Pune scientist's complaint against cook for 'posing' as Brahmin exposes caste rift

A police complaint by a Indian Meteorological Department scientist against her house help claiming that she was falsely claimed to be a Brahmin has once again deepened the divide between the Brahmin and the Maratha community.

On Thursday, Megha Khole a former Deputy Director of (Weather Forecasting) at the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) Pune on Thursday approached the Sinhagadroad police station with a peculiar complaint. According to Khole (Brahmin) her househelp had wrongly claimed that she was a Brahmin and worked in her home fraudulently for a year.

Khole claimed that Nirmala Yadav a Maratha had wrongly claimed that she was a Brahmin to work in her home during auspicious occasions like Ganesh Chaturthi and for observing Shradh for her parents.

The Sinhagad road police in Pune have filed a case of impersonation and section 352 for assault or use of criminal force and section 504 for insulting a person with an intent to provoke breach of peace.

The police complaint filed by Khole has become viral in the net and has deepened the divide between the Maratha community and the once powerful Brahmin community.
On Friday, angry Maratha Kranti Morcha a powerful group that has been demanding reservations for the community staged a protest outside the IMD office in Pune demanding that the cops register a case of against Megha for caste segregation. Meanwhile a section of the Brahmin community in the state has also come out in support of Megha by saying that the latter was just following her rituals.

There are many who feel that the issue could further cause a rift between the Marathas and the Brahmin community. “The caste related cleavages have become very sharp now. I hope anti Brahmanism doesn’t get flared up again due to this. We don’t follow such practices in our home and for many of us it was a surprise that some one was still practicing such things. I dont think many in our community support Khole's stand,” said Aruna Pendse, who belongs to the Brahmin community.

Pendse is a political analyst and former professor at the Mumbai University.
Pendse’s fear that anti Brahmanism might rear its head is not out of place. The Maratha community has always been at logger heads with the once powerful Brahmin community in the state. The fissures between the two goes back many decades back when Brahmin priests refused to participate in the coronation of legendary Maratha ruler Shivaji as the King prompting the latter to get a Brahmin priest from Varanasi.

In fact, political analysts believe that one of the reasons for the farmers protest by the Maratha community for reservations is also because Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis himself is from the Brahmin community.