COLONIALITY OF GENDER: REFLECTIONS ON THE GENDER REHERSALS IN COLONIAL KERALA
Dr. U.V. Shakkeela
Introduction
Gender roles are performances rehearsed continuously irrespective of societies and cultures. Roles differ, but the rehearsals repeat at regular intervals. Gender roles, thus are influx always. An attempt is made in the paper to probe into the gender roles in the context of colonialism. Colonialism, as cultural and political conquest had left a profound impact on the native societies and mooted restructuring of existing gender norms. Colonialism created its own gender norms which was basically hegemonic. The paper examines the gender relations that colonialism brought into the social institution of marriage, family and education among various castes of Kerala during colonialism and the resultant formulation of colonial gender norms. The topic is significant in the context of looking at colonialism increasingly a gendered act.
Transformation in Marital Life
The institution of marriage and the norms attached to it undergone a sea change under the British. Various kinds of conjugal life were in practice among different castes. Polygamy was in practice among the Nambutiris. Nambutiris, people belonged to the apex of caste hierarchy, usually practised two types of conjugality. The eldest male member used to marry woman from his caste and brings her to his home; the younger male members kept relationship with Nair women, obviously not through a legal wedlock like the case of the eldest Nambutiri male. The relationship of younger Nambutiri with Nair women is called Sambandham. Both men and women were free to tie and untie the cohabitation in the case of Sambandham. It was not intended to be lasting. From the context of the Nambutiri women, choice in marital life was limited. She had to wait till the choice of the eldest male member of a family accidentally falls on her. This forced woman to accept the position of second or third wife of the eldest male member. For this reason, the multitude of Nambutiri women remained single.
Nair men married from their own castes and; women either married Nair men or cohabited with Nambutiri men. Women were allowed to cohabit with more than one man at a time. Polyandry was thus a common practice. The presence of licentious Nambutiri in almost all the Nineeenth century novels in Malayalam making advances on Nair women was a mockery of once dominating position of Nambutiri men in choosing the Nair women. It also indicates that Nair women had little chances to thwart the sexual advances of dominant Nambutiri. Certainly, demand for a transformation in the marital life was first sprouted among the Nairs. The resistance came not from the Nair women; on the other hand, from Nair men who no longer ready to suffer the highhandedness of Nambutiri men in view of a shift in political balance against the later. The accession of British uprooted them from power. It reflected on the gender relations followed and accepted mode of man-woman relationship hitherto. Indeed, the coloniality of gender builds upon the coloniality of power.
The Nair women did not play an active role in the transformation. The novel Indulekha was falsely placed the agency of women in the transformation of marital structure. It testifies the observation of P.K.Balakrishnan. He observes thus- Indulekha is not the result of any transformation in the social set up of Malabar but it did initiate social transformation among the Nairs.1 The observation is better understood when one analyses the role of women in the socio-economic transformation under colonialism. The novel definitely would have influenced conceptualizing new womanhood in Kerala in the wake of modernization under the British. The novels that produced in the nineteenth century portrayed Nair women as objecting to the advances of Nambutiri men. Indulekha, Meenakshi, Parangodi, Lakshmikutti- heroines of the 19th century novels had Nambutiri men as villains. Heroes, who happened to be the fiancées of Nair women, were obviously Nair men. The novels of the nineteenth century reflected well the society and social institutions in flux instigated by colonial men for colonized male. It ultimately placed Nair women in the hands of Nair men. One good thing that Indulekha contributed to the society was that it initiated the women and men alike to stand for transformation. But the transformation was not in favour of gender equality rather it led to the ‘inferiorisation of indigenous women’ under the politics of colonialism.
