Nangeli: Today is the time when women get to enjoy the same rights and opportunities just like the men do. But, things weren’t the same few decades back in time.
For a very large part of the time in history, women were considered to be inferior to men and subjected to various forms of discrimination.
They were often viewed as personal property and listed alongside lands, livestock, and other assets owned & cared for by men. But, this rampant discrimination did not stop some brave women of the past to rise against the entire society if needed and fight for their basic human rights.
The social structure divided the society into different categories based on their occupation.
It can be broadly classified into four types: The Brahmins were the priests who were responsible for preaching the sacred knowledge, the Kshatriyas were the warriors who protected the kingdom against foes, the Vaishiyas were the division comprised of the farmers, artisans, and wealthy merchants, and the Shudras were the servants who worked for the other castes.
This resulted in the Shudras to be labelled as inferior and this caste-based hierarchy resulted in uncontrolled suppression and ill-treatment of the Shudras by the members of the other castes. The womenfolk of this community were often exploited by the upper caste men to fulfil their sexual fantasies.
Breast Tax or Mulakaram was a tax which was imposed on lower class women if they covered their breasts. The 19th century holds within itself the remnants of Nangeli’s sacrifice.
The Pooja Raja in Travancore made the Malarayans pay money at the rate of one anna, two pies (8 pies) a head monthly as soon as they were able to work, and a similar sum of presence money besides certain quotas of fruits and vegetables and feudal service. The head money was called Thalakaram in the case of males and Mulakaram (breast money) in the case of females.
About Nangeli
Nangeli was a woman who lived in the early 19th century at Cherthala in the erstwhile princely state of Travancore in India who revolted against the harassment. She chopped off her breasts and presented them to him in a plantain leaf.
Unfortunately, the legend couldn’t survive and soon she died of loss of blood. Hereafter, her husband Chirukandan, seeing her mutilated body was overcome by grief and jumped into her funeral pyre – in what was supposedly the first male sati.
After the tragic death of Nangeli, a series of revolutions took place against the system where women from the Nadar communities are popularly known to have fought for the right to cover their breasts during the Channar revolt between 1839 to 1859. Eventually, the breast tax was eventually abolished in 1924.
Aftermath
The topic caught wide attention in 2016, when BBC reporter Divya Arya reported on a series of paintings by artist Murali T on the legend of Nangeli.
Back then social customs on clothing were tailored to a person’s caste status, which meant that they could be identified merely by the way they dressed.
Despite the fact that evolution has dawned upon the world, there exists a certain group of people who still look down on individuals, based on their caste.
It is to be added that the caste of an individual affects their options regarding marriage, employment, education, economies, mobility, housing and politics, among others.
However, at the present times many measures have been initiated by the Government to eradicate these kinds of social systems. Recently, PM Modi made an agenda where it focuses on eliminating the caste system in the country.
India has improved to some extent in this 21st century on several fronts. However, there is still lots of room to grow. The Indian government has an effective plan of bringing people together from all walks of life.
Yet, certain inherent ideological contradictions will stand in the way while solving this issue. Regardless, that should not deter our hope in escaping the shackles of casteism.
