I appeal to all the Shudra/OBC/SC/STs to celebrate the Indian English Day on 5 October, 2018 as we have no significant place in the world of English even after 200 years of English education in India. We need to own the language as ours and learn it with vengeance. We have never been allowed to learn any Pan Indian or global language for millennia. Even now, the conspiracy of English educated Brahmin/Bania intellectuals is to deny this language of power and glamour to us. 
 
English teaching for the Indian Brahmin children started in the year 1817 on 5 October, which coincided with my birthday, much later in 1952. I was born in a shepherd family which had no right to education in any language. However, I went to Telugu medium school in the early sixties and learned the English language I speak and write on my own with an undaunted struggle. I then realized this language has the power to liberate education starved SC/ST/OBC/Shudras for centuries.
 
The Indian Christians taught English only to Brahmins and Banias but not to the Shudra/OBC/SC/STs for a long time. Now scores of world-class English medium private schools, colleges and universities are coming up with the tacit support of the ruling Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Bharatiya Janata Party.
 
Even now the best Christian and Non-Christian private schools only teach Brahmin, Bania, Kayastha and Khatris as they have economic resources at their command. As a result, Delhi is being ruled by these four castes, no matter who is the Prime Minister of the country. Narendra Modi and Amit Shah, though non-English speaking Banias, rule politics. All the top industrialists, politicians, bureaucrats, economists, media men, women, educationists, mainly coming from those four castes with good command over English rule India.
 
The complete control of the RSS over central power structures has not changed the power position of the Bania, Brahmin English class of India. The English speaking and writing intellectuals (most of them are BJP spokespersons on English TV channels) cannot win elections, hence get into Rajya Sabha as Arun Jaitley, (earlier Arun Shourie did), Nirmala Sitharaman, Prakash Javadekar, Ravishankar Prasad, Smriti Irani, Swapan Dasgupta, Rakesh Sinha, GVL Narsimha Rao did and so on. They became rulers and policy makers. Hardly any Shudra/OBC/SC/STs exist in this crop of rulers.
 
During the Congress regime, Manmohan Singh, Jairam Ramesh, Abhishek Singhvi, Manish Tiwari, Janardhan Dwivedi and so on, used the same channel of entry to get power. This caste- class that controls the nerve centre of the nation is in every major national political party.
 
The present English speaking and writing intellectuals, who rule India through Rajya Sabha, are strong RSS army men and women. Hence it now says the “RSS is not opposed to the English language” and wants the English education to remain in the private sector but not in the state sector.
 
It is fully supporting the establishment of private schools, colleges and universities by the top 20 monopoly companies—including Reliance, Adani, Vedanta, Lakshmi Mittal, Bharti group, Azim Premji and so on. They are establishing rich private English medium schools and colleges and universities in which no SC/ST/OBC/Shudra from rural areas can get in.
 
Even though a section of Jats, Gujjars, Patels, Marathas that are fighting for reservation could afford it because of their hold on the agrarian economy, they never realized its importance. They were or are mad linguistic chauvinists of their regional language. This is what the Brahmin, Bania English educated elite want so that the power of English could remain in their hands.
 
The Shudra agrarian castes have never understood the link between English education and Delhi’s power. After four years of RSS/BJP rule, they seem to have realized that the Brahmin, Bania forces have become more powerful than ever before. Hence many are asking for reservation but the English educated forces in the top judicial system will not allow that to happen. It is this English educated class that interprets the constitution, mostly in the favour of its own self.         
 
The ST/SC/OBC/Shudra children and youth can never get into these institutions as they could not enter the best Catholic schools and colleges like St. Stephen’s of Delhi or St. Xavier’s of Mumbai for several decades. Now they cannot get into the rich private universities because they lack that kind of elite English and money.
 
The lower caste, community children have only one way to get the English medium education. They have to force the state governments of all states to make all government schools teach in English medium. For that, these castes and communities must overcome the hatred and fear of English education and fight for that language medium in government schools.
 
All the major public and private schools, colleges and universities run in English medium where the presence of Shudras like Marathas, Patels, Gujjars, Jats, Kammas, Reddys, Lingayats are marginal, leave alone that BC/SC/STs. Unless these castes take the initiative, the Government sector will not change the language policy in the provinces.    
 
The very same English educated Brahmin, Bania intellectuals injected anti-English culture into the psyche of lower castes. They also injected a fear that no first-generation school going children can learn English, as it is a foreign language. They never let the examples like Mahatma Phule, Ambedkar or this author, who not only learned but mastered English without even going to the Christian or Non-Christian English medium schools within one generational learning of reading and writing. They do not let them realize that English is the easiest language that the children from the productive castes and communities could learn.
 
The higher Shudras like Marathas, Patels, Jats, Gujjars and so on, realized, of late, that their position in the Delhi power structure, in the national and international markets, is very poor because of lack of English education and reservations. Their feudal estates, the landed properties, no longer allow them to control the power structures of Delhi or the massive capitalist industries and markets, both in India and abroad.
 
They are slowly realizing about the link between bureaucratic power and globalized English language-controlled market system. Their feudal estates are shifting into the hands of monopoly industrialists in the form of special economic zones. The old Shudra feudals have now become rich farmers without understanding modern markets and the new Mall Economy. They are just sellers of produce in that market.
 
