Temple as the Site of Struggle: Social Reform, Religious Symbols and the Politics of Nationalism in Kerala

doi:10.4236/ahs.2013.22010

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Advances in Historical Studies

2013. Vol.2, No.2, 57-69

Published Online June 2013 in SciRes (http://www.scirp.org/journal/ahs) http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ahs.2013.22010

Temple as the Site of Struggle: Social Reform, Religious

Symbols and the Politics of Nationalism in Kerala

M. R. Manmathan

Department of History, Farook College, Calicut University, Kerala, India

Email: mrmanmathanmr@gmail.com

Received December 31st, 2012; revised February 20th, 2013; accepted February 28th, 2013

Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the

original work is properly cited.

The temple entry movement of the 1920s and ’30s in Kerala, South India, has become a landmark in the

history of social reform and nationalist movements for its uniqueness and sweeping success. Popular his-

tory has presented the episode as an integral part of the Nationalist Movement and the Gandhian Con-

structive Programme mainly because the temple-entry issue was endorsed by the Kerala State Congress

Committee and the agitation was concluded under its auspices. But this popular and idealist impression of

the movement has been challenged from various quarters. It is pointed out that there have been very little

attempts at linking the event with the advancing civic rights movement led by the lower caste people for

freedom of worship and social equality which was gaining a radical turn by the 20s and 30s; the pressure

exerted by the untouchables to achieve civic freedom even at the cost of re nouncing Hinduism had creat ed

an alarming situation which no caste-Hindu could ignore. Even more surprising is the absence of aca-

demic attempts to link the agitation with the Malabar Rebellion of 1921; in fact the Rebellion had chal-

lenged the very survival of the Congress organization in Kerala; this factor forced them to retreat from the

earlier secular plane to a religious idiom of politics for which the question of temple-entry served their

purpose. The Temple entry movement, therefore, has to be studied in the light of the antipathy shown by

the Congress towards popular and radical agitations and in the context of its growing tendency to incline

towards Hindu symbols in politics as a means to escape addressing vital and burning social issues.

Keywords: Temple-Entry; Constructive Program; Vaikam Satyagraha; 1921 Rebellion; Religious

Conversion; Indian National Congress

Introduction

Social reform movements of early twentieth century Kerala

differed from their north Indian counterparts in certain basic

features. Firstly, they overlooked individualistic and usually

female-oriented reform programs and confronted inequalities

among Hindu castes, which were more glaring in Kerala than

anywhere else in India. At the early stages of the all-India re-

form movements the “evils” of society, mostly inflicted upon

women-sati, the prohibition on remarriage of young widows,

purdah, the custom of early marriage, and lack of educational

opportunities for them-engaged the reformers’ attention, and

crusades for laws to protect (mostly high-caste) women and the

founding of institutions to support and educate them defined the

practical reform programs (Heimsath, 1978: pp. 24-26). In Ker-

ala, women’s causes never caught on1; Kerala’s social evil was

caste. Secondly, they were all caste/community movements;

preoccupation with community-subjects marked their social

presence. The process of the “construction of Hinduism” (Mu-

raleedharan, 1996; Viswanathan, 2003), which was one of the

focal points of the early social reform movements of North

India, both as a desperate resistance against colonialism (“Re-

sistant Hinduism” against “Renascent Hinduism”, Young, 1981)

and as a prospective nationalist program, was only a succeeding

agenda for the reformers of Kerala2. In other words, what was

at stake was primarily the status relationship between commu-

nities; the formation of a unified Hindu religious community,

by forging a symbolic unity of castes through the portal of the

temple3, was not taken up seriously till the early 1920s. Thirdly,

2The Renaissance intellectuals focused mainly on relieving Indian religion

of the features most attacked by Christian missionaries and to remodel

Hindu religion in accordance with the Judeo-Christian conceptions o

monotheism and anti-idolatry. This process of shaping Hindu religion ac-

cording to a totally alien concept is termed as “Construction of Hinduism”.

3“Hinduism… does not meet the fundamental requirements of a historical

religion of being a coherent system; but its distinct religious entities do.

They are indeed religions; while Hinduism is not” (Stietencron, 1989: p. 20)

The lower caste Hindus had their own shrines (kavu), the belief system and

ritual practices of which were basically different from that of the Brahma-

nical temples. The Izhava social reform movement was a campaign to “san-

skritize”their s ocial cu sto ms, rit uals and cere monies : Arya n god s to replace

primitive deities (“to obtain high gods for lower castes”, Lemercinier, 1984:

p. 248), learning of Sanskrit and founding of school for Vedanta and the

congregati on of m onks.

1Mainly for the reason that society had been impregnated with mother-right

cultural norms and thus women—except in Nambutiri Brahmin and some

Muslim households—were already liberated. Customs like Sati, female in-

fanticide, and the disfigurement of widows which so enraged Indian social

reformers, failed to emerge from the mother-right culture of Kerala. Widow

remarriage, a highly charged issue throughout India, caused no ripples ei-

ther, because most low caste and Nair widows freely remarried. Among the

ambutiris mature marriage was the norm, not child marriage, and so wid-

owhood could not claim major attention among their reformers. Infant mar-

riages among all commun it ies were ra re.

M. R. MANMATHAN

these movements played a very insignificant part in the anti-

British nationalist opposition (Houtart & Lemercinier, 1978: p.

5). The outstanding enemies here were internal, and the British

colonist appeared to the depressed communities as an element

favorable to their emancipation, since it was he who had been

responsible for the abolition of slavery and for so many liberal

reforms. For the upper castes too the British offered opportuni-

ties for emancipation, since educational progress and changes

in marriage rules were largely dependent on their consent. In

general, thus, the attitude of the caste associations towards the

emerging nationalist movement was one of distrust and caution.

Against this background, my attempt here is to discuss how

the temple-entry movement of the 1920s and ’30s signified the

above mentioned features and determined the nature and gen-

eral course of nationalist politics in Kerala. It rejects the na-

tionalist proposition of the temple-entry movement as a great

humanitarian and philanthropic endeavor mediated by the Gan-

dhian programme of social upliftment (Pilla, 1986: pp. 357-368;

409-415; Chandra, 1989: pp. 224-234; Menon, 2001: pp. 141-

163; 316-331; Menon, 1997: pp. 74, 82) towards creating a

“community of equals” and places it against deep social pres-

sures from below. In fact the episode of temple entry agitation

represented a conclusive act of the movement for civil rights

led by the untouchable castes from the early nineteenth century

(Jeffrey, 1978a: pp. 136-169). But the Congress involvement in

the struggle in the 1920s, and even later, should be examined

from two political standpoints—a shrewd drive to pacify lower

caste radicalism (Aloysius, 2010: p. 181) (which was aggra-

vated by religious conversions) and to find a quick deliverance

from the moral setback inflicted by the Rebellion of 1921

(which in fact threatened to destroy the very foundations of the

Congress in Kerala). The highly complicated socio-political en-

vironment brought about by the rebellion problematized both

the future course of nationalist political action and the status

quo of existing community and class relationships upon which

nationalist politics had laid its roots.

This paper, apart from examining the role of lower caste ra-

dicalism in engendering the temple-entry movement, examines

the hitherto unexplored story of the impact of the 1921 Rebel-

lion in putting pressure on the Congress to deviate from its

earlier secular stance to an apparent Hindu idiom of politics.

Historians have noted this point earlier (Jeffrey, 1978a; Menon,

1994) but a serious effort to develop it into a polemic has not

been undertaken. My attempt here is to create a counter-narra-

tive, not by depending on any new sets of empirical data, but

through a re-reading of the existing texts, which are, however,

mostly of elite origin. Sources having subaltern inclination are

rare, but those that are available from the part of both the Izha-

vas and the Mappilas are certainly made use of; the missionary

and colonial records are treated with care as they represent an-

other set of elite sources. The paper would first trace out the so-

cial situation of nineteenth century Kerala, the long history of

the movement for civil liberties and the politics of rising na-

tionalism, and then proceed on to discuss how the temple entry

agitation reflected the concerns of the caste Hindus about the

growing lower caste radicalism and attempted at addressing it

through social reform measures.

Historiography

Though there are plenty of literature on the civil liberties

movement, the nationalist struggle and the 1921 Rebellion, and

a few attempts at connecting the temple entry movement with

the conversion issue, there are practically no attempts at linking

it with the 1921 rebellion. The Census Reports of Travancore

and Cochin from 1871 to 1941 as well as the manuals of Tra-

vancore (Aiya, 1906; Pilla, 1940) and Cochin (Menon, 1911)

contain rich data on the condition of the untouchable castes.

