If western society is guilty of apartheid, India is guilty of the practice of untouchability. No other country is as stratified as India is as far as the caste system is concerned. It is clear from the poem that the speaker has suffered the bane of discrimination in human society. His statement that, if he were a tree, no bird would ask him what caste he is, makes it clear that the speaker is made to feel ashamed of his caste repeatedly.
When he states that the shadow of the tree which is formed on the ground when the sunlight falls on it, wouldn’t feel defiled, it is clear that people keep him at a distance and do not allow even his shadow to come in their way as he and his shadow are considered impure. When he talks about the sweet friendship with the cool breeze and leaves, it is crystal clear that in society not many extend to him their hands of friendship. When he avers that raindrops wouldn’t turn back from him considering him a dog eater, it is understandable that people from whom he hoped for sustenance just as a tree gets its sustenance from water, he got only ** and rejection.When he writes that mother earth wouldn’t flee from him with the * of getting defiled, the picture of upper caste people shooing him away forms in the imagination of the readers. The phrase ‘branching out’ makes it clear that the hopes and aspirations of the lower caste people are curbed and they are not allowed to make use of their potential. The image of the sacred cow coming to the tree and giving the tree the joy of being touched by the three hundred thousand gods sheltering inside her, the speaker shows that entry to sacred places is denied to him. It could even be an ironical reference to the higher caste people who worship cows as divine but fail to see divinity in their fellow human beings. It could even be a mockery of the upper caste people who worship thousands of gods but have no respect for their brethren.
Finally, when the speaker says that if he were a tree he would have the privilege of being burnt in the holy or becoming the bier, it is clear that, as a human being, he knows that he would be shunned even after and wouldn’t be allowed a decent . Thus, as a human being, in life and *, he would be condemned, but as a tree, he would live a life of dignity and joy. Thus the speaker makes it clear that instead of being born as a human being in a society which practises discrimination, it is better to be born as a tree or any other creature in nature, as in nature there is no division.