In one of my recent interactions with one of the richest Private English Medium Universities, The Ashoka University Haryana, among the alumnae who have undergone high-end leadership training course, there was not a single Jat or Gujjar, or Patel. They were all Brahmin, Banias with sympathy for poor and lower castes. There are no organic English speaking and writing intellectuals from the agrarian Shudra communities. They need motivation for English medium education.                               
 
Each year, the Shudra/OBC/SC/ST exclusion from the main market of India is increasing. Top industries, both hardware and software, is run by the Banias and Brahmins who have international standard English education that is acquired both in foreign and Indian schools, colleges and universities. All ideological forces, the right, left and liberal Brahmin, Banias are comfortable with the present private English medium education and regional language ghettoized in government sector education.
 
The Shudra/OBC/SC/STs must break this monopoly of the caste/community elite. The lower caste forces must begin to celebrate English language education as Indian. The double standards of the Brahmin, Bania elite must be fought with the same weapon that they control the lower castes with: first with Sanskrit and now English. Therefore, the new slogan “Bahujan Bache English Pado, Brahmin Bache Sanskrit Pado,” makes sense.   
 
The youth from all the Shudra/OBC/SC/ST communities should not remain in the regional language trap and in the grip of the propaganda that English is a foreign language. English has become a very powerful Indian language that controls the power, industry and communication structures of India. It has survived here more than two hundred years. Hence, we must own it, learn it and rule the nation through it.
 
Therefore, celebrate the birth of that language on 5th October to motivate ourselves.        
 
Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd is the Chairman, T-MASS and political theorist. He is the Director, Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policy, Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad.
 

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The Sangh Parivar elements that worked hand in glove with Arya Vysyas, who wanted to lynch me at Parkal on September 23, after the TDP Parliament member T.G Venkatesh issued a threat on September 17, have shown their true colours. They caught hold of a 22 year old Dalit boy, sporting a big saffron tilak on his forehead. This boy said, “Kancha Ilaiah is dog! He criticized Hindu Dalits by writing Smajika Smugglerlu: Komatollu’’. They got case registered against me for atrocities against SC/STs. The media including the Business Standard felt this is a rare case of SC/ST atrocity so far registered. But this is yet another type of lynch-mob politics. They have filed several cases in several different places against me. As I have utmost respect for judiciary I am willing to go through the judicial processes.

I have fought the RSS, ABVP network in Osmania University and outside for thirty five years and now they think, they have a chance to lynch me in one form or the other. These forces never fight for the rights of Dalits/Adivasis/OBCs but whenever the Baniyas or Brahmins are in trouble they deploy all their forces including SC/ST/OBCs. Even the OBC/SC/STs are not allowed to go to the support of their own communities, whenever they face atrocities and humiliation. But their upper caste members—mainly the Brahmin-Bania members rush to the aid of any so called spiritual force, or cow related issues or in defense of their own upper caste networks. They do every possible thing to defame any Dalit-bahujan intellectual writing on Indian history, the labour related issues, wages, atrocities and so on. But they would never speak about increasing the agrarian wages, protecting the farmers from suicides.

They accuse all such defenders as Left and Anti-national. The defenders of rich, religious gurus (whatever could be their role in the society), they rush to their defense and proclaim that is nationalist act. So their nation constitutes the rich people, big business forces, religious gurus (whose contribution to production is zero) and cows. They never treat buffalo as Indian animal at all! I need to be lynched because I stand by the SC/ST/OBCs, buffaloes, soldiers serving on the borders and lowest rung of the police force, who again come from the lowest castes and communities. Anybody who speaks of human rights is anti-national. This is bizarre democracy they are running from Delhi now.

After they failed at Parkal, they think this atrocity case would kill me on my own ground, as I wrote extensively about Dalitisation of the Indian society as a process of de-casting and de-classing of it. I strongly defended their beef food culture (in the recent cow centered vegetarian campaign of the Hindutva). This only shows that they stoop down to any level to protect their funding Vysya coffers. My ‘Buffalo Nationalism’ has put them in fix, as it keeps on fighting their ‘Cow Nationalism’ politics.

The Two Dramas      
When the Bharatiya Janta Party came to power 2014, it started enacting two dramas on the national stage. These elaborate charades, related to defense and glorification of India internationally, were aimed at ensuring the the BJP’s survival by showcasing them as the most nationalist party. Their approach was two pronged; they used cow protection — the so called Gaumata of the nation, and Yoga – the nation’s source of health and power, to further their own agenda.

Around these two dramas, it deployed its upper caste leisure centered Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh activists and retired officials from cozy jobs mainly coming from non-agrarian social background. More than all these forces the whole Peethadhipathi, Sadhu Sanyasi, yogi network, which mainly comes from the non-agrarian caste cultural, and non-productive backgrounds are deployed, to attack anybody who talks about cow as economic animal.

Even Prime Minster Narendra Modi also must have sold tea in his childhood but, never grazed cattle in the fields. Selling tea is also a business activity not a productive activity, like grazing cattle, tilling land, pottery, carpentry… manufacturing a plough to till or forging a wheel for transport. Mohan Bhagawat and Amit Shah have much less to do with grazing cows, leave alone buffaloes. Yet all of them made the cow protection, not cow grazing, as the national legal problem causing huge problem of food, employment, and law and order.

The question of yoga is a much more serious issue. Though Ramdev, a Yadav by birth, made it a big method of health protection among the middle class. The brahmnic thinkers, who never got involved in tilling the land or grazing the cattle, and supposed to be the authors of all funny theories, projected Yoga as the most useful nation saving body exercise. The BJP owned it as if that is the most suitable exercise for armed forces that need to fight mighty powers like China in the East and not so powerful Pakistan in the West.

