Divisions
80-589: Denotified Tribes are the tribes in India that were listed originally under the Criminal Tribes Act of 1871, as Criminal Tribes and "addicted to the systematic commission of non-bailable offences." Once a tribe became "notified" as criminal, all its members were required to register with the local magistrate, failing which they would be charged with a crime under the Indian Penal Code . The Criminal Tribes Act
160-484: A 'more secure, more prosperous' country and 'thing, dakaiti, and predatory castes [were] suppressed' amongst other achievements. The Criminal Tribes Act was one of the many laws passed by the British colonial government that applied to Indians based on their religion and caste identification. The Criminal Tribes Act and its provisions used the term Tribes , which included castes within their scope. This terminology
240-513: A case in this matter (Borker 12). Though it was primarily directed at tribal communities, various incarnations of the Criminal Tribes Act also included provisions limiting the rights of transgender and gender non-conforming individuals and communities in India. Hijras in particular were targeted under the Act. The Criminal Tribes Act of 1871 created the category of " eunuch " to refer to
320-409: A deflection from serious enquiries to the causes of crime. Sociologist Meena Radhakrishna argues that moral and material progress was demanded to be at a faster pace through a set of new social and political policies in the colonies. She also notes that after the revolt of 1857 , many tribal chiefs were labelled traitors and considered rebellious. One of the important persons who participated in
400-613: A few such as by sage Arunaketu include hymns with deeper philosophical insights. The Aranyakas discuss sacrifices , in the language and style of the Brahmanas , and thus are primarily concerned with the proper performance of ritual (orthopraxy). The Aranyakas were restricted to a particular class of rituals that nevertheless were frequently included in the Vedic curriculum. The Aranyakas are associated with, and named for, individual Vedic shakhas . The Atharvaveda has no surviving Aranyaka, though
480-457: A fine. Colonial authorities claimed that it was necessary for "eunuchs" to be registered under the Act to prevent them from kidnapping children and/or engaging in sodomy. In reality, there was little official evidence of any gender non-conforming communities in India kidnapping children, or of many children living in gender non-conforming communities. The few children that were found to be living with hijras were removed from their care, despite
560-412: A forest" or rather, "belonging to the wilderness". It is derived from the word Araṇya (अरण्य), which means "wilderness". Several theories have been proposed on the origin of the word Aranyaka . Originally, as per Oldenberg (1915), it meant dangerous texts to be studied in the wilderness (Taitt. Ar. II). A later, post-Vedic theory holds that these texts were meant to be studied in a forest, while
640-648: A part of the ancient Indian Vedas concerned with the meaning of ritual sacrifice, composed in about 700 BC. They typically represent the later sections of the Vedas, and are one of many layers of Vedic texts. The other parts of the Vedas are the Samhitas (benedictions, hymns), Brahmanas (commentary), and the Upanishads (spirituality and abstract philosophy). Aranyakas describe and discuss rituals from various perspectives; some include philosophical speculations. For example,
720-510: A ritual of reciting it with surya namaskara exercises after each of its 132 anuvakas. Parts of the Kaṭha version of this section has been published by L. v. Schroeder in 1898. Chapter 2, discusses the five Mahā-yajñas that every Brahmin has to do daily, most importantly the daily recitation of the Veda (svādhyāya). Further, the sacred thread, the yajñopavīta, sāndhyā worship, that of the ancestors (pitṛ),
800-490: A scarf or catgut string, looted, and hidden.' The same definition was emphasised in Richard Sherwood's report in 1819 as well as that these groups were highly diverse, involving multiple castes, religions, and ethnicities. In 1830, William Henry Sleeman anonymously published an article which sealed the understanding that it was a religious practice. Sleeman, thereafter, wrote three books on the thuggees. Simultaneously,
880-508: A term which may extend to seven years, and shall also be liable to fine." Looking at the historical context of lawmaking in British India, it seems that creating laws was not only aimed at addressing social issues and served as a means for the imperial government to shape its image. Laws like the CTA were enacted to acknowledge and combat a widespread "social evil," and the act conveyed this message to
