Bhama’s Karukku

ONE

Our village is very beautiful. Even though you don't see much by way of progress or
anything like that here, I love this place for its beauty. Although it's only a small village,
many different communities live here. But before I come to castes and communities, I
have a lot to say about the village itself.
The mountains range right around the village. They are lovely to look at. People say
they are the Western Ghats. They have names, too, for some of the mountain peaks.
One is called the Marakkaa puucchi malai. This mountain, if you look at it properly, is
just like a heap of paddy. Right at the peak, perches a crag that looks exactly like a
marakkaal paddy measure. That's why the mountain has that name.
On top of another peak is a Perumaal saami temple. A temple where the Naicker
community worship. That mountain is known as the Perumaara. And the fields there are
called the Perumaara fields.
There are many more rocks roundabout such as Nari paara, Vannaan paara, Vattala
Vitthaam paara. It seems in the old days Nari paara was full of woods, crowded with
foxes. People say that the foxes living there would raid the fields round about and
completely ruin them. But apparently this has not happened so much in recent times.
They say there is a tank at the top of Vannaan paara. In the past, the Vannaan boys
would wash clothes there, steaming and whitening them. And Vattala Vitthaam paara is
so named because Vattala Vittha Naicker has his fields there.
Most of our people are agricultural labourers. When there is no call for work in the fields,
they go up to the woods on the mountains, and make a living by gathering firewood and
selling it. People from the better-off castes never have such problems, though. They
own fields with boundaries; they have dug wells and established pump-sets; they can
work their land all year; they eat well and live in comfort in their homes. Anyway, besides
wells there are any number of ponds in these parts.
In the rainy season our village becomes even more lushly beautiful. The rain-water
comes bounding and leaping down the mountain slopes and fills the streams that
encircle the village. At such times one can catch fish in the abundant stretches of water.
All that water accumulates at last in the ponds and lakes. So that's another thing that
helps agriculture.
If you look in a westward direction, the lakes and ponds stand side by side, strung
together in a row: taamara kulam (lotus pond), baathraang kulam (named for the priests
or podagar who lived nearby), jeevaneri kamma (the lake of life), aiyar kulam (pond of
the Aiyars), periya kulam (the big pond), poder kulam (probably also named for the
podagar), vilraang kulam. The pond nearest our street has two names. The shore
nearest us is anupaang kulam. The opposite shore is called Vathraang kulam after the
village of Vathraa.
When the rains fall heavily and the big lake fills up, our pond too normally brims over. It
used to be fun to walk along the shore at such a time. When there was plenty of water,
they would pull up the hatches to the canals feeding the lake, and let the water flow
through. People would catch any amount of fish by placing earthen pots just where the
water flowed through. The streets overflowed with fish during the season. People sold
all sorts of fish like silabi kendai, paaruku kendai, keluti, ayirai, koravi, viraal. But in our
own street, we mostly bought and cooked curries out of silebi kendai and paambu
kendai. Because that was the cheapest we could get. The upper castes bought and ate
ayirai, keluti and viraal. But we couldn't afford to pay that much for what we ate.
When the pond was full, people sat under the shade of the banyan tree which grew on
the shore, talking of the past. The wind blew fresh and cool, almost like a sea-breeze.
Such a sense of comfort, there would be. Your eyes would almost droop into a slumber.
The wind, rippling the surface of the water, made endless tiny waves, pretty to see. You
could stand on the shore and watch the fish leaping. The bright fish would leap into the
air, glinting in the sunlight. Water-snakes would lift their heads above the water and look
abou.t Little boys aimed their stones at them. Quick as a flash they would disappear into
the water. As soon as the man who held the fishing rights for the pond went off for his
meal of kanji or whatever, everyone, big and small would whip out their fishing rods. If
you used the earthworms from rubbish heaps as bait, then you could catch fish very
easily. People would light small fires of straw, right there on the shore, and roast the
newly caught fish. It used to taste delicious. But if ever the caretaker caught sight of us,
then that was it. He'd confiscate all the fish and smash up the rods as well. Small
children splashed about and played in the water like little tadpoles, throughout the hot
afternoons. Next to them, buffaloes bathed pleasurably. Some of the more daring and
mischievous boys climbed on to a buffalo's back and rode as far as the middle of the
pond and back. Even an infant, born just the other day, tumbled naked in the water.
There is a small water-source in the middle of the lake, surrounded by banyan trees.
Even when the lake dried out, the little pond at its centre always held water. When the
lake floor was dry, they would grow something or other there - perhaps cucumber, or
some millet like cholam or kambu. If you went there and pulled off a cucumber to eat, its
touch upon the tongue was wonderful on a hot day. In any case there is a special taste
to food snatched by stealth.
At dawn and at dusk, the eastern and western skies are splendid to see. When we used
to go out in the early morning to relieve ourselves, a bright red sun, huge and round,
would wake up in the east and climb into the sky. It would make its way, peering
between the trees, glowing, its light spilling and sparkling. And in the same way, at
evening time, when it went and dropped through the mountains, all the fields
roundabout would be luminous with a yellow light A cool southern breeze would blow
through the fields. The crops glowing, swaying in the breeze, filled the heart with delight.
To look at the light in the western sky was like looking upon a revelation of God. And at
that very moment herons and crows and all the other birds would wing their way home
to their nests.
To the west of our village, there is a place we call the mandavam. It's a pillared
structure, now in ruins. The Muniappasaami temple is right there. It is actually at quite
some distance from our street. Yet people would go that far, five or six miles to the fields
and building there, in order to scrape together a living. Once a year there was a festival
there at the Muniappasaami temple, when offerings of food and money were made. It
was said that a man called Bondan, from the North Street of our part of the village, went
there once and stole the money offering, and untied the temple bell and carried it away.
This was a man well known for his skill at burglary. Yet people were shocked that he
had gone and burgled - of all places - the Muniyaandi temple.
From that day, people said that as night-time drew near, Muniyaandi would walk along
the rubbish tip at our street, burning torch in hand, furious. They said that he walked
along, calling out, "Return my offering to me, put back my bell, otherwise I will burn
down this entire street until nothing is left but ashes." Many people had caught sight of
him as he did this. But nobody understood what it was all about. Later when they started
asking each other, Bondan's father, Savurinaayagam Thaattha told everyone what had
happened. Then they all joined together and insisted that Bondan should return the
money and replace the temple bell. He did as he was told, going to the mandavam with
the mark of the cross upon him to return the bell and the offering money. After that the
terrible Devil never came down our street again.
There used to be lots of stories about this Bondan-Maama. His chief means of livelihood
was stealing limes, coconuts and mangoes from the landowning families' gardens and
selling them. Once at midnight, he climbed a coconut palm to pluck some coconuts. As
he gradually moved upwards from the base of the coconut palm, a strange form slid
down its trunk from above. He was perplexed fora while, wondering who it could be.
Then, in a flash realizing it was a pey tormenting him, he clambered down hastily, and
dashed off to another garden.
Another time, just as he was coming along, having helped himself liberally to a sackful
of mangoes, he saw the caretaker ahead of him. There was no way he could escape, so
he decided to jump into a nearby well and pass the time there, hiding his bundle under
water. It was rather like the tale of the man who feared the sun and jumped into a pan of
boiling water, though. Because, once he was in the well, a cobra suddenly spread its
hood and made to bite him. They say it came towards him, hood raised, hissing. It was
dead dark, besides. Somehow he kept the cobra. at bay until the watchman moved
away from there, and then he came home safe and sound with his bundle.
Then, on another occasion when he was out on his raids, a snake bit him right on his
big toe. And it was no ordinary snake either, but a king cobra. Anyone else would have
died of fright there and then. This man, though, immediately struck a match, burnt out
the spot, cut away the toe with his sickle, then finished his raid and returned. Such a
sharp fellow he was.
It was said that he even managed to survive an encounter with an "ayyangaatchi"
troupe. An ayyangaatchi troupe, they used to say, was a crowd of peys, large and small,
coming along with lighted torches. People hardly ever caught sight of them. If anybody
saw them, there was no escape. The merest glimpse would induce fever, frightful
diarrhoea and eventual death. But Bondan got away with it.
Most of the land belonged to the Naicker community. Each Naicker's fields were spread
over many miles. The fields in every direction had their own names. There was one field
called olivizhikkaadu, the field of awakening sound. They said it was an open ground
where everything that was said aloud, echoed. There were other fields known as
mandavak kaadu, otthaalu kaadu, chadayaalu kaadu and the field with the lotus pond.
Our people knew all the fields by their names and turned up exactly where they were
required to work. Otthaalu field was called that because a single banyan tree, an aalu,
stood at its centre. Chadayaalu field had banyan trees with aerial roots which fell like
plaited hair and fixed themselves into the earth.
Just at the entrance to the village there is a small bus-stand. This is the terminus. The
bus will take you no further. It is as if our entire world ended there. Beyond that, there is
a stream. If it rains it runs full of water. If not, it is nothing but a stinking shit-field. To the
left there is a small settlement often to twenty houses, known as Odapatti. It is full of
Nadars who climb palmyra palms for a living. To the right there are the Koravar who
sweep streets, and then the leather- working Chakkiliyar. -Some distance away there
are the Kusavar who make earthenware pots. Next to that comes the Palla settlement.
Then immediately adjacent to that is where we live, the Paraya settlement. To the east
of the village lies the cemetery. We live just next to that.
Apart from us, one after the other, there were the houses of the Thevar, Chettiyaar,
Aasaari and Nadar. Beyond that were the Naicker streets. The Udaiyaar, too, had a
small settlement there for themselves. I don't know how it came about that the upper-
caste communities and the lower caste- communities were separated like this into
different parts of the village. But they kept themselves to their part of the village, and we
stayed in ours. We only went to their side if we had work to do there. But they never,
ever, came to our parts. The post-office, the panchayat board, the milk-depot, the big
shops, the church, the schools - all these stood in their streets. So why would they need
to come to our area? Besides, there was a big school in the Naicker street which was
meant only for the upper-caste children.
