Abstract
This article examines a recurring pattern in South Asian social and political life: the use of ideological and institutional power by Brahmanical elites to suppress dissent and preserve hierarchical privilege. Beginning with the Peshwa period in western India—when a Brahmin administrative and ritual elite consolidated local power—the article traces continuities through nineteenth-century reform critiques (Jyotirao Phule), twentieth-century anti-caste agitation (B.R. Ambedkar), modern left-wing critique (Govind Pansare), and finally to the ideological corpus and political practices of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and associated organisations. Using historical records, reformist texts, and reporting on contemporary incidents, the article argues that hostility toward soldiers, farmers, and the poor when they demand accountability or rights is not random but rooted in historical social structures that valorise hierarchy and obedience.
Table of Contents
Introduction: Why this question matters
When army personnel, farmers, or impoverished citizens publicly question policies or seek redress, the reactions they receive — from organized party cadres, vigilante groups, or even local police — sometimes include intimidation, violence, or legal harassment. These incidents raise basic questions: Are such reactions political expediency alone, or do they reflect deeper social and ideological currents? Is there historical continuity between earlier Brahminical consolidation of power (for example, under the Peshwas) and modern Brahmin-dominated organisations and parties? To answer, we must situate contemporary events within deeper historical and ideological roots.
1. The Peshwa polity: Brahmin rule and social order
1.1 The Peshwa as power centre
From the early 18th century until the Third Anglo-Maratha War (1817–19), the Peshwas—initially ministers, later de facto hereditary chief executives—exercised power across significant parts of western India. By the late 18th century the Peshwa’s court at Pune was the administrative heart of a Maratha confederacy; many key offices (administrative, fiscal, ritual) were held by Brahmin families, including Chitpavans and other Brahmin sub-groups. Colonial and post-colonial histories record frequent factional violence, summary punishments, and practices that consolidated elite authority against rivals and subordinate groups. Examples of brutality and public punishments—executions, displays of criminal bodies, and harsh reprisals against rebels—are recorded in contemporary chronicles and later histories of the Marathas and Peshwas. Wikipedia+1
1.2 Social consequences: denial of rights and ritual exclusion
Within Peshwa-administered territories, caste hierarchies were often enforced through ritual exclusion, labour obligations, and legal restrictions. Lower-caste and untouchable communities were frequently restricted from temple entry, education, and land rights; they performed compulsory services and labours which reinforced social immobility. Historians and modern scholars show that Peshwa-era institutions played a part in embedding local social hierarchies that were then reproduced in different guises under colonial and post-colonial rule. Wikipedia+1
2. Nineteenth-century reformers: Phule’s attack on caste hierarchy
2.1 Jyotirao Phule and Gulamgiri
Jyotirao (Jotiba) Phule (1827–1890) was one of the earliest and most radical anti-caste thinkers in western India. His book Gulamgiri (1873) framed caste as a form of internal slavery—arguing that the Brahminical order functioned to preserve privilege by denying education, land rights and dignity to lower-caste people and Dalits. Phule explained caste oppression as an organised, systemic deprivation enforced by ideology, ritual and law; he promoted education for the oppressed and questioned the moral claims of Brahminical texts and priestly authority. His critiques are sometimes phrased in the rhetorical idiom of “exposing” Brahminical fraud and ideology. ResearchGate+1
2.2 Phule’s legacy for later anti-caste politics
Phule’s clear linkage of ritual ideology to material domination shaped later movements: his emphasis on education, rational critique, and community organisation prefigured Ambedkarite politics and the social-activist traditions in Maharashtra that contested both caste violence and cultural hegemony.
3. Ambedkar: the juridical and ideological critique of Manusmriti and “Brahminism”
3.1 Ambedkar’s method and the critique of Brahminical literature
Dr. B. R. Ambedkar’s intervention into the debate over caste and law is foundational. From his early essays to Annihilation of Caste and his critique of the Manusmṛti, Ambedkar argued that many ancient legal and religious texts had been used to naturalise social inequality and to block rational inquiry. He showed how textual sanctity (the claim that certain social orders are divinely sanctioned) became a tool to withhold rights, including education, property and political voice, from whole social categories. Ambedkar famously concluded that texts like the Manusmṛti had to be publicly interrogated and their claims exposed. Brandeis Library Journals+1
3.2 Ambedkar on law, dissent and modern citizenship
Ambedkar’s politics emphasised the Constitution and equal citizenship as counter-instruments to textual and ritual domination. Where ritual hierarchies demanded silence and obedience, the Constitution sought to guarantee speech, assembly and welfare. Ambedkar’s critique also framed the problem in terms of power: when elites retain moral authority to define who is “civilised” or “impure,” democratic accountability is easily undermined.