The sports like running, high jump, long jump, the body exercise by working the productive fields have no TV shows. Their existence is now seen as anti-national. But the most serious question is should army recruitment adopt Yoga that is being promoted by the Prime Minister, his entire Government and the Sangh Parivar all over the nation as the measure of selection. Should police institution also adopt that sport, as a daily exercise to maintain their body?

National Icons   
The great Sadguru who constructs an imaginary Yoga Guru (of black Shiva image) got it inaugurated by the PM. But they never talk about the first ever Indian city builder called Harappa (which name resembles the popular cattle grazer God called Beerappa about whom there is narrative in my book Why I am Not a Hindu) as great Indian. It was during Harappa period that the division of labour took place. Different sections of the Harappa society specialized in different things of city building. Brick making, carpentry, pot making, animal grazing, canal constructing, tank bund making, road laying and so on. It is this ancient labour centred Indian that would be an iconic model. But not an imaginary Yogi, who sits like dead stone in Coimbatore that would be a iconic model for developing nation.

The BJP does not have interest in projecting dignity of labour, peasant economic hard work, the labouring masses as the essence of Indian being. Instead they project un-productive saint as the sole symbol of nation. The worst is that they hate those who talk about production, people’s philosophy of equality. They hang around mythological texts as essence of the nation. But to me the nation lives in the labour of people, which the BJP never wants celebrate.

The farmers and other productive mass of India have seen the two dramas—the drama of Cow and Yoga—that the BJP has been playing as just onlookers. Alongside these two dramas the more serious actions of De-monitization and GST imposition are having telling impact on their life. Let us wait and see how it unfolds in future.

(The author is Member, T-MASS, an organization that works for social Justice, dignity of labour and English education in Government schools in Telangana)   

The post Kancha Ilaiah: The government’s elaborate nationalist charade appeared first on SabrangIndia.

I requested this organisation to establish such schools in late the 1990s where, the poor can study English medium within in the village across the nation. I interact with my village students, parents  and see that they are taught reasonably good English, mathematics and also the Dignity of Labour.

For this purpose I wrote “Dignity of Labour in Our Times’’, a book around their own parental tasks. There are 376 kids are studying there this current academic year. This organisation runs 107 such schools with an intake about 27,000 kids from SC/ST/OBC and minority background in very remote villages in the country.

From my village school four kids have got into medicine, few got into NITs, and many are in good engineering colleges. But for that school they would not have dreamt of accomplishing and completing such courses and neither they could have studied with a confidence. The society charges a fee ranging from Rs 3,220 per year for LKG and Rs 5,260 for Class X per year. The SC students of the village pay only Rs 1000 per year. Hence they need help from outside. They mobilise such financial help. I have nothing to do with it or its management. I only give academic advice.    

One Mr.Albert Lael, who worked with this organisation established one such school in his own village, Kaukuntla, Devarkandra Mandal Mahabub Nagar (dist) and managed to put his own mother as principle. It appears that he wanted take over the school for himself and thereafter developed some problems within the organization. Anyone can compare both Papaiahpet and Kaukuntla schools. Lael and Jerusalem Mattiah who mediated the vote for note (Revanth Reddy case) started a campaign in association with Paripurnanada,  who attacked St. Mother Theresa as a person of ‘low’ or ‘loose’ character (women’s trafficking character), and who was also anti-Dalitbahujan and anti-English education for the SC/ST/OBCs in the villages. This is a dangerous trend.  English Education for the SC/ST/OBCs is my long term commitment.  

These forces which educate their children in urban Christian schools in English medium have no right to accuse me. Any harm unleashed on these village children’s English medium education is nothing but crime against humanity.    

 (The author is also Member T-MASS)      

The post My Association with Christians, A Clarification: Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Image: TV 5

A three-member bench comprising Chief Justice Deepak Mishra, Justice A.M. Khanwilkar and Justice D.Y. Chandrachud dismissed the PIL by Mr K.L.N.V. Veeranjaneyulu who appeared as party in person. He contended that the writer through his book was trying to promoting enmity among different groups in society and targeting the Vysya community with an intention to humiliate and insult them.

The bench pointed out that banning the book would amount to infringing on the freedom of expression and speech guaranteed by the Constitution. The Supreme Court said that writers have to express their opinions within the purview of the law.

Kancha Ilaiah, speaking to Sabrangindia, hailed the verdict as not just the victory of freedom of expression per se but also one that will now open the path to new perspectives in research on “accumulation and capital.” Kancha Ilaiah’s life was in danger and under threat over the past weeks as protests against the book had even turned violent.

Finally he had forced himself under ‘house arrest’ on the issue. Sabrangindia’s repeated campaigns had helped highlight the issue and finally grant him support and protection.

What is Kancha Ilaiah’s Book?
The book titled, Samajika Smugglerlu: Kommatullu, or “Social Smugglers: Kommatis.” argued that ” the “private-sector economy is a modern form of “Guptadhana” had, since mid September, generated angst and aggression from the members of the Arya Vysya community in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh began holding protests against the work of the academic and writer Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd. The community, which is also referred to as Kommatis, and is understood to be an upper-caste Vaishya group, had taken grave offence to the contents of a short Telugu-language book, Samajika Smugglerlu: Kommatullu, or “Social Smugglers: Kommatis.” The Telugu book is an adapted extract from Shepherd’s book Post-Hindu India, which was published in 2009. Samijika Smugglerlu argues that the Baniya community—often referred to as Vaishya, the term from which the Arya Vysyas derive their name—has maintained a monopoly over business in India, and excluded Shudra, Dalit and Bahujan groups from the benefits of capital growth in the country.