There were five streets that made up the part where our community lived: South Street,
Middle Street, North Street, East Street and Olatharapatti Street. Row upon row of
houses. Three-quarters of them were cottages with palmyra-thatched roofs. In between,
a few with tiled roofs. Here and there, a few houses of lime and plaster. Those were the
houses of the government employees.
In the streets, the children used to wander, bare-bottomed, both boys and girls. Even if
a few boys wore pants, they would usually have slipped down, hardly covering what
they were supposed to cover. Their bottoms were never as big as their bellies, so their
pants would not stay up. The moment it struck twelve, they'd rush off plate in hand,
even the tiniest crab-like ones, for their free meal. The church bell struck the hour at
twelve. That was the signal.
In the afternoon, after five o-clock, the streets were all noise and bustle. Men and
women would be out there, shouting and yelling. Usually there were fights going on
among those who waited their turn at the single water-pump. It took such an age to fill a
single water-pot, even if you worked the pump strenuously. But the quarrels and fights
going on there really made you laugh.
Once, it seems, a woman called Gnanappu, from the Middle Street, left her bucket to
mark her place in the queue and went off on some chore or other. Before she returned,
the others took her bucket away and placed it the end of the queue. It seems she stood
her ground stubbornly, saying, "How dare you chuck away my bycket" Everyone there
burst out laughing because she kept on saying "bycket" for "bucket." It seems she was
incensed and started cursing and calling them names, saying, "You are only fit to collect
sniggers and slippers like Chakkili boy".
The names you heard along our streets would really surprise you. People's baptismal
names, given at church, were one thing; the names we used in the street were quite
another. One child's name was Munkovam, short-temper. A woman was called Midday-
masala. One day she ground masala at midday, and made a curry. Usually, in our
street, no one cooked at noon. It was only in the evening that people cooked rice, made
a curry; at other times it was always kuuzh, millet- porridge. So grinding masala at
noon-time was a real surprise to us. A certain child who was very dark-skinned and
plump was named Murugan-spring pig. It seems that pigs wandered about, well-fed and
plump, by the spring of Murugan; that's why. There was a woman who leaked all over
her legs when she relieved herself; she was called Kazhinja, Leaky. A small girl who
went off to practise swimming in the well, but could only manage to float, was promptly
named Medenda, Floater. Yet another woman used to go about chasing crows away
when she was a small child. The name stuck to her, Kaakkaa, Crow. I could go on and
on. Konnavaachi (Starer), Deaf-one, Dumbo, Crazy, Severiyaa (Xavier), Black-ant,
Manacchi (Flat nose), Uzhamuki (Running nose), Green-nose, Needle-bum. All sorts of
names like that.
There was no shortage of nicknames for boys either. There were lots of those too, in
fact. One boy was called Dal-bum. Nobody knew why. Yet another who used to say
"Endrayya" instead of "Engayya" as a small boy, was stuck with the name "Endrayya."
And the little chap who used to say "teppa tuuzhu" for "keppa kuuzhu" was called Teppa
Tuuzhu even when he grew up. And so I could go on with names like Black-mouth,
Nezhucchaan (Staggerer), Belly-button, Kaaman (Jack of all trades), Bondan
(Snatcher), Vidvi (Idiot), Naadodi (Wanderer), Idiot and Half-ear.
This fellow called Kaaman lived quite near our house. It seems his real name was
Maria-Lourdes. Nobody knew who gave him his nickname, nor why. Anyhow, he was
called this from the time he was a small child. Now he would be about twenty, twenty-
five, perhaps. Until about a year ago, he wouldn't do any work, but only wandered about
the streets. If anyone asked him to go to the shops for them, he'd do it. Or if they asked
him to go and post a letter at the post-office, he'd go. If ever he did this, people would
give him five or ten paise. He'd buy some food out of that, eat some gruel, and stretch
out along the front ledge of our cottages, without a care all day, until milking time in the
evening. Some people called him a simpleton. Some said he was half-crazy. A strange
melancholy kind of boy he was
And then everything changed. Suddenly he began to go to work somewhere, regularly.
Only no one seemed to know what exactly it was he did. Anyhow, he had been given a
khaki uniform for his work. On Sundays he would appear at church in the very same
uniform. There wasn't a single person in village who didn't laugh at those khaki pants
and shirt. Then, after a while, all that disappeared, and he was back again, lying on our
front ledges like a broody hen sitting on eggs. All of a sudden, for some reason, he
began to take on coolie-work like everyone else. Nowadays he goes to work regularly.
And for the past four or five months, he has been wanting to get married, it seems. If
anybody asks him, "Who's going to give their daughter to you, of all people?" he will ask
them in his turn, "Why, what's wrong with me?" People say that nobody in this village is
likely to give him their daughter or their money; if he finds a girl elsewhere, he'll be
lucky.
Some folk say that if by chance he does get married, he'll make quite a good job of
cooking the food. They say he can make a rice-gruel as well as any woman can. But
he'll cook the rice, eat it all by himself and leave the pots washed clean. His own mother
says that! It seems he can polish off a half- measure of rice all by himself. Anyway, we
have all sorts of people like this. could write a whole book about each of them
****
There's a village to the north of us. It's called Archanaavaraam. That's where you'll find
the Nallathanga temple. Nallathangaal is very famous in our parts. If you ask some of
the older folk, they'll tell you her story in great detail and with a lot of fervour.
In the old days there were two people in this village; one, the elder brother; the other,
the younger sister. As their parents were dead, the brother looked after the little girl, and
in due course got her married to someone from Maanaamarutai or thereabouts. After he
had given her away, he too found himself a wife. But the woman he married, Muuli
Alangaari, was a vain and conceited woman; she could never allow anyone to be close
to her.
After some time, there was a terrible famine in Maanaamarutai, where Nallathangaal
had gone after she married. By this time, Nallathangaal had borne seven children, one
after another. After the birth of each child she had written to her brother. The vain and
conceited sister-in- law intercepted each letter and flung it into the fire. So the elder
brother had not got any news of his sister. He was always worrying about her; how she
was, what was happening to her.
When Maanaamarutai was suffering from the famine, Nallathangaal wrote yet another
letter to her brother, telling him about her pitiable condition. By some kind god's mercy,
the brother happened to be at home at the right time. He read the letter and sobbed his
heart out like a woman. When he asked his wife where all his sister's previous letters
had gone, she deceived him with all sorts of fibs, and somehow got round him. Anyway,
the elder brother set off immediately for Maanaamarutai and brought away
Nallathangaal and her seven children. As they neared his village, he told Nallathangaal
to go on ahead, while he himself went to buy some necessary household things. When
Muuli Alangaan saw Nallathangaal approaching with her seven children, she ran and
locked all the doors to the house so that no one could come in. Nallathangaal
approached the door and knocked on it several times, and said at last, "If I have been a
true and faithful wife, this door will open at once." And sure enough, it did.
She called her children to her, went in, and sat down. The children, who had walked in
the heat for a long time, were so ravenous that they fell upon everything they could find
in the house, and began to eat with great relish. Muuli Alangaari was furious when she
saw this. She plucked away the food from the little ones and drove them all out.
Nallathangaal gathered her children about her, and not knowing what to do or how to
survive, pushed all seven of them into a nearby well, and then jumped in after them and
perished. And when she was throwing the children into the well, the last little one
escaped and ran away. He rushed off and took refuge with a shepherd. But
Nallathangaal ran after him, dragged him away from the shepherd, flung him into the
water and leapt in herself.
When the elder brother came home with his purchases, he found his wife alone at
home. When he asked her where Nallathangaal and the children were, she lied that
they had not been seen at all. He ran out of the house immediately and searched
everywhere. At last the shepherd told him the whole story. At once the elder brother
understood everything. When he realized what his wife, in her cruelty, had done to his
little sister, he carried Muuli Alangaari to the burning kiln, threw her inside, and killed
her. Then he made statues of Nallathangaal and her seven children, and placed them in
a shrine which he built right next to the well. He made a statue of the shepherd too. And
then he himself died. I don't know whether all this really happened or not. But to this
day, the well, the temple and the statues are all still there.

TWO
When I was as studying in the third class, I hadn't yet heard people speak openly of
untouchability. But I had already seen, felt, experienced and been humiliated by what it
is.
I was walking home from school one day, an old bag hanging from my shoulder. It was
actually possible to walk the distance in ten minutes. But usually it would take me thirty
minutes at the very least to reach home. It would take me from half an hour to an hour
to dawdle along, watching all the fun and games that were going on, all the entertaining
novelties and oddities in the streets, the shops and the bazaar. The performing monkey;
the snake which the snake- charmer kept in its box and displayed from time to time; the
cyclist who had not got off his bike for three days, and who kept pedalling as hard as he
could from break of day; the rupee notes that were pinned on to his shirt to spur him on;
the spinning wheels; the Maariyaata temple, the huge bell hanging there; the Pongal
offerings being cooked in front of the temple; the dried-fish stall by the statue of Gandhi;
the sweet stall, the stall selling fried snacks, and all the other shops next to each other,
the street light always demonstrating how it could change from blue to violet; the
narikkuravan hunter- gypsy with his wild lemur in cages, selling needles, clay beads and
instruments for cleaning out the ears - Oh, I could go on; and on. Each thing would pull
me to a stand-still and not allow me to go any further.
At times, people from various political parties would arrive, put up a stage and harangue
us through their mikes. Then there might be a street play, or a puppet show, or a "no
magic, no miracle" stunt performance. All these would happen from time to time. But
almost certainly there would be some entertainment or other going on.
Even otherwise, there were the coffee clubs in the bazaar: the way each waiter cooled
the coffee, lifting a tumbler high up and pouring its contents into a tumbler held in his
other hand. Or the way some people sat in front of the shops chopping up onion, their
eyes turned elsewhere so that they would not smart. Or the almond tree growing there
and its fruit which was occasionally blown down by the wind. All these sights taken
together would tether my legs and stop me from going home.
