JAT-PAT-TODAK MANDAL OF LAHORE--V
Some have dug
a biological trench in defence of the Caste System. It is said that the object
of Caste was to preserve purity of race and purity of blood. Now ethnologists
are of opinion that men of pure race exist nowhere and that there has been a
mixture of all races in all parts of the world. Especially is this the case
with the people of India. Mr. D. R. Bhandarkar in his paper on Foreign Elements in the Hindu Population
has stated that " There is hardly a class, or Caste in India which has not
a foreign strain in it. There is an admixture of alien blood not only among the
warrior classes—the Rajputs and the Marathas—but also among the Brahmins who
are under the happy delusion that they are free from all foreign
elements." The Caste system cannot be said to have grown as a means of
preventing the admixture of races or as a means of maintaining purity of blood.
As a matter of fact Caste system came into being long after the different races
of India had commingled in blood and culture. To hold that distinctions of
Castes or really distinctions of race and to treat different Castes as though
they were so many different races is a gross perversion of facts. What racial
affinity is there between the Brahmin of the Punjab and the Brahmin of Madras ?
What racial affinity is there between the untouchable of Bengal and the
untouchable of Madras ? What racial difference is there between the Brahmin of
the Punjab and the Chamar of the Punjab ? What racial difference is there
between the Brahmin of Madras and the Pariah of Madras ? The Brahmin of the
Punjab is racially of the same stock as the Chamar of the Punjab and the
Brahmin of Madras is of the same race as the Pariah of Madras. Caste system
does not demarcate racial division. Caste system is a social division of people
of the same race. Assuming it, however, to be a case of racial divisions one
may ask : What harm could there be if a mixture of races and of blood was
permitted to take place in India by intermarriages between different Castes ?
Men are no doubt divided from animals by so deep a distinction that science
recognizes men and animals as two distinct species. But even scientists who
believe in purity of races do not assert that the different races constitute
different species of men. They are only varieties of one and the same species.
As such they can interbreed and produce an offspring which is capable of
breeding and which is not sterile. An immense lot of nonsense is talked about
heredity and eugenics in defence of the Caste System. Few would object to the
Caste System if it was in accord with the basic principle of eugenics because
few can object to the improvement of the race by judicious noting. But one
fails to understand how the Caste System secures judicious mating. Caste System
is a negative thing. It merely prohibits persons belonging to different Castes
from intermarrying. It is not a positive method of selecting which two among a
given Caste should marry. If Caste is eugenic in origin then the origin of
sub-Castes must also be eugenic. But can any one seriously maintain that the
origin of sub-Castes is eugenic ? I think it would be absurd to contend for
such a proposition and for a very obvious reason. If Caste means race then
differences of sub-Castes cannot mean differences of race because sub-Castes
become ex hypothesia sub-divisions of
one and the same race. Consequently the bar against intermarrying and
interdining between sub-Castes cannot be for the purpose of maintaining purity
of race or of blood. If sub-Castes cannot be eugenic in origin there cannot be
any substance in the contention that Caste is eugenic in origin. Again if Caste
is eugenic in origin one can understand the bar against intermarriage. But what
is the purpose of the interdict placed on interdining between Castes and
sub-Castes alike ? Interdining cannot infect blood and therefore cannot be the
cause either of the improvement or of deterioration of the race. This shows
that Caste has no scientific origin and that those who are attempting to give
it an eugenic basis are trying to support by science what is grossly
unscientific. Even today eugenics cannot become a practical possibility unless
we have definite knowledge regarding the laws of heredity. Prof. Bateson in his
Mendel's Principles of Heredity says,
" There is nothing in the descent of the higher mental qualities to
suggest that they follow any single system of transmission. It is likely that
both they and the more marked developments of physical powers result rather
from the coincidence of numerous factors than from the possession of any one
genetic element." To argue that the Caste System was eugenic in its
conception is to attribute to the forefathers of present-day Hindus a knowledge
of heredity which even the modern scientists do not possess. A tree should be
judged by the fruits it yields. If caste is eugenic what sort of a race of men
it should have produced ? Physically speaking the Hindus are a C3 people. They
are a race of Pygmies and dwarfs stunted in stature and wanting in stamina. It
is a nation 9/1Oths of which is declared to be unfit for military service. This
shows that the Caste System does not embody the eugenics of modem scientists.
It is a social system which embodies the arrogance and selfishness of a
perverse section of the Hindus who were superior enough in social status to set
it in fashion and who had authority to force it on their inferiors.
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