The Devadasi, Dharma and the State Author(s): Janaki Nair Reviewed work(s): Source: Economic and Political

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The

Devadasi,

Dhanna
Janaki Nair

and

the

State

If the sphere of thefamily was the one over which the nationalist elite declared their sovereignty,both reformand were born of the antagonismbetweenthe coloniser and the colonised. However, resistancetowardrejormin that domnain2 such as of thisparticulardynamic.Theprocess states of state legality remainedindependent in largeprincely Mysoreftnrms of modernisationwas initiated b)ythe bureaucracyitself. This article delineates one aspect of this modernisingprocess that signalled shifts in the definitionof domestic and to thelegal-administrative surrounding thegradualdisempowerment measures notn-domestic sexuality, givingspecificattention to temples. of devadasis attached nmuzrai I
THE project of modernisation in colonial Indiawas problematised by the antagonisms between the colonial state and nationalism. On the one hand, in the economic domain, the colonial authorities were reluctant modernisers, conceding littleto thedemands of the nascent Indian bourgeoisie, even retardingthe possibility of transformation of the Indianeconomy.' On the other hand, the household, and specifically conjugality, increasingly became the only space where autonomyandseltfrulecould be preserved., the domain in which the loss of economic and political controlcould be compensated: indeed, it was within this domain that the pre-history ot' political nationalism was enactedandnationalistsovereigntywas first secured.) The dialectic between coloniser and colonised indicates that even when the logic of colonialism was one which denied trulydemocraticsocial change and thereby preserved the"ruleof difference",therewere moments when political exigencies demanded that it extend its circle of indigenous collaborators. It is important however to determinethe preferredmodes by which the circle of collaborators was enlarged: concedingthedomainof theprivate to the continued reign of Indianpatriarchy, thatis theactive retention of anundemocratic domain, was one such preference. It'the sphere of the family, then, was in fact the one over which the nationalistelite declared their sovereignty, as Partha andTanikaSarkar Chatterjee seemto suggest, bothret'orm andtheresistance towardsreform in thatdomain were bornof the antagonism betweencoloniserandcolonised.Therewere, however,significant partsof colonial India, the princelystates for instance,where forms of state legality remained independent of this particular dynamic. Initiativesaimed at recasting concepts of conjugality and the familydid not emanatefromor dissolve into the terms of discourse that have been elaborated by several social hittorians of British Ind.ia. Princely states varied enormously in size and importancebut in large states such as Mysore, the project of modernisation was launched by the bureaucracyitself. This bureaucracycould Economic and Political Weekly not, except episodically4 express any antagonism towards the paramountpower which had institutedit in the first place. At the same time, the relationshipbetween this andthe subjectsof Mysorewas bureaucracy mediated by the nominal authorityof the Maharaja.As its own power derived from the sanction of the colonial state, the of the princelystatebore all the bureaucracy marks of heteronomy. Yet as indigenous administratorswho had more in common with the subject people and their king, the actions of the bureaucracy did not generate the same hostility as reformatory efforts did in British India. In a princely state such as Mysore, under the titularleadershipof the Maharaja,a Hindu king, non-interference with the personal laws of Hindus did not carry the same charge as it did in British India. Thus, participating in the earliest legislative debate in Mysore, on the regulation to prevent child marriage, representativeassembly member Srinivas Rao said: "the objection that government should not interferein social mattersholds only in those cases in which the government is an alien government. But a native government can legislate for the native community in such matters."5 In the operationsof the bureaucracy of the princely state we may trace elements of a moral-intellectual leadershipwhichused the formsof the modernstatethatwere imported via the agency of colonial rule to produce an interventionist state"entering the domain of productionas a mobiliser and manager of investible resources."6 The Mysore bureaucracy also undertook a programmatic, if molecular transformation of Mysore society: commensurate ,with its "imagined economy"was an"imaginedlegality"which would universalise the "legal form".' Graspingthis transformatory and relatively independent role of the managerial elite becomes possible only by moving beyond reductionistargumentsthat posit the state as an expression of class relations to one which recognisesit as a terrain, acknowledging the significanceof the politicalfunctions of the state and the bureaucracy as an independent actor.'TheMysorebureaucracy, the upper echelons of which were drawn froma sectionof the westerneducatedupper castes, enjoyed few organic links with the dominantagrarian classes; at the same time, an urban bourgeoisie of any significance was virtuallyabsentin Mysore.Yetculturally and ideologically, the managerialelite was linked strongly to a bourgeois order.9Only a framework thatrecognisesthe bureaucracy as the "repository of the bourgeoisie's 'politicalintelligence' "'apermitsusto make sense of the totality of legislative and administrativeinitiatives that attempteda moleculartransformation of social relations in Mysore, often reaching into the heartof the family without provoking protests comparableto those in British India.At the same time, the Mysore bureaucracyby no means embodied democraticideals: in that sense, it was truer to the despotic colonial regime from which it derived its power and the indigenous princely authorityin whose nameit ruled.Acknowledgingthemodalities of a not-quite democratic modernisation instituted by the Mysorebureaucracy enables us to grasp the paradoxes of a process in which it only intermittentlybowed to the opinions and oppositions of the state's dominantelites. WhenCongressnationalism finally gained some groundin Mysorein the late 1920s and 1930s, its principalcritiques were directed against the 'authoritarian' natureof the Dewan's rule, ratherthan the agendaof modernisationas such, for it was the same terrain over which it sought to establish dominance. * If the historiography of Mysore has recognised the specificity of the state's initiatives between 1881 and 1947, it has usually been in order to affirm or deny Mysore's positionas a modelstate.However, suchanalysesrarelydeal withthepragmatics of power as it produced a contradictory whichfully reflectedthecombined modernity and uneven development of capitalism in India.To appreciate theeffortsof theprincely state bureaucracywe must rememberthat social movements lacked intellectual force andwereorganisationallyweakin Mysore," unlike directly ruled partsof colonial India where the social reformmovementinitiated by male cultural nationalists in the 19th century and first wave Indian feminism, which began in the 191Os,foregrounded the women's question though in very different 3157

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ways.'2 Members of the Mysore Brahmo to support Samaj,forexample,werereluctant in Bangalore.andother a widow remarrying associationssuch as the Bangalore Literary Society, and the Widow Union, the Rara:de Remarriage Association confined their energies to holding occasional talks and speeches.'" The Mysore state's et'forts at passing and implementing regulations and laws intended to recast family life and to develop private sources of normative behaviourthat were delinked from religion indicatedan interestin extending the scope of statelegality as modernisingstrategy.the limited success of such initiatives were an indicationof the constraints of modernising under the paramount power of the colonial state. This article delineates one aspect of this modernising process that signalled shifts and changes in the position of women within families, and in definitions of domestic and non-domestic sexuality especially as it was aligned with access of women to propertywithin and beyond the family.Specific attentionis paidto the legaladministrative measures surrounding the gradual disempowerment of devadasis attachedto Muzraitemples. While drawing a distinctionbetween the princely state and BritishIndia,it is importantto point out that neither the means by which the project of limitedmodernitywas achieved norits goals In weredemocratic,farless anti-patriarchal. Mysore, as in the rest of India, modernity, as mu'chas the traditions it supplantedor incorporatedcontinued to be the bearerof patriarchal ideologies. If the measures undertaken by the colonial governmentdid little to level gender relations, neither did the initiatives of the princely state. Furthermore,with the idealisation of the middleclass womanas the subjectof reform, class and caste inequities were rarely addressed, and even positively affirmed.'4

