p. 10 | India During 1912

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Jan 21, 1913

India During 1912

(From Our Own Correspondent)

(Concluded from last week)

Changes in Caste System

SOCially, there is evidence of a desire of revising the inexorable caste system that has done more than any one thing to keep India down. Both Christianity and its progress among the “untouchables,” and the new political program, have brought about this change. A movement to make all Hindus willing to touch these untouchables, is steadily progressing. In North India, there is a propaganda which puts these hitherto untouchable classes through a ceremony, called a purification ceremony, after which they are allowed to draw water from the village wells, and take food and give food to the high castes. It is amusing to read the accounts of the amazement of these lower castes when they are put through this ceremony, and then conducted to the center of the village to draw water from the well from which their ancestors have been forbidden for centuries, and from which, if they had drawn during their lifetime, they would have brought dire vengeance on their own head. One can scarcely blame them for shrinking back, and finally drawing the water with fear and trembling.

No doubt Hinduism has become alarmed at the thousands of these untouchables who have become Christians. Then again, when the basis for political representation was fixed, there was a great effort put forth by Mussulmans to have the government not count as Hindus these untouchables, who, altho doing the servile work of the Hindus for centuries, were still not counted as worth the spiritual ministration of the Brahmans, and whose presence was forbidden entrance in Hindu temples. However, those in the West should not be too quick to take these movements as evidences of the early abolition of caste. It is simply evidence of a readjustment of the entire caste system to meet modern conditions, and is very likely to leave all the evils of the caste system, from a Christian standpoint, more firmly entrenched than ever before.

Lessons from the Census

The figures of the last census will soon be completely published in all their details, and I will write concerning them at a future time. Suffice it for the present to say that there are now 315,132,537 souls in India, a most substantial gain for the decade, in spite of plague, famine, and serious economic conditions. There are good authorities who claim that as soon as a reliable census is possible for China, that it is doubtful if she will exceed by very much this enormous figure. For the Christian, this vast number of souls presents a most powerful plea. As we compare this census with that of ten years ago, it is encouraging to find that Christians have increased; but any one with a sense of facts will be unable to see in this increase any promise of a speedy conversion of all India. Less than one and one quarter of the whole population are Christian, and less than one half per cent are Protestant. This Christian community is very unevenly distributed. One hundred million have never yet heard the voice of a Christian, or the sound of the Christian religion. There are about 22,000 Christian workers in India, ninety per cent of whom are Indian, ten per cent foreign. Among the foreigners forty-six per cent are males, fifty-four per cent females; while among the Indians the females number only thirty-one per cent. Eighty-one per cent of these workers are in British territory, and nineteen per cent in native states. The call of these figures, with the great gaps caused by unentered fields, makes a strong plea for more men and means, that the work may be finished.

The Pig Rupee

An incident has happened during the year that has recalled the bullet, the biting of which was supposed to have been one of the immediate causes of the great mutiny. With the new reign, we of course have a new coinage. This year the designers tried to make a design that would be distinctively Indian. They put the effigy of the king in his royal robes, with his crown, and hanging from his neck was what was intended to be the figure of an elephant—the emblem of royalty in India. But the figure is small and rather crude, so that it recalls a pig rather than an elephant. At once, there was a great hue and cry on the part of the Mohammedan population. “The government is trying to defile the Moslem,” was the cry that spread like wildfire. One Moslem wrathfully said, “How can I say my prayers with the effigy of a pig in my pocket?” The matter reached such serious proportions that the government issued the order to withdraw the obnoxious coin. But they still are circulating freely, and it is not known whether this last order has been rescinded or not. At any rate, the writer has not yet found a Moslem who has refused one of them.

Famines in 1912

It is said that poor unfortunate India is rarely free from famine conditions. It is only the news of the great ones that reach across the seas. It is estimated that even in normal years at least five per cent of the population have to retire to rest every night without having had sufficient to eat for the day. But this year has seen two considerable famines,—the one largely in Gujarat in the Bombay Presidency, carried over from last year’s failure of the rains, and the other on the Deccan, now in progress because of the failure of this year’s rains in those parts. The great famine in Gujarat was marked, as no other previous one has been, by the hearty coöperation of Hindu and Christian for the alleviation of the suffering. Hinduism has been provoked to emulation by the great examples of Christian benevolence seen in the past, and this famine marked a co-operation between all classes never before seen. The relief work was so well organized that there was scarcely any loss of human life, but thousands of cattle and buffaloes perished. As the Indian is largely dependent on his live stock, it is easy to see the economic consequences of the loss of this stock, which it is very difficult to replace. In the present famine on the Deccan, more than 300,000 cattle have already perished, in spite of the heroic efforts that are being made both by government and private charity. In closing the financial account of the Gujarat famine, Dr. George Taylor, of the Irish Presbyterian Mission, Ahmedabad, reported:

“RELIEF COMMITTEE

“In glancing over the balance-sheet of the Famine Relief Fund, I could not help thinking that there is one very real asset which may well be taken into account, tho not admitting of expression in rupees, annas, and pies. The months of scarcity have come and gone, and have left behind them many memories, some indeed sad enough, yet others bright and pleasant. We shall not willingly forget the bond of sympathy that has, these past twelve months, drawn us together as fellow workers in a good cause. Despite distinctions of class or caste and creed, we have been privileged to coöperate one with another in the administration of relief; and, standing shoulder to shoulder, confronting a common foe, we have realized, in some faint degree at least, that solidarity which constitutes one of the most precious possessions of any community. Should this sense of solidarity have been at all strengthened, then the recent famine has not proved an unmixed evil. If, during this time of affliction, the rich have drawn closer to the poor, if the strong have befriended the weak, if Englishmen and Indians, Christians and non-christians have linked themselves in a common service of compassion, then most assuredly has this affliction brought in its train blessings in disguise.”