Devadasi; Holy Ariyan Hindu Prostition System in Indian Temples

Devadasi system is not only exploitation of women, it is the institutionalized exploitation of women; it is the exploitation of Dalits, the lower class of untouchables; it is the religious sanction given to prostitution of helpless economically and socially deprived women; It is the glorification of humiliation of women. Inherent in this system is the fascistic belief that a certain section of human population, the lower caste, is meant to serve the ‘higher caste’s superior men’. Inherent in it is the feudal-lord-temple-priest-nexus, where the priest, already having a psychological hold over the minds of simple people to the point of dictating their way of life, uses his power to give ‘religious sanction’ to the practice by declaring it ‘sacred’, and thus cajole and lure simple minded villagers into this worst form of prostitution.

Devadasi literally means God’s (Dev) female servant (Dasi), where according to the ancient Indian practice, young pre-pubertal girls are ‘married off’, ‘given away’ in matrimony to God or Local religious deity of the temple. These girls are not allowed to marry, as they were supposedly married to the temple. She ‘serves’ the priests and inmates of the temple, and the Zamindars (local land lords) and other men of money and power, in the town and village. The ‘service’ (sexual satisfaction) given to these men is considered akin to service of God. The Devadasi is dedicated to the service of the temple Deity for life and there is no escape for her. If she wants to escape, the society will not accept her.

The Devadasi system is still flourishing in parts of India, especially in the South and specifically in the states of Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. Ironically, these are the techno-savvy states now synonymous with Indian progress in the global market.

If you take the beautiful country road from Dharwad, Karnataka, you will reach the small temple village of Saundatti in South India. It is in this village that the Devadasi tradition, one of the most criticized forms of prostitution in India is still practiced. Despite the governmental ban, hundreds of girls are secretly dedicated to Goddess Yellammaevery year.

Renuka temple in Saundatt

There are more than 450,000 Devadasies trapped in this form of prostitution, deified and glorified by the heinous religious sanctions. According to the 1934 Devadasi Security Act, this practice is banned in India. This ban was reinforced again in 1980s but the law is broken every day. Poverty and ‘Untouchablity’ contribute to the persistence of this terrible practice.

Devadasi Yellamma poses for the camera

Priest Yedurayariah at the Renuka temple

Continuing Practice of Dedicating Dalits as Devadasies

A report commissioned by the National Commission for Women (NCW) in India reveals the shocking reality of how thousands of Dalit women continue to be forced into the Devadasi system in several states of India. Estimates suggest that girls dedicated to temples in the Maharashtra-Karnataka border area number over 250,000 and are all from the Dalit community of untouchables. More than half of the Devadasies become prostitutes.

The beginning of this system can perhaps be mapped out in the inscription found in temples. The word Emperumandiyar which was used in the sense of Vaishnavas before 966 A.D. got the meaning of dancing girls, attached to Vishnu temples, in inscriptions of about 1230-1240 A.D. in the time of Raja Raya III. [Raghavacharya: I, 118]. In many quarters the emergence of the Devadasies has been linked to the downfall of Buddhism in India that the Devadasies were Buddhist nuns can be deduced from many evidences: They are unknown to ancient India. Jaatakas, Kautillya or Vatsayana do not mention them, but later Puranas found them useful. The system started only after the fall of Buddhism and records about them start appearing around 1000 A.D. [Bharatiya Sanskruti Kosh, IV, 448]. It is viewed that the Devadasies are the Buddhist nuns who were degraded to the level of prostitutes after their temples were taken over by Brahmins during the times of their resurgence after the fall of Buddhism.

Devadasi Drummer- Miniature Painting

The Devadasi system was set up as a result of a conspiracy between the feudal class and the priests (Brahmins). The latter, with their ideological and religious hold over the peasants and craftsmen, devised a means that gave prostitution a religious sanction. Poor, low-caste girls, initially sold at private auctions, were later dedicated to the temples. They were then initiated into prostitution.