clearindication,she saidthat"Hindu religion does not sanction immoralityin either man or woman". The abolition of a practicewhich "in the name of s6rvice to God has condemned a certain class of women to a life of either a concubine or prostitute"only became law in 1947 in Madras.Yet what took years of active campaigningand effort by feminists such as Reddy was achieved by mere administrative fiat in Mysore state. The Mysore government did not labour under the same constraints as the alien colonial authorityin rewritingIndiantradition;their policies neitherprovokedalarmsof'religion in danger nor accusations of ignorance of the sastras. In fact, the Mysore government's order of 1909 only representedthe f'inalstage in a process of producinga new moral order that had begun in the early 190s. This was when the f'irststeps were taken to align notions of dharma- morality or law with suasive power, a moral order which the Maharaja protected - with an emerging colonialjudicature by a bureaucracy pledged to developingandexpandingformsofjustice thatwere no longerembeddedin, or derived from, cultural forms characteristicot' the pre-colonial order. When the British effectively took over direct administration of the kingdom of' Mysore in 1831 from Maharaja Krishna Raja Wodeyar Ill, whose family had been 'restored'to the thronein the f'irst place by the British who wrested control ot' the provincefrom 'Musliminterlopers'in 1799, it was in the nameof bettergovernance.The king's inef'ficiency and feckless spending which haddepletedthestate'srevenueswere cited as causes of' the insurrectionof, the disgruntledpalekars of the Nagar region.'7 Although the rhetoric surrounding the decision to resumedirectrule was-saturated with the idiom of improvement,it was clear that the primary British concern was the TI state's abilityto paythe Rs 24.5 lakhsubsidy to the East India Company, on which In 1929, MuthulakshmiReddy, the first conditionalone the'Hindu rulingfamily was Indian womanlegislatorandanindefatigable installed. One of the serious charges made campaigner against the devadasi system, against the Maharaja was the free and easy moved a bill to end the dedicationof women manner in which he had granted 'inams' to temples in the presidency of Madras.In "not in reward of public services, but to her statementof objects and reasons for the favourites and companions."" Thus in his bill, Reddy complained of the inadequacy brief tenure as the supreme authorityfrom of Sections 372 and 373 of the IndianPenal 1811-1831, the Maharaja grantedinams of Code in preventing such dedication, and variouskindsamounting to Kantiroy Pagodas insisted that "a legislative enactment is 1,68,400 (approximately Rs 4,84,000), therefore necessary in dealing with the effectively doublingthe size of inamgrants. practiceof dedicationper se..."'" Deploring The fact that these were lands which lay in the fact that the agitation of "high minded the fertile wetlands along the Cauveri and Hindus" for devadasi abolition since 1869 Hemavathi rivers, and among rich garden had not yielded legislation, she praised the landsoutside Bangaloreonly aggravatedthe princely state of Mysore for setting a good situation.'9 Since the principal source of example by passing a governmentorder for revenuein Mysorewas land,the loss entailed completeabolition as early as 1909g.Ih Sinee by these generous grantswas unacceptable Mysore was alIsoa Hindu state, this was a to the colonial authorities.

Yet the EIC otficials couldlhardly have been ignorant of pre-colonial systems ot power and authority, as presented in the copious writings of Francis Buchananand MarkWilks, servantsof the company:they could not have overlooked the fact that precolonial monarchical authority wals establishedandlegitimisedpreciselythrough such grants.The teinple. for examnple, was a key institution in the formationof sociali communities, a site where both symbolic and material resources were redistributed rendering "public, stable and culturally exchangesat the level of politics appropriate andeconoinics.""' The assumptionot direct rule in 1831, then, was promptedas much by an anxiety over the resurgence of monarchical forms of power which could become the locus of challenges to colonial power as over the continuied paymentof the Mysore subsidy. When the royal fat.mily resumed its rule 1 aft&r a 50-year over Mysore in I%X interregnumof direct British rule, it was undervastly alteredcircLumstanices, in which a powertul, autonomoousmonarchy had become impossible. hlle king, Chamaraja WodeyarX, schooled into obedieniceto the Paramountpower and in the useless social graces and skills more appropriateto the British aristocracy,' was only nominally a 'sovereign.: administrative power rested moreor less wholly in thebureaucracy headed andhiscouncil bytheDewan(primeminister) of ministers.)2The responsibilities t the newly indepenidentadministration under wereenormous,notthe Dewan Rangacharlu least of which was the payment of an enhancedsubsidy of Rs 35 lakh(thoughthe enhancement was deterred for a period of five years, and then turther 10 years) and the repayment of loans contracted duringthe devastating famine of 1876. Of utmost urgencywas a landrevenuecode on the lines of the Bombay code, which came into force only in 1888, atter which all landin Mysore was surveyed and settled by 1899.2' Land revenue settlements occurred alongside the scrutinyot inams by the inam department,and the reorganisationof the Muzrai The wordMuzrai, department. which was derived from the Persianword 'Mujra'. meaningdeductionsor allowances, reterred to allowances granted for religious and charitable the period purposes.24Throughout of direct British rule, the administration of the Muzrai departminent presenteda thorny problem,since interterencein the use of the. economicandcultural ol thetemple resources could lead to contlicts ovcr legitimacy and authority, as well as political contlicts between religious elites. Neverthieless,the colonial state, despite intermitteint avowals to the contrary2reorganised and penetrated, 'secularised' the meaning and content of temple rituals, revenues and finances, and reinscribedthe social status of the temple

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withincolonial society.26 As a consequence, the decision was made to appoint six high caste 'dharmakarthas' (temple managers)to superintend temple rituals,offerings, etc, as was done in Madras to avoid the of a "Christian ofticer of the embarrassment Government"performingacts which were connected with."idolatrous buildings and In Mysore, wheredirectrule was practices". it was consideredundesirableto temporary, transfer the management of religious institutionsto privatecommittees:in the two places where such committees had been formed, feuds had erupted, so the managementof these temples stayed with In aneffort to control governmentofficers.27 of revenues,a regular .the 'misappropriation' auditof the accountsot;each institutionwas andcomparedto the 'tasdikpattis' prepared of sanctioned of expenditure).2X *(lists amounts The state also reserved the right to replace managements that were inefficient, and resume lands where more- efficient managementscould not be found.29 Persistentdemands made in the Mysore representative assembly after 1883 for reforms in temple management led the Mysore government to appoint a special as Muzraisuperintendent. The new oftticer officer.A Srinivasacharlu, brisklywentabout thebusinessof introducingnew budgetsand (temple sanctions,appointing'dharmadarsis' managersequivalentto the dharmakarthas of Madras),revising and regulating tasdik pattis.' all of which aimed at restoringthe original objects of grants made to temples, securing better officials for temples and as 'math' (monastic orders with substantial material resources) heads,in short."toimpart to the worship and rituals therein more impressivenessand solemnity by a stricter conformity with the spirit of the Hindu religion as expounded by accepted authorities."32 The Muzraisecretary'sbrief was to bring 'light and air' to the mysterious womb of the temple in both a literaland metaphorical sense, expose the misdeedsof the custodians of temple rituals and revenues, and 'clean up' both the temple surroundingsand the rituals and practices." An opportunity to effect a serious and irrevocable chflnge in thepoliticaleconomyof thetemplepresented itself soon after he assumed charge. The Muzraisecretarywas presented with a bill of Rs 12/5/4 as paymentto a woman called Ramamani who had performed 'tafe' (dancing) services at the car festival of Bhoganandeswara temple at -Nandidurg, He only reluctantlyagreed Chikkaballapur. to pay, saying that such tafe services were an unnecessary waste of money that could be betterspenton "improvingsanitation".34 Promising to issue a circular outlining the legitimate services of devadasis in temples. Srinivasacharlucategorically asserted that they did not include tafe or dancing.

We do not know the basis on which the Muzrai secretary made his categorical decision, i e, knowledge of the scripturesor familiaritywith temple custom, but it may have been promptedin partby the growing clamour in the neighbouring. Madras presidencyof the anti-nautch(literally antidance) campaign conducted largely by educateduppercaste Hindus."Forthe most part, Mysore appearsto have escaped any such vociferous campaign. In 1891 however, the Vrittanita Chintamani, echoing the fears that were voiced in the Madras press, conceded that the concern for the abolition of the devadasisystem was rooted in fears of female empowermentwithin the new colonial dispensation. Thus, it noted that some dancing girls'of Madras were very rich, lived in large houses, kept carriages and paid large amounts of municipal taxes: this entitled them to vote in municipal committees. The paper suggested that these rights be withdrawn to reduce the embarrassment faced by respectablegentlemenwho hadto beg these 'low women' fortheirvote.6 To someextent, such upper caste discomfort with these culturaltraditionswere an indicationof the success of missionary critiques of 'bad' Hindu practices.'7 By this time, we may recall, Leagues for Social Purity and Temperance had emerged in various parts of the country." The MysoreMuzraisecretary did notissue the promised circular in 1892, but waited until 1898 to implementhis decision during the revision of the tasdik pattis of the andMelkotetemples(whichwere Nanjangud among the largestof the temple institutions in Mysore)." On that occasion, he directed that tafe women should not be admittedto any kind of duty in the two temples, and although they could continue to be paid while they were alive, theirposts shouldnot be tilled up after their deaths."' Even in 1898, thereappears to havebeenno sustained discussionof whatconstituted the 'legitimate services' of devadasis:the Muzraisecretary was obviously secure in his belief that the 'immorality' of devadasis was too selfevidentto warrant discussion.The unilateral -decision of the governmentto reformtemple traditions by divesting devadasis of their roles, however, soon required detailed elaboration as the implications gradually untoldedto boththosedisempoweredby the decision and those who stood poised to benefit from it.

