The Myth of Poor Brahmins in India – Brief History of Their Generational Wealth - Velivada

Author – Anuradha Bele

The Union of India did not exist before 1947, the union was a collection of more than 550 princely states and many thousands, if not lakhs, of smaller estates, owned by hereditary landowners who collected revenue and if Brahmin, rarely paid rent and taxes. [1][2][3]

The Brahmin caste was at the top of the hierarchy throughout the sub-continent in spite of intra-regional differences. [4]

Looking at a few cities in all regions of India, we see a distinct pattern in their mode of living and their evolution as the most powerful and highly affluent caste. The Brahmins were concentrated on the wet river valleys across the sub-continent because of the prosperity of such belts due to abundant agrarian production and wealth, there were practically none in the dry zone villages. They got into ‘alliances’ with the traders and the other rich agricultural castes, in a policy of accommodation with the political elites.[5][6][7] Brahmins were appointed as advisors or ministers to warrior chiefs and kings; as temple priests, temples being receptacles of wealth which were ploughed back into trade [8], including products[9] and slaves[10][11][12][13] then, and now in stock markets[14] and gold monetisation schemes [14]. The Brahmins got the place in the royal court as chief priest and priest of the palace.[15] They had powers to decide the functions of the palace and movements of the ruler.[16] They often accompanied the kings to new lands to counter the resident Brahmins and were amply rewarded.[17] Brahmins were gifted gold, silver, utensils, horses, cows and more importantly, rent-free land by the kings because Laws of Manu stated that giver of land gets to land, a giver of gold long life, a giver of a house most excellent mansions, a giver of silver (rupya) exquisite beauty (rupa), so for whatever purpose a man bestows any gift, for that same purpose he receives in his next birth.[18] These lands were not taxed.[19] Even with the colonial government, they continued to enjoy the tax-free status. The Brahmins did not work on their lands, the work was done by landless labouring castes.[16] The headman/zamindar and the accountant were important for the empire. Often, the accountant or both the headman and accountant were Brahmins.[5] The priest was almost always a Brahmin.[20] Since only the top three savarna castes could get an education, based on the Law of Manu written by the Brahmins,[21] this caste quickly moved to urban areas for education and varied economic opportunities.[6] Educated Brahmins were soon dominating as administrators, teachers, medical practitioners and lawyers, especially in urban areas, most of them were from major landowning families.[5] Endogamy remained an institution to maintain caste[22]. Thus, Brahmins became an influential class of opinion makers asserting themselves in newspapers, cultural activities, political organizations and other sectors due to access to modern education and leisure to pursue varied professions due to generational wealth.

Starting with the western region of the subcontinent, in Surat, the most important port in British India, the walled city housed the Brahmin, Baniya (Vaishya) and Jain community, employed in business, mainly cotton, gold and silver zari, slaves and in government services in the Mughal Empire, Gujarat Sultanate and then the Maratha rulers and then the British. Included were a variety of Brahmans such as the Nagar, Anavil, and Audich; as many as forty-one subdivisions of Hindu Vaniyas; Jains (who were considered Vaniya by caste) Kayasthas; and Brahman-Kshatriyas. The Jains and Baniyas were known by the prefix ‘Modh’ meaning ‘big/large’ depending on their prosperity, the surname ‘Modi’ seems to be derived from this. Together, these high-status families composed almost one-fourth (25%) of Surat’s population. In 1872, 8,988 Brahmans, 11,559 Vaniyas, 3,717 Jains, 420 Kayasths, and several hundred members of other high castes lived in Surat. Strict caste laws of endogamy, commensality and prohibition of foreign travel were followed and the mahajan or panch would maintain these rules through various orders. In their religious practice, Jains and Vaishnava Hindus employed Brahmans in domestic ceremonies, performed worship in each others’ shrines, and honored the same holy men. As a rule, the priest belonged to the corresponding sub-division. For instance, a Modh Bania ( eg: M.K.Gandhi) generally had a Modh Brahmin as his family priest and a Shrimali Bania a Shrimali Brahmin. At the same time, they generally kept a great social distance from people of low or middle caste. Endogamy and descent thus remained critical for inclusion in this community. Untouchables lived outside the city boundaries. [23] In 1682, this port alone exported 1,436,000 pieces of cotton and the total for the whole of India, including Calcutta and Madras and few more ports came to more than 3 million pieces – each piece being about 18 yards in length. Ship’s musters of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries detail thirty to forty different sorts of cotton fabrics, each with a name: bafta, mulmul, mashru, jamdani, moree, percale, nainsukh, chintz, etc, all paid for in bullion: in 4 years alone between 1681 and 1685 the East India Company imported 240 tonnes of silver and 7 tonnes of gold into India. [24]

