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M. Ishii. The Ecology of Transaction.
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The Ecology of Transaction
Dividual Persons, Spirits, and Machinery in a Special Economic
Zone in South India
Miho Ishii
Kyoto University
Abstract
In this paper, I analyse relations between humans and nonhuman entities,
including deities and machinery, linking the concepts of dividual persons and
substance-codes (Marriott 1976) with transactional networks (Appadurai and
Breckenridge 1976) and the ideas of hybrid and limited networks discussed by
Strathern (1996). In būta (spirit) rituals in the coastal area of Karnataka, people
enter into transactional relations with the deities, in which all human and non-
human participants appear as dividual persons exchanging their substance-codes
as ‘gifts’. Such relations have been disrupted, however, by the construction of a
huge industrial zone in the area. How, then, can transactional networks including
unique nonhumans, such as būtas and machines, be recreated? Through close
investigation of ritual transactions between people and būta, I examine how the
būta ritual (re)creates a unique ecology of humans and nonhumans, and how the
potentially limitless extension of networks in and beyond industrial facilities can
be limited.
M. Ishii. The Ecology of Transaction.
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Transaction, Dividuality, and the Network in South Asia
In his essay entitled ‘Hindu transactions: diversity without dualism’
published in 1976, McKim Marriott describes South Asian society as ‘an
elaborate transactional culture, characterized by explicit, institutionalized
concern for givings and receivings of many kinds in kinship, work, and
worship’ (Marriott 1976: 109). He also proposes that South Asian
personhood is characteristically ‘dividual’:
Persons—single actors—are not thought in South Asia to be ‘individual’,
that is, indivisible, bounded units, as they are in much of Western social
and psychological theory as well as in common sense. Instead, it
appears that persons are generally thought by South Asians to be
‘dividual’ or divisible. (111)
According to Marriott, dividual persons absorb various material
influences and emit particles of their own ‘coded substances’—essences,
residues, or other active influences—to others.
1
They engage in transfers of
bodily substance-codes through parentage, marriage, provision of services, and
other kinds of interpersonal contact. As a result, ‘Dividual persons, who must
exchange in such ways, are therefore always composites of the substance-codes
that they take in’ (111).
Around the same time, Arjun Appadurai and Carol Breckenridge (1976)
also published an article describing the personhood of Hindu deities and the
‘transactional network’ involving humans and deities. According to Appadurai
and Breckenridge, rather than as a mere image or symbol, the deity in a south
Indian temple is conceived of more as a person who is both sentient and corporeal
(190). Through worship and offerings, devotees enter into an ‘active transactional
relationship’ with the deity, which initiates a process of redistribution. The
devotees conduct transactions with the deity as a ‘special person’:
At one normative level, the deity … commands resources (i.e., services
and goods) such as those which are necessary and appropriate for the
support and materialization of the ritual process described above. But
these resources are not merely authoritatively commanded and received
by the deity. On receipt, they are redistributed in the form of shares
1
On the concept of ‘substance-code’, Marriott writes: ‘Varied codes of action or codes for conduct
(dharma) are thought to be naturally embodied in actors and otherwise substantialized in the flow
of things that pass among actors. Thus the assumption of the easy, proper separability of action
from actor, of code from substance…is generally absent: code and substance…cannot have separate
existences in this world of constituted things as conceived by most South Asians… Before one
begins to think of Hindu transactions, one thus needs firmly to understand that those who transact
as well as what and how they transact are thought to be inseparably “code-substance” or
“substance-code”’(1976: 109–10, emphasis added). See also Marriott and Inden (1977).
M. Ishii. The Ecology of Transaction.
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(paṅku) to the royal courtiers, the donor (yajamāna), and worshippers at
large. The authority to command and redistribute resources places the
deity at the center of a transactional nexus in which the deity is expected
to be generous. Ritual which constitutes worship provides the schematic
and elementary unit in which to observe the transactional network where
first the deity and subsequently the donor are the object of gifting activity.
(195, emphasis added)
As presented by Appadurai and Breckenridge (1976), this argument has
close similarities to that of Marriott (1976). If Marriott’s ideas of dividual
personhood and substance-code are applied to the account of Appadurai and
Breckenridge, it can be said that both the devotees and the deity are dividual
persons engaged in the exchange of their substance-codes as ‘gifts’ for each other
in a transactional network that enchains them.
2
As we will see later in the case of
būta worship, the substance-codes gifted by devotees to deities are offerings,
while those given by deities are power (śakti) and blessings, distributed among
devotees in the form of prasāda (blessed offerings from the altar). Concerning
this point, Marriott (1976: 110, 113) describes particles of substance-codes as
constantly in circulation, just as power, which is present in various objects such as
persons, gods, and land, flows everywhere. Thus, along with offerings, which are
composites of various social relations, power circulates in transactional networks
between humans and deities.
Before we consider this point more closely, it is worth considering
Marilyn Strathern’s ideas about how persons, hybridity, and networks are
presented (1988; 1994). Discussing the disposition of networks that both link and
sever social relations, she points out the hybrid form of humans and nonhumans
involved in the transactional process. This analysis of persons, hybridity, and
networks sheds new light on the ideas of transactional networks, dividual persons,
and substance-codes discussed by Marriott (1976) and Appadurai and
Breckenridge (1976). Exploring these ideas further, dividual persons can be
analysed as hybrid, being composed of various substance-codes or, in effect, an
amalgam of social relations. Additionally, each flow and circulation of substance-
codes in būta worship constitutes a limited transactional network that links, while
simultaneously cutting, social relations.
2
On gift exchange in Hindu society, see Parry (1986) and Raheja (1988).
M. Ishii. The Ecology of Transaction.
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Hybrid Personhood in Transactions, or How to Cut the Network
It is well known that Strathern (1988) applied Marriott’s notion ‘dividual person’
in her analysis of Melanesian society. In The gender of the gift (1988) she writes
that ‘Melanesian persons are as dividually as they are individually
conceived….Indeed, persons are frequently constructed as the plural and
composite site of the relationships that produced them’ (13). Her remarks indeed
recall Marriott’s insistence that dividual persons are always composites of the
substance-codes that they take in through transactions (1976: 111).