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#1732875612124960-594: A thuggee in the British archives is during murder investigations in 1809. In the Indian region of Etawah , the magistrate report of James Law to the Commander-in-Chief William Dowdeswell describing the involved thugs as strongly leagued together, organised, ancient, and secretive. In the same year, another report by Judge T. Brooke to Dowdeswell further defined thuggee as 'a crime in which unsuspecting travelers were approached in disguise, strangled with
1040-438: A tribe was officially notified, its members had no recourse to repeal such notices under the judicial system. From then on, their movements were monitored through a system of compulsory registration and passes, which specified where the holders could travel and reside, and district magistrates were required to maintain records of all such people. The British government was able to summon a large amount of public support, including
1120-510: A woman of the Nandiwale tribe, who makes a living selling utensils and cutlery, was subjected to a violent attack in the Indapur block of Pune district. She was accused of stealing silver spoons from a household and, without any inquiry, was stripped and beaten. Her belonging to a tribe that was once deemed criminal was deemed sufficient evidence of her guilt. Shockingly, the police did not even register
1200-687: Is extraordinary and leaves scores of learned and talented historians tone-deaf to voices that were there before, during, and after the Europeans reached, and quit the subcontinent . Ancient and medieval literature from the Indian subcontinent have mentions of outlawed tribes. These include the Vedic Aranyaka , epics of Ramayana and Mahabharata , ancient and medieval storytelling of Katha , dramas, and Jataka tales . In these texts, roads, mountain passes, and forest pathways are teemed with robber bands waiting to prey on merchants and travellers. They come from
1280-432: Is mortal, they strive for immortality. They are equipped with all this... such a human being is an ocean. He partakes of everything in the world, and still his thoughts go beyond it. And even if he were to partake of the other world, his thoughts would also go beyond it. — Aitereya Aranyaka 2.3.2 – 2.3.3 There are five chapters each of which is even considered as a full Aranyaka. The first one deals with
1360-473: Is no absolute distinction between Aranyakas and Upanishads , as some Upanishads are incorporated inside a few Aranyakas . Aranyakas , along with Brahmanas , represent the emerging transitions in later Vedic religious practices. The transition completes with the blossoming of ancient Indian philosophy from external sacrificial rituals to internalized philosophical treatise of Upanishads. "Aranyaka" ( āraṇyaka ) literally means "produced, born, relating to
1440-420: Is so named after Vana-Forest life by moving to the forest. From 75 till end of life person lives life of an ascetic, contemplating on supernatural, pure philosophy, accepting whatever is available for sustaining the life. It is mostly in helping the society in whatever manner possible, giving benefit of long experience and knowledge accumulated during the lifetime. Taittiriya Ar. 2 says, "from where one cannot see
1520-430: Is the caste system. As it is, traders go by caste. A family of carpenters will be carpenters, a century or five centuries...Viewed from this angle, the meaning of professional is clear. It means tribes whose ancestors were criminal from time immemorial, who are themselves destined by the usage of caste to commit crime and whose descendants will be offenders against law until the whole tribe is exterminated or accounted for in
1600-510: The Gopatha Brahmana is regarded as its Aranyaka, a remnant of a larger, lost Atharva (Paippalada) Brahmana. Human beings But only in human beings is the Atman [soul] obvious, for they are equipped with cognition. They speak what they have understood. They see what they have recognized, and know what will exist tomorrow. They know of this world and of the other. Through that which
1680-530: The Kingdom of Marwar reiterates the precolonial roots of 'criminal tribes.' The erstwhile Rathor state attributed an inherent tendency towards animal killing and crimes of Thori and Bavris communities. Archival records show the anxiety of Rathor administrators who viewed these communities as inclined to steal and raid villages. While other communities in the kingdom also engaged in raiding, they were not classified as inherently criminal. Therefore, Cherian argues that it
