WHY LAWLESSNESS IS LAWFUL? 63
a much fuller sense because all his relationships are settled by himself for himself. The touchables or untouchables are in no sense individuals because all or nearly all of his relationship are fixed when he is born in a certain group. His occupation, his dwelling, his gods and his politics are all determined for him by the group to which he belongs. When the touchables and untouchables meet they meet not as man to man, individual to individual but as members of groups or as nationals of two different States.
This fact has an important effect upon the mutual relationship between the touchables and untouchables in a village. The relationship resembles the relationship between different clans in primitive society. In primitive society the member of the clan has a claim, but the stranger has no standing. He may be treated kindly, as a guest, but he cannot demand “justice” at the hands of any clan but his own. The dealing of clan with clan is a matter of war or negotiation, not of law; and the clanless man is an ‘outlaw’, in fact as well as in name and lawlessness against the strangers is therefore lawful. The untouchable not being a member of the group of touchables is a stranger. He is not a kindred. He is an outlaw. He cannot claim justice. He cannot claim rights which the touchable is bound to respect.
The third thing to note is that the relationship between the two, the touchables and the untouchables, has been fixed. It has become a matter of status. This status has unmistakably given the untouchables a position of inferiority vis-a-vis the touchables. This inferiority is embodied in a Code of Social conduct to which the untouchables must conform. What kind of a code it is, has already been stated. The untouchable is not willing to conform to that Code. He is not prepared to render unto Ceasar what belongs to Ceasar. The untouchable wants to have his relationship with the touchables by contract. The touchable wants the untouchables to live in accordance with the rules of status and not rise above it. Thus the two halves of the village, the touchables and the untouchables are now struggling for resettling what the touchable thinks is settled for ever. The conflict is centered round one question—What is to be the basis of this relationship? Shall it be contract or shall it be status?
This raises some very interesting questions. How did the untouchables come to have the status of the lowliest and the low? Why has the Hindu cultivated this hostility and contempt for the untouchables? Why does the Hindu indulge in lawlessness in suppressing the untouchables as though such lawlessness is lawful?
To give an adequate answer to these questions one has to go to the law of the Hindus. Without a working knowledge of the rules of the