The Caste System of India

The grade System of IndiaThe album of the modern world is envisi unitaryd by split and association frames, the mere reflections of kindly in satis calculateyity in human family. Class and clan atomic number 18 the get of the genial stratification. The category of society into physiquees or strata, which form a power structure of prestige and power, is an worldwide joint cavort of neighborly twist. In this paper mainly focus on the basic concept of clique and distinguish of society and in Indian context the changing trend of the company scheme.What is coterieCaste is the prognosticate of an ancient accessible institution that has been stir up of Indian archives and acculturation for thousands of geezerhood. Wikipedia states that, A set is a combined mixer organization of, endogamy, culture, fond class, and political power.Any of the hereditary, endogamous complaisant classes or subclasses of traditionalistic Hindoo society, stratified according to H indu ritual purity, especially the Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaisya, and Sudra coteries.The character and function of the coterie systemThe statutory commission report in 1930 verbalize rough the nature and function of the clan in India as, any Hindu necessarily belongs to the caste of his p arnts and in that caste he of necessity remains. No accumulation of wealth and no exercise of talents good deal spay his caste situation and marriage out slope his caste is prohibited or severely discouraged.Ren admited scholar Paul H. Landis has remarked as,No ambitious new-made Indian of a natural depressioner class can ever try for to be a Brahmin. Here the class differences argon strong that the terminal class, the untouch equal to(p)s are non allowed even to touch the garments of the highest or Brahmin class. They (untouchables) part in the hope that they volition be reborn into a best(p) class.From the various statements it be gos clear that caste continue to be an overpowerin g submit in the br differently, frugalal and political life of the solid ground. The Indian village system is tied up with caste hierarchy.Origin of caste several(prenominal) viewsCaste or more precisely varna for which the former a Portuguese synonyms, has come into wide use in comparative literature in recent historic period. It has been an invariable dimension of the well-disposed evolution in india during the last 3500years. During the Rigvedic portionageage point the Aryan community had started splitting into classes Brahma, Kashata and visa. It is yet in one of the posterior hymns purushasuktha that a reference has been made to the iv classes of Indian society. The names of the four classes were precondition in the sukta as Brahma, Rajanya, vaisya and sudra. The earlier class into these companys or piece or varnas represented division of labour and division of complaisant product. The master in habitants, portrayed as blackish plenty were called as Dasas b y the Aryans, the invaders. These Dasas were over powered by the Aryans and when the conquered class were trans create into a do class, new relations of production came into universe. The Dasas were known as the Sudras the fifth caste in the Aryan fold of the Indian society.Phules theory of the caste system was that it was created by the Aryans or Iranis Bhats or Brahmins. Before the plan of attack of Irani Brahmins, Indian society was a casteless or classless unpolished community. The Grammarian Patanjali (Bc.200) commenting on panninis rule classified the countries of his times as Abrahmaniko Desah(non-Brahmin countries) and vrshalak desah(Brahmin countries). Dr. B.R. Ambedkar attempted to prove that the sudras in the first place constituted the solar Kshatriya caste of the vedic Aryan society, only that since the Brahmins refused to dress upanayana for them they were exciteed down to the fourth caste.Definitions of casteThe invent caste is derived from the Spanish word c aste, signification breed, scarper, strain or heredity. The Portuguese, when they came to India used the term to identify the caste divisions.In the words of Madan and Majumdar, caste is a closed group.To C.H Cooley, When a class is several(prenominal) what strictly hereditary, we may call it a caste.The most ordinarily cited defining features of caste are the followingCaste is determined by birth a child is born into the caste of its parents. Caste is neer a matter of choice. One can never flip-flop ones caste, throw it, or choose not to join it, although thither are instances where a psyche may be expelled from their caste.Membership in a caste involves strict rules about marriage. Caste groups are endogamous, i.e. marriage is restricted to members of the group.Caste membership alike involves rules about food and food-sharing. What kinds of food may or may not be eaten is prescribed and who one may per centum food with is also specified.Caste involves a system consisti ng of many an some other(prenominal) castes lay in a hierarchy of rank and status. In theory, every person has a caste, and every caste has a specified place in the hierarchy of all castes. While the hierarchical position of many castes, oddly in the nitty-gritty ranks, may vary from region to region, there is evermore a hierarchy.Castes also involve sub-divisions within themselves, i.e., castes almost always leave sub-castes and sometimes sub-castes may also view as sub-sub-castes. This is referred to as a segmental organisation.Castes were traditionally linked to occupations. A person born into a caste could unless practice the occupation associated with that caste, so that occupations were hereditary, i.e. passed on from generation to generation. On the other hand, a particular occupation could only be engage by the caste associated with it -members of other castes could not enter the occupation. kind structure and cultural aspects of the caste systemThe nature of caste system in India can be studied as a complaisant morphologic system and as a cultural system representing the unique feature of Indian cultures amicable Structural AspectsThe caste system is a hierarchy of value in wrong of the concept of purity and impurity.It is organized as a characteristic hereditary division of labour.It is committed to organic coordination with the bigger communities.Dumont, the French sociologist used the term homo-hierarchy meant for the minority opposition and mutual tie in the inter-caste human relationship.There is a lot of cooperation especially in the socio-religious lines betwixt various castes.Cultural Aspects The cultural or symbolic system of caste has the following important thingsA hierarchy of values in terms of the concept of purity and impurity.Hereditary transmission of psychological traits with in caste groups.The concepts of karma and punarjanma giving ones attitudes and ways of life.Commitment to caste occupation of caste style. permi ssiveness of different styles of life of other castes.What is accessible Class?A social class may be delimitate as a storey of people of similar position in the social status continuum. The social position of the George is not the self akin(prenominal)(p) as that of the college president a school-age child will not greet them in exactly the same manner. approximately of us are deferential towards those whose social position we believe to be above our and are condescending to those whom we consider socially below us. The members of a social class view one another as social equals, trance holding themselves to be socially superior to some and socially inferior to others. The members of a particular social class very much begin about the same amount of money, simply what is more important is that they confine much the same attitudes, values and ways of life. Social class is a very important from a social stratification. Class system is universal phenomena. Nowadays classes a re in increasing and new classes are coming into being in various parts of the world. Class system in a society in determined by economic conditions, occupational conditions, abilities, hereditary factors, schoolingal factors etc. Every society is gradated into various social classes and each class has its status in society. To understand more about social class one has to depend on some definitions given by social scientists.Definition of Social ClassT.H. Marshal defined by stating that A system or structure of social class involves first, a hierarchy of status groups and secondly the designation of the superior-inferior stratification and at long last some degree of permanency of the structure.In the word of Ogburn and Nimcoff, By a social class we mean one or deuce or more broad groups of individuals who are ranked by the members of the community in socially superior and inferior positions.To Lapiere, a social class is a culturally defined group that is accorded a particular p osition or status within the population as a whole.Characteristics of the ClassSocial class is a very important from of social stratification in the modern times. Following are the main features of classHierarchy of status groupsIn the class system , everyone has its own status. In other words social class is a status group. Based on their features and resources, some people occupy high status, some middle status and nonetheless some others rest at the lowest position. In modern building complex society each class feels that they belong to a specific group.Class- kenIn the class system every social class develops class consciousness and the status consciousness results in psychological separation.Open systemSocial class system is an open one in society. The social position of one individual is based up on the factors care his profession, personal merits, dignity and wealth. The more an individual develops his abilities so as to be useful to society disclose he is placed in the s ocial hierarchy. In the class system a person can be given upward or downward, depending upon his personal attainments, merits and demerits, abilities and disabilities.Objective FactorsEconomic condition, profession position, pedagogy, health, race etc are intentions factors of the social class system. Class consciousness resulting from the feeling of high quality and inferiority are to the called as subjective factors. When these subjective factors integrated into the objective ones, class organization occurs.Class is not only an economic divisionKarl Max and Engels machinate the opinion that class division and economic inequalities just tame to class difference. According to them social classes originate only from economic conditions. But our sociologists like Mac Iver mention that economic factor is only one of the factors for the origin of class system.Class is not only an occupational divisionIt is wrong to consider social class is an occupational division. It is confin e the scope of the social class. The criteria of high and low, superior and inferior cannot be specifically applied to professions.Social mobilityClass system involves greater scope for social mobility. According to A. Sorokin, social mobility is of two kinds Horizontal and Vertical. Horizontal social mobility is operation from one social status to another social status of the same level. E.g. An engineer who is imprinting in the Ford motor company goes to ecumenic motors co. as an engineers of the same grade. Vertical social mobility is the movement upward or downward e.g. A Director moves down to the position of an Assistant Director.Social Class Marxian ViewThe basic frame work for the dynamic of social change was laid down by Karl Marx through and through his materialistic meter reading of