Caste and Race in India c5.12.1

c5.12.1

(j) breaches of the customs of the trade peculiar to the caste; (k) encroaching on another's clientèle, and raising or lowering prices; (l) killing a cow or any other forbidden animal; (m) insulting a Brahmin; (n) defying the customs of the caste regarding feasts, etc., during marriage and other ceremonies.¹ It will be seen from this list that some of the offences tried by the governing bodies of castes were such as are usually dealt with by the State in its judicial capacity. Thus, a caste was a group with a separate arrangement for meting out justice to its members apart from that of the community as a whole, within which the caste was included as only one of the groups. Hence the members of a caste ceased to be members of the community as a whole, as far as that part of their morals which is regulated by law was concerned.² This quasi-sovereignty of the caste is particularly brought to notice by the fact that the caste council was prepared to re-try criminal offences decided by the courts of law.³ This means that in this caste-bound society the amount of community-feeling must have been restricted, and that the citizens owed moral allegiance to their castes first, rather than to the community as a whole. By segmental division we wish to connote this aspect of the system. The punishments that these councils awarded were: (1) Out-casting, either temporary or permanent; (2) fines; (3) feasts to be given to the castemen;