Page 104 - DSOC202_SOCIAL_STRATIFICATION_ENGLISH

Unit 6 : Caste

In past decades, Dalits in certain areas had to display extreme deference to high-status people, Notes
physically keeping their distance—lest their touch or even their shadow pollute others—wearing
neither shoes nor any upper body covering (even for women) in the presence of the upper castes.
The lowest-ranking had to jingle a little bell in warning of their polluting approach. In much of
India, Dalits were prohibited from entering temples, using wells from which the “clean” castes
drew their water, or even attending schools. In past centuries, dire punishments were prescribed
for Dalits who read or even heard sacred texts. Such degrading discrimination was made illegal
under legislation passed during British rule and was protested against by preindependence reform
movements led by Mahatma Gandhi and Bhimrao Ramji (B.R.) Ambedkar, a Dalit leader. Dalits
agitated for the right to enter Hindu temples and to use village wells and effectively pressed for
the enactment of stronger laws opposing disabilities imposed on them. After independence,
Ambedkar almost singlehundedly wrote India’s constitution, including key provisions barring
caste-based discrimination. Nonetheless, discriminatory treatment of Dalits remains a factor in
daily life, especially in villages, as the end of the twentieth century approaches.
Caste, Varna, Sub-Caste and Tribe
Many people confuse caste with varna, sub-caste and tribe. The inter-changeability of these terms
has created confusion in the sociological analysis of the institution of caste. Referring to this
conceptual confusion, S.C. Dube (1958 : vi) writes that the analytical short-cuts often blur the
distinction between them (that is, terms like varna, caste and sub-caste), and the resulting portrayal
of the social system does not remain useful for the purposes of meaningful comparison. The
absence of common operational definitions and generally agreed upon units of analysis in studies
of caste has obscured the understanding of caste as an essential aspect of the social system of
Hindu India. Though the need for clarification between these concepts has been pointed out by all
scholars, including Ghurye, Srinivas, Dube, Bailey and Mayer, etc., yet nobody has succeeded in
pointing out the clear-cut difference in the various concepts. Logically it may be maintained that
caste is a developed form of varna which had started as a class in early India and gradually came
to have religious sanctions. It is the accepted religious principles supporting the caste system that
distinguish it from the stratification system in America and many other countries based on ascriptive
status, endogamy and low-prestige status (for example, of Negroes).
Caste and Varna
Caste and varna are two separate concepts. It was Senart who for the first time brought to the
attention of the world the fact that a caste and a varna are not identical. The peculiarity of the
Hindu theory of social organization is its reference to Varnashram organization. Though the varna
organization and the ashram organization are two separate organizations, yet they go together as
they refer to the problems of nurture and nature of man. Ashram organization refers to the conduct
of an individual in the world (nurture) in different 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. In the ashram organization, the problem is
approached from the point of view of training or nurture of an individual through four different
stages of life (Brahamcharya, Grihastashram, Vanprasth, and Sanyas), whereas in the varna
organization, the problem is considered from the point of view of an individual’s position in
relation to group and with reference to his innate nature and his tendencies and dispositions.
In the Rig Veda (written in about 4000 B.C.), only two varnas have been mentioned : Aryavarna
and Dasa varna. However, in the same Veda, there is a description of the division of society into
three orders : Brahma (priests), Kshatra (warriors) and Vis (common people). There is no mention
of the fourth order, that is, Sudras, though there is a reference to groups despised by the Aryans,
like Ayogya, Chandal and Nishad, etc. These four orders ultimately became four varnas. Initially, the
Sudras were not considered as untouchables. Srinivas (1962 : 63) has also maintained that the

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