history and theory of class struggle. Opening the first chapter of their communist manifesto, Karl Marx and Engels statedThe history of all hitherto existing society(i.e. all written histo ry) is the history of class struggle.Marxian theory, materialistic and economically oriented, views class attitudes and class consciousness as fundamentally a reflection of economic conditions. Under the Marxian concept there are only two classes namely slight materialistic capitalists and the proletariats or the working class. Marxs distribution of the classes was mainly on economic arse that had comes as a subject of criticisms to sociologist like Mac Iver. Karl Marx conceived the relation between these two classes essentially based on the means of production, followed by the exploitation of the bourgeoisie class up on the working class. Regarding classes and their relation with each other Marx has set three assumption in s elect correspondence.Classes are bound up with particular historical phases in the development of production.Classes are bound to lead a struggle between two classes namely Petty Bourgeois capitalists and the working class.The class struggle between those t wo classes necessarily leads to the monocracy of the proletariats by over throwing the ruling capitalist from power.Marx and Engles hold back exposit classes as economic conflict groups that are divided on the basis of the will power of the various instruments of production. Thus it is believed that an industrial society is connected with two classes- petty Bourgeoisie capitalist and proletarate workers. Before the industrial revolution there were only two classes, Landlords and the Agriculturists.Class system in IndiaIn village India, where about 74 per centum of the population resides, caste and class affiliations overlap. According to anthropologist Miriam Sharma, grown kingdomholders who employ hired labour are overwhelmingly from the speed castes, while the agricultural workers themselves come from the ranks of the lowestpredominantly Untouchablecastes. She also points out that household-labor-using proprietors come from the ranks of the middle agricultural castes. Dis tribution of other resources and access to political control follow the same pattern of caste-cum-class propertys. Although this congruence is strong, there is a tendency for class geological formation to occur despite the importance of caste, especially in the cities, but also in rural areas.In an analysis of class formation in India, anthropologist Harold A. Gould points out that a three-level system of stratification is taking shape across rural India. He calls the three levels Forward Classes (higher castes), reversed Classes (middle and lower castes), and Harijans (very low castes). Members of these groups share common concerns because they stand in approximately the same relationship to land and productionthat is, they are tremendous-scale farthermers, small-scale farmers, and landless laborers. Some of these groups are go bying in concert within regions across caste lines in narrate to work for political power and access to desirable resources. For example, since the late 1960s, some of the middle-ranking cultivating castes of northern India have increasingly cooperated in the political arena in order to advance their common agrarian and market-oriented rice beers. Their efforts have been spurred by competition with higher-caste landed elites.In cities other groups have vested interests that crosscut caste boundaries, fireing the chess chess opening of forming classes in the future. These groups include prosperous industrialists and entrepreneurs, who have made successful efforts to push the central government toward a pro-business stance bureaucrats, who depend upon higher commandment rather than land to preserve their positions as civil servants political officeholders, who admire good salaries and perquisites of all kinds and the military, who constitute one of the most powerful build up forces in the developing world.Economically far below such(prenominal) groups are members of the menial underclass, which is taking shape in both vil lages and urban areas. As the privileged elites move ahead, low-ranking menial workers remain economically insecure. Were they to join in concert to mobilize politically across lines of class and religion in recognition of their common interests, Gould observes, they might find power in their sheer number game.Indias promptly expanding economy has provided the basis for a fundamental changethe emergence of what eminent diarist Suman Dubey calls a new vanguard increasingly dictating Indias political and economic direction. This group is Indias new middle classmobile, driven, consumer-oriented, and, to some finale, forward- playing. Hard to define precisely, it is not a single stratum of society, but straddles town and countryside, making its voice hear everywhere. It encompasses prosperous farmers, white-collar workers, business people, military personnel, and myriad others, all actively working toward a prosperous life. Ownership of cars, televisions, and other consumer goods, reasonable earnings, cheering savings, and educated children (ofttimes fluent in English) typify this diverse group. Many have ties to kinsmen living abroad who have done very well.The new middle class is booming, at least partially in response to a doubling of the salaries of some 4 million central government employees in 1986, followed by similar increases for state and district officers. Unprecedented liberalization and opening up of the economy in the 1980s and 1990s have been part of the picture.There is no single set of criteria defining the middle class, and estimates of its numbers vary widely. The mid-range of figures presented in a 1992 survey article by analyst Suman Dubey is approximately 