Why Dalits embrace Buddhism and not Islam

Often a question arises for a Dalit  - If Hinduism treats them as outcasts, then which religion would they chose. The options for some are Christianity, some are Islam and most are Buddhist. So why choose Buddhism. It is not my intent to insult any religion and I am only outlining what is already said in religious books. I also apologize if this post comes across as offensive or divisive. 

On closer inspection of Islam, one thing that is disturbing is the Islamic Hadiths that talk about the whiteness of the prophet. If you look at this link it talks about all the Hadiths extolling the fair complexion of the prophet to a great extent 

https://wikiislam.net/wiki/Qur'an,_Hadith_and_Scholars:Muhammad's_White_Complexion

Even in today's world, Islam has different sects and some Muslims are treated inferior to others. Though this might be a generalization, Arabs have a history of looking down upon people who are from Africa and the subcontinent (even if they are Muslims). Read up on evidences of maid torture to learn more.

Another disturbing thing about Islam was that there are specific verses that talk about owning slaves in a war and mistreatment of non-believers. Owning slaves is never a good thing. Irrespective of whether it is a powerful Dalit or Brahmin or Muslim or whatever, you cannot be allowed to hold slaves. Slavery is bad no matter who does it. 

The Buddha was an enlightened soul who gave up everything to extol the virtues of peace and kindness. He never spoke about war, never spoke about having slaves. He spoke about compassion and peace, even to his worst enemies. 

Jesus was in many ways similar, but there has been caste discrimination of Dalits by caste Christians. This usually does not come out but I have seen numerous instances in villages where caste Christians belittle the Dalits and commit atrocities on them.

In today's India when Dalits look upon the ills of Hinduism and decide to leave the Hindu fold, Buddhism should be the only logical choice. Buddishm was most appealing to Babasaheb because his teachings fall right into place given our geographical and cultural context. 

Time for a Dalit introspection

There needs to be a time for Dalits to introspect. There are several issue plaguing Dalit society from within. Let us compare with an example - Most African American kids take pride in their aggression. They want everyone to know that they are from the hood or the ghetto. There is a similar feeling amongst Dalit youth of today.

Revolution can be aggressive but attitudes and lifestyles cannot. Dalits need to be militant to protect themselves against unwanted aggression by caste Indians. However, they should refrain from self destructive habits.

Babasaheb Ambedkar did not want to take up an aggressive path. When he chose his religion, he chose carefully. Buddha stood for non violence and peace. He was careful not to espouse wanton violence. However, today among the Dalit youth alcoholism and alcohol fueled aggression are rampant.  Dalit women face the brunt abused not only by non-dalits but also by some Dalit men with these aggressive mindsets.

Why Dalits must learn English

We Dalits definitely need to learn English as our primary language.  Before language zealots from all communities assail me let me say that I am not opposed to learning ones mother tongue. That comes by default. By learning a regional language you can compete in that region with members of that region. However, the competitive gap widens because of English.

Language zealots in all states push for their respective language and give their kids education in English. When it comes to English only Dalits get left behind. This is typical of the language medium schools. Most Dalits go to schools run by the state government and because the states insist that their language be given priority most of these government run schools are in the regional language medium. In Tamil Nadu, most government schools are Tamil medium. Even there, caste discrimination exists. On getting out of school, even with reservation in place students educated in regional language feel like fish out of the pond in colleges where the language of study predominantly is in English.

A Tamil Nadu Dalit  cannot converse with a UP Dalit because they cannot speak a common language. Many have argued that that common language could be Hindi. But that is again, pushing Dalits into the India bucket. English allows us to compete outside of India as well. So why compete in India, why not compete in the world?

So, Dalits should lobby hard for these schools to be converted to English medium. Regional language can be made mandatory. Everyone will learn it. However, it is better if education is imparted in English. Language zealots cannot and must not divide the downtrodden.

Dalit Women - the most stigmatized in society

We see a lot of articles written about inter-caste marriages.  If you take a count of those marriages between Dalits and Non dalits you will almost always see that the incidence of male Dalits marrying outside their caste is more than that of female Dalits marrying outside their caste. There is an unproven hypothesis that males try to marry outside their class more than females (especially if their class is an oppressed one)

To this claim, I have seen African American women miffed at the idea of their men marrying white women. They claim - we do not see the reverse happening.  At least, the African American women can speak out loudly and freely. In India, this is not the case.

Add to it, India's obsession with skin color. This has created several deep rooted issues in the psychology of all Indians. Most Indian movies, especially south Indian ones clearly show males going after females who are fair skinned (and implied to be from the "upper" castes.) Why can't a movie show a caste Hindu or a Brahmin falling for a Dalit girl. And please let the Dalit girl be played by someone who looks like Tamilian.

Even famous Dalit leaders such as Thirumalvalavan mentioned in speech the need for Dalit men to marry caste Hindu women. "Every caste Hindu woman should have an Adi Dravidar husband". Why not extend the same to Dalit women. Has any leader come out and said black is beautiful, so marry Dalit women. Has any leader encouraged non-dalits to marry Dalit women. Sadly, male chauvinism knows no caste.