In the introduction to Post-Hindu India, Shepherd writes that the book covers “Dalit-Bahujan cultural, scientific and economic knowledge systems, analyses their overall relationships with each other and also with the Hindu religion as a spiritual system.” In addition to the chapter on the Vaishya community, the book contains individual chapters on various communities residing in India, and, based on their traditional occupations and knowledge system, analyses the development of the Indian economic system. It theorises that the Hindu religion’s failure to reckon with the evils of caste oppression will lead to its demise. (An extract can be read here.)
 
Sabrangindia was the first to allow space for this extremely though provoking discourse,considered ‘anathema’ by the privileged. On September 14, ” What is Social Smuggling by Sahukars (Traders)? asks Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Kancha had said in Sabrangindia. He wrote, “I wrote this book to show that the real producers of the wealth of the nation are castes that range from Adivasis to all Shudras (including kapus, Kammas, Reddys, Jats, Patels, Gujjars and so on)”

“The two dwija castes—Banias and Brahmins— by my generation (with a personal experience all around) are outside the basic production controlling the business from rural grain markets to Ambani, Adani, Vedanta kind of monopoly capital. The richest among them come from the Vysya community. Caste, thus, is  a reality.  The Brahmins have a control over the Hindu spiritual system and also educational institutions and the bureaucracy.”   
     
“The Brahmins are there in all Government jobs, the software industry and higher education. They are also there in all kinds of private sector jobs. The ratio of Directors of the Companies as per a study by Prof. D. Ajith, Han Doker and Ravi Saxena ((EPW-2012), Corporate Boards in India -Blocked by Caste? August 11, 2012, Vol. XLVII, No. 31, p.41)) shows this representation, caste-wise in the industrial and financial sector: Banias 46%, Brahmins 44.6%, Kshatriyas 0.5%, OBCs (that includes all Shudra castes) 3.8%, SC/ST 3.5% and others 1.5%.  This shows an absolute control of these two castes on the industrial and financial power.  

“Everything is being linked to nationalism these days. That is, in a way, good.  When foot soldiers are fighting on the Himalayan borders facing cold and bitter winds, in overall difficult situations on the Pakistan border, why should not Indian Industry give one job to a person from one soldier’s family member within industry based on qualifications?  Why does Indian industry not create a Farmer Protection Fund from its annual profit at least to the tune of 1 percentage?  In a caste based system, they too should have a Social Responsibility towards then lower castes and Adivasi masses. This system can run through the economic system: from top industry to the grain market Shahukars in the rural sector.  Why do not the Shahukars establish humanitarian relations with farmers, at least by helping them at the time of suicide deaths by going and helping them? Today the social relations between the Bania Shahukars and the farmers are very negative.  This has to change at all levels.

“The private sector can provide one job for those constables died in bouts of internal conflict.  Anybody can see their family conditions being pathetic after such sudden deaths.  Year after year, the state’s public resources are being shifted into the private sector, by rendering that sector JOBLESS.  In the last three and half years of this ultra-nationalist regime,  so-called development has become JOBLESS.  Therefore, everybody should have a share in the private sector jobs.  

Related Articles:
1. In this Age of Nationalism, It’s Not Just Citizens but Industry that Should be Nationalist
 

The post SC Gives a Clear Verdict for Not Just Free Expression But Bahujan Interpretation of India’s Political Economy: Kancha Ilaiah’s Social Smugglers, Kommatis appeared first on SabrangIndia.

 
The speech was delivered on 12^th October, 2017 in the U.S. House of Representatives and the speech available at http://houselive.gov/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=2&clip_id=11904
 
The transcript of Speech by Mr. Franks is as follows;
 
Thank you Mr. Speaker.  

Mr. Speaker, the first amendment of our constitution gives us this precious freedom of speech that we so cherish in America. Contrary to the heated debate in public opinion, we’re in the United States rarely facing the kind of persecution that necessitated this great protection.  So I rise today to shed light on the abridgement of freedom of speech that is often widely discussed but few Americans ever have to endure.  Individual freedom of speech is infringed.  Sharing one’s views freely on the internet can be punishable, even by death. Late one evening in September, a well-known Indian journalist Gauri Lankesh was murdered outside her home. She was an establishment figure with a reputation for her fearless criticism of undemocratic elements within the parties in power.  The circumstances of her death were strikingly similar to the murders of three additional Indian activists.  
 
And just weeks ago, another  India’s most prominent political journalist, Professor Kancha Ilaiah, who continuously questioning the caste social order and was threatened by BJP allied member of India’s parliament.  This member issued a statement that ‘the professor should be publicly hanged’.  He received numerous death threats.  These threats had significant effect.  A mob tried to attack Professor Ilaiah with stones.  Prof. Ilaiah is now under self-imposed house arrest because he’s simply not safe otherwise.  Was professor Ilaiah’s crime significant?
 
