35 Social and Cultural Awakening in India

D. Subramanyam Reddy

1. Introduction

The British rule in India had perceptible social and cultural influence on Indian society. After the battle of Kirkee in 1817, British rule became politically steadier than ever before. It helped introduction of a series of reforms. One of them was the abolition of Sati.

1.1 Sati :

In the early years of 19th century, Sati was mainly confined to Bengal. In Hooghly, Nadia and Burdwan which formed part of Calcutta division, the largest number of Satis took place. In Ghazipur, now in Uttar Pradesh and Shahabad, now in Bihar the practice was not unknown; in fact, it increased from 20s of 19th century. In Western India, excepting Konkan, the practice was rare. The annual variation here was between 27 and 40 upto 1827. In southern India, only Ganjam, Machilipatnam and Tanjavur had fairly large Sati occurrences. In Rajputana, Punjab and Kashmir the practice was stopped by Charles Metcalfe with the backing of Mughal tradition. In Aligarh and Agra, Sati seldom occurred. In foreign settlements like Goa, Serampore, Chinsura and Chandernagore it was prohibited and hence a few cases occurred. In the six divisions of Bengal, the number of Satis approximated more than three-fourths of the total in British India. The annual variation, here, was between 378 and 839 from 1815 to 1828. The practice existed among all castes. But, in districts like Nadia, Varanasi and Shahabad most of the Satis confined to Brahmins and Rajputs. Among the princely families, the sense of pride and heroism elevated Sati into noble act. But, the rite was mostly practiced by women whose husbands belonged to the middle and lower middle classes. The causes contributing to the continuation of Sati include the position of women in the Hindu system, the plurality of wives in some cases (particularly among Kulin Brahmins), the prospect of enforced austerity after the husband’s demise, social convention, strong local feeling in favour of the rite, the malevolent intentions of the Brahmins, the antiquity and adoration of the practice.

It took the British authorities more than thirty years to abolish Sati. The regulation of 1812, an earliest measure relating Sati did not think of abolishing the rite. It merely said the practices allowed or prohibited by religion would be maintained as they were. But, girls under sixteen, women pregnant or under the influence of drugs or with infants in arms were to be restrained from performing Sati.

Though, the checking of the practice, the presence of a police officers on the spot and his dissuasive efforts, mild punishments in cases of irregularity, the preparation of Sati lists eveny year and prevention of illegal Satis formed part of the Government policy, the number of Satis did not diminish. In fact, the presence of police officer at the time of Sati made people to take less notice of Sati though the number of Satis deminished in certain years, as in 1822-24, the number never reached the figure of 1815.

The Court of Directors could have tried to end the practice. But, they left to the discretion of the Governor–General. However, the Evagelicals in England, particularly Wilberforce and Lord Teignmouth took lot of interest in the abolition of Sati in 1813. On the basis of the information they got from the Serampore missionaries, William Carey and William Ward. Carey and Ward had employed persuasive and propaganda technique for the prevention of Sati through the Friend of India and the Periodical Accounts. Rammohan Roy had also published his tracts in 1818-1820, making the point that the rite of Sati was not enjoined by the Sastras. This material was used by the Serampore missionaries to shatter the generally accepted view that Sati was an integral part of the Hindu religion. Orthodox Hindu opinion against the abolition of Sati was advocated by Radhakanta Deb, and Bhawani Charan Banerji.

When Bentinck took up the question of Sati, he found that the abolition had been recommended by the judges of the criminal courts. To be on safe side, he wrote to 49 officers asking their views on the possible effect of the suppression, particularly in the army. Majority of them opined that there would be no problem. Then he passed Regulation XVII on December 4, 1829 ‘declaring the practice of Sati or burning or burying alive the widows of Hindus, illegal and punishable by Criminal Courts’. Similar legislative measures were later enacted in Bombay and Madras.

1.2 Infanticide:

Infanticide was notice by Sir John Malcom in Malwa where it was prevalent among “some Rajput chiefs of higher classes”. It was mainly confined to the Rajputs of Varanasi, Kathiawar, Kutch, Jabalpur and Sagar. In Kathiawar and Kutch as also in Rajputana the practice was very common. In the former areas it owed its origin to the Jahreja migrations from Sindh. Jaipur, Jodhpur, Kota and Bundi were the principal places in Rajputana where the practice was of frequent occurrence. This was because the Rajputs were too proud to give their daughters in marriage to men of a humbler status. In districts like Jhelum and Rawalpindi in Punjab and in States like Mandi and Jammu and Kashmir, the practice was prevalent. Under special circumstances the Sikhs also killed their infant daughters. The act was performed in secrecy through strangulation or starvation of the child or the application of acoud (probably juice of the ak) to the nipples of the suckling mother.