And then, according to the season, there would be mango, cucumber, sugar-cane,
sweet-potato, palm-shoots, gram, palm-syrup and palm-fruit, guavas and jack-fruit.
Every day I would see people selling sweet and savoury fried snacks, payasam, halva,
boiled tamarind seeds and iced lollies.
Gazing at all this, one day, I crossed the street of the Pallas and came to my street, the
street of the Parayas, that is, my bag slung over my shoulder. At the opposite corner,
though, a threshing floor had been set up, and the Naicker watched the proceedings,
seated on a piece of sacking spread over a stone ledge. Our people were hard at work,
driving cattle in pairs, round and round, to tread out the grain from the straw. The
animals were muzzled so that they wouldn't help themselves to the straw. I stood for a
while there, watching the fun.
Just then, an elder of our street came along from the direction of the bazaar. The
manner in which he was walking along made me want to double up. I wanted to shriek
with laughter at the sight of such a big man carrying a small packet in that fashion. I
guessed there was something like vadai or green banana bhajji in the packet, because
the wrapping paper was stained with oil. He came along, holding out the packet by its
string, without touching it. I stood there thinking to myself, if he holds it like that, won't
the package come undone, and the vadais fall out?
The elder went straight up to the Naicker, bowed low and extended the packet towards
him, cupping the hand that held the string with his other hand. Naicker opened the
parcel and began to eat the vadais.
After I had watched all this, at last I went home. My elder brother was there. I told him
the story in all its comic detail. I fell about with laughter at the memory of a big man, and
an elder at that, making such a game out of carrying the parcel. But Annan was not
amused. Annan told me the man wasn't being funny when he carried the package like
that. He said everybody believed that Naickers were upper caste, and therefore must
not touch Earay. If they did, they would be polluted. That's why he had to carry the
package by its string.
When I heard this, I didn't want to laugh any more, and I felt terribly sad. How could they
believe that it was disgusting if a Paraya held that package in his hands, even though
the vadai had been wrapped first in a banana leaf, and then parceled in paper? I felt so
provoked and angry that I wanted to go and touch those wretched vadais myself,
straightaway. Why should we have to fetch and carry for these people, I wondered.
Such an important elder of ours goes off meekly to the shops to fetch snacks and hands
them over reverently, bowing and shrinking, to this fellow who just sits there and stuffs
them into his mouth. The thought of it infuriated me. How was it that these fellows
thought so much of themselves? Because they had scraped four coins together, did that
mean they must lose all human feelings? What did it mean when they called us
"Paraya? Had the name become that obscene? But we too are human beings. Our
people should never run these petty errands for these fellows. Weshould work in their
fields, take home our wages, and leave it at that
Both my grandmothers worked as servants for Naicker families. In the case of one of
them, when she was working in the fields, even tiny children, born the other day, would
call her by her name and order her about, just because they belonged to the Naicker
caste. And this grandmother, like all the other labourers, would call the little boy Ayya,
Master, and run about to do his bidding. It was shameful to see them do this. Even the
way they were given their drinking water was disquieting to watch. The Naicker women
would pour out the water from a height of four feet, while Paati and the others received
and drank it with cupped hands held to their mouth. I always felt terrible when I watched
this. My other Paatti was the same. As soon as dawn broke, she would go to the
Naicker houses, sweep out the cowshed, collect up the dung and dirt, and then bring
home left over rice and curry from the previous evening. And for some reason she
would behave as if she had been handed the nectar of the gods.
It was a long time before I realized that Paatti was bringing home the unwanted food
that the Naickers were ready to throw away. One day I went with Paatti to the Naicker
house. After she had finished all her filthy chores, Paatti placed the vessel that she had
brought with her, by the side of the drain. The Naicker lady came out with her leftovers,
leaned out from some distance and tipped them into Paatti's vessel, and went away. Her
vessel, it seemed, must not touch Paatti's; it would be polluted. Sometime later, I said to
Paatti she should not lay herself open to such behaviour; it was ugly to see. What Paatti
said to me in return was this: These people are the maharajas who feed us our rice.
Without them, how will we survive? Havent they been upper-caste from generation to
generation, and haven't we been lower-caste? Can we change this?
My elder brother, who was studying at a university, came home for the holidays. He
would often go to the library in our neighbouring village in order to borrow books. He
wason his way home one day, walking along the banks of the irrigation tank. One of the
Naicker men came up behind him. He thought my Annan looked unfamiliar, and so he
asked, "Who are you, appa, what's your name?" Annan told him his name. Immediately
the other man asked, "Thambi, on which street do you live?" The point of this was that if
he knew on which street we lived, he would know our caste too. Annan's reply was
sharp, like a slap in the face, "I am a Paraya from the Cheri Street." Then he stalked off,
as fast as he could. Naicker was furious. He felt he had been shown up. He asked
someone else there, "Who is this fellow? Look at the way he talks." This other man
explained who Annan was, by mentioning our Paatti. "Oh, that is our Rakammas
grandson."
The next day, when Paatti went to work, the Naicker spoke to her angrily. "How dare
your grandson talk to me so arrogantly?" Paatti managed to handle it by saying, "See,
Ayya, he's an educated lad; these college boys will talk like that."
Apparently it was just the same at the library. They would look at the Paraya lads from
the Cheri street in a certain way, with a certain contempt. Once, when Annan was
signing out his books, he added his title, MA, on a sudden impulse. Immediately the
attendant brought him a stool to sit on, and what's more, began addressing him as 'Sir.'
Annan told me all these things. And he added, "Because we are born into the Paraya
jati, we are never given any honour or dignity or respect We are stripped of all that. But
if we study and make progress, we can throw away these indignities. So study with
care, learn all you can. If you are always ahead in your lessons, people will come to you
of their own accord and attach themselves to you. Work hard and learn." The words that
Annan spoke to me that day made a very deep impression on me. And I studied hard,
with all my breath and being, in a frenzy almost. As Annan had urged, I stood first in my
class. And because of that, many people became my friends, even though I am a
Paraichi.
But it was the same story at school, though. They always spoke in a bad way about
people of our caste. If ever anything bad happened, the would say immediately, and
without hesitation, "It must be one of the Cheri-children who did it." About three quarters
of the children in the school were Pallar and Parayar. All the same, the priests had built
the school in the Nadar Street. The church too, was in the same street; so was the
priests' house.
Everyone seemed to think Harijan children were Contemptible. But they didn't hesitate
to use us for cheap labour. So we carried water to the teacher's house; we watered the
plants. We did all the chores that were needed about the school.
Then I was in the seventh class. Every day, after school, I would play with the other
children of our street before going home in the evening. There were two or three
children who were related to me, and other boys and girls who always played together
as a group.
One day, we were playing on the big neem tree in front of the school, hanging like bats,
upside down from its branches. After a while, we started on another game - running
right up the coconut palm and touching its tip. The coconut palm grew slantwise, at a
convenient angle. If you came running along from a distance, at top speed, you could
reach right to its tip and touch the coconut growing there. Spurred on by the excitement
of the first few who managed to touch the coconut, those who came later, grabbed it
and gave it a twist before climbing down. By the time I got there, the coconut fell at my
touch, dropping with a thud. It wasn't even a fully ripened coconut, just a green one,
without so much as water in it. All the children were frightened and ready to scatter.
Everyone said that it was I who had plucked it. Then we just left it there and ran home.
The next morning at assembly, the headmaster called out my name. "You have shown
us your true nature as a Paraya" he said. "You climbed the coconut tree yesterday after
everybody else had gone home, and you stole a coconut. We cannot allow you inside
this school. Stand outside." I was in agony because I had been shamed and insulted in
front of all the children.
The headmaster was of the Chaaliyar caste. At that time, there was a battle going on
between the Chaaliyar people and us, about the cemetery. All the children eyed me in a
strange way and walked off to their classes. I was in such shock and pain; I didn't know
what to do. Then a teacher who lived along our street came by and advised me to go to
the priest, tell him everything, and bring a letter from him to the headmaster. I went to
the priest and told him the whole story in detail, and begged him to give me permission
to go back to school. The priest's first response was to say, "After all, you are from the
Cheri. You might have done it. You must have done it." The tears started welling up in
my eyes, and I wept. After a long time, the priest wrote a note asking that I should be
allowed to return to the school. When I took it to the headmaster, he abused me roundly,
using every bad word that came to his mouth, and then told me to go to my classroom.
When I entered the classroom, the entire class turned round to look at me, and I wanted
to shrink into myself as I went and sat on my bench, still weeping.
I studied up to the eighth class in my village, and then went on to high school in a
neighbouring town. I was very surprised when I saw the school there, the children who
attended it and the clothes they wore. I felt very shy and almost fearful. It felt good just
to climb the stairs and to walk into the classrooms upstairs, in such a big school. But I
got used to it soon enough. And I also began to work at my studies eagerly. The children
living in the hostel who were the same age as me wore smart clothes and possessed all
sorts of finery like jewels and wrist-watches. I thought to myself that they were, in all
probability, from upper-caste families.
The Warden-Sister of our hostel could not abide low-caste or poor children. She'd get
hold of us and scold us for no rhyme or reason. If a girl tended to be on the plump side,
she'd get it even more. "These people get nothing to eat at home; they come here and
they grow fat," she would say publicly. When we returned to the school after the
holidays, she would say, "Look at the Cheri children! When they stay here, they eat their
fill and look as round as potatoes. But look at the state in which they come back from
home - just skin and bone!" It was really embarrassing. We too paid our fees like
everyone else, for our food, for this and that. Yet we had to listen to all this as well.
When I went home for holidays, if there was a Naicker woman sitting next to me in the
bus, she'd immediately ask me which place I was going to, what street. As soon as I
said, the Cheri, she'd get up and move off to another seat. Or she'd tell me to move
elsewhere. As if I would go! I'd settle into my seat even more firmly. They'd prefer then
to get up and stand all the way rather than next to me or to any other woman from the
Cheri. They'd be polluted, apparently. This happened to me several times. When I came
home and told my mother, she advised me, "Say you are from a different caste. They'll
never know." I'd tell myself, "But why should I pretend to these people that I'm from a
different caste?" All the same, the pain I felt was not a trifling one.