Kancha Ilaiah was called as modern day Dr. Ambedkar, the father of the Indian Constitution.  The crime of Professor Ilaiah is that he was the author of “Why I am not a Hindu?” and a recent translation of his “Post-Hindu India” (2009) is what sparked the threats book was described in a polarized context of modern day India, specifically dealing with the productivity of ‘the dalits’ and ‘the lower caste’ and seemingly spiritual and monetary monopoly of ‘the higher castes’.  These became more relevant in the crisis. This resulted farmers’ suicides due to hopelessness and massive joblessness due to the de-monetization and economic slowdown.
 
Mr. Speaker, I stand on the floor of the United States House of Representatives to state unequivocally that the United States and the entire global community is and should be deeply concerned about this threat to the life of Professor Kancha Ilaiah, one of the world’s well-known intellectuals. Our trusted ally and friend, India, is better than this, Mr. Speaker. Professor Kancha Ilaiah’s freedom of speech should not be infringed and his protection and that of those like him should be the utmost priority to the Indian government.  I’m able to express freely this viewpoint because we have freedom of speech in this United States of America. Mr. Speaker.  May we remember at what cost and for what purpose we were given this priceless freedom. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I yield back.

The post Concern for Kancha Ilaiah’s Protection in U.S. House of Representatives appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Noted writer Kancha Ilaiah’s car being mobbed during the attack at Parakal town on Saturday.

This was done in my book entitled  ‘Post-Hindu India’ published by Sage in 2009 after the lower castes and Adivasis failed to get any reservation agreement within the private sector.  The Telugu translation was published in 2011.  The booklet that has been made controversial with a title Samajika Smagglerlu is only the Teluguised version.  The central theme of the whole book is whose merit is merit and on what is merit quantified? And how every sort and kind of work has its own merit? Therefore, the private sector has to open up for the entry of the lower castes and Adivasis, as they too are meritorious.    

The UPA-I government had conceived of  such a proposal that created a mechanism but top scions of industry rejected it on the ground that lower castes and Adivasis have no MERIT to handle the jobs in the private sector.

I wrote this book to show that the real producers of the wealth of the nation are castes that range from Adivasis to all Shudras (including kapus, Kammas, Reddys, Jats, Patels, Gujjars and so on).

The two dwija castes—Banias and Brahmins— by my generation (with a personal experience all around) are outside the basic production controlling the business from rural grain markets to Ambani, Adani, Vedanta kind of monopoly capital. The richest among them come from the Vysya community. Caste, thus, is  a reality.  The Brahmins have a control over the Hindu spiritual system and also educational institutions and the bureaucracy.   
     
The Brahmins are there in all Government jobs, the software industry and higher education. They are also there in all kinds of private sector jobs. The ratio of Directors of the Companies as per a study by Prof. D. Ajith, Han Doker and Ravi Saxena ((EPW-2012), Corporate Boards in India -Blocked by Caste? August 11, 2012, Vol. XLVII, No. 31, p.41)) shows this representation, caste-wise in the industrial and financial sector: Banias 46%, Brahmins 44.6%, Kshatriyas 0.5%, OBCs (that includes all Shudra castes) 3.8%, SC/ST 3.5% and others 1.5%.  This shows an absolute control of these two castes on the industrial and financial power.  

Everything is being linked to nationalism these days. That is, in a way, good.  When foot soldiers are fighting on the Himalayan borders facing cold and bitter winds, in overall difficult situations on the Pakistan border, why should not Indian Industry give one job to a person from one soldier’s family member within industry based on qualifications?  Why does Indian industry not create a Farmer Protection Fund from its annual profit at least to the tune of 1 percentage?  In a caste based system, they too should have a Social Responsibility towards then lower castes and Adivasi masses. This system can run through the economic system: from top industry to the grain market Shahukars in the rural sector.  Why do not the Shahukars establish humanitarian relations with farmers, at least by helping them at the time of suicide deaths by going and helping them? Today the social relations between the Bania Shahukars and the farmers are very negative.  This has to change at all levels.

The private sector can provide one job for those constables died in bouts of internal conflict.  Anybody can see their family conditions being pathetic after such sudden deaths.  Year after year, the state’s public resources are being shifted into the private sector, by rendering that sector JOBLESS.  In the last three and half years of this ultra-nationalist regime,  so-called development has become JOBLESS.  Therefore, everybody should have a share in the private sector jobs.  

Why is the Modi regime silent on this fundamental issue?  Our demand is at least start an opening with 5 per cent reservation for the above mentioned nation defending forces and the lowest caste categories like Adivasis, Dalits, Dhobis and Barbers depending on their qualifications. In a country like this industry must also show its nationalist commitment combined with positive moral sentiment as Adam Smith theorised, several centuries ago.

It is a researcher’s duty to do research on all communities. If the richest community does not have any positive moral sentiment towards the poorest and weakest people, hurting that sentiment in the process of writing is unavoidable. When Dr.B.R.Ambedkar wrote the Annihilation of Caste Mahatma Gandhi in his dissent letter said that you have used less harsh words for the hardships that the untouchables suffered for centuries. Why is that spirit missing today?

If the Vysyas that include many top industrialists like Ambanis and Adanis take the initiative to give some token preferential treatment for the people I mentioned above the health of the national economy will  certainly improve. In our view that is their nationalist responsibility. 

