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Law, Legitimacy, and the Hereditary Rights of Tamil Temple Priests

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Anthony Good
Anthony Good
Affiliation:
University of Edinburgh
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Extract

This paper examines the arguments whereby the Brahman priests of a Hindu temple in the town of Kalugumalai, South India, claim exclusive rights to perform worship in that shrine. For comparison, it also deals briefly with the priests of a much larger temple in the nearby city of Madurai, whose arguments partly contradict those used in Kalugumalai. This discrepancy will be explained by treating both sets of arguments as strategic statements, which legitimize the self-interests of their respective protagonists.

Type
Articles
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 23 , Issue 2 , May 1989 , pp. 233 - 257
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1989

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References

1 Field and archival research in 1983–84 was supported by E.S.R.C. Research Grant number G 00230100. Mr D. Venkadesan helped greatly in the collection of data. Legal documents were examined in the archives of Tirunelveli District Court and the Madras High Court. I thank Mr Narasimhan and Mr K. Venkatesan of the English Records Section at the Madras High Court, for their invaluable help. I am grateful to participants in the Anthropology seminars at Madras, Edinburgh, Durham, and the L.S.E., where earlier versions of this paper were delivered. I particularly thank Chris Fuller for his comments. Final responsibility is, of course, my own.

2 A religious endowment is any form of wealth or property set aside permanently for a religious purpose; Mudaliar, Chandra, The State and Religious Endowments in Madras (Madras: University Press, 1976), p. 5.Google Scholar

3 Sontheimer, G.-D., ‘Religious Endowments in India: The Juristic Personality of Hindu Deities’, Zeitschrift fur Vergleichende Rechtswissenschaft 67 (1964), pp. 45–100;Google ScholarAppadurai, A. and Breckenridge, C. A., ‘The South Indian Temple: Authority, Honour and Redistribution’. Contrib. Ind. Sociol. (n.s.) 10 (1976), pp. 187–211;CrossRefGoogle ScholarAppadurai, A., Worship and Conflict under Colonial Rule: A South Indian Case (Cambridge: University Press, 1981), pp. 20–1.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4 Derrett, J. D. M., Religion, Law and the State in India (London: Faber & Faber, 1968), p. 484.Google Scholar

5 Mudaliar, , State and Religious Endowments, p. 8.Google Scholar

6 Iyer, P. Ramanatha, The Madras Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Act (Act XIX of 1951) (4th edn rev. Iyer, P. R. Narayana) (Madras: Madras Law Journal, 1953), pp. 5–6.Google Scholar

7 Ibid., pp. 15–42.

8 In 1949 the Board tried to impose a Scheme of Management on the temple, including the appointment of an E.O. chosen by it. Following a law-suit (Original Suit no. 22 of 1949 in the District Court, Tirunelveli; Appeal Suit no. 462 of 1951 in the High Court, Madras) an E.O. was appointed, but he was made answerable to the Trustee who, the Appeal Judge commented, ‘could not be reduced to a mere cipher’.

9 Govt. of Madras, Report of the Estates Land Act Committee, 1938. Oral Evidence (Madras: Government Press, 1938), vol. II, p. 238.Google Scholar

10 To be precise, rights are ideally transmitted according to Mitaksara inheritance law. That is, they are divided per stirpes among surviving branches of the partilineage, and per capita among same-generation individuals within each branch. For a simple illustration, see Fuller, C. J., Servants of the Goddess (Cambridge: University Press, 1984), pp. 84–5.Google Scholar

11 These cases were: (i) Original Suit no. 35 of 1943 at the Subordinate Judge's Court, Tuticorin; (ii) Appeal Suit no. 218 of 1945 at Triunelveli District Court; (iii) and (iv) Second Appeals nos 1052 and 2297 of 1946 in Madras High Court.

12 Very late marriage seems to have been usual among these Pattars. For instance, Virapaku was over 60 when his eldest son was born in about 1856, and into his seventies before his youngest son, Ganapati, was born around 1867. Pre-puberty marriage was normal for Brahman girls at that time, so their wives would have been very much younger.

13 Estate Office to Temple Manager, 10–5–1864; Exhibit D-1 in S.A. no. 2297 of 1946 (to which all Exhibit numbers refer).

14 Estate Amildar to temple staff, 26–1–1870; Exhibit D-2.

15 Temple Manager to Maharajah, 26–3–1871; Exhibit D-4.

16 Estate Office to temple staff, 11–11–1873; Exhibit D-5.

17 Muccilikka (Bond) by Pattar, Senpakarama, 25–12–1873; Exhibit D-6.Google Scholar

18 Temple Peishkar to Estate Office, 30–8–1885, and resulting Order from Office, 6–9–1885; Exhibit D-9.

19 Suppiramaniya, and others to Raja, 2–12–1883; Exhibit D-7.Google Scholar

20 Order from Estate Dewan, , 25–8–1900; Exhibit D-17.Google Scholar

21 Order from Estate Dewan, , 26–9–1900; Exhibit D-18.Google Scholar

22 Muccilikka by Sundara, and Vanji, 29–11–1901; Exhibit D-20.Google Scholar

23 Muccilikka by Sanmukasundara, , 29–11–1901; Exhibit D-19.Google Scholar

24 Order from Estate Superintendent, 22–4–1903; Exhibit P-16.

25 Temple Peishkar to Sanmukasundara, , 6–2–1904; Exhibit D-22.Google Scholar

26 The marriage ties between the disputing lineages, here and subsequently, suggest a second dimension to the dispute. It is impossible at this late date to know whether these alliances were unsuccessful attempts to resolve the dispute over the priestly rights, or the cause of disagreements in which the priesthood was merely one issue among many. Marriages between close cross-relatives are much favoured in South India.

