"Buddhist Principles and Periyar"

K.Veeramani

Gautama Siddhartha (B.C. 566-486) became the Buddha, the Enlightened One after which he led a life of selfless and dedicated service, spreading the message of compassion and reason. His conception of religion was purely ethical. He put all his emphasis on conduct. In his view saintliness and contentment were to be found not in worship or rituals, but in selfless and virtuous labour. He did not accept the authority of the Vedas, and opposed the Varna-Jaathi (caste) system. In Buddha's philosophy, there was no place for heaven, purgatory or hell. Matter has force and all substance motion. The soul is a myth. He never pretended that God was speaking through him. He taught in Pali, the language of the common people who found emancipation from fear and superstition in his noble teachings.

Buddha's simple and open-minded approach, his adherence to rational outlook, his abhorrence of obscurantist speculation about elusive (non) entities, and his opposition to hierarchical birth-based graded inequality appealed to Periyar E.V.Ramasamy (17.9.1789 - 24.12.1973) who ceaselessly and wholeheartedly strived hard for restructuring the ignorant, superstitious, divided and discriminatory Indian society on the basis of liberty, equality, enlightenment and self-respect. Though he rarely cited the ideas and opinions of others to prove his point or to add weight to his judgement, he used to speak in praise of Buddha and Thiru Valluvar for their stress on the spirit of inquiry, and on the virtues of love, wisdom and fraternal social relations.

Periyar formulated the Indian social issues in relation to religion in this way : How to wean people from their belief in the Vedic and Puranic gods around whom the orthodoxy, to promote their own vested interests, have spun despicable and degrading stories? How to make them give up their wasteful and harmful worship of the idols, participating in meaningless, mechanical and extravagant rites, rituals, ceremonies and festivities? How to make people imbibe noble principles and values and to adopt a cultured rational way of life? Periyar resorted to two kinds of solutions to these issues : First, he demonstrated to the masses the powerlessness of 'gods' by breaking the idols and burning their pictures. In this way, he also encouraged them to hate the injurious and baneful beliefs and practices. Secondly, he propagated the virtuous, truthful and beneficial ideas, values and ways of living by organising functions in the name of the Buddha and Thiru Valluvar.

In pursuit of this policy, Periyar asked his followers to celebrate on 27th May 1953 the festival of Buddha and to break the idols of the elephant-headed god, Ganesha, who is also variously called as Pillaiyar, Vigneswara, Ganapathi, Gajapathi, Vinayaka etc. His appeal was carried out through out Tamil Nadu. Periyar and his companions celebrated the Buddha day in Tiruchirappalli and broke the idols in the open ground (maidan) before the Town Hall. This daring unheard of activity stirred the minds of the people. They began to question the authenticity of the 'puranic' stories and doubt the efficacy of gods. The Hindu orthodoxy perceived this trend to be a dangerous one as it threatened the psychological basis of their traditional privileged status. So the Hindu Sanathanists formed an association to 'eradicate' Atheism, and through its secretary filed a case, under section 295 of I.P.C. against Periyar and two of his companions, T.P.Vedhachalam, a senior advocate, and M.R.Radha, a popular rationalist actor, stating that they had hurt the religious sentiments by their iconoclastic activity. First, the Divisional First Class Magistrate and then the District Sessions Judge declared the case unsustainable. Consequently, the complainants appealed to the Madras High Court. Justice N. Somasundaram dismissed the appeal petition on 13th October, 1954, stating that though the intentions of the respondents might have been to hurt the religious sentiments of a large numbers of people, their action was not an offence because they broke only the images they had themselves made or bought, and not those worshipped in a temple.

To propagate the principles of Buddha, Periyar E.V.R convened a conference at his native town of Erode on 23rd anuary, 1954. presiding over the conference, Dr.G.P.Mallalasekhara, Professor of Buddhist Culture in the University of Ceylon (Sri Lanka), observed that the teachings of Buddha, when properly followed, would contribute to international understanding and world peace. He complimented Periyar for endeavouring to reform the society, amidst concerted and sustained opposition, in accordance with the path shown by Buddha.

Raj Boj, General Secretary of All India Depressed Classes Federatifon and Member of Parliament inaugurated the conference. He said the depressed classes and a vast majority of others in India were subjected to various kinds of cruelties and deprivations under Brahminical social order. Buddhism treated all equally, and in ancient times it overthrew the authority of Brahminism. But Brahminical revival took place through the spread of Saiva and Vaishnava sects and social inequalities got entrenched. The people in the south of India stood unitedly behind Periyar E.V.Ramasamy for the purpose of putting an end to Brahminism. The various struggles they launched under his leadrshlip in this regard had inspired those in other parts also, told Raj Boj.

