New Ideas in India During the Nineteenth Century | Page 9

when we reach the consideration of new religious ideas, ideas.

[Sidenote: New ideas opposed to caste, namely, individual liberty and
nationality.]
If Hinduism as a social system is to be moved by the modern spirit, we
may look for movement in the direction of freedom of individual action,
that is, the loosening of caste; we may look for larger ideas of
nationality and citizenship, superseding to some extent the idea of caste.
As is not infrequent in India, Government pointed out the way for
public opinion. In 1831 the Governor-General, Lord William Bentinck,
issued his fiat that no native be debarred from office on account of
caste, creed, or race, and that a son who had left his father's religion did
not thereby forfeit his inheritance.
[Sidenote: Loosening of caste.]
To any observer it is now plain that while caste is still a very powerful
force, and even while new castes, new social rings, are being formed
through the working of the spirit of exclusiveness, the general ideas of
caste are undergoing change. In these latter days one can hardly credit
the account given of the consternation in Calcutta in 1775, when the
equality of men before the law was asserted, and the brahman,
Nanda-kumar, was hanged for forgery. Many of the orthodox brahmans
shook off the dust of the polluted city from their feet and quitted
Calcutta for a new residence across the Hooghly. In 1904, we find
conservative Hindus only writing to the newspapers to complain that
even in the Hindu College at Benares, the metropolis of Hinduism,
some of the members of the College Committee were openly violating
the rules of caste. In the same year a Calcutta Hindu newspaper, the
_Amrita B[=a]z[=a]r Patrik[=a]_, declared, "Caste is losing its hold on
the Hindu mind."[12] The recent denunciation of caste by an
enlightened Hindu ruler, the Gaekwar of Baroda, is a further significant
sign of the times.
[Sidenote: Offences against caste.]
What does caste forbid and punish? Freedom of thought, if not
translated into social act, has not been an offence against caste at any
time in the period under review, neither has caste taken cognisance of

sins against morality as such. The sins that caste has punished have
been chiefly five, as follows: Eating forbidden food, eating with
persons of lower caste, crossing the sea, desertion of Hinduism for
another religion, marrying with a person of a lower caste, and, in many
communities also, marrying a widow. The Hindustani proverb, "Eight
brahmans, nine cooking-places," hits off with a spice of proverbial
exaggeration the old punctiliousness about food. The sin of eating
forbidden food is thus described by Raja Rammohan Roy in 1816: "The
chief part of the theory and practice of Hinduism, I am sorry to say,"
writes the Raja, "is made to consist in the adoption of a peculiar mode
of diet; the least aberration from which (even though the conduct of the
offender may in other respects be pure and blameless) is not only
visited with the severest censure, but actually punished by exclusion
from the society of his family and friends. In a word, he is doomed to
undergo what is commonly called loss of caste."[13] Now, in respect of
the first three of these offences, in all large centres of population the
general attitude is rapidly changing. In the light of modern ideas, these
prohibitions of certain food and of certain company at food, and of sea
voyages, are fading like ghosts at dawn. An actual incident of a few
years ago reveals the prevailing conflict of opinion, especially with
regard to the serfdom which ties down Indians to India.
[Sidenote: An actual case.]
Two scions of a leading family in a certain provincial town of Bengal,
brave heretics, made a voyage to Britain and the Continent, and while
away from home, it was believed, flung caste restrictions to the winds.
On their return, the head of the family gave a feast to all of the caste in
the district, and no one objected to the presence of the two voyagers at
the feast. This was virtually their re-admission into caste. But shortly
after, a document was circulated among the caste complaining, without
naming names, of the readmission of such offenders. The tactics
employed by the family of the offenders are noteworthy. The demon of
caste had raised his head, and they dared not openly defy him. So the
defence set up was the marvellous one that, while on board ship and in
Europe, the young men had never eaten any forbidden or polluted food.
They had lived upon fruit, it was said, which no hand except their own

had cut. The old caste sentiment was so strong that the family of the
voyagers felt compelled to bring an action for libel against the
publishers of