Many of the children at my school were very poor at their lessons. I studied hard and
got the best marks in my class. Because of this, all the children would speak to me and
were friendly. Frequently I remembered what Annan had said to me when he was at
home. The teachers and sisters who taught me often encouraged me and were friendly
towards me. This made me even more keen about my lessons. They asked me to help
the children who were really backward at their lessons. I was overjoyed.
All the same, every now and then, our class teacher, or the PT teacher would ask all the
Harijan children to stand up, either at assembly, or during lessons. We'd stand. They'd
write down our names, and then ask us to sit down again. We felt really bad then. We'd
stand in front of nearly two thousand children, hanging our heads in shame, as if we had
done something wrong. Yes, it was humiliating.
I was awarded a prize for standing first among all the Harijan pupils of that district who
took the government S.S.L.C. exam that year. My name was called out in assembly, and
everyone clapped. My mother and I stood side by side very happily. And on that day I
wasn't embarrassed to besingled out as Harijan, as the Harijan child who had gained
the best marks. I was even pleased. And the other children congratulated me for doing
so well. I thought, why? Is it impossible for a Harijan to study, or what? I felt a certain
pride then, a desire to prove that we could study just as well as others, and to make
progress.
So I finished my schooling in these parts and started my college studies at a village
some distance away. I had thought that at such a big college, at such a distance away,
among so many different students, nobody would bother about such things as caste.
But even there, they did certainly consider caste differences. Suddenly one day a
lecturer announced, "Will Harijan students please stand; the government has arranged
that Scheduled Caste students should get special tuition in the evenings." Just two
students stood up: myself, and another girl. Among the other students, a sudden
rustling; a titter of contempt I was filled with a sudden rage. At once I told the teacher
that I didn't want their special tuition or anything else, and sat down. It struck me that I
would not be rid of this caste business easily, whatever I studied, wherever I went.
At another time I asked for permission to go home because my younger brother and
sister were to make their First Communion. It was to be for a Saturday and Sunday;
these were anyway customary holidays. Even so, the Principal and the Warden joined
together and were adamantly refusing to allow me to go. I grew hot with anger. I saw
with my own eyes that they were giving permission for the wealthy children to go home.
I lost my temper and challenged them head-on, "How is it that you are allowing these
others to go; why is it that you only refuse me?" The reply that I was given: What
celebration can there be in your caste, for a First Communion?" They told me, in their
domineering way, that they could not let me go to attend minor occasions like this. The
more they spoke, the more I felt a wild rage impelling me to go, come what may. So I
stood my ground obstinately. I managed to get my way at last by insisting that there
cannot be different rules for different castes, only the same rules for everyone.
Anyway, I finished there and went to a different college in order to take a B.Ed. degree.
It was the same story there too. Yet, because I had the education, because I had the
ability, I dared to speak up for myself; I didn't care a toss about caste. Whatever the
situation, I held my head high. And I completed whatever I took up, successfully. So
both teachers and students showed me a certain affection, respect. In this way, because
of my education alone I managed to survive among those who spoke the language of
caste-difference and discrimination.
Then I completed my education and went to work. At my first place of work, a nun asked
me, "Are you a Nadar" I said, "No, we are Parayar." When I recall the expression that
came over her face, I want to laugh, even now. Most of the nuns there were Telugu
people. They did not care for Dalits like us. Then, what else? The next five years that I
worked there were a continuous battle. I had a lot of spirit and guts at that time. The
children in my class, and all the school children liked me. Many of the children there
were Dalits themselves. So I was happy teaching the children and arguing with the
nuns. I enjoyed standing up to the authorities and teaching with some skill and success.
I might have continued in that way. But from somewhere or other a desire came over
me. It struck me overwhelmingly that these nuns collectively oppressed Dalit children
and teachers so very much; why should I not become a nun too and truly help these
people who are humiliated so much and kept under such strict control? The thought
kept returning every day, however hard I pushed it away. So at last I resigned the
teaching post that I held, and went and entered a religious order.
People I knew well, both from within the family and outside it, told me I should not leave
the work I was doing. They said I could do far more useful work as a lay-person than I
would do as a nun. They said that caste-difference counted for a great deal within
convents. But would I listen? In spite of everything they said, I entered the order. Before
my decision, I had read about the woman who founded thatparticular order, how she
had done so for the sake of the poor and lowly; lived and died for them alone. I wanted
to be like her, living only for the poor and downtrodden; so I entered that particular
order. But once inside the convent, it was like coming from the backwoods into a big
metropolis. My first thought was that I had arrived at a place which had no connection at
all with me. Then I thought, well, I should wait and see. I was deeply troubled. But I tried
hard to quieten myself.
One day, the Sister who was supervising our training, asked me in English why the birth
dates were different on my degree certificate and on my christening certificate. I said
that the people at my school had put down whatever birth date they chose for me
because they didn't know any better. She would not believe me. Well, that would not
have mattered either. But she would not leave it alone. She complained, "You Tamil
people want to get admission into schools under false pretenses, changing the dates on
your birth certificates." I thought to myself what a nuisance this is turning out to be; thus
far they made us hang our heads in humiliation because of our caste; in this order being
a Tamil seems to be equivalent to being a Paraya.
Then I told myself, "Well, after all, this woman doesn't know about village life, that's why
she snaps at me like this." So a little later, I explained to her in great detail that there
was no great problem about getting admission at our school; that on the contrary,
teachers visited homes and dragged their pupils out; and so there was no need to put a
false date of birth in order to find a place in the school. Even after all that she insisted
that I was lying. So I left it, realizing that there was no point in talking to her any more.
It was only after this that I began to understand, little by little, that in that order, Tamil
people were looked upon as a lower caste. And then, among Tamils, Parayar were a
separate category. Even so I continued to stay in the convent. Among those who were
training with me to become nuns, every single one was anxious to find out to what caste
I belonged. One day, one of them asked me straight out. When I answered her honestly,
she would not believe me. So I let it go, thinking, "What more can I do. Leave it. If you
want to believe me, do so. If not, what can I do about it?"
There were only a few days left for us to finish our training and to become fully-fledged
nuns. In a particular class, a Sister told us that in certain orders they would not accept
Harijan women as prospective nuns and that there was even a separate order for them
somewhere. I was thunder-struck. I despaired at heart, thinking, "She tells us this now,
at the last moment." Anyhow, I thought I should ask her about it, and so I went to her
and explained that I was from a Harijan family, and asked whether the order accepted
Harijans as nuns. At once she asked me whether any other order had invited me to join
them. I said yes, while I was working in a convent school earlier, the Sisters had invited
me to enter their order. Our Sister said, "Well, they asked you too, did they? Don't worry
about it. You may join us." I wished I could have disappeared from that spot and
vanished then and there. I lamented inwardly that there was no place that was free of
caste. And so at last I became a nun and was sent to a convent elsewhere.
I was shocked when I saw this convent and the school attached to it. I couldn't begin to
think how I would spend my years in such surroundings. And this convent too was not
without its caste divisions. From the very first moment I understood the state of affairs.
In that school, attended by pupils from very wealthy households, people of my
community were looking after all the jobs like sweeping the premises, swabbing and
washing the classrooms, and cleaning out the lavatories. And in the convent, as well,
they spoke very insultingly about low-caste people. They spoke as if they didn't even
consider low-caste people as human beings. They did not know that I was a low- caste
nun. I was filled with anger towards them, yet I did not have the courage to retort
sharply that I too was a low-caste woman. I swallowed the very words that came into my
mouth; never said anything out aloud but battled within myself.
According to their notions, low-caste people are all degraded in every way. They think
we have no moral discipline nor cleanliness nor culture. They think that this can never
be changed. To aid us is like aiding cobras. They speak such words all the time, without
even thinking. And I sat there like a lump of tamarind, listening to all this and dying
several deaths within. I would tremble to think how they would react if they realized that
I was a Dalit. And being a coward, I survived somehow.
In spite of my being a Tamil woman, I was held in some respect because I did all the
jobs that were allocated to me capably. But I felt a burning anger when I saw that all the
menial jobs there were done by Dalits who were abused all the time and treated in a
shameful and degrading way. I was pained to see even older people trembling,
shrinking like small children, frightened by the power and wealth that the sisters had,
burying their pride and self-respect, running to do the menial tasks assigned to them. If
ever I told them that there was no need for them to die of fear, they need only do their
work well, collect their wages and go their way, they would reply that it was all very well
for me to say that. After all I was here today, tomorrow I might be somewhere else; it
was they who had to stay and suffer. And that struck me as true too.
In this society, if you are born into a low caste, you are forced to live a life of humiliation
and degradation until your death. Even after death, caste-difference does not disappear.
Wherever you look, however much you study, whatever you take up, caste
discrimination stalks us in every nook and corner and drives us into a frenzy. It is
because of this that we are unable to find a way to study well and progress like
everyone else. And this is why a wretched lifestyle is all that is left to us.
If you are born into a low caste, every moment of your life is a moment of struggle.
People screw up their faces and look at us with disgust the moment they know our
caste. Itis impossible to describe the anguish that look causes. But along with the
anguish, there is anger, too. What can our anger do to them though? It seems we have
to swallow our anger and just carry on with our troubled lives.
How did the upper castes become so elevated? How is it that we have been
denigrated? They possess money; we do not. If we were wealthy too, wouldn't we learn
more, and make more progress than they do? But when it comes to it, even if we are as
good as they are, or even better, because of this one issue of caste alone, we are
forced to suffer pain and humiliation.
