This is to certify that the

_ thesis entitled

A REVOLUTION OF THE COLORED RACES:

MERGING OF AFRICAN AND INDIAN THOUGHT

IN A NOVEL.
presented by

Shruti Bhawana Tewari

has been accepted towards fulﬁllment
of the requirements for

 

Mastmst—degree in English

 

\
\ My): professor

Date June 17 2002

 

0-7639 MS U is an Afﬁrmative Action/Equal Opportunity Institution

4-3"
7'4

 

 

 

LIBRARY

Michigan State

University

 

 

PLACE IN RETURN BOX to remove this checkout from your record.
To AVOID FINES return on or before date due.
MAY BE RECALLED with earlier due date if requested.

 

DATE DUE

DATE DUE

DATE DUE

 

ZEE£13IUUA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

6/01 c:ICIFIC/DareDue.p65-p.15

 

A REVOLUTION OF THE COLORED RACES: MERGING OF AFRICAN AND
INDIAN THOUGHT IN A NOVEL

By

Shruti Bhawana Tewari

A Thesis
Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulﬁllment of the requirements
for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS
Department of English

2002

ABSTRACT
A REVOLUTION OF THE COLORED RACES:
MERGING OF AFRICAN AND INDIAN
THOUGHT IN A NOVEL.
By
Shruti Bhawana Tewari

“We are - a part of a great committee of a darker peoples;”
This is what the Indian Princess of the novel Dark Princess
tells the protagonist, Michael Towns, an African American
youth, “... of those who suffer under the arrogance and
tyranny of the white world,” (p16). Dark Princess by WEB
Du Bois deals with the issues the “Darker World faces” (p
19). Using the novel as a jumping off point I intend to look
at the inﬂuences of African and Indian thought on each
other’s cultures and what binds these two together. Recent
research has shown inﬂuence of Africa in ancient India.
The fact that Du Bois decided to merge the two cultures
together is ahead of its time. Why did Du Bois use an
Indian element in his novel? May be in his exile in Ghana
he came across a lot of Indians and found their struggle
similar to that of African Americans? This thesis will

investigate that and more.

For all their love and encouragement to my parents: Asha and
Bhushan

iii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This thesis would not have been possible without the immense help and
encouragement I received from several people. Firstly, I’d like to thank
my advisor, Dr. Gregory Thomas for all the help and constant prodding.
Thank you for all the hard work you put in and for having faith in me
Greg! To Jennifer Nichols, thank you for introducing me to Du Bois and
the constant encouragement and the most valuable gift, friendship. To
Jenn Nichols, Fernando and Monica Montes and Debra Davis I would also
like to add a note of appreciation for all the “fun distractions” while I
wrote this. Thanks to my parents, for never forgetting to ask me how my
thesis was coming along. To my sisters Anvita Malhan and Mitika Tewari,
as well as my brother in law, Andy Malhan, thank you for your love and
support. Also to Mugdha Rai, my best friend, who egged me on and
encouraged me from across the world in Australia. Thanks also go to
Sharon Pillai for her constant concern and encouragement. To Abha
Shrotiya, Ajay Oka, Pranav Shrotriya and little darling Aditya Oka thank
you for being my home away from home, andfor all the emotional support.
I’d also like to thank my fellow graduate students and ﬁiends whom I
cannot name here, but who were extremely helpful. To the faculty for all
their help and support throughout my two years. Thank you to all my

students. Finally, thank you to Dr. Judith Stoddart for everything.

iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction ............................................................... 1

History of Hinduism and Connection
With Africa ............................................................... 2

Discussion of Dark Princess; Inﬂuence
Of Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr and

Malcolm X ................................................................ 9
Conclusion ................................................................ 34
Bibliography .............................................................. 36

“...Afrikans all over the world

Moving to the new way
A world of Good people is coming!
We gonna help make that world
We gonna help eliminate the negative
accentuate the positive
yellow folk brown folks and red
folks will too
they hurting "

Afrikan Revolution by Amiri Baraka1

INTRODUCTION

“We are - a part of a great committee of a
darker peoples;” This is what the Indian Princess of
the novel Dark Princess tells the protagonist,
Michael Towns, an African American youth, “. .. of
those who suffer under the arrogance and tyranny of
the white world,” (p16). Dark Princess by WEB Du
Bois deals with the issues the “Darker World faces”
(p 19). Using the novel as a jumping off point I
intend to look at the inﬂuences of African and
Indian thought on each other’s cultures and what
binds these two together in the novel.It may not
seem on the outset that the cultures have many
things in common, but with deeper probing it
becomes more explicit. To begin with, I intend to

give a brief introduction to Indian and African

 

l Amiri Baraka, The Leroi Jones/Amiri Baraka Reader

cultures, and then move onto an introduction of
Dark Princess and the movies and music I will
discuss in this paper. Recent research has shown
inﬂuence of Africa in ancient India. The fact that
Du Bois decided to merge the two cultures together
is ahead of its time. Why did Du Bois use an Indian
element in his novel? Especially since the novel was
written before Indian independence? May be in his
exile in Ghana he came across a lot of Indians and
found their struggle similar to that of African
Americans? Whatever the case, it was extremely
insightful and has opened up a whole realm of
thought for me. This essay intends to investigate
issues that are raised by the novel and will
hopefully expand into a larger project in the near
future.
HISTORY OF HINDUISM AND CONNECTION
WITH AFRICA

Surprisingly, there seems to be a signiﬁcant
similarities and links between Hinduism and Aﬁica
Churches were extremely important to the black
social movements of the late 19th century and early

20th century as both spiritual and social hubs for

their followers, in the same way, Hinduism is as
much a way of social life as it is a religion. The
caste system, is an integral part of Hindu religious
doctrine and practice. The origin of the caste
system is not known with certainty, some speculate
it came about with the arrival of the Aryans.
However, modern theorists assume that caste
system arose from racial distinctions, and
occupational differentiation.

