Emergence of a New Caste System
Caste is an integral part of identity for any regular Indian. While we are mostly aware about its present connotations, the origins of caste system is still shrouded in mystery.
Most of us have been fed this theory that caste emerged from the varna system as mentioned in the Rigveda. We are also told how the original varna system was not based on birth, rather it was rooted in occupation i.e. the learned scholars became Brahmins, the warriors were the Kshatriyas, the businessmen became Vaishyas and the service class came to be called the Shudras. Later this system gradually transformed into one based on birth.
However, any curious mind would wonder how exactly did this transformation take place?
In course of reading some sociology I came across a very interesting explanation for this by an Indian sociologist Andre Beteille. In this blog I will write about how this transformation took place and how we may be witnessing the same phenomenon all over again with the evolution of new castes.
The OLD caste
To understand this, let us first pen down what characterized a traditional caste;
- membership of castes is ascriptive (based on birth)
- castes were associated with a particular profession
- marriages were preferred within the same caste group
- the lifestyle and culture of people who belonged to the same caste was similar
These characteristics led to formation of homogenous groups of people with similar culture and lifestyle, who married amongst each other. Beteille used examples from the professional classes today to explain how an occupation based varna system transformed into a caste system based on birth.
The NEW caste
- They have a very different lifestyle and work culture different from other professions
- Doctors prefer to marry fellow doctors for the same reason
- Children of doctors are more likely to be doctors
Thus, we observe that doctors today exhibit almost all the characteristics of a loosely constituted caste group. They have a distinct culture, they prefer to marry among themselves and their kids are very likely to follow their parents profession.
You can now extrapolate this to any other profession. Take for example personnel from the armed forces, they have a distinct lifestyle, overwhelming majority of them come from generational soldier families and they prefer to marry their kids to other armed forces families.
On the other extreme, consider a slum household. People living in slums have a distinct (insanitary) lifestyle. The adults are engaged in informal sector jobs with poor working conditions. They are excluded from participation in mainstream culture of society. Their children are very less likely to be educated, hence are most probably doomed to live a similar lifestyle. Their marriages are also most likely to take place among themselves.
What we observe today is that we are at the same juncture in history when professional groups are beginning to be closed to outsiders. The 'upper' and 'lower' professions are becoming largely self-recruiting. Today, kids follow their parents profession, tomorrow they will 'have to follow' their parent's profession. Thus, we are entering a whole new caste system.
Some History! How did the original transformation from varna to caste take place?
As we discussed earlier, the original varna's were based on occupation and skill. Understanding and remembering long texts of vedas and other spiritual texts needed skill which not everyone possessed. Since these texts were transferred orally, scholars had to memorize these texts. Thus, only the skilled, learned scholars could become brahmins. This ensured that the system could not be based on birth.
However, with invention of scriptwriting on manuscripts things changed. Now the scriptures could easily be written down on manuscripts and be transferred. There was no need for memorization as one could always carry along these manuscripts to perform the rituals. Thus, gradually people started to hold onto their privileged positions and preferred to transfer the knowledge of these scriptures only to their children.
To concretize the system further, an amendment was made to the rigveda itself. A tenth mandala was added which talked about the varna system. Here the division of society into varnas was linked to the god himself (or herself). It was stated that Brahmins originated from the head of the brahman, Kshatriyas from the arms, Vaishyas from the thighs and Shudras from the feet. This linking of occupational division to divine origin made it difficult for people to question it as whenever something is linked to divinity, people accept it without questioning.
Thus, several factor contributed to lead us to this present system of ascriptive caste system from the open meritocracy based varna system.
- Amit Chauhan
You always come with new perspective. I do agree with the notion proposed by you. This is the new normal with respect to the transformation of caste system.
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