Author – Dr Amritpal Kaur

According to Linda Alcoff, a feminist philosopher and social epistemologist, Identities are culturally located historical formations, open to reinterpretation. She conceptualises identity as the horizon of agency tied to a visible marked public identity and an internal lived subjectivity. Public identity is our socially perceived self within the systems of perception, classification and the networks of community in which we live whereas lived subjectivity refers to who we understand ourselves to be, how we experience being ourselves and the range of other reflective activities. Lived subjectivity doesn’t perfectly map onto one’s public identity. Likewise, when you ask any Sikh about the relationship between caste and Sikhism, he/she will state that a person who believes in caste cannot be a Sikh, but simultaneously engage in discriminatory practices.

The Sikh public identity as one who believes in equality is in stark contradiction with his lived subjectivity where discrimination based on caste and gender is not only rampant but a consistent phenomenon.

Caste as a pan Indian reality, exists everywhere. In order to understand how caste operates in Sikhism, we need to separate caste from Hinduism’s ideological framework of purity pollution and look at it as a historically evolved structure of social relations and political economy of a given region that sustains and reproduces caste in everyday life. Not looking at the ground social realities, often leaves an impression that Sikhism represents a homogeneity of castes. Caste may be dead ideologically in Sikhism but it survives and thrives as a source of identity.

Sikhism grew out of the powerful anti caste Sant tradition of 14th and 15th centuries in northern India. The Sant tradition, like bhakti tradition dwells in devotional bhakti with a sharp difference in their dispositions. Bhakti tradition is replete with warm emotions for incarnations of God with attributes (sarguna), while the bhakti of Sants is one of attributeless, formless or all pervading reality which is realizational. The Sants were little bothered about the hollow premises and rhetoric of the shastras. Gail Omvedt writes that the Sant tradition was influenced by Sahajyana, an offshoot of buddhism, and non vedic strand in the Sant tradition was an important legacy of Buddhism. Guru Nanak’s thought was a reworking of the Sant synthesis which culminated constructively in the advent of Sikhism.

As an organised religious system Sikhism established itself in 16th and 17th centuries in Punjab and is widely understood and celebrated as an egalitarian religion. The founder of Sikhism, Guru Nanak believed in an electric faith and being a mystic poet sang hymns of Namdev, Kabir, Ravidas, Sain, Beni. Sikhism’s devotional goal is to become one with the One who is Omnipotent, Omnipresent, fearless, all loving and without form. Thus the One is free from distinctions of caste, creed and gender. Nanak rejected ritualism, ascetic practices, idol worship and avtarwad. He framed the concept of dignity of labour and is known to have taken to cultivation of land conceptualising God as Sacha Wud Kirsan(The True Great Cultivator). Guru Angad, the second Sikh Guru, is believed to have earned his living by twisting ropes. Kirat karo, Vand Chhako, Naam Japo (Do labour, eat by sharing and recite god’s name) was the principle of all the Gurus.

Nanak identified himself with the lowliest of the low and initiated the egalitarian practices of Sangat (religious congregation), Langar (free community kitchen where food is prepared and served to all without distinction), Pangat (unstratified sitting arrangement) and Kadah Prasad (blessed food) which is served by and to all without discrimination. One of the important aspects of Nanak’s philosophy was his emphasis on worldliness. He denounced the caste system while living in the social world as against the choice available within classical Hinduism through renunciation and is, therefore, fondly remembered as a socially involved renunciate.

Nanak rejected Sanskrit in preference to the indigenous spoken language. The second Guru standardised the Gurmukhi script while the fifth Guru compiled the first canon of faith, the Adi Granth in which he included saints from shudra and untouchable castes such as Ravidas (a cobbler), Sadhan (a butcher) and Sain (a Barber), who have condemn the caste practice more vehemently than the gurus. The Adi Granth is considered to be the book of wisdom and not the word of God. As a socio-religious liberation force, Sikhism culminated in the creation of khalsa by the tenth guru, Guru Gobind Singh who believed that Manas ki Jaat Sab ek pacanbo (all men were from one caste) and chose five disciples (panj pyare) from different sections of the society (none from the untouchable caste) sharing the blessed water from one bowl.

Despite the ideological and scriptural rejection of the caste system, one reason for the contradicting identities of Sikhs could be that all the gurus came from khatri families and never married out of their khatri kinship. In early years the khatris were the prominent followers of the Panth (Guru’s path) and they entered the faith with their caste intact. It was neither expected nor required to discard the caste belongings by them. All gurus married their sons and daughters in khatri families and the followers were not expected to not follow the customary endogamous practice.

