Pasi (caste)

Pasi
Regions with significant populations
	Bihar, Uttar Pradesh
Languages
	Hindi
Related ethnic groups
	Turuk Pasi

The Pasi (also spelled Passi) is a Dalit (untouchable) community of India.[1][2] They live in the northern Indian states of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.

Etymology

The word Pashi, according to William Crooke, has been derived from the Sanskrit word Pashika, a noose used by Pasis to climb and tap toddy, a drink obtained from palm tree. The tapping of toddy is the original occupation of the Pasi community. However, just like other aspirational caste groups of India, Pasis have a myth of origin. They claim that they originate from the sweat of Parshuram, an incarnation of Vishnu. They claim support for this in the word sweat being derived from the Hindi word Pasina and it further paves the way for their claim of "Kshatriyatva".[3]

Population

The Pasi live mainly in the northern Indian states of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, were their traditional occupation was that of rearing pigs.[4] The Pasis of most of the north Indian states has been classified by the Government of India as Scheduled Caste(SC).[3] As of the 2001 Census of India, the Pasi are the second-largest Dalit group in Uttar Pradesh, where they constituted 16 per cent of the Dalit population and were mostly recorded in the Awadh region.[5] The 2011 Census of India for the state recorded their population as 6,522,166. That figure included the Tarmali.[6]

History

Ramnarayan Rawat notes the role of the Pasi community (and other untouchable castes) in the Kisan Sabha Movement to have been understated by earlier historians, in that they documented a minimal and late-arriving Pasi involvement and additionally, one that was inclined to criminal behavior such as rioting, rather than political activism.[2] From a reading of the archives, he notes that the involvement of Pasi and Chamars were significant from the outset and they being land-occupiers had the same concerns as of other savarna groups, rather than being the 'alienated' pig-rearers, hitherto assumed and portrayed.[2] Chandra Bhan Prasad, a political commentator, has recalled about how those who continued pig-rearing were ill-treated by socio-political activists, who blamed the occupation in large part for their untouchable status rather than the Brahminism.[7]

The Pasi have in recent times engaged in invention of tradition. Badri Narayan, a social historian and cultural anthropologist, says that

Sources of vision and contemplation are absent without literature. This feeling, along with the growing urge to construct an assertive identity and the sense of being deprived of history, led the Pasi community towards the invention of heroes, histories and myths and their documentation in the print medium.[8]

Of late, Hindu Nationalists (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and affiliates) have been trying to appropriate different folk-heroes of the Pasi caste, as Hindu icons to mobilize the electoral prospects of Bharatiya Janata Party.[9] The Hindu nationalists have supported claims that there was a Pasi kingdom that ruled in what are now Uttar Pradesh and Bihar during the 11th and 12th centuries. The rulers of this claimed state included Suhaldev and Bijli Pasi.[10]

Ramnarayan Rawat notes the role of the Pasi community (and other untouchable castes) in the Kisan Sabha Movement to have been understated by earlier historians, in that they documented a minimal and late-arriving Pasi involvement and additionally, one that was inclined to criminal behavior such as rioting, rather than political activism.[2] From a reading of the archives, he notes that the involvement of Pasi and Chamars were significant from the outset and they being land-occupiers had the same concerns as of other savarna groups, rather than being the 'alienated' pig-rearers, hitherto assumed and portrayed.[2] Chandra Bhan Prasad, a political commentator, has recalled about how those who continued pig-rearing were ill-treated by socio-political activists, who blamed the occupation in large part for their untouchable status rather than the Brahminism.[7]

Notable people

Uda Devi, claimed to have been a fighter at Sikandar Bagh in the Indian Rebellion of 1857.[11]

References

Pandey, Gyan (1988). "Peasant Revolt and Indian Nationalism: The Peasant Movement in Awadh, 1919-1922". In Guha, Ranajit; Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty (eds.). Selected Subaltern Studies. Oxford University Press. p. 274. ISBN 978-0-19505-289-3.
Rawat, Ramnarayan S. (2011). Reconsidering Untouchability: Chamars and Dalit History in North India. Indiana University Press. pp. 12–15. ISBN 978-0-25322-262-6.
Badri Narayan (2012). Women Heroes and Dalit Assertion in North India: Culture, Identity and Politics. SAGE. p. 136. ISBN 9780761935377.
Hunt, Sarah Beth (2014). Hindi Dalit Literature and the Politics of Representation. Routledge. pp. 8, 23. ISBN 978-1-31755-952-8.
Vij, Shivam (8 May 2010). "Can the Congress Win Over UP's Dalits?". Economic and Political Weekly.
"A-10 Individual Scheduled Caste Primary Census Abstract Data and its Appendix - Uttar Pradesh". Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India. Retrieved 4 February 2017.
Prasad, Chandra Bhan (2011). "My Experiments with Hunting Rats". In Babu, D. Shyam; Khare, Ravindra S. (eds.). Caste in Life: Experiencing Inequalities. Pearson Education India. pp. 161–162. ISBN 978-8-13175-439-9.
Narayan, Badri (2006). Women Heroes and Dalit Assertion in North India: Culture, Identity and Politics. SAGE Publications India. p. 140. ISBN 978-8-13210-280-9.
Narayan, Badri (14 January 2009). Fascinating Hindutva: Saffron Politics and Dalit Mobilisation. SAGE Publishing India. pp. 65–72. ISBN 978-93-5280-135-0.
Badri Narayan (2012). Women Heroes and Dalit Assertion in North India: Culture, Identity and Politics. SAGE. p. 72. ISBN 9780761935377.
Narayan, Badri (2006). Women Heroes and Dalit Assertion in North India: Culture, Identity and Politics. SAGE Publications. pp. 139–143. ISBN 978-0-7619-3537-7.