Change, be glad, be happy

http://bit.ly/1TN2KNF
Teotonio R. de Souza
A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine wrote a column here decrying the ugly past of caste
discrimination, women reduced to sex-objects, religion led by fanatics, and so on. It sounded
like one of those songs of lamentations in Latin, like Deus meus cur derelinquisti me? (=My
God, why have you abandoned me?) which one heard year after year like the pre-monsoon
showers during the Holy Week, and which devout Goan catholics miss in the post-Liberation
Goa. Since God in post-Liberation Goa understands Konkani, a change for the better, but the
preachers of yore displayed their flashes of divine wisdom to the rural faithful with impressive
Latin quotes.
My London-based author-friend makes use of every available occasion for passionate pleas
for change, presuming obviously that it will bring cheer and happiness to mankind in India and
the rest of the world. London has that tradition since the times A. Huxleys Brave New World.
But Huxleys utopian fiction did not save England and Europe from World War II, and I fear my
friends utopianism and desire for change may go the same way.
The visible lack of some serious reflection about the past social and economic contexts that
made various situations, seen now as ugly and regrettable, both possible and admissible,
leaves a reader like me somewhat skeptical about the bursts of enthusiasm of the lovers of
change.
It is fashionable today to be prophet activists, but most candidates ignore why Israel of old
needed Judges and Prophets. The former led the people during times when there were no
consecrated kings, and the latter were a sort of theologians of History, who warned the kings
from time to time of dangers of leading the people astray with changes they wished to bring
about. It would shock the modern candidates for prophecy that that historic task of a prophet
in the Bible was to ensure against changes that deviated from the Past, from the compact with
God of Israel.
I would recommend to my change-loving activists the reading of a small booklet containing
Upton lectures delivered in 1926 at Manchester College, Oxford, by Indias second President S.
Radhakrishnan, and entitled The Hindu View of Life. He delivered them more or less at the
same time Hunxley wrote his Brave New World. Anticipating the ethnic cleansing that Hitler
would set in motion, Radhakrishnan presented the rise of caste system in India as a Hindu
solution to ethnic cleansing.
In a country like India that has suffered repeated tides of immigration across centuries, the EU
non-solution of today woud be disastrous and Jewish holocaust a relatively minor tragedy. One
cannot forget 10 millions refugees that came from Bangladesh in 70s and stayed on. EU today
with more resources is fretting and fuming about a couple of million immigrants, which it
insists in calling refugees, shunting them from country to country, and raising walls. When it
suited the West European politicians the Berlin Wall was a scandal. Radhakrishnan explains
that despite modern views about caste discriminations and exclusions, those were introduced
as a Hindu solution to large-scale population influxes.
Two main characteristics of a caste are the practices of social isolation through commensality
and banning of intermarriages. Viewed without modern prejudices about social exclusion,

freedom to choose marriage partner, freedom to eat with whomever one chooses and
whatever one wishes, the refugees generally dislike their women being taken over by strangers
or being forced to eat what they are not used to. The caste ensured these protections and
allowed the immigrants to lead their lives peacefully, contributing to the host society with
their skills. The castes were also professional schools that preserved and transmitted those
skills from generation to generation.
One has to agree that many of the exaggerations and abuses in the past practices need to be
reviewed and changed, but the West forgets its pedagogy when convenient. Motivating
through education, rather than imposing by law and force need to be the instruments of a
healthy change. But even there we may see hurdles difficult to bypass, such as the
intermarriages among Konkani speaking Goans of different castes. My London-based Goan
friend has certainly this grievance in the catalogue for change.
Marriage is not just between two individuals. It also links families, and marriage outside ones
family sought and ensured this social enrichment. Marriage is also to enjoy a pleasant life
together, not an option for constant irritations day in and day out. I doubt a brahmin used to
taka will bear for long hearing a chardo wifes teka. This is only a sample of linguistic
undertones that will not vanish with love and passion.