The Untouchables Who Were They And Why They Became Untouchables ?

by B.R. Ambedkar

There is a world of difference between one who is learned and one who is an intellectual.

The new modern Hindu realises the wrong. But he is ashamed to discuss it in public for fear of letting the foreigner know that Hindu Civilisation can be guilty of such a vicious and infamous system or social code as evidenced by Untouchability.

After the period of defilement was over and after the purificatory ceremonies were performed the defilement vanished and the individual became pure and associable. But the impurity of the 50-60 millions of the Untouchables of India, quite unlike the impurity arising from birth, death, etc., is permanent. The Hindus who touch them and become polluted thereby can become pure by undergoing purificatory ceremonies. But there is nothing which can make the Untouchables pure. They are born impure, they are impure while they live, they die the death of the impure, and they give birth to children who are born with the stigma of Untouchability affixed to them. It is a case of permanent, hereditary stain which nothing can cleanse.

The Broken Men had, therefore, to live as stray individuals. In Primitive Society where tribe was fighting against tribe a stray collection of Broken Men was always in danger of being attacked. They did not know where to go for shelter. They did not know who would attack them and to whom they could go for protection. That is why shelter and protection became the problem of the Broken Men.

we can say that the two struck a bargain whereby the Broken Men agreed to do the work of watch and ward for the Settled tribes and the Settled tribes agreed to give them food and shelter.

The unit of Hindu society is not the sub-caste but the family founded on the rule of exogamy. In this sense the Hindu family is fundamentally a tribal organisation and not a social organisation as the sub-caste is. The Hindu family is primarily guided in the matter of marriage by consideration of Kul and Gotra and only secondarily by considerations of caste and sub-caste. Kul and Gotra are Hindu equivalents of the totem of the Primitive Society. This shows that the Hindu society is still tribal in its organisation with the family at its base observing the rules of exogamy based on Kul and Gotra. Castes and sub-castes are social organisations which are superimposed over the tribal organisation and the rule of endogamy enjoined by them does not do away with the rule of exogamy enjoined by the tribal organisations of Kul and Gotra.

If the same Kul and Gotra were found to exist in different castes and communities it would be possible to say that the castes though socially different were racially one.

Before the Census of 1910 the Census Commissioner had a column called "Population by Religion". Under this heading the population was shown (1) Muslims, (2) Hindus, (3) Christians, etc. The Census Report for the year 1910 marked a new departure from the prevailing practice. For the first time it divided the Hindus under three separate categories, (i) Hindus, (ii) Animists and Tribal, and (iii) the Depressed Classes or Untouchables. This new classification has been continued ever since. II This departure from the practice of the previous Census Commissioners raises three questions. First is what led the Commissioner for the Census of 1910 to introduce this new classification. The second is what was the criteria adopted as a basis for this classification. The third is what are the reasons for the growth of certain practices which justify the division of Hindus into three separate categories mentioned above. The answer to the first question will be found in the address presented in 1909 by the Muslim Community under leadership of H.H. The Aga Khan to the then Viceroy, Lord Minto, in which they asked for a separate and adequate representation for the Muslim community in the legislature, executive and the public services. In the address* there occurs the following passage – "The Mohamedans of India number, according to the census taken in the year 1901 over sixty-two millions or between one-fifth and one-fourth of the total population of His Majesty's Indian dominions, and if...

and this is where all the idiots say Britishers created Caste System in India.

One is the general atmosphere of scorn and contempt spread by the Brahmins against those who were Buddhists and the second is the habit of beef-eating kept on by the Broken Men.

First is the contrary statement contained in that Very Sutra. At 15, 14, 29, the Sutra says :- "The cow and the bull are sacred and therefore should be eaten".