Prabhupāda: Government's duty to see that people may not become cheated. (Hindi) Let me speak in English, so they can follow.
Guest: So they can follow.
Prabhupāda: Yes. No. Take for example a man is representing himself as brāhmaṇa but he's doing something else. That should be stopped. You are doing the business of a śūdra, why you are claiming as brāhmaṇa? This is government duty.
Guest: Now say this person who is doing wrong(?)...
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Guest: ...is very touchy about his being śūdra?
Prabhupāda: No, why he should be?
Guest: No, but he thinks that all of us look down upon him. So one has to be very careful. And I think that if you could say something about the real Harijana.
Prabhupāda: Yes, that I'll speak, that I'll speak. Now, if he is coming from the śūdra community...
Guest: Yes.
Prabhupāda: ...but he is now minister...
Guest: He's a brāhmaṇa.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Lady Guest: Not even brāhmaṇa.
Prabhupāda: Not exactly, yes.
Lady Guest: Not a brāhmaṇa.
Prabhupāda: But at least he's a kṣatriya.
Guest: He's a defense ministry.
Prabhupāda: Yes, defense ministry is kṣatriya and that is, that is the sanction of the śāstra.
- yasya yal-lakṣaṇaṁ proktaṁ
- puṁso varṇābhivyañjakam
- yad anyatrāpi dṛśyeta
- tat tenaiva vinirdiśet.
- (SB 7.11.35)
This is the statement by Nārada Muni. I shall quote the śāstra.
Guest: Right (?).
Prabhupāda: Just like kṣatriya. Kṣatriya's.... Guṇa-karma-vibhāgaśaḥ (BG 4.13). According to guṇa, śauryaṁ tejaḥ, yuddhe cāpy apalāyanam. These are the kṣatriya qualities. So śāstra says if these qualities are anyatrāpi dṛśyeta, if these qualities are found somewhere else.... Suppose a śūdra, a caṇḍāla, if these qualities are found there, then he should be designated by that post, not as śūdra.
Guest: (indistinct)
Prabhupāda: There are many instances but this is the injunction of the śāstra. And practically also. Suppose a man is a medical practitioner. He may be born in a brāhmaṇa family or śūdra family. Nobody wants to know to which family he belongs to. If he sees that he is a medical practitioner, he has passed the MD examination and that he is practicing then people accept him as doctor, medical man. Nobody asks him, "Are you a brāhmaṇa, then I make my treatment with you?" Nobody asks that. So, this is śāstric injunction. Then later on this caste brāhmaṇism, śūdraism made the whole thing, whole Hindu culture, Vedic culture spoiled.
Guest: Quite right.
Prabhupāda: That is the.... Now it is the duty of the secular government.... Now if somebody is claiming that, "I am brāhmaṇa", then government should force him to become actually a brāhmaṇa. That is government's duty, that is secular state. Not that let people go to hell, we don't care for them, that is not required.
Guest: Yes, but if a brāhmaṇa is not behaving...
Prabhupāda: If you are claiming to become a brāhmaṇa, you must act as a brāhmaṇa.