning and significance of life seeking, learning and sitting together. Upanishads have been one of the important sources of Vedanta which challenges us to realize the reality of self and the world beyond all illusive appearances, caste and gender. Probably, drawing inspiration from this source, Adi Shankara challenges us to realize that the self is neither body nor caste or gender. The self is chidanandarupa—manifestation of bliss and consciousness. The challenge for transformation of caste is to realize that each one of us—Brahmin or Dalit—is chidanandarupa and it is not just a product of caste system. The self is simultaneously socio-historical and chidanandarupa—transcendental. The socio-historical production of self as caste-marked self is also confronted with the realization of chidanandarupa—the transcendental self of beauty, bliss and consciousness—that lies with and across the caste self. We find such a challenge of realization in many scholars and activists including Rohit Vemula. In his letter before ending his life on 17 January 2016, Vemula challenges us to realize that each one of us is not just a caste or an identity, we are also a mind and we have a spark of star in us: ‘from shadow to stars’ (Vemula, 2016). We can read Shankara’s Atmastakam and Rohit Vemula’s letter together to realize that we are shadows, stars and chidanandarupa.
In his Atmastakam, Shankara says, ‘na me mrutusanka, na me jativeda’ [I do not have fear of death, I do not have discrimination of caste]. Shankara puts non-fear of death and lack of caste discrimination together which points to the reality of caste discrimination, fear of death and death going together. Vemula’s annihilation of his own life is a product of this conjunction, but Vemula’s letter is also a defiance of this and is a testimony of no fear of death. Another important aspect of Vemula’s life and letter here is the concluding line in his letter when he writes, ‘Do not trouble my friends and enemies on this after I am gone’. This is an aspect of love and radical love of care for all without any sense of vindictiveness and revenge especially when he has been subjected to such humiliation and torture as the university where he studied had withheld his due scholarship amount. Vemula’s last line is a testament of radical love embodying the undying reality of love as embodied in seekers and martyrs such as Jesus Christ and Gandhi. It is also an embodiment of what Yengde (2019) calls ‘Dalit love’ which embraces all and is not bounded by what Yendge calls ‘Brahminical exclusion’.
Annihilation of Caste: Limits of Annihilation, Sociopolitical Mobilization and the Challenges of Transformation of Consciousness
Ambedkar’s project of annihilation of caste has involved the mobilization of people and social energy for questioning the caste system. It has been accompanied by both legal and social mobilization. But Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste has mainly involved legal and social mobilization of transformation of structures of caste discrimination. In this, he has given primal significance to state and state apparatus and now we need to find an alternative realization of Ambedkar, as suggested by Kanchana Mahadevan (2018), which also realizes the limits of state and significance of civil society in this task. Social mobilization of annihilation of caste has mainly been anti-hierarchical and in many cases anti-Brahminical, but those calling for annihilation of caste do not question their own caste identity, their own pigeonholes as Ambedkar might say. Understandably because of the weight of centuries of oppression, the mobilization of annihilation of caste has been primarily structural and it has not involved the project of transformation of consciousness of those who are shouting slogans about annihilation of caste as well as fighting for it. To put it simply, which may sound blunt, those speaking for annihilation of caste do not themselves try to transform their own casteist consciousness which is similar to the problems of annihilation of class as those who are calling for class annihilation are themselves not often aware of and work towards the embodiment of overcoming class privilege in their own lives.8 Many low-caste people themselves practise caste discrimination, especially with regard to marriage with caste groups below their ranks, though Ambedkar himself has given primal significance to inter-caste marriage in his Annihilation of Caste. Even in landscapes of low-caste reality and struggles against caste, some groups such as Mahars in Maharashtra, Madigas in Andhra Pradesh and Chamars in Uttar Pradesh have fared much better, and there is not necessarily any heightened consciousness and urgent attention to plights of less privileged groups in the anti-caste struggles of India today or in the dominant politics of Dalits.9 Reference to acknowledgement and realization of such caste discrimination is not a justification for the existing caste hierarchy but the need for continued struggle for transformation of caste consciousness as well as organizational structures of existing caste discrimination and domination.