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#17328756121241760-465: The National Commission for Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes (NCDNSNT) of Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment recommended equal reservations , as available to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes , for around 110 million people belonging to the denotified tribes, nomadic or semi-nomadic tribes in India. Along with the tribes designated as, "Nomadic" or "Semi-Nomadic",
1840-469: The mantras used in the pravargya Shrauta ritual that is considered to be dangerous as it involves heating a specially prepared clay vessel full of milk until it is glowing red. It is fairly close to the Kaṭha version. Chapter 5, treats the Pravargya-yajña in prose discussion (brāhmaṇa style). Again, it is fairly close to the Kaṭha version. Chapter 6, records the ‘pitṛmedha’ mantras, recited during
1920-468: The 1860s, colonial lawmaking in Punjab was primarily aimed at addressing the issue of criminal activities by certain tribes, which presented a significant challenge for the provincial administration. These criminal tribes were often perceived as a social evil and a threat to the economic mainstay of the populace, which was agriculture. The colonial officials recognised the importance of maintaining law and order in
2000-502: The Act, wherein local governments were empowered to establish separate "reformatory" settlements, for tribal boys from age four to eighteen years, away from their parents. In 1911, it was enacted in Madras Presidency as well, bringing entire India into the jurisdiction of this law. The revised version of the act then affected 1,400,000 people belonging to the nomadic communities, especially Yerukalas , Koravars , and Korachas. In
2080-579: The Aziz Nagar settlement. The oppressed people in the Aziz Nagar settlement were without even basic facilities and food. T. M. Jambulingam Mudaliar visited the Aziz Nagar settlement unofficially and provided food and basic necessities to affected people there. Jambulinga Mudaliar vehemently opposed the Criminal Tribes Act, but only the Criminal Tribes Act against the Vanniyar Padayachi of the South Arcot
2160-587: The Criminal Tribes Act 1871, was applied mostly in North India , before it was extended to the Bengal Presidency and other areas in 1876, and updated to the Criminal Tribes Act 1911, which included the Madras Presidency . The Act went through several amendments in the next decade, and, finally, the 1924 version incorporated all of them. At the time of Indian independence in 1947, thirteen million people in 127 communities faced search and arrest if any member of
2240-728: The Katha Aranyaka discusses rituals connected with the Pravargya . The Aitareya Aranyaka includes explanation of the Mahavrata ritual from ritualisitic to symbolic meta-ritualistic points of view. Aranyakas , however, neither are homogeneous in content nor in structure. Aranyakas are sometimes identified as karma-kanda (कर्मकाण्ड), ritualistic action/sacrifice section, while the Upanishads are identified as jnana-kanda (ज्ञानकाण्ड) knowledge/spirituality section. In an alternate classification,
2320-762: The Madhyandina version. Like the Taittiriya and Katha Aranyakas it exclusively deals with the Parvargya ritual, and is followed by the Brihad-Aranyaka Upanishad (Satapatha Br. 14.4–9). There is also a certain continuity of the Aranyakas from the Brahmanas in the sense that the Aranyakas go into the meanings of the 'secret' rituals not detailed in the Brahmanas. Later tradition sees this as a leap into subtlety that provides
2400-658: The Purusha, just as Agni in speech, Vayu in Prana, the Sun in the eyes, the Moon in the mind, the directions in the ears and water in the potency. The one who knows this, says the Aranyaka, and in the strength of that conviction goes about eating, walking, taking and giving, satisfies all the gods and what he offers in the fire reaches those gods in heaven. (cf.10-1). Chapter 11 prescribes several antidotes in
2480-547: The basis of family units. The measure was a part of a wider attempt at social engineering which saw, for example, the categorisation of castes as being "agricultural" or "martial" as a means of facilitating the distribution of property or recognising which groups were loyal to the colonial government and therefore suitable for military recruitment, respectively. Elsewhere the concept of Reformatory Schools for such people had already been initiated by mid-19th century by social reformers, such as Mary Carpenter (1807–1877), who
