The Village -18

....In the not so old Hindu Peshawa raj of Marathas, the untouchables were not allowed to walk on the streets of Pune city in morning and evening. This avoided the falling of polluting shadows on caste Hindus of the city. In evening and morning the shadows become larger and their chances of falling on Brahmans increased manifold that would have polluted them and their sacrosanct self. There are people who still yearn for those times when everything was in its proper place; when the movement of polluting shadows was under control. These are the people who think that India is going to dogs because of not following such traditions. In some places the untouchables were required to carry a small earthen pot around their necks so that they could spit in it to avoid contaminating the streets on which the uppity nosed high castes walked. However, the spitting of high caste did not pollute the streets; their spiting was unhygienic but not polluting. There is a difference between pure and clean, one can be clean and still impure and unclean but still pure. Some spiritual aspects of Hindu religion are fathomless. The logic stands on it head. There is rationality in irrationality. Somebody still has to isolate any polluting substance in the saliva of untouchables and which is not found in the saliva of high caste people. And still somebody has to find out the reasons for which the saliva of upper caste could not pollute the streets of Pune while that of untouchables’ could. In some places they had to tie a broom around their waists to automatically sweep the streets that became polluted by their walking. For the untouchables the veritable hell was in this world only; others had to die to see it. For them the arrangements to live in hell are made here itself - the eternally privileged untouchables! Otherwise who would go to such an extent to do this for them? Is it the law of Karma or something else? It was courtesy the pure, pious and powerful lawmakers. In some places they had to wear a black thread around their necks or wrists for quick identification by the upper caste people who then could keep safe distance from them. They could only talk to Brahmans from a distance so that their polluting breath did not touch them...