Various types of man-woman relationship were in vogue among the Thiyyas, a caste placed below the Nairs in caste hierarchy. Thiyya men practised polygamy depending on his financial status. He had the freedom to marry a woman and brings her home; can be a visiting husband. All the other castes below the Thiyyas followed the kind of loose marital life. Women of the untouchable castes had enjoyed the freedom to have more than one life partner in her life time. They seemed more licentious in the coastal towns which were bustling with trading activities. Poor economic condition is attributed as the reason that prompted women to choose men of wealth as was happened in the case of cohabitation with European men. To make it clearer, women of the untouchable castes opted European men as their partners, as a means of economic stability. Temporary nature of these relationships was not a discouraging factor in entering into a family life. The sexual access in the relationship, until recently is interpreted from the patriarchal and heterosexual understanding which is Eurocentred. The example of the life of Kunhi Kurumbi, a Thiyya woman who was having relationship with three men- two British officers and one Nair- is a case in point. She was a partner of the British resident, J.C.Hannyngton(1835-1895). His career in India spanned between 1857 and 1892. He came to Malabar in 1861 and remained there for 10 years. He died in 1895 in London. Hannyngton met Kunhi Kurumbi, while he was working as Assistant, and later Magistrate at Thalassery. The relationship between the British and Thiyya women was mostly of temporary nature and usually it lasts till the British officer transferred to some other parts of India. Hannyngton had an English wife when he entered into an intimate relationship with Kurumbi. Two daughters called Martha and Devi(1864-1941) were born to her out of her relationship with Hannyngton. She took Dr. W.G. King, a British Medical officer, as her partner when Hannyngton left Tellicherry after ten years of sojourn for Trichy. Govindan King and Krishnan King were two sons born from her relationship with King. C.K. Revathi Amma also mentioned in the autobiography, Sahasrapoornima,2 her great grandmother’s marriage with a Maharashtrian businessman. There was no taboo imposed on her. The marital life of various castes in the nineteenth century was thus varied and adjusted on the socio-economic and political conditions introduced and favoured by colonialism. Anibal Quijano and Walter Mignolo looks at this metamorphism in gender relations under colonialism as the deliberate attempt of colonizers and had far reaching impact of influencing the gender relations in the postcolonial societies of the colonized. They observed thus- the coloniality of power is understood to act to dismantle ‘other knowledges’ and ways of life, and is the persistent categorical and discriminatory discourse that is reflected in the social and economic structures of modern postcolonial society.3- The life and body of Kunhi Kurumbi acts as site of hegemonic gender practices of the European colonizer but also provides clues to constructing and understanding the gender identity of indigenous non-western woman.
The British takeover of power and the subsequent engagement with the western values obviously resulted in a transformation in the concept and structure of married life of all castes. The institution of marriage among the Nairs called Sambandaham invited severe criticisms from the British. They took it as a kind of concubinage. The Malabar Marriage Act 1896 legalizing sambandham form of marriages was the result of debates sprouted among those who come into contact with the British. Mannath Padmanbhan , in his speech delivered in Tellichery in 1932 sarcastically presents the nature of marriage among Nairs thus- Any man from any part of the world when he happens to listen the news of a man weds a woman, for sure takes in that the man has a wife and the wife has a husband; but in the case of a marriage solemnized in the Nair taraward the news implies that the woman no longer have a husband and, married man has no longer having wife.4. In fact, marriage was the first social institution of the natives that was discussed and debated as part of the social discourses in the colonial period. Sir C.Sankaran Nair who belonged to the emerging professional bureaucracy took the initiative in introducing the Bill in the Madras Legislative Council and the subsequent appointment of Malabar Marriage Commission in 1891. By the discourse on Nair marriage, Nair men benefited. Nambutiri men were replaced by Nair men in the case of Nair women. As no property dealings involved in Sambandham marriage, no economical or social benefits derived to Nair women as result of the end of sambandham marriage. Sambandham was basically an institution to upkeep the economic security and gender was placed to keep the smooth functioning of the economic arrangements. No gender restructuring in view of the replacement of Nambutiri with Nair is not in air as marriage reform was not intended gender equality. Vinita Menon observes, in her studies to Indulekha thus- the educated men in elite families of the period wanted to be part of the professional bureaucracy emerged under the British in the second half of the 19th century. They felt inferior and highly critical not only in the Nair-Nambutiri relationship but also a family which is not male centered.5 The comment falls on line with Maria Lugones reading of colonization from gender perspective. She observed thus- colonialism altered the indigenous sense of self and identity, as well as understandings of cosmology and of gender relations.6
Nambutiri married life forced to change with the Malabar Marriage Act in 1896. The discontent of the younger Nambutiri men became all the more difficult to control and the reform among Nambutiries was imminent and inevitable. V.T. was not a sudden star emerged on the sky; on the other hand he spearheaded and harnessed the social transformation in consequential to colonialism to the favour of his caste. Were the sufferings of women or the discontent of the unmarried younger Nambutiries prompted the Nambutiri reformers to stand for the cause of change?! V.T’s autobiographical account depicts vividly the discontented life of the Appans among the Nambutiri community. There is nothing seemed revolutionary in the reform initiated by V.T and others in the community. Same caste marriage was replaced which gave both men and younger Nambutiri men to marry from their own castes. Widow marriage or maiden marriage- both kinds of marriages entrust the same role and condition for women. There is no gender restructuring