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2560-414: The basis of the 1836 act. Nevertheless, these understandings and common parlance precedes British arrival in India. The Thuggee Act provided the legal jurisprudence to understanding crime in India as an organised and hereditary in the person of a thug. The law allowed individuals to be convicted based solely on affiliation to a criminal group without evidence of having committed a crime. The first mention of
2640-509: The basis of their usefulness to the state. Observable differences became inherent tendencies. When combined with poorly understood Indian notions of community, such tendencies became essential, unchanging certainties. The Thuggee Act of 1836 set the legal precedent for the Criminal Tribes Act 1871. Colonial records characterises thuggees with five qualities--strangulation, secrecy, organisation, antiquity, and religiosity. These distinguished them from other categories of criminality and provided
2720-593: The brahma-yajña, and the cleansing homa-sacrifice ('kūṣmāṇḍa-homa') are all treated in detail. – In this chapter the word ' shramana ' is used (2-7-1) in the meaning of an ascetic (tapasvin); this word was later used also for the Buddhist and Jain ascetics. – Discussed and translated by Ch. Malamoud (in French, 1977); the Kaṭha version of this section has been published by L. v. Schroeder in 1898. Chapter 3, treats technicalities of several other homas and yajnas. Chapter 4, provides
2800-405: The colonial state (Safdar 20). The castes and tribes "notified" under the Act were labelled as Criminal Tribes for their so-called "criminal tendencies". As a result, anyone born in these communities across the country was presumed as a "born criminal", irrespective of their criminal precedents. This gave the police sweeping powers to arrest them, control them, and monitor their movements. Once
2880-500: The denotified tribes are eligible for reservation. Here are a list of tribes and castes which were listed under Criminal Tribes Act by British government in India . Criminal Tribes Act Since the 1870s, various pieces of colonial legislation in India during British rule were collectively called the Criminal Tribes Act (CTA). This criminalised entire communities by designating them as habitual criminals. The first CTA,
2960-431: The early part of Vedas are called Samhitas and the ritualistic commentary on the mantras and rituals are called the Brahmanas which together are identified as the ceremonial karma-kanda , while Aranyakas and Upanishads are referred to as the jnana-kanda . In the immense volume of ancient Indian Vedic literature, there is no absolute universally true distinction between Aranyakas and Brahmanas . Similarly, there
3040-588: The early uncritical print by L. von Schroeder It is also known as Shankhyayana Aranyaka. There are fifteen chapters: Chapters 1–2 deal with the Mahavrata. Chapters 3–6 constitute the Kaushitaki Upanishad . Chapters 7–8 are known as a Samhitopanishad. Chapter 9 presents the greatness of Prana. Chapter 10 deals with the esoteric implications of the Agnihotra ritual. All divine personalities are inherent in
3120-427: The economic production patters. The reforms altered land revenue obligations and tenant-landlord relations as well as the police and judicial systems in colonial India. The Regulation XII of 1793 legislated that 'wandering' communities could be put to work on roads or otherwise forcibly settled down. British officials were encouraged to compile lists of these attributes pertaining to each community and, classify them on
3200-447: The fact that most of the children did not have any other legal guardians and had been adopted into the hijra community because they were orphans or unwanted by their biological families. This practice became controversial and did not enjoy the support of all British colonial officials. Henry Schwarz, a professor at Georgetown University specialising in the history of colonial and postcolonial India, wrote that this decades-long practice
3280-502: The forests, which are at the periphery of civilisation in Brahmanic cosmology. They are at 'the cosmic fringe, the wasteland, a socially negative space home to various outsiders to ordinary moral, ritual, legal, and social life.' Sage Manu wrote of them as living outside the village, wearing garments of the dead, eating their food from broken dishes, and wandering from place to place. Historian Divya Cherian in her eighteenth-century history of
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3360-434: The form of rituals for warding off death and sickness. It also details the effects of dreams. Chapter 12 elaborates the fruits of prayer. Chapter 13 treats more philosophical matters and says one must first attitudinally discard one's bodily attachment and then carry on the ‘shravana’, manana and nidhidhyasana and practise all the disciplines of penance, faith, self-control etc. Chapter 14 gives just two mantras. One extols