According to the famous Indian scholar Jogan Shankar, following reasons played a major role in supplanting the system with firm roots:

1. As a substitute for human sacrifice, being and offering to the gods and goddesses to appease and secure blessings for the community as a whole;

2. As a rite to ensure the fertility of the land and the increase of human being and animal population;

3. As a part of phallic worship which existed in India from early Dravidian times;

4. Probably sacred prostitution sprang from the custom of providing sexual hospitality for strangers;

5. Licentious worship offered by a people, subservient to a degraded and vested interests of the priestly class;

6. To create a custom in order to exploit lower caste people in India by the upper castes and classes.

Devadasi, the court singer- Miniature painting

Dalit Devadasies

It is interesting to note that the untouchables belong to the Dalit community and are lower caste Hindus, though, otherwise are not allowed to drink water from the same well as the rest of the higher caste people of the village. They cannot eat from the same plate or sit in the same place as upper caste people. They work mostly as night-soil cleaners.

When it comes to sex they are not only ‘touchable’ but are actually forced into sex by the higher caste Hindus and practices such as the Devadasi system are invented to facilitate and perpetuate their exploitation.

It is these powerful sections of the society, who control not only the economic and social activates but also the minds of the poor villagers that pose the biggest impediment to elimination of this evil. There is a crying need for a more comprehensive legislation to emancipate these vulnerable girls.

A word about Untouchables or Dalits

Many sociologists believe the caste system in India originated as a way of dividing labour and as a method of exercising social control for maintaining order. Its power – and almost absolute acceptance – stems from the fact that caste derives religious sanction for India’s majority from the 4,000-year-old Manu Sashtra or the Laws of Manu. According to this, society was divided into four broad social orders, or varnas, at the head were the Brahmins, a priestly class, who are the most pure. From the arms came the Kshatriyas, the warriors and rulers. From the lower limbs were born the Vaishyas, the traders. And from the feet the Sudras, the lowest caste, destined to serve the other three.

‘Untouchables’ were considered so impure and polluting that they were not even included in the system by Manu. This translated into their complete exclusion from society. Their hamlets were outside the village, and they could not even talk to or walk on the same path as the other castes, much less touch them. When the British ruled in India, they left this caste distinctions alone to avoid unrest. In some ways they even reinforced it, finding Brahmins useful as clerks and administrators who served the British Empire faithfully. Today, in India, the Untouchables call themselves ‘Dalits’, which means ‘Broken People or the Down-trodden people’. There are almost 180 million dalits in India alone and at least another 60 million around the world who face caste discrimination of various kinds.

Perpetuation of Devadasi System

Traditional empires being despotic restricted trade to the palaces and temples, forbidding the common masses from trading or traveling. Only priests, the royalty and certain privileged merchants (who were closely regulated) traded and traveled. And one lucrative trade that the priests and princes often monopolized was the oldest and most despotic of all, prostitution. Doubtless the girls were seduced by a theology of mysticism, just as the widows who, as suttees, threw themselves on their dead husbands’ funeral pyres believed they were attaining spiritual purity, but the sexual economics of female exploitation provide a candid explanation of what was happening.

Legends to support Devadasi system

To keep the Bahujans and Dalits under control, stories were manufactured and incorporated in various Mahatmyas in the Puranas. There are three important legends, we should know about. It may be useful to know these traditional stories told by Brahmins and believed to be true by the sufferers themselves. Vasant Rajas, "Devadasi: Shodha ani Bodha", (Marathi), Sugava Prakashan, Pune, 1997, has given the account of various legends in Puranas concerning this practice.

Legend of Renuka or Yallamma

According to this legend, Renuka appeared from the fire pit of 'Putra Kameshti' Yadnya performed by a Kshatriya king Renukeswara. She was married to Rishi Jamdagni. The couple had five sons including Parasurama. One morning she was late in coming home from the river as she was sexually aroused by watching the love play in river, of a Gandarva raja with his queens. This enraged Jamdagni who ordered his sons to kill her. All other sons refused and were burned to ashes by the Rishi's curse, but Parsurama beheaded her. The Rishi gave him three boons. By first, Parshurama asked to bring back to life his four brothers. By second he wanted his mother to be made alive. But her head was not available. So Parshurama cut the head of a woman from 'Matang' caste, and Jamdagni revived his wife with Matangi's head. By third he wished to be free from the sin of matricide. But Renuka was cursed by Jamdagni to have leprosy and was banished from the hermitage. However, some ‘Eknatha’, 'Jognatha' Sadhus in the forest cured her. She returned back to Jamdagni who pardoned her and blessed her that she will attain great fame in Kaliyuga