How is it that people consider us too gross even to sit next to when travelling? They
look at us with the same look they would cast on someone suffering from a repulsive
disease. Wherever we go we suffer blows. And pain. Is there never to be any relief? It
doesn't seem to matter whether people are educated or not. They all go about filled with
caste hatred. Why, even the nuns and priests, who claim that their hearts are set upon
service to God, certainly discriminate according to caste. And in my heart I have even
grieved over the fact that I was born as I am.
Are Dalits not human beings? Do they not have common sense? Do they not have such
attributes as a sense of honour and self-respect? Are they without any wisdom, beauty,
dignity? What do we lack? They treat us in whatever way they choose, as if we are
slaves who don't even possess human dignity. And if ever a Dalit gets wise to this and
wants to live with some honour and self-respect, they jump up and down as if something
really outrageous is happening. They seem to conspire to keep us in our place: to think
that we have worked throughout history like beasts, should live and die like that; we
should never move on or forward.
Because Dalits have been enslaved for generation upon generation, and been told
again of their degradation, they have come to believe they are degraded, lacking honour
and self-worth, untouchable; they have reached a stage where they themselves,
voluntarily, hold themselves apart. This is the worst injustice. This is what even little
babies are told, how they are instructed. The consequence of all this is that there is no
way for Dalits to find freedom or redemption.
We who are asleep must open our eyes and look about us. We must not accept the
injustice of our enslavement by telling ourselves it is our fate, as if we have no true
feelings; we must dare to stand up for change. We must crush all these institutions that
use caste to bully us into submission, and demonstrate that among human beings there
are none who are high or low. Those who have found their happiness by exploiting us
are not going to let us go easily. It is we who have to place them where they belong and
bring about a changed and just society where all are equal.

THREE

I was eleven years old. My mother delivered twin babies: I remember it well. Although
we were delighted that a younger brother and sister were born together, it was obvious
that the older folk were troubled. They seemed to think that it would be difficult to bring
up twins. I really was not old enough to understand it all. It was during this time too that
there were frequent skirmishes between our caste people and the Chaaliyar community.
Sometimes these would even develop into full- scale fights.
The cemetery where the Christians buried their dead was just next to the Chaaliyar
community school. Only we Dalits buried our dead there, though. The upper-caste
Christians had their own cemetery elsewhere. It lay beyond the bus stand. Fights arose
between the two castes because the Chaaliyar claimed that our cemetery actually
belonged to them. Those Chaaliyar fellows had planned that if they could claim the
cemetery by provoking a fight if need be, then it could become part of the playground or
gardens of their school. So there were constant fisticuffs and skirmishes between our
two communities.
Going by the way people spoke, the Chaaliyar lads didn't have much common sense or
wit. They'd wet themselves even if one raised one's voice to them. That was the extent
of their courage and daring. But apparently they had much more by way of land,
property and money than we did. It was because of their possessions that they were so
uppity. Besides, other caste fellows had spurred them on by jeering at them for being
scared of Parayar. So, even though they knew about the courage and strength of our
boys, the Chaaliyar kept on picking quarrels.
Our people forbade the children who normally went past the Chaaliyar settlement on
their way to school to walk together in that direction. They cautioned any group who
went past that place on their way to the bus-stand or the fields, to be vigilant. Besides
this, they said that women and children should never go there on their own, and that the
men should always carry a weapon at their waist while going there or returning from that
spot. In spite of all these warnings, one evening there was an outcry that the Chaaliyar
had stabbed Izhava's husband, who was from our North Street. Our entire settlement
was in shock, people running about here and there, lamenting and shrieking.
I was just coming home from school at the time. My heart began to beat fast when I saw
everyone running along the streets, the women hitting themselves on their heads and
weeping. But I couldn't understand what it was all about. My mother and grandmother
told us we were not to go out of the house. From the doorsteps of our house we could
see nothing. At last my grandmother went out to find out what was going on.
"Such a stout man, that Izhava's husband. Yet those Chaaliyar boys stabbed and felled
him."
"It seems that the spear with which they struck his thigh pierced it right through and
came out the other side." "It seems there was blood everywhere. It seems the old boy
just sank down right there. By a lucky chance that Paniyaaramuttu Maama saw him at
that moment and rushed to tell the menfolk. Otherwise he would have lost the little
thread of life left in him."
"At once they yoked a cart and took him away to the Free Hospital. If he survives, it will
be as if he has been granted a new life."
People were saying things like this in the street.
The men who were standing about in the street were beside themselves with fury.
Maama Paralokam spoke up with a frenzied show of heroics, "What sort of low-down
louts these are! It's shameful that men of their sort should come and strike down our
fellows. Chi, it's a disgrace, it stinks. Never in history has it been known for a Paraya to
die at the hands of a Chaaliyar." And he spat out his betel juice in a stream.
"If they had the least little bit of decency or manhood, they would have come and fought
us face to face. But these are like cowardly women, catching hold of a fellow who was
just going about his business, and finishing him off"
"If you are truly men of our caste, you'll kill ten men in place of the one they took, and
garland them with their guts."
Even as the old woman, Thavasi, was saying these words, people thudded past us,
running towards the cemetery with knives and staves. All the men and women began to
run in that direction, then. Behind them, the children followed, weeping with terror. And
all the street-dogs ran too, barking as they went The entire, street emptied and looked
desolate. Only two or three old folk were left at the madatthu saavadi, our Caste
community hall.
The fighting really came to a head at the cemetery gardens, it seems. All the Chaaliyar
women had hidden themselves behind the trees, from where they flung stones and
rocks with as much skill as their men might have done. As our men fell behind, the
Chaaliyar men ran past them without even pausing to turn around, scrambled into the
school building and locked the doors behind them.
"Look, if they had only fallen into my hands, I'd have pulverized them!"
"They are cowards who take to their heels at the very sight of our faces. How come they
put on such airs! Sons of whores!"
After a good deal of exchange of abuse like this, life gradually returned to normal in our
street.
For a few days both sides were quiet. Then, all of a sudden, a fight broke out again
because some people from our street had beaten up a Chaaliyar caste fellow. At once,
the Chaaliyar lot went and placed a complaint against our community at the police
station. It seems they had fabricated an elaborate case, putting in a little of what had
happened, but also including a lot that had not.
Varghese complained, "The day they struck Chinnappan- macchaan we should have
gone and complained at once. We were fools and idiots then. Now look how they've
cooked up a whole case against us when we barely touched that man."
"It seems the charge is against our entire Paraya community, not just the men who were
mixed up in the fight."
"How can he complain against all of us, da? He's only got a case against those fellows
who fought with him.
"They've gone and given a statement that all our men went into the Chaaliyar settlement
and vandalized their school, their houses and their temple. They say we threw stones
and broke all the tiles of their roods They say we dragged their women out and
disgraced them, and that we entered their houses and looted their property."
"Well, but have these policemen gone and lost their brains? Wont they have to hold a
proper enquiry?"
"Exactly. Just because a man chooses to say what he likes, does it mean that the fellow
who listens has to lose his commonsense? Let the police go and see for themselves
whether they can find any damage to those people's houses."
"It seems they anticipated that, broke some of their own tiled roofs here and there,
heaped up some rocks and stones at likely places and set it all up."
"So now, what are we going to do?"
"That's it, macchaan. We have to get our headman to organize us, house by house.
Then we must collect all the weapons we will need. That boy, Katterumbu's son, he
knows how to make country-bombs. We must have some ready. We'll show them. We
won't let them off."
And so, having made a few decisions, they then went away, about their business.
As I heard more and more of this kind of talk, I began to wish desperately that I could
see the showdown that had been planned to take place in the cemetery. But I knew that
my family would never allow me to go. At the time of the fray they would keep me locked
in and never let me go out. The school gave us a holiday, though. And just by chance
my younger brother and sister, both fell ill. It seemed it was always like that with the
twins. Whatever illness they had, they always had it together. My mother took one child,
my grandmother the other, and they set off carrying them, to walk the two miles to the
hospital. As they left, they told me to look after the house and see to my other sister. At
that time, I was the oldest child among those of us who were at home. After me, there
was my sister, then seven years old.
In a short while, the street was in an uproar. I went to the door and stuck my head out.
Men and women were running alone without stopping, talking about the fight that was
going on, at that very moment, at the cemetery. I really wanted to go with them. Now, to
go to the cemetery from our house, you had to cross four or five streets and come to the
very edge of the village. There was a huge fig tree in the cemetery. I had been there
before, to gather the fruit. I had also been there with other children when a threshing
floor had been set up and the paddy winnowed.
I desperately wanted to go and watch the fight, but at the same time, I was reluctant too.
I was afraid that if my mother arrived and found out, I'd be well and truly beaten. For
some time, I hesitated. Then I took courage, told my little sister to look after the house,
and rushed off towards the cemetery. Our people were standing on our side of the street
flinging their stones. I saw an uncle of ours standing there along with the rest, throwing
stones. Then the men began to move forward, still throwing stones, and carrying sticks
and poles, while all the women and children followed, very very slowly, terrified. From
the Chaaliyar settlement side, not a single man was to be seen. Nor were they throwing
stones. I thought that they were surely defeated. All the children of my age said the
same thing. We told each other gleefully that all the Chaaliyar had run away and hidden,
and that we had most certainly won.
Even as we were rejoicing, it all turned into a tragedy. All of a sudden, a huge gang of
policemen came out of the Chaaliyar settlement, batons in hand, drove our men back
ruthlessly, mercilessly beating up those they caught, before arresting them. We couldn't
make out where the police had hidden themselves for so long. All of us fled, fearing for
our lives. The men made straight for the fields and woods and tried to hide there. The
police chased and caught as many as they could. It seems those of our men who
couldn't run anymore, just lay down among the crops and held their breath.
Then the police came to our part of the village, rounded up all the men whom they found
there and beat them black and blue. Still raining blows on them, they drove them into
their lorries. A few men escaped by running as fast as they could, along the shores of
the lake, and away. And it was they who told the men who were hiding in the fields not
to return, but to stay there among the mountains and the woods.
