Periyar on Economics

by Mukilan Murugasan
(Malaysian Dravidian Association)

Good morning ladies and gentleman. I have been asked to give a presentation on Periyar on Economics. Our society at one time was an advanced society. We have made great contributions to the world we live in. We gave the world Thirukkural. It covers all aspects of a human life and teaches how one should lead his life. Then we have King Chola who established empires. He travelled up to Kedah. We have our traders who travelled to countries as far as Rome. We built huge temples. We have great literatures. We have great poets. We lived in peace and harmony. Our language is one of the oldest languages in the world and therefore we are one of the oldest civilizations.

But what happened to all this achievements today? The British brought us in as coolies. We cleared the jungle. We constructed the roads. We planted the rubber trees. We died by snakebites, mosquito bites and diseases. But are deprived of opportunities. Madam Muthammal Palanisamy in her autobiography titled “Shore to Shore” described they manner the British treated Indians. During the colonial period an Indian who interacts with the British were not allowed to wear hats or shoes. They are required to remove their hat and shoes and stand barefooted before the British officer as a sign of respect. Dr. Shanthi Thambiah, a Social Anthropologist with University Malaya in her article titled “Toil of the migrant women” said that during the height of indentured Indian labor migration, abuses relating to young women were rampant. Similarly, Indian women and children living in rubber estates contributed to the household economy and to the plantation economy. Indian women’s share of the labor force in plantation increased from 20 percent to 25 percent in the late 19th century to 43 percent in 1947. Outside the plantation economy, Indian women worked as domestic servants and laborers. We are the highest number of drinkers. We are the number ones where crime is concerned. We share only 1.5% of the economic cake. We rate the highest in suicide.

I am sure you are quite familiar with the following names. Dravidar Kazhagam, Malaysia Dravidar Kazhagam, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, Anna Dravida Munetra Kazhagam, Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam. All these associations carry the word Dravidar. And they also have Periyar as their mentor or leader. So, what is Dravidar and who is Periyar? Why did struggled so hard for our community. For that we have to take a look at the past.

The Aryans entered India from outside around 1900 – 1750 BC. Their central source was the Rigveda. The rigveda portrays them as warrior tribes who glorified military skill and heroism, loved to drink, hunt, race, and dance; and counted their wealth in cattle. They looked down on the short, dark-skinned indigenous people. Those the Aryans fought lived in fortified towns and put up a strong defense against them. The key to the Aryans success probably lay in their superior military technology; they had fast two wheeled chariots, horses and spears. The epics present the struggle in religious terms; their chiefs as heroes, their opponents as irreligious savages who did not perform the proper sacrifices. As the head of the tribe was a chief, or raja who led his followers in battle and ruled them in peacetime. The warriors in the tribe elected their chief for his military skills. Next in importance to the chief was the priest, entrusted with sacrifices to the gods and the knowledge of sacred rituals. In time as Aryan society put increasing emphasis on proper performance of the religious rituals, priests evolved into a distinct class. The warrior nobility met at assemblies to reach decisions and advise the king. The common tribesman tended herds and in time worked the land. The conquered non-Aryans fell the drudgery of menial tasks. However, the people who spoke Dravidian languages maintain their control. In the Ramayana and Mahabharata, the people of the south and Sri Lanka are spoken as dark-skinned savages and demons who resisted the Aryans. R.C. Majmudar goes on to identify, the indigenous resistance as coming from the Dravidians, the assumption being that the indigenous people spoke a Dravidian, as opposed to a Sanskritic, language.
“It was not merely a struggle between two nationalities. The Dravidians had to fight for their very existence but all in vain. The Dravidians put up a brave fight, and laid down their lives in hundreds and thousands on various battlefields, but ultimately had to succumb to the attacks of the invaders. The Aryans destroyed their castles and cities, burnt their houses, and reduced a large number of them to slaves.”

The Manu Dharma is the law book of the Hindus. It stipulates morality, law and custom of the Hindu society. However, Dr. N. Kanthasamy, a strong advocate of the Vedas, Upanishads, and Ithihaasas is somewhat critical of the Manu Dharma. His article in Tamil Oli published in 1996 by the University Malaya Tamil Language Society says that the texts in the Manu Dharma clearly exhibit the hierarchy of caste distinction. Dr. N. Kanthasamy further adds on that the Manu Dharma narrates an account of the four-fold caste system. From the mouth of Brahma originated the Brahmins. From his own arm came the Kysatriyas. The Vaishyas and the Sudras came from his thigh and foot, respectively. This sort of legendary birth of the four-fold caste may seem ridiculous at the surface level but it is only symbolic. Mouth indicates speech. So, the Brahmins who came out from the Brahma’s mouth were famous for their learning and scholarship. Arm indicates strength and hence the warrior caste became meaningful. The last two organs denote movement and industry, which are essential for the merchant community and the working class, respectively. However, the dominance of the Brahmins existed uniformally through ages. It should be noted that the first three castes had some rare privilege while the last class was always under privileged and suppressed. Most of the specialists who had studied the institution of the four-fold caste with the social background concluded that the system was cleverly and cunningly postulated by the upper class Brahmins.