no knowndirectreferencesto dancingin the temple in the oldest books of dance theory, theNatyashastra andtheAbhinaya Darpana; thereis first mentionof it in the I Ith century collection of stories,the Kathasaritsagara.4 Yet as a 'nityasumangali', aneverauspicious woman, the devadasi was to deal with the 'dangerousdivine', a role thatwas only later overshadowedby her artisticperformances in the temples and in the court.42 Inscriptional evidence from medieval Karnatakais more revealing. Before the II th century, when temple women were assignedspecificduties,thereis only mention of the word 'sule' (ineaning prostitute)in inscriptions. In the 11th century, a time when the temple as an institution was expanding, the word 'patra' (meaning singing/dancinggirl) was graduallyattached to them.43The word 'devadasi' itself is conspicuous by its absence in this period, it was thencurrent in theinscriptions although of neighbouring regions as well as in the 'vachana'literature of the Virashaivas.4" By the 12th century, when the temple as an institution had expanded considerably nA only in size but in the complexity of rituals performed,specific duties were assigned to temple women; indeed, the temple complex came increasingly to resemble the king's court,andthe devadasi's relationto thedeity the courtesan'srelationto the approximated king.45 The sacred prostitute gradually became the custodianof the artsof singing and dancing. Forherservices to thetemple,thedevadasi enjoyed grantsmadeeitherto herpersonally or to the temple. These included grants of lands, some of which were made by upper caste women themselves.46 By the late 19th century, the devadasi tradition was a decidedly matrilineal one. The young dedicated girl underwentrigorous training in 'nritya'andGitaundera male guru,which entitled her access to a structureof cash payments through the temple or through personallandgrantsfromthesexualalliances she developed with upper caste patrons.4" Her strict professionalism, says Amrit Srinivasan, "made her an adjunc.t to conservative domestic society, not its anassertion borneoutby thenumber ravager", of female donors of grants to temples for theirservices."8 Indeed,the devadasi's legal rights entitled her to adopt daughtersand. pass propertyon to her female descendants. Successive censuses since 1891 had entered the natuvas and kaikolas underthe II1 group 'dancersand singers' acknowledging males as the musicalaccompanists of female Tracingthegenealogyoflthetempledancer temple dancers.Noting that the community assumedsome importance in thediscussions of kaikolaswere concentrated in the Mysore of the Mysoreofficials, as we shallsee. What district, and the smaller numberof natuvas exactly were the traditionssurrounding the largely in Kolar district, the census report practiceof'devadasis dancingin thetemples? also indicated that self-perceptionsamong Thetextualantiquity of the traditionof temple thiesecommunities was alreadychanging: is somewvhat uncertain.There are thus members of these communities from damncing

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various castes who were adopted by professional women dancers, initiated into 'aksharabhyasa'(literacy) and to a life of dancingandsinging(p423). Despitea valiant ethnographiceffort aimed at marginalising if not altogether suppressingthe devadasi, her professionalism and her skills intrude into the account. Clearly, then, by lyer's own indirect admission, devadasi women and natuvan men belonged to the same occupational category: some devadasi women became-professionaldancerswhile others formed domestic relationships with natuvans. Even those women who did not become devadasis enjoyed a contiderably higher status than other categories of women under Hindu law in that their daughters inherited equal shares with the sons. In the case of devadasis,however,"the childrenbelong to the mothers,andthe girls born or affiliated inherit her property,the male members being only entitled to maintenance".54 We mustnotexaggeratethepowerenjoyed by devadasis, who despite their relative autonomyneverthelessremaineddependent on that triad of men within the political economy of the temple, the priest,guru and patron.55 Yet, since her sexual services were embedded within the wider culturalsphere of symbolic and materialexchanges in the temple,thedevadasienjoyeda positionquite distinct from those of proletarianisedsex workers, and even basavis. Once more, we turnto lyer. Basavis, Iyersays, were women drawnfrom a rangeof lower castes, distinct in most cases from those which dedicated girls to the life of a devadasi. Thus the bedars, dombars, holeyas, madigas, andvoddasoftendedicatedtheir kilakkyatas girls as basavis at the local temples. The system, says lyer, functioned as a way of overcoming problems arising from the absence of a son to inherit property.Thus sonless parents instead of adopting a son often dedicated a daughterwho thereafter functionedas an 'honoraryson', continuing to live in her father's house, inheritinghis propertyand performinghis funeralrites.56 She usually developed a relationshipwith one man of the same or higher caste who paid her fatherback for the expenses he had incurred.Her children were legitimate and female natuvans! Yet although a photograph wereentitledto a sharein theirgrandfather's of a handsome 'Natuva Dancing Woman' properties. thetext, devadasis arereferred Yet neither lyer, nor M N Srinivas after acqompanies to throughout his account as a separate him,57 tells us how a concern for preserving category of 'Professional (performing) a line of inheritancecould have developed Women' and as one of the 10 endogamous amongthese primarilylandless,agricultural groups constituting the community of labourercastes such as the holeyas and the performers.By way of explanation for the madigas and why it should have taken this "disproportionately high number of particularform of dedication as basavis. females (64 percent) amongst the natuvans Could the system in fact have been a part enumeratedin the 1901 census" according of a social logic thatpermitted heirlessupper to Iyer was "the greater care bestowed on caste men to produce a legitimate line of female than on male children"and also the inheritance through analliancewitha basavi? continued recruitment of girls from Could the paymentmade to her fatherhave other districts of Mysore had returned themselves as Telugu banajigas.49 However, even in 1901, a considerable of adoption of femalesintothenatuva amount community must have been going on: although the absolute number of people themselvesas natuvasandkaikolas reporting wasdrasticallyreducedin the 10-year period from7,442 to 2,163, nearly64 per cent were females.5"By now it was clear that the decrease of 5,279 or 71 per cent of the underthis headwas becausemost population now returned themselves as banajigas or lingayats. In 1901, however, before the reformeffort of the Mysore administration had begun to operate in ways that would signal the decline of this community, the census reportedthat "atthe presentday [the devadasis] are a distinct caste having laws of their own and their own constitutional settis and yajamans whom they obey."5' A less drasticdecline in numbers,to 1,745, was reportedin the 1911 census: however, most members of the community were in Bangalore andKolardistricts, concentrated the two major industrialareas of the state. Mysore, the seat of princely power, had by this time ceased to provide the necessary forcing them patronageto these performers, to reclassify themselves or to seek employment elsewhere.2 lyer wrote his By the time Ananthkrishna on MysoreTribes multi-volume compendium and Castes in the early 1930s, a censorious attitudetowardsthe devadasis was already a part of the middle class common sense. lyer's accountwasrepletewithcontradictions and the disastrous inflections inherent in colonial ethnography-were evident in his description of the natuvans (male musical accompanists who performed with the devadasis).The natuvansmeriteda separate chapterin his work althoughthey were not a caste, and in his anxiety to make them, ratherthanthe devadasis, the key figures in this community of performers, lyer was forced into almost gymnastic contortions. The name natuvan, he emphasised, "is an occupational term, meaning a dancing master which is applied to males of a c>ncing girl group to train girls in What then are the women of dancing."53 this community called? Not devadasis, but

had the effect of preventing her from becoming a claimant in the propertyof her higher caste patron? This remains only a speculationhere, but it is clear from several ethnographies that the basavis enjoyed enviable property rights, and like their inhabited devadasi and nayar counterparts, the very heartof Hindu laws of inheritance, rather than remaining islands, or even of exceptionwithinHinduLaw. archipelagos Nevertheless,in ordertohypostatiseHindu Law as one which excluded all forms of female inheritance,and thuscast it in a form those more familiarto Europeanpatriarchy, spheres of female economic power had to be recast as aberrations,inconsistent with the body of HinduLaw. Having selectively grafted as 'Hindu Law' a set of practices which were far from universal, colonial authoritieseffaced the historical processes by which such a graftinghadoccurred.Thus by the late 19th century, the existence of women with property rights was posed as a 'problem' since "the rightof the daughter to inherit property[was] in violation of the ordinarycanonsof HinduLaw."Thoughthe issue was neversatisfactorilysettledby civil courts, the revenue authorities frequently registered the pattas (deeds) of a deceased 'raiyat' (peasant) in the name of his basavi daughter,a rightwhich even male inheritors in the Hinduline (as defined by the colonial authorities)admittedwas hers by custom.-8 Althoughthe dedicationof girls below 18 as basaviswas madeanoffenceunderSection 372 of theIndianPenalCode, Muthulakshmi Reddypointedoutthatthetempleauthorities, parents and general public "honestly feel that religion sanctions it and the law is not The basavi's duties absolutely against it."59 within the temple however were- only nominal, and in Iyer's words "they did not forhire" prostitute themselvespromiscuously as did devadasis".1' Their links with the temple institution were therefore far more tenuous than those of the devadasis, whose performances, despiteIyer's censorioustone, were central to temple rituals, and earned themrespectwell into the lastdecadeof 19th century. IV The Muzrai secretary's order only deepened the crisis resulting from the disappearing patronage of local political elites after the establishmentof Britishrule in Mysore. If competing claims over temple resources had been made throughoutthe 19thcentury,the new orderserved to multiply them. In 1898, Vydya Srikantaiah of Gauribidanur sought the permissionof the government to resume tafe service inams on the (presumablygrantedby his forebears) grounds that the tafe women were not rendering service as per the sastras.6'The Kolardeputycommissioner of investigations