Also Read

Why are we silent on the grave threat to Kancha Ilaiah?
What is Social Smuggling by Sahukars (Traders)? asks Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

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Professor Kancha Ilaiah

While it is nobody’s suggestion that India was a tolerant land some three years back and suddenly has developed intolerance, none can deny the fact that the goons threatening intellectuals and activists have certainly become more arrogant and encouraged by the absolute ‘disinterest’ shown by those in power. In the past few years we have lost number of persons in the cause of human rights and secularism and probes have reached nowhere even though links with organisations associated with Hindutva groups have been reported in the media.  

Activists are being threatened; intimidated and street goons have taken it upon themselves to provide ‘justice’. Where the person is a bit powerful, cases are filed against him in the court while goons are let loose to physically intimidate him.

Kancha Ilaiah is a well-known Bahujan philosopher who has been actively critiquing the Brahminical social order and its injustices meted out to the Dalits-OBCs and adivasis. Should he not be allowed to do this under the garb of ‘hurt’ community sentiments? It is not the question of any outsider writing a critique but a person from the community historically denied right. The only difference this time was that his new book that has come out is about the Vaishya (also spelt Vysya) community which is basically a trading community.

Normally Brahmins are the target but this time the Vaishyas (Banias) have taken it upon themselves to protest against Ilaiah for writing against them. The main contention of the community is that they have been called ‘social smugglers’ by Kancha Ilaiah in his book. One Member of Parliament from Telugu Desam Party, TG Venktesh, has reportedly threatened to kill him and asked for his hanging. Yesterday, his vehicle was attacked and a prompt action by his driver saved his life.

So shocked was Prof Ilaiah that he felt deeply isolated and decided to confine himself to his home for the next one week. It is said that an intellectual at this stage is facing so much threat of physical violence and no assurances from the authorities for his safety. Now the issue is being deliberately being politicized to create a Hindutva frenzy in the state so that corrupt politicians can reap the benefit of the emotional blackmailing of people.

This is the ‘New India’ where the Brahminical Hinduism will come through violent means. No criticism would be allowed or countered through a fair critique. It is not that Ilaiah wrote for the first time. His thought provoking books are there in open and should be welcomed. One can disagree with him and for that we have all avenues to not merely protest peacefully but also to write counter arguments to denounce him but that is not happening.

With so much of the media and the publishing world in hand, these power elite are still fearful of a few who critique them. We are informed that Gandhi was a Bania. None deny that. We are not here asking anyone to be unhappy where they are born. None come here with a fixed birth record except in the Brahminical system where your caste and occupation are fixed with your birth. That is what we call caste based varnashram dharma and it must be rejected.

We cannot hide the fact that caste system and caste discrimination are the biggest obstacle in the development of this country. In fact the caste system remains our biggest hurdle in national unity and integration. The caste system creates prejudices in the minds of people and limits your mobility beyond your own castes. Once you confine yourself within your caste, everything outside it looks as suspect and dangerous. Can we have a united India with so many thousands of caste and each considering it superior to other?

Critiquing India’s notorious caste system is nothing wrong but will ultimately help India get stronger and united. Even then if Ilaiah has said anything academically or factually wrong then there are options before the people to go to the court or even write rejoinder, engage in a democratic debate. Huge number of upper caste members dominate our media, academia, intelligentsia and they can write a counter critique of Ilaiah. But the street protests that we are witnessing in Andhra and Telangana are merely for political purpose and need to be unconditionally condemned.

The videos of protest using innocent children to urinate in public on the photograph of Ilaiah is nothing but the sick mindset of people who are using children to reap the rich harvest of hatred during the election. It is deeply despicable and condemnable. Why should children be used in a debate which is academic debate? And even if they are used, is this the best way to use their ‘creativity’. Is this not an imposition of male supremacy as we find no girls or women in the protest?

Kancha Ilaiah has not killed anyone, nor is he spreading hatred against particular communities or people. He has not threatened anyone but only spoken through his writings against what he and many like him consider historic wrongs. Isn’t it his right to question and speak up against the social injustice that prevailed for centuries in our society?

Isn’t it for Indians to ponder as why one community is in business or knoweldge while other is purely for cleaning human excreta? Is this not a reservation which has existed in this filthy society where a few protested but those who enjoyed kept quiet? When this hegemony is challenged then the question of merit is raised as if all those in the Dalal Street in Mumbai are the most meritorious people. Caste system is nothing but hidden apartheid and you cannot hide from the fact that it needs to go and should be abolished as Dr Baba Saheb Ambedkar as well as many others like him, had wanted.

What is more disturbing is the failure of the two state governments of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana to provide him protection and take action against those threatening him. The way political protests have been launched against him is clear indication of the local politicians who are being encouraged by their respective parties to intimidate a scholar through street goondaism. The two chief ministers of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana are the same persons who refused to speak up against institutional murder of Rohith Vemula.

Even when the entire country stood up for Rohith’s cause, the two upper caste governments actually were determined to treat him as a ‘non-Dalit’, a deliberate ploy to divide people on caste lines and deviate from the real issue of the prevailing caste prejudices in their system. A Member of Parliament of TDP has openly threatened to Ilaiah him but there is no action from the party head and chief minister Chandrababu Naidu. The goons are openly attacking him and monitoring his physical movement but the two chief ministers remain shamelessly silent on the issue.

Another appalling thing is the conspicuous silence of intellectuals and political parties as Kancha has himself said. This is a very disturbing fact. We know he has been a critique of Brahminical system in our political parties and intelligentsia including the Left. This is not for the first time that any intellectual has spoken about the Left and other political organisations. It was a critique of Dr Ambedakr, Phule, Periyar and many others who have followed their path over the years. There are of course upper caste people who acknowledge their faults and happily engage in a fruitful discussion on the issue which is a welcome sign.

