Alberuni
came to India in the eleventh century. What he wrote about the then India is no
doubt some genuine historical documents which can not be refuted. Chapter LXIVl
of Alberuni’s “India” contains the description about the rites and customs practiced by the
Non-brahmans of India in eleventh
century.
Beside the Brahmans there were three other casts namely Kshatriya, Vaisya and Sudra. Occupation and the way of the functioning were strictly defined, any breach of it was a crime of grave nature. In the caste hierarchy the Kshatriya comes after the Brahman. They could offer fire and act according to the rules of Puranas, they could read the Veda and learn it , but they had no right to teach the Veda. The Kshatriya were assigned to rule the people and to protect them. After the completion of twelve years of age a Kshatriya hade to were a single cord of the threefold ‘yajnopavita’ and a single other cord of cotton. The Vaisya had another profession, particularly for their own. They cultivated the land and tended the cattle. They were allowed to gird himself with a single ‘yajnopavita’ made of two cords. The Sudras were very low caste and they were the servants of the Branmans. They were extremely poor and they did gird themselves with the linen .
The lower
casts, the Vaisya and Sudra, were the victims of religious persecution. If they
recited the Veda privily, they were acutely accused by the Brahmans before the
ruler who readily ordered to cut his tongue off. The works of piety ,
meditation of God and alms-giving were allowed to them. Any sort of
cross-occupation were not only prohibited , but also treated as a sin or crime.
So a Brahman engaged in trade or a Sudra in agriculture was treated as almost
the crime of theft. So, the regulation regarding the caste and occupation balance
was strictly maintained.
A strange story , may be anecdote, is related by Alberuni about a Brahman and a Candala. Generally, a son never died before his parents. It so happened that the son of a Brahman died before his father. The Brahman took the dead body of his child to the king and complained that such thing did never happen in that kingdom. Son’s death before his father’s was no doubt an innovation for that country and this was due to some rotten and heinous act took place on that land. A thorough search made it confirmed that a Candala took severe and great pain in performing worship and in self-torment. On the banks of the Ganges the candela hanged himself with something with head downward. As soon as the king found him, he bent his bow and shot him to death. Quite ironically the king uttered , “ I kill thee on account of a good action which thou art not allowed to do.” Miracle happened when the Brahman returned home, he found that his son was alive
Beside the Candala all other men who were not Hindu were called Mleccha who were unclean, who killed men and slaughter animals and ate the flesh of cows. The Candal and the Mleccha were humiliated and persecuted and were the helpless victims of social and economic discrimination. It would not be unfair if it is commented that to the eyes of intelligence all thing are equal, to ignorance they appear as separated and different. A vivid picture of social and cultural life in India in Alberuni’s time is reproduced here as the historical documents.