Later, in her 1996 essay ‘Cutting the network’, Strathern elaborates her
notion of the (dividual) person in Melanesia by applying the concepts of ‘hybrid’
and ‘network’ originally developed by actor–network theorists (e.g., Latour
1993; Warnier 1995). Using Daniel de Coppet’s (1994) ethnography of
the ’Aré’aré of the Solomon Islands, Strathern illustrates the hybridity of
humans in this society. According to Coppet (1994: 42, 52–3), The ’Aré’aré
divide living creatures into three elements: body, breath, and image. Upon death,
the person decomposes into these: the body, a product of nurture from others, is
eaten as taro; breath is taken away in the breath of slaughtered pigs; and the
image becomes the ancestor (Strathern 1996: 525–6). Strathern thus argues that
the living human being is a ‘hybrid’ person and, moreover, each of the three
components is also a person. She writes:
I use the term ‘person’ since the human being is also conceived as an
aggregation of relations; it can take the form of an object available for
consumption by those others who compose it. In these acts of
consumption, the person is, so to speak, hybridized, dispersed among a
network of others. (526)
Here Strathern’s main concern, however, is not how a network composed
of both human and nonhuman persons extends itself, but how its extension can be
controlled or cut. In the Solomon Islands, shell money, which embodies the image
of the deceased, plays an important role. In essence, an item of shell money has
circulatory power because other entities, events, and products are converted into
it: past encounters and relationships circulate in condensed form in its ‘body’. At
death, there is a finalizing sequence of exchanges in which the two other
components of the living human, body and breath, are converted into money
(Coppet 1994: 53–4). The ancestor-image eventually encompasses the others, and
the sequence stops at that point. ‘Money thus becomes the repository or container
of prior interchanges’ (Strathern 1994: 526).
Strathern’s close investigation of Coppet’s ethnography of the ’Aré’aré
(including marriage and kinship systems in Melanesia, which I cannot discuss
M. Ishii. The Ecology of Transaction.
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here) yields several important axioms regarding hybridity and networks: the
hybrid is an amalgam of social relations (Strathern 1996: 527); networks—either
homogeneous or heterogeneous—constructed through transactions must have
limits; and the protocols for creating networks of varying lengths have different
capacities for sustaining flow or stopping it (523, 528–9).
This analysis enables Strathern to identify a problem with the analytical
networks of actor–network theory, which are basically regarded as limitless (1994:
523). Contrary to the network as conceived by some actor–network theorists,
Strathern’s network has a certain length and thus can be cut at some point.
3
In this paper I analyse būta worship in a rural area located in Mangalore
Taluk of Karnataka state (South Kanara). Using the concepts ‘hybrid’ and
‘network’ in the Strathernian sense, I reconsider the concepts of dividual persons,
substance-codes, and transactional network between humans and deities presented
by Marriott (1976) and Appadurai and Breckenridge (1976).
Marriott (1976) has mainly discussed hybridity and network in the context
of typical social relations in Hindu society, such as inter-caste transactions;
similarly, Appadurai and Breckenridge (1976) have examined transactional
networks in terms of authority, honour, and the redistribution process in Hindu
temples. Of these ideas, ‘dividual persons’ has gained the widest exposure beyond
South Asian social contexts, yet most discussions have focused on issues of
individual–dividual dichotomy as if it corresponds with Western and non-Western
personhood, or have made cross-cultural comparisons of the conceptualization of
‘person’ (e.g., Busby 1997; Mosko 2010; Rasmussen 2008; Smith 2006; Smith
2012).
4
The category of ‘person’, however, in anthropological inquiry is not
restricted to humans. As we have seen, in the 1970s Appadurai and Breckenridge
were already arguing that Hindu deities are corporeal special persons, and
Strathern has since further expanded the conception of the person: nonhuman
components of the amalgamated human being are also persons (‘a person is made
up of persons’) (1996: 526).
5
By linking the concepts of dividual persons, substance-codes, and the
transactional network with innovative ideas such as hybrid-nonhuman persons and
3
Strathern also argues, ‘if we take certain kinds of networks as socially expanded hybrids then we
can take hybrids as condensed networks. That condensation works as a summation or stop’
(1996: 523).
4
For the anthropological debates on personhood, see Carrithers, Collins, and Lukes (1985),
Jackson and Karp (1990), Lambek and Strathern (1998), and Mines (1988; 1994). See also Daniel
(1984), Dumont (1965; 1970; 1980), Freeman (1999) and, for examination of South Asian
conceptions of personhood, Sax (2002) .
5
The recent arguments on ‘animism’ also focus on the relation between human and nonhuman
persons. See, for example, Bird-David (1999) and Willerslev (2004; 2007).
M. Ishii. The Ecology of Transaction.
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limited networks as presented by Strathern, and by examining them in the
contexts of both traditional village societies and modern industry, I attempt to
show the broader significance of these concepts as effective tools for
understanding the way humans relate themselves socially with nonhumans, and
also how a unique ecology composed of both humans and nonhumans can be
created through their transactions.
6
I use the term ‘ecology’ here as distinguished from the natural
environment. Ecology connotes the intertwined relationship between living things
and their milieu, and likewise, a unique order, or ‘melody’ (Toadvine 2009: 88),
through which all things are linked and organized. In this paper, the term ‘ecology’
denotes the unique form of flow and circulation of substance-codes, and also the
assemblage of humans, nonhumans, and their milieu created through transaction.
7
As will be shown in this paper, cultivated land and its products in South
Kanara can be understood as ‘hybrid’, comprising the labour/service of people,
inter-caste and intra-kin relations, and the power of būtas as the ultimate owners
of the land. In the yearly būta rituals, people offer farm products to the būtas
incarnate in impersonators, and in return they receive blessings and divine power
from the deities. Thus, the people enter into active transactional relations with the
deities, in which both humans and deities exchange their substance-codes (i.e.,
offerings and divine power, respectively). These particles of substance-codes
circulate within the transactional network between humans and deities. The
question raised here is, how is this flow of substance-codes controlled or limited?
One way to approach this question is to use ideas of hybridity, transactions,
and networks to examine how būta worship has accommodated the construction
of a huge industrial zone in this area. Since the 1990s, a project to create the
Mangalore Special Economic Zone (MSEZ) has been underway and land
acquisition by the Mangalore Special Economic Zone Ltd. (MSEZL) has
displaced many people. The project has destroyed several villages and numerous
religious structures.
At first glance, turned into the industrial zone, land acquired by the
company seems de-hybridized: separated from existing social relations, it has
become mere ‘ground’. Applying the concepts, we soon realize that the land in the
industrial zone, composed of humans and nonhuman entities such as the labour
6
For examination of unique corporeal interactions between humans and nonhumans including
deities, see also Ishii (2012; 2013).
7
This idea is based on the notion ‘Umwelt’, presented by Jakob von Uexküll, which indicates the
intertwined, coherent relationship formed between an organism, other creatures, and their
milieu. Ted Toadvine (2009: 88) argues that the notion of melody, in terms of animal–nature
relationship, elucidates the ontological status of the animal’s Umwelt, its milieu or environment.
M. Ishii. The Ecology of Transaction.
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and social relations of people of various origins, scientific knowledge and
technology, and the power of machines, is still highly hybrid. It is indeed a
heterogeneous network which extends itself far and wide. How, then, can the flow
of power and relations in these industrial plants be controlled, that is, how is can
the network be cut? Keeping these questions in mind, let us turn to some cases
from the field.