Dr. N. Kanthasamy, further notes that the Aryans after establishing themselves in India introduced the caste system to subdue the people of the lower ranks. Manu, the lawgiver had modified the rules, morals and the customary laws to regulate the four-fold social system. The ethical course assigned to each of the castes differs considerably. If a Brahmin committed a crime, the punishment imposed will be very mild. If a Sudra committed a similar crime, the punishment would be very severe. Thus the punishment varied from caste to caste for the wrong doers. The type of ethics was promulgated during the period when the rules were under the control of the Brahmins and priests.

On the punishment for low caste people, the Manu says the following:
Apastambha Dharma Sutra III, 10-26, says:
The tongue of a Sudra, who spoke evil about a Brahmin, should be cut off. A Sudra who dared to assume a position of equality with the first three castes was to be flogged. If a Sudra overheard a recitation of the Vedas, molten tin was to be poured into his ears; if he repeated the Vedas his tongue should be cut and if he remembered Vedic hymns, his body be torn into pieces.

The Manu stipulates that the Sudras should not earn money and should not become ministers. They are supposed to eat only the remnants and residues of what has been eaten by higher castes.

Brahmins should not be taxed and should be maintained by the State.

No collection of wealth was to be made by a Shudra, even though he may be capable, for a Shudra who has acquired wealth would pain a Brahmin, and that Brahmins may appropriate by force the property of the Shudra.

Even if a Shudra acquired wealth, he must always remain a slave. His main job is to wash the feet of the higher caste.

Even if a Shudra is learned and virtuous, he should not be given respect and honor.

The First Indian Governor General and Ex-Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu Mr. Rajagopalachari, alias Rajaji, advocated that people should pass down through generations the professions of their father and forefathers in order to reduce unemployment. This suggestion was highly praised by many newspapers owned by Brahmins. The reasoning behind this advocacy was to keep the low castes tied down to their menial jobs while the Brahmins maintained their high positions. Periyar was against this proposal and fought vigorously against the implementation of the policy. This caused Rajaji his Chief Ministership and eventually the policy was withdrawn.

India till today is economically backward due to the Brahmins not allowing others to progress. They hold high offices in government; control the news media, educational system and so on. This prevents others from rising up, and breaks free of the caste system bondage. Periyar says with all the facilities at their disposal they produce brilliant scientists, doctors etc. Assuredly even the low caste Hindus could do this if they were provided with the same facilities.

Periyar’s philosophy is that, different sections of a society should have equal rights to enjoy the fruits of the resources and the development of the country. They should all be represented, in proportion to their numerical strength, in the governance and the administration of the state. Periyar’s unique contribution was his insistence on rational outlook to bring about intellectual emancipation and a healthy world-view. He also stressed the need to abolish the hierarchical, graded, birth-based caste structure as a prelude to build a new egalitarian social order. In other words, he wanted to lay a sound socio-cultural base, before raising a strong structure of free polity and prosperous economy.

Periyar opined the huge amount of money spent on temple worship, pilgrimages, and festivals if channeled for the improvement of scientific knowledge, education, and industrial development will prevent the migration of Indian laborers to foreign countries. It will also halt the Brahmins who make up only 3 percent of the total population to dominate the rest of the population.

Periyar points out that, weddings in the Tamil society are wasteful and causes tremendous amount of difficulty for the families of the bride and bridegroom. It also involves a lot of wastage for everyone. However, the people involved often disregard the difficulties and wastage resulting from the wedding. They are of the opinion that, it is an obligation to spend large amount of money for a wedding. They do not mind going through the hardship and difficulties arising due to the wasteful expenses. The wastage and difficulties is not confined to the families celebrating the wedding but it also extends to the relatives, friends and neighbors. Almost all families that celebrate the wedding borrow recklessly and spend lavishly to satisfy those who attend the wedding. They also do this fearing that others may speak low of them.

Those wasteful expenses cause many families to crush and they remain in debt for a long period of time. Napoleon Hill, the author of The Law of Success also shares a similar view. He says that there are many young couples these days start their family with unnecessary debts hanging over their heads and never manage to get out of from under the load. After the novelty of marriage begins to wear off the married couple begin to feel the embarrassment of want, and this feeling grows until it leads, oftentimes, to open dissatisfaction with one another, and eventually to the divorce court.