So what is a caste and why is it signiﬁcant to
this project? I will examine what caste is ﬁrst and
then elaborate on the links between caste, race and
India and African links. In general, a caste is an
“endogamous hereditary group of families, bearing
a common name; oﬁen claiming a common descent,
as a rule professing to follow the same hereditary
calling, clinging to the same customs, especially
regarding purity, meals, and marriages, and often
further divided into smaller endogamous circles.
Moreover, tribes, guilds, or religious communities
characterized by particular customs—for example,
the Lingayats—could easily be regarded as castes.

The status of castes varies in different localities.

Although social mobility is possible, the mutual
relationship of castes is hierarchically determined:
local Brahman groups occupy the highest place, and
differences in ritual purity are the main criteria of
position in the hierarchy. Most impure are the
untouchables, shudras or, to use modern names, the
exterior or scheduled castes, which, however, have
among themselves numerous divisions, each of
which regards itself as superior to others.” (Smith
8).

The link between caste the
untouchable/shudra/harijan (all the same caste)in
particular, Africa and Africans is extremely
interesting as “the term Shudra is ﬁrst recorded
from Sanskrit texts as refening to one of the black
aboriginal tribes that the Aryans encountered. It is
the name of a black tribe that was adopted into
Sanskrit and was subsequently used to denote those
blacks that had entered the caste system as the
lowest ‘varna' or color. They were the black vama.
Initially, a distinction was drawn between Shudra
and Adivasi (aboriginal blacks outside the caste

system). However, in Prakrits the distinction was

blurred, and Shudra was used for any aboriginal.
During the Islamic Califate of Hindustan, Arabic
became a sacred language, and in Arabic ‘sudd'
means black (hence the ‘bilad as-Sudan' or the
Sudan of Africa), and hence Sudra was used for any
black, even the blacks imported from Africa.”2
Until the adoption of the new constitutions in
independent India and Pakistan, the untouchables
were subjected to many social restrictions, which
increased in severity from north to south in India.
This relates to the racialized situation in the United
States.

VT Rajshekar, in his book Dalit: The Black
Untouchables of India, states that he will offer an
“expose of the historical roots of Nazi racism in the
ideology elaborated by the Aryan conquerors of the
original black population of the once ﬂourishing
Indus Valley civilization, a conquest that marked
the introduction of Brahmincal Hinduism and the
caste system” (Rajshekar 2). This can be equated to
the White European’s invasion of Aﬁica and

starting the slave trade. Rajshekar proves this point

 

2 http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Ithaca/l 335/Anthro/sud_afr.html

as he notes, “The original black peoples of the Indus
valley came to be deﬁned in terms of their
conquerors-as Untouchables-in much the same way
as African-Americans were deﬁned in American
history books as slaves rather than captured
Africans, obliterating their identity” (Raj shekar 4).

The Dalit, Shudra, or Untouchable who
were the original inhabitants of India resembled
Africans in physical features, “It is said that India
and Africa were one land mass until separated by
the ocean. So both the Africans and the Indian
Untouchables and tribals had common ancestors.”
(Raj shekar 43)

Many observers today say the Civil Rights
movement is over and the blacks won. Certainly,
signiﬁcant progress has been made legislatively and
socially, but the sad fact remains the racism
continues to plague the American consciousness.
Likewise, the Indian constitution today formally
recognizes the plight of the untouchables, besides
banning untouchability, the constitution also
provides these groups with speciﬁc educational and

vocational privileges and grants them special

representation in the Indian parliament.

In his book, Introduction to the Study of
African Classical Civilizations, Runooko Rashidi,
in the Chapter “African Presence in Asia,” states
Dr. Cheikh Anta Diop’s conception of the ‘Zone of
Conﬂuence.’ ‘The Zone of Conﬂuence’ is the
middle ground between the Southern or Black
cradle and the Northern or White Cradle. The
inﬂuence of Africa on Asia is hardly studied and
Diop states that it covers more than 90,000 years. “
As the ﬁrst known hominids and modern human
populations as simple hunters and gatherers and
primitive agriculturalists, as heroic warriors and
premier civilizers, as sages and priests, poets and
prophets, and even as servants and slaves the Black
people have known Asia intimately from the very
beginning.” Rashidi goes on to add about the Blacks
in Asia, “ Who these Blacks are, and what they have
done and are now doing are profound questions that
beg and demand answers. These answers which we
must diligently seek to supply, are not designed
merely to satisfy the intellectual curiosity of an elite