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enablethemtostrengthentheirrelationshipnotonlywiththeirsuperiors,butwith their subordinates andpeersas well. A more lasting solution to the embarrassmentof seeing devadasiscontinue theirrole 1994, 130p,bibliography; 22x14cmISBN81-85880-24-7 Rs 150.00 in temple rituals than mere official disapprovalwas to cut at the source of their Sendyourordersand write for complete catalogueto:
maladies.67

his bureaucracy. The first petition of Kittasani, Nanjasani, Kalyanisani and six other women emphasised the sovereign's duty to protect customary practices and scriptural duties without recognising that the maharaja himself was powerless to interveneon their behalf. Their appeal to a law and morality that they believed was upheld by the monarch received no more than cursory attentionat the palace, whose officials despatchedit to the governmenton January 16, 1905 as a matterunconcerned with the palace. In a recognition of the shifting relations of power, the devadasi's next petition was addressedto the Muzrai commissioneras well, requestingreinstatement as per family traditions, but now expressing a willingness to adapt to the changed circumstances. Their overriding more disapproving note, the VrittantaPatrike anxiety was to preserve not just their reportedin 1896 that the royal family had livelihoods but their skills in music and spentRs 16,000 on dancing girls for a royal wedding:worseyet was the respectaccorded dancing which, they said, should not be to these women, who were paradedthrough allowed to languishanddie for wantof state the dynasticcapitalalong with the brideand patronage:the devadasis thereforeoffered to performat state gatheringsif necessary.7" groom in 'howdahs'.4 TheMuzrai therefore issuedstrict secretary The Mysoreofficials who could no longer ordersdisallowingthe 'detestablecreatures' rely on government fiat to initiate social from accompanying the Maharaja's change on this scale sought a referenceto procession on his tour of Sivaganga and happily consort with the apsaras (heavenly the sastras as the indisputableword on the Melkote temples in 1900, despite the angels), giving them fulfilment":they too dutiesof devadasis.7 ' We havealreadynoted admission of the palace controller that the should be allowed to serve god tlhrough the ambiguities of the sastraic record duties of 'dancinggirls' though not defined serving king, guruand priestwho were akin compared to the far more reliable epigraanywherecertainlyincluded tafe services.65 to god, and thereby give and receive phical record, so the dewan's request for Even if the ceremonialduties performedby fulfilment.69 clarification in 1906 about "how far the theMaharaja werecriticalto the legitimation Between the tremuloussignaturesof the sastras enjoin the service of dancing girls of theactionsof theindigenousbureaucracy, devadasi women affixed to a handwritten in temples" was itself an invitation to the content and natureof these ceremonies Kannadapetitionand the typedgovernment legitimise a particular, rather than some were defined by the bureaucracy itself. orders and clarifications in English lay a universal, sastraic tradition.The 'agamiks' Assured that his actions would meet the chasm that separatedprevailing notions of entrusted with the task masterfully approvalof the British resident in Mysore, dharma, protected by the king, from the demonstrated, throughcitationfroma genre Srinivasacharlu said he "intended to do modalities of modernity, set in motion by of textsdealingwithtemplerituals,'Shaiva', away with dancing girls who sometimes accompanied the Isthakabal party (welcominggroup)of the Maharaja at major temples"atMelkote,Sivaganga,forexample and accordinglyissued orders to all deputy commissioners responsible for the local arrangementsduring such visits.' Every effort was made to see that women were NEW DIMENSIONS IN MODERNMANAGEMENT preventedfrom dancing in the temples. The By administration prided itself on granting no Dibakar exceptions to the new rule, even when Panigrahy petitionswere presentedby women such as and the dancer of T'Narsipur or Meenakshi of The basic objectiveof the book is to assist the executives,managers in 1905, bothof whomclaimed administrators Tirumakudlu to performmore effectivelyin theirjob. The book outcomes that they had yowed to dance at the Girija specifictechniques supported by step-by-step, day-to-day approach whichwill Kalyana at Nanjangudto be cured of their revealed not only that these women were renderingdaily tafe services as requiredof them but that they were in possession of title deeds that could not be simply taken away without transgressing the bounds of legality.62 The Muzraisecretarywas however quite determinedto put an end to the practice of dancingin temples and temple processions. Inthis, he was amplyaidedby publicopinion opposed to the continuedindulgence of the Maharaja in practices that were an of themiddle tothe moralities embarrassment Prakasikadespaired class. Thus Karnataka of seeking governmentassistance for social reform,reportingthat 'a nautch party' was held at a wedding attended by both the in 1896.63 On a far Dewan andthe Maharaja should not be filled. Over a period of time, thiswouldleadto adeclineintheemployment of devadasis in temples, and temple rituals themselves wouldthereforeundergochange by adaptingto their absence. Not only did this representa fargreaterincursioninto the traditionalduties and rightsof devadasis, it ensured that the change was irreversible. The first spirited challenge to the new situation came from the 12 devadasis who worked for the Srikanteswara temple at Nanjangud, a prominent temple complex that hadJlong enjoyed princely patronage. In two emotional petitions which cited the authority of the 'sastra' ('Veda Bharata Shastra agamashastra')and 'sampradaya' (customarypractice),the women reminded the sovereign of his dutytowardsprotecting hereditary occupations such as theirs.6" Unlike the brahmins, they said, who had 'chattrams'(feeding houses) and maths to take care of their needs, the devadasis had only theirartisticskills with which to render service to god and earn their livelihoods. The learnedprieststhemselvesclaimed,they said,that"punyatmas (greatsouls) who have performed rituals such as yagas', yagnas and agnistho.ma,will attain paradise, and

livelihood, i e, to suspend payments and resourcesthatsustainedthe devadasiandher arts. The Muzrai secretary recognised this heorderedthatpositionsthatfell vacant Wrhen templesafterthedeathof adevadasi it Muzrai

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that 'Pancharatra', 'Vykhanasagamasastras,72 devadasisdid indeed have specific services to renderin the temple. From the moment theywokeup,bathedandputon freshclothes and adornedthemselves with flowers, they in temple rituals spentthe day participating which included waking up the deity with song and dance rituals, lighting the lamps in the evenings, and performingprescribed musicaland dance oblations at set times. In addition, the agamiks said, the scriptures them to performa series of special required ritualson specific days throughoutthe year. In turn, devadasis were entitled to a share of the offerings as a temple honour and to paymentsfromtemple revenues.Indeed,the non-performance of these duties by the devadasiswasdeemedso grievousa violation of the temple code that the priests were required to perform rituals of atonement ('prayaschitta').7"They concluded their comment, submittedto the governmenton July 24, 1906, with the sly suggestion that althoughthis was what the sastrassaid, the government should do whatever was appropriate. The ambiguity of the response was clearly produced by the valorisation of textual authority by the Mysore officials since the agamiks, who were now called upon to provide a definitive statement, were probably just one of the many who the structure of temple tradition. determined There was little in their testimony, moreover, that could be deployed by government officials seeking legitimation for the decision to do away with the devadasi-and her role in temples. Attention was now trained on the "personal purity andrectitudeof conductandcelibacy which were considered essential in the case of female servants of god."74 The sastraic authorities were once more summoned to adjudicateon the question of whetherstrici 'brahmacharya' was expected of devadasis. The agamiks in their second memo of August 16, 1907 complied with the expectationsof the authoritiesby reiterating the need for strict brahmacharyaamong devadasis"even though they may have tied thediali(necklacethatis a sign of marriage)" in other words, even though they were ti the deity. They raisedthe spectre married of a worldturnedupside down, which it was the dutyof the governmentauthoritiesto set right. "Due to kala vaishamya (the of time)all varnashramacharas deterioration have come to confusion. If you, as upholder of the dharma,make them follow sastraic injunctions,it will be good for the country, king and people."75The evocation of .a powerful dystopia had long served as the formatfor the voicing of uppercaste, male anxieties, particularly about the sexual appetite-s of women.76 The Mysore administratiQn was-now confident that the decision to discontinue the services of

devadasis could even be turned to their advantage.If the devadasiscould be shown as having violated sacred traditions, this in a wvould cast the Mysore administration new light, not merely as protectorsof true dharmabut restorersof a previous standard
of purity:

