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Caste System
A hierarchical caste system is an integral part of Indian society. Within Indian culture, North or South, Hindu or Muslim, urban or rural, virtually all people and things are ranked. If you are attuned to the theme of hierarchy in India, you can see it everywhere. Although India is a political democracy, in daily life little attention is paid to notions of equality.
Within most villages or towns, everyone knows the relative rankings of each locally represented caste, and people's behaviour towards one another is constantly shaped by this knowledge. Between the extremes of the very high and very low castes, however, there is sometimes disagreement on the exact relative ranking of castes in the middle.
Castes in India are primarily associated with Hinduism, but also exist among other Indian religious groups. Muslims sometimes expressly deny that they have castes - they state that all Muslims are brothers under God - -but observation of Muslim life in various parts of India reveals the existence of caste-like groups and clear concern with social hierarchy. Among Indian Christians, too, differences in caste are acknowledged and maintained.
Hindu scriptures do not mention a caste system, but when the Europeans colonised India, they assumed the Manusmrtri to be the "law book" of Hinduism. This led them to believe that the caste system was an integral part of Hinduism – which many Hindu scholars fiercely contest, arguing that it is not a religious practice but an outmoded and anachronistic social practice.
After independence the leaders of India decided that the country would be democratic, socialist and secular. The Indian Constitution therefore formally outlawed the practice of the caste system. In modern India, the caste system has all but disappeared in public life and is in decline in metropolitan and urban areas, greatly influenced by Western cultures and economic development. However in rural communities caste practices are strongly adhered to.
The caste system is extremely complicated and there are several thousand castes (called "varna" which means "kind") and sub-castes (called "jat" or "jati"). Some jati have also sub-divided into what can only be described as clans.
Castes are defined by mutual interaction amongst the members and there are two common bonds between caste members – "roti" (which means "bread") is the practise of eating together or at least eating the same foods, and "beti" (which means "daughter"), which is the practice of inter-marriage.
Historically, the four classic castes are the Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra. But India is a huge country, and so within these four main classifications there are regional and local groups which observe differing practices. Sub-castes are myriad and can differ from village to village in some cases.
Historically, there was also a sub-class beneath the caste system called the "Untouchables" who were considered, in reality, beneath humanity in many respects. Although some regarded them as the lower-end of the Shudra caste, they were generally regarded as being unworthy of consideration. This is principally because the work they did was seen as being unhealthy, disgusting or polluting. Untouchables lived outside the normal boundaries of villages in a sub-culture of their own, being made pariahs in all senses of the word.
Mahatma Gandhi tried to remove the stigma of being "untouchable" by calling them "Harijan" (a term which is now seen as being derogatory) and the modern way of referring to them is "Dalit".
In the mid-1950’s substantial numbers of Dalits converted to Buddhism at the instigation of B.R. Ambedkar. In 1997, K.R. Narayanan, a Dalit, became President of India.
Over the years, there has been considerable violence as a result of differences between castes. In recent times the most "celebrated" case involved Phoolan Devi who was raped and mistreated by upper caste Thakurs. She became a bandit and carried out very violent robberies directed against upper caste people, families and businesses. In 1981, her gang massacred 22 Thakurs, few of whom had any connection with her own rape.
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