ISSN 2455-4782

EGO POLITICS

Authored by: Gnyanada Pallepati*

* 5th Year BBA LLB Student, O.P. Jindal Global University ______

ABSTRACT

This paper will focus on the clan of Malabar Nairs, their marriage system, family structure, inheritance and property rights and the changes that occurred in the above-mentioned sections due to the intervention of the British and how their Matrilineal society became a patriarchal one.

The paper will also talk about Friedrich Engels theory on “The Origin of Family, Private Property and the State”, the paper consists brief detail of the theory and what does Engels try to convey through the theory.

The analysis part of the paper analyses the process of changing the Malabar Nairs community from a matrilineal one to a patriarchal one through the lens of Engels theory, through this the paper analyses the inheritance changes, private property changes, oppression of women, etc.

Finally, the conclusion will talk about the present-day scenario.

Keywords: Malabar Nair; Community; Politics

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INTRODUCTION OF MALABAR NAIRS

The Tarawad System: The Malabar Nair community was one of the honored castes of Kerala. They had good educational qualifications and had control over most of the land in that area. The Nair community followed matrilineal structure of joint family where the women is the head of the family, which was called the tarawad. These joint families were made by a woman, her children and her siblings, her sister’s children, and her daughter’s children. The wife of every male member and the husband of every female member lived in their respective houses. The children of a male member of the tarawad resided with their mother in her house.

The Marriage System and Children: A Nair was usually a child of a Nair male and a Nair female, or of a Kshatriya male and a Nair female, or of a Nambuthiri male and a Nair female. The Nambuthiri Brahmins were another dominant caste in Kerala, they followed the patriarchal form of family where the male is the head of the family. Only the younger sons of the Nambuthiri Brahmins could marry the Nair women. Since the Nairs find their descent from their female line, they can marry any number of times. As they followed the matrilineal descent and inheritance, there was no reason for the Nair women to economically rely on their husband, due to which there was no proper reason which shows why they should restrict themselves to a single spouse or a monogamous marriage.

Inheritance System: The Nairs followed the system of Marumakkathayam for their inheritance. In this system the inheritance was traced through the female lineage (i.e. through sister’s children). The children of the male members will be a part of their mother’s tarawad. In a tarawad each of its member acquires an interest in the joint family property since their birth. There is a fluctuation in this interest of every member in case of a birth or death in the family. The woman in the Nair community not only possess a share in the joint family property, they also had a right to own separate property that is different from the joint family property for their personal use or maintenance. In a tarawad the individuals cannot enforce partition. The partition can take place through the common consent of the complete tarawad.

Though the centre of the tarawad was a woman it was managed by the eldest male member of the family, who is known as Karanavan. The spirit of their law says that the joint property belongs to the female lineage, at the same time the law felt that women won’t be able to handle

128 | P a g e JOURNAL ON CONTEMPORARY ISSUES OF LAW [JCIL] VOLUME 7 ISSUE 1 ISSN 2455-4782 the family government due to which the eldest male member of the family is made as the life trustee of the joint property. In the absence of the senior male member in the family, the senior female member can take over the responsibilities of the tarawad and the property.

Matriliny specifically meant that the women could appear in public, speak to men, work in the society, and show initiative in any field as per their interest and choice, and have their rights in the joint property and individual property without any discrimination.

CHANGES IN NAIR COMMUNITY AFTER THE BRITISH ADVENT

From the early 19th century, the advent of British led to various socio-political and economic changes in the Malabar Nair community. Their intervention has also led to a subsequent legal codification that they brought many changes in the sovereign authority of the region. The transformations that were brought in the Malabar region were to bring in the Anglo-Indian law which is prevailing in many other parts of the country during the British Rule, along with this there was another reason which was to introduce the Principle of stare decisis (or precedents) i.e. they wanted to apply the rulings of Bengal courts to the Malabar region as well.

This led to a series of judicial changes, especially in their inheritance system. Firstly, the eldest male member of the family was made as the head of the joint family. Through this the eldest male member was given the power which led to a conflict between the old and the young members of the family, and between the male and female member of the family. The British intervention has also led to the changes in the impartible rights of property of the Malabar Nairs. After these changes occurred, the women were not allowed to undertake property transactions of family’s economy anymore. The individuals could use their share of the joint family property for their personal purposes and partition should be done without any partiality.

