Page 168 - DSOC201_SOCIAL_STRUCTURE_AND_SOCIAL_CHANGE_ENGLISH

Unit 6: Caste System in India

• Ashram organization refers to the conduct of an individual in the world (nurture) in different Notes
stages of his life and varna organization refers to the work that an individual would undertake
in the society according to his nature. The approach to the study of these two organizations is
different.
• The division of society into four varna (or four orders or classes) was based on the division of
labour. Brahmins actcd as priests, Kshatriyas as rulers and fighters, Vaishyas as traders, and
Sudras as a servile class. Each varna worshipped different deities and followed different rituals.
• Varna means ‘colour’, and it was in this sense that the word seems to have been employed in
contrasting the Arya and the Dasa, referring to their fair and dark colours respectively.
• “The difference in religious practices and techniques reflects the separate existence and history
of these entities than serves as cause for their separation from the larger units.”
• The three functions performed by sub-castes are: restricting marriages, restricting commensal
relations, and regulating behaviour or communal life in terms of subsisting within the larger
society. Max Weber (1960: 31) also holds: “Today one caste frequently contains several hundred
sub-castes. In such cases, these sub-castes may be related to one another exactly or almost exactly
as are different castes. If this is the case, sub-castes in reality are castes; the caste name common
to all of them has merely historical significance”.
• The third criterion is language difference between a tribe and a caste. It is suggested that each
tribe has its own language but not a caste; for example, Gonds speak Gondi language, Bhils
speak Bhili or Vagdi language, Santhals speak Santhali language, and so on.
• In India, the situation is even more complicated because there is hardly any tribe which exists
as a separate society. No tribe in India has a completely separate political boundary. Big tribes
like Bhils, Santhals, Oraon, etc. are territorially dispersed.
• Caste and class are both status groups. A status group is a collection of individuals who share
a distinctive style of life and a certain consciousness of kind.
• Three criteria are generally used for determining an individual’s position in the class system:
objective, reputational, and subjective. The objective criteria are: income, occupation and
education; the reputational criteria refer to the attitudes and judgements of other members of
the community; and the subjective criteria refer to how people place themselves within the
society.
• The structure of caste could be discussed by analyzing its important features. When Bougle
(1958) has postulated three elements of caste, namely, hereditary specialization, hierarchy and
repulsion or opposition, Hocart (1950) has emphasized on ritual purity and impurity, while
Risley (1915) has referred to endogamy and hereditary occupation. Ghurye, Hutton, Ketkar,
Dutt, etc. have also pointed out all these features. In giving these features, the scholars have not
made distinction between caste as a unit and caste as a system. Keeping this difference in view,
it may be maintained that the important features of caste as a unit are hereditary membership,
endogamy, fixed occupation, and caste councils; while the features of caste as a system are
hierarchy, commensal restrictions, and restrictions with regard to physical and social distance.
The slight difference between. Marriott’s and Freed’s procedure was that Marriott presented
the cards one by one, while Freed presented them altogether.
• In recent years, though there has been a change in some characteristics of the caste system but
there has been no change at all in the hierarchical characteristic. Restrictions on social interaction
have been imposed because of the belief that pollution can be carried by mere bodily contact. It
is because of such beliefs that the low caste people engaged in inferior occupations are avoided
by the upper caste people.
• Castes engaged in defiling or menial or polluting occupations are treated as untouchables.
They are called outcastes, depressed classes or scheduled castes. These castes are believed to
have descended from the races originally inhabiting India before the invasion of the Aryans.
The membership of an individual in a caste is determined by his birth. Since each caste has its
own rank in relation to other castes, the high or low status of an individual depends upon the

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