It may not a coincidence that one of the oldest temple of Saivite worship, built around 9th or 10th century[8] and one of the richest temples in India[25], Somnath temple is situated in Veraval near Surat. Mahmud of Ghazni in 1024, plundering the Somnath temple is said to have taken away the wealth of almost 20 million dinars (ancient gold coin), amounting to nearly 6 tonnes of gold.[26]

In 1169, an inscription records the appointment of the chief priest of the Somanatha temple, Bhava Brihaspati, said to be from Kannauj, from a family of Pashupata Shaiva Brahmanas, he initiated a succession of powerful priests. The funds from temples formed a sizable investment into the trade. Another source of local income was the large sums of money collected in pilgrim taxes by the administration in Somnath. [8] The Sompura Brahmins are the hereditary priests in the Somnath temple. In Gujarat around 10th century, there were around 4000 temples in which lived over 20,000 devadasis.[27] L.K Advani’s Rath Yatra in 1990 started from here[28], the Sompura Brahmins are now designing the Ram Temple in Ayodhya. [29] Prime Minister Narendra Modi is one of the trustees of the Somnath temple. Currently, the temple is said to have more than 130 kgs of gold and 3 tonnes of silver. [30]

Moving to the south, in Tamil Nadu, in “Brahman villages,” where Brahman landowner (mirasidars) owned the majority of the land and formed the dominant caste, Brahmans(both landlords and others, such as priests) lived in the agraharam (rent free villages). [5] The taxes from such villages were assigned to the Brahmana donees, who were also given the right to get the donated land cultivated. [31] The agraharam, consisting of one or more streets, was exclusively occupied by Brahmans and spatially demarcated from the main village area, often called the ‘ur’, where the non-Brahmans lived. The untouchables lived in a colony(cheri) separated from this area.[5] At the beginning of the nineteenth century government officials were inclined to support some of the mirasdars’ claims, to revenue free lands (inams) and occupied land. In1858 an Inam Commission, set up to validate only inams in lawful possession for fifty years and to resume or commute the others, settled 367,427 titles covering over 6 million acres. Well over half were inams held for personal benefit, mainly by Brahmins and other religious functionaries; their inams covered 3.7 million acres. 1.5 million acres were held by nearly 80,000 temples, mosques, churches and over 150,000 acres by charitable institutions, largely shelters for travellers. Incidentally, village schools had a mere 507 acres.[32]

In 1852 Madras had 1,185 mission schools with 38,055 students. Out of the 62 arts colleges in India in 1882, Madras had 25. Brahmins formed the majority of the educated in Madras presidency. In 1890-91, of the 3,200 students in arts colleges, 38 were Europeans and Anglo-Indian, 244 Indian Christians, 46 Muslims, 658 Non-Brahmins and 2,208 Brahmins. In the whole of India, 895 out of every 1,000 males were illiterate in 1891 census. However, in Madras Presidency, of every 1,000 Brahmins in Madras, 722 were literate. [33]