attempted. The initiative also did not come from women. The actors of the play- Adukkalyil ninnu Arangahekke were men. The bold attempt of Kuriyedathu Tattri in 1905 did more harm to traditional gender norms than the reform work of Nambutiri men. The restructuring of gender relations was not attempted in the reformation among the Nambutiris carried on under the paternalism of V.T.Bhatthirippad. The younger Nambutiries called Appan who were denied the opportunity of a legal wedlock or put it in another way, who have the freedom of sexual licentious with more than one Nair women, have brought under the accepted form of monogamous marital life. The colonizers, by this means achieved two goals-one , the uncontrolled energy of Appan were harnessed through the institution of marriage which the British found morally right and secondly, from the point of view of the security and survival of the colonial state too, the threat from the deviated is minimized. It is to bear in mind in the context of British aversion towards native arrangement of married life that revolutionary changes were taking place in Victorian society too at the time. The British in the Victorian period insisted that marriage be based on true love and companionship. The Victorians were the first people in history to try to make marriage the pivotal experience in people’s lives and married love the principal focus of their emotions, obligations and satisfactions.7. When the chances of Appans marrying from their own caste can be taken as preferential, Nambutiri women, both widows and maiden were directed to wed Nambutiri men. Reformers did not bother the age difference of the couples who got married under the reformers’ initiative. When M.P.Batthirippad married Arya Anthrjananm at the age of 40, the wife was younger to him for 28 years. Modernity helped castes to rewind their structure and framework in the wake of colonialism rather than making any inroads into the traditional gender relations. Because colonialism was basically a gendered project where patriarchy determined the contours of modernity and the transformation it produced, did not intend a violent disruption in the male domination of the colonized.
The marriage system of untouchables was also undergone change under the western influence. Missionaries played an important role in Malabar in this transformation as they were vocal in criticizing the loose morals of the untouchables. Untouchables who were converted to Christianity were the early models of western type of married life. This is well illustrated in the novel Sukumari, written by Josph Mooliyil, the Christian convert from Thiyya community. The Victorian ideal of companionship and mutual love was eulogized by the author through the couples Sukumari and Sathyadsan. The intensification of romantic love in Britain encouraged couples to see God in their partners. In 1863, Annie Fields, an English lady wrote to her husband: thou art my church and thou my book of psalms.8 It does not differ from the nationalists’ insistence of Indian womanhood which epitomized Puranic ideals of femininity. Marriage is defined in a novel way unheard among the natives. The marriage of one of the inmates of an orphanage at Chirakkal, described in the novel Sukumari, gives the introduction and incorporation of western values into the social fabric of the colonized. The author also wanted to describe it in the novel purposefully as the missionaries looked at the sexual licentious practised by the natives scornfully. The head of the orphanage at Chirakkal , a white missionary, gave a talk the day before the marriage of the inmate Valsala. It goes as follows- ‘Wife should surrender to the dictates of God, obey and respect the husband in right things, should incur respect in her husband through her good deeds. Taking care of husband is the chief duty of a Hindu woman and Christians should not leave this custom. They should take care of each other.9 Therefore, modernity did not make any major transformation in the gender roles as under colonialism, the colonized and colonizer male negotiated women’s space in the society.
While same caste marriage was encouraged by the Nairs and Nambutiries, inter-caste marriages were encouraged by the untouchables. Men harnessed the reins of renaissance. Upper caste gender norms are applied on women discarding the caste hierarchy in kerala as elsewhere in India. Modernity necessitated bringing Deprived caste women into a common gender norm outlined by Caste men. Dalit women required to be disciplined on line with the emerging values of Renaissance. Ayyankali wanted Dalit women to have the feminine propriety and advised them to obey their husbands. This was indeed to go in line with the caste women. The upper caste morality of women was strictly imposed by Ayyankali while he was the Judge of Dalit Court at Venganoor. He gave severe punishments to sexual licenses to both men and women. Adultery was punished with conventional practices. One such incident was described by Appan Vanchiyoor, grandson of Ayyanakli, and he remembers one such punishment imposed by Ayyanakali. A woman had an affair with her brother-in-law. ‘When I came to the Court at Venganoor, I saw Ayyankali issuing the verdict in the case. The verdict decreed that the accused man had to carry the woman on his shoulder along the street. Women who had illicit relationship with men had to face humiliation. The neck of the accused is fastened by a chain of coconut shells and paraded in the street with the accompaniment of drum and other musical instruments.10 These kinds of punishments which were cruel and inhuman were given to bring Dalits to the gender norms of the dominant caste. The marital relationship among Pulayas was not strong. Bride and bridegroom can freed from marital ties ant any time they want. Ayyankali made efforts to change the loose marital relationship. He wanted to raise his community to the status enjoyed by the savarna. Therefore, he encouraged Dalits to marry the upper caste. He asked the Dalit women to keep their bed room open for the savarna men. It was endorsed by Thankamma, the daughter of Ayyanakali, in an interview. This stance did not produce much positive results as was revealed by her and one of her students accompanied her. It was an irony that modernity prompted the Nambutiries to introduce same caste marriage and the same modernity prompted the Dalits under Ayyankali for intercaste marriage. Colonialism, in many respects, mooted caste restructuring rather than modernizing gender relation. Reformers were careful to keep women of each caste within its limit and reformation in the gender roles attempted so far as it does not malign their caste status.