Būta Worship and Land as Hybrid
The Landscape of the Perar
Worshiped throughout South Kanara, būtas are deities and spirits: as deities, they
are often apotheosized local heroes who met tragic deaths; as spirits, they take the
forms of the wild animals dwelling in the forest. The būtas are closely related to,
as well as being embodiments of, wild, dangerous, and fertile divine power. Būta
ritual mainly involves spirit possession, oracles, and interactions between
devotees and būtas incarnate in impersonators belonging to the Nalike, Parava,
and Pambada castes (all designated scheduled castes). Priest-mediums called pātri
or māni of the Billava caste and mukkāldi of the Baṇṭ caste conduct the rituals.
8
Among all the devotees at the village būta shrine, the shrine’s patrons play the
most important role. Most of them are landlords of local manors called guttus,
who belong to the Baṇṭ caste.
9
I conducted fieldwork in two adjoining villages, Mudu Perar (East Perar)
and Padu Perar (West Perar) in Mangalore Taluk, Karnataka.
10
In Perar, thick
forests and shrubby hills fringe lowlands, divided, to the south by a major river.
Land in Perar is classified into several categories according to its soil and
humidity. The wet lowlands produce mainly rice and areca nuts, meanwhile,
several kinds of vegetables are produced in the dry highlands. The landscape of
Perar thus has vividly contrasting flat, green irrigated rice fields and wild hills and
forests. Scattered throughout the extensive wet-paddy fields, local manor houses
8
The traditional occupation of the Billava caste is toddy-tapping and that of the Baṇṭ caste is
cultivation. While Baṇṭ is regarded as the ‘dominant’ caste in the area, most of the caste groups
in the research field are designated as ‘Other Backward Classes’ in Karnataka State.
9
On būta worship in general, see Brückner (2009), Claus (1979; 1984; 1991), Gowda (2005), and
Ishii (2010).
10
These two villages formerly comprised a single village called Perar until they were
administratively separated in 1904. The official language of Karnataka is Kannaḍa, while the
native language of South Kanara is Tuḷu. This paper follows the system of transliteration of
Upadhyaya (1988–1997). The fieldwork on which this paper is based was conducted from May to
September 2008, in March, August and September 2009, from December 2010 to January 2011,
in March, August and September 2012; and from January to March 2013.
M. Ishii. The Ecology of Transaction.
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and the residences of landed farmers can be seen. Most of the current-day wage
labourers, whose parents or grandparents were attached to the households of
powerful guttu houses, live in the highlands.
Besides the paddy and other cultivated fields, forests and hills called guḍḍɛ
are an important resource for the villagers’ lives. People often go into the guḍḍɛ to
hunt game or gather useful plants. Since most of the land occupied by guḍḍɛ is
under the control of local manor houses, villagers who hunt there share part of the
game bag with the members of the manor house. The guḍḍɛ is believed to be the
dwelling not only of wild animals, but also of būtas and other spirits. In Perar,
several nāga (cobra) shrines called nāgabana are located inside groves, and a
shrine to Pilicāmuṇḍi (a tiger būta) is located on top of a hill near the village būta
shrine. Because it is believed that the būta of various wild animals, along with
other dangerous spirits, wander in the guḍḍɛ, it is regarded by most villagers as a
fertile, but hazardous place.
As is apparent in local legends, the territories of Perar, including dwellings,
cultivated fields, guḍḍɛ, and wastelands, are deeply related to the būtas’ power.
For example, the pāḍdana (oral epic) of Perar narrates the legend of Nadu, a
tragic hero who travelled across the country, and then after his death, was revived
in Perar as a very powerful būta, Balavāṇḍi, the main deity of the village shrine.
Balavāṇḍi and related būtas such as Arasu, Pilicāmuṇḍi and Brammabermerụ are
believed to be the ultimate owners of Perar land. Thus they have the power to
protect the land as well as to authorize the guttus’ rights to their territory.
Land Tenure, Kinship, and Būta Worship
In this section I will first illustrate the traditional system of būta worship and
ritual service at the village shrine, which is closely related to land tenure and the
redistribution of farm products in Perar. Next, I will examine the maintenance and
inheritance of both land and būta worship at the kin level. From these
investigations, I will show how land in Perar is, in the Strathernian sense, hybrid.
Būta worship in Perar is based on a sophisticated system called kaṭṭụ
(custom or law). The most privileged families in relation to būta worship are a
Brahman family called the Pejattaya and sixteen guttu families. These families are
hierarchically ranked from the Muṇḍabettu guttu at the top to the Perēr guttu at
the bottom. Except for one Gowda family and three Billava families, all the other
guttu families are Baṇṭ. Each guttu family has various roles and duties, which
organize the rituals at the village shrine. The first and the second guttu (the
Muṇḍabettu and Brāṇabettu) have major responsibility for patronage and
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management of būta worship at the village level. The primary patron of the
village shrine, the Muṇḍabettu guttu head called the gaḍipattunārụ, has command
over all the other guttu members and ritual workers.
The ritual roles of these sixteen guttus are complemented by another set of
sixteen families called the uḷaguttu (sub-guttu). Under these guttu and uḷaguttu
families, dozens of people called cākiridakulu (ritual servants / people in service)
execute various services for būta worship at the village level. These people are
from particular families of several service castes, for example, Maḍivāḷe
(washermen), Jōgi (musicians), Baṇḍāri (barbers) and Pambada (būta
impersonators). Among them, one Pambada family plays an especially important
role in Perar būta worship. Its male members are trained as dancers and mediums
of the daivas, or major būtas.
Traditionally, each cākiridakulu family was granted a portion of tax-free
land called umbaḷi from the Muṇḍabettu guttu. Some settled on this land, which
came to be named after its owner, for example, pambadelɛ koḍi (Pambada’s
Hilltop) or jōgilɛ bailụ (Jōgi’s Plain). Also, these cākiridakulu families enjoyed
rights to shares of paddy produced on particular plots of land called bākimāru,
which were the property of the village būta shrine and were managed mainly by
the head of the Muṇḍabettu guttu. All ritual expenses and shrine worker rewards
used to be paid in the form of paddy produced on this land. Apart from the
cākiridakulu families, in reward for their services or offerings to the būta shrine,
other families of various castes such as Billava, Ācāri (carpenters), and Gauḍa
(cultivators and cattle-breeders) also enjoyed rights to shares in the prasāda
distributed during the nēma (yearly ritual in the village shrine).
11
In Perar, būta worship has thus formed the core of social and economic
relations in the village through the (re)distribution of land, local products, and
prasāda. Perar land and its products are primarily regarded by the villagers as the
embodiment of the būta’s power, and each family is granted rights to shares in
plots of land, local products, and privileges in exchange for performing different
services at the village būta shrine.
Būta worship in the area is also closely related to kinship. The ritual roles
and status of each family in the village būta shrine are inherited within the descent
group. For example, in a Baṇṭ family which follows matriliny (aḷiyasantāna kaṭṭụ),
ritual roles and status, family land, and other family properties are all inherited
11
This system of būta worship in Perar can be interpreted as a ‘system of entitlements’ (Tanabe
2006), which existed in pre-colonial West and South India in various forms. In the pre-colonial
system of entitlements, Akio Tanabe argues, members of a local community were granted various
rights to shares of local products and royal and/or community honours and privileges in exchange
for performing different duties and functions for the reproduction of the state and community.