4. Govind Pansare and the left critique of Hindutva and historical myths
4.1 Pansare’s writing on history and ideological mobilisation
Govind Pansare (1933–2015), a Marxist intellectual and activist from Maharashtra, wrote against what he called the “saffronisation” of history—efforts by Sangh Parivar-affiliated groups to recast historical figures and events in an exclusionary nationalist frame. Pansare’s accessible biographies and polemical essays sought to de-mythify popular historical narratives and point out how historical memory could be instrumentalised to justify modern exclusionary politics. He linked such cultural campaigns to political mobilisation that marginalised dissenters, reformers, minorities and progressive activists. Internet Archive+1
4.2 Political consequences and the climate for dissent
Pansare’s assassination in 2015, and parallel attacks on other rationalist and anti-superstition activists (e.g., Narendra Dabholkar, M. M. Kalburgi), underscored the shrinking space for certain kinds of dissent and the risks faced by those challenging dominant narratives. Pansare’s writings and his fate are commonly cited by scholars and activists as emblematic of intensified cultural-political policing in recent decades. Wikipedia+1
5. RSS, Hindutva ideology and continuity with older Brahminical logics
5.1 Foundational ideas: Savarkar, Hedgewar, Golwalkar
The Hindutva ideological corpus—codified in works like Vinayak Damodar Savarkar’s Hindutva: Who is a Hindu? and the organisational practices of the RSS since its foundation in 1925—emphasises cultural homogeneity, a majoritarian conception of nationhood and a return to mythicised civilisational glories. Early Sangh leaders were influenced by conservative and sometimes explicitly hierarchical readings of Hindu social order. Critics have pointed out that some RSS leaders and early texts privileged Brahmanical social institutions and ritual hierarchies as stabilising and authenticating features of national identity. The Hindu Centre+1
5.2 Golwalkar and the preference for social order
M. S. Golwalkar’s Bunch of Thoughts and related writings are often read as advocating a hierarchical social order in which cultural conformity and duty are emphasised over pluralist constitutional values. Critics have argued that Golwalkar’s prescriptions, when translated into political mobilisation, can delegitimise dissent and make it easier to treat those who question majoritarian narratives as “anti-national.” Historians and journalists have traced ideological affinities between early Sangh thinking and conservatively hierarchical social traditions. The Hindu Centre+1
6. Patterns of repression: policing dissent in modern India
6.1 Political mobilisation and the branding of dissent as anti-national
Contemporary incidents—where soldiers, farmers, students, or activists who question policy or ask for accountability face vilification—fit a pattern where the political ecosystem (party cadres, social media armies, sympathetic elements within the administration) labels dissent as disloyal or destabilising. This political branding facilitates social sanction, makes legal or extrajudicial action more likely, and reduces public sympathy for aggrieved groups. Reporting by domestic and international outlets documents multiple episodes where protesters (including farmers during the 2020–21 protests, critics of policy such as OROP or Agnipath) faced policing and social hostility. Financial Times+1
6.2 When the military questions policy
Serving or retired army personnel who publicly question pay, pension, recruitment schemes or other policy measures confront a distinct political problem: any critique framed in nationalist language or highlighting institutional mismanagement can be co-opted by both political actors and media narratives. When such critique embarrasses ruling elites, loyalist networks may respond by delegitimising the critic—sometimes violently. This phenomenon is not unique to India but takes specific forms in a polity where cultural majoritarianism and an emphasis on symbolic patriotism have grown. Contemporary news accounts show episodes where ex-servicemen were shouted down, detained, or physically confronted while raising valid administrative or welfare questions; these incidents are often widely reported on social and mainstream media. Financial Times
7. Linking the threads: ideological continuity and institutional practice
7.1 How ideas become practices
There is a chain from ideology (texts and ritual prescriptions that valorise hierarchy), to institutional practice (administrative and social structures that normalise subordinate roles), to political mobilisation (organised groups defending a hierarchy), to the policing of dissent (state or para-state actors enforcing conformity). The Peshwa-era institutionalisation of caste status, the colonial legacies that froze and codified those statuses, and the modern ideological project of Hindutva together create an environment in which challenges to authority by marginalised groups are framed as threats rather than legitimate claims. This is not to say every BJP or RSS member personally endorses caste-based domination—but the organisational logics and rhetorical frames make suppression of dissent more likely. Wikipedia+2Brandeis Library Journals+2
7.2 Cultural sanctification of obedience
Texts like the Manusmṛti (and the way they have been interpreted in later centuries) often valorised social order and devalued questioning. Reformists and modern constitutionalists (from Phule to Ambedkar) saw this as strategically important for the preservation of elite interests; they therefore insisted on the necessity of rational critique and public law to secure equality. When modern political movements (or their cultural prisoners) gesture back toward a social imaginary that prizes obedience, those who question the new order—be they farmers demanding fair terms, soldiers asking for just pensions, or poor people asserting rights—are vulnerable to delegitimation. Brandeis Library Journals+1
8. Select case-studies and illustrative incidents
Note: the following are indicative illustrations drawn from reportage and scholarship; they are not exhaustive legal case-studies but show the kinds of incidents that support the larger pattern.
