Caste in Modern India and Other Essays
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CASTE IN MODERN INDIA AND OTHER ESSAYS M. N. Srinivas ASIA PUBLISHING HOUSE BOMBAY • CALCUTTA • NEW DELHI • MADRAS LONDON • NEW YORK -iii- CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 1 1. CASTE IN MODERN INDIA 15 2. A NOTE ON SANSKRITIZATION AND WESTER- NIZATION 42 3. VARNA AND CASTE 63 4. CASTES: CAN THEY EXIST IN THE INDIA OF TOMORROW? 70 5. THE INDUSTRIALIZATION AND URBANIZATION OF RURAL AREAS 77 6. THE INDIAN ROAD TO EQUALITY 87 7. THE NATURE OF THE PROBLEM OF INDIAN UNITY 98 8. THE STUDY OF DISPUTES IN AN INDIAN VILLAGE 112 9. VILLAGE STUDIES AND THEIR SIGNIFICANCE 120 10. SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY AND THE STUDY OF RURAL AND URBAN SOCIETIES 136 11. HINDUISM 148 INDEX 161 -vii- INTRODUCTION The essays included in this volume were written during the years 1952-60. Each one of them was written in response to a specific invitation to contribute to a seminar, symposium or learned publication. In each case there was a deadline, and as everyone knows, meeting the deadline frequently involves a compromise with one's conscience. But it is also true that, in many cases, the essay would not have been written but for the deadline. The essays are on a wide variety of topics, and I would like to stress the fact that they were written over a period of eight years. My views have naturally undergone a certain amount of change during this time but I have refrained from making any except minor verbal alterations in the essays. An essay has a structural unity and it is not possible to add or delete paragraphs. I find the writing of a new essay less difficult than changing an old one. Apart from this, a few of the essays included in this volume have stimulated a fair amount of discussion and it would not be fair to my critics to alter them substantially. II Caste in Modern India : The first essay included in this book "Caste in Modern India", was read as the Presidential Address to the Anthropology and Archaeology Section of the Forty- fourth Session of the Indian Science Congress, which met in Calcutta in January 1957. In it I tried to highlight the part played by caste in the democratic processes of modern India, and in administration and education. I must confess that I was somewhat disturbed by what I felt was an increased activity of caste in certain areas of public life. In this connection I came across certain conflicting attitudes among the elite. On the one hand there seemed to be a touching faith in the efficacy of legislation to cure ancient and deep-seated social 'evils.' On the other hand, there was not only no determined effort on the part of the elite to fight these evils but there was also a tolerance of their practice. 1 ____________________ 1 See in this connection Chapter 4. -1- When "Caste in Modern India" was read at Calcutta it drew from the Times of India 2 the comment that I was exaggerating the role of caste in Indian public life and politics. But the General Elections which followed a few weeks later seemed to shock thoughtful people into an awareness of the relation between caste and elections. This relationship was manifest not only in those areas in South India which were regarded as the traditional strongholds of caste but also in certain parts of North India such as Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. The Congress Working Committee, meeting soon after elections, took formal note of the fact that caste considerations had played a large part in influencing voting behaviour. A well-known political leader remarked that whatever the political party to which candidates professed to belong, they really stood from their castes. The General Elections of 1957 may be said to have awakened the Indian intelligentsia as to the actual considerations which influenced voting. It also led to the widespread condemnation of exploitation of caste-links for election purposes. Condemnation, however, is not the same thing as abstaining from the desire to use it to further the interest of one's own party. Elections to panchayats and municipalities held in subsequent years have shown conclusively that caste considerations are potent. 3 The establishment of Panchayat Raj in Rajasthan and Andhra has given a new fillip to caste. The hold of caste is also seen in the tenacity with which castes which were once classed as 'backward' cling to that privilege. The Mysore Backward Classes Committee Report ( 1961) published a list of backward castes on the basis of the number of high school students per thousand of a caste's population. (This is done in spite of the fact that statistics regarding caste are not firm, and the unit which is regarded as a caste is often quite arbitrary.) The Lingayats were classified as a 'forward community" in the Report, but they brought such political pressure to bear that the Mysore Cabinet ordered that they be classified as a "backward" community. The Report of the Administrative Reforms Committee of Kerala ( 1958) pointed out, in an admirable way, the risks and drawbacks of treating caste as the basis of backwardness and the attraction of using the economic criterion in determining the backwardness of individuals, but felt that the time was not ripe for its adoption. 