Response to Doctor and the Saint

Though Annihilation of Caste is marked as one of the thoroughly researched works written on Caste system existing in India, it was Arundhathi Roy’s “Doctor and the Saint” which was written as a foreword made it gain public attention. The title “The Doctor and the Saint” refers to the two historical figures where the Doctor represents Dr. B.R Ambedkar and the saint refers to Mahatma Gandhi who was sarcastically referred to as ‘saint’ by Ambedkar. The text was actually written as a speech which was undelivered because of the protests from the Hindu reformist groups. Later the text was self published by Ambedkar. The foreword has instilled many stormy debates in the literary spheres not just by the “Gandhians” but also by Dalit intellectuals who raises the question of exclusionary politics and notes on how Arundhathi Roy tries to assert herself in the writing rather than writing about Ambedkar. Arundhathi Roy shifts the focus of attention to the contrasting attitudes existing between Gandhiji and Dr. B.R Ambedkar. This debate has always existed as one outside the establishment.

            She begins the essay by asking why there are discussions and discourses on Malala and not on Surekha, an Indian Dalit woman. Surekha’s disaster was never a point of attention in Indian public sphere while Malala attained a celebrity status when the Taliban shot her and she miraculously escaped from death. Surekha and her family were brutally murdered by the upper caste men which got presented in the media as a ‘morality muder’. Roy provides statistical reports of NCRB which throws light to the terrible experiences Dalits still experience in India. Casteism which is seen as something of the past is still seen to be prevailing and ‘Dalits’ are still outcasted in Indian society. According to the NCRB Reports, a crime is committed against a Dalit by a non Dalit in every sixteen minutes. 1574 Dalit women were raped in India in 2012 when the national media projected Nirbhaya as ‘India’s daughter’. Dalit aspirations are seen as a breach of peace and how the law and order system keeps peace is by upholding caste system. Roy says “Annihilation of caste is a breach of peace”. Caste has been brooding in Indian society which some say is invisible since it is not colour coded like apartheid in the west. She writes that Indian society is still divided based on Varnashrama as one finds business class mostly belonging to the Banya-Vaishya caste and the supreme positions in government service are handled by the people belonging to Brahmin- Kshathriya varnas. Roy suggests that reservation is the only solution to this situation; it will help a Dalit to break out into the mainstream. But according to the statistical records, 71.3% of the Scheduled Caste students cannot even complete their high school and is thus denied the opportunity to even low-end government jobs. Brahmins who form a 3.5% of Indian population constitute 72% of the government servants. These are all pointed to the ridiculous excuse of ‘genetic malnourishment’.

            Gandhi was always labeled as the immortal name in India. The adjective ‘Mahatma’ to the name was unchallenged in Indian history. Gandhism more than a political thought has transformed into a lifestyle these days. Naturally, the questions raised by Roy against Gandhiji are pointed as blasphemy. According to Roy in her speech in Columbia University, if she apologizes, she can only apologize for quoting from Gandhiji. Gandhiji explicitly supported casteism. “ I believe that if Hindu society has been able to stand, it is because it is founded on the caste system….I have no use for a Brahmin if I cannot call him a Brahmin for my life” (qtd. in Roy 18) Gandhi’s racist perspective is reflected in his opinion on the black community in South Africa as well, “Some Indians do have contacts with Kaffir women. I think such contacts are fraught with grave danger. Indians would do well to avoid them altogether” (Things you did not know Gandhi said). Arundhathi Roy in her essay exposes the real Gandhi who was cleverly covered up in history.     This was disturbing to many politicians and historians in India. Gandhians openly recorded their protest against Arundhathi Roy. They questioned the authority of a [woman] fiction writer to challenge the history. Shashi Tharoor criticized Roy for misinterpreting Gandhi and his “Ideal Bhangi”. Her authority was also questioned by the veteran historian M.G.S Narayanan as an attempt to “please Marxists and Ambedkarists” by “insulting the Father of the Nation”. She replied to the criticisms raised against her so," Gandhi was a fascinating character who captured the public imagination in his own lifetime and still seems to mesmerize people. I don’t think readers of The Doctor and the Saint will come away thinking it is an uncritical, worshipful hagiography of Ambedkar and a relentless condemnation of Gandhi. The outburst that happened in Kerala, the threats of arrest, the processions though                             sometimes its pretty hurtful, is a ultimately a good thing. All of us have been                                     marinated in so many thousands of years of institutionalized prejudice". (Frontlines of                        Revolutionary Struggle)