We children and all the women ran as fast as we could, falling over each other, until we
stumbled into our houses. Outside, we heard the thud of police boots stamping up and
down, the sharp sounds of blows as our men were struck repeatedly, and the yells,
"Ayyo Amma" of unendurable pain. As the women saw their husbands, their children,
their fathers and their brothers being beaten, they cried out in pity. At that time there
were no men in our own household. Both my father and my elder brother were away,
elsewhere. Yet I too could not help weeping. And my sister wept with me. As we were
weeping together, my mother and grandmother returned home from the hospital. Even
as they approached, they could see the police beating and arresting our men; and they
were frightened. Paatti asked me, "Why, whatever happened, di? Did the fighting break
out again?"
I told them all that had happened. They only said, "Who told you to go to the cemetery
and watch the fight? What would we have done if one of those stones had fallen on you
and broken your skull?" They let it go at that. Everyone, was in such a state of shock
that I escaped. Had it been another time, I would have got a good hiding.
The crying and shouting didn't come to an end until evening time. But then, in the
evening, the whole street was as silent and still and as desolate as a cremation ground.
Not a single man could be seen. Only the women huddled together here and there,
whispering among themselves. I couldn't understand anything. Nobody from my house
spoke to anyone outside. We sat there, silent. Now and then, if my baby brother or
sister cried, I ran to their cradle and rocked it, afraid of their making the slightest noise.
In the dense silence of our street, the babies' cries cut into our hearts with a sharp pain.
Paatti arrived at night. She explained in detail all that had happened that day.
"It seems that the Chaaliyar folk invited some people known as the 'Reserve Police' all
the way from Sivakasi, butchered a sheep for them and arranged a feast. They've taken
an oath to destroy our boys, they say, so without counting the cost they are slaughtering
sheep at the rate of two a day and feasting the police. Do we have such means? Here
we are, struggling just for this watery gruel. So how will the police or the government be
on our side?"
"It seems that every single man they could catch sight of they beat up and then
arrested."
"What will they do to them, Paatti?" I asked.
"They'll take them and they'll whip them like they whip animals until they can neither see
nor breathe, and then they'll clap them in jail, just barely alive. That's what they say."
"And Paatti, will they give them food to eat after they have beaten them up?
"What food? Nonsense. They'll give them a tiny bit of ragi or cholam gruel in the name
of food, they say. Now if they were rich, or upper caste, or if the police were obliged to
them in some way, they would just have given them a couple of light taps. They would
have looked after them well enough."
"And Paatti, when will they let them go home?"
"They have to survive in the first place. After all those blows, after they have been
subject to torture, after the case is adjourned several times, and then heard at last,
heaven only knows when they'll come home."
That night, nobody could sleep. All through the night the police prowled round and round
our streets. There was no sound at all, except for the sound of the policemen's boots
and the barking of the dogs. The very sound of the boots was frightening. Each step felt
as if the boot was treading on my chest and pressing down. I wanted to cry out aloud.
But I lay there in fear, my hand pressed to my throat. If any of the young ones started to
cry, our women hastened to quieten them in whatever way they could. It was like that in
our house too. There was a fear in our hearts that if the police heard the noise, they
would come into our houses. Even the slightest noise sounded huge to us, made our
insides quake.
The next morning, the women did all their usual work as well as that of the men. The
police continued to prowl round and about. It seems they had turned up in order to
gather up every single man who had escaped them so far. That morning, very fearfully, I
came out and sat on our front verandah-ledge. A number of women were gathered
outside, talking together. They spoke in low voices about what had happened the
previous day, as if they were exchanging secrets.
"It seems that the police beat up a certain Alphonse very severely. It seems he couldn't
stop vomiting blood. They say it is unlikely he'll survive."
"In North Street, while they were beating up Maariappa's son, it seems a five-rupee note
fell out of his pocket. It seems his mother stooped to pick it up, weeping all the time. At
once a policeman put his boot against her stomach, kicked her aside, and took the
money himself."
"They caught hold of the teacher who lives on North Street and thrashed him soundly.
He bowed to them with folded hands and pleaded, saying, *Saar, I'm only a teacher,
saar. I don't stick my head into all these things, saar." They gave him another couple of
blows, but left him alone after that."
As they were saying all this to each other, we heard the sound of boots approach, and
everyone ran away. I too went in hastily, and locked the door.
As usual, the women went to the fields where they worked-as day-labourers. On their
way, they took gruel to the men hiding in the woods, told them the news, and went on.
And so the women somehow managed on their own, even without their men's earnings.
Every day the police walked around the streets. Then they began to enter the houses
one by one, in search of the men who were in hiding. It seems the Pallar men had
tipped off the police that some of our men might actually be hiding inside their houses.
When Paatti heard this she was furious. She railed against them in a single breath.
"Look at these Palla boys; they'll betray their own people. When these boys were
terrified of the police and hiding from them, all of them lay safely in Paraya houses.
They ate our food and drank our water. We took them in and protected them because
we believed they were our people. Now, look, they can't feel the same about us."
At that very moment, someone banged on our door with some violence. While all the
rest of us were cowering with fear, certain that it must be the police, my grandmother
went and opened the door. The headman leapt inside, dashed into the big earthenware
enclosure where we stored paddy, and hid himself there. His mother followed him in and
said, "The police are searching even now, from house to house. He can't run and hide
anywhere else at this time. There are police surrounding the whole area. Please hide
him somehow, please protect him." Then she went and sat down, outside. We were all
terrified. I thought to myself, please God, please don't let the police come to our house.
We continued to hear the thuds as the police struck their heavy blows, our men
screaming in pain, and women shouting and yelling in protest. We trembled within as
we heard all this. I stood on the ledge-like bench within the house and looked out, and I
could see the steel helmets of the police going past our house, in rows. In the next few
minutes, ten or twelve of them had marched their way right inside. My mother stood
stock still, one of the babies in her arms. They kicked open every door and looked
inside all the rooms. They peeped into the bathing area. They glanced over the place
where the firewood was stacked.
The naataamai, having dashed into the room where the storage jar was kept, had shut
its half doors, bolted them from the inside, and retreated well within the jar. The police
kicked at the half-doors, and when they wouldn't open, summoned my mother and
ordered her to open them. When my mother tried to shift them, it became apparent that
they were locked on the inside. Now the police were suspicious. They accused my
mother of hiding people there and acting out some sort of charade. Then they kicked
the doors open, breaking them apart, burst in, caught hold of the man who was hiding
there in the jar, lifted him out by his hair and rained blows upon him. Tears filled my
eyes. This was the first time that I had ever seen the police beating up a person they
had seized. If one policeman slapped the headman's face, all the rest followed, slapping
him in the very same spot. If one stamped on him, then everyone else did the same. At
last, still hitting him, they dragged him to the door and kicked him outside. His mother,
who was outside, pleaded and wept saying, "Ayya, he is the headman of this place.
Leave him alone, saami." In reply they said, "O, so he's the headman, is he?" And they
gave him a few more blows.
In spite of all these atrocities, it turned out that in two or three houses, the women
managed to hide their men and save them. In one house, they shut up the man inside,
and sent the police away, saying, "Ayya, she's just started her labour pains; there's no
one else here." It was all dark inside the house. The police believed the story and went
away.
In another house, a woman thrust her husband inside a sack and sat on top of it,
saying, "Ayya, I've got a cold and fever. It's four days since my husband went away; he
hasn't been in these parts at all, saami." And so the police left.
Then right at the middle of the street, they hid two men and said, "Ayya, our little girl is
covered in small pox. Please don't go in with your boots on. There's nobody else here,
Ayya." The police, apparently, didn't even enter the house when they heard this. It
seems the police behaved deplorably towards the women as they went from house to
house. They used obscene language and swore at them, told them that since their
husbands were away they should be ready to entertain the police at night, winked at
them and shoved their guns against their bodies.
From sunset time the women began to be scared out of their minds. While there was
still a little light they cooked and ate some gruel, then they gathered the children
together, and went off to sleep in the church courtyard. Some women even untied their
cows and calves and took them along. Not a fly nor a cow was to seen on the streets.
When I saw what was happening, I too was frightened. I went up to my mother and tried
to persuade her that we too should go away to the church. But she asked me, how was
she to manage in the church with two tiny babies? Where would she tie up the two
cradles for the twins? So she refused to go. In the end we were the only folk to stay at
home that night.
And at night, the police again walked round and round. But they didn't enter our house.
In the morning, the women returned to the street as usual, and set off for their
customary coolie-work. The police were furious that the women were smart enough to
continue working and taking care of their children even without their men, and so they
rounded up all the women workers, forced them into their lorries and dropped them off
on the other side, in the village. The police were really riled when they heard that the
women who went to work were actually taking food to the men who were hiding in the
forest.
Then two or three days later, someone informed the police that some men were hiding
in the church, just beneath the belfry. At once they came in a posse climbed up to the
belfry,apprehended all those whom they found there, and dragged them bodily through
the Chaaliyar street.
The women said it was our local parish priest who had informed the police. All the
same, one of the men who had hidden in the church escaped somehow and the police
went after him. that time, a man from another caste was ploughing the priest's fields.
The man who escaped grabbed the plough from the other man's hand, sent him away,
and daubed himself all over with the wet earth. Then he drove the bullocks, did not
show his face directly to the police, and got by that way. But in spite of all these
strategies and hardships, about three-quarters of the total male population of our
Community were caught at last. A few had disappeared into the mountain jungle.
The case was heard at court. We were told that all the men had been moved to the
Marudai jail. There was no money to pay for the hearing. So the women divided the cost
among themselves and arranged to collect the money.
Now just at that time, a small boy died. He saw just ten years old, from a family living on
the North Street. They were distantly related to us. We were frightened even to go near
the cemetery. The Chaaliyar boys used to hang around there. In our streets, constantly
patrolled by the police, there was no other male presence. Everyone was in a quandary
about what to do with the boy's body at a time like this. Then there was the other anxiety
that before he was buried, his father should at least see him. At last my Paatti and some
of the older women sat together, talked and made a plan.