Due to a substantial lack of Dalit Sikh perspective on the Sikh history, most of the Dalit heroic characters who have contributed in the establishment of Sikh faith with their heart and soul, have been eliminated from the mainstream Sikh history narratives. The most noted Sikh history from a Dalit perspective was written by Naranjan Arifi who gives the account of Rangretas or Mazhabis (the untouchable caste of sweepers) joining the Sikh faith as early as the period of the fifth Guru Arjun(1563-1606).

The most famous dalit family was that of Bhai Jaita, a courageous warrior and a scholar poet, who composed a long poem Sri Guru Katha, that provides a good look into the life events of Guru Gobind Singh. Alas, it has escaped the notice of mainstream Sikh scholars who also happen to be high castes sikhs. His great grandfather had served the fifth and sixth gurus, whose son Sukhban was a musician and established a musical school, Sukhban’s son Jashban was close to the seventh and eighth gurus, his two sons Agya ran and Sadanand rendered gurbani for Delhi Sikh congregations, Sadanand becoming a close companion of the 9th guru. Jaita, the elder son of Sadanand carried the severed head of guru Teg Bahadur from Delhi to Anandpur in 1675. The tenth guru embraced him with a blessing “Rangrete guru ke bete”(the untouchables are guru’s sons) and proclaimed Jaita as his fifth son.

There were many Dalit warriors in guru Gobind Singh’s army while some of them were among the gurus 52 court poets. Kavi Dhanna Singh Ghai, Aalam Singh, Dhakkar Singh, Dharam Singh, Garja Singh, Man Singh and Nigahi Singh were notable ones. Wazir Singh was another poet of Punjabi and braj bhasha. Sadhu Daya Singh Arif, who mastered Gurmukhi, Urdu, Persian, Arabic, Sanskrit and Giani Ditt Singh, who in his book Naqli Sikh Prabodh stresses that baptised amritdhari sikh was identified primarily by his caste and he calls the upper caste sikhs as Naqli Sikhs (counterfeit sikhs), rarely find any mention in mainstream Sikh history narratives.

Amid sustained persecution by the mughals, Sikhs organised themselves into five warrior bands, one was entirely of Mazhabis or Rangretas under the command of Bir Singh Rangreta. After he was killed under a conspirative move by upper caste sikhs, Mazhabis were not allowed to hold any command position but their military prowess was used by several kingdoms (misals) which were selected on caste lines. They were somehow able to construct mazhabi singhan da Bunga (the lodging of mazhabis) in the golden temple complex in 1826, but it was converted to a dining hall later. There was an imperceptible rise of sanatan Sikhism, a fine mix of Hindu caste centric practices in Sikhism, in the second half of 18th century. Henry Steinbach, a European soldier in Ranjit Singh’s army made a keen observation- “The assumption of irresponsible power by Ranjit Singh destroyed to some degree the potency of khalsa”. Ranjit Singh, who founded the Sikh empire, abolished the collective management of the golden temple and allowed the right to appoint the temple manager.

The Sikh community has evolved through a complex interaction between religious principles, tribal cultural patterns of the dominant jat caste and their political interests. This has resulted in a Sikh caste hierarchy distinct from and yet parallel to that of Hindu caste hierarchy. The Jat caste (land owners) is considered to be at the top followed by khatris, Arora Sikhs who constitute the trading caste. These are followed by the artisan castes including Ramgarhias (Sikh carpenter caste) and Ahluwalias (kalals). The untouchable castes include Ramdasia Sikhs, ravidassia sikhs, Rai Sikhs, Mazhabi and Rangreta Sikhs. The Ramdasia Sikhs (Chamar Sikhs) consider themselves to be superior than ravidassia Sikhs while both these castes consider themselves superior to the Mazhabis and Rangreta Sikhs (Chuhra Sikhs).

The consolidation of caste in Sikhism needs to be understood in the context of large scale entry of Jats into Sikhism that not only helped them improve their low status (shudras in the context of Hindu caste hierarchy) but also turned them into a powerful community. Jats entered the Sikh fold during the time of sixth guru in large numbers and rose to a position of landowning aristocracy during the time of maharaja Ranjit Singh (1799-1839). Jats not only constituted a major part of Ranjit Singh’s army, were also the major recipients of the jagirs and religious grants. Irfan Habib says that Jats were the pastoral people first noticed in Punjab during 7th to 9th centuries, were known for their indifference to Brahmanical social stratification and the Gurus willingly raised them to the positions of high authority in the new Panth.

By providing their loyal support in the defeat of Indian mutiny (1857-58), Jats were substantially recruited by the British army as the most prominent martial races of India. Under the policy (1885-1940) related to the development of canal colonies involving allocation of land for ownership and cultivation was allocated to dominant landholding castes. The Punjab Alienation Act 1901 further privileged the positions of the Jats, by denying access to landholdings to the non agricultural castes. It was only after independence that Dr B.R Ambedkar as the Law minister moved to repeal the act in 1952 to remove this disability. Ambedkar told Rajya Sabha in 1954 that the untouchables or Kamins were not entitled to build their houses in a pucca form on the land in which they lived. They are always afraid lest the zamindars of Punjab may at any time turn them out. (Moon 1997 volume 15).