group, but to further the vision of Pan-Africanism

and reunite a family that has been separated for too
long.” (Rashidi 89). This is Rashidi’s view in1992.
Was Du Bois a precursor of all of this? Was he
ahead of his time in uniting the long lost family of
Indians and Africans? WEB Du Bois does state in
The World and Africa that “ﬁrst a prehistoric
substratum of Negrillos; then the pre Dravidian, a
taller, larger type of Negro; then the Dravidians,
Negroes with some mixture of Mongloid and later
of Caucasian stocks. The Dravidian Negroes laid
the basis of Indian culture thousand of years before
the Christian era” (p176). Wayne B.Chandler in
African Presence in Early Asia feels that “Du Bois
is correct of course in his identiﬁcation of the
Harappans as Black; however, the Harrappans
represented a meshing of the Ethiopian Negrito and
the Proto-Australoid solely.”(p86) It then becomes
obvious that Du Bois was aware of this thinking and
was therefore spanning his Pan-Africanism. The
link between African Americans, Indian
Dalits/Shudras/Untouchables is similar in the way
they are viewed by the “majority” in their social

system, and both groups share an obvious link with

Africa.

DISCUSSION OF DARK PRINCESS;
INFLUENCE OF GANDHI. MARTIN LUTHER
KING JR AND MALCOLM X

According to Claudia Tate, Du Bois relied
on his knowledge and background in other cultures
and religions to provide the framework presented in
Dark Princess, which also served as a vehicle to
explore his own personal desires. Unfortunately,
historical accuracy tends to take a backseat to
personal ﬂights of fantasy in this book. Pointing to
his strong ego and respect for historical accuracy,
Tate says that, “Although Du Bois saw himself as a
modern man, indeed a man of scientiﬁc reason, he
was for the most of his life a romantic who linked
his revolutionary doctrine to his belief in
providential history and thereby transformed social
data into eroticized cultural metaphors. But, unlike
most of his contemporaries, this modern Victorian
was not afraid to reveal -- albeit in abstract,
idealized, and novelistic forms -- his deepest and
most personal desires in his writings” (xxvi).

Certainly, the book is tame by contemporary

standards, but the narrative is sluggish and
contrived, and Du Bois met with limited success
and some criticism as a result of writing Dark
Princess. Nevertheless, today, Du Bois’ fans are
legion and they are practically effusive about
anything he wrote.

In her introduction, Claudia Tate says that
Du Bois may have had Dark Princess in mind when
he insisted on the right of “black folk to love and
enjoy” in “The Criteria of Negro Art.” “For in this
novel Du Bois not only promoted racial propaganda
by countering the ideology of white supremacy with
black exceptionalism; he also dared to portray
lavishly, indeed wholeheartedly embrace beauty,
reﬁnement, and sensuality in the novel and, thereby,
reject the stereotypes of unsightliness, coarseness,
and wanton sexuality routinely associated with
black people” (xx). In this regard, Tate says, “the
plot of Dark Princess is rather fantastic. Parts I and
II -- ‘The Exile’ and ‘The Pullman Porter’ --
emphatically rely on romantic conventions to plot
racial frustration by mapping it onto the story of

courtly love . . .. No longer believing in the ethic of

10

hard work, Matthew becomes an exile in Berlin.
Here, he deﬂects a racist insult from injuring a
beautiful woman of color, Princess Kautilya of
India. She is the head of an international team of
people of color who are forming an organization to
resist Western imperialism” (xxi-xxii).

Upon his return to America, Matthew meets
the fanatical leader, Perigua; becomes a Pullman
porter; and, with Perigua, “plans a strike of the
Pullman porters which does not come off. But later,
when a fellow-worker, innocent of the charge of
insulting the mistress of a Klansman, is lynched,
Matthew and Perigua plan to avenge his death by
wrecking a train carrying Klan delegates. However,
Towns learns that the Princess is on the train -- and
hundreds of white lives are saved; however, Towns
refuses to tell all he knows of the plot to wreck the
train and is sent to Joliet prison.” (Race
Discrimination 5)

Sara Andrews, a secretary, who enjoys wide
political inﬂuence in Chicago, manages to get
Towns a pardon. Our protagonist and Sara marry

and he becomes a member of the State Legislature.

ll

“Through graft Sara becomes rich and ambitious.
She gives an exclusive little party, including several
prominent whites, to launch Matthew for Congress.
However, the Princess of Bwodpur, who has been
working as a servant and a factory girl "to see it for
herself," suddenly appears and spirits Towns away.”
(Race Discrimination, 5-6)

According to the 1928 review, “When the
Princess leaves him he goes back to manual labor
and Sara secures a divorce. The princess has an
ideal of justice to the dark races (although she
remains untouched by her own ‘untouchables’)”--
and she loves Matthew, so she decides to renounce
her right to become a ruling monarch, "one whose
jewels and motor cars, gowns and servants, palaces
and Durbars would make a whole world babble."
She, who had been presented at the Court of St.
James's, who would not "stoop to English
strawberry leaves," goes to the home of Matthew's
old mother in Virginia to await the birth of
Matthew's child, the next Maharajah of Bwodpur.
After the future monarch is born Matthew marries

the Princess. So it all turns out better for Matthew

12

Towns than if he had become a doctor (“Race
Discrimination” 5-6).