4 Only two Indian States, Maharashtra and Gujarat, now use the economic criterion exclusively in determining backwardness. III A sociologist would define caste as a hereditary, endogamous, usually localized group, having a traditional association with an occupation, and a particular position in the local hierarchy of castes. Relations between castes are governed, among other things, by the concepts of pollution and purity, and generally, maximum commensality occurs within the caste. In the above definition it is assumed that a caste group is always easily identifiable and that it does not change its social boundaries. This, however, is not true. A caste is usually segmented into several sub-castes and each sub-caste is endogamous. This segmentation is probably the result of a long historical process in which groups continually fissioned off. As a result of this long process of development there has come into existence several cognate groups, usually found scattered over a limited geographical region (this, however, ____________________ 4 We have considered the question of reservation of posts for backward classes. In this State, 40 per cent of the posts in Government service are reserved for Backward Communities. This is in addition to the reservation of 10 per cent for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Within this 40 per cent there is a 'principle of subrotation' by which a certain percentage is reserved for a community or group of communities. "The system, as it now exists, has several disadvantages. Firstly, there is a continuous clamour to include more and more communities in the list and the basis for the assessment of their backwardness is not entirely satisfactory. Secondly there are among the 'backward classes' communities which are 'relatively advanced' and those who are truly backward. The latter have a feeling that the benefit of the reservation generally goes to the former. The 'principle of subrotation' has not met this to a satisfactory extent. Thirdly, there is the consideration, that such reservation inevitably brings down the quality and standard of the services. The most important point, however, is that the system creates a psychology amongst all the communities by which caste and communal consciousness is perpetuated. "On account of these, it has been suggested by some that the criteria for backwardness should be economic rather than those based merely on communities. This suggestion looks attractive. But, apart from the fact that over 80 per cent of our people should be considered to be economically backward, it ignores the historical fact that economic backwardness in our country, has, in most cases, been the concomitant and result of social backwardness. -3- is increasingly less true of the higher groups), each of which retains a sense of its identity as well as its linkage with other similar groups. Traditionally, it was the smallest group which constituted the unity of endogamy, and the identity of this tiny group stood out sharply against other similar groups. All the members of this group pursued a common occupation or a few common occupations, and this group was the unit of social and ritual life. The members of this group ate food cooked by each other, shared a common culture, and in most cases, were governed by the same caste-panchayat. During the last sixty years or more, however, the linkages between groups have become more and more significant, and the strong walls erected between sub-castes have begun to crumble. The endogamous circle is widening, especially under the impact of the dowry system which is specially characteristic of the high castes. Certain other factors have also been significant in this context : the greater mobility brought about under British rule, the movement to the cities for higher education and employment, urban cosmopolitanism and Westernization. In the case of the lower castes, which were also more rurally oriented than the higher, political factors have been responsible for the weakening of the barriers between sub-castes. Thus, leaders of the non-Brahmin castes in South India came together in order to obtain certain concessions and privileges, and to break the Brahminical dominance. Not only were the internal divisions within each non- Brahmin caste ignored, but all non-Brahmins including Jains, Christians, and Muslims came together on a ____________________ "It is exceedingly difficult to suggest a simple solution to this complicated problem. A certain amount of protection and encouragement to the backward classes is necessary for some time to come, so that they may get over the handicaps to which they have been subjected for centuries.