The two manuals of Malabar (Logan, 1887; Innes, 1908) dis-

cussed the role of the colonial state as instrumental in emanci-

pating the downtrodden. Some of the anthropological studies

taken up during this period (Thurston, 1909; Iyer, 1909, 1939)

discussed the social condition and inter-caste relationships to

analyze how customs and traditions stood to counter the en-

gagement with modernity. We have three important pieces of

missionary literature (Day, 1863; Mateer, 1871, 1883) which

looked down at the “primitive” and “superstitious” customs and

systems of the people of the land and placed Christianity as a

great redeeming force. Two recent studies also have tried to

locate missionary intervention and the presence of a powerful

Christian community as decisive factors in the modernization of

Kerala society (Kawashima, 1988; Onwerkerk, 1994).

Academic studies on the social and religious reform move-

ments of Kerala in general and the Izhava reform movement in

particular placed them against the existing “context” (of caste,

social evils, deprivation) and the impending forces of moder-

nity (new education, missionary activity, colonial agency and

the rising middle class consciousness) and analyzed the varied

factors which helped or obstructed the potential of different

social groups to appropriate reformism as a means to overcome

their state of deprivation. (Rao, 1979; Isaac & Tharakan, 1988;

Jeffrey, 1994). There were also attempts at examining the fac-

tors for the radicalization of the Izhava caste movement and its

later inclination towards left-wing ideology (Jeffrey, 1978b).

Some scholars considered missionary presence as instrumental

in the gradual radicalization of the Izhava movement and the

slow expansion of its emancipation agenda (Pulapilly, 1976).

There were also attempts at analyzing the ideological founda-

tions of the reform movements and to identify the unique fea-

tures of the “Kerala Renaissance” (Houtart & Lemercinier, 1978;

Heimsath, 1978, 1982).

On the Malabar Rebellion we have an unending series of lit-

erature belonging to diverse ideological streams ranging from

colonial to nationalist and Marxist to subaltern. Discussion on

the Rebellion has generally been focused on whether they were

communal or agrarian uprisings, or whether they were moti-

vated by economic or religious imperatives. Despite “fanatical

outbreak” being the predominantly shared official version of

the uprisings, agrarian grievances as a possible factor did not

remain totally unnoticed. Two early exponents of the religious

interpretation (Conolly, Strange), while recognizing the poverty

and destitution of the Mappila “fanatics”, rejected them as a

reason for the “outbreaks”. In contrast, Logan identified agrar-

ian discontent as the main causative factor, but underlined the

tur bul ence and fan atical c har acter of th e Ma ppi las (Logan, 1887).

The government held that Mappila religiosity exacerbated by

nationalist politics was the prime moving force behind the re-

bellion of 1921 (Tottenham, 192 2; Nair, 1923; Hitchcock, 192 5).

More recent studies have attempted to interpret the militancy of

the Mappilas as a means of defending the frontier of Mappila

society-internal frontier was with the Hindu society dominated

by landholding Brahmins and the external frontier with the Eu-

ropeans, from Portuguese to the British. The nineteenth century

uprisings were jihads to defend the internal Islamic frontier.

M. R. MANMATHAN

The rebellion of 1921 was different in that it was directed to-

wards an identifiable political goal, i.e., establishment of an Is-

lamic kingdom (Dale, 1980). The nationalist version is repre-

sented mainly by the autobiographical sketches of the Congress

leaders which, while justifying the decision of the Congress to

uphold the Khilafat issue, found fault with the government po-

licy of repression and the irrationality and intense religiosity of

the Mappilas (Nambutiripad, 1965; Nair, 1971; Menon, 1986).

A dominant section of left wing historians followed an essen-

tially economic interpretation, treating agrarian discontent as

the prime factor with religion as a means of mobilization (Nam-

butiripad, 1952; Hardgrave, 19 77; Dhana gare, 197 7; Wood, 198 7;

Gangadharan, 1989; Panikkar, 1989). Among them Panikkar’s

study stood different in that it treated the context (anti-British

feeling and the urge to free from the exploitation of the proper-

tied classes) and ideology (religion translated discontent into

action and provided the vision of an alternate society) equally

decisive. A recent study examined the uprisings from a subal-

tern perspective and placed the Mappila insurgency along sub-

alternity and religiosity, which are specific to premodern con-

sciousness, in order to exonerate it from the alleged blemish of

“communalism” and “jihadism” (Ansari, 2005).

For a survey of the nationalist movement in Kerala we have

several studies, both panegyric and critical. Studies which fol-

lowed the official Congress view (Pilla, 1986; Menon, 1997;

Menon, 2001) perceived the shifting strands of nationalist posi-

tion with reference to its primary (anti-colonial) preferences

and its (umbrella-type) all-class and secular character. The dis-

position of the Congress in taking up the internal issues affect-

ing class/caste relations on a secondary footing has been justi-

fied on this premise but it is further argued that the constructive

program was actually devised to serve this purpose—to sup-

plement political action through social and humanitarian work

(including efforts to eradicate untouchability)—which aimed at

cleansing the nation of blots which stood against true and ideal

nationhood. The nationalist reading of the temple-entry move-

ment followed such a glossy picture: uplift of the depressed

sections of Hindu community through constructive program

was an integral part of the work of the Indian National Con-

gress in Kerala (Menon, 2001: pp. 141-163; 316-331). That the

dual task taken up by the Congress, to build the nation and to

construct a solid Hindu community, was not a mistaken strat-

egy; in the context of the predominantly Hindu majority na-

tion-state, the appropriation of Hindu religious symbolism was

not incongruous (Chandra, 1989: pp. 230-234). A critical str ea m

against the nationalist position came from various quarters,

especially the left and the subaltern-dalit groups. The left per-

ceived the nationalist movement as having had an implicit class

agenda which got reflected in its ideology and method of po-

litical action and argued that the constructive programme was

devised to establish Congress hegemony over low castes and

untouchables and to pacify the mounting “pressures from be-

low” which threatened to offset the interests of the dominant

social groups who were steering the movement (Nambutiripad,

1952: pp. 131-132; Sarkar, 1990: p. 230). An article on Guru-

vayur satyagraha, while treating it as a part of the nationalist

movement, analyzed the role of factionalism within the Con-

gress as a possible reason for diverting the Civil Disobedience

Movement (CDM) into a social struggle and attributed the fail-

ure of the struggle to the basic limitations of the Congress atti-

tude towards untouchability (Gopalankutty, 1981). The Dalit

perspective blamed Gandhi for perceiving untouchability sim-

ply as a religious issue, not as a question of civil right, and

hence in practice, it appeared to counter their own idea and

struggles for emancipation (Aloysius, 2010: p. 181; Ravindran,

1988).

Two studies have tried to link the temple-entry agitation with

the struggle for civil rights and the inner politics of the nation-

alist movement (Jeffrey, 1978a; Menon, 1994). While the for-

mer identified the “modernizing” impact of colonialism and the

“civilizing” impact of missionary work as decisive in the crea-

tion of a powerful middle class and a congenial ideological

environment leading to radicalizat ion of the reform proc ess, the

latter discussed the difference in the degree of power and dep-

rivation among hierarchically arranged social groups in the

traditional social order and presented the nature of their re-

sponse to colonialism/nationalism on the basis of the degree to

which the changes which took place under the colonial system

favored their emancipation/retention of privileged position.

The Social Spectrum of Kerala

The caste structure of colonial Kerala stood different from

the pan-Indian scenario. The existing varna and jati system

varied from the ideal four-fold model with the total absence of

the Vaishyas and a very marginal Kshatriya presence; the tradi-

tional trading and commercial functions were by and large the

preserve of the non-Hindu communities like the Jews, Muslims

and Syrian Christians and the ruling lineages of medieval Ker-

ala were substantially drawn from Sudra-Nair caste who how-

ever were gradually elevated to Kshatriya-Samanta status.

Brahmins (including the Kerala Brahmins called Nambutiris

and the immigrant Tamil and Kannada groups) constituted a

mere 1% of the population of the land but they occupied the

upper echelons of ritual hierarchy and owned substantial landed

properties. The populous, martial and matrilineal caste of the

Nairs, who were the ruling class and constituted a substantial

portion of the military force in the pre-British era, were ac-

corded higher status for being “clean sudras” which led the

Brahmins to enter into alliance with them by arranging liaisons

with their women4 and by entrusting them with the manage-

ment of their landed estates and temples. All of the above

groups along with the several tiny castes of temple-servants

called Ambalavasis constituted the elite Hindus (savarna). All

the castes below the Nairs were avarnas (untouchables) and in-

cluded, in terms of hierarchy, the Izhavas, Pulayas, Cherumas,

Parayas and Nayadis. In addition there were the fishing and

tribal communities. Pulayas, Parayas and Cherumas served as

agrestic laborers and occupied very low social position and eco-

nomic power tantamount to serfs. Defilement practices consist-

ing of untouchability, unapproachability and even un-seeability

determined inter-caste relations and was apparently influenced

by the notion of hierarchy. The savarna-avarna divide medi-

ated by socioeconomic and political inequalities hardened and

dehumanized relationships between social groups.

