See, the Marathas, even if they do not have money to buy a beedi, they call themselves ‘raje’.

(An Ambedkarite activist, Fieldwork 2009)

 

Marathas are very orthodox people. They feel that they have ruled this state for so many years, Shivaji Maharaj! (smirks). They believe that they are the rulers and other communities are subservient to them. They will not do marriage outside their caste.

(A Deshastha Brahmin respondent in Mumbai, Interview 2016)

 

[..] Jijau [Mother of King Shivaji] had recognized the strength of Marathas four hundred years back and that strength is being noticed now by the whole of Maharashtra and and the world […]

 

Where is the Zamindar Maratha any more? Patil and Zamindar Maratha are now landless. When the Marathas had patil-ki, everyone used to come to his [our] door – bhima, mang, chambar, sali, mali, loki, teli, tamboli, kumbhar, dhangar, hatkar, parit, Musalman. Yapeki kunihi yaycha – no one ever returned empty handed. Now we are landless and educated but unemployed, the reason for this is us not having aarakshan (researvations). Because reservations are given on caste-basis. Marathas need reservation […]

(A young Maratha girl speaking at a Maratha rally, Mumbai 2017)

THE above quotes from an Ambedkarite activist, member of Deshasta Brahman association in Mumbai and a speech at Maratha rally in Mumbai respectively, point to the eroding power of Marathas, their lost glory and their struggle to regain kingly-caste [raje] power. In this article, I engage with the status struggles of Marathas, their imagined victimhood and their raje [kingly] power that is threatened by mobility of castes considered lower than Marathas. I suggest that Marathas collectively mastered the art of liberatory violence in pre-colonial times and regularly laid bare its emancipatory potential for status and material advancement.

Much focus is on the present times where the Marathas are now being increasingly framed as oppressors by the marginal castes. Marathas are fighting back to secure their ‘lost’ glory by claiming new victimhood. They resort to a discourse of class (poverty) and democratic procedures along with violence against marginal groups. The case of a new-found Maratha victimhood points to the important role status anxiety can play in victimhood claims. When used by privileged status groups, victimhood has paradoxical outcomes, and the discourse of class produces social closure and simultaneous violence against marginal groups.

 

Marathas in some ways conquered their kshatriya-hood through King Shivaji’s military successes, though not always with the consent or support of the Brahmins. In popular Maratha history, the period of Chhatrapati Shivaji, besides military success, is considered to be revolutionary where the Marathas climbed the social ladder through military might. Boton¹ emphasizes the role of the American revolution of 1776 in promising mobility and status to everyone beyond the nobility, based on their material achievements. This was mostly a limited promise that ended up producing a new mobile class of snobs (sine nobility). The snobs were not nobles but status remained important for snobs and they could inflict severe emotional penalties on the poor who were bereft of symbols of social importance. What did the Marathas achieve through their military revolution and newly gained kshatriya-hood?

Maratha selfhood came to be highly influenced by status achievements based on violence. O’Hanlon² notes a popular local Marathi saying, ‘Kunabi maazala ani Maratha jhala [When the Kunabi turns arrogant he becomes a Maratha].’ Shahanav (96) clans as assal or ‘true’ Maratha families claimed a genealogical link with the old kingly Rajput families of northern India. They also claimed the varna status of kshatriya that was appropriate to a ruler or a king, whereas the ordinary kunbi family accepted the varna status of the shudra, the servants of the other three varnas.³ The Brahmans on their part asserted for long that there were no intermediate varnas left in Hindu society between those of Brahman and shudra following the final assault on kshatriyas by Parasuram.

The Brahmins based their case on two arguments: first, the Hindu puranas had narrated how Parashuram, the sixth incarnation of Vishnu, had completely exterminated the entire kshatriya varna; second, most of the elite Maratha families had manifestly lapsed from religious rituals, social practices, and the strict genealogical purity that were proper to true kshatriyas. Indeed, many of their habits resembled those of Muslims rather than the twice-born Hindus.⁴

 

The Maratha revolution thus achieved kshatriya status for them. The rest of the service castes⁵ could also bask in their success – as the Marathas had managed to tame the Brahmins. The Brahmin-Maratha conflict however continued and the divided Marathas progressively lost power to their Brahman ministers despite their claims to kshatriya-hood. Brahmans on the other hand, proved the Parashuram thesis by slowly displacing the Marathas from several south western states.