3440-506: The fringes of the society, living as petty traders, pastoralists , gypsies, hill and forest dwelling tribes, they did not conform to the prevailing European standards of living, which involved settled agriculture and waged labour. Those with nomadic lifestyles were seen as a menace to 19th century society and required control, or at least surveillance. Historian Jessica Hinchy argues that the laws also repositioned families in space; it geographically redistributed and immobilised population on
3520-424: The general public (Safdar 20). When the colonial state annexed Punjab, it posed numerous challenges due to its geographical location and proximity to Afghanistan and the restive northern regions of India. The crime statistics of the 1860s were inconsistent, with occasional fluctuations that colonial administrators attributed to different reasons, such as crop failure and the nomadic lifestyle of certain tribes. During
3600-499: The governorship of Warren Hastings , legal regulations allowed for punishment of an offender's family and village. It was rooted in the existing jurisprudence that criminality was hereditary in India and criminals were such by profession and belonged to like-minded fraternity. The growth of gang robbery by lowland villagers in the late eighteenth century was significantly due to the Cornwallis administrative reforms rather than changes in
3680-568: The group was found outside the prescribed area. The Criminal Tribes Act 1924 was repealed in August 1949 and former "criminal tribes" were denotified in 1952, when the Act was replaced with the Habitual Offenders Act 1952. In 1961 state governments started releasing lists of such tribes. Today, there are 313 Nomadic Tribes and 198 Denotified Tribes of India who continue to face its legacy through continued alienation and stereotyping with
3760-657: The groups were forced to report weekly to local police, and had restrictions on their movement imposed. The colonial government prepared a list of "criminal castes", and all members registered in these castes by caste-census were restricted in terms of regions they could visit, move about in or people they could socialise with. In certain regions, entire caste groups were presumed guilty by birth, arrested, children separated from their parents, and held in penal colonies or quarantined without conviction or due process. Despite previous regulations, until 1871, no community or caste were collectively classified as criminal. In 1871-72,
3840-584: The late nineteenth century was an important turning point for British legal discourse with far reaching political and ideological consequences. Public interest in criminality was growing; crime and criminals increasingly became part of popular fact and fiction. Several reasons were cited for criminality, including alcohol, poverty, urbanisation, overcrowding, and decline in morality. Darwin's theories of evolution also provided for new social and political discussions. One school of thought attributed crime to genetic traits transmitted over generations. It provided for
3920-410: The law enforcing machinery and the landlords in the villages. As a result, women of these communities suffer from physical, emotional, and psychological trauma, perpetuating a cycle of marginalisation, vulnerability, and exploitation. The extent of these human rights violations is evident in the community survey, reflecting the urgent need for action to address this systemic issue (Borker 9). For example,
4000-420: The list, the colonial government used the category of 'tribe' for rhetorical and administrative purposes. This categorisation evoked qualities of 'wildness' and 'savagery' in the way that caste seemed to fail. Under these acts, ethnic or social communities in India were defined as "addicted to the systematic commission of non-bailable offences" such as thefts, and were registered by the government. Adult males of
4080-430: The manner of the thugs. When a man tells you that he is an offender against law, he has been so from the beginning, and will be so to the end, reform is impossible, for it is his trade, his caste, I may almost say his religion to commit crime. James Fitzjames Stephen testified, "When we speak of professional criminals, we...(mean) a tribe whose ancestors were criminals from time immemorial, who are themselves destined by
