Caste system in India

This article is about socio-political stratification in Indian society. For socio-religious Hindu stratification, see Varna (Hinduism).
"Castes in India" redirects here. For the book, see Castes in India: Their Mechanism, Genesis and Development.

Mahatma Gandhi visiting Madras (now Chennai) in 1933 on an India-wide tour for Dalit (he used Harijan) causes. His writings, and speeches during such tours, discussed the discriminated-against castes of India.

The caste system in India is the paradigmatic ethnographic instance of social classification based on castes. It has its origins in ancient India, and was transformed by various ruling elites in medieval, early-modern, and modern India, especially in the aftermath of the collapse of the Mughal Empire and the establishment of the British Raj.[1][2][3][4] It is today the basis of affirmative action programmes in India as enforced through its constitution.[5] The caste system consists of two different concepts, varna and jati, which may be regarded as different levels of analysis of this system.

The caste system as it exists today is thought to be the result of developments during the collapse of the Mughal era and the rise of the British colonial government in India.[1][6][7] The British Raj furthered this development, making rigid caste organisation a central mechanism of administration.[6] Between 1860 and 1920, the British incorporated the Indian caste system into their system of governance, granting administrative jobs and senior appointments only to Christians and people belonging to certain castes.[8] Social unrest during the 1920s led to a change in this policy.[9] Caste was no longer used by the colonial authority to functionally organize civil society. This reflected changes in administrative practices, understandings of expertise, and the rise of new European scholarly institutions.[10] After the 1920s, the colonial administration began a policy of positive discrimination by reserving a certain percentage of government jobs for the lower castes. In 1948, negative discrimination on the basis of caste was banned by law and further enshrined in the Indian constitution in 1950;[11] however, the system continues to be practiced in parts of India.[5] There are 3,000 castes and 25,000 sub-castes in India, each related to a specific occupation.[12]

Caste-based differences have also been practised in other regions and religions in the Indian subcontinent, like Nepalese Buddhism,[13] Christianity, Islam, Judaism and Sikhism.[14] It has been challenged by many reformist Hindu movements,[15] Sikhism, Christianity,[14] and present-day Neo Buddhism.[16] With Indian influences, the caste system is also practiced in Bali.[17]

After achieving independence in 1947, India enacted many affirmative action policies for the upliftment of historically marginalized groups as enforced through its constitution. These policies included reserving a quota of places for these groups in higher education and government employment.

  1. ^ a b de Zwart (2000).
  2. ^ Bayly (2001), pp. 25–27, 392.
  3. ^ St. John (2012), p. 103.
  4. ^ Sathaye (2015), p. 214.
  5. ^ a b "What is India's caste system?". BBC News. 25 February 2016. Retrieved 27 May 2017. Independent India's constitution banned discrimination on the basis of caste, and, in an attempt to correct historical injustices and provide a level playing field to the traditionally disadvantaged, the authorities announced quotas in government jobs and educational institutions for scheduled castes and tribes, the lowest in the caste hierarchy, in 1950.
  6. ^ a b Bayly (2001), p. 392.
  7. ^ Bayly (2001), pp. 26–27:What happened in the initial phase of this two-stage sequence was the rise of the royal man of prowess. In this period, both kings and the priests and ascetics with whom men of power were able to associate their rule became a growing focus for the affirmation of a martial and regal form of caste ideal. (...) The other key feature of this period was the reshaping of many apparently casteless forms of devotional faith in a direction which further affirmed these differentiations of rank and community.
  8. ^ Nehru, Jawaharlal (2004). The discovery of India. New Delhi: Penguin Books. ISBN 0-670-05801-7. OCLC 57764885.
  9. ^ Dirks (2001b), pp. 215–229.
  10. ^ Guha, Sumit. "The Birth of Caste". Beyond Caste. Permanent Black. pp. 38–39. ISBN 978-81-7824-513-3.
  11. ^ "'I would tell the other girls at school that I was Brahmin': The struggle to challenge India's caste system". ABC News. 27 June 2022.
  12. ^ "What is India's caste system?". BBC News. 19 June 2019.
  13. ^ LeVine, Sarah (2009). Rebuilding Buddhism: The Theravada Movement in Twentieth-Century Nepal. Harvard University Press. p. 21. ISBN 978-0-674-02554-7.
  14. ^ a b Cohen (2001), p. 21.
  15. ^ Dirks (2001a), p. 3.
  16. ^ Omvedt, Gail (2014). Buddhism in India: Challenging Brahmanism and Caste. Sage Classics. p. 252. ISBN 978-81-321-1028-6.
  17. ^ Geoffrey Robinson (1995). The Dark Side of Paradise: Political Violence in Bali. Cornell University Press. p. 32. ISBN 0-8014-8172-4.