In Tamil Nadu, in the early twentieth century, Brahmins made up to 2.5% of the total population of the state. The fertile Kaveri delta which makes up most of the old Thanjavur District, Brahmins, many of them wealthy mirasidars, were an unusually high 9 per cent of the population in the late nineteenth century. Despite emigration and land sales, Brahmans in the delta in the 1950s were still “wealthier, more numerous, and more powerful than in any other south Indian district”[5]. Incidentally, the Vice President nominee in the United States, Kamla Harris’s grandfather, the Brahmin P.V.Gopalan hails from Thanjavur district, Painganadu village where he served as a stenographer with the British East India company. [34] The PV Gopalan family resided in the Painganadu Agraharam in Thulasendhirapuram in Mannargudi taluk in Thiruvarur, in Tamil Nadu.[35] His name is still listed as Skilled Support Staff in Regional Centre, Indian Council of Agricultural Research in Kozhikode, which requires qualification of matriculation only. [36]

Brihadeshwara Temple, built-in 9th or 10th century, is also located in this district and owns 157 acres land, it also has a tradition of hereditary Brahmin priests and trustees.[37] One inscription of 1004 A.D. in Tanjor Temple mentions the numbers of devadasis to be 400 in Tanjor, 450 in Brihadeswara temple and 500 in Sorti Somnath temple.[14] There are around 88 more temples in this district. The 34,000 temples in the state-run by the Tamil Nadu government department today own a total of over 5 lakh acres of agricultural land, or about 5 per cent of all agricultural land in Tamil Nadu, the highest percentage of any state in the country.[37]

In the east, in present-day Bengal and Bihar, the Brahmins, Kayasthas and Baidyas-calling themselves the Bhadralok (‘genteel folks’)- comprising around one-fifth (roughly 20%) of the population[38], form the ruling castes. The institutionalisation of ‘kulinism’ (“elite-subgroup”) was based on rules regulating marriage practices. Violation of the rules of matrimony led to loss of social status and expulsion from the caste community. This was also due to political power in Bengal passing to Muslim rulers by the turn of the 13th century, and the practice of granting honours to Brahmin, Kayastha and Baidya lineages, as by the Hindu kings, was discontinued. Over the centuries of Muslim rule in Bengal, many Brahmins, Kayasthas and Baidyas pursued successful careers, holding administrative and military positions under the Muslim sultans of Bengal. They acquired land (jaigirs), held powerful positions at the court of the independent sultans of Bengal for successive generations, they also took Islamic titles. The earnings from their untaxed jagirs were collected by way of surplus extraction through rent and revenue, ignoring the interest of the state and mass of cultivators. Gopinath Bose, a Kayastha known by his Islamic title Purandar Khan, was finance minister and commander of the navy under Sultan Hussain Shah in the 15th century. He was simultaneously the leader of the Kayastha community in the region. In order to curb the tendency of Bengali Brahmins and Kayasthas to develop close social relations with the Muslim rulers they served, there was a periodic assembly of the caste community hosted by its leaders in which social verdicts would be delivered, based on the conduct of various families, akin to a court. [39]The first British Governor-General, based in Fort William (Calcutta) , Warren Hastings, in 1772, directed the civil and revenue courts to base their judgments as much as possible on texts such as the Law Code of Manu. This was done by employing 11 Brahmins by the Revenue Board from 1773 to 1775 to compile for use in courts the Sanskrit law code and then it was translated into Persian. [40] Baidyas, were involved in studying, teaching and practising medicine and law but they had been kings, ministers and big land-owners. Jyoti Basu, founder of Communist Party of India and the Chief Minister of Bengal from 1977 to 2000 was from Kayastha (or Baidya) caste. [41][42] He led one of the bloodiest caste massacres of ‘chotolok’ (‘caste-less people’) in Marichhjhapi.[43]