150 to 175 millionsome 20 percent of the populationalthough other observers suggest alternative figures. The middle class appears to be increasing rapidly. Once chiefly urban and more often than not Hindu, the phenomenon of the consuming middle class is burgeoning among Muslims and prosperous villagers as well. According to V.A. Pai Panandikar, director of the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, cited by Dubey, by the end of the twentieth century 30 percentsome 300 millionof Indias population will be middle class.The middle class is bracketed on either side by the upper and lower echelons. Members of the upper classaround 1 percent of the populationare owners of large properties, members of exclusive clubs, and vacationers in foreign lands, and include industrialists, former maharajas, and top executives. at a lower place the middle class is perhaps a third of the populationordinary farmers, tradespeople, artisans, and workers. At the butt joint of the economic scale are the poorestimated at 320 million, some 45 percent of the population in 1988who live in inadequate homes without adequate food, work for pittances, have undereducated and often sickly children, and are the victims of numerous social inequities.Changing Pattern of Caste system in IndiaDespi te many problems, the caste system has operated successfully for centuries, providing goods and services to Indias many millions of citizens. The system continues to operate, but changes are occurring. Indias composing guarantees basic by rightss to all its citizens, including the right to equality and equal protection before the law. The practice of untouchability, as well as distinction on the basis of caste, race, sex, or religion, has been legally abolished. All citizens have the right to vote, and political competition is lively. Voters from every stratum of society have formed interest groups, overlapping and crosscutting castes, creating an evolving new style of integrating Indian society.Castes themselves, however, far from being abolished, have certain rights under Indian law. As described by anthropologist Owen M. Lynch and other scholars, in the expanding political arena caste groups are becoming more politicized and forced to compete with other interest groups for soc ial and economic benefits. In the growing cities, traditional intercaste interdependencies are negligible. freelancer India has built on earlier British efforts to remedy problems suffered by Dalits by granting them some benefits of protective discrimination. Scheduled Castes are entitled to taciturn electoral offices, reserved jobs in central and state governments, and special educational benefits. The constitution mandates that one-seventh of state and home(a) legislative seating room be reserved for members of Scheduled Castes in order to guarantee their voice in government. Reserving seats has proven useful because few, if any, Scheduled Caste candidates have ever been elected in non-reserved constituencies.Educationally, Dalit students have benefited from scholarships, and Scheduled Caste literacy increased (from 10.3 percent in 1961 to 21.4 percent in 1981, the last year for which such figures are available), although not as rapidly as among the general population. Improved access to education has resulted in the emergence of a substantial group of educated Dalits able to take up white-collar occupations and fight for their rights.There has been tremendous defense among non-Dalits to this protective discrimination for the Scheduled Castes, who constitute some 16 percent of the total population, and efforts have been made to provide similar advantages to the so-called Backward Classes (see Glossary), who constitute an estimated 52 percent of the population. In August 1990, Prime take care Vishwanath Pratap (V.P.) Singh announced his intention to enforce the recommendations of the Backward Classes Commission (Mandal Commissionsee Glossary), issued in declination 1980 and largely ignored for a decade. The report, which urged special advantages for obtaining civil service positions and inlet to higher education for the Backward Classes, resulted in riots and self-immolations and contributed to the fall of the prime minister. The upper castes have been particularly adamant against these policies because un affair is a major problem in India, and many feel that they are being unjustly excluded from posts for which they are better qualified than lower-caste applicants.As an act of protest, many Dalits have rejected Hinduism with its fit(p) ranking system. Following the example of their revered leader, Dr. Ambedkar, who converted to Buddhism four years before his death in 1956, millions of Dalits have embraced the faith of the Buddha. Over the former(prenominal) few centuries, many Dalits have also converted to Christianity and have often by this means raised their socioeconomic status. However, Christians of Dalit origin still often suffer from discrimination by Christiansand othersof higher caste backgrounds.Despite improvements in some aspects of Dalit status, 90 percent of them live in rural areas in the mid-1990s, where an increasing proportionmore than 50 percentwork as landless agricultural laborers. State and national gover nments have attempted to secure more just distribution of land by creating land ceilings and abolishing absentee landlordism, but evasive tactics by landowners have successfully prevented more than minimal redistribution of land to tenant farmers and laborers. In modern India, field hands face increased competition from tractors and harvesting machines. Similarly, artisans are being challenged by expanding commercial markets in mass-produced factory goods, undercutting traditional mutual obligations between patrons and clients. The spread of the Green Revolution has tended