The Time of Kali: Violence between Religious Groups in India

Social Research, Fall, 2000 by Sudhir Kakar

At an emotionally more neutral level, Hindus and Muslims also share a common disapproval of acts that hurt the religious sentiments of the other community. Archetypal incidents that precipitate a riot draw condemnation even at times when communal identities are rampant; acts such as throwing the carcass of a pig in a mosque or that of a cow in a Hindu temple. There is an unarticulated expectation that such an incident should belong to the beginning of an account of a Hindu-Muslim riot even if it did not actually take place. This disapproval is often couched in terms of empathy: "Their religious feelings are the same as ours and we would not like it if it were done to us." The existence of this empathy, even in the time of Kali, prevents a complete dehumanization of the "enemy", from a Hindu or Muslim considering the other as subhuman.

The Killers Among Us

Most people, of course, do not take part in the actual violence during a riot. This is generally the province of certain young men (and older veterans) of the community although everyone--man, woman, child--will pitch in when their house or neighborhood is being attacked by a mob. Almost everyone, though, is an accessory --if not an accomplice--to the murders, arson and looting committed by their own community's "soldiers." For in the poor neighborhoods where they live, there are not too many who would agree with the characterization of the killers as goondas (i.e., thugs) by the police and upper middle class sentiment. Loosely organized in gangs, many of their leaders, who are trained wrestlers (pehlwan), earn the bulk of their income from involvement in the distillation and selling of illegal liquor and from what they delicately describe as "land business."

Baldly stated, "land business" is an outcome of India's hopelessly clogged legal system. Landlord-tenant disputes, as well as other disputes about land and property, can take well over a decade to be sorted out if a redress of grievance is sought through the courts. Therefore, the pehlwan is approached by one of the parties of the dispute to evict or otherwise intimidate the opposing party. The dispute being thus "settled", the pehlwan receives a considerable fee for his services. In case of well-known pehlwans with a large supply of young toughs as their all-purpose assistants, land business can be very profitable. Many do not need to use strong-arm methods any longer. The mere fact that a well-known pehlwan has been engaged by one of the parties is enough for the opponent to back down and reach a settlement to the dispute. In some cases, if the second party also employs a pehlwan to protect its interests, the two pehlwans generally get together and reach a mutually satisfactory solution which, because of the fear they arouse, they can impose on their clients. Violence occurs only when a pehlwan tries to muscle into someone else's territory.

Before the independence of the country in 1947, the wrestlers, Hindu or Muslim, were traditionally patronized by Indian princes who had court wrestlers, just as they had court painters or musicians. Although some politicians tried to replace the princes as patrons of wrestling gymnasiums after independence, using them for strong-arm methods to achieve political ends, in general the wrestler had lost the elevated view of his calling. It is in the polarization of Hindus and Muslims and in the context of religious revivalism that the wrestler is again finding a role as an icon of the community's physical power and martial prowess. Although he is still often used by the politician, the wrestler can again hold a moral high ground and be proud of his new role as "protector of the Muslim (or Hindu) nation."