Periyar E. V. Ramasamy Quotes

Untouchability is a hydra-headed monster.

I regard untouchability as such a grave sin as to warrant divine chastisement.

A Sudra [lowest caste untouchable], though emancipated by his master, is not released from servitude; since that is innate in him, who can set him free from it?

Some men say that they should be satisfied with the abolition of untouchability only, leaving the caste system alone. The aim of abolition of untouchability alone without trying to abolish the inequalities inherent in the caste system is a rather low aim.

When untouchability is rooted out, these distinctions will vanish and no one will consider himself superior to any other.

Untouchability is an error of long standing.

Ravana was a rakshasa but this rakshasi of untouchability is even more terrible than Ravana.

Caste is a state of mind. It is a disease of mind. The teachings of the Hindu religion are the root cause of this disease. We practice casteism and we observe Untouchability because we are enjoined to do so by the Hindu religion. A bitter thing cannot be made sweet. The taste of anything can be changed. But poison cannot be changed into nectar.

Untouchability is a blot on Hinduism. It is a canker eating into its vitals.

Untouchability is a many-headed monster and forms, some of them so subtle as not to be easily detected.

No stone should be left unturned to bring home to the family members that untouchability is a sin and a blot on Hinduism.

If untouchability is an integral part of Hinduism, the latter is a spent bullet.

India will have to hang down her head in shame if even one person is left who is said in any way to be untouchable.

I have suffered racial prejudice, and I know how painful it is. People need to take this issue more seriously and engage in this fight against racism.

We have to eradicate caste.

'Article 15' prohibits any kind of discrimination on the basis of caste, creed, or religion. My film is about the discrimination we practice on various levels.

We have tolerance, respect, and equality in our written laws but not in the hearts of some of our people.

My fight against untouchability is a fight against the impure in humanity.

The purification required is not of untouchables but of the so-called superior castes.

Hinduism dies if untouchability lives, and untouchability has to die if Hinduism is to live.

The untouchability of Hinduism is probably worse than that of the modern imperialists.

It is a crime and a sin to regard a person as untouchable because he is born in a particular community.

Bigotry has always been the poison of America, and we oughta do everything to eradicate it with no excuses or explanations.

Ageism is as odious as racism and sexism.

You have to be taught to be second class; you're not born that way.