According to Periyar, a wedding indicates a decision by a man and a woman to live together as a husband and wife. It should not mean anything more than that. Therefore, making elaborate preparations, spending lavishly on decoration, jewellery, transport, clothes, food, wedding halls and other meaningless religious rites are unnecessary.

Most people cite religious rites are intended o be cited as evidence in case of legal difficulties that may arise later. However, a marriage that is conducted in the Marriage Registrars office costs nothing and it is legal and binding. Therefore, religious rites, which involve wastage of time, money and energy, must be avoided.

The money that is spend on feast, buying and distributing clothes to relatives, making jewelleries, and other wasteful expenses could be deposited in the bank and earn an interest out of it. The accrued amount could be used for the well being of their children. The enormous amount of money spent on nuptials and the ceremonies related to childbirth should be channeled towards proper upbringing of the couple’s children.

Periyar says that despite all these, women find pleasure in slavish marriages. This is due to their parents bringing them up without any education, independence and self-respect.
Periyar suggests that every wedding should be conducted with minimum expenses. Pomposities and unnecessary expenses should be avoided altogether. Grand feasts, buying clothes for all the relatives and performing religious rites during weddings are all wasteful. Instead a marriage can be conducted in a Marriage Registrars office in the presence of two witnesses. This type of weddings will only involve minimum charges.

On speaking about expenses, Periyar concludes that an increase in income is not important for an individual or a family. One should instead learn to minimize expenses and learn to save. Whatever may be the financial status of the family, the expenses should be within their limits. It is very unprincipled on the part of a women of ordinary means desire to dress like a rich woman. One should learn to spend according to his income. Expenses should be carefully planned and somehow, saving should be effected. Lavish expenditure spoil’s one’s character. A person who earns RM2000 month who tries to live as person who earns RM5000 a month will have a debt of RM3000. Every member of his family will have the same spending habit as they acquire this habit from their parents. The children when they think of going to the college, it becomes impossible due to their parents debts. This makes the entire family unhappy and miserable.

One day Periyar was having dinner in one of the officials house. After dinner a young man was pouring water while Periyar washed his hands. The young man kept on pouring water even after Periyar asked him to stop. Periyar stopped him and asked whether will he do the same if it is ghee. There will come a time when everyone will have to pay for drinking water.

Periyar once summoned Anna to send a telegram to someone. The telegram is supposed to read as already told. Periyar immediately said why two letters. We will have to pay for that. Why can’t we use tolded instead. Anna hesitated. Anna being a MA graduated felt awkward to use such word fearing that others will make fun of him. Periyar asked, “why Annadurai, why are you hesitating?” Anna replied that there is no such word as tolded in English. So, Periyar asked what is the meaning of told. Anna replied it means informed. Periyar replied if that is the case tolded means already informed. That’s all.

From this two illustration some of us may think that Periyar is a miser. We must first understand the difference between a miser and prudent spender. A miser is a person who will not lose a single cent. He will not hesitate to live at other peoples expense. A prudent spender on the other hand is someone who spends his money carefully that is by avoiding unnecessary expenditures.

Practically all people who live beyond their means are tempted to speculate with the hope that they may recoup, at a single turn of wheel of fortune. The wheel generally stops at the wrong side and, far from finding themselves out of debt; such people as indulge in speculation are bound more closely as slaves of debt.

In order to become rich one has to make sacrifices. Someone made the sacrifice of spending less and invested the difference in something that went up in value and made him rich. Some people, somewhere, sometime, got rich without making any kind of sacrifice, but I have never run across them.

The sacrifice may have been made by the rich man or woman, or by his or her father, grandfather, or great-grandfather, or uncle, or friend, or someone else. If an oil well pops up on the farm, the sacrifice isn’t great, but then again, someone had to save up the money to buy the farm in the first place.

Most great fortunes I know about were started by someone who worked long hours, scrimped and saved and made unbelievable sacrifices to get the fortune started. There are only three ways someone can get rich. One is to inherit it. You don’t have to do anything about it as your ancestry is completely beyond your control. Someone else has made all the sacrifices of spending less than they earned to create this wealth for you.

The next one is to marry it. This is something that one can work on. This can be quite a project and I have seen both men and women work this approach to wealth quite effectively. I don’t see anything wrong with it. I see most people believe that the good lord made someone especially for you.