An examination of the position of the Izhavas in the tradi-

tional social structure reveals the range and magnitude of di-

verse kinds of relative deprivation. They are an ethnic cate gory,

found all over South India (Izhavas and Shannars in South Tra-

4Such conjugal alliances were called sambandham in which the male part-

ners were just “visiting husbands”and the wives along with their children

lived in matrilineal extended households maintained by impartible joint

property. This practice was popular among matrilineal castes like the Nairs,

Kshatriyas and Amba lavasis who had liaisons with the Brahmins.

M. R. MANMATHAN

vancore, Chovans in North and Central Travancore and Cochin,

Tiya in Malabar, Billava in Tulunad, Nadar in Tamil Nadu and

Idiga in Mysore) and the various cognate castes in Kerala con-

stitute a large ethnic bloc. The most popular theory is that the

Izhavas were migrants from Ceylon (Aiya, 1906: pp. 398-402;

Thurston, 1909: pp. 292-418; Innes, 1908: pp. 124-125; Logan,

1887: p. 80) and were Buddhists by faith (Kunhuraman, 1925;

Aiyappan, 1965: p. 119). The occupation of the Izhavas in the

traditional caste order was coconut plucking and toddy-tapping,

though they were engaged as tenant cultivators, agricultural la-

borers, weavers and coir workers. They also practiced ayurveda

and astrology and had a tradition of military service (Iyer, 1909:

p. 298). The Izhavas ranked lower than the Nairs and above the

Cherumas/Pulayas in the caste hierarchy. Though the Izhavas

were at the top of the category of castes who caused distance

pollution, they had to keep a distance of 36 feet from the Nam-

butiri Brahmins and were not allowed to enter temple s managed

by the upper castes. They also did not have the right to use

public roads and wells of the upper castes (Aiyappan, 1944: p.

39) and were denied admission in caste Hindu schools and gov-

ernment jobs. Their women were not allowed to wear upper

garments or any ornaments. The Nairs often demanded unpaid

labour (uzhiyam) from them (Mateer, 1871: p. 43; Day, 1863: p.

322). Under the existing three-tier agrarian social structure,

most Izhavas occupied the position of sub-tenants or agricul-

tural laborers. Most of the janmis were Nambutiris, Kshatriyas

or aristocratic Nairs. Kanam tenants who held the lease for a

period of twelve years (but sub-leased them) were mainly Nairs.

Verumpattam was the lease for a three year tenure and Izhavas

and Mappilas were the prominent sub-tenants. Agricultural la-

borers formed an important category, and this consisted of the

Izhavas, Pulayas and Cherumas.

The political attitude of the Mappila community of Malabar

represented a more complex pattern. Mappilas (or Moplahs),

the Muslims of Malabar, traditionally trace their origins to the

ninth century, when Arab traders brought Islam to the west

coast of India (Miller, 1992: pp. 40-45). By 1921, they consti-

tuted the largest—and the fastest growing—community of Ma-

labar. With a population of one million, 32 percent of that of

Malabar as a whole, the Mappilas were concentrated in south

Malabar, i.e., in the Ernad, Valluvanad and Ponnani taluks of

the erstwhile British Malabar described in colonial records as

“fanatical zone” (Innes, 1908: p. 89). In Ernad taluk, the center

of the rebellion, they formed nearly 60 percent of the popula-

tion and in Walluvanad, 35 percent. The community has been

characterized as consisting of pure Arab settlers, of the descen-

dants of the Arab traders and women of the country, and of

converts to Islam from the lower Hindu castes (Innes, 1908: p.

26). The Mappilas were a mercantile community concentrated

along the coast in urban centers. Segregated from the Hindu

population in separate settlements, they had considerable auto-

nomy, and under the Zamorin of Calicut, they enjoyed prestige

as well as economic power (Zaynu’d-Din, 1942). From the six-

teenth century, with the rise of Portuguese power in challenge

to Mappila commercial interests, the greater portion of the

community moved into the interior of Malabar and increasingly

came to be agricultural tenants, low in status and desperately

poor (Dale, 1980: pp. 54-82). In sharp contrast to the general

prosperity enjoyed by the Mappilas of the North (where early

converts included propertied classes of the high castes), the

Mappilas of South Malabar were principally converted from the

lower Tiyya, Cheruman and Mukkuva castes, for whom “the

honor of Islam” brought freedom from the disabilities of ritual

pollution. It was in these inland areas of the south and among

the poorest sections of the population that the Mappila commu-

nity expanded most rapidly (Hitchcock, 1925: p. 9).

During the successive invasion of Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan,

in the late eighteenth century, Malabar was thrown into social

turmoil. The Mappilas tried to reap political and economic

gains from it by declaring their proprietorship rights over their

tenurial lands and by remitting land tax directly to the govern-

ment defying caste-Hindu landowners (Dale, 1976; Miller,

1992: p. 81; Menon, 1999). The caste Hindus responded to this

hopeless situation by fleeing from Malabar and seeking refuge

in the self-proclaimed Hindu state of Travancore after either

disposing of their property or deserting them to the Mappilas

(Narayanan & Kesavan, 1983: p. 275). The situation was also

significant in that large number of lower caste Hindus utilized

the opportunity to enhance their social prestige by embracing

the religion of the new rulers (Kunju, 1989: p. 79). The defeat

of Tipu and the subsequent British land settlement policies in

Malabar, leading to the restoration of the social and economic

position of the dominant castes, severely affected the position

of the Mappilas in South Malabar—by imposing enormous

amount of rent and by fixing heavy renewal fees on tenurial

contracts (melcha rth) (Panikkar, 1989: pp. 1-48), they were op-

pressed in particular. Reduced to insecure tenancy, vulnerable

to rack renting and eviction at the hands of Hindu janmis sus-

tained by British courts, the Mappilas responded in a series of

outbreaks5. During the course of these nineteenth century out-

breaks, the number of conversions to Islam heightened dra-

matically. In converting to Islam, those of lower castes were not

only freed from the traditional social disabilities of the outcaste,

but they joined a community of resistance wherein their protest

against janmi tyranny was supported by their fellow Muslims

(Hardgrave, 1977: p. 62)6. The recurrent Mappila riots of the

19th century were, to a large extent, in spite of their predomi-

nant religious character (Dale, 1975), defensive responses to, or

retaliatory acts against, such tyrannical acts and in that sense

were essentially economic phenomena (Gough, 1968-1969). The

sweeping militancy of the Mappilas and the exceptional enthu-

siasm they expressed in violating traditional caste dharma com-

bined with the rise in their demographic strength intensified the

5The term “outrage”was used by the British to refer to those outbreaks o

Mappilla violence in which the attack usually against a nambutiri or Nair

landlord; sometimes against a European official or a convert who had

slipped back into the Hindu fold and thus threatened community solidarity

was followed climactically by the religious suicide of all involved, in the

secure knowledge that by their martyrdom they would attain the houri bliss

of Paradise. The incidents in which the mappillas “sought actively their own

death”, 29 in number between 1836 and 1919, were normally suppressed in

a few days and involved in each case a relatively small number of people.

Only in eight of the outbreaks did more than ten Mappillas become martyrs

(or shahids) (Hardgrave, 1977: p. 62).

6The Census of India, Madras (1871: p. 7) noted that the Cherumas “have to

a large extent embraced Mohammedanism, and in so doing have raised

themselves and their su ccessors in t he social scale. The tyranny o f caste no

longer affects the Mussalman converts and under these circumstances it is

no cause for surprise that the Mussalman population on the Western Coast

should be fast increasing”. Subsequent Census Reports recorded the contin-

ued Mappila increases and actual declines in the number of Cherumas re-

ported. Between 1871 and 1881, the Mappila population of Malabar in-

creased by 12.3 per cent, compared to only 3.4 per cent of non-Mappilas

(Census of India, Madras, 1881: pp. 39-40). Between 1881 and 1891, Map-

pilas increased by 18 per cent, in comparison to a 10 per cent increase for

Hindus (Ce nsus of India, Madras, 1891: p. 67).

M. R. MANMATHAN

social distance between the Mappilas and the high caste Hindus

(Miller, 1992: p. 98). The setback inflicted on the material in-

terests of the dominant groups had started to articulate slowly in

the form of religious polarization and in widening the commu-

nal divide.

