Caste Never Died, It Just Went 'Clandestine': A Revealing Review of 'Jati: Badalte Pariprekshya'

In his book "Caste: Changing Perspectives" (Jaati-Badalte Pariprekshya), Surinder Singh Jodhka responsibly explains how the caste system, discrimination, and untouchability have gone through a period of transformation in India since independence, citing several research studies and conclusions on caste communities.

Published by Rajkamal Prakashan, the book "Caste: Changing Perspectives" presents numerous facts about Indian castes, especially the Dalit community. These facts include research and reports on caste by some Indians, as well as conclusions drawn by some foreigners, which are included verbatim.

The book "Caste: Changing Perspectives," written by Surinder Singh, is originally a Hindi translation by journalist Jitendra Kumar of "CASTE," which was published in the Oxford India Short Introductions Series.

This caste-based book mostly revolves around the "Dalit" community. However, while reading it, some conclusions drawn about Dalits may cause turmoil in your mind, while in other parts, you will read things that we can feel or see around us in today's era. The author earnestly highlights the surveys conducted by sociologists and anthropologists on Indian caste communities, especially the erstwhile untouchable castes, and the truth visible on the ground.

I cannot say with full certainty that you will agree with every fact included in the book; you may also disagree with some parts.

According to the classical Dumontian sociology included in the book, caste was an integrated system based on a religious ideology, which created a common consensus on the values of purity and impurity in a hierarchical social system. Those who were at the bottom of the caste hierarchy were just as committed to maintaining the order of purity and pollution as they were personally unhappy with their status within this system, but they accepted it. The only available option to exit this system was renunciation (sannyasa), meaning leaving the community and the normal 'worldly life'.

In his introduction to the book, Surinder Singh writes:

"Since the 1950s, the process of economic development and the institutionalization of democratic politics have changed almost all aspects of Indian society, including the institutional character of caste. However, the reality of caste has certainly not ended. Although in some cases caste groups have aligned themselves in the form of 'caste associations' and political equations, it is still presented today in different ways as high-low and inequality. In other words, caste is alive and kicking; it exists not only as an identity but also as privilege in some places and as disadvantage in others. Many also argue that the presence of caste has continuously increased in public rather than diminishing."

He further writes, "Caste has become a very important and interesting subject for research. Apart from sociologists and social anthropologists, historians, political scientists, economists, and even creative writers have written a lot on the various dimensions of caste. They have been working on this subject with different types of ideological frameworks and political sensitivities. Over the years, caste has emerged as an important factor in the democratic political process. The government's reservation policy and the political mobilization of communities have completely changed the value of caste in contemporary social India. Today, caste has not only become an important element of public policy for the developmental state but has also become a significant factor for those global funding agencies and civil society groups that are working for poverty alleviation."

The book also talks about some untold historical aspects. For example, the origin of the word 'Dalit' is said to be in political movements in Maharashtra, meaning 'broken, fallen to the ground, or oppressed'. It is also mentioned that the word Dalit was first used by the nineteenth-century reformer Jyotiba Phule in the context of caste oppression. Furthermore, the book reveals historical facts about how the words untouchable, Dalit, and Harijan came into existence.

Regarding the condition of Dalits in pre-independence India, the book states that rural settlements in different parts of the subcontinent were designed in such a way that untouchable caste communities lived far from the main settlements. This was despite their services being required by the village community. Due to their separation from the village community and their employment in tasks considered menial, they lived miserable and humiliating lives in social situations.

Around the time of independence, the book describes how the caste system in India always kept the untouchables isolated, even if they were engaged in their traditional identity-based work for only a short time. This is explained as follows: in most of rural India, a large portion of untouchables was part of the local agricultural economy and worked as agricultural laborers. But the function of the caste system always kept them divided. For instance, even if they were involved in leather-related work for only a short period, their social identity was determined based on this short duration of work—that they were untouchables and belonged to the lowest rung of the caste hierarchy.

In the book, we read how every caste has a story to tell about its origin, which keeps the caste divisions intact.

Regarding the changing nature of untouchability over time, the book states that more than 25 years after I.P. Desai's Gujarat survey, an all-India survey conducted in 2001-02 in rural settlements across 11 states of the country found that despite the ground reality of caste certainly changing, the practice of untouchability had not completely ended. More importantly, perhaps, there had been no significant relief in the social and economic conditions of the majority of untouchables. The survey reported that:

Untouchability not only exists throughout rural India but is also able to sustain itself by adapting to new socio-economic realities and is taking on new and more clandestine forms.

The book also provides a sequential account of the brutal caste-based atrocities committed against known untouchables in Indian history. This includes details from the burning alive of 42 Dalits in Tamil Nadu's Thanjavur district in 1968 by dominant castes to the murder of an entire Dalit farmer's family in Khairlanji, Maharashtra, in 2006. It also provides information on how the voice of the Dalit community, which faces discrimination based on dissent, color, and race, is now being strongly presented from the local level to the national and international levels. Discussions, studies, and deep deliberations have begun on this.

Who is Surinder Singh Jodhka, the author of "Jati: Badalte Pariprekshya"?

Surinder Singh Jodhka is a Professor of Sociology at the Centre for the Study of Social Systems, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. His major books include 'The Oxford Handbook of Caste' (co-edited with Jules Naudet), 'The Indian Village: Rural Lives in the 21st Century', 'Agrarian Changes in India' (ed.), 'The Indian Middle Class' (co-authored with Aseem Prakash), 'Caste in Contemporary India', etc. He has been honored with the 'Amartya Sen Award' by the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR).