________________
138
TULSI-PRAJNA
(c) The existence of more than two races the Aryans and Nagas,
is not proved in Ancient India. So one cannot contend that first a face was conquered and made untouchable by the Dravidians and subsequently the Aryans conquered Dravidians
and made them Shūdras. (d) Even if the existence of more than two races in Ancient India is
admitted, the results obtained by the application of anthropometry to the various strata of Hindu society disprove that the untouchables belong to a race different from the Aryans and the
Dravidians. 5. While assigning an important place to racial differences in his theory, Stanley Rice believed that the unclean and filthy occupations were an important factor in the origin of untouchablity. Dr. Ambedkar is not willing to admit it either. His argument is that the Aryans did not mind engaging themselves in filthy occupations, He quotes from Närada Smrti to prove that impure work was done by slaves. Those slaves who did impure work including scavenging were not non-Aryans necessarily. When the Chāturvarnya became well-established the institution of slavery was reorganized on th basis of the principles of graded inequality. Then the lower var 28 could become slaves of the higher varnas and not vice versa. Even then the people of any varna who became slaves would be doing impure work and there would be no question of a section becoming untouchable for filthy occupations. 6. The words Antya, Antyaja, Antyavāsin, Bābya etc. do occur in the Dharmasūtras and the Smrtis but they are used for the people who lived at the outskirts of the villages. They were 'impure' at the time, but not 'untouchable'. 7. Untouchability originated from the contempt for Buddhists. People living at the outskirts of the villages had become Buddhists and did not care to return to Brāhmanism after it became triumphant as easily as others did. The opportunity to malign them was provided by the fact that even after turning to Buddhism, they did not give up the practice of eating the flesh of dead cow and using its skin. They continued because no question of violence was involved in it. Even when the Imperial Guptas forbade slaughter of cows and the rest of the Hindus gave up the practice of cating the fresh flesh of cow, the Broken Men did not discontinue eating the flesh of dead cow. The laws of the Guptas did not apply to them as they were not killing animals, but using dead ones. But such practice combined with the Brāhmaṇas' hatred far Buddhists made them untouchables. 8. Amedkar believes untouchability did not exist up to 200 A.D.
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