In 1852, a special commission, headed by T. L. Strange, was

appointed to investigate the causes of the outbreaks. Strange

rejected the view that the disturbances had their origin in agrar-

ian discontent or poverty and attributed it to religious fanati-

cism stirred by the teachings of ambitious priests. He recom-

mended a repressive policy, enacted into law in the Moplah

outrages Act, XXIII and XXIV of 1854. A special force of

police was raised in Ernad to enforce these measures (Logan,

1887: pp. 570-571). The failure to quell the outbreaks despite

strong police measures persuaded the government to appoint

William Logan, the District Collector, as Special Commission-

aire, in 1881, to enquire into land tenures and tenant rights in

Malabar. Logan believed the problem to be rooted fundamen-

tally in the early British misunderstanding of the traditional re-

lationship of the janmi to the land. Rather than seeing the janmi

as one of several agricultural classes with rights to the land and

its produce, British officials viewed him as rather like an Eng-

lish landlord to be protected with the force of Law (Logan,

1887: p. 584). However, the government refused to implement

his recommendations which is evident from the statement of

District Collector Innes who writing at the turn of the century

attributed the outbreaks to “three main causes, poverty, agrarian

discontent and fanaticism, of which the last is probably the

chief” (Innes, 1908: p. 89).

The establishment of British rule marked the beginning of a

social transformation. A notable feature was the consolidation

of diverse political units into larger administrative ones. By

1793 the whole of Malabar came into the hands of the British

and became a district of the Madras presidency. Travancore and

Cochin continued under princely rule but as subordinate allies

of the British and guided by a British officer called Resident in

administration. The consolidation of power in the British hands

led to the introduction of a uniformity in basic legislation.

Slavery was abolished in Malabar in 1843 by the British and

through Royal Proclamations in Travancore and Cochin in

1853 and 1854 respectively (Basu, 2008: pp. 57, 62-63). But in

the realm of land tenure and educational progress law and cus-

tom stood opposite to each other. In 1793 the British recog-

nized the janmi as the owner of the land and kanakkar as the

lease, holding a mortgage. Thus the verumpattakar tenants were

dependent on their lords and if they revolted against the land-

lord, they were evicted. From the beginning of the nineteenth

century, large number of schools was started by the Christian

missionaries to impart education to the converted people. Tak-

ing queue from them, the governments of Travancore, Cochin

and Malabar opened schools, but it benefitted the Nairs and the

Syrian Christians. As untouchables, the Izhavas could not profit

from them but the mission schools provided them openings for

education. The strong anti-British attitude of the Mappilas kept

them away from English education for a long time. The Tiyyas

of Malabar and the Muslims of Travancore fared well and did

not face much deprivation; under direct British rule, the Tiyyas

could prosper educationally and socially and as traders and

landowners, the Muslims of the princely states could make use

of the possibilities opened up by modernity (Logan, 1887: p.

144; Iyer, 1909: p. 283).

The Civil Rights Movement

Kerala began to experience the impact of colonial modernity

from the early decades of the nineteenth century, the ramifica-

tions of which were felt in the public sphere in different times

and in different degrees. One of the most important impact was

felt in the social realm, in the form of efforts at reforming cus-

toms and democratizing social relationships. It was the (Protes-

tant) Christian missionaries (such as the London Mission Soci-

ety (L.M.S) in Southern Kerala, Church Mission Society

(C.M.S) in Central Kerala and Basel Evangelical Mission Soci-

ety (B.E.M.S) in Northern Kerala) who took the pioneering

steps in promoting social reforms; they actively engaged in

spreading the message of reform by imparting modern educa-

tion to the untouchables and encouraging the new converts to

openly question symbols of caste oppression and rules of ritual

pollution (Aiya, 1906, I: p. 525; Manavalan, 1990: p. 120). The

revolt of the Christian converted Shanna r/ Na da r women of Sou-

thern Travancore to get their right to wear upper garments

really shook southern Travancore in the first half of the nine-

teenth century (Hardgrave, 1968)7. Similarly, the activities of

the missionaries and the pressure exerted by them played a

decisive role in coercing the governments to abolish slavery in

both Travancore and Malabar in the middle of the nineteenth

century (Basu, 2008: p. 74). The missionaries were also the first

to introduce print-culture in Kerala. They utilized the print me-

dia to oppose customs and practices which had contradicted

with modern outlook and human reason (Anderson, 1983: pp.

41-49)8. The efforts of the missionaries had had its desired ef-

fect, especially among the lower castes, and large mass of such

people became converts to Christianity. But missionary appeal

failed to much impress the upper or middle level caste groups;

even the untouchable caste of the Izhavas took advantage of the

new opportunity and the newly acquired knowledge to attain

upward social mobility within the existing Hindu social order

through radical social reform (Sahodaran, 1920: pp. 290-294;

Jeffrey, 1974: p. 48)9.

Early attempts at social reform were followed by organized

struggle for social change which also had its genesis in the

princely state of Travancore. Though being conservative and

very vigilant in protecting the old social order, the government

had started “modernizing” the state by founding schools, roads,

law courts, and efficient bureaucracy. Meanwhile, a powerful

middle class, which had been developing among the untouch-

able caste of the Izhavas, grew more and more frustrated over

the state policy of keeping them away from government schools

and service. In 1896 the Izhavas of Travancore submitted a

huge memorandum (signed by 13176 men known as Izhava

Memorial) calling upon the government to open public schools

and services to them (Rao, 1979: p. 34). The failure of such

7The struggle is examined from various viewpoints. While some people

from within the caste see it as part of an epic struggle to free the lower

classes from feudal domination (Yesudas, 1975), the missionary perception

take it as the triumph of decency and Christian values (Mateer, 1883:

Ch.XXXIV). Hardgrave regards it as part of a wider movement within the

caste order of south India for the Nadars to raise their status in the social

hierarchy (Hardgrave, 1969).

8Anderson attributes the success of European Reformation to print-capital-

ism and stresses the coalition between Prote st antism a nd pr int-capitalism.

9Sahodaran, the magazine published by the radical Tiyya lawyer C. Krish-

nan from Calicut, urged the Izhavas to concentrate on reforming Hinduism

from within as no other religion was so liberal and tolerant. Jeffrey added

that as large number of Izhavas prospered, they were able cautiously to

imitate the manners of Nairs.

M. R. MANMATHAN

early steps persuaded them to turn towards more radical meas-

ures under a strong organization, that is, the S.N.D.P. Yogam

under the powerful leadership of Sri Narayana Guru. The Yo-

gam took up a two-pronged struggle—the fight for social equa-

lity and freedom of worship and the internal reform of the Iz-

hava caste to make it a model community (Pulappilly, 1976: pp.

35-39). The radical demands raised by the S.N.D.P. in Travan-

core, such as the freedom to use public roads and temple-entry

and representation in government jobs and legislatures, and the

strategy of mass struggle they adopted to achieve their demands,

clearly reflected their resolve to transform—not merely to re-

form—the existing social structure (Heimsath, 1982: p. 33). In

British Malabar, the state did not adhere to caste rules and h enc e

the lower castes could get recruited into even higher govern-

ment posts (Menon, 1901: p. 182; Kesavan, 1968: pp. 263-270).

Thus the Tiyyas in Malabar were not as deprived as their Izha va

counterparts in Cochin or Travancore and hence militant lower

caste social reform movements failed to take roots in Malabar.

By the 1920s the movement for civil liberties was taking new

proportions. As already noted, the lower caste untouchables had

expressed their resolve to better their social position through

mass conversion (to Christianity in southern and central Kerala

and to Islam in northern Kerala) and to distance themselves

with the politics of nationalism since the Indian National Con-

gress was identified to represent upper caste interests and to

perceive the colonial master as a potential ally in the path to

social emancipation. But the middle level caste of the Izhavas

who till then refused to experiment the possibilities of the poli-

tics of religious conversion and worked to occupy a “respected

place in Hindu society” than to satisfy with a “doubtful Chris-

tian role between contemptuous Syrians and polluting Pulaya

converts” (Jeffrey, 1974: p. 48), now began to seriously think

of renouncing Hinduism for getting a more honorable status in

the civil society. The Congress decision to uphold the cause of

temple-entry stemmed from this predicament, because religious

conversion was slowly growing into a vital social issue capable

of subverting the existing social equilibrium solidly rooted in

birth rights and hereditary social privileges.