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within the matrilineal descent group (kuṭuma). It is also notable that in addition to
worshipping at the village būta shrine, most Hindu families in Perar worship
‘family būtas (kuṭumada daiva)’ and ‘land būtas (jāgeda daiva),’ which belong to
a particular family and its land, at their own family shrines or altars. In the yearly
būta ritual (kōla) at the family level, the head of the family organizes the ritual
and all family members are expected to join. They give offerings to the būta,
incarnate in an impersonator and, in return, the prasāda provided by the deity is
distributed among the donors. These family or land būtas are inherited through the
unilateral family line. It is also believed that if the descendants of a family fail to
properly maintain būta worship, everyone in the descent group will suffer the
curse of the būtas.
As summarized above, būta worship in Perar is based on the interrelation
of villagers of various castes, and on kin relations within each descent group. In
other words, būta worship can be understood as an amalgam of social, economic,
and kin relations in the village society, or a ‘socially expanded hybrid as a
condensed network’ (Strathern 1996: 523, 527). Furthermore, the land and its
products in Perar are also hybrid. As mentioned, būtas are believed to be the
ultimate owners of Perar land. Thus the land and its products primarily accrue to
the būtas and also embody their fertile and dangerous power. At the village level,
both a portion of umbaḷi land and its products are distributed to families in
exchange for their ritual service at the village shrine; meanwhile, at the family
level, family land is inherited and its products are distributed among the family
members. Both at the village and family levels, a portion of paddy, coconuts,
areca nuts, and other farm products, the fruits of the service and labour of the
people on the land, is first given to the būtas as an offering and then
(re)distributed among the members worshipping the deities. The land and its
products are thus composed of both human and nonhuman constituents, such as
the būtas’ divine power, inter-caste/familial relations as well as intra-descent
group relations, and human labour and service on the land.
If we view būta worship as a condensed network and the land and its
products as hybrid entities, how do the fragments of each component circulate,
and how is the flow controlled in transaction? Next, focusing on the ritual
transactions between people and būtas in Perar, I will examine these issues.
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Ritual Transaction, Dividual Persons, and the Circulation of Power
First, I examine with the baṭṭalụ kāṇikɛ kambuḷa ritual (henceforth kambuḷa), which
is dedicated to the būtas and organized by the first guttu of Perar. Below is a
summary of the ritual based on accounts of Subba of the Manṣa caste,
12
who was
born in the early 1940s and plays an important role as a priest (kallāla) in this ritual.
In the morning of the day before the kambuḷa, I [Subba] go to the
kambuḷa field [of the Muṇḍabettu guttu]. First I put white mud on each of
the coconut trees surrounding the field. This turns the kambuḷa field into
a bride. Then I put the white mud on pūkarɛ [a stake] in the middle of the
field. After that, I come back to the guttu house, where they give me two
pieces of clothing. When it is getting dark, after taking a bath at home, I
put on these clothes and go to a Billava’s house. There I sleep on a
coconut leaf prepared by the head of the house until around midnight.
When I wake up, I go to a place called Bolinji guḍḍɛ [Bolinji Mountain].
When I reach its summit, I climb onto a giant rock and call out to all the
būtas, including the buffaloes,
13
to come to the kambuḷa. I call three
times this way, ‘kāṇikɛda kambuḷa, eru vo eru [kāṇikɛda kambuḷa, buffalo,
oh buffalo!]’.
Then I come down to a place called manjotti, just beside the kambuḷa
field, where my [male] family members are playing dōlu [a big double-
faced drum] while they wait for me.
14
We dance together and when we
finish the dance I throw kōlu [a stick] on the ground, which I have carried
to the mountain with me. Then we come back to the guttu house where
they serve us rice and vegetable curry.
On the day of the kambuḷa, a pair of buffaloes is taken into a buffalo
house. After reciting a prayer, I tie a nuga [yoke] onto the necks of the
buffaloes, hold it, and run onto the kambuḷa field along with the beasts.
After that, we [Subba and his family members] go back to the guttu
house and dance again in front of the guttu people. The next morning, I
plant a handful of naṭṭi [young rice plants] in the kambuḷa field, on the
east side of the stake.
Based on the above account, I will now analyse the transaction between
būtas and humans in the kambuḷa ritual in terms of dividual persons, hybridity,
and the network. The whole ritual process can be understood as the circulation of
būta power from the wild guḍḍɛ to the cultivated field. The wild and fertile power
12
Subba himself insists that he is an ‘Ādi Draviḍa (original Dravidian)’.
13
According to local legend, in antiquity a person and two buffaloes disappeared on the
mountain. The buffaloes called by Subba here are supposed to be the būtas of those
vanished buffaloes.
14
In the past, on the next day of the kambuḷa, Subba and his family used to visit each house
of the village dancing and playing instruments. Nowadays they dance and sing only at the
guttu house.
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of the būtas, personified in the buffalo būtas, is summoned by Subba. Through his
invocation of the būtas in the būta territory of the wild mountain, Subba himself
partly embodies their wild and fertile power. This power, concomitant with
Subba’s journey, first flows into the manjotti field, and is distributed among the
male members of the Manṣa family.
15
Then the power of the būtas, which is
personified in Subba (metaphorically) as well as in the living buffaloes
(metonymically), finally flows into the kambuḷa field as the ‘bride’. The kambuḷa
field is filled with the būta’s power, and later this power is transformed into the
paddy in the field.
In this ritual, the power or substance-code of the buffalo circulates in the
network, linking the wild with the agricultural fields. Hence, the buffalo can be
regarded as a ‘dividual person’ who is involved in, as well as constitutes, the
transactional network. Subba, as an interim priest, works as a medium or carrier
of the power of the buffalo-būta-person. At the same time, his movements guide
the flow of this power by leading it first into the manjotti, then into the kambuḷa
field, and finally into the young paddy which he plants by hand.
Correspondingly, at the time of harvest, Subba is the first person to cut the rice
in this field. At this moment the būta’s power, which had been transformed into
land and produced paddy, returns to the people through Subba. Here Subba acts
as ‘both container and channel, blocking flow and bodying it forth’ (Strathern
1996: 528). And the paddy produced in the kambuḷa field can be understood as a
hybrid composed of the būta’s power, human labour and service, and the kin
relations of the first guttu family.
Next, focusing on the nēma, let us examine the process of the circulation
and redistribution of the būtas’ power personified in various forms such as human
impersonators, farm products, and prasāda.
The yearly ritual starts on the night of the full moon in the month of māi
and is held for three days and nights.