They decided that two women would go to the mandavam fields where the boy's father
was hiding. They would take a sari with them when they went. They would find him and
fetch him home in the darkness of the night. They'd make him wear the sari, disguise
himself as a woman, cover his head, and pretend to be a mourner attending the funeral.
At the same time that evening, some others would go to the cemetery and prepare a
grave for the burial.
Apparently one woman asked what they should do if there was any trouble while they
were digging the grave. At once my Paatti had said, "Go away you crazy thing, you
know that these Chaaliyar boys take a couple of policemen with battery operated
torches to watch over them even when they relieve themselves. If we go together at
evening time and stand together, they won't come out, even to shit. All their song and
dance display is because these policemen protect them. Anyway even the police will
never go near the cemetery once daylight's gone. They'll tuck into their free fodder and
then stretch themselves out to sleep."
Now, the mandavam fields lay about four or five miles to the north of us. Near the
mandavam there was a banyan tree. People said a fire-breathing pisaasu lived in the
branches of that tree, keeping guard over seven cauldrons of coins. It would try to lure
passers-by, showing them the coins out of a cauldron. They said that countless people
had seen that pisaasu. They said it stood very tall, between the sky and the earth. Its
hair hung in long matted locks. Each nail had grown as long and sharp as a knife. Its
eyes glowed like torches. Smoke streamed out of its mouth and nostrils. Also it could
appear in any form it chose. Some people had seen it as a tiny baby, some as a fox,
and some even as a young girl. And it was towards this very same mandavam that the
women were hurrying with their sari.
Meantime, some others took their shovels to the cemetery after the sun went down, and
began to dig the grave. At the dead of night, between ten and twelve, the father came
disguised in a sari, saw his son, and stood silent, stunned, unable even to cry out loud.
On their way home, they had been stopped by the police. The accompanying women
had immediately raised a funeral dirge, an oppaari, wept aloud and said, "The sad news
has just reached us, saami. We come from the next village to attend the funeral." The
police had moved them on.
They kept a vigil all night, and even before cock-crow the women set out with the dead
body and buried him themselves, in the cemetery. Before dawn broke properly, the
boy's father set off in his sari with the two women accompanying him some distance;
then he disappeared intothe same mandavam fields. Everyone talked about this
incident in our parts the next day. Everyone was full of praise; they said how clever the
women had been and how smartly they had managed everything themselves. A few
days later, some of the men who had been taken away and arrested, were returned on
bail. Others were still kept imprisoned. The case went on for a long time, with repeated
adjournments. In the midst of all this, Middle street Alphonse who had been beaten by
the police until he vomited blood, died the second day after he was let out of jail. They
wept as they buried him, saying, "He was such a robust man. But with the thrashing the
police gave him, he just went suddenly."
Little by little, we began to forget the fighting over the cemetery. The Paraya community
and the Chaaliyar community began to act towards each other in a normal way, once
again. The older women of the Chaaliyar community came into our streets to gather
cow dung, or to sell gram and fried tamarind seeds
Suddenly one day, as I was coming home from school, I saw everyone running towards
the bus stand. By this time I had moved on to a different class in school. When I asked
what was going on, people said that the verdict on the case about the cemetery had
been favourable to us, and that all our men were released and were coming home. I
went straight home, flung my school bag down, and went racing with the other children
to watch the fun. And, yes, all the men of our street came home. As the husbands came
home, each was asked to step over a long-handed pestle used for pounding grain,
which was laid across the front entrance of the house. After that they were given water
to bathe. Then they were handed new veshtis and shoulder cloths to put on, and taken
indoors at last. They did this in every house where the men returned. Everywhere there
was laughter.
"We have been burying our dead in this cemetery since my grandfather's time at least.
Now suddenly these fellows turned up with their bullying tactics. God himself wouldn't
stand for it. That's why we won the case."
"It's that St Anthony who brought us victory."
"They thought our Paraya boys would be easy game. But Our Lady exposed that
thought for the sham it is, didn't she?"
"We must have a sung Mass, a Pusai, in gratitude next Sunday"
"Why must there be a sung Pusai, di? Did this priest ever help us, even with the dust of
his feet? When our men who were hiding in the church were caught and taken away,
this priest was sitting at ease in his bungalow, his legs crossed, smoking his cigarette
happily and watching it all."
"And not only that, sister-in-law. We didn't have the money to attend the adjournment
and asked the priest for a paltry loan of a few rupees, but he absolutely refused."
People talked in this way, taking different sides. But in the end, there was just great
happiness that the case turned out in our favour.
***
After this particular inter-caste trouble, there were also skirmishes between Pallar and
Parayar on many occasions. Every time there would be just a small altercation that
flared up into an outright fight between the two communities.
The first time there was a fight between Pallar and Parayar, it began over a ripe banana.
A man from the Palla street, known as Ondiviran, was coming along, his cart loaded
with a bunch of bananas. The young lad, Pavulu, grandson of Thavasi-Pethiya, went
and pulled off two or three of the fruit and ate them. The very first words between the
two were abusive, and the verbal abuse very soon turned into a fist- fight. Then four
other Palla boys joined in and beat up Pavulu, raining blows upon him. Just as Pavulu
came home to our area and complained about what had happened, several Pallars
entered the Paraya quarter with their sticks and knives. Just then there were not so
many men in the Paraya quarter. Two or three old men, a few young boys, and Susai
who was on leave from the army, joined together, and went with folded hands to try and
make peace. They weren't deterred when the others threw stones. Somehow they
dared to press on,and to say to them, "Appa, should we come to blows and actually kill
each other over a mere banana? Let us call a village meeting and settle things
peacefully." But they had a real struggle on their hands before they could get the others
to agree. Anyhow, they finally managed to call a meeting, and to punish Pavulu
appropriately.
After this particular fight, the boys on both sides nursed their revenge. Four or five
months later a fight erupted in the ration shop. That effeminate grandson of Benjamin's
went and made trouble in the ration shop, and another fight flared up between Parayar
and Pallar. This time neither side would give in, and they challenged and fought each
other bitterly. The Palla boys stood at the edge of the lake and flung stones. The
Parayar threw stones in retaliation, and it really turned into a pitched battle. Some of the
more daring women from the Paraya community took idli steamer lids to fend off the
stones that were aimed at them, and joined in the fray.
While this fight was going on, the military man, Susai, ran as fast as his heels could
carry him along the fields to report it to the police station. On the way he saw four or five
Pallar with sickles in their hands, parading along the shore. By some kind saint's favour,
he turned suddenly, and on the pretext of washing his hands and feet, climbed into the
well of the Kaakkaa-mandai and hid there. Otherwise they might have caught him and
chopped him up then and there. As soon as their heads were hidden, he raced along
the ridge of the fields and brought back the police with him. And as soon as the police
arrived, the men fled like a flock of crows.
So for some time there was an uneasy kind of peace. But a few days later, as Monangi's
son was standing at the oil shop, buying something, a number of Palla boys joined
together and beat him up. When the boy came running home, half dead and alive, to tell
us what had happened, a real brawl followed.
Just when it seemed that the hostilities were abating a bit, a few Pallar caught hold of a
Paraya boy who had gone into the woods, hacked at him anyhow, and buried him then
and there. The Paraya men went and dug up his body and removed it to the cemetery.
After that, they watched out fora hapless Palla boy who had gone eastward to graze his
goats, fell upon him and killed him. After that the police came, dragged away the boys
from both castes to the police station, shoved them in jail and locked them up.
The case still goes on. Adjournment upon adjournment follow each other. Because of
the case, the boys on both sides cover their backsides, and go about circumspectly.
God knows what will happen in the end. They fight to the death one moment; the next
moment they join together again. Suddenly, and for no reason at all they'll be fighting
and wrestling with each other. A hundred times a second there are scuffles amongst
them. Shameless fellows. Of course the upper-caste men will laugh at them. Instead of
uniting together in a village of many castes, if they keep challenging each other to fights,
what will happen to all these men in the end?

FOUR
From the time that I was a small child, I saw people working hard; I grew up amongst
such people. At home, my mother and my grandmother laboured from sunrise to sunset,
without any rest. And to this day, in my village, both men and women can survive only
though hard and incessant labour.
There is work of various kinds. If you look at agricultural labour, there's ploughing,
manuring, watering, sowing the seed, separating the seedlings and planting them out;
then, weeding, spraying the fields with fertilizer, reaping the grain, working on the
threshing floors, planting groundnut, selecting ripe coconuts. All this. Apart from this
work in the fields, there's construction labour: digging wells, carrying loads of earth,
gravel and stone. If even this is not available, then people have to go up to the hills to
gather firewood, or they must work with palm-leaves, or at the kilns making bricks.
People have to do some work in order to eat.
More than three quarters of the land in these parts is in the hands of the Naickers.
People of our community work for them, each Paraya family attached to a Naicker
family, as pannaiyaal, bonded labourers. As far as I have seen, it is only Palla and
Paraya communities who work in this way. Other communities don't have to work so
hard. The Koravar or gypsies, and leather-working Chakkiliyar would sweep the streets,
dredge and clean the drains, and make a living that way. Sometimes they wove
winnowing trays, boxes, baskets for carrying paddy, and chicken coops, and earned a
few coins that way. Everyone in my community had to work hard for their livelihood.
Only a few of the teachers' families lived with any degree of comfort.
Everybody said that my Paatti was a true and proper servant. She worked as a labourer
to a Naicker family, but she was also a Kotthaal - she hired labourers for them, brought
them to work regularly, supervised them, and made sure they received their wages.
Except for Sundays, she went to work every single day. Sometimes, if the Naicker
insisted, she would rush through Pusai before daylight on Sunday, and then run to work.
She'd rise before cock-crow at two or three in the morning, draw water, see to the
household chores, walk a long distance to the Naicker's house, work till sunset and then
come home in the dark and cook a little gruel for herself.