Finally, the criticism focused on the
contrived marriage of whimsy and fact (“The book
is well written, but there is enough material in it for
several novels, and the plot is ﬂamboyant and
unconvincing”), but zeroed in on what appeared to
be the biggest problem of all with the book.
According to the reviewer, it was the theme of

‘6

miscegenation which was . so decidedly
controversial that to those who believe in the
preservation of racial purity the book will fail to
lessen their prejudice” (Race Discrimination, 7).
Interestingly, from a politically correct point of
view, the effort to appear balanced in their
assessment only leads to examples of what DuBois
was saying all along about life in America: there
was a legitimized form of popular thought about
black people in America, characterized by a “wink-
wink, nudge-nudge” quality which celebrated
blacks who were a “credit to their race” and who

could meet the high standards required for

admission into mainstream society.

13

Like the caste system of India, this social
framework only serves to heighten the differences
between the “haves” and the “have nots,” and
history has shown that those with power, prestige,
and money are generally unwilling to give them up
willingly. The 1928 reviewer concedes that, “There
is, however, real meat in Dark Princess, and such
proof of the author's power that it seems a pity he is
not using his talent to show the natural ability of the
colored man or the nobility of his character, as in
‘Porgy,’ rather than to dwell, over sensitively, on
social injustices which are inevitable in any period
of racial transition and development -- of white or
black” (“Race Discrimination” 6).

Tate says that while Du Bois believed that
this novel was an “inspiring work of race
propaganda, ‘a romance with a message’ about ‘the
difﬁculties and realities of race prejudice’ on
‘ambitious self-seekers of all races,’ most of his
black contemporaries were not impressed. While
Dark Princess realistically depicted the frustrations
that ambitious black people faced as a consequence

of racial prejudice and the corruption of urban

l4

politics, the novel’s fantastic plot, its spectacular
messianic ﬁnale (reminiscent of the Magi’s
adoration of the Christ child), unrestrained
sensuality as well as explicit sexuality overwhelmed
most of Du Bois’ ﬁrst readers” (xxiii).

The author’s reliance on Indian philosophy
to provide a vehicle for his personal ideas about
human sexuality makes for some interesting
comparisons. The similarities reveal that, even
when philosophers in India and the West were
struggling with the same problems and sometimes
even suggesting similar theories, some Indian
thinkers, like their black counterparts in America,
were creating their own novel formulations and
argumentations.

“Problems that the Indian philosophers
raised for consideration, but that their Western
counterparts never did, include such matters as the
origin (utpatti) and apprehension (jﬁapti) of truth
(pramanya) (West 5). However, the research shows
that many of the people of India were experiencing
the same types of oppression and discrimination

which blacks in America were being subjected to at

15

the turn of the 20th century. Du Bois’ description
of race as a socially constructed category melds
very well with the extensive caste system in India.

Problems that the Indian philosophers for
the most part ignored but that helped shape Western
philosophy include the question of whether
knowledge arises from experience or from reason
and distinctions such as those between analytic and
synthetic judgments or between contingent and
necessary truths. Indian thought, therefore, provides
the historian of Western philosophy with a point of
view that may supplement that gained from Western
thought”

An examination of Indian thought, then,
may “reveal certain inadequacies of Western
philosophical thought. It may also make clear that
some concepts and distinctions may not be as
inevitable as they may otherwise appear.” Du Bois
attempts to acknowledge these distinctions in “The
Maharajah of Bwodpur,” but the narrative tends to
the ﬂowery extremes of historical accuracy, and it
makes the going slow. For example: “The world is

a great ripe cherry, gory, rotten -- it must be plucked

16

lest it fall and smash” (262) and “We will build a
world, Matthew, you and I, where the Hungry shall
be fed, and only the Lazy shall be empty. Oh, I am
mad, mad, Matthew, this day when the golden earth
bows and falls into the death of Winter toward the
resurrection of Spring!” (283). And, “It is unheard
of that a Maharanee without a Maharajah should
rule in Bwodpur [and] all is not well in Bwodpur;
even the throes of revolution threaten: Moslem and
Hindu are at odds; Buddhist and Christian quarrel.
Bwodpur needs me, Matthew, but she needs more
than me: she needs a Maharajah” (262).

Du Bois is clearly exploring some personal
fantasies, which, according to all accounts, are
based on his unsatisﬁed, puritan libido rather than
his political agenda. “And you must go. Bwodpur -
- the darker peoples of the world call you. .
Kautilya, darling, then I will come -- of course I
will come. I will do anything to make the broad
straight path of your duty easier to enter. Only one
thing I will not do, neither for Wealth nor Power
nor Love; and that is to turn your feet from this

broad and terrible way. And so to bid you

17

Godspeed -- to greet you with farewell and to hold
you on my heart once more ere I give you up to God
-- I come, Kautilya.” “Oh, Matthew -- my beautiful
One -- my Man -- come -- come! -- and at sunrise.”
“I am coming” (302).

