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Breast tax

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Tax imposed on the lower caste and untouchable Hindu women by the Kingdom of Tranvancore

The breast tax (mulakkaram or mula-karam in Malayalam) was a tax imposed until 1924 on the lower caste and untouchable Hindu women by the Kingdom of Tranvancore (in present-day Kerala state of India) if they wanted to cover their breasts in public. The lower caste and untouchable women were expected to pay the government the breast tax when they started developing breasts. The lower caste men had to pay a similar tax, called tala-karam, on their heads. Travancore tax collectors would visit every house to collect the breast tax from any lower caste women who passed the age of puberty. The tax was evaluated by the tax collectors depending on the size of the woman's breasts. The tax was a financial burden on lower caste women at which it was aimed.

The breast tax was levied by Travancore on lower caste Hindu women, which was to be paid if they wanted to cover their breasts and was further assessed in proportion to the size of their breasts. This was seen as a sign of respect towards the upper caste and the lower castes including Nadar and Ezhava women had to pay the tax. Dr. Sheeba KM, professor of gender ecology and Dalit studies, says the purpose of the tax was to maintain the caste hierarchy.

The law resulted from Travancore's tradition, in which the breast was bared as a sign of respect to a higher-status person. Attingal Rani once had a lower caste woman's breast cut off as a punishment for wearing upper cloth. For example, the Nair women were not allowed to cover their breasts while in front of the Namboodiri Brahmins or entering the temples, while the Brahmins bared their breasts only to the images of the deities. The women of the even lower castes, such as Nadars, Ezhavars and untouchables castes, were not allowed to cover their breasts at all. With the spread of Christianity in the 19th century, the Christian converts among the Nadar women started covering their upper body, and gradually even the Hindu Nadar women adopted this practice. The tax was a financial burden on lower caste women at which it was aimed.

References

  1. Konikkara, Aathira (3 January 2019). "Kerala's Women's Wall goes beyond the Sabarimala temple controversy". The Caravan. Retrieved 15 October 2021.
  2. ^ "The CBSE Just Removed an Entire History of Women's Caste Struggle". The Wire. Retrieved 13 November 2019.
  3. ^ "The woman who cut off her breasts to protest a tax". BBC News. 28 July 2016. Retrieved 13 November 2019.
  4. "Nine weird taxes from around the world – Really absurd". The Economic Times. Retrieved 13 November 2019.
  5. Allen, Charles (7 August 2018). "WHO OWNS INDIA'S HISTORY? A CRITIQUE OF SHASHI THAROOR'S". Asian Affairs. 49 (3): 355–369. doi:10.1080/03068374.2018.1487685. By the start of the 19th century the ordinary people of Travancore were being required to pay as many as 100 petty taxes, ranging from head tax, hut tax, marriage tax and taxes on the tools of one's trade to taxes on the family cow, goat or dog, wearing jewellery, staging festivals, growing moustaches, and above all what became known as the breast tax, mulakkaram, by which the women of lower social groups had to expose their breasts or pay a tax. The Brahmins, naturally, paid no tax at all.
  6. Nair, Adoor K. K. Ramachandran (1986). Slavery in Kerala. Mittal Publications. p. 45. The Pooja Raja in Travancore made the Malarayans pay money at the rate of one anna, two pies (8 pies) a head monthly as soon as they were able to work, and a similar sum of presence money besides certain quotas of fruits and vegetables and feudal service....The head money was called Thalakaram in the case of males and Mulakaram (breast money) in the case of females.
  7. K.S. Manilal (15 November 2012). "Sikhism in Kerala: Forgotten Chapter in the Social History of the State". Samagra. 8: 3–4. ISSN 0973-3906. One such infamous law that was in force in Travancore until as late as the first quarter of the 20th century was known as Mulakkaram, i.e., the law of breast tax. According to this law the avarna women, were to pay tax to the government for their breasts from the very time of their girlhood, when they start developing breasts
  8. R. N. Yesudas (1980). The History of the London Missionary Society in Travancore, 1806–1908. Kerala Historical Society. p. 19. The lower classes were to pay tax for the hair they grew, and for the breasts of ladies called breast-tax.
  9. ^ Jacob Kattackal (1990). Comparative Religion. Oriental Institute of Religious Studies. p. 144. In South India, until the 19th century, the 'low caste' men had to pay the 'head tax', and the 'low caste' women had to pay a 'breast tax' ('tala-karam' and 'mula-karam') to the government treasury. The still more shameful truth is that these women were not allowed to wear upper garments in public.
  10. "Breast Tax and the Revolt of Lower Cast Women in 19th Century Travancore". 17 May 2019. Retrieved 14 November 2019.
  11. Pathak-Shelat, Manisha; Bhatia, Kiran (2021). Raising a Humanist: Conscious Parenting in an Increasingly Fragmented World. SAGE Publishing India. ISBN 978-93-5388-777-3.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link)
  12. ^ Allen, Charles (2017). Coromandel : A personal history of South India. London: Little, Brown. p. 285. ISBN 9781408705391. OCLC 1012741451.
  13. Archana Garodia Gupta (20 April 2019). The Women Who Ruled India: Leaders. Warriors. Icons. Hachette India. pp. 155–. ISBN 978-93-5195-153-7. Retrieved 13 May 2020.
  14. Keerthana Santhosh (2020). "Dress as a tool of Empowerment: The Channar Revolt" (PDF). Our Heritage Journal. 22: 533. Archived from the original (PDF) on 3 July 2020. Retrieved 15 May 2020.
  15. Renjini P and Dr. C Natarajan (2017). "Rani Gowry Lakshmi Bai: Abolition of slavery in Travancore" (PDF). International Journal of Home Science: 337.
  17. "Nangeli and the first documented 'Pati Sahagamanam'". Souhardya De. Sunday Guardian. 31 October 2020. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  18. ^ "Feeling Overtaxed? The Romans Would Tax Your Urine". History. 14 April 2016. Retrieved 15 October 2021.
  19. Keerthana Santhosh. "CONDITION OF WOMEN IN PRE-MODERN TRAVANCORE" (PDF). {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  20. Judge, Paramjit; Bal, Gurpreet (1996). Strategies of Social Change in India. MD Publications. p. 167. ISBN 9788175330061. Retrieved 11 July 2021.
  21. Robert L. Hardgrave (1969). The Nadars of Tamilnad. University of California Press. pp. 59–62. OCLC 12064.
  22. Robert L. Hardgrave, Jr. (1968). "The Breast-Cloth Controversy: Caste Consciousness and Social Change in Southern Travancore". The Indian Economic & Social History Review. 5 (2): 171–187. doi:10.1177/001946466800500205. S2CID 143287605.

Sources

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