As we move ahead on this, a few lines of thought about consciousness are crucial here. For many thinkers and practitioners, consciousness is mainly determined by structures of societies and histories. This is an approach we find, for example, in Marx and many sociologists and historians. But there are some others who look at consciousness having an autonomy of its own though it is related to societies and histories in complex ways (Cohen, 1994; Ingold, 1986) while some others look at it as trans-social and trans-historical. We find the latter in many streams of spiritual visions, including thinkers and seekers such as Buddha and Sri Aurobindo. But I take an approach to consciousness which is simultaneously social and trans-social, historical and trans-historical, that is, while consciousness is shaped and produced to some extent by structures of societies and histories is nonetheless not solely confined and limited to socio-historical determination but has an autonomous realm for engagement, movement and manifestation (see Unger, 2001). Consciousness is a movement which is flowing across self, societies, cultures and histories and, while being affected by these, also have the capacity to interrogate, confront and transform these (see Cohen, 1994; Giri, 2013; Ingold, 1986). For transforming caste domination and creating conditions of non-domination (Forst, 2017), we also need these autonomous and inter-linked works of consciousness where all concerned work and meditate not to be the bearers of caste discrimination and domination and embody a different, non-caste and trans-caste modality of being, intersubjectivity, becoming and dynamics of new social co-realizations. These aspired for movements of social co-realizations, embody beauty, dignity and dialogues across rather than graveyards of ugliness, violence and nomological assertions and annihilation.
Adi Shankara in his Atmastakam invites us to realize that self is neither body nor jati; it is chidanandarupa. Realizing this is crucial for annihilation and transformation of caste. But Shankara had his own limitations in transcending caste domination. The story goes that when he was on his way to Benares, he saw a Chandala—a low-caste person—on his way. Coming from his Brahminical background, Shankara wanted to avoid him but suddenly the Chandala reappears as Siva in front of him thus helping him avoid the difficult situation of shaking his hands with a Chandala or even embracing him. But what if the Chandala does not want to reappear as Siva and appears as Ambedkar sticking to his own position and wants to embrace and be embraced by Shankara in a journey of mutual cognition, critique and recognition.10 This calls for the transformation of the still persisting caste prejudice of Shankara. Here, Ambedkar’s challenge is crucial which is also a frontal challenge to the patronizing attitude of many of the caste reformers. The Chandala does not want to turn into Siva now. The chandala is here to stay to question and confront for his and her rights, justice, dignity and responsibility, and also for an embrace of soul.
But the project of transformation that is there in Shankara’s Atmastakam has been annihilated in the historical practices emanating from Shankara. He was engaged in a fight with the Buddhists and following Shankara’s victory, many of the Buddhists were annihilated in India. The digvijaya or victory of Shankara has been accompanied by ascendency of casteist Brahminical domination in societies and histories. Caste and gender domination and annihilation of the others such as Buddhists have been part of this structure of annihilation. Right from Adi Shankara, none of the Shankaracharyas in the four mutths [monasteries] established by him come from non-Brahmin castes as well neither of them are women. So gender and caste exclusion is part of the historical manifestation of the Shankarite system. Realization of each one of us as chidanandarupa calls for the transformation of such a system of exclusion and here Ambedkar’s project of annihilation of caste is important. Ambedkar’s challenge can transform the patriarchal and Brahminical system of Shankaracharyas and make it open for all. Women and Dalits should also be Shankaracharyas which is crucial for transforming Hinduism as well and its association with caste hierarchy and exclusion (Nadkarni, 2006). It must be noted here that women becoming priests is a crucial challenge of realization of dignity in such hierarchical spaces such as Roman Catholicism (Vattimo, 2002). In his Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar (2002[1936]) argues at great length for the need to destroy the hereditary priestly caste and make it open to all.
