The document discusses the secularization of caste and emergence of a new middle class in India. It describes how colonial policies led to the de-ritualization and politicization of caste, resulting in reservations politics and class formation across caste lines. A survey found that India's new middle class includes upwardly mobile members from various castes and around half from lower castes, with political views differing more by class than caste.

1. SO 101: Indian Social Structure
Session 2: The Emerging Middle
Classes
Readings: Serial No. A2

2. Secularisation of Caste and
Making of New Middle Class
D. L. Seth
(Reading Material Page No. 12-20)

3. Lecture Outline
• Introduction: Features of Caste System and
Brief Historical Sketch
• Colonial Discourse
• Secularization of Caste – De-ritualization;
Politicization of Castes; Politics of Reservations;
Classisation of Caste
• Emergence of a New Middle Class

4. Caste: Origin and Brief History
• Existing for thousands of years, the caste
system got its name about 500 years ago
• Derived from 'casta' in Portuguese, the term
caste has since been used generically to
describe the whole ('varna-jati') system.

5. Caste - Features: Portuguese Duarte
Barbosa’s 16th century Account
• Caste as a hierarchy, with brahmans at the top
and 'untouchables' at the bottom.
• Untouchability as linked to the idea of 'pollution’.
• Existence of a plurality of 'castes' separated from
each other by endogamy occupation and
commensality.
• Application of sanctions by castes to maintain
their own customs and rules.
• Relationship of caste with political organisation.

6. Colonial Discourse 1
• The new discourse centered on whether caste
was a system beneficial to Indians or it
worked against them.
• Orientalist scholars viewed caste as serving
some positive functions.
• The missionaries saw it as an unmitigated evil.

7. Colonial Discourse 2
• Although the varna theory was discarded,
caste continued to be seen as a vertical
hierarchy of ritual statuses embedded in the
religious and cultural context of the village.
• The administrative and anthropological
concerns of the British officers led them to
counter both the Orientalist and the
Missionary views of caste.

8. Colonial Discourse 3
• From 1901 Census, the colonial state began caste
wise enumeration of the entire Indian
population.
• This highlighted how the social and economic
advantages accrued to some castes and not to
others in the traditional hierarchy.
• Consequently, many castes demanded for special
recognition by the state for receiving educational
and occupational benefits and for political
representation.

9. Colonial Discourse 4
• On the whole, the colonial regime, not only
introduced new terms of discourse on caste, but
brought about some changes in the caste system
itself.
• A large part of these changes were related to the
larger historical forces of modernization,
secularization and urbanization which had begun
to make some impact on the Indian society by
the end of 19th and the beginning of the 20th
century.

10. Colonial Discourse 5
• Formation of a new, trans-local identity
among 'lower castes', collectively as a people
with the consciousness of being 'oppressed'
by the traditional system of hierarchy.
• New ideological categories like 'social justice'
began to interrogate the idea of ritual purity
and impurity.

11. Colonial Discourse 6
• Castes of similar positions in different local
hierarchies began to organize themselves
horizontally into regional and national level
associations and federations.
• Lower castes’ aspiration for upward mobility
began to attack the very ideological bases of
ritual hierarchy of castes in terms of modern
ideological terms as equality and justice.

12. Secularization of Caste
• De-ritualization;
• Politicization of Castes;
• Politics of Reservations; and
• Classisation of Caste

13. Secularization
• …has detached caste from the ritual status
hierarchy – de-ritualization
• …has imparted caste a character of power
group functioning in the competitive
democratic politics - politicization.
• …has consequently led to classisation

14. De-Ritualization 1
• Changes associated with decolonization have
led to de-ritualization of caste.
• Erosion of rituality – Collapse of a large part of
the ‘support system’ of the caste.
• Caste now survives as a kinship-based cultural
community.
• Caste consciousness is now articulated as a
political consciousness… leading to its
systemic disintegration.

15. De-Ritualization 2
• The ideology and organization of the traditional
caste system have thus become vastly eroded…to a
much greater extent in the urban areas and at the
macro-system level.
• Castes survives as micro-communities based on
kinship sentiments and relationships.
• Traditional Jajmani system has been replaced by
relationships of employer and employee… economic
relationships have become more contractual and
monetized.