16
It primarily consists of the rituals
for Balavāṇḍi, Arasu, and Pilicāmuṇḍi and each ritual comprises the
same basic process. In the nēma, the main deities always appear from
outside the central shrine. For example, after the priests accompanied by
some ritual workers walk up to the Pilicāmuṇḍi shrine on top of a hill and
offer a pūjā to the deity, Pilicāmuṇḍi, incarnate as the possessed
Pambada impersonator, who comes down from the hilltop to the central
15
According to my research assistant from this region, the dancing ritual performed by the SC
family in the kambuḷa used to include a sexual performance: it is said that when the male
members of the family waiting for the kallāla to return from calling the būtas on the mountain,
they used to drink toddy; and when they were about to start dancing, they would have sexual
intercourse with each other.
16
The month of māi in the Tulu calendar currently corresponds to about 15 February to 15 March
in the solar calendar.
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shrine. In a similar way, Balavāṇḍi, incarnate in the Pambada
impersonator, also appears from outside the shrine as a half-naked,
dangerous and furious deity.
The first stage of the ritual is called the gaggaradecci.
17
The Pambada
impersonator, wearing a heavy anklet called a gaggara, stands in front of
the altar, on which the sacred treasure (baṇḍāra) of the būtas is
enshrined. The moment the gaḍipattunārụ offers a prayer, the body of
the impersonator begins to shake and the other guttu heads throw rice
and flowers over him. Possessed by the būta, the impersonator dances
around the precincts and, in rank order, one by one greets the Pejattaya
and guttu heads .
The second stage is the recitation of the oral epics by an impersonator in
front of the devotees thronging the shrine. In the third stage, called the
nēmadecci,
18
the impersonator wears a big halo-like structure called an
aṇi on his back. The priests, heads of the guttus, and main ritual workers
follow him, and together they all march around the precinct. Then,
possessed, the impersonator speaks oracles in front of all the guttus. He
receives a young coconut from the gaḍipattunārụ, pours its juice on the
floor and gives it back to the gaḍipattunārụ with blessings. At the end of
the ritual, the possessed impersonator touches the hands of each guttu
head with his sword and gives them blessings.
During the ritual, the devotees interact with the būta through the Pambada
impersonator. The most significant and repeated form of their interaction is the
mutual gifting between the guttu heads and the būtas. In the yearly ritual, the
guttus offer the būtas a part of their farm products such as paddy, coconuts, and
areca nuts, which embody the fertile power of the būtas, the labour and service of
humans, and the social relations in the village. The būtas receive and consume
these offerings,
19
and return oracles and blessings to ensure the future prosperity
of the whole village. Finally, some of the offerings are redistributed as prasāda
among the devotees. Through this ritual process, condensed in the farm products,
offerings, and prasāda, the būtas’ power flows and circulates in the transactional
network comprising part of the more extensive network between humans and
deities, as illustrated below:
17
Gaggaradecci is the initial dance performed by the impersonator wearing sacred anklets
(Upadhyaya 1995: 1036).
18
This word originates from the phrase ‘nēmada ecci’: the shivering of the būta impersonator’s
body during the annual festival (Upadhyaya 1997: 1844).
19
On the consumption of offerings by the būtas: after the ritual for Pilicāmuṇḍi inside the
precinct is complete, the deity is offered both vegetarian offerings and blood sacrifices right
outside the shrine building.
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Figure 1: The transactional network between humans and būtas
In these transactions, the offerings and their transformed substances,
prasāda, regarded as the substance-codes of humans and deities, that is, hybrid
‘persons’, are consumed and thus dispersed among the network (Strathern 1996:
526). Similar to the role of Subba in the kambuḷa ritual, here the būta
impersonators act as mediums or carriers of the būtas’ power, and at the same
time their movements induce and direct the flow of the substance-codes.
20
Likewise the būtas and devotees are regarded as dividual persons who exchange
their substance-codes with each other; or to use Strathern’s words, they act as the
‘turning point for directing the flow of the fertility back’ (Strathern 1996: 528).
Both in the kambuḷa and the nēma, the flow of substance-codes is
primarily personified in and directed by the medium or priest or both. It is also
noteworthy that the extension of the transactional network is limited by the rights
or belongings of both humans and būtas (see Strathern 1996: 525). On the side of
the humans, the extension of the circulation and (re)distribution of substance-
codes as prasāda is restricted to members who have the right and duty to enter
into transactional relations with the deities (moreover, the flow and
(re)distribution process of substance-codes is ordered according to the rank and
sex of the participants
21
). On the side of the deities, the extension of the
circulation of substance-codes as offerings is limited to būtas worshipped by the
main patrons of the ritual, that is, būtas belonging to or personifying the power of
a particular house, land, and guḍḍɛ.
From the above description, it is clear that the ritual transactions and flow
of substance-codes in the transactional network performatively link the
participants, both human and nonhuman, and at the same time set the boundaries
20
Although the role of the priest is also very important to ‘controlling’ the flow of the būtas’
power in the yearly ritual, there is not enough space to elaborate on this point here.
21
For instance, in the ritual held at the family level, first the head of the family and other male
members receive the prasāda and then it is distributed among the female members of the family.
Humans give farm products
as offerings to būtas
Būtas receive and
consume the offerings;
give blessings and power
to humans
Humans receive and (re)distribute
the blessed substances as prasāda
from būtas; consume the prasāda;
cultivate the land, grow and harvest
farm products
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separating the people according to their belongings and the būtas according to
their identification with particular territories. It is thus regarded that the
transactional network of humans and deities creates the unique ecology of Perar,
which is composed of various hybrid, dividual persons such as the land, būtas,
and people.
Next, let us examine the relations between humans and deities in a huge
development project which has almost totally destroyed traditional social relations
and local networks, focusing on a new turn in būta worship and the ‘revival’ of
the transactional network in industrial plants.
The Land ‘De-hybridized’? The Developmental Project and Land Acquisition
Since the 1990s, a huge project aimed at the creating the Mangalore Special
Economic Zone (MSEZ) has been promoted by the central and state government,
as well as by several multinational corporations (mostly related to the petroleum
and petrochemical sector). In the course of this project, several villages and
numerous religious structures, including būta shrines, have been destroyed, and
land acquisition by Mangalore Special Economic Zone Ltd. (MSEZL) has
displaced many people from their land.
22
According to MSEZL’s website, the proposed MSEZ enclave
encompasses 4,000 acres. In the first phase of the project, 1,800 acres were
acquired by the company. By the end of the 1980s, before the foundation of
MSEZL, Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd. (MRPL), an industrial
entity adjoined to and closely involved in the MSEZ, had already acquired another
1,700 acres in five villages and displaced 609 families (Dhakal: n.d.). Against this
compulsory land acquisition, destruction of villages, and environmental
contamination by MSEZL, various anti-development movements led by local
farmers and fishermen’s associations, college students, social activists, and
journalists have arisen in Mangalore.
The relationship between the people and the būtas has undergone drastic
changes owing to the construction of the MSEZ in the area. I will now briefly
examine the case of Thokur village, located near Perar village. The first guttu in
Thokur is a historic family which is referred to in a seventh-century epigraph.