The making of the Maratha as kshatriyas by almost forcing the unwilling Brahmin was no less than a social revolution of status change. The hegemonic influence of the Marathas strengthened after the end of Phule’s ideological leadership of the non-Brahman Satya Shodhak movement. Post-Phule, Satya Shodhak came to be increasingly dominated by Marathas and did not easily accommodate the concerns of untouchables and other lower castes.

 

Rodrigues⁶ suggests that the non-Brahman movement was never an ideological union of castes, and the interests of the landowning Marathas dominated. In their struggle over status and resources with the ‘oppressive’ Brahmins, violence against Brahmins came to be an important repertoire of kshatriya-Marathas. Brahman protection societies grew up in several towns in southern Maharashtra to counter the activities of Satya Shodhak.⁷ As the Brahmins moved to the Hindu Mahasabha and RSS from Congress, due to their disagreements with Gandhi, Marathas took control of the Congress and the independence struggle in western India. The assassination of Gandhi brought out the ‘worst passions of the Marathas as they fell back on their age-old methods of problem solving: on violence and redistribution against the Brahmins.’⁸

The Marathas thus fought their lived and imagined victimhood through a praxis of violence. The status of kshatriya-hood was an achievement with material ramifications, but the social aspects of status mobility had far-reaching consequences on the selfhood of Marathas and caste relations in rural Mahararashtra. With the power of Brahmin almost eroded from rural Maharashtra following the violence and their eviction in 1948, the Marathas came to be both kings (raje) and givers (danat), and indeed the regulators of caste hierarchy in the village polity.

 

Under the postcolonial democracy, Brahmins were slowly ousted from their ritual, economic and political roles in rural Maharasthra. The panchayats and the cooperative sector (credit and sugar) came to be dominated by the Marathas.⁹ The credit and sugar cooperatives were key institutions that sustained economic and political inequality between the Marathas and other marginalized groups. Both of these sectors received regular grants from the state government in the form of working capital, loan waivers and subsidies. Similarly, various educational institutions managed privately by the Marathas were provided aid by the government, strengthening their socio-cultural, political and economic capital.

The Marathas are close to thirty per cent of Maharashtra’s population. However, merely emphasizing their numerical preponderance does not help in comprehending Maratha power in Maharashtra. The logic of numbers seems irrelevant in the case of Maharashtra, as the Mahars are the most numerical caste after the Marathas. Dumont instead notes the homology between the caste of the king and the dominant caste and the reproduction of royal function at the village level by the dominant castes.¹⁰ However, ‘the subordination of the political and economic criteria to that of ritual status in Dumont’s model plays down the significance of social change in colonial and contemporary times.’¹¹ The Maratha reproduction of royal function at the village level did not mean that they had accepted the ritual superiority of Brahmins as anticipated by Dumont.¹² Maharashtra witnessed a specific trajectory of Maratha politics that was anti-Brahmin during the colonial period, followed by violence and contempt towards the Scheduled Castes in the postcolonial period.

 

After 1948, the Marathas came to assume both a kingly role and that of regulating caste relations in Maharashtra’s villages. In contemporary times, Maratha violence against members of the Scheduled Castes has been evoked due to a range of social actions that elicit kingly disapproval: Ambedkar Jayanti celebrations, temple entry, playing loud music, criticizing caste Hinduism, or an assertion by members of the Scheduled Castes in the village panchayats.

The village of Pindi, like several other villages of rural Maharashtra, displays features of Maratha Rajeshahi. However much has changed in contemporary times, particularly due to the economic mobility of former untouchable castes and their Ambedkarization. In January 2009, there was a new case of atrocity in this village, against which several Ambedkarite organizations protested. Two college going Mahar girls were beaten up by young Maratha men, with their mothers joining in to thrash the girls. Though these Maratha men used to eve-tease the girls regularly, on that day things turned violent. One of the affected girls later narrated the cause of the incident.