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#17328756121244160-855: The many, often unrelated gender non-conforming communities in India, including hijras , khwajasarais , and kotis . The label "eunuch" was used as a catchall term for anyone thought not to conform to traditional British ideals of masculinity, though in reality most of the communities classified as "eunuchs" did not identify as male or female. Under the Criminal Tribes Act, a eunuch could be either "respectable" or "suspicious." Respectable eunuchs did not engage in "kidnapping, castration or sodomy ," while suspicious eunuchs performed in public and wore what British officials classified as female clothes. The Criminal Tribes Act banned all behaviour considered "suspicious," warning that anyone found engaging in traditional hijra activities like public dancing or dressing in women's clothing would be arrested and/or forced to pay
4240-468: The nationalist press, for the excesses committed, because the Criminal Tribes Act was posed widely as a social reform measure which reformed criminals through work. However, when they tried to make a living like everybody else, they did not find work outside the settlement because of public prejudice and ostracisation. Historian David Arnold has suggested that because many of these tribes were small communities of poor, low-caste and nomadic people living on
4320-819: The other holds that the name came from these being the manuals of allegorical interpretation of sacrifices, for those in Vanaprastha (retired, forest-dwelling) stage of their life, however the Vanaprastha Ashrama came into existence only well after that of the Sanyasin (Sprockhoff 1976), according to the historic age-based Ashrama system of human life. Four Ashrams consist of Brhmacharya up to 25 years for learning and grooming for life; Gruhastha from 26 to 50 years for marriage and worldly activities; Vanaprastha from 51 to 75 when person/couple retire from active family/social life and devote time in religious, philosophical pursuit. It
4400-555: The past) all called on the idea of hereditary robber tribes to pursue a wide range of distinctive purposes. Nevertheless, colonial rule advanced these stereotypes of congenital criminality to cement vertical power relations. In addition, contemporary discourse of crime in Britain also influenced perception and response in the larger colonies like India; class and caste seemed to converge in legal discourse and legislations in India. Professor Henry Schwarz notes that, as early as 1772, under
4480-399: The policing and judicial systems and media portrayal. Terming entire communities as criminals, barbarians, vagabond, or thieves is rooted in Indian caste discrimination. Anthropologist Anastasia Piliavsky argues that the stereotype of 'criminal tribes' has a deep history and predates colonial legislation in India. She adds, the hypnotism of this bias [colonial construct of criminal tribes]
4560-443: The province and introduced various legal statutes, such as the Criminal Tribes Act (CTA), to achieve this goal. The CTA aimed to target the most accessible and visible suspects. These criminal tribes were already socially ostracised due to their lack of 'animal capital' or 'land capital,' which determined one's social status in pre-colonial Punjab. This social structure was formalised under the capitalist modes of production introduced by
4640-524: The regimen known as ‘Mahaa-vrata’. The explanations are both ritualistic as well as speculative. The second one has six chapters of which the first three are about ‘Praana-vidyaa’ – meaning, Prana, the Vital Air that constitutes the life-breath of a living body is also the life-breath of all mantras, all vedas and all vedic declarations (cf. 2.2.2 of Aitareya Aranyaka). It is in this portion of the Aranyaka that one finds specific statements about how one who follows
4720-402: The revolt was Banke Chamar . The colonial government found the demarcation between wandering criminal tribes, vagrants , itinerants , travelling tradesmen, nomads, gypsies , and eunuchs ( hijras ) difficult to manage. They were all grouped together, and their subsequent generations were labelled a law and order problem for the state. Though various marginalised caste groups were added to
4800-569: The rituals for the disposal of the dead body. Chapters 7, 8 and 9, are the three vallis of the well-known Taittiriya Upanishad . Chapter 10, is also known as the " Mahanarayana Upanishad ". It has several important mantras culled from the three Samhitas. TA 10.41–44 is known as the "Medha sukta". The Katha Aranyaka is fairly parallel to the text of the Taittiriyas. It has been preserved, somewhat fragmentarily, in just one Kashmiri birchbark manuscript. It has recently been edited and translated, cf.
