India s New Caste Politics

India s New Ruling Caste

We are seeing the formation of a new Indian caste a caste of rulers different from India s traditional Kshatriya caste before our very eyes.

There are, however, caste related problems.

Caste was irrelevant to the Buddha.

We've done away with the caste system.

The Buddha said you could be from any caste.

Caste, once again, is casting its shadow over India s politics.

The caste system and labor laws prevent an efficient labor market.

But boosters of caste politics claim that it is not economic deprivation but the social backwardness from which these castes have historically suffered that makes caste reservations necessary.

Hence, caste has not been an indicator of material deprivation, even during the early decades of the twentieth century. But boosters of caste politics claim that it is not economic deprivation but the social backwardness from which these castes have historically suffered that makes caste reservations necessary.

Each caste contained a varying mixture of landless laborers, cultivators, and landlords.

Like existing castes, the new caste specializes in one occupation political office.

Beneath them were the warriors, the caste to which the Buddha belonged.

Many consider India s increasing mobilization along caste lines a welcome assertion of identity.

Whether caste is a good indicator of socioeconomic deprivation remains an unsettled issue.

Thus, the economic status of households varied a great deal within each caste.

Usually a prosperous caste succeeded in raising its rank in the ritual hierarchy.

Chief, why are you choking the very air of our village... ...with this caste division!

Indeed, the protagonists of caste politics and caste based public policy simply cannot validate their assertions, offering only small sample surveys that can be grossly misleading in the context of a huge country characterized by monumental diversity.

For example, less than one third of workers in this period followed their traditional caste occupations.

In any case, the majority of peasants belonging to any caste, upper or lower, were poor.

These values are free from the chains of caste, class, creed, gender, age, ethnicity and language.

A lot of the Indian problems are related to the ideology of caste and other things.

To fight the English is our duty but mixing a low caste... ...is like poisoning milk.

Half vanilla, half chocolate.

Half astern. Half astern!

Since independence in 1947, a majority of India s prime ministers have been Brahmins, the highest Hindu caste.

The Brahman priests stood at the pinnacle of a rigid social hierarchy a sacred system of caste.

Caste, once again, is casting its shadow over India s politics. Caste based reservations (reserved places) in education and government employment are supposed to benefit India s most deprived, but in reality they have hardened, rather than eroded, India s ancient system of discrimination.

Half Shakespeare and half me.

If caste is a good indicator of deprivation now, it should have been even clearer in the past.

Workers belonging to each caste pursued a wide variety of occupations, although agriculture provided the bulk of employment.

Half a year! half a year...

They're half man and half animal!

It's sort of half and half.

So you're half sweet, half acid.

I'm half alligator, half snapping' turtle.

Hence, caste has not been an indicator of material deprivation, even during the early decades of the twentieth century.

Unlike Dalit Sikhs and Buddhists, Muslim and Christian Dalits had not been granted Scheduled Caste status under domestic legislation.

The Lord who ferries us all across this sea of life... ...was himself ferried by a low caste boatman.

Eritrea has half, while Yemen has half.

Background upper half red lower half yellow

Half of half a serving... Seriously... Comments

You can also do half and half.