Whatever mayhavebeentheoriginalobject of the Devadasis,the state of the institution in whichthesepeoplearenow of immorality to justify the actiontakenby foundappears in removingthemfromthe the government sacred institutionslike temples." The new measures which had only been applied to the two large temples were now extended to all Muzrai institutions in Mysore: Devadasis who held land directly, and possessed deeds to prove that, were confirmed as the owners of that property in perpetuity on the payment of quit rent. Even in those cases where lands were not directly held by the women but by the temples, the government could not resume land: lands donated to temples could only be resumed if services for which they endowed were not performed. Devadasis could hardly be dispossessed for nonperformanceof theirduties when such nonperformance was no fault of theirs. The government advocate, therefore, made the ingenious suggestion that the Inam departmentcould certainlyenforce the new rule against "women who have not preserved their chastity and celibacy". By making celibacy, and not just the performance of dance rituals, a condition of their continued enjoyment of temple grants,the stateadroitlycontainedthe crisis produced by its own illegality in ending 'local law-ways. The irony is inescapable, since in most cases, as we have seen, the women hadreceived land grantsfrom male patronsfor services whichcombinedartistic and sexual skills. It is also striking that the Mysore adminis,tration was constrained in its actions by two contradictorysets of rules: by the sastraicinjunctionsandconcepts of dharma which were theologicallyderivedon the one hand, and by the drive towards defining a legality delinkedfrom religionon the other. The officials' resolution.of thecontradictory pulls was not the repudiationof either one, but a judicious applicationof each side of the argument to convince different constituencies. This staved off possible orthodoxaccusationsaboutignoranceof the sastras, and therefore alienation from the people -they sought to, govern, while simultaneouslysatisfying the urgesof those who cast themselves as 'modernisers', redefiningandrecastingtraditionsthatwere an impedimentto the transformedpolitical and economic uses of the temple complex. The secondcouncillor KPPuttanna Chetty commendedthe "highmoralcourage"of the

government in excluding devadasis from their temple services. Yet it was not just women who had been found lacking in the morality appropriateto temple offices: the venality of male. archakas "men of little learning and not of high moral character" was legendary.However, thereis no further referenceto this lapsed traditionin the final GOof 1909whichabolishedtheemployment W-omen of devadasisin Muzraiinstitutions." alone ('notoriously of loose morals') bore the responsibility for the degeneration of high ideals. By investing the devadasi with such a notion of agency, the emerging ordermade herthe subjectof her patriarchal own history,andheldher responsiblefor her descent into oblivion. The absorption of the artistic dance traditions of devadasis into a 'national culture' forged by upper caste nationalists after suitablereformshas been documented elsewhere and will not concern me here. What is striking about this moment in Mysore history is the speed with which new traditions were forged: thus in 1908, the new Muzraisecretary,while conceding that Srinivasacharluhad been mistaken in his belief that tafe services were not scripturally ordained, argued against the reversalof his predecessor's 1892 decision by observing that over the past 15 years, "people had got used to the absence of Devadasis' service". to The determinationof the bureaucracy put an end to temple services of devadasis did not end with the passage of the governmentorder.The governmentstill had to deal with petitions from devadasis who resented the abrupt termination of their services in temples, or the transferof their to other people.79In 1919, in remuneration responseto the concernsof a memberof the legislative council who urged stern actions to restore"thedecency and purityof public worship",the Muzraisecretarycalled on the deputy commissioner of every district;to reporton the implementationof the order. Their responses clea3rlyshowed that they were fulfilling the wishes of the government quite efficiently. In most cases, inam lands and temple perquisitesgiven to tafe women had been resumed after the death of incumbents.x" The DCs of Kadur,M'ysore and Chitaldurg reported there were no devadasiinamsinhtheirdistricts.TheShimoga DC said that while one inam had been resumed, four other holders were categorically informed that the perquisites they enjoyed were only in their lifetime. OtherDCsof Hassan,Tumkurand Bangalore briskactionagainsttheinamholders: reported in Kolardistrictalone, as manyas 33 temples still enjoyed tafe service inams. Since the active renderingof tafe service was no longer the criterionfor enjoying the tafe service minas, devadasis such as Muniamma, who had served both the Sri

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Gopala Swami and Sri Chandrasekhara Kolardistnrct, Swamytemplesof Srinivaspur, tor 50 years, suddenly foundtheir claims to personalinamgrantschallengedby non-tafe members of the family." In this case, the government ruled that the lands belonged to thefamilyandnotto herpersonallydespite the appellant'sclaims that she had paid the kandayam (land revenue) from 1900 and enjoyedthe landabsolutelyandexclusively. Othertemple officials, who clearly stood to benefit from the resumptionof tafe service inams, lost no time in divesting the female descendantsof devadasis of such land.Thus the 51/2 acres of dry land and the 1.16 acres of wetland of devadasi Seshi of the Sri temple of Nambihalliin Someshwaradevaru Srinivaspurtaluk, which was legally made in 1873, and over to Venkatalakshmamma enjoyed by the latter's female descendants, was resumedin 1929 as Devadaya land for service to the temple.K2

anddelink it fromservice to the temple was sophistication and literary merit of a certain puritanism which was at odds Muddupalani'swork, as well as its attempt with her anxiety to develop women's at subversion, and published a fresh independetice. She therefore resolved the edition of the book. Responding to the troubling question of devadasi sexuality outrage of some reformers who declared within the parameters set by male the poem obscene and vulgar, the colonial nationalists by encouraging them to marry authorities seized all copies of the book in and domesticate themselves.xs For the 191 1 under Section 392 of the IPC. It was most part, references to female sexuality clear that, on the critical question of in journals like Saraswvahi, edited by subordination of female sexuality, the R Kalyanamma,remained muted. On one interests of empire and nation were not occasion when it was disciussed, as in the necessarily in opposition. profile of Yamini Poorna Tilakamma, The gradual erosionof thematerial support abilitiesof thedevadasi resulted reference was to the reformedsexuality of fortheartistic a fallen woman who responded to the call in her decline as a professional dancer, sexof Gandhi. Tilakamma, whose "moral producingin its place a proletarianised weakness"in herearly childhood in Guntur worker,with nothingto tradebut hersexual led her to the life of veshya/devadasi, services, which were now a threat, rather household. continued as a prostitutefor 18 years until thananadjunct,to thepatriarchal in 1923, in the "sacred age of Gandhi", In many ways the Devadasi became from her urban she set up an institution, Yuvathi indistinguishable Sharanalaya.devoted to the eradication of counterparts,and t'romthe Basavis in the prostitution, and an end to the devadasi rural areas. Beginning in the 1930s, the V system. Credit is given not only to expanding markets for prostitutesin cities among Tilakammabut to "theAndhraleaders who such as Bombayfoundreadyrecruits the devadasis and basavis of Mysore."x Throughthe suppressionof the polyvalent made her take up this work.""x own survival A sign of the shift from a defence of BangaloreNagaratnamma's rolesof the devadasi,the Mysoreauthorities had begun drawing the lines between certain forms of sexuality in the name of as a skilled musician and the patronageshe respectable and disrespectable female "tradition"to a more active distanciation continuedto receive were exceptionalrather sexuality, a distinction that was consonant from such traditions was the fate of the than the rule."9Not only had the Mysore Radlhika government invented a split between to a large extent with dominant nationalist reprintof Radhika Santwanam.X" was a book written by an 18th respectableand disrespectablesexuality, it discourse especially in the period of Santwinamio Gandhiannationalism." The new morality century courtesan of the Thanjavurcourt, had realignedaccess to propertyalong such which was concretised by Gandhian Muddupalani. It was a subversion of axes as well. Once the critical relation erotic genres in thatit centredon between new patriarchal definitions of nationalism signified a shift from the traditional nationalist response of the last decades of women's sexual pleasures. In 1910, female sexuality and women's rights to herselfa learned propertywas redefined, it became possible, Nagarathnamma, the 19th century. The cumulative et'fects Bangalore ot'the implementation. and then repeal, of woman, renowned musician and courtesan especially in the 1930s to legislate against the Contagious Diseases Acts in British and a Gayaka (a member of one of the immorality on the one hand (evidenced by cantonmentsin India. the intermittentuse endogamous groups from which devadasis the passage of the Suppressionot'Immoral of lock hospitals to regulate urban were drawn) was entranced by the Traffic in Women and Girls Act of 1937) prostitution throughout the 19th century, and the gradual growth of Leagues of Social Purityand Temperance committees consisting of missionaries as well as Indian Anti-Nautch campaigners, had produced something of a backlash. Indigenous male c __ elites increasingly felt themselves reduced to the level of clients when they had once the surveillance beenpatrons,andportrayed ? 40.00 EASTON measures ot the British authorities, wlho DAVID STRUCTUPI POLITICAL OF AN4LYSIS THE were unable to distinguish family womcni ?11.95 t'romothers, as a violation of communutl DAVID HELD honour. Once more, the reqistance to STATE A THE MODERN THEORY POLITICAL colonial intrusion into the private domain RAYMOND ? 12.95 PLANT was articulatedas resistance to colonialism THOUGHT POLITICAL MODERN itself: the 1888 Congress annual meeting ? 11.95 E. CONNOLLY WILLIAM therefore passed a resolution seeking to &MODERNITY THEORY POLITICAL abolishBritishLaws regulatingprostitution on the grounds that the honour of ? 15.99 HAMPSHER-MONk IAIN respectable Indian women was at stake." THOUGHT POLITICAL MODERN OF A HISTORY In the period of Gandhian nationalism, Fax/Mall your orders to however, chastity in "thought. word and BOOKSELLERS .,RAWAT h deed"were seen as critical for the development of the moral force of a satyagrahi. 302 004 JAIPUR 3-Na-20,Jawaha Nagar, MuthulakshmiReddy's Thus,undergirding 1-141-567748 +9 Fax: Phone: .91-141-5670 campaign to enf'ranchisedevadasi minas