In Bengal, certain districts were divided into a number of local areas called “parganas, related to revenue farming. There were ninety-eight parganas in 1807. Number of parganas had Brahmin zamindars. They were Brahmins, but nearly illiterate. “They would be totally destitute of any appearance of literature, had they not been taught by rote a few verses of Songskrito (Sanskrit), and informed of their meaning…. They seem to pass their time chiefly in sleeping, eating, picking their teeth, and other such recreations, or in listening to singers and story-tellers, and very rarely go out of the house.” One more instance must be cited to illustrate their manners. The parganas numbers 87 and 88 formed part of an immense estate which was granted by the Nawab of Bengal to a Brahman who had rendered him an important service; namely, that of treacherously giving up the registrar-general’s seal, which was in his keeping, and affixing it to certain revenue accounts of the Subadar, which the chief Qanungo (land record keeper) had refused to pass. The bhadralok, however, defined themselves as well educated and refined—refined not only in relation to profession, but also in terms of the arts, character, cultivation, language, clothing, food, profession, etc. To undertake manual labour would be to sully their bhadrata (bhadra-ness).[44]

Many of the bhadralok first made their fortunes by acting as agents (banians) of the British and other foreign merchants and later became zamindars. By the mid-nineteenth century Bengalis had moved into landholding and away from commercial and banking activities, and simultaneously the Marwaris began to dominate trade and banking in Bengal. Many Brahmins were also involved in the salt business. They were at first acting just as dalals (brokers/agents), since ‘although the Shasters (Shastras) prohibit trading in salt to a Brahman, that prohibition … is not considered to extend to agents between the buyers and the sellers to the article’. For merchants, it was important to keep good relationships with Brahmans in order to run the business smoothly and to enhance their status in society. When salt belonging to a Brahman was to be re-sold, the sale would become a disaster. According to the British government, ‘a Brahmin, besides resorting to the customary modes of exciting the sympathy and procuring the support of the other dealers, used those means which a Brahmin alone can employ to deter them from breaking him down’. The Brahmans’ role in interlinking various merchants was encouraged by the institution called dals. Dals were social factions, formed under the leadership of a rich man, a ‘dalapati’. Dals dealt with all matters concerning caste rules. Every bhadralok belonged to a dal, and influential bhadraloks among them set up dals and acted as dalapatis. Most Calcutta dalapatis had followers in the rural areas, in their zamindaris and their ancestral villages. Many salt merchants extended their business operations to the trade-in other commodities, banking and money lending, and investment in landed properties. Large Calcutta merchants also invested in government bonds and opium.[45] Bengal was considered by the British as a ‘sink of gold and silver’ as most of the payment was done in bullion.[46] Dwarkanath Tagore (grandfather of Rabindranath Tagore and a close relative of Sharmila Tagore) was one such Brahmin zamindar, who diversified into business ventures and also[47], became Head Dewan of British East India’s Salt and Opium department. [48] All his papers were burnt by Rabindranath Tagore due to the discomfort with the origin of the family fortune built by him. [47]

Incidentally, further along, the coast, Jagannath Puri temple, rebuilt around 12th century was often plundered for its wealth. The Utkala Brahmins are the hereditary priests here. The Brahmin priests there had sasana villages, an autonomous community with revenue, judiciary and police power. No government official, unless specifically ordered by the government could exercise any power in a sasana village. In 1952, 24 such villages were known. Along the periphery of sasana villages, were ‘Karabada’ Brahmin villages where trade was carried out.[49] Presently, Jagannath temple owns 60,418 acres of land and many mines and quarries.[50] According to the details available after 1952, besides the temple elephants, horses, furnitures and utensils of various kinds, there are 150 items of gold ornaments which include three gold necklaces (Haridakanthi Mali) weighing more than 120 tolas (1 tola = 11,6638 grams) each; Suna Shri Bhuja and Sri Payara of Jagannath and Balabhadra weighing 818 and 710 tolas respectively; Suna Mukutas or gold crowns of Jagannath, Balabhadra and Subhadra weighing 610, 434 and 275 tolas respectively, and various other gold ornaments some of which are set with precious stones. The Bhitar Bhandar (inner treasure) has 180 items of jewellery which include 74 items of pure gold ornaments some of which weigh more than 100 tolas, plates of gold, pearls, diamonds, corals etc., and 146 items of silver articles, some weighing more than 500 tolas each. The temple also charges fees from the pilgrims for visits, selling nirmalaya etc[51]