“While it is difﬁcult to say that one view or
another can be said to represent either the entire
“black” or “Indian” philosophies, there are
sufﬁcient commonalties among the mainstream
views to allow us to draw some conclusions. On
the one hand, the various Indian philosophies
contain such a diversity of views, theories, and
systems that it is almost impossible to single out
characteristics that are common to all of them.
Acceptance of the authority of the Vedas
characterizes all the orthodox (astika) systems, but
not the unorthodox (nastika) systems, such as
Carvaka (radical materialism), Buddhism, and
Jainism (Smith 5). Three basic concepts form the
cornerstone of Indian philosophical thought: the
self, or soul (atman), works (karma, or karrnan), and
salvation (moksa).” West goes on to say that aside

from the Carvakas,” all Indian philosophies concern

l8

themselves with these three concepts and their
interrelations, though this is not to say that they
accept the objective validity of these concepts in
exactly the same way. Of these three however, the
concept of karma (signifying moral efﬁcacy of
human actions), seems to be the most typically
“Indian.” The concept of atman, not altogether
absent in Western thought, corresponds, in a certain
sense, to the Western concept of a transcendental or
absolute spirit self—important differences
notwithstanding. The concept of moksa as the
concept of the highest ideal has likewise been one
of the concerns of Western thought, especially
during the Christian Era, though it probably has
never been as important as for the Hindu mind.”
West adds that most Indian philosophies assume

6

that moksa is possible, and the ‘impossibility of
moksa” (aninnoksa) is regarded as a material
fallacy likely to vitiate a philosophical theory.

“In addition to karma, the lack of two other
concerns further differentiates Indian philosophical

thought from Western thought in general. Since the

time of the Greeks, Western thought has been

19

concerned with mathematics, and, in the Christian
Era, with history. Neither mathematics nor history
has ever raised philosophical problems for the
Indian. In the lists of prama nas, or ways of
knowing accepted by the different schools, there is
none that includes mathematical knowledge or
historical knowledge. Possibly connected with their
indifference toward mathematics is the signiﬁcant
fact that Indian philosophers have not developed
formal logic. The theory of the syllogism (a valid
deductive argument having two premises and a
conclusion) is, however, developed, and much
sophistication has been achieved in logical theory.
Indian logic offers an instructive example of a logic
of cognitions (jﬁanani) rather than of abstract
propositions—a logic not sundered and kept
isolated from psychology and the true nature of
knowledge, because it is meant to be the logic of
man's actual striving to know what is true of the
world”(West 5).

W. E. B. Du Bois, as a spokesman for the

,,

“Harlem literati, and, by 1928, a spokesman for

black people in America, was in an inﬂuential

20

position to advance the causes for which the
NAACP was embracing, but some observers note
that this book, at least, probably represented an
extension of Du Bois’ not-insigniﬁcant ego and
personal fantasies than a realistic appraisal of the
real problems facing blacks in America at the
beginning of the 20th century. In its review of Dark
Princess from 1928, the New York Times says that,
“Dr. Dubois, the author of ‘Darkwater,’ again
brings forth another book about his race in the story
of Matthew Towns, a young negro. Matthew is
studying to become a physician, and, after taking
honors at the University of Manhattan, ﬁnds himself
unable to register for obstetrics because of racial
discrimination” (1-2). The review says that Du
Bois presented a protagonist who left America
feeling the country had become “. . . impossible —-
unthinkable” and set sails for Europe. In the Berlin
café, Du Bois uses the meeting of Town with
Princess Kautilya of Bwodpur, to provide the
framework by which the reader is provided Du
Bois’ personal worldview, one which believes in the

superiority of the “darker races of the world.” The

21

princess gives Towns a letter to deliver in America
to an alleged leader of an organization having as its
purpose “. . . a widespread and carefully planned
uprising of American blacks” (“Race
Discrimination” 4).

The relations between Hindus and Christians
have always been complicated, but the problems
shared by “peoples of color” around the world
managed to cut across cultural and geographic
borders, thanks in large part to people like Du Bois
and his colleagues. According to one theologian,
“many Hindus are ready to accept the ethical
teachings of the Gospels, particularly the Sermon on
the Mount (whose inﬂuence on Gandhi is well-
known) but reject the theological superstructure.
Many adherents of bhakti movements (the Christian
inﬂuence on which has been grossly exaggerated)
feel that the Christian conceptions, which are
regarded as a kind of bhakti, do not realize in God
the multiplicity of human relations of love and
service.”

The theologian goes on to add “educated

Hindus, though assimilating some Christian ideas,

22

often regard missionary propaganda as an attack on
their national genius and time-honored institutions
and take offense at what they regard as the
disrespectful utterances of Christian missionary
literature. Further, they are averse to the
organization, the reliance on authorities, and the
exclusiveness of Islam and Christianity, considering
them to be only obstacles to harmonious
cooperation.” According to Smith, they subscribe to
“Gandhi's opinion that missionaries should conﬁne
their activities to humanitarian service. In fact,
since independence, many inﬂuential Indians, who
often also ﬁnd in Hinduism what might be attractive
in Christianity, have viewed conversion with
signiﬁcant disfavor. Movements that advocate a
Hindu theism, then, which are designed to rival
Islam and Christianity, like the Arya Samaj, make
serious efforts to reconvert Christians to the Hindu
community. Nonetheless, people seem to tolerate
the proximity of Christian converts, even if they
transgress Hindu taboos, provided they form a more
or less separate community. In this regard,

Christians also often form castes or endogamous

23

bodies, which are analogous to castes. Indeed, they
are sometimes are admitted to temples forbidden to
Hindu untouchables. In Malabar, for example, due
to their high economic position, Christians came to
be practically equal with Brahmans. Today,
nationalism has challenged the more serious-
minded Indian Christians to express the genius of
their faith in Indian modes and pattems. This has
led, since 1921, to the emergence of Christian
ashrams in the south” (Smith 7-8).