‘On that day, when we were returning from the fields, one of them commented, "Salaam tumchyasabhyatela, Mahar layachsabhyajhale (Salutations to your decency, Mahars have become too decent/civil)". He pushed me from behind and I fell down. Pointing my finger at him, I shouted back "Can’t you see?" He reacted by slapping me and said, "You Mahar, how can you point a finger at me like that?" His mother and the other boys also joined him in beating me.’ (Informal discussion, 19 May 2009.)¹³

 

For Marathas, the Mahars as uncivilized subjects, need to embody docility in keeping with their lowly status. Any decency in their public life would directly affect the status position of kingly-Marathas. The fact that a Mahar girl pointed her finger at a Maratha man broke all status expectations and roles of village society, where Marathas dominate both the polity and economy. The Marathas refer to themselves are raje (king) locally and the word maaz (body fat [excess]/transgression) is regularly used by the Marathas to refer to untouchable behaviour that is seen by them as socially inappropriate – failing to follow caste occupations, not letting Marathas to pass first on beaten tracks, celebrating Ambedkar or Annabhau Sathe Jayanti, participating in rallies for land rights or worse, falling in love with Maratha women.

In Pindi, previous cases of violence had been reported including disciplining of young dalit men. Two youths had been beaten up by the Marathas on the suspicion of them having a love affair with Maratha girls. In 1998, one of them was tied to an electric pole and thrashed whilst his brother was hung upside down in a well and dunked. In 2001, another youth was unrobed, his head shaven, and he was paraded through the village to the police station where a case was registered against him under Section 395 (dacoity).¹⁴ This youth was kept in the police station for three days where he had begged to register a case against those who had beaten and humiliated him. However, only a simple non-cognizable (NC) offence was registered against the Marathas.

 

My book, Civility against Caste,¹⁵ detailed the politics of Maratha rajeshahi (kingly aspirations) and its violent outcomes for the Scheduled Castes. In rural Maharashtra, ensuring the daily social practice of caste seems to be largely a Maratha burden. In Marathwada region for instance, between the years 1990 and 2009, Marathas were involved in 54 per cent of the cases registered under the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.

Beyond the violent modes of rural governance that raje-Marathas use there is also danat (obligation to give) for castes considered lower. Anderson, et al. provide a nuanced quantitative reading of Maratha power under rural democracy and the decentralized politics of Maharashtra.¹⁶ The Marathas comprise 60 per cent of village pradhans, as against their population of about 40 per cent. The ‘superior social cohesion’ amongst the Marathas – both landholding and landless – has led to a kind of political exchange in which the non-Maratha landless groups accede to their subordination to ensure minimal transfers.¹⁷

 

The Marathas thus use local governance and democracy for the consolidation of their status rather than for development purposes. Their control and dominance over local institutions of government further rationalizes their raje-kingly status. As one of Andersons respondents notes: ‘Marathas have always been the rulers and so it is natural for people to accept their leadership. They have danat (obligation to give). When labourers go to them for help in times of need (especially for marriage ceremonies and illness), they give...’¹⁸

There are multiple discourses of victimhood used in Maratha popular mobilization that have evolved over a period of time; the atrocities of the Mughals inflicted on the valiant Maratha who fought back, the oppression from vile Brahmins that nationalist Marathas crushed in 1948. The period after the mid-1980s has, however, seen the withering of Maratha dominance in Maharashtra. The OBCs and SCs have become increasingly politicized, and the discourse of Maratha victimhood now emphasizes poverty, along with protective laws like OBC reservations and SC-ST Act, that ‘victimize’ Marathas. While previous victimhood was fought back with violence as the key repertoire, contemporary victimhood demands both the use of violence and need for reservations for Marathas.