If anything specific actions should be taken for the upliftment of Dalit women. Dalit women bear the brunt of being a Dalit and a Female. They need help for these odds to be surmounted. Statistics should be collected. Support is a must for Dalit women. And intercaste marriages of Dalit women with non Dalits should be encouraged. Activists in India should stand up and take notice. 

Dalits and Brahmins should unite - especially in the southern states like Tamil Nadu

This might be an unpopular topic to write on, and one that my fellow Dalits would disagree with, but one that I felt should be written. Brahmins and Dalits in South India (especially Tamil Nadu) must unite. Why is this important? I have tried to outline why a Brahmin Dalit unity is very very important in today’s context. That is not just the way forward, but how it should have been. I hope to not offend any readers whichever caste they might be from. We all  would need to strive for a casteless society but certain facts must be stated. Also, I do talk about caste Hindus here just as an historical context but there could be caste Christians as well discriminating against us Dalits. 

So, why do I feel Brahmins and Dalits need to unite? 

Personal Experience 

As a Tamil Dalit, my friends who were Brahmin Iyers were the only ones who did NOT question my caste. Everyone else, like the Thevars and Mudaliars criticized the Dalits without knowing which caste I belonged to. Later, they tried to casually talk behind our Brahmin friends’ backs, saying things like “Oh those brahmins propagated caste”. This is a typical pattern used by non-Brahmin caste Hindus and every Dalit should be cautious not to fall into this trap. 

It is not  hard to reverse this interpolation into history. Probably as some say (and I don’t care much for religious texts of any faith) the caste was based on occupation not birth. The keepers of the rituals were Brahmins but the powerful ones were the ruling, and business castes. It is very easy to imagine the timid Brahmins being threatened by these powerful ruling castes to change this narrative into one of birth. I use timid not in a negative way but only to mean that Brahmins are not proud of aggression, a trait that I see to this day. 

Somehow, I am not convinced that the entire caste Hindu population were asked to take up casteism by the Brahmins who still are merely a 3% of the population. The Kshatriyas and Vaishyas are an intelligent bunch. Do you think they would blindly listen to a minority? For a poor priest, it does not matter if a Dalit gives him a rupee or a Devar gives him a rupee. Caste matters however for a powerful landowner who works in the land for cheap. An unending supply of cheap bonded labor is what they needed. 

Take a look at caste based violence perpetrated against the Dalits. Vitriolic attacks usually come from the non-brahmin castes. Devars, Vanniyars and Gounders have taken up the mantle to attack Dalits. The Brahmins on the other hand rarely (if at all) resort to violence. I have personally seen Brahmins married into Arundhathiyar families and coexisting peacefully. I have a friend married to a Brahmin woman and the family rallies around him like he is their own. Again, these are personal examples and cannot be applied to all situations. 

History

There have been many Brahmins supportive of the Dalit cause once they have realized the folly of their ways. A few examples:

- Vaidyanatha Iyer led the Tamil Nadu Harijana Sabha and was instrumental in the temple entry movement (which again was hijacked by caste Hindus)

- Ramanujacharya, another brahmin was instrumental in trying to eradicate caste. Now, Dravidian leaders pen serials in praise of him.

- Bharathiar - reviled by nearly everyone had scant respect for people who practiced casteism.

- Adi Sankara himself is said to have recognized the folly of caste when Shiva came to him in the form of a beggar

I can also take a list of people from the North like Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Ishwar Chandra Vidhyasagar  but that would be unnecessary.

The British invasion happened and the Brahmins worked for the British along with the caste Hindus and that became their undoing. The British in a bid to divide bought caste into highlight and was lapped up by the caste Hindus.

When the above mentioned Brahmins started realising their folly and began expressing their solidarity with Dalits the Dravidian movement arrived. The non-brahmin upper caste came up with an idea to unite the masses for a common cause - Pick the population who are just 3% and heap the blame on them. Also, they themselves categorized their communities as BC, OBC etc. Their modus operandi - we might have been the ruling class but now we are BC, OBC. How this is palatable in today’s societies is beyond comprehension. 

These Dravidian groups also had a Tamil national identity. Again, Dalits and Brahmins were left out of this. A Sakkiliyar would be categorized as Telugu and for no reason at all Brahmins were regarded as Sanskrit speakers in spite of them being extremely tied to Tamil as their mother tongue - (e.g. UV Swaminatha Iyer etc). You could never ask a Naicker where he was from, or a Mudaliar if he was a Kerala Mudali. If you are thinking the ties between a Tamil Naicker and their counterparts in Andhra are tenuous you are right. So are the ties between Brahmin/Dalits and their  counterparts in the other states. 

So my fellow Dalits be very very wary of this Brahmin baiting by non-Brahmin caste Hindus.