The inﬂuence of Du Bois’ focus on the
plight of the downtrodden and oppressed of India
had a signiﬁcant impact on succeeding generations
of black activists in America and has provided a
source of inspiration for the leaders of both faiths
which were to follow. For example, in “The
Reconciliation Sutras of Two Twentieth-Century
Doctors of Nonviolence: Mahatma K. Gandhi and
Martin Luther King Jr.,” Purushottama Bilimoria
advises that, “Little did the well-attired, English-
trained lawyer, fresh from India and thrown off the
train at the Pietennaritzburg railway station in Natal

Province (South Africa) in 1893, realize that his

24

6

chance encounter the next day with an an
American Negro who happened to be there’ would
have long reverberations across two continents. But
the generosity shown by a powerless black
American, in a land where he enjoyed no privileges
or rights of his ancestors, to an equally
disenfranchised and palpably shaken Indian
immigrant, would remain in the back of Gandhi's
ever-alert mind” (Bilimoria 1). This author says
that as “Gandhi learned more about the
dispossessed and marginalized, he saw that those
supposedly free people had other types of
constraints to their freedom as well.”

According to Bilimoria, “While the
successful young advocate (Gandhi)went on to ﬁght
for the labor and residence rights of Indians, the
image of the African American who helped him
ﬁnd lodging in the otherwise whites-only town
followed him. He sometimes encountered black
Africans as inmates in the jails he would be thrown
into for his civil agitations on behalf of the Asian

and colored workers in white South Africa”

(Bilimoria 4). It was this burgeoning “. . . critic of

25

imperialism [who] recognized distinctive processes
in the continuing enslavement of people of color
across the globe” (Bilimoria 5). Gandhi never lost
sight of the plight of the descendants of the former
slaves and colored people in America, while also
acknowledging the more enlightened principles of
the US. Constitution and of leaders such as
Thoreau, Jefferson, Lincoln, and John Dewey
(Bilimoria. 2).

Bilimoria beautifully adds that “in the deep
south of sub-Saharan Africa, Gandhi drew world
attention in 1907 as he led the ﬁrst-ever successﬁil
satyagraha, or active resistance based on non-
violent principles. This movement would gradually
sweep across the rest of the world, beginning with
its adoption for the nationalist freedom struggle in
India under Gandhi's own leadership. As a result, it
also managed to motivate the black-led Civil Rights
campaign in the United States and culminated only
at the end of the 20th century with South Africa's
own emancipation from apartheid.” Bilimoria also
notes that “Gandhi frequently made a point of

inquiring with “deep empathy” concerning the

26

struggles and challenges facing the "Negroes" in
America. Gandhi felt blacks in America suffered
the same honid social stigma as did the
"untouchables" at the lowest rungs of India's caste
system. Further, Gandhi maintained high
aspirations for the spirit of the American "Negroes"
to be able to overcome the obstructing social and
political barriers, which in some ways were less
traditionally or irredeemably textured than in India's
own weighty past. Du Bois connected with the
plight of the Indian and Gandhi connected with the
challenges facing blacks in America. Like the Civil
Rights movement in America, progress in India also
required a lengthy period of time. Racism and
discrimination were fought through the “
convergent ingenuity of itinerant Indian freedom
ﬁghters and preacher-advocates of a home-grown
peaceful voice against the proscription of ‘Negroes,
Jews, and women’ from mainstream American life.
Inspired by the ideas of Ruskin, Emerson, and
Thoreau, Gandhi's radical journals from the humble

printing press in Phoenix Settlement outside Durban

reached America, usually through contacts in

27

Britain and Europe. African Americans began to
attend conferences in England and Paris on Pan-
African and Colored Peoples Congresses, where
followers of Gandhi articulated the rationale of the
common plight of ‘brown and black races’”
(Bilimoria 4). In this regard, among the participants
from the United States was our own W. E. B. Du
Bois, whose acquaintance (and that of the other
ﬂamboyant all-African leader, Marcus Garvey) with
expatriate Indian nationalists led to a steady stream
of them on conference and lecture tours of America
(usually to New York and subsequently to the
American South) (Bilimoria 5).

John Haymes Holmes likened Gandhi to a
“Social Jesus” who was ﬁghting for the wretched
and oppressed peoples of the earth. The idea of the
wretched is well known from Fanon’s The
Wretched of the Earth, he states in the book: "The
well-being and the progress of Europe have been
built up on the sweat and the dead bodies of
Negroes, Arabs, Indians and the yellow races. We
have decided not to overlook this any longer."

