The Arya Samaj Movement and its contributions

By. Dr Ravi Srivastava- Priest, Arya Samaj Mississauga

Before we discuss the Arya Samaj and its contributions, we should ask a question “What compelled Maharishi Swami Dayanand to establish the Arya Samaj”? He saw the degraded and debased condition of the Hindus. His heart bled at the sight of millions of people, weak, disjointed, deranged and almost chaotic, helpless and hopeless, ignorant. Deluded, servile and dominated by few proud, parasitical, living in luxury. He wanted to unite the Hindus into one united people to cast off the artificial and self-imposed bonds that tied them to their present position. He wanted them to remove from their eyes the bandage that prevented them from seeing the light of Truth and Liberty. He wanted the society to arise pure and strong from the prevailing welter and corruption, ignorance and internal strife and stand on its own feet and take the proper place among the nations of the world.

With the above goals in mind, Maharishi Swami Dayanand established the Arya Samaj on April 10, 1875 ( Saturday, Chaitra Shukla 5, S.1932) in Dr Manik’s garden near the Prathna Samaj Hall in Girgaun Road at 5:30 P.M..The Arya samaj was based entirely on the authority of the Vedas conditioned by Rationalism and Utilitarianism. The sixth Principle of the Arya samaj illustrates the main goal of the samaj. It states “The Prime object of the Samaj is to do good to the world, i.e to ameliorate physical, spiritual and social standards of all persons.” Since its establishment, the Arya samaj movement has made innumerable contributions in the social and spiritual fields. Some of the contributions are enumerated below.

Religious Field: Polytheism, Idolatry, Iconolatry, Animal sacrifice to please GOD, Avatars and Incarnation of GOD, Ancestor worship (Sraddha), Pilgrimages, Pantheism and Priestcraft.

Social Field: Untouchability, Caste System, Child marriage, Polygamy, Widow Marriages, Sati, Purdah, cow protection and Women Education and Equality.

I shall focus on the major contributions by the Samaj in the Social field.

Untouchability: Swamiji was deeply perturbed by the attitudes of Orthodox Brahmins towards the depressed class of the Hindus, known as Dalits, Outcaste or Untouchables. They were not allowed to enter Hindu temples, homes and Brahman rituals. They were prohibited to fetch water from the village wells. Their children were not allowed to study in the village school with other children.Swamji was first to declare equal rights for lower caste, the right for education, right for reciting Ved mantras, right for interdinning, right for marriage and right to fetch water from common wells. Swami Shraddhanand (formerly known as Lala Munshi Ram) spent his whole life for the upliftment of the lower class. This cause was taken up by Mahatma Gandhi and the Congress Party during freedom movement. . Thanks to Swamji that in 1950, The Indian Constitution adopted to provide equal social, religious and Cultural rights to the Dalits or Harijans. For the last 30 years Swami Agnivesh has been fighting an uncompromising fight against untouchability.

Caste System: The Sanskrit word for the caste is Varna or Jati or Jat which means a group of people having a specific social rank. It also means “ colour”. Some authors believe that the Aryan (being fair in complexion) wanted to maintain their distinction from Dravidians (dark complexion) and used the colour to segregate them. According to Dr Karve, Varna is used in Vedas to denote class or category rather than colour.

The Varna system allows us to see how a system can survive for several million years. With the evolution of society, in order to maintain law and order and to govern effectively, it became essential to classify people not only in terms of their different qualities but also with respect to their different privileges. Each class thus, had a specific role to play in society as well as a unique function. Thus the four castes developed out of necessity. The Varna of Brahmins commonly identified with the learned ones. The Varna of Kshatriyas, associated with Ruler and Warriors. The Varna of Vaishyas, associated with Commercial livelihood. The Varna of Sudras, associated with Minial Labour. All were interlinked and functioned in close co-operation. There are thousands of Vedic mantras where we pray to GOD to let all live together, eat together, enjoy together, pray and progress together, fight the evil together and work for global peace together. Vedas also teach us that in the sight of GOD, all are equal and the colour or country makes no difference. There is no such thing as a master race or a superior or a Nordic race. The Arya Samaj has been propagating and implementing this in eradicating Caste system based on birth.

As a priest, I am delighted to say that our children are forcing the parents to break the fetters of the prevalent Orthodox Caste System. I have performed over 150 inter-caste marriages and over 250 inter-racial marriages during the last 10 years.

Status of Women: During the Vedic period, women were greatly honoured and enjoyed equal status with men. They were active participants in all fields of life. During the post-Vedic period, women started losing their status in society. Manu, the progenitor of Hindu race did not treat women at par with men so far as the Vedic rituals were concerned. The women were not eligible for the study of Vedas, nor for use of mantras in performing sacraments except marriage. He stated that being tender, women should be protected by father in childhood, by her husband in young age and by the sons in old age. She lost her identity after marriage. During the Moghul rule, women suffered further degradation. Since polygamy was a norm with the Muslims, they picked up any woman they wanted and kept her in their “harems”. Indian women started using “Purdah” –a veil to protect themselves. Parents started marrying their daughters at an early age. Some began to consider a girl as misery and a burden which has to be shielded and protected from the eyes of intruders and needed extra care. On the other hand, a boy did not need any such protection. Thus a viscious circle started in which the women were at the receiving end. All this culminated into new evils such as Child marriage, Sati, Jauhar and restriction on girl education.

Maharishi Swami Dayanand was deeply perturbed with this sad plight of Indian women. He was the first to roar like a loin in public platforms for female education giving evidences of admirable type women Rishis like Gargi and Maitriya. Around 1870, Swamji opened several Patashalas (schools) at Farrukabad, Kashi, Kasganj and Challsan. He also initiated a Kanya Patashala ( a girl school) at Meerut. After Swamji’s death, the Arya samaj movement under the leadership of teachers like Swami Shraddhanand, Lala Dev Raj etc, continued to establish many girl schools. With the success of Kanya Pathshalas, on June 14, 1896 the Samaj established the Kanya Mahavidhyalay (Institute of higher education for women). The students of this institution included a mixture of unmarried, married and widow women. Since then the Arya Samaj has opened over 500 Institution throughout India. The Institutions include girl schools, girl colleges, Gurukuls, Orphanges, Industrial schools and Widow shelter houses.

Indian women are indebted to Swamji and the Arya samaj for restoring their rights so that they can become the President, the Prime-Minister of India and can compete with men as equals in every field of life.

As a whole, it can be said that the reforms of Arya Samaj are of great significance and have made huge impacts on the contemporary Hindu society. The Arya Samaj has become a major acculturative movement with its purified Hinduism.