The criticism often raised against the text is that Arundhathi Roy confined the discussion in the text to the limits of the contrast/ debate between Gandhi and Ambedkar. Nishikant Kolge comments on Roy’s writing so, "Apart from reading the saint’s writings, she should have also looked at the historical circumstances that had forced a novice politician to accept the role of a public man. She should have considered the kind of people with whom the politician was to work, both as associates and as opponents. She should have also developed a proper understanding of social, economic and political position of the Indian community in South Africa, as well as the nature and limit of grievances they could practically think of" (3).

            Dalit camera, a group of students who work in solidarity with Dalits pointed their arguments criticizing the text. The questions they asked include ignoring the historical significance of the work Annihilation of Caste and the purpose of her essay as the introduction to the work by Ambedkar. They also raise their doubts on exclusionary politics expressing their concern on a non Dalit scholar introducing the book. They argue that the essay is like a reappraisal of Gandhi and Ambedkar is merely ‘used to introduce’ Gandhi (Roundtable India). The media attention Navayana and Arundhathi Roy got was in complete contrast to the complete ignorance faced by Ambedkar who later self published the text.  Arundhathi Roy answers to these questions outrightly rejecting the notion of exclusionary politics and thinks the argument is misleading. Regarding the question of weighing Gandhi over Ambedkar, Arundhathi Roy answers so,

                         It was Ambedkar's debate with Gandhi over the Annihilation of Caste and                                   Ambedkar's own voluminous writings on Gandhi that led me to look at Gandhi                                     in  a completely different way from the one we have been brainwashed into.                                         Gandhi thwarted Ambedkar at every step. But who, other than Dalits, knows                                        this? Today, there is a huge project within the establishment and its pet                                            intellectuals, to coopt  Ambedkar into being the junior partner in Gandhi's fight                                        against caste. All the anticaste Poets and intellectuals, including those who                                         renounced Hinduism, are being made part of the great Hindu pantheon, and this                                 includes Ambedkar  himself. (Round Table India)

            She concludes her letter telling that “I was writing for those in India,and as well as outside, who are new to the subject, for whom caste is just some exotic Hindu thing….it is written in complete and absolute solidarity with the anticaste movement, and because I believe that caste corrodes us all” (Round Table India). Here Arundhathi Roy reveals her stand saying that her work was also written to gain appreciation from the West where casteism is not understood in its real sense.

            The essay is a timely and timeless argument as ‘divinity of merit’ and ‘inferiority of reservation’ is something which shakes the educational institutions every now and then. The preface written by Arundhathi Roy shows that India has not gone much from the times of Ambedkar. The significance of the text in contemporary India is highlighted in the preface. The preface serves as an answer to the ridicules on genetic malnourishment and the protests against merit.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

“Arundhathi Roy: The Debate on Gandhi Myth”. Frontlines of Revolutionary Struggle. 25 Oct     2014.Web. 11 Oct 2015.

“Round Table India: An Open Letter to Ms. Arundhati Roy.” Dalit Camera: Through                                   Untouchable Eyes. 15 Mar. 2015. Web. 11 Oct 2015

“Arundhathi Roy replies to Dalit Camera” Dalit Camera: Through Untouchable Eyes. 15 Mar.     2015. Web. 11 Oct 2015

Kolge, Nishikant. “The Politician: A Response to Arundhati Roy’s The Doctor and The Saint”     Gandhimarg Quarterly 36.1(2014): 145-164. Web. 13 Oct 2015.

Roy, Arundhati. “The Doctor and the Saint.” Introduction. The Annihilation of Caste: The                       Annotated Critical Edition. By B. R. Ambedkar. New Delhi: Navayana, 2014. Print.

Shanmugavelan, Murali. “Arundhathi Roy’s book on caste rejected by some anti caste activists”. Independent. 18 Dec 2014. Web. 11 Oct 2015.

“Things you did not know Gandhi said”. Navayana. N.d Web. 16 Nov 2015.

“Shashi: Arundhathi Roy misinterpreted Gandhi” Indian Express 28 Aug 2014. Web. 11 Oct        2015.