For one to get rich he must first of all understand the difference between asset and liability and buy assets. That’s alone one has to know. This may sound simple but a lot of people have no idea how profound this rule is. Rich people acquire assets. The poor and middle class acquire liabilities, but they think they are assets. We must not see the words but what the numbers are telling us. When we read a book we must not see what the words are telling us, but what the story is telling us. We book a house worth RM100, 000. We pay a 12 percent down payment of RM20, 000 apply for a loan of RM80, 000. We pay a monthly installment of RM500 for the next 30 years. Which means we are going to work till retirement to pay for this liability? Now did we acquire an asset or liability? If we pay a monthly installment of RM500 for the next 30 years we would have ended up paying RM180, 000 for a loan of RM80, 000. That is we have made the bank richer by RM100, 000 and we become poorer by RM100, 000.

An asset is something that puts money into your pocket. A liability is something that takes out money from your pocket. So if you want to be rich simply buy assets. If you want to be poor simply buy liabilities. In most families they work hard in an effort to go get ahead. Not because they don’t make money. But because they spent their lives buying liabilities that they think assets.

A poor person works hard and spends his income in paying rent, transport, food and clothing. His income is just enough to pay for all this. Should anything extraordinary happen he has to borrow. In the subsequent months he will be paying for an additional expense that is the interest on the money borrowed.

A middle-income person also works hard to earn money. But he spends his income differently. For example, a recently married couple, highly educated young couple moves in together, in one of their cramped rented apartments. Immediately, they realize that they are saving money because two can live as cheaply as one.

But the problem is their cramped apartment. They decide to save money to buy their dream home so they can have kids. They now have two incomes, and they begin to focus on their careers. Their incomes begin to increase. As their income rises, their taxes also go up. Then they decide to go out and buy a house of their dreams. Now they have a new tax, called property tax, assessment rate, and etc. Then, they buy a new car, new furniture and new appliances to match the new house. All of a sudden, they wake-up and realize that they are full of mortgages and credit-card liabilities. Then a child comes along. Then they work harder. More money means more taxes. A credit card comes along. They take it. After a few months it maxes up. They see an advertisement by a bank in the papers saying that they offer low interest rates for refinancing houses. They refinance the house and settle the credit card loans. They breathe a sigh of relief. Their credit cards have been paid off. They have actually folded their credit card loan into their housing loan and pay for it for the next 30 years.

Then one day their friend invites them for a Mega Sale. A chance to save money. They say to themselves, “I won’t buy anything. I’ll just go look. But I’ll take my credit card along, just in case if I find something.”

We have seen this kind of people. They do not know what the trouble is if they do not know how to spend the money they have.

In the case of rich people, the assets that they acquire produce more income than expenses. As a result the rich get richer and richer.

In addition, married couples should not live for themselves. They should learn to share their wealth with those who are in need. One should bear the little inconvenience when helping someone. Periyar adds on that a person who is only concerned in accumulating wealth will have his entire life spent on seeking wealth. The children were often neglected and they turn out to be a menace for the society such as the bohsia’s in the KL city. Parents have themselves to blame for this. But they take the pleasure in blaming the foreign culture, Internet and so on. By adopting this principle in all affairs of life, Periyar says one will be doing some service to the society.

Periyar further adds that there is no necessity to bear children. Men will not lose anything if he does not have children. The desire that one’s property should go down to one’s own blood provides the basis for the wish to have children. In Russia, Periyar says since individuals do not have the right to own property; the government itself takes interest in the children. Individuals should bear children only if he can provide the child everything it needs. Education is to enable one to live with freedom and to lead a good life. Therefore men and women should not be in a hurry to beget children soon after marriage. A married couple should wait at least five years before they think of having a baby. Periyar also lashes out at people who say that children are god-given by questioning them that will the god provide food for all the children that are born.

Periyar further says that one should engage in trade in order to prosper. A trader no matter how small is his business will have more money than a person who works for others. A farmer will remain as a farmer forever, unless he knows how to market his products. He will be rich only if he finds treasure while working his land.

In the same time for a petty trader to grow rich he must have the intelligence, self-confidence and above all honesty. He must be also caring and earn the respect of his community. He has to be generous and do some community service.

Once Tamil Periyar Thiru Vi. Ka was running a Tamil daily “Thesa Bakthan”. At that time both Periyar and Thiru Vi. Ka were in Congress. Periyar sent an amount of Rs1000 as donation as financial assistance for Thesa Bakthan. Thiru Vi. Ka immediately published this news in Thesa Bakthan as Periyar Ramasamy contributed Rs1000. Periyar immediately wrote a letter to Thiru Vi. Ka requesting Thiru Vi. Ka to amend the news as Donation of Rs1000 was received through Ramasamy Naiker. The reason for this was the contribution included donations made by others. Periyar could have easily kept mum about the news report. However, his honesty earned him tremendous amount of respect. This made him a great leader. Till today the organization that he set up is still receiving donations. There are over 46 institutions today ranging from hospitals, schools, orphanage and etc under the management of Dravidar Kazhagam.