This family has played the central role in the village-wide worship of a powerful
22
MSEZL is a combination of both central and state government institutions and a private
financial company. It currently consists of Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd. (ONGCL), the
Karnataka Industrial Area Development Board (KIADB), Infrastructure Leasing and Financial
Services (IL&FS), and the Kanara Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI). The New Mangalore
Port Trust (NMPT) is also an equity partner of MSEZL (Dhakal n.d.: 3).
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būta called Jārandāye. In 1993, during MRPL construction, most of the villagers
were displaced from their land without adequate compensation and moved to a
rehabilitation area constructed in a nearby town. Due to this destruction of the
village and emigration of the villagers, būta worship in Thokur lapsed for about
a decade.
The main members of the first guttu, however, continued negotiations with
the company and, in 2003, they finally succeeded in regaining part of their land.
They reconstructed a new shrine for Jārandāye on the top of a small hill
surrounded by industrial plants and construction sites. Although the Thokur guttu
managed to rebuild the village būta shrine at a new site, the agricultural land and
forest of the village had already been destroyed and most villagers had left the
village. In the absence of social relations among the villagers and without the
persistence of intimate relations among the land, people, and būtas, it was
impossible for the guttus to perform the būta ritual as before.
In the process of land acquisition and the destruction of the unique ecology
of this area, the transactional relations among humans and deities were disrupted.
At the same time, it seems that Thokur land that was once composed of the būta’s
power, inter-caste and intra-kin relations, and the labour and service of the
villagers became alienated from these local relations and turned into mere ground.
In other words, the land which used to be a hybrid of humans and nonhumans was
de-hybridized by industrialization.
Close investigation of the situation soon reveals, however, that the land in the
MSEZ, or rather the MSEZ itself, is still hybrid, but in a new sense. It is composed of
humans and nonhumans, scientific knowledge and technology, and the power of various
machines. It is indeed a condensed network which extends itself far and wide. There
follows an examination of the industrial plants as hybrid entities.
The Mangalore Special Economic Zone as Hybrid
The MSEZ is a heterogeneous network. First, it is composed of several complexes
of interconnecting components such as manufacturing facilities, pipelines, and of
other support facilities (which are also composites of feedstock, chemicals,
machines and technologies, human labour, and so on). Second, the MSEZ extends
itself via infrastructure such as roads, railways, harbours, airports, underground
pipes and cables. Third, it is connected to the natural environment through, for
example, the disposal of industrial effluent into the Arabian Sea, the damming of
rivers, and environmental assessment and monitoring. Lastly, the MSEZ is linked
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to the global economy via the national and international flow of finance and
labourers as well as the entry of multinational corporations.
Let us first look at the basic composition of the MSEZ. Developed as a
petrochemical cluster, the MSEZ has mutually supportive units connected in
upstream and downstream linkages that feed raw material input and supply
internal markets (see Fig. 2). MSEZ phase-I comprises the MRPL phase-III
refinery, an aromatic complex, and an olefin complex.
23
These complexes have
been developed on the already-acquired 1,800 acres of land by the anchor
promoter of the MSEZ project, ONGC-MRPL (Dhakal n.d.: 4).
(Figure2: Mutually supportive units in the MSEZ. http://www.mangaloresez.com/index.html)
Next, let us examine the infrastructural networks that link the
MSEZ/MRPL to the outside world. According to Shiva C. Dhakal (n.d.), the
MSEZ is connected to New Mangalore Port (NMPT) via a road-cum-pipeline
corridor for the transportation of cargo, crude and products. The corridor also
connects the MSEZ to the national highway. Three more roads are planned to give
23
The aromatic complex produces mainly benzene and paraxylene, and the olefin complex
produces high-density polyethylene (HDPE), linear low-density polyethylene (LLDPE), butylene,
polypropylene, and other products.
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access to MSEZ phase-I, the industrial zones for the olefin complex, aromatics
complex, and several other plants inside the MSEZ (Dhakal n.d.: 4).
Regarding this, an article on MSEZL’s website entitled ‘The dedicated
corridor from the port to the plants’ says, ‘A dedicated pipeline-cum-road corridor
bridges the distance…between the port and the MSEZ. This ensures that material
is moved in minutes between the port & SEZ units.’ Similarly, the MRPL’s
website includes an article on pipelines, reproduced in part below:
Pipelines
MRPL Oil Jetties are located inside the NMPT. There are 6 lines
running from the Refinery [MRPL] to the coastal terminal out of which
four are White Oil lines and 2 are Black Oil lines….Products are loaded
using hoses at virtual jetty and jetty-9. Marine loading arms at jetty
10/11 are hydraulically operated and interlock facility for tripping the
loading pumps and disconnecting the loading arms is also available.
Maximum loading/unloading rate through each loading arm is 2200kl/hr.
With a view to reduce transportation cost of evacuation, a cross country
pipeline between Mangalore and Bangalore became a necessity.
Accordingly the Petronet MHB Limited was formed to implement the
project and operate this Cross-Country pipeline. ONGC holds a 23%
equity holding in this pipeline.
As emphasized in these articles, the MSEZ/MRPL is linked to mega-cities
such as Bangalore and Delhi and then to national as well as global markets
through infrastructural networks based on the most up-to-date scientific
technology. As shown below, the plants are also linked to the natural environment
through the disposal of industrial effluent as well as environmental monitoring.
Waste water treatment
The state-of-the-art Modern Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP) that
has been installed to treat Refinery waste water containing sulphide,
phenol, oil & grease etc., and thus meeting the limits of MoEF [The
Ministry of Environment and Forestry] Standards / KSPCB [Karnataka
State Pollution Control Board] Standards. The treatment consists of
physical separation, chemical and biological treatment and final
filtration with polishing. The treated waste water is discharged into the
sea … at a distance of 650 M. and at a depth of 6.5 M. The discharge
point was selected by the National Institute of Oceanography after
carrying out a detailed study on the effect of this stream on marine life.
The quality of the treated waste water and marine environment around
the discharge point is monitored by an independent agency all around
the year … The MRPL has developed and implemented a process for
treating the effluent with hydrogen peroxide, which reduces the sludge
formation. There is constant monitoring of the quality of the treated
waste water and air emissions. The MRPL is a certified ISO
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[International Organization for Standardization] 14001:2004 and
possess excellence in environmental performance.
It is noteworthy that the concept of ‘environment’ appearing in the above
article connotes a clearly different meaning from the local concept of guḍḍɛ in this
region. As we have already seen, the guḍḍɛ is a particular place closely connected
to the power of būtas. It is also connected to certain groups of people through land
tenure, hunting and gathering, and the circulation of būta power actualized in būta
rituals. In particular, the transactions between the village people and the būtas
dwelling in the guḍḍɛ construct a network of restricted length (Strathern 1996:
529). By contrast, the ‘environment’ in the context of the wastewater treatment
and environmental monitoring and care in industry indicates the global
environment, a ubiquitous system of almost limitless extent.