The Nationalist Politics

The nature of political awakening in Kerala differed in the

three political regions in accordance with the prevailing politi-

cal climate—while in Malabar where direct colonial rule ex-

isted, nationalist movement had made deep inroads by the be-

ginning of the Gandhian era but in the princely states of Tra-

vancore and Cochin they were at low ebb. In Travancore and

Cochin, political condition of the princely state weakened the

possibilities of the spread of a strong nationalist movement and

hence the rising middle class of both the upper and lower castes

concentrated on pr o moting commun ity inter ests (Kesav an, 1968:

pp. 356-357). This was the background of the Izhava memorial,

and the Abstention Movement of the 1930s, in which various

deprived groups formed a coalition forum called Joint Political

Congress to press forward their middle class demands for re-

served representation in government jobs and legislatures in

accordance with population strength against the huge monopoly

of the Nairs and Brahmins. The non-cooperation or civil dis-

obedience movements of the 1920s and 30s did not make any

political effects here; politics of the princely states evolved

around social issues, skillfully masterminded by caste/commu-

nity organizations.

The nationalist movement came relatively late to “sleeping

Malabar”. While a District Congress Committee had been

formed in 1908, it was not until 1916, with the beginning of the

Home Rule Movement that Malabar began to awaken politi-

cally. The fifth Malabar District Conference was held at Man-

jeri in 1920 with Annie Basent in chair in which the extremist

group could pass a resolution in favour of tenancy reforms

against the moderate stand who under Basent boycotted the

proceedings. The demands for tenancy reform came principally

from the class of kanakkar, substantial tenants who were large-

ly intermediaries between janmis and the vulnerable verumpat-

takkar, tenants-at-will. The janmis were mostly Nambutiri

Brahmins, the kanakkar were disproportionately Nairs and the

verumpattakkar were overwhelmingly drawn from the Mappila

community and from Tiyyas, Cheruman and other depressed

Hindu castes. The Nair Kanakkar, prosperous and articulate in

defense of their interests, had long been active before govern-

ment commissions and in the Madras legislative assembly in

efforts to secure more favorable tenancy rights for themselves.

But it was not until 1920, in linking the tenancy issue with the

Congress-Khilafat struggle for Swaraj, that the tenancy move-

ment gained momentum. The Congress was still a predomi-

nantly Hindu organization, dominated largely by Nair lawyers

from the kanakkar class. The rise of the Khilafat issue10 and

Gandhi’s decision to link it with the noncooperation movement

fundamentally transformed the character of the Congress (Nam-

butiripad, 2005: p. 42)11.

Non-cooperation was formally launched on August 1, 1920,

and on the 18th of that month Gandhi and Shaukath Ali visited

Calicut to bring its message. Khilafat committees began to

sprout in Malabar and official reports revealed that Mappilas of

Ernad were more interested in the tenant cause and only on up-

holding that issue the agitators could make any advance (Tot-

tenham, 1922: p. 4). Agrarian tension increased in the light of

the rumor of an impending tenancy reforms in Malabar and

while landlords increasingly evicted tenants, Nair leaders of the

Congress sought to mobilize the active support of the Mappila

cultivators—both for tenancy reforms and in the name of

Khilafat. Intense campaigning for Khilafat scared the official

circles, in the light of “fanatic outbreaks” of the past, and igno-

rance and backwardness of the Mappilas, which led them to ban

public meetings (Madras Mail, 1921, Feb. 8: 9; Ap. 27: 8); ex-

pansion of the tenancy movement under Congress auspices

spread alarm among landlords and officials alike. In the context

of all these the All Kerala Provincial Congress was held at Ot-

tappalam on 26 April 1921, in which large number of Khilafat

volunteers in uniform attended (Panikkar, 1989: p. 132) and an

ulema conference exhorted all Muslims to support the Khilafat

as a religious duty and to join the Congress to fight for the

Khilaft through the struggle for swaraj. A tenants’ conference

convened at Ottappalam strongly supported resistance to land-

10The Khilafat movement sought to preserve the integrity of the Ottoman

Empire and the Turkish Sultan as the Caliph. The movement beginning in

1919, protested against British support for the dismemberment of the Otto-

man Empire and the abolition of the Caliphate. The Indian movement was

led by the Ali Brothers (Shoukath and Muhammad) but Congress soon

supported the issue as Gandhi saw in it a golden opportunity to weld Hindu-

Muslim unity and combine anti-British issue of Khilafat with the movement

for Swaraj through non-violent noncoope r ation.

11E.M.S. wrote that a striking solidarity had developed between the Mappi-

las and the class of lawyers, journalists and politicians (i.e., Congressmen)

who brought them into nationalist politics; both were lured by tenant inter-

ests, and looked forward to get a tenancy legislation passed.

M. R. MANMATHAN

lords and Government in the form of noncooperation (Hard-

grave, 1977: p. 70). Congress leaders like K. P. Kesava Menon

and K. Kelappan addressed several Khiafat conferences (Me-

non, 1986: pp. 82-83). The “wonderful” organization of the Khi-

lafat movement (Madras Mail, Aug. 8, 1921: p. 6) and the tra-

ditional system of communication among the Mappilas (Hitch-

cock, 1925: p. 3), along with the official anxiety over the Map-

pilas utilizing the newly forged solidarity to redress their im-

mediate grievances (Tottenham, 1922: p. 26) forced the gov-

ernment to take strong punitive measures against them which,

within a few days, led to the eruption of a violent uprising.

The rebellion actually started with th e Tirurangadi i nc ident in

which nine Mappilas were killed in police firing while a group

of 2000 people marched to the police station demanding the

release of their fellowmen taken into custody during a police

action at the Mambram mosque in search of some Khilafat vo-

lunteers (Hitchcock, 1925: pp. 31-34). Thereafter violence

erupted which was marked by widespread attack on symbols of

government authority, such as police stations, courts and record

offices and cutting of railway and telegraph lines. Landlords-

Nambutiris and Nairs—were the principal victims of the attacks,

several of whom fled from the area to the nearby towns of

Calicut or Trichur. At the earliest stages, Hindus were clearly

involved, but with time and growing violence (and with the

proclamation of the Khilafat kingdom in south Malabar), their

numbers rapidly diminished (Hardgrave, 1977: p. 83), which

imparted a communal color to the rebellion. For almost six

months the “Mappila zone” was under the control of the rebel

leaders. The government soon resorted to reinforcements which

led the rebels to retire into safe areas and to fight a guerilla war.

There were frequent reports of rebel atrocities, sporadic inci-

dence of violence against Hindus and cases of forced conver-

sions to Islam (Nair, 1923: pp. 76-79)12. This has been attrib-

uted primarily to two factors: the impression among many re-

bels of the movement leading to the establishment of an Islamic

state and to the widespread suspicion of Hindus acting as in-

formants for the government (Panikkar, 1989: pp. 179, 198). By

the beginning of 1922 the rebellion was crushed causing heavy

casualties on the rebel side and all the leaders were soon ar-

rested or shot dead13. Panikkar identified at least three patterns

of rebel activity in the whole course of the rebellion. The initial

political mobilization was effected by the Khilafat and Con-

gress activists who were soon rendered ineffective and the ac-

tual course of the revolt thereafter developed outside the politi-

cal movement in which it had initially developed. In this second,

but short-lived, stage the locally influential leaders took over

the direction of the rebel proceedings but ceased to be effective

when the army operations began. In the third and crucial stage,

the insurrection was now conducted by the rural poor them-

selves, either under grass-root level leadership or without any

recognizable leadership at all. The pattern of rebel proceedings

underlined a consciousness primarily rooted in an opposition to

the landlord and the colonial state. Against the selective and

limited nature of rebel violence (against the janmis and their

servants) of the nineteenth century, in 1921 a distinction was

made between the lenient and exacting landlords (although atti-

tude towards Europeans was uniformly hostile); several of the

latter category were executed and murders and physical assaults

on others were largely punitive actions against collaborators

and informers of the British army (Panikkar, 1989: pp. 198-

199).

In the context of the eruption of violence and the evolution of

the revolt into a communal outbreak the Congress withdraw its

support to their earlier ally, the Mappilas. The Congress leaders

were in fact taken by surprise at the unexpected developments.

But their activity was confined to the two trips they made to the

rebel area in the early stage of the rebellion; afterwards they

remained passive spectators-partly because they could not ap-

prove of the rebel action and partly because of their lack of

confidence in being able to influence the rebels (Panikkar, 1989:

pp. 149-151). The attitude of the Congressmen drove the Map-

pilas to identify the Congress with the Hindus (Panikkar, 1989:

p. 189). The relief and reconstruction measures undertaken after

the rebellion also underlined the communal divide—the Con-

gress was active only among the Hindu refugees. The years that

followed the suppression of the Rebellion and the withdrawal

of the non-cooperation movement made it extremely difficult

for the Congress organization to function in Malabar. K. P. Ke-

sava Menon, the Congress leader, described the situation thus:

“For a long time after the rebellion no public activity was possi-

ble in Malabar. Enmity towards the Congress was evident eve-

rywhere. The authorities stated that the Congress had brought

down calamity on the country through participation in the Khi-

lafat agitation. They even wanted all the Congressmen in Mala-

bar to be imprisoned. The Muslims complained that those who

had induced them to join abandoned them when police oppres-

sion and firing by the troops started” (Menon, 1986: p. 128).