Gender restructuring occurred in the redefined marital life under colonialism. The imaginary and ideal intense emotional bonds between husband and wife did not help to undermine the gender hierarchy of the home. Although most men still believed they were the rightful heads of their households, they became more likely to exert their control through love and consent than by coercion.11 The observation of Coontz in the context of Victorian England can be applicable in the case of Kerala too. The mere examples of the life of the couples belonged to the category of reformers irrespective of caste can be a visible example of the gender relationship evolved under colonialism. The family life of the nationalists of the first half of the 20th century followed this pattern. K.P.Kesava Menon who married Lakshmi in 1906 reminiscences his family life with his wife thus: The role of a wife in managing the sorrows and pleasure of one’s life is immense. The peace and well being of a man depends on how wife balances pleasures and sorrows of life. A man aspires a peaceful family beyond all other pleasures in life.12 He described Lakshmi a befitting wife. She was an adept in cooking, serving, housekeeping. She never complained of scarcity of provisions at home as it might disturb her husband. Still she manages to cook delicious food with meager provisions. She showed interest in reading and kept silent if her opinion crosses with that of her husband.13
Chetante Nizhalil(1985) autobiography of Leela Damodhara Menon, the title itself is an indication of the summary of her life. Like a shadow she followed Menon. The kind of life Chandrika Balakrishnan had with her husband, revealed in her autobiography, ormayude odakzhalumai, had also reflects the same gender norms in the family. Women followed men. The families of deprived castes and their management are comparatively less discussed. The description of Chandrika of her father in her memoirs is akin to that of a Karanavar. She remembers her father with awe and respect. That is the reason why K.Balakrishnan, the fiancé of Chandrika protested the role played by her father in the family. In a letter written to Chandrika , Balakrishnan said- the father-son relationship in a modern family should be anchored on value a system wherein anything can be said in an atmosphere of love and not out of respect or awe.14 The words of K.K.Kochu about his father, testifies the dominant male in the nuclear family. He writes: “The role my father played in the family has to be condemned. He was like a despot. We did not have the right to speak loudly while he was at home. We are allowed to have our dinner after my father had his food however late he comes home. We are not allowed to sit in his chair or cot.15 Father was placed as the head of the nuclear family and he was looked at with awe and respect. One cannot say that the domination of the father in the family was a result of the transformation on modern lines. Patriarchal structure remained intact and only certain titles like karanavar and Moosa Nambutiri in the joint families have got deformation. When the joint families are replaced by nuclear families, the power of Karanavar and Moosa Nambutiri transferred to the father figure of the nuclear families with certain modifications necessary.
Nuclear family
The English educated, western trained professional group among the Deprived castes was exposed to the concept of nuclear families in the second half of the nineteenth century itself. It was quite a fashion among the western educated professional men belonged to deprived castes. Mooliyil Krishnan (1850 -1923)Tutor in Presidency College, Madras took his wife, Lakshmi, along with him to his workplace after his marriage in 1882.16 He took great care to educate his wife and appointed a teacher to improve her English. She participated in the exhibitions held at Madras at her time. Relatives and friends of Krishnan used to visit them at Madras and received their sumptuous hospitality. He built a house in Madras according to the plan prepared by his wife and the house is known Lakshmivilasam. C.K.Revathi Amma accompanied her husband when he was transferred from Mahe to Karaikkal. They preferred to stay separately from the joint family when they decided to settle permanently at Mahe. ‘We found nuclear family better to joint family after spending a few years in Karaikkal at comparative ease’- said Revathi Amma. The memoirs of Chandrika Balakrishnan provide a picture of the well to do Ezhava nuclear family which imbibed the spirit of modernity. Chandrika wrote in the preface of her memoirs that her home, her family, her father and her mother are most dear to her. ‘They bestowed me love which is beyond my thought. Though she shared love with kith and kin’s in the extended families, the core of her love centred on the nuclear family. This family centred concept is something colonial and (for that reason modern) could be traced to the general process termed coloniality of gender.