(Fanon, 96)

28

Du Bois had characterized the nature of oppression
and racist climates of supremacist systems in India
and America as being fundamentally similar. Du
Bois also emphasized that the nonviolent resistance
tactics used by Gandhi were highly effective in
calling attention to the downtrodden of India, and
that “ . . . there is today in the world but one living
maker of miracles, and that is Mahatma Gandhi. He
stops eating, and three hundred million Indians,
together with the British Empire, hold their breath
until they can talk together; yet all that America
sees in Gandhi is a joke, but the real joke is
America." (Bilimoria 6)

“Each major step in Gandhi's struggle-~his
imprisonment, virtual impeachment for sedition,
jubilant court-case speeches, fasting, successful
satyagrahas such as the Salt March--and his
personal messages to "The Negroes of America,"
were noted in the leading black papers, magazines,
and independent church newsletters. In particular,
the noted NAACP journal Crisis (subtitled "A
Record of Darker Races" and stamped with seven

Hindu swastikas), edited since 1910 by Du Bois,

29

along with (Garvey's) the Negro World, Atlanta
Daily World, Chicago Defender, Christian Century,
and others, stepped up coverage of Gandhi in 19208
and 19305. Articles featured the increasing trafﬁc
between Gandhi's India and the American South,
beginning with the ﬁrst African-American
delegation to meet Mohandas Gandhi in 1936 (led
by Howard Thurman). Gandhi's moving interview
with Sue Bailey Thurman is reported in Thurman's
monograph "Head and Heart," alongside a rare
photograph of a Gandhi, now deep in India's crisis,
with Sue Bailey (the original of which is in Emory's
Special Collections). In 1947, Bilimoria says that
black America joined in the celebrations of India's
hard-eamed Independence with a delegation, which
was headed by Mordecai Johnson (of Howard) and
Benjamin Mays (of Morehouse).” (Bilimoria. 4-5).
“In Martin Luther King Jr., (black) America
found the matured spirit of an indigenous Mahatma,
prepared to lay down his life for an all-out struggle
against the continuing oppression of its
"untouchables." The on-going process of

reconciling nonviolence with violence-prone

30

authorities and racist institutions, however, was a
long time in the making in racialized America, as in
colonial Africa and British India. This is how the
fervently productive and politically signiﬁcant
threads were woven between the Indian freedom
movement with its transnational advocates and a
ﬂedgling African-American liberatory
consciousness, beginning with Pan-Aﬁican
advocates like Du Bois and Garvey, and continuing
well into the post-World War years, through to
Indian Independence and the civil rights movement

in the South.” (Bilimoria 7).

Religion is very signiﬁcant in Dark
Princess. To begin with the Princess is called
Kautilya, and her son is named, ChandraGupta,
these were actual characters that existed in Indian
History. “Kautilya (more popularly known as
Chanakya), was a Brahmin minister under
Chandragupta Maurya. Kautilya wrote a treatsie
called Arthashastra, a book, written in Sanskrit,
which discusses theories and principles of
governing a state. The title, Arthashastra, which

means "the Science of Material Gain" or "Science

31

of Polity", does not leave any doubts about its ends.
According to Kautilya, the ruler should use any
means to attain his goal and his actions required no
moral sanction. The only problems discussed are of
the most practical kind. Though the kings were
allowed a free rein, the citizens were subject to a
rigid set of rules. Arthashastra remains unique in all
of Indian literature because of its total absence of
specious reasoning, or its unabashed advocacy of
realpolitik, and scholars continued to study it for its
clear-cut arguments and formal prose till the twelfth
century. Espionage and the liberal use of
provocative agents is recommended on a large
scale. Murder and false accusations were to be used
by a king's secret agents without any thoughts to
morals or ethics. There are chapters for kings to
help them keep in check the premature ambitions of
their sons, and likewise chapters intended to help
princes to thwart their fathers' domineering
authority. However, Kautilya ruefully admits that it
is just as difﬁcult to detect an ofﬁcial's dishonesty,
as it is to discover how much water the swimming

ﬁsh drinks. Kautilya helped the young

32

Chandragupta Maurya, who was a Vaishya, to
ascend to the Nanda throne in 321 BC. Kautilya's
counsel is particularly remarkable because the
young Maurya's supporters were not as well armed
as the Nandas. Kautilya continued to help
Chandragupta Maurya in his campaigns and his
inﬂuence was crucial in consolidating the great
Mauryan Empire. Political theorists have often

likened him to Machiavelli”.3

W.E.B. Du Bois said, on the launch of his
groundbreaking 1903 treatise The Souls of Black
Folk, “the problem of the Twentieth Century is the
problem of the color-line”—a prescient statement.
Setting out to show to the reader “the strange
meaning of being black here in the dawning of the
Twentieth Century,” Du Bois explains the meaning
of the emancipation, and its effect, and his views on
the role of the leaders of his race. The theme of
religion is very signiﬁcant by the end of the novel,
after Kautilya’s and Michael’s son, Chandragupta is
born there is a series of invocations of various

Gods-Christian, Hindu, Islam. The child is viewed

 

3 http://www.sscnet.ucla.edL1/sout111asia/Historv/Anciexit/Kautilyahtml

33

as a savior and is called, “Messenger and Messiah
to all the Darker Worlds.” The Messiah” is a child
from a union of Black and Indian, and is the

messenger to all the Darker Worlds.