The caste-Hindus who were opposed to the Congress, on the

other hand, denounced them for supporting the “foolish” and

“fanatic” Mappilas and for inciting them to plunge into a vio-

lent action (Yogakshemam, 1921, 11: 47, 2). The Congress

leadership sadly realized that the first political struggle it un-

dertook in Kerala ended in tragedy and the alliance with the

Mappilas proved self-annihilating as they not only not refused

to adhere to Gandhian ahimsa but advanced it into a class and

community struggle. More disturbing was the sense of unity

evinced by the Mappilas and their resolve to sacrifice for a

cause which was alien to the Hindu tradition and hence incom-

patible to “national” interests.

The Congress could not recover from the fatal blow inflicted

on its morale by the rebellion for long; it could not think of

political campaigning—even to summon a Congress meeting. It

tried to overcome this political lethargy by focusing on the

social front and by drifting towards political journalism. This

was the background of the birth of the nationalist newspaper

Mathrubhumi and the launching of the Vaikam satyagraha (Me-

non, 1986: pp. 139-149; Gangadharan, 2008: p. 248; Nambu-

tiripad, 2005: pp. 65-68)14. The temple entry movement in fact

12The pro-British Madras Mail was in the forefront in this venture. The anti-

Mappila reaction was presented by the Mail in its daily reporting and in a

(later) series on “The Moplah Rebellion”. It referred to the “innate charac-

teristics” of the Mappila as “his mad fanatical fury, his murderous spirit and

his reckless disregard for life” (Madras Mail, 1921, Nov. 14: 5; Nov. 15: 7).

Gopalan Nair’s Malabar Rebellion devotes 21 pages to atrocities allegedly

committed by the Mappilas against the H i ndus (Nair, 1923: pp. 52-72).

13Official figures recorded 2339 rebels killed, 1652 wounded and 5955

captured. K.P. Kesava Menon estimated that as many as 10,000 may have

lost their life in the rebellion (Menon, 1986: p. 116).

14Mathrubhumi Daily was started in 1923 from Calicut with K. P.Kesava

Menon as its founder editor. Congress leaders and people sympathetic to the

nationalist movement helped to raise the necessary funds. It consciously

tried to propagate nationalist and patriotic sentiments as well as a spirit o

Hindu unity.

M. R. MANMATHAN

provided the Malabar Congressmen with a programme, and a

lease of life, as it opened before them a safe field of activism; it

shifted the centre of activity to further south where Mappilas

were absent and furnished with a fine opportunity to compen-

sate for the earlier “disastrous” alliance with the Mappilas by

fighting for a Hindu cause (Jeffrey, 1978a: pp. 153-154)15. The

Congress was turning more Hindu and more rightist; communi-

ties of foreign religious affiliation were increasingly identified

as external to the national self and as threatening “national” in-

terests.

The Temple-Entry Movement

The political and social atmosphere of Kerala in the 1920s

and 30s grew tense with the Indian National Congress uphold-

ing the cause of temple entry. In 1924 the Congress organized

the vigorous 20 month long satyagraha at the Vaikam temple

with the simple aim of securing the right to use the approach

roads of the temple for the untouchables. While the upper

castes and non-Hindus including Christians and Muslims freely

used the temple roads, the untouchables like the Izhavas and

Pulayas were forbidden to pass through them. The Izhavas were

on the verge of a revolt over the question of caste pollution and

viewed it as an obvious act of social injustice and open viola-

tion of human rights. The S.N.D.P. Yogam was seriously dis-

cussing the means to overcome this social stigma. Since the

Izhavas had their own temples in which they themselves acted

as officiating priests, their eagerness to get access to savarna

temples was more a matter of civil rights than a question of

freedom of worship. T. K. Madhavan, the prominent leader of

the S.N.D.P. Yogam and the true spirit behind the satyagraha,

managed to get a resolution passed at the Congress session in

1923 at Kakinada on the question of the removal of untouch-

ability. The Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) de-

cided to launch a satyagraha at Vaikam on this basis (Menon,

1986: pp. 160-164). Gandhi blessed the satyagraha but cau-

tioned against non-Hindu participation and non-savarna leader-

ship in it as it was strictly a Hindu cause and a golden opportu-

nity for caste-Hindus to atone for a heinous sin (Young India,

1925: p. 135; Proceedings, 1925). The satyagraha attracted

countrywide attention and people from all over India reached

Vaikam to support the struggle. The savarna-jatha (upper caste

march) organized under the leadership of Mannath Padmanab-

han to the capital Trivandrum, to impress upon the king of the

urgency of the demand, truly reflected this spirit. The pro-

longed campaign and the direct involvement of Gandhi forced

the authorities to come to a settlement according to which all

the approach roads, except the eastern one, of the temple were

thrown open to all people irrespective of caste and community.

The modalities of the agreement was a subject of intense debate

and the Congress was blamed for deserting the struggle halfway

and for effecting the agreement only to the Vaikam temple (Ra-

vindran, 1988: pp. 144-149). Due to this reason, several similar

struggles had to be waged for the same purpose subsequently.

As a result, in 1928, approach roads to all temples in Travan-

core were thrown open to all people (Menon, 1984: p. 327).

The second satyagraha struggle under the K.P.C.C. against

caste based pollution, but now to get the temple open to all

Hindus, was organized in 1931-32, in the course of the C.D.M,

at the Guruvayur temple in Malabar. While the struggle at Vai-

kam was a social reform measure divorced from any political

movements, at Guruvayur it was integral to a political program

(Gopalankutty, 1981). Nevertheless, in Kerala, the zeal for so-

cial reform overshadowed the rising countrywide political en-

thusiasm; for the K.P.C.C. the temple-entry issue was more

important than the C.D.M. and leaders like Kelappan concen-

trated heavily on the question of untouchability (Mathrubhumi,

1931, Ap. 6, June. 21, July. 29, July. 31 & Sep. 10; 1932, Marc h .

5, March. 27 & Aug. 4). Gandhi also asked the satyagrahis to

detach the struggle from all its political affiliations and from the

organizational links of the Congress in order to rescue it from

government repression and to ensure its success. Though the

temple-entry agitation was perceived as tantamount to the

“struggle against imperialism” by some of its leaders (Gopalan,

1973: p. 28) as it kept vigil against disunity and factionalism,

what really prompted the Congress to confine the struggle to

temple-entry was the bitter experiences of 192116. The Zamorin,

who was the trustee of the temple, however, refused to step

down to negotiate a settlement which led Kelappan to start a

fast unto death which, however, was withdrawn under the ad-

vice of Gandhiji (Mathrubhumi, 22 Sep. & 4 Oct. 1932). The

satyagraha as a whole was finally terminated before achieving

any of its declared objectives. A period of three months was

given to the Zamorin to effect temple-entry, failing which

Gandhi would himself offer satyagraha; but it was postponed

and did not take place at all. A referendum was held among the

caste Hindus of Ponnani taluk, where the temple was situated,

which revealed that 70% of them supported the cause of temple

entry (Mathrubhumi Weekly Temple Entry Special Issue, 16

Nov. 1937). N.P. Damodaran, one of the leaders of the satya-

graha, later recollected that though the agitation failed to meet

its immediate objective, it created a climate in favour of temple

entry (Damodaran, 1981). The movement for temple entry reg-

istered its crowning victory when the Travancore government

made the temple entry proclamation in 1936 by which all tem-

ples in Travancore were thrown open to all Hindus (Menon,

1984: pp. 327-328). Nevertheless, the temples of Cochin and

Malabar remained closed before the avarnas till 1947.

Politics of the Temple-Entry

Movement

The temple-entry movement was important for several rea-

sons. Firstly, it was a conscious effort on the part of the Con-

gress to integrate the various castes and communities under the

Hindu fold through social and religious reform, which repre-

sented a powerful domain of the nationalist movement. Temple

could rally diverse sections together without dislodging the

existing power relations and a symbolic unity could pacify

lower caste radicalism. The Congress decision to take up the

issue in Kerala was certainly in the context of the inclusion of

the removal of untouchability as part of the Gandhian construc-

tive program and its decision to fight out social evils in accor-

dance with the nation-building project, but the constructive

16The fear of the Map pil as loo med larg e even i n th e 30’s and du ring the salt

march it is reported that salt law had been broken all over Malabar except in

the erstwh ile “rebel” areas . Moreover, th e procession on foot from Payyan-

nur, heading for the Guruvayur satyagraha stopped short of the “rebel” area.