Britishers considered Mazhabis as good soldiers and opened recruitments for them in separate regiments of the imperial army, which somewhat raised their status. However, Mazhabi regiments were separate and distinguished from the exclusive Jat Sikh regiments.

The launch of the Singh Sabha movement during the 1880s with a slogan “We Sikhs are not Hindus” is considered to be the most powerful reform movement in the Sikh community, but unfortunately it was more interested in converting untouchables into Sikhism and opening schools and colleges. The social aspect of Sikh community by the early 20th century was described as Sanatan Sikh tradition. Mazhabis were forbidden to enter the golden temple for worship, their offerings of Kadah Prasad were not accepted and they were denied access to public wells and other utilities(Giani Pratap Singh 1933). As a result they started moving towards christianity as they were let down by Sikh practices. The Akali struggle for liberation of gurudwaras(1920-25) was dominated by Jats and caste equality or removal of Untouchability was contrary to their disposition of social domination. The green Revolution further raised the economic and political hold of the landowning class in general, widening the social inequalities.

Most of the Sikh values are Jat values and they assert that the Sikh national character (whatever his origin), is considered identical with the Punjabi Jat. The leadership of SGPC and communist parties has been a Jat leadership. Although there is a noticeable number of Mazhabi and ramdasi granthies (professional readers of the holy scripture) among the Sikhs, yet the control of religious institutions lies in the hands of the upper caste sikhs. The presence of SC Sikhs is not appreciated in their gurudwaras. They are instructed to sit at the end of the rows, to come for Langar at the end, kept out of service of cooking or serving food at Langar and occasionally not allowed to carry the Granth Sahib from the Jat gurudwara to a Dalit home for Akhand path. Separate gurudwaras and cremation grounds are a hard hitting reality in the Sikh society today. More than 80% of untouchable Sikhs live in rural areas away from infrastructural advancements. Incidents like rape, gangrape, stripping and walking Dalit women by Jat zamindars in the village in order to punish them for non payment of loans, social boycotts are a common sight. The Mazhabis and ramdasias are way backward economically, politically and socially than their counterparts who moved to Ad Dharm where they could score ample opportunities for educational and economical success.

Most of the schools in villages are called Dalit or harijan schools as upper castes do not send their children to government schools.

It is not enough to function through representation that is constructed by the other. This is equally true for the feminine principle in Sikhism. Sikhism, like all other religious systems, has an aggressive male presence, both institutional and domestic. While the religion is devoid of priestly class, one might assume that men and women would have equal access to working of the organised and institutionalised religion, but in practice these affairs are managed by men with women confined to the female tasks of food preparation and general cleaning. Whereas the faith allows equal access to worship and practice, but women have been ignored and dislocated from the institutional practices. Women have a limited or no access to feminist thought in hierarchical bound practice of the faith within religious institutions and Sikhism is no exception. Because of the dominance of androcentric ideology in the practice of Sikh faith and the interpretation of Sikh scriptures, Sikh women have always been placed outside the domain of shared knowledge and experiences. With new explanations of patriarchy, feminism and gender relations, many women have questioned the unwelcoming of female agency or feminine principle in active participation of Sikh practices. This one sided androcentric possibilities have lead to the exclusion of feminist possibilities as interpretators and commentators of the scripture.

Sikhism remains unreformed in traditional patriarchal kinship practices that depend on the intersection of gender and caste. It has a basis for ongoing caste and gender disparity among its followers. The Sikhs continue to arrange their house holdings around endogamous marriages which reproduce gender, caste and power that privilege men. The operation of caste and gender is further entangled with the dynamics of shame and honour. Many scholars have pointed out this disparity -” Women are far from equal in Sikh institutions

(Jhutti-Johal 2010), The Guru’s message may be out of step with contemporary feminist perspectives (Nayar2010, p 269), The masculinized khalsa centric Sikh body is not only normative but hegemonic (Alex,2001)”.

The householdings of Sikh families are not the nucleus of Sikh spiritual development as preached by Nanak, but have remained a prosaic, hierarchical and deeply unequal site of kinship. The ongoing inequalities of caste and gender are located in the doctrine of households within the traditional kinship and marriage system which not only reduces female existence to gender specific roles and negates female sexuality but has also remained untouched by Sikh revitalisation. While in Hinduism the fundamental location of caste and gender is the household, it becomes extremely difficult to address them when caste and gender do not find a conceptual place in the text.

Thus in Sikhism caste based sexual atrocities and dislocation of feminine agency lies covered under the blanket.