CONCLUSION

Throughout this study there was an
emphasis on creation, including the actual
conception of a child, promoting a new generation,
which cannot ﬁt easily into any category, save that
of “non-white.” These two cultures and people, the
Africans and Indians around the world, share a
common history, a past ﬁlled with oppression, and
they also share the concept of rebellion. In addition,
the proposal of unifying these two peoples takes
place throughout many time periods and countries.
DuBois’ suggestion of a “Congress of Colored
People,” seems plausible. In reality, the new
generation of these people, will be the “Messiah” or
the “Messenger,” and colored people every where
will have a platform to stand together in unity, and
do not have to “suffer under the arrogance and

tyranny of the white world” any longer. The music

34

that unites the people of the “Darker World” will
soon have children that will inhabit this place and
that hopefully will make living on Earth a whole

different ball game.

35

Bibliography

Bilimoria, Purushottama. (August 1999) “The
Reconciliation Sutras of Two Twentieth-Century
Doctors of Nonviolence: Mahatma K.
Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.” Emory Univ.
December 26, 2001. [Online]. Available:
http://www.emory.edu/ACAD_EXCHANGE/
2001/decjan/bilimoria.html.

Eds. David Dabydeen and Brinsley Samaroo (1996)

Across the Dark Waters: Ethniciy and Indian

 

Identity in the Caribbean London, UK: Macmillan
Caribbean

“Dark Princess : A Romance.” (2001) The Book
News, Portland, Oregon. December 26, 2001.

Du Bois, W. E. B. (1995) Dark Princess. Intro.
Claudia Tate. Jackson: Univ. Press of Mississippi
Fanon Frantz (1963) The Wretched of the Earth
New York : Grove Press

Franklin, John Hope & Moss, Afred A. Jr. (1994)
From Slavery to Freedom: A History of Aﬁican

Americans. 7th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill

36

Harrison, Mark (1999) Climates and Constitutions
New Delhi: Oxford University Press
Hampton, Thomas. (2001) “William Edward
Burghardt Du Bois (1868-1963).” I Hear America
m December 25, 2001. [Online]. Available:
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/ihas/icon/ dubois.html.
Heuman, Gad J. (1981) Between Black and White
Race Politics and the Free Coloreds in Jamﬂa
1792-1865 Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood
Press Ed. I.T.K. Egonu (1988) Readings in African
Humanities: Aﬁican Perspectives in World Culture
Nigeria: Vivians and Vivians Foundation
Eds. Ivan Van Sertima and Runoko Rashidi (1998)
Aﬁican Presence in Early Asia. New Brunswick
(USA) and Oxford (UK): Transaction Books
Kosambu, DD. (1965) The Culture and Civilization
of Ancient India in Historical Outline London:
Routledge and Kegan Paul
“Marcus Garvey and W. E. B. Du Bois.” (2000)
Rites of Passage. December 25, 2001.

[Online]. Available:

http://www.ritesofpassageorg/g-duboishtm.

McGill, Ralph. (November 1965) “W. E. B. Du

37

Bois.” The Atlantic Monthly. [EBSCO host].
Morris, Aldon D. (1984) The Origins of the Civil
Rights Movement: Black ommunities Or anizin
for Change. New York: The Free Press.
Paik, Irvin, (1976) “A Look at the Caricatures of the
Asian as Sketched by American movies,”
Counterpoint: Perspectives on Asian Amerm,
The Regeants of the University of California,
“Race Discrimination.” (May 13, 1928) The New
York Times. December 26, 2001. [Online].
Available:

http://partners.nﬂimescom/books/OO/ 1 HOS/specials
/dubois-dark.html.
Rajshekar, VT. (1987) mlit: The BlaLk
Untouchables of India Atlanta GA: Clarity Press
Rashidi, Runoko (1992) Introduction to the Study of
Africa Classical Cithions London: Kamak
House

Rodney, Walter (1990) Walter Rodney
M Institute of the Black World. Trenton, NJ:
Africa World Press
Rudwick, Elliot. (2001) “Du Bois, W(illiam)

E(dward) B(urghardt).” [CD-ROM].

38

Encyclopedia Britannica 2001 Deluxe Ed.

Smith, Brian K. (2001) “The place of Hinduism in
world religions.” [EBSCO host].
“Talented Tenth” (2001) [CD-ROM] Enclyclopedia
Britannica 2001 Deluxe Ed
Thapar, Romila (1996) A History of India. vol I
England :Penguin
Wager, Jennifer. (1994) “W.E.B. Du Bois:
Freedom Fighter.” W. E. B. Du Bois Virtual
University. [Online]. Available:
http://members.tripod.com/~DuBois/jenn.html.
West, A. (2001). “Indian Philosophy.” [CD-
ROM]. Encyclopedia Britannica 2001 Deluxe Ed.

Ed. William J. Harris. Baraka, Amiri. (2000)
The LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka Reader.

New York: Thunder's Mouth Press

39

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

iiii:iiiiiililliyijiii