The existence of infanticide was mainly due to the deplorable position of women in Hindu society. The burdensome dowry system and compulsory lavishness in expenditure on marriage, the extraordinary demands of caranas (bards and genealogists), the difficulty of finding suitable husbands, and the Rajput sense of honour and pride were some of the causes for this. Having unmarried daughters was also considered neglect of religious duty and a social shame.

Since infanticide had no religious sanction behand it the British government evolved a clear-cut policy in this regard. In Bengal and Western India agreements were concluded with local chieftains and landlords; literature on the criminality of the rite was circulated; prizes were given for anti-infanticide essays, and fines were imposed for violating the agreements. The Bengal Regulation XXI of 1795 declared it to be murder. It was extended to the new provinces in 1804. Even then, the practice existed in secrecy in 1813 also. In Kathiawar, in 1834, the proportion was 60 out of 183, and in 1841, it was 232 out of 506. On November 28, 1843 the Bombay government informed the Court of Directors that not a single instance of infanticide came to the notice of the Political Agent in 1841. In 1851, the government claimed that, in Kutch, a more or less the same number existed in sexes. In Punjab, as in other regions, the method of persuasion, fines and entering into agreements with local rulers was followed. There was also some special legislation. All these reduced infanticide. The relaxation of the rule of hypergamy as also the pressure of public opinion eradicated it entirely.

1.3 Slavery :

Slavery practiced in the name of Hinduism and Islam was of two types: domestic and predial. To these could be added the nautch girls and prostitutes. Slavery was prevalent in Malwa, Malabar, Dacca (Bangladesh), Delhi and the Presidencies of Bengal and Madras. Predial slavery existed mainly in Bengal, Madras, Assam, Coorg and southern Bombay. In 1812, it was estimated that one-sixth of the population of Sylhet (Bangladesh) consisted of slaves. They were mostly descendants of insolvent debtors. In Kamarup 12,000 slaves were released after its cession to the British. Large numbers of slaves migrated from Rajputana as fugitivs from Maratha oppression. Slaves were exported to Poona and the Deccan where they fetched high prices and brought in large profits to the Maratha Brahmins. In Dacca the slaves accounted for one-sixth of the whole population. In Malwa, it confined mainly to females. In southern Maratha, domestic slaves numbered 15,000. In Cochin, the slaves numbered 12,000. Deccan had domestic slaves but no agricultural slaves. In Malabar, both these types existed. In 1819, there were 82,000 slaves in Kanara and 1,00,000 slaves in Malabar. Slavery existed in northern India, especially in Punjab and Kashmir. In 1841, Sir Bartle Frere estimated the number of slaves in British India (as then constituted) as eight to nine millions.

The Portuguese, the Dutch, the French, the Arabs and “ several foreign European seafaring people and traders” purchased and collected children of both sexes in a clandestine manner and exported them overseas. This traffic in slaves was attacked by Cornwallis in a proclamation of 1789. The same kind of proclamation was issued by the Madras Government in 1790. Through private merchants and commercial houses and the hired agents (who were offered rewards), the offenders were convicted, tried before the Supreme Court, Calcutta, and sentenced. In 1811, Regulation X was passed by the Bengal government for preventing the “importing of slaves, either by land or sea, into any of the territories under the Presidency of Fort William”. This regulation was given wide publicity and the same was communicated to the local governments of Bombay, Java, the Prince of Wales Islands, Mauritius, and Ceylon and to the Resident of Fort Marlborough. Traders who were imported slaves into British territory were apprehended, especially those from the hill country. In the districts of Bareilly, Moradabad, Kanpur, Farrukhabad, Elawah, Agra, Aligarh and Saharanpur the traffic in slaves was prohibited.

Regulation III of 1832 disallowed traffic in slaves from one province to another province, but permitted it within the district. This law was openly defied in Calcutta; children were hawked about in the streets. The traffic in slaves from one district to another district was made a penal offence. Act V of 1843 provided that the civil courts should not take cognizance of claims to slaves, a measure which abolished the right of slavery and ultimately paved the way for the total eradication of this evil. Similar measures were taken in the state of Travancore in 1855. Slavery now began to disappear in British India, to which alone the Act of 1843 applied, and all trade and possession of slaves was finally prohibited by the Penal Code of 1860.