Buddhism, Vedanta and Tantra
Historically and philosophically Shankara was in dialogue with Buddhism and some of the Buddhist challenges deeply influenced him. Ambedkar also embraced Buddhism, thus Buddhism becoming a thread of conversations between Shankara and Ambedkar. The Buddhist vision and practice of anatta [no self] is a significant challenge to essentialist caste self and casteist identity. Anatta is also part of the inter-linked vision and practice of paticcasamuppada [co-dependent] origination which contributes to realizing self and society as part of commons (Ambedkar, 2002[1936], p. 268). This vision of paticcasamuppada has a practical and mystical dimension and challenges all concerned to realize that we are part of webs of interdependence (Bhikhu, 2011). In India, the interdependence among castes has been historically manifested in a hierarchical and dominating jajmani system. But now the challenge is to transform the caste-based system of inter-dependence to a dignified web of co-dependent origination, mutual flourishing and non-domination. Ambedkar emphasizes upon the need to create spaces of living and thinking in commons which caste system has not enabled in India.
But Buddhism itself also drew from the spiritual sources of the Upanishads and Vedanta as Buddha also drew from the spiritual wisdom of the indigenous and tribal people of India. Thus, Buddhism and Vedanta have mutually challenged and nourished each other. But the dominant manifestation of Buddhism and Vedanta in Indic tradition has been patriarchal. Moreover, Tantra as a multi-dimensional journey and movement with the feminine in self, culture, nature, divine and the world has also influenced in varieties of ways Vedanta and Buddhism, many a time revitalizing both these traditions. Shankaracharya himself wrote a deeply evocative prayer to the Divine Mother called Soundaryalahari. Many of the existing communities in India, including Dalit communities, are patriarchal, and Dalit thinkers such as Kancha Ilaiah do not necessarily acknowledge the frontal significance of gender liberation for the annihilation of caste. Anti-caste movements as part of struggle for both cast and gender liberation can sing with Shankaracharya’s Soundaryalahari and realize beauty, dignity and radiant fire of Divine Mother in each of our soul as well as in self, culture and society (see Clooney, 2015). They can also sing and cook together which is a challenge for the male reformers of caste including Buddha and Ambedkar.
Tantra has questioned practices of caste and gender hierarchy. Ram Manohar Roy drew inspiration from Mahanirvana Tantra, not only from Western ideals of liberty and equality (see Watanabe, 2000). For the transformation of caste and gender domination, we can now also draw upon Tantra (see Saxena, 2021). In fact, Tantra has energized both Buddhism and Vedanta. The quest for gender equality in Ambedkar’s project of annihilation of caste has a Tantric dimension in reality and potential that many of the masculine Dalit activists need to realize (see Rege, 2013). But unfortunately, it is not realized by even women Dalit activists and feminist scholars working for Dalit emancipation and caste liberation. Ambedkar’s (2008) own essay on Tantra in his Riddles of Hinduism points to this, but this needs further critical elaboration and realization.
With such a multi-dimensional realization of dimensions and challenges of transformation, we can now revisit the Gandhi Ambedkar dialogue for the transformation of caste. Gandhi learnt throughout his life and tried to realize the pain and sufferings of brothers and sisters belonging to the low caste. He initially began with an approach of Varnashramadharma as a way of division of labour without hierarchy and prejudice, but, towards the end of his life, he abandoned this approach and advocated inter-caste marriage, like Ambedkar, as a way of transforming caste system. Gandhi also advocated for the abolition of dowry, which he thought is linked to caste-based marriage. This advocacy has a Tantric dimension as with the sharing of bodies and intimacy through marriage we can realize the beauty and warmth of human intimacy. After passing away of his first dear wife Ramabai, Ambedkar himself Sabita from Brahmin caste,11 as Gandhi himself solemnized many inter-caste marriages in Sevagram inspired by the life, dedication and commitment of his fellow co-traveller and fighter Gora from Andhra Pradesh who married a person from the low-caste.