4880-455: The roofs of the settlement", which does not indicate a forested area. Aranyakas are diverse in their structure. Jan Gonda summarizes: The structure of the Aranyakas is as little homogenous as their contents. Some portions have the character of a Samhita , others of a Brahmana , others again of a Sutra , according to the material that, varying from Veda to Veda, and from school to school,
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#17328756121244960-492: The same year, it was applied in Bombay Presidency . In 1908, special 'settlements' were constructed for the notified tribes where they had to perform hard labour. With subsequent amendments to the Act, punitive penalties were increased, and fingerprinting of all members of the criminal tribe was made compulsory, such tight control according to many scholars was placed to ensure that no future revolts could take place. It
5040-554: The tradition of the Taittiriya shakha . They were adopted from the Kāṭhaka shakha, and mostly deal with varieties of the Agnicayana ritual and with Vedic study. Chapter 1, is a very late Vedic chapter, which even has some Puranic names; it is usually called the Āruṇa praśna for the particular style of fire-brick piling dealt with in the text. It is also referred to as the "Surya namaskara chapter" by South Indian Brahmins who have created
5120-530: The upper castes convicts featured more in proportion to their population compared to the backward castes. However, after the revolt of 1857, the propensity of the Indigenous tribes to revolt, and with weapons was duly noted by the British colonial officers. T. V. Stephens, the chief architect of the 1871 law, and a member of the Law and Order Commission, while presenting his diabolic law, said, The special feature of India
5200-508: The usage of caste to commit crime, and whose descendants will be offenders against the law, until the whole tribe is exterminated or accounted for in manner of thugs". While very few officials expressed concern about endowing the police with too much power, most British administrators approved of the draconian measures. The British Government appointed W. W. Hunter , a senior official, to undertake 'a great stock-taking' after hundred years of British rule in India. He noted that India had become
5280-444: The various ways – like pada-paatha, krama-paatha, etc. – of reciting the Vedas and the nuances of the ‘svaras’. The fourth and the fifth Aranyaka are technical and dwell respectively on the mantras known as ‘MahaanaamnI’ and the yajna known as ‘Madhyandina’. There are ten chapters, of which, one to six form the Aranyaka proper. The first two chapters are part of the aṣṭau kāṭhakāni (the "8 Kathaka sections"), which were not native to
5360-474: The vedic injunctions and performs the sacrifices goes to become the God of Fire, or the Sun or Air and how one who transgresses the Vedic prescriptions is born into lower levels of being, namely, as birds and reptiles. The 4th, 5th and 6th chapters of this second Aranyaka constitute what is known as Aitareya Upanishad . The third Aranyaka in this chain of Aranyakas is also known as ‘Samhitopanishad’. This elaborates on
5440-429: The village communities. These women are particularly vulnerable to exploitation and abuse due to their marginalised status, and they are often victimised by every one of them. They face the misuse of power by the police and the caste communities in the villages, who arrest or illegally confine them for crimes others commit. Women and children are not spared, as they become easy targets of the lustful and corrupt personnel in
5520-522: The villages with history of "misconduct" was also common. The Aziz Nagar settlement in South Arcot District was opened on 22 September 1913 to deal with the so-called criminal tribes of the Madras presidency, including Veppur Parayars and Piramalai Kallar, in South Arcot district. Some of the peoples of Veppur Paraiyar and Piramalai Kallar were arrested under the Criminal Tribes Act and formed
5600-495: The “I am Brahman” mantra and says it is the apex of all Vedic mantras. The second mantra declares that one who does not get the meaning of mantras but only recites vedic chants is like an animal which does not know the value of the weight it carries. Chapter 15 gives a long genealogy of spiritual teachers from Brahma down to Guna-Sankhayana. The Aranyaka of the Shukla Yajurveda is part of its Brahmana: Satapatha Br. 14,1–3 in