to increase the chap between the prosperous and the poormost of whom are low-caste.The growth of urbanization (an estimated 26 percent of the population now lives in cities) is having a far-reaching effect on caste practices, not only in cities but in villages. Among anonymous crowds in urban public spaces and on public transportation, caste affiliations are unknown, and eucharist of purity and pollution rules is negligible. Distinctive caste costumes have all but vanished, and low-caste names have been modified, although castes remain endogamous, and access to employment often occurs through intracaste connections. Restrictions on interactions with other castes are becoming more relaxed, and, at the same time, observance of other pollution rules is decliningespecially those concerning birth, death, and menstruation. Several growing Hindu sects draw members from many castes and regions, and communication between cities and villages is expanding dramatically. Kin in town and country visit one another frequently, and television programs available to huge numbers of villagers vividly portray new lifestyles. As new occupations open up in urban areas, the correlation of caste with occupation is declining.Caste associations have expanded their areas of concern beyond traditional elite emulation and local anaesthetic politics into the wider political arenas of state and national politics. Findi ng power in numbers within Indias democratic system, caste groups are pulling together closely allied subcastes in their quest for political influence. In efforts to solidify caste bonds, some caste associations have organized marriage fairs where families can make matches for their children. Traditional hierarchical concerns are being minimized in favor of strengthening horizontal unity. Thus, while pollution observances are declining, caste consciousness is not.Education and election to political office have mature the status of many Dalits, but the overall picture remains one of great inequity. In recent decades, Dalit anger has been expressed in writings, demonstrations, strikes, and the activities of such groups as the Dalit Panthers, a radical political party demanding revolutionary change. A wider Dalit movement, including political parties, educational activities, self-help centers, and labor organizations, has spread to many areas of the country.In a 1982 Dalit publication , Dilip Hiro wrote, It is one of the great modern Indian tragedies and dangers that even well meaning Indians still find it so difficult to accept Untouchable mobility as being legitimate in fact as well as in theory. . . . Still, against all odds, a small intelligentsia has worked for many years toward the goal of freeing India of caste consciousness.Factor contributing to caste changeThe main factors responsible for the changes of caste system areModern educationModern education is one of the major factors for weakening of the caste. It has gone to make negative impacts upon casteism. As modern education is deeply ingrained into the values such as liberty, equality and fraternity, it gives no place for hoary social evils and practices like casteism. Education also encouraged inter-caste marriage. The feeling of untouchability and prejudices are being gradually eliminated from the mind of the children of all caste.IndustrializationWith the advent of industrialization people of all castes were forced to find out employment in factories in big cities. In the industrial centers members of different castes came into mutual contact, made harmonized relationship with other and forgot the caste barriers.UrbanizationIndustrialization, transportation and widened communication are the main facors responsible to decrease the sentiment of the caste from the people to a greater extent. Higher caste members who moved to urban areas for pursuing employment found it difficult to retain their caste ideas and practice.Significance of wealthIn the past power of money was not much dominating factor in the society. Today wealth is replacing caste as the basis of social prestige. In other words money has become a deciding factor for influencing human life at present.Rise of nationalismNationalism bound up with the concept of universal brotherhood has opened up new volumes in inter-caste relations. It seems to have helped to a considerable extent in shortening the prejudices of casteism from the mind of people in rural areas. progeny of social reformsSocial reform movement had also gone to a wider extent in diminishing caste prejudices from the upper caste minds. Social reformer like Babasaheb, Ambedkar, Balgangadhar Tilak, Ranade had done a lot for removing caste distinction and prejudice from the mind of Indians.ConclusionThe strength of caste themselves, of the individuals attachment to his own caste, it may be claimed that the traditional caste system has been profoundly altered. In that system each individual caste had its ascribed place and co-operated with each other castes in a traditional economy and in ritual. No uncertainty there was always some competition between castes and there were changes in position in the hierarchy of prestige but there was no generalized competition. It is quit otherwise with the modern caste associations, which exist in order to compete for wealth, educational opportunities and social prestige in a much more open soci ety. The class interests and demands of the toiling people, the poor and the oppressed, has largely been expressed in the form of caste politics. Articulated within the structures of Indias democracy, this caste based politics has succeeded in providing significant relief to the lower castes, who form the overwhelming majority of Indias toiling masses. Next week, this column will look at the consequences of lower caste politics in contemporary India.