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Updated: June 19, 2025
Many of the Panchamas, especially in Southern India, are little better than bonded serfs; others are condemned to this form of ostracism by the trades they ply.
Thus probably half the Sudras of the present day were at some more or less remote period Panchamas. Again, during periods of great civil commotion, as in the 18th century, when brute force was supreme, not a few Panchamas, especially low-caste Mahrattas, made their way to the front as soldiers of fortune, and even carved out kingdoms to themselves at the point of the sword.
In every circumstance of his life the vileness of his lot is brought home to the wretched pariah by an elaborate and relentless system of social oppression. I will only quote one or two instances which have come within my own observation. The respective distances beyond which Panchamas must not approach a Brahman lest they "pollute" him differ according to their degree of uncleanness.
It is easy enough for the Panchama friends to see that non-co-operation against this evil government presupposes co-operation between the different sections forming the Indian nation. The Hindus must realise that if they wish to offer successful non-co-operation against the Government, they must make common cause with the Panchamas, even as they have made common cause with the Mussalmans.
The Bishop of Madras claims that within the last 40 years, in the Telugu country alone, some 250,000 Panchamas have become Christians, and in Travancore another 100,000.
Low as is their social status, it is but little lower than that of the Panchamas who have obtained a footing on the nethermost rung of the social ladder of Hinduism without being admitted to any sort of contact with its higher civilization or even to the threshold of its temples.
And so far as I can see, there is no leader among the Panchamas who can lead them to victory through non-co-operation. The better way, therefore, perhaps, is for the Panchamas heartily to join the great national movement that is now going on for throwing off the slavery of the present Government.
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