5680-453: Was 'a complex of factors--landlessness, poverty, and the resultant martial weakness--in addition to a hereditary association with theft that led to a caste's perception as criminal.' Piliavsky also summarises these as socio-political decisions with varied purposes, prior to colonial legislations and subsequent list-making, Authors of ancient treatises, Mughal rulers, European travellers in precolonial India, and itinerant groups (today and in
5760-399: Was collected in an Aranyaka corpus. Linguistically and stylistically also, these works form a transition between the Brahmanas proper and the speculative literature that follows them and develops part of the ideas and lines of thought which are characteristic of them. Many Aranyaka texts enumerate mantras, identifications, etymologies, discussions, myths and symbolic interpretations, but
5840-544: Was in 1871 and at that time there was no consensus nor any definition of what constitutes a "tribe". The terms " tribe " and " caste " were used interchangeably for these tribes. The UN's anti-discrimination body Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) asked India to repeal the Habitual Offenders Act (1952) and effectively rehabilitate the denotified and nomadic tribes on 9 March 2007. In 2008,
5920-513: Was preferred for various reasons, including Muslim sensitivities that considered castes by definition Hindu, and preferred Tribes as a more generic term that included Muslims. The Act was initially applied only to the North-Western Provinces , Oudh State , and Punjab . An inquiry was set up in 1883, to investigate the need for extending the Act to the rest of India, and received an affirmative response. 1897 saw another amendment to
6000-536: Was repealed in 1949 and thus 'de-notified' the tribal communities. This Act, however, was replaced by a series of Habitual Offenders Acts , that asked police to investigate a suspect's "criminal tendencies" and whether their occupation is "conducive to settled way of life." The denotified tribes were reclassified as "habitual offenders" in 1959. The name "Criminal Tribes" is itself a misnomer as no definition of tribe denotes occupation, but they were identified as tribes "performing" their primary occupation. The first census
6080-697: Was repealed. In the coming decades, to evade prosecution under the Act, many of these notified tribes took up nomadic existence, living on the fringes of society. Professor of history Ramnarayan Rawat states that the criminal-by-birth castes under this Act included initially gujjar and lodhis but expanded by the late 19th century to include most of Chamars , as well as Sanyasis and hill tribes. Other major British census based caste groups that were included as criminal-by-birth under this Act included Ahir, Bowreah, Budducks, Bedyas , Domes , Dormas, Gujjar, Rebari , Pasi , Dasads, Nonias, Moosaheers, Rajwars , Gahsees Boayas, Dharees, Sowakhyas. and One such measure
6160-422: Was reversed at the start of the 20th century with the proclamation that people "could not be incarcerated indefinitely on the presumption of [inherited] bad character". Aranyaka Sama vedic Yajur vedic Atharva vedic Vaishnava puranas Shaiva puranas Shakta puranas The Aranyakas ( / ɑː ˈ r ʌ n j ə k ə z / ; Sanskrit : आरण्यक ; IAST : āraṇyaka ) are
6240-435: Was subsequently extended to the rest of British India, in part or its entirety. According to Indian penal code 1860, "Section 401: Punishment for belonging to a gang of thieves.—Whoever, at any time after the passing of this Act, shall belong to any wandering or other gangs of persons associated to committing theft or robbery habitually, and not being a gang of thugs or dacoits, shall be punished with rigorous imprisonment for
6320-665: Was the Criminal Tribes Act of 1871, under the provisions of which Meenas (Mina)were placed in the first list of the Act in 1872 in Patiala and East Punjab States Union, Rajasthan and Punjab Hundreds of Hindu communities were brought under the Criminal Tribes Act. By 1931, the colonial government listed 237 criminal castes and tribes under the act in the Madras Presidency alone. Women from de-notified and nomadic communities were victimised after CTA and often faced severe human rights violations and abuse of power by various actors, including law enforcement authorities, politicians, landlords, and
6400-449: Was the first to coin the term "dangerous classes". Because it came to be thought that behavior was hereditary rather than learned, crime became ethnic, and what was merely social determinism till then became biological determinism . Many of the tribes were "settled" in villages under the police guard, whose job was to ensure that no registered member of the tribe was absent without notice. Also imposition of punitive police posts on
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