cow better than a human being

The Kukke Subramanya temple in the sound kannadiga district of the state of Karnataka is very famous or better to say so notorious for the over 400 year old tradition of the practice of a ritual called ‘made snana’. What does it mean?

It is a custom or a ritual of people rolling over (urulu seve) the leftover of the food eaten by the Brahmins. Even the food is served differently and the upper caste people never sit along with the other caste people ('pankti bhedha' (discrimination based on caste/religion/gender)). What is the problem if it is a ritual and something to do with the faith? The problem is only when the low caste people are made to roll over the food eaten by the upper caste people.

In India you find million reasons to divide people. And the most popular and accepted way of dividing people and holding one’s head high is of diving people into high and low castes. People are proud of establishing that the other is a low caste in comparison to oneself. So in this practice what happens is just that the high caste Brahmins are establishing and confirming themselves over the other people condemned to be in the low caste that they are superior to them.

In this world where the inhuman traditions and customs are being abolished and man try their best to consider everyone equal over the divisions of caste, religion, creed, race, language etc., and the government is endorsing such a division in the Kukke Subramanyan Temple. The courts do not use their power to stop this abject injustice.  So where is the equality of human beings here? Where is the basic human dignity? What is the respect for the fellow human beings? These practices are sometimes more than the apartheid practiced in South Africa.

In a country where through social reformation the practice of untouchability, child marriage, sati (widow jumping into the pyre of the dead husband) etc. were abolished, these practices continue now or get reinvented in this 21^st century where the right wing Hindu nationalist parties are widening their interests through politics based on castes and religion.

It is not a problem of one religion. All the world religions have a different version in India. Muslims divide themselves on the basis of Sunni, Shia, Alavites, mohammadiya, high and low castes and on so many other minor divisional categories. Christians divide themselves on the basis of denominations, rites, newly converted and traditional, adivasi Catholics and dalit Catholics and many others. Sikhs, Jains and Buddhists and all find their own different ways of dividing people and setting each one as high and low.

The religions have become a cause to divide the humanity in a very abject and crude manner, killing each other and protecting against caste mixing. The ‘holy cows’ yearn more respect than the human beings in India. To all those who believe in rebirth, please do pray to be born as a cow in India in the next birth.