27 Estate Dewan, to Temple Peishkar, 25–10–1906; Exhibit D-34.Google Scholar

28 Estate Dewan, to Peishkar, 30–11–1906; Exhibit D-37.Google Scholar

29 Peishkar, to Ganapati Pattar, 5–4–1907; Exhibit D-38.Google Scholar

30 Estate Dewan, to Peishkar, 23–4–1910; Exhibit D-41.Google Scholar

31 Order from Maharajah's Assistant, 3–5–1926; Exhibit P-17. The disputes were among the four branches in this case, not between them and Sanmukasundara. The system whereby any arccakar could come in and do arccanais whenever he chose (which still prevails in Madurai) was therefore stopped. It was decreed that only the duty Pattar could perform private arccanais. Others can now do so only with his express permission, as his assistants.

32 Original Petition no. 13 of 1935 in Tirunelveli District Court; unfortunately the case documents have been destroyed.

33 The draft plaint for O.S. 35 of 1943 pointed out that the last four days of the month are especially lucrative, as they usually contain the last Friday and/or Saturday, which attract many private worshippers. Giving these days to Sanmukasundara therefore showed ‘the special favour shown by the Zamindar to him’. This passage was thoroughly scored out with ink in the typed draft, however. Presumably it was decided not to draw the Judge's attention to it, lest he should restore this particular turn to Ganesa or, at least, conclude that depriving him of it had sufficed to answer the other arccakars’ grievances.

34 Petition, 29–7–1935; note attached thereto, 12–10–1935 Exhibit P-20.

35 Dated 6–2–1939; Exhibit P-21. It is not surprising that this family should have taken the initiative. They are acknowledged as by far the most expert and orthodox of the arccakars. Moreover, they had most to gain by Sanmukasundara's removal from the lucrative final turn.

36 Report dated 6–7–1939; Exhibit P-22. On the notion of mirāsi see footnote 50.

37 Order, 6–7–1940; Exhibit P-24.

38 Order of Estate Superintendent, 16–3–1940; Exhibit P-27.

39 Petition, 21–10–1940; Exhibit D-51.

40 Petition to Dewan, , 27–3–1940; Exhibit P-28.Google Scholar

41 Statement, 19–3–1941; Exhibit D-52.

42 Notice, 9–9–1940; Exhibit D-50.

43 Original Application no. 153 of 1941.

44 Annexure to Order no. 3360-F, 12–8–1941; Exhibit D-53.

45 The question whether the priests enjoyed the inām lands qua arccakars or merely qua Brahmans, formed a second strand to the legal arguments about heredity. Unfortunately there is no space to pursue this issue in the present article.

46 There is rather more support for the Judge's contention in the 1870 document, wherein an estate official notes that the two brothers claimed to have themselves proposed Senpakarama's appointment. Even so, the fact remains that it took an order from the estate (the 1864 document) to bring that arrangement into effect.

47 Hereditary rights to office cannot be claimed once the rights concerned have been enjoyed by other without challenge for an uninterrupted period of twelve years. Varadachari, V. K., The Law of Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments (2nd edn, rev. Sarathi, V. P.) (Lucknow: Eastern Book Co., 1977), p. 227, cites the most recent version of the Limitation Act.Google Scholar

48 He adds that ‘for a period of 80 years their ancestors and predecessors-in-office have been enjoying only a turn of 26 days…, the trustee of the temple having exercised the right of appointing the archaka for a period of four days’. This assumption that the 4-day turn existed throughout the 80-year period, disregards overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

49 Fuller, , Servants of the Goddess, p. 105. This entire section is based upon material drawn from Fuller's book.Google Scholar

50 Ibid., p. 110. For example, Nelson, J. H., The Madura Country (Madras: William Thomas, 1868), Book V, p. 13, comments that ‘mirāsi’—the term used by both parties in the Kalugumalai case—‘is generally taken to be hereditary right or privilege, but what the right or privilege consists in, it is by no means easy to ascertain…I believe that…it never amounted to more than an imperfect right of occupancy of State lands’ (or, in the present case, inām lands?). Fuller suggest that the switch from a legal system based on the authority of the king to one based on the legality of the courts, led to greater codification in the sphere of property succession, and so contributed to a greater stress on the hereditary nature of priestly office.Google Scholar Such a change is implied in Varadachari, , Law, p. 224.Google Scholar

51 Fuller, , Servants of the Goddess, p. 88.Google Scholar

52 Ibid., p. 111.

53 Pillai, W. E. Ganapathy, Etaiyapuram Past and Present (Madras: S.P.C.K. Press, 1890), p. 19.Google Scholar

54 Ibid., p. 25.

55 Exhibit D-8, dated 20–12–1883.

56 Bourdieu, P., Outline of a Theory of Practice (Cambridge: University Press, 1977), P. 40: ‘officializing strategies, the object of which is to transmute “egoistic”, private, particular interests…into disinterested, collective, publicly avowable, legitimate interests.’CrossRefGoogle Scholar