The marchers took a train from Feroke to Tirur “because of a rumor that the

Mappilas would prevent them from moving into Ernad” (Menon, 1994:pp.

103-104).

15In an interview K. P. Kesava Menon revealed that for the Congressmen from

Malabar district, the temple-entry campaign gave an opportunity to revive

interest—at a safe distance—in a Congress that had suffered a severe setback

with the Mappila rebellion of 1921 (cited in Jeffrey, 1978a: pp. 153-154).

M. R. MANMATHAN

programme itself betrayed its elitist character (Kooiman, 1995:

p. 45; Onwerkerk, 1994: p. 56). Writings of Gandhi in the early

twenties, and even later, revealed how the Congress leadership

was getting seriously troubled by lower caste radicalism and the

increasing volume of religious conversions (Young India, 27.10.

1920: 135; 04.06.1925: 135; 19.01.1921: 6; 04.05.1921: 3; 27.

04.1921: 5; 22.09.1921: 11; 29.09.1921: 12; 13.10.1921: 13;

Harijan, 11.02.1933; 31.10.1936)17. Of equal importance was

the basic limitation of the anti-untouchability program: it

searched for a moral solution to repair inequalities to recast the

nation but without dislodging the basic social structure18. The

Congress leadership in Kerala also refused to address the eco-

nomic content or power relationships rooted in it but rather took

it as a question of equality within religion and an unfortunate

aberration from scriptural injunctions.

Secondly, the heated debates unleashed by the Izhava middle

class on religious conversion was acquiring political and eco-

nomic dimensions. C.V. Kunhuraman, the firebrand leader of

the S.N.D.P. and the editor of Kerala Kaumudi had made the

alarm signal by urging the Izhavas to renounce Hinduism if the

upper castes did not support their cause of temple entry (Kun-

huraman, 1936). A section of the Izhavas enthusiastically wel-

comed the suggestion. Though there were differences of opin-

ion as to which religion they should opt—whether Christianity,

Islam or Buddhism—the challenge fell like a bombshell on the

savarna groups. Although conversions had been taking place

among the untouchables from very early times and its pace had

considerably increased by the nineteenth and early twentieth

centuries, the ‘20s and ‘30s were special because now the chal-

lenge came from the Izhavas who though “are avarnas are rich

and educated” (Kelappan, 1925). The loss of the middle class

was exceptionally harmful as they could threaten—as in the

case of the Christian mi ddle class of ce ntra l Trav ancore (Je ffrey ,

1978a: pp. 153-154)—the material pursuits of the upper caste

Hindus. A powerful section within the S.N.D.P—including Ku-

maran Asan, T. K. Madhavan and A. Ayyappan, and of course

Sri Narayana Guru too—stood for a reformed Hinduism (Ke-

savan, 1968: pp. 274-276). But radicals held fast to the idea of

conversion; preferably to Buddhism against the Sri Lankan

background of the Izhavas (Kunhuraman, 1925); this had lent

space to speculations, that the conversion issue was a pressure

tactic to enforce a reform of customs. However, it had its de-

sired effect: caste Hindus increasingly began to realize the need

of ritual reform which is evident in the rhetoric against conver-

sions with a stress on the innate quality of Hinduism (Thampan,

1932; Nambutiripad, 1932). The Nair aristocracy fanned Nair

communal passions against the Christian capitalists who were

buying up their land and prestige (Isaac & Tharakan, 1988: p.

166). Leaders like “Mannam, who was not a Gandhian and was

in general opposed to the Congress”, participated in the Vaikam

Satyagraha for his concern over the loss to Hinduism of con-

verts to Christianity (Onwerkerk, 1994: p. 59). The temple en-

try movement under the leadership of the Congress thus repre-

sented an attempt at forging a consolidated Hindu identity and

to discourage conversions which was engendered by disabilities

enforced by the caste system. Religious conversion could cause

trouble to the caste Hindus because “it reduced their rhetorical

constituency” (Jeffrey, 1978a: p. 143). The writings of Kelap-

pan clearly demonstrated how the temple-entry movement was

directly linked to the threat posed by religious conversions (Ke-

lappan, 1925; 1932a; 1932b)19.

Thirdly, the Congress interest in the temple-entry struggle

was an attempt to offset the damage caused to its prestige and

honor by the incidents of 1921. Congress leadership tried to

escape from the initial shock by expressing its “firm convic-

tion” that the non-cooperation and Khilafat movements were in

no way responsible for the outbreak. The Congress view was

recorded in the resolution of the Working Committee in Sep-

tember 1921, expressing a “sense of deep regret over the deeds

of violence done by the Mappilas in certain areas of Malabar”

and resolved that the rebellion was not caused by the Khilafat

or Non-cooperation movements, and that the causes of the re-

bellion had nothing to do with these movements (Sitaramayya,

1946: p. 216). Prominent Congress leaders in Kerala shared this

view as is understood from Kesava Menon’s comment that “it

was wrong to have connected the Khilafat problem with the

Nationalist Movement” (Menon, 1977: p. 48). Congressmen in

Kerala were under siege for upholding the Khilafat issue and

forging an alliance with the “fanatic” Mappilas which brought

about “great hardships to the Hindus and dishonor to the land”.

The committees appointed by the Congress failed to make a

comprehensive and objective enquiry into the cause of the re-

bellion, which led to develop controversies with strong political

and communal overtones. K. Moidu Maulavi, Khilafat leader

and staunch nationalist, reiterated his firm conviction that the

rebellion was a struggle for freedom, it started as an anti-impe-

rialist rising, although “in the end the British authorities had

succeeded to an extent in degrading it into a communal con-

flict” (Maulavi, 1981: pp. 136-141; 152-154). But Kesava Me-

non stated (later) that it would not be correct to consider the

“Mappila Rebellion” as part of the Nationalist movement be-

cause the rebels “were motivated more by religious zeal and

17In a series of articles entitled “The Removal of Untouchability” wrote in

Young India and Harijan, Gandhi viewed conversion rather more inspired

y the desire for material benefits than for spiritual needs. The lower caste

eople were getting converted because of untouchability which has to be

eliminated not only to cleanse Hinduism of its evils but to attain swaraj also.

Foreign rule in India is a divine punishment for following this curse which

“is a crime against god and humanity”. In fact untouchability was not a part

of original Hinduism and hence those who threaten to abandon Hinduism

are deceiving their religion. He consoled the untouchables that their low

social stature is not due to their fault and urged the savarna people to take

up the removal of untouchability as an act of atonement before they were

too late to do so.

18“Untouchability was both a moral and political problem: the former be-

cause its eradication involved undermining its moral legitimacy and chang-

ing, or at least softening, Hindu attitudes; the latter because it was deeply

rooted in the highly unequal structure of power relationship between the

upper castes and the harijans and could not be removed without restructur-

ing it. It had therefore to be fought at both levels. Gandhi’s campaign was

conducted only at the moral and religious level. Hence he concentrated on

caste Hindus…, appealed to their sense of duty and honor, mobilized their

feelings of shame and guilt, and succeeded in achieving his initial objective

of discrediting untouchability and raising the level of the Hindu… con-

sciousness. Since he did not organize and politicize the harijans, stress their

rights and fight for a radical reconstruction of the established social and

economic order, Gandhi’s campaign was unable to go further” (Parekh,

1989: pp. 245-24 6).

19K. Kelappan, the great Gandhian Congressman and the foremost cham-

pion of the temple-entry movement in Kerala, in his article on the Vaikam

Satyagraha (1925: pp. 42-45), justified the struggle in the context of the

increasing tendency of the lower castes, especially Izhavas, to renounce

Hinduism. In another article written around the time of the Guruvayur Sat-

yagraha, he expressed great concern over the harms caused by conversions.

This article is s p ecially no t ed for his attit ude of the Musli m “other”; th ey are

erceived as a threat to the nation and national unity; mainly because o

their so lidarity and str ess on intern ational brotherho od (1932a: pp. 7- 8). He

also suggested a “secular” programme the government should follow to

curb the grow th of (Muslim) comm u nalism (1932b: pp. 4-5, 10).