In his approach, Gandhi was influenced, among others, by the Vedantic ideal of non-duality. His work for abolition of untouchability and later for transformation of caste was animated by the realization of non-duality and unity between the self and other. Gandhi here was influenced not only by Vaishnava tradition but also by the path of Pranami religious and spiritual movement which included books and inspiration from many religious traditions. He was also influenced by Narayana Guru who also drew on Vedantic visions of non-duality as well as Buddha’s critique of caste and put in the service of eradication of caste discrimination and transformation of caste (Krishan, 2018). Although born into a low caste Irava, Narayan Guru wrote in Sanskrit and engaged himself with the Vedantic tradition. He established an Advaita Ashram in Kalady, the birth place of Shankara which had no idol and performed no puja. In 1921, Narayan Guru said, ‘Whatever may be the difference in man’s creed, dress, and language etc. because they belong to the same kind of creation, there is no harm at all in dining together or having marital relations with one another’. It was in the background of Vaikkom Satyagraha that Gandhi visited Guru in 1925 in which E. V. Ramaswami Naicker-Periyar, the leader of the Vaikom Satyagraha from Tamil Nadu, was also present. This meeting had considerable impact on Gandhi which led him to include the abolition of untouchability in the action programmes of Indian National Congress although Periyar considered this inadequate and later on became a staunch critique of Gandhi and his approach to the caste question and started the self-respect movement in Tamil Nadu.
Ambedkar was influenced by Buddhism and was open to Upanishadic, Buddhist and Tantric ideas and ideals. We find similar cross-currents of influence and confluence in Gandhi as well.12 For the realization of non-duality and unity, we need to cultivate simultaneously Buddhist, Vedantic and Tantric dimensions which in case of Gandhi has also involved border crossing dialogues with Jainism, Christianity and Islam. Vedanta in Gandhi has been multi-dimensional, simultaneously focusing on self and social transformation as, in Ambedkar, Buddhism has also simultaneously focused on self and social transformation. The neo-Vedanta of Gandhi and neo-Buddhism of Ambedkar are multi-dimensional, and we now need to cultivate this multi-dimensionality further. Neo-Vedanta of Gandhi emerged out of his acceptance of challenges of equality both from Indian traditions as well Christianity and Islam as Gandhi walked and meditated deeply with Tolstoy as well as Islamic ideals of equality and dignity. Both Christianity and Islam had also influenced Ramakrishna Paramahansa and Swami Vivekananda who also challenged caste domination. The implication for Ambedkarite movement against caste domination is also to engage with a broader hermeneutics and social struggle of transformation engaging itself with Buddhism, Vedanta, Tantra, Christianity, Islam, indigenous and other contemporary visions and practices of liberation.
Transpositional Movements
This calls for transpositional movements and practices, moving from our own inherited and ideologically accepted positions and move across positions with critique, creativity and transformations. Those of us who are born in Dalit life-worlds need to move transpositionally to Brahmin life-worlds and many other contemporary life-worlds as well. This can draw inspiration from Gandhi’s transpositional wish that he wanted to be born as a Bhangi in his next life. In his own life, Gandhi also worked as a Bhangi, performing the manual labour of a cleaner. He also combined intellectual, manual and spiritual labour. With difficult struggles of education and social mobility, Ambedkar had mainly focused on intellectual labour in his life and work which was not necessarily linked to manual labour. At the same time, Ambedkar led the Labor Party of India in 1936 which did electorally well in the provincial elections of Bombay Presidency. Ambedkar had fought for the rights and dignity of labouring classes in the Roundtable Conference, and, as Labor Minister in Viceroy’s War Cabinet, he has enacted many pro-labour legislation. Building on both Gandhi and Ambedkar, the challenge for us is to create movements of integration of manual, intellectual and spiritual labour which can help us in the transformation of caste domination (cf. Sohn-Rethel, 1978). A transpositional movement across Dalit and Brahmin life-worlds can help us realize the plurality in these life-worlds, for example, some Brahmins as seekers of knowledge and not just mechanical reproducers of caste hierarchy and domination. Ambedkar’s emphasis on education for both the transformation of caste and the realization of individual worth and social democracy can learn from the habitus of learning in some Brahmin life-worlds without reproducing the weight of caste hierarchy. Without essentializing Brahmins and Dalits and even without uttering these names and creating new names as Ambedkar challenges us (2002[1936], p. 278), we can learn intellectual, spiritual and manual labour from each other. This calls for going beyond the dualism of Sanskritization and Dalitization (cf. Ilaiah, 1996), and realizing the significance of dialectic of self-realization and co-realization (Giri, 2002).