Finally, let us briefly investigate how the MSEZ is linked to national and
international labour markets and the global economy. According to Thomas
Farole (2011), SEZs in general are primarily established with the aim of attracting
direct investment by foreign investors, including multinational corporations.
Heather P. Bedi (2013: 38) argues that SEZs are unique enclaves with a free-
market orientation and are thus privileged with legal and tax concessions that
transcend prevailing national laws. The creation of SEZs enables a country to
create areas of advanced infrastructure and incentives that cannot be pursued
throughout the nation. Similarly, Michael Levien (2011: 454, 461) argues that
SEZs are ‘hyper-liberalized export enclaves’ or ‘free-market utopias.’ In the case
of SEZs in India, according to Levien, the private sector is enticed with offers of
cheap land to develop the zones and create a ‘world-class’ industrial and
commercial infrastructure. Additionally, streamlined bureaucratic procedures and
blanket tax and tariff concessions draw exporting companies to set up offices and
factories in these zones. Although SEZs are ‘spatially delimited experiments with
extreme levels of liberalization’ in a nation (Levien 2011: 454), they develop
themselves as cosmopolitan cities directly connected to the global economy.
The MSEZ is no exception. Numerous multinational companies have
launched developmental projects in the MSEZ and some foreign companies have
joined these projects as the subcontractors or technological advisors of Indian
companies such as Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserves Ltd. (ISPRL). Though
MSEZ/MRPL employs people from all over the country, most of the well-paid
employees such as managers, engineers and other specialists are from the urban
middle class, while most of the unskilled labourers, including not only members
of the displaced households but also migrant workers from other regions, are of
rural origin (see Levien 2011: 476). The MRPL has a residential area called the
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‘colony’ for its white-collar employees, which contains modern facilities such as a
shopping complex, swimming pool, recreation club, public school, hospital, and
bank branch. Suddenly appearing in a rural area, the MSEZ/MRPL is a
cosmopolitan enclave that has expanded at the expense of local villages,
landscape, and ecology.
As seen above, the MSEZ is a heterogeneous network which extends far
and wide. It is also understood as an amalgam of humans and nonhumans: it
consists of human labour and service, scientific knowledge and technology,
manufacturing facilities, infrastructure, feedstock and chemicals, and so on.
Similarly, each product of the ‘downstream industry’ in the MSEZ can be
regarded as a hybrid of various components such as feedstock, machines and
technology, and the labour and social relations of the people who participate in the
manufacturing process.
Nevertheless, the form is obviously not the same as the human–nonhuman
relations or transactional network found in būta worship. In the būta ritual, the
flow of substance-codes in the transactional network is activated and controlled
by both humans and the deities. Here, they both appear as dividual persons, as
donors as well as recipients of gifts to and from each other. In other words, they
act as the ‘turning point for directing the flow of the fertility back’ (Strathern
1996: 528).
By contrast, even though the people in the plants well understand
infrastructure such as roads and pipelines as ‘networks’ in the usual sense, they do
not generally experience participation in a transactional network which links them
with the nonhumans in their surroundings. Apparently, humans are the only
intentional agents organizing and controlling, in addition to the power of the
machinery, the flow of substances such as feedstock, products, and industrial
effluents. In such a situation, the human–nonhuman relation in industrial plants is
not regarded as social; neither humans nor nonhumans appear as dividual persons
who transact their substance-codes as ‘gifts’ to each other.
Moreover, the MSEZ networks extend almost limitlessly outwards. As
suggested in the web article about MRPL’s wastewater treatment, for example,
the flow of substances such as industrial effluent is to some extent controlled by
the experts. Yet they cannot follow, monitor, or control the flow completely: the
whole process of the flow in such a heterogeneous network linking the plants to
the outside world, global environment, and global economy cannot be fully
grasped or controlled by a handful of specialists.
24
In other words, there is no
24
This corresponds to one argument on risk: ‘… lack of control is an important characteristic for
situations involving environmental and technological risks. Although there is a strong link to
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perfect device to control, block, or turn back the flow. Thus in the MSEZ, humans
and nonhumans, in effect, take on their roles individually in a single part of a
limitless network, and have no sense of how to stop its extension.
This situation can occasionally be changed, however, and the local
transactional network between humans and nonhumans can be recovered or newly
created. One such occasion is that of crisis or accident inside the plant.
Crises in the Industrial Plants and the (Re)creation of the
Transactional Network
Accidents or crises occurring inside the industrial plants provide people with
occasions for changing the usual human–nonhuman relations in industry. In such
situations, the flow of substances or the power of the machinery is uncontrollable
even inside the plants, and humans are overwhelmed by the power of nonhumans.
To solve this predicament, people seek not merely technical solutions but try to
regulate or reconstruct their relationship with their nonhuman counterparts—and
here again the būta rituals play an important role, as shown in the cases below.
Blast at MSEZ construction site kills 3
Mangalore, May 26: A blast that occurred at a crude oil storage project
site belonging to Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserves Limited (ISPRL)
near Bajpe, on the outskirts of Mangalore, this evening is believed to
have killed 3 people including a Korean and injured 5 more.
As reported above, there was an explosion on 26 May 2011 at a plant
inside the MSEZ owned by ISPRL. Three persons died, including a Korean
engineer, an employee of the Korean company SK, which had received a contract
from ISPRL.
On 25 July 2011, The Canara Times published a special report headlined
‘Dismissing SEZ works, Korean engineers are busy constructing a gudi [shrine]
for daivas!’ According to this article, despite taking adequate precautions, the
Korean company had often encountered similar accidents. This time, an SK
employee arranged a ritual (aṣṭamaṅgala praśne) conducted by an astrologer, and
as a result, the following ‘facts’ were revealed: At the place where ISPRL built its
plant, a powerful būta called Pilicāmuṇḍi had formerly been worshipped. The
explosion and other accidents inside the plant were caused by the ire of the būta
human intervention, it is often not possible to point to one particular decision or a particular
culprit. Beck speaks in this regard of “everyone (being) cause and effect, and thus non-cause”,
which in a complex industrialised world leads to a state of “organized irresponsibility” (Beck
1992: 32–3, 50)’ (Bergmans 2008: 180).
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over the discontinuance of these rituals. To appease the deity, SK organized a
ritual at the site and decided to build a new shrine for Pilicāmuṇḍi.
Interviews with Vaadiraaja, a Brahman astrologer who conducted a ritual
for SK, and Deevaraj, an Indian employee of the same company, corroborated the
facts given in The Canara Times report: after the accident, several ISPRL officers
visited Vaadiraaja. Hearing their request, he conducted a ritual and found that
there were originally shrines for Pilicāmuṇḍi and nāga at the site. Following this
revelation, the Korean managers of SK organized a ritual called mṛtyuñjayahōmo
[ritual for saving lives] on a large scale inside the plant. In this ritual, not only the
Indian employees but also the Korean managers played the important role of the
patrons; they dedicated offerings to the deity and received prasāda from the
Brahman priests.
