Who Were the Shudras?

The theory of invasion is an invention. This invention is necessary because of a gratuitous assumption which underlies the Western theory. The assumption is that the Indo-Germanic people are the purest of the modern representatives of the original Aryan race.

Who Were the Shudras? is a history book published by Indian social reformer and polymath B. R. Ambedkar in 1946.

Quotes

Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Writings and Speeches, Volume 7 edited by Vasant Moon, Education Department, Govt. of Maharashtra Publications, Mumbai, 1990. Quoted in Talageri, S. (2000). The Rigveda: A historical analysis. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan.

• So far as the Rig Veda is concerned, there is not a particle of evidence suggesting the invasion of India by the Aryans from outside India.
  • p. 68

• So far as the testimony of the Vedic literature is concerned, it is against the theory that the original home of the Aryans was outside India.
  • p. 68

• The language in which reference to the seven rivers is made in the Rig Veda (x. 75,5) is very significant. ... — the rivers are addressed as 'my Ganges, my Yamuna, my Sarasvati' and so on. No foreigner would ever address a river in such familiar and endearing terms unless by long association he had developed an emotion about it.
  • p. 68

• The third point to note is that whatever the degree of conflict, it was not a conflict of race. It was a conflict which had arisen on account of difference of religions. That this conflict was religious and not racial is evidenced by the Big Veda itself. Speaking of the Dasyus, it says : — “ They are avrata , without (the Arya) rites...
  • p. 69

• the distinction between the Aryans on the one hand and the Dasas and Dasyus on the other was not a racial distinction of colour or physiognomy. That is why a Dasa or Dasyu could become an Arya.
  • 72

• The theory of the Aryan race set up by Western writers falls to the ground at every point…
  • 72

• Anyone who cares to scrutinize the theory will find that it suffers from a double infection. In the first place, the theory is based on nothing but pleasing assumptions and inferences based on such assumptions. In the second place, the theory is a perversion of scientific investigation. It is not allowed to evolve out of facts. On the contrary, the theory is preconceived and facts are selected to prove it. ...
  • 72-73

• The theory of the Aryan race is just an assumption and no more. It is based on a philological proposition put forth by Dr. Bopp in his epoch-making book called * Comparative Grammar which appeared in 1885. In this book, Dr. Bopp demonstrated that a greater number of languages of Europe and some languages of Asia must be referred to a common ancestral speech. ... This assumption is the major premise on which the theory of the Aryan race is based.
  • 73

• From this assumption are drawn two inferences : (1) Unity of race, and (2) that race being the Aryan race. The argument is that if the languages are descended from a common ancestral speech then there must have existed a race whose mother tongue it was and since the mother tongue was known as the Aryan tongue the race who spoke it was the Aryan race. The existence of a separate and a distinct Aryan race is thus an inference only. From this inference, is drawn another inference which is that of a common original habitat. It is argued that there could be no community of language unless people had a common habitat permitting close communion. Common original habitat is thus an inference from an inference.
  • 73

• The theory of invasion is an invention. This invention is necessary because of a gratuitous assumption which underlies the Western theory. The assumption is that the Indo-Germanic people are the purest of the modern representatives of the original Aryan race. Its first home is assumed to have been somewhere in Europe. These assumptions raise a question : How could the Aryan speech have come to India ? This question can be answered only by the supposition that the Aryans must have come into India from outside. Hence the necessity for inventing the theory of invasion.
  • 73-74

• The third assumption is that the Aryans were a superior race. This theory has its origin in the belief that the Aryans are a European race and as a European race it is presumed to be superior to the Asiatic races. Having assumed its superiority, the next logical step one is driven to take is to establish the fact of superiority. Knowing that nothing can prove the superiority of the Aryan race better than invasion and conquest of the native races, the Western writers have proceeded to invent the story of the invasion of India by the Aryans and the conquest by them of the Dasas and Dasyus.
  • 74
  • Ambedkar, B. R. 1946. Who Were the Sudras? Bombay: Thacker. (pp 72-75). Quoted in Bryant, E. F. (2001). The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture : the Indo-Aryan migration debate. Oxford University Press. ch 3