For the transformation of caste domination, there is a need for simultaneous engagement with all the sources of self and social liberation as mentioned above and not only be confined to the historical legacy and thoughts of Ambedkar. The challenge of transformation is also not met by locking ourselves or enacting in a vicarious way the fight between Gandhi and Ambedkar. Gandhi and Ambedkar had their fights and also debates, but what do we gain by reproducing these ad infinitum now? For all of us engaged in the struggle for transformation of caste, we have a necessity and responsibility to simultaneously engage ourselves with both Gandhi and Ambedkar and not construct and condemn one from an apriori identification with the one against the other.13 An either or politics or hermeneutics is not adequate. We need a politics and hermeneutics of simultaneous engagement, simultaneously engaging ourselves with the vision and struggles of both Gandhi and Ambedkar and in the process transcending their limitations and making them part of contemporary multi-dimensional struggles for liberation. One of the limitations of both Gandhi and Ambedkar is that both of them had an insufficient identification with the problems of the tribals of India. Ambedkar himself had a problematic construction of tribals in his Annihilation of Caste.14 In our life-worlds, many a time tribals are exploited by the Dalits, and contemporary Dalit politics is not sufficiently sensitive to the complicity with which Dalit groups are entangled in these webs of exploitation. It must be noted that some Gandhian movements and leaders such as Ekta Parishad and P. V. Rajagopal are simultaneously working on caste and tribal questions by bringing them together for fighting against land alienation for realizing some minimum amount of land for all (see Reubke, 2020). However, none of the notable Dalit leaders and intellectuals seems to establish moral, political, intellectual and spiritual solidarity with the tribals and also work against the exploitation of tribals.
Self and Other and Creation of Non-Domineering and Evolutionary Solidarity
In transforming structures of caste domination and consciousness, going beyond the dualism of the self and other, is a continued challenge before us. This is a calling of permanent Satyagraha, which is a deeper challenge than the logic of permanent revolution. Both Gandhi and Ambedkar offered themselves to the call of Satyagraha in life and politics for transforming existing systems of domination. But now this Satyagraha calls for continued sadhana and struggles to overcome the dualism between the self and the other. The project of the annihilation of caste is still understandably imprisoned in a logic of dualism between Brahmin and Dalits and the challenge for all of us concerned is to struggle to transform caste domination without being totally imprisoned in a dualism of Brahmins and Dalits; however, for contextual reasons, we may have to live and struggle with the limits of the dual. Non-dual realization is a continued journey and here it is also linked with a permanent task of establishing maîtree or friendship across boundaries of entrenched dualism. Ambedkar’s constitutional and spiritual project in both his working with Indian constitution and his work as a Bhikhu is to help us create friendship in a world of enmity and hatred. Establishing friendship challenges us to go beyond a model of permanent enmity offered in both dominant movements of politics and theology and political theologies of modernity. For the transformation of caste domination, Gandhi, Ambedkar and Sri Aurobindo in their own ways challenge us to realize the limits of political theology of enmity and violence and embody friendship, fraternity and ahimsa in our own lives, consciousness and social relationship (Connolly, 1991; Dallmayr, 2007; Gandhi, 1947; Guru & Sarukkai, 2019; Lindlely, 2002; Neelakandan, 2016; Painadath, 2007; Sen, 2009; Sri Aurobindo, 2001; Srinivas, 2003). This is a journey of practical spirituality (Giri, 2018; Mahadevan, 2021).
