Smash the brahminical patriarchy

‘Smash the Brahmanical patriarchy’ is a public participatory installation. This installation’s act of performativity has been inspired by Radhika Vemula’s protesting act of smashing the four ghata (pots) signifying the vertical section of the caste system during Elgar Parishad in Bhima Koregaon. The act of smashing the caste system is a symbolic gesture of annihilating caste.

This work is a public participatory performance in which people get an instruction card that tells them to identify their pot from which section of strata of the system they belong to. The second instruction has two options: they can either keep the pot with them or they can break the system by smashing it on the ground. Public intervention work can be unpredictable at times for example Marina Abramovic’s 1974 performance could have gotten her killed. During Smita’s performance, few people from the audience had an in-depth conversation about the system. They discussed amongst themselves about how to abort the caste system, the importance of the reservation and current caste-based issues. But few of them argued on a pro stance for the hierarchical system of Varna. It turned into a heated argument and they were quite enraged about the performance. This could have easily turned into an unpleasant violent situation but was thankfully resolved due to the intervention of other audience members.

Photograph:Polina Schapova

Radhika Vemula is smashing the four ghata (pots) signifying the vertical section of the caste system during Elgar Parishad in Bhima Koregaon. Screenshots of the viral video footage, 31st December 2017

“Smash Brahminical patriarchy” performance with public participation, 2018. Instructions card;
Photograph: Smita Urmila Rajmane

From their perspective, the system is not vertical but horizontal. She says, “I found the similarities in the argument which has been made by M.K.Gandhi in the Harijan, February 11, 1933, p. 4. In his words-  “I am a firm believer in Varanashram. I have not hesitated before or now to consider it as a gift of Hinduism to mankind. Acceptance of that Dharam is, so far as I have been able to see, a condition of spiritual growth. The four divisions are not a vertical section, but a horizontal plane, on which all stand on a footing of equality, doing the services respectively assigned to them. In the Book of God, the same number of marks are assigned to the Brahmin that has done his task as well as to the Bhangi who has done likewise.”