Temple of Renuka was built in 13th century in Soundati hills. The Jains believe that Renuka is their 'Padmawati'. For centuries, the devotees of Renuka, who are mostly Dalits and Bahujans, assemble there twice a year on Magha and Chaitra full moon days for pilgrimage and offer their daughters to make them Devadasies.

Legend of Renukamba

There is a temple of Renukaamba, built in 14th century, at the top of Chandragutti hill in Shimoga district in Karnataka. The gullible masses from Dalit and Bahujan communities are made to believe that Renukaamba Devi is the incarnation of Renuka or Yallamma of Saundatti. The specialty of this temple is that Dalit women must go naked to worship this Devi. It is called 'Betale Seva' or 'Nagna Puja' i.e. naked worship. A legend in the Purana says that if the girls go naked and pray to the Devi they get good husbands and married women get all their wishes fulfilled, the childless women get children, and that those Shudra women and girls who do not follow these traditions meet with a lot of calamities. The chief Minister of Karnataka had to appoint a committee to investigate whether "Nagna-puja" has any religious sanction of Hindu Sastras. The report was submitted in 1988 and states that there is no such sanction in Hinduism. In 1992 a ban was imposed on "Nagna-puja". There was a hue and cry raised against it, but since then it has stopped.

Legend of Khandoba

The third deity of Devadasies is Khandoba of Jejuri, although there are eleven 'pithas'. It is the 'kul-daivat' of dalits, though many others worship him including some Muslim devotees, who presumably were dalits, and worshipped this deity before their conversion to Islam. Even robbers would attend the annual fair and finalize their plans there. They were, presumably, of ex-criminal tribes, which was a part of the Dalit community. Brahmins have homologized this deity and made out stories that Shankara took this form of Martanda, to protect the Brahmins from the Asuras.

People offer their sons and daughters to this deity. The terms used are Waghya for male and Murali for female. It is a form of Devadasi. Murali, whose token marriage is performed with Khandoba, remains unmarried throughout her life and leads a life same as the Devadasi of Yellama. After Ambedkarite awakening in the Matang society, who forms the majority of Murlis, this practice has declined albeit not completely stopped.

'Muralis' are girls dedicated to god Khandoba in their infancy or early childhood by their parents. "Poor deluded women promise to sacrifice their first born daughters if Khandoba will make them mothers of many children. Then after the vow the first-born girl is offered to Khandoba and set apart for him by tying a necklace of seven cowries around the little girl's neck. When she becomes of marriageable age, she is formally married to Khandoba or dagger of Khandoba and becomes his nominal wife. Henceforth she is forbidden to become the wedded wife of any man, and the result is that she usually leads an infamous life earning a livelihood by sin. Some of these girls become wandering muralis. Others become ordinary public women in any town or city, while a few are said to live for years with one man.

The parents of such girls do not feel ashamed to take her earnings, because they belong to Khandoba, and what they do is not considered a sin in the eyes of his devotees. Kunbis, Mahars, Mangs and other low castes make Muralis of their daughters in this fashion" . High caste people of the region also worship Khandoba but their mode of expressing reverence to the god differs. Thus "Not a few high caste people visit Jejuri to pay their vows; but they never give their own girls to Khandoba but buy children from low-caste parents for a small sum of money, which is not a difficult thing to do and offer them instead of their own children".

Recent Case Study:

An eight-year-old Murali is living in a remand home in Pune after she was rescued from Jejuri last year. Locals say that when she was just a few months old, she was found under a bamboo basket in one of the corners of the temple, with a garland around her neck, turmeric on her forehead, and her hands and legs tied with a rope. Members of a local labour organization took her into their custody, but because the child was 'offered' to Lord Khandoba already, they did not dare bring her up in any other way. A 60-year-old woman living near the temple voluntarily offered to look after her. However, since last year, she began harassing the little girl, by forcing her to beg and goading her to encourage male attention.