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and for the rights of women to property on the other. As the devadasis were symbolically and materially deprived of their resources, and consequently unable to practise their artistic skills, they were reducedto the status of proletarianisedsex workers. When the extension of Hindu women's rights to propertydid take place, with tile relatively uncontested passage of the act amending women's rights under Hindu Law in 1933, it was middle class, upppercaste women, whose sexuality was reined in to the domain of domestic monogamous life, who stood to gain. Havingdeclaredwomen's rightsto property underHindu Law an anomaly when it was linkedto non-patriarchal forms of marriage and family, the state could now bestow rights on women within the frameworkof the patriarchalhousehold. What new codes of morality did new nationalist patriarchy propose for mdn themselves? Here the Gandhian ideal of celibacy was far less pervasive, and not surprisingly,one of the persistentdemands of first wave feminism was an end to the moral double standard.9" Even the ideal of companionatemarriagepursuedwith such vigour in colonial India was not one that necessarily entailedstrictmonogamyof men. While there was certainly a contractionof legitimatespheresof male sexualfulfilment, the growth of prostitution in an illicit subterranean sphere,suppressedfrom-public view, ensured the "natural" promiscuityof menacontinuedmodeof expression.Writing in 1930, Ananthakrishna Iyer speculates on the origins of the devadasi system thus: "the founders of this institution made this an outlet for safeguarding family women for the good of the country.9' This understandingresonated in the arguments made by opponents of proposed strictures on the practice of prostitution during debates on SITA in the 1930s.92 Ifstrains of democracywithintheemerging conception of modernity may be traced at all, it is the yearnings of male nationalists fora companionatemarriagein which wives consented to the "natural"promiscuity of men,providedit did not occur at the expense of the domestic arrangements.In his brief sketchof BangaloreNagaratnamma included in a collection of writings on the luninaries of Mysore, D V Gundappa(DVG) speaks at lengthof the virtuesof one of her patrons, a MysoreHigh Courtjudge, Narahari Rao.91 Narahari Rao attended her performances daily, and resolved to become her patron. DVG reconstructs a dialogue between Rao andhis wife thatbearsdetailed Nasahari quotation: When Narahari Rao desired to become a of Nagaratnamma, he firstsoughtthe patron of hislawfulwife(Dharmapatni). permission He called his wife and said: NarahariRao: Listen, I want to ask you something.I need your permission. Economic and Political Weekly

[This is part of a larger project on Law, Modernity and Patriarchyin India. A small part of this material has appeared in my article We do not know whether such a 'From Devadasi Reform to SITA: Reforming conversation did take place, but it is Sex Work in Mysore State, 1892-1937', interestingthat DVG reportsthis exchange National Law School Journal, Special Issue just before he speaks of the embarrassment 1993, 82-93, Draftsof this version werepresented to audiences at Brown and Johns' Hopkins caused by Narahari Rao's patronage of Universities, USA: I am grateful for the help of Nagaratnamma to the government of H S Krishnamurthy, N P Shankaranarayana, Mysore, whose employee he was.94When Basavaradhya, Devara Konda Reddy and S P the dewan learned of the daily visits of Tewari. Uma Chakravarthy, MaryJohn, Barbara NarahariRao to Nagaratnamma'squarters Ramusack, Lisa Armstrong,Vijay Prashadand in the official governmentcarriage,replete Madhava Prasad have commented on earlier with the regalia of the princely state, he versions; I remain responsible for the uses to decidedto intervene.He requestedNarahari which I have put all their comments.]

Wife [who remains unnamed]: Will anyone believe that you need my permission [for anything]? Tell me what you want me to do. N: It's not that way. This is a special situation. I have become enamoured of s music for several days now. Nagaratnamma' She sings very well. I wish to be able to listen to her music now and then. If you have any objections, tell me now and I shall let go of this interest. W: It is my desire that your desires be fulfilled. N: I will ensure that you are not inconvenienced by this. W: How can it be an inconvenience to me? You have done your duty by the family. Our children have grown and.are standing on their own feet. Our daughters are married. Our sons are educated. Now it is our duty to keep you happy. Thus this n,oble woman (Mahathayi) gave her permission. Only then did NarahariRao go ahead with his plans.

The ease with which the Mysore bureaucracy displaced monarchicinstitutionsis an indication of the material ineffectuality of monarchicalrule underparamount colonfal power. Colonial rule had however enabled the Mysore bureaucracy to extricate recognisably patriarchalelements from a pre-colonial order that legally extended femaleandmalesexualitybeyondthedomain of the conjugal family. What was put in its place, both in the nationalist imagination and in bureaucratic practice,in the name of a new, abstract legality, was a more thoroughly patriarchalfamily order which maintained the illusion of mutual respect and companionship.

Notes

Rao notto sully theimagdof thegovernment by visiting Nagaratnammain the official vehicle.Narahari Raowas suitably chastened, and readily complied by ending his use of the government vehicle, though he continued his patronage of Nagaratnamma. It is-striking that the moral objection to Narahari Rao's actions came from the government ratherthan the wife. It is also interestingthata split was achievedbetween the spheresof the publicandthe private.-The granting of patronageto a devadasi was a public expression of power by zamindars, notables,chieftains in pre-colonialIndia,in return for religious honour and sexual services, which were inseparable. In modernising Mysore, however, such patronagehad to be privatised,markedoff from the public world where the facade of anew moralitywas maintained. Only aElong as theirpatronageof public women such as Nagaratnammaremained a private matter could public men, judges uuch as Narahari Rao, uphold and dispense a new order of justicedelinkedfromprincelyformsof power and authority.Meanwhile,the modernityof the middle class woman was expressed in theformof herconsentto a formof patronage thatrecalledan olderextendedsexual order. Her 'modernity'consisted in permittingthe continuation of a reformed patriarchy; promiscuitywas a privilege of the modem male as long as he remainedattentiveto his duties as a father.