Periyar unveiled the portrait of Buddha and spoke on the occasion. He told that the conference convened to propagate the principles of Buddha might also be termed as one opposed to Brahmins who were responsible for driving out Buddhism from the land of its origin. Buddha advised that no one should follow him blindly nor accept unquestionably whatever he uttered. The Self-respect movement stressed the same view for about 30 years from its very inception in 1925. Periyar welcomed the revival of Buddhism in India.

One of the resolutions passed in the Erode conference for the propagation of Buddha's principles said this :

"As the Hindu scriptures (Sastras), mythologies (Puranas) and epics (Ithihasas) are concocted and used by the Aryans for their domination and progress and to enslave, degrade and keep in ignorance the Dravidians, they should be eradicated."

Another resolution stated : "As Buddha's life and teachings expose the falsity of the concepts of god, soul, heaven, hell, fate, rites, rituals and ceremonies and stress non-discriminatory, egalitarian social order based on love and mutual help, all sections of people in Tamil Nadu, all organisations and institutions should take steps for the spread of his principles and their application in the actual life of the human race."

While speaking in a public meeting in Madras (now Chennai) on January 31, 1954, Periyar said: "Buddha's philosophy, teachings and principles are very useful for the activities of upholding our principles (stated in Self-respect movement) and of eradicating harmful things."

Periyar went to Rangoon, capital of Burma (now Yangoon and Myanmar respectively) to attend the world Buddhists conference, and spoke in it on 3rd December 1954. He met there Dr. Mallalasekhara, President of the World Buddhists Association and Baba Saheb Dr. B.R.Ambedkar. Periyar and Ambedkar had a long discussion for more than an hour on 5th December. Perhaps this was their last extensive exchange of ideas in person before the latter passed away two years later on 6th December 1956. Baba Saheb had by that time decided to get converted to Buddhism, and asked Periyar to follow suit. But the latter told that he preferred to expose the cruelties of Hinduism by remaining within its fold as otherwise his adversaries would divert the minds of the people and mislead them saying a non-Hindu had no right to criticise the Hindu way. He also requested Ambedkar to take along with him a very large number of people in case he embraced Buddhism.

In his rationalist Tamil daily 'Viduthalai' dated 4th April, 1956, Periyar wrote thus : " I request members of Dravidar Kazhagam and all others to celebrate in a grand manner the 2500th birth anniversary of Buddha in Chennai and in all parts of Tamil Nadu and to take all efforts to propagate his precepts in such a way as to make all people to imbibe them in their hearts. To my knowledge the following are the important among his precepts.

1. Subject everything (you come across) to thorough inquiry using your intellect.

2. Accept only those that you reason finds as proper.

3. Do not accept the incomprehensible and merely imaginary words like god, sou 0.l, devas, heaven, hell, Brahmin, Sudra and Panchama.

Of all the creatures in the world, humans are supreme being endowed with the faculty of reason that is capable of comprehending a thing after proper inquiry and analysis (rational thinking.)

4. Do not believe any thing just because it is claimed to be god's revelation, it is mentioned in the scriptures (Vedas), it is the opinion of a great person, it is followed by a very large number of people or it is practised for quite a long time. Believe only that which appeals to your well informed mind and reason.

Periyar undertook a north Indian tour in February 1959. He addressed very large gatherings in Kanpur and Lucknow. What he spoke about Buddha in those meetings was reported briefly in 'Viduthalai' dated 21st February, 1959 : "To eradicate the degradation of Sudras and Panchamas who are nowadays known as backward people, we have to eradicate religion, scriptures (Shastras) and gods created by the Aryans. So long as these entities remain, we cannot abolish caste. It is for this reason Ambedkar became a Buddhist. He also made many others to join Buddhism. So all should come forward to get red of Hindu religion, god and caste, by means of adopting the Buddhist path.

Buddha's philosophy of compassion and reason, mutual understanding and peace appealed to Periyar. What we have given here is only a glimpse of what he did through out his life to emphasise the Buddhist concern to uphold human dignity and establish an egalitarian social order.

The modern rationalist online. -- URL:

http://files.periyar.org.in/TheModernRationalist/