The Madras High Court Bench here on Thursday expressed deep concern over the caste system not having spared even dead bodies from its fold and lamented that the practice had percolated into Christianity too by making the followers of the religion fight among themselves over the right to maintain separate burial grounds for different denominations.
Disposing of a public interest litigation petition related to a dispute between Roman Catholics and Pentecosts over a burial ground at A. Vellodu village in Dindigul taluk, a Division Bench of Justices S. Manikumar and G. Chockalingam said: “Christianity has no caste system. What is prevalent and practiced in Hinduism appears to have been percolated into the above said religion.”
Wondering whether the holy Bible allows such a practice, the judges said that it was a question best left to be answered by the conscience of the practitioners “who seek pride in having their caste tags.” They rued that the caste system was so deep rooted that people fight over places for burying dead bodies, force revenue officials to convene peace committee meetings and even litigate.
Authoring the judgment, Mr. Justice Manikumar said: “During their lifetime, people fight for rights — customary, personal, property and so on. We are pained to see that even after death, the fight continues for burial… Graveyard is a place to rest. We wish the dead ‘Rest in Peace’ but on the facts and circumstances of this case, we could see that there is no peace for the living as well as the dead.”
The Bench also recalled former judge K. Chandru to have quoted the lyrics of a Tamil song ‘Samarasam Ulavum Idame…’ from the 1956 movie ‘ Rambaiyin Kadhal ,’ in a decision rendered in 2008 to state: “At least in departure from this world there should be unity and apartheid may not be practised by official acts of Madurai Corporation by maintaining different sheds for different castes at Thathaneri cremation ground.”
In so far as the present case was concerned, the judges accepted the submission of Dindigul Revenue Divisional Officer that he had settled the issue by allocating a separate site to be used as burial ground for Pentecosts and said that it should be treated only as an interim arrangement until the Collector resolves the issue by keeping in the mind the Constitutional goal of achieving equality and fraternity.
“We only pray that our religious heads would also address the mass about equality, fraternity and brotherhood,” the Bench concluded.