A local journalist got to know her story and sought the intervention of advocate Varsha Madgulkar, a local social activist. Both of them whisked the girl away from the clutches of her foster mother and registered a police complaint. The journalist, Vijaykumar Harishchandre, says,

"Even the police were hesitant to initiate any action because she was a 'Murali' and they feared the wrath of Lord Khandoba. However, with the intervention of the officers of the Women and Child Welfare Department, she was finally rehabilitated in a remand home in Pune."

The Plight of Joginis

Anjamma’s Story

Anjamma is a Jogini

‘My mother died when I was three. When I was seven, my brother got polio and was paralyzed. My father had to take out a loan and I went to work rolling bidis (cigarettes) to help pay it back. But it was not enough and the landlord to whom my father owed the money said that he should send me to be dedicated to the goddess to earn more money. I didn’t want to go. I felt very bad. My father said: ‘If you don’t obey me, I will die.’ So I went to the temple. All my relatives came. I had a new sari and many jasmine garlands. The priest called a man to tie the wedding tali [necklace] around my neck. The man was Rangasamy and he was 25 years old. I was eight.

Three times a year we Joginis used to go to the temple for important festivals. Everyone worshipped us and treated us well. We danced and went into a trance. Everyone fell at our feet and called us goddess. On those days we became very important. The rest of the time they made fun of us. When I was 12, I came of age (puberty). Rangasamy kept coming and telling me: ‘I tied tali on you, why don’t you sleep with me?’ I said no. But everyone in the village said: ‘Child, you are a Jogini. It is your duty. You have to sleep with him.’

He had a wife and two kids. He gave me money and rice. After one year I had a child, a baby boy. Soon after that, he abandoned me. I went to Bombay for construction work to support my child. When I returned to the village another fellow called Raghav was very nice to me. He said to my father: ‘I will protect her.’ He also had kids. I became pregnant again and had a girl. But he left me after six years.

I joined the ‘Joginis’ organization. I decided to fight the system. To prevent my sisters from suffering like me. I go to temples now and stop the Jogini dedication. People said: ‘After sleeping with so many men, what’s your problem?’ The upper caste men started saying we spread AIDS. I said: ‘You sons of bitches, motherfuckers, bastards, go tell that to your wives and mothers. I’ll get the government to do DNA tests on all Jogini kids and you can take them. I’ll take the Joginis away and look after them. I’ll expose each of you who sleep with us and then abuse us.’ Yes. They’ll shut their mouths and run when they see me now.’ Interview by Mari Marcel Thekaekara.

Ashama

Ashama

‘Since the day of the initiation, I have not lived with dignity. I became available for all the men who inhabited Karni. They would ask me for sexual favors and I, as a Jogini, was expected to please them. My trauma began even when I had not attained puberty.’ (Testimony of a 35-year-old former Jogini named Ashama)

The Devadasies, spread all over India, lead intolerable lives. They have been quenching the thirst of millions of upper caster Indian males lusts. Since the inception of this deplorable system, the Joginis have been subjected to merciless subjugation and injustice.

Many of these women were tiny girls when they became Devadasies, "dedicated" to the sect by poverty-stricken parents unable to pay their future dowries and hopeful that a pleased goddess would make the next pregnancy a boy. Tradition has for centuries locked Devadasies into a proscribed and highly stigmatized social role. Forbidden to marry or work outside the temple, they have spent their lives tending the shrines and decorating altars, singing and dancing, telling devotional stories and collecting coins from worshippers to support themselves and their religious work.

They continue to face discrimination and indignities on the basis of caste, remain politically powerless and suffer from acute poverty, oppression and exploitation. They run high chances of acquiring sexually transmitted diseases. Although in independent India, many steps have been taken to prevent the system and rehabilitate the Devadasies, they are not enough to improve the situation as the root cause of poverty continues to push young girl to the roads of ‘sacred prostitution’.