• The fourth assumption is that the European races were white and had a colour prejudice against the dark races. The Aryans being a European race, it is assumed that it must have had colour prejudice. The theory proceeds to find evidence for colour prejudice in the Aryans who came into India. This it finds in the Chaturvarnya — an institution established by the Indo-Aryans after they came to India and which according to these scholars is based upon Varna which is taken by them to mean colour.
  • 74

• Not one of these assumptions is borne out by facts. Take the premise about the Aryan race. The theory does not take account of the possibility that the Aryan race in the physiological sense is one thing and an Aryan race in the philological sense quite different, and that it is perfectly possible that the Aryan race, if there is one, in the physiological sense may have its habitat in one place and that the Aryan race, in the philological sense, in quite a different place. The theory of the Aryan race is based on the premise of a common language and it is supposed to be common because it has a structural affinity. The assertion that the Aryans came from outside and invaded India is not proved and the premise that the Dasas and Dasyus are aboriginal tribes of India is demonstrably false.
  • 74-75

• The originators of the Aryan race theory are so eager to establish their case that they have no patience to see what absurdities they land themselves in. They start on a mission to prove what they want to prove and do not hesitate to pick such evidence from the Vedas as they think is good for them.
  • 75

• Prof. Michael Foster has somewhere said that ‘hypothesis is the salt of science.’ Without hypothesis there is no possibility of fruitful investigation. But it is equally true that where the desire to prove a particular hypothesis is dominant, hypothesis becomes the poison of science. The Aryan race theory of Western scholars is as good an illustration of how hypothesis can be the poison of science as one can think of.
  • 75

• The Aryan race theory is so absurd that it ought to have been dead long ago. But far from being dead, the theory has a considerable hold upon the people. There are two explanations which account for this phenomenon. The; first explanation is to be found in the support which the theory receives from Brahmin scholars. This is a very strange phenomenon. As Hindus, they should ordinarily show a dislike for the Aryan theory with its express avowal of the superiority of the European races over the Asiatic races. But the Brahmin scholar has not only no such aversion but he most willingly hails it. The reasons are obvious. The Brahmin believes in the two-nation theory. He claims to be the representative of the Aryan race and he regards the rest of the Hindus as descendents of the non-Aryans. The theory helps him to establish his kinship with the European races and share their arrogance and their superiority. He likes particularly that part of the theory which makes the Aryan an invader and a conqueror of the non-Aryan native races. For it helps him to maintain and justify his overlordship over the non-Brahmins.
  • 75-76

• Turning to the Vedas for any indication whether the Aryans had any colour prejudice, reference may be made to the following passages in the Rig Veda : In Rig Veda, i . 117 . 8, there is a reference to Ashvins having brought about the marriage between Shyavya and Bushati. Shyavya is black and Bushati is fair. In Rig Veda, i . 117 . 5, there is a prayer addressed to Ashvins for having saved Vandana who is spoken as of golden colour. In Rig Veda, ii . 3 . 9, there is a prayer by an Aryan invoking the Devas to bless him with a son with certain virtues but of ( pishanga ) tawny (reddish brown) complexion. These instances show that the Vedic Aryans had no colour prejudice. How could they have ? The Vedic Aryans were not of one colour. Their complexion varied; some were of copper complexion, some white, and some black. Rama the son of Dasharatha has been described as Shyama i.e., dark in complexion, so is Krishna the descendant of the Yadus, another Aryan clan. The Rishi Dirghatamas, who is the author of many mantras of the Rig Veda must have been of dark colour if his name was given to him after his complexion. Kanva is, an Aryan rishi of great repute. But according to the description given in Rig Yeda — x . 31 . 11, he was of dark colour.
  • 77-8

• This evidence from the Zenda Avesta as to the meaning of the word Varna leaves no doubt that it originally meant a class holding to a particular faith and it had nothing to do with colour or complexion.
  • 82

