Parnika Jain Week 3

Week 3
Parnika Jain


In Gail Omvedt’s book- Understanding Caste, the two chapters that interested me were “Hinduism as Brahman Exploitation” on Jotiba Phule and “Hinduism as Patriarchy” on Ramabai, Tarabai and the early Feminists. Jotiba Phule has drawn a parallel between the Europeans who colonized many countries and the Brahmins who have pushed their tainted ideologies on us. However he claims that the inhuman laws and crude ideologies of the Brahmins is found nowhere else in the world. Jotiba Phule also said caste system was nothing but a system of slavery. He called it deception as it was cleverly imposed on the people on grounds of religious beliefs. He also wanted the shudras and the ati-shudras to come together to fight this oppression. He compared this exploited mass with the Blacks of America. He propounded that this deception was based on an incorrect reading of the Vedas. He reinterpreted these myths. Over the years after getting inspired by Pandita Ramabai and Tarabai Shinde and understanding male patriarchy and the double bind these exploited women were in. He shifted his understanding to caste with male- female equality. He educated his wife Savitribai. He believed that knowledge was the way to defeat this problem. Even though Pandita Ramabai was mild in her writings she was the first woman to openly reject Hinduism as it was inherently patriarchal and only appeased to elite Brahmin men. She converted to Christianity and moved to England. Gail Omvedt calls her the first person to envision a casteless, classless and patriarchy free society. For she had helped several women despite their backgrounds to fight the plague and rejected the various caste rituals. Tarabai Shinde was harsher in writings when compared to Pandita Ramabai. She attacked the life set out for women by the Brahmins. She even attacked the Gods and the Rishis. Both Tarabai and Ramabai attacked the patriarchy and the double bind the women were in.