George Bernard Shaw once wrote that every intelligent man makes his own religion though there are a hundred versions of it. When Ambedkar failed in his attempt to annihilate caste through reformation of Hindu minds, he chose the path of religious conversion. He was keen on two indigenous religious traditions which have challenged Brahmanism in a thoroughgoing way – Buddhism and Sikhism.

He describes Buddhism as a world transforming religion and not only chooses Buddhism as an emancipatory religion for his followers but also reinterpreted Buddhism as Navyana that challenges Brahmanism (main exploitative system of Indian society), Marxism (main social ideology that opposes exploitation) and existing interpretation of Buddhism itself.

Ambedkar rejected Sikhism mainly because he could foresee that his people would suffer a huge political marginalisation if they join the Sikh faith as it is absolutely biased in practice. Ambedkar believed that cultivation of mind must be the ultimate aim of human existence and Dalits in all organised religions are denied the opportunities for intellectual activities. They are allowed to engage in the mainstream cultural narratives only as long as they remain passive worshippers or propagators of devotional spiritualism. The intellectual awakening of Dalits would amount to the political death of the oppressors. They are kept submerged in the mystic or metaphysical realm of devotional/divine spiritualism which not only kills any rebellious spirit but also hinders the unification of Dalits at a psychological level. This unity is the prerequisite for Dalit revolution to happen. According to Willa Appel, the marginal people who have no political voice, who lack effective organisations and who do not have regular institutional means of redressal inhabit a cult producing ability. This ability of Dalits and women is normalised by the oppressors.

Devotional spiritualism is no way better than a cult and it is tolerated because it has no power to effect cultural change.

Ambedkar found in Buddhism the opportunities for intellectual inquisitiveness, provability, humanism, scientific temperament, universal morality, questions about larger meanings of moral existence which were not present in other faiths as a collective. Buddha does not compartmentalise morality to religion or transcendental sphere or devotional spiritualism. Being non deterministic or absolutist (Buddha did not believe in root principle or mool mantra), Buddhism challenges to redefine spiritualism in terms of human and social relations. By doing so it helps to create concreteness of self within its corporeal surrounding rather than in some theoretical/notional assumption of universal self or any other self devised outside of human perception. Concreteness of self produces love/concern for others (compassion in dispassion) and is different from abstract individualism. For a socio-cultural Revolution Dalits need a spiritualism that will make them active thinkers and not mere passive worshippers. Buddha as a ‘Margadata’ shows us the way to climb the scala-menti (mental ladder) through the intellectual efforts in order to reach the ultimate truth. Ambedkar’s decision to choose Buddhism over Sikhism is a clear reflection of his intellectual stalwartness.

Lastly, I would like to add a few words from an ambedkarite journal advising Dalits of Punjab (see www.ambedkar.org, 10 june 2003) :-

“The Punjabi untouchables must grasp the truth that the Sikhs had over 250 years to get rid of Hindu caste system, but have miserably failed. There is no point in pursuing a path, which has already been tested and found to be leading nowhere. The answer still seems clear to me that Punjabi untouchables should reassess their position anew and embrace Buddhism like all educated Ambedkarites of India. There is still time to redress our past errors and to reclaim our separate identity and dignity by discarding Hinduism and all its branches by embracing Buddhism.”

At the same it would be interesting to observe how the hierarchical realities based on gender and geographical locations are taken care of in the revival of Buddhism project.

References:-
1. Visible Identities:- Race, Gender and the Self by Linda Alcoff.
2. The Sants by Schooner and McLeod
3. Religious Rebels of Punjab by Mark Juergensmeyer
4. Making Sense of Dalit History by Raj Kumar Hans.
5. The Sikhs, Ideology, Institutions and Identity by Jagtsr Singh Grewal.
6. Sikhism and Caste Question by Surinder S Jodhka
7. Scheduled castes in Sikh Community – a historical perspective by Harish K Puri
8. Structures of Social exclusion, dear culture and Dalit social mobility in contemporary east Punjab by Ronki Ram
9. Jats of Punjab and Sindh by Irfan Habib
10. Ranghrehtian da Itihas by Niranjan Arifi
11. Castes of mind – colonialism and the making of modern India by Nicholas B Dirk’s
12. Understanding Sikhism, feminist critique of socio-religuous discourse by Satwinder Bains.
13. The body of the gurus- Sikh scriptures from a contemporary feminist perspective.
14. Relocating Gender in Sikh practices by Doris Jacobsh
15. Dr Ambedkar and Punjabi by DC Ahir.
16. Buddhism in India – challenging Brahmanism and caste by Gail Omvedt
17. The Sikhs by Khushwant Singh.
18. Books by W.H. McLeod, (a) The Sikh concept of caste (b) The evolution of Sikh community
19. Cults of America – programmed for paradise by Willa Appel

About the author – Dr Amritpal Kaur is an oral n dental surgeon practising in Jalandhar, Punjab.