Role of women as mothers is well established in the nuclear household along with its responsibilities. Mothers were not seen as women but as human machine loaded with the upkeep of family, house, and home with permissible propriety. K.K.Kochu remembers his mother, Kunhami, who ran the family alone. She defines the responsibilities and the values to be inculcated in a girl who is supposed to take the responsibility of a nuclear family in future. ‘Girls should be confident and should keep the house and surroundings clean, should prepare food palatable and tasty.”17 She also decorated her house with furniture like cot, table chairs and bronze utensils. kunhami used to wear clean and washed clothes and keep her body clean unlike her fellow caste women.18 Kunhami like any other deprived caste woman is transforming, sometimes imitating the savarna woman and other times imbibing the spirit of western life style. Bharathi, mother of Chandrika led the family alone in the absence of her husband who was a post master in the service of the Ceylonese government. Her mother had in fact run the family. She brought up her three children including Chandrika and provided them best education available at the time. She described her mother as a strong woman and she valued education above all factors in life. Chandrika reminds gratefully choking with emotion the strong presence of her mother in her life. “Instructions of my mother are the only source of relief to me. A sense of pride is the foremost feeling come to my mind when I think of my mother – says Chandrika.19
Education
Education played a pertinent role in transforming the kerala society under colonialism. This was particularly so in the case of Deprived castes. Education and schools were considered as the features of low caste identity. The potential of education as an agent of transformation was very well recognized by the deprived castes even before the caste Hindus could embrace the possibilities given by education. It was not only an agent for the upward mobility for the deprived castes, it bestowed them the opportunity to shed off the deprivation that they suffered in the caste ridden society. The novel, Saraswativijayam (1889) written by Potheri Kunhambu strongly recommends the lower caste people for a change in the deplorable condition and projected education as the ladder for women to climb up in the society .It was considered as the sole means by which the lower castes and women could come out of the outmoded caste based feudal system in operation. Lower caste women had less reluctance in joining the schools run by the missionaries compared to upper caste. The heroines in the novels Indulekha and Sukumari represent the two modes of education of girls taking roots in Malabar. Indulekha, the Nair heroine of Chandu Menon received informal education and Sukumari,the Thiyya heroine of Joseph Mooliyil received formal schooling in a missionary school.
The early exposure of deprived caste women to education has given them opportunity to realize the benefits of it and women embraced it on a large scale by discarding the propaganda and apprehension of the public that education would lose their femininity and thereby subvert the prevailing gender norms. The novel, Sukumari, reflects the apprehension of the then society about the education of women. Satydasan, the would-be husband of Sukumari expressed his suspicion about the introduction of girls’ school and the absence of imparting religious education to girls. They would become useless- argues Satyadsan. They would not look after their husbands and go astray. Sukumari refutes the opinion of Satydasan and asserts that education would make them capable to solve the obstacles in front of them. She said that increase in knowledge would make people more humane and obedient. In fact, women’s magazines like Lakshmibai also shared the views of Satyadasan. Sukumari’s reply provides the image of a modern educated docile woman.