1.4 Child Marriage :

Though the Government did not interfere in matters relating to child marriage, polygamy and widow remarriage, the missionary zeal for social reforms, western ideas of humanitarianism and equality, religious movements like the Brahmo Samaj in Bengal and the Arya Samaj in the North and movements of a secular character like the Indian National Social Conference, the Depressed Classses Mission and the Servants of India Society led to prohibition of child marriage and polygamy and removal of the ban on widow remarriage.

It was in 1860 that an Act was passed to deal with the age of cons ent and consummation and not with the marriage ceremony itself. It raised the age for consummation of marriage in the case of girls to ten. In 1891, the age of consent was raised to twelve for girls. In 1925, the age was raised to thirteen for married girls and fourteen for unmarried ones. In 1929, the Child Marriage Restraint Act, known as the Sarda Bill (after its mover, Rai Sahib Harbilas Sarda) was passed. It penalized parties to marriage where the girl was below fourteen or the boy below eighteen years of age. The law came into force in 1930. The census of 1931 showed that there was an orgy of infant marriages, and the law was regarded as anti-religious. The Act could not be effectively implemented due to lack of machinery for enforcing its provisions, and unwillingness of the people. By the Hindu Marriage Act of 1955, the minimum age limit for the bridegroom was fixed at eighteen years and for the bride at fifteen.

The raising of the age of marriage among the educated classes has been effective largely due to education, economic pressure, and break-up of the joint family system. The lower castes are generally anxious to adopt their usages to those of their superiors as a means of enhancing their own social prestige.

1.5 Joint family:

The legislative measures on inheritance and the marriage rights of women have enabled woman to emerge as an individual personality and exercised a tremendous influence on the joint family and carried forward slowly the work of disintegration, originally started by the judiciary in its administration of Hindu law. Due to the force of migrations, the extension of communications and the growth of an individualist spirit the institution of joint family no longer remain inviolate.

1.6 Caste :

The British, by and large, maintained neutrality in matters of caste. They regarded it as the steel frame of Hinduism. But, the pressure of western ideas and missionary propaganda brought changes in caste from early 19th century. This happened, at first, among the students of the Hindu College and the Medical College, Calcutta. The only legislation having direct bearing on the caste system was the Caste Disabilities Removal Act XXI of 1850. It protected converts either to Christianity or Islam from losing rights due to change of religion. In 1933, an Act for removing caste tyranny was passed in Baroda. Its object was to impose legal restraints on further divisions of castes and sub-castes.

Changes in caste system was also due to English education, modern civilization, growth of industry, greater mobility, voyages overseas to western countries, and reform movements like the Self Respect Movement and the Indian National Social Conference. Brahmins were deprived of their immunity from capital punishment. The judicial system has impaired the caste Panchayats and councils. There was also weakening of restrictions against eating, drinking and inter-caste marriage, particularly among the educated classes and in cities and towns. Adult franchise, education and the legal rights given to the Harijans are likely to remove gradually some of the features of the caste system. The missionaries, the Arya Samaj (by its suddhi activity), the Depressed Classes Missions, the Servants of India Society and the Indian National Conference mobilized public opinion and took various measures for the eradication of untouchability. Mahatma Gandhi undertook a fast in 1932 in order to secure adequate political representation of the untouchables and roused the conscience of his countrymen against the injustice of untouchability. In states like Travancore proclamations were issued to admit untouchables into temples. But, subsequently, the Bill for their entry into temples had to be withdrawn due to serious opposition. In Madras, the Civil Disabilities Removal Act of 1938 was passed. In Thanjavur, temples and shrines were thrown open to all. Under the Constitution of India, untouchability is forbidden and there is provision of special safeguards for scheduled castes and tribes. Enforcement of any disability arising out of untouchability is an offence punishable under Article 17 of the Constitution. There is reservation of seats for the scheduled castes in the Lok Sabha and in the state legislative assemblies. The Constitution has also provided for the reservation of appointments to these castes in the services of the union and state governments.