I A K Bagchi, 'Colonialism and the Natureof CapitalistEnterprise', Econonticand Political Weekly, 23 (July 30, 1988): PE-38-49. 2 Tanika Sarkar. 'Rhetoric against Age of Consent: Resisting Colonial Reason and the Child Wife', Economic ancdPolitical Weekly, 28, 36 (1993), pp 1869-78, especially p 1870. 3 ParthaChatterjee, 'TheNationalistResolution of the Women's Question' in Recasting Women:Essays in Indian ColontialHistory, Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick: 1990, pp 233-53. 4 See for example, the divisive debates on the prospects of a car factory being located in Bangalore in my 'Emergence of Labour Politics in South India:Bangalore 190()-1947' (PhD Dissertation, Syracuse University, 1991), especially Chapter 1. 5 Proceedings of the Mysore Representative Assembly, October 1893, 45. See also M Sharna tao, Modern Mysore: From the Coronation of Chamaraja Wodeyarthe X to thePresentRule,Higginbotham's,Bangalore: 1936, pp 98, 432. 6 ParthaChatterjee,NationaliistThoughtin a Colonial World: A Derivative Discourse? (Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, 1992), p 47. i Evgeny Pashukannia,Law and Marxism:A General Theory( 1929), translated by Barbara Einhorn,Pluto Publishing, Worcester: 1989, pp 42, 45. 8 Although Sudipta Kaviraj makes this suggestion with referenceto.thecomposition of thepost-independence andcharacter Indian state, I believe it is a useful characterisation

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of bureaucratic functioning in princely Mysore. See Kaviraj 'A Critique of Passive Revolution', Economicand Political Weekly, 23 (November 1988), pp 2429-43, especially pp 2430-31. As Pranab Bardhan has shown, this had enduring consequences for the composition of the post-independence ruling coalition, which consists not merely of an alliance between an urban bourgeoisie and rural landlord class, but also a powerful whichenjoys relativeautonomy bureaucracy, vis-a-vistheothertwomembersof thecoalition but neverthelessextends their power. Pranab Bardhan, The Political Economy of Development in Indita, Basil Blackwell, Oxford: 1984. Laura Engelstein traces a moment when liberal ideology appeared to enjoy the supportof a substantialfraction of the Russian intelligentsia. while failing to become fully hegemonic. The Keys to Happiness:Sex and the Searchfir Modernity in Fill-De Siecle Russia, Cornell University Press,(Ithaca, 1992) especially 6-7. Since the ideals of bourgeois liberal culture remain reified in her accountand are unrelatedto the conditionof their possibility in fin-de-siecle Russia, however, the universal subject of History in her account remains (western) Europe,and the Russian 'modern' bears the burden of being unoriginal and imitative. 10 Kaviraj,A Critique of Passive Revolution, p 2431. I I Groupsformed in Mysore and Bangalore to encourage widow remarriage, for exainple, survivedbeyondtheirfirstfew meetings. rarely Gustafson, 'Mysore, 1881-1902', p 2. of the representativeassembly and Mnembers legislative council never failed however to summon the spectre of an English style suffragemovementin discussionson women's of the Mysore rights. Proceedings Assemblv(PMRA)1921, p68. Representative 12 For a good overview of the social reform andfeminist movements, see Radha Kumar, TheHistoryoJDoing: An IllustratedAccount oJ Movements for Women's Rights and Fentittism in Itndia, 1800-1980, Kali for Women, Delhi, 1993. 13 M Jamuna. 'Social Change in Mysore with Special Reference to Women', Unpublished PhD Dissertation, Bangalore University, 1990, p 75. in Recasting 14 SangariandVaid, 'Introduction', Women,p 17. 15 Stri Dharma, Vol 13, March 1930, p 217. 16 Stri Dharna, Vol 13, December 1929, Nos I and 2. 17 Sastri, The Administrationof Mysore under Sir Mark Cubbon, p 18. 18 Letter of Governor General Bentinck, Septeinber 6, 1831, as cited in Sastri, The Administration of Mysore under Sir Mark Cubbon, p 26. 19 Ibid, p 28. 20 Arjun Appadurai and Carol Breckenridge, 'The South Indian Temple: Authority, Honours and Redistribution', Contributiotns to indian Sociology, 10 (1984) pp .187-211. 21 See the description in Shaina Rao, Modern Mysore, p 40. 22 Ibid, pp 50-52. 11 HayavadanaRao, Mysore Gazetteer,Vol IV, pp 139. 140, 146. (nd, np), p 1. 24 Muzrai'i Memosranduin,

25 In 1835, governorGeneralWilliam Bentinck issued instructions to superintendents in Mysorewhich said "allthe ancientusages and institutionsof the countryespecially those of a religious nature shall be respected and Sastri, The maintained inviolate". ofMysore, 141.This principle Administration was-stated afresh in the Despatch from the Court of Directors, April 21. 1847, Muzrayi Memorandum,p 5. 26 For Madras,see Arjun Appadurai,Worship acndConilict under Colonial Rule: A South Indian Case. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1981; see also Franklin Presler, Religion under Bureaucracy: Policy and Administrationfor Hindu Temples in South India, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge,1987. In fact, the Civil Procedure Code of 1887 empowered Madrascourts to on a temple settle a scheme of administration if no other shortrange remedy was available. Presler, p 25. p 10. 27 Muzrtayi Memoranidum, 28 Ibid, p 11. 29 Ibid, p 12. 30 Addressof the dewan of Mysore to the representative assembly, October 4, 1892, p 19. 3 1 Hayavadana Rao, Mysore Gazetteer, pp 686-89. 32 Address of the dewan, 1892, p 19. 33 There are suggestive parallels here between the growing concernwith disease controland of physicalhygiene which tnay new standards not be purely coincidental. 34 Proceedings of the Government of Mysore (hereafter Proceedings), February 8. 1892, Muzrai. 35 Amrit,Srinivasan,'Reformand Revival:The Devadasi and Her Dance'. Economic aind 20:44(1985), p 1873.Nautch Political Weekly, parties were troupes of dancing and singing women who were frequentlyengaged for the of upperclass Indianpatrons, entertainmnent and in the early stages of Britishrule, for EIC officials as well. The unconstrainedsexuality of dancing woeitn was legendary. 36 Vrittanta Chintamani, October 14, 189 1, NativeNewspaperReports (NNR),TamilNadu State Archives (TNSA). 37 Derrett, Religion, Law and State in India, p 452. 38 Kumar, The History (4 Doing, pp 34-37. 39 File no 186 of 1898-1899, 'Revision of the Temple Tasdik Pattiof the Sri Srikanteshvara at Nanjangud', Muzrai Department,KSA. 40 Proceedings, April 1909, Muzrai. 41 GayatriSpivak, 'Feminism and Decolonisation', Differences 3.3 (1991), p 153. 42 Saskia Kersenboom Story, Nityasumangali, Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi, 1987 p 47. 43 Aloka Parasher and UshaNaik, 'TempleGirls of Medieval Karnataka', IESHR,23.1 (1986): pp 63-91 especially 66-67. 44 Ibid, p 64. 45 Ibid,pp67, 76. See also, L K Ananthakrishna Iyer, The Mysore Tribes and Castes, Vol 1, Mysore 1935, p 217. 46 Ibid,p 70. See also, CynthiaTalbot,'Temples, Donors and Gifts: Patternsof Patronagein I3th CenturySouth India', Journ(al of Asian Studies, 50.2 (May 1991), pp 308-340. 47 Srinivasan, 'Reform and Revival', p 1870. 48 Discussions of women's donationsto temples do not delineate the spaces within medieval social formations where some women of

independent means, other than Devadasis, must have existed if they had control over land they could gift away. 49 Census of India, 1891. Vol XXV, Part I. Report, Mysore (1893), p 242. 50 Census (if India, 1901, Vol XXIV. Part 1, Report, Mysoro, 539. 51 Ibid, 539. 52 Centsus () India, 1911,Vol XXI, Part1,Mysore (1912), p 172. 53 lyer,MysoreTribesandCastes,Vol IV(1929), p 422. 54 Ibid,p 427. This was strikinglysimilar to the matrilineal arrangements of the nayars of Malabar, who followed the Marumakkathayam law through most of the colonial period. 55 Both Amrit Srinivasan and Veena Talwar Oldenburgview the relative freedoms of sex workers,whetherdevadasis or courtesans,as an indicationof the spaces within patriarchy which were absolutely autonomouts. See Srinivasan, 'Reform and Revival' and Oldenburg'Lifestyle as Resistance:The Case of the Courtesans of Lucknow', Femini.st Studies, 16.2 (Summer 1990). 56 Iyer,MysoreTribesand Castes.Vol 11 (I1928), p 214.. 57 M N Srinivas, Marri'age arnd Family itn Mysore, New Book Co, Bombay, 1942, especially, pp 177-84. 58 As cited from the Jourtrtal o? the Anthropological Society *o Bombay,in Iyer, Mysore Castes and Tribes. p 214. 59 Stri Dharma, March 1930, p 217. 60 See also Srinivas, Marriage and Family in Mysore,especially pp 177-184. Concernedas he is with the delineation of ritualsand their meanings, Srinivas mentions the inheritance rights of Basavis only in passing. 61 File no 8 of 1898-99, Muzrai Department, KSA. Resumption refers to the process by which successors of an original donorof land to a temple made a claim to take back the land on the grounds that the services for which it had been granted was improperly performed. Presler. Religion under Bureaucracy, p 18. M 62 Deputy Commissioner of Kolar to Muzrai Secretary, November 18, 1898, File no 8, 1898-99, Muzrai Department,KSA. 63 KarnatakaPrakasika, January16, 1893;June 26, 1983, NNR, TNSA. 64 Vrittanta Patrike,May21, 1896,NNR,TNSA. 65 File no 2 of 1900-1901, SI no Sect V, Muzrai Department, KSA. 66 Srinivasacharluto S M Fraser, October 31, 1900, File no 2, 1900-01, Muzrai, KSA. 67 File no 124, Sl no 1-3, July 190S, Muzrai Department, KSA. 68 File no 84, 1905, Petitionno 2104, November KSA. 13, 1905, Muzrai Department,. 69 Ibid. 70 The female entertainersof Shanghai waged a similarbattleagainsttheeffortsof authorities to legally classify them as prostitutesalong with women employed in tea houses, inns andhotels. Ina spiritedprotestagainstofficial blindness to their artistic skills, they argued they were singing girls who sold only their voices and not theirbodies. Nevertheless,the modernised elite demands of an emnerging erasedthese distinctionsandmadeproletarian sex workers of them all. Sue Gronewald, Merchandise: Prostitution inChina, 'Beautiful