8.1 Farmers and the 2020–2021 protests
The three farm laws introduced in 2020 triggered mass mobilisation. Protesting farmers, many from marginalized agrarian backgrounds, reported vilification in media and by political actors; some media frames presented them as “anti-reform” or “politically motivated,” which complicated public sympathy and made suppression easier. The policing and lawfare employed against protestors, and the branding of farmer leaders, offer an example where organised majoritarian rhetoric coalesced with state action to suppress sustained dissent. (Scholarly and journalistic coverage of the protests documents the heavy policing, the role of social media narratives, and the ways in which counter-narratives were organised.) IDEA Publishers
8.2 Ex-servicemen and pension/recruitment protests
There have been multiple reports over the years of ex-servicemen and serving personnel expressing frustration about pay, pensions, and recruitment terms (e.g., OROP debates; more recently, reactions to Agnipath). When these grievances were aired publicly they sometimes received hostile pushback from political loyalists and online mobs. The reactive pattern — delegitimise the speaker, not address the claim — is a classic strategy to neutralise politically inconvenient demands. Financial Times
8.3 Attacks on rationalist activists
The assassinations and attacks on Dawkhkar, Kalburgi and Pansare are stark examples of violence against cultural dissent. These murders followed robust public campaigns against superstition and sectarian myth-making, and they triggered debates about the role of vigilante violence and the political environment that makes such attacks possible. Pansare’s long-standing criticism of saffronising tendencies placed him in direct conflict with hard-line ideological networks. Wikipedia+1
9. Counter-arguments and caveats
The argument in this article is structural and probabilistic, not deterministic. Important caveats:
- Not all Brahmins are ideologues — Brahmin identity does not automatically imply RSS or BJP membership; many Brahmins are active in progressive politics, social reform or secularist movements. Historical patterns describe social tendencies and institutional equilibria, not universal individual behaviour.
- Political expediency matters — Violence and suppression are often politically instrumental, not purely ideologically derived. Parties and groups may suppress dissent to maintain power regardless of deeper ideological consonance.
- Complex causes — Local incidents have multiple causes: police culture, local political rivalries, economic incentives, and criminality can all combine with ideological frames to produce repression.
- Change over time — Organisations evolve; the RSS and BJP of the 1920s–40s differ in many ways from their contemporary forms. That said, intellectual continuities and organisational networks matter for how political action is shaped. Scholarship and reporting show both change and significant continuities. Financial Times+1
10. Policy and civic responses: towards reducing the habit of suppression
If the pattern described above is to be interrupted, several interlocking steps are required:
- Education & critical literacy: Strengthen critical reading of historical sources and expand public education focused on constitutional values, civic rights and critical thinking (echoing Phule and Ambedkar’s priorities).
- Independent policing and accountability: Create transparent mechanisms to ensure local law enforcement cannot be weaponised for partisan suppression; strengthen independent complaint and oversight bodies.
- Protection for dissent: Legal and administrative protections for peaceful protest and whistleblowers, especially soldiers, ex-servicemen and marginalised groups who raise legitimate issues.
- Countering disinformation: Invest in public information campaigns and independent media literacy to reduce the power of “branding” dissent as disloyal.
- Social dialogue & land/livelihood reforms: Address underlying grievances—agrarian distress, irregular employment, pension shortfalls—so that political mobilisation is less likely to be framed as “anti-national” rather than as claims for rights.
These measures resonate with the reformist agendas of Phule and Ambedkar, who insisted on education and constitutional law as bulwarks against domination.
Conclusion: structure, agency and the political present
The violence or harassment directed at army personnel, farmers, and the poor when they question authority is a symptom of structural continuities in Indian social and political life. That pattern is traceable to Peshwa-era institutional arrangements that valorised ritual status and obedience; it was critiqued by reformers like Jyotirao Phule and B.R. Ambedkar; and today it is both ideologically and instrumentally visible in segments of Hindutva politics and its mobilisation strategies. Exposing those continuities—examining texts, archival records, and contemporary practice—helps turn an anecdotal sense of “hostility” into a documented pattern amenable to democratic reform.
References
I list here the main online sources used in this article. For academic publication you should consult original editions, archival materials (e.g., Mountstuart Elphinstone, James Grant Duff) and printed scholarly monographs in addition to the web material.
- Ambedkar scholarship and critiques of Manusmṛti (essays and academic articles). See scholarship that collects Ambedkar’s reading of Brahminical texts and his constitutional critique. Brandeis Library Journals+1
- Phule, Jotirao — Gulamgiri and interpretative essays on Phule’s critique. (See research summaries and PDFs discussing Gulamgiri and its critique of caste.) ResearchGate+1
- Govind Pansare — “Who Was Shivaji?” (English translation) and Pansare’s essays on saffronisation and cultural politics; background on Pansare’s activism and assassination. Internet Archive+1
- M. S. Golwalkar — Bunch of Thoughts (PDF/archival version) and discussion of Golwalkar’s perspective on social order. The Hindu Centre
- Recent reporting and analysis of the RSS and its political influence (Financial Times overview; various analyses of Hindutva’s political ascent). Financial Times+1
- Colonial and early modern histories of the Marathas and Peshwas (Grant Duff, Elphinstone and modern histories documenting Peshwa-era practices, including recorded episodes of repression). See histories and entries on Peshwa-era events like executions and political reprisals.