When I was a bit older, Paatti used to take me to the fields with her. We were not a
household with many comforts or conveniences. During the school term, as soon as
lessons were over, I'd go and collect such things as the thorns used for fences, or
palmyra and coconut-palm stems and fronds for fuel. I would collect fresh cow dung and
pat it into flat cakes for burning. Sometimes I would go into the fields and pick up dried
cow dung. During the school holidays, I would go with Paatti or some other woman to
work in the fields. Most often I helped to pull up the groundnut crop and to clean and
sort the pods.
To pull up the groundnut crop and to clean and separate the pods, you had to wake up
very early, well before cock-crow, pour some millet porridge into a carrying vessel, and
run with it. In the fields, you had to pull up a heap of groundnut plants, and then sit down
to pulling off the pods. At mid-day break, we would drink our kuuzh along with a
mouthful of fresh nuts. We would separate and clean the pods until sunset time, and
then carry them to the Naicker's granaries. There, the Naicker's pannaiyaal would
measure the cleaned groundnuts by the marakkaal, and pay us five or ten paise for
each marakkaal. However hard you strained yourself it never came to more than five
rupees in all. We'd take what we were given, and come home only at dusk. After we
came home, we'd buy a little rice, light the hearth and cook some gruel.
If we were going to glean the last of the groundnut crop that was left over in the fields,
we would go somewhat later. We'd go here and there all over the fields where the
groundnut crop had been pulled up, and use our shovels at random to hammer into the
earth and rake it, so that we could pick up all the stray groundnuts. The Naickers were
never happy about this, though. They would chase us, throw stones and pieces of wood
at us and drive us away. Occasionally, some of the Naickers would allow us to glean
and strip the fields on condition that we gave them half or a third of what we had found.
If we found any groundnuts, well and good. If not, we had nothing. In any case, the
Naickers would only let us go home in the evening, after they had taken their share. We
would take what was left to the chekkadi, the bazaar where the oil-press was at one
time, sell it to the tradesmen there and buy some rice or a little broken-grain. You
couldn't put the broken-grain gruel in your mouth. It stank so much. But if we had no
money, broken-grain gruel was all we could eat. Sometimes I sold my groundnuts and
brought the money home to my mother. Sometimes, I just gave her the groundnuts.
We'd go at daybreak to the Naicker's house to shell the groundnuts. Here they would
measure out the dried groundnuts to us, by the marakkaal. We'd sit in the cattle- shed,
take up the groundnuts in both hands alternately, and break the shells by smashing
them against the floor. If we were in a great hurry, we'd use both hands as well as our
teeth to shell the groundnuts. If you used your teeth, your mouth would fill with dust and
your throat would choke. But could one afford to bother about all that? We had to work
as hard as we could to shell all the nuts. At the same time, we had to be careful not to
crack the nuts themselves. If too many of the nuts were broken, the Naicker would be
really angry. You can't use broken nuts as seeds, can you, that's why. If we chatted in
between shelling, or ate one or two of the nuts, that was it. Naicker would be furious and
swear at us, using every term of abuse he knew. They paid us five to ten paisa per
marakkaal. So we didn't make that much money this way either. At the very most, we'd
make five or six rupees. Even so, I went with Paatti to shell groundnuts.
lf none of this work was available, I'd go off to collect stray onions left in the field or
thorny twigs. Some days I'd go with other children to collect firewood from the mountain
jungle. On such days, I'd wake up in the early morning, pour some kuuzh into a carrier,
and collect four annas from my mother to give to the 'Guarder' or forester. If we didn't
give any money to the Guarder, he would not allow us to collect any firewood. He lived
in the forestry bungalow and had a habit of coming round on inspection unexpectedly.
It wasn't that easy to go into the jungle. We had to climb the steep mountain slopes one
by one, pick up the dried pieces of wood that lay here and there, and then tie them
together into bundles. Before you could manage to do this, the twigs and thorns would
scratch and tear your face, your hair, your arms and legs. Sometimes your skin would
be all torn and bleeding. But if you worried about all this, there was no way you could
gather firewood. Sometimes your hair would get all entangled in the branches and
nearly split your skull apart You never knew which way to go forward. What roads or
paths were there for you to take? We had to push and shove and crawl our way through
bushes and briars.
After all this struggle and hardship, you couldn't just tie up your bundle, lift it on to your
head and walk home. Something would pull you back here, a tree or a creeper would
block your way there. So you could never climb down the hill easily. "You had to creep
along gradually, slowly rolling the firewood bundle forward. Having reached the base of
the hill one way or another, you could then carry your bundle on your head and walk
home, by which time, what little energy that was left in you would have ebbed away, and
the load would feel really heavy. It wasn't a short distance, after all, between the
mountain jungle and our village. The others would bring their bundles to the Naicker
street and sell them for seven or eight rupees each. But I never actually sold a bundle of
firewood. I took mine home for our use.
In those days, my mother too used to go collecting firewood. On one occasion she
brought home a bundle of firewood, leaned it against the wall and then began vomiting
vast gobs of blood. But it was only by toiling like this, without taking any account of their
bodies as human flesh and blood that people of my community could even survive. As
soon as children grew up to be ten or twelve years of age, they'd go and find some way
of making money. Until that time, they'd go about carrying their younger siblings on their
hips. They'd even gather a few twigs and sticks, and learn to boil a little gruel. It was
always the girl children who had to look after all the chores at home. The older women
would come home in the evenings after a day's work, and then see to the household
jobs. If there were boys in the house, they would graze the sheep and cattle. When they
grew a bit older, they'd go off to work in the fields like the older men.
When it was harvest time, we used to take a wide winnowing tray and stiff broom, and
go and stand by the lake shore or even by the bank of the filthy canal, so that we could
sweep and gather up the ears of grain falling off the sheaves that were being carried to
the thrashing floor. We'd winnow the grain we collected and take it home. But it was only
the young children and the old women who did this. Grown up girls and women in their
prime, though, went directly to the fields, winnowed the grain there by the basketful and
were paid in kind.
In this way, whatever we made, either by picking up the scattered grain with great
difficulty, or from winnowing it in the fields, we then took to the shops. There were Nadar
men who would set up shop in our streets, weigh the grain and take it in exchange for
tapioca or some such other goods. And at that time, we never realized how badly we
were swindled during these bartering sessions.
In exactly the same way, when the cotton pods burst, we'd bring the cotton we gathered,
and exchange it for goods. The tradesmen always managed to collect several bundles
of cotton or grain for themselves by cheating us. Our hard work was exploited half the
time by our Naicker employers. The rest of the time we were swindled by these
tradesmen. So how was it possible for us to make any progress? It seems that it is only
the swindlers who manage to advance themselves. But there is no way at all for the
Dalit who sticks to fair methods, and who toils hard all her life, to make good.
Until the time that I was in the eighth class, I worked in my village in all these ways. All
the time I went to work for the Naickers, I knew I should not touch their goods or
chattels; I should never come close to where they were, I should always stand away to
one side. These were their rules. I often felt pained and ashamed. But there was
nothing that I could do. They belonged to a higher caste. They had the money. We had
to listen to what they said. However furious or resentful I felt in my heart, I have stepped
aside for them, along with the other women of my community.
I was admitted into the convent school in the nearby village so that I could attend the
ninth class. There I did not have to work all the time like this. I ate my meals, and I
studied; that was all. During the holidays I returned to my own village. Children who
boarded at the convent and studied there certainly had a special status in our village. All
the same, when I went home I did all the chores that fell to me customarily.
After the tenth class, I finished my final exams and went home. My mother was walking
from the street of the Naickers with a bundle on her head, made up of mango wood
which she had gathered and tied together. I went along with her, back and forth, with
two or three headloads of firewood which I gathered for her. To come to our part of
village from the Naicker street, you had to cross the Nadar street, the Thevar street, and
then come past the oil-press and bazaar. Some people who had seen me carrying the
firewood said to my mother with astonishment, "Your daughter has finished her
schooling at the convent, yet she doesn't mind carrying firewood like this." I don't know
why they were so surprised. In those days I really enjoyed that kind of hard physical
labour. It is only recently that I find I cannot do it anymore. Because I've been to other
places and have been engaged in studying different things, I find that my body isn't as
flexible as it used to be.
When I saw our people working so hard night and day, I often used to wonder from
where they got their strength. And I used to think, that at the rate they worked, men and
women both, every single day, they should really be able to advance themselves. But of
course, they never received a payment that was appropriate to their labour. And another
thing. Even if they did the same work, men received one wage, women another. They
always paid men more. I could never understand why.
Even though they worked so hard and suffered bodily pain, our people laughed and
were cheerful. This is a community that was born to work. And however hard they toil, it
is the same kuuzh every day. The same broken-grain gruel. The same watery dried-fish
curry. It seems they never ever reflect upon their own terrible state of affairs. But do they
have any time to think? You have to wonder how the upper-castes would survive without
these people. For it's only when they fall asleep at night that their arms and legs are still;
they seem to be at work at all other times. And they have to keep working until the
moment of death. It is only in this way that they can even half fill their bellies.
Mind you, things get steadily worse and worse. In the old days, it is true, even tiny tots
would hold on to sheep and cattle, and look after babies as they tumbled about in the
streets around their houses. Nowadays, poor things, they go to work like adults. At
crack of dawn, even before the Madurai bus makes its appearance, these days, the van
from the match-box factory will arrive. These tiny crab-like children pour their kuuzh into
their carriers half asleep, totter along to the van, climb in and go off to work. They work
at sticking on match-box labels; they make firecrackers and use chemicals; and they
return home exhausted, at seven in the evening. At an age when they should be going
to school, studying like everyone else and playing about in the evenings, they are shut
up inside the factories instead. There are two or three schools available for the children
nowadays. But these little ones' fate is the smell of match-box solution, not the smell of
knowledge or learning. How can they afford to study, when it is such a struggle even to
fill their bellies?

FIVE

There was nothing special that was laid on for us by way of recreation or pastimes in
our streets. When school was over, we children joined together and played our games;