This is the period of a great crisis. Those who are targeting Ilaiah know it well that there are wide differences among the non-Hindutva groups. This is not merely the problems of the Left forces but also of the Ambedkarites and Bahujan forces. It is not the time to get into digging history and then taking a stand. In my opinion every Ambedkarite or a true intellectual of any variety, Left or socialist or freethinker will always defend an individual’s right to freedom of expression and engage in democratic debates.

Moreover, it is not a street brawl that Ilaiah has engaged in but a purely academic work which can and should only be countered through academic exercise or democratic protests. The pain is that we have not heard intellectuals, academics taking any stand on it particularly outside Andhra and Telangana except for some individual responses on social media. It is good that the Congress Party has issued a very strong statement in the media as their spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewallah demanded action against the threatening MP and protection to Ilaiah. This is certainly a positive sign and we appreciate it.

India is fast becoming a mob republic where the power elite has developed various ways to not only intimidate you but also to put you in deep distress, go to the extent of physical hurt or even elimination. The mobs are being encouraged to take law in their hands and they have the fullest backing through the PR agents who can easily convert a wrong into right and the vice versa but then these should be the finest hours for all of us who are fighting against the subjugation and discrimination as it is the right time to see the truth, decide our stand and our attitude.

We need to develop a culture of debate and discussion as that is the only way to save us as a society and as a nation. Once people start taking law in their hand and deciding to judge everyone in the street we will have none to blame but ourselves. It is better to learn from the experiences of others. People in Sudan, Yemen, Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and elsewhere know well the importance of democracy where in the name of identities and national interests people have killed each other. India survived as a democracy and fared well because despite all our weaknesses, we promoted ideas through constructive debates. We agreed to disagree.

If you don’t like Ilaiah or any one like him, don’t read him, switch off your TV or counter him ideologically through various mediums. Each one of have various options including social media and it should be used to strengthen debate. But don’t fall prey to the political goons who are only using sentiments to spread hatred and promote their political interest. Professor Ilaiah must be provided all the security that he needs and those threatening to kill him must be prosecuted.
 
 

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What is Social Smuggling ?

In his latest book Post-Hindu India where he has developed the argument of caste economic exploitation in a chapter Social Smuggling, the supremac. His effigies have been burnt in Telegana and Andhra Pradesh by Arya Vysya Sangam demanding a ban on his book, and his immediate arrest. 

The concept Social Smuggling I coined in my book Post-Hindu India (Sage 2009) has generated a law and order issue, created by the Arya Vysya organizations of the two Telugu States.

The Vysya Associations have issued a death threat to me for applying this concept to the Vysya model of caste based business historically leading to a massive amount of wealth being hidden under ground called Guptha Dhana.

The chapter Social Smugglers that was first translated by Msco publishers in the whole was published by a small local book seller with the title Samajika Smugglerlu: Komatollu. This booklet is being burnt all over Andhra Pradesh and Telengana to pressure the state Governments to ban it. In this context the concept Social Smugglers needs to be examined at some length here.

The Social Smuggling process started from the post-Guptha period of fifth century AD and continues to operate even today. Till British colonialism came to India the completely caste controlled business was only in the hands of the Banias. Even the British did not touched the caste centered business from the villages upwards, including the ritual economy around Hindu temples.

Wealth and gold was also hidden in the temple treasuries without allowing it to re-enter market transactions. This whole process of wealth accumulation by exploiting the labour of the productive masses, drawing it into a caste economy and not allowing it to plough back into society, cannot be understood by the concept ‘exploitation’ that was very apt for the West.

Indian exploitation has a massive component of the use of caste ‘social borders’ to control the accumulated wealth within that border of heavily exploited wealth. It was used by the traders for their good life and gave enough to the temples for better survival of priests. The remaining surplus was hidden under ground, over ground and also in the temples. This process did not allow the cash economy to come back in the form of investment either for agrarian development or for promotion of mercantile capital. This whole process is nothing but Social Smuggling. The wealth did not go outside India but did get arrested and used only within the caste borders.

This process is continuing even now in different modes. In all grain markets the Shahukars are the main buyers of the produce for very low cost from the farmers and sell the same goods for huge prices for the same producers of wealth.

Let us take rice, for example. Paddy is bought from farmers at a very low price by the Shahukars. They convert the paddy into polished rice in their mills and sell back to the same producers for a five to six times higher price. So also for cotton, chilli and so on. The largest rice mill owner network is controlled by this caste. From this to pushing the Indian economy into the monopoly of the Ambani-Adani massive ‘caste control of capital’ has become possible only because of Social Smuggling.

From the Bombay mills to all petroleum products, ownership is established by a mix of class exploitation and caste business encirclement. This trader caste based encirclement does not allow any other caste business person to survive.

The second major character of, thus, socially smuggled economy is that it does not have any human empathy for the lower caste poor. The poor among the same caste get some help but the wretched of the earth —the Dalit Adivasi poor—do not get sympathetic treatment. They are not able to establish some Social Justice Fund in their caste organizations, like the Muslim rich do in the name zakat for the poor of their own religion. The upper castes claim that the SC/ST/OBCs are Hindus. But they never share a rupee with them in the ritual or social realm.