Moving onto north of the subcontinent to Kashmir, when oppression by the Afghani governors became unbearable, the Kashmiri Brahmins appealed to the Sikhs for help in 1819. Kashmir subsequently became part of the Sikh kingdom, and after its annexation by the British, the country was sold by the British to the Brahmin Dogra Maharaja of Jammu, Gulab Singh in 1846. Under the rule of the Dogras, the Pandits held many responsible posts in government and administration, even when the last Maharaja took Jammu and Kashmir into the Indian Union in 1947. During the last hundred years, and until the unrest, the Pandits constituted not more than 5% of the population of the state of Jammu and Kashmir. The Kashmiri Pandits, all belong to the Sarasvata division of North Indian Brahmins, thought to have come from the Sarasvati area in Kurushetra (Now in Haryana State). In 1875, there were estimated 52,576 Hindus in Kashmir, 28,695 of whom lived in Srinagar and the small towns, and 23,881 are rural Hindus so more than 50% were already in urban areas. Outside the capital, they were prominent in the larger towns such as Islamabad (Anantnag), Bijbror, Vantipur, Pampur, Sopur, Baramula, and in many villages. The work of the Brahmins was the astrologer class (Jotish), the priest class (Guru or Bachabat) and the working class (Karkun)(clerks). The vast majority of the Pandits belong to the Karkun class, employed by the state and were known for their oppression of the king’s subjects, only occasionally curbed. Some them had received high positions in Government, for example as chief ministers. The Brahmins were landholders, especially of personal agraharas and of land attached to temples, at the confluence of the holy rivers (Jhelum and Sindhu/Indus). As everywhere in India, Brahmins were not to be killed, even in instances of rebellion against the King eg: in King Sagrama’s time (1236-1252), the sons of one Kalhaa where were spared the death penalty by Sagrama, in spite of their rebellion. However, they, later on, murdered the king and therefore were executed by Sagrama’s son, king Ramadeva (1252-86). However, Lakmaadeva, the adopted son of Ramadeva, again was a Brahmin. Some of the Brahmins always functioned as royal priests, for example, at the coronation (and its yearly repetition) and jatakarman (birth of a child) and in a special case, they even chose a new king. They also became chief justices. Brahmins in Kashmir joined the army quite frequently and rose quickly. For example, Rakka, a Brahmin, was a foot soldier but was made chief minister. Bhujaga, son of the Brahmin Samanta, was a commander in Sagramaraja’s army.

Kashmirian Brahmins, like others of their caste, have been migrating due to political unrest and for economic opportunities at all stages in the history. Evidence for Kashmiri Pandit emigration comes from the inscriptions at the Tiruvallesvara temple, South of Madurai in Tamil Nadu, which were made under the Pallavas (275 CE to 897 CE/AD, pastoral tribe feudatories of Satavahana Kingdom) and which clearly state that Kashmiri Brahmins had come and settled there. This movement was connected with the spread of Śaivism and the interrelations of Śaiva centers in the various parts of the subcontinent. Interestingly, the ritual handbook of the Saivas, the Karmakaakramavali, is used both in Tamil Nadu and in Kashmir. Groups of Brahmins emigrated under some of the Sultans, notably Sikandar, (1489-1413), and especially also during the Afghan occupation (1752-1819) when they spread all over Northern India. Dhar family of Kashmiri Brahmins who claim that they originally emigrated under Sultan Sikandar, were employed by the Bahmanis and later worked for the Moghuls. Another Brahmin, Chander Bhan served as a munshi in the office of the Moghul prince Dara Shukoh. Another example of emigration under Afghans was that of the Kashmiri Pandit Nehru family, which spread all over Northern India.