• (1) The Vedas do not know any such race as the Aryan race. (2) There is no evidence in the Vedas of any invasion of India by the Aryan race and its having conquered the Dasas and Dasyus supposed to be the natives of India. (3) There is no evidence to show that the distinction between Aryas, Dasas and Dasyus was a racial distinction. (4) The Vedas do not support the contention that the Aryas were different in colour from the Dasas and Dasyus.
  • Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Writings and Speeches, Volume 7 edited by Vasant Moon, Education Department, Govt. of Maharashtra Publications, Mumbai, 1990. Quoted in Talageri, S. (2000). The Rigveda: A historical analysis. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan.
  • 82

• Anyone who reads these verses, notes what they say calmly and coolly and considers them against the postulates of the Western theory will be taken aback by them. If the authors of these verses of the Rig Veda were Aryas then the idea which these verses convey is that there were two different communities of Aryas who were not only different but opposed and inimical to each other. The existence of two Aryas is not a mere matter of conjecture or interpretation. It is a fact in support of which there is abundant evidence.
  • 84

• About the Dasyus, there is no evidence to show that the term is used in a racial sense indicative of a non- Aryan people. On the other hand, there is positive evidence in support of the conclusion that it was used to denote persons who did not observe the Aryan form of religion.
  • 107

• What is the origin of the word Dasyu it is difficult to say. But a suggestion has been put forth that it was the word of abuse used by the Indo-Aryans to the Indo-Iranians. There is nothing unnatural or far-fetched ’ in this suggestion. That the two had come into conflict is borne out by history. It is therefore quite possible for the Indo-Aryans to have coined such a contemptuous ; name for their enemies. If this is true, then Dasyus cannot be regarded as the natives of India.
  • 108

• That the Dasas and Dasyus were the same as the Shudras is a pure figment of imagination. It is only a wild guess. It is tolerated because persons who make it are respectable scholars. So far as evidence is concerned, there is no particle of it, which can be cited in support of it.
  • Ambedkar, B. R. 1946. Who Were the Sudras? page 111
  • 111

• The true conclusion to be drawn from the Rig Veda is not that the Varna system did not exist, but that there were only three Varnas and that Shudras were not regarded as a fourth and a separate Varna. The second piece of evidence I rely on is the testimony of the two Brahmanas, the Satapatha and the Taittiriya. Both speak of the creation of three Varnas only. They do not speak of the creation of the Shudra as a separate.
  • 146

• The Shudras were one of the Aryan communities of the Solar race. . . . The Shudras did not form a separate Varna. They ranked as part of the Kshatriya Varna in the Indo-Aryan society..
  • Ambedkar (1946), quoted from Bryant, E. F. (2001). The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture : the Indo-Aryan migration debate. Oxford University Press. chapter 2
  • 239 , iv-v

Quotes about Who Were the Shudras?

• Ambedkar also attempted to uplift those who had suffered the most at the hands of Brahmanical Aryan culture: the Sudras. But, unlike Ramaswami, his method was not to attempt to uncouple this social class from an alien Aryan culture. On the contrary, according to Ambedkar (1946), "the Shudras were one of the Aryan communities of the Solar race. . . . The Shudras did not form a separate Varna. They ranked as part of the Kshatriya Varna in the Indo-Aryan society" (v). On the basis of a variety of passages, particularly Mahabharata, santi parvan 38-40 (which describes a Sudra by the name of Paijavana performing a major sacrifice conducted by Brahamanas), Ambedkar argued that the Sudras were once wealthy, glorified and respected by rsis, composers of Vedic hymns, and performers of sacrifice. Due to continuous feuding with the Brahmana class, the Sudras inflicted many tyrannies on the Brahmanas, who, in retaliation, denied them the upanayana initiation ceremony, causing them to eventually become socially degraded. Ambedkar, in his book Who Were the Sudras? (1946) offers a critique of the philological basis of the Aryan invasion theory, that in places is well-informed and well-argued. He adamandy rejected this theory, which he saw as partly responsible for propagating the erroneous idea that the Sudras were a non-Aryan, indigenous ethnic group.
  • Edwin Bryant, The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture

• Ambedkar was a nationalist, and he saw through the anti-national, colonial inspiration of the Aryan Invasion theory (which the British called the furniture of Empire).
  • Elst K. Ayodhya and After: Issues Before Hindu Society (1991)

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