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1860-1936'. WomenaindHistory, I (Spring 1982), especially pp 51-66. 71 Note of Dewan, November 10. 1906, File no 84, 1905, Muzrai, KSA. 72 The agamasastrasare the texts that outline however,theShaivaAgamas all templerituals: forthe Shaivitetemples, arethesole authorities and Vaikhanasaagamas and the Pancaratra for the Vaishnavite temples. The agamiks cited from both sets of texts. Swaminatha Siva Chariyar, Kamikagamaha (Dakshina BharataArchaka Sangha, 1975). 73 Memo dated 2104, November 13, 1905, File no 84, 1905, Muzrai, KSA. 74 Muzrai secretary's Note, ibid. 75 Memo no 2675, dated December 9, 1905, ibid. 76 The chief features of this dystopia as summarisedby Sumit Sarkarare "oppressive mleccha (alien and impure)kings, Brahmans corrupted by too much rational argument, shudras, expoundingthescriptures overmighty and ceasing to serve the brahmans, girls choosing theirown partners,and disobedient and deceiving wives having intercoursewith menials, slaves and even animals". Sarkar, 'Kaliyuga,Chakri,and Bhakti:Ramnakrishna and His Times', Economic and Political Weekly, 27 (July, 1992): p 1549. 77 Note of the Muzraisecretary,April 1906, File no 84, of 1905. Muzrai Department, KSA. 78 Proceedings,April 1909, MuzraiDepartment. 79 File no 718-16, Muzrai, KSA. 80 File no 56-19, Si no 1-15, 1919, Muzrai KSA. Departmient, 81 File no 364-28, SIno 1-6, MuzraiDepartment, KSA. 82 File no 369-29, SIno 1-4, MuzraiDepartment, KSA. 83 Perhaps the most striking instance of the distanciation of nationalist elite from disreputablewomen was Gandhi's refusal to allow nearly 200 prostitutesof Barisal from participating in the Non-Co-operation movementuntilthey publicly renouncedtheir profession. See MadhuKishwar, 'Gandhion Women', Economic and Political Weekly, 20-40 (October 5. 1985) and 41 (October 12, 1985). 84 Although the extension of the CD acts in
England was resented as a threat to virtuous

puritanical form was enabled by recasting it as high brahmanic culture, which it was now safe, even desirable, for wotnen of upper caste families to acquire. See Reform and Revivail. 90 See for example, several articles in Stri Dharma,especially the issue of January1930, pp 79 ff. 91 lyer, Mysore Tribesand Castes, Vol IV, 423. 92 See N G Sanjivaiah's intervention, Proceedings of the Mysore Representative

Assembly (PRMA), October 1934. p 126. KelavuMahanijaru.Gokhale 93 D V Gundappa. Instituteof Public Affairs, Bangalore, 1987, pp 166-78.1amgratefultoTejaswiniNiranjana for this reference. 94 DVG himself, as a memberof the legislative council, vigorously opposed the passage of the Suppression of Immoral Traffic Act on the grounds thatit was a ploy of missionaries to gain converts from among the rescued women, PMLC, December 18. 1935, p 177.

DISCUSSION

Not a 'Language'Problem
Taposh Chakravorty
IN his 'A 'Language' Problem' (EPW. July 30) GPD is on a quest for the secular strandof 'fundamentalism',and this quest is certainly the most progressive quest of the majority of mankind at the end of the currentmillennium.The global rulingclass would be searching for this strand so that it too can be falsified. The global proletariat would also be searching for this strand. since this strandalone can answer the faith 'fundamentalism' has been reposed with by its millions. The current discourse is thick- and many-layered. It is necessary to set down the basic lines clearly. Since the world got into its presentphase, historically called modern times, its proletariat has had itself seduced by the liberties of the industrial revolution only to be flung off again, back into a much more sapping servitude of today. At the turn of the millennium, the proletariat is once again on the rise. The rise, as the rises of the proletariathave to be, is profoundly secular - in fact militantly secular now. The western intelligentsia and the media are theologising this secular rise in their beliefs and propaganda, as much as the 'regional' feudal elements, clerics, and the rentierbourgeoisie are. Both know the true nature of fundamentalism, since both arecreating the social conditions which are making the proletariat rise. But the. proletariat is being confused into seeing itself as divi-ded even in faith. GPD is telling us to see Taslima and her effect as a part of the struggle between western imperialism and the regional proletariat. But he is saying this obliquely. Such sensitivity is perhaps appropriate. But a less scholarly sensibility need not be so oblique. Indeed, this whole fundamentalism 'thing' of the western world's media is of course a distortion of reality, as is the ruling western philosophy of 'deconstructionism' which provides the post-existentialist elan to the capitalist ideology today. Indeed, after having beseiged the world proletariat'smind with distortions of the reality of socialism - a task made most easy by the collapse of the Soviet Union's state - it is now distorting the reality of fundamentalism. Indeed, in the world's class struggle battle has been joined at the level where it is most profoundly political, the level of faith. Faith is not belief; it is higher than belief which can be in this or that doctrine, Hindu, Christian,Islam,etc; it is permeated with hope. Indeed in the rise of 'fundamentalism' there is a rise of proletarian hope. No country in the world today is in a this thanIndia, betterposition to understand since it has been experiencing its own fundamentalism which is not Islamic. Indianshave the best chance of beating off. the distortions of the western media. ParticularlyHindu Indians who constitute a sizeable minority in today's world. The 'average' Hindu - who is certainly not the Indo-Anglian segment - is of India's and the world's proletariat. He sees his life worsening as the years go by. His economic struggle to live is taking up more and more of his time andvital energies. The economic struggleconsists of struggle with the forcesand effects of a globalising western imperialism. In this struggle he has been losing the positive nourishmentsfrom the sboil and ecosystems, social structures, culture, and language. To.him it is clear what is responsible for this; it is that forward post of western imperialism he daily struggles with out of economic necessity, although he may not see the chain leading from this forwardpost of its centre; indeed he may not even recognise his arena of daily struggle as a forward post. But it is certainly clear to him that Islamic 'fundamentalism' is, at the most, a distraction.from what he has to grapple with every day. Lately some sectarians 3167

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women by members of the CD campaign, it did not have the same charge as the honour violation of family and commnunity by alien authorities appeared to have in colonial India. See Judith Walkowitz, Prostitution arndVictorian Society: Women Class and the State, Cambridge University Press, New York, 1989, 110. Stri Dhaurma,September 1932, Vol XV, No 11, 609. See Saraswathi,1923, Vol 6, No 3, pp 62-68. Tharu and Lalita, Women Writing in India, Vol 1, pp 1-9. See Law Commission of India,Sixty-Fourth Report on the Suppression of Immoral Girls 1956, (1975), (arnd TrafficAct in Womnen 5; Towards Equality: Report of the Committeeon the Status of Womenin Itndia, Delhi, 1974, p 92. Note thatwomen fromthe devadasi tradition only survived as singers in the reformed social order,not as dancers. AmritSrinivasan argues that the revival of the dance and musical forms of the devadasis in a suitably

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