This was not the first ritual for būtas to be organized within the plant. In
the late 1990s, during the construction of the MRPL plants, numerous, but not all,
religious structures were demolished. One of remaining structures is a būta shrine
called the Raktēśvari sāna (shrine). It is said that when the company was about to
demolish this shrine, they received an oracle from an astrologer saying that they
should not demolish it. As a result, it was saved and is now a site of worship for
workers inside the plant.
According to Prakash, an MRPL executive officer, a compressor
broke down in 1999 at a site near the Raktēśvari shrine. Japanese engineers
who were posted at the MRPL site for technology transfer, checked the
Japan-made machine. Try as they might, they could not find the cause of the
malfunction. They checked the machine and soil again and again, but were
unable to solve the problem. Finally, they agreed to consult an astrologer.
Following to the oracle’s prescription, the engineers performed a ritual at a
temple in Mangalore. They offered a sacred toḷasi tree (Ocimum sanctum) to
the Raktēśvari shrine and also constructed a place of worship at the site.
After the ritual, the machine worked again.
As shown in these cases, in critical situations such as explosions or
breakdowns, the operation of machinery and the flow of substances in the plants is
uncontrollable, even for experts. In such situations, the power of machines is often
perceived to ultimately be a manifestation of the būtas’ power and agency. As
with the living buffaloes in the kambuḷa ritual, which embody the būtas’ wild
power, an uncontrollable machine personifies the power of the būta dwelling there.
Like the buffaloes in the kambuḷa field, the machine here becomes a dividual-
person who embodies and transfers the būta’s power. Identifying the power of
machines with that of a būta, the people in the plants seek a way to reconstruct
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human–nonhuman relations and control the flow of power and substances, but not
in the usual technical way.
In būta rituals conducted in the plant, people give offerings to the būtas
whose power is embodied in the machine-person. With the help of priests, the
būtas receive these offerings and return prasāda to the people. The dangerous
flow of substance-codes, or the power of the būtas in the plant, impersonated in
the machines, is thus channelled into a newly created transactional network
involving humans and nonhumans, and turned into ‘grace’ to be distributed
among humans.
As I suggested earlier, in the yearly būta ritual in Perar, participants, both
human and nonhuman, are performatively linked by the flow of substance-codes
in the transactional network between the būtas and devotees. At the same time,
the nēma sets boundaries both to separate people according to their belongings,
and to separate būtas according to their identification with particular territories.
Similarly, the būta ritual in the plants performatively links the various people such
as the priests, company officers, managers, foreign engineers, other employees
and wage labourers with their nonhuman counterparts, then turns them all into
dividual persons through the transactional process. At the same time, it separates
them from others who do not have the right and duty to participate in this
transactional network.
It is notable here that this boundary is not always self-evident but is
performatively created through the ritual process itself. In Perar, only the people
who are responsible for certain territory participate in the ritual for the būtas
dwelling there; at the same time, their responsibility for the land, as well as their
right and duty to attend the būta ritual are guaranteed by their service at the būta
shrine. Likewise, only the people responsible for the work at the site participate in
būta rituals at industrial sites; at the same time, their responsibility for the site, not
merely as their workplace but as the būta’s land, as well as their right and duty to
participate in the ritual, is created through and guaranteed by their worship of the
būtas. In other words, they create their own unique positions in the plant by
linking themselves to particular territory, būtas, and people—but not to others.
Through this ritual process, the seemingly limitless network of humans and
nonhumans in the MSEZ is temporarily cut and is transformed into a local,
circulative network of finite length.
The būta ritual in industrial plants thus (re)creates a unique ecology
composed of various dividual persons such as humans, būtas, and machinery; they
transact their substance-codes as ‘gifts’ to each other while also acting as both
stimulators of and turning points in the flow of the transactional network.
M. Ishii. The Ecology of Transaction.
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Conclusion
In this paper, focusing on būta worship and the construction of a huge industrial
complex in South Kanara, I have examined the relationship between humans and
nonhumans, including deities and machinery. By linking the concepts of dividual
persons, substance-codes (Marriott 1976), and transactional networks (Appadurai
& Breckenridge 1976) with the ideas of hybridity and limited networks (Strathern
1996), I have reconsidered these concepts as effective tools for analyzing human–
nonhuman relations both in traditional South Asian societies and also in other
social settings.
As we have seen, cultivated land and its products in South Kanara are
understood as hybrids composed of the labour/service of people, inter-caste and
intra-kin relations, and the wild power of the būtas. In būta rituals, both humans
and deities exchange their substance-codes as ‘gifts’ for each other. The
substance-codes circulate within the transactional network between humans and
deities, both of whom act as turning points for ‘directing the flow of the fertility
back’ (Strathern 1996: 528). Here, the flow of substance-codes and the extension
of the network are limited by the rights or belongings of both the humans and the
būtas. This analysis has shown that the transactional network of humans and
deities creates a unique ecology composed of various hybrid, dividual persons
such as land, būtas, and people.
While the indigenous transactional relationship between local people and
būtas has largely been destroyed due to industrialization in this area, the MSEZ
itself has developed as a heterogeneous network composed of both humans and
nonhuman entities. In the limitlessly expanding network of the MSEZ, human–
nonhuman relations are not, in effect, transactional or social: neither humans nor
nonhumans appear as dividual persons who exchange their substance-codes as
‘gifts’ for others.
In this context, accidents inside the plants may become occasions for
changing the usual human–nonhuman relations. Identifying the power of a
machine with that of a būta dwelling in the site, people, in effect, (re)create the
transactional relations with their nonhuman counterparts. Through the ritual
process, the būta’s power embodied in the machine flows into the newly created
transactional network between the people and būta-machines, and is turned into
‘gifts’ for the humans. The būta ritual in the industrial plants thus (re)creates a
unique ecology composed of dividual persons, both human and nonhuman, who
link themselves with each other and, at the same time, limit the flow by making
boundaries, or cutting the network.
M. Ishii. The Ecology of Transaction.
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The above analysis suggests that the concepts of dividual persons,
substance-codes, and the transactional network may be useful outside of the
traditional South Asian social settings originally examined by Marriott (1976) and
Appadurai and Breckenridge (1976). Moreover, the ideas suggest how it may be
possible to cut an immeasurable network, which is not merely an ‘analytical
network’ (Strathern 1996: 523) but also an actual industrial and environmental
one. They suggest a way to limit the flow by transforming the limitless network
into a transactional circulation in which the substance-codes of both human and
nonhuman persons flow as ‘gifts’ to each other.
Applied in a new context, these classic concepts have been enlarged as
ever-creative tools for understanding how humans relate themselves socially with
nonhumans, and how a unique ecology composed of both humans and nonhumans
can be generated. Consequently, in order to create a unique ecology of post-
humanist anthropology, it may well be needed to let these ideas flow in a network
of humans and nonhuman entities, including anthropologists, their research fields
and ethnographies, as fertile gifts for us all.
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