16. Politicization of Caste 1
• Incorporation of castes in competitive politics
– de-legitimization of the old hierarchical
relations among castes, facilitating new,
horizontal power relations.
• The process of politicization of castes acquired
a great deal of sophistication in the politics of
the Congress Party, which scrupulously
avoided taking any theoretical-ideological
position on the issue of caste versus class.

17. Politicization of Caste 2
• Congress Party rarely used such dichotomies as
upper castes vs. lower castes or the capitalists vs.
working class in its political discourse… the key
concept was nation-building.
• This ensured for the Congress a political
consensus across castes, despite the fact that it
was presided over by the hegemony of a small
upper caste, English-educated elite in
collaboration with the regional social elites.

18. Politicization of Caste 3
• This collaboration between the two types of
elites, created a new structure of
representational power in the society, around
which grew a small middle class…
• …constituted of the upper caste national elite
living in urban areas and the rural social elite
belonging to the dominant peasant castes as
well as those upper caste members living in
rural areas.

19. Politicization of Caste 4
• For the lower castes of small and marginal
peasants, artisans, the ex-untouchables and
the numerous tribal communities, their low
statuses in the traditional hierarchy worked
negatively for their entry in the modem
sector.
• This did objectively create an elite-mass kind
of division in politics, but not any space for
class based politics.

20. Politics of Reservations 1
• It was around mid-1970s, the upper caste
hegemony over national politics began to be
seriously challenged…largely due to the social
policies of the state, particularly that of
reservations (affirmative action).
• …a small but significant section of educated
lower caste groups entered the bureaucracy
and other non-traditional occupations.

21. Politics of Reservations 2
• At the beginning of the 1980s, the Second
Commission for Backward Classes (the Mandal
Commission) proposed to extend Reservations
in jobs and educational seats to the other
backward classes.
• This proposal was stoutly opposed by sections
of the upper and the intermediate castes who
by then were largely ensconced in the middle
class.

22. Politics of Reservations 3
• A confrontation of interest between the upper
and intermediate castes on the one hand and
the lower castes on the other.
• A resurgence of lower castes in national
politics … ‘Mandalization of Politics’… has
since resulted in radically altering the social
bases of politics in India … Hegemony of
Congress Party (composed of English-
educated elites) came to an end.

23. Politics of Reservations 4
• In sum, the state policy of affirmative action
gave a big impetus to the process of
politicization of castes (as well as to de-
ritualization of inter-caster elations).
• Special educational and occupational
opportunities of members of the numerous
lower castes, converted their traditional low
ritual status into an asset for acquiring new
means for upward social mobility.

24. “Classisation of Caste” – D. L. Sheth
• Releasing of individual members of all castes
from occupational and status hierarchy.
• Linking of their interests and identities to
organizations and categories relevant to
urban-industrial system and modern politics.
• Classisation is a process by which individual
members of different castes relate to
categories of social stratification of a type
different from that of caste.

25. Emergence of a New Middle Class 1
• 'New' because its emergence is directly
traceable to the disintegration of the caste
system, this has made it socially much more
diversified compared to the old, upper caste
oriented middle class of pre-independent era.
• It is open to members of different castes -
which have acquired modern education, non-
traditional occupations and higher incomes
and the political power.

26. Emergence of a New Middle Class –
CSDS Survey Findings 1:
• Seth mentions findings of a CSDS survey of
9614 Indian citizens:-
• Inclusion of small upwardly mobile dominant
castes of rich farmers.
• 20 per cent of the sample population was
identified as belonging to the middle class.
• The upper and the rich farmer castes together
dominate the Indian 'middle class'.

27. Emergence of a New Middle Class
– CSDS Survey Findings 2:
• About half of the middle class population
came from the dalits (SCs), the tribals (STs)
the backward communities of peasants and
artisans (OBCs) and the religious minorities
• Statistically highly significant differences in
political attitudes and preferences, between
members of the middle class and the rest of
the population

28. Emergence of a New Middle Class
– CSDS Survey Findings 3:
• The difference between the lower caste and
upper-caste members of the middle class was
found to be much less than that between
members of the middle class and their caste
compatriots not belonging to the middle class.
• The Indian middle class today has a significant
rural component.
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