The implementation of the Mandal Commission recommendations has also led to greater political awareness amongst the OBCs. Violence has been an important repertoire of the Marathas mainly used against former untouchables but not limited to them, in unified Maharashtra. A Maratha in Beed shared his discomfort with the mobility of Vanjaris (the OBC caste aligned with the BJP) and their appropriate (violent) response:

‘These Mundes […] Vanjaris they are tucch (lowly). Some ten to fifteen years back we didn’t even touch them or allow them to get close, now they are everywhere […] Did you see how they were recently beaten up by Marathas in Wadawani […] All the bikes with Bhagwan Baba [religious symbol/Guru of Vanjaris] on them were broken.’¹⁹

 

The discourse of victimhood amongst Marathas became shriller following the implementation of Mandal report and the enactment of the Atrocities Act in 1989. Various Maratha social organizations in Maharashtra, including Maratha Sevak Sangh – the only Maratha formation known for its anti-Brahman(ic) stance, had come together in August 2008 to make two demands – scrapping of the SC/ST (PoA) Act (referred to locally as atrocity kaayda [law]) and the other was reservation for Marathas based on an ‘economic’ (not social) criteria. These demands emerged in the mid-’90s and have continued unabated, while non-Marathas, who are placed lower in the caste hierarchy, have upped the discourse of Maratha domination and violence.

In 2015, Nagraj Manjule’s film Fandry was released followed by Bhaurao Karhade’s Khwada. Both did well at the box office and engaged with the theme of Maratha dominance and violence in Maharashtra. This was followed by Nagraj Manjule’s Sairat in 2016 which broke all the records of success in Marathi regional cinema. Sairat too engaged with Maratha rajeshahi and violence. In May 2016, several Maratha organization protested the depiction of Marathas as oppressors in the movie.

Between 2015 and 2018, the records show that 885 Scheduled Caste women were raped in Maharashtra.²⁰ However, none of these crimes evoked the display of public outrage as did the rape and murder of a 15-year-old Maratha girl by drunk SC youth in Kopardi village, Ahmednagar district. 13 July 2016 was framed as a dark day in the popular history of Marathas. This rape galvanized the Marathas in Pindi village too.

 

What followed were massive silent protests across Maharashtra of Marathas, addressed and led by Maratha women. This massive transgression against Maratha rajeshahi by (ex) untouchables led to state-wide muk (silent) rallies followed by immediate calls for scrapping the SC-ST Atro-cities Act and enactment of reservations for Marathas in Maharashtra. While the protests were silent and peaceful, the threat of violence was always articulated as a mode of securing justice (reservations). The rape and murder of ‘Jijau’s²¹ daughter’ was both an insult to Marathas and a violation of their kingly honour. The largest and the final rally was called the Maratha Kranti (Revolution) convened at Mumbai which showcased Maratha victimhood, their valiant past and threat of a violent future. No leader took the lead; instead, young girls who had memorized their speeches addressed the crowds. One of them said:

‘We Never thought that in the land of Shivaji something like this [rape of Maratha girl] could happen. They broke her limbs, they violated her. They were confident because of atrocity kaayda (law). Rakshasa, you have misused atrocity kaayda. The culprits should be hanged or else how will we consider this state constitution as pure?

If you do not understand our request, treat this as a notice and if you do not understand notice, treat this as a signal, and if you do not understand signal, treat this as a threat.’

The naradhams (lowly humans) who were involved in the rape of the Maratha girl were said to have garnered the courage to do so due to the atrocity kayada. The Maratha demand for hanging the rapists and for reservations were soon conceded. In November 2017, the accused in the Kopardi case were convicted and awarded the death penalty. This was a rare example of justice being served without delay, and in June 2019 the Bombay High Court upheld reservations for the Marathas.

 

Maratha rural power is based on the homology of political and sexual dominance in their imagined village kingdoms. Caste boundaries and roles, if violated by lower castes, especially former untouchables, directly threaten the kingly elements of Maratha power in the village context. As a consequence, the social, economic and political mobility of members of the Scheduled Castes and Other Backward Classes have caused status anxiety amongst the Marathas. The king has to now become an ordinary citizen and violence has been normalized to counter Marathas anxiety. Maratha violence was not, however, restricted only to marginal groups.²²

As Marathas came to be increasingly framed as ‘oppressors’ by marginal castes in Maharashtra, they reacted by resorting to a discourse of victimhood based on class, poverty and an erosion of honour. Marathas rose to be a ‘victim’ class in and for itself, and the Kopardi rape provided the collective will for saving Maratha honour. Status anxiety thus fuelled Maratha victimhood even though it lacked universal elements of justice. The discourses of justice generated out of honour and status anxiety do not need elements of civility, reason and more particularly universal possibilities of moral community.

