Caste system is a deep rooted problem of Indian society. It was injected through various scriptures during Aryan invasion to India. They came to India from outside and established their domination on Indian inhabitants of that time who were the Mongolians, the Austrics and the Dravidians (a mixture of Austric and Negro) by imposing inferiority complex in their minds. To impose inferiority complex in the minds of the original inhabitants of India, the Aryans who were boasted with so much superiority complex used to call them with the disrespectful title like demon, ghost or witch etc. Lord Shiva, the founder of human civilization who was born about 7000 years ago taught the then non-Aryan inhabitants of India the science of Tantra, medicine, music, art of dance to uplift their condition. For that reason only Shiva had to undergo a lot of torture, criticism and opposition by the Aryan.
So the seed of this caste system was actually sown by the Aryan invaders. Gradually it became more complex as hundreds of castes and sub-castes came into being. It became so deep rooted that people of India until now have hard time to give it up although in the present day society it has almost become like an unfashionable phenomena.
Shrii P. R. Sarkar, the father of PROUT philosophy was not only a political thinker, or an economist. He had a multi-dimensional personality. He was a poet, a musician, a philosopher, a linguist, an agriculturist, a physicist and a social reformer with his own unique view about a universal humanism and over all he was a spiritual Master to millions of his disciple. He termed it as Neo-Humanism. He had introduced revolutionary view to all his disciples to overcome from the short barriers based on caste, race, sex, religion or nationality. One of his very significant contributions to the humanity is the concept of Revolutionary marriage system. He always encouraged arranging or conducting this revolutionary system of marriage among people from different caste, race, religions or nationality. He had written more than 300 books on various subjects and in various languages. One can very easily understand his radical way of thinking towards annihilation of all dogma and blind faiths like caste system and the sex discrimantions on the basis of the faul dictates of the religious scriptures.
“You can easily understand from these events and various marriage systems that women were merely playthings in the hands of a group of opportunistic, capricious men. Today their position has changed on paper, but the actual position remains virtually the same as before. People guided by righteous intellect should be vocal against these ugly customs and injustices to women. Further, they should work to abolish these things without any more delay. The path which Lord Shiva showed for social emancipation should be adhered to by His followers. The path should be made wider, paved well, and made easily accessible, instead of making it more thorny.” (From Awakening of Women, by Shrii P. R. Sarkar).
Following are the excerpts from some recent discussion on the caste system which appeared in The Statesman, a leading English daily news paper published from Kolkata.
Editorial: Lessons in caste: School children discriminate at meal-time
Instead of removing poverty and teaching social equality, mid-day meal schemes seem to have become a vehicle for discrimination and oppression negating the rationale for which they were started. Last month a principal and teacher of a school in Madhya Pradesh prevented their wards from eating mid-day meals cooked by a Dalit woman. A few days ago, upper castes students at a primary school near Lucknow refused to have a meal with their Dalit classmates. Other incidents go unreported. Prejudices are probably better camouflaged in urban areas, but in villages oppression takes on a cruder form, with caste often acting as the trigger.
It is bad enough that adults discriminate along caste lines but it is shocking when the perpetrators are primary school children. These tender young minds are not born with caste distinctions, and yet thanks to the society they live in they pick up prejudices very quickly. What does this say about the values our system teaches? More than 50 years after the Directive Principles of State Policy were drafted, such instances as have recently been reported show how abjectly we have failed and how deep-rooted the caste system actually is. No amount of quotas and job reservations will help unless there is social awareness and a change in attitude towards caste demarcations. The first lessons in inculcating awareness must be taught by parents at home and by teachers at schools. But if they are the ones who persist in perpetuating prejudices and preaching discrimination, it is only natural that their children will imbibe these values and grow up bigoted. A conscious effort is needed to break this cycle. It isn’t just the state’s responsibility; every person needs to be involved. Only then can we call ourselves a civilised society.
(Source: The Statesman)
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Break caste system by inter- caste marriage
Sir, — Lessons 0n how to eradicate prejudices of caste system in your perspicuous editorial “Lessons in caste” (4-5 October) are sound in theory. But it is well-nigh impossible to carry them into effect. It is the caste Hindus who strongly oppose “lessons in inculcating awareness” and Dalit elevation by holding to the sacredness of caste order with divine belief. Take Brahmins for instance.
Can the teachers/ parents of the Brahmin caste ever be crusaders against caste conflicts? They are responsible for their innocent children who “imbibe these values and grow up bigoted”. How? Their boys who reach the age at 9, 11 or 13 are sacramented with holy threads.
Then these chaste boys bear a new identity of higher caste. Isn’t it a practice of caste-distinction? Thus seeds of the caste system are sown into these tender young minds and children of today become bigots of tomorrow. These young children would have acted as tools to fight casteism had they been given scope to study Dr BR Ambedkar and social reformers like Raja Rammohan, Vidyasagar, etc through their text-books at schools. Under the Directive Principles of State Education Policy, Life and Works of Dr Ambedkar may be brought into curricula at school and colleges to achieve the purpose. But it will not happen because all political and educational powers are under the control of caste Hindus who cherish the caste system. Conscious efforts are politically subdued in order that the youths do not try to raise any question against inequality and oppression.
Dr Ambedkar also advocates that inter-caste marriage is one of the best lessons to eliminate the baneful caste system. “The real remedy for breaking caste is inter-marriage. Nothing else will serve as the solvent of caste,” says Dr Ambedkar in his great speech “Annihilation of Caste”.
— Yours,
Rabindranath Sarkar, Kolkata, 15 October.
(Source: The Statesman)