Class exploiters in the West have a social investment fund. Willing preferential treatment for blacks and poor and so on are some of the aims. The Social Smugglers do not even have that kind of God feared empathy. Hence the lower caste poor die of starvation, hunger and distress generated suicides. The rich peoples wealth accumulation has no limits.

It is this Socially Smuggled economy that does not want to allow even preferential treatment to the Dalit/Adivasis/OBCs by providing employment in the shops and companies. These masses have been asking for reservation in the private sector for decades. And as soon as such concerns and demands are raised the Shishakar anchors shout in unions ‘MERIT IS DEAD.’

Socially Smuggled economy produces intellectuals who constantly protect that encircled border of wealth very seriously.

Caste Economy within Nation State
The Caste economy has established its own borders within the nation state. This issue could not be addressed within the framework of class exploitation. The notion of social smuggling no doubt, has to be developed much more in the future. But I made a small attempt in my book Post-Hindu India and it has brought the richest caste of India onto the streets.

For this they are burning my effigies all over the Telugu States for the last three days. Death threats are being issued. But they can be stopped only by counter mobilization of all Shudras (Kammas, Reddys, Jats, Patels, Maratas, OBCs, Dalits, Adivasis so on). All these communities are still operating mainly in the agrarian sector and small entrepreneurship.

In the shahukar economy they are very few and continue to be victims of the Social Smuggling process in the Indian caste economy. Let our economists debate this notion of Social Smuggling.
 
(Prof. Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd is Director, Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policy,Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Gachibowli, Hyderabad-32)

Related Articles:

1. The Day of the Violent Vegetarian and the Myth of the Militant Meat Eater
2.Academics Cry Halt to Hounding of Kancha Ilaiah by Brahminical Bodies, Police

3. Untouchable God

The post What is Social Smuggling by Sahukars (Traders)? asks Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd appeared first on SabrangIndia.

According to his complaint registered at the Osmania University police station, Hyderabad, he received abusive and threatening calls from unidentified persons over his book ‘Samajika Smugglurlu Komatollu‘ (Vysyas are social smugglers).

The police have registered a case under section 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and have begun investigations.

Protest meetings have been held in Hyderabad by various Arya Vysya associations according to whom the title of the book and some of its contents were “derogatory and demeaning” to the community. They have lodged a police complaint against Ilaiah but no case has been registered as the police is looking into the plaint.

In his complaint Ilaiah has said, “I feel terribly threatened with their abuses, phone calls and messages. They are doing fearful activities against me on the streets.”
 
 

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In 1817, sometime in the month of October, English teaching was started in Calcutta by gathering together a few Brahmin male children both by British educationalists and Indians. Today, in 2017 we need to celebrate the 200^th year of English education in India.
 
For the last few years we Osmanians at the Osmania University, within the monumental arts college building built by the famous Osman Ali Khan, the last Nizam, celebrate October 5 as the ‘Indian English Day’. Everyone knows that October 5 is ‘International Teachers Day’. Some of us thought that it should also be celebrated as the Indian English Day.

As I said in 1817 the English teaching started by imparting English alphabets to some Brahmin children because in those days there was no scope for the Dalit-Bajujan or even the  upper Shudras to study in any school.  Even persons like Rajarammohan Roy who was associated with that initiative were casteists. Roy thought of reforming Brahmin women’s life but never took any initiative for educating the lower castes.

The first educated modern Shudra in India was Mahatma Jotirao Phule, who studied in a Scottish English medium school in Bombay province. That was much later in the 1840s as Phule was born in 1827. The Calcutta province was in the grip of both Britishers and Brahmins. No caste reform movement was initiated by the Bengali Brahmins. Because of a Shudra ruler like Shivaji  who resisted Brahmin hegemony in the Bombay region some changes began there. 

Subsequently his grandson Sahu Maharaj took a serious step towards the anti-Brahmin mobilisation of Shudras and Dalits. Thus, that land became the land of the Dalit-Bahujan English Education also. If Calcutta province represented the Brahminical English the Bombay province represented the Dalit-Bahujan English.

Dr.B.R.Ambedkar was the first Dalit to get education in an English medium school and later on world class higher education. Even the Muslims of India were pushed back from access to English education because they went in for education in the Persian and Urdu medium. Sir Sayyad Ahmmad Khan pushed the ideology of English education within the Muslim community. Now there are several English educated Muslims in India. But for their English education the Universities like Aligarh Muslim University and Jamia Millia English medium universities would not have existed and because of these institutions there is a modern Muslim community emergent and resilient.

Today the Dalit-Bahujans and Muslims and other minorities have attained their present position because of English education, though they are the least educated among all. If a person like me having come from a totally illiterate shepherd family could challenge mighty Brahminism that controls state power, temple power, even the educational power it was because of my access to ‘their’ English (earlier Sanskrit), though learned under the tree schools, at a very late age in my village.

The celebration of the Indian English Day is also needed to checkmate Hindutva forces from confining the SC/ST/OBCs to regional languages while they educate the rich and the upper castes in private English medium schools with their money power. Our struggle is to establish common medium and syllabus based schools for all children—the rich and poor of any caste.

I appeal to all those lovers of equality to celebrate today, October 5, as the Indian English Day and send a message to the diabolical convent and foreign English educated people: you cannot stop us from accessing good English education in our village schools by selling the bogus theory that English is not Indian language. We declare that ‘English is Indian’. We study in English and preserve our buffalo cultural nationalism as against the unproductive cow nationalism which is for Brahmins alone.
 
 
 

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