1.7 Widow remarriage and Women’s rights :

The agitation for widow remarriage was started by Rammohan Roy. It culminated in a legislation brought forward by Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. Hindu Widow’s Remarriage Act was passed in 1856. A Widow Marriage Association was started in 1861 in Bombay. The Arya Samaj took up the issue of remarriage of widows on its list of social reforms. The Hindu Law of Inheritance (Amendment Act) of 1929, the Hindu Women’s Right to Property Act 1937, the Hindu Marriage Disability Removal Act of 1946, the Special Marriage Act of 1954, the Hindu Marriage Act of 1955 and the Hindu Succession Act and Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act of 1956 have given equality to Hindu women in matters of marriage, adoption and inheritance. The Anti-Dowry Act of 1939 was passed in Sindh. A marriage bill was introduced in Bombay for the prevention of bigamous marriages. The Special Marriage Act of 1954 fixed the age of marriage at twenty one years for bridegroom and eighteen for the bride. The Hindu Marriage Act of 1955 enforced monogamy, and also introduced judicial separation, nullity and divorce. The main provisions of the Act correspond with those of the Special Marriage Act, except that in Hindu marriage the age limits were kept at eighteen years for the bridegroom and fifteen for the bride. The Hindu Succession Act of 1956 introduced inheritance rights for women in equal degree with men, though it withheld from the daughter the right to claim partition of the family dwelling place. The law relating to adoption gave Hindu women the right to adopt and also rights relating to minority and guardianship. Divorce is conditioned by the provision insisting on three years of marriage, and while the civil marriage law contemplates divorce by mutual consent, the Hindu marriage law gives no such latitude.

2. Social Reform :

As noted earlier the 19th century India was noted for intolerance with regard to caste. Social life was dominated by caste taboos and religious dogmas. People accepted as a way of life, the practices like child marriages, polygamy, persecution of widows and devadasis, dowry and superstition. The Vysyas and people of other communities tried to attain equal status with the Brahmins by performing Vedic rituals and sacrifices. That this tendency was spreading among other communities is proved by the fact that Chinta Raghunatha Reddy of Vayalpad in Chittoor district of present Andhra Pradesh, influenced by the Arya Samaj, put on sacred thread according to Vedic rites and came to be known from then onwards as Raghunatha Varma.

2.1 Spread of Western Education and its Impact :

The spread of Western education in India was the result of the efforts made by the Christian Missionaries, the natives and also to some extent by the Government through its departments. The introduction of English education and the constant flow of Western ideas became responsible for inculcating a new spirit and thought in India. The new educational system opened new vistas of life to the people. In every sphere of life the impact of the west was visible. Much of the organization of the democratic state, its secular character, the structure of its institutions and political ideologies underlying them were all largely European in inspiration. Also, English education altered the aspirations of the educated people and changed their style of living. The western education broke the intellectual monopoly of the Brahmins. The non-Brahmin castes with the background of western education entered the British administrative services and attained a respectable place in society. These educated middle classes eventually provided leadership for various movements in the country.

2.2 Railways :

The modern means of communication and transport also played an important role in modernizing India and promoting a sense of unity, brotherhood and helped in the growth of nationalism. In this regard railways were a potent means of unifying the country. Travel over one’s own country is usually a great education in patriotism.

2.3 Role of the Press :

The establishment of newspapers became a powerful factor in the development of Indian nationalism. In fact, it had become a powerful institution in moulding public opinion in the area of politics; the influence of the press was the most significant from the point of view of the political awakening and unrest among the people. It also broke down internal barriers and encouraged inter-regional solidarity. In fact, the press ably supplemented national literature in contributing to the growth of political consciousness among the people. Most of the news papers were crusaders against the foreign domination of the country. It was their mission to educate the people politically, help them to assimilate progressive ideas and carry to them doctrines of the great political thinkers of the west. Topics like liberty, democracy, self-government and nationalism were discussed and examined in their columns. In the next place it was their constant effort to expose the misdeeds of the Government and subject its wrong policies to merciless criticism. They made the people conscious of their rights and freedoms and fearlessly advocated popular causes.

2.4 Genesis and Growth of Public Opinion:

The impact of the socio-religious reform movements, the impact of the uprising of 1857, the spread of western education, the emergence of various associations, modern means of communication and transport systems, the role of the press, the rise of middle class intellectuals and emergence of restless and dynamic leaders etc., were responsible for the growth of public awakening and the rise of Indian nationalism in the nineteenth c entury. The first sprouting of Indian nationalism were visible in the third decade of nineteenth century with the rise of Brahmo Samaj in 1828, followed by other factors contributing to flowering of Indian nationalism and taking the shape of a movement for freedom from foreign yoke.

3. Summary:

The social evils, their arrest and consequent rethinking among the people about such things, modern education social reform, role of the press and modern communication systems promoted awakening among the people.

Web links

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_reformers_of_India
• http://www.historydiscussion.net/history-of-india/religious-and-social-reform-of-india-theindian-renaissance/1637
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brahmo_Samaj
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_reform_movements
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ram_Mohan_Roy
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dayananda_Saraswati
• http://history4upsc.blogspot.in/2010/07/social-and-cultural-awakening.html