M. R. MANMATHAN

interest in the Khilafat than by true national consciousness”

(Menon, 1977: p. 48). In their highly illuminating accounts of

the event, two other prominent Congress leaders—K. Madha-

van Nair and Mozhikunnath Brahmadathan Nambutiripad—

traced the origin of the rebellion back to the high-handed Brit-

ish policy of repression (Nair, 2002; Nambutiripad, 1965). By

attributing the violence of 1921 to the official atrocities, they

justified the decision of the Congress to ally with the Mappilas

but regretted for associating with a group still unfit for a mod-

ern and secular political struggle—and thus justified the official

Congress position rejecting the struggle as a part of the national

movement. They also shared the colonial perception of the up-

rising as nothing but a “riot” and treated the Mappilas as “wild”

and “fanatic” people who could not be trusted or easily tamed.

Neither did the rebellion confine its impact to Malabar poli-

tics alone. The widespread propaganda recounting awesome

details of the “Hindu suffering” at the hands of the Mappila

rebels gave birth to an aggressive Hindu campaign, at first

against the “cruel Mappilas” and later against Muslims in gen-

eral. On the other hand, the sufferings of the Mappilas deeply

moved Muslims all over India. Frantic appeals for helping them

received generous response from the North. All these affected

the relationship between the Hindus and Muslims all over India.

“The exaggerated tales (about the rebellion)… inflamed feel-

ings. The cry of Hinduism in danger was raised and movements

of Shuddhi (reconversion) and Sanghathan (organization) plan-

ned. A vicious cycle of accusation and counter-accusation was

set up which created the heat in which the tender plant of

Hindu-Muslim unity began to wither” (Chand, 1972: p. 497).

The “communal antagonisms generated by the Malabar Rebel-

lion” (Brown, 1972: p. 329) and the steadily advancing nation-

alist discourse centered on religious and cultural nationalism

greatly strengthened the concept of the Muslim “other” to the

extent that even the great Izhava reformer and poet Kumaran

Asan wrote a tale of the Rebellion villainizing the Mappilas in

which he told the tale of a Nambutiri girl thrown desolate by

the “cruel Muhammedans” during the revolt of 1921 (Asan,

1969). Similarly, in his “statement” attached to the 1970 edition

of K. Madhavan Nair’s Malabar Rebellion, K. Kelappan shared

the concern of the Congress leadership towards the “minority

Hindus of Ernad” against the “illiterate”, “ignorant” and hence

“rude” Mappilas (Nair, 2002: ix-xii)20.

The fear of the Mappilas for their “lack of civility”, the wide-

spread concern over the hardships of the (upper caste) Hindus

who had escaped from the affected areas to take shelter in the

nearby town of Calicut or in the princely states of Travancore

and Cochin, the cooperation extended by Congress to the relief

measures undertaken by the Arya Samaj, which was also very

active in reconverting the Hindus who were converted to Islam,

(Ansari, 2005: p. 64) the total breakdown of the organizational

structure of the Congress and its inability to carry on even nor-

mal political activity in the face of official retribution and

popular distrust in its programs, all forced the Congress to re-

treat to a Hindu idiom of politics (Menon, 1994: p. 78). Gan-

dhi’s statement—“The Moplahs are Muslims”—reveals the

stereotypical character-construct of the Muslim (Ansari, 2005:

p. 73). The leadership of the Congress in Kerala could not get

out of the shock inflicted by the events of the rebellion, espe-

cially the attack of the Mappila rebels on caste Hindus. This

was not surprising because in Malabar caste system conformed

to a kind of class order: the caste Hindus were the landlords or

the prominent leaseholders of the area while the Mappilas were

the sub-tenants under them (Panikkar, 1984). Among the higher

castes in particular, it is observed, the attitude towards Islam

was coloured by the way in which Islam impinged upon their

interests (Misra, 2004: p. 20). That the lower caste tenants re-

fused to rebel against their upper caste lords in Malabar clearly

revealed the manner by which caste hierarchy and the mode of

class response got enmeshed. The higher castes could realize

that the threat posed by conversion to their interests could only

be countered by bringing various caste groups together on some

common issue and by reforming social practices which seg-

mented them; efforts to forge a symbolic unity among Hindu

communities around the question of temple-entry appeared a

useful weapon to discourage the untouchable castes to get at-

tracted to religions which promised to emancipate them. For the

dominant groups, religion offers the necessary ideological justi-

fication for existing social divisions, makes these divisions

appear non-antagonistic and holds together a potentially di-

vided society into a single whole (Chatterjee, 1989: p. 172).

Thus, the championing of the temple-entry cause (mainly at

Vaikam) provided the Congress with a big lease of life: it gave

a platform for action with a strictly non-political program; it

saved them from official surveillance as the centre of activity

was shifted to the safe environs of the princely state of Travan-

core; it eschewed the fear of communal tension because the

Mappila factor was absent in Travancore (Menon, 1994: pp.

103-104) and above all, it provided the Congress with an op-

portunity to expiate for the “sin” of allying with the “danger-

ous” Mappilas by upholding a “Hindu” cause. Congressmen

played the role of an arbiter between various Hindu castes,

which in fact signaled a retreat from secular political activity,

but it opened before them a program of action after the “Map-

pila” rebellion (Menon, 1994: p. 80).

Conclusion

The temple-entry movement decided the future course of

politics in Kerala at least in three respects. Firstly, it provided a

conclusive end to the civil rights movement undertaken by the

untouchable castes leading to the attainment of the right of

universal temple-entry. The questions of religious disability and

freedom of worship slowly subsided to become less and less

powerful to command the discourse of civic life and political

culture. The debates centered on religious conversion as a

means of social emancipation also faded out altogether (Isaac &

Tharakan, 1988: p. 168; Narayanan, 2011). The (upper caste)

leadership of the Congress was able to coerce the caste-Hindus

to compromise on the question of temple-entry as the only vi-

able means to ward off religious conversion which challenged

the very survival of the Hindu community. Secondly, with the

success of the temple-entry agitation the conversion movement

certainly began to wane in Kerala, but it greatly undermined the

secular image of the Congress for its propagandist role in dis-

20Chatterjee (1995: p. 126) writes that the fact that Indian nationalism is

synonymous with “Hindu nationalism” is an entirely modern, rationalist and

historicist idea. The notion of “Hinduness” is not defined by any religious

criteria at all. There are no specific beliefs or practices which characterize

this “Hindu” and the many doctrinal or sectarian differences among Hindus

are indifferent to this concept. Even anti-Vedic and anti-brahmanical relig-

ions as Buddhism and Jainism count here as “Hindu”. Clearly excluded

from this jati are religions like Christianity and Islam. The criterion fo

inclusion and exclusion is determined by their historical origin. Buddhism

and Jainism are ‘Hindu’ because they originated in India while Islam and

Christianity originated outside and are, therefore, foreign.

M. R. MANMATHAN

seminating the so-called “Essentials of Hinduism” and in seek-

ing to forge a (Hindu) “community of equals” (Menon, 1994: p.

80) through a common bond of religiosity and uniformity of

religious worship around temples. In that sense the temple-

entry movement marked a definite stage in the process of the

disjunction of folk religion and other currents of religion. Re-

ligion is no longer divided into lower religion and higher relig-

ion, but into religion and superstition (Sontheimer, 1995: p.

396). Hence it was a shuddhi movement—to cleanse religion of

blots identified incompatible with modernity and the essentials

of nationhood. The temple-entry satyagraha attains significance

against the dual task taken up by the Indian National Congress

—to construct a modern nation-state and to mould a national

(Hindu) religion. But it had its disastrous consequences—in

driving religious minorities away from the organizational fold

and ideological appeal of the Congress. The bitter experiences

of 1921 followed by the conscious involvement of the Congress

in the affairs of religious nationalism forced the Mappilas to

keep away from nationalist politics and slowly drift towards a

marked sectarian identity. The slow but steady drift of the Map-

pilas into communal politics became inevitable (Panikkar, 1989:

p. 190). Thirdly, the struggle for temple-entry helped in deliv-

ering the Congress from the moral setback it faced after the

Malabar rebellion, but in the unique social context of Kerala

where reform movements had succeeded in shaping an ideo-

logical environment in favor of social equality, its withdrawal

from direct politics to engage with socio-religious issues, dis-

regarding more important questions of material deprivation and

class disparities, transcending caste/religious affiliations, re-

duced its political constituency and created a fertile ground for

the proliferation of left political ideology in subsequent times.

Moreover, in the 1930s, the strong communal and caste con-

sciousness let loose by the agitation against caste disabilities

could lead the poor towards class consciousness (as caste

roughly coincided with class in Kerala). With the Temple entry

Proclamation in Travancore in 1936—“the final act in the em-

bourgeoisment of society” as Nambutiripad saw it (Jeffrey,

1978: p. 82)—the middle class members were accorded the

right to use temples and abruptly lost interest in the poor of

their own caste. But the political excitement awakened among

the poor and low caste could not be made to go away; it lay

ready to be developed into class consciou sn ess .

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