But all such hopes were proved so short-lived. A week after the verdict, the judge who dared the charpoi-hookah raj, was forced to seek more security and transfer to a 'safer' place. The Khap elders also mobilized the villagers, held demonstrations and moved about shouting intimidating slogans. There are fresh acts of coercion against those who stay neutral. Later the 'elders' called a meeting of 36 Khaps and sought amendments to the Hindu Marriage Act banning 'sagotra' weddings. Some youths - mark youths, not the turbaned oldies - even demanded boycott of the government schemes as protest.

The apex conclave also served an ultimatum to each MP from the region to pledge support to the Khap tradition. The MPs must openly commit to the amending the Hindu Marriage Act. In case any MP fails to fall in line, they will face protests and boycott. Clearly, indignation of the civil society and media bashing seem to have only further hardened the arrogance of the caste gerontocracy. Things like public execution of sagotra couples, sati and sacrifices thrive in areas where social revolutions and religious reform movements of the last two centuries have got bypassed. By and large, these areas had missed even the JP and Mandal movements. In their sweep, social and religious movements had also challenged the imposition of some of the feudal-brahmanical mores.

The task for the civil society is to complete such minimum social reform and help the villagers understand the absurdity of the obscurantist practices. Some of such beliefs are so deeply ingrained in our psyche. They are not confined to Khaps. Take the sagotra obsession. Most upper castes, especially Brahman communities, still abhor the idea of sagotra marriage. A look at the wedding web sites will prove this point. Many have gotrawise categorization. Even the well-educated, high-flying types still prefer gotra compliance while negotiating arranged marriages. Gotra is the first query while consulting Kundlis (horoscope). This writer knows senior civil servants and learned professors genuinely believing that sagotra marriage is a form of incest and must be shunned.

No amount of reasoning could convince them that gotra has no biological basis. The only difference is that while the oldies of backward caste panchayats impose the gotra rules on every family under the lathi, the sophisticated follow it as family tradition. Consider the case of a young couple - both from well-heeled professional families. They encountered the parental boycott only because they happened to be of the same gotra. The parents calmed down after they had a kid. This was a decade back and they are all healthy and happy. Sadly, we have missed the point that the crude ways of the caste panchayats cannot be eliminated by arrests and death penalties alone. The civil society has to run public campaigns both against the Khaps taking the law into their own hand and to expose the medieval practices. In the case of the latter, none of us have even attempted ideological campaigns.

Gotras, like other Vedic era social classifications like Vansha, Varna, Kula and Jana, has little relevance in contemporary life. Caste is a day-to-day reality. Gotra comes only for marriage and death. Originally there were eight gotras confined to Brahmans. Then these spread to Kshatriyas and Vaishyas. Later even some Shudra groups adopted the gotra lineage as a mark of sanskritisation. In the process, the number of gotras went up to three dozen from the original eight. Families belonging to each gotra (some with a following of two crore prople) claimed themselves to be the direct descendents of the respective rishis. But there is little evidence to prove such claims, genetic or material.

Take the case of the professional family mentioned above. This Brahman family's gotra is Vishwamitra, who was a Kshatriya before he became an ascetic rishi. This is certainly incongruous. Even great rishi like Gautama had given little credence to gotra identity in an era when it had overriding relevance. Chandogya Upanishad narrates a sequence where son of Jabala, a woman who had many paramours, goes to the rishi's ashram for studies. When asked for gotra, the boy replied: “My mother did not know my father's gotra.” Admiring the boy's truthfulness, Gautama accepted him as his disciple who later became the great Satyakama rishi. Incidentaly, Satyamaka himself left behind a gotra of his own.

Historians like D.D. Kosambi had ruled out any genetic origin to the institution of gotra. Romila Thapar describes how families and dynasties sought recognition by claiming imagined genealogical links for themselves. This was specially true of the newly formed dynasties eager to validate themselves by new kinship and suitable accommodation in chronological lists. Succession as in Vedic texts, 'elders' in Sangha or descent groups like Suryavanshi and Chandravanshi, has a common practice. Thus genetic speculations into such vast claims are not going to take us anywhere. Inclusion has always been a preferred tool in social climbing. Families earned ritual rights and access to Vedas through peer favours and migrations to new areas. Adherence to different schools of brahmanical rites and adoption of gotras by emerging groups were never uncommon.

This dual challenge calls for a two-pronged push: judicial and administrative action to ruthlessly deal with the violators of law on the one hand, and civil society pressures to bare the futility of medieval practices, on the other. The latter is specially necessary in regions dominated by caste panchayats. However, politicians and administration have only made matters worse. The latter faithfully followed the British strategy of retaining the old feudal institutions and using them in its favour.

Thus the law and order authorities helped the Khap oldies enforcing their own law like exile and execution. Politicians tried to perpetuate the caste panchayats so that they could use their ability to transfer bulk votes. Congress as well as the local parties has always been patronizing the Khaps. This helped tighten their hold on the reluctant villagers and gave them further recognition. A visit to the caste panchayat-dominated areas will convince one about the extent of the public revulsion against Khaps. Civil society activists outside have a role to play in strengthening such emerging sections. (IPA Service)