Chandrika Balakrishnan’s autobiography focuses mainly her life as a student. It gives an opportunity to peep into the aspirations and importance that women invested on education of daughters. The autobiography reveals the ardent desire of the deprived caste to come up in life through education. Priorities of women changed. They were brought up carefully and seemed well groomed. Education was given priority. Girls were also brought up with the purpose of achieving professional heights. In the absence of facilities like accommodation in Trivandrum, even rich families showed reluctance in sending their daughters to higher education; instead they prefer to send them for stitching or music and culinary classes and to family life. The interests and care of parents on their education was very well reflected by Chandrika throughout the memoir. She passed school final. Remembers those days thus - so first child of parents is getting ready for college. One cannot reveal their happiness and heart- felt happiness in words. My higher study was dear to them as their life.20 In fact, parents wanted their two daughters to pursue higher education and make them doctors. But they preferred marital life. Chandrika and her sister became graduates and brother became a doctor. Chandrika asserts that what else parents of her time need better than seeing their children well educated and well placed. Even in selecting bridegrooms, Ezhava parents preferred well educated boys. The most important aspect that C.V.Kunhiraman found attractive in C.Kesavan, his future son-in law was that he was brilliant in studies. C.Kesavan was the father-in-law of Chandrika. K.K.Koch reminisces that his mother had a firm decision that she would not sent her children for wage labour. She pinned her dreams on the education of her three children. She was under the impression that all her miseries would end when they enter into governmentt jobs after education.21
Chandrika did not join M.A English though she got admission. She thought that wife should not excel her husband in education. Balakrishnan, her ‘would be’ had B.A. only. The same predicament that E.K.Janaki also confronted when she pursued education beyond the limit set by the then society. What role should a woman lead if she aspires for professional heights through education is not addressed by the patriarchal society. Chandrika cut short her higher education to fallin line with in the parameters set by the society and Janaki pursued education and reached the professional heights unthinkable to the women of her age by choosing the life of a spinster. K.K.Kochu’s sister discontinued her higher studies to be with the man of her choice. Family continued as the bastion of patriarchal values though it belonged to deprived or dominant castes and feminine values are weighed in relation to the surrender and sacrifice of their selves to the male dominated family. This conflict between individual freedom and familial values, between male domination and female subordination is visible in the transformation inspired by modernity. This predicament of women was not felt or dealt as a calamity as nuclear families are increasingly looked upon as a haven or better space for the effloresce of feminine charms and freedom.
Conclusion
Reformation of gender relations under colonialism was primarily a male project. The magnitude of gender restructuring attempted under colonialism was determined by castes of the colonized and the patriarchal notions of the colonizer. The indigenous or precolonial gender relations existed ,especially among the Deprived castes, seemed giving more space to women. But the gender restructuring under colonialism completely erased those spaces and sealed them with upper caste feminine virtues which ensured marginalization and subordination of women in the gender relations. Thus postcolonial societies remained primarily patriarchal and it points out the need for a gender rehearsals in the post colonial societies of the colonized.
End Notes
2 C.K.Revathi Amma, Sahasrapoornima.Memoir. Sahasrapoornima(Mal.). Autobiography. Calicut: C.K.Revathi Amma Millennium Charitable Trust, 1977.p.65
3 A. Quijano. Coloniality and Modernity/Rationaliy, Cultural Studies.vol21,march/may 2007, 2007.pp.168-178
4 P.Bbhaskaranunni. Keralam irupatham nuttantee arambhahil.,2005. Trissur, Kerala Sahita akademi, 2005. P.192.
5 O.Chandumenon Iindulekha. Novel Pazhama series, TVPM:Chinta, 2013.p.14
6 Maria Lugones.Heterosexualism in the Colonial/Modern Gender system-Hypatia. Vol.2, 2008,p.2
7 Stephanie Coontz. Marriage, a History. How Love Conquered Marriage.Pengiun, 2005. P.178.
8 Stephani Coontz. Marriage, a History. How Love Conquered Marriage.Pengiun, 2005. P.179.
9 Joseph Mooliyil. Sukumari, Tellicherry,(1897) ed. N.Santoshkumar. Thiruvananthapuram: Chinta, 2013. p. 90-91
10 T.H.P.Chentharasseri. Ayyankali Sovaunir, Harigan international, TVM: Prabhat, 1979.p.38-39
11 Stephanie coontz. Marriage, a history. How love conquered marriage.pengiun, 2005. P.181.
12 K.P.Kesava Menon. Kazhinakalaam. Calicut:Mathrubhumi, 1957.p.30
13 Ibid
14 Chandhrika Balakrishnan, Oormakaludae odakkuzhalumayi. Reminiscences, Kottayyam,1975.p.70
15 K.K.Kochu, Dalit Nerkazhchakal. Tvm: Raivan, 2013.p.17
16 K.M. Nair.. Mooliyil Krishnan. Calicut, normprining,1971, p.28
17 K.k.kochu. Dalit Nerkazhchakal. Tvm: Raivan, 2013.p.18
18 K.k.kochu. ‘Ammyenna Nrkazhcha’. Dalit Nerkazhchakal. Tvm: Raivan, 2013.p.18
19 Chandhrika Balakrishnan, Oormakaludae odakkuzhalumayi. Reminiscences, Kottayyam,1975.p.73
20 Chandhrika Balakrishnan, Oormakaludae odakkuzhalumayi. Reminiscences, Kottayyam,1975.p.76
21 K.K.Kochu, Dalit Nerkazhchakal. Tvm: Raivan, 2013.p.15.