However, the relationship between Brahmins and the king always has been ambiguous. The Gandhara Brahmins were imported by Mihirakula The Hun to buttress his rule in Kashmir. The Brahmins from Gandhara accepted agraharas from Mihirakula who established a thousand agraharas for Brahmins at Vijayesvara (Bijbehara in Kashmir). Mihirkula The Butcher, was probably goaded by the Brahmins, when he massacred the Buddhist bhikkus. When the Brahmins felt threatened or disturbed by royal politics, they took to various sorts of measures to rein in the kings. Usually, they put pressure on the king by mass fasting, often in the gokula, (matha – like monastic establishments for Brahmins)where the Brahmins always assembled to discuss religious and political issues. The pariadya (priests) and purohitas first tried to destroy king Tuga by a fast, then they began to employ sorcery against the kings, and are said to have killed several kings by magic. The Brahmins thus held considerable power exercised through fasts (prayogopavesana). Gandhi’s “satyagraha” and some others of his coercive methods have their predecessors here.

The king also bestowed the royal insignia on a Brahmin (to keep their kingly purity). Land holding Brahmins and temple priests were organized in ‘parads’, they and other pariadyas of temples met, with music, in the gokula for 5-6 days to elect the new king. The Brahmins’ extra-ordinary income is shown, for example, in Jonaraja’s Rajataragini, by an incident under King Sihadeva (1286-1301). The king performed an elaborate bathing ceremony of Vijayesvara with an expense of one lakh of gold niskas (gold coins) (weighing total 3.7 tonnes of gold)[52], under the guidance of the Brahmin Sakarasvami, who then received the income of 18 mathas from the king. In the same way, king Uccala (1101-1111) gave thousands of cows, horses, gold, and other gifts to Brahmins who officiated at sraddhas and at propitiatory rites in connection with bad omens, eclipses, comets, etc. Income was also gained from recitations at a temple and the recitation of Puranas. The Brahmins could also gain income, as some still do, from selling puja articles at temples. [53]

Vaishno Devi temple in Kashmir is one of the richest temples in India said to have 1.2 tonnes of gold and annual visits by 10 million pilgrims. Shrine was said to be discovered and established in the 10th Century AD. [54]The sole trustee of the temple under Dharmarth Trust, before being handed over to Shrine Board in 1986-87, was Dr.Karan Singh, a Kashmiri Brahmin, heir of Maharaja Gulab Singh and son of last King, Maharaja Hari Singh. Karan Singh served as Prince regent and Governor of Jammu and Kashmir in independent India. [55] During the first 20 days after the state take-over in 1986, the donations made inside the cave amounted to Rs 20 lakh in cash and gold and silver. Before the take-over, these inside offerings were shared by 4000 baridar Rajput and Samnotra Brahmin families. According to traditionally set formulas, a family’s “bari”(“turn”) could come every two, four or six years on a given day of that particular year. While the trust did not take money from inside the shrine, it collected property rent, voluntary donations and earned income from forest contracts. Shops closer to the shrines were given on year-long leases at between Rs 35 lakh and Rs 80 lakh in 1980s. The Dharmarth Trust earned half its income from Vaishno Devi.[54]

Thus, the mode of living of the Brahmin shows that with the complicity of the ruling class, they have shamelessly accumulated huge quantities of wealth, especially land and gold via the temples and donations, by fanning the fires of superstition with chicanery, fear and dubious religious texts, all for their own self-interest. The land gifted to them is tilled by the landless labor of castes not allowed to own land by the Laws of Manu, similar to slave labour. This explains how in today’s times also, standing crops are destroyed by machine-wielding state authorities, to hand over land to their groups. The gold accumulated in the temples and personally may be used to further control the price of gold in the market and set up lucrative ornaments and other businesses. They have active disdain for manual labour and contempt for the labouring castes. No wonder Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar has called them ‘most inveterate enemies of the servile classes’.[56] Thus, their morality is based only on self-interest and pursuit of power at the cost of misery of the masses. Any person who reveres and/or identifies with the labels given by them is still under Brahmin control and is adding to the wealth of this parasitic and highly moneyed caste.

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