The sadhana and struggle of transformation of caste domination here is linked to the creation of non-domineering solidarity. This solidarity is not static but evolutionary, preparing us for our inter-linked evolutionary consciousness which helps us transcend the limitations of both tradition and modernity. Presenting Ambedkar’s ideal, Gopal Guru (2017, p. 746) writes: ‘The ultimate value is maître or friendship. In order to transform the existing condition one requires the political solidarity of those who have stake in creating a new social order’. The stakes here involve all concerned, going beyond the dualism of the high and the low, Brahmins and the Dalits although far more Dalits have far more life stakes involved in transforming caste domination. However, solidarity here also calls for what Gianni Vattimo (2011) calls charity which is not paternalistic sympathy but acts and meditation of compassio-nate identification. Compassion here is also not devoid of the ever-present processes of confrontation which are helpful if they are non-violent, but, in socio-historical processes, violence does take place in transforming systems and consciousness which then is a challenge for continued movement of transformation from violence to non-violence. For the transformation of caste domination and creating conditions and movements of non-domination, we need to work on both structural transformation and transformation of consciousness. However, here are challenges as well as possibilities of learning, and courageous movements are manifold. We can never forget the challenges that Isabel Wilkerson, a recent critic of caste, presents us in her book:
We are not personally responsible for what people who look like us did centuries ago. But we are responsible for what good or ill we do to people alive with us today. We are, each of us, responsible for every decision we make that hurts or harms another human being. (2020, pp. 387–388)
Acknowledgments
I am grateful to Dr Parthasarathi Mondal of TISS for his kind invitation to the TISS conference, to Professor Aakash Singh Rathore for his kind invitation to the Bangalore conference on Ambedkar in 2017 and to participants in all these for their comments and reflections, especially to Professor John Clammer of Jindal Global University. I am grateful to Vishnu Varatharajan now at the Graduate Institute, Geneva, for his help with editing and references for this text.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.
Footnotes
1. Here I draw inspiration from the classic work of Orlando Patterson (1982), Slavery and Social Death: A Comparative Study.
2. In his Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar writes:
There have been many who have worked in the cause of the abolition of caste and untouchability. Of those, who can be mentioned, Ramanuja, Kabir and others stand out prominently. Can you appeal to the acts of these reformers and exhort Hindus to follow them. (2002[1936], p. 296)
3. Regarding Swami Vivekananda and caste and its link with the current Dalit mobilization, Michael de Saint-Cheron’s words deserve our careful consideration:
However, the tidal wave that drove him made Vivekananda understand that the caste system, and the concept of the mleccha (the non-Hindu, or outsider) needed to be reformed into a Sanatana Dharma, a Universal order of Vedanta which believes that the Brahmin or Kshatriya, the caste of aristocrats to which he belonged himself are not superior to the genuine aristocracy that can only be acquired by an active resistance to evil, or by the intrinsic value of the soul. One can but conclude that the Swami’s optimistic vision failed. But the present day uprising of intellectual Dalits (untouchables), the poorest of whom remain outcast in India and the rest of the world, against oppression under the Brahmins [the author here refers to Kancha Ilaiah’s Why I am not a Hindu] is a continuation of battles he initiated, is it not? (De Saint-Cheron, 2016, pp. 31–32)
4. For understanding Shankara and Advaita Vedanta, works of T. P. Mahadevan (1968), Govind Chandra Pande (1994) and Hirst (2005) are helpful. I do not engage with the details of their works in this essay.