Due to the pressure by the British, Nairs found themselves under intense pressure. The government started to demand the payments in cash and not in kind, the people aspiring for government jobs needed to have credentials from the new fee-paying schools which they established where the fee had to be paid in the form of cash. The Britishers played a political and an economic play which led to tension and pressure in the Nairs and they began to change their matrilineal structure and started accepting the patriarchal family system.

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The colonial legal intervention reshaped the authority, power, and rights within the households of Malabar Nairs based on the gender, generation and inheritance which led to their change in their society.

FRIEDRICH ENGLES THEORY

Friedrich Engels wrote the theory “The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State” in the year 1884, his theory was in the light of the writings of Lewis H. Morgan. His main purpose for writing this theory was to provide the materialistic analysis of how the family system which we see today came into existence along with the rise of the class society which led to the oppression of women. He compares family with the state and says that, like state the family also comes into the interest of the small ruling classes who want to have control over their property.

He talks about the way in which there was no system of monogamous marriage in the pre-class societies and that both men and women enjoyed their sexual freedom, during this period the concept of family was completely different. It was the change in the social forces that brought the change in the concept of marriage which also led to the rise of inequality between people who had wealth and those who did not, and also between the men and women.

This inequality led to the rise of the Private Property. The monogamous marriage was the only way for a father to know his true heirs so that his property could pass on from generations to generations. Marriages were nothing but just a little more than a property relationship. Engels rightly says that, “The legal inequality of the two partners, bequeathed to us from earlier social conditions, is not the cause but the effect of the economic oppression of the woman.”

Though there have been changes since Engels wrote his theory, it is still important because it has located the source that led to the oppression of the woman in the class society and the origin of private property.

ANALYSIS OF THE CHANGES OCCURRED IN THE MALABAR NAIRS THROUGH THE LENS OF FRIEDRICH ENGELS

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What if we see the process of the changes occurring in the Nair community due to the British intervention.

1. Introduction of Monogamy and change in the family structure: As per Engels theory, monogamy was not the first type of marriage system that prevailed it was due to the social changes which occurred in the society which led to the monogamous marriage system, specially because of the new forms of wealth. The male became the dominant in this kind of marriage and treated the female like cattle or a property, the wife couldn’t go against the husband because he was the one who owned everything due to which she was economically dependant on him. Moreover, the change into the monogamous marriage system is also that in the group marriages the father did not know who his children were which led to a difficulty in the inheritance system, but now if the wife has only one husband it is easy for him to know who is children are and pass on his property to his next generation.

This is like what happened in the Nair community also, firstly the Britishers wanted to apply the Anglo-Indian law in the whole country for which they wanted to change the Nairs into a patriarchal society. For this they started questioning the men regarding the legitimacy of their kids, moreover, they started making the male members of the house as a sovereign due to which the women (i.e. the sisters) lost their property rights, the courts also said that the women cannot have any separate property. Now the families consisted only of the husband, wife and his children, the women had to go back to their husbands and in the same period the inheritance system also changed, through this system it was the children of the male members who will be inheriting the property, due to this men became very conservative about their kids and the women were obliged to not marry more than one. The women could not do anything as they were economically dependent on their husbands and were completely oppressed.

2. Change in the Inheritance System: Engels says that there is a change in the system of inheritance when compared between the primitive societies and the class societies. In the primitive societies both the spouses contribute equally for the household, the property was used in common. Though the property was used in common by the family, the individual property rights prevailed. The right on sharing of the property never extended till inheritance, the property used to be shared between both the spouses itself.

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In the families that belong to civilization, both the spouses get their share of property from their respective households and this property goes to the children or their alive spouse. He says that this being prevailed in both the patrilineal and matrilineal clans. He follows Morgan in his theory, but specifically says that Morgan has erred in saying that matrilineal clan was before patrilineal clan.