 

The case of Maratha victimhood points to the making of a caste collective that claimed and sustained its new kshatriya status through violence. Marathas embodied kshatriya status to make violence an important repertoire against Brahmins in the past and against the ‘untouchables’ in present times. Maratha claims of victimhood hardly evoke the universal discourse of equality and justice as they derive their ethics from caste honour and caste closure. In the last few years, Marathas made the most of their temporal and strategic victimhood by mobilizing around class (poverty amongst Marathas) and rape of a ‘Jijaus’ daughter’, to successfully secure reservations for the community and the death sentence for ‘untouchable’ rapists, while several cases of rape and murder involving victims from other marginal groups await justice.

 

Footnotes:

1. A. Botton, Status Anxiety. Penguin, London, 2008.

2. R. O’Hanlon, Caste, Conflict, and Ideology: Mahatma Jotirao Phule and Low Caste Protest in Nineteenth Century. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985.

3. Ibid., p. 17.

4. Ibid., p. 25.

5. Names of these service castes (Mahar, Mang, Chambar, Sali, Mali, Koli, Teli, Tamboli, Kumbhar, Dhangar, Hatkar, Parit, Ramoshi) are regularyevoked while celebrating Maratha glory as service castes who served the cause of Marathas/King Shivaji.

6. L. Rodrigues, Rural Political Protests in Western India. Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1998.

7. M. Patterson, ‘The Shifting Fortunes of Chitpavan Brahmans: Focus on 1948’, in D.W. Atwood, M. Israel and N.K. Wagale, (eds.), City, Countryside and Society in Maharashtra. Centre for South Asian Studies, Toronto, 1988, pp. 35-58.

8. Ibid., p 36.

9. S.M. Dahiwale, ‘Consolidation of Marathas Dominance in Maharashtra’, Economic and Political Weekly 30(6), 1995, pp. 336-342; D.B. Rosenthal, ‘"Making It" in Maharashtra’, The Journal of Politics 36(2), 1974, pp. 409-437.

10. L. Dumont, Homo Hierarchicus: The Caste System and Its Implications. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1980, p. 160.

11. T.N. Madan, ‘Louis Dumont 1911-1998: A Memoir’, Contributions to Indian Sociology 33(3), 1999, p. 479. doi:10.1177/006996679903300301.

12. L. Dumont, 1980, op. cit.

13. During fieldwork, another incident of violence against a twenty-year-old Mang youth was reported in a village in Aurangabad district. He was tied to an electric pole in front of Shivaji’s statue and thrashed, chilli and salt rubbed in his wounds till he died. The Mang youth was said to have been infatuated with a Maratha girl. In 2015, all the accused were acquitted of murder charges.

14. In 2018 a Maratha IPS office posted in Majalgoan was filmed boasting of filing false cases and beating up SCs who used the SC-ST Act.

15. Suryakant Waghmore, Civility Against Caste: Dalit Politics and Citizenship in Western India. Sage Publications India, Delhi, 2013.

16. S. Anderson, P. Francois and A. Kotwal, ‘One Kind of Democracy’, 2011. Retrieved from http://ciar.ca/one-kind-of-democracy/$file/onekind.pdf

17. Ibid.

18. Ibid., p 21.

19. Field notes, August 2008.

20. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/sc/st-cases-in-maharashtra-rose- after-16-shows-data-given-to-house-panel/articleshow/66061760.cms

21. Jijabai, mother of King Shivaji, is regularly evoked in popular Maratha discourse as the guiding force.

22. In 2015, a Maratha family in Kolhapur murdered their daughter for marrying a Brahmin and the Brahmin son-in-law too was killed.