5. I am grateful to my dear and respected friend Professor Francis X. Clooney of Harvard University for sharing with me these contrary aspects of Ramanuja which we need to work and mediate with in transformative ways. Regarding the exclusion of Shudras from reading the Vedas, it is important to remember what Ambedkar (2002[1936]) writes about it:
Some people seem to blame Rama because he wantonly and without reason killed Shambuka. But to blame Rama for killing Shambuka is to misunderstand the whole situation. Ram Raj was a raj based on chaturvarnya. As a king, Rama was bound to maintain chaturvarnya. It was his duty therefore to kill Shambuka, the Shudra who had transgressed his class and wanted to be a Brahmin. This is the reason why Rama killed Shambuka. But this also shows that penal sanction is necessary for the maintenance of chaturvarnya. Not only penal sanction is necessary, but the penalty of death is necessary. That is why Rama did not inflict on Shambuka a lesser punishment.
6. As Kanchana Mahadevan argues,
Besides the modern concept of justice, Ambedkar’s critique of Hinduism also appeals to the Buddhist critique of caste and its virtues of compassion and fellowship. This is buttressed by the Buddha’s non-essentialist approach to the self, as well as his stress on non-dogmatism, nonabsolutism and non-authoritarianism, as preconditions for religious conviction. (2018, p. 115)
7. For example, Shankara tells us while interpreting Vedic rituals that what is important is not the formal repetition of rituals but self-realization and sadhana. Swami Vivekananda writes about this:
If you will kindly look into the introduction to the Shariraka-Bhasya of Shri Shankaracharya, you will find there the Nirapekhata (transcendence) of Jnana is thoroughly discussed, and the conclusion is that realization of Brahman or the attainment of Moksha do not depend upon ceremonial, creed, caste, color, or doctrine. It will come to any being who has the four sadhanas, which are the most perfect moral culture. (2009, p. 341)
The meditative approach to rituals in Vedanta finds some correspondence in meta-knowing in Confucianism which is usually look at as consisting of ritual actions. According to Youngmin Kim (2018), the subject in Confucius is an agent of meta-knowing and is not a mere reproduction of existing modes of knowing and conventions.
8. In a seminar on caste in 2011 in Chennai, Anand Teltumbde, a noted and devoted scholar and activist, pointed to the contradiction in the project of annihilation of caste without a foundational critique of caste and casteist consciousness (see Teltumbde & Yengde, 2018). In the field of class solidarity and realizing the ideals of egalitarianism, G. A. Cohen (2000) raises the same challenge of disjunction between theory and practice in his paper ‘If You’re an Egalitarian, How Come You’re So Rich?’
9. In his study of Dalit Bahujan politics and policies in Uttar Pradesh, Bardri Narayan (2016, p. 19) points to this unfortunate and tragic reality: ‘The marginalized communities that have gained power do not want to share it with less fortunate brothers, thus creating a dominant community’.
10. On the need to link cognition and recognition together, please see Strydom’s (2012) formulation of this in his discussion of the work of Axel Honneth.
11. Sabita came from a Brahmin family which followed Kabirpanthis as Ambedkar himself. One of the readers of this essay has suggested that Ambedkar did not marry inter-caste for the sake of abolition of caste. It may be, but the fact remains that Ambedkar married inter-caste which is significant itself.
12. In their dialogue, Daisaku Ikeda and Lokesh Chandra (2009) explore Buddhist influence on Gandhi.
13. In his latest book on Gandhi, Ramachandra Guha (2018) challenges us to understand the limitations of Arun Shourie’s critique of Ambedkar and Arundhati Roy’s critique of Gandhi.
14. In his Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar (2002[1936], p. 270) uses the word savage to characterize the tribals as he writes, ‘Caste is, therefore, the real explanation as to why the Hindu has let the savage remain a savage in the midst of his civilization without blushing or without feeling…’.
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