Firstly, if Engels observes through his view the Nair community also had a common property which was used by the complete family but that was not bought through equal contribution of both the spouses, it was only the mother’s property. Though this property was used in common every person of the family knew their share which kept on fluctuating on a new birth or death, moreover, this property was not easy to be partitioned every person in the family should accept for partition of a single person’s share also. As Engels says that matrilineal clans have inheritance, Nairs being a matrilineal community the inheritance prevailed but through the female line. The Britishers wanted to change this, in short, they wanted to convert the Nair community like the Nambuthiri Brahmin community where the patriarchal system prevails, and the inheritance happens through the father and not through the mother. This led to a change in the complete inheritance system and now calling out for the partition if one has the rights on the property was also made easy which led to the ownership of the private property. As Engels sees it all these changes were don due to the social changes that occurred in the society after the intervention of the Britishers, who wanted to rule the country as per their system.

3. Private Property: Engels says that it is through the industrial production that the urban culture gets introduced. Through this the concept of private property gets introduced, due to which the differences arise between people who have wealth and people who do not which also leads to utilizing the labour of others. In this process the kinships also broke and the state got the exercise of control on the unilateral and small kindships. Due to these changes the self-sufficient agricultural economies and domestic production led to large scale factory production.

After the British intervention, it changed the existing system of that area into a capitalistic one. Since there was an introduction of the private ownership of the property, the lands were sold with an increasing frequency. The capitalists and the

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traders have benefited from this, but the village henchmen and the independent Nair cultivator’s status came down to that of a tenant especially due to the entrance of the capitalists. Due to this there was breaking up of the kinships also as they thought that the matrilineal joint family system was not suiting the demands under the new economy due to which individualization increased specially to go well with the educational and the administrative systems. If this is seen through the view of Engels it can be said that through urbanization and modernization the capitalism and private property has increased.

4. Oppression of women: Engels felt that through the social changes the women were being oppressed, he specifically says that from the 18th century women were the slaves of men. Women were treated like property of men especially after the introduction of monogamy, the men had relations with other women whereas the women had sexual restrictions. Their was no equality between the genders. The man had the authority, power, and property rights in the family, specially in a patriarchal family the men had extreme supremacy and oppressed in all means. Engels says that emancipation of women is complete only after the economic emancipation of women.

The Malabar Nairs naturally gave importance to the women in the family, they were the head of the family even then the society was matrilineal in nature and not matriarchal, men also had rights in the family. At once all this is gone on the intervention of British, through the process of changing this matrilineal society into patriarchal many changes were made in the fields of marriage, inheritance, private property, etc. If these are observed from Engels view point, through the whole process it was women who had a drastic change in their lifestyle and rights. They no more had choice of sexual preferences and were not allowed to marry more than one person. They were no longer allowed to hold separate property for themselves, in case they have any it should added into the property of the joint family, this made them economically dependent on their husbands. All these changes were not for the empowerment of women rather it deteriorated their position and oppressed them.

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CONCLUSION

In the present scenario, the economic emancipation of women which Engels wanted is happening. Women are given equal rights in both inheritance laws and in the work place. This will most probably lead to equal status of men and women in both society and the family without any state intervention, because whatever happened with the Nair community was due to the intervention of British, before them the people there were happy with what they had and their means of life, though the Britishers brought in modernization they have also or one can say that they have caused more harm to the cultural sentiments of the people and oppression of women.

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REFERENCES

1. Scariah, and Celinamma. “Two Images of Matriliny: the Khasi and the Nair.” North- Eastern Hill University, http://hdl.handle.net/10603/60758. 2. Schulte, Elizabeth. “ORIGIN OF THE FAMILY, PRIVATE PROPERTY AND THE STATE.” SocialistWorker.org, 12 May 2018, http://socialistworker.org/2008/05/12/origin-family-private-property. 3. Trat, Josette. “Engels and the Emancipation of Women.” Science & Society, Vol. 62, No. 1, Friedrich Engels: A Critical Centenary Appreciation , 1998, pp. 88–105., www.jstor.org/stable/40403689. 4. Stern, Bernhard J. “Engels on the Family.” Science & Society, Vol. 12, No. 1, A Centenary of Marxism, vol. 12, no. 1, pp. 42–64., www.jstor.org/stable/40399874. 5. G. Arunima. “A Vindication of the Rights of Women: Families and Legal Change in Nineteenth-Century Malabar.” Changing Concepts of Rights and Justice in South Asia , 1998, pp. 115–139. 6. Jeffery, Robbin. “Legacies of Matriliny: The Place of Women and the ‘Kerala Model.’” Pacific Affairs, vol. 77, no